Tear Down That Big Tent
by Dave the Sandman, Guest columnist
A society can best be judged by how it cares for its weakest citizens.
I find US politics fascinating, but in that same way you just cant seem to avoid sneaking a look at the crumpled wrecks in a crash as you slowly creep by in your car. I watch carefully, for a lifetime of experience has taught me that whatever goes on in the US soon reaches the green and pleasant land of my birth, the UK[1]. I admire the great politicians and presidents of your past and like one of those, Franklin D Roosevelt, thought maybe its time for a little “fireside chat”. Also like him I’d like to discuss something my US cousins seem to find controversial: socialism.[2]
Recently I read an excellent book about the rise of the religious right in the US and its corrosive effect on your democracy – American Fascists by Chris Hedges[3]. That title may seem extreme, but consider the way that Al Stefanelli and his family, and maybe others you know, were not only shunned but driven out of their homes and jobs by their friends, neighbours and employers once their atheism became public knowledge. Look at what has happened to two brave schoolkids who stood up to protest against 1st Amendment abuses – Jessica Ahlquhist and Damon Fowler. Or the little 10 year old who refused to recite the Pledge because “Liberty and Justice for All” didn’t apparently include LGBT people. Or….and that list gets longer every day.
Read the book – the reason for using such an extreme descriptor as “fascism” to describe the US religious right is not only in there but fully justified.
Chris’ book seeks to try to explain why the US is still so raddled by the religious, and one of the potential reasons he sets out particularly struck home. The US is truly “exceptional” compared to the rest of the industrialised west in that it has no real comprehensive social welfare systems, and certainly no universal social health and medical coverage such as the National Health Services of European states. These were things Roosevelt proposed in his Second Bill Of Rights, instituted by the European states, and ignored by his own. And the end result? A society of fear and uncertainty, where any fall from full employment and good health means potentially your bank account goes bye bye, your ass is out on the street and it’s Kraft Macaroni Dinners till kingdom come. If you are a member of a church you can go beg them for help till the government throws you some stale crusts. If you aren’t… well just book yourself a cardboard box on Skid Row.
Shabby GOP liars like Gingrich, Romney and Santorum rail against a “European style welfare state society”, and by constant repetition of that dishonest meme make it a common perception amongst my US cousins that European welfare systems have resulted in poverty for Europeans and relative prosperity for Americans. They conveniently ignore respected research by the EU Organization for Economic and Cooperation Development showing that in 2011 the level of poverty in the United States was worse than that of the Czech Republic, Denmark, Hungary, Austria, the Netherlands, France, Slovenia, Norway, Finland, Sweden, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium, Ireland, Poland, Britain, Italy, Greece, Portugal, and Spain[4].
Now, look at the faith map of the USA. Where the people are poorest and least protected there the faiths thrive and spread like a bad dose of clap. Throw into that witches brew the GOP and religious rights attacks on public schooling resulting in an ill educated and ill informed population unaware of their rights. Add almost total control of a mainstream media constantly screaming about the evils of socialism and how it is “un-Christian” and “un-American” and you have the perfect Petri dish for religiosity. It allows politicians and other corporate shills to go on TV or stand on a rally stage and denounce the Occupy protesters seeking the barest form of social justice as socialist/Marxist/Nazi /Commie/Un-American scum whilst prefacing their selfishness and stupidity with that threadbare and idiotic canard “As a Christian…”
Really? I must re-read the Bible as I must have skipped the bits where Jesus sneeringly told the beggar to get a job then gave the moneylenders in the Temple a bail out.
As for socialism….well the US loves socialism[5]. You love your Medicaid, your farm subsides, your market price controls, economic protection measures, public education, food stamps and welfare support- all of which are pure socialism[6]. The problem I think, as a commie pinko Brit, is of course not that you have socialism in the US, it’s that you just don’t have enough of it in the right places. I think that may be the underpinning reason that, unlike the rest of the west which does have comprehensive systems, you’re still stuck in the religion trap.
My reasons for thinking this? Which party is it that is most lock tied to the extremist religious right? Which party most loves to wave its Big Tent Christian credentials and Holier Than Thou cards the most? Which party reads the Constitution out loud, tearily bleats “With Liberty And Justice For All”, then denies the rights of others such as minorities, women and LGBT citizens to live happily and peacefully with equality under the law? Which party is it that frustrates and compromises measures to protect the weak, ill and poor thus driving them into the hands of their churchy mates? Which party is it that supports ramming their own brand of ugly Bronze Age faith and “values” down your necks, between your legs, and into your classrooms?
You got it – the ones who scream loudest about the evils of socialism whilst bilking the government for every farm subsidy and pray away the gay Medicaid payment they can pocket on the sly, at the same time guaranteeing big fat socialist tax subsides for their corporate pay masters. The party that constantly refers to its “Christian” moral credentials. The rosy specs flag wrapped fact challenged Bible waving arch-revisionists of the GOP.
So, the log is burning low and my pipe and brandy are calling. Ponder on this my American friends.
Had Franklin D Roosevelt staved off illness just a few more months and got his way, instituting his Second Bill Of Rights, how religious do you think the US would have been 60 years later? As in Europe, where his ideas and principles took root and thrived, would the churches now stand empty and the pews and hymnals be gathering dust?
Have a good long hard think about things that could be. Do you want a safer, more secure, more egalitarian and religion free public life and society? Do you want “freedom of” to include “freedom from”? Common Sense and compassion in your politics? Liberty and Justice For ALL? You don’t need to stick on the Che Guevara beret and adopt a thousand yard stare of destiny my friends. “Small s” or what you Americans term “progressive” socialism is not Stalinism, Marxism, Maoism, nor is it Nazi-ism. European style socialism is just making sure the weak, the poor and the ill aren’t forced to beg for charity, and everybody gets a fair crack at success and happiness through a decent education and health support. It is an “ism”…..its ALTRUISM. Its answering the question “Am I my brothers keeper” with a YES. Its being the Good Samaritan on a religion free impartial state level, and that’s what FDR knew to be true.
Like taking down any tent you start with the loosening the guy ropes and kicking out the tent pegs. If you want to take down US Big Tent Christianity, best you just listen to Franklin D Roosevelt…. We in Europe did.
ABHOR THE WHORE….TEAR DOWN THAT BIG TENT!
[1] For example UK Prime Minster David Cameron’s recent statement that the UK is a “Christian nation”. Where have you heard that lie before?
[2] Just before his death Franklin D Roosevelt proposed a “Second Bill Of Rights” for the US. It would have implemented welfare and economic stimulus measures that would have served to support and protect the working and middle classes. See further his Jan 11th 1944 State Of The Union address at http://www.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/archives/address_text.html.
[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Fascists:_The_Christian_Right_and_the_War_on_America
[4] http://www.oecd.org/document/24/0,3746,en_2649_34637_2671576_1_1_1_1,00.html
[5] I note that the word socialism is so despised in the USA, and so misunderstood, you had to rebrand it “progressive” so people would put away the pitchforks and torches.
[6] As was borne out by poll after poll by various respected organisations during 2011 and reported in news media.
Kicking Out The King Pole
by Dave the Sandman – Guest Columnist.
“Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.” – Carl Sagan
“What can be asserted without proof can also be dismissed without proof.” – Christopher Hitchens
If there is a tenant of fundamentalist Christianity that is guaranteed to have me spitting blood and feathers it is Biblical Literalism. Belief that the Bible is the inerrant word of God, passed directly to modern generations through age after age of wise minds is pure insanity. The wickedness that this belief system facilitates is like the classic “Mafia Octopus” diagram, where the Literalism is the head and the tentacles wrapped around all aspects of society are things like Creationism/Intelligent Design, bigotry against gays and minorities, the oppression of women and denial of rights to self determination, attacks on abortion providers and their facilities, perverse and unjust laws, the suppression of scientific research and education and substitution of quackery and conspiracy theories, etc.
