The Thinking ‘Kat: Individuality
Having seen pertinent, overlapping topics come up via Bruce Gerencser (among others), I decided to offer my own thoughts, via the subject of individuality. These are tricky, challenging matters, and whilst I try to avoid distressing material, I cannot guarantee I’ll be able to avoid it here, so please bear that in mind before reading too far into this post.
The War on Individuality
Across a couple of sites, I have read conservative Christians warn of indoctrination, and I cannot help but find these warnings to be rather ironic. Organised religion is all about indoctrination and conformity. It is considered part of the mission of churches to spread the word, and to convince and encourage others to see the world through the same lens. Some particularly fundamentalist Christians fervently believe individuality should be crushed under conformist demands, demands that would erase the LGBT community from existence, and force everyone – including other Christians – to worship, and indeed think, in a particular manner.
One need only look at the language these fundamentalists use to demean anyone who does not think as they do. They call those who seek the same rights and freedoms as everyone else ‘bullies’. They refer to people who are transgender as sick and sinful. They in fact encourage a centuries-long trend of bullying and violence against anyone does not conform to their rigid ideology. ‘Live and let live’ is an alien concept to these fanatics. What’s worse is how they react when people reject the imposition of organised religion. They whine as to how they are being oppressed, though they cannot actually demonstrate any erosion of their own rights and freedoms.
The behaviour of those who claim to have an objective moral standard is often very much at odds with what most prudent people would seem decent. The wish to force conformity upon non-believers is rooted not in morality, but in fear, hate, and a desire for power.
Bodily Autonomy
So much of this war on individuality can be seen in the desire to control other people’s bodies. One need only take a cursory glance at how fanatics handle trans people. There has been much in the news lately about public bathrooms in the USA. Ignorant people have written misleading, whingy puff pieces about how trans people are sick and wrong. The religious right could direct people to tackle the meaningful problems of our age (such as climate change, and economic inequality), or they could look to handle the alarming number of pastors and preachers who commit sexual offences, but no, they focus on trans people as the major issue. They do this not out of love, but out of fear and revulsion, and they do not care about how damaging their words and deeds are. Trans people – alongside the rest of the LGBT community – are routinely demonised, ostracised, and treated in an appalling manner, for merely wanting to be themselves, without prejudice and judgement. It is often – and ironic too – the case that those who judge the LGBT community are of a woeful moral standard, the last people who have any right to judge others, and yet they wage war on the concept of bodily autonomy, out of rage and fear.
This can be see in how women are treated by religious fanatics. Women are often regarded as irrelevant. They are considered to be second-class citizens, whose bodies exist purely for the service of men. Some particularly cruel fanatics believe women should never, ever be believed when they speak of sexual assault, and some also believe that once women fall pregnant, it does not matter if they die or are crippled by pregnancy complications. This is because (in an ironic yet dishonest twist) the fanatics believe life is so important, the embryo takes precedence over the mother. The mother can be discarded, for she is just a woman, a vessel, and nothing more, in the eyes of these twisted people.
Controlling women has long been part of fanatic conservative religious discourse. There is a lengthy history of psychological manipulation, in the form of victim blaming/shaming. Women have been bartered via marriage for the benefit of power and wealth. The belief that women are property has gradually been overcome, but even today, some people have the impression that women should not have any authority over their own lives and bodies, that their lives only have meaning when serving the wants and needs of men.
Freedom, but only for Believers
Now, I am not suggesting that every Christian (or for the matter, every follower of every other faith) believes this, but it certainly seems that some feel rights and freedoms are conditional upon religious beliefs. Of course, even within Christianity (and for that matter, within other faiths), there is disagreement as to who the true believers are, which is as compelling as any a reason for why rights and freedoms should never be dependent upon one’s faith. Some might call this selfish (merely betraying their lack of English comprehension), but what is truly selfish is the demand that everyone conform to the ideals of any given religious belief. Freedom should never be conditional on religion. it is a pity some people think bullying and demeaning others into accepting this condition is somehow OK.
