Columnist Henry Porter writes in today’s Observer (my emphasis):
When the European Court of Human Rights announces a ban on crucifixes in Italian schools, you can either celebrate the liberal march of secularism or deplore the illiberal attack on religious expression and national tradition.
Perhaps there is a third option which is to say that this has nothing to do with rights and everything to do with the EU's manic drive to standardise behaviour and attitudes, in the same way as it regulates the transportation of livestock and the safety specifications of new mowers.
The crucifix is none of the EU's business …
Dead right Mr Porter. It is none of the EU’s business and … err … that is why the EU has nothing to do with it. Now read very carefully, I shall type this only once. The European Court of Human Rights is run by the Council of Europe (an entirely different body from the European Union) and has nothing at all to do with the EU.
That is a fact that is known to anyone with the slightest knowledge of Europe. Such a basic blunder as yours is to be expected from ignorant British Eurosceptics in saloon bar discussions of the iniquities of those funny foreign ways that those funny foreign Europeans are allegedly forcing on them. To find it in your article in the Observer merely tells me that while you may think that you love Europe, as your headline says, you don’t understand the very first thing about it and that the rest of your article can safely be ignored.
You also totally fail to understand the nature of secularism as it has been practised in Europe for 220 years or the power and influence of the Catholic church in Italy (clue: I don’t think you’d like it).
Another cause for serious concern is that nobody at the Observer said, ‘But look Henry. We can’t possibly publish this. It's factually incorrect in the major point on which you base your argument.’
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