How Religion Is Killing Our Most Vulnerable Youth

[metta]

How Religion Is Killing Our Most Vulnerable Youth

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bishop-gene-robinson/how-religion-is-killing-o_b_764568.html

 

[Negasta]

I gave up after the 2nd paragraph.

Religion doesn't kill people. People kill people.

People kill people in the name of religion.

Christianity, Judaism and Islam all advocate a peaceful non-violent lifestyle.

That is nonsense and if you were in any way intellectually honest you would admit it. Just read any of the holy books of those 3 desert dogmas and you will see exactly how they specify infidels, gays and uppity women should be dealt with.

 

[metta]

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xuva1ZQ4Qc&feature=sub[/ame]

 

[fetaby]

Anyone with a brain cell can understand that the books were written for the time of their eras so customs referred to were appropriate for their time. What they TEACH and ADVOCATE is non-violence, love and peace.

They should also teach some reading comprehension then, cause what you say and what is happening are two different things.

And to answer your question as far as a minority making the decisions for a group? When that minority is in a position to lead the group. The majority of people have little to no stance on homosexuality until they are introduced to the ideals that same sex love is a sin. Their mind is then influenced into the black and white dichotomy of right and wrong.

And if something is wrong/sinful, it becomes okay to start the fear and hate.

You can say these religions are preaching tolerance and acceptance all you want. The evidence points to the contrary.

 

[fetaby]

I phrased it poorly, but it does make me upset that the gay community often displays widespread intolerance in ways that only inhibit the goals of progress.

Knowing the landscape of intolerance does not impede progress.

Accepting intolerance from others for what ever reason they give it does.

You see it as blaming, I see it as defining and acknowledging. The offenses have already been made, and progress is understanding as much and taking a stand.

 

[fetaby]

No one said you need to accept intolerance.

And saying gay people are misplacing blame on these organizations for maintaining a level of homophobia is?????

Offenses have been made, that means blame is applicable.

As for the article, it does give hope that all is not lost in the realms of religion. And perhaps one day, the followers of those religions will know what all gay people should know. Being gay is not a sin.

 

[CenaOrtonlover]

But religion is not responsible.
Anything can be used as a weapon... if religion did not exist, there would be some other tool for homophobes.

I don't think anyone here is trying to tell you that religion is the only source of hatred and homophobia but it is in fact the largest. If you can sit there and tell me that religion has not had a hand in many of the homophobic acts we see throughout the world (whether it be assault, murder, bullying, demeaning our people etc.) than you are either very unobservant or a mindless drone who has been brainwashed by the cult that is religion. I am not saying that all people who follow a religion are among the hateful and homophobic. There are a lot of them who aren't. But a vast majority of them are. I can't speak for other religions because I don't know very much about them, but as for as christianity goes, they make a very clear stand against homosexuality and that it is a "sin". It's because of that stand that many of their followers commit hate crimes against the gay community and it's because of that stand that we have so many LGBT youth who feel like they are a bad person and that they don't belong and that they are going to burn in hell because of something they have no control over

 

[CenaOrtonlover]

Maybe I'm out of the loop here but I haven't heard anyone blaming blacks for Prop 8

 

[gsdx]

The Crusades. Inquisitions. The Dark Ages. Galileo. Salem, Massachusetts.

The list goes on and on and on. Religion has been persecuting people for thousands of years and I can't ever see it stopping. As long as they deem themselves better than everyone else, they will spread their evil rather than the goodness that their God tells them they should share. They preach one thing and practice just the opposite.

 

[tider39]

The history of religion is one of exclusion, violence, division, and retribution. Nothing really good has come from religious fervor. It is a deadly threat and should be eliminated. Judaism, Christianity, Islam, etc. etc. all have a bloody history and that simply is beyond debate.

 

[fetaby]

What is the goal here? What does the gay community hope to achieve?

To inform those who may not know, religion as it is now is no friend to the gay man. Individuals saving their time and money.

B/c the stance of this placing this blame only succeeds in alienating large blocs of people who could have helped the cause.

If they want to help, who's stopping them?

I've never needed a black person to tell me I shouldn't hate them because they are black. That's something I figured out all on my own.

As for the prop. 8 mess you keep bringing up? The only black people who need to be blamed for it's passage are the ones who voted for it, as well as the white people who voted for it, and the hispanic as well.

Blame does nothing in the long run. It doesn't motivate or mobilize a cause. But it does inform, and it does teach.

 

[fetaby]

So how do you move forward?

It's not so much a matter of us moving forward, but them catching up.

 

[BostonPirate]

this reminds me of Eddie Izzards comment on Guns...

“And the National Rifle Association says that, "Guns don't kill people, people do,” but I think the gun helps, you know? I think it helps. I just think just standing there going, "Bang!" That's not going to kill too many people, is it? You'd have to be really dodgy on the heart to have that…”

Guns are the means of focusing a mans anger into deadly force, and all too often religion is the fire that stokes the hatred and anger.

Its really really naive to say that religion hasn't caused untold death and fomented antigay sentiment.

 

[fetaby]

Actually, its gays who want better rights.. it's gays who want acceptance. It's gays who are hoping to move forward.

Not better rights, equal rights.

Acceptance is negligible, tolerance is demanded.

 

[anchihiro]

Let me ask then, a hypothetic society that is 100% non religious without any outside influences, how do you think the gay people would be treated by law and publically?

 

[Royal Heart]

Anyone with a brain cell can understand that the books were written for the time of their eras so customs referred to were appropriate for their time.

I agree, but the majority of hardline right-wing religious folks disagree with you. They believe the books are written for all times and all customs. They truly believe that these books are meant to apply to us now.

These people are not just getting their ideas out of gay air, they're getting them from their religious doctrines. They read that their God tells them that homosexuality is an abomination, and that they will not inherit the Kingdom of God, and that they'll be thrown into the Lake of Fire during the End Times. From this they extrapolate that gays are immortal and corrupt, they're sub-human. It then becomes incredibly easy to discriminate against them.

Yes, the Abrahamic Religions are responsible. They are where these ideas that LBGT people are unclean come from, they have books which imply that only heterosexual unions are permissible.

It's like you wrote: They were written for the people of that era. The people of that era were far less tolerant, enlightened, empathetic than we are today (generally).

 

[bankside]

So it's okay to blame blacks for Prop 8? It's okay to blame religion for hatred?

What is the goal here? What does the gay community hope to achieve?
B/c the stance of this placing this blame only succeeds in alienating large blocs of people who could have helped the cause.

This is the stubborn approach that delays the achievement of rights and acceptance.
Hopefully there is someone or some organization with a plan that involves more than just blaming people.

Actually, according to this information, you can blame black protestants and white evangelicals, at least on equal marriage. I don't give a damn if that alienates them. We're the ones who are alienated here. Perhaps they need to worry about our alienation for a while.