Stumble it!Lets not become ‘Them’
posted in Society by themaiden |I spend a lot of time on this blog writing about tolerance. I try to argue tolerance for everyone not actively harming someone else. I try to press the point that we’ve got to get along or we’ll all go down in flames together. I try to stress that tolerance means co-existing with people you don’t like. Choose otherwise and you start to fragment the society upon which we all depend. Choose otherwise and cliquish factions start to coagulate and start to war.
Tolerance– the tolerance upon which civilization depends– is not a matter of keeping one’s mouth shut, of never challenging beliefs. It is a matter of behaving civilly in the public sphere.
I’ve argued for gay marriage, opposition to which is a form of senseless intolerance.
I’ve argued against, on principle, a law that amounts to a kind of intolerance of opinion even though that law attacks a mindset I find repulsive.
What this means in no uncertain terms is that prosecution of a crime is at least partially dependent upon the opinions, the convictions, and the beliefs, of the person who committed the crime. There is no way to reasonably spin this as anything other than prosecution for ‘thought crime’. The law cannot concern itself with the underlying motivation for the crime, except for the issue of self-defense.
I’ve argued for tolerance of religion.
Unlike many of the faithful on the right who whine about religious freedom, I actually do support religious freedom. When I say that I support religious freedom I do not mean that “I support everyone’s right to follow my religion.” What I mean is that however stupid I think your faith is– and by implication, however stupid I think you are– I do support your right to practice it so long as it doesn’t involve, for example, making candles out of baby fat or otherwise injuring non-consenting people.
I’ve argued against intolerances provoked by religion.
Individuals must be allowed to disagree, to criticize, to parody, and to ridicule. Otherwise, there is no freedom, really. It is not true, as printed in an Al-Thawra editorial, that it is unjust to allow one group to insult another. It is unjust to allow one group to run roughshod over another, but ideas are a different matter. No group, or individual, can be bound to agree with another group nor can an idividual be bound to hold his or her tongue about that disagreement. Such shackling of the mind is an insult to humanity. It is part of freedom, part of being free, part of love of freedom, that one accepts that one’s belief’s will find detractors.
And I’ve tried to point out how religion promotes such nonsense.
So it is with much irritation that I address this:
Reason for Boycott: Each year at christmas time, the wrapper design for Sunbeam bread is changed to show “Little Miss Sunbeam” in prayer. The graphic is the same as the one used for the sun catcher sold on the corporate website. www.sunbeambread.com Letters have been written to the company to ask that the practice be stopped. The company’s response is that many customers like the design. Apparently, the company is not concerned about all of its customers.
Boycott a business over a god-damned wrapper? Please. What whiny self-righteous crap.
There are reasons for boycotts and some points at Atheist Activist are valid, but others– most, probably– are nonsense. This is not “Driving a Wedge Between Church and State”, as the tag line reads. This is another form of intolerance. A business has a right to print baby Jesus on its wrappers if the owners wish. Let’s not become like ‘Them’ folks.
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