By Rawlanda Hinds, staff reporter
The Religious Liberty Accommodation Act is a bill that gives businesses, profit or nonprofit (in some states) the right to deny service to members of the LGBTQ+ community based on religious or moral beliefs, without facing retaliation from the state.
Very similar to the Jim Crow laws, this bill is just another way to enforce discrimination, allowing places to deny service to people based on sexual preferences. The effects of bills like these are often not seen until after they have created violence and segregation between groups of people.
Hasn’t America learned its lesson already?
The umbrella of religious freedom just isn’t enough. During the era of Jim Crow, Christian ministers taught that whites were “Chosen people”, and African-Americans were cursed to be servants.
Apparently, God supported racial segregation, and now he supports denial of LGBTQ+. Religious freedom is how America has always justified discriminatory acts and allowed people to think what they think is fine. Protesting against it is fine, but to take action and deny people of their rights to shop and be a part of community organizations is ludicrous.
Religious scriptures don’t just bash the LGBTQ+ community, but it allows for people to simply mind their businesses and accept people for how they are.
Hebrews 13:1-2 (NIV) “1. Keep on loving one another as brothers and sisters. 2 Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it.”
“As a Christian, you can hate the idea not the person, because of that, you should show people respect…Treat others how you want to be treated,” junior Emmanuel Giannakopoulos said.
Religion doesn’t dispel the actions being taken on a group of people, no matter how much we disagree with aspects about them.
“Forgiveness is a virtue of the weak, and an ornament of the strong. Forgiveness subdues [all] in this world; what is there that forgiveness cannot achieve?” translated from Mahabharata by freshman Medina Surajpal.
“… This is an important aspect of life, which needs to be considered in tough situations, but is always the right thing to do,” freshman Medina Surajpal said.
Religions don’t just allow their followers to ignore the help of people. When will we learn that God is just as accepting and forgiving everywhere?
Surat al-Mumtahana states, 8 “God does not forbid you from being good to those who have not fought you in the religion or driven you from your homes, or from being just towards them. God loves those who are just,” translated by junior Amina Chowdhury.
“As a Muslim, I believe that Islam doesn’t allow a person to deny services to LGBT people or anyone who may be different than us because it’s not morally correct. It’s not right for anyone to use religion to justify their actions when these people have really done nothing to you. This Free Religion Bill is not going to be used for positive reasons, but rather to hurt innocent minds and make them feel as if they don’t belong,” junior Amina Chowdhury said.
This bill will do nothing but harm the people who claim to be protected. There can’t be a sacrifice of the rights for a large community just to feed the lady who didn’t want to bake a cake for the happy gay couple.
