Freedom from Religion

Right when Fredrik is in the middle of a discussion with me and on Richard Dawkins' website about why America ended up so religious compared to the many very secular countries in Europe (you can find some of this discussion here), it seems that the Swedish government has today put forth a motion to make marriage gender-neutral in Sweden -- that is, to allow same-sex couples to marry.

For those of you who don't know: in Sweden a same-sex couple can currently have a "registered partnership". Entering a registered partnership is quick and painless -- it doesn't involve any more paperwork than getting married, for sure -- and two registered partners have the exact same legal rights and obligations as a married couple, save one: the default parenthood of one partner if the other partner has a baby. That is, when our baby is born, Fredrik will automatically be registered as its father, because we are married and our marriage means, among other things, that he is presumed to take father-type responsibility for any baby that I give birth to (without any illusion or give-a-damn about whether or not he is actually the biological father). If we were NOT married, which is the case for the parents of over 50% of the children born in Sweden today, we'd have to go down to Socialen and both of us swear that he's the baby daddy -- again, without any actual paternity test or anything. It's just a matter of taking responsibility for the baby, and a married man is seen to have done that in automatically and in advance when he said "I do". Homosexual couples in a registered partnership are put in the same category as "sambos" (couples who just live together, who also basically have the same rights as married couples, by the way) in this respect; in the case that one of them gives birth or adopts a child, the other has to take 5 extra minutes to fill out a little paperwork in order to become the child's other parent. As you can tell, I don't see this as a terrible inconvenience, even if my friends that have had "love children" think the process is a wee bit embarrassing.

The other point to be made before dissecting an article on the subject is that I think same-sex couples should be able to be married and that all such domestic/family partnerships should be entirely gender-neutral -- and neutral in a lot of other ways, really -- so while I think the difference between marriage and registered partnership is paltry and inconsequential, I see no need for there to be a difference and understand the feeling of inequality that looms in the air as long as the difference exists.

So when I saw a quote on DN.se today from Göran Hägglund, leader of the Christian Democrat party in Sweden, I became a little perplexed. Ponderous, if you will.

See, the majority and Government in Sweden right now is a "conservative" one, or moderate or liberal or whatever combination of "we're not socialists" is your favorite label. The Christian Democrats are a part of this majority and Government, along with 3 other parties. But while the motion to make marriage gender-neutral is being put forth by the Government, the Christian Democrats (which I will call KD) are not a part of the motion. They don't like this gender-neutral marriage business -- and since they're called the Christian Democrats, it doesn't require a long explanation as to why.

What might surprise you, on the other hand, is that I voted for them in the last election. So you can imagine that I'm a big vexed and kerfuffled over the fact that they're dissenting from the rest of the government on this question. And the quote from Göran Hägglund that vexed and kerfuffled me was that this motion is a "threat to religious freedom."

Wha... uhh?

See, I was not 100% shocked that they didn't want to be a part of making same-sex marriage legal in Sweden, even if I was a bit sad that a party that I liked quite a lot was actively differing from my own opinions (some of them passively differ from my opinions about abortion, in the sense that the pro-lifers in Sweden tend to be members of KD but even they know that they'd be wasting their breath). But when I saw this quote I thought... no, Göran, honey, you're not going to go down that road, are you? Please tell me that "Think of the CHILDREN!" isn't going to be mentioned in the accompanying article anywhere?

Luckily, I didn't end up disappointed at all. The article explaining Hägglund's and KD's view, which you can read here, does not go down the "Think of the CHILDREN!" road at all. Rather, they suggest that making marriage gender-neutral while simultaneously making no change to who is allowed to perform marriages will most likely put people -- churches and mosques, specifically -- in the position of being forced to perform marriages that violate their religious beliefs. While allowing churches and other religious institutions to continue to decide who they are willing to marry is an idea you can dabble with for a little while, it doesn't take long to see that that is not a good solution (if you don't believe me, think of the business of pharmacists being allowed to refuse to dispense birth control pills in the U.S...). So KD's suggestion is that marriage become a 100% civil/secular contract and the right to join people into their civil/secular contract be completely taken away from religious institutions.

This is, in my opinion, perfectly spot-on.

It makes more sense. A marriage in the church has no reason to have anything to do with being entitled to half of a house or right to visit a person in the hospital or change which cable channels you get even if the account is in the other person's name. A civil marriage has nothing to do with loving and cherishing the other person and promising to do so until you die, so help you "some fictional character" (as Magnus Betnér has apparently put it). A common argument from anti-gay-marriage activists is that man-woman marriage is "tradition"; that it's "always been that way" -- well, then we're only working harder to preserve the tradition by making a church wedding nothing more than an exchange of words and a promise to God, as that's what it was from the beginning before all of this legal business came in much later.

