Tuesday, March 06, 2012

Religious considerations

Interestingly, there's a poll on the Telegraph website to find out if people support same-sex marriage.

The options are as follows:

No - It would be too offensive for many religious people 8.41% (2,927 votes)
No - And I think that even civil partnerships go too far 10.81% (3,762 votes)
Yes - Gay people should have the same rights as everyone else 43.61% (15,182 votes)
Yes - Religious considerations have no place in a modern society 37.18% (12,945 votes)

I selected "Yes - Gay people should have the same rights as everyone else".

I am a secularist because I think that it is the best way to guarantee religious freedom (the freedom to profess whatever religion you choose, or not to profess any religion). But is it true that "religious considerations have no place in a modern society"?

So people who don't think that religious considerations have any place in a modern society obviously think that people of religion should not criticise abuses of power by the rich and powerful, then? (Well, obviously not if the churchmen concerned are themselves rich and powerful, because then they would just be hypocrites.) Many people seem to have conveniently forgotten that many reforms and freedoms were won because of campaigns by people from liberal religious traditions.
Anyway, for whatever reason, I am pleased that over 80% of respondents support same-sex marriage.

3 comments:

Archdruid Eileen said...

They're not very good options, though, are they? For example I'd want to vote for "Civil partnerships are fine because they provide equality in law with marriages, and civil partners get the same inheritance and other rights, which is quite right. But I'm not sure about same-sex marriages because I'm still trying to figure out whether the meaning of the word "marriage" covers the relationship. Doesn't mean I'm against or for, but I do need to have a bit more of a ponder."

But that option wasn't there.

Yewtree said...

You want nuance and subtlety from journalists?

Cheryl said...

It's not so much a lack of subtlety, it's that a poor selection of options is no way to find out what people really think - even leaving aside the problems of a self-selected sample and (all too often) options carefully selected and slanted to the one(s) the writer wants or expects.