It's OK to say someone is wrong!

It's the law statewide in WA but will soon be coming to a restroom near you – the end to gender discrimination! What discrimination? They mean the barbaric practice of having separate facilities (restrooms, locker rooms, spas, etc) for men and women. How archaic it is that modest people do not want to disrobe in front of people whose gender is different than their own!

It's the usual tactic of liberals to force the majority to kowtow to the minority. Last time it was gay marriage. It wasn't enough that a gay couple had the right to have a ceremony and call themselves married, liberals wanted to make everyone else to treat them as married. Now they're doing the same thing with gender-confused persons. They can't just pretend to be another gender, we're being forced to accept their stated gender.

The problems I have with this are the same problems being discussed by everyone else. Why do I have to share a locker room with a woman because she's confused about her gender? And what's to stop a grown man from using these laws to spy on little girls in restrooms? If a man wants to wear a dress and say he's a woman, he can. There wasn't a law against it. But now there are laws that say women have to welcome him into their locker rooms and restrooms. What about my rights? What about my right to privacy? What about my right of association? What about my right of religion? It's the majority that is made to feel uncomfortable for the sake of sparing the feelings of the minority. It's insane.

But none of this is really the point of my post. Instead, it's about this twisted attitude of tolerance that says we must accept people for who they are. Here's a short video that really drives this point home.

At the end of the video, the interviewer sums it up well. How can we discuss complicated issues if one side believes no one should ever say another person is wrong? A 5'9”, grown, white man could say he's a 6'5”, 7-year-old, Chinese woman and enter the first grade. You can see the college students hemming and hawing in the video, struggling to be tolerant of what they knew were ridiculous claims, but they just couldn't bring themselves to say the interviewer was wrong. It's funny, because I'm sure these same students would have no problems telling me I'm wrong to believe in creation or that Christians are wrong to call someone a sinner.  It's my opinion that this brand of tolerance is dangerous. 

I've heard about a strange disorder called xenomelia (literally, “foreign limb” in Greek). People with this disorder do not identify with one or more of their extremities. They might feel like their foot, for example, doesn't really belong to them. Victims of xenomelia will often ask doctors to amputate the intruding limb. Fortunately, most doctors will refuse.

My point in raising xenomelia is to demonstrate that the correct treatment for victims of dysphoria is not necessarily to indulge their disorder. Since we don't amputate the healthy limbs of people with xenomelia, why should we perform gender-reassignment surgery on people with gender-identity disorders? From a Federalist article we read:

[A] study commissioned by The Guardian of the UK in 2004 reviewed 100 studies and reported that a whopping 20 percent (one fifth) of transgenders regret changing genders.... The review of 100 studies also revealed that many transgenders remained severely distressed and even suicidal after the gender change operation. Suicide and regret remain the dark side of transgender life.

I'm not a medical doctor – but neither are most of the liberals (or these college students) who are pleading for tolerance and acceptance of the transgendered. It seems to me the jury is still out on the best treatment of gender-confused people and this rush to normalize them isn't helpful to anyone, especially the victims. I believe we've let political forces influence our medical decisions. It will not surprise me if laws are passed that ban counseling for gender-identity disorders if the goal is to rid the victims of the desire to change genders.

But this phenomenon to “not judge” people for how they identify themselves isn't limited to gender-identity. We see similar “tolerance” of other types of body modification like tattooing, piercings, gauging, and even more extreme examples. There are also examples of people obsessed with improving appearance through plastic surgery and boob jobs. At what point do we tell people they're harming themselves? Or are we just supposed to indulge any behavior because that's how they identify themselves?

Yet more than all that, I feel this attitude is especially dangerous in the Church. How many times have you heard Christians say something like, “we have to hate the sin but love the sinner”? I agree, but part of loving the sinner is to tell them they are sinners in need of forgiveness. We cannot water down the gospel by telling people, “Jesus loves you just as you are.” If we allow people to think it's OK if they are gay or a philanderer or a drug user or whatever other vices they may have, we're telling them they don't need a Savior!

1 John 1:8-9 says, If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

The key to the gospel is repentance. Unless a person is convicted of his sin, he will not feel the need to repent. If we are telling people they have no sin, the Bible says we're lying! If we love people, we need to tell them the truth. It's for their own good! It's OK to tell people they're wrong!

Too Quick to Forgive

The Bible commands us to forgive. Sometimes, though, someone may have committed such a great wrong against us that we have trouble forgiving him. In those cases, we feel justified in holding a grudge. Nevertheless, the Bible is clear – if the sinner repents, we are to forgive him.

Be on your guard! If your brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him. And if he sins against you seven times a day, and returns to you seven times, saying, ‘I repent,’ forgive him.”

Luke 17:3-4

The words of Jesus are clear: we rebuke the sinner but then we forgive him if he repents! Christians, in general, tend to be very forgiving. In the case of our personal dealings with other people, it's probably always the best thing to do. Don't hate. Don't hold a grudge. Just forgive. However, from a political perspective, I believe we're a little too quick to forgive.

I was reading and article online about the Fire Chief in Atlanta who was just fired for having written a book (completely on his own time) that discussed his Christian perspective on sexual morality. Considering that this is a municipality, a governing body, punishing a person for expressing his religious beliefs, I don't see how this is not a violation of the Free Exercise clause of the First Amendment. The mayor of Atlanta said, “I will not tolerate discrimination of any kind within my administration.” Now that's funny. I guess he means, “discrimination of any kind against gays.” He seems to have no problem with personally discriminating against Christians.

Now, I hold government bodies to a different standard than I do private employers. I believe the state cannot be allowed to discriminate at all. We could not, for example, have a fire department that refuses to enter a black neighborhood or a police department that refuses to arrest white people accused of crimes against blacks. On the other hand, I believe private individuals and employers should have the right to discriminate. If this fire chief worked in another capacity for a private employer, I wouldn't be arguing that his rights were violated. However, I would still hold it against that employer.

