I’m not seeing the difference. I was dressed up funny 'cuz I was Catholic.
If some kid gets beaten up for wearing a yamulke that’s not related to religion?
I think it’s kind of silly to deconstruct the reasons too much. You have one group beating up another habitually for surface differences.
Dave:
Bite me buddy. I went from St. Cassians to Montclair High School and that was a pretty tough school. Being a white kid in that school wasn’t easy. My first year, I would have to come home and skip the rest of the day of school if I needed to use the bathroom because a white freshman was risking a lot to use a bathroom by himself.
You couldn’t eat lunch either. If you got into line you’d have a couple of black upperclassmen get behind you and in front of you and hit you up for money, and they’d hurt you if you didn’t give it to them.
For the first two years you had to act like a sheep and travel with a group of friends through the halls on in line, or in the locker room, because there were groups of black kids that were just looking for the opportunity to get you alone so they could take your money, twist your arm, or put your in a headlock.
When I returned from College I worked in NYC and would have to commute through the port athority bus teminal, and it was the same thing all over again for higher stakes. Do not get alone. You will be mugged.
I’m sorry that it was that way, but that is an accurate portrayal of what I’ve been through.
If you want to know what it’s like to be the target of persecution and discrimination or violence, and you’re a white guy, take a stroll down 41st St. by yourself late some weekday night, walk through the nether regions of the Port authority bus terminal and wait for a bus.
I lived like that. It’s reality. There are places and circumstances where it’s very dangerous to be a black person, where you will be a target for violence, and persecution.
There are also place where it’s like that to be a white guy. I grew up in some of them. I worked in some others. Don’t tell me that I don’t know what it’s like. I do.
Pardon me for jumping into the middle of the analysis of whether the BSA, **Sauron[b/]'s stepMinion, Scylla, and other asported suspects are homophobic, but I think some blater needs to be refuted here.
Simply for being a Christian? I concede this is possible. But I suspect it’s probably much more likely that the reason was that they attempted to witness in some singularly obnoxious fashon. I don’t know this for a fact, of course, and that is no excuse for assault. But reading the rest of your posts, I can form an opinion about what “being a Christian” means in your definition.
So have I – right here, as a matter of fact. And do you know the funny thing about it? Among my foremost defenders were (1) conservative christians, (2) liberal Christians, (3) skeptical atheists and agnostics, (4) gay activists of a variety of beliefs, (5) at least one devout Jew… And I “considered the source” – who it was that was assulting me And the irritation just went away.
But according to your earlier post, you’re not for “gay rights” – which is it? Or do you think that people shouldn’t do the above mentioned crap, but if they do, the gay people have no rights as victims, and should just put up with it?
Just the wording of this sentence demonstrates that you do not have a clue what is being talked about. And it’s been made clear that “being gay” is not “living a particular lifestyle” enough times in enough places that it’s obvious that you are intentionally refusing to accept any statement that conflicts with your bigotry.
You might have noticed a few of us saying exactly that, including at least one lawyer spelling it out.
The entire point of this thread is the hypocrisy of the Boy Scouts claiming on one hand that they are a private group who can exclude whoever they want and on the other hand that they’re a quasi-public service group providing a special program for boys and deserving of public support for doing so.
I guarantee the girls are talking about both subjects, just not in front of you.
So give us some examples where it was reported. It’s a story I hear a lot – but never with any proof.
I think you’ll find that nobody who is an ongoing member here regards all Christians as evil, oppressive, and horrible (nobody’s told me or Siege that we are, Sauron and Aries28 that they are, or tomndebb that he is) – just a particular group, which calls itself the Religious Right (though it is not particularly either), which seems intent on legislating its opinions on what proper moral behavior is into statute law that everyone must follow.
then why
Birthright, right? I applaud what you’re doing there. (For those who don’t know, Birthright is a Pro-life group that doesn’t just try to get abortion made illegal, but rather provides practical help for pregnant girls, such as is noted in the quote. It’s probably one of the most decent elements of the whole abortion controversy.)
There are a lot of different feminist groups around – and I would bet you that there are several which would support this sort of endeavor. It is, after all, empowering the girls to take control of their own lives.
