I've Just Been Discriminated Against Because I'm A Christian

It genuinely shocked me when a local buy/sell Facebook group admin openly discriminated against my listing for no other reason than because I am a Christian. Maybe he had other reasons, but his honest explanation was that religious things weren’t allowed because it was a “multicultural” group. The only thing about it that was “religious” was me.

I believe Australia has an awesome culture, and believe we’re a nation of thinkers, not lemmings. (The picture of a snowflake isn’t about me complaining about personal offense, but the disappointment that some Aussies are turning into people easily offended by someone merely being a Christian, and blinkered to any reality before or after that.)

I mean, what an entirely ignorant thing to say, apart from the blatant hypocrisy of his discrimination.

Australian history is of Judeo-Christian cultural settlement and prosperity. 45% of Aussies still identify as Christians.
Extreme multiculturalism removes permission to differentiate between positive and negative cultural influences. Yet if you’re discriminating against someone because they don’t agree anything and everything is true and beneficial for Australian culture, then you have no logical grounds to discriminate against anyone else who simply wishes to potentially discuss extreme multiculturalism, amongst other things.
The event I was sharing as a local was not religious. It’s at a golf club, the bar will be open, and I’ll be interviewing Mark Latham (not a Christian) to hear and discuss his views on all kinds of issues. It couldn’t be more inclusively secular. This suggests the admin’s goal wasn’t open mindedness, but targeted exclusion based solely on my personal beliefs – which is very anti-multicultural.
There was absolutely no other reference to rules against politics, or offering “out of immediate area” products/services, or any other potentially reasonable and legal discrimination. He lamely responded to my clarification that he was wrong about it being a religious event with, “It is what it is mate”.

Multicultural, except for Australian culture, is what it would appear “it” is.

The event seems to have triggered him because it warns that it will not be an event for SJWs or snowflakes looking for safe spaces from micro-aggressions.

By the way, I didn’t report him to Facebook (his particular type of bigotry wouldn’t transgress their community “standards” anyway). I also won’t complain to the Human Rights Commission, or sue him, or cry in a corner while hugging my knees and rocking gently. I’m participating in public discussions and wrote this post to try and be part of the solution to such ignorance.

Who cares why this bloke who doesn’t know or value his national culture and history, and has a problem with Christians. What I care about is his inability to defend very bad ideas, because that’s how they flourish: people being unconcerned with more information. That’s how the media leads gullible people down the garden path. When good ideas are controversial, and bad ideas are popular, the only solution is sunlight – public debate and discussion.

Our various worldviews are irrelevant when it comes to public debates. Only ideas and actions are up for discussion, as it’s more than obvious that people coming from different backgrounds and with different worldviews can agree on good ideas and appropriate behaviours. That’s what it means to be a pluralistic, inclusively secular society.

If homosexual marriage is such a great idea, why the intellectually-dishonest fear of a public debate? If Islam is so great an idea, why the impossibility of exposing it to the same level of public scrutiny as Christianity without having your character called into question? If promoting sexual promiscuity to pre-teens and gender confusion to children is marvelous education policy, why the hysterical bullying of rational disagreement?

This is a discussion we need to have more widely and more often because of the obvious growing trend of bigoted and prejudiced religious discrimination in a society claiming to promote love and tolerance. The solution to ignorance is information, education. The solution is not bigger governments and more laws protecting precious people’s feelings.

I refuse to accept Australia becoming an environment where ignorance flourishes like weeds for lack of gardening. It breaks my heart to see our citizens wearing bigotry against Christianity and our foundational values like badges of virtue.

Don’t be a lemming, mindlessly following progressive groupthink and celebrity SJWs. Don’t be a snowflake, melting under the slightest heat of scrutiny, living in the dark. Open your mind to the possibility you’re actually wrong about one or two things you firmly believe, and invite honest discussions while requiring evidence, logic, and the mutual opportunity to argue your idea.

We don’t have to agree on everything to advance Australia, but we do have to at least not be afraid of discussing anything.