Why Doesn't FFRF Go After Islam?

[Music] [Music] welcome to ask an atheist I'm Annie Laurie Gaylor co-president of the Freedom From Religion Foundation and this is the second of our new participatory program asked and atheist where you can participate and it doesn't matter if you call yourself an unabashed atheist or an indifferent agnostic or a believer who's just curious I'm Dan Barker I'm FFRF co-president and by the way a former evangelical minister who saw the light and I'm Andrew Seidel an atheist and a constitutional attorney here with FFRF and in every week of this program look for us at the same time same place staff from the Freedom From Religion Foundation will tackle a controversial or thought-provoking or topical subject and it usually has something to do with free thought or the separation between state and church last week we explained what's wrong with the Ten Commandments and there's a lot wrong with the Ten Commandments today we're going to talk about a persistent but unsupported criticism of FFRF something we hear from the right wing to make us appear exclusively anti-christian and biased we hear it from the likes of the blaze or Todd Starnes who asked why doesn't FFRF go after Muslims who violate the First Amendment and of course we FFRF don't actually go after anyone of any religion we go after violations of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to our godless Constitution we work to uphold a valued constitutional principle so F F F is not anti-christian FFRF is pro state church separation we are anti Christianity and government or Islamic government and will pursue any at state church violation regardless of which religion happens it to be encroaching upon our Constitution put another way FFRF is equal opportunity when it comes to battling religion we are the Watchers on the wall Jefferson's wall of separation between Spade and church we've tackled violations by Jewish groups Buddhists Muslims and of course Christians in fact I've actually written legal letters on violations involving all these different religions from Buddhist shrines on public properties to ritual Jewish circumcision where the moil actually sucks the blood from the cut foreskin this happens in New York City today often giving the infant herpes we've even stopped the government from preferring religion generally over a non religion just last week I wrote Orange County Florida a letter explaining that when the government endorses multiple religions over non-religion such as by organizing a Christian Jewish and Muslim prayer which actually happened that is still a constitutional violation the government must be neutral on matters of religion so why doesn't FFRF go after state church separation problems involving Islam the answer is simple we do a recent example happening right now is in Mecklenburg North Carolina where the Board of County Commissioners declared May 26 to 24 as the month of Ramadan Ramadan of course is the Islamic holy month marked by fasting to celebrate the first time Allah supposedly spoke to Muhammad Mecklenburgh resolution talks about drawing closer to God about the revelations of the Prophet Muhammad and even about the existence of a soul the resolution did not explain that these are merely beliefs of those who celebrate the holiday our secular government must scrupulously avoid making a declaration about the veracity of religious beliefs so FFRF wrote a letter educating the county asking them to refrain from such violations in the future that is a complaint about Islam that we made about the same time that the blaze was again asking us why don't we go after Islam so the blaze was upset about a comment that I made and it was about a New York public school accommodating the religious beliefs of some students and I was asked to weigh in when the principal at a high school in Clinton Park New York reserved a room where Muslim students could briefly go throughout the day during the month of Ramadan the principal identified this as an accommodation he pointed out it was student initiated he noted it did not interfere with educational activities and that reserving the rooms didn't display students or educational activities without this public accommodation that there would have been losing students who would have missed school for many days in a row I pointed out that there were problems with this that the principal's had to monitor that paraphernalia should not be left in the classrooms that should be called a prayer room for example and I also told them I don't really like this but this is new public accommodation law that has evolved in my lifetime but like JFK I really believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute but since this accommodation laws here to stay this seemed like the very best the schools could do and we also pointed out that if there's more damning facts that come to light showing entanglement or endorsement we'll reassess so there are two basic reasons why it may seem like we don't address violations of Islam the first is demographics the u.s. Muslim population is one percent while Christians are at more than 70% there are just fewer Muslim violators out there but it's not just a question of the numbers our government is structured so that majority rules on certain issues so it is the majority that will usually violate the rights of the minority this is precisely why we have a bill of rights the Bill of Rights exists to protect the minority from the tyranny of the majority so the democratic process coupled with demographics automatically checks most of the Islamic state Church violations that