Are religious freedom advocates 'Christian Supremacists'?

pdudgeon

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Is national identity a simple matter of demography? If it can shift one way, theoretically it can also shift the other. And presumably this is neither moral nor immoral. Right?

So if demographics can shift away from a nation's historical and traditional identity and character, it is neither moral nor immoral to shift them back toward the nation's historical and traditional identity and character. Wouldn't you agree?
modern day France would be a great example of this. re. the problem with burkas on the beach is not in character with how the French see themselves dressing, and is not what their beaches are known for internationally.
thus to allow the influx of burkas on the beach is to call into question the character of the country's native inhabitants.

historically Hawii had exactly the same problem as France in the above example, when the Christian missionaries infiltrated and changed many of their cultural norms. the change in religion was good, but the loss of their culture was not.
 
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thecolorsblend

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It's neither moral nor immoral if it is not coercive--if attempts are not made to prevent certain demographic groups from voting, for example, through suppression laws.
I'm not aware of any law that says "These ethnic groups here are not permitted to vote" so I think we're good.
 
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thecolorsblend

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modern day France would be a great example of this. re. the problem with burkas on the beach is not in character with how the French see themselves dressing, and is not what their beaches are known for internationally.
thus to allow the influx of burkas on the beach is to call into question the character of the country's native inhabitants.
Agreed. What we see there is a pretty one-sided demand for accommodation. Because I'm pretty sure a French person who visited a beach in a predominantly Moslem country and did what the French normally do at their own beaches would not, to put it delicately, receive very much accommodation.

And yet the French are expected to adjust their society to accommodate an unwelcome immigrant group that only some of their politicians want in the country.

The fact that this same unwelcome group has a nasty habit of shooting French citizens and running them over with trucks doesn't help matters.
 
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dzheremi

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Seems kind of like the difference between a Patriot and a Nationalist. You would be the Patriot side, someone who stands behind their faith and thinks what it has done is awesome, but recognizes that other people have other faiths that they feel the same way about and that doesn't bother you.

Well, no...why should it bother me? We've always lived with people of other faiths. In the Holy Land, there were the Jews and the pagan Greeks, in Egypt there were the Jews and the pagan Egyptians, in India there were (and still are) the much more numerous Hindus, etc. None of this has ever been a problem, though it also hasn't always been a picnic, either. I guess you could say that's it's not a theological problem, though it has occasionally been a political problem, in some eras and places more than others.

The other side would build up their faith at the expense of others. It is so superior that others hardly have the right to exist.

But whether or not it is superior shouldn't have anything to do with whether or not other faiths should be allowed to exist. Those are two different positions, and they're not mutually exclusive. I can have my religion and think it's great, you can have yours and think it's great, and at the end of the day that's how it should be. Completely separate from that, the laws of the country should be for everybody. When they aren't, you end up with really bad situations where, as some people apparently fear, demographic shifts can radically alter the character of the society, such that if some country in Europe experiences massive Muslim immigration (for instance), there are fears that the newly ascendant Muslim groups will attempt to establish their law over that of the preexisting law. That is a reasonable fear in that case (after all, that's what happened in all the countries that were originally conquered by Islam in the 7th-8th centuries, during its initial expansion), but it wouldn't be so easy in a society with religiously-neutral law and strong protection for minority groups, because in those cases pure strength in number can't in itself do anything. If there is any looming danger in Europe it is in the attempted destruction of both of those things by those who would like to introduce concessions to religious law on the national stage (cf. voluntary religious law for individual communities such as, e.g., Jewish or Orthodox Christian dietary rules -- these aren't any 'less enforced', I take it, but I don't imagine that they'll throw you in jail for not keeping kosher in Israel, or that not fasting for Lent is a crime in Ethiopia the same way that eating during Ramadan will earn you a trip to the police station in Pakistan) precisely because they do not recognize any such separation between religion and politics. Islam doesn't do "Let's not use the state to enforce our religion", and apparently some forms of Christianity don't either. But since I come from a particular Church tradition that knows better (after 14 centuries and counting under Islam, about two hundred under the Chalcedonians, etc.; we've had really bad luck with governments except for maybe the 150 years or so between the end of the Diocletian persecutions in c. 313 and the aftermath of Chalcedon in 451), I can't agree.

I guess that's what I find so weird about a lot of this discussion, because it seems like people are trying to use the very thing that could destroy them to protect themselves from destruction. I don't think it's going to work, and furthermore it strikes me as nonsensical.
 
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imind

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What's unloving about that? If I were calling for some sort of physical harm upon the Miscellaneous (you're welcome to suggest another term for me to use if Miscellaneous is bothersome, btw), it's simply acknowledging that the Miscellaneous built 1% of the country. Considering my previous stance on this, I thought I'd be applauded for giving them their due.
i'm still curious to know how you're quantifying these "contributions." care to explain?
 
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thecolorsblend

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i'm still curious to know how you're quantifying these "contributions." care to explain?
I'm really not; I'm just accepting the proposition that the Miscellaneous have contributed something in order to keep the peace; not because I actually believe it. So here we are.
 
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thecolorsblend

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i had a feeling you didn't have any evidence to back your claims...thanks.
Golly, this is the thanks I get? Others were the ones saying the Miscellaneous somehow contributed something to the building of this country. I only acknowledged that proposition as an accommodation to the feels of the more hand-wringing members of this forum; I don't recall having espoused a belief in their "contributions" to anything, really. Certainly I'm not the one who suggested they contributed anything at all to the building of this country; others did and I decided to roll with it to keep the peace...thanks.
 
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Wunderlust

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A new report from the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, and related comments by its chairman, have sown fears that people of faith are being smeared as bigots.

Continued below.
http://m.ncregister.com/50904/d#.V9lqmEb3bCQ

I find it fascinating.

Christians will oppose marriage rights to same sex couples on the basis of their faith, and then cry foul when they tell customers they aren't willing to bake a cake for their wedding and get sued.
 
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