Mitt vs. atheists, martyrs

"Freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom."

-- Mitt Romney, Dec. 6, 2007

I'll probably want to discuss Mitt Romney's "Faith in America" speech at greater length later, but the quote above was the sound bite so let's deal with that first.

That's a nice bit of parallelism. It pleases the ear even as it disturbs the brain. In a formal sense, the statement is valid. The first part is not true "just as" the second part is not true.

Romney repeatedly says in his speech that his topic is religious liberty and his own faith. Given that, it's not surprising that he would argue that "freedom" and "religion" are compatible or complementary. But he goes beyond that, arguing that each requires the other -- that religion is necessary for freedom and that freedom is necessary for religion.

Let's deal with the latter assertion first: "religion requires freedom." There are far too many counter-examples for this to be true. Think of China, where the government denies religious freedom to millions of Christians and Falun Gong adherents and Tibetan Buddhists. Yet despite this lack of freedom, despite this active oppression -- and, in a way, in response to this oppression -- these faiths are all thriving. This is what the early Christian theologian Tertullian was getting at when he said, "the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church." Religion can survive, and thrive, in the absence of freedom.

This part of Romney's statement only makes sense if you read it as meaning "religion deserves freedom," but this is a weird and unhelpful way of stating this truth. Consider, as another example, the statement "speech deserves freedom." Stating it that way makes it seem as though the freedom and the right in question belong to speech itself, in the abstract, rather than to the speakers. Likewise, Romney makes it seem as though religious liberty -- freedom of conscience -- is something that belongs to religion itself in the abstract, rather than to every person. (There's a reason why Jefferson did not write the Declaration of Independence this way. He did not write: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights.") Every individual deserves religious liberty and justice requires that they be accorded that right, but religion does not require freedom.

But as potentially troubling and unfactual as the latter part of Romney's assertion is, the first part of it is worse.

"Freedom requires religion," Romney said. Had he said, "Freedom requires religious freedom," then I would agree, absolutely. Try to imagine if you can a society in which people were denied this most intimate of freedoms, the freedom of conscience, yet remained in all other respects free. Such a thing is impossible. This is part of the genius of the First Amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Take away any one of those freedoms and you take away the others as well. Each of those freedoms requires the others.

But Romney did not say that freedom requires religious freedom. He said, "Freedom requires religion." And that's a contradictory statement -- a very different, and very frightening, thing.

If freedom requires religion, then the a-religious and irreligious, the non-religious and un-religious are the enemies of freedom. Romney believes, in other words, that atheism is incompatible with freedom. Whatever it is he means by "religious liberty," he does not believe it can safely be applied to atheists.

Keep in mind that this is Mitt "double Guantanamo" Romney talking -- he's made it clear what he wants to do to those he regards as the enemies of freedom.

Much of the rest of Romney's speech recalls President Eisenhower's famous gaffe, "Our government makes no sense unless it is founded on a deeply felt religious faith, and I don't care what it is." That is, essentially, Romney's strategy for coping with voters' suspicions about his Mormonism -- a vague appeal to the grand, but contentless, importance of "deeply felt religious faith." Yet this emphasis on sincerity over substance makes no sense when applied to his claim that "Freedom requires religion."

Whatever else that claim means, it seems to imply that freedom requires the right kind of religion. Having already established, in the case of atheists, that individuals are neither competent nor entitled to decide for themselves what they should or should not believe, it thus falls to the government to make this decision.

"Freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom" implies that the government must protect religion's right to freedom by determining which believers have the right kind of religion (the kind that freedom requires) and which believers have the wrong kind of religion (the kind that threatens freedom by exercising it).

I'm a Baptist, which means that for me religious liberty is not only a human right and a constitutional right, it is also a religious belief. We Baptists believe in "soul freedom," meaning nobody else can decide for you what it is that you believe (that's why we don't baptize until you're old enough to choose baptism for yourself). So I'm pretty sure, from Romney's point of view, that I'm the wrong kind of believer with the wrong kind of religion. How about you?

Comments

[Lynet]

Thank you! Nice to know there are believers out there who will stick up for atheists when it really counts.

[Lurker]

Religion does not really need freedom, as you say. If you believe in something, you pursuit your belief regardless of the obstacles on your way. Naturally, this may mean you become a martyr and with your family, you suffer a horrible, tormentous death or (maybe even worse) a horrible, tormentous life. Yet, what is this compared to the eternal reward that's waiting for you?

