A few topics on today's agenda, so let's get to it. The first is the whole "religious freedom" kerfuffle in Indiana. I use quotes because it is not really a religious freedom law; we already have a real religious freedom law, it's called the First Amendment. This faux religious freedom law is actually a law designed to ensure religious people (particularly fundamentalist Christians) can discriminate against people (particularly gays) without fear of legal recourse. As somebody who is not religious and who views religious causes through very skeptical eyes, and as somebody who loves gay people (most the ones I know, anyway), you can probably guess on which side of the aisle I sit. What has been most interesting/amusing to me about this whole debacle is watching Indiana governor Mike Pence try to hold two opposing views at once and placate two constituencies that want mutually exclusive things. It's been an especially bold and pathetic bit of doublethink, even by political standards. He felt the need to "fix" a law, with which he said there was nothing wrong. He said the media was misrepresenting the law's intent, but then evaded George Stephanopoulos' very direct and clear questions of clarification. Then once the heat got turned up, he said that the law did not allow for discrimination against gays and lesbians, despite signing it in a private ceremony attended by several outspoken opponents of gay rights. As The Onion puts it: "Indiana Governor Insists New Law Has Nothing To Do With Thing It Explicitly Intended To Do," which is so spot-on it's not really appropriate for a satirical newspaper. There's no joke there.
Because, the thing is, many religious organizations want the express "right" to discriminate against gay people. They believe homosexuality is a sin, and they want to treat gay people as sinners not as normal members of socity. (See, for example, the file on the American Family Association, the head of which was at Pence's aforementioned signing ceremony.) Many ultraconservative, religious business owners want to be able to deny service to gay people with impunity. I know this -- we all know this -- because they say this. It's not a secret. Denying gay people equal rights is a matter of principle and even of pride to many religious fundamentalists. Take, for example, the Christian owners of the Indiana pizzeria in this story. They said point-blank they would refuse to cater a gay wedding (the obvious joke being, of course, that no gay couple would ever have their wedding catered by a pizzeria). And lest you think they are some sort of extreme outlier, read the full story. After protesters harangued them into shutting down -- which I don't think is right, by the way; it's fine to protest/boycott them and trash them on Yelp, but bombarding them with fake orders is straight-up harassment, and it's wrong, in my opinion -- prominent conservative groups rallied to their side and raised, at last check, nearly $1 million for them to reopen. They have become martyrs of the "good Christian" cause, standing up to the bullying, sinful Left.
And that's another reason why I think it is bad to harass the bigoted pizzeria owners. It gives credence to Pence's misguided claim that "tolerance is a two-way street." This is an argument I read often in the comments sections of articles and on Facebook, that supporters of gay rights are often the real bigots because they discriminate against Christians. In the case of the Indiana law it goes something like this: people who are against the law are hypocrites, because they preach tolerance, but they are intolerant of the people who are in favor of the law. (In fact, the Wall Street Journal made that argument here.) But to the people who believe that I say this: I do not think tolerance means what you think it means.
First of all, when people say "we need to be tolerant" they are not saying "we need to be tolerant of all people and all ideas at all times" (and if they are, they should be ignored). Obviously there are situations in which intolerance in the proper course of action. For example, as a society, we should obviously not be tolerant of people who think it's fun to walk up and down the street and kick people in the shins at random. Rather, "be tolerant" is shorthand for "be tolerant toward the person whose lifestyle does not negatively affect you or anybody else in any tangible way." This is really what people mean when they say "be tolerant," but it's not what people say because people just don't talk that way. ("Don't judge" is a similar phrase in this regard.) And this is why it's not right to discriminate against gay people: Homosexuality, even if it's not for you, even if you think it's sinful, does not tangibly affect you (or anybody else) in a negative way. It just doesn't. To illustrate this I will quote Barney Frank in a recent episode of Fresh Air about being a gay congressman during the DOMA debate:
Which brings me to my main point: tolerance is a two-way street, but it turns into a closed street if one side is blocking the other side's way. That is to say, it is okay to be intolerant toward intolerant people. In fact, it's not just okay, it's what we should do. It sounds paradoxical, but it's not because the intolerances are not the same. We should be tolerant of gay people, because being gay doesn't hurt anybody in a tangible way; we should be intolerant of people who are intolerant of gays, because their intolerance does hurt people (namely gay people) in tangible way. Intolerance of intolerance is not hypocrisy, it's fighting back. And a key point in the Indiana law, is that conservatives, many of whom are outspokenly against gay rights, are the ones who started all of this by passing the law. They went on the offensive. The backlash was the reaction; it doesn't happen without the initial action. So saying opponents of the law are intolerant is a bit like saying a guy getting punched in the neck is being intolerant for punching back in an attempt to stop his attacker.
I mean, if you want to know on which side the real bigotry lies, ask yourselves this question: If both sides sat down at the table together and somebody proposed a new law in which sexual orientation was treated exactly equally to religion -- in hiring practices, in marriage, in consumer rights, in adoption, etc., in all these things gays and religious people were given the exact same protections -- which side says yes and which side says no? I think you know the answer, and I think you get my point.
Okay, dismounting soapbox in 3-2-1 ...
Like usual, I set out to write about five things and took up all my time writing about one. C'est la vie.
Until next time ...
