Cadets who complain about “unwanted” proselytizing need to grow up and learn tolerance
By Seth Richardson
Science fiction writer Robert Heinlein often discussed tolerance of diverse culture and religion in his novels, and he said “If the natives rub blue mud in their belly-buttons, it’s polite to rub blue mud in your belly-button.”
Yesterday, the Washington Post reported that 41 percent of Air Force Academy cadets participating in a religious tolerance survey who are non-Christians “were subjected to unwanted proselytizing at least once or twice last year.”
What a bunch of panty-waist crybabies. This does not reflect well on the character of those who complained.
Using data obtained from the Air Force Academy under a Freedom of Information Act request, Post reporter Dan Elliot analyzed the results of a survey taken by the Academy on religious tolerance. Eliott writes, “In a survey in 2004, religious tolerance became a sensitive issue at the academy with a finding that many cadets heard slurs or jokes about other religions and that some felt ostracized because they weren’t religious. Gould, who was not at the academy at the time of the 2004 survey, has made it a priority to improve religious tolerance, launching new programs and frequently reminding cadets, faculty and staff of the need to respect others’ beliefs, or lack of beliefs.” The Post reports that 19 percent of cadets who “participated” in the poll were subjected to any sort of “unwanted” proselytizing.
But the real questions are, do cadets have a right, or even a justifiable expectation of being free of “unwanted proselytizing” from their fellow students? The answer is no, they categorically and constitutionally do not. Should they welcome attempts by others to proselytize as opportunities to engage their fellow cadets in respectful and substantive discussions about religion and religious tolerance? Absolutely. Should they be free to walk away from such discussions? Sure, but it’s better for them if they don’t. Should cadets feel “ostracized” because they are not religious? No, only children whinge about being excluded, not military officers. Should cadets learn how to tolerate and celebrate religious freedom because that is one of the things that they will be putting their lives on the line to defend?
Unquestionably yes.
These future military officers need to learn how to listen politely to the opinions of others, no matter how offensive or outrageous, and learn to engage in reasonable, reasoned discussion and debate about any subject, including religion, because they will certainly face such discussions as officers.
By the same token, if a cadet becomes aware of expressions of religious bigotry or intolerance on the part of other cadets, it is that cadet’s duty under the Honor Code to report such moral and ethical lapses to the proper military authorities for investigation. Offensive religious bigotry in the form of demeaning or deprecating “jokes” about other religions, or lack thereof, cannot be tolerated. Such bigotry is beneath the dignity of the Corps of Cadets and it demeans the Air Force Academy and the United States. Those who show signs of such bigotry must be carefully examined for fitness to remain in the Academy and must at the very least be counseled and instructed in proper deportment for military officers. For an officer in the Air Force to take an arrogant, intolerant, insensitive, bigoted and dismissive position when confronted by a religious belief that he or she does not subscribe to is failing to fulfill that officer’s duty to represent the United States of America to the best of their ability. Cadets need to be held to this high standard. This should be as iron-clad a rule of conduct in the Honor Code as the prohibitions on lying, and in egregious or repeated cases, should be cause for expulsion, and that is all that the Commander needs to say about it.
To suggest that our future military officers need to be protected against the free exercise of religion by their peers is ludicrous, and worse, it’s detrimental to their development as competent military officers.
Radical anti-theists like Mikey Weinstein, who go into a tizzy any time religion comes up in the military, are doing great harm to the intellectual and moral strength of our Academy cadets with their interference, and it’s time the Air Force tells Weinstein and his ilk to go pound sand, and that Air Force Academy cadets are expected to be tolerant and able to hold their own in any discussion or debate, be it about religion or anything else, just as they are expected to be able to demonstrate intellectual prowess, rhetorical excellence, superior reasoning, and extraordinary tolerance and respect in all situations.
Far too much attention is being paid by the Academy to this politically-correct anti-religious crusade that Mikey Weinstein is on. He has managed to strike fear into the officials at the Academy with his self-aggrandizing grandstanding. How disappointing. How harmful to the efficiency and effectiveness of our military.
It’s time for the Academy to dis-invite Mr. Weinstein’s interference with the proper training and education of our future military officers, and it’s time for the juvenile whiners who complain to either suck it up and act like the military officers they hope to become, or muster out of the service, where they can engage in all the anti-religious bigotry and whining they like.
© 2010 Altnews
It occurs to me that it would be bad for morale if circumcized Jewish and Moslem member of the military had to fear being proslytized in the shower.
