The Ugly, Nasty Underside of Rigid Belief

Lurking under the stiff, starched collar of "conservative" propriety is a truly ugly little collection of beasts. In the english language, these creatures have names - Ignorance, Intolerance and Self-Righteousness.

Lately, the so-called "Social Conservatives" have been demonstrating this in spades, and in a number of dimensions. Let's visit the denizens of the bestiary:

Ignorance

At first, this little creature almost appears cute - sort of like a hamster, until you discover that some mad wizard cross-bred the thing with a Komodo Dragon and a salted slug. I do not mean the ignorance of someone who pushes you out of the queue at the coffee shop, but the ignorance that derives from a lack of knowledge.

Bishop Fred Henry has demonstrated this in spades. In his now infamous "Pastoral Letter" railing against same-gender marriage, the good bishop tried to connect homosexuality with pornography, prostitution and adultery. A more amazing piece of illogic I have never seen. Anyone who has even a modicum of background in psychology will recognize that there is no possible link between homosexuality and these other topics. Bishop Henry has demonstrated an obdurate refusal to acknowledge that there is information that renders his assumptions questionable.

Intolerance

Another nasty little beast, the Intolerant masks itself in the chameleon cloak of belief, and the rightness of a belief. Found in the shadows, these creatures are like the animation of the Dust Dragon you find under your bed. Ugly, gross and more air than substance.

Columnist Ted Byfield, and his spawn, Link Byfield, exemplify these creatures. At no time do facts cross their lips unless it is convenient to support their position. The Byfields and their ilk demonstrate their utter intolerance for those that are different from them time and again. They invoke the constitution of this land only when they believe that their "right" to spew vicious epithets against those that are different in thought and belief from them are "attacked". The rest of the time, they heap scorn upon it, claiming that the document is a part of some "Liberal Conspiracy". (If I hear the term "Liberal Conspiracy" from these nut-balls one more time, I'm going to ask them if it is equivalent to the Zionist Conspiracy of Ernst Zundel.

Self Righteousness

These creatures are particularly vicious. The results of some mad priest cross-breeding a harpy with an oak tree, a compost heap and a rhinocerous, these creatures are loud, irritating and very unpleasant to be around - as well as taking up all available verbal space within a few miles of them.

Rigid in their adopted beliefs, these beings perceive the world through a filter that makes them believe that that there are absolute rights and wrongs. These beliefs are usually codified in their unique interpretation of some musty scriptures that were written 2000 years or more in the past, and written by people long dead.

Usually, these people cloak their rigid thinking and unwillingness to consider new ideas in the language of respectable religious belief. Don't be mistaken, religious belief is not in itself rigid or inflexible, but rather these creatures make it such, and then use it as a club to beat others who think differently than they do over the head with it. As I recall, during the debate over Turbans in the RCMP, these creatures were as vehement in their opposition to the Turban as they are acting now over same-gender marriage.

The claim that the world (or society) as we know it will end should the "cause-celebre" of the week come to pass has inevitably turned up false time and again, whether it is women's rights, abortion, divorce, black rights, equality for the ethnically diverse peoples of this nation.

Usually when I start to see these creatures forming around people making argument for some belief or another, I start digging around for the facts - such as they exist, and ask myself if the awful harms to society that they proclaim are probable at all. Usually they are not, and worse, those claiming that world will end in biblical fire do so by co-opting the honest beliefs of people for whom faith is a means to bring a little joy to those around them and using those beliefs for the purposes of asserting political power.