If you were frightened and confused by the horrific events in Aurora, Colorado last Friday, Christian hardliners want you to know that they have their God has everything under control. They believe that it is good that you were frightened. Hopefully, you will remain frightened for a long time. Your fear and anxiety are exactly what they say the Biblical god demands and wants. Christians want you to know that it was their god's rage over the slight easing of fearfulness in society which prompted Him to deputize James Holmes to ram the message of His righteous anger into the hearts and minds of the American people through the senseless slaughter of innocents.
...but do what the pastor tells you!
That's right. According to the American Family Association's Fred Jackson, the Colorado killer was used by the Christian god to terrorize the American people. In spite of the ever-increasing radicalization of the population through Christian evangelism, and an historic level of unconstitutional religious encroachment into the public sphere, elite Christian leaders insist that there is still not enough fear in American society. Too few Americans accept the authority of church elitesGod with enough unquestioning obedience. Not enough Americans fear the power of ChristianityGod with the proper servility. And fundamentalist Christian church leaders know just who to blame: "Jackson:I have to think that all of this, whether it’s the Hollywood movies, whether it’s what we see on the internets [sic], whether it’s liberal bias in the media, whether it’s our politicians changing public policy, I think all of those somehow have fit together—and I have to say also churches who are leaving the authority of Scripture and losing their fear of God—all of those things have seem to have come together to give us these kinds of incidents. Newcombe: I think that’s so true. It’s as if we said to God, publicly or in the public arena, ‘get out, You’re not welcome here anymore’ and it’s as if God removed His protection from our land.
...and sometimes, "Love" hurts.
Jackson: I think the sources of this is [sic] multifaceted but you can put it all I think under the heading of rebellion to God, a rejection of the God of the Bible. I think along with an education system that has produced our lawyers, our politicians, more teachers, more professors, all of that sort of thing, is our churches, mainline churches. We’ve been dealing Teddy and I know the AFA Journal has been dealing with denominations that no longer believe in the God of the Bible, they no longer believe that Jesus is the only way of salvation, they teach that God is OK with homosexuality, this is just increasing more and more. It is mankind shaking its fist at the authority of God. James: And God will not be silent when he’s mocked, and we need to remember that. Jackson: We are seeing his judgment. You know, some people talk about ‘God’s judgment must be just around the corner,’ we are seeing it." - conversation between the popular rightwing Christian radio host, Fred Jackson, Jerry Newcombe of Truth in Action Ministries and Jackson's co-host Teddy James of AFA Journal. ("Rebellion against God" is code for "rebellion against unconstitutional religious influence". When civil rights groups protest the unconstitutional religious interference in government, they are accused of "rebellion against God". "Rejection of God" is code for "rejection of inappropriate religious attacks on individual rights and freedoms". When conservative Christian groups attempt to deprive citizens of their human rights, the people who protest are accused of "rejecting God").
According to the self-appointed God-spokesmen, the all-loving, all-knowing, all-powerful (also silent and invisible) Creator of the Universe is understandablyoutraged when humankind fails to tremble in terror at the very thought of Him, yet He is curiously incapable of easily and lovingly repairing the error in His own creation. So, we are told that every now and then He causes a terrible event on earth (or fails to prevent a terrible event - same difference, really, since His presence and His absence are equally indiscernible) to remind us of our sinful failure to fear Him enough. His spokesmen then gleefully point to these disasters as evidence that all the things which threaten themGod's supremacy in American society are evil and should be blamed for the pain and suffering of innocents. (Apparently, they can't explain why God never seems to target the specific objects of their His wrath directly, nor why they expect anyone to believe that a god who would rain down terrible suffering on innocent men, women and children as an object lesson to sinners should be considered a "loving" god.)
terrorize, terrorise[ˈtɛrəˌraɪz]
vb(tr)
1. to coerce or control by violence, fear, threats, etc.
2. to inspire with dread; terrify
The terror evoked by random acts of violence is a feature, not a bug, in the eyes of the powerful Christian elites Almighty. It has proven to be a very useful weapon in the ongoing battle for Christian world dominance. By planting the seeds of fearful hatred in the minds of traumatized believers and then redirecting that fear toward the enemies of Christian hegemony, the religious right - and its political arm, the Republican party - divides and polarizes society into "us" and "others", with themselves as the authorities ruling over the ever-growing "us". They wield the fear of God's wrath to ensure fearful compliance, and - since "God" is never seen or heard by anyone - they appoint themselves as His spokesmen and the ultimate interpreters of His righteous will, ensuring that their will is rarely effectively challenged. They systematically coerce the population of believers - through fear of their god - and coerce non-believers - through social pressure as believers' fear grows that other citizens who are not like "us" will bring god's wrath down on them, even if they are innocent, god-fearing believers! - to be less and less tolerant of differences, and to demand greater and greater conformity to their religious authority. In short, they assign all of the power over society that is hypothetically "God's awesome power" - to themselves. It is terrorism-by-proxy. And it is very effective.
God hates whoever the church hates! Are you listening, atheists and gays?