I think freedom of religion is more of a practical thing: we know that a religious person is bound to follow his conscience, not the law. It is of no use making a potentially good and productive citizen to suffer only due to his beliefs. We just lose a good citizen and give the persecuted faith a martyr. So, it is better to recognize such beliefs and afford them a protection, thus minimizing non-rational quarrels about matters of faith. Millenia of religious discussion have shown that you cannot give a rational preference to any religious choice, so they are all equal. Because it would be futile to ban them all, it's better to allow them all.

[Jos]

you cannot give a rational preference to any religious choice, so they are all equal.

I dunno. Religions that mandate the ritual sacrifice of firstborns or something are, in my eyes, not quite so deserving of protection as religions that don't.

OK, so, nowadays human sacrifice isn't exactly in vogue any more, but still. Letting a person get away with, say, tax evasion just because he's religious and therefore "follows his conscience, not the law" doesn't sound right to me.

[magistra]

I agree with Fred: saying that 'freedom requires religion' is just another version of the claim that atheists can't really be moral. And as a Christian, I have to say: that is untrue. There are many non-believers whose character and life I admire, and the largely secular societies in Western Europe have not seen any greater moral breakdown than the largely religious US. (I think religious faith can under certain circumstances help a believer lead a moral life, but that's a very different statement).

[James]

Romney's statement is true, but only because "X, just as Y" is true if both X and Y are equally false: "The sky is green, just as grass is blue".

"OK, so, nowadays human sacrifice isn't exactly in vogue any more" -- I dunno, it seems to me that fatwas and executions for blasphemy are nothing but human sacrifice, murder to appease an angry deity.

[cjmr]

Fatwas and executions for blasphemy have nothing at all to do with appeasing an angry deity. They have everything to do with appeasing an offended individual clergyman.

[M Groesbeck]

So I'm pretty sure, from Romney's point of view, that I'm the wrong kind of believer with the wrong kind of religion.

The "right kind of believer", in the case of Romney (and most of both the Republican party and most of the religious right wing) has nothing to do with theology and everything to do with politics. Whatever your theology, if you claim it as support for a programme of authoritarian capitalism and mass poverty, you're the "right kind of believer".

[Tim Lehnerer]

I think that might be the first time I've seen a Christian stick up for the rights of atheists. You're good people, Fred, and you give me hope for the future.

[Zorya]

So I'm pretty sure, from Romney's point of view, that I'm the wrong kind of believer with the wrong kind of religion. How about you?

I'm Wiccan, so I suspect that not only would I be the wrong kind of believer, I would be some sort of Satan worshiper.

Romney's speech left me very uncomfortable.

[MikeJ]

I was surprised that when you were talking about religion not requiring freedom, you missed an obvious example: the slave church. Yes, many slaves were forced to "accept" Christianity, but many really did believe. I'm sure the descendants of those slaves would disagree with Mr. Romney. I wonder what the descendants of the masters think about it.

[Tonio]

Excellent post, Fred. I'm a bit surprised to learn that you're a Baptist, since almost all of the Baptists I've met have been politically and theologically conservative. Are the Baptist churches in Maryland part of Southern Baptism?

I didn't hear all of Romney's speech, so my reactions are from reading the material out of context. Does the "freedom requires religion" line suggest that Romney doesn't really believe in separation of church and state, or does the context suggests otherwise? It's possible that Romney was simply using parallelism in language to have a memorable quote.

I did catch this part:

[quote]But in recent years, the notion of the separation of church and state has been taken by some well beyond its original meaning. They seek to remove from the public domain any acknowledgment of God. Religion is seen as merely a private affair with no place in public life. It is as if they are intent on establishing a new religion in America—the religion of secularism. They are wrong.[/quote]

Can we please do away with the "public domain" straw man for good? No reasonable non-Christian seeks to push religion underground. The point of preventing the Ten Commandments from being posted in courthouses is keeping government neutral among competing religions. Either Romney does not understand that government and the "public domain" are not the same thing, or he's deliberately playing to the fears of conservative Christians. Or both.

[Caravelle]

almost all of the Baptists I've met have been politically and theologically conservative
Isn't Jimmy Carter a Baptist ?

[cjmr]

Are the Baptist churches in Maryland part of Southern Baptism?

Some of them are. In our town we have a Southern Baptist church, a Free Will Baptist church, and at least two that don't declare their affiliation (if any) on their signs. Southern Baptist is a theology, not location-based, as far as I can tell.

