patron saint of irony

Third day in a row but here's Melanie Phillips' take on a recent court ruling extending anti-discrimination protection to a man with firmly held environmental beliefs:

In any rational universe, he would be sent away with a flea in his ear for trying it on. [my emphasis]

That appeal to rationalism is followed, of course, by outrage that religious beliefs are not being accorded special status in law.

Finally, there's space for a quick renewal of victim status: that a woman (Phillips, M) who writes regular columns - some of which appear in national newspapers - voicing her scepticism of man-made global warming is somehow the victim of discrimination because people don't take her entirely seriously.

Also: for continuing discussion of Phillips' Israel purity test - which has now extended to castigating Britain's "timid Jews" for failing to vocally agree with her - see Obsolete. As noted earlier this week, Phillips is now arguing that to criticise her is a form of violence - a verbal pogrom, a phrase which she has now repeated to describe the treatment of Israel by "Britain’s political and intellectual class." Will Phillips be extending this metaphor to directly accuse those who criticise her of anti-semitism?