Are Christians Persecuted in the U.S.?

A recent commenter on this blog alleged that religious people face discrimination in the U.S.  I have frequently heard this outrageous lie from other religious fanatics.  I have learned it is a sure sign that I am dealing with a fanatic because the facts are so much to the contrary that it is difficult to know where to begin.  Usually the person is complaining about the fact that their religion isn't allowed to become or act like the "established", favored religion.  In essence, they are complaining about the fact that they are not allowed to force their religion on the rest of us. 

Rob Boston published a nice, short article today in Alternet, 5 Reasons the Religious Right Should Stop Whining About Being Persecuted, which lays out some basic points concerning the ridiculousness of these claims.  I strongly recommend reading it.

Bias Against Non-believers V

Yesterday a religious fanatic posted comments on some of my posts.  One of the comments denied the reality of the extreme bias that non-believers in the U.S. face every day.  Consequently, I decided to post this video on the subject, which contains quite a bit of evidence concerning this bias:

Religion, Racism, and Narcissism

Narcissists are people with severely wounded and threatened egos.  Deep down they feel very inferior.  They compensate by trying to find or invent ways to feel superior.  Religion and racism both appeal to them because they allow the narcissist to feel superior simply for belonging to a "superior" group.  They can feel superior simply because of their skin color, their ethnic heritage, being a member of the "one true church" or a member of the "chosen people", etc.

A recent series of articles in Media Matters provides evidence of this link between religion and racism (not to mention ignorance).  The articles focus on an attempt to build a sort of white supremacist homeland in a region of Montana.  When explaining why they chose Montana, one of the leaders of the movement said: 

"Our Christmas parade still goes by that name and we have a nativity scene in our public square with a Baby Jesus... Come Home!"

If you spend any amount of time exploring the statements of white supremacists in America, you will realize what that "come home" exhortation means.  It is often used and is shorthand for "come home to the religion of your forefathers".  

The religion they are referring to, of course, is a traditional version of American Christianity.  This is somewhat ironic because the leaders of the white supremacist movement seem to be completely ignorant of the fact that Christ was a Jew and that their European ancestors were actually converted at the point of a sword and were, in fact, pagans.  Like most religious people, I am sure that they "deal" with these facts either by ignoring them or wishing them away.  Facts are mere nuisances, at worst, when they can be chosen based on how one feels about them. 

Grace

With Thanksgiving just around the corner in the U.S. many people are facing the prospect of visiting the home of a relative for a meal with heavy overtones of tradition--and religion.  One of the most common questions for non-believers at this time of year is how to act when one's host says a prayer before the meal.

Generally, of course, the polite thing to do is say nothing.  When one is a guest in another's home, the traditions and practices of the host are to be tolerated with the utmost politeness.  This is a simple rule and is almost universally followed.  When religious people dine at the home of non-believers, they almost never have the temerity to demand that a prayer be said.  There are occasions when this will happen, however--such as when a parent visits an apostate child and fails to respect the child's wishes and status as an adult.  There is little doubt in anyone's mind that such behavior is rude and insulting.

There is another circumstance that non-believers sometimes face in this regard.  Sometimes relatives who ordinarily do not say prayers before meals will decide to say a prayer simply because they know a non-believer is in attendance.  If you find yourself in this situation, try not to laugh and try not to comment.  The person insisting on prayer is probably hoping to start a "discussion", which means, of course, a religious argument. 

Be the better person and don't take the bait.  Instead, look around the table to see if there aren't any like minded persons in attendance.  If there are no other non-believers, you might at least be able to discover which attendees are aware of the rudeness of this anomalous prayer.

If unable to avoid the argument, your first ploy should be to point out the person's hypocrisy in not saying such prayers for years and years and then choosing to do so only when a non-believer is present, which is not only hypocrisy but deliberate rudeness.  You should make that point explicitly.  Having invited you into his or her home, thus indicating you are welcome, the host has suddenly decided to send an unmistakable signal that you are not welcome. 

Do not say that the prayer itself is offensive, that would be playing right into their hands.  Simply point out that it is obviously aimed at you because it is not the normal custom of the household.  But, do not object to the prayer itself.

