I’ve seen many pagans pish-posh youngsters who share stories of maltreatment from non-pagans.  It seems it’s generally because said youngster has used the taboo P-word: persecution.

It’s almost as if the invocation of the P-word somehow invalidates the youngster’s experiences altogether: They just have a persecution complex.  They’re just being dramatic.  They simply need to shut up and quit whining.

Honestly, I’m appalled by this attitude.  Obviously we shouldn’t be slinging around the P-word like birthday confetti, but it doesn’t change the fact that the person has been unfairly treated.

It occurred to me that in some instances, we may not have a persecution complex so much as a vocabulary failure.  I can’t really recall any pagan literature or sources that offer any guides or help on what terms to couch various experiences in.

First, let’s go over just what persecution is.  Persecution is defined by Dictionary.com as a program or campaign to exterminate, drive away, or subjugate a people because of their religion, race, or beliefs.

Now, let’s examine some potential problems, and what they actually are:

• If someone has gotten into trouble for wearing a pentacle at a school where Christian students are allowed to wear crosses, that student has faced discrimination.
• If someone repeatedly tells a pagan that xe needs to Accept Jesus Or Else on a regular basis, that pagan is being harassed.
• If someone makes a snide remark about sacrificing animals, declares that a pagan religion isn’t a “real religion,” or dismisses xir faith as a “phase,” that’s a microaggression.
• If someone destroys or damages a Yule display out of malice, that’s an act of vandalism.

Now that that’s out of the way, here are some things that are NOT MALTREATMENT OF ANY KIND:

• Being asked what evidence you have to support your beliefs, or how you know they’re true.
• Being criticized for cultural appropriation.
• Being called out on misleading or just plain wrong information.
• Someone letting you know that they aren’t interested in your beliefs.
• Getting into trouble for violating safety codes and/or doing something that could seriously damage an area.

So in essence, don’t use the P-word lightly (because it probably isn’t, and there’s probably another word that describes what happened more accurately), and don’t summarily dismiss someone’s story because xe used the P-word.

• To risk alienation from family and friends!
• To feel alienated from their entire culture!
• To risk losing their job!
• To risk abuse for demanding the same religious rights Christians claim!
• To be marginalized by the government!
• To be blamed for all the worlds’ problems!
• To have their very citizenship questioned!

OMG!  WHO WOULDN’T WANT TO JUST CHOOSE TO STOP BELIEVING THE BIBLE?!

One does not simply “choose” to believe or disbelieve anything.  People arecompelledto believe based on their knowledge and experience.  Most ex-Christians cannot “choose” to believe the Bible any more than they can just choose to believe that the sky is pink with purple polka dots.

abaldwin360:

Freedom of Speech

Every time a public figure makes a statement (or several statements) filled with hateful bile and faces backlash, the first thing you hear from them and anyone who supports their hate is “Freedom of Speech”. It happened with Hank Williams Jr. and it’s happening with Rush Limbaugh.

Sure, they are exercising their freedom of speech, they weren’t arrested for what they said. Freedom of speech protects you from being silenced by the government. That’s it. Everyone else who is against what they say are practicing their freedom of speech too. That’s how it works. Freedom of Speech isn’t freedom from being criticized or protection from responsibility for what you say, and if people don’t want to support companies advertising (paying for) their hateful rhetoric, they have every right to tell said companies, who will exercise their freedom to pull financial support. 

Just like fools like Rush Limbaugh have the right to say what they want, everyone else is allowed to say what they want too. 

Statements like “but what about his freedom of speech” in these cases demonstrates a lack of understanding  and a lack of critical thinking.

Freedom of Religion

This is another one, in Tennessee and Michigan groups are trying to make exceptions in laws against bullying in school that exclude bullying homosexuals for religious reasons. They are arguing that it is part of their religion and violates their rights not to be able to do so. 

Then there is the argument about health insurance covering contraceptives that I just wrote a lengthy post on earlier today.

Your religious freedom doesn’t give you the right to infringe on other people. Your freedom is no more important than anyone else’s. It’s as simple as that. 

Secular Society

When a group says that a lack of publicly lead prayers or religious affirmations in public places (that is places paid for by taxpayer dollars) is an endorsement for non-religion and taking away religious freedom.

No, it’s not. It’s a show of respect for all religions, not endorsing one over the other. It’s in the first amendment. You are still free to pray to yourself or in a group of your peers, you are still allowed to freely practice your religion. Your religion is no more important than anyone else’s under the constitution. Deal with it.  

Hating bigots makes you a bigot.

The astounding lack of logic in this statement only demonstrates a lack of critical thinking facilities in the person making the statement.

This is like saying getting angry at someone for vandalizing my car makes me just as bad as someone who vandalized my car out of anger.

Disliking a person who is a terrible person does not make me a terrible person. 

You dislike me just because my opinion is different.

Damn straight. If your opinions are based on hate, bias, willful ignorance, oppression, or intentionally misleading, there’s a pretty good chance I’m not going to like you. This ties into the “hating bigots makes you as bad as a bigot” statement and demonstrates a lack of logic, as well as trying to make one’s self a victim.

You are not being very open minded

I’ve run across this one a lot. Someone will (for example) call out a person or a group of people who made hateful, bigoted or untruthful remarks and someone defending those remarks will accuse you of being close minded.

Being open minded doesn’t mean you are accepting of everything. It means you will look at something from several angles and independently come to your own conclusion based on information presented to you.

It means you draw your conclusions and form your options based on the best available information free of the opinions of others.

The same goes for being a free thinker.