If you narrow down this view of to those of a family nature, a quick view on Jeremy Kyle will give you the impression that man kind as we know it, has long since negated its right to existence. People fighting over this, having long standing feuds over that, its quite sad. Of course the producers of the show insure that they have participants that will add ‘entertainment value’, however it has become more common than not that people look to see what they can get, rather than they can give.

For those who of you are unaware, I am of the Jewish faith, and arguably one of the biggest festivals starts tomorrow night, that of Pesach. The fact that this holiday lasts 8 days results in it being a significant family affair, with grandparents, aunts, uncles, family friends all getting together to, well, eat!

As this is such a family oriented time of year, I wanted to put key to keyboard and tell the world how lucky I, together with my brother and sister are to have two such wonderful parents.

You don’t have to look to far to find parents whose unconditional love and respect for their children falls below that of theirs, however you will struggle to find parents whose surpasses it.

Im not going to go into detail as to all the things which they have done for their three children (as it would take too long), however it is safe to say that they have worked tirelessly to ensure that my siblings and I, have been given every tool to have the best start in life, and for that I personally couldn’t me more thankful!

My Two Beautiful Parents

Anyhow, in anticipation for him to return, being the wonderful big brother that I am, I baked him a cake, below is the recipe and some pictures on how it turned out.

Cake Ingredients:

• 300g caster sugar
• 3 eggs
• 300ml sunflower oil
• 270g peeled bananas, mashed
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon, plus extra to decorate
• 300g plain flour
• 1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 100g tinned pineapple, chopped into small pieces (although I used fresh)
• 100g shelled pecan nuts  (or walnuts), chopped, plus extra, chopped and whole to decorate (although I used chocolate chips)
• two 20cm cake tins, base-lined with greaseproof paper

Frosting Ingredients:

• 500g icing sugar, sifted
• 160g unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 50ml whole milk
• a couple of drops of vanilla extract (although I used lemon extract)

Cake Instructions:

1. Preheat the oven to 170C (325F) Gas 3.
2. Put the sugar, eggs, oil, banana and cinnamon in a freestanding electric mixer with a paddle attachment (or use a handheld electric whisk) and beat until all the ingredients are well incorporated. Don’t worry if mixture looks slightly split.
3. Slowly add the flour, bicarbonate of soda, salt and vanilla extract and continue to beat until everything is well mixed and smooth.
4. Stir in the chipped pineapple and pecan nuts (or chocolate chips) by hand until evenly dispersed.
5. Pour the mixture into the prepared cake tins and smooth over with a palette knife.
6. Bake in the preheated oven for 25-30 minutes, or until golden brown and the sponge bounces back when touched.
7. Leave the cakes to cool slightly in the tins before turning out onto a wire cooling rack to cool completely.
8. When the cakes are cold, put one cake on a stand and spread about one quarter of the frosting over it with a palette knife.
9. Place the second cake on top and spread another quarter of the frosting over it.
10. Top the cake with the remaining spread the remaining frosting over the top and sides. Finish with nuts (or chocolate chips) and a light sprinkling of cinnamon.

Frosting Instructions:

1. Beat the icing sugar and butter together in a freestanding electric mixer with a paddle attachment (or use a handheld electric whisk) on a medium-slow speed until the mixture comes together and well mixed.
2. Turn the mixer down to slow speed.
3. Combine the milk and vanilla (or lemon) extract in a separate bowl, then add the butter mixture a couple of tablespoons at a time.
4. Once all the milk has been incorporated, turn the mixer up to high speed.
5. Continue beating until the frosting is light and fluffy, at least 5 minutes. The longer the frosting is beaten, the fluffier and lighter it becomes.

As you may have guessed from the title of this post its down to two things; my laptop and an innocent piece of fruit, the dreaded orange.

Lets deal with each of the respective items in the turn which they turned an innocent Tuesday into one from hell.

When I opened the blinds this morning I was greeted by glorious sun, therefore I decided that rather than uni at a fast pace, I would leave a little earlier than normal, thereby enjoying a leisurely stroll with some music provided courtesy of my iPhone.

All was well, I arrived safe and sound in the lecture theatre, only to reach into my bag and realise that my Macbook Air was not there. I can’t go a day at university without my laptop. It has my notes, materials and acts as a dictaphone for the lectures. I had never forgotten it before, so instantly wanted someone to blame; however after coming to the conclusion it was my fault I also decided that I had to go back and retrieve it. With only 15 minutes before the lecture started, and contrary to my previous belief that there is never a taxi around when you want one, there was.