The fire chief article included a link to the Duck Dynasty fiasco that happened about a year ago. I don't watch the show, but I understand one man on the show expressed his religious beliefs about gay marriage and A&E, the channel which carries the show, tried to drop him from the show. Cracker Barrel, a restaurant chain that offers southern style cuisine, also said it would no longer sell Duck Dynasty merchandise. Well, the backlash they received from the public was so severe, both reversed their decisions within 48 hours.

Since both A&E and Cracker Barrel are private businesses, I believe they were acting in their rights. They shouldn't face government fines for their decisions but these employers need to be held accountable by the public. Frankly, I'm getting sick and tired of businesses discriminating against Christians for the sake of tolerance toward gays.

When A&E and Cracker Barrel made these decisions, the public let them know they didn't like it. But even though they reversed themselves, I wonder how repentant they were. A NY Daily News article quotes A&E as follows:

“We at A&E Networks expressed our disappointment with his statements in the article, and reiterate that they are not views we hold,” the network’s statement continued. “But ‘Duck Dynasty’ is not a show about one man’s views.”

Hmm. That doesn't sound very repentant. To me it sounds like they're saying, “We still hate Robertson's views but we're going to keep him on the air because we don't want to lose all the viewers who agree with him.” I would have liked to hear something more like, “We were wrong and acted rashly. Robertson expressed his deeply held religious beliefs and we should have respected his right to do so. We believe in tolerance and that should include tolerating even those views different than ours.”

Cracker Barrel was slightly more contrite. Another NY Daily news article says:

You flat out told us we were wrong. We listened. Today, we are putting all our Duck Dynasty products back in our stores. And, we apologize for offending you.... We respect all individuals' right to express their beliefs.... We certainly did not mean to have anyone think different. [They should apologize for their poor grammar. They should have used “differently.”]

Do see what I mean by only, “slightly more contrite”? You told us we were wrong. We apologize for offending you. We didn't mean to have you think we don't respect everyone's beliefs. Where's the part where they said, “We were wrong”?  We're constantly being abused by intolerant businesses and government officials and we accept their non-committal apologies. 

1 John 1:9 says, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins.” What kind of “confession” is it if I said, “Forgive me, God, if I've done anything wrong”? In such a weak prayer you're not even admitting to any sin, let alone confessing one.  If these companies would admit to being wrong, I would forgive them. But since they don't, I won't. They need to be held accountable for their sins. We need to make them see that we won't forgive them until they repent. If we hold their feet to fire every time they make a bad decision, they might become a little more circumspect. Maybe they'd reconsider their corporate philosophies. Maybe they'll stop making such bad decisions in the first place.

Shut up and write the check!

So, I've told you before that liberals are brain damaged. Here's another example.

Liberals claim to be tolerant, right? I think their favorite Bible verse is, “Judge not lest ye be judged.” It's probably the only verse some of them know. If a person wants to have sex without being married, with multiple partners, or even with same sex partners, it's none of my business. What happens between consenting adults is a private matter and my opinion of the behavior is not welcome. I even hear similar things from Christians: how, if a young, single woman gets pregnant, we need to support her as a church and not judge her. Does any of this sound familiar?

Here's where the brain damaged part comes in. Liberals are champions of the “right to privacy” but what happens when these people contract a sexually transmitted disease or a young girl gets pregnant? Often they seek out public assistance!

How many millions are we spending on AIDS research? How about welfare, food stamps, and rent subsidies to single mothers? And don't forget the tax payer money going to Planned Parenthood to pay for abortions! When these people were engaging in their reckless behavior, it was a private matter; now that they have to face the consequences of their bad decisions, it's suddenly not so private anymore. Now they expect to be supported by the public.

It's not just the people who engage in this type of behavior that bother me; it's also the enablers, those who defend them. The same people who are telling me not to judge those who do these things are also telling me I have to pay more in taxes to help them.

It's rather pathetic. Liberal elitists view themselves as tolerant (by not judging others) and compassionate (by wanting to support them). What they don't understand is that this kind of tolerance and compassion only exacerbates the problem. People need to be told that bad decisions have consequences. They need to hear that having a child before being married virtually guarantees a lifetime of poverty. They need to be told that abstinence is 100% effective at preventing pregnancy and STDs. They need to understand that “safe and legal” abortions can have severe and lasting physical and psychological side effects. We also need to stop subsidizing poor choices with government programs that only perpetuate poverty.

If the public is paying the bills, then shouldn't the public have a say in the matter? What is wrong with telling young men and women it's a bad idea to have sex or to live together without being married? Yet if I say this, then I'm the one accused of being “intolerant” or that I'm trying to force my religion on everyone else.

Liberals are 100% backward in their thinking. The compassionate thing to do is to tell people it's wrong to engage in certain behaviors. If we truly care for these people, we need to set them on the right track. The liberal solution is that I should shut up and write a check!

More Liberal Bigotry

Liberals are bigots. It's a symptom of their ideology - an inevitable consequence of their political agenda. Bigotry is as fundamental to liberalism as swimming is to fish. You cannot be a liberal without being a bigot. Liberals, for example, see every black face as a victim. They don't believe blacks are able to take care of themselves so they must be subsidized with tax payer dollars. Liberals stereotypically believe every black person is the same – they think the same, they struggle the same, and they are all equally victims of whites. Never mind Dr. King's dream that men should be judged by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin, if a black man wants a job, or to go to college, or to start a business, liberals automatically think he needs special consideration because he's black. The color of his skin is the first criterion liberals consider. It's called, “affirmative action.” To liberals, blacks are “disadvantaged” as though being black is like being handicapped.

Because they are bigots in their very core, liberals are blind to they own bigotry. It's kind of like that stinky person who can't smell his own body odor. If a conservative should disagree with a black person about anything, then liberals assume the conservative is only disagreeing with the person because he's black. They just can't understand the concept of judging a person (even a black person) by his actions or words. Likewise, if conservatives talk about “welfare reform,” liberals accuse them of racism because the liberals think most people on welfare are black. And heaven forbid if a black person dares to believe he's not a victim and works hard to improve himself because then that person is accused of trying to “act white” and labeled an “Uncle Tom.”

