Gentle Reader, I have mentioned in earlier posts that I live in an affordable rental building run by an organization of fundamentalist Christians. They are not bad people and many of them are lovely, kind, supportive and caring. A few, especially those in upper management have struck me as being harsh, paranoid and intolerant. I think of such as Christian fundamentalists. They are not really Christians but because of their conservative and fearful mentality they tend to find expression of their intolerance of others through the Christian religion. They could as easily be Muslim fundamentalists or Jewish fundamentalists if it weren't for their intolerant fear of people who are different from themselves. Now I could well be misjudging these people, since I don't really know them. But let's just say that my personal experience of them has been anything but positive so you will identify a certain bias in my writing.
Generally, the managers and staff in my building seem pretty respectful of diversity even if it means respectfully agreeing to disagree, and I have become quite fond of them. But then I found this horrid little fundamentalist tabloid in the foyer, called the Light Magazine, a lot worse than the BC Christian News which at least encouraged people to think out their faith. It is pure, paranoid, self-righteous fundamentalist crap. There was one interesting article about the recently passed bill for doctor-assisted suicide and generally I found myself in agreement with the writer that it probably isn't a good idea, but where we part company is:
1. I think the horse is already out of the barn and we are going to have to adapt and live with the legislation because it does represent a major shift in popular thinking, and this is rather different from continuing to protest and try to revoke. I call for damage control, but this I have mentioned already in other posts, so there is no need here to repeat myself.
2. While I agree that suffering is part of life and needs to be accepted and embraced as such the writer of the article showed a marked lack of empathy about those who are living with intolerable suffering and for whom death would be the best way out, even if I might have qualms about this.
3. They really went off the rails when they quoted an organization of fundamentalist right-wing nutters, who believe, among other things, that educating children should be the responsibility of the parents and not of the state, or society. They appear to believe that this is the way that God ordained it and so on the Eighth Day God created Home Schools. Well, Sunshine, let me tell you this much. Had my parents been the ones to educate me I would have ended up in really deep shit, for which reason I thank our public education system, the time I spent in community college, and all the thousands of intriguing books, articles and essays I have read and enlightening radio programs I have heard and documentaries I have seen and lectures and public forums and presentations I have attended, none of which my parents would have been any more useful in for me than putting four tits on a bull. But here I digress. Here is the quote from one Mark Penninga, executive director of the Association for Reformed Political Action Canada:
"What happens to a society that discourages new life, kills vulnerable life, surgically alters healthy bodies to conform to unhealthy minds, puts the greatest taxes on those who are the most economically productive, and treats a basic building block of life (carbon) as if it were a pollutant? That society is committing suicide."
Well, Gentle Reader, far be it from me to dignify such blatant, egregious stupidity by replying but I will say this much: Any society that would force women unable to cope with having unwanted children to be perpetual baby machines till they have died a premature death without being able to fulfil any of their dreams; any society that so blatantly judges queer, two-spirited and transgender people to conform to a binary sexuality that is completely foreign to them, just because it conforms to their very narrow and erroneous interpretation of the teachings and life of Jesus Christ; any society that denies the responsibility of the wealthy to pay their share for the common good; and any society that is set to deny and ignore the findings of science about climate change due to global warming, for me anyway, would be worse than living in a theocratic North Korea.
While I am entirely in favour of freedom of speech and for this reason would not think of opposing the right of anyone to leave this kind of noxious garbage in the communal area of my apartment building, I am equally in favour of addressing and denouncing the dark and twisted message of a very crippled and crippling version of the Christian faith that is being promulgated here.
There you have it.
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