My Freedom to Beat You Over the Head Ends - At Your Head

Never have so many people enjoyed so many freedoms. Can you imagine what’s next?

 By MICHAEL SHERMER


I’m afraid I can, all too well. Are you going to warn me of even worse than I can imagine? I imagine so.

“This trend is what Dr. King meant by describing the rights revolution he helped to lead a “moral arc” that bends toward justice, and why I chose to title my latest book The Moral Arc, because history really has progressed since the invention of rights during the Enlightenment in the late 18th century.”

Packed a lot of wrongness in one long sentence. 1. Misappropriating MLK’s term ‘moral arc’ 2. “invention of rights” Mr Shermer must be unfamiliar with the sentiments expressed by the Founders in the Declaration that rights are ‘endowed by our Creator” 3. I don’t have time right now to google for the development of rights throughout history, including those damned priests I’m sure Shermer thinks are ignorant superstitious clods – Aquinas, etc, you know.

Wait, his understanding of the source and meaning of ‘rights’ gets better.

“Same-sex marriage and gay rights in general are themselves the legacy of the rights revolutions that took off in the late 1700s when the idea of rights was invented and then demanded, first in the American Revolution (starting with the Declaration of Independence) and then in the French Revolution (with the Rights of Man).”

Several thousand people had their rights violated at the collarbone by the French Revolution. If he wants to associate himself with that, God help him.

“Never in history have so many people enjoyed so many freedoms.”

Freedom to express an opinion different from Mr Shermer’s in public on SSM or homosexual acts or adoption by single people or homosexual couples?
Uh, no.

Freedom to equip oneself with protection against violent assault?
Uh, no.

Freedom from government mandate that one pay for health care procedures that violate one’s moral standards
Uh, no.

Freedom for small businessmen to participate in rites that seek to solemnize acts that are recognized as highly immoral and an affront to their religious faith?
Uh, no.

Freedom from having ones children told by the state government that the beliefs and moral standards their parents taught them were bigoted, wrong, superstitious and ought not to be believed?
Uh, no.

Freedom from representatives of the state providing prophylactics, pharmaceuticals and perhaps even abetting in surgical procedures without parental knowledge or consent?
Uh, no.

“Can you imagine what’s next?”

I shudder to even think.

“Illinois took a first bold step in decriminalizing sodomy in 1961, but at the time homosexuality was considered to be a perversion—even a mental illness—and if police caught a man engaged in “lewd” behavior his name, age and even home address could be published in the local newspaper (like pedophiles today).”

From which we may infer that pedophiles of the not too distant future will be treated like homosexuals of today? Wait; when conservatives have warned of that, they are pilloried and the idea laughed at. Now we are supposed to look forward to it as the next big leap in the expansion of rights along the arch of history?

“Mark my words: Now that the highest court in the country has made same-sex marriage the law of the land, I predict that within a few years Christians will come around to treating gay men and lesbians no differently from how they now treat other groups whom they previously persecuted—women, Jews and blacks.”

Setting aside the question begging about Christians persecuting this and that identity group (as we are now supposed to call them), please do hold your breath, Mr Shermer.

“The gay rights revolution will continue to fine-tune laws related to inheritance, taxes, job discrimination, family rights (that of surrogate parents vs. same-sex parents) and—now—divorce and custody issues.

Most of which had been already addressed in civil union laws in the states. So, that really isn’t it, is it? Oh, except for “job discrimination.” Following his anti-Christian screed, can you doubt that Shermer is salivating for the next court case challenging a church or school’s right to hire employees who do not openly condemn its faith?

“And then there’s atheists, agnostics and secular humanists—who have been following the strategy of the LGBT community in “coming out” campaigns to show that we are just as moral, just as worthy and just as good citizens as believers.”

He isn’t hiding his anti-Christian hopes and prayers – wait…

In whom does he hope? The USSC, apparently.

After a meandering consideration of animal rights, the death penalty and human trafficking around the world, Oh, and climate change, of course, Shermer ends: “And, of course, there is the defense of the rights our ancestors left us, if (pace Benjamin Franklin) we can keep them. As Franklin’s friend and colleague Thomas Jefferson cautioned, “Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.”

Which is why freedom loving people have to keep a sharp eye on people like Shermer.