A baby is not a mistake! :mad:
Good stuff, and praiseworthy. I have some doubts that secular help is not available – I suspect that the Christian groups weren’t willing to solicit it or accept it. (There are some groups that feel that “worldly” help “taints” their ministry.)
So stick around. Let the insults roll off your back. Trun the other cheek. Walk a second mile with some of these people, and learn about them. You’ll find a community where Christian, gay, libertarian, political conservative, and anything else you care to name can talk together and learn from each other. One word of advice: before you render one more opinion about “homosexuality,” politely and humbly ask the gay people here to explain to you why it is that they get irked at the “it’s a choice” and “gay lifestyle” lines. I guarantee you’ll learn something important and valuable, in addition to the answer to your question.
Amen to that! Though IMO, it’s that you give because you have received, first, from the truest friend of all.
You would have been beaten up just the same if you went to a secular private school that required a dorky uniform. It is the dorkiness of your uniform, and not the fact that the uniform signified a denominational choice, that lead to your beatings.
That’s why I asked if Catholic kids who attended the public school were regularly beat up. I doubt they were (unless they were dorky for some other reason). The beatings you describe do not show any kind of anti-Catholic animus on the part of your tormentors; rather, they show that dorky-looking kids tend to get beaten up (in other news: bear shits in woods, water is wet, Pope is Catholic).
Scylla, I agree with you on most things, but here you’re just being deliberately dense. Snap out of it, frcryinoutloud. **
Usually when a kid gets beaten up for wearing a yarmulke, it’s not because the yarmulke looks dorky; it’s because the yarmulke is specifically identified with Judaisim. Yarmulkes simply aren’t as comical as the costume you describe. A better comparison would be the treatment of kids wearing yarmulkes and kids wearing crucifixes around their necks.
I suppse that somewhere, some time, some kid may have gotten beaten up for wearing a yarmulke because a bully thought it looked dumb rather than because the bully was looking to single out Jews. But common sense and historical experience tells us that’s the lesser likely explanation of the two. On the other hand, kids in dorky private school uniforms – regardless of religious affiliation – have been beaten up since time immemorial.
Here’s a quick test for you, Scylla: when the kids were beating you up, were they calling you a pansy or were they calling you a Papist? I’m betting the former is more likely.
Wait, Scylla, I’m confused. Are you suffering from descrimination and persecution because you went to a Catholic school and got beaten up for your pretty little uniform or are you suffering from descrimination and persecution because you lived and worked in a rough neighborhood? Please clarify because I’m having trouble keeping track of the bullshit you’re slinging and would hate to respond to one immaginary instance of you being the victim of racism when you were actually blathering on about how much you have in common with Joan of Arc. Thanks awfuly.
It’s a total nonissue. You’re getting beaten up for being different.
It’s not a comfort that it’s not actually directed at the tenets of the Church, but at the uniform. It didn’t matter to me then, and it doesn’t now.
I knew how it felt to be thirteen years old and afraid because one group was going after me because I was a member of another. Anything beyond that is besides the point.
Weirddave:
And yet you blame your mentaly challenged state on me.
Actually, I don’t have these problems any more. So I am not “suffering” from discrimination or persecution in this regard at present.
In past I suffered from both, as I describe it. I know you say you’re confused, but do you really have a problem comprehending more than one example at a time?
Fuck you Dave for a kneejerk prick. What kind of dimwitted dipshit can’t understand a plural?
Me: This and this happened
You: I’m confused. How could two things possibly happen? Which is it?
What the fuck. You’re not that stupid.
You’re an asshole and a fucking idiot for calling me a liar? You don’t this shit happens? You don’t think my experience is common to those growing up in multicultural areas, or people commuting from NYC?
Are you seriously pretending that it doesn’t happen? Go walk through the port authority at midnight. Go be a white kid at Montclair High School, and then get back to me.
