In Andrew Sullivan’s post titled: Religious Belief and Bigotry, he touches on the issues of the term “bigotry” and when the term is appropriate to use. He breaks down the groups of people who are opposed to civil marriage equality and their reasoning’s. The minimalist conservatives, according to Sullivan are a sincere group who do not trust a major change in their core social institution. And the other group are the ones who are consistent with their religious position, and are opposed to civil marriage equality because of their religious affiliations. These two groups, according to Sullivan should not be considered bigots. I agree with the latter of two groups. However, I don’t think distrusting a change in a group’s social institutions is a valid reason to be opposed to civil marriage equality. Their distrust to make the change is based on intuition, which I don’t think is a good enough reason to not want to accept civil marriage equality. Like Sullivan stated, you can’t reason someone out of something they didn’t use reason to get into, which is how he defined bigots.
This post was very interesting to me because he spoke about an issue that I have been constantly debating about with others and myself. He states that one of the ways to tell if certain groups are bigots, in this case, a religious group is if they are consistent with their religious position. He made a great point about the inconsistency of the Catholic position and how they basically pick and choose what part of the religious text to follow. They believe gay marriage is immoral, but are not penalizing those who participate in pre marital sex. In the Quran, the religious text for Islam, there are pages and pages of guidelines on what a person must do in order to be considered a good Muslim. And a very common problem I’ve noticed within the Muslim community is how some Muslims choose to follow certain things in the Quran, but totally disregard other parts, causing hostility amongst fellow Muslims. I know many Muslims who are totally against homosexuality, but eat pork (the consumption of pork is forbidden, according to the Quran). The contradiction is why these people would be labeled as bigots. The reasons for the opposition aren’t based off of religious factors, because if it were, they would be following all the rule of the religious position. The reason is merely personal taste. These people just choose not to accept gay marriage because they don’t like it, and are not interested in debates to possibly change their perspectives. However, if these people were persuaded into shifting their views, then according to Sullivan, they should not be considered bigots. If these groups of people who are opposed to gay marriage are given time without being attacked for their views, they may eventually be persuaded into changing their views of gay marriage.
This is my first time reading a piece of Sullivan’s writing, and it was very enjoyable. His style of writing is simple and easy to follow; yet it’s clear he is very knowledgeable and open-minded.
seasmin92 