In general, we have a simple rule:  The owner of the home decides whether there will be prayer, and the guests abide by that decision quietly.

These observations about propriety and prayer can be used to shed some light on the school prayer debate.  When the religious insist on having organized school prayer, they have to know full well, on some level at least, that they are sending a message to any non-believer present that says "this is our house, and you are merely a guest here".  As I have written before this, in large part, is the precise reason they want to have organized prayer.

A schoolhouse, or any other government building, does not belong to any one person or to any one group.  It belongs to everyone, including non-believers.  In such a case, the proper thing to do is not to raise the subject of religion at all.  This, too, is the proper rule of etiquette, that we all observe in our day to day lives.  When we have relatives over from different religions we do not initiate discussions about which religion is the "true" religion.  Doing so would only incite conflict and controversy.  It is rudeness to start such a discussion, especially when those gathered came together for other reasons.

Government buildings are neutral ground.  They belong to no one and to everyone.  They are created for a purpose that we all share, and that purpose is NOT religion.  No one person or group has the right to demand prayer anymore than they have the right to exclude other citizens who don't belong to their group.

Ignorant Bliss

I just read an excellent essay by a Canadian woman named Cathy Oliver.  It was originally published on Pharyngula, P.Z. Myers' excellent blog.  Here is a link to it on Alternet.  The author tells of the occasion when she realized exactly why she was an atheist.  I won't spoil it by telling too much, but I do want to quote two of her lines from the essay because they are truly priceless in their summation of why it is better to be an atheist:

"I’m really an atheist because religion is selling ignorant bliss – and I don’t want it."

Followed by this in the next paragraph:

"If I have to trade a bit of happiness for the ability to think for myself – done."

I wanted to share these because they are both (especially when used together) excellent short answers to why one prefers to be an atheist--something that almost all atheists have to explain on occasion.

A News Story About Atrocities In Franco's Catholic Spain

Christiane Amanpour has produced a short news segment about a new BBC documentary chronicling one of the worst crimes of General Franco's fascist, uber-Catholic regime.  During that regime, the children of "undesirable" parents were stolen and sold to Franco's supporters in order to make sure that they were appropriately brainwashed in religious authoritarianism.  Who were these "undesirable" parents?  Liberals (the few left that weren't executed by the regime during the civil war), the poor, single mothers, etc. 

The same sort of thing occurred in Argentina during their dirty war against liberals and secularists, and, although she doesn't mention Chile, I would be quite surprised if they did not do the same.

The BBC documentary will air in the U.S. on BBC America on November 3rd of this year.  We should all watch it.  More important, we should all remember that the religious are at war with us and will stop at nothing to marginalize and eradicate us.  These stories are just examples of how serious this secret, undeclared war can be.

Reproduction As Warfare

I am sorry I haven't posted lately.  I have had a lot of things occupying me in the last few weeks, and the posts I am working on seem unfinished as yet.  I felt I had to pass on something I read this morning, however.  A frequent poster on Think Atheist posted one of the best and most succinct explanations of the reasons for religious hostility to birth control, and I just had to pass it on (with a slight modification or two):

"Along the course of time, while religions were being invented by the leaders of humans, and gods were invented to instil fear in order to control the masses, unlimited reproduction, seen as a weapon of war, war by numbers, was a primary component of the purpose of religion.  Unlimited reproduction (breeding) is still a component of the religious wars. Overbreeding and religion are inseparable. Religious people are indoctrinated into thinking that humans are precious, in order to create more disposable humans, in order to outnumber the other religious factions.  Religious citizens are the breeding pawns of war mongers.

Our methods of economics, notwithstanding its many faults, has taught us one very important consideration, the availability of a resource is inversely proportional to its value.   Religious leaders know this.  As our human population expands, it becomes more and more important for religious leaders to instil the "precious human" doctrine.  We need precious disposable humans to send to slaughter at war, to ensure our place at the top of civilization.  Breeding contributes to the war effort.

Now... women in the west have been reducing our war effort, but what have our governments done to compensate?  [They] encourage population growth in the third world, then import those disposable war workers here.  As usual, our governments working against us."

Just above this person's comment, you will find another post on the topic that is also quite informative.