[MikeJ]

I was raised a Southern Baptist before fleeing. My favorite bit of their doctrine was also the part they loved to screw up the most. The priesthood of the believer. There's no need for anybody to come between you and god. Not just no need, but no possibility. Your every action is between you and god and nobody can make any claim to knowing god's will for you better than you do. Until.....

They hate the fact that when you follow this doctrine, you can't really tell people what to do. So for an escape clause, they tell you, yes, do what ever you feel is right, but you can't be a stumbling block to others. See, god might not mind if *you* dance or drink or have premarital sex, but the stoopid humans won't get it and your actions will lead them astray. The people in charge get to tell everybody what to do, and everybody gets to keep doing all the things they want to do anyway, they just have to do them in secret. Which can actually make some things more fun, but quickly becomes a drag.

[Tonio]

Isn't Jimmy Carter a Baptist ?

True, but I've never met him.

[Fred]

Tonio --

Baptists tend to be schismatic (a side effect of that same soul freedom) and often only loosely affiliated with the larger associations or conventions -- none of which are denominations per se, so there are local churches, but no Baptist Church (the 'C' in SBC stands for Southern Baptist Convention).

A bit more history: The biggest Baptist schism came in 1845. There was no formal denomination, but Baptist churches joined together to pool their money to send missionaries. The split came over the question of whether or not a slave-owner was qualified to serve as a missionary. That split led to the division between what are now the Southern Baptists and the (formerly "Northern") American Baptists. The legacy of that split lives on more in theology than in geography -- Southern Baptist churches tend to be much more otherworldly (more about that here).

Maryland, Delaware and West Virginia are thus kind of odd cases. As former slave states, their Baptist churches tend toward the otherworldly focus of the slaveowning American religion, yet because those states fought on the American side in the Civil War, those churches also tend to associate and identify with the northern churches.

[Jay Lake]

Hey there. Long time listener, first time caller, as they say in the talk radio biz.

I'm a passionate liberal-progressive secularist. I'm an atheist in the literal sense, though I tend to shy away from the militancy implied in the label -- I am also borderline radical on First Amendment freedoms, most specifically including religious freedom.

To me freedom of religion necessarily means freedom from religion. Not an obscuring of religious practices or symbols from the public square (they are speech too, after all), but the freedom of members of society to be exempt from specific religious requirements.

For example, in the United States I cannot be charged with blasphemy, because I do not participate in any belief structure where that notion has meaning. Not so in many Muslim countries. Teaching Intelligent Design in schools is no different except in degree -- it's the imposition of private faith on public life.

Christian revisionism of our political and social history doesn't help their case outside their own choir lofts.

I will also observe that I deeply resent the belief on the part of many people of faith that I am incapable of moral or ethical decisions without divine guidance.

[Carol]

Isn't Jimmy Carter a Baptist?

If I remember correctly, Jimmy Carter, Al Gore, and Bill Clinton were all raised Southern Baptist but fled for the slightly more liberal Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. They don't like homosexuality, but they do allow female pastors and don't ascribe to Biblical inerrancy. They also seem more committed to the Baptist congregational rule and have a policy on homosexuality for the national organization that individual congregations can ascribe to or not, as they see fit. Distinctly unlike the Southern Baptist Convention that has been known to chuck out local churches for performing gay unions and accepting "practicing" homosexuals as full members of the church.

[Armando]

Fred,

I rarely comment on this blog, though I've become (after discovering it through a link to the LB Fridays) quite a fan of your writing. This entry reminded me why that is, and I wanted to comment about that. Thank you.

I, personally, am not sure what to make of this speech. I'm not sure that the uncomfortable bits are not simply the result of bad speech writing. I suppose we can't take that chance, though. As a former evangelical (and Catholic before that, now an agnostic) I know WHY Romney needs to go out and defend his faith to a largely evangelical Republican base: mormonism is seen as a cult in these circles. Ten years ago, I would've been right there with them expressing my displeasure. Of course, Romney's (or anyone else's) religious views should not matter when running for office (or for anything else, really, except, I suppose, when becoming part of the clergy), but the audience Romney was speaking to does not see things this way. If it were up to them, America WOULD be a Christian nation (and someone should remind Mr. Romney of what John Adams had to say about that. It's nice that he would quote him out of context the way he did yesterday, though) by force. It's a scary proposition, to say the least.

Anyway, I'm rambling. Now you see why I tend to lurk.

