Freedom!

If there one word that sums up the reason America is a nation, it’s got to be this one.

But the current attitude regarding freedom among libertarians, red staters and
other conservative camps is mind bending. I’m just going to call them ’the right’ so I can use two words. The right seems, on the one hand, to want less government interference in our lives. That was the thrust of the original Tea Party slogans. But if that is inconvenient, they want the government to intervene so that a man cannot marry a man, a woman cannot marry a woman, a buyer can decide whom to sell goods to and persons in general cannot do what they want in the privacy of their own bedroom.
Religious beliefs cover a lot of ground. It gets pretty damn weird when you think of some of the implications of refusing a person something because of what you believe.
What if my religion unequivocally states a man shouldn’t eat red meat? What if my minister tells me that it’s absolutely forbidden to hang out or do business with someone who symbolically eats the body and drinks the blood of their savior? What if I believe it’s wrong to worship snakes? (I’d have to check for holes in your arm.)
I mean, we could eliminate a lot of business here people. We could have Wal-Marts just for Muslims, Starbucks for Christians and Burger Kings for Jews. We could have airlines for the Amish.
If we, in any way, decide to refuse service or goods to a person because of our belief system about the world or any god, we are trashing the one concept that must go along with freedom. That word is tolerance.