Freedom of Religion -
- Thread starter Big Nasty
- Start date
Which society do you mean? I'm going to talk about the United States under the Constitution.
Freedom of religion is two things. Freedom of religious belief (or lack of belief), and religious expression.
Freedom of belief is absolute. The government has no business punishing for belief under any circumstances whatsoever.
Freedom of religious expression is itself comprised of the freedom to express beliefs verbally, protected at least to the degree of political speech and other protected speech, and freedom of expression through practice, including among other things ceremonial and other religiously motivated real world behavior. Those are not protected to any greater degree than behavior impelled by any other motive.
If religious behavior, whether ceremonial or not, violates an otherwise valid laws that applies to everyone else, i.e. a "neutral law of general applicability," then it is just as prohibited regardless of its religious motivation. This rule is stated in the Supreme Court case Employment Division v. Smith and is the currently applicable rule for such situations.
It means, in short, that your religious belief doesn't trump your obligation to obey the law. Sounds pretty liberal and secular, right?
It was written by a celebrated Supreme Court Justice.
That Justice?
Antonin Scalia.
Freedom of religion is two things. Freedom of religious belief (or lack of belief), and religious expression.
Freedom of belief is absolute. The government has no business punishing for belief under any circumstances whatsoever.
Freedom of religious expression is itself comprised of the freedom to express beliefs verbally, protected at least to the degree of political speech and other protected speech, and freedom of expression through practice, including among other things ceremonial and other religiously motivated real world behavior. Those are not protected to any greater degree than behavior impelled by any other motive.
If religious behavior, whether ceremonial or not, violates an otherwise valid laws that applies to everyone else, i.e. a "neutral law of general applicability," then it is just as prohibited regardless of its religious motivation. This rule is stated in the Supreme Court case Employment Division v. Smith and is the currently applicable rule for such situations.
It means, in short, that your religious belief doesn't trump your obligation to obey the law. Sounds pretty liberal and secular, right?
It was written by a celebrated Supreme Court Justice.
That Justice?
Antonin Scalia.
Societies seem to keep trucking on when they ban freedom of religion, so I suppose we don't need it.
But it's a lot like freedom of speech, you can have huge conseqences for restricting even a little bit. And the societies that only allow one or no religions always elevate a caste of people who decide what is true or not. It never ends well.
That said I'm fully supportive of banning cults, scientology being the worst example. It was designed specifically to funnel money away from the vulnerable, while entrenching itself into positions of secular power. It's a religion in name only, countries that allow it are objectively worse off.
But it's a lot like freedom of speech, you can have huge conseqences for restricting even a little bit. And the societies that only allow one or no religions always elevate a caste of people who decide what is true or not. It never ends well.
That said I'm fully supportive of banning cults, scientology being the worst example. It was designed specifically to funnel money away from the vulnerable, while entrenching itself into positions of secular power. It's a religion in name only, countries that allow it are objectively worse off.
Yeah but if cults can be banned then where would the government draw the line, could they ban Jehovah's witnesses? I think persecution would only fuel a groups fervor.
But, the creation of laws with the explicit purpose of banning specific religious practices is unconstitutional, right?
I'd prefer if they did, to be honest. It's a for-profit scam. If we can ban pyramid schemes, we can ban Joho's. And millions of people around the world will rejoice at having to never politely accept one of those shitty watchtower magazines again.
The problem is that it's always a slippery slope with these kind of things. If we ban the Jehovah's Witnesses or Scientology, a lot of people won't be sad to see them go, but whatever law they use to take them down may be used by the government to ban anything it doesn't like. Then, what next? Mormonism? Islam? Christianity, even?
If you want freedom you have to protect people you otherwise would never protect.
Yes, but why do you think people who practice human sacrifice will most likely get arrested for it?
JW are a cult, but they're not a scam. Or if they are they're a terribly inefficient one. Unlike most cults they don't charge for membership and all the shit they publish is free. Your run-of-the-mill mainstream Christian megachurch is much more of a scam than them.
Yeah it'd get messy, but by refusing to restrict the freedom of people in this manner, you're letting other people restrict their freedom instead. People born into cults aren't really 'free' as we understand the concept. Mormons in particular are well-known for this. I figure there has to be some happy medium, where proof of intent to harm is presented before a cult can be banned.
I fucked up, it's not JW's that practice tithing. Although their leaders are doing pretty damn well for themselves...
Yes. Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye v. City of Hialeah, 508 U.S. 520 (1993). In this effectively unanimous Supreme Court decision, the Court struck down a local ordinance against killing animals not intended for eating, presumably for humanitarian or public health reasons. In fact, it was intended to prohibit Santeria practitioners from practicing their faith. The supposedly neutral purpose was a transparent sham.
I wouldn't ban Scientology as an organization or a belief system, but both the members and the organization should be prosecuted for the crimes they commit routinely. The effect would be the same. People are afraid of this cult, though, because of its litigious and terrorist practices, and the political will does not exist to prosecute it.
Well, a lot of people I come into contact with think that religious freedom should only consist of Freedom of belief, and that the government should be allowed to outlaw religious practices that are "deviant and inconveniencing to the general public".
To connect with your example above, I think that the majority of Americans regard animal sacrifice as something deviant.
It's generally legal to kill animals for food, because they're varmints, because you no longer have an economic use for them, or any reason other than when it is motivated by pure cruelty. To discriminate specifically against an otherwise legal action because it's religious in nature is definitively religious discrimination.
The majority opinion is more or less irrelevant.
If people weren't allowed to practice their religion they would either mass migrate to some place where they could or rise up and fight the government. There's no good incentive to not have religious freedom. At best people would leave, at worst get angry with their nation's betrayal.
IMO removing the tax-exemptions for churches would go a long way towards curbing some excesses of megachurches or the likes of Scientology.
Shroom King
kiwifarms.net
Someone famous (I forgot who, maybe George Carlin?) said that not only do we need freedom of religion but also freedom from religion.
That's very fedora though.
I should have the right to perform Human Sacrifices openly as my ancestors did before the Romans ruined things, could use Death Row Inmates as it was done to remove the scum from society.
That would remove the cost from the taxpayers and might help to lower the crime rate if when you murder someone you get slowly roasted alive.
That would remove the cost from the taxpayers and might help to lower the crime rate if when you murder someone you get slowly roasted alive.
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So you oppose free expression then? How do you propose to force nonbelievers to change?
EDIT: maybe I misinterpreted at first, it sounds like you're just saying you believe anyone who doesn't follow your religion is following satan. Well, the beauty of our system is that you cannot be punished by society for believing that even if none of us agree with you.
I believe very strongly that thoughtcrime should not be prosecutable, and as several have said the entire purpose of codifying free belief and expression is to protect people from restriction just because they're unpopular.
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