An example of the Literalist position can be found in a recent laughably insane online article titled “Scientific Accuracy”[1] posted by the comically misnamed Institute of Creation Research:
Either the Bible is wholly reliable on every subject with which it deals, or it is not the Word of God.
The arguments against the viability of Literalism are plural. As was picked up by a recent blog post by fellow traveller Ernest Perce[2], the New Testament is packed with contradictory statements of “fact” about Jesus and his life. That alone should be enough to disprove the credibility of the Literalist argument. After his baptism did Jesus go for his long walk in the desert, or did he go to Canaan for a piss up? On what day was he crucified? At what time? By whom? And so the list goes on and on. There are whole websites dedicated to New Testament inconsistencies. They need whole websites because there are so damn many inconsistencies.
Then we can turn our gaze to the Old Testament. As Al Stefanelli detailed in his biographical post, it was his realisation that the story of Noah in the Old Testament was a badly plagiarised version of the flood section of The Epic of Gilgamesh, written a thousand years or more before the Hebrew version, which triggered his walk away from the Literalist faith and into the light of reason. As a lad who studied geology all the way to University level, let me assure you that whilst there is evidence of localised drastic flooding in the Middle East, and particularly Egypt and Mesopotamia at various phases, there is not one jot of evidence for global scale flooding. Not one, and its not like in the early days of the science there were no geologists looking for it. That also sets aside other related arguments against the physical possibility for such an event such as physics, hydrology, climatology, etc.
The Old Testament would have you believe that the Psalms were the work of King David, yet if that is so how is it that large sections of them are directly plagiarised from much earlier Egyptian hymns and prayers, some from the monotheistic “heretic” pharaoh Akhenaton whose Aten worship heresy may just have been the genesis of Abrahamic monotheism? Possibly because the Hebrew scribes heard Egyptian traders saying those prayers? Or maybe Israelite traders heard them on their travels and brought them home when they returned?
There are many historical versions of the Bible in museums around the world, and analysis of their contents shows clearly that whole sections of the Bible were added during the Middle Ages. The book itself was compiled and edited at the Council of Nicaea under the orders of Constantine. There was a move shortly afterward, headed by a Roman called Marcian, to have the whole Old Testament dumped as it was Hebrew not Christian. The King James Version has been shown by scholars to have conveniently translated certain sections to enforce the idea of monarchy being ordained by God and thus beyond the laws of man. Modern literary analysis and comparative religion scholars can clearly demonstrate that most of the Old Testament is second hand plagiarism, and that this carries over into the New Testament where large bits appear plagiarised from Hellenic and Roman pagan sources such as Virgil and Plato. And if the Bible is the infallible word of God, given there are many different versions of the text, which one is it that is “his”?
And then there’s the most damning argument against Literalism of all. From its earliest days the state of Israel funded archaeological research focussed on establishing the historical accuracy of the Hebrew books we call The Old Testament. Team after team have gone over the Holy Land and its neighbour states with a fine tooth comb, sat in dusty rooms deciphering and analysing the written texts on papyri and clay tablets, read temple walls and explored city ruins, catalogued clay pot fragment after fragment, bead after bead. And their conclusions after 60 years of solid internationally recognised and lauded exploration and research? That the “Old Testament” texts have almost NO VALUE WHATSOEVER as a historical record of the Israelites.
They found no evidence of Exodus either in Egypt itself, where there is a gold mine of written textual history, nor in the deserts of the Sinai. It seems that if the Tribes of Israel did wander about for 40 years, they left not one single bit of reliable evidence of their passing. Not one pot shard, not one fire hearth, not one bead. Here is another ponder point. Have you noticed that the stories of the Israelites oppression by evil old Pharaoh and his sons seem a little scant on actual details, such as the names of the two or more pharaohs involved in that oppression and the cities they were made to build at his whim? This is the same book that spends whole chapters with the “A begat B begat C begat D” blather in painful and boring detail. You would think that they would name and shame the ancient Israelites equivalents of Hitler and Stalin then wouldn’t you? And let us consider the plagues. Why is it that the Egyptians, obsessed with recording accounts of famines and floods on the walls of temples and tombs, taxation accounts and papyri, would fail completely to record such a series of horrific empire shattering disasters? They did in respect of less dramatic national disasters.
Moving along. When Joshua was supposedly marching round the walls of Jericho and blowing his trumpets there were no major walls there at all. The ruins that have been found date from much later, in fact around 1000BC when the first books of the Bible were being written down. And while those walls appear to have been brought tumbling down in a siege, there is no evidence that it was an Israelite army that did it. Just as there are no traces of the wandering, there are no traces of the genocidal wars of Joshua and his mass ethnic cleansing on the orders of Yaweh. All that smitey spitey head chopping must have left some evidence in the way of mass graves and ruined villages and towns…..so why isn’t it there? Perhaps because it never happened?
Cross culturalisation and mythology plagiarism is a common thread throughout societies, and the Abrahamic family tree is just one example. A recent example perhaps – Joseph Smith pulled the same trick when he re-wrote the Bible to put Eden in Missouri and had Jesus doing a post resurrection tour of the pre-colonies USA. And look how well that obvious nonsense has gone down.
I am a big adherent of the argument presented by the late and inestimably great Christopher Hitchens and that of the equally sage Carl Sagan, both of which I quoted at the head of this article. As Ricky Gervaise explained to the media last year, one reason underpinning his atheism is that if someone claims they can fly your logical response would be to say “Show Me!” You would ask them to jump off a roof or ladder and demonstrate this claim. If I said I had an underpants gnome in my pocket you would ask me to show you it, and when I didn’t you would quite rightly laugh in my face and call me a fool. So why do we allow Literalists to get away with their equally insane and demonstrably anti-evidential stance?
Now, when around two thirds of your country’s population are prepared to ignore, discredit and discount the mountain of evidence against Literalism that is a serious problem. Its corrosive effects spread like a cancer, from the ugly fascism of Domnionism to denying kids access to scientifically accurate educations and sex education in schools. It means that gay minorities are persecuted and slandered, and women are forced to carry babies to term they don’t want and can’t support.
Unfortunately, Hitch’s simple dismissal tactic is neither persuasive in the court of public opinion, nor effective in countering Literalsm’s spread. Instead, we must adopt Dr Sagan’s advice, demand evidence, and where none exists, or what does exist directly contradicts Literalism, we must use that as our weapon of choice. As people of reason and evidence, knowledge and science, we can no longer sit idly at the sidelines while all end of nonsense and myth is injected into public discourse as fact.
When you read a letter in your local press written by a Literalist clown, write one to the same paper slapping their insanity down with facts and evidence. When that letter or a blog post is online, use the “Comments” section to do the same[3]. When a politician wheels out Literalist stupidity to justify whatever bigoted law they propose or position they take, write to their staff and the press calling them out. Then when it comes to election time use the media and your own mouth to spread the word and influence the vote and get rid of the idiot concerned.
When you go to a museum and see the donations box stick a few bucks in there. That money helps the museum stay open and do its thing, and serves to counter the donation gathering of shabby anti-intellectual clowns like Ken Ham, the Aussie Ayatollah of Appalachia, used (ostensibly) to build their stupid Creation Museums. When you read a media article written by the ironically named scam organisation The Discovery Institute write a letter in not forgetting to point out their IDiotc anti-science’s greatest defeat – Kitzmiller vs Dover.
