They shout Discrimination?
While surfing around some blogs, and various reports I am finding a lot of discussion on the subject of “Discrimination against Christians” and I am dumbfounded that the Christians in this nation would even mutter the word “Discrimination”. I found the following article very relevant to how I feel about the subject:
In the April/May 2005 issue of Free Inquiry, Tom Flynn writes in his article “Discrimination Against Christians? Oh Please…”:
Majority Christians accurately foresee that their present-day privileges may one day go the way of teacher-led Bible reading. Just as Southern whites did after the Civil War, majority Christians are reacting in ways that are, well, reactionary. …
Attacks on teaching evolution and efforts to reinstate school prayer increasingly portray majority Christians as victims. And, of course, there was last year’s eagerness to turn back the clock on “Happy Holidays.” Taken together, these initiatives could move the country back toward de facto discrimination against both the nonreligious and all those who are religious but not Christian.
Clearly, majority Christians are getting a lot of mileage out their claims of discrimination. So it’s time to ask some blunt questions. Are majority Christians being discriminated against? No. Are they being treated unfairly? No. Is anyone trying to take their rights away from them? No. But are majority Christians the targets of a reform movement that seeks to take privileges away from them? Emphatically, yes. Many of those privileges are illicit, and their removal will help to bring about a more just and equitable society.
Like Southern whites in the Jim Crow years, today’s Christian Americans have been made to give up only some of the illicit privileges they accumulated in the past. The unfairness of the privileges they retain grows more odious with time as the nation becomes more religiously diverse. “Judeo-Christian” practices that seemed acceptable when Christians and Jews dominated debates over religion in public life are transparently unacceptable today, when Christians and Jews share the nation with atheists, agnostics, secular humanists, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs, neopagans, and so on.
Notice the use of the phrase “Religious Privilege” and use of the word “Privilege” drives home the reality that “Christians” have gained “a great deal of Benefits” both legally and socially that they really never were entitled to in the first place. They have been at this so long that they feel “They deserve these Benefits” and to experience a loss of “Influence” in our society make them feel that “Their Vital Rights are being infringed upon”. If we were dealing with actual Civil rights, like the right to speech, then claims about “Discrimination and persecution would be justified.” The Reality of the situation is that Christians are losing privileges — they are losing the ways in which they have been treated better than everyone else. Because of this, they are “not actually being discriminated against” — “But the discrimination against others is ending.” It’s not unlike how the elimination of “white privilege” was “perceived by whites during the Civil Rights era.”
He goes on to quote Lindsay a attorney and founding member of the Council for Secular Humanism’s First Amendment Task Force, what’s really happening when conservative Christians complain about discrimination:
What is going on here is whining: whining by individuals and groups who have been deprived of the truly privileged position they once enjoyed. For most of this country’s history theism, in particular Christianity, has enjoyed favor. . . . The courts have put an end to some, but certainly not all, of this collaboration between church and state. In doing so, the courts have upset many who assumed that this was the proper way of doing things . . . and who did not see anything coercive, let alone unconstitutional, about such practices. Not unnaturally, they have interpreted the courts’ action as an attack on religion, when in reality they were simply an attempt to put an end to the privileged position that religion enjoyed.
Religion still continues to enjoy a “Privileged role in Society”. What is ending in society as a whole is “Sympathy towards Christianity as a whole”. And Christians are being forced to accept the reality that they “Share the same level of respect of other Religions”. They do not deserve or command any special place in the “Religious communities of the world”. Yet they seemingly cannot accept that reality and complain their “Rights are being taken away”.
Just imagine for a second, that Adolf Hitler wrote a letter to President Roosevelt “Complaining that he didn’t understand why his nation was being Discriminated against” and “We just don’t understand the Third Reich”. It would appear to me that although it may sound a bit “extreme to use Hitler as a example” it may not be at all. What were the Crusades? How many millions have perished in the “Religious Holocaust” that history has seen?
What is really happening here, is the refusal of “Christianity to accept they are losing political and social influence”. Their literal level of “Control and Manipulation” is being infringed upon, and they see it as “Civil Rights Violations”. Christians believe this nation was founded on Christianity, and that Christianity is our “Primary Religion” despite even the founding fathers Stating otherwise. A “complete” separation of Religion and State to undo the “Neo-Conservative movement” that was put in our political system under the Reagan Administration, is absolutely “Imperative” to the further success of our great nation.
I agree to not having prayer in schools to force other beliefs to participate or listen. I agree to not having Christian views taught in school or other public places but I also agree Christian people should not be forced to have their children taught things in school they think is wrong! That is true equality on both sides.