Ten minutes later and £7.50 lighter I had my laptop in hand just in time for the lectures.

The second item to ruin my day was the orange. Small, round and orange in colour, this innocent fruit can bring joy to those on a break or who simply need a burst of vitamin C. My reason for consumption was the first. As is customary I purchased said orange from the green grocer on Oxford Road. As supplier of all of my fruit and veg requirements, I am familiar with the quality and price which give explanation to my returning custom.

Sitting down I began to peel, it came off in tiny tiny pieces, squirting orange juice all over me, my desk, and surrounding papers. I kid you not, it took me over 10 minutes to peel the thing. The only thing that kept me going was knowing how refreshing the taste would be as it entered my mouth.

The first segment entered my mouth…it was bitter…it had pips in. I swear, I would have thrown it across the room if the juice wouldn’t have dripped down my arm, however it would have done, making me even more sticky than I already was.

So dear reader, two every day items, the laptop and the orange, I for one will never look at them in the same light again.

You may be online in less than 10 minutes, however within 15 minutes of setting up your account you will be receiving your first spam email messages, and within a few weeks you will be receiving more spam email, and even some email from its cousin, ham email than genuine messages.

Before we delve a little deeper, for those unsure of the terminology we shall quickly define them now.

Spam messages are those which you receive out of the blue, offering to sell you anything from a piece of the moon to a piece of cheese. They often come from email addresses that don’t exist, and instead have been ‘spoofed’ by the spammer. The main reason why spam is sent out is because its cost free, marketing software can allow a computer to send upwards of 10,000 emails an hour, and all you need is one unsuspecting person to either enter their credit card information on a banking site that isn’t theirs, or purchase a acre of the moon which can’t be visited, for them to turn a profit.

Ham on the other hand, as the name would suggest is a cross between genuine messages and spam. Marketing emails from companies that you have purchased items from, notification emails from social networking sites and alike; these have a genuine purpose, and you may have authorised these services to send you emails, however deleting them or unsubscribing from them all can be a chore.

So what is the solution?

Up until a few days ago, I was under the impression that there was only one, client side software. For those who don’t want to use a third party email provider such as Google or Hotmail to filter their spam, a piece of software could be installed that would monitor the email coming in and then determine whether or not it would be spam based on certain algorithms. If it was spam it would put it in a folder that you could just ignore. The solution I had chosen was SpamSieve, and for the best part it worked very well. There was however one small caveat, in order for the spam filtering to be effective, at least one of my computers had to be on in order to filter out the spam before being retrieved by my iOS devices.

In the early days this wasn’t too bad, as I only received a few spam messages a day, however over the past few month I have been receiving between 10 and 20 spam messages an hour!

SpamSieve, as well as other client side spam filters work on the process of ‘blacklisting’, whereby the filter says everything is good unless you tell it that its bad. The filter then attempts to work out what is good by looking at your address book, and key words associated with spam contained within the body and subject of the message.

This is all very well and good, however spammers are getting more sophisticated, either tricking the filter to allow the message through as good, or confusing it to such an extent that it requires your intervention. Over time this has become more of a hassle.

Not surprisingly ‘whitelisting’ is the opposite of ‘blacklisting’, which everything is suspected to be spam until you tell it otherwise. This is the process which Spam Arrest uses, what more its server side, meaning that its spam filtering is applied to all devices that access your email whether or not they have client side spam filtering on.

Spam Arrest is a subscription based service, with price plans ranging from $5.95 (£3.75) per month, to $89.95 (£56.66) per 24 months thereby receiving a 47% discount. Rather than try and explain how it works, here is a video which I think explains it quite well:

So, Spam Arrest puts itself between your email and your clients. You can export your address book to Spam Arrest so that addresses that you have already used are ‘whitelisted’, it auto ‘whitelists’ email addresses you send message to so that they can reply without having to go through the verification process. Those who email you and are not ‘whitelisted, get an email asking them to fill in a CAPTCHA, a process that only has to be done once. You can of course check online mails which are ‘in holding’ to authorise them manually; something you may need to do for a few days whilst you ‘whitelist’ email addresses from shopping sites etc etc.

Due to the fact that the majority of spam is sent from email addresses that are neither monitored or even exist, the spammers won’t fill in the CAPTCHA; and if by some very small chance they did, it would only allow one email through from that address, allowing you to ‘blacklist’ it manually.

