Tag Archives: religion

The Fake “Black Genocide”

July 23, 2015Politics, Uncategorizedabortion, christianity, liars, misogyny, politics, race, religionHarry Underwood

Christian anti-abortion folks who harp about a “black genocide” are some of the most uncaring, hard-hearted, shame-projecting liars.

As if any of them care one bit about AfAm women’s lives, equities or freedoms as much as their uteri.
As if any of them care that the fetuses which develop into infants will grow up into less-than-desirable AfAm women and men.
As if specifically *our lives* matter to the anti-abortion activists.
As if any of these activists think of AfAm women outside of the “welfare queen” “poppin’ out babies” stereotype.
As if any of these activists consider that birth control, condoms and other tools of hygiene should receive more investment and less demonization.
As if any of them are not the ick-attracted authoritarian jackasses who never offer solutions beyond “ban abortion” and “make sex sacred”.
As if you care much about the growth of the AfAm population for as long as abortion has been legal in this country, but that’s an inconvenient truth which disrupts your feigned “black genocide” martyrdom.

Seriously, I wonder why the Southern Baptists ever allied with you lying jackasses after their racist hissy-fit over integration. But you lie about a lot of things to get your ban in place, especially about AfAm women, their bodies and the women and men who love both.

You are as fake as the Exodus, Willie Lynch, the “War on Christmas” and American exceptionalism. We won’t live by your savior narrative. Look at yourself, and say no to #misogynoir. #BlackLivesMatter

My Video Chat w/ The Circle on G+ Hangouts

Pillarization in America

March 30, 2015Uncategorizednon-discrimination ordinance, religionHarry Underwood

In regards to something that Candy said about McKoon’s RFRA, I wonder if anyone has heard of the Dutch system called “pillarization” (“verzuiling”), the system of “politico-denominational segregation of a society” in which, according to Wikipedia, “societies were (and in some areas, still are) “vertically” divided into several segments or “pillars” (zuilen, singular: zuil) according to different religions or ideologies. The best-known examples of this are the Dutch and Belgian ones.

These pillars all had their own social institutions: their own newspapers, broadcasting organisations, political parties, trade unions and farmers’ associations, banks, schools, hospitals, universities, scouting organisations and sports clubs. Some companies even hired only personnel of a specific religion or ideology. This led to a situation where many people had no personal contact with people from another pillar.” Unlike South African apartheid and American Jim Crow, this wasn’t imposed with the collusion of the state and select religio-racial institutions against other religio-racial institutions. Instead, it was imposed by a society which sought to allow for “sphere-based” development along ethical-religious lines. The Calvinist Protestants built their own social safety net in a way which favored their own parishioners, and the Catholics duplicated the same for their own parishioners in order to prevent their working-class members from joining socialist trade unions and organizations which violated what we call “sincerely-held religious beliefs”.

Finally, the socialists built their own “pillar” separate from the other two in order to support fellow socialists (a system unique to Western Europe), while the liberals were left to the remaining nonsectarian public institutions which came to be called the “General pillar”. This system was in existence from the 1860s until the Cold War, when many Dutch citizens started to merge their institutions across sectarian lines and dismantled much of the century of pillarization. Little is left of it, while Belgium has largely retained it in the form of political/language-based pillarization. Here in the U.S., if Candy and other self-identified libertarians accommodate the RFRA’s argument of only going to places where you are welcome because of/in spite of your background, and we distinguish our services/non-profits/businesses by our religio-social allegiances/ accommodations/criminations, I think the pillarization system is where we might be headed.

If we are encouraged to only go to LGBT/woman/PoC/atheist/vegan/etc.-friendly businesses and services rather than “trouble”/”oppress” those business owners and congregations who see such identities and associations as “morally wrong” or “confused”, and reactionary Christians encourage fellow parishioners to only go to places owned or operated by fellow parishioners who advertise such a religious identity, we are segregating ourselves into our own spheres and losing sight of our shared humanity, which is most apparent in the public space.

I’m not just talking about LGBT minorities choosing only accommodative spaces. I’m talking also about the allies who would willingly choose such spaces in solidarity, or would exercise the same solidarity with other groups which are criminated by reactionary politics. In our solidarity and “talking with our feet”, are we also diminishing the public spaces which are most available? Are we also diminishing chances for societal change and access to such changes?

We’re stickering up and marking our accommodational lines – progressive, libertarian, reactionary, whatever – to the advantage of those who are cynical about the social contract and wish to see it ripped apart.

