Religious groups demand state sanctioned, taxpayer funded bigotry
Dr. Trent Reardon writes, "Religious groups demand the right to practice their beliefs and live according to their particular holy book. Consistent with these beliefs, they demand the right to practice open bigotry and call it ‘religious freedom’. The Baillieu government is currently in the process of extending the ‘rights’ of religious groups to trample on the rights of others. This is unacceptable."
Religious groups demand the right to practice their beliefs and live according to their particular holy book. Consistent with these beliefs, they demand the right to practice open bigotry and call it ‘religious freedom’. The Baillieu government is currently in the process of extending the ‘rights’ of religious groups to trample on the rights of others. This is unacceptable.
Religiously run schools and businesses currently have the right to hire and fire someone based on factors over which a person has no control such as their sexual orientation or gender identity. This practice is open discrimination based ignorance, fear and bigotry and should not be tolerated in the twenty-first century.
Religious groups choose to accept public funds to perform activities such as schooling, health services and charity work. The moment they receive these funds, they should be bound to the same laws and regulations of any other group. Anything else is state sanctioned, taxpayer funded bigotry. Regardless of funding arrangements, these irrational and hateful views should still be challenged in the public arena using reason and evidence until it is eradicated.
If a non-religious business openly fired someone over their sexual orientation or marital status, that business would be fined, vilified and their public image immediately and irreversibly damaged.
The right of any one person or group is not absolute and must be balanced against the rights of others. When a religious group says ‘we must be allowed to fire homosexuals/unmarried people/Atheists etc to have religious freedom’, they have demonstrated a profound ignorance of the very rights they demand. Would society accept a religious group firing someone based on their race or the colour of their skin? No. Would they allow that same group to own slaves? No. Many passages in their holy books support just these positions, but they wouldn’t dare try and implement them today because society fought hard to tear these ‘rights’ from the hands of ‘loving’ religion.
The Progressive Atheists call on all Australians and levels of government to continue to fight hard for justice and equality of all people. Bigotry and discrimination have no place in modern Australia.
Dr Trent Reardon
President
The Progressive Atheists