I moved to Kentucky in the summer of 1970, when I was only 4 years old. Even though I was a more than a decade removed from Segregation, I remember some of the racial tensions that still lingered in the South. Being white myself, I can't say I can entirely empathize with the struggles blacks faced in the 50's but I can at least say I'm sympathetic to it. I can imagine, at least a little, the smoldering defiance Rosa Parks must have felt when she refused to give up her seat to a white man and move to the back of the bus.

Certainly there was racism then. For the record, I'm against racism but I'm still for liberty. If a person wants to be racist, I think it's his right to be a racist. However, the real problem wasn't necessarily the racist attitudes that were prevalent at the time but rather it was the segregation laws that put teeth in racism. For example, it would be sad if a black man wouldn't marry a white woman for fear they might be shunned by a racist society. It's a far worse thing, though, to make laws against interracial marriage. It was the laws allowing segregation that truly made blacks the victims of racists.

Democrats back then were all for institutional racism. For example, it was Democrat governor, George Wallace, who stood blocking the steps to a segregated school in Alabama and said, “segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever.” Since then, Democrats may have officially denounced segregation, but they are still not able to divorce themselves from the racism inherent in the liberal wing of the Democrat party.

So where am I going with all this? I mention this now because here in my own beloved state of Kentucky, liberal Democrats have abused the power of their office to impose their racism on another class of people – Bible believing Christians. Just recently, our Democrat Secretary of State, Bob Stewart, advised Ark Encounter, LLC, the group building the Noah's ark themed attraction in KY, that the state has changed its mind on the group's application for a tax incentive KY makes available to tourist attractions. The Ark Encounter will not be receiving the incentive after all.

When I first wrote about the Ark Encounter project 4 years ago, it had already been approved to receive a special tax incentive the state of KY makes available to lure tourist attractions here. It's not really a subsidy, per se. Instead, new tourist attractions can receive a partial rebate of the amount of sales tax they generate for the state. In other words, for every sales tax dollar the state receives from Ark Encounter visitors, they would give a few cents back to the park. So it doesn't cost the state any money – the state is making money from the park. What's more, it's only paying the incentive out of funds received by people visiting the park! No money is being taken from property taxes, income taxes, etc.

Some other attractions in KY that have received this same incentive are the Newport Aquarium and the Kentucky Speedway.

When the park originally applied for the incentive, it was clear this was a for-profit endeavor but was still overtly religious in nature. From the get go, folks like Barry Lynn objected to a religious organization receiving “tax payer funding” but the incentives were approved notwithstanding. With that approval in hand, the group raised the necessary funds, purchased the land, got the permits, and began building. Now, the state has changed its mind and told the group they will not receive the incentive after all. They claim to object on the grounds that AiG intends to use the park to proselytize (AiG has always been very clear about this) and that workers are required to sign a faith statement – which is a federal right for religious organizations. So the objections sound rather shallow since very little has changed about the park's stated goals since the state approved the original application.

I'm not sure how much the group relied on this incentive to make its decision on where to build but I know it was at least a factor. Its location is only a few miles away from OH and IN so the group had other options on where it could build and still be reasonably close to the Creation Museum. It's a rather dirty trick to lure the business in with the incentive and then take it away after it's too late to change its mind.

But besides that, what annoys me the most about all this is how the state is hurting Christians with its racist policies. We saw the same thing when the Boston Mayor wanted to ban Chick-fil-A because its president supported traditional marriage or the confiscatory fines levied against Hobby Lobby because they did not want to pay for employees' abortion inducing drug prescriptions. Time after time, the government treats religious people and businesses as second class citizens. Sec. Stewart said in his letter that the Ark Encounter, “will generate jobs and visitor spending that will be welcomed in the local economy.” I'm sure it will and he is happy to accept it; he just won't offer the same incentive KY has given to non-religious attractions. It's sort of like the bus driver who didn't mind receiving a fare from Rosa Parks but still didn't want her to sit in the white people's section.

If this were a black owned business, Democrats would be falling all over themselves to give away subsidies because they believe blacks can't run a business without help from white liberals. But this is a Christian owned business and they treat Christians differently. They can't see how refusing to give a religious business the same incentive available to anyone else is discrimination.

I'll say it again. Liberals are bigots.

Liberalism: The Cult of Intolerance

My recent visitor, Carvin, has given me a lot of points to discuss. In a reply to him, I mentioned I would make use of some of his comments to write future blog posts. Many of the points he raised are of interest to everyone.

His first comment was to a post I had written titled, “And You Think We're Embarrassing?” You can read the post for yourself, of course, but my main point was how certain liberals (like Pam Platt of the Courier Journal) seem embarrassed by Bible believing Christians while liberals seem to embrace outrageous antics like those seen at Gay Pride parades. In his response to my point, Carvin said:

[M]ost liberals are perfectly fine when you limit your trouble to an opinion which you express. Your certainly do run the risk of being considered homophobic, but that comes with the territory of the fundamentalist view of homosexuality- it is, in fact, homophobic. It is a Biblical interpretation that is used in the oppression and control of non-hetero people. Again, just having a view on this is still fine. Most liberals would be quite happy if the fundamentalist view was kept within house- that is, if you feel it is wrong to be in a homosexual relationship, this is fine: just don't force anyone else to live by your standard.

If liberalism were just someone's opinion, I would happily agree with Carvin. Everyone is entitled to his opinion – even a wrong opinion. Liberals are wrong about a lot of things and I can live with them being wrong. The real problem, though, is that liberals aren't content with expressing their opinions. Liberals are elitists who not only think they know what's best for every, they aggressively seek ways to impose their standards on everyone else.

Do you think I'm exaggerating? I've been writing this blog for almost 7 years now and I have more than a few examples of this occurring. Let me remind you of just a few that I've already discussed.

