I agree overall with your points, but there is just one caveat: your points are spoken from American and Christian perspective, and there is homophobia in some cultures that are not Christian-based. Majority Chinese, for example, describes themselves as atheists, but they are by and large homophobic. I might be wrong, but I heard CCP is cracking down on fashion, aesthetics and male celebs that might be “too feminine”.
I suspect that our home grown American and Christian homophobia is not Christian-based at all. People don’t like the thing that is different or icky, and instead of being introspective about why that is or if it’s the right thing to do, they see that the Bible or their preacher agree. Then it’s time to turn off the thought process and just go with it.
It’s just a happy little evil coincidence. Typical biblical cherry picking being spoon fed to the base. Funny how little discussion they have about how the Bible has instructions for abortions and how to treat your slaves.
The intolerance of narrow monotheism is written in letters of blood across the history of man from the time when first the tribes of Israel burst into the land of Canaan. The worshippers of the one jealous God are egged on to aggressive wars against people of alien [beliefs and cultures]. They invoke divine sanction for the cruelties inflicted on the conquered. The spirit of old Israel is inherited by Christianity and Islam, and it might not be unreasonable to suggest that it would have been better for Western civilization if Greece had moulded it on this question rather than Palestine.
— Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan
Christianity is inherently intolerant (see the 10 commandments).
With or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil - that takes religion.
— Steven Weinberg
I agree overall with your points, but there is just one caveat: your points are spoken from American and Christian perspective, and there is homophobia in some cultures that are not Christian-based. Majority Chinese, for example, describes themselves as atheists, but they are by and large homophobic. I might be wrong, but I heard CCP is cracking down on fashion, aesthetics and male celebs that might be “too feminine”.
I suspect that our home grown American and Christian homophobia is not Christian-based at all. People don’t like the thing that is different or icky, and instead of being introspective about why that is or if it’s the right thing to do, they see that the Bible or their preacher agree. Then it’s time to turn off the thought process and just go with it.
It’s just a happy little evil coincidence. Typical biblical cherry picking being spoon fed to the base. Funny how little discussion they have about how the Bible has instructions for abortions and how to treat your slaves.
It’s not. It’s an inherent quality in Abrahamic monotheistic religions.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_monotheism#Violence_in_monotheism
The intolerance of narrow monotheism is written in letters of blood across the history of man from the time when first the tribes of Israel burst into the land of Canaan. The worshippers of the one jealous God are egged on to aggressive wars against people of alien [beliefs and cultures]. They invoke divine sanction for the cruelties inflicted on the conquered. The spirit of old Israel is inherited by Christianity and Islam, and it might not be unreasonable to suggest that it would have been better for Western civilization if Greece had moulded it on this question rather than Palestine.
— Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan
Christianity is inherently intolerant (see the 10 commandments).
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance
Oh I wasn’t suggesting that Christianity was off the hook. It’s just that people do not require religion to be bigots.
Oh, so, perhaps… something along the lines of:
With or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil - that takes religion. — Steven Weinberg
…?