If you know moderate people of faith who do not adhere to the stupidity of Literalism, get them onboard as well. Point out that the Literalists are dragging their faith through the mud by association and their country back into the days of Cotton Mather and the Salem witchunts. Remind them that once the fundy loons have finished with us, it will be their moderate faiths and non-Literalist creeds that are next on the hit list. And when they laugh it off and say you are paranoid, smile and suggest they read a Dominionist manifesto or The Wedge Document. That will wipe the smile off their face.
For 30 years the rats have had the run of the ship. They have eaten the cargo, crapped up the bilges to blocking point, and are now nibbling away actively at the wheelhouse steering ropes. From the Houses of Congress, through the courts of the land, to the pharmacy on your main street the place is infested with holier than thou rats. Its time for us cats to get organised, get active, and take back the ship before it hits the reef and sinks for good. We can no longer sit idly by as we sail gently into the dark night.
Literalism is not just one of the guy ropes or tent pegs of USA style Big Tent Christianity, it is the “King Pole” itself. It is the central pole that holds up the whole damnable circus marquee, and THAT is why it must be taken down.
Get off your ass, get out those tools. Combat the king pole of Literalism wherever you find it, and TEAR DOWN THAT DAMN BIG TENT.
Holier Than Thou
by Dave the Sandman, guest columnist
First a little background. Till the age of 18 I attended what was, back in my day at least, a strict single sex Catholic school (Thornleigh Salesian College, Bolton, Lancs, UK). Now back then you had to be a good practicing Catholic just to get in, I was taught almost exclusively by priests and lay brothers of the faith, and RE (Religious Education) was a set part of the standard curricula till you were 16 (I got a B at O Level in it…so much for the theologically ignorant atheist argument eh?). That doesn’t mean I was one of the faithful myself, as at 12 I worked out it was all contradictory claptrap, but as Shakespeare had Richard III say: “I can smile and murder whilst I smile”.
Anyways, on to the point. Now over in the USA , and increasingly in the UK, we hear the opinions touted that atheists like you and I have no moral basis for our actions – we are without faith, without grace, and moral relativists stuck in a wicked world of materialistic nihilism. Oh yeah?
In the Wacky Races rotating door world of the GOP primaries we have seen one sickeningly hate filled idiotic cross burner after another proudly tout their Holier Than Thou credentials and with teary eyes explain how their drive for wealth and fame and power is in fact divinely mandated. One after another these cretinous skinwastes have been exposed as liars, philanderers and immoral scum, and one by one they have been sidelined. This has resulted in the rise of Rick Santorum, gay hating family values bigot and all round know nothing closet racist plutocratic white bread retard. He is flying his god credentials hard, and constantly referring to how Catholic and moral he is. So, lets compare this shabby Forest Gump warrior for Rome with me, the immoral nihilistic moral relativist and hellbound lapsed follower of Mother Church.
Rick, as evidence can prove, is arguably a fully blown Creationist. He tried unsuccessfully to get Creationism …sorry Intelligent Design…..rammed into US schools[1]. I on the other hand, being of a scientific and rationalist bent, and English, fully understand and support Evolution as the only explanation of how I now sit at a keyboard typing this rant. Mother Church, via the last two Popes writings and public addresses, supports and accepts Evolution, albeit in a deistic format. So…that’s Sandman 1, Santorum 0.
Santorum, from what he has sad publically in the past, appears to be arguably a Biblical Literalist who believes the Old Testament is the word of God. I on the other hand, as I can read and I like to learn about history and cross culturalisation of mythologies, know for a fact that the Old Testament is all plagiarised from earlier cultures such as the Assyrians, and the rest is just propaganda written by scribes to the Jewish royal court to make themselves appear bigger and more important than they were. Mother Church via doctrine as taught at schools like the one I attended teaches that the Old Testament is largely, if not totally, allegorical. That’s Sandman 2, Santorum 0.
Being of a “small s socialist” bent, (I’m English so socialism is bred into us), I believe in things like a fair and reasonable distribution of wealth across societies is a good thing we should strive for. Santorum believes that raging income equality and a “dog eat dog / sod you if you fall behind” system is what is best[2]. Pope Benedict has publically decried income inequality between rich and poor, calling it a “scandal”. Score that Sandman 3, Santorum 0.
I also believe and fully support a strong and robust social welfare safety net including comprehensive state funded universal healthcare for all. Santorum on the other hand fully supports the Ryan Plan that would dismantle what little the US has in the way of public healthcare and welfare. He most recently spoke, which he now denies, that taking away welfare payments and food support from “blacks” would be a good thing. And Mother Church’s opinion and doctrine? Well, they say I’m right and Rick is wrong[3]. Sandman 4, Santorum 0
Having had some background in consumer rights regulation and monopolies investigations I know that market regulations, particularly in financial sectors, are not just desirable they are damn well essential protections for society’s wellbeing and benefit. Santorum on the other hand thinks and maintains that it is regulations and regulators who cause financial collapses and economic stagnation. Mother Church has stated publically as doctrine that market regulation is necessary to protect the public from financial malpractice[4]. So now that’s Sandman 5, Santorum 0.
Workers Rights and labour policy perhaps? As I’m English I believe in strong unions and was myself at one time a Union representative. Rick says that Unions should be abolished and is against any form of public sector pay negotiations by labour movements. Mother Church has been strongly pro-Union since Pope Leo issued the Rerum Novarum in 1891, and maintains that standpoint to this day via its Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church. Sandman 6, Santorum 0.
As I’m English and have an IQ larger than my shoe size I also understand Climate Change concerns and am persuaded by the 94% of scientists who think than anthropomorphic influence is a real thing and a glaring threat to our wellbeing. Santorum, being a brain dead US politician and paid for shill of the energy companies, says its all a bunch of bunk and a conspiracy by some evil cabal of mad scientists to attack the US industrial complex’s profit margins. Mother Church? Ah, well Pope Benedict and his berobed staff agree with me and those scientists[5]. Sandman 7, Santorum 0.
Torture is an evil practice that degrades both the victim and the state that carries it out. It is of no value in terms of intelligence gathering, and has always failed to be an effective tool of state security. 5 minutes in a room with me and a pair of pliers and I can have you admitting it was you that shot JFK. I say that as a rationalist, as a history buff, and an ex-UK government intelligence analyst. Santorum has time and again spoken out supporting torture. Mother Church? Modern Catholic doctrine calls torture “an intrinsic evil”[6]. Sandman 8, Santorum 0.
Jesus Rick! Eye on the ball son! Swing the bat, hit the ball, run for base! Easy see. So, what are we left with?
Rick hates LGBT people and has compared them to paedophiles and bestiality freaks. I support and speak out for LGBT rights and making the word ALL in “Liberty And Justice For All” mean what it says. Mother Church rails against gays and condones/conceals the actions of kiddy fiddling men in black. Score 1 for Rick. Mother Church abhors abortion rights for women, and equally abhors any form of contraception. Rick is fully on board with that. I am most certainly not. Score another for the Rickster.
But hang on! The score at the end of the match is still Sandman 8, Santorum 2. Holy crapballs Rick! That means not only am I a better Catholic than you, I appear to also be Holier Than Thou!
And far be it for me to do this Rickky, but must I really remind you about old Mother Church’s carved in stone principles of Magisterium and Papal Infallibility?
You see Rickky you cardboard Catholic not only am I, an anti-theist positive atheist, a better Catholic than you….. you my pedigree chum are a HERETIC!
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santorum_Ammendment
[2] http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2011/12/20/393539/santorum-im-for-income-inequality/
[3] http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/1102903.htm
[4] http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/25/world/europe/vatican-calls-for-global-oversight-of-the-economy.html?_r=1
[5] http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2011/11/pope_durban_climate.html
[6] See further http://www.faithfulcitizenship.org/
You’re Not Being Persecuted!
by Steve Martin, Guest Columnist
All across the United States (but particularly in the South) public schools are violating the Constitution by sponsoring prayers in schools or before athletic events. Thankfully, groups like American Atheists and the Freedom from Religion Foundation (FFRF) are trying to uphold the law. Unfortunately, many Christians just cannot seem to get their heads around this, even though it’s often those very same Christians who scream the loudest about upholding the Constitution and liberty for all. (What they apparently mean is liberty for Christians).