Compelling Christians to comply with secular standards probably occurs most often in public schools. In June, 2006, valedictorian, Brittan McComb, was asked to give a speech to her graduating class. She was a Christian, and wanted to give thanks to God for His role in her life. School officials warned her to omit references to God and on the day of her graduation, when she began making reference to God, the school officials turned off her mic. This was her speech talking about her achievements yet school officials didn't think she should be thanking God. I guess it would have been OK if she thanked Oprah.

When the Creation Museum opened, a group called DefCon attempted to thwart their efforts. A board member of DefCon was also an elected, public school official who encouraged public school teachers to sign a petition against the museum. What ever happened to the supposed “separation of church and state”?

Nature wrote an article called, “Dealing with Design” wherein it explained to educators how they should teach students to reconcile their religious beliefs (as in the creation account in Genesis) with “science” (meaning “evolution”). This is not just teaching evolution; it's an active attempt to dissuade a student away from his biblical belief and accept a secular belief.

Do I even need to talk about the National Center For Science Education? The groups stated purpose for existing is to combat a belief in creation among students. More recently, the group also has been recruited to combat doubters in global warming.

But of course, liberals don't just limit their attempts to control to just students. In 2001, a lesbian couple sued two Christian doctors who had refused to provide artificial insemination on the grounds of their religious beliefs. The lesbian couple was able to get the service elsewhere but sued in order to punish the Christian doctors for not complying to the liberal lesbians' standards.

Because of his support of traditional marriage, the president of Chick-fil-A was told by an Chicago alderman, “There are consequences for freedom of speech (and) in this case the consequences are... you're not going to have your first free-standing restaurant in Chicago.” So, in this case, who is forcing their standard on whom?

Obamacare is forcing all employers, including businesses owned by Christians, to provide birth control and abortion-inducing drugs to their employees, regardless of the employers' religious objections. Not only is the employer's right to practice his religion made subservient to the employee's unenumerated “right” to an abortion, the employer is ordered by law to pay for it!

There are even more that I have cited on my blog and many, many more that I haven't. People can't buy 32 oz colas in NY because they might get fat. McDonald's can't put toys in their happy meals because parents can't say no to their kids. School officials search students' lunchboxes to make sure parents are doing their job. Parents can't have school vouchers because they might send their kids to white supremacy schools (I'm not kidding). Need I remind Carvin that he himself has endorsed compelling business owners to pay higher wages because the liberal thinks the wage should be more. The list goes on.

When liberals think something is right, they don't just talk about it. They don't just express their opinion about it. They want to force people to comply with it. They do it because they think they're the experts and we just don't know how to take care of ourselves. See this video and hear it for yourself. Time after time after time, liberals are happy to compel people to conform to the liberal standard. I don't blog about liberals just because they annoy me (though they do). I blog about liberals because they are a threat to liberty.

No Christian Owned Businesses Allowed In Boston!

You know, I've about had it up to here with liberals. I'm not talking about the rank and file Democrat, mind you, though they're annoying enough. I'm talking specifically about liberals in elected office. They go far beyond annoying.

A certain amount of “bleeding heart” can be attributed to altruism. Feed the hungry, help the poor, and similar objectives may be noble ideals but liberals and conservatives have different ideas about how to address them. The problem with liberalism is that, the more committed one is to the idea, the more irrational he must be. A quest for tolerance, for example, virtually drives liberals to be intolerant. It's unavoidable. So I've resigned myself to the fact that, if I wish to contend in the arena of ideas, I will have to suffer listening to the hypocrisy of liberals. Oh well.

However, when we're talking about elected liberals, we're talking about something else all together. Because of their political office, they are in a position to force their ideology onto people. They're not just annoyances, they're despots!

Just recently, Dan Cathy, the President of Chick-fil-A made some comments about how he supported the biblical definition of marriage and expressed his concerns that America's attitudes toward gays might bring a judgment from God. Whether or not anyone agrees with Mr. Dan's comments is not the point. No one can argue that Mr. Dan has a first Amendment Right to say them. The First Amendment not only protects his free speech, it also protects his right to hold his religious beliefs. And just in case you haven't read the First Amendment lately, I will remind you that it specifically forbids the government from infringing on our freedom of speech or prohibiting the free exercise of our religion. In other words, the First Amendment doesn't restrict what I can do – it restricts what the government can do.

Of course, liberals politicians will never let something like the Constitution stand in the way of their particular brand of justice. In response to Mr. Cathy's comments, Boston Mayor, Thomas Menino said the following:

“I was angry to learn on the heels of your prejudiced statements about your search for a site to locate in Boston. There is no place for discrimination on Boston's Freedom Trail and no place for your company alongside it.”

Isn't that strange? I mean, what would liberals be saying if a conservative mayor said something like, “Because of their favorable view of gay marriage, Starbucks is not welcome in our city”? No doubt they'd be protesting that mayor just like they are now protesting Chick-fil-A. Liberals are blind to their own intolerance.

Other liberal politicians have made similar remarks. One Chicago alderman, Joe Moreno said, “There are consequences for freedom of speech (and) in this case the consequences are... you're not going to have your first free-standing restaurant in Chicago." Gee. How much more blatant can they be? Do I need to remind the alderman that free speech specifically means that one can express his political or religious views without consequences? I suppose I must because he doesn't seem to get it. If a private citizen suffers political reprisal for expressing his political or religious views, he doesn't have free speech!

Would liberals dare say the same thing of black owned businesses?  What about a Muslim owned business? Never mind.  The hypocrisy of liberals in this case is an ancillary issue. What concerns me more is the blatant attack on religious liberty. Democrat mayors and other elected officials are specifically abusing the powers of their office to exact punishment on a privately owned company because of the religious beliefs of its president. This should be grounds for their impeachment.

These people should be ashamed but they're not. They remind me of the Democrats of old who stood on the steps of schools in the segregated south and refused to let black students enter. The Mayor of Boston might as well post a sign at the city limits: “No Christian Owned Businesses Allowed In Boston!”