we see and there's a second reason why you don't hear much about these violations it's because they often don't fit the media narratives for example when FFRF challenged a muslim college professor who was promoting his personal religion in the public classroom we sent our press release to fox news who sent it all over the country complete with audio clips and PowerPoint slides showing the violation here's the one that reads logical inference confirms the existence of God well of course it doesn't that's a factual statement about a religious belief that is untrue and is being taught in a public school classroom so FFRF successfully fought this religious endorsement but our action didn't fit the right-wing media narrative of atheist targeting only Christians so despite tons of evidence audio and visuals and more you never heard about it abbit an and you've had public debates with with Muslims correct well with several Muslim apologists and Muslim scholars over the years in fact I've done nine public debates with Islamic scholars they're kind of similar apologetically to the Christian theologians I started I did one in 2003 I debated Hasan ein Raja Bali at the Islamic Center in Queens New York and then I've debated Muslims in Dearborn Michigan in Minneapolis and a few times in London publicly challenging the irrationality of the Koran and the dangers of Islamic dogma so the Freedom From Religion Foundation has given prominent critics of Islam such as I enter CMD and paws Neiman Osman awards for their intellect and bravery ffs related charity non-belief relief of which I'm particularly proud has given tens of thousands of dollars to help relocate non-religious Bangladeshi bloggers who've been on a hit list for daring to challenge Islam we're helping an endangered Iraqi woman right now the simple fact is that our position differs from the right-wingers who accuse us of hypocrisy for not taking on Islam it's different because it's intellectually honest and logically consistent because it lacks the cognitive dissonance required of religion we shudder at the prospect of one nation under God as much as we would if it were one nation under Allah we fight for our secular government and our godless Constitution not the arrogant and unreasonable position that the government should favor one particular imaginary being over another we believe a secular government is the only path to peace and true religious liberty and that means our government may not endorse or promote any religion and etc of course actually has two purposes we work to keep students your separate as the Constitution demands we also work to educate the public about matters of non-theism and as part of that second purpose we have never ever shied away from criticizing religion and that includes Islam well especially in the wake of terror attacks conducted by Islamists the Islamic theocrats motivated by Islamic holy texts unlike many believers who offer thoughts and prayers to victims we point out that religion itself is the problem we need less religion not more and that includes Christianity as well as Islam and by the way instead of offering prayers FFRF non-belief relief gave $10,000 to the human compassion fund which handed over the money directly to the victims and surviving families of the the massacre in the pulse in Orlando Florida which by the way happened a year ago this week an epic raft also differs with the Southern Poverty Law Center which has done great work but unfortunately they have added ayaan Hirsi Ali who is a heroine of the first class to move their list of anti Muslim extremists for criticizing Islam not for making bigoted statements against Muslims none of I am statements quoted by the Law Center were against Muslims they were legitimate criticisms of Islam and if anyone had reason to be an islamaphobe and I'm not using that label it would be someone like I and her CLE who has been the who faces the threat daily of harassment and death by Islamic Islamist extremists it's part of her daily existence yet she has not hesitated to speak out publicly as an infidel as she called herself an atheist as an international critic of the Muslim treatment of women and importantly there is a distinction between ideas and people and that distinction is critical ideas 10 and should be criticized scrutinizing and criticizing ideas is the very basis of freedom of thought our most cherished freedom religion is nothing more than a set of ideas bad ideas that can and should be exposed but we should distinguish between ideas and the people who believe in them painting all Muslims as terrorists is counterproductive and factually wrong saying that Islam contains bad ideas and that those bad ideas can motivate and justify violent action is a plain fact the difference between people and the ideas they hold is critical because people can change their mind all it takes for a believer to become an atheist is for them to change their mind about one belief and as Thomas Paine said the mind once enlightened cannot again become dark and so I think on that very bright note let's get to your questions and the first question is a video submission from a friend of FFRF and a complainant whom we've helped with a discrimination issue Mohamed Sayed president of X Muslims of North America hi my name is Mohammed Sagan and the president of X persons of North America we're a nonprofit dedicated to the needs of Isis work to erase the pasta stigma and normalize decide within Muslim communities we also help across all the building communities around the United States and Canada my question to you Dan and Annie is