Among some of the more absurd claims I’ve heard from some Christians is that Christianity is “under attack”, and that they are being persecuted by such efforts to uphold the Constitution. Take a recent case in Alabama, for example, where the FFRF is trying to stop prayers that invoke “Jesus” before athletic events. David McKelvey, a pastor nearby the school, told Fox News that the complaint was “unfortunate” but not surprising. Christianity, he said, is under attack. “It’s going on all over the place,” he said. “You just hate for it to be coming to your doorstep.” [Translation: “It sucks when we get caught violating the law.”]
Don’t you just love it when the person breaking the law acts like the victim?
And, make no mistake, breaking the law is exactly what Christians like McKelvey, and all public school officials and teachers who promote school prayers, are doing. Many Christians simply do not understand the law; a quick read of the comments by self-identified Christians on Fox News’ website will demonstrate this.
What follows is an analysis of just a few comments demonstrating the victim mentality. Comments are in a different font and italicized.
While I’m a Christian, I lived for a time in a predominantly Jewish town where there were many expressions of Judaism and I wasn’t the least bit offended. Why would an atheist want to stop expressions of Christianity? What they’re doing borders on hate crime.
It’s a hate crime to prevent school officials from officially endorsing a particular religion via prayer at a public event? Whether or not someone is “offended” is irrelevant. Further, atheists are not stopping expressions of Christianity. They are stopping illegal, unconstitutional, publicly endorsed prayers. The “victim” mentality is shown in this comment.
The following comment makes a threat towards the person who complained about the prayer, trying to suggest that atheists are “making life miserable” for “good Americans” (which, presumably, means “Christians”).
“Did anyone get this person’s address??? These bozos make life miserable for good Americans, so let’s make life miserable for them for a change!!!”
How about this one?
“Why is it that atheists are the only ones allowed to have free speech and are the only ones allowed to prevent others from taking part in free speech?”
Again, this person is trying to say that atheists are somehow preventing his/her free speech. This is somewhat ironic, given the fact that it’s the school who is officially leading the prayers and who is clearly attempting to silence atheists. The reality of the situation is the exact opposite of what this commenter is saying.
How’s this one for bad advice and ignorance of the law?
I would love to sue them over them stomping on our right to the freedom of religion, it doesn’t read freedom from religion.
This commenter wrongly believes that stopping prayer at a public school event is “stomping” on their rights. Again, we clearly can see the victim mentality here.
Here is a common faulty argument, followed by the claim of persecution:
OUTSTANDING!!!! Religion is based upon FAITH. Christianity is a FAITH in Jesus who is the Christ. Atheism is a FAITH that God does not exist. Therefore, it is the height of hypocrisy for atheists to push their religion on Christians.
Aside from the gross misunderstanding of atheism as requiring “faith” and being a religion, preventing public prayer is not pushing anything. Quite the opposite: atheists are trying to prevent religion from getting pushed on everyone at these events.
To read the full article and/or to peruse the thousands of comments, go here.
I could cite hundreds, even thousands, more comments just like those above, but I think I’ve shown enough to get the point across. Christians who make comments such as these are attempting to convince others that Christians are the victims. In reality, everyone except Christians are the real victims when forced to sit through public school-endorsed prayers. Moreover, no one is saying that Christians aren’t allowed to pray. If that was the case, then Christians might have a point. Rather, the argument is that public officials cannot endorse any particular religion, and teachers cannot make everyone’s kids pray in school.
So why, then, do some Christians make this claim of persecution? There could be several reasons. The first is simply a misunderstanding of the Constitution. Perhaps they genuinely believe it means only the freedom to practice religion, but not the freedom to be an atheist. Second, it also could be because they want to avoid and deflect any real debate. Rather than responding to, for example, the Constitutional question about the separation of church and state, the claim that removing prayer from schools is an effort to suppress Christianity makes for a convenient red herring. By playing victim, these Christians are able to derail the debate, making it all about their alleged victim status. Third, no doubt, many Christians are worried that Christianity is losing its privileged status.
This third reason warrants some further analysis. If anything, Christianity still enjoys a place of privilege in the United States, often in unconstitutional forms, and, in reality, non-Christians and non-believers are persecuted (perhaps “persecuted” is too strong of a word, but suffice to say that non-Christians are marginalized by being told they are “not the norm.”) Thus, what Christians are reacting to is that loss of privilege, whether real or perceived. (I would argue that Christianity still enjoys all sorts of privilege in the U.S.)
However, when atheists speak up about public prayer, for example, it becomes harder to hold on to the delusion that everyone is Christian and that anything other than Christianity is abnormal. (This is also why many Christians react so strongly to any sort of billboard or sing on a bus that questions the existence of a deity.) In the same way that gay rights advocates had to work towards getting people to realize that heterosexuality is not the only sexual orientation that is “normal” and “acceptable”, atheists, and people who believe something other than Christianity, are beginning to erode the cozy, privileged relationship between Christianity and normalcy. It’s not that Christians are being persecuted that gets a reaction; rather, it’s their realization that non-Christians are no longer being silent on the issue.
It seems that members of nearly every religion, at some point in time, actually were persecuted. This is not surprising, since theists believe their god/s is/are the true god/s (by definition, they must think this, otherwise they would choose a different faith, or become an atheist.) And, when one believes that their god is the true god, they feel emboldened to act in ways they otherwise would not. In particular, some believe that their violence is justified. In other cases, at the very least, they believe they have some kind of divine authority to attempt to silence non-believers and believers of other faiths. (This reminds to point out that members of non-Christian faiths ought to be joining, or at the very least, thanking, atheists for preventing state-sponsored Christianity.)
One final thought that hopefully reaches some Christians: When Christians in the United States act like victims, they demean those individuals who really are being persecuted on this planet. In reality, it makes U.S. Christians look petty and egotistical.
Don’t go there…
Why the religious often claim to be offended, and why atheists should continue to critique them anyway, by Steve Martin, Guest Columnist
As a recently “out” atheist, I have begun more frequently to engage in discussions in public forums about beliefs in god/s. When I question or challenge my friends about their beliefs, they often pull the “I’m offended” card, or the “this isn’t the right time and place, dude” card (what is the right time, I wonder?) Rarely is the content of my criticism addressed. Instead, I’ll get the text version of an eye-roll, such as an, “oh, Steve”, meaning, that I should “not go there,” or some other attempt to shut me up. In colloquial terms, religion is, conveniently for theists, a “don’t-go-there” topic. Effectively, theists have found a way to silence atheists, especially those atheists who try hard to be “friendly.”
In the wake of the tsunami that devastated Japan, a friend of mine posted a Facebook status essentially asking that “He” (referring to the God of Christianity) help the Japanese. I asked, in a reply post: “Why did ‘HE’ cause the tsunami in the first place?” I think that’s a fair question. Does it not seem odd to request assistance from an all-powerful, all-knowing god to help the Japanese after that very same god just destroyed half the country with a tsunami? Isn’t it, in fact, going against God’s will if you pray to help people that God obviously has chosen to destroy? Nonetheless, I was immediately attacked by several people for being, apparently, some kind of jerk. All that for a question. In the end, after making some kind of strange claim that DNA’s complexity actually proves there’s a god, my “friend” “unfriended” me on Facebook. Apparently, he dislikes dissent and criticism even though he claims to be a patriotic, open-minded American.