[Geds]

yet because those states fought on the American side in the Civil War

Don't you mean "Union?" [/historian nitpicking]

Bah. Somebody upthread said something I wanted to comment on, but now I don't remember where the original quote was.

Anyway, I see this as Romney attempting to further ingratiate himself with the Christian Right and distance himself from his own Mormon background. I had a conversation with a Southern Baptist pastor friend of mine just after Romney threw his hat in to the ring that centered around the issue of how the various churches will deal with Romney, since Mormons = enemy, but other than the Mormon thing he was the closest candidate to the laundry list of desires from the Christian part of the political spectrum.

Huckabee's sudden leap in popularity might have just caused lots of problems for Romney and he's probably trying to reposition himself by saying he's not giving up the Mormonism thing but that he's not going to stand in the way of Christians.

[Tonio]

Jay Lake, welcome. Your position is almost exactly the same as mine.

[Jake]

So I'm pretty sure, from Romney's point of view, that I'm the wrong kind of believer with the wrong kind of religion. How about you?

Me, I'm just glad I live in Canada.

Seriously, though, I want to add my voice to the chorus of atheists who say thanks for having our back. And I hope you know that were our positions reversed I'd do the same for you.

Because it would be futile to ban them all, it's better to allow them all.

Wrong. The reason to allow all religions is not because banning them would be futile. It's because banning them would be *wrong*. Like Fred said:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Take away any one of those freedoms and you take away the others as well. Each of those freedoms requires the others.

If you take away people's right to gather for worship you've taken away their right to peaceable assembly. If you take away their right to proclaim their religious beliefs, you've taken away their freedom of speech. In fact, I would go so far as to say that there's no need to make freedom of religion explicit, since it follows directly from the other rights, but given the number of people who somehow manage not to realise that, best to make it explicit anyway.

[Tonio]

other than the Mormon thing he was the closest candidate to the laundry list of desires from the Christian part of the political spectrum.

Politically, how close is Mormonism to fundamentalism? I had understood that during the debate over ERA a generation ago, the Mormon influence was a big reason that some Western states rejected the amendment.

[Bruce in South Florida]

Religion requires freedom? Does Mitt's Bible not have Exodus? And is it missing the end of Genesis, too? What a silly, silly man Mitt is...

[Chris_C]

Let's deal with the latter assertion first: "religion requires freedom." There are far too many counter-examples for this to be true. Think of China, where the government denies religious freedom to millions of Christians and Falun Gong adherents and Tibetan Buddhists.

I'm surprised you went with China as your example, first thought to my mind was an established church.

[Chris_C]

Let's deal with the latter assertion first: "religion requires freedom." There are far too many counter-examples for this to be true. Think of China, where the government denies religious freedom to millions of Christians and Falun Gong adherents and Tibetan Buddhists.

I'm surprised you went with China as your example, first thought to my mind was an established church.

[Ron]

Outstanding analysis, Fred. I've been reading a lot of blogosphere critiques of the speech this morning and yours is the first to make the point about the falsity of the second part of the soundbite.

[Fraser]

As Echidne pointed out on her blog, there's an obvious contradiction between saying "I believe in Jesus Christ as the son of god" and then adding that nobody should ask him about the tenets of his faith because that would be a religious test which is unconstitutional.
Which would imply Romney thinks that being a Christian is a legitimate standard for judging his fitness for office.
Alternatively, he's simply pandering to the religious right: Look, I'm a Christian too! Don't reject me the way you would an unbeliever!
Either way, it's a poor match for JFK's classic speech, which seemed to speak to all faiths or no faith (I say seems because as an unchurched Christian I can't speak for atheists or non-Christians).

[Clusive]

I wonder if part of the anxiety Christians are feeling about the lack of prayer in schools, of governmental celebration of Christmas, etc. is due to the erosion of the public sphere in general. It seems fairly well documented (Bowling Alone and others) that American life has become dramatically more private and more isolated in the past few decades. So maybe, without religion in the schools and courts, there's nowhere left to share it with other people.

Because heaven knows no one goes to church anymore.

[Keith]

Don't worry Fraser, many an un-believer admires JFKs speech. And JFK in general. Hell, I'd take him and his wacky wife (and Marilyn Monroe) over any of these jackasses, any day of the week and twice on Sundays. To have a real statesmen, and one dedicated to seperation of church and state...

[Brian J.]

