Outrage about Intolerance

Lots of people are down on religion these days, and understandably so. The Religious Right has a lot of power and is alienating a lot of people. It irritates me to no end that our nation’s leaders are allowed to make discriminatory comments and face no repurcussions. I know that everyone’s allowed to have their own opinions and in this country, everyone is allowed to voice their opinions, but how is it acceptable for our nation’s leaders, who claim to be religious, to say such hateful and hurtful things?

Religion is celebrated by humans. (Except for my man JC,) humans are not perfect and have fundamental flaws. Therefore, no religion is perfect either. But when you get down to most religions’ (not just Christianity’s) basic message, what’s not to like about “treat others the way you want to be treated”? And what is so hard about it? It’s such a simple lesson – one of the only things I actually remember from elementary school religion class. Why are there so many people who struggle with that principle?

I got fired up about this a couple weeks ago while I was on the elliptical at the gym reading Newsweek. There was an article about the Republican’s 2008 potential presidential nominees. (The reporter noted that Mitt Romney, the Morman, is the only candidate with one wife. I thought that was damned funny.) One of the other candidates, I don’t even remember which one, said something about how homosexuality should not be tolerated and it set something off in me. It’s that feeling of outrage similar to the one you felt when you were little and realized that injustice exists and no one is doing anything about it. Somewhere along the line, you grow up, become desensitized and silence your conscience. (Channeling inner Whitney) It’s not right, and it’s NOT ok. The world would be a better place if people with power were committed to treating the largest number of people the right way.

After reading that article, in the course of three days, two radio shows on two different channels were talking about homosexuality in animals. I had never heard anything about that topic. I started thinking about how you would set up that experiment to conduct good research. I googled “homosexuality in animals” and was amazed by how much reputable research (like national Geographic) is already out there. Over many years, scientists have observed homosexuality in some 450 species. If you believe that the scientists’ observations are accurate, and accept that human beings are animals, it’s not much of a stretch to conclude that homosexual humans are probably born that way. I don’t get what is so hard about this.

As I get older, I find myself becoming less and less tolerant of people who are not willing to consider information that is in opposition to their opinion. I can’t handle how people judge each other, without even knowing each other. I despise irresponsibility.

In proportion to the amount my intolerance is growing, I find that my love, admiration, and gratitude for other things, people, and ideas is growing. I’m committing myself to acknowledging and showing sincere appreciation. More on this some other time.