Random terrible events happen: they always have and they always will. The evil genius of fundamentalist Christians is that they know how to use these inevitable natural and man made disasters as tools for their own Machiavellian brand of power consolidation. They harness fear and bigotry created by religious belief, redirect it into hatred toward the elements in society which threaten their own power, thus eliminating their enemies and removing all barriers to their dream of an American theocracy. They terrorize the vulnerable victims of a local or national disaster with the dread of an angry god - evoking the same terror of god's wrathful jealousy which was inculcated through childhood indoctrination - and then they direct that frightened anguish toward others whose refusal to accept Christian authority they accuse of bringing this suffering down upon innocent, persecuted Christians. It is an awesome one-two punch: a form of terrorism more lethal to our pluralistic, democratic Republic than anything the United States has ever faced. Terrorized people historically bow to the perceived security of authoritarianism. The power of religious belief, inculcated early and reinforced regularly - especially in the public sphere - enables church elites to use the fear of God to coerce a population to destroy church enemies, to support religious agendas and to obey church elites, all without lifting a finger! Of course, in places where there is too much human-created peace, tolerant multi-cultural social order and too few natural disasters, strong Christians willdo what they have to do to help themselves their god out. In the USA, where there is no shortage of natural sources of human misery, the Christian right still furthers their own ambitions helps their god out by doing their utmost to incite violence and human conflict through the constant drumbeat of fear and othering. The dignity and humanity of the victims in Aurora is nothing to them, when measured against what they perceive is their god-given right to use the horrible tragedy for their own political gain. We don't know yet what the Colorado murderer's motive was, and we may never know, but whatever Holmes may think his own motives were, influential Christians want everyone to believe that he was the unwitting lash of their God's judgment. The truth doesn't matter to the Christian right, nor does common human decency. For them, the Aurora massacre has already served its purpose.
...and weHe won't hesitate to use terrorism to consolidate ourHis power! Got that, America?
Even the Canadian PEARL (Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory) is threatened.
Just a reminder that religious fundamentalism is growing and thriving everywhere in the world:
Canada:
This week in Ottawa, Ontario, an international conference on evolutionary biology is being held. Scientists from North America and Europe will meet to discuss progress in biological research, further advances in evolutionary theory and many other topics of interest to practitioners of evidence-based science and the people who recognise its importance to humanity.
Ironically, however, the host country has been weathering an embarrassing number of popup storms in the officially clear skies of Canadian rationality and progress. Religious fundamentalists have "planted churches" in every province and territory, just as they have in the USA, and (just as they have in the USA) they have been patiently following a multi-year plan to "restore" Canada to Christianity (their own, narrow version, naturally). As in the USA, they started by undermining the foundation of modern, free society - public education - and as in the USA, their favorite targets are science and sexuality.
Canadian scientists march to draw attention to the suppression of evidence-based science.
"The cuts, according to the organizers' media release, are being imposed on critical research programs in Environment Canada, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, the National Research Council of Canada, Statistics Canada, through the closure of Experimental Lakes Area, the Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory and the First Nations Statistical Institute, and through the elimination of the National Science Adviser and National Round Table on Environment and Economy."
and
"There is growing concern in many quarters about what is being viewed as the government's excessive information control. Several organizations say they are concerned with what they call the silencing of Canada's federal scientists." Natalie Stechyson, The Ottawa Citizen.
Also, while Canadians are rightly proud of their country's official recognition of the humanity and equality of LGBT people, there has never ceased to be a determined opposition to it (coming mainly from religious groups, as usual), and they are making gains:
Southern Ontario School board hires security after threats because of upcoming vote to ban distribution of Christian bibles in public schools story.
Europe:
Even in 2007, some Europeans recognised that creationism was posing a serious threat to education in European countries. In October of 2007, PACE (Parliamentary Assembly Council of Europe) adopted resolution 1580, The dangers of creationism in education.
Giant's Causeway creationism "controversy" in Ireland.
This opinion piece in the UK's The Daily Mail manages to be anti-science, anti-American AND tell readers that "no matter how fast and far we run from Him, we always seem to make our way back, rather like someone lost in the forest." From sneering condescension toward science and scientists (Carl Sagan...infantile?) to barely concealed, seething contempt for anything American, this piece is not to be braved without donning a hazmat suit. Oh, and it is dissing the potential discovery of the Higg's boson.
Asia: Pakistan's only nobel laureate, physicist Abdus Salam, is shunned in his home country and references to him are stricken from school textbooks. Salam did pioneering work in the effort to discover the subatomic Higg's boson (often misleadingly called the "god particle"). Story here. Indian skeptic charged with blasphemy for rationally explaining a "miracle". Friendly Atheist, April 14, 2012 Sanal Edamuruku's situation worsens. (The Humanist, July 4, 2012). After being hounded out of India for revealing the simple scientific explanation for a Catholic "miracle", Sanal Edamuruku has been the target of an international manhunt at the urging of the Catholic archdiocese in Bombay.
Hey, Mitt. Why not skip the slow torture and just raze them all to the ground?
