# Dumbest religious persecution ever **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [May 6, 2005, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713 "2005-05-06T16:19:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2005, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/121 "2005-05-09T15:44:16Z")
Okay, I believe I understand the underlying theory somewhat now, magisterial though it may be. Thanks to both Left Hand of Dorkness and Dio for your patience in explaining it. Perhaps the tax could be eliminated entirely were it not necessary to finance the behemouth bureaucracy that must interpret and enforce such theories as these. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2005, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/122 "2005-05-09T16:00:19Z")
If wishes was horses, we’d all be eating steak. -Jayne ---
**Author:** ![villa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/bc79bd/32.png) [@villa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/villa)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2005, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/123 "2005-05-09T19:45:43Z")
> [@Left Hand of Dorkness](#): > > My very limited understanding is that churches receive tax-exempt status in order to assist them in performing good deeds, similar to a 501©(3)'s status. Personally, I think churches ought to be treated like any other nonprofit and be subjected to the same rules. There might be a few exceptions (I’m okay with allowing religious nonprofits to hire a leader based on religion, for example–no reason why Sisters of Mercy Hospital can’t specifically hire a Dominican nun), but overall I think they should confirm to the same rules as other nonprofits. > > That way, there’s no government recognition of religion that can get in the way. Religious groups get the same set of rules as nonreligious groups to play by. > > Daniel Kind of. The problem arises, IMHO, because 501©(3) lists religion as a category to receive tax exempt status. I have no issues with a church hospital or school getting a tax exemption under the exemption for health care and educational establishments. I think where the establishment problem occurs is when religious groups are granted tax exemptions as religions. That gets the government into the mucky business of having to determine what a religion is (which of course they have blundered royally into with the Religious Land Use and Instittionalized Persons Act). Seperating out the religious from non-religious aspects of a church - tax exemption for the school, no tax exemption for the preaching - also makes your later problem easier to deal with. General laws such as discrimination ones should certainly apply to the non-religious functions undertaken by churches. You want a tax exemption for your hospital, then you have to hire gay people/people of different religions/women (depending on the law in your jurisdiction). There is a greater argument to allow the ‘religious’ aspects to go unregulated if they aren’t being directly subsidized by the same taxpayers who (in theory) were responsible for the anti-discrimination legislation in the first place. The problem at the moment is that while you are right in saying they receive tax exemptions to help them do good deads, religion is defined in and of itself as a good deed. Having re-read what you wrote, I think we are in pretty close agreement, at least on the tax exemption side if not fully on the discrimination side. ---
**Author:** ![rjung](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/45deac/32.png) [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2005, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/124 "2005-05-09T20:30:05Z")
In a related vein, apparently a North Carolina Republican has [introduced a bill](http://www.au.org/site/News2?abbr=pr&page=NewsArticle&id=7353) that would allow clergy to endorse candidates from the pulpit and still retain a tax exemption of their house of worship. [Bill summary here.](http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d108:h.r.00235:) It’s got a _wonderfully_ innocious :rolleyes: name, too – the “Houses of Worship Free Speech Restoration Act.” ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2005, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/125 "2005-05-09T20:51:52Z")
Yeah, uh, we prefer you not pay attention to our state government, people. You know, the place where someone advised teenagers who had sex to spray their genitals with Lysol afterwards to prevent STDs? Let’s just pretend they don’t exist, mkay? That’s right, nothing to see, move along. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2005, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/126 "2005-05-09T21:13:32Z")
> [@rjung](#): > > It’s got a wonderfully innocious name, too – the “Houses of Worship Free Speech Restoration Act.” Bwahahaha! > [@](#): > > An organization […] shall not fail to be treated as organized and operated exclusively for a religious purpose, or to have participated in, or intervened in any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for public office, […], because of the content, preparation, or presentation of any homily, sermon, teaching, dialectic, or other presentation made during religious services or gatherings.’. I think that the grammar is a little screwed up there. Am I reading that right – is that amendment intended to make it so that a sermon that consists of a half-hour of “Vote for Bob!” can’t be held to be participating in a political campaign, when it comes to tax law? I propose a new bill: The USC should be amendended so that jamming an umbrella up the ass of Walter Jones and then opening it shall not be treated as a criminal assault. Whee! ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2005, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/127 "2005-05-09T23:10:47Z")
> [@Left Hand of Dorkness](#): > > Yeah, uh, we prefer you not pay attention to our state government, people. You know, the place where someone advised teenagers who had sex to spray their genitals with Lysol afterwards to prevent STDs? Let’s just pretend they don’t exist, mkay? $5 says that there’s a site on Yahoo Groups that…_likes_…this. ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2005, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/128 "2005-05-09T23:31:44Z")
> [@Left Hand of Dorkness](#): > > Yeah, uh, we prefer you not pay attention to our state government, people. You know, the place where someone advised teenagers who had sex to spray their genitals with Lysol afterwards to prevent STDs? Let’s just pretend they don’t exist, mkay? > > That’s right, nothing to see, move along. > Daniel North Carolina is also the state in which it’s impossible to rape a woman. As I recall, the former Senior Senator Jesse Helms declared that if a woman wasn’t interested in sex, then her “juices won’t flow” or some such. ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2005, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/129 "2005-05-09T23:51:04Z")