Hey, dickweed, you’re the one who was going on and on about being “religously persecuted” because you got beaten up in your little uniform. When nobody bought that story, you pulled from somewhere ( your ass, maybe ) this long song and dance about growing up in a tough neighborhood. Big deal. I have plenty of clients today down around North Ave. and Pensylvania Ave. I used to work as a teenage on the “wrong” side of lower Park Heights. When I was 18 I was the only white employee at a business run by black folks in a poor neighborhood. I took a wrong turn one night at about 2 AM years ago and walked right smack dab through the middle of the Murphy Homes housing projects. I have had a black man stick a sawed off shotgun in my gut and demand my wallet. There’s lots more stories like that if I felt like recounting them and through all of this, even though I have run across people who cursed me or tried to hurt or kill me simply for being white I have never felt that I was a “victim” of racism, predjudice or descrimination. You know why? Two reasons. Number one, nothing here is even close to something that could be considered institutionalized racism, it’s simply random assholes. Number two, I am cursed with this little thing called a brain that gives me common sense and perspective. You ought to get some, it keeps you from making a fool of yourself with outlandish statements.
Look, no one here is suggesting that bullying of any kind is acceptable. I don’t believe anyone here has claimed that the kids who terrorized you as a youth were justified in doing so.
But you made a specific claim: that you were picked on because of your religion. You specifically said “So, until the fucking day we can make you nine years old, dress you like a leprechaun, and prance you past an inner city public school, don’t fucking talking to me about not being persecuted for my religion.” You also repeatedly play up the fact that the private school was of the Catholic persuasion.
It is that claim – that you have been persecuted because of your religion – that myself and others are taking issue with. That’s simply an absurd interpretation of those facts. You were bullied because of anti-dorkiness animus, not anti-Catholic animus.
Since we seem to be sharing our childhood experiences of being beat up, let me add mine.
When I was a kid I was often tormented and on occasion beat up by some kids whose neighborhood I had to pass through on my way home. They didn’t beat me up because I was white or middle-class or (nominally) Presbyterian. They didn’t beat me up because I was too smart or too dumb or blue-eyed or right-handed. They beat me up because they could. They always gave some reason for their actions, but I always knew it was bullshit.
They beat me up because beating kids up made them somehow feel superior, and I happened to be available.
So do I get to claim persecution, and if so which flavor?
Ok my first post was incomplete in its points because I was dragged off to New Years dinner wif da family. Good times were had by all, two glasses of wine were imbibed by this particular citizen of Troy, and I’m back to complete it and expand.
My first point is pretty well stated in the original post in that I feel the BSA has little to no room to dance around here anymore. They can be a private organization making their own rules that are not in violation of any federal law, fine A-Okay. I’d be upset if the government placed too strong a hand on private organizations anyway, even if I find their views offensive. The simple fact, however, of taking that stand places them on similar footing with many religious organizations who are doing wonderful work in the world but also actively and knowingly discriminating against people without tangible cause. That footing is a lack of government aid in all projects until such time as they cease that activity. Them’s the rules. You play the game or you go home.
Secondly, I wasn’t going to get dragged into this warring over kids joining the Scouts or not but this touches somewhat close to home. As many here are aware, I am gay. I was also a Cub Scout and (briefly) a Boy Scout. I was also involved in 4-H when I was a tyke not so long ago. Would I trade those years and experiences if taken back to that point, knowing what I know now? Absolutely not. During my time in Scouting I met some very fine, knowledgable, and wise people whose words and actions I treasure to this day. My Den leader was a wonderful lady who never made us feel anything less than proud, who always had fun and enlightening activities for us to do, and whose son has turned into a rather vociferous supporter of gay rights in his circles. In short, Scouting was a blessing for me and anyone who would take their broad brush to tar those people can kiss my rainbow-painted ass. I can look back and not once see an incident of homophobic discrimination or sissyphobia from the leadership (the other scouts, as I advanced to Boy Scout, were a different issue that precipitated my leaving). If a kid wanted to join my local troop I’d tell them a big “hell yeah!” because I believe they have a better than average chance of taking away some very good life lessons and I refuse to deprive another person of that chance for an abstract stand on one singular issue which they can still make from within said organization.
