God hates fags!
I was mailed a link to an article about 'Judeo-Christian' values the other day (by a person who, if he's reading this, I respect the opinions of and do not assume he agrees with everything the author says), and at the moment I am in total confusion as to specifically what these values that Jews and Christians have that people with different religions don't. It can't be believing in a god, or as he puts it "Instead of being guided by God, the Bible and religion, great numbers... have looked elsewhere for moral and social guidelines." because most religions have a set of principles and rules and often texts that people look to for guidance. It can't be believing in the same god, because the god of the Old Testament has a rather different personality and set of priorities than the god of the New Testament. It can't be things like not being ragingly foul to each other and not raping maiming and killing thy neighbor, because every religion tells you not to do those things, and most religions have broken one or other of those rules as a group trying to convince people how right they are about not doing them.
His main objection (his name is Dennis Prager and you can find him at www.townhall.com) is as follows: "The entire edifice of moral relativism, a foundation of leftist ideology, is built on the notion of feelings deciding right and wrong. One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter."
He goes on to list the following things as examples of how this leads you to go wrong:
"War is not the answer"
"animals-and-humans-are-equivalent"
"support of liberals for radically redefining the basic institution of society, marriage and the family"
"sympathy for homosexuals"
"The "self-esteem movement" -- now conceded to have been a great producer of mediocrity and narcissism -- was entirely a liberal invention based on feelings for kids."
"The liberal preoccupation with whether America is loved or hated"
"the entire worth of the human fetus is determined by the mother's feelings"
"Elevating motives above results"
But admits:
"Patriotism is largely a feeling; religious faith is filled with emotion, and religion has too often been dictated by emotion"
Now, the things he ascribes to a lackof these unspecified Judeo-Christian values (and I don't want to be ignorant and prejudiced myself by suggesting those only consist of 'Don't be gay' and 'Don't have abortions', but these are the only examples I ever get given) fall in to two categories- things I broadly agree with, and things that not only Jews and Christians believe. Things I broadly agree with, for example are that yes, sometimes war is the answer, and I'm grateful to every soldier who ensured the situation where I have friends who are Jewish and every other minority Hitler would have no doubt got around to wiping out eventually if he'd had his way. I agree that animals and humans aren't the same or of the same kind of importance. It was a bloody disgrace to waste so much time on fox hunting when there were so many more important issues that could have been worked on. Animals do have an importance, the food chain and interdependent nature of the natural world being a good example, and deserve not to be unnecessarily poorly treated, but I am higher up the food chain by dint of opposable thumbs, and I shall continue to use my thumbs to hold my bacon sarnie. I also agree with criticism of this 'Don't hurt the ickle children's feelings by telling them how to behave' nonsense. It leads to the deeply unhappy out of control kids we saw on Brat Camp (in every case blatantly the parents fault for spoiling them and being lousy people and lousy parents) and to greater stress for those of us who have to be on public transport with them.
The thing is, I wasn't bought up 'Christian', my parents went to church and Sunday school as young people, but they never took me. And I must have been smacked about a half dozen times ever. Somehow although I'm a raving loony, I'm not a total brat and I never have been. Practical upshot: there were never any rows about me going to clubs etc cos I knew without having to ask I was going nowhere until I was legally old enough or without respec'ing my mother with the details of where I was going and Mi Janey's mobile number in case of emergencies. She's happy, I'm happy. Trust earned, good times had.
As to the things I agree less with, concern about people saying it's ok to be gay, concern about the different types of family that exist these days and so on, I always got the impression from the (for example) Hindu and Muslim kids at school who had conservative parents that these were issues for them too. So it's conservative members of most religions, not just the 'J-C' brigade.
As to 'elevating motives above results', history has taught us to be careful of things being the thin end of a bad wedge. The intentions of the people lobbying for certain laws may not be that they are one day used to persecute people, but you have to be very careful about the precedent you are setting. If you can declare one group of people, say homosexuals, to be less equal than others, what group can you later not declare to be less equal? Women? Old people? The disabled? Can you swear to me there'll never be another Hitler? Can you swear to me it wont be in America or Britain?
Then we come to the issue of using 'feelings' as a basis for decisions. What is the effect of your conscience if not to give you a feeling? And what is the dislike of homosexuals if not a feeling of disgust? That is the basis of most people's objections to gayness. "It's disgusting, it's not natural!" Ok. Tell that to the penguins. Yes, I'd not relish getting sticky with a lady myself, as it goes. Doesn't bother me if someone else does though. As it goes I'm not up for batty action either, but as long as it's not aimed at my batty I don't care who is.
The idea that it is even remotely possible for what someone else does in the bedroom to affect me (unless you mean in a 'my sister making me an aunt' -don't, by the way- way) is utterly ridiculous. And I know someone with a gay mum. She's not gay, even a tiny bit. And of all the men I'd trust to be responsible babysitters to any kids I might catch in the future if my vaccination fails me, the gay ones would be highest on the list. The straight ones have more of a tendency to get the beer out and stick a horror film/Slipknot album on, and I'd far rather they watched 'The Sound of Music' or listened to Abba (sorry, I'm allowed a couple of gay jokes, I'm being affectionate). If you are allowed to ban people from shagging people because you find it disgusting, can I ban the 'Fat girls and Feeders' and the middle aged leather clad wife swappers you see on channel 5?
So I would ask anyone reading this who knows what these values that only Jews and Christians have, that both Jews and Christians have (I'll let you off on 'all Jews and Christians have') to post as a comment or email to me one value that you have that you would expect me as a pagan not to have, and one each for as many other religions as you can manage that you would expect them no to have. Then I'll know where I'm going wrong, wont I?


1 Comments:
we've all got our murdering nutter fringe elements haven't we. oh, except witches.
Feelings inculde other peoples and it's rightness that's supreme be it god originated or not.
there are good and evil. and your conscience gives you the feeling of whether you're doing right or wrong. if religion helps you set the boundries jolly good, but it's not the only way.
And it'd be wrong to found a country by cheating it out of or stealing it from the natives and killing them if they object, then? lets give thanksgiving for that....
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