Tolerating the Intolerant!

This week the UK gay rights group, Stonewall, published its list of the top gay-friendly UK employers. I was somewhat surprised that The Christian Institute (TCI) ran with the story highlighting the prominence of the various UK police forces.  TCI is a conservative Evangelical UK institution known for opposing  gay rights.

Unfortunately the TCI quickly switched the content to the recent investigations of Christians. Therefore in my opinion, although they do not say it out right, by implication that more gay people in the police force is leading to persecution of Christians; that the gay community has a vendetta against Christians; the police and society in general is becoming intolerant of Christians.

This is very disappointing to link persecution of Christians with the improvement of diversity in the police force this way. The two are unrelated.  The police are finally taking homophobic hate crime seriously - and so they should.

TCI Silence on the "Kill-The-Gays" Bill

I do think it a little rich to go on about tolerance when the TCI has said nothing (from what I can make out) on the Ugandan "Kill-The-Gays" bill. Sorry, but the TCI's silence is so deafening that one cannot hear its own complaint about intolerance.

Additionally, some the "Christian" comments on the TCI's Facebook page show little of the tolerance the TCI wants the police and others to show Christians. Postings there use pejorative terms, e.g., "perversion", "correct path", "sin", "immorality", etc. These terms are not in line with tolerance and they maintain stereotypes & prejudices (see below).

Tolerating Intolerance

I agree that some people in the gay community show hate & animosity towards Christians (I've been at the receiving end of it myself), and this is sometimes hypocritical.

However, what the TCI and others appear to be asking for is, "You need to be tolerant of my intolerance of you."

This discredits Christians immediately as they are bound to Christ's command, "Do to others as you would like them to do to you."

Therefore Christians cannot legitimately use the philosopher Rawl's statement that society must tolerate the intolerant:

Rawls concludes that a just society must be tolerant; therefore, the intolerant must be tolerated, for otherwise, the society would then itself be intolerant, and thus unjust. However, Rawls qualifies this conclusion by insisting ... that society and its social institutions have a reasonable right of self-preservation that supersedes the principle of tolerance. Hence, the intolerant must be tolerated but only insofar as they do not endanger the tolerant society and its institutions. 

Wikipedia (16/1/2010 20:33) Tolerance

Homosexuals vs Christians

The gay community are really saying that on tolerance, Christians need to take the log out of their eye before taking the spec of dust out of someone else's.

The vast majority of intolerance & prejudice I see today is still directed by the straight community at the gay community:

• I hear much about people being subjected to homophobic bulling at school (whether they are gay or not) as "gay" is an acceptable pejorative word. I hear much of straight people who assault, rape & murder gays for just being who they are. I also hear many cases of people loosing their jobs or thrown out of their houses for being gay (by homophobic landlords, by law in the Ugandan "kill-the-gays" bill, or because they cannot afford the taxes when their partner dies).
• I hear little of people bullied at school for just being straight or gay people assaulting, raping & murdering straight people just because they are straight. I hear very few situations of people loosing their jobs or being thrown out of their houses because they are straight or committed adultery.

Maybe that is why the gay community:

• Remain suspicious of Christians & report them to the police.
• Think Christians have "blood on their hands" until they break their silence on homophobia and heterosexism and, they accepted that they are responsible for feeding homophobia because of their pejorative views that homosexuality is an inherently evil sexuality & all same-sex behavior is wrong.

Jesus Confronted Sin

Yes, the Bible is replete with Jesus for one confronting sin ... of all sin. Even if one does accept that all same-sex behaviour is wrong, one is applying two standards maintaining that heterosexual behaviour is a private matter and that homosexual behaviour is a public matter (as some Christians maintain). I still cannot understand why some Christians feel that homosexuality is a special kind of sin ... if it is a sin?

Jesus was also without sin!  That placed him in a much stronger moral position to confront sin.

Additionally, the Christian right need to realise that not all Christians regard homosexuality as a sin. Secular society most certainly do not: their professional bodies will guide their assessment of what is right and wrong, e.g., The American Psychological Association, the American Psychiatric Association, National Association of Social Workers and the Royal College of Psychiatrists. All of these organisations consistently state that homosexuality is not a choice.

But What Of Christian's Rights

On TCI's Facebook page, one of its supporters posted:

A man, whose family was German aristocracy prior to World War II, owned a number of large industries and estates. When asked how many German people were true Nazis, the answer he gave can guide our attitude toward fanaticism. 'Very few people were true Nazis,' he said, 'but many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools. So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories.'