Aaaannnndddd....Lynna from the commentariat at Pharyngula posted a link to this New York Review of Books review of Mitt Romney's campaign white paper, A Chance For Every Child: Mitt Romney's Plan For Restoring the Promise of American Education.
And what a paper it is. Vouchers! Draining to public purse to fund private religious schools! Public funding for teaching religious dogma as scientific and historical fact, ceasing the certification of teachers (and establishing no-fault firing), on-line for-profit "schooling"....oh the list of conservative red meat-flavored goodies is almost endless.
"The central themes of the Romney plan are a rehash of Republican education ideas from the past thirty years, namely, subsidizing parents who want to send their child to a private or religious school; encouraging the private sector to operate schools; putting commercial banks in charge of the federal student loan program; holding teachers and schools accountable for students’ test scores; and lowering entrance requirements for new teachers." Diane Ravitch, New York Review of Books, July 2012.
Our era's "civil rights" issue: take that you whiny women, people of color and..wait, except latinos. I need latino votes and really latinos can almost pass for white...
Most nauseating Best of all, Romney unblinkingly refers to the battle over public education as "the civil rights issue of our era".
"Romney claims that school choice is “the civil-rights issue of our era,” a familiar theme among the current crop of education reformers, who now use it to advance their efforts to privatize public education…."
Once again, Mitt Romney's utter lack of respect for the real issues which confront average Americans every day flabbergasts yet simultaneously doesn't surprise anymore.
In my post about education yesterday, I alluded to the fact that religious conservatives consider free, high-quality public education to be their number 1 enemy (although they portray it as the enemy of all the public, which is yet another instance of "evil is good" "black is white" obfuscation of reality which is such a fixture in Christian manipulation of the public discourse). With this document, Mitt Romney has not merely signalled but trumpeted his intention to deliver the death blow to American public education.
"Another school [in Louisiana], the Eternity Christian Academy, which currently has fourteen students, has agreed to take in 135 voucher students. [Details from Bobby Jindal's education reform legislation that follows the Romney model --Louisiana enacted the reform law in April, 2012.] According to a recent Reuters article: '...students in this school “sit in cubicles for much of the day and move at their own pace through Christian workbooks, such as a beginning science text that explains “what God made” on each of the six days of creation. They are not exposed to the theory of evolution.'"
Libby Ann is the blogger who emerged from the Quiverfull movement somehow with her self-esteem intact and a sense of her own full worth as a human being somehow unvanquished. In her current series of posts at Love, Joy, Feminism she discusses the courtship rituals in the Quiverfull movement, particularly as they affect girls.
Weeping girl prostrates herself on altar, praying not to lead men astray by her very existence.
Read Libby Ann's post about Christian courtship. The pervasive conviction about the necessity for policing female "purity", the enthusiastic acceptance of authority of a father and later the husband over daughters, and the belief that, without male authority figures' constant vigilance young women will descend into moral (sexual) disarray is almost indistinguishable from the attitudes of fundamentalist non-Christian religious groups in the middle east, India, Pakistan and Afghanistan. The acceptance among young women that this controlling behaviour is "protection" is chillingly similar to the ideas in which women in the most oppressive societies on the planet also are inculcated, through fear, oppressive social policies and even legal systems based upon misogynist "holy books".
Although the Quiverfull sect of Christianity is extreme in many ways, their philosophy around courtship and marriage mirrors the resurgent religious fundamentalism in several other Christian sects. Purity ceremonies, at which adolescent girls are pledged to remain virgins until marriage (under the watchful gaze of their fathers or nearest adult male relative) have become ubiquitous in the evangelical Christian communities which have exploded throughout the USA.
With the current rash of laws put forward by conservative Christians limiting women's rights to bodily autonomy, reproductive freedom and equal human rights, it is impossible to ignore these similarities between the professed desires of the rising fundamentalist Christians in this country and those of their spiritual brethren among the fundamentalist religionists of other regions of the world.
In their contempt for and desire to control women, fundamentalist Christians have clearly indicated what the future USA of their dreams would be like should they succeed in forcing the country into Biblical theocracy.
Are we prepared for the consequences if we continue to continue to look the other way? Will Christian moderates continue to pretend that the fundamentalist version of their cherished religion is different from fundamentalism elsewhere? How long will we continue to kid ourselves that "it can't happen here"?
Just in case anyone is still clinging to the false notion that aggressive Christianity is a non-issue in countries other than the Jesus-soaked USA, consider a recent situation in Japan.
A lesbian couple approached the Tokyo Disneyland to request permission to hold a ceremony to mark their union as a couple. Japan does not allow same-sex marriage, so it could only be an unofficial "wedding". Happily, Tokyo Disney agreed to the request. Chalk one up for Tokyo Disney! However, the couple were barred from exchanging any vows because of "Christian teachings". Wait, what? Christian teachings? Wasn't there a lot of talk recently about how religion for the Japanese, if they had any at all, was some form of vague, spiritual Shintoism? What is that I hear people saying about Japan's enviable secular society? No, it's not. (Cue the "but this is an isolated incident" prevarication).
