Thursday – If you hate me, you're a bigot. If I hate you, it's justified.

[ninanevermore]

Or is it the other way around?
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The last I checked, my father was writing a book called What's Destroying America. Maybe he's finished with it, for all I know. He doesn't discuss his book with me, and I'm pretty sure the reason he doesn't is because he thinks I'm one of the people destroying America. To maintain peace in the family, he bites his tongue.

As a dyed-in-the-wool conservative Republican who never misses Bill O'Reilly's show on FOX News, he seems to think that if everyone in the world thought like him and Bill, things would just go a lot smoother. In the name of maintaining peace in the family, I refrain from pointing out to my father that if everyone thought like he and Bill O'Reilly, the two of them would have no one to complain about and they would both be miserable until they found a new hobby.

Personally, I don't think anything is destroying America. She's a tough old girl. Her birth pains were a revolution, her adolescence angst had to be resolved with a civil war, and she's pulled through countless other wars, depression, and civil unrests. Like any well-rounded person, she's changed her opinions about a lot of things as she's gotten older, including women's rights and civil rights, and she's grown more tolerant as she's grown more educated. Books like the one my father is writing don't give her due credit. My father isn't alone in not giving her due credit; a lot of people I encounter seem to think the problems with the world today are because everyone else doesn't see things the way they do.

This isn't just a problem in America; it's a problem everywhere. But since I live in America, that's where I'm best able to observe and comment on it.

I've noticed that that conservatives blame everything on liberals, and liberals blame everything on conservatives. The only thing these two groups agree on is that moderates such as myself can't be trusted. As a moderate, I get to blame everything on the hardcore extremists who can't get along and find common ground (beyond that neither of them can stand the likes of me).

Religious people don't trust non religious people, and the non-religious people blame everything on religion even though greed and lust for power are the more likely suspects. I take particular amusement in the rise of the fundamentalist non-believers who have adopted the more obnoxious attitudes and tactics of the fundamentalist believers for their own uses, and now "witness" their non belief with all the zealotry of the most fanatical hell-fire-and-damnation clerics.

I've heard a lot of right-wing Christians demonize every variety of non-Christian out there from Muslims to atheists. In turn, a lot of people who have either rejected Christianity or only gleaned what they know about it from media depictions, blame this religion (the one I was raised in) for every oppression they come across.

It's okay for them to say, "I can't stand Christians." But if you were substituted the word "Jews" or "Blacks" or "Asians" or "Gays" for the word "Christians," these same people would call you out for being a bigot. They would be right. And you would be right for calling them bigots right back.

I suppose you could say I'm moderate in my religion as well as my politics. I once took an Internet quiz to find out what religion would suit me best, and it turns out I would make a great Liberal Quaker. That was the first I'd heard that Liberal Quakers even exist, but apparently I should find some to mingle with because it sounds like we could be great friends.

I admit I like all kinds of religious folks. That includes not only other Christians, but Jews and Muslims and Hindus and Buddhists and Neo Pagans and Wiccians and those people who just say they're spiritual without committing to one belief system in particular. I also like non-religious folks who don't mind that I have a religion. I like human beings, and humans have all kinds of different ways of seeing things.

I've found that the hateful beliefs that some people chalk up to religion are often just people taking their society's prejudices and cloaking them in religion. These same bigotries exist in non religious people, as well. I once knew an atheist who told me he "couldn't stand faggots" and he hated "most, but not all, blacks." This tells me that bigots come in all creeds, and some come creedless. I've also met plenty of tolerant religious people, despite the rumor that we don't exist.

I think the prism of human belief is interesting and beautiful, and I'm not out to wipe any group of people off the earth. We don't have to agree about everything or even anything, we just have to get along and accept each other's right to disagree.

This goes for politics as well as religion.

It all boils down to having tolerance and respect for each other. If enough people get this through their heads, then nothing can destroy America or the world, because all good people would be willing to stand up for each other, and those who aren't so good wouldn't stand a chance against us.



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Comments

[suspiria.livejournal.com]

You sound so remarkably sane! The thing that gets me in particular are the "open-minded liberals" who have more hate in them than the conservatives/religious groups/whomever they hate for hating. It's mind-boggling.

