Letter to the Editor: Religious Freedom bill bad for everybody
Throughout U.S. history, many groups of individuals have struggled for the freedom to practice their basic rights. These struggles continue today, especially with the LGBTQ community’s fight against discrimination.
Recently in the State of Indiana, a controversial “religious freedom” bill has been proposed, Senate Bill 101. The bill claims to protect the religious rights of business owners, however it is outright discrimination and will have detrimental consequences for the LGBTQ community and the state as a whole as it becomes more unwelcoming to visitors. The Religious Freedom Bill is threatening to legitimize the discrimination of LGBTQ individuals through the justification of religious freedom and this is simply unacceptable.
Religious freedom is a fundamental right of every inhabitant of the country. Companies, businesses, and individuals already have the right to speak out on their religious beliefs without fear of reprimand from the government. The Religious Freedom and Restoration Act of 1993 currently protects this right.
The issue with the Religious Freedom Bill this act is that we would be allowing discrimination by protecting businesses that refuse service to individuals who do not align with their religious beliefs. This is a trend that we have already seen in history and is very similar to when segregation was legal. Denying service to an individual based on their sexual orientation is no different than enforcing the Jim Crow laws.
Throughout many decades, our country has created new laws and made changes to existing laws in order to protect the rights of individuals who have suffered discrimination because of their race, religion, disability, and gender. Today our nation seems to be slower at protecting the rights of those discriminated against based on their sexual orientation.
Let us not confuse what religious freedom is and instead work together to protect the rights of all of our citizens equally.
Evelyn Rivas
Huntingburg, Ind.
To those who hold the notion that discrimination isn’t wrong as long as other options are available: There were seats open in the back of the bus, and there were diners open that would serve blacks. The fact that other options are available is irrelevant. It is discrimination, and discrimination flies in the face of “Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”.
Using majority power to oppress minorities is something our founding fathers very much wanted to prevent. They understood the dangers of “tyranny of the majority” all too well (read James Madison’s Federalist Papers #10). The issue was so important, the US Constitution was written around protections against it. This is why we elect legislatures instead of voting on laws directly, and why we have a Supreme Court.
I have a suggestion. If everyone who believes this law is truly about religious freedom wants to show their sincerity, let’s make a small amendment to the law. Let’s add a clause saying that if someone wants to claim the right to run their business according to their religious beliefs, they must implement such beliefs uniformly. So, if you want to claim that Christian beliefs prevents you from providing service for a same-sex marriage, no problem. BUT, you must also refuse service for marriages between divorced couples as well (unless such divorce was the documented result of sexual infidelity on the part of the couple’s previous spouses).