do you see any significant differences between Islamic Christianity in the verse of how they breach the separation of church estate well that is a broad topic and we don't get that many as as andrew explained video and we don't get that many complaints about the Muslim religion they're usually about school accommodation I can't you know what like the washing hands fountains that some schools put into the schools to accommodate Muslim students who need to do that every day yes and and also we've had some complaints over the years about in the Twin Cities about accommodations for that at airports for example exactly one of the one of the issues is we actually get a lot of complaints that are not legitimate right we get a lot of complaints there they're basically right-wing trolling there they're not real state Church issues I think there are significant state church issues but most of them come from Christian encroachments for the reasons that we already said internationally I think it's definitely a different scenario I mean we have we've been seeing blasphemy laws they've been all over the news lately this is a huge problem and it tends to be a problem in Islamic countries more and I think that as the Muslim population grows I think we'll be seeing more conflicts and we'd be better able to answer that question but the vast preponderance of state Church complaints that come into the Freedom From Religion Foundation of course are about the dominant religion in our country which is Christianity well because in this country like to point out Islam as a minority remember back more than a century ago when Catholicism was a tiny minority they had to kind of keep their heads down they were the minority that would be protected from the tyranny of the majority by the First Amendment so many lawsuits were taken by expect in but where would that worth protective us suffer yeah which are actually very good but then later when Catholicism became huger they kind of flipped and I don't need that protection as much and they're more violators now so if they want us to fund Catholic schools and they want to ban birth control so we are fighting that so that's why we don't see we see Muslims more often keeping their heads down in this country while they are small but let's not give them too much rope usually minorities are very supportive of the separation of church and state historian ish and connections one of the cases we did work on was we held Muhammad's group get a cake baked that's fact they were trying to get a cake to celebrate their second anniversary and the Wegmans grocery store Baker there refused to bake a cake for X Muslims and do you remember the reason why yeah well they were apostates basically well it because they had some Muslim workers yes it was it was Muslim workers in the bakery that protested and said we aren't going to make this which of course that violates the civil rights of the X Muslims of North America so I wrote a letter and to their credit Wegmans grocery store acted very quickly and correct the violation and did absolutely the right thing and they got their cake I think they should have given it to them for free but they did do it and do you want to explain the Civil Rights Act briefly sure that is a violation sure so the Civil Rights Act prevents people from being discriminated against in places of a public accommodation on the basis of their religion among a few other things and refusing to provide service to somebody because they are no longer a Muslim is absolutely religious discrimination as is charging them more because they are in X Muslim or because they are not Christian or because they're not Jewish something along those or because they are Christian or Jewish mean it applies equally absolutely so you can have your cake and eat it too even if you are next month well yes former Muslim yes and I think was that your victory yes congratulations and that that Mena it was it was a pleasure to help tell but coming they're a great group they do great work so and I think we have another question I think we have one from Facebook or from Twitter now and this one is from Mitch withers he says should the government banned certain religious attire like the burqa they ban other practices and then how does the government protect oppress without infringing on the religions on religious freedoms other practices that have the overall effect of subjugating women as part of that question and this is a very for any issue and I felt very strongly I understand why France banned the burqa I very much disagreed with banning the burqini that they have retrench done because it's the perfect way to enslave somebody it's the perfect way to bring a terrorist in the country or in an airport I mean if you shrouded and you have no identity how does the government how does anybody know who they're dealing with and we did have one case here in the United States and I'm sorry I didn't look up in advance about the final verdict on that but a Baptist woman converted to the Muslim religion and then she said that she wanted to have her burka on her driver's license now this is caring Singh ridiculous extremes because the purpose is a driver's license so you can identify who someone is and I that to me is absurd but useless to have a personal ID card that doesn't have your face on it and also I think back to it was abyss smart the little Mormon girl that was abducted she was walking around in front of people who knew her on the streets with her abductor because he hadn't shrouded her so there are real you know criminal and identity issues with a burka and it's