He then continues:

You can apply the above to militant Islam [sic], the rampant homosexual lobby [sic] or any other totalitarian ideology... but... its OUR silence that allows our FREEDOMS to disappear!

The scary thing is that the poster sounded so much like I did 10-15 years ago. I have learned to be careful with these types of arguments. I agree that Christians need to stand up for their faith ... as Christ commanded them to.

However, the Muslim and homosexual communities could also use this argument for their rights against "militant", "rampant" and "totalitarian [Christian] ideology" ... and others.

We live in a multi-cultural secular society where our respective rights will compete. I do not wish to live in a Muslim theocracy any more than a Muslim wants to live in a Christian theocracy.

This is why tolerance is so important. Tolerance does not mean that we acquiescingly condone the other person's belief system or views; that we are compromising our own beliefs.

We agree to disagree and respect each other's rights. We ensure that everyone is treated equally under the secular laws of the country.

However, Rawls' limit on tolerance (above) needs to be applied as it should have been with the Nazi's!

Gays Crying Wolf

At the same time, I do believe that the gay community does need to be careful they do not abuse their new found respect. They must be careful not to report any which incident they are offended at; otherwise they may find that the police no longer will take their complaints seriously when truly needed.

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"Should gays be executed?"

"Should homosexuals be executed?" was the opening question on the BBC' Word Service's Africa Have Your Say programme on 15 December 2009. It created a furore in the UK. The BBC quickly back peddled, ditching the offending title and replacing it with "Should Uganda debate gay execution?"

Too late ... the damage was done.  Apart from the hate parade that the BBC moderators allowed, many complained that their license fee should not be used to discuss the existence of a minority group.

The BBC then issued two apologies ... of sorts. The first was from David Stead and the second from Peter Horrocks.

Regrettably, the apologies amount to nothing more than, "We're sorry you were offended but we were right to do it." As such, I'm unable to accept the apology. In fact, I find it rather patronising as it makes out that myself and others are simply over reacting.

In one of the Facebook groups, someone posted:

"If it wasn't for the BBC world service you would probably not be aware of this gross human rights abuse, this alone makes it worth your licence fee."

Fore mostly I wish to make absolutely clear that I fully support debate on the Ugandan proposed Member's bill. However, I am completely against the manner in which the BBC went about it.  Like many others I was already aware of this bill's existence and the BBC did a huge disservice for gay rights in Africa.

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While I agree that the editor attempted to place the question in context, by starting with the original question, they made a serious and contemptible error in judgement:

Firstly, for the Editors to even admit that they "thought long and hard about using this question which prompted a lot of internal debate", and then changed the question when people started objecting, smacks of incompetence and unprofessional-ism.

Secondly, neither the initial question nor the revised question had anything to do with the Ugandan Member's Bill. The bill calls for the death penalty in the case of aggravated Homosexual assault. Nor did the debate address the other significant issues in the bill, including:

• the fact that a Ugandan committing a homosexual act in another country where it is legal, could be extradited back to Uganda to face prosecution; or
• that friends and family members could be jailed for not reporting homosexual activity.

Surely then, if the intention was to foster debate as the Editor's "apology" claims, there were other more relevant points to use in a more responsible manner? Therefore, to me, this appears to be nothing more than a cheep and ill thought out attempt to grab headlines or attention.

Thirdly, the initial question is deeply rooted in a homophobic attitude that executing gay people for just being gay is even plausible and therefore debatable. All this did was give homophobic people a platform to voice their views in an semi-controlled manner. I did note that the BBC moderators even allowed generalised statements against homosexuals that had nothing to do with the Ugandan issue.

Finally, posing the question, "Should homosexuals be executed?", risks normalising the question. It should always remain heinous and never up for debate. Jennie Kermode's article makes this point very well.

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If you think my objection disproportional, then I would like to refer to the BBC's  Brand/Ross/Sachs issue: Brand was fired, Ross sanctioned and others lost their jobs. Yet they only insulted one person. However, the BBC still defends their decision to debate if an entire group of people should be executed for a characteristic they have no control over.

The BBC would never run a poll on whether Jews should be bombed as a solution to the Palestinian issue! Yet again, the BBC has demonstrated that they regard gay rights as the black sheep in the equality fold; paying more sensitivity to others. So much for impartiality.

