Reply #7: Wait a minute: Why is religion in that category? [View All]

[ihavenobias]

Comments about race, gender and sexual oritentation (all things you can't change, including the last one IMO) being off limits I totally understand and 100% agree with.

But why in the world would religion (a particular set of beliefs people choose to believe in, or not) be in this category?

For example, if someone is seriously considering Mike Huckabee I shouldn't be labed as "intolerant" if I bring up his (religiously based) beliefs on creationism, homosexuality (at one point he put it in the same category as pedophelia and necrophelia) and quarantining people with AIDS.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2007/12/17/huckabee-equated-homosexu_n_77178.html

The fact is, religion can (and often does) greatly inform someone's worldview, judgement and decision making (if they *choose* to let it) and IMO, that makes it subject to scrutiny just like any other belief.

PS---Where was the uproar when Mitt Romney said "It is as if they're intent on establishing a new religion in America - the religion of secularism. They're wrong."?

Answer: There WAS no uproar. The mainstream media largely thought the speech was BRILLIANT, or at the very least, ok. Even liberal commentator/columnist Eleanor Clift said (on The McLaughlin Group) there was nothing in the speech that would bother secularists. Keep in mind the conservative estimate is 20 million atheists/agnostics/secularists in the US, which is the single largest bloc of people after Catholics if I remember correctly.

Cenk Uygur made an excellent point when he wrote, --what if I were running for president and I said this-- "It is as if Romney is intent on establishing a new religion in America -- the religion of Mormonism. He is wrong."

Just imagine the ENORMOUS uproar that would result. Seriously, think about for a minute. Those two sentences would be EVERYWHERE, along with charges of hatefulness, intolerance, etc. The moral outrage would boil over. But when Romney says what he says? Crickets chirp. And so it goes on this issue.