also a symbol of subjugation for women and so with the French Leyte we see a concept and they felt that it was also demeaning to offer into women and that these women Muslim women who were coming into the country were being denied their civil rights rather than being deprived of their civil rights because they wanted to wear a burqa I think it's very different that headscarf issue is completely different but when your identity is actually enshrouded this is a major but in our country isn't the general principle that our secular government can impose some limits if they have a secular purpose if they're if there's a public interest or you can stop religious parents from denying medical treatment of their children another thing you know you know the state can step in and take over and override what they say are their religious views if there is a good secular purpose for it and the driver's license is one good example there is it's not like the religion like the government is persecuting religion there's a general secular reason for it but there you know on the other hand people may wear ski masks that are partly as hiding their identity wrap up with scarves in the cold I mean it's hard to know where to draw the line but not on the driver's license not on their driving license how ridiculous so it's basically a balancing act if there is a legitimate secular purpose to say no you can't wear this into a bank for instance or through customs and immigration services or to get your driver's license photo then then yes but then I also balanced that against what about a girl going to a public school and she totally enshrouded I mean I can see how that would be very disruptive you might not even know it's her yes you have to balance that then against the First Amendment rights also you know one of my favorite cases is Cohen versus California where the Supreme Court upheld the right of a 19 year old to wear a jacket that the draft into a County Courthouse and in it the majority wrote that one man's vulgarity is another man's lyric it's just kind of one of one of the famous Supreme Court lines but so you do have a First Amendment right to wear what you want but there also are these very serious issues and it may be that the woman doesn't want to wear the burka and this is I mean this is a symbol that's demeaning to women whether she embraces her for chains or not that there is a feminist issue there and I have had the horrible experience of trying on a burqa being given one by an excellent woman who let women try it on and it feels very claustrophobic or the most I mean and it really does completely take away the identity of women they just become objects and things on the street that you don't notice they have no identity anymore so it's a very distressing a way to subjugate women I also wonder if it might not be something in terms of putting it into practice that might be counterproductive whereas if you would say you were to ban the burkas it seems to me that these women might just be stuck at home then they might never be able to write and that's one of the arguments against it in France and I don't think that a burka ban has come up in the United States hasn't really been an issue idol group say this is really where maybe the Afghan women coming into France this fear down the debate so it is a thorny topic and during my debate in after my debate in Queens where I debated husana and Raja Bobby where I said that I think the main purpose of Islam is the control of access to females and look how these women are dressing is these are male property and these men think they owned it and they can cover it after the debate some angry Muslim women came up to me and said how dare you tell us what we can and can't wear we are choosing to wear these scars we are choosing to honor our faith and our husbands by dressing like it it's not because we feel oppressed we are proud to dress like Muslims well and again I would say in the United States there's no question that the head scarves and similar attire are not going to be an issue but the burqa has some problems and the burkina is just a little half the bikini was that's for the beaches yeah and and then that band was got out of control I just look like discrimination it did it did and I think too there's there's a certain amount of it's not you can't ban an idea right that's not the way to defeat the idea the way the way to defeat an idea is with better ideas and with discourse I think and then petite women have been allowed to enjoy the beach and go swimming and they weren't hurting anybody and they weren't actually full with their faces weren't fully enshroud it was just called for painting there you know so I've got I got a good question here from Jeremy Watkins from Facebook he says do you see any difference in the Islamic law Sharia law in our government making laws supporting and enforcing Christian beliefs as laws he doesn't see a difference he thinks that calling us a Christian nation is no different than saying it's an Islamic nation well I think yes Jeremy's got a good point there and the people who are most concerned about Sharia are usually the religious right who want to impose Christianity and Bible based government on the rest of us and there have been some unconstitutional bills passed and various capes saying we can't bring in Sharia law well we don't need those we have a First Amendment and the First Amendment is because us from having religious laws just because they see it as the competition you know we we territorially control this Christian nation and these Outsiders are coming in to try to take