Bigotry towards people of faith is actively riled against (see the 5 posts by Hugh Hewitt in response to Al Sharptons anti-Mormon remarks). But, bigotry towards Atheists gets much less attention.
Case in point, Mitt Romney’s remark:
“we need to have a person of faith lead the country.”
While largely benign, and something that doesn’t strike me as outside the range of normality in terms of what politicians are likely to say, it certainly does make a statement. He’s saying that Atheists and Agnostics are not fit to be President. That is a clearly bigoted remark.
As an agnostic, I don’t feel offended. And I don’t think it’s good practice to go around verbally lynching people on every little outburst (we’ve all made stupid comments). But, it is good practice to point out the obvious logical connections between statements and their conclusions.
(Hat Tip: Andrew Sullivan)
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3 Comments
Hmmm… I personally see a substantial different between saying a person of faith makes a better President than saying, a person of this faith makes a better president than some other faith. It depends on what assumptions we would put with the atheist. Assuming a real atheist, that is someone who believes philosophically that there is no god and there is some proof there is no god (since simply not knowing would be agnostic), we could assume that existence has no particular meaning other than what we ascribe to it. One could go down a Nietzche “superman” or whatever you want to translate the word as, road. One may think that an atheist president is accountable to no one.
On the other hand, I would consider it fair discourse for an atheist to say he prefers a President be an atheist because they would not feel obligated to God. I wouldn’t consider that bigoted.
Interesting thought though.
It is refreshing to see a leader reveal his moral standing. Too many “wanna-be” leaders “wanna agree” with everyone. Mitt Romney believes in Israel’s destiny, as he sees it, God given. He may be a builder of the bridge connecting the “Crossroads of the East” with the “Crossroads of the West.”
For those with God or no God, qt least they know where he stands.
Well Saij, I just did a little research into the definition of bigot. It is a terrible-sounding word and I don’t think any thinking person wants to be one…but the expression of a strong opinion doesn’t seem to be bigotry. Bigotry is prejudiced, unreasonable and intolerant. It could be that Romney is all those things (He would certainly not be my choice for any public office) but that comment doesn’t seem to be bigoted in and of itself. Do you not have strong opinions yourself which you express in your writing? I’ve read you for a couple of weeks now and I certainly wouldn’t call you a bigot. dwhitsett.wordpress.com
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[...] This guy think’s Mitt is a bigot. I haven’t paid enough attention to Mitt to know that for sure. But I do know he’s used racist language in a speech. To be fair, he later apologized, but the apology made it clear that he’s so secluded from the real world he didn’t realize his statement was offensive. [...]