BBC Poll:Two-thirds demand respect for religion

Handsome Bob

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1154683/Two-thirds-demand-respect-religion-Christianity-place-public-life-says-poll.html

There was also an endorsement for the way the media report religion.


More than half of Christians and Muslims said the affairs of their faith were fairly reported, and 74 per cent of Sikhs said their faith was accurately portrayed in the media.

I was especially surprised by the quote I highlighted. Excluding the recent spate of reports mentioned in the link, I find the media coverage on religion quite one sided. Usually when I come across the media 'on relgion' it's either an article about fundamentalist nutters (primarily Phelps), creationism or religion getting in the way of science. Genuinely surprising I must say to see more than half of Christians and Muslims feel that their religion is treated fairly.

Fanny Cradock

Maybe we are just a bitter old bunch here.

MrPudding

Excellent survey. 1045 people questioned and they are extrapolating what the entire population of the UK, thinks? And can break it down into what 4 different religions think? Worthless.

MrP

EDIT: The comments are very funny. There were 36 of them when I was reading them. They have a cool feature where you can rate the comments, interestingly pretty much all the "go christianity" comments have negative rating whilst all the "Evil Atheist Materialist Conspiracy (TM)" type comments have positive ratings. What should we extrapolate from that?

Dave!

MrPudding wrote: »

Excellent survey. 1045 people questioned and they are extrapolating what the entire population of the UK, thinks? And can break it down into what 4 different religions think? Worthless.

MrP

Gallup typically uses 1000 people for its polling also, you think they're worthless also?

1000 people can be a good sample
http://media.gallup.com/PDF/FAQ/HowArePolls.pdf

MrPudding

Dave! wrote: »

Gallup typically uses 1000 people for its polling also, you think they're worthless also?

1000 people can be a good sample
http://media.gallup.com/PDF/FAQ/HowArePolls.pdf

Fair enough I suppose, assuming the sample was representative. I withdraw my worthless comment, on the condition that the sample was representative. Interestingly, 100% of jews questioned in this survey disagreed with the statement "Our laws whould respect and be influenced by UK religious values."

MrP

Zombrex

MrPudding wrote: »

Excellent survey. 1045 people questioned and they are extrapolating what the entire population of the UK, thinks? And can break it down into what 4 different religions think? Worthless.

The problem isn't really the sample size more then questions people were asked. They are too vague to have much meaning

"Our laws should respect and be influenced by UK religious values"

I would say yes to that and I'm a atheist secularist. The spin the Daily Mail puts on it is rather hilarious

robindch

Daily Telegrot wrote:

Two-thirds of Britons believe that the role of religion in public life should be respected

If you asked the entire sample, I'll bet 50p you'd get 1,045 different definitions of the word "respect"

The original, and frankly fairly dull, report is here.

robindch

MrPudding wrote: »

Interestingly, 100% of jews questioned in this survey disagreed with the statement "Our laws should respect and be influenced by UK religious values."

100%? It's probably more accurate to say that both of them disagreed with the statement.

Or was there three jewish people? Yesee, 100% (2) disagreed with the "laws should be influenced by religious values" comment, but a massive 150% (3) of the two people interviewed felt that religion does (50%, 1) or does not (100%, 2) have an important role to play in public life.

Or did the two people have three opinions? I think the Telegraph should let us know!

Slav

robindch wrote: »

Or was there three jewish people? Yesee, 100% (2) disagreed with the "laws should be influenced by religious values" comment, but a massive 150% (3) of the two people interviewed felt that religion does (50%, 1) or does not (100%, 2) have an important role to play in public life.

Or did the two people have three opinions? I think the Telegraph should let us know!

Let us know what? Don't tell us you have never heard "2 Jews -- 3 opinions" that every good Jew just love to quote at every occasion!

Galvasean

LZ5by5 wrote:

Excluding the recent spate of reports mentioned in the link, I find the media coverage on religion quite one sided. Usually when I come across the media 'on relgion' it's either an article about fundamentalist nutters (primarily Phelps), creationism or religion getting in the way of science.

Read the Indo. They like to publish opinion pieces on why non-believers are bad.
Recent spate? Feh, for a very long time there have been sob stories about some poor lady who got fired for being Christian, only later to be revealed that she was just breaking rules and tried using her religion as a rescue clause.

Húrin

What on earth are " UK religious values"?

MrPudding

Húrin wrote: »

What on earth are " UK religious values"?

Presumably "broadly" christian.

MrP

PDN

Húrin wrote: »

What on earth are " UK religious values"?

It's a sort of vague new age paganism where absolute beliefs are abandoned in favour of sentimental piles of flowers when someone famous dies and where Jade Goody becomes a saint by being unlucky enough to contract cancer.

Húrin

MrPudding wrote: »

Presumably "broadly" christian.

MrP

using "broadly" in its broadest sense of course!

(or just, PDN's answer)

Biro

MrPudding wrote: »

They have a cool feature where you can rate the comments, interestingly pretty much all the "go christianity" comments have negative rating whilst all the "Evil Atheist Materialist Conspiracy (TM)" type comments have positive ratings. What should we extrapolate from that?

That some athiests have nothing better to do than browse the web looking for Christians to bash!

MrPudding

Don't knock it 'till you've tried it.

MrP

robindch

Biro wrote: »

That some athiests have nothing better to do than browse the web looking for Christians to bash!

MrPudding wrote: »

Don't knock it 'till you've tried it.

It would be tasteless to make a joke here about bashing the bishop.

Rev Hellfire

robindch wrote: »

It would be tasteless to make a joke here about bashing the bishop.

And you said power wouldn't change you...