So why are believers so quick to claim they’re offended by criticism (or even just simple questions about why their god allegedly behaves in certain ways)? This is what I think is happening: the religious mindset has so identified their own sense of “self” so strongly with their belief in a god that they cannot separate a critique of an idea from a personal attack. In argument terms, they truly seem to think that critiquing the belief in a deity (or whether or not Jesus existed, rose from the dead, etc.) is an ad hominem argument. I’ve got news for them. It’s not a personal attack, and, if a theist takes it as a personal attack, then that is all the more reason for some serious reflection.
This often results in yet another paradox: I’ll call it the “I’m going to post things on Facebook about god even though it’s a personal relationship [presumably with their god?], and then I’ll get mad when atheists critique it.” Well, I just must ask them: If it’s so personal, and I shouldn’t respond or question it, then why do you post about it on Facebook, or attend public prayer sessions, or, for that matter, go to church at all? If it’s actually only “personal”, why are you telling everyone about it, and why are you living your public life according to it? The answer is simple: because it’s not a personal relationship. The only reason they are claiming it’s a personal relationship is to side-step any criticism by appealing to everyone’s sense of wanting to get along. If it was only personal, then the rest of us likely wouldn’t even know about it. Instead, on a quite regular basis, the rest of us hear about god, prayers on Facebook and in our public schools, Catholic voting guides, abortion-rights infringements, the Defense of Marriage act, and so on and so forth. It’s clearly not just personal, so, please stop hiding behind that shield. It’s flimsy, and it won’t protect you anymore from atheists who are finally growing confident enough to challenge you.
Regardless, whether personal or not, once revealed publicly one’s beliefs are open to critique. Every idea is open to critique. Do political ideologies enjoy such immunity from criticism? Actually (and unfortunately), this is beginning to happen, and I would argue that it may very well be because of the dangerous linkage between religion and politics and the erosion of the separation of church and state. Anyone following the current Republican debates for the Presidential candidacy can see how the candidates attempt to “out-god” each other. Invariably, when religion seeps into politics, politics will begin to take on some of the traits of religion and theism, such as believing things “on faith.” At that point, political ideas also are apparently off-limits for critique, and in some cases are believed to be true despite any corroborating evidence. “Faith” is dangerous in all aspects of life and the political realm is no exception.
Do scientific hypotheses, once posited, merely become truth? Ironically, many Christians frequently point out (wrongly) that evolution is “just a theory” (they misunderstand the meaning of “theory” in scientific usage, but that’s a different essay) and therefore need not be accepted. I could only wish that theists would scrutinize their own beliefs as much as they challenge widely-accepted scientific theories merely because they contradict the words of one book.
What I aim to do, regardless of whether or not it “offends” someone, is to get them to think. Instead of thinking, however, they immediately respond, often hypocritically with a personal attack, that I’m being offensive or that I’m being a jerk (or pick your favorite insult). So what? Nowhere is there guaranteed to anyone a right not to be offended. Indeed, I would claim that our nation is great precisely because many brave people, at great risk to their own way of life, stood up throughout history and “offended” the majority. Believers in god/s can be offended all they want because our right to critique ideas is precisely why this nation, founded not on Christian values but on Enlightenment ideas, has freedom of speech. Thomas Jefferson once wrote that “dissent is the highest form of patriotism.” We have a right to critique their religious beliefs, just like they have the right to hold onto them (but not to enforce them on others). But those beliefs are not allowed to be vacuum-sealed, hidden away from all non-believers, in some kind of protective wrapping. If the United States actually was founded on Christian ideas, the first amendment would never have been ratified or even written, because the church and the clergy have always suppressed the questioning of ideas, beliefs, authority, and dogma.
So, fellow freethinkers, offend all you want! Don’t stop challenging people’s beliefs. Don’t stop challenging your own beliefs either. Just remember to attack the idea and not the person who believes it.
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Al Stefanelli’s blog has moved to Freethought Blogs.
Important Information About This Blog
A Change Of Venue For Al / A New Space For Guests
Greetings dear readers. As you know, beginning in October, I will be blogging on Freethought Blogs. I consider it an honor to be among so many of my fellow bloggers that most of us have come to know well and respect. However, this blog has build up quite the readership over the last year or so, and I have decided to use this space to host guest columnists. So, if you are an aspiring blogger or writer, and would like to get a little more exposure, send me an email and let’s talk. I will be looking for well-written and relevant articles, preferably under 2000 words, on atheism, freethought, humanism, secularism, etc. I will be publishing two articles a week here, so I will be pretty particular as to what I put up here. Suffice to say, grammar and spelling is important, as is sentence structure and the ability to parse your thoughts. Good luck!
- Al Stefanelli
The Limits Of Free Speech
by Joyce Arthur – Guest Columnist.
Joyce Arthur is a writer, activist and founder and Coordinator of the Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada, a national political pro-choice group. This article originally appeared on the RH Reality Check blog, and is being reprinted here with the express permission of the writer.
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The popular catchphrase of free speech defenders is a quote attributed to Voltaire: “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” Civil libertarians often defend and support the notion that the right to freely express offensive opinions is a bedrock human right that should not be abridged except under very narrow circumstances—typically for hate speech that directly incites violence against a person or group of persons. However, I support broader prosecution of hate speech—defined here as speech that disparages a person or class of persons based on an immutable characteristic (colour, race, origin, gender, sexual orientation, disability, and age), or their occupation, family or marital status, and religion or lack of religion. Proscribing hate speech more broadly would, I believe, foster a more inclusive, tolerant, and safer society.
Many western countries already do criminalize hate speech [6] in a more encompassing way, although enforcement is often weak and spotty. A typical example is Canada, where it is illegal to “expose a person or persons to hatred or contempt…on the basis of a prohibited ground of discrimination” (Canadian Human Rights Act [7]) and to “wilfully promote hatred against any identifiable group” (Criminal Code of Canada [8]). The United States, however, stands almost alone in its veneration of free speech at almost any cost. The U.S. Supreme Court insists that the First Amendment protects hate speech unless it constitutes a “ true threat” or will incite imminent lawless action [9].
But societies should take action against hate speech without requiring that a few specific words by themselves must directly and immediately incite violence, or be likely to. That sets a very high bar and is difficult to prove. It also allows purveyors of hate to evade responsibility simply by not making explicit calls for violence. Further, our new digital world raises the stakes—the Internet has spawned a proliferation of hate speech along with useful information such as bomb-making instructions or the home addresses of abortion providers. This has enabled others to commit violence long after the words were first published.
Violent acts of hate are generally preceded by hate speech that is expressed publicly and repeatedly for years, including by public figures, journalists, leading activists, and even the state. Some examples include Anders Behring Breivik’s terrorist acts in Norway (June 2011), the assassination of Kansas abortion provider Dr. George Tiller (May 2009) and other abortion providers in the 1990’s, the Rwandan genocide against the Tutsis (1994), and the Nazi Holocaust
Courts of law should be able to look at broader patterns of hate speech in the culture to determine whether a hateful atmosphere inspired or contributed to violence, or would likely lead to future violence. When hate speech is relatively widespread and acceptable (such as against Muslims or abortion providers), it’s not difficult to see the main precursor to violence—an escalation of negative behaviour or rhetoric against the person or group. Dr. George Tiller endured a previous assassination attempt and a decades-long campaign of persecution waged by the anti-abortion movement, which worsened over time, especially in the last year or two of the doctor’s life. Anders Behring Breivik had actively opposed multiculturalism for years and had immersed himself in Christian Right propaganda about the supposed threat of Muslim immigration to Europe, a view popularized only in recent years by a growing army of anti-Muslim bloggers and right-wing journalists.