over some of our territory so they're threatened by Sharia law not seeing the Bible says you should before you take the beam out of someone else's eyes you should take the mote out of your own they're not seeing if they're part of the same problem quoting the Bible back at some dentists TV and I mean for me I think anymore you pit we we the United States invented the solution to this in 1787 it's called the separation of state and church if you're worried about Sharia law support state church separation donate some money to FFRF we are fighting this by supporting state church separation that's the way to beat it and then I would add that of course we are very worried about Sharia law as it is being forced on women in Islamist nations all around the world and much about Sharia law comes from the Old Testament or the Hebrew Testament that is shared in common by the Islamic Jewish and Christian religions these mosaic laws that we talked about last week that when you hear about women being stoned to death and Islamist Nations because they're not a virgin or because they've been committing adultery that law is in the Mosaic law the mosaic code in the Old Testament that Christians supposedly Revere and there are so there's commonalities here it's just not being applied but of course we're very I mean these are very Barrack there are some modern Christians in America called we constructionist who actually do want to go back to the actual Old Testament laws and bring America back to what they think was the true founding of our country and maybe some of the rest of you are watching The Handmaid's Tale it's tonight get the series conclusion tonight and again and I have been watching it I geez I'm wearing the same color but I out but that's the whole idea of the Christian Reconstructionist going back to Old Testament I can wear that white hat thing to show you it is not a handy a terrifying future so we have another question this is from a believer I think quote separation of church and state is absolute the separation of church and state is not in our Constitution and not in our Bill of Rights why are you insisting on telling people that it is so this is like one of the most common arguments that we hear and it's it's just so lame Dan you have a good you have a good Republican you like to give but anyway I know you have them well it is couched in absolutes of course the First Amendment of the Establishment Clause of the Constitution Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof there are two clauses we're talking about the first and under the bill under the Fourteenth Amendment it was it applies to state citizens a lot of people don't know that and they say oh it only applies to Congress and it is couched in absolute and Thomas Jefferson when he was president of course was asked by the Baptist's of Danbury Connecticut to explain the meaning of the Establishment Clause and he famously said it affects a wall of separation between church and state and that is absolute and so the idea here is that that's a phrase that represents a constitutional principle there are other phrases that don't appear in the Constitution like right to privacy or interstate commerce these are phrases that the courts have used to refer to certain parts so the separation of church and state has a long revered history that phrase is in a lot of Court decisions but if we were if we were to take that phrase away because those exact words don't appear in the founding document then we should also take out the word Trinity from Christianity because the word Trinity appears nowhere in the Bible all these churches are Christmas or or original sin or a whole bunch a concept that Christians talk about all the time the word Trinity represents a print that is established by the Christian religion in fact in the Bible although that word doesn't appear there so there's there's probably three or four dozen Christian words that we would have to throw away if we're going to follow this questioners advice why I love bringing the war on Christmas to June and I think that it's going for doing that I also my one of my favorites is fair trial this is absolutely a right that we have fair trial yeah and it's enshrined in our Constitution and it's convenient shorthand for several different rights in the Constitution but this is the this is the phrase that we use to describe it same with state church separation it's a metaphor that just is descriptive of a constitutional principle and it was the first time was used was by the Supreme Court was actually in 1878 in the Reynolds case and and another thing that I like to point out too is that before the First Amendment was passed the original Constitution only mentioned religion once and that was the prohibition on religious tests no religious test shall ever be required for any office so that the references are exclusionary to religion exactly and it is one of the most emphatic statements in the entire document if you want to talk about an absolute no shall ever any it is about as absolute as the language in the Constitution debts I mean it was usually left deliberately vague so that they could build this government but not there and also my favorites refrain is that we do have a godless Constitution there's no references to religion in it except exclusionary and sovereignty is given in We the People the founders the framers of our Constitution were the first in history not to claim a pipeline to a divinity and think about it our Constitution is the longest live Constitution in the world this has been very successful if we if America is going to import