Warning: Christians, shield your eyes from this terrifying image!
Anyway, after a brief kerfuffle over "an employee's" dictate that the ceremony must have one participant dressed in groom attire and one dressed in bride attire so as not to "offend" park visitors (an outcry on Twitter and other social media brought about a hasty retraction from Disney, thankfully), the theme park seems to have embraced a position of acceptance, setting the stage for future ceremonies so that same-sex couples can celebrate their union there with family and friends. Considering the cultural pressure against it - not to mention the powerful worldwide Christian lobby - my hat is off to Tokyo Disney for doing the right thing.
In the larger Japanese society, however, same-sex marriage continues to be the same thorny subject that it is in the USA:
"There needs to be more pressure for legal unions between gay people in Japan," said Taiga Ishikawa, one of only a handful of openly gay politicians in the country. "This is only a guess, but I'd say there are more people now who are in long-term relationships and want that to be recognized in the form of a civil partnership."
And of course, there are the usual homophobic and hateful tropes raised by prominent public figures equating marriage between two loving human beings to bestiality, pedophilia and general immorality. In this case, a film celebrity:
Commenting on TV on President Barack Obama's recent declaration of support for gay marriages in the US, the film director and comedian Takeshi Kitano told a fellow guest: "Obama supports gay marriage. You would support marriage between humanoid and animals eventually, then," before questioning the ability of gay couples to raise children.
These vicious and hateful slurs questioning the humanity and morality of GLBT people are one of the most repugnant weapons that Christians use in their bigoted campaign to marginalize and oppress. The "slippery slope" trope is particularly ironic coming from a group constantly balancing on the edge of a slimy slope of their own. David Barton, Christian apologist and professional liar demonstrates (If you prefer text, read this transcript of a right-wing radio talk show interview with Barton for an even clearer insight into the way these people think, and to understand what they would gladly do once they have the power to do it):
"I don't care what the Supreme Court says". Yes, that's right. He is saying that Christians are above the law.
Christians are adamant in their "righteous" zeal and open about their intention to force everyone in this country to submit to Biblical law and, in due course, to force every country in the world to convert and/or submit to the brand of Christianity that they are aggressively spreading via the modern Christian "missions" movement. Anderson Cooper's interview (CNN) of a defender of the pastor whose horrific anti-gay rant I linked here underlines just where that slimy slope would dump us.
Bible-based law in action.
Christians want the US Constitution subordinated to or replaced by "Yahweh's Law". They are proud about this - don't forget: they truly believe that they are doing what is best for all of us, even if they have to lie, cheat and trick the rest of us to achieve their goal - and they are actively, tirelessly working to bring it about. This Christian version of sharia would reduce women to the status of domestic animals or chattel, would criminalize inborn human sexual orientations and would demand the death penalty for dozens of offenses which our modern morality recognizes are not only not capital offenses but in many cases are not offenses at all. But true Bible-believers honestly believe that is what God wants for us, though we may not understand and resist. Just as they see indoctrinating children with fear of hell before children are old enough to defend themselves against the often permanent psychological impact, they see it as their job to lead those who disagree with them out of "sin" by forcing their religious belief system on them "for their own good".
So, following the logic of Christian antagonists - who hate and revile GLBT people so much they call for their punishment, persecution and even deaths - we should take a closer look at their proposed "improvements" of current laws; laws agreed upon by elected human beings to whom they already believethey are not answerable. Citizens who value the rule of law which protects our secular society for all citizens need to pay attention to what these Christians say and believe. They believe that their god's law supercedes the rule of civil law - including the Constitution of the United States and the Constitutions of all countries. When pressed on the question of who gets to say what "god's law" actually is, Christians point to the Bible as the final and inerrant authority.
This reality, following the Christians' own logic, begs the question of just where following "Yahweh's Law" will lead us. Conservative Christians have already succeeded in gaining enough power to roll back secular law to deprive women of most of their hard-won reproductive and equal pay rights. Christians have succeeded in denying GLBT people of the right to marry, their right to protection from bullying and a host of other forms of discrimination. Christians have succeeded in circumventing the legal separation of church and state in so many ways that their religion, their calendar and their privileges have become ubiquitous in the culture, and their power continues to grow.
If and when they succeed in changing enough laws that their continued power is assured, what then will stop Christians from imposing every jot and tittle of the Biblical laws upon all people? They already treat women and LGBT people as less than fully human. How soon before they will return us to the Biblical days of stonings for adultery and theft? Forget "training up a child"; the Bible is clear that a rebellious child must be stoned to death. What will stop the Christian majority from imposing these and similarly horrific laws on us?
"I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished." Matthew:5:18 (NIV)
Christians insist that the Bible is literally, unerringly the word of God. Those of us who have been avoiding the issue - telling ourselves that Christians just mean some of the Bible is to be followed to the letter, or only the New Testament or only the "red text" of Jesus' words - need to start paying closer attention. There is no way around the fact that the entire Bible is sacred truth to Christians and, in the New Testament, Jesus himself affirmed that the Mosaic laws must not be discarded.