As these examples illustrate, we can often pinpoint the main purveyors of hate speech that lead to violent crimes. In the Norway shootings, the killer Breivik relied heavily [10] on writings from Peder Jensen (“Fjordman”), Pamela Geller, Robert Spencer, Mark Steyn, Jihad Watch, Islam Watch, Front Page Magazine, and others. Such individuals and groups should be charged with incitement to hatred and violence. Similar culpability for the assassination of Dr. George Tiller should rest on the shoulders [11] of the extremist anti-abortion group Operation Rescue and Fox News commentator Bill O’Reilly.
In general, anyone spewing hate to an audience, especially on a repeated basis, could be held criminally responsible. This would include politicians, journalists, organizational leaders and speakers, celebrities, bloggers and hosts of online forums, and radical groups that target certain categories of people. We also need to hold people in accountable positions to a higher standard, such as government employees and contractors, ordained religious leaders, CEOs, and the like.
Criteria by which to assign culpability could include a speaker’s past record of prior hate speech against a particular person or group, how widely and frequently the views were disseminated, and the specific content and framing of their views. In cases where violence has already occurred, judges could determine how likely it was that the violent perpetrators had been exposed to someone’s specific hate speech, and hand down harsher sentences accordingly.
The Harms of Hate Speech
The apparent assumption of free speech defenders is that offensive speech is essentially harmless—that is, just words with no demonstrable link to consequences. But questioning whether speech can really incite someone to bad behaviour seems irresponsibly obtuse. Obviously, words have consequences and frequently inspire actions. A primary purpose of language is to communicate with others in order to influence them. If that weren’t so, there would be no multi-billion dollar advertising industry, no campaigns for political office, no motivational speakers or books, no citizen-led petitions, no public service announcements, and no church sermons, along with a myriad of other proven examples where speech leads others to act.
The majority of hate speech is targeted towards gays, women, ethnic groups, and religious minorities. It’s no coincidence that straight white men are generally the most ardent defenders of near-absolute free speech, because it’s very easy to defend hate speech when it doesn’t hurt you personally. But hate speech is destructive to the community at large because it is divisive and promotes intolerance and discrimination. It sets the stage for violence by those who take the speaker’s message to heart, because it creates an atmosphere of perceived acceptance and impunity for their actions. Left unchecked, it can lead to war and genocide, especially when the state engages in hate speech, such as in Nazi Germany.
Hate speech also has serious effects on its targets. Enduring hatred over many years or a lifetime will take a toll on most people. It can limit their opportunities, push them into poverty, isolate them socially, lead to depression or dysfunction, increase the risk of conflict with authority or police, and endanger their physical health or safety. In 1990, the Canadian Supreme Court stated [7]that hate speech can cause “loss of self-esteem, feelings of anger and outrage and strong pressure to renounce cultural differences that mark them as distinct.” The court agreed that “hate propaganda can operate to convince listeners…that members of certain racial or religious groups are inferior,” which can increase “acts of discrimination, including the denial of equal opportunity in the provision of goods, services and facilities, and even incidents of violence.”
In democratic societies that stand for equality and freedom—often with taxpayer-funded programs that promote those values by assisting vulnerable groups—it makes no sense to tolerate hate speech that actively works to oppose those values. Further, hate speech violates the spirit of human rights codes and laws, diminishing their purpose and effect. A society that allows hate speech is a society that tolerates prejudice at every level—politically, economically, and socially—and pays the consequences through increased discrimination and violence.
Answering Objections from Hate Speech Defenders
The most popular solution to the problem of hate speech is “more free speech.” This seems to make sense on the surface, and sometimes works well in practice. For example, there are many outspoken atheists who do a good job of publicly defending themselves and their fellow atheists from the prejudice and hatred too often expressed by religious people. But even if the targets of hatred can ably defend themselves from verbal violence, why should they have to? Why should a democratic society privilege the right to free speech over the well-being and privacy of those with less privilege?
Most vulnerable groups, however, do not have a level playing field on which to respond to hate speech against them. They are often outnumbered, out-resourced, and out-funded by the haters, simply because of their disadvantaged position in society. Sexism and racism are still thriving in the 21st century, which means women and most minority groups have a harder time getting published and heard and taken seriously in mainstream society. Which brings us full circle—perhaps one of the reasons sexism and racism are still so prevalent in modern society is because free speech is exercised largely by the privileged at the expense of the unprivileged.
A common objection to prosecuting hate speech is that it might endanger speech that counters hate speech. For example, a critique may repeat the offending words and discuss their import, or it may subvert the hate message in a subtle or creative way that could be misunderstood by some. But context is everything when determining whether speech is actually hateful or not, so this objection seems nonsensical. Any reasonable judge should be able to discern the difference in intent or effect behind a hateful message and the speech that critiques it.
Another objection is that prosecuting hate speech removes accountability from those who actually commit the violence, turning violent perpetrators into victims of hate speech. But no-one is suggesting that hate speech causes people to act against their will or takes away their personal responsibility. Typically, hate speech creates an environment in which a person who is already sympathetic to the views of the speaker feels validated and encouraged to take action, with a reduced fear of punitive consequences and even anticipation of praise and support from the in-group that shares their views. Nothing prevents a hate-inspired murderer from being prosecuted in the same way as any other violent murderer—in fact, many countries mete out harsher penalties for hate-motivated crimes. But those who inspired the murderer should also be prosecuted separately under hate speech laws.
Many people seem to treat freedom of expression as an almost sacred, inviolable right, but this is far from the reality. In constitutional democracies, free speech is already justifiably restricted in a multitude of ways by law or policy, even in the United States. The quintessential example of prohibited speech is falsely shouting “Fire!” in a crowded theatre. Besides hate speech itself, some other generally accepted prohibitions of speech include:
- Sedition (advocating force as a way to change the government)
- Threats
- Defamation (libel and slander)
- False or misleading advertising
- Buffer zones around abortion clinics that prevent anti-abortion protesters from harassing patients and staff
- Quiet zones near hospitals or schools
- Municipal bylaws restricting the location, size, type, content, and display of signs, posters, objects, ads, etc.
- Profanity on public airwaves
- Publication refusal, censorship, and the right to edit enforced by news websites, online forums and blogs, newspapers, magazines, radio, and other media
- Company confidentiality policies (such as employees being prohibited from sharing trade secrets or talking to the media)
- Gag orders or publication bans in contracts, court cases, and settlements
In practice, courts will look at circumstances on a case-by-case basis to see where a balance should be struck between freedom of expression and some other value or right. No single right trumps another in all circumstances, not even the right to life. For example, Canada’s constitution (Section 1 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms) allows a fundamental right such as freedom of expression to be limited to protect someone else’s fundamental rights, such as the right to life or liberty—or in the case of abortion, women’s right to safely access a necessary medical service, which courts have determined outweighs the protesters’ right to protest outside clinics.
Some current legal restrictions on free speech are not on the above list because they are clearly illegitimate. One of those is insulting your country’s head of state [12], currently illegal in at least eight countries, mostly in western Europe. This offence is called “lese-majesty,” a holdover from the days when kings were divine. But if political leaders are immune to criticism or ridicule, they have far too much power over the people and the country cannot be a true democracy. In general, the public must be allowed to pass judgment on public figures, because the latter owe their position to public support in the first place, which should not be coerced or bought. For example, public figures in the U.S. are not protected from defamation unless it was done with malice—knowledge of falsehood or reckless disregard for the truth.
Many countries also criminalize blasphemy [13]—the criticism of religious doctrines or practices. But the desire to protect religion from criticism is simply a reflection of the insecurity of believers who doubt their own beliefs. Blasphemy laws have more in common with hate speech actually, because they often result in hateful rhetoric and violent acts against the “blasphemers.” Further, many religious people have a tendency to confuse hate speech with dissent, such as Catholics who hurl accusations of “bigotry” when someone criticizes Church policies or dogma. But hate speech is personal—it is directed against people based on their identifiable characteristics. Dissent on the other hand is speech against other opinions, beliefs, or positions. Dissent is an essential component of a free democracy, and it includes blasphemy. In other words, you should be free to attack Catholic policies that protect abusive priests, but it would be hateful to say that all Catholic priests are pedophiles.