You're pretty close, Clusive; the surge in the number of atheists and agnostics means that American Christians, who had grown dependent on the public sphere's unquestioning acceptance of their dogmas, now cannot count on taxpayer money to spread their religion for them by supporting Christian dogmas and expressions. (They could go to church, but what's the point of "saved" people constantly hectoring each other?)

American Christianity now depends on its merits- and that's a bad place for Christianity, or any other religion, to be, because those merits are unprovable. To be very polite.

[McJulie]

you cannot give a rational preference to any religious choice

you cannot give a rational preference to any religious choice

There's a distinction here that I think it's important to make: between religion as a mystic/supernatural belief system and religion as a code dictating behavior.

There is no way to rationally evaluate a mystical belief system. Mystical beliefs are subjective, emotional, and inherently irrational. They might be beautiful and inspirational, or terrifying and bizarre, but they are never rational.

You can evaluate behavior rationally. Behavior can be directly observed, and it has obvious effects that can also be directly observed.

atheists can't really be moral.

I suspect that those of religious faith cling to this belief because otherwise they would have to admit the obvious, empirical truth: there is no predictable connection between a person's mystical belief system and his or her moral behavior.

[Hob]

So, how much religion would it take to generate enough freedom to let some people out of Guantanamo? Because I'm willing to chip in a little more religion, myself, if that's what it takes. In fact if Mitt happens to be President in a year and a bit, I bet we could get a small crowd of people to pray in front of his house every day if that'll work.

[McJulie]

"But in recent years, the notion of the separation of church and state has been taken by some well beyond its original meaning. They seek to remove from the public domain any acknowledgment of God."

Religious types have been complaining about this since I was a kid in the 1970s, which I guess is recent when regarded against the entire sweep of human history.

When I was a kid I thought the solution was obvious: more inclusion, not less public religion. But I'm no longer sure my simple solution would work.

The link is gone from the Seattle PI's web site, but last year there was a dust-up at SeaTac airport -- they had a display of Christmas trees, and a local rabbi requested that they also put up a menorah, which he would provide. They didn't want to. He threatened a lawsuit. Instead of putting up the menorah, they took down the trees. The rabbi, dismayed (and also getting hate mail) dropped the lawsuit. The trees went back up. Still no menorah.

This year, the airport has a holiday display of Christmas trees that don't look like traditional Christmas trees. Instead they look like cold, lonely winter trees. And also no menorah.

Most stories about this that I have seen imply that the rabbi complained about the trees, and the trees went away. But that's not quite it. He just wanted religious inclusion -- my simple childhood solution. And for some weird reason the Port Authority decided against that solution. If they had to include everyone, they would include no-one.

So I have a theory: this sort of thing is actually driven by the conservative religious types who later complain about it. Because what they really hate is that having to include religions other than their own. They hate it so much they would rather remove all traces of religion from the public sphere.

[Tonio]

Because what they really hate is that having to include religions other than their own.

I would love to see a town green have as many symbols as possible: Nativity, menorah, Islamic star & crescent, Buddha, Wiccan pentagram, Hindu, Humanist, Bahai. Just to piss off the people you are talking about.

(Did I forget any religions? The military uses an atom drawing for atheist soldiers' headstones, which I find strange since atheists don't worship atoms. I imagine a religious schism between the Protonians and the Electronites.)

[Izzy]

I suspect that those of religious faith cling to this belief because otherwise they would have to admit the obvious, empirical truth: there is no predictable connection between a person's mystical belief system and his or her moral behavior.

Pretty much.

I would argue that there are some forms of belief that tend to *encourage* various forms of behavior, usually negative. Fundamentalist Christianity tends to produce intolerant pricks; Satanism tends to produce the most annoying of the Mall Goth subspecies; and so on.

[Geds]

Politically, how close is Mormonism to fundamentalism?

It's pretty close. The real issue is that Mormonism is actually generally more socially conservative than fundamentalism (caffeine is a drug, for instance). The biggest problem I've noticed with fundamentalists is that they confuse "socially conservative" with "politically conservative" on a regular basis.

In both cases, too, the belief systems have a sort of, "Well, it's good for me so it should be good for everybody," mentality. Since they're socially similarly conservative, Mormons and fundies can be political bedfellows.

Because what they really hate is that having to include religions other than their own. They hate it so much they would rather remove all traces of religion from the public sphere.

That's an interesting and brilliant observation, McJulie.

It also leads to a self-fulfilling sense of religious zeal. The Rabbi asked for inclusion, it was taken as an attack, they took the display down and blamed the Rabbi. So it's the Rabbi's fault there's no Christmas, even though they themselves made the decision to pull the tree down.

