British Humanist Association Conference 2003

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A Humanist Family at the 2003 BHA Conference
by Ariadne Tampion

Inclusivity lies at the very heart of the humanist ethos: each of us is an individual human being, as worthy of respect as any other. The acid test of any inclusive philosophy, I believe, has to be its attitude to children. What better way to test Humanism than to take our two children to Conference?!

To be fair, we had done it before. When our eldest, Sophie, was a tot we took her to three consecutive Conferences. John and I shared out the conference sessions and took it in turns to look after Sophie. We had her by our side at the meals and social events. At the first, Chester 1995, Wendy Sturgess wrote a poem about the weekend in which she merited four whole lines:

One lass deserves a special trophy,
Our smallest member, name of Sophie -
A Humanist, bright-eyed and new;
She's keen - and very nearly two.

The only remotely negative comment we had was at York 1997 when some wag told us we shouldn't bring a child to Conference because "it reminds the rest of us we are getting older."

But the years had passed since then, and the Humanist Family Network had become established. One recognised hazard of an organisation providing special facilities for a minority interest is the exclusion of members of that minority from the mainstream. There was, of course, a risk that this would happen even in the Humanist movement, whose members are, well, human.

Justine Brian, BHA Membership Services Officer, was positive when I rang to enquire about booking, and sorted us out with a family room at the Great Barr Hotel, Birmingham. When we arrived we discovered she had prepared special delegate packs for the girls and their own delegate badges. BHA Chair Chris Butterworth gave them a special mention in her welcome speech.

John did not arrive until late as he travelled from London after work, so after the introductory session the girls and I mingled in the bar before dinner. Their age difference began to show. Sophie was quite happy in conversation with adult humanists but Isobel (age 4) was somewhat restless. We had offered Sophie the opportunity to attend the conference sessions on human rights, but, mature for a nine-year-old as she is, she still rated this as 'boring', preferring to enjoy the social side of the conference only and sit the formal sessions out with her sister.

The Saturday afternoon walk in Sandwell Valley Country Park was something everybody could enjoy, despite the less than perfect weather. The end point was an RSPB centre, with hides for bird watching and some interesting educational games in a study room (first picture). It would have been nice to spend longer there but the schedule was tight.

After dinner that evening we all attended the start of the auction to raise funds for the campaign to free Dr Younis Shaikh from prison in Pakistan where he is under sentence of death for blasphemy.

The second picture shows Babu Gogineni, IHEU Executive Director, addresssing the gathering about its serious purpose before the start. First item under the hammer was a large white teddy bear, donated quite spontaneously by Isobel from her collection as we had discussed possible items back at home. We had arranged to have the teddy auctioned first so that Isobel could go to bed, but she was sufficiently interested in the proceedings to last another half dozen or so items. Sophie stayed until the bitter end, when she left as the proud owner of a work of art depicting Shakespeare's Globe.

Then there was the challenge of how to amuse the girls when one parent was in a conference session. The hotel was located in motorway junction wasteland a good mile from the nearest local centre, although Sandwell Valley Country Park was of course just across the main road. Plans to take them 'out', however, fell prey to the weather (whenever we thought the sun had come out it started raining again) so we were very grateful for the hotel room televisions and the colouring and puzzle books we had brought with us. In addition there was a copious supply of balloons from the string of wedding parties to use the hotel.

Overall, Sophie gained a lot from the weekend; learning about how conferences are conducted and meeting many interesting humanists. Of particular note were two Canadian humanists, Peter Eady and Dan Mayo (third photo), over here on business who were delighted to discover that the BHA was having its main conference during their stay.

Dan is a children's entertainer and he gave the girls a copy of his latest CD to listen to and comment on. For Isobel there was the excitement of staying away from home and simply being part of it all. Both girls were made consistently welcome throughout, were often admired and definitely added a certain 'colour' to proceedings.

For grown-ups, the BHA Conference offers some meatier humanism than the Family Network weekend and the chance to mix with a wider range of humanists. For humanist parents the two events are essentially complementary. For the children, it would obviously be improved by the presence of a few more children. Depending on the ages and numbers of children present, activities could be arranged for and by them: maybe discussion sessions for the older ones and games for the younger ones. I understand the BHA staff are looking to organising general humanist conferences on a two-yearly basis (alternating with the Officiants' Conference; following a couple of years of cancelled conferences it appears the BHA is not big enough to sustain both annually). We certainly intend to be there in 2005 and hope to see a few more families this time.

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Since the Conference Ariadne has written a short Novella which you may be interested to read - Automatic Lover