Examples of Anti-Abortion Hate Speech That Should Be Prosecuted
The history of violence against abortion providers makes a very strong case for prosecution of those who disseminate hate speech against them. Almost all of this violence has occurred in the U.S., which makes a compelling argument for limiting First Amendment protections of hate speech.
On a Sunday morning in May 2009, abortion provider Dr. George Tiller was assassinated while attending church in Wichita Kansas. The killer, Scott Roeder, had been planning the act for some time and had gleaned information about the doctor’s movements from Operation Rescue—an anti-abortion group that Roeder was actively involved in [14] and donated money to. This radical group had moved to Wichita in 2002 for the sole purpose of driving Dr. Tiller out of business, and in the seven years leading up to his murder, Operation Rescue (OR) engaged in a relentless campaign of hate and harassment against him, including aggressive picketing, numerous articles and press releases, baseless criminal charges, frivolous lawsuits, and trumped-up grand juries convened against him. (Dr. Tiller was fully vindicated in every legal battle.)
Two years before the assassination, Roeder posted on OR’s blog, urging people to attend Dr. Tiller’s church. He himself attended the church a few times, and also participated in OR’s pickets outside Dr. Tiller’s clinic. Roeder was in regular contact with OR’s President Troy Newman, as well as Senior Policy Advisor Cheryl Sullenger, who was convicted in 1988 of conspiring to bomb a California abortion clinic. When Roeder was arrested, Sullenger’s phone number was found on a post-it note on the dash of his car. Sullenger later admitted having several previous conversations with Roeder, in which she gave him information on Dr. Tiller’s habits and whereabouts, including his trial dates. In the months before the murder, Roeder had attended at least one court hearing—sitting beside OR’s President Troy Newman—to hear Dr. Tiller defend himself against scurrilous charges brought by OR.
It’s clear that Roeder was not a “lone wolf.” [14] Perhaps Roeder did not directly involve anyone else in his plans, but no-one develops their views in a vacuum. Dr. Tiller’s murder was the natural culmination of over 20 years of anti-abortion harassment and violence directed at him and his clinic, much of it by Operation Rescue. Roeder had been immersed in OR’s violent anti-abortion rhetoric for years, so his beliefs and compulsions were fed by that environment, and thrived on it. Obviously, it played an encouraging role in the violence he committed.
Another key person who helped fuel the fire was Fox TV commentator Bill O’Reilly, who has about 3 million listeners. Between 2005 and 2009, Bill O’Reilly and his guest hosts talked about Dr. Tiller on 29 episodes, including just one month before the assassination. The most common epithet repeated many times by O’Reilly was: “Tiller the Baby Killer.” Other comments [15] by O’Reilly included: “[Tiller] destroys fetuses for just about any reason right up until the birth date for $5,000.” He ‘s guilty of “Nazi stuff.” “This is the kind of stuff that happened in Mao’s China, Hitler’s Germany, Stalin’s Soviet Union.” He “has blood on his hands.” He’s “a moral equivalent to NAMBLA and al-Qaida.” He operates a “death mill” and a “business of destruction.” “I wouldn’t want to be [him] if there is a Judgment Day.” Although O’Reilly didn’t specifically incite someone to murder Dr. Tiller, he put him in the cross-hairs, providing enough motivation and encouragement for someone to carry out the unspoken deed.
Of course, it wasn’t just Dr. Tiller and his clinic that were the targets of ongoing harassment and inflammatory hateful rhetoric. The reign of terror directed at clinics and providers across North America has been going on for 35 years—including 9 previous murders and 20 attempted murders of doctors or clinic staff, 100’s of arsons and bombs and butyric acid attacks, and 1000’s of death threats, stalking, clinic invasions, vandalism, aggressive pickets, and hate mail. Some shootings in the early 1990’s were directly preceded by “Wanted Posters [16]” put out by anti-abortion groups on the doctors, complete with their home and clinic addresses and often their photographs. Doctors David Gunn and John Britton were murdered by anti-abortion extremists and had been featured on wanted posters, along with George Tiller, who was shot and wounded in 1993. (The murder of a fourth doctor on a wanted poster, George Patterson, could not be conclusively linked to an anti-abortion extremist.) The posters were deemed by a federal court in 2002 to be a “true threat” under the FACE Act, federal legislation that protects clinics from violence. Noting that the posters had preceded the murders, the court said it was the “use of the ‘wanted’-type format in the context of the poster pattern—poster followed by murder—that constitutes the threats,” not the language itself. With this decision, the judges overturned a lower court ruling that had deemed the posters and a related website to be “protected speech” because they did not directly threaten violence.
Conclusion
When people and courts defend hate speech against abortion providers as “protected speech,” it must be asked: Why are abortion providers required to risk their lives so their persecutors can have free speech rights? Why should doctors constantly have to look over their shoulder in fear, go to work in bullet-proof vests, pay out of pocket for security guards and other expensive safety measures, keep their home address a secret and their curtains permanently drawn shut, and see their children ostracized and bullied at school, just so their persecutors have the right to call them “baby killers”? Why does the right to free speech allow members of this vulnerable minority to be openly defamed and targeted for decades until they’re finally assassinated? And why do the families of the slain victims have to suffer in their grief and loss, because free speech was deemed more important than the lives of their loved ones?
The idea that vulnerable persons and groups should have to tolerate hate speech against them in the name of freedom of expression—often over decades or a lifetime—is offensive. We’re talking about peoples’ lives after all—this is not just a philosophical debate. The right to free speech is a fundamental value, but it should not be allowed to outweigh the basic human rights of other people, especially their right to life.
- Joyce Arthur
Source Links:
[1] http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/user/joyce-arthur
[2] http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/
[3] http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/taxonomy/term/8157
[4] http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/taxonomy/term/8202
[5] http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/taxonomy/term/8207
[6] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hate_speech
[7] http://www.chrc-ccdp.ca/proactive_initiatives/hoi_hsi/qa_qr/page1-eng.aspx
[8] http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/C-46/page-137.html
[9] http://www.firstamendmentcenter.com/speech/internet/topic.aspx?topic=internet_hate_speech&printer-friendly=y
[10] http://www.loonwatch.com/2011/09/anders-breiviks-spider-web-of-hate/
[11] http://www.operationrescue.org/archives/video-o%E2%80%99reilly-confronts-tiller-the-baby-killer-in-wichita/
[12] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lese-majesty
[13] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blasphemy_law
[14] http://www.msmagazine.com/spring2010/lonewolf.asp
[15] http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2009/05/31/tiller
[16] http://feminist.org/rrights/ncap_wantedposters.html
[17] http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/user/login?destination=print%2F17487#comments
[18] http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/user/register?destination=print%2F17487#comments
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Al Stefanelli is the Georgia State Director for American Atheists, Inc., and is also the author of “A Voice Of Reason In An Unreasonable World – The Rise Of Atheism On Planet earth.” He also writes for the National Atheism Examiner.
We’re Moving To Freethought Blogs!
In case you were not aware, the “official” name of my blog is “A Voice Of Reason In An Unreasonable World.” This blog has been around for a long time. I started this blog back in 2005 as a website, and have moved it a couple times. For the past year or so I’ve been right here on the WordPress network and every month approximately a hundred thousand of you have been reading my words.