Ive been using Spam Arrest for just under 48 hours now, and even though there is a free 30 day trial, the very fact that I have had NO spam delivered over this period, a stark contrast from my hundreds each day has made me bite the bullet and purchase a two year subscription.

Its worth noting that for the cost of your subscription you can protect up to five mailboxes, with additional mailbox protection available to be added to your account for a one off payment

All in all I am very very impressed with Spam Arrest, its the solution that I have been looking for, knowing that I am not being hit with spam each time I open my inbox has given me a underlying sense of satisfaction knowing that spammers are not getting any screen time on my devices any more.

If you are interested in Spam Arrest, I would be most grateful if you could click on the ‘Spam Arrest‘ text contained within this review, as this will use my affiliate link, for which I will get a small cutback on any service you purchase. NB, this review has not been commissioned by Spam Arrest and I have received no payment or discount for writing about their service. I merely think its a great solution to spam email which I wish to share with you.

“Better to write for yourself and have no public, than write for your public and have no self.”

Many people always wonder why other people blog, and they wonder even more why I blog, after all, it can appear self indulgent writing about yourself or your beliefs constantly. However I think this is half the fun.

Taking time out of your busy schedule to put key to keyboard to and construct a valid argument on your chosen topic not only enables thoughtful debate, but increases your knowledge as you research the topic in question.

As Steven Droke said:

“Knowledge is power, and enthusiasm pulls the switch.”

So whats stopping you, start up your free WordPress blog now and get blogging. Its great fun, and I personally find it a great way to unwind and de-stress!

Go on, start your own blog, what have you got to lose?

Alcohol

We have all been there, we have all had far too many drinks and some of us have even wanted to become best friends with the lamppost. Putting all alcohol into room 101 is perhaps a little too far, and perhaps should put in cheap alcohol that is drunk to excess every week across the UK by many. The drinking culture that we have in the UK, which is unlike that of any other culture in Europe is perhaps best kept for another blog post; however once the copious amounts of alcohol has been drunk, the NHS and therefore tax payer are often forced to pick up the bill for those who require a stomach pump or night in the cells.

Hundreds of millions of pounds are used to mop up the streets and protect innocent members of the public from alcohol infused incidents, and with the prices of alcohol getting cheaper and cheaper the money that could be used to fund education, better public transport and shorter waiting times in the NHS are instead being used on the people who’s idea of fun is going out, getting completely smashed, starting a fight before occupying a NHS bed for the night.

Umbrellas

What on earth could be wrong with umbrellas, after all they keep us dry when it rains? Well there are two main bugbears with umbrellas that I have, firstly the quality and secondly the user interaction some have with them.

Lets first take the quality. You get super tough ones that are able to withstand force nine gales however are unable to withstand the British weather – how can this be so? Over the past few months we have been quite lucky in Manchester not to have rain as much as we are used to, and my umbrella looks deductively at me by not being used, and to be honest I would love to use him, however guaranteed that the moment he steps foot outside the house, he will turn inside out and ruin my life by making me look ridiculous as I struggle to put it the right way.

Secondly people who use them. These fall into two camps and you know who they are. The first camp are the people who walk as bold as brass down the street with their brolly open even tho their is not a drop of rain in the sky. It is almost as if they are practising for the high wire at the circus just wanting to practice holding it. Yes the rain my make your hair wet, but there is no rain, so you don’t need it open! The second of the two camps are those who have MASSIVE umbrellas. The ones I’m talking about are the golf umbrellas that you can fit a family of four under, perfect for a natural disaster area where that said family of fours home has been destroyed by a tsunami, they are not however suited to walking down the street. Pavements in the UK are able to support two lanes of traffic, perhaps three on a good day; and what we do not need are these lanes of pedestrian based highway to be congested with a large umbrella that has been half turned inside out which shouldn’t have been opened in the first place as there was no rain!

Computerised Telephones

What was wrong with humans answering the phones? Oh I know, they were too expensive, so instead companies who make billions in profit decide that they would spend serious money on a computer system that efficiently deals with your calls, putting you through to the correct department to be quickly death with. Well if it were like that, I wouldn’t have a problem- yes the fact that the call has been made that much more impersonal, but I would be dealt with quickly.

Instead we have two options, the first of which is the ‘intelligent’ computer system; one that you can talk to normally and it attempts to figure out what you are saying. Well it doesn’t, you spend five minutes telling it that you want to speak to customer service, only to be told that you are going to be transferred to the accounting department. Accounting department doesn’t sound like customer service at all, its totally different – so how can it make such a mistake?