Any doubts people might have about the determination of Christians to enshrine Biblical "truth" into this culture while they push out secular knowledge which threatens their religious beliefs - or threatens the justification of Biblical foundations for their ascension to authoritarian power - must be dispelled. This belief in absolute Biblical "truth" is the foundation of their efforts to force educators to teach Biblical creationism as science. This determination is the source of their push to deny global climate change. It is the impetus behind their efforts to undermine scientific research, to defund public education and to gut the public social safety net.
The Christian accusations against GLBT people have no foundation in fact, unlike my concerns about the slippery slope from Christian influence on secular laws to a return to the brutality and conservatism of a Bible-based legal structure. There is ample evidence which unequivocally proves that the homophobic Christian hypotheses about the people they hate and fear are false, while there is no evidence that Christians would not persecute non-Christians, LGBTs and women should they gain enough power to do so, and plenty of evidence that they have begun to do exactly that. Indeed, we have a long history that shows just how viciously oppressive, immoral and evil unfettered Christian power can be.
Here is the true slippery slope: If Christians manage to impose any more "Bible-based" law onto the citizens of the United States (and in Canada, and in the UK, and in continental Europe, and in Australia, and in ...), it will only be a matter of time before women lose what remaining human rights they have not yet lost to religious conservatism (including the right to vote), children will be abused and even killed if they do not conform to Biblical strictures, and our dreams of a secular, free and open society of peaceful coexistence will be shattered for generations to come.
It has happened before. I hope we are wise enough to recognise that it could happen again, if we do not take steps to defend our freedom from religion.
via Pharyngula. Better to laugh than to cry, I suppose! "(GOP), it's not you, it's - no, no it's you."
Bill Donahue, chief American Catholic (sorry Santorum), is outraged over President Obama's declaration of support for marriage equality for all. In an interview with Piers Morgan on CNN last night, Donahue was unequivocal about where he stands:
United States Catholic Congress?
Perhaps someday, Bill.
You've got majority Christians
on your side, after all.
"I want the law to discriminate against straight people who live together — I used to call it shacking up, now it’s called cohabitation — I want the law to discriminate against all alternative lifestyles, against gays and unions." Bill Donahue on CNN.
Got that everyone? Phil proudly and publicly speaks for the "moral majority", the Christian right who so enthusiastically supported Rick Santorum, Rick Perry and the entire cast of Bible-believing theocrats who are currently running the Republican party. He wants the law to discriminate against anyone whose life and "choices" do not pass his the Biblical sniff test.
But wait, what did Jesus have to say about abortion? Nothing, you say? Ok, well, what did he say about gay marriage? Oops, nothing again! Well, surely Jesus had something to say about a man and a woman and holy matrimony...?
Bingo! Why yes, yes Jesus DID mention the holy bond between a man and a woman. It is the only currently relevant relationship arrangement that he did comment on: Jesus was against divorce.
Since Christians are fighting against laws
which make Jesus weep, they ought to
criminalize people who divorce.
You first, Donahue!
""And the Pharisees came to him, and asked him, Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife? tempting him. And he answered and said unto them, What did Moses command you? And they said, Moses suffered to write a bill of divorcement, and to put her away. And Jesus answered and said unto them, For the hardness of your heart he wrote you this precept. But from the beginning of the creation God made them male and female. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife; And they twain shall be one flesh: so then they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. And in the house his disciples asked him again of the same matter. And he saith unto them, Whosoever shall put away his wife, and marry another, committeth adultery against her. And if a woman shall put away her husband, and be married to another, she committeth adultery." —Matthew 19:1-9.
Phil Donahue, who is divorced, is in a tizzy over gay marriage and abortion, and yet he is curiously undisturbed by divorce, the only social issue of these three that Jesus actually condemned, clearly and unequivocally. Jesus pointed out that the provision for divorce in Mosaic law was made because Moses had to accommodate the "hardness of heart" of the men of his time, but now that Jesus was there, that Mosaic law no longer applies. Old covenant/New Covenant. It's simple, really.
Except that it isn't.
So, let's try to get this straight: Christians want gay marriage and abortion outlawed because they claim that some vague prohibitions of these things appear - however ambiguously and subject to interpretation - in the Old Testament of their holy book. Bible-believers claim that this is solid Biblical law and they will do everything in their power to enforce it - not just within their own religious communities, but throughout society - by working tirelessly to write state laws that force their religion down everyone else's throat. In other words, to establish a Bible-based authoritarian theocracy - the Iran of the west, if you will.
Sure there were hundreds of "laws"
but come on, laws, schmaws. The Christian right will decidewhat is or isn't law now. Got that, everyone?
But wait! The Old Testament also laid down rules about 600+ other things, ranging from rules about food, dress, associating with people of different genders, tending animals, keeping house and countless other matters of daily life, out of which the brief, often mangled verses that modern Christians point to to condemn homosexuality and abortion are carefully cherry-picked. Never mind those verses, modern Christians chuckle, they are obviously not meant to bind us today. Only a select few prohibitions are still in effect today, and fundamentalistChristians will decidewhich ones will become the law of the land, thanks very much to the Christian majority - especially you, moderates; they just could not have done it without you! - which has given them unprecedented political power.
