What's For Dinner?

Let's go to Long John Silver's!

Liberté? Mais non!

From the BBC. Brigitte Bardot was fined by the French government for criticizing Islam. Do you suppose they fine people in France for criticizing Christians?

Bardot fined over racial hatred

A French court has fined former film star Brigitte Bardot 15,000 euros (£12,000) for inciting racial hatred.

She was prosecuted over a letter published on her website that complained Muslims were "destroying our country by imposing their ways".

It is the fifth time Ms Bardot been convicted over her controversial remarks about Islam and its followers. This is her heaviest fine so far.

The French film idol, who is 73, was not in court to hear the ruling.

The fine - equivalent to $23,000 - related to a letter she wrote in December 2006 to the then Interior Minister, Nicolas Sarkozy, which was published on her website, in which she deplored the slaughter of animals for the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha.

She demanded that the animals be stunned before being killed.

She said she was "tired of being led by the nose by this population that is destroying us, destroying our country by imposing its acts".

In a letter to the court Ms Bardot, who is a prominent animal rights campaigner, insisted she had a right to speak up for animal welfare.

The prosecutor said she was weary of charging Ms Bardot with offences relating to racial hatred and xenophobia.

Freedom, Part 2

Once again (and this time complete) the first freedom guaranteed by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;

I didn't intend to have a second post on religious freedom but the situation with the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS) piqued my interest. This is the church/compound that law enforcement authorities raided this week in Texas and removed hundreds of women and children. Members of the church are accused of polygamy, and physical and sexual abuse.


The guarantee of "free exercise" of religion obviously does not provide protection for unlawful behavior. That's a good thing....Right? In this case involving the FLDS the answer is obviously and emphatically Yes! Law enforcement should have stopped this cult's activities years ago.


There is an interesting article regarding the FLDS on MSNBC titled "Is Texas Group a Religious Sect or a Clear-Cut Cult?" From this article:

Janja Lalich, a sociologist at California State University, Chico...told LiveScience she definitely thinks the Texas compound should be called a cult. "If you've got a group that's abusing hundreds and hundreds of women and children, let's call it what it is," she said....the distinction between a legitimate sect and a cult is simple: It depends on what or whom you worship. "In a healthy or legitimate religion or sect, you are presumably worshiping some higher principle or some higher authority," Lalich said, "whereas in a cult people tend to end up worshipping that living human leader." She added, "Your salvation is tied up with that particular living leader, and obeying orders and not breaking the rules, and subjecting yourself to whatever personal transformation you're expected to go through to be on that correct path to salvation."

She hits on some of the hallmarks of a true cult:

1. Abuse or violence used against those who disobey, disagree or try to leave.

2. Leaders who claim to have the key to salvation. Outside of the cult there