Tag Archives: Fascism

News

Should Christians who vote for socialism expect to keep their religious liberty?

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Four white Canadian police officers arrest black pastor
Four white Canadian police officers arrest black pastor

I saw two interesting news stories about how Catholic hospitals were targeted by the secular left government and courts. The first story comes from progressive state of California, where the courts wanted to force the Catholics to perform sex-reassignment surgeries on transgender people. The second story comes from Canada, where the state wanted the hospital to perform euthanasia.

Here’s Evolution News reporting on the first story:

A Catholic hospital chain known as Dignity Health refused to perform a hysterectomy on a transgendered male, as against Catholic moral teaching. The patient sued for discrimination, but the case was dismissed on the basis that the hospital was legally following its faith principles. Alas, a Court of Appeals reversed the decision, reinstating the case to the active docket.

Here’s the court’s decision – they said it was illegal discrimination on the basis of “gender identity”:

The pleading alleges that Mercy allows doctors to perform hysterectomies as treatment for other conditions but refused to allow Dr. Dawson to perform the same procedure as treatment for Minton’s gender dysphoria, a condition that is unique to transgender individuals. Denying a procedure as treatment for a condition that affects only transgender persons supports an inference that Dignity Health discriminated against Minton based on his gender identity.

So, the secular courts, which are filled with government employees whose salaries are paid by Catholic taxpayers, decided that Catholics don’t have a right to act like Catholics. In California, Christians must be forced to act like atheists.  Or else be punished by the legal system.

Here’s the second story out of Canada, from Global News:

Under the threat of a possible court challenge, Nova Scotia has quietly changed its policy on medically assisted dying at a Catholic hospital in the province.

In a statement to Global News, the Nova Scotia Health Authority (NSHA) says: “Assessments and provision of MAiD [medical assistance in dying] will be available in a section of St. Martha’s Regional Hospital complex at the Antigonish Health and Wellness Centre.”

St. Martha’s Regional Hospital was exempt from assisted dying services as the result of a 1996 agreement between the Nova Scotia government and the Sisters of St. Martha that gave control of the hospital to the Nova Scotia government.

The agreement made medical assistance in dying forbidden at the hospital in Antigonish, N.S. The Sisters of St. Martha say they believe in protecting life until the end.

Because Canada has a “Medicare for All”, single-payer health care system, all payment for medical services is performed by the secular left government. Christian nurses, doctors, hospitals, etc. thought that it was “compassionate” for government to take over the provision of health care, so they allowed the government to come in and take control of their hospitals. Today, Christians have a choice. They can either perform abortions, sex-changes, IVF (which usually involves discarding embryos), breast enlargements, etc. OR they can stop practicing medicine.

American Christians in non-SOGI-states should take note of how the secular left treats Christians in health care. This is how they want to treat Christians in every area – public, and private. It’s already happening in Canada. Teachers, police, lawyers, judges can come into your home, and tell you how to live, and how to raise your children according to secular leftist values. And Christians in Canada are paying the atheist progressives to rule.

Remember: the government that is big enough to give you everything you want – free schools, free health care, free education, etc. – is big enough to take everything you have.

It would be nice if Christian parents and Christian churches had taught young people about the critical importance for smaller government as a requirement for a society that allows religious liberty. I see a lot of concern from Christians about global warming, illegal immigrants, refugees, etc. But not much about which policies allow Christians act like Christians in public.

I know that Christian parents are so busy, and Christian churches are not really places where young people can develop a Christian worldview. If you learn anything from a Christian upbringing, you learn how to color pictures, memorize Bible verses, say “the Bible says so”, and sing praise hymns. Is all that good protection against the policies of the secular left? How many young people today who were raised in the church think that “medicare for all”, “green new deal”, etc. won’t affect their religious liberty? How many of them know what it’s like to be a Christian in atheist socialist states like North Korea – or even in less communist countries like Canada?

News

Duke University bans Christian club for adhering to Christian principles

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UVA students following their leftist masters
UVA students following their leftist masters

Duke University… I remember blogging about them before. The first time, they falsely accused members of their lacrosse team of rape. The second time, a gay Duke University employee was arrested for selling his adopted 5-year-old to other gay men for sex. So, not a very good university. And they’re going to be an even worse university after banning Christian clubs on campus.

Here’s the story from The College Fix:

The Christian student organization Young Life excludes two categories from leadership: “persons who engage in sexual misconduct or who practice a homosexual lifestyle.”

