With Barack Obama re-assuming his role as commander-in-chief for the next few years, the only option now is to look forward as he further cements his place in the annals of history as the most progressive leader the United States has known. We will have universal health care. Abortion will not be outlawed. To deal with our deficit, Obama will be standing firm as he pushes for a 1.6 trillion tax hike on the very wealthy– anyone making over 250,000 annually. The DREAM goes on for immigrants. More disadvantaged kids will be able to take advantage of the Pell Grant program, which Obama was able to expand during his first term by cutting out the banks. Medicare will live on. Social Security will live on. The troops are coming home from Afghanistan. The Senate is more culturally diverse than ever before. Gay marriage will become a reality. And as of December 1st, recreational marijuana use will be legal in two states.
I have been unable to properly transcribe my pride and elation over the victory achieved by the liberal base. For all the perceived confidence on the left, there were real concerns that fostered white-resentment would cause an upset at the polls. Major news outlets have mused or offered significant data as to how or why Obama won, twice, making him also the only President to be elected with an unemployment rate well over 5%. Is it a younger, more secular and tolerant following? My theory is based on just that– a growing body of educated atheists and skeptics that have easy access when it comes to acquiring information in this technological age. We’re no longer shooting blind when it comes to religious or scientific theory and faith alone doesn’t cut it anymore. Getting right down to it, we have a GOP that incorporates Christian values to defame any who oppose their policies and furthermore enforce and uphold their version or standard of living to cultivate or retain religious voters. It is no surprise to me then that religion, or Christianity in this case, is the weapon of choice as it has been used or abused to justify the mass degradation and oppression of indigenous groups or people of differing faiths and how it simply does not work in a more secular society. Christianity has murdered millions. Christianity has justified slavery, racism and a bundling of ordinances or laws that promote a ‘moral’ version of civility and order.
Here are a few religion-based quotes that helped shape or reinforce intolerant views and have endured to this day:
It is generally believed that the curse which Noah pronounced upon Canaan was the origin of the black race. Certain it is that when Noah said, “Cursed be Canaan, a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren,” he pictured the future of the Colored race. They have been and are a race of servants, but now in the dawn of the twentieth century, we are all coming to see this matter of service in its true light and to find that the only real joy in life is in serving others; not bossing them. There is no servant in the world as good as a good Colored servant, and the joy that he gets from rendering faithful service is one of the purest joys there is in the world. The Golden Age, July 24, 1929, p. 702 – From The Watchtower, a bible-based magazine published by the Jehovah’s Witnesses.
Mormon leader Brigham Young stated: “Shall I tell you the law of God in regard to the African race? If the white man who belongs to the chosen seed mixes his blood with the seed of Cain, the penalty, under the law of God, is death on the spot. This will always be so.” From the Journal of Discourses, vol. 10, p. 110. These teachings were formally renounced in 1978.
Scriptures used to support anti-gay legislation:
In a similar way, Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding towns gave themselves up to sexual immorality and perversion. They serve as an example of those who suffer the punishment of eternal fire. Jude 1:7 – Old Testament
If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads. Leviticus 20:13 – Old Testament
Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 1st Corinthians 6:9-10 – New Testament
White-resentment describes the views of working (often religious) middle to upper class whites that have been made to feel that minorities are at the crux of our financial woes and are a drain on the system. Republicans tout the idea, especially near election time, that white families face even heavier taxes to supplement those do-nothing blacks and Latinos. The added religious spiel is nothing more than an attack on the moral values of minority groups to garner more leverage with those same misinformed, angry whites who often have very racist views.
All throughout the campaign, this was the rhetoric as told by the right. Obama wants to give minorities and women free stuff. They attacked Obama for not being American or a good Christian. They say we are a nation of takers. Mitt Romney‘s 47% are a group of whiny and godless bums who refuse to take responsibility for their own lives and feel entitled to government handouts. Recently he credited his loss to just that, refusing to take responsibility for his own party’s shortcomings.
The GOP has a problem. People are not so eager to follow and are more open-minded than ever before. Christianity no longer has the power it once did, the power to divide and conquer. Whites receive more government assistance, per capita, than blacks and data is readily available to support this. Blacks and Latinos work as hard as anyone else and to suggest otherwise is mind-boggling and racist. It’s time for the GOP to unite with the people and to stop with the mind games and race-baiting. We don’t want free stuff, we want jobs, we want opportunity. We want equality for all. When will Republican party develop a political strategy that does not involve anti-gay, anti-women, anti-minority and ultra-Christian language? The world is changing and they’d better change with it.
A white male with a felony record is three times as likely to receive entry-level job offers than a black man with a college degree and no criminal record. Something’s wrong here.
Be Clear 