If religionists offend us by calling atheists “immoral”, “scummy” or just plain “evil”, we do what any rational and confident person of sound judgement does: we ignore them (or if you’re like me, you write steamy vitriol in your pathetic blog). That’s usually the extent of our outrage, but for religious folks, who benefit from the tyranny of their majority, the inverse reaction to being offended is not so muted.

Take the example of Harry Taylor, who left sexually explicit images of religious figures in the prayer room of John Lennon Airport (the irony, it burns!). He’s been  recently convicted of “aggravated intentional harassment” (is there any other kind of harassment other than intentional?). Although it might sound like a pretty mild charge, it carries with it a maximum penalty of seven years in prison. Yes, you heard right, Mr. Taylor could go to jail for almost a decade for offending a priest in an airport named after a guy who’s most popular song extols the joys of living in a world without religion. My head is officially about to explode.

The Crown Prosecution is trying to defend this draconian law, saying it looks at each case based on its own merits. What fucking merit is there in convicting a man for offending someone? No one has a right to “not be offended”. You live in a world where people have different opinions and ideas, and it’s inevitable some of those will offend you. Fucking deal with it.

The British government is cowardly for allowing such a law to exist, and it’s citizens should be ashamed such a case was even prosecuted. For a so-called “secular” country, you have a lot of house cleaning to do.