The latter is apparently a ban on practicing homosexuals, not Christians who identify as gay and believe their faith requires them to remain celibate.

The Duke Student Government Senate didn’t see a distinction, and used the organization’s orthodox Christian beliefs on sexuality to deny official recognition to a proposed Young Life chapter last week.

This isn’t the first time that something like this has happened to Christians on secular university campuses. Before Duke University, there was Tufts University and Vanderbilt University.

Tufts University:

Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts, is the latest higher education facility to crack down on student-led religious groups. In a recent move, the school’s student government banned the Tufts Christian Fellowship (TCF), an evangelical organization. The decision was made because TCF, which is the campus’ chapter of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA, requires that those serving in leadership positions must embrace “basic biblical truths of Christianity.”

The group’s demand that leaders be Bible-believing Christians was found to be in violation of Tuft’s non-discrimination policy. Last month, the Judiciary recommended that the belief requirement be moved from the constitution’s bylaws to its mission statement; while the bylaws are legally-binding, the mission statement is not. TCF didn’t comply and, now, the group is officially unrecognized by the university.

Vanderbilt University:

Vanderbilt University has decided that Christian student groups that hold traditional Christian religious views are not welcome on campus. They will no longer be recognized as valid student organizations. Vanderbilt’s reason is that such groups require that their leaders be Christian—that is, that their leaders embrace certain core principles of Christianity and try to live according to these principles. In Vanderbilt’s view, religious beliefs and standards “discriminate” against those students who do not subscribe to them. Therefore, student religious groups with religious beliefs and standards are banned.

The situation would be unbelievable—were it not true. The issue came to a head this year when a student group at Vanderbilt Law School, the Christian Legal Society, submitted its “constitution” to the university. The constitution provided that the group’s leaders should believe in the Bible and in Jesus Christ as their Lord and savior; that they should be willing to lead members in worship, prayer, and Bible study; and that they should “strive to exemplify Christ-like qualities.” Vanderbilt’s Director of Religious Life, Reverend Gretchen Person, replied that such views were forbidden. Vanderbilt’s policies “do not allow” religious groups to have such an “expectation/qualification of officers,” she wrote. Last week, the administration officially declared the policy that Vanderbilt will exclude student religious groups that “impose faith-based or belief-based requirements for membership or leadership.”

It’s probably a good idea for Christian parents to do a thorough evaluation of universities before sending your children there. Not every university beliefs in basic human rights like free speech or freedom of association or freedom of religion. But they all believe in separating you from your money, which is why you need to be careful. By the way, I don’t recommend joining Young Life, Intervarsity Christian Fellowship, Campus Crusade / CRU. The only good Christian club on campus is Ratio Christi. Make sure the university you pick has a chapter.

News

Facebook uses pro-abortion “fact checkers” to label pro-life pages “fake news”

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Facebook banned Franklin Graham for "hate speech"
Facebook banned evangelist Franklin Graham for “hate speech”

Recently, this blog’s Facebook page reached 5000 likes. We were immediately hit with a fact-check by a secular leftist, who labeled an  satirical meme image as “fake news”. Facebook informed me that they would be lowering our distribution for not being secular leftists. In fact, Facebook is censoring anyone who disagrees with the Democrat party, because the 2020 election is almost here.

Here’s the story from the Daily Caller:

Live Action founder and President Lila Rose said Facebook allowed abortionists to fact check Live Action content and label it as misinformation.

Facebook cited a fact check from two third-party fact checkers, telling Rose and Live Action that their statement “abortion is never medically necessary” was both inaccurate and misleading.

The Aug. 30 fact check, published in Health Feedback, targeted an August 9 video that included the statement “abortion is never medically necessary.” Another video shared by Live Action featuring Dr. Kendra Kolb explaining why abortion is never medically necessary was also fact checked.

Live Action’s page was punished for posting “fake news”, according to Facebook’s pro-abortion “fact-checkers”. There is no way to appeal a fact-check.

Live Action decided to make their case known to the Republican party, and they have responded.

Fox News reports:

Four Republican senators blasted Facebook for ‘censorship’ over the tech giant’s recent fact check of pro-life organization Live Action.

In a letter today to CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Senators Josh Hawley of Missouri, Ted Cruz of Texas, Kevin Cramer of North Dakota and Mike Braun of Indiana condemn the company’s “pattern of censorship” and demand that it issue a correction, remove any restrictions placed on Live Action and its founder Lila Rose, as well as submit to a “meaningful” external audit.