Some Christians, Donahue presumably among them, feel A-OK - actually passionate - about persecuting GLBT people claiming their "authority" to do so is derived from the vicious teachings laid down in the Old Testament. They feel A-OK about tormenting and subjugating women too, denying them free agency and denying them the right to control what happens to their own bodies, citing the Bible as the inerrant source of their knowledge of what is the righteous treatment of women.
Except when a "moral majority" says it is.
Got that, sluts, homos and godless socialists?
Yet, these same Christians argue with no apparent discomfort that they are also A-OK wearing mixed fibers, eating shellfish, not stoning their children to death for disobedience and (usually) refusing to condemn a raped virgin daughter to marry the rapist (other peoples' daughters, of course, are sluts) - rules which are likewise laid down in the very same Old Testament books. But that is different, they argue. Those rules were only meant for that time and that place. Those rules went by the wayside once Jesus came along. Out with the Old Covenant with Moses, in with the New Covenant through Jesus. Read the black text, follow the red! Bible-belief is so simple. God is good!
Turning to the New Testament, we find that Jesus never once mentioned homosexuality. If Christians follow the red text, and abide by the New Covenant that Jesus is believed to have made with them, then Christians ought to make no judgement on homosexuality. Further, Jesus specifically stated that homosexuality can be inborn (Matthew 19:12). Indeed, by following other words directly attributable to Jesus, Christians of good conscience ought to be supporting equal rights and fighting for the protection and dignity of those who are marginalized and downtrodden in society, too.
So which will it be, Christians? Which Testament do you plan to force onto the entire population of the United States when your ambition of a Christian theocracy is fully realized?
Bible-believers unite!
Biblical Law in the USA!
The Old Testament condemns homosexuality and demands that women he subjugated almost totally - mere chattel to be used by men for reproduction. It also demands that parents kill their children for disobedience, and it prohibits countless activities which are widely practiced by Christians today. If the religious right is following the Old Testament, then they had better get right with God and follow all of it, instead of cherry-picking. Stop eating pork and shellfish, legislate stonings for disobedient children, force your daughters into marriage to rapists; get with the Bible-based program here!
The New Testament emphasizes charity toward the poor, protection for the weak and helpless, loving forgiveness for others, turning the other cheek and above all, refraining from judging others. Jesus said nothing ever about homosexuality (or abortion) and in fact, he affirmed that homosexuality is inborn - which spoils the Christian argument that it is a choice, thus putting them at odds with God's creation, the filthy sinners - and he condemned divorce. Christian self-named "Jesus-freaks" had better get right with Jesus and follow all of his teachings, instead of cherry-picking. Give up your money and look after the poor, accept that homosexuality is inborn and leave your judgement to God, turn the other cheek and above all, no divorce! Did you get that, Bill?
"Judge not, that you be not judged. For with the judgment that you pronounce you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get. Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, "Let me take the speck out of your eye," when there is the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye." - Matthew 7:1-5
Bill Donahue again: "I want the law to discriminate against straight people who live together — I used to call it shacking up, now it’s called cohabitation — I want the law to discriminate against all alternative lifestyles, against gays and unions."
Gee, Bill. Personally, I want the law to discriminate against hypocritical assholes who wield the Bible as a cudgel against those they hate.
There is not too much that I could write that hasn't already been written about the vote today in North Carolina. Def Shepherd (link to the right) has written eloquently, passionately and sometimes angrily on this topic over the past couple of months, finishing up yesterday with this 11th hour thoughtful post yesterday. If the ballot initiative banning any unions other than one between one man and one woman is approved tonight, then North Carolina will have banned not only gay marriage but also many other forms of domestic unions and civil unions. The draconian measure would change marriage rights for current partnerships as well as prevent any future legal partnerships if they do not meet the narrow, religious standard set by the initiative's proponents.
Let's call this vote what it really is: a push by religion to dehumanize some people.
It is time for people to speak out - loudly - against this blatant discrimination. This egregious denial of civil rights to people based upon religious ideology is unconstitutional and it is unAmerican.
Why do these Christian zealots hate America so much?
It is time for people to speak out. It is time for people of good conscience in this country to stand up to the tyranny of the religious majority and declare that in a democratic republic, the rights and freedoms of all people are to be respected.
No, freedom of religion does NOT mean that any religion can force other people to live by its ideology. Religious freedom means the adherents of that religion are free to obey their religion's ideology, not that they can enshrine their religion into law in order to take away the freedom of others.
The opinion polls leading up to the NC primary were not encouraging. But hopefully, there has been more movement in the direction of love and decency than those polls have indicated. Tonight, we will see.
Please view the video below. I warn you - it is heartbreaking.
It's a rainy Monday morning, and I am recovering from the weekend trip for the graduation. I've got nothing (yet!). Lucky for us, there is always something excellent out there on the interweb!