The problem with brushing something under the carpet is that it leaves a bump for people to trip over later. Within three weeks the BBC had to revise another headline: "Malawi gay couple to face justice after engagement"! This time the change was replacing "justice" with "court". While this may not be the same order of magnitude as the "execute gays" fiasco, for this lack of impartiality to reoccur so soon just beggars belief!

I concur entirely with Ben Summerskill, chief executive of Stonewall, the gay rights organisation,

"Given the near invisibility of so many gay issues from BBC news and current affairs - including recent murders of gay people - it does seem odd that the BBC should invite people to contribute to their web forum asking if gay people should face execution. It is becoming increasingly difficult to sustain the idea that the BBC should receive £230 million from lesbian and gay licensee fee payers every year".

Telegraph (17/12/2009) BBC causes storm by asking if gay people should face execution

I feel strongly that even an out right apology is not sufficient. This was a very serious error of judgement and those responsible should be disciplined. I do not wish to have my license fee funding such debates nor the salaries of editors and producers who thought long and hard over it.

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At the time of writing this blog, the BBC had issued no further apology nor taken any further action. OFCOM the regulator has written back to me stating they cannot deal with the issue and referred me to the BBC Trust.  I've already written to the Trust and still awaiting their response.

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Does the Bible really clearly state that homosexuality (a sexual orientation) is a sin?

In my previous blog, I discussed that modern psychology differentiates between one's sexual identity (heterosexual, homosexual and bisexual) and how one's behaviour is informed by one's sexual identity. In this blog, I wish to explore if the Bible does clearly regard all aspects of homosexuality as evil or a sin.

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1) Interpreting the Bible (Hermeneutics)

Oddly, I'd like to begin the discussion on whether or not the Bible clearly condones slavery. Please bear with me. The web site Got Questions defends the Bible against the accusation that it does clearly condone slavery. I particularly agree that

"what many fail to understand is that slavery in [Biblical] times was very different from the slavery that was practised in the past few centuries in many parts of the world."

It is a very important step in hermeneutics (the theory & methodology of interpretation) to first & foremost understand ancient texts in context of the anthropology and sociology of the time they were written, as well as what we know from archaeology.

Once we understand this, we can then place the scripture in our modern context and defend the Bible against its critics. On the issue of slavery, another website Fighting For God reinforces this important hermeneutic step.

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2) Homosexuality in Biblical Times

However, the Got Questions web site's discussion on homosexuality immediately abandons this first hermeneutic step. It launches straight into a condemnation of homosexuality using modern terms:

"The Bible consistently tells us that homosexual activity is a sin ..."
Got Questions (2009) What does the Bible say about homosexuality? Is homosexuality a sin?

Actually, the Bible cannot consistently tell us anything about homosexuality in the modern sense of the word (i.e., a sexual identity/orientation): the word "homosexual" is a relatively new word (circa 1892) and did not exist in Biblical times. For example, it is erroneous to translate the obscure Greek word "arsenokoitai" into the modern word "homosexual": "arsenokoitai" refers to a person behaving in a certain way, not to a type of sexual orientation. (Fighting For God)

"Biblical writers had no concept of sexual orientation or sexual development as we understand those today. Therefore, passages that reference same-sex sexual activity should not been seen as comprehensive statements concerning homosexuality, but instead should be viewed in the context of what the ancient world that produced the Bible understood about sexual activity."
Fighting For God (2009) Attack #6 - The Bible Is Anti-Homosexuality

Now I appreciate that some readers are probably jumping up and down screaming, "You gay people and your sympathizers will twist scripture any which way you wish to justify your sin!" Please understand that I remain committed to the authority and integrity of the scriptures. However, I believe we must be consistent with our approach when interpreting scripture. We cannot use one technique when it suites us to defend the Bible on slavery and, then use another when we want to condemn homosexuals and justify things like the Ugandan "anti-gay" bill. After all the Bible is not open to private interpretations (2 Peter 1:20).

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In conclusion I must admit that I was also one who thought that the Bible was very clear in its condemnation of homosexuality. However, I now believe that homosexuality is a modern concept and the Bible does not deal with it. It could not; the concept was not around at the time! What is apparent is that the Bible condemns certain kinds of sexual behaviour, both heterosexual and homosexual. What it is consistent in condemning is sexual behaviours that are selfish, abusive, non-consensual and domineering. In reviewing the texts that apparently condemn homosexual behaviours, this condemnation consistently relates to the latter and I'm not able to find any condemnation of loving, caring and consensual homosexual behaviour.

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