Is hate speech against religious people acceptable?

HuddaBudda, 10 months ago

I have been a christian most of my life and I am not fully sure how to respond to this.

I feel like if you cannot test your faith, put it in the ring and let it dance with the other arguments. Then what is your faith except blind servitude? I also understand that not everyone is going to believe the way I do, and that is alright too. So long we get to debate logically, then I have no problem with it.

But I do think this is needed, Christianity needs to be judged, it needs to be criticized, because that is the only way Christians are going to grow.

But I also understand that Christians seem to be jumping into calculus 3 (Leviticus), before they've mastered the basics (Love your neighbor as yourself). So it is no wonder that most people who want to debate as a christian come from a place of (You are wrong, I am right), but also they don't understand the context of what they are regurgitating. Or even why it matters.

TL:DR Christians are going to bring in a lot of information that is wrong, but I also think it is necessary for that wrong information to be brought to the light for us to grow.

ElectroVagrant, 10 months ago

To OP: no, hate speech & discrimination against religious people is not acceptable nor allowed. The examples cited appear to not meet that threshold to the admins or moderators of that community. I would recommend discussing this with either group if you believe otherwise.

If you would like to discuss religion there are a variety of communities you can find here and for Christianity specifically, here.

While I think the topic of religious discussion across the fediverse could be interesting, I don’t think this thread offers a constructive basis from which to have this discussion, and as such I am locking it. For those interested in discussing the topic on a more constructive basis feel free to make a new thread here, or for religion more broadly or Christianity specifically, whichever active communities you find in the linked search results.

dsemy, 10 months ago

Honestly, I love Lemmy as a platform and the idea behind it, but currently it really feels like an echo chamber when it comes to religious/political subjects.

As much as I hate to say it, I saw a much bigger diversity of opinions on Reddit.

ulu_mulu, 10 months ago

I wonder where is the actual line of what is allowed and what is not on this instance

I’d like to know this too, because banning a community just because they don’t want to talk about something - and that apparently offended someone, while allowing other communities free rein over content that could offend someone, makes me confused about how the rules are actually applied.

Roundcat, 10 months ago

I fail to see the examples you give as hate speech against religious people.

If there was content like memes equating jews to lizards, going off on muslims being inherently violent, or saying all catholic priests were child molesters, I think you would have a case, especially since the last two are memes I would commonly see on Reddit's religiousfruitcake sub.

The first example you give just comes off an an edgy (lol I'm so logical. These ideas are the same)
The second is making fun of the placements of two signs
the last two are plays on the question "If god exists, why does he let bad things happen?" Which is a question that many atheists ask themselves.

Hate speech would be a call to do violence against religious people, or spreading stereotypes that perpetuate violence and discrimination. All I see here are mid to bad jokes.

Also, and this goes for any community here, just because a joke or meme offends you, doesn't inherently make it hate speech. I think a christian sub would be in their right to post memes poking fun at atheism.

kher, 10 months ago

Like this one? lemmy.world/post/1440242

I am not saying that the community should be banned, I am just saying that if the c/christians were banned just for not allowing LGBTQ+ content, then applying the same standards this one should be banned as well.

And hate speech is incredible volatile definition, it seems like everyone is using it how they feel like.

BrianTheFirst, 10 months ago

These are all true though..

Roundcat, 10 months ago

Based on my post, yes, that would fit. Allegations of child molestation are serious enough to incite violence against groups of people who are undeserving, and as someone raised Baptist, this would be something I would hear a lot from people who wanted to exclude or discriminate against Catholics.

Ultimately though, "hate speech" is a hard thing to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the speaker/poster was posting with the intention of hate, which is why it's seldomly used in prosecution. The above post could also be seen as a jab at recent news regarding a priest who got caught molesting children, or a criticism of the church rather than the adherents.

My issue with the banning of queer topics and members is that not all Christians are LGBT shunning. There are plenty of Christians who are queer, or have queer family, or are affirming or supportive of queer people. To ban the discussion or participation of queer topics and people would be to deny a group of people membership based on their interpretation/ belief/ or denomination of Christianity. To make that a rule in a general Christian sub comes with the implication "if you are queer affirming, you are not a true Christian and aren't welcome here"

The issue above feels more of a matter of exclusion rather than hate speech.

iridaniotter, 10 months ago

No, hate speech isn’t okay. But your examples are not hate speech, so there’s no problem.

autumn, 10 months ago

To me, “This community does not affirm practiced LGBTQ+ lifestyles” isn’t hate speech, but is anti-lgbtq, which is a thing the admins of lemmy.world are right to take action on if they’re trying to cultivate an instance that is friendly to lgbtq folks.

I think that’s why even though the community had additional rules in the sidebar about not condoning violence against lgbtq, and athiestmemes has content Christians find offensive, the admins deleted the community. It’s clearly still a contested subject within the thread, but at the end of the day lemmy’s general response to people that don’t like the rules of their instance is to find another instance.

Something else to note is that there are multiple levels of shunning in fediverse. The admin in the thread deleted the community, but would still federate with a server that hosted it.

Roundcat, 10 months ago

To me “This community does not affirm practiced LGBTQ+ lifestyles” implies if you are a queer or queer affirming Christian, you are not welcomed in this sub, which is excluding a large amount of Christian fed users. Even with the views towards queer people aside, you are basically drawing a line in the sand in a faith based sub based on interpretation, denomination, and belief.

Rottcodd, 10 months ago

You're fighting a losing battle.

The simple fact of the matter is that virtually every single human being is bigoted in some way or another AND virtually every one of them is convinced either that they're not bigoted at all or that their bigotry is wholly justified because the people they hate purportedly deserve it.