Individual freedom and the right to bodily autonomy - the principles behind our understanding of consent - were the principles upon which many of us assume the Supreme Court's Roe v Wade decision was based, although the case itself was focused on a citizen's right to privacy around making decisions concerning her bodily autonomy and medical care. Laws which deny a woman the right to bodily autonomy - including laws that deny a woman the right to control what happens to her own body in favor of giving any potential fetus the "right" to use her body against her will or without her consent - are an unconstitutional denial of individual freedom because they relegate a woman to a legal status that is less than human. The legal precedent that a woman actually has the right to consent to the risks and responsibilities of pregnancy, and an equal right to decline consent to those risks and responsibilities was thought to be finally established. But since Roe v Wade was argued as a case for privacy, it has never been a guarantee of women's reproductive rights. It has always been vulnerable to attack, either through court challenges or through legislation which has chipped away at it.
One way or another, the Republican Party will find a way to control those sluts!
From the moment Roe v Wade was decided, the religious right began working to overturn it. Outraged that women had at last been granted the right to choose if and when to be pregnant - a right which conflicted with the patriarchal order which demands that men have complete authority over women - the "moral majority" began a campaign of slut-shaming, raising the specter- never far beneath the surface in any misogynist culture - that uncontrolled women would engage in wildly promiscuous and "irresponsible" sex and darkly warning that the new law would bring about the downfall of American civil society However, when this tactic initially only gained traction within the most conservative and misogynistic segments of society, conservatives realized that the problem was that a majority of Americans in the late 1970's actually respected a woman's right to choose - and that most Americans believed that the consensual sexual activity of women was no more society's business than the consensual sexual activity of men.
Religious conservatives soon zeroed in on "consent" as a potentially malleable concept that they might be able to use to drive a wedge between women and their human rights, thereby setting the stage to put women back in their traditional place. In order to overcome the legal issue of consent, religious and political conservatives began working tirelessly - using tactics including slut-shaming, abstinence-only purity campaigns inserted into public schools, and falsely equating microscopic blastocysts with full term babies - to entrench the notion that recreational sex involving the conscious avoidance of pregnancy is shameful and that only marital sex which welcomes the prospect of conception should be recognized and supported by society. Their aim was to increase public acceptance of explicitly Christian sexual mores in order to garner voter support for their social agenda. The ultimate goal was to get this explicitly Christian theology enshrined into law: that whenever a woman has consented to sex, she has automatically consented to pregnancy, too.
That's right, ladies, when you consent to sex, you consent to pregnancy. And when you don't consent to sex, you consent to pregnancy, too! You and your uteri are in a perpetual state of consent to pregnancy! Ain't patriarchy grand?
Eventually, extreme conservatives began to worry that exceptions for rape and incest could possibly become a loophole through which some lying women could escape unwanted pregnancy, leading to the push for the elimination of exceptions for rape and incest as legal justifications for abortion. Building on the false premise that a conceptus is equal to a full-term baby, conservatives argued that a fertilized egg, no matter how it came into existence, is an innocent life deserving of protection. Completely ignoring the question of whether a woman who has been raped is deserving of society's protection and adroitly sidestepping Roe v Wade, forced-birth groups wrote bills denying abortion rights to women even in the case of rape or incest which their political arm, the Republican party, sponsored in state legislatures. In one giant leap of cruel imagination, conservatives managed to establish as a serious idea that even when a woman does not consent to sex, her consent to pregnancy should be automatic in the eyes of the law.
Lest there be any doubt about the intentions of the religious conservatives and their hired guns in the state and federal legislatures to render the legal notion of female consent completely irrelevant and completely powerless, forced-birth organizations created "personhood bills" which they instructed their Republican lackeys to sponsor and pass in various states. "Personhood" bills, if signed into law, would confer the full rights of a "person" - a deliberately vague term, but generally considered to be equal to a live-born child - to all fertilized ova. Such laws would criminalize most forms of female-controlled contraception, emergency contraception, assisted reproduction and, of course, all abortions. They would also open the door to state-sponsored invasion of women's privacy and health care rights since legally protected "persons" could potentially be "murdered" before a conception is discovered to have taken place. Furthermore, such laws would criminalize anyone who attempted to help a woman abort the conceptus "person" either by performing a surgical procedure, providing medical abortifacents, or driving a woman across state lines to obtain an abortion in a non-"Personhood" state.
Got that, gals?
"Personhood" laws are the holy grail of the forced-birth movement and the ultimate goal of religious conservatives. If passed, such laws would strip women of all bodily autonomy in matters of reproduction. Women would be denied female-controlled birth control, they would be denied emergency birth control if their partner's birth control fails or he refuses to use it and they would be denied abortions - even if they are impregnated by rape and even if their health or lives are endangered by a pregnancy. In short, thanks to the twisted culture of "life" pushed so ruthlessly onto them by religious conservatives, women would be compelled to sacrifice their happiness, risk their health and even lose their lives because a single-celled conceptus has been granted a right to occupy her body which supersedes all of her rights including her humanity, her dignity and her right to life.
Keep that contraception out of those sluts' hands!