It preserves religious freedom entirely -- no, strengthens it, I'd say. It would sever unnecessary ties between church and state, and a church wedding would be "voluntary" to a much greater degree than it is now. I find this not only a benefit to the churches and mosques -- who I whole-heartedly believe should be able to reject performing same-sex marriages if it violates their religious principles -- but it addresses a pet peeve of mine: it would mean that far less non-religious people would get married in churches. Let's face it, the vast majority of people get married for the legal and civil benefits, and the fact that many of them do it in a church -- despite it being practically the only time they set foot in a church in their lives -- is because it's traditional and/or convenient and/or pretty. But if the church no longer had the right to perform the legal side of the union, this vast majority of people who are seeking just that would have to actively choose to "add on" the churchy part, and I rejoice in the idea that they would not make that choice. This brings us back to Fredrik's discussion about why America is religious and Sweden is secular (de facto, when the de juro situation is quite the opposite in many respects), as it just bothers the living fuck out of me as an "it's the principle of the thing!" American atheist that people go around having church weddings and baptisms despite their non-belief just because it's a pretty building or because "everybody else does it" or because it means their kid gets presents.

It would even help make it so that marriage could have a more flexible definition in other aspects, aside from the question of same or opposite gender. Have you all seen the movie I Now Pronounce you Chuck and Larry? Two straight guys enter a registered partnership so that the kids of the one guy, who is injured and unemployed, can benefit from the health and life insurance of the other guy, who gets said benefits from his job and can transfer them to his family. The climax of the movie revolves around them having to prove that they're in love and actually have sex, etc., because of suspicions that they're "defrauding" the city and/or the insurance companies with their partnership. But why should this be fraud? If two friends are close enough so that one wants to help raise the other's children and make sure they are provided for, should sex be a prerequisite for whether or not they're allowed to enter into such a union, contract, or agreement? But wait, I haven't said what genders they are -- what if one is a man and one is a woman? Then no one would question it -- hell, if sex were a pre-requisite for being allowed to be married, half of all married couples with children would be going through some sort of forced divorce right now (and wouldn't THAT be in line with society's goals!). But what if it's two men? See -- why does that make a difference? But now I'm either preaching to the choir or to the deaf, so perhaps I'd best move on.

I see a few comments after the article claiming that KD's suggestion is "impossible to implement." I don't for the life of me see why not -- especially since a full seperation of the religious and the legal side of weddings has been in place for years in many other European countries.

Another comment at the end of the article shows a typical lack of understanding for what discrimination and freedom of speech, among other legal and philosophical concepts, actually mean. *"I would like to see KD's proposal go through, but their reasoning doesn't hold," the commenter writes, my translation. "We have freedom of religion, yes, but it doesn't mean that I can do whatever I want in religion's name. If I believe that my gods are pleased if I sacrifice children or circumsize women, I still can't do it, though I can believe it. Neither can a priest say whatever they want just because of religion." This person's understanding of freedom of religion (as well as freedom of speech, and the concept of discrimination) is no more mature or better developed than the adversary I imagined in the beginning of my post -- the super-fundamentalist Christian who claims that homosexual marriage (or indeed, even allowing homosexuality at all) infringes on their freedom of religion simply because they can't raise their children (OMG Think of the CHILDREN!) in a society that is queer-free. Refusing to perform a purely religious ceremony (as it would be according to the proposal) that would violate the religion itself is not discrimination, nor can it be classed in the same category of "secular morals trump religious ones" as forbidding human sacrifice or female circumcision. Otherwise, you'd have to believe that it's discriminatory for a Christian priest to refuse to perform a female circumcision or a marriage between an old man and a 10-year old girl -- but then you'd be contradicting yourself, no? Plus, the statement that a priest can't say whatever he wants and refer to his religion for protection is, in my opinion, simply false. We're treading dangerously into the territory of confusing civil rights with the right not to have our precious little feelings hurt.

Marriage was, from its very beginnings, a religious institution. One which people make a promise to god and in front of their families -- and, if I'm permitted a side note, was most often polygamous and non-voluntary in its origins (so spare me the drivel about "traditional marriage"). For the sake of the society we live in today, the blending of this religious tradition with a legal one -- shared property, rights and responsibilities as supported by a legal system -- by using the same name for it can be seen as a regrettable mistake. Allowing the same people to seal both contracts was an even bigger mistake, or at the very least something that ought to get thrown out the window in a democratic society in which citizens are supposedly able to enjoy freedom from establishment and freedom to practice.