> [@Left Hand of Dorkness](#): > > If wishes was horses, we’d all be eating steak. > -Jayne We’d be eating horse steaks??? ---
**Author:** ![EddyTeddyFreddy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eddyteddyfreddy/32/18796_2.png) [@EddyTeddyFreddy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EddyTeddyFreddy)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2005, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/130 "2005-05-10T01:12:35Z")
> [@spooje](#): > > We’d be eating horse steaks??? Only in France. ---
**Author:** ![NothingMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b77776/32.png) [@NothingMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NothingMan)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2005, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/131 "2005-05-10T03:31:00Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > I say save our ammunition, we have bigger fascists to fry. I think I’m getting _whooshed_ here. If this isn’t the case may I just say that I grew up in the “triangle” part of North Carolina. Then I went to college in the “triad” part of North Carolina. I now have a job right over the Smoky mountains (see “Location:”) from North Carolina. This is in my back yard and it scares the hell out of me. There are seemingly educated and well spoken folks from this part of the country that genuinely believe if you don’t support GW then you are a traitor. The logic they use and point of view they have is infallible in their own eyes…God is with THEM and no one else. I’d say there is no more important line of battle in the war against ignorance than this one. YMMV. **I’ve** written some congressmen. ---
**Author:** ![Mockingbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c68b51/32.png) [@Mockingbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mockingbird)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2005, 10:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/132 "2005-05-10T10:05:42Z")
> [@NothingMan](#): > > YMMV. **I’ve** written some congressmen. So have I and now I have 10 dates in the next two weeks. Looks like I’m getting some _serious_ Santorum. And probably anal sex from the other nine too. ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2005, 10:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/133 "2005-05-10T10:24:43Z")
That was Rep. Henry Aldrich, and he didn’t claim it was impossible to rape a woman, but that it was impossible for a rape victim to get pregnant, because if the woman isn’t consenting, “the juices don’t flow”. Helms is alleged to have made a similar comment off the record. The Washington Post Magazine ran an article on him in the early 1990’s (I believe the writer was Juan Williams). A pro-choice activist or lobbyist claimed Helms said to her that if a victim is truly raped, she won’t get pregnant. > [@Liberal](#): > > North Carolina is also the state in which it’s impossible to rape a woman. As I recall, the former Senior Senator Jesse Helms declared that if a woman wasn’t interested in sex, then her “juices won’t flow” or some such. ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2005, 10:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/134 "2005-05-10T10:27:00Z")
Correction: Henry _Aldridge_ ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2005, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/135 "2005-05-10T13:50:42Z")
[Local coverage ain’t exactly treating this minister well](http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050510/NEWS01/50509030/1001). Local folks may be conservative, but most of them aren’t awful. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![EddyTeddyFreddy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eddyteddyfreddy/32/18796_2.png) [@EddyTeddyFreddy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EddyTeddyFreddy)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2005, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/136 "2005-05-10T14:05:40Z")
I daresay it isn’t helping Rev. Chandler any that he’s been the pastor of that church for only three years and a lot of the people he kicked out or who left in protest have been involved in it for decades. ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2005, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/137 "2005-05-10T16:11:53Z")
Remove .45 from holster. Pull hammer back. Aim at big toe. Squeeze trigger. 😃😃😃😃😃😃😃 ---
**Author:** ![SnakesCatLady](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4af34b/32.png) [@SnakesCatLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SnakesCatLady)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2005, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/138 "2005-05-10T23:14:26Z")
As I was packing to leave Florida Monday a similar situation was on the news. A pastor told the congregation from the pulpit that if they had voted for Kerry they needed to “repent or resign.” Two members of the church were kicked out. One of them had been a member of the church for 42 years. I definitely think they should lose tax-exempt status. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2005, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/139 "2005-05-11T01:08:45Z")
[Waynesville church pastor at center of controversy over pulpit politics resigns](http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050510/NEWS01/50510017/1001) > [@](#): > > Just a few minutes after an East Waynesville Baptist Church business meeting began, Pastor Chan Chandler and his wife left the meeting without comment. Later, the pastor’s lawyer said Chandler decided it was best for the church that he leave. Attorney John Pavey said Chandler would pursue other opportunities and continue working on his master’s degree. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Reeder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c6cbf5/32.png) [@Reeder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reeder)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2005, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713/140 "2005-05-11T01:21:35Z")
> [@Squink](#): > > [Waynesville church pastor at center of controversy over pulpit politics resigns](http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050510/NEWS01/50510017/1001)😃 See! There is a God! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dumbest-religious-persecution-ever/302713.md?page=8)