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'Comment is free, but facts are sacred'

In an editorial for Newstalk ZB on February 13th, radio breakfast show host and Seven Sharp anchor Mike Hosking attempted to tackle, throw his two pence in, or otherwise muddle through the debate around a Human Rights Commission complaint against St Heliers School in Auckland.

Mr. Hosking joins in a maelstrom that surrounds two families – neither adhering to Christianity - who laid a complaint after their children were automatically inducted into a religious instruction class taught by the Churches Education Commission.

Not religious education, but instruction in how to love Christ, understand Bible stories, and “identify God as their friend”. In 2009, the Human Rights Commission ruled that religious instruction carries “an explicit or implicit endorsement of a particular faith.”

(As I revealed in July last year, more than 800 state primary and intermediate schools around the country feature a version of this instruction.)

I do not begrudge Mr. Hosking, a renowned journalist and talented broadcaster, his opinions. But these opinions absolutely must be founded in fact, and he has failed to partake in this basic principle.

The distinction between skeptical education and wide-eyed instruction is a crucial one. The classes run by the CEC do not examine Christianity in a context of history, applying reasonable questions and rationality equally. They are pure theology and indoctrination, and feature a “tenuous link to curriculum values.” Towards high school students, this might be more forgivable, but the target of such evangelism is Year One and Two students barely advanced from their ABC’s and 123’s.

Mr. Hosking’s conclusion that “the bigger role of education is to broaden the mind and get us all to ask questions and be inquisitive” is quite radically divorced from the reality of the system these parents have been fighting against.

Although it would be true to say the programme can be opted out of, the consequences of parents doing so is hardly reasonable. As has been well documented, Jeff McClintock’s daughter at Red Beach Primary was made to sit in the ‘time out’ corner while participating students were “singing, doing fun activities and hearing stories."

Other children who were removed from such classes among Northland schools were made to stack chairs, pick up rubbish, or wash dishes in the staff room. What fate was visited upon children whose parents didn’t raise the attention of the media is sadly not known.

Perhaps the most sinister part of Mr. Hosking’s obfuscation was his claim that one of that parents who complained to the HRC was “Muslim, which indicates perhaps a lack of tolerance, tolerance perhaps being one of the virtues her kids might have learned in Christian studies.”

This is shameless prejudice (and poor journalism) for two reasons. Firstly, Mr. Hosking seems to believe that all Muslims are intolerant and unwilling to understand the beliefs of others – a plain version of bigotry akin to racism. Therefore, apparently any objection or dissent is simply not allowed from outside the Christian community. (One wonders what Mr. Hosking would be saying if it were the Mosque Education Commission and not the Churches Education Commission administering classes.)

And here’s the kicker, dear reader: Maheen Mudannayake, the aforementioned complainant, is a man (not a woman as you may have noted above) and certainly not a Muslim. He is a Buddhist.

(I could not find any news report whatsoever that identified Mr. Mudannayake as either female, or Muslim.)

This is not, as Deborah Coddington claimed in yesterday’s Sunday Star Times, a debate around the teaching of culture, language, or faith during regular classroom hours, or even the role of traditional Christian charity in wider society.

It is instead about the respect that ought to be given to parents who identify with Islam or Buddhism, or who have not made up their minds, or who lack faith altogether, and the education of their children.

Simply put, the most listened-to Breakfast show host in the country has misled his audience with an editorial so rife with factual inaccuracies that an apology is probably warranted to Mr. Mudannayake. As I insisted above, there is reasonable leeway given when expressing an opinion, but that opinion must be grounded in hard truth – not speculation or omission.

Follow James on Twitter: @James_ARobins