anything I wish it would be this idea not McDonald's and we can connect us to Islam because the treaty with Tripoli had to do with the Islamic ruler of the country or state of Tripoli the Bay of Tripoli who was nervous about having a treaty with a supposedly Christian country because there would be this clash and our founders it was written under Washington and sign that Adams wrote a treaty with Tripoli and it says the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion so don't worry we're no threat to Islam and the Senate unanimously consented to that language so yes what year was that at 1797 197 go back and look on it yeah Google that don't take our word for that one so we have another question from Christopher Alan Pew and this is not directly on point but it does relate is FFRF going to tackle the religious freedom bill that was just passed in Florida do you want to talk to that absolutely so first of all it does relate to Islam a little bit because the the bill that was passed which basically said that kids are allowed to pray in public schools which has never been a question what it's actually trying to do is actually trying to encourage kids to pray and to tell teachers and staff that they are allowed to join in that prayer which is definitely going to lead to some coercion so first of all i FF RS has done three different Action Alerts on this bill at different times to our members telling them to oppose it our local group led by David Williamson actually testified against this bill and we did put out a statement on it yesterday but one deny statement out today today and one thing that the sponsors never never realize is that Christianity is on the decline in this country and it is atheism and non religion and some of the minority religions that are on the rise so this also Fosters Mormon messages and Islamic messages and hopefully we'll see some atheist messages but I think it also Foster's division welcome because there's nothing more divisive in the school than religion and when you say you can pray in school what we mean by that is of course well there's that old saw I don't really like it but you hear it as long as there are math tests in school they'll be prayer in school but what we're talking about is not post public prayers private prayer is how much is praying to themselves it's not disrupting the classroom or you know praying is before they eat but it's not forcing other people to pray with them or having the endorsement of the school it's just private as it should be lutely and i think i think to one of the things that we're going to see lead this bill lead to we're going to see some bullying I've already dealt with some serious bullying problems because of religion in the public schools in Florida and when teachers get involved in a religion of their students it absolutely becomes worse for those minority students and we're definitely going to see more of that as a result of this bill which was pushed by representative daniels who as she live tweets and has facebook live her her christian religion all over her Facebook page I mean she does sermons throughout all over her Facebook page and we've actually been dealing with that the Florida Ethics Board about that so stay tuned for mornings and so if there are violations and tangle 'men from this will be will be on it we are I need to pray before Matt tests and I found out that God wasn't any smarter than me so that's one of the one of the lines in one of my songs that it's a truth another question we do have another question this one is from Kathleen sue AK and she's making a counterpoint here she's saying that setting aside a room in a school for any length of time for the purpose of prayer is using taxpayer funds for religious reasons so I think she's pushing back on the New York case well I mean I'm with you really in spirit because dude many about 33 of our state constitutions say nobody shall be compelled to attend director support a place of worship but in this case it's not being called a prayer rooms it's a short term accommodation Ramadan often doesn't fall during the annual school year depending on where you live in your school schedule it's a very minor accommodation and under accommodation law under what the Supreme Court has approved I don't think that we can act on it and do you have any other Clause yeah I don't I don't think it's it's a it's a violation that we that we would take action on anything to collaborate the Equal Access Act is something that was passed by Congress in the early 90s and then the Supreme Court approved and FFRF opposed the accomodation act but it's the law of the land so and that says that if you have if you allow students to meet about academic subjects you have to law student clubs that are for religion or I dance religion or political clubs in many schools did not allow prayer clubs to meet or Christian clubs and now they have them thanks to the Equal Access Act but there are some stipulations that teachers are not supposed to be involved and that's where the Florida law is really learning the line but with that kind of decision by the Supreme Court that kind of accommodation law we have to be realist and what can we do about it so if they had a sign over the rule said prayer room please be quiet for most one students only or they were broadcasting it on the PA system or another thing that we've actually we have dealt with before was I think it was at the University of Iowa where they were actually setting aside prayer rooms in the University Center and they had it divided up by sex men only women only and so if we're something