Bigots! Tyrants! Bullies! Despots! Did I mention how they annoy me?

It's Now A Crime to Tease Someone

I was a little surprised to hear the verdict in the “webcam spying” case. Actually, I wasn't surprised; it's more like concerned. According to Philly.com, “Former Rutgers University student Dharun Ravi was found guilty of invasion of privacy and bias intimidation Friday in a webcam spying case that focused national attention on the harassment of gay teenagers.” [bold added]  It's the “bias intimidation” part that really scares me.

From what I understand about the case, the 20-year-old defendant had witnessed, via his webcam, his gay roommate kissing another man. He tweeted about it and jokingly said he would invite others to view the next encounter. In spite of some early rumors surrounding the case, no videos of the act were made and certainly nothing was posted on YouTube. The gay roommate, Tyler Clementi, committed suicide, allegedly out of humiliation over the incident.

From the article, a gay-activist attorney said of the verdict, “The verdict today demonstrates that the jurors understood that bias crimes do not require physical weapons like a knife in one's hands.” Really? I don't think the jurors understood very much at all. The article cites one law professor as saying, “The jury appeared to find that Ravi's intentions were not out of hatred or bias but the jurors believed Tyler Clementi perceived them as such.”

Let's set aside the “invasion of privacy” charge for a moment. What exactly is bias intimidation? From this verdict, it doesn't need to be a threat or even need to be intended to intimidate. It simply has to be perceived as intimidating. Remember, we're not talking about the KKK burning a cross in the front yard of a black family. In a case like that, there is overt intimidation and the possibility of violence is very real. In this case, no one threatened the gay student. They merely teased him. More precisely, they didn't even tease him – some people joked about him online. There was never any threat of violence. The “victim” wasn't scared; he was humiliated.

Is this really the precedent we want to set? If you make a joke about someone – never intending to harm him – you could still go to jail? Are gay people so thin skinned that we need to arrest people who are perceived as “insensitive”?

Let's apply this same standard to another demographic. Should we arrest people who make jokes about blacks? Some liberals would say yes so that doesn't work. Let me think... what other group might we use? What about... oh, I don't know... let's say, Christians. If someone makes insensitive remarks about Christians, is it a hate crime?

Let's suppose for a moment, that some atheist blogger wrote a scathing piece about Ken Ham and said hateful things like, “Millions of people, including some of the most knowledgeable biologists in the world, think just about every day that you are an airhead, an ass, a birdbrain, a blockhead, a bonehead, a boob, a bozo, a charlatan, a cheat, a chowderhead, a chump, a clod, a con artist, a crackpot, a crank, a crazy, a cretin, a dimwit, a dingbat, a dingleberry, a dipstick, a ditz, a dolt, a doofus, a dork, a dum-dum, a dumb-ass, a dumbo, a dummy, a dunce, a dunderhead, a fake, a fathead, a fraud, a fruitcake, a gonif, a halfwit, an idiot, an ignoramus, an imbecile, a jackass, a jerk, a jughead, a knucklehead, a kook, a lamebrain, a loon, a loony, a lummox, a meatball, a meathead, a moron, a mountebank, a nincompoop, a ninny, a nitwit, a numbnuts, a numbskull, a nut, a nutcase, a peabrain, a pinhead, a racketeer, a sap, a scam artist, a screwball, a sham, a simpleton, a snake oil salesman, a thickhead, a turkey, a twerp, a twit, a wacko, a woodenhead, and much, much worse.”

Oh, wait a minute, PZ Myers did write that about Ken Ham on his blog. So, is this “bias intimidation”? Isn't Ken Ham being ridiculed because of his religious beliefs? Myers may not be intending to intimidate Ham but, according to this new standard, there need not be any threat of violence. Mr. Ham only needs to feel humiliated. If Mr. Ham, in a fit of depression and humiliation, should jump off the Brent Spence bridge, PZ Myers would probably cheer. No liberal would think for a minute that Myers should face 10 years in jail for his blatant assault on Ham's religious beliefs.

Isn't a person's religious views protected from hate speech or is protection only reserved for a person's sexual orientation? For the record, though, I believe the whole notion of “hate speech” or “hate crimes” is misguided. We already have laws protecting people against violence. What need is there to protect them against ridicule? Sticks and stones, as they say. If I cried “hate speech” every time someone tried to shame me for my religious beliefs, half the cyber-world would be under arrest.

Once again there is a glaring, double-standard in the liberals' application of “rights.” They're not interested in equal treatment of everyone. Tease a gay, go to jail. Ridicule a Christian day after day for years, win the adoration of millions of liberals everywhere. Have I mentioned before that liberals are hypocrites?

Shut Up and Eat the Fish!

I'm not Catholic but where I grew up, there was a large Catholic population. I went to a public school but a large percentage of the kids there were Catholic. At that time, the Catholics still observed the practice of not eating meat on Fridays and, so, the public school I went to always served fish on Fridays. Why? Because a lot of the kids there were Catholic and could only eat fish. You see, even though it was a public school, they made a concession because of the religious beliefs of their kids.

Now, like I said, I'm not a Catholic. There wasn't anything about my religious beliefs that prevented me from eating meat on Fridays. I would have preferred a cheese burger over the fish. If I wanted, I could have had a fit about it. My parents could have hired a lawyer and sued the school over some violation of the separation of church and state. But I didn't do any of these things. Even though I was very young, I understood the concept of tolerance. I shut up and ate the fish.

Tolerance then meant something different than it does now. What liberals call “tolerance” now means not offending anyone. More precisely, "tolerance" means not offending liberals. If I were to pray out loud, for example, I'm being intolerant because an atheist might be offended. I suspect that if that attitude prevailed when I was young, the Catholics would not have been tolerated. The minority atheists would not have been tolerant at all. They would have protested having to eat fish.

