Conscience Creep: How “Religious Freedom” Spiraled Out of Control...

a reply to: ketsuko

I would call it collectivism creep.

People are no longer allowed to be themselves in society. The lines have so blurred that my life and my faith are no longer just my own but apparently must impact everyone around me even if I only live my principles. I must adhere to the preferred public orthodoxy at all times or I am somehow a threat to everyone else.

Stop making me a part of your collective and the problem is solved.

The line that has been blurred is between conservative political ideology and religious faith. Not content to restrict the impact of their beliefs to their own lives, those in the Religious Right continually try to interfere with the lives of others. What kind of mental contortions are required for a conservative to assume the role of victim under these circumstances?

It's mind boggling.

In recent years, conservatives have been desperately trying to use the law to impose their allegedly Christian morality on the rest of the country as they have launched one legislative campaign after another to enact laws to prevent gay people from sharing equally in the protection of fundamental liberties enjoyed by the rest of us.

Even before the SCOTUS ruling rendered that strategy universally dead in the water, they'd already begun to adopt a new obstructionist strategy; crowd-funded wannabe martyrs, thrust into the limelight and making specious claims about observing ad hoc religious precepts created expressly for the purpose of continuing the efforts of the right to impose its will on the rest of society.

No matter how hard right-wingers try to camouflage the truth behind layers of spin and the pseudo-intellectual rants about collectivism, the fact remains that they have and do act collectively to suppress the rights of others.

That's a simple, inescapable fact.

I can't stand these backwards religions and how they have wormed their way into so many aspects of our society, anyone with any intelligence at all knows Tom Cruz is our one true god and savior. Why have Christmas when you can have Cruzmas? Why have Hanukkah when you can have Tomukkah? It's 2015 people, it's time to stop living in the past and embrace our destiny of one world under Tom.

originally posted by: ketsuko
The lines have so blurred that my life and my faith are no longer just my own but apparently must impact everyone around me even if I only live my principles.

If your life or your faith DOES impact someone else, you're the one doing the "creep". Live by your principles, AS LONG AS it doesn't impact someone else, and all will be good.

Stop making me a part of your collective and the problem is solved.

Stop impacting other people's lives and the problem is solved. Other people's rights are just as important as yours, in this "collective" we call society. If living by your faith IMPACTS someone's lives, in a way that isn't welcome, you're going too far with it. You don't have the right to do that. If you want to live your life however you want, then society isn't the place for you.

Great thread, OP! This has been happening for so long, that many religious people think they are owed a special treatment. I have chuckled at the THOUSANDS of times I've seen religious people claim that gay people wanted "special rights" (to get married like the rest of us) and now, it's the religious who are demanding (and in some cases receiving) special rights, like a right to discriminate in business or government.

a reply to: InfidelCastro

anyone with any intelligence at all knows Tom Cruz is our one true god and savior.

Here I was, reading merrily along, and not expecting the above whatsoever. I almost spit my coffee out, you heathen.

a reply to: Benevolent Heretic

Great thread, OP! This has been happening for so long, that many religious people think they are owed a special treatment. I have chuckled at the THOUSANDS of times I've seen religious people claim that gay people wanted "special rights" (to get married like the rest of us) and now, it's the religious who are demanding (and in some cases receiving) special rights, like a right to discriminate in business or government.

I have to tell you, BH. I was not expecting all that I found. It surprised me to find out how deep the rabbit hole goes on this one. In some ways, the separation of church and state really has been illusory. Our government HAS made laws "respecting an establishment of religion". Just not in the way we might have originally expected. It was, without a doubt, an interesting research project to take on.

There is and has been a root within Christianity (and many other cults) that requires the members to identify themselves as "separate" or "above" or "special" as compared with the majority of other humans.

This is the fundamental complexity of the issue OP is pointing to here, in my mind.

originally posted by: Gryphon66
There is and has been a root within Christianity (and many other cults) that requires the members to identify themselves as "separate" or "above" or "special" as compared with the majority of other humans.

This is the fundamental complexity of the issue OP is pointing to here, in my mind.

You are correct. The Abrahamic religions in particular foster an elitist(chosen ones, elect of god) mentality. Though they are by no means alone in such thinking. Nor can those who are a part of it, see it for what it is.

a reply to: Klassified

Exactly.

Witness members here who seem to have perfectly functioning, rational minds, that rabidly support whatever insanity any branch of their cult is involved in.

Watch the logical knots they tie themselves in ... and this phenomenon that you're pointing to so objectively becomes utterly clear.

It's not a matter of "believing differently" or "having an opinion" ... it's a matter of wide-scale/wholesale denial of reality.