I agree violence in any form is wrong. To physically hurt or threaten physical violence to gays is wrong but it is also wrong the death threats going out to people that voted for prop 8 as well as any other violence to church buildings and people, to anyone or anything is wrong, period! Both should be allowed peaceful demonstrations and violence is always wrong except self defense, period! I would never compare gays fighting for gay marriage to the thousands of blacks that endured death and beatings before the end of slavery. It is wrong the deaths of anyone but it does not take gay marrage to end gays from being killed as it took a end to slavery to stop mistreatment to blacks!
I am amazed that people think a expression of opinion is hate! People can have beliefs and still have love, too! I have heard a lot of speech from gays that did have hate in it and I am sure Christians have had hate in some of their speech, too, but to lump all gays and all christians into the same category is wrong. There are peaceful loving people that are gay and there are peaceful loving Christians that are against it.
If Christians truely believe in God and that God’s judgement will come down on this country if they don’t stand up for what they believe, that is not hate! It is never hate to stand up for what you believe as long as there is no violence and no threats! If gays or christians are violent or talk down the person then that is wrong.
I can understand why christians think if gay marriage is allowed then preachers would be forced to marry them, their children forced to listen about the gay lifestyle, and other freedoms that they do not want to lose! Much the same as non christians not wanting prayer in schools. If that is wrong and no one is going to be forced to marry gays and gay lifestyle won’t be taught in school, etc. then maybe there should be lawyers and judges out spoken more to prove this won’t happen! People should not have to understand or agree with each other! Just to respect each other. Agree to disagree!
I may not be making any sense the way I am trying to say yes both can have their free speech and both can have love but both can not be violent in speech or in attacking for any reason but that is my view nethertheless.
In response to “Justme’s” reply:
I would like to thank JUSTME for their reply, and in doing so, I would like to use this reply as a example of sorts. I respect what you are try’ing to say here. A expression of “opionion” is not Hate, I agree with that. What is being lost in the opionion is the “Analysis” of the issue. In reading my post “They Shout Discrimination” it speaks to many issue’s in regard to “Perception”. The perception of the situation by each side is in “somewhat contrast of reality”. Meaning “heterosexual” Christians will not understand the “true issue’s” if they are not more involved in learning them. The same is true concerning “Religious Homosexuals” but with a twist. They are practicing both a Religion and a Lifestyle that “contradict” eachother. A sort of “I want my cake and eat it too” that ultimately undermines the “goal of equality”. To make a stand on a subject or situation is key to the success of the goals of it. We “MUST” stand on one side, and make our case, then and only then can we get to “division”. After “Division” has been truly achieved we move onto “Struggle”. Arguably we are currently in a “Struggle” mode of sorts, right now. Then comes “Change”. Change can be compromised by “Struggle” if the people struggling to achieve a goal become “indecisive” along the way. It is important to keep a “eye on the target”.
So with all of that being said, we cannot simply “agree to disagree” because that is simply not progress at all. If we stayed with that principle “Black people would still be sold under slavery”, and “Women would not be able to Vote” and so many more examples! It is important for people to make their case “using logical reasoning”, and “without emotional bias”. My next blog post will address this issue.
As for the subject of “Homosexuality” being taught in schools? No one is advocating that we sit children down “and discuss their individual sexuality” that is just first of all “Nuts!!” Second of all “Unrealistic”. Our children deal with “Gay” people in society on a daily basis, and it now becomes a reality of accepting that there are people who “are not gender specific”. This will teach our future generations how to “better communicate and deal with society”. We cannot advocate teaching our children to “bury their head in the sand” and act like it isnt there”, like so many people try to do. That is not a solution or a remedy. Children need information!! They like all “People” thrive on knowledge. They will be more receptive to “diversity” and better equipped to bring “Equality” to society as a whole if they understand as many aspects of it they can.
On the subject of “Gay Marriage”, I do not think we can simply say “they should only be able to be married by a Justice of the Peace”. Why? Because yet again another example of how by not standing for a “Side so to speak” people open the door for “confusion/misunderstandings”. There are some churchs who “cater to the gay community” which yes is a “hypocracy” of sorts. So with that being said its another front on the battle. Gay people should not have opened that door in the first place, so it would not be a issue later. Just as the “Religious community” should not have allowed it if they didnt agree with it in the first place. This always unfortunatly boils down to “what is right and wrong”, which I am writing about in my next Blog Post. Sometimes despite how we feel about something we have to come to the comclusion “its just the right thing to do”, and leave it at that. Civil rights, and “Equality” in general is the Right Answer to these questions.