Because, the thing is, many religious organizations want the express "right" to discriminate against gay people. They believe homosexuality is a sin, and they want to treat gay people as sinners not as normal members of socity. (See, for example, the file on the American Family Association, the head of which was at Pence's aforementioned signing ceremony.) Many ultraconservative, religious business owners want to be able to deny service to gay people with impunity. I know this -- we all know this -- because they say this. It's not a secret. Denying gay people equal rights is a matter of principle and even of pride to many religious fundamentalists. Take, for example, the Christian owners of the Indiana pizzeria in this story. They said point-blank they would refuse to cater a gay wedding (the obvious joke being, of course, that no gay couple would ever have their wedding catered by a pizzeria). And lest you think they are some sort of extreme outlier, read the full story. After protesters harangued them into shutting down -- which I don't think is right, by the way; it's fine to protest/boycott them and trash them on Yelp, but bombarding them with fake orders is straight-up harassment, and it's wrong, in my opinion -- prominent conservative groups rallied to their side and raised, at last check, nearly $1 million for them to reopen. They have become martyrs of the "good Christian" cause, standing up to the bullying, sinful Left.
And that's another reason why I think it is bad to harass the bigoted pizzeria owners. It gives credence to Pence's misguided claim that "tolerance is a two-way street." This is an argument I read often in the comments sections of articles and on Facebook, that supporters of gay rights are often the real bigots because they discriminate against Christians. In the case of the Indiana law it goes something like this: people who are against the law are hypocrites, because they preach tolerance, but they are intolerant of the people who are in favor of the law. (In fact, the Wall Street Journal made that argument here.) But to the people who believe that I say this: I do not think tolerance means what you think it means.
First of all, when people say "we need to be tolerant" they are not saying "we need to be tolerant of all people and all ideas at all times" (and if they are, they should be ignored). Obviously there are situations in which intolerance in the proper course of action. For example, as a society, we should obviously not be tolerant of people who think it's fun to walk up and down the street and kick people in the shins at random. Rather, "be tolerant" is shorthand for "be tolerant toward the person whose lifestyle does not negatively affect you or anybody else in any tangible way." This is really what people mean when they say "be tolerant," but it's not what people say because people just don't talk that way. ("Don't judge" is a similar phrase in this regard.) And this is why it's not right to discriminate against gay people: Homosexuality, even if it's not for you, even if you think it's sinful, does not tangibly affect you (or anybody else) in a negative way. It just doesn't. To illustrate this I will quote Barney Frank in a recent episode of Fresh Air about being a gay congressman during the DOMA debate:
So they came up with this notion - and that's why it was called the Defense of Marriage Act. To be intellectually honest it should've been we don't want those people to be able to get together act. But they had to come up with supposed negative social consequences. And one of the reasons that we were able to win this battle was they made the mistake because once Massachusetts broke the logjam and started same-sex marriage, it became undeniably clear that there were no adverse consequences. So they had built their arguments on a false premise. But you correctly said, oh, it's the institution of marriage. In a debate on the Defense of Marriage Act, I get on the floor and said I want to understand how does the fact that I love another man hurt your marriage? What about my relations - voluntary relations - with another guy in any way jeopardizes your marriage? And I said I'll yield to any member of the House wants to explain to me how what I would do would hurt your marriage. And one guy got up - Steve Largent from Oklahoma (note from DG: gotta love it when your first sports hero as a kid turns out to be a right-wing bigot) - and he said, well, I'll tell the gentleman this - no, it doesn't hurt my marriage. It doesn't hurt the marriage of other people here, but it hurts the institution of marriage. And my response was, well, it doesn't hurt any individual marriages, but despite that, it somehow hurts the institution of marriage. That is an argument that ought to be made by someone in an institution.
Or, on the topic of the India law specifically, Penn Jillette put it nicely when he said, "Business owners aren't being asked to have sex with their gay customers."
I look at it like this: I'm not religious; I don't particularly like religion; I'm not even spiritual; but I am extremely tolerant of religion and spiritualism. Almost all my friends and family are religious or spiritual in some way, and I live in a neighborhood of, literally, dozens of churches and other places of faith. I have zero problem with this (other than on Sunday afternoon it can be hard to find street parking). In fact, I like the sense of community it fosters, even if I don't directly partake. It's a very diverse neighborhood, but everybody is cool with everybody else, because everybody else is cool with everybody.
I look at it like this: I'm not religious; I don't particularly like religion; I'm not even spiritual; but I am extremely tolerant of religion and spiritualism. Almost all my friends and family are religious or spiritual in some way, and I live in a neighborhood of, literally, dozens of churches and other places of faith. I have zero problem with this (other than on Sunday afternoon it can be hard to find street parking). In fact, I like the sense of community it fosters, even if I don't directly partake. It's a very diverse neighborhood, but everybody is cool with everybody else, because everybody else is cool with everybody.
Which brings me to my main point: tolerance is a two-way street, but it turns into a closed street if one side is blocking the other side's way. That is to say, it is okay to be intolerant toward intolerant people. In fact, it's not just okay, it's what we should do. It sounds paradoxical, but it's not because the intolerances are not the same. We should be tolerant of gay people, because being gay doesn't hurt anybody in a tangible way; we should be intolerant of people who are intolerant of gays, because their intolerance does hurt people (namely gay people) in tangible way. Intolerance of intolerance is not hypocrisy, it's fighting back. And a key point in the Indiana law, is that conservatives, many of whom are outspokenly against gay rights, are the ones who started all of this by passing the law. They went on the offensive. The backlash was the reaction; it doesn't happen without the initial action. So saying opponents of the law are intolerant is a bit like saying a guy getting punched in the neck is being intolerant for punching back in an attempt to stop his attacker.
I mean, if you want to know on which side the real bigotry lies, ask yourselves this question: If both sides sat down at the table together and somebody proposed a new law in which sexual orientation was treated exactly equally to religion -- in hiring practices, in marriage, in consumer rights, in adoption, etc., in all these things gays and religious people were given the exact same protections -- which side says yes and which side says no? I think you know the answer, and I think you get my point.
Okay, dismounting soapbox in 3-2-1 ...
Like usual, I set out to write about five things and took up all my time writing about one. C'est la vie.
Until next time ...
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