Irony. Seems to go out of the window. We are all so brainwashed to believe that Glitter looking at naughty photos is a worse crime that say Tony Blair KILLING THOUSANDS OF LITTLE CHILDREN in his wars. My "joke" showed that WE are all BRAINWASHED by the media into believing that a Dirty Vicar/Popstar/Judge looking at Child Porn is lower than say a Politician who orders the death of thousands of children. The MEDIA tells us SADDAM was worth the "collateral" damage of all that death. Well sorry folks - we have been sold a MASSIVE LIE by the media and most of us are happy to "live in the lie". Our CITY OF LONDON pushed up fuel prices and by doing so thousands of children are starving around the World to death as I type this...... Of course the BBC will carry photos of GLITTER being released today - but wont cover the deaths ( many ) caused by our greedy economic system. We prefer to "demonise" sad individuals like GLITTER rather than deal in the truth. The joke was IRONY. We are so brainwashed that our comments react to the joke rather than the truth. The truth that our "Great Britain" is responsible ( regrettably ) for thousands of children dying around the World - directly. In the last 10 years. Gary Glitter is a singer - yes he has done bad things - yes possibly several children have had their lives ruined by him so he deserves to go to prison and sign the Sex Offenders register and certainly no one should let him babysit their kids. BUT whilst our media and us condemn him - we allow the REAL criminals who "kill" children and ruin their lives through other ways ( Economic - Political - War ) to get off completely free. How weird. What a skewed society we now have in the UK. Though many of you do not believe in God or have hang ups about religion - if you did believe in God as I do you would also believe that ALL LIFE is special - and ALL PEOPLE are valuable. Whether they are a little Islamic baby in Bagdad or a kid growing up in Toxteth Liverpool or the children of the Royal Family. God created us all. In addition demonising people does not help - forgiveness and teaching changes people's lives and helps them to stop offending. Anyone who is perfect on here and has never hurt anyone or done anything wrong - I applaud you and would love to know how you can take the moral high ground on all of this. GLITTER gave alot of people pleasure through his music - helped alot of people enjoy life more. His acts are despicable. But I am sure there is good in the bloke - and I find the current "kick him" attitude to be just as disasteful. The Nazis created such a feeling as this in the 1930s ( Their target were Jews who the demonised ) today we have a more subtle target of our New Labour Overlords - "terrorists" and "paedos" - the 50s/60s saw the target as "commies" and so on..........brainwashed people of the UK - loose your chains and start thinking for yourselves - please before we sleepwalk into a dictatorship in the UK.

Really excellent post, BR. I hope one day people will wake up and heed your words, which are spot on, though sadly, I have little faith in humanity, at least in the short term.

I must however, as you may have expected, take issue with your references to religion. The fact that I know that when an innocent life is extinguished, there is nothing but decomposition and eternal oblivion surely makes me feel the pain of it even more. There is no heaven for the world's victims. No comfort. Just graves. Life is only sacred because we only have one.

Evil Bush is a born again Christian, is he not? Blair too. The violence of Islam gave them their excuse to commit so many atrocities.

Maybe, just maybe, humankind will wake up one day and ditch faith in favour of its nemesis TRUTH.

With reference to your post. I totally believe you are entitled to believe that when we die that is it - all snuffed out. And your belief does fuel your very good view that all life is therefore special.

I also believe that my view to believe in God is not incompatible with that - and that I also as Christian Aid says believe in "life before death" as well !!

People claim to be Christian or Muslims - in the same way that people claim to be singers ( Watch X Factor ) when they are in fact deluded.

Bush and Blair will have to answer to God for their actions. I agree with you that their actions have been evil. I do hope that they can see that one day and get forgiven for it.

There are amazing Christians out there doing amazing work - like the Bishop of York - who has stood up against tyranny and has done eveything he can using his position to help the poor. So I do believe that religion at its purest can change lives. Though I know that some people who claim to follow God can kill and main - like terrorists of all faiths.

I look at creation and music and wonderful human beings like all of us on here - and it actually reinforces my faith in God because creation and humanity are special - even if we are flawed. Our ability to love - seek truth - write amazing songs and pieces of music and literature - is truly brilliant. We also have the capacity to love and care for others if we are taught the right things.

Demonising people for their mistakes or weaknesses is just a further exaggeration of the "schoolyard bullying" which children do. The media in the UK has the average collective age of 6 years old. They live in a permanent Playground level of debate - and sadly many others follow that type of behaviour. By doing that we marginalise many in society - who then turn to behaviour which may be criminal in order to belong.
We also offer no way out for people who have committed crime - reminds me of the line "off with their heads" ! Funny in a book - but not so funny in real life.

I respect you not believing in God - and I wish you well in all that you do and I am glad that we agree that all life is special and to be valued.

You are, I believe, a person of great humanity, BR, as I at least try to be.

Do you think you would lose that humanity if you lost your faith? I'm sure you would not, because it comes from within you. On the other hand, those who kill for their religion would have nothing left to kill for if they lost their faith.