So what are you going to do? Nitpick my post? Call me homophobic? Honey, nothing gets my blood racing more than the sight of two men lip-locked and Mr. Right is out there for me so go ahead and call me what you like. I’ll be down with my Gay/Straight Alliance friends at Jacob’s dancing (or at least randomly and violently moving badly upon a dance floor) my sweet lil queer Tiger Cub/Cub Scout/Boy Scout/Catholic School Boy heart out. Because I’ve got regrets from life, but being BSA ain’t never been one of them.
Well, Dave if you’ve had a shotgun stuck into your face and don’t consider it persecution, what was it then?
And I’m not sure what you mean by “instituionalized.” It seems to me that you were probably a target because of your appearance, what you looked like.
Frankly, I really don’t see what seperates the experience you had of getting a shotgun in your face in a black neighborhood, and a black man being threatened by some Hicks.
It looks to me like these are both incidents that have a lot to do with the victims race.
Apparently you’re distinction is that whenever it happened to you, it was just “assholes.”
No shit. Who do you think does these things? Nice people? The hicks that beat up the black guy aren’t assholes?
What exactly seperates the opportunistic racially motivated violence you say you’ve experienced from that of a black man or a gay man in a similar situation?
Dewey:
Well, it seems to me that it’s only Catholic kids that have to wear the truly dorky outfits, and if that’s not persecution I don’t what is (facetious detector should be going off.)
I suppose your correct that we could not most accurately describe this as religious persecution, as I originally did. I suppose it is sloppy of me to do so. I think the main point that persecution is persecution still stands.
Dave again:
Another reason for a fuck you, is this Joan of Arc, climbing on a cross thing. I’m not trying to do that. I’m trying to point out that it’s the rare person that doesn’t get persecuted at some point.
Some people encounter it more frequently than others, but it’s a common experience. It is in fact these experiences that instill in me the certitude of why persecution and discrimination is wrong.
It’s because I do identify with them. I think we all do.
The idea that “You don’t know what it’s like,” is stupid. Most of us do know what it’s like. Most of us have experienced it.
I pretty much reject the idea that being persecuted for being Gay is inherently worse than being persecuted for being black, or for being a kid in a dorky uniform.
The reason why you’re getting persecuted doesn’t significantly modify the experience.
Persecution is the banal mundane activity of assholes, and it doesn’t seem to have significant variance depending on the reason why it occured.
Sure. That’s because I lived my entire childhood in a single setting. Every year was the same as every other year.
If you’re going to be a dick and bring these things up, it behooves you to actually recall the specifics of the story, wherein I specifically give mention to differing periods.
The context where I was fairly tough was as as a grade schooler, and also within the confines of St. Cassians which I attended for one year, in the 8th grade.
As I mention in that story you bring up, things changed when I went to High School.
So if you actually go back and read the story again, you will see that is consistent.
Doubtless your confusion is because you are just really really stupid and you assume that if somebody says something in one context than it must apply in all contexts, even if that person says otherwise.
Having read that story you are probably under the simplistic notion that my entire childhood consisted of a single scene. Why you would do this, is because you must be stupid as I describe several scenes from my childhood in that one story.
It may surprise you to learn that things were different when I was in the second grade than when I was in 11th.
Perhaps one day I will post about kindergarten and tell how I had no interest in girls. You will doubtless absorb this in some single cellular brain function, and if later I mention that I am married you will spring forth and say “AHA! You are a liar. You posted in your kindergarten story that you didn’t like girls!”
I find myself agreeing with Scylla here.
Quitting Boy Scouts over the antics of some guys on a “high council” which has almost no effect on my own troop would seem very foolish.
I doubt anyone would have been excluded from my troop for being gay or non-religious. I was agnostic, myself.
Presumably, nobody who is attacking members of the Boy Scouts has ever helped the Democratic party, or voted for Clinton, because of the “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.
Having said that, I am not currently supporting Boy Scouts at all, because of the exclusionary policies of the higher ups.
If I had kids, and they wanted to join Boy Scouts, I would let them, as long as I knew the particular troop to be a good one.
And I would vigorously defend them from any monster who tried to attack them for being a Boy Scout.
Have you considered that a reputation at his own private school would hardly be well known by the inner city public school?
And even in the highly unlikely case that it was, being known as the “private catholic school tough guy” would probably make him more likely to be a target there.
