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Politics : Bill Clinton Scandal - SANITY CHECK -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Neocon who wrote (55751)	7/12/1999 8:36:00 AM
From: Johannes Pilch	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 67261

I do not think allowing communities to express their religion freely and corporately will set religious affiliation as a national standard of citizenship. We have Chinatowns and Little Italys everywhere, and no one claims ethnic affiliation is a standard of American citizenship. Now an implicit standard is quite difficult to avoid in nearly any circumstance. One person might look across the country at the various pockets of like-minded and similar looking folk, and see an implication that ethnic affiliation is an American standard of citizenship. On the other hand a person such as myself might begin looking for opportunities to infiltrate the various ethnic camps to learn what they are doing all huddled up in their respective places to themselves. We really cannot legislate personality. We can and should pass basic laws that give folk the legal right to explore different peoples and practices within America, and this includes moving to and participating in their communities in every way, even to the point of fully embracing them as their own. We can also as a society work to create a national culture that encourages a freer attitude toward the cross germination of ideas and peoples (especially since more often than not diversity seems generally superior to specialisation). But we really should not be in the business of forcing atheism or any other religion upon folk. Now on this matter of asking minorities to sit still during a benediction. Perhaps this is no great issue for you because religion for you is not a terribly defining issue. Nevertheless for a hard Atheist or Orthodox Jew, having to hear someone praying in Jesus' Name each day or even during a periodic ceremony may get a bit old real quick. I know I would certainly not truck hearing folk praying to Allah or Krishna. We should not force anyone to sit still for an offensive benediction. They should be completely free to get up and leave while the benediction continues. If their religion means so much to them that they cannot tolerate remaining in a certain community, then they should be free to move to an area where such benedictions are not given. They should not have power to force the entire community to give up its religion. Lastly, on the issue of a student being able to declare to another that a certain thing is un-American by referring to something allowed by the school system. This is certainly not unique to circumstances where posting the Ten in a school occurs. Virtually anything approved by a school system can be used against some person's deeply held belief. Public schools in America have, for example, literally taught girls how to use condoms by unrolling the condoms onto cucumbers. When parents or students have objected and asked that abstinence be taught as part of the sex-education curriculum, teachers have used the very fact of their having the system's approval to support the notion that their views are American, and that teaching abstinence is religious, prudish, unconstitutional and therefore un-American. The same tactic has been and is being used by students against other students. Merely because some kid can say Hinduism is un-American and then point to the Ten is nothing that is not happening right now. So the point is powerless. Indeed it supports my view.