The second option you could get is the ‘non intelligent’ computer system; the one where you have to “select the following option” from your keypad. If it were between a handful of options I could deal with that. I like to think that I have a relatively good short term memory, however I defy anyone to remember 9 option choices, it becomes a test of memory, its almost as if you can’t speak to a representative unless you have an IQ of over 110 and can remember 9 things inside out. If a person answered the phone, I would remain calm, get to speak to whom I wanted to, and all would be well in the world.

Smokers

Perhaps the most controversial on my list for room 101 items. Firstly lets tackle the issue of smokers rights, yes you do have rights, you are an ordinary citizen of the community apart from you want to smoke. I can live with that, I can almost live with the fact that huge amount of NHS resources are dedicated to smoking related illnesses as this is contracted by the tax and duty that is paid on cigarettes (although smoking outside hospitals still baffles me), what really gets my goat is where smokers smoke.

Picture this, you are in a nice park, the birds are singing the sun is on your neck and you are going for a walk. Or if that is not your cup of tea perhaps envision yourself walking the beach, the crashing of the waves lap around your feet and you breathe in to smell the fresh air only to get a nose full of smoke from the person in front of you cigarette that they have just lit up. Oh I can hear the arguments smokers are putting up, you shouldn’t stand so close, you can always walk somewhere else etc etc, but why should I? Firstly I don’t chose to stand close to smokers, far from it, I want to get as far away from them as possible, and as for walking in a different direction putting aside the fact smoke lingers in the air, why should I change the way I live my life, just because I don’t want to be the victim of passive smoking, and instead breathe in fresh air not that of Silk Cut!

Footballers Pay

First of all a small disclaimer, I don’t enjoy watching football; thats not to say that I’ve not been to any live games. I have, I’ve actually seen Manchester United play, not once but twice, and whilst live football isn’t as bad as having to endure it on the TV for over 90 minutes, but its still not my idea of fun.

Lets look at the skills involved with being a good footballer. Top of the list is being able to kick a ball, with the second most important skill is being able to kick it well. For this sheer amount of talent what would you expect someone to be paid? Over £40,000 a week!!! Lets contrast this with a fairly typical job, say, I don’t know, a nurse. As with our footballer, lets look at the skills involved; be patient, be knowledgeable of lifesaving skills, being able to be on ones feet all day – often without taking a break, etc etc etc. Average pay for this £27,000 a year!

Yes, for those who are talented enough to be able to kick a football, they are paid more in a week, than the nurse gets paid in a year. Justifiable? I think not!

Complaining – People Cant Do It Properly

For the majority of us, we British are well mannered people, we are the experts in cuing up and biting our tongues when something happens we don’t like. This is all well and good, but there are times when something really gets under our skin, and because very few of us have stood up for our rights in the past we are unsure how to do it properly.

The key eyed amongst you will have seen many a blog post on my site where I have locked arms with companies including Sky and Play.com being amongst my favourite, and after no small amount of resistance, I eventually got what I asked for. In this economic downturn we as consumers need to make sure that our money goes further than before, and often the companies which claim to be on our side are those whom make the highest profits; and one can’t help but wonder why. Is it because they don’t invest properly in customer service training, cut corners on quality control, or simply don’t have enough people manning the phones at stores or head office. When something goes wrong with either an item or service you have paid for stand up for yourself, go to the top if need be, and remember, it costs more on advertising for a large company to gain a new customer, than to help rectify a problem of a current one.

Racists, Homophobic’s & Antisimitics

If there is one thing that we all have in common, is that we are all different, and from an early age we as children learn to accept this. It is only when we become older that we are put into social categories, and expected to confirm to those stereotypes. Now for those who kill, burgle and commit other unspeakable crimes, then they are arguably able to labeled with public stigmatism’s as they have brought this misfortune upon to themselves. They have chosen to stand out from the crowd and are different from the norm.

Those who single others out on being a different religion, different sexual orientation or even go as far as insight racial hatred are highlighting the difference between humans for no reason other than to attempt to give justification to what is in affect bullying. I have be brought up with the view that provided someone lives their live differently in a way that doesn’t affect me I should take no offence to that; and quite rightly so. Taking this to the extreme, if someone wanted to dress in pink from head to toe, yes I would find it weird, but provided they don’t insist I should dress from head to toe in pink why should it bother me? It is the same with religion et al.