like that we would certainly take action too and also a public university where there are campus ministries all over the place I don't know why prayer room would be needed in a campus setting well sure it's a little different yeah like if it was there often churches across the street Mormon churches across the street in the western states from schools taking advantage of the open you know that students can be the released time law the students can be released for an hour a week to go visit a church and being doctrine ated but there's not a mosque across the street from this particular school so I think that was the issue but they're not bringing in people they're not nobody should really know about it should just happen and not have anything to do the school day I don't like it but I don't see that the law can be changed at this point I think that's accurate so we do have one more question which which is actually apt for today Tom Tinley asks where does FFRF fall when it comes to teaching the Pledge of Allegiance in public schools with its under guard line and today is the anniversary of the the day we mourn the addition of under God to our pledge 67 years ago what I think 60 some years ago 50 64 was a 60 some years well I remember my okay well when I went to kindergarten this is ironic I went to kindergarten and a Christian school Hawthorne Christian school in California and we learned the Pledge of Allegiance in 1954 one nation indivisible with liberty and justice for all the law changed that year and under God was inserted I went to to first grade than at a public school and I had to relearn it one nation under God indivisible and it felt wrong is the way you first learn it is labor the way it naturally sent and one nation indivisible is beautiful after the Civil War all the states were fighting now we are one nation indivisible and then they inserted that we did just right inserted this phrase that divides what is indivisible now they're taking the most divisive concept and history really dictated by any indivisible absolutely and they're also giving the idea that piety excuse me is equated with patriotism it also excludes the what close to 35 percent of Millennials today who are non-religious so why should there be an oath that excludes citizens based on religion that's clearly a religious litmus test for good citizenship and has caused untold problems for non-believers and for FFRF because excuse me it gives the impression that our nation is founded on a god and in fact we have Agatha's Constitution and at the offices of the Freedom From Religion Foundation we have framed some of the original pledges that used to be in school rooms prior to this tampering in 1954 that are godless and written by a minister written by Minister and his family opposed amending the pledge and also this was something that many groups many religious groups like to claim credit for Knights of Columbus there's some Protestant minister who said he had the ear of Ike and then there's that various family group holds the annual pervert prayer breakfast in Congress and they had great till to do with it and it really was a pushback against so-called godless communism and we have seen so many violations dating to the 1950s because of that and I feel like I was born in the mid 1950s and I feel like I spent my whole life trying to undo many of these violations that were passed in the 1950s so to that questioner we are absolutely opposed to the Pledge of Allegiance in schools and we are often supporting students who are being penalized they have an absolute right not to to sit down they have an absolute right not to be turned into outcasts be told to leave the room but this happens a lot because and we have given some students after the still words to some feisty students who have protested that I have a question though can I jump in I wanted what just to top that real quick one thing that people might if you are a Christian and you don't understand our reluctance to say this phrase and you don't you don't get it just imagine if it said one nation under a lot imagine if your child had to get up every single morning Christian and say pledge allegiance to one nation under Allah and that will give you a little bit of an idea below my question relates to that and I'm not sure I know the answer do do Muslims in America consider the phrase under God to include under our law or do they see that as a Christian God only I do not know the answer to that we should ask a Muslim how they feel so when they say when they say one nation under God are they thinking Allah or are they thinking the Christian God well I mean it is a monotheistic religion and so everything works yep it's all economic observes Judaism although Christians believe in three gods that is really not really manifesting there is a really interesting history behind challenging the pledge of allegiance to this is one of the first times the Supreme Court most quickly reversed itself in 1941 they actually came down with a decision called gobitis where they said that children did have to stand and say the Pledge of Allegiance and taken by Jehovah Witness they were taken by Jehovah's Witnesses and they still after the decision came down refused to stand and there was such violence and bullying directed at these poor kids that it just a couple years later in 1943 the Supreme Court changed its mind and said no you do have a right to sit out the Pledge of Allegiance if you want to and that was even before it was tampered with so that it was not a godly oath but Jehovah's Witnesses have a religious objection to taking any kind of