I thank you all for coming here, perusing my articles and, of course, your comments. Starting in October, I am proud to announce that I will be moving my blog to Freethought Blogs, a new project that seeks to bring together some of the most often read, linked and controversial writers in the Freethought blogsphere. Freethought Blogs already hosts many of your favorites, including:
- Alethian Worldview
- Almost Diamonds
- Assassin Actual
- Blag Hag
- Blue Collar Atheist
- Butterflies and Wheels
- Camels With Hammers
- Comradde PhysioProffe
- Dispatches from the Culture Wars
- Greta Christina’s Blog
- Lousy Canuck
- Pharyngula
- Reasonable Doubts
- The Digital Cuttlefish
- The X Blog
- The Zingularity
- This Week in Christian Nationalism
Freethought Blogs is your one-stop shop for news, video, audio and commentary by your favorite Freethought bloggers. I invite you to visit and soak up the reason and logic to keep up with what is going on in the Freethought blogsphere. You’ll be glad you did.
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Al Stefanelli is the Georgia State Director for American Atheists, Inc., and is also the author of “A Voice Of Reason In An Unreasonable World – The Rise Of Atheism On Planet earth.” He also writes for the National Atheism Examiner.
A God That Doesn’t Deserve To Be Worshiped
by Guest Columnist, Ray Dickerson
A perfect and loving being created us all 6000 years ago only to realize that his creation was flawed. So, he damned us all to a punishment of eternal burning. He was a loving God and really didn’t want us all to burn forever for how he created us, so he devised a clever way to forgive us after thinking about it for 4000 years. Have a son and kill him, and ask that we accept the zombie as our lord. We will still have sin but it will then be OK to be how he created us. Thank god we weren’t part of the unfortunate who didn’t have the luxury of accepting a zombie into our hearts. We can now go to heaven where the greatest thing our minds can devise is reality.
If you don’t believe all of this you deserve to burn in hell forever. End of story. You cannot even be good while you are writhing and screaming in pain for five years and be absolved of your punishment. Not even ten years or one hundred. Not even a million years, you deserve this punishment for not believing the irrational and unbelievable.
It’s the fact that you subscribe to this mindset that concerns us atheists and sickens us. How terrible a mindset to accept this as truth. No wonder you look down on such wonderful members of society. According to your beliefs we deserve an overkill of punishment. You say “our beliefs are not offensive to you,” but as you can imagine, we grow weary and critical of the constant terror and threats of hell while you laugh at the thoughts of our suffering, all associated with your beliefs.
So when someone asks us “what is your religion?” as if to set us up to fail, we hear, “will you be burning forever?” We would appreciate it if your terrorism and threats weren’t shoehorned into our lives in every way you can devise.
When we read, “In god we trust,” we think about all the children who have died unnecessarily at the foot of their parents, refusing to seek out scientific medical treatment and “trust god” instead. We think of all the churches that were struck by lightning because the members chose to “trust god” instead of the newest technology called lightning rods to protect them instead. We think about all the supposed “witches” who were dragged from their families and burned until they had no more life for causing the church to be struck. We think about the starving nations who “trust god” to bring rain and water their crops instead of allowing mass amounts of parents and children alike to die from something a loving god could easily fix. We think about a man trapped in a wheelchair who never got to ride a bicycle or run as a child, who lost limbs when he was just a baby because he was caught in a war zone – a battle that each fighter vowed to “trust god” because each side’s god was the better choice.
A great many atheists remember how we would “trust god” in our everyday lives only to be let down time and time again and finally lose the justification that “god works in mysterious ways,” and finally be free of this confusion. When we realize the bottom line, “worship me or burn,” we cannot ignore the question of just how benevolent this god actually is. If this god does, in fact, exist like you say, then we choose not to worship him as we wouldn’t feel he deserves it with all the turmoil and suffering this world provides to so many innocent people.
We are definitely proud of you for not being offended by our cries to stop the madness, trust in humanity and finally live in peace. It must be tough for you to do so.
- Ray Dickerson
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Al Stefanelli is the Georgia State Director for American Atheists, Inc., and is also the author of “A Voice Of Reason In An Unreasonable World – The Rise Of Atheism On Planet earth.” He also writes for the National Atheism Examiner.
Vaginas, Penises, Swastikas and Crescent Moons
A Commentary On The World Trade Center Cross
By now, most people are aware that American Atheists, Inc., is suing a few entities in order that the Christian Cross monument be removed. In fact, American Atheists, Inc. is suing the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, the State of New Jersey, Governor Chris Christie (in his official capacity), the City of New York, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg (in his official capacity), Silverstien Properties, Inc., the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, the World Trade Center Foundation, the National September 11 Memorial and Museum, the Church Of The Holy Name Of Jesus, Brian Jordan (an individual), ten John Doe’s and World Trade Center Properties, LLC
This has generated a lot of controversy, not only in the Christian Community, but within the ranks of Atheists, as well. While I reason that the majority are supportive of our efforts, there remain a vocal contingent of us who think the suit is a waste of time, unpopular, divisive and disrespectful to the beliefs held by other Americans. Some have stated that we are proselyting by the very act of filing this lawsuit. To that, I state that religious people proselytize. Atheists educate.
But I digress…
One of the favored arguments that is coming up with more frequency is that the Cross should be allowed because it was part of the rubble. While I can understand this reasoning on the surface, when you begin to reflect on what that actually means, you can see how illogical this argument is. Because something was found in the rubble that resembles or apes a symbol that is worshiped by a certain group, then we should allow others to participate in kind. There was a lot more material other than steel I-beams in that rubble.
Thus:
- What if some of the rubble closely resembled a penis? Shouldn’t a penis worshiping religion be allowed to “erect” their monument?
- What if some of the rubble closely resembled a vagina? Shouldn’t a vagina worshiping cult (NSFW) be allowed to display their holy symbol?
- What about an I-beam rubble configuration that depicted the Swastika? Shouldn’t the Hindu’s (like the one used in this article) or Native Americans be allowed to proudly display one?
- What about rubble that resembles the Crescent Moon? Shouldn’t Muslims have THEIR symbol side by side with the Christian Cross?
In fact, there are hundreds of religious symbols in the world, and the World Trade Center was an international entity. Perhaps one example of each should be included, as long as some of the rubble resembled their symbols? By the way, the Christian Cross monument is not exactly as it was found. There was fabrication work done to it. Just so you know. Google it.
Yes, the suit is unpopular with a lot of people, but the point was not to make friends, give away kittens and sing Kumbaya. When American Atheists, Inc., sued to remove prayer from public schools, it was also a very unpopular idea, even amongst Atheists. In retrospect, though, it was a pretty damned good idea. This lawsuit does not represent a fight “against” religion, but fight “for” the United States Constitution, particularly the First Amendment.
You may say, “Who does the Cross monument hurt?” Everyone who is not a Christian, even those who state that they don’t care. Ignorance is no excuse for allowing the abrogation of anyone’s civil rights. Nearly everything surrounding the Cross is in violation of the First Amendment, and if nothing was done about it because people believe we should accommodate the Christians, then it will set a precedent and Crosses will be popping up all over the place. As it is, several states had to enact legislation prohibiting roadside memorials due to the clutter of crosses adorning our state highways.
The point is, popular or not, this needs to be done, and it needs the widespread support of everyone who is not a Christian, especially Atheists. It doesn’t matter if you don’t see the point of it, if you think it is making us look silly and abusive or if it just plain pisses you off. What does matter is that the Governments of the city of New York and New Jersey, and the Federal Government not promote any specific religion, and do not, in any way, size, shape or form expend any funds in said promotion.
The only reasonable, logical and reasonable alternatives are either a single monument that reflects all beliefs (that would be one helluva monument) a secular monument or no monument at all.
This is a sensitive issue, granted. But it is also a serious one that needs to be addressed in the courts of law, regardless of public opinion.
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