If it bothers them, (and if it happens, which I doubt), then they simply tell the nosy, ill-mannered person to shut up and leave them alone. They are adults, they don’t need nannies.
Seth:
It is one thing for cadets of equal rank to share their religious views; quite another for senior officers to impose their views. With that kind of imposition, there is an implication that failure to attend the same church, respond appropriately to prayers given by the officer, etc., might be hazardous to one’s career in the short-term at least. That kind of problem was identified by a retired Navy chaplain who investigated religious intolerance at the AFA.
Yes, of course it’s inappropriate for either officers or instructors to do so, I said that. But that’s not what we’re talking about, we’re talking about “harassment” by their peers.
This is all so odd to me. When I was in the Army religion was a total non sequitur. I can’t even recall a person who went to church. It just never came up.
Interesting. I’m guessing that’s more because your fellow soldiers didn’t advertise their religion than that they have no religion.
Then again, being in the military isn’t very conducive to regular religious services either.
I suspect that the proportion of religious military personnel closely mirrors the percentage of religion in the civilian population, which means that some 80 percent of your fellow servicepeople were religious.
I think that the military, being an agent of the people of the United States, must adhere to the principles that it is sworn to protect and defend. One of those principles being freedom of religions and concurrently freedom FROM religion. Cadets and staff can practice and believe whatever religion each chooses, but intruding any religious doctrine into military training, or enlistment/commission is a violation of the separation of church and State and a violation of the First Amendment.
I agree with this in substance, but not in detail. There is no “freedom FROM religion” right inherent in the Constitution. None at all.
There is only constraint upon government not to “establish” religion.
Regarding the First Amendment and the right to freedom of expression. currently there is some brouhaha over Amazon Kindle offering a book that is allegedly in support of pedophilia and advises the avoidance of retaliation, The Pedophile’s Guide to Love and Pleasure: a Child-lover’s Code of Conduct” by Philip R. Greaves II
The brouhaha is, in part, over whether Amazon should even offer this ebook and whether everyone should not boycott Amazon because they do.
I am not an advocate of the act and do think engaging in the act is victimization and should be prosecuted. However, I loathe censorship and do advocate for the First Amendment. If one has a strong negative reaction to literature of this type then such a one should just not buy it. Boycott the seller if you wish. What one has no “right” to do is call for the censorship of the book itself or expect that all other informed adults should follow suit with a boycott. The book is not the act. Reading the book might provide useful insight into a mind set that is foreign–even if repellent–to most people. That insight might enable the protection of children in ways reactive censorship and outrage might never accomplish.
Dammit, no edit.
currently should be capitalized.
The act refers to having sex with children.
Religion is evil.
People may be evil or good, but religion is neither, it’s just a set of ideas. How you practice your religion is what counts.
Oh, by the way, Atheism is a religion too.
Really? What god does an atheist worship?
Secularism.
Religion and theism are two different things. Religion is how you go about practicing your beliefs, theism is about belief in a deity. They are not necessarily connected, and there are a number of acknowledged non-theistic religions, including Buddhism and Secular Humanism.
Atheism per se is not a religion, but it is commonly practiced as a religion by it’s radical adherents.
No god. No worship. No whoreship to any deity.
No whoreship to any principle or philosophy.
The practice of religion requires neither gods nor worship.
Nein. Atheism is not a religion. A religion is something practiced–a verb. Atheism is not a verb, It is a philosophy. An adjective at most.
Actually, the word “religion” is a noun.
Neither Atheism nor Secularism is a religion. What dark hole do you pull such nonsense from?
Thesim is WHAT you believe (in some sort of supernatural deity). Religion is HOW you practice what you believe.
Atheism is a religion to the extent that groups or individuals practice atheism as “something one believes in and follows devotedly; a point or matter of ethics or conscience.”
(http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/religion}
Because many Atheists (big A) have a specific and identifiable and largely coherent body of beliefs about theism, rooted in their belief that God does not exist, such persons can be rightfully said to be practicing Atheism.
Big A “Atheism” describes explicit atheists who are those who have knowledge and understanding of theistic concepts and ideas and have knowingly and deliberately rejected theism. Depending upon how they practice their beliefs, they may or may not be defined as “religious” and therefore Atheism may itself be defined as a “religion.”
The definition of “atheism” (little a) is more generalized and describes the “implicit atheist,” or one who has no knowledge or understanding of theism, like a child or mental defective.
