From: niepornt@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (David Marc Nieporent)
Subject: Re: The Supreme Court Upholds Freedom of Speech
Originator: news@nimaster
Keywords: AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power
Organization: Princeton University
Date: Fri, 22 Jan 1993 17:01:42 GMT

In article <19571@smoke.brl.mil> matt@smoke.brl.mil (Matthew Rosenblatt) writes:
>In article <1993Jan15.184050.21761@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu> lrabe@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Lee A Rabe) writes:
>>In <19564@smoke.brl.mil> matt@smoke.brl.mil (Matthew Rosenblatt) writes:

>>>We've already heard and seen that it's OK to storm into
>>>a Catholic Church, interrupt the Mass with screams and
>>>jeers and catcalls, call the Cardinal names, and throw 
>>>the Host onto the floor and step on it.

>>>When did we see it?  A couple of years ago.  Where did we 
>>>see it?  We saw it at Saint Patrick's Cathedral on Fifth Avenue.
>>>Who did it?  A bunch of Catholic-hating sodomites.  Why weren't
>>>they beaten within an inch of their lives and thrown out into
>>>the street?  I don't know.  [Matt Rosenblatt]

>>Yes.  You are so right. This is *horrible*.  The Catholic Mass is a sacred,
>>holy time.  The Catholics are worshipping their OneTrueGod, and their choice
>>of religious beliefs should be respected.

>>But, if this holds true, it HAS TO HOLD TRUE FOR *EVERYONE*.
>>[Lee Rabe]

>Well, sure it does!  The reason so many of our ancestors came to
>this country was to escape regimes where those who held unpopular
>beliefs and practiced unpopular religions were persecuted.

No, it was mostly that they were jealous of those regimes -- they didn't
think it was fair that *they* didn't get to persecute people, too.  So
they came to the US and founded colonies so they could.

>>So, the next time wiccans are practicing *their* faith, worshipping their
>>God/desses (who, btw, they believe in just as much as Catholics believe in
>>their OneTrueGod...), please don't interrupt their services.  Don't take away
>>and profane their holy items.  [Lee Rabe]

>Have Christians been bursting into Wiccan-owned property, interrupting 
>Wiccan services, carrying off and profaning Wiccan holy items?  If so, 
>those Christians ought to stop doing that -- immediately.  This is America.

Dunno, but probably.  Pat Robertson isn't very fond of witchcraft, for
some reason.

>>Don't assume that just because their faith is
>>different from yours, that it is wrong.  [Lee Rabe]

>That's not the issue.  The issue is that in America, people have the
>right to practice even a faith that I believe is wrong (in the sense
>of "incorrect").  The idea of the Inquisition was that only Truth has
>rights, whereas Error has no rights.  The modern counterpart to the
>Inquisition is the doctrine, common on American campuses, that Racism,
>Sexism, and Homophobia have no rights -- no right to be expressed,
>no right to be heard -- because some people are offended by hearing
>them.  Just as the Inquisition has no place in America, so its modern
>counterpart has no place in America -- as the United States Supreme
>Court had to remind Donna Shalala of the University of Wisconsin.

>>My biggest gripe with *SOME* Christians is that they want religious freedom
>>to preach their faith --- and then want that same freedom to be denied to 
>>other faiths.  How hypocritical.  [Lee Rabe]

>How about the Evolutionists?  At first, only Creationism could be taught
>in the public schools.  It was prohibited by law to teach Evolution 
>there, as the Scopes "monkey trial" demonstrated.  One would think 
>that once Evolutionists won the right to have their doctrine taught 
>in public schools, they would be the most tolerant of letting Creation
>be taught there also.  One would think that those whose ideas had been
>suppressed would be least likely to go about suppressing the ideas of others.

>But that's not what happened.  What happened was that as soon as the
>Evolutionists had gained power, they proceeded to use Federal lawsuits
>to ban Creationist teaching from the public schools.  It is a natural
>tendency for someone who believes he has the Truth to want to suppress
>the teaching of what he thinks is Error, and the Evolutionists succumbed
>to that natural tendency.  Hypocrisy?

No; there's no comparison.  Creation is a religious doctrine, solely.
It has no relation to biology, and, as such, does not belong in biology
classes.   The establishment clause kinda prohibits it, anyway.  If they
want to teach it in a mythology class, or a comparative religions class,
they can go ahead -- no one would stop them.

>American history shows that the Puritans came to America to get away
>from persecution by the Church of England, and that it took only
>a few decades before the descendants of these same Puritans were
>hanging witches in the New England.  Hypocrisy?

-- 
David M. Nieporent   | "We don't need anymore [sic] wretched refuse.  It's 
niepornt@phoenix.    |  time to send the Statue of Liberty somewhere else"
   princeton.edu     |      -- Jack "Not a bigot" Schmidling, 1/7/93
Baltimore Orioles 93 |
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