oath yeah this was 1941 for gobitis in 1943 for Barnett so a pretty quick turnaround and also a good thing for us to remember as we're fighting the secular fight that the Supreme Court can change its mind and pretty quickly sometimes on these issues and that was a very eloquent language where it said if there's any fixed star in our constellation it's that that the government cannot prescribe orthodoxy and belief for other things it's a that is a great paragraph that we quote often in our letters and that's another example of a minority religious group feeling persecuted actually created some good law and so I we're looking to see do we have any part of the question we do and this is a good one this is from Jeremy Watkins what are your thoughts on blasphemy laws more specifically the recent death sentence in Pakistan over blast me on social media against the Prophet Mohammed has there been any similar cases in America well you know there were many blasphemy prosecutions in the United States in the 19th century yes Robert Ingersoll the famed orator agnostic defended a prominent case one of the greatest defenses and attacks on blasphemy laws that I've ever read this was a New Jersey case in I don't remember their year but it was a gentleman named Reynolds I believe and and Ingersoll just took down blasphemy laws in words you've never even ever read guy highly recommend everybody go find it and read it it's really wonderful and also I think you wrote the FAQ I might help to learn on blasphemy that we have at our legal website at FFF org and there's a under legal there's a drop down and there's an FAQ and there's a whole thing about blasphemy but in answer to Jeremy's question of course this is horrifying and we are horrified at death sentences or imprisonment for blasphemy for being an atheist it's outrageous we have done an action alert we haven't seen other groups do it against the Saudi man that has been sentenced to death basically for blasphemy for being an atheist even though there's some questions about his mental health and even though he's rescinded his statements it's horrifying that our government would do business with the Saudi government that they would not respond to our appeal to the State Department to help to save this man's life this blasphemy sentence in Pakistan it's terrifying to see how atheists and non-believers and apostates are being treated around the world and this is just a way to destroy the freedom of thought it's a way to end the ability of people to to even in their own minds question whether or not this God exists and and bussing the idea that we talked about on the program last week you know they admit that the very idea of God is just so weak and fragile that it can't withstand criticisms well because God is all-powerful and don't you dare hurt his feelings but also it's a perfect argument for separation of church and state it isn't the business of a government to care whether their citizens believe in a God or which God or any gods it's that first commandment being used by a government to put people to death and this is one of the reasons why we have fought so hard against the Ten Commandments in public places in the United States I mean this is a life and death issue in many parts of the world where religion is part of the government and I would take the First Amendment over the first commandment any day and twice on the Sabbath now I think that does it for our questions for today oh wait no we do have one more okay what are your thoughts on the teachers being given a directive to have students recite the Pledge can they be fired if they defy that directive so I think he's talking about tiaras Emily Emily McFarland asking about teachers telling their students to go ahead and stand for the Pledge we can revisit that I think yeah well and I think the other issue is what about the rights of teachers who don't want to be involved in the pledge and that would be something that is potentially could be litigated to penny and what appeals district we're looking at because teachers rights haven't really been established but they do not have the right to force a child to participate or stigmatize them or force them to stand out nothing that is something that we've actually seen happen many times sadly we've seen teachers chastise students for refusing to stand for the pledge we've seen them that make fun of students in front of their peers and this is one of the ways that we can show religion is so divisive and it's one of the reasons that the founders chose to separate state and church in the first place so you're here for a separation of church and state absolutely so I think that that does it for our questions but if people want to submit questions you guys can submit your questions online we actually have a email address that you can send them to if you have a video question we might put it on the air we'll be announcing our future topics on Facebook later this week so please send in your questions and we'll be happy to answer them and thank you for listening thank you for participating so tune in next week same time same channel for another edition of ask an atheist and in the meantime maybe join FFRF we could use the support [Music] [Music] [Music]

Channel: FFRF

Views: 33,984

Rating: 4.6567163 out of 5

Keywords: Freedom From Religion Foundation, FFRF, Islam, Atheism, Atheist, Andrew Seidel, Annie Laurie Gaylor, Dan Barker, Separation of Church and State, Supreme Court, Religion in Schools, islamic, Islam in America, muslims, muslim

Id: XOCo0W2VW4k

Length: 47min 43sec (2863 seconds)

Published: Fri Jun 16 2017