This intolerant doctrine of “tolerance” is now the norm in schools. What do schools do now to accommodate the religious beliefs of their students? We no longer have the example of serving fish on Fridays. We do, however, have a sizable percentage of kids who believe in Biblical creation. What accommodations are made for them? Of course, I don't expect public schools to teach Genesis but couldn't they at least show a little respect for their students' beliefs? How about teachers not calling a belief in creation, “superstitious nonsense”? How about not using science books that describe creationism as, “the biblical myth that the universe was created by the Judeo-Christian God in 7 days”? How about not banning from college any home-schooled kids who used a creation based curriculum? Couldn't these things be seen as just a touch intolerant?

Again, I'm not asking schools to teach creation. It would just be nice to see a little of this tolerance I keep hearing about.

And You Think We're Embarrassing?

I've said many times in the past that I can't figure out the left. In fact, I've said it so many times that I'm starting to feel a little silly. Surely I can come up with something a little more original, can't I? Honestly I can't. I just cannot understand how liberals think. Oh sure, I always know what they're going to think; they're always going to hate Christians and conservatives. It's their reasoning that I can't figure out. They are able to simultaneously hold completely contradictory views and still be totally oblivious to their hypocrisy. How does a mind work like that?

OK, here's the most recent example. Liberals are all about diversity, right? I mean, they're for equality, tolerance, fairness, yadda, yadda, yadda. Take something like homosexuality. If my city ever hosted an event like a Gay Pride parade, I'd be embarrassed. Yet not the liberals. They're proud of their gay pride. To them, being gay is like a virtue and the more outrageous a gay person is, the more tolerant they are. If I don't “tolerate” their embarrassing antics, then I'm the one who has the problem. I'm called a homophobe.

Now let's compare that to the recent announcement to build an Ark-based tourist attraction in Kentucky. It seems that Courier Journal columnist, Pam Platt, is really embarrassed by it. In her editorial, A Whirlwind of Ignorance, (a reference to the movie, Inherit the Wind, based loosely on the Scopes trial), Ms. Platt said, “the proposed creationism park reinforces unfortunate stereotypes about Kentucky and Kentuckians.” In other words, she believes if we build such an attraction, it would only prove we're all just backward hicks.

Ms. Platt, where's some of that liberal tolerance now? Why is it that cities like San Francisco are called progressive and enlightened because of their tolerant attitude toward flaming homosexuals while KY embarrasses you because people here actually believe the Bible? I guess some beliefs are more equal than others. I wonder what liberals would be saying if there were a Gay Pride museum being built instead. No doubt we'd be hearing pleas for tolerance.

Can you imagine the outrage I would hear if I said I would be embarrassed if a Mosque was built in my neighborhood? Yet liberals see no hypocrisy when they feel embarrassed by Bible believing Christians. Liberals' hearts don't bleed for us.

It's clear to see who is the bigot here. Ms. Platt is a bigot of the most blatant sort. The Courier Journal should be embarrassed by her.  There's a term for Ms. Platt and those like her – they're called “theophobes.”

More Intolerance Toward Christians

I've said before that if there is going to be a supposed “separation of church and state,” it must go both ways (here). Some folks obviously don't get it. I know they don't want students being taught creation in public schools. OK, I'm fine with that as long as teachers understand that neither should they be allowed to make comments on the students' beliefs. Alas, it doesn't work that way.

A recent example of their glaring double standard is unfolding in Knoxville, TN. The schools there are using a science book called, Asking About Life. Page 319 of the book describes creationism as, “the biblical myth that the universe was created by the Judeo-Christian God in 7 days.” Do you see how that might be offensive?

Never mind that I disagree with the truthfulness of the above statement, it's wrong on a number of levels. First, if this is supposed to be a book about science, why does it even discuss beliefs? Just the title of the book, “Asking About Life” suggests that the goal of the book goes beyond merely discussing science. Some evolutionary apologists have made comments like, “science tells how and religion tells why.” The title of this book seems to contradict that.

Beyond all this, however, there is still the nagging problem of the separation of church and state. If liberals object to a public school teacher endorsing creationism under the umbrella that it would endorse a religious belief, then why are they not equally concerned about using a text book that specifically denounces a religious belief? I ask rhetorically, of course, because we already know why: when liberals invoke separation of church and state they mean to say they want to be free from religion.

Liberals are blind to their own hypocrisy. They are hypersensitive to even the most subtle religious observance – such as a teacher wearing a cross – yet they see nothing wrong with calling a student's religious belief a “myth.” And let's be clear, they specifically see nothing wrong with attacking a Christian student's belief. Had this book made an insensitive comment about a Muslim belief, the book's editor would likely have already been prosecuted for a hate crime.

Kurt Zimmermann, a father in the Knoxville school district, has asked that book be banned due to its bias against Christians. Knoxville County School superintendent, Jim McIntyre, disagrees and refused to remove the book from use. The school review committee agreed with McIntyre though a few did think some of the material in the book was “questionable.” Even so, they agreed to here an appeal from Zimmermann on May 7.

The issue should be cut and dry. Public school teachers, as representatives of the state, are supposed to remain neutral toward religion. They should not endorse a particular religious belief and neither should they condemn one. You would think a school superintendent or the members of the review committee would understand such a simple concept. What part of “prohibiting the free exercise thereof” is ambiguous? Perhaps I'm expecting too much from these school board members; maybe they too are victims of public school indoctrination!

This is Tolerance?

For a group that continuously pleads for “tolerance,” liberals are the most intolerant people you will ever meet. To them, “tolerance” means that we must accept their values as being equal – nay, superior – to our own. Here’s a case in point:

In California, back in 2001, a lesbian couple wanted to have a child via artificial insemination. However, the medical practice where they sought services was owned by two Christian doctors who refused to provide the service because of their religious beliefs. Rather than respecting the doctors’ beliefs, the intolerant lesbians sued saying they were being discriminated against. The case made its way to the CA Supreme Court which ruled against the doctors. I guess the doctors’ right to practice their religion (which is supposed to be protected by the First Amendment) is trumped by some un-enumerated “right” to be gay. The parties have recently reached a settlement ending the case.