Seth: I’ve searched washingtonpost.com for the article you referenced and came up empty. Can you provide a link? Are you sure it was from October of this year?
Uhm, what? Religion is nothing without actual people. I have been religious and now atheist (again). I still know people who are still religious. They are not corrupt because they are religious. Most of them are just like you and I. As is the case for most aspects of life.
You may be confusing “theistic” and “religious.”
Your freedom to swing your fist ends at my nose. Similarly, your freedom to practice your religious faith ends when I tell you I’m not interested in converting. If you insist on harassing someone after they say “not interested,” then it should be treated exactly the same as sexual harassment.
Not true. My freedom to swing my fist doesn’t necessarily end at your nose. If I have a good legal reason, or a right to swing my fist and connect with your nose, you’re just SOL.
In this case, the metaphor describes the relationship between your saying “not interested” and the speaker’s First Amendment right to continue talking right through your dissenter’s veto.
That’s how it works around here. His right to spout bible verses and tell you you’re going to hell trumps your lack of interest every single time, which means that he’s free to continue to harangue you for as long as he likes. As long as all he does is engage in free expression, your protests mean absolutely nothing.
Your only alternatives, if you don’t wish to engage the debate, are to stop your ears, ignore his proselytizing, or walk away.
But so long as you are in a public place, he or she is free to expound on any subject that pleases them, including religion.
If you don’t like it, well, it sucks to be you. Feel free to move to, oh, North Korea or China, where free speech and religion are not protected.
Seth, do you think a religious person would be as gracious towards an atheist or secularist who engaged in a similar level of debate when that debate was carried out in a public sphere and was vociferously ant-theism?
Should s/he be?
In my experience, the theistically religious people I know are perfectly willing to engage in rational debate.
It seems that what’s at issue here is freedom of speech versus individual preference, not religion or atheism.
The propriety of any speech depends largely on the venue and circumstances, and what is appropriate in the public square may not be appropriate at a private dinner party.
In the public square, however, at least in this country, one’s desire not to be subjected to speech that one finds offensive is subordinate to the right of a speaker to say what he wants, and those who object have a duty to stop their ears or walk away rather than interfering with the public speech of others.
Spoken like a true Christian bully.
No one is compelling you to stay and listen to the message. So long as you are free to stop your ears or walk away, and you fail to do so, you are consenting to be an audience.
Which would make you an atheist masochist I suppose…
It’s time to close the academy and refund the money to the taxpayers. That would solve this and a whole bunch of other problems. Let’s be honest here. Iraq is about establishing a democracy in the heart of the ME to keep oil flowing and Afghanistan is about a pipeline from the Caspian to the Arabian Sea. Neither war is about defending America. Eisenhower was correct. The military-industrial complex should be feared. If any CIA spooks are reading, I am using an IP spoof.
You think an IP spoof is going to stop the CIA? Didn’t you know they have a direct hook into the network nodes and IP address servers and can resolve your physical location within a few meters using a combination of intel data and satellite surveillance.
What’s worse is that they can remotely turn on your webcam and microphone and listen in on you without your knowledge any time they want.
I understand that tin-foil wrapped around the head will help keep the microwave brain scanners at bay however.
Good luck with that.
I hope they try listening to me. I will bore them to tears.
I have no web cam so they will have to go to my Flicker to know what I look like.
The thing is, I am not important. Why waste resources checking up on me?
I think you are wrong on many points. It is usually the Christians screaming about being persecuted, a laughable notion. Your Christian supremacy views are what is wrong. Mikey, a true patriot, espouses freedom for all, not just the chosen few.
You should peruse his website.
http://www.militaryreligiousfreedom.org/about/our-mission/
The issue is not “persecution,” it’s “education.” Military officers are expected to be both intelligent and tolerant and capable of making rational decisions free of prejudice and bigotry. They don’t learn how to deal with diverse, and even offensive religious opinions by having the Academy suppress such speech. They learn how to deal with it by dealing with it like adults.
Weinstein interferes with this process by creating a culture of “victimization” where those offended by others in matters of religion are able to run to Mommy and complain that they are being “harassed” or “intimidated” or “subjected to unwanted proselytization.”
Military officers must learn how to improvise, adapt and overcome adversity of extreme nature, including physical abuse, harassment and intimidation. The notion that they are being allowed to whine and complain about feeling “intimidated” merely because someone expresses an opinion on religion does not bode well for their mental, emotional and intellectual health as military officers who may face REAL religious hostility after being shot down and captured by Islamic militants.