Voila! You have a ready-made controversy.

It's the same thing with the "War on Christmas." I don't think anybody would be paying much attention to "Happy Holidays" v. "Merry Christmas" if there wasn't attention being drawn to it. But that false sense of persecution allows the faithful to be whipped in to a froth and blow the whole thing out of proportion.

[indifferent children]

> I imagine a religious schism between the Protonians and the Electronites.

I don't mind the Electronite dogma, but do they have to be so damn negative about everything? :)

[cjmr's husband]

The military uses an atom drawing for atheist soldiers' headstones

It's the logo for the American Atheists; there's a big A in the middle, and one of the electron orbits is incomplete, to represent the inherent incompleteness of scientific knowledge or something like that.

[rampancy]

Fred,

This post kicked serious ass. Posts like this remind me how people like you and Bob Gifford still make me feel good about being a Christian.

[cjmr]

Satanism tends to produce the most annoying of the Mall Goth subspecies

I'd be surprised if, upon polling 1000 Mall Goths, any actual Satanists were found.

[MikhailBorg]

I was watching "Miami Ink" the other day, and this Satanist woman comes in for her pentagram & goat tattoo. Listening to her, Satanism is a happy religion full of personal responsibility, respect for others' boundaries, love, and puppies.

I watched that, thinking, "I taught myself demon-summoning out of the Dungeon-Master's Guide (1st ed.) for this??"

(Okay, not really. But still, wow.)

[Geds]

I'd be surprised if, upon polling 1000 Mall Goths, any actual Satanists were found.

I was having a conversation about this with a friend of mine regarding a bunch of Wiccans he knew who weren't really Wiccans. We ended up on the idea that a lot of such people are just doing it for shock value, like the annoying high school "atheist" who is just claiming to be one because he doesn't want to go to youth group any more.

Actually, that's the saddest thing I've noticed. A lot of people seem to pick their belief systems based on who they'll spite more than what they actually believe. Which is probably why a lot of Christians just kind of pick and choose doctrines and Scriptures all willy-nilly.

[cjmr]

A lot of people seem to pick their belief systems based on who they'll spite more than what they actually believe.

Sadly, that's exactly what my mom thought when I converted to Catholicism. I must have done it to please my mother-in-law and spite her, because surely I couldn't actually believe in it or anything.

[Izzy]

I'd be surprised if, upon polling 1000 Mall Goths, any actual Satanists were found.

I'm not sure how many *actual* Satanists are out there. I mean, in my cranky-observer-of-the-"occult world" experience, "Satanists" fall into a couple categories:

a) Out-and-out creepy Mansonesque bastards who, in fairness, would probably be just as creepy if they were good Catholics/Presbyterians/Wiccans/etc,

b) LaVeyans, who are basically all about rebellion against societal standards, maaaaan, doing whatever they want, the strong deserving to rule the weak, blah blah. Basically the Digivolved form of Those Guys Who Take Ayn Rand Way Too Seriously.

c) "Yeah, man, I love Satan! He's so cool and rebellious and punk! I have an inverted altar...in my mom's basement...where I live..."

Three great flavors of "ew."

[Angelika]

"religion requires freedom."

Actually, Romney wasn't quite as wrong with that part of the quote, as it seems at first. Religion does require freedom: To remain sincere, religion requires the freedom to chose an alternative. While a faith can thrive despite persecution, a view into history shows that a religion that has become the only alternative turns easily into an oppressive machinery and a mockery of itself. (Probably not quite what Romney meant by his quote.)

[Geds]

because surely I couldn't actually believe in it or anything.

Yeah. I've got a friend who seems to think that whenever I try to explain why I left Christianity I'm doing it as a personal attack against her beliefs. You know, the ones I used to share with her.

Three great flavors of "ew."

Oh, man, and I was thinking of inviting you to my Satanist party down in the basement this weekend. Shoot, we're never going to get any girls down there...

[Geds]

Fred's a Baptist and tells people what to do financially all the time. That's not limited to conservatives.

I was wondering how Scott was going to spin this...

[Geds]

Also, MikeJ said the Scott quoted text, not Fred, just in case anybody else is keeping track.

[Lee Ratner]

I just want to make a minor correction Fred. I work as an Immigrant lawyer. Most, nearly all, of the cases I do are asylum claims from China. Some of the cases are people persecuted for their involvement in Falun Gong. Falun Gong explicitly does not view itself as a religion.