There's a particular set of bigoted views that's tolerated or even expected throughout most of the mainstream western internet, and according to those views, hating Christans (among others) is at least wholly acceptable, and generally even encouraged. And naturally, the bigots who do it are convinced that they aren't bigots, or at least that their bigotry is justified. And nobody is going to convince them otherwise.

Now, one could get around that, and particularly on the fediverse, by seeking out places that don't reward hating Christians, but unfortunately, those places are almost certainly just going to have a different set of people that everyone hates, and with the way society has divided up, their set is likely going to be even larger and more problematic than the set of people the first place hates.

Really, at least unless and until somebody manages to make a success of a site that actually takes a stand against hate broadly (instead of, as virtually all who claim that actually do just taking a stand against the hate of the groups they support and conveniently ignoring the rest), about the best you can do is settle for a place that's somewhat less noxiously hateful than another, and as necessary, block its worst elements.

And yeah - if you're so inclined, you can try to get the bigots to see the fact that they're bigots, but don't expect any good to come of that.

DessertStorms, 10 months ago

Oppression is about power dynamics.

There is pretty much nowhere on earth where Christians are powerless or oppressed, the opposite is true, they hold immense amounts of power globally. Meanwhile LGBTQA+ people are still oppressed, to varying degrees, almost everywhere, and have no structural power at all.

Christianity has inflicted death and war and violence and hate since its conception, while LGBTQA+ people just want to exist as they are.

Speaking out against them is not comparable, and pretending it is is disingenuous at best.

Roundcat, 10 months ago

I mean there are parts of Africa and Asia where there is indeed Christian persecution, but definitely not the same thing that many Christians in western countries talk about when they wish to pull books from a library, or establish prayer in a public school and get pushback.

DessertStorms, 10 months ago

Right, and in those parts of Africa and Asia Christians aren't in power. Also the fact that you could probably count those countries on one hand maaaaybe two, proves what a rarity it actually is, so bringing it up is neither helpful nor productive, it's just whataboutism.

Roundcat, 10 months ago

Is it rare? Certainly. Are they any less deserving of our attention? Certainly not. I feel any group of people who faces violence based on their religion or religious background deserves justice, whether they are Uighurs in China, or Christians in...well China.

In fact feel the same way about the Persecution complex many Western Christians have that you do. In fact our conversation proves my point that the fake persecution that many western christians whine about subtracts concern or attention from real Christian persecution that happens outside the west.

HubertManne, 10 months ago

I think each user and place should do what they think is best. It sounds like you are talking about lemmy on this kbin magazine. Personally the ideal for me is everything allowed federation wise but the instance may not allow something based on how the maintainers feel but the thing can just find a home somewhere else in the federation. then me as an individual just blocks them if I don't like them.

wethan2, 10 months ago

Just so you know, this is a post on c/general on lemmy.world, not kbin

HubertManne, 10 months ago

yeah my bad. The interface can be hard to read at times.

activator90, 10 months ago

Imo, you should be allowed to mock everyone, religions, LGBTQ+ or atheists

The moment you start giving special treatment to atheists and consequently inferior treatment to Christians you start threatening the basic tenets of freedom. Which in the long run could be very dangerous for a free society

aaron_griffin, 10 months ago

There is no line. It’s up to whoever runs each instance.

I know you’re looking for a broad moral rule that applies here, but you won’t find it. Federation allows us all to coexist.

So if an instance owner decided that a specific community has policies they don’t like, it’s totally fine for them to shit can them.

MonsieurHedge, 10 months ago

Personally, I consider Christianity a hate group, so they get the banhammer the same as the KKK or whatever.

trent, 10 months ago

The Fediverse is pretty radical. I'm an atheist also, an exmormon, and I think this might just be a misunderstanding.
The rule, "no LGBTQ+ content," I don't think is saying "no gay people." I am pretty sure it is just asking to avoid the topic, to prevent bigoted discussion from happening.
As fair or not as you want it to be, LGBTQ+ is a controversial topic for religious people, and I think it's fair to just put a pin in that discussion in your community. But what do I know?

HuddaBudda, 10 months ago

I could understand stuff like porn and that, obviously it's a christian forum.

Though I am not sure why Christians can't talk about LGBTQ+ topics. Is it taboo to talk about such things? Are we to pretend they aren't real people that exist? That they don't deserve the same rights we do?

At best, it is cowardice to not discuss these things, at worst it is bigotry against a group of people that have done nothing wrong.

Drewfro66, 10 months ago

Speaking as an Atheist and lapsed Catholic:

I agree completely. While religion has a component of belief, it is primarily an identity, that the vast majority of people are born into. Despite not believing in God, in many ways I still consider myself a Catholic (as does the church). The idea that religion is about your personal relationship with God and belief is a Protestant one.

There is a reason why religion is included among other protected classes, but political affiliation is not.

Atheist communities online have a sanctimonious tendency to consider their bigotry above reproach. It’s how you get the slide of figures like Richard Dawkins into the right-wing on the coattails of islamaphobia.

There’s a fine line between making fun of a belief and stereotyping an entire religious group. And some religious groups - like Mormons or Wahhabists - are deserving of most of the hate they get. But the Catholic Church is not as bad as many make it out to be and millions have been massacred even in modern times over anti-Papistry. Spreading the ideas of Islamaphobia and anti-Papistry kills people.

I think there’s a gray area with State Atheist countries. I think the way, say, the DPRK handles it - with the complete outlaw of religion - is not the right approach. In China, religious minorities are protected under the law but not allowed to join the Communist Party, which I think is close to the right approach.

kher, 10 months ago

I think you understood perfectly the point I was making.