It'd be sad if it weren't so irritating.

Great thread Klassified!

I have to say, Christians wouldn't be so intolerable if they weren't so guilty of this and then adopting a persecution complex when called out on it or having those undeserved privileges they had revoked. This obviously doesn't apply to all of them. In fact, I'd say that a good many really DO understand what separation of church and state exactly is. But it's ALWAYS the vocal minority that gives them a bad name...

The problem is that we can't just ignore them like in previous situations that happened in the past that are called up for precedent for the modern ones. They've hijacked one half of the political spectrum and are using that to drown out any rational dissent, even from their own religion.

a reply to: Krazysh0t

For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.

Matthew 24:24

If the "Christ" that is apparently a self-serving, money-loving, vitriolic hater of the sick, poor and bereaved that many of these folks seem to worship today isn't "false" ... then I don't know what the word means.

If the "prophets" of this modern church that are more interested in "profits" than following the teachings of Jesus ... (i.e. any TV preacher or mega-church pastor and any who follow them) I still don't know what "false" means.

But I know what false means.

a reply to: Krazysh0t

They've hijacked one half of the political spectrum and are using that to drown out any rational dissent, even from their own religion.

This is an important point to raise, and I mentioned it in relation to slavery in the OP. We have Christians today, trying to speak out against the extreme sects, and they get drowned out with the "fingers in ears - La la la - I can't hear you", because many of them are on the wrong side of the aisle.

a reply to: Klassified

According to the vocal minority in the "religious Right" ... no liberal/Democrat/progressive could even actually BE Christian.

Which points again to that psychotic, cultic sense of being "separate."

God forbid we care about the sick, the poor, the widows and children ... etc. ... you know, the ones Jesus SPECIFICALLY asked us to care for.

a reply to: Klassified

They've clearly learned from their past failures.

a reply to: Gryphon66

And then when you point this out to them you get deflections and accusations of attacking their faith. The best is when a Christian insinuates that an atheist/agnostic can't know anything about Christianity.

What astonishes me is how Christians can claim they are being persecuted because they are being prevented from persecuting those they disagree with. "Burning witches, after all, is for everyone's benefit" style of BS logic.

With that mind set...I don't trust em! And question the validity of anything they say.

And even when hidden, the spiritual arrogance is readily apparent.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.

In the terminology of the day I believe that meant they just would not involve or allow religious institutions to be involved or influence the writing of any law regarding anything.

They may have had it right at one time, but as always, somebody has to come along and turn a good thing into a bad thing according to their opinion and conscience.

It never should have ever become the issue it is today, along with a lot of other issues that muddy the water and prevent progress.

originally posted by: Krazysh0t
a reply to: Gryphon66

And then when you point this out to them you get deflections and accusations of attacking their faith. The best is when a Christian insinuates that an atheist/agnostic can't know anything about Christianity.

As in 99% of our topics here, I agree with you completely.

Again though, that's because Christianity or [insert any cultic belief structure here] has an inherently xenophobic attitude toward "the world." Non-believers just can't understand the "special truth" that they can see in their own scriptures/beliefs/etc.

In the rational world, this is because that "special truth" et. al. is propagated on illogical, imaginary nonsense.

But that nonsense actually forms THE BASIS of their understanding of reality.

This is why I personally have a hard time not comparing extremist or Fundamentalist religions to mental illness.

a reply to: Gryphon66

I don't see it as mental illness, because even the staunchest young earth creationists (the most deluded Christians) are still able to function at high intellectual capacities in regards to things that aren't related to religion, or even in pursuit of promoting their religious causes. I see it as brainwashing. Pure and simple. It's the world's oldest and most effective propaganda.

originally posted by: Krazysh0t
a reply to: Gryphon66

I don't see it as mental illness, because even the staunchest young earth creationists (the most deluded Christians) are still able to function at high intellectual capacities in regards to things that aren't related to religion, or even in pursuit of promoting their religious causes. I see it as brainwashing. Pure and simple. It's the world's oldest and most effective propaganda.

Potato, potatoe? LOL

A lot of seriously mentally ill people function at high levels of intellectual prowess.

But, you're right ... whether we view it as a disability or negative perceptual programming ... it is the denial of reality implicit in the issue is the serious problem facing our society.

a reply to: Gryphon66

It may not seem like much of a difference to you, but to me I see a big difference. Brainwashing from propaganda can be resisted if you have the intelligence to overcome them (and once it is recognized and resisted it becomes easier and easier to break the programming as time goes on), while mental illnesses are ingrained in your head and it is pretty much a life long battle to stay on top of them.