Something has to stand in the gap between (ir)religion and state

March 23, 2015Politics, To Export 2, Uncategorizedgovernment, legal fiction, politics, religion, religious freedom, secular state, secularity, separation of religion and state, Wheaton CollegeHarry Underwood

Reading this post by Winnifred Sullivan on the Hobby Lobby and Wheaton College decisions, I got the gist of her argument: that we, no matter our political persuasion, have extended the legal “religious freedom” idea to its logical point of absurdity.

But something caught my eye in this paragraph:

But when the church and the state went their separate ways—when the church was disestablished—the intimate articulation of political, legal, and religious fictions lost their logic on a national scale. They no longer recognize one another. The legal and religious fictions of religious freedom have become lies designed to extend the life of the impossible idea that church and state can still work together after disestablishment. There is no neutral place from which to distinguish the religious from the non-religious. There is no shared understanding of what religion, big “R” religion, is. Let’s stop talking about big “R” religion.

This perhaps best articulates the disconnect between religion and the state in which organized religion – and the various means of power which it can assume – is much more free to run amuck over the rights of individual human beings.

I think that, rather than being content with this current separation of religion and state, in which the two “agree” to separate from each other (which has stopped applying in many places), something should stand in the gap between the two. Some sort of fiction – not just an institution, but an entire legal fiction – should act as a buffer between religion and the secular state, in such a way that the state would be able to eliminate any reference to the words “religion” or “faith” from documented law and jurisprudence.

In fact, for any institution or fiction which considers itself secular or nonsectarian (such as education), something should stand in the gap between religion and such-and-such nonsectarian institution.

But what could be strong enough, conducive enough to hold together that wall of separation?

Can the interfaith/intervalues coalitions – those organizations which classify themselves specifically as explicitly welcoming of multiple religions – be part of that wall?

Perhaps

I went to a public school up til 6th grade, and it was often bad (except for when I went to spelling bees). Then I went to a private religious school in Warner Robins from 7th to 12th, and my self-esteem hit rock bottom.

In public school, I often argued with teachers. In private school, the teachers (not all) paddled my ass a lot.

Frankly, in elementary school at Miller, I remember that I most enjoyed my time in Special Ed.

Mom thinks that Special Ed was what the teachers sent students to when they thought something was wrong with us. I didn’t get such a luxury in private school.

Ishtiaq Hussain gives an interview on his paper “The Tanzimat: Secular Reforms in the Ottoman Empire”, and takes on the fundamentalist idea that sharia is supposed to be a penal law:

Also, read Hussain’s book here: http://faith-matters.org/images/stories/fm-publications/the-tanzimat-final-web.pdf

There is finally a UU channel on Roku!

December 20, 2014To Export 2, Uncategorizedreligion, religion on tv, Roku, roku channels, unitarian universalism, uuHarry Underwood

Unitarian Universalist Church of Arlington, VA, now has a channel app on Roku. You – yes, YOU, dear reader – should check it out.

What the fuck.

Via JMG:

Phillip W. Unruh and Sandra L. Unruh today filed a motion to intervene in the ACLU’s marriage equality case in Kansas. As laid out in multiple points in their brief, the Unruhs declare that legalization of same-sex marriage would constitute the literal theft of their straight Christian marriage, a property which is guaranteed to belong only to them per the Fifth Amendment.

The full brief is here.

via Joe. My. God.: KANSAS: Straight Couple Seeks To Intervene In Marriage Case Because Gays Literally Want To Steal Their Marriage.

There are better ways of making an impact than casting pearls before swine

October 20, 2014LGBT, To Exportchristianity, lgbt, religion, same-sex marriageHarry Underwood

Noah Michaelson, editor for HuffPo’s Gay Voices, takes on gay evangelical businessman Matt Stolhandske’s publicized offer of a $150,000 “olive branch” donation to a anti-gay Christian fundamentalist baker couple who refused to bake a wedding cake for a lesbian couple:

Well, guess what, Stolhandske? You are an apologist for homophobes. And this kind of anti-gay behavior shouldn’t be rewarded. While I don’t like to see anyone suffer, this wasn’t something that just happened to the Kleins. They willfully disregarded the law — they went so far as to close their store rather than offer their services to a gay couple — and when you break the law, there are consequences.

Besides, what kind of a message does paying for these people’s fine really offer? It’d be one thing if Aaron and Melissa had shown any sign of remorse for what they did or promised to change their behavior, but they haven’t, and it doesn’t appear that their minds (or hearts) will change anytime soon. Instead, they’d rather lose their business and put their family in jeopardy. And now Stolhandske wants us to co-sign their hate because of some misguided mumbo-jumbo about love and acceptance.

Michaelson provides a list of organizations at the end which would do more good with Stolhandske’s money.

via Here’s a Better Idea for the Gay Man Who Wants to Raise $150,000 for Anti-Gay Bakers | Noah Michelson.

Harry's Blog

Musings of Harry Underwood