The Republican Party, which has degenerated to little more than the political arm of the conservative religious right, has been striving relentlessly to ensure that women will be legally forced to bear all of the negative physical, social and most of the financial repercussions for any unplanned pregnancy, while the churches themselves underline and enforce the subordinate and inferior position of women in the culture. Through tireless efforts to withhold access to contraception from women, the religious right ensures that reproductive control remains primarily in the hands of men. Thanks to ideologically-driven appointments to the FDA and the business interests of both drug companies and the medical establishment, only male-controlled methods of reliable contraception are available without a prescription, forcing women to navigate (and pay for) "care" from layers of medical and pharmacy gatekeepers before they are permitted to obtain reliable female-controlled contraception.
Religious patriarchy allows society to label unplanned pregnancy a "women's issue" in spite of the fact that it takes both a man and a woman - both failing to use effective contraception - to create an unplanned pregnancy. The fact that society allows unplanned pregnancy to be framed as a women's issue reveals the depth of the unconscious misogyny which lays the responsibility for - and the consequences of - an unplanned pregnancy squarely in the woman's lap, while little thought - and almost no censure - is directed toward the "guilt", the "promiscuity" or the "irresponsibility" of the man involved.
The old joke about keeping women barefoot and pregnant? Not so funny anymore.
More insidiously, when pregnancy and the laws restricting women's rights over when and if they will become pregnant is framed as a women's issue, conservatives ensure that half the population at least may ignore the very real danger to women's health and safety. Few men pay attention when women's rights are being stripped away because the phrase "women's issue" is unconsciously received as a signal that the subject is unimportant and less than men's other concerns. Even men who love the women in their lives are lulled into a false sense of "nothing to worry about" as their wives, their sisters and their daughters are slowly but surely reduced to the legal status of walking wombs compelled under threat of criminal prosecution to gestate the offspring of any man who succeeds in impregnating them - whether by mutual and loving consent, by accidental failure of birth control or by force.
In this way, the religious patriarchy ensures both that women cannot control their own reproduction completely (since women - even abstinent women - can be, and often are, the victims of forced impregnation) and that no man - not even a rapist - needs to accept the decision of a mere woman on the question of whether or not he can use her body to reproduce. That is because the "right to life" of a conceptus is, in fact, really just an extension of men's rights. A conceptus is always some man's potential offspring, and at its core, religious teaching is all about enshrining the right of every man to reproduce. If women are allowed the freedom to choose, some men would almost certainly have difficulty finding a willing mate with whom to procreate. Religions which enforce the authority of men over women and which restrict the freedom and choices of women therefore speak to the root of cultural misogyny - men's fear of the potential power of women to control their (men's) ability to reproduce. "Right to life" is actually the trojan horse by which male rights over women are being inserted directly into women's uteri. That's right. It's a great big legal 'fuck you, women'!
While religions pay lip service to condemning male brutality and offer assurances on how a "godly man" behaves, they strenuously resist efforts to enact laws which could increase rape prosecutions or extend protections for women against sexual assault, citing concerns about - you can guess - men's rights. The ultimate social priority of religion is to confirm and enforce the authority of men over women. To that end, religious conservatives - and their men in government - are willing to grant even rapists and abusers privileges over women, to safeguard the authority of "godly" men. In short, in order to protect the privilege of all men, themselves included of course, even "godly" men who profess to abhor rape willingly award rapists and abusers the right to reproduce using women's bodies against their will. As always, there is no thought spared for the humanity of the women who would be sacrificed to this Christian ideology. At best, they are dismissed as the "blessed" recipients of a "gift from God".
This is already a real thing in the conservative Christian world
In the Republican vision of the future - as in the past it idealizes - "freedom" and "rights" will only fully belong to men and to the potential offspring of men, while women will be, at best, reduced once again to second-class citizenship, and, at worst, returned to sexual and reproductive slavery. Political, financial and social oppression of women, reproductive slavery and viciously misogynistic church-mandated rules of correct behavior and dress (for women only) are the unceasing reality for millions of women in theocracies around the world. All of these forms of oppression of women are rooted in the desire of these conservative societies to control the sexuality and reproductive freedom of their women. Almost without exception, societies based upon religious laws which both deny women fully human status and hold them accountable for the sexual activity of both genders strictly limit female freedom and impose exaggerated requirements for modest dress on their women and girls. If a Christian theocracy is successfully installed by conservatives in the United States, ever-deepening oppression will become the inevitable future for women and girls here.
Religious conservatives want Roe v Wade overturned because they oppose the principles of individual freedom and the right to bodily autonomy for women upon which the decision was based. That denial of those rights would relegate women to less than human status is exactly the point. Second-class status for women would be a feature, not a bug, for Christian conservatives since the Bible commands that women are not equal but subordinate to men. Bible-based religion asserts that man is the original human and woman, taken from man, is less than human. This is the reality of Bible-based governance. It seems like a nightmare from the dark ages, or some dystopian futuristic novel, but this is really happening right now in the land of the free and the home of the brave.
The terror evoked by random acts of violence is a feature, not a bug, in the eyes of the 
