Today I was faced with an interesting question. What is and is not okay to discuss on your own Facebook, Blog, etc? It is your outlet for freedom of speech. It is your page. People can either read it. Agree. Comment. Or Disagree. Comment. Or ignore it completely. You as the writer do not force them to read. You do not make them sit down and read every word you write. Ultimately, it is their decision to read your posts or blogs. Therefore, they are actively choosing to participate in your exercising of your right to free speech. Now, if they disagree, that is also their right. We are lucky enough to live in a county that allows these rights. There are some that do not. We are not the only ones that allow this, but that is for a different blog.
That being said, should I decide to respond to the actions that I have witnessed, both on the internet, as well as out in the world. That is also my right. I chose to participate in the freedom of speech that others have used and decided to respond to that with my own. However, I am always amazed at how so many infringe on the rights of others under the guise of exercising their own.
Using your freedom of religion to infringe on the freedoms of others is not the way it works. Using that same freedom to deny women birthcontrol, or benefit hate groups, or deny marriage to people who are unlike you. To stand on a street corner with a megaphone, screaming at the people going by that they are going to hell unless they believe in Jesus and repent to god. Countless times they invade college campuses under the guise of free speech to preach and yell and insult the students who mostly just want to get to their next math class. However, when that free speech is used in return, when someone starts to insult them back, when someone points out the flaws in their religious belief system, when someone stands up for what they belief in contrast to those crusading Christians... they claim that their freedoms are being taken away. That its their freedom of religion that we are now infringing on.
I stand against the double standard that this country has developed. Where it is ok for Christians to do whatever they want in the name of Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Religion but that the rest of us cannot! I stand against the 78 billion dollars in tax revenue that could be collected from Christian Churches but aren't. We could reduce the national debt substantially if we collected that money. I stand against the hundreds of billboards and signs and offensive messages on Church signs that I pass daily. I stand against homophobia that is being propagated through the media and internet.
I leave with a question- How is it ok, for Christian hate groups to exist to the extreme they do, but its not ok for us to criticize them openly for it?
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