The 2021 census is set to be skewed to disadvantage the non-religious. Opinion piece Barking & Dagenham Post 12.8.20.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
“The accuracy of the census to be held next March is at risk of being wrecked by a confusing question.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n It was announced in July that we will be asked <\/em>\u201cWhat is your religion?\u201d\u00a0 This is clearly open to misinterpretation. The census is an expensive, time-consuming and important process. It helps set the country\u2019s course for the next ten years. Inaccurate answers will have profound consequences.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n The same leading question was used in the last two censuses. It is based on the false presumption that we all have a religion. And it leads many people to say they have a religion when in fact they have no religious belief. They simply name the religion that is part of their cultural background even though they don\u2019t actually practise it.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Evidence of the confusion was revealed by a Humanist sponsored poll held at the time of the last census in 2011.\u00a0 Just 29% answered positively to the question \u2018<\/em>Are you religious?\u2019 That is less than half the 61% who ticked the religion box for the census question. The authoritative British Social Attitudes Survey, which does not ask leading questions, shows a significant majority\u00a0 have no religious belief.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Underestimating the numbers results in unfair provision for the reasonable needs of the non-religious in institutions like schools and in social care.\u00a0 Examples include arrangements for teaching about non-religious beliefs and provision of non-religious pastoral support. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Humanists UK will continue to lobby for census wording fit for the 21st Century.<\/em>“<\/p>\n\n\n\n Paul Kaufman The 2021 census is set to be skewed to disadvantage the non-religious. Opinion piece Barking & Dagenham Post 12.8.20.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9c4oP-zB","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2207"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2207"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2207\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2208,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2207\/revisions\/2208"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2207"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2207"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2207"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Chair East London Humanists<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"