Let’s look at two Facebook “fact checkers”, and an example of their “fact-checking” and see how objective and non-partisan they are.

Let’s look at the first far-left Facebook partner: Politifact. Politifact is just a group of journalists from the Tampa Bay Times newspaper.

Avik Roy, health care policy expert at Forbes magazine, writes about Politifact’s assessment of Obama’s promise to Americans about keeping their health plans after Obamacare.

2008 PolitiFact before the election: ‘We rate his statement True’

Roy writes: (links removed)

On October 9, 2008, Angie Drobnic Holan of PolitiFact published an article using the site’s “Truth-O-Meter” to evaluate this claim: “Under Barack Obama’s health care proposal, ‘if you’ve got a health care plan that you like, you can keep it.’” The article assures us in its headline that “Obama’s plan expands [the] existing system,” and continues that “Obama is accurately describing his health care plan here…It remains to be seen whether Obama’s plan will actually be able to achieve the cost savings it promises for the health care system. But people who want to keep their current insurance should be able to do that under Obama’s plan. His description of his plan is accurate, and we rate his statement True.”

[…]As per PolitiFact’s usual M.O., Holan didn’t seek out any skeptical health-policy experts to suss out the veracity of Senator Obama’s signature claim. Instead, its sources included Jonathan Cohn, a passionate Obamacare supporter at The New Republic, and various interviews and statements of Mr. Obama. Holan simply took the “keep your plan” promise at face value, dismissing as dishonest anyone who dared suggest that Obama’s claim would be impossible to keep. “His opponents have attacked his plan as ‘government-run’ health care,” she wrote, the scare-quotes around “government-run” being visible to all.

PolitiFact’s pronouncements about Obamacare were widely repeated by pro-Obama reporters and pundits, and had a meaningful impact on the outcome of the election. Indeed, in 2009, PolitiFact won the Pulitzer Prize for its coverage of the 2008 campaign.

Here’s the screen capture from 2008:

Politifact caught with its pants on fire
Politifact caught with its pants on fire

Before the election, it’s true! And Obama got re-elected, because people believed that. But what happened after the election?

2013 PolitiFact after the election: ‘We rate his statement Pants On Fire’

Roy writes: (links removed)

On December 12, [2013] the self-appointed guardians of truth and justice at PolitiFact named President Obama’s infamous promise—that “if you like your health care plan, you can keep it”—its 2013 “Lie of the Year.”

[…]On November 4, Jacobson rated as “Pants on Fire” the President’s new claim that “what we said was, you can keep [your plan] if it hasn’t changed since the law passed.” Both pieces were edited by Angie Drobnic Holan, who had initially granted PolitiFact’s seal of approval to Senator Obama’s 2008 promise. Holan delivered the coup de grâce, declaring as PolitiFact’s “Lie of the Year” the “keep your plan” promise.

“The promise was impossible to keep,” says Holan in her December piece. Now she tells us! But none of the key facts that made that promise “impossible” in 2008 had changed by 2013. The President’s plan had always required major disruption of the health insurance market; the Obamacare bill contained the key elements of that plan; the Obamacare law did as well. The only thing that had changed was the actual first-hand accounts of millions of Americans who were losing their plans now that Obamacare was live.

And the screen capture from 2013:

Politifact says: we were just kidding! Kidding!
Politifact says: we were just kidding! Kidding!

So when Politifact rates a statement by a Democrat as true, what they really mean is that it’s pants-on-fire-false, except when Politifact wants to collude with the Democrat party to influence elections.

What about Snopes?

The Daily Caller explains:

Snopes’ main political fact-checker is a writer named Kim Lacapria. Before writing for Snopes, Lacapria wrote for Inquisitr, a blog that — oddly enough — is known for publishing fake quotes and even downright hoaxes as much as anything else.

[…]She described herself as “openly left-leaning” and a liberal. She trashed the Tea Party as “teahadists.” She called Bill Clinton “one of our greatest” presidents. She claimed that conservatives only criticized Lena Dunham’s comparison of voting to sex because they “fear female agency.”

[…]Lacapria — in another “fact check” article — argued Hillary Clinton hadn’t included Benghazi at all in her infamous “we didn’t lose a single person in Libya” gaffe. Lacapria claimed Clinton only meant to refer to the 2011 invasion of Libya (but not the 2012 Benghazi attack) but offered little fact-based evidence to support her claim.

It’s groups like far-left groups like Politifact and Snopes who are spotting “fake news” for Facebook.