# Why Do Christians Feel So Victimized - Defined Edition
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-christians-feel-so-victimized-defined-edition/685652
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [April 8, 2014, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-christians-feel-so-victimized-defined-edition/685652 "2014-04-08T16:55:27Z")
**Posts on this page:** 7
**Page:** 8
### Author:  [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)
#### Post date: [April 10, 2014, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-christians-feel-so-victimized-defined-edition/685652/141 "2014-04-10T23:55:06Z")
> [@doorhinge](#):
>
> ATHEISTS it is then.
>
> _Quote:
> Originally Posted by doorhinge
> Atheists have felt sufficiently persecuted to the point where they chose to file lawsuits in order to stop church bells from pealing and school children from reciting the Pledge of Allegiance. Are atheists sufficiently persecuted by ringing bells and pledge recital to consider themselves to be persecuted?_
>
> Or are they just pissed because the word atheist isn’t Capitalized?
What the fuck are you on about? You even quoted the line that answers your changed question: here it is again:
> [@me](#):
>
> Of course not. But atheists may have read polls suggesting that a substantial majority of Americans believe they should be unable to hold public office, for example, and may end up feeling a wee bit persecuted therefore.
As for the brick example, I also don’t feel persecuted when I see government employees mildly overstepping the separation of church and state in the opposite direction. I know that our nation’s separation of church and state can be a tricky sort of neutrality to maintain, and even when the case law is established, it’s significant how much case law there is, how guides have been written for various government officials (e.g., teachers) explaining exactly what’s okay and what’s not okay. I understand that less-capable or less-informed government officials, attempting to maintain neutrality, will sometimes err in one direction or another; if the error is innocent, I’m forgiving.
---
### Author:  [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)
#### Post date: [April 11, 2014, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-christians-feel-so-victimized-defined-edition/685652/142 "2014-04-11T00:59:47Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#):
>
> Not really. I can see the personal sentiment in someone talking about their cat, but to simply parrot a bit of dogma one was indoctrinated with from childhood…
>
> For sufficiently generous definitions of “original”, that’s not original.
>
> No big deal.
That’s a remarkably dismissive statement.
The message that Jesus exists is arguably one that arises from indoctrination, but the feeling and complexity that an individual has towards his notion of Jesus is deeply personal and at least notionally unique.
And this is a fair example of ill-treatment: mild, to be sure, but you just offered the argument that there is more personal sentiment in saying your cat is the best cat ever than in saying you believe Jesus was the stone the builders rejected and that He is now the cornerstone. That’s factually unsound, and insulting to boot.
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### Author:  [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)
#### Post date: [April 11, 2014, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-christians-feel-so-victimized-defined-edition/685652/143 "2014-04-11T01:00:54Z")
> [@Voyager](#):
>
> Because, as in the pledge case, the mention of God is not considered to be religious in the United States. Thus putting God on a brick meant it would not be a religious message which they incorrectly thought was prohibited.
Ok, that’s a fair point.
---
### Author:  [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)
#### Post date: [April 11, 2014, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-christians-feel-so-victimized-defined-edition/685652/144 "2014-04-11T03:26:49Z")
> [@Bricker](#):
>
> That’s a remarkably dismissive statement.
When it comes to religion, I have a remarkably dismissive stance.
> [@](#):
>
> The message that Jesus exists is arguably one that arises from indoctrination, but the feeling and complexity that an individual has towards his notion of Jesus is deeply personal and at least notionally unique.
Yeah, and if you’d lived in ancient Greece, you’d be sacrificing animals to Zeus and Athena and probably be quite sincere in the process.
> [@](#):
>
> And this is a fair example of ill-treatment: mild, to be sure, but you just offered the argument that there is more personal sentiment in saying your cat is the best cat ever than in saying you believe Jesus was the stone the builders rejected and that He is now the cornerstone. That’s factually unsound, and insulting to boot.