Most of us have been on holiday abroad, and for those who take the time to sample the local cuisine (not just drink beer and eat chips) you will appreciate the excitement of experiencing of trying new flavours, and then going and carrying out local activities such as scuba diving, or rock climbing. All of this is possible because we are all different. If everyone lived the way that people in England did, there would be no point going abroad (apart from the improved weather). If everyone celebrated the same holidays then there would be no holidays such as St Patricks Day, Chinese New Year and Halloween as not all of these holidays are native in our country of residence.

There is no point in disliking someone over their skin colour, religion or sexual orientation, for one reason, they may be different to you, but you are also different to them.

Public Transport

There is one thing that the UK can not get right, no matter how many billions of pounds we put into it, no matter how many consultants are on the payroll or times changes are made we simply can’t get public transport right.

There are two main branches of public transport which I will hope to look at, buses and trains. Both run by private companies however all receive large subsidies from government. The main issues I have with public transport are as follows:

Firstly the timetable, what is the point in it? Very rarely does a bus or train actually run to the scheduled time, more often then not they just turn up when ever they feel like it, and in the case of buses you will spend 30 minutes waiting for one bus, then 3 of the same route will go past in as many minutes. On the continent they have satellite tracking and display screens at stops telling you how long you have to wait, in the UK we have a piece of paper with an ‘estimated’ time.

Secondly the lack of seats. You pay for a ticket, you walk to the platform or bus stop only to see a line of people already waiting before you. You wait patiently, perhaps even cue, then as the bus or train pulls up (10 minutes late) you see that its already full. So as the cue moves forward the possibility of getting a seat goes down, in-fact so does the change of actually getting on this bus/train. The driver asks everyone to move further down, however no more space becomes available, so you have to wait for the next one. You look at the timetable then realise, there is no point, as the next one will come when it feels like it.

Finally, we are told to get out of our cars and use public transport. Be Green, don’t drive to work, have a stress free trip by allowing someone else to do it for you. Well thats all very well and good, however its hardly stress free. The chances are that the bus/train won’t arrive on time so you would be late to work and there will be no room for you to sit down meaning you will have to stand getting all hot and bothered as you try to prevent yourself from being thrown across the vehicle with every turn and stop. Yes, if you travel off peak the service is relatively good, however as an alternative from a car, its just not a viable alternative.

How can we be getting it so wrong, when you look at some EU countries and other first world transport systems, and their run so well!

Small Talk

Oh we have all been there, you know the occasions, the ones that you had no intention of going to, however because of ‘political’ reasons you feel duty bound to put in appearance. Having walked through the door the atmosphere is mediocre at best, everyone dressed up smartly, glass of something in one hand, and some form of miniature food in the other all talking about something pointless as they skirt around the major issues of life.

You know the topics I’m on about, ‘the weather’, ‘the state of the country’, ‘recent deaths’, ‘recent births’ and even ‘the new Argos adverts on TV’.

Now if these are the highlights of any get-together then clearly I am either attending the dregs of social gatherings or I’m the only one who can’t see the point in making such small talk. Getting dressed up smartly I can see the point to and seeing people you have not seen for some time, I can see the point to; however after that it tends to go downhill. Miniature food, not really much point, i’d rather have full sized food if I’m honest. A miniature spring roll is nice, but a grownup one would taste even better. Small talk is just as pointless as speaking to a computerised telephone, you walk away from the conversation knowing no more than you already knew, the only downside is that with small talk you have to nod and smile, something that you don’t have to do whilst on the phone, perhaps the only perk!

Prices For Cups Of Tea

Millions get drunk each year, you may choose to embellish yours with a drop of milk or a sprinkling of sugar, and if the occasion calls for it a biscuit may be served on the side. Getting in from work or a particular busy day a cup of tea will often hit the spot, releasing the muscle tension and allowing the worries of the day to flow out transporting you to a state of bliss.

But what happens if you’re out and about when the stress becomes too much or thirst strikes you down? The only option is to purchase a hot beverage from a coffee shop or vending machine. Baring in mind that the cost of tea bags, hot water, milk and sugar when at home are minimal, the most expensive ‘ingredient’ is likely to be the electricity, one would expect that such hot beverage outlets would be able to get a discount for buying their materials in bulk, sadly they don’t.

More often than not a cup of tea from a vending machine will cost you £1.25, if you go to a proper shop the prices can range from £1.50 all the way up to £3.50 depending on your brand and size. Well this in itself may not seem a lot but lets contrast this with the cost of another vital liquid, petrol. At the time of writing this post the average price of one litre of petrol was £1.301, so for less than the cost of a cup of tea you get more liquid than a cup of tea.