So it's cool to see that I'm in full agreement with Göran. Though I don't know... can my "it's the principle of the thing!" American atheist heart continue to allow me to vote for the CHRISTIAN democrats? That's a toughy.

---

*"Jag skulle gärna se KDs förslag av andra skäl, men KDs resonemang håller inte. Vi har religionsfrihet ja, men det betyder inte att man får göra vad som helst i religionens namn. Om jag tror att mina gudar blidkas av att offra barn eller omskära flickor, så får jag inte göra det (men tro det). Inte heller får man som präst säga vad som helst med hänvisning till religionen."

Free at Last

Does anyone else have the urge to dance around and sing "Ding Dong, the Witch is Dead"?

Elvis's favorite sandwich was fried peanut butter and banana. Coincidence? I think not.

Peanut Butter: The Atheist's Nightmare


Bananas: The Homopho... er, Atheist's Nightmare


Fredrik says, "What I want to know is why god didn't make the peanuts into peanut butter straight away. And why he didn't make at least one of our digits a spoon to eat it with."

Now now. You can't expect the omnipotent designer to have thought of everything.

Humanity

More Poll Smoking on MLK Day

An interesting article about a poll conducted by CNN regarding people's views on race relations in the U.S.: Most blacks say MLK's vision fulfilled, poll finds.

What's most interesting is the seeming contradictions in the poll's findings. First, the fact that blacks are apparently much more content than whites in regards to the current condition of race relations in the U.S. (69% of blacks and 46% of whites saying MLKing's dream has been realized) makes me wonder what thought processes members of the two different groups used. A concept like "race relations" can be very broad indeed, and perhaps the black respondents were thinking about entirely different aspects than the white respondents. One possibility, however likely or unlikely, is that the white respondents genuinely realize how far there still is to go in a way that the black respondents don't. Another possibility is that it's a form of "well-meaning hippy disease," where the whites don't realize how condescending and patronizing their well-meaning is ("They have such beautiful children!" says Larry Wilmore). Then you also have the very likely possibility that the blacks were thinking "Yeah, I feel I can be an equal, contributing, respected member of society" whereas the whites were thinking "They're all criminals and crackheads!" The irony being, anyway, that the discrepancy itself suggests there are at least a few kinks left in the area of race "relations".

Then you have the fact that, even though more than half of whites say MLK's dream hasn't been fulfilled, half of them answered that the Voting Rights Act was no longer necessary. So apparently ability to exercise the right to vote was not one of the areas where they felt race relations needed improving. (Sadly, that puts my "They're all criminals and crackheads!" theory in the lead.)

Also amazing is the fact that as late as March 2008 it was only 34% of blacks and 35% of whites that said MLK's dream had become a reality. I guess we can all guess what event of the last 10 months triggered this doubling. But the article goes on to state that a majority of blacks no do NOT believe that Obama's presidency will trigger a new era in race relations and that, in contrast to how they felt right after the election, the majority believed that race will always be an issue in America. A similar drop in whites' enthusiasm was noticed, it says. So race is and always will be a problem, even though we live in a nation where MLK's four children are judged not by the color of their skin but by the content of their character?

I want them to do a new poll, but this time I demand answers in the form of a 1000-2000 word persuasive essay.

Logical Fallacy

Here's a phrase that I'm sick of:

Women have had babies for thousands of years/hundreds of years ago/when I was pregnant I did/didn't/women did plenty of/never did X or Y, and they survived/their babies survived/the human race survived.

Yes, you're correct, the ancient Egyptians had babies, too. And they also probably drank beer and smoked whatever ancient Egyptians smoked and didn't read What to Expect when you're Expecting and didn't use pain killers or iron supplements or avoid blue cheese.

They were also most likely years younger on average when giving birth than we are, and rather than being some sort of magical super-race devoid of miscarriages and birth defects as the argument would suggest, I'm guessing their infant, child and mother mortality rates as well as their rates of physical and mental birth defects were a lot higher and their average life expectancy a lot lower. So, since my personal goal in life is actually not to be a part of making sure that the human race continues to survive and evolve but rather to make sure my OWN kid and I both survive and remain healthy, I am in no hurry to emulate the ancient Egyptians' or any other wistfully remembered past culture's gestational methods just so that I can have more fun -- scratch that, just so that YOU can have more fun -- at a party.

So the fact that certain or all people X number of years ago did not act in the same way while pregnant as we do today is wholly uninteresting because of the fact that they didn't get the same outcome as we get today. Next time someone uses this argument on me to try to get me to drink a glass of wine, I'll pick at them for their silly modern habit of showering and brushing their teeth and cooking their meat before they eat it. After all, cavemen didn't do those things, and things obviously worked out fine for them.