Hey, the person actually _has_ the cat, the cat is demonstrably _real_ (or at least it is plausible to assume so, given that I don’t know the person or their cat). Applying metaphorical (yet deep and cosmic) significance to someone who may or may not have existed and whose message has been filtered through 2000 years of translation and revision… I’m not seeing the personal connection other than what your parents told you that you should feel. I suppose you might have decided to feel as you do when you reached adulthood, but that certainly gives you no claim on what is factually sound. I’ll stipulate that you and others _feel_ X is real, but that comes coupled with the burden of having to deal with people who\* don’t\* feel _X_ is real, such burden being the normal cost of adulthood.
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### Author:  [@doorhinge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doorhinge)
#### Post date: [April 11, 2014, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-christians-feel-so-victimized-defined-edition/685652/145 "2014-04-11T15:59:15Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#):
>
> Of course not. But atheists may have read polls suggesting that a substantial majority of Americans believe they should be unable to hold public office, for example, and may end up feeling a wee bit persecuted therefore.
>
> **Note the changing in wording** : it’s not non-Christians per se who object to the Pledge of Allegiance’s theistic add-on, **but rather atheists**. I don’t think that many more Muslims or Jews have a problem with this add-on than do Christians.
> [@doorhinge](#):
>
> ATHEISTS it is then.
>
> _Quote:
> Originally Posted by doorhinge
> Atheists have felt sufficiently persecuted to the point where they chose to file lawsuits in order to stop church bells from pealing and school children from reciting the Pledge of Allegiance. Are atheists sufficiently persecuted by ringing bells and pledge recital to consider themselves to be persecuted?_
>
> Or are they just pissed because the word atheist isn’t Capitalized?
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#):
>
> What the fuck are you on about? You even quoted the line that answers your changed question: here it is again:
>
> As for the brick example, I also don’t feel persecuted when I see government employees mildly overstepping the separation of church and state in the opposite direction. I know that our nation’s separation of church and state can be a tricky sort of neutrality to maintain, and even when the case law is established, it’s significant how much case law there is, how guides have been written for various government officials (e.g., teachers) explaining exactly what’s okay and what’s not okay. I understand that less-capable or less-informed government officials, attempting to maintain neutrality, will sometimes err in one direction or another; **if the error is innocent, I’m forgiving**.
(bold and underline added)
I did “Note the changing in wording” and, at your suggestion, rewrote my post substituting _atheist_ for _non-Christian_. Please forgive me for any perceived error.
---
### Author:  [@Strassia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Strassia)
#### Post date: [April 11, 2014, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-christians-feel-so-victimized-defined-edition/685652/146 "2014-04-11T16:56:48Z")
To get back to the OP, I think some of the feeling of persecution comes from projection.
Not all Christians feel/claim to be persecuted. And even those that do, don’t all feel/claim the same amount of persecution. I suspect that the amount of feared persecution would correlate nicely to the amount of persecution they feel they should be able to inflict on others.
Those that truly fear that that Christians will be banned from public life and Christian churches shut down are most likely the same people who want to ban mosques and require a religious test for public office. To such a person that is the natural state of things. And there are only two options in status: persecutor or persecuted. And for years the country has been changing little by little and preventing them from persecuting. In their minds that can only mean that those they have worked so hard to keep down are gaining the upper hand and soon they will be the ones on the bottom.
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### Author:  [@Bo\_Pai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bo_Pai)
#### Post date: [April 12, 2014, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-christians-feel-so-victimized-defined-edition/685652/147 "2014-04-12T13:23:08Z")
> [@](#):
>
> The inflicting of suffering, harassment, isolation, imprisonment, fear, or pain are all factors that may establish persecution.
That sounds like the whole of modern society.
The problem with defining things like this is that no one can define what does or doesn’t offend or persecute someone else. And a society that uses flippant ideas like “boys will be boys” to excuse what can literally be felt as torture to another shouldn’t whine about things like Columbine.
Columbine was one of 6 school shootings in 1999. There were about a dozen, just in January, of this year. And that’s just school shootings.
You’d think a society might learn from such things, but it doesn’t. It is true, that boys are boys - but they are the boys of parents that live in a predatory society. Persecution is real and has a profound effect on the mental state of its victims.
Most Christians make no personal claims of persecution. And that’s not a “majority” like the 20% or so of the voting age population that elects your political leaders. It’s more like the 90% of Christians that \*aren’t \*hollering or preaching at you. People that most anti-religion movements conveniently lump in with the other, screaming 10%.
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