If they can’t figure out how to defuse and deflect a religious debate among their fellow cadets, how can they hope to cope with genuine, lethal religious hostility in the field?
Weinstein needs to butt out and mind his own business and allow cadets to grow up into strong, capable officers rather than treating them like children and coddling them when their feelings get hurt.
Seth, this will only work as long as cadets are not penalized for doing it.
So in other words, you support the documented cases of harrassment at the Academy against non-Christians, or those not-Christian-enough, because they’re just “crybabies”.
Funny, I thought that military personnel were bound to obey all applicable service regulations and uphold the Constitution. Not in your world, aparently.
Well, I say there is no “harassment” in the first place. When one Cadet engages in religious proselytizing on his own time, in an appropriate place (outside of classes) and in a non-disruptive manner and within the general guidelines of the Academy regarding interactions among one’s peers, the content of the communication is irrelevant because the other Cadets who are party to the conversation are free to ignore the communication or walk away from the conversation. It’s not “harassment” because there is no element of coercion.
Cadets are not REQUIRED to sit there and listen to another Cadet expounding on the virtues of Jesus. Therefore their continued presence in the vicinity is fully voluntary and “harassment” simply cannot occur. Only free speech.
Now, when a superior officer or instructor at the Academy REQUIRES a non-religious Cadet to attend a religious assembly, that is clearly and unequivocally a violation of the First Amendment rights of the Cadet and should be punished.
But conversations between peers? No way.
Seth: I’ve searched washingtonpost.com for the article you referenced and came up empty. Can you provide a link? Are you sure it was from October of this year?
Sorry, I can’t find the article either. It may have dropped off the radar.
Seth: I tried to post a reply last week that, at the invitation to the comment form, included a link to website I created which cites Judaism’s positions as to why Jesus could not be the Messiah. It was held for review, and not published, because of the link. It makes me think that you favor Christians sharing their faith with non-Christians, but the Gazette opposes a learned rebuttal. If so, then you should also call the Gazette “wimps.”
Baruch, it’s possible that your comment was incorrectly captured by the Gazette’s anti-spam program. I get literally hundreds of spam “comments” each week, and I cannot individually review them.
This is usually the case when a link is included in a post. I may have inadvertently deleted it.
If this happened, I apologize. You may send your response to me directly with the link at
Seth.Richardson@Gazette.com
and I’ll make sure it gets up, or you can repost without the link, and I think it’ll get through.
I did not, and would under no circumstances delete a valid post with a respectful argument merely because of the religious commentary involved. I support religious freedom, and as a Tolerist, I welcome all views, so long as they are respectful and do not contain offensive language or personal insults.
Your opinion is contrary to that of a Yale University team that investigated the Academy’s basic training environment. According to a 2005 Gazette article, the study said:
“Although more than 90 percent of cadets are Christian, a Yale official said the call to evangelize creates an intimidating environment when non-Christian cadets perceive the leadership endorses a certain faith.
“’Anyone who is not conservative Christian would begin to realize they have to get with the message or find ways to survive outside the message,’ said Kristen Leslie, a Methodist who holds a doctorate in pastoral care and counseling and led Yale’s visiting team.
“’When those things happen and the chain of command doesn’t stop it, it’s tacitly approved by chain of command,’ she said. ‘For anyone to differentiate themselves is very problematic and even threatening.’”
It is not appropriate for an Evangelical chaplain to tell cadets to go back to quarters and tell non-Christian cadets that they are going to Hell for their beliefs. It is not appropriate for cadets to claim that the Holocaust was punishment for Jews not accepting Jesus. Not Christian cadets can easily feel intimidated by the sheer numbers against them, especially those in leadership positions, and unwilling to make the numerous arguments possible against Christian views (assuming that the students have the requisite knowledge).
Sorry, but it is the right of all cadets to express their religious faith in appropriate venues, and that includes talking with other cadets in quarters and telling them they are going to Hell. So long as they are not acting in the official performance of their duties, and are speaking for themselves and not the military as a whole, it is fully protected constitutional speech of the highest order.
Ms. Leslie is simply wrong. Yes, people will have to learn to “survive outside the message.” So what? AFA cadets are taught to survive in the wilderness, when being pursued by people who are trying to kill them. It’s called “escape and evasion training.” Learning to “survive” religious proselytizing is just another skill they need to hone.
Mikey? Who is Mikey?
Mikey Weinstein, purveyor of anti-religious zealotry in the military.
He’s a gadfly known locally.