Petrol, made from oil, going through such an intense chemical processes costs more than a bit of hot water and a few tea leaves. Madness!

Alcohol, Umbrellas, Computerised Phones, Smokers, Footballers Pay, Complaining, Racists, Public Transport, Small Talk and Cups of Tea - just a few things I would put in room 101

Personally I think the meaning is now lost, it seems to be a competition to see whom has received the most valentines day cards, for example on February 15th, what is the first question you are greeted with? “Did you receive any valentines day cards, and if so how many?” It is almost as if love has been turned into a competition.

In a world where there is so much hatred and war going on, it is nice to see that a day that celebrates love still exists, however for some it is often overshadowed because they have no-one to love.

This is where I think they are wrong!

Everyone has someone they love and whom they can wish a Happy Valentines day to. There are people who are in our lives who we may not be physically attracted to, but do love, as they have either been with us from a young age, shared special memories with or been through the same tough times.

These people you arguably love just as much as you would do (or perhaps even more so) a girlfriend, boyfriend, wife, husband, you simply love them in a different way.

Personally, I think Valentines day has been highjacked by some couples, and its time that we reclaim this day for day we can all love.

So after all of that, whom am I wishing a Happy Valentines Day to:
* My family; including Mother, Father, Brother, Sister, Grandparents, Aunts, Uncles, Nephews (if I have any), Nieces and Cousins.
* Manchester Metropolitan University Girlies and Ian.
* University of Salford People; in particular Harry Power, Stevie Ball and Sarah Capjon.
* My followers on Twitter
* My readers of my blog.

Happy Valentines Day To You All xxx

JFS has provoked anger from parents and pupils by teaching sixth formers that homosexuality can be “cured”.

As part of the school’s Jewish studies curriculum, pupils are shown a website from the American group JONAH – Jews Offering New Alternatives to Homosexuality.

It promotes the idea that homosexuality can be “mitigated and potentially eliminated” and sends participants on retreats such as “Journey into Manhood”.

The JONAH website is introduced at the end of the textual study part of a lower sixth lesson on homosexuality and the Orthodox viewpoint.

Pupils have complained that, coming at the end of the lesson, there is no opportunity for debate and that the JONAH website was effectively presented as the authoritative statement of the Orthodox view.

One of the students at a recent lesson said: “We discussed whether someone chooses to be gay or not. Then there was the concluding voice of “the Jewish view”, where we looked at Orthodox Judaism, which condemns homosexuality.

“At the end, we were asked what we thought about religious Jews who might hate themselves because their religion condemns being gay. The last slide on the PowerPoint was a picture and a link to the JONAH website, after we were discussing what gay Orthodox Jews can do, if they hate themselves.”

The student said there was no condemnation or discussion of the controversy around gay “conversion”, and no alternative group was mentioned. “I was appalled; it felt like it was saying, ‘If you are having doubts, check this out’.”

Another pupil who was in the lesson said: “If I were gay or worrying about my sexuality, sitting through that lesson, I would have been so upset. They could have advertised other organisations, which are not there to convert but to support whatever decision people want to make. I know most people were offended by it.”

JONAH has run sessions in the UK. Rabbi David Mitchell of West London Synagogue said he was aware of people who had been involved in the organisation’s “therapy”. He said: “I find it deeply distressing that this group was referred to as part of a Jewish studies lesson, and have concerns about whether those preparing have students’ best interests at heart, without referring to the damage JONAH has done.”

Keshet UK, the lesbian, gay and transgender forum, whose co-chair Dave Shaw is an ex-JFS pupil, said it was “appalled” at the claims.

JFS head teacher Jonathan Miller said the JONAH website was intended to illustrate the different Jewish perspectives on the issue. Mr Miller said: “It is absolutely not the case that we promote JONAH. The teaching materials explicitly state that Judaism would utterly condemn homophobia and discrimination.

“The website is referred to at the end of the lesson, as another opinion, ‘some Jews think this’, to leave students with food for thought.

He said the school was looking into the issue of when it should be viewed during the lesson. “We are always reviewing what we teach after something like this comes up. There have already been discussions about it at the school. Absolutely, we will address it.”

Personally I think this is disgusting, as a Jew I am of the view that those who life their lives in a way that does not affect me should be able to do so without the fear of hatred; and as such I have sent the co-directors Arhur Goldberg & Elaine Silodor an email expressing my disgust.

I would advise you to do the same, however if sending an email please put your points across in a polite manor. Their email address is info@jonahweb.org

A copy of the email I sent is below.