Hobby Lobby and Religious Freedom

This week, oral arguments were heard in the Hobby Lobby case. The Hobby
Lobby corporation wants to be exempted from the Affordable Care Act's
requirement that employer sponsored health insurance must provide
contraceptives at no cost to the employee. The owners of the company
happen to be right-wing christians (no big surprise there). This is a
bit disconcerting. Can a corporation have religious freedom rights?

I don't think so. Most of the arguments were made on this point.
Most of the supporters of Hobby Lobby's position seem to think that the
corporation's rights are the same as the owner's rights. However, I do
not believe that the US Constitution allows for corporate entities to be
considered equivalent to a citizen of the US. Can a corporation then
vote? Or be counted by the census? Can it serve in the armed forces?
Can it hold public office? Can it serve on a jury? If we must extend
religious freedom to a corporations, we must extend these other rights
and responsibilities to them.

The most troubling aspect of this is that it would allow the corporation
to violate the religious freedoms of it's employees. Would they be
allowed to require it's employees to go to church? After all, the
employee would have to make accommodation for their company's religious
stance. What about other religiously fraught debates? If a gay man works
for Hobby Lobby, and is in a state that allows same-sex marriage, can
they deny his partner health coverage when they get married?

I heard a program on NPR that had a panel discussing this. Every member
of the panel except one referred to the medications in question as contraceptives. That is the purpose of these drugs, to prevent conception. The lone standout was one of the attorneys for Hobby Lobby. He insisted on
calling them "abortion drugs". This is one of the ways that the religious
right operates. If they are against something, they try to change the
terminology to make their position look like the best one, regardless of
the science or other facts that oppose them. Calling contraceptives
"abortion drugs" is deceptive at best. It is an attempt to paint all
women who use them as being sexually promiscuous and having low regard
for human life. It refuses to acknowledge that there can be other
reasons to use them, unrelated to preventing pregnancy. It refuses to
acknowledge the fact that monogamous heterosexual married couples may
need to use them to become temporarily infertile so they can have
children on their own schedule. It completely ignores the rights of all
people to control their own bodies.

I am certainly hoping that the Supreme Court decides this against Hobby
Lobby. That would maintain the freedom of the most people.

Fred Phelps

I suppose I should weigh in on the recent death of Fred Phelps. He was a
man who followed his religion to it's logical extreme and taught nothing
but hate. There is now one less man spreading hate, and that is all that
needs to be said.

Culture Shock at the Truckstop

This evening, I was heading into the truckstop to take a shower and I
came across a group of muslims conducting their evening prayers. I then
began to wonder just what the other truckers thought about that. My
thoughts are that the islamic variety of imaginary sky daddy is just as
ridiculous the christian one. However, I certainly don't want to refuse
them the right to believe as they wish. Elsewhere in the truckstop were
the usual christian literature stashes, evidence of the general
right-wing christian leanings of the typical trucker.

It occurred to me that most truckers observing the muslim prayer ritual
would likely think that "those people" shouldn't be allowed to do that
in front of good, decent Americans. Somehow, I don't think they would
feel the same if a religious minority came out and said the same thing
of them.

Alabama: Deep South in action

The Alabama state legislature is looking to show how uninformed about
the First Amendment they really are. A house committee in the state has
pushed forward a bill to require that she school day open with a
christian prayer. Not just allow, but require. link
Wasn't this issue settled fifty years ago by the Supreme Court?

Their reasoning is that if Congress can open with a prayer, then so can
schools. I personally feel that Congress should not be opening with an
officially sanctioned christian prayer. The constitutionality of that
practice can be debated. But when you have a captive group of children
that cannot come and go at will from the proceedings, that definitely
oversteps the boundary set up by the First Amendment. It has always been
legal for children and teachers alike to pray while in school, it is
the mandated, school-led prayer that is prohibited.

I looked at the text of the bill, it thinly disguises the prayer
requirement by saying that the prayer time is to instruct the students
in the opening procedures of Congress. The prayer is to be one of
the prayers that was given by the House or Senate chaplain, or a guest
member of the clergy. If this actually becomes law, I would encourage all
teachers in Alabama to research and find a specifically non-christian
prayer that was offered to open Congress, and then encourage their
students to go home and tell their parents what religious tradition the
daily prayer comes from to the christians can get an understanding of
what their privileged viewpoint actually does. You can bet the law
would be repealed in a hurry.

Cognitive dissonance part 2

The Conservative Political Action Conference has broken its agreement to
allow a booth hosted by American Atheists. (press release at
http://news.atheists.org/2014/02/25/press-release-cpac-boots-atheist-booth)
Although I am very liberal in my political viewpoint, I know that there
are other atheists who are quite conservative. The position of CPAC
seems to be that it is not possible to be conservative without being
religious. Their stated reason for excluding atheists? The "tone" of the
message from American Atheists. Huh? This from a group that welcomes
such people as Rush Limbaugh and Anne Coulter? Their "tone" is much
harsher toward non-conservatives than the idea that religious equality
is a good thing no matter what political views you may hold.