[neanahe.livejournal.com]

I guess this is my open letter to those very people. :)

[simplecity2htwn.livejournal.com]

When I came to Texas I discovered that people were (how shall I put this) "passionate" about their beliefs. It's good to find that there are some folks here who can still stand to listen and appreciate the views of others without immediately wanting to take a pitchfork to them.

You're alright in my book Olive Snook. LoL

[neanahe.livejournal.com]

A lot of us who to don't tow the right wing line have learned to keep our mouths shut here in Texas, mostly because we figure it isn't worth getting into a shouting match with these "passionate" people. I can get along with conservatives and liberals alike, just so they don't cram their beliefs down my throat. In fact, I enjoy talking and sharing and looking for common ground. Discussing and debating is fun for me, arguing and insulting is not.

The problem with the lunatic fringe in either camp is that they aren't into finding common ground so much as they are into trying to destroy whatever ground you stand on. :P

[woohag.livejournal.com]

I have this exact same thing with my mother and other close family members, and I find it best to steer WAY CLEAR of any political talk at all. I usually end up crying at how warped they are and pondering how I came out of a person who thinks like that. :)

[neanahe.livejournal.com]

In my family, if they stop talking when I walk in the room, I know they were talking about politics.

The funny thing is, my little clan (no matter what stripe we are) mostly only likes to talk politics with people who agree with us. We like validation, but not debate. Since most of them don't agree with me, the topic is taboo when I'm in the room.

Works for me. :)

[millysdaughter.livejournal.com]

I find the extremists of any stripe rather scary. But I am sure I would fare better in your father's fantasy world than in many of the other dream world scenarios I have seen preached on LJ. We do get some rabid extremists on here now and then.

[neanahe.livejournal.com]

Very rabid. So rabid that I wrote this post rather than gently disagree with them in their own journals and have their like-minded f-list jump me.

What can I say? I'm a lover, not a fighter.

[magsmom.livejournal.com]

well, to be excrutiatingly honest...I think the world would be better if everyone thought like me too...but I don't think like your dad.
Go figga.

[neanahe.livejournal.com]

LoL! Believe it or not, my father is a very nice and decent man. He's just crabby and old and set in his ways. He's a civil engineer, so he doesn't see room for a lot of nuance. Either something is right, or it's wrong. It works, or it doesn't. When it comes to construction and design, his point of view works very well.

[magsmom.livejournal.com]

He sounds like my dad. He too was a nice very decent man who was well liked and well respected. But he did have his opinions and I'm sure I was on his political hit list. He was impossible, but great at the same time. He died a couple of years ago. I'm a grown woman and had been independent of him for nearly 30 years, but dad is dad, especially when he's a larger than life guy and the hole he left will never be filled.

Enjoy your dad while you can.

[neanahe.livejournal.com]

I will. I'm well aware of that void that parents leave in their wake. My mother died when I was 15 (the nerve of her, leaving so soon without bothering to see me grown up). You get used to the grief and get on with your life, but you never really get over it.

[jenelycam.livejournal.com]

Very well written, and totally agreed. *HUGS*

[neanahe.livejournal.com]

Thanks, Dawn! *hugs back*

[callmekili.livejournal.com]

I've also met plenty of tolerant religious people, despite the rumor that we don't exist......We don't have to agree about everything or even anything, we just have to get along and accept each other's right to disagree.

if only the world could believe these same things....i like to believe im one of those "tolerant religious people" who believes that its okay for people to have differing opinions... i get the surprised look from many too when that comes to the surface.

It all boils down to having tolerance and respect for each other. If enough people get this through their heads, then nothing can destroy America or the world, because all good people would be willing to stand up for each other, and those who aren't so good wouldn't stand a chance against us.

if we could get the world to stand behind this, we'd definitely be far better off!!

[neanahe.livejournal.com]

I guess we tolerant people need to speak up more. Our nature is to be tolerance, but when we tolerate intolerance and don't speak up, we kind of condone it and give the idea that we're okay with it. :)