Oh, by the way, the couple did get the service performed elsewhere and have had 3 children since filing this lawsuit. So it’s not that they couldn’t get the procedure – they were just mad because they couldn’t get it from these Christian doctors. The plaintiff’s attorney said, “It shows a journey that our whole society is taking together, away from intolerance and towards inclusion.” Give me a break. Why couldn’t the gay couple have been tolerant of the doctors’ religious beliefs?

And if you think I’m exaggerating, let me direct your attention to the Hatch Amendment that was defeated in Senate committee yesterday. By a vote of 13-10, the committee members voted down an amendment to the controversial health care bill that would have strengthened existing conscience laws that allow doctors and hospitals to refuse to provide abortions on religious grounds. If health care reform is passed, Christian doctors, nurses, and hospitals could someday be forced to provide abortions. I guess the “right to an abortion” also trumps our right to exercise our religion.

I’d say this is the start of a slippery slope but I fear we’ve already slid down this slope and now wallow in the mud at the bottom. Imagine these very possible scenarios: You’re a Christian landlord and you don’t want to rent your home to an unmarried or gay couple. Too bad! What about if you’re a Christian business owner and you don’t want to include gay partners on employee benefits? Tough luck! What if the pastor of your church refuses to perform a wedding ceremony for a gay couple? Where does it end? If the CA Supreme Court ruling holds, our protected right to practice our religion is subservient to someone else’s right to “not be discriminated against.” We will be forced by law to engage in activity that violates our religious beliefs. And it’s all being done in the name of “tolerance.”

The Separation of Church and State Goes Both Ways

I’m not a fan of the term, “separation of church and state.” I believe it’s a poor paraphrase of the first amendment which actually says, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;” Even a casual reading of this sentence reveals that the restriction is placed on congress (i.e. “the state”). The purpose of the amendments is to protect individuals from the government – not to build a wall between the two.

Too many people have gotten it all wrong. They believe schools should be void of religion. For example, a while back, I blogged about a student who had her microphone turned off during her valedictorian speak at her graduation. Her offense was that she discussed God too much.

Well, one student wasn’t going to take it anymore. In Santa Ana, CA, one student sued his history teacher after the teacher called the student’s belief in creation “religious, superstitious nonsense.” On Monday, a federal judge found that the teacher had indeed violated the constitutional rights of the student. You can read the Fox News article here.

This should have been a no-brainer. What part of “prohibiting the free exercise thereof” didn’t the teacher understand? If a student has a religious belief, then that’s his religious belief. Teachers are not duty bound nor vested with some supreme authority to correct the “superstitious” beliefs of their students. It doesn’t matter if the teacher believes the student is wrong. It’s not the job of the state to decide which religious beliefs are correct and which aren’t.

I hope this is the start of something. We need more precedents like this. If they want a separation of church and state then they need to learn to keep the state away from the teachings of the church. Let the schools teach evolution in the classroom – but then make the teachers shut up about what the students learn from their parents and their church. The separation of church and state must go both ways.

Creation in the Classroom

I’m already on record as saying I don’t want public schools to require teachers to teach creation. I am in favor of teachers being allowed to discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the theory. In February, 2008, Florida went the other way and passed a law requiring schools to teach evolution.

In a New York Times article, author Amy Harmon details the challenges face by one FL biology teacher. From the article:

ORANGE PARK, Fla. — David Campbell switched on the overhead projector and wrote “Evolution” in the rectangle of light on the screen.

He scanned the faces of the sophomores in his Biology I class. Many of them, he knew from years of teaching high school in this Jacksonville suburb, had been raised to take the biblical creation story as fact. His gaze rested for a moment on Bryce Haas, a football player who attended the 6 a.m. prayer meetings of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes in the school gymnasium.

“If I do this wrong,” Mr. Campbell remembers thinking on that humid spring morning, “I’ll lose him.”

Huh? He’ll “lose him”? You’ve got to be kidding me! There you have it folks – indoctrination at its finest. It’s not enough to teach evolution and make sure kids understand the theory; they have to believe it hook-line-and-sinker or they’re lost!

The rest of the article highlights Mr. Campbell’s frustrations:

…at the inaugural meeting of the Florida Citizens for Science, which he
co-founded in 2005, he vented his frustration. “The kids are getting hurt,” Mr.
Campbell told teachers and parents. “We need to do something.”

Oh no, he didn’t! Did he just say kids are getting hurt?! Yes!! Creationism is child abuse – just ask Mr. Campbell.

Of course, the article tries to portray Mr. Campbell as a noble educator with the children’s best interests in mind. It talks about, for example, his patience with Ms. Yancey – the seemingly misguided science teacher who allows children to “draw their own conclusions” about evolution. How enlightened of him!

It’s obvious that Mr. Campbell sees this as a battle between his science and the religious beliefs of his students. He’s also afraid his side is losing:

“The discovery that a copy of “Evolution Exposed,” published by the creationist organization Answers in Genesis, was circulating among the class did not raise his flagging spirits. The book lists each reference to evolution in the biology textbook Mr. Campbell uses and offers an explanation for why it is wrong…. A pastor at a local church, Mr. Campbell learned, had given a copy of “Exposed” to every graduating senior the previous year.”

Where is this supposed “separation of church and state” I keep hearing about? Why does this teacher see it as his personal mission to undo the religious teachings these kids here at home and in church? Why does he lament so when a pastor gives students information that supports the idea that Genesis is a factual account of the creation? Aren’t pastors supposed to preach and defend the word of God?

Again, it’s OK to teach evolution. It’s OK to ask a student what he understands of the scientific theory. It’s not OK to undermine the religious beliefs of the students.

Another Take on eHarmony

OK. So, I’m on the Internet the other day and I hear it again – QUOTE: “if you're a Christian, don't live in a country that values tolerance and diversity.” If I hear one more liberal talk to me about tolerance, I’m going to… Well… I guess I can’t do anything about it but I won’t like it in any event.

