Don't turn a blind eye to creeping theocracy

[Ian David]

COLUMN By TIM GORDINIER, Ph.D.
Humanist Network News
April 13, 2005

The recent hypocrisy and grandstanding of some members of Congress in the Terri Schiavo right-to-die case is just one tree in a forest none of us should miss.

I refer to it as a creeping theocracy: this incremental, but seemingly inexorable injection of religious dogma into our public life and space. And yet this alarming trend is becoming so commonplace across our nation that it elicits little or no outcry from the public. Like the proverbial frog in the pan of water (which will allow itself to be cooked to death if you ever-so-slowly raise the temperature), there seems to be a quiet resignation across the country as our political landscape gets transformed beyond recognition.

Lest some folks think I'm exaggerating the magnitude of the problem, one has only to take a close look at some happenings over the past several months: There is the posting of the Ten Commandments in courthouses and other government buildings, the constitutionality of which is now being addressed by the U.S. Supreme Court. There is the teaching of "intelligent design" -- a more sophisticated version of Creationism -- in our public school biology classes, now being adjudicated in a Pennsylvania district court. There is the Justice Department attempt to negate Oregon's right-to-die law without any congressional mandate to back up its actions. There is the scary attempt by Texas textbooks to flood all our public schools with primers that will blot out mention in its pages of such realities as divorce, condoms, gays and out-of-wedlock children.

There is even talk of Congress stripping the federal courts of jurisdiction when it comes to that branch of government hearing cases dealing with church/state separation issues or state laws involving gay unions. (This last imposition coming from the very same folks who so recently and improperly intruded the national legislature into the Schiavo case; when the Florida courts were following well-established case law and most assuredly were not being activist.)

Do you see a clear pattern emerging yet?

More:
http://humaniststudies.org/enews/index.html?id=186#n9

[ThumperDumper]

1. Old news, but I agree.

I wish they would take one state; pick one and win what they want - remove the Seperation between Church and State. Let the SEE what the ALTERNATIVE is. Do it in Florida or Texas or something.

Let 'em pass the religious laws requiring this and banning that. Let 'em fight over the details. Let 'em wade through the muck of what the extremists want.

THEN we can all point to the flaming disaster area and say "SEE! We TOLD YOU!", and it'll forever serve as an example of what happens when the religious nuts get what they want.

[Tux]

3. They own Texas

But yes, let them have an experiment there and see what happens. I bet they'll have unwanted children, high AIDS rate, massive unemployment, too many people in prison, and be killing each other over whether or not Dale Earnhart should be a saint.

[atommom]

2. Good article. I just wish the MSM would wake up and stop enabling

these people. To a large extent, they've taken over the media, and they've got their claws in our government too. I'm beginning to wonder how bad it has to get before the public gets alarmed.