VERSION|0.5.1|NAME|Steve|DATE|1359975528|CONTENT|I liked his inclusion of homosexual men and women among the marginalised people, while accidentally forgetting to mention who was and is most responsible for that marginalisation. It’s like Stalin bemoaning the existence of the Gulags.

The confusion he seems to make, though, is that if a cultural strand is a valid viewpoint (and for the most part, all are), it must therefore be valid in totality. This is ridiculous. The experience of a section of society does not legitimise all aspects of that culture. You can respect the viewpoint of, say, British Pakistanis as a group, you can understand that the standard British history is not written from that point of view, you can try to ameliorate this deficiency in historical analysis (as many people do), but at the same time you can criticise and try to remove aspects of that culture that are flat-out wrong. The subjugation of women that exists in some sections of that culture is wrong, while at the same time most other aspects of that culture are fine. Cultural behaviour is not monolithic – you don’t have to take it or leave en bloc.

So with Catholicism (and any religion). I might not want to go to mass, or believe that bread becomes flesh, or think that condoms are evil, but I’m happy for Cliff to think that if he wants to. But in accepting his right to be a Catholic, I absolutely do not have to accept every aspect of it. On many things he and his organisation are wrong, wrong, wrong. This TFTD seemed to be a special plea that because we accept that Catholics are free to be Catholics, we also have to accept their organisation’s occasional nastiness as part of the deal. Well no, we don’t.|IP-ADDRESS|10.0.119.228, 217.36.222.79, 10.37.43.201|MODERATIONFLAG|