It came up in a discussion about eHarmony’s decision (coercion?) to make their services available to gays. Concerning eHarmony, this liberal said, “the right to promote one's values ends where other people's rights begin.” That’s curious. Why can’t it be the right of someone to be gay ends where my right to exercise my religion begins? For ones who wear the mantle of “tolerance”, liberals are the most intolerant people I’ve ever met.

But I’m not here to talk about tolerance. Today, I’m going to talk about the economy. Yes, I think this issue of “fairness” is hurting the economy and I’ll show you how. In my post, eHarmony Caves, I said that if I were the owner of eHarmony, I simply wouldn’t do business in NJ. It just now occurred to me that a lot of people probably feel the same way.

We’re supposed to live in a free market society. To many people, the American dream is to own their own business and to be their own boss. Liberals, of course, believe the American dream is equality to everyone. Not equal opportunity, mind you, but equal results. If someone is very successful in business, and makes a lot of money, the Obama/Biden ticket says it’s time for that person to be “patriotic” and “share the wealth.”

But this eHarmony thing shows another area where liberals want to meddle in the free market. If I run a business, I have to “be fair” in my business dealings as well. Imagine, for example, I save a little money and buy a small house that I’m going to fix up and rent. As a Christian, perhaps I have a moral objection to renting the house to same sex couples. Perhaps I have a moral objection to renting it to unmarried couples. So what? As a Christian landlord, isn’t that my right? I guess not because if I refused to rent to a gay or unmarried couple, you can bet that I’d soon be hearing from a civil rights attorney or even the attorney general.

If I were forced to rent a home and facilitate a relationship that I thought was immoral, I would probably sell the home and forget the whole thing. Likewise, if I wanted to start a business that catered to Christians, but knew I’d have a legal battle from non-Christians and gays, then guess what? I’ll probably not start the business!

What if the owner of eHarmony decided that instead of caving on the issue, he would just close shop instead? In an economy already hurting for jobs, it would be still one more business putting people on the streets.

Now some people will think I’m over reacting. Just ask yourself this: if you are a Christian, would you start a business if you were FORCED to employee gays, give benefits to the same-sex partners of gays, and discipline Christian employees if they dared to object? If anyone answers “No, I wouldn’t start the business” then I rest my case. If even one person doesn’t open a business for fear of violating his religious convictions, then that’s one less opportunity to grow the economy.

Now, if I wanted to open a business that promotes pornography, drinking, dancing, etc, the liberals don’t seem to mind that at all – unless of course I allowed smoking there!

Further reading: eHarmony Caves

eHarmony Caves

In case you haven’t heard, eHarmony has recently settled a 7-year-long lawsuit in NJ by agreeing to offer its services for gays to meet same sex partners (source here). Previously, the site only arranged meetings for heterosexual couples with a focus on long-term relationships and even marriage. Match.com and Yahoo have long offered their sites/service to gays.

I think it’s a ridiculous case. Some news reports have compared it to “a meat-eater suing a vegetarian restaurant for not offering him a rib-eye, or a female patient suing a vasectomy doctor for not providing her hysterectomy services.”

To have fought the battle for seven years is to be commended but the sudden about face is somewhat disconcerting.

The dating site came into prominence in 2001 after its founder, Clark Warren appeared on James Dobson’s radio show. It immediately received 90,000 referrals and has climbed from 4,000 clients in 2001 to more than 20,000,000 today. According to Dr. Dobson, Dr. Warren told the LA Times that association of eHarmony with Focus on the Family is “the kiss of death.”

And when I say, “cave” I mean they CAVED – big time. Some of the terms of the agreement are as follows:

>eHarmony will launch the new same-sex dating site, named "Compatible Partners," by March 31.
>They will offer a free, 6-month subscription to 10,000 gay users.
>Pay the plaintiff, Eric McKinley $5,000 and fork over $50,000 to New Jersey's Civil Rights division "to cover investigation-related administrative costs." (AKA shakedown money)
> Post photos of same-sex couples in the "Diversity" section of its website.
>Revise anti-discrimination statements placed on company websites, in company handbooks and other company publications to make plain that it does not discriminate on the basis of "sexual orientation"

Now, if I owned eHarmony, I would have simply posted the following on my website:

"We’re sorry but our services are not available to residents of New Jersey. For additional information, please contact your attorney general.”

Further reading: Another Take on eHarmony

Cafeteria Christians

“These things said he in the synagogue, as he taught in Capernaum. Many therefore of his disciples, when they had heard this, said, This is an hard saying; who can hear it? When Jesus knew in himself that his disciples murmured at it, he said unto them, Doth this offend you? … From that time many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him.”
John 6:59-61, 66

The buzzword today is, “tolerance.” I’m OK, you’re OK, and we all can worship God in our own way. If anyone says Jesus is the ONLY way, he’s accused of being intolerant.

Too many Christians have bought into this lie. The saddest part is, they apply this philosophy to not only other people, but to themselves as well - “I can believe what I want and God will still love me.” I call these people cafeteria Christians; they pick and choose the parts of the Bible they agree with.

>God is love. OK, that sounds reasonable.
>Preach the gospel to every creature. Isn’t that being a little pushy?
>If you lust after a woman then you’re an adulterer. The term “adulterer” might sound too harsh.
>No one comes to the Father except through Jesus. I don’t believe God means that.

Cafeteria Christians reject the clear teaching of Scripture and replace it with their own “feel good” opinions. By doing this, they create another god for themselves, a god made in their own image. This is a god that doesn’t command them, reign over them, chastise them, or even judge them. They don’t even need to read the Bible, they just seem to know who their god is and they worship him their own way.

But you can’t be a halfway Christian. Jesus said, “And why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46) He said further, “He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad.” (Matthew 12:30)

The Bible says 2 people cannot walk together unless they are in agreement (Amos 3:3). When Jesus preached, He had some people who seemed interested for a while. But when He started saying things they disagreed with, they stopped being followers. If someone wants to disagree with the Bible, it’s his prerogative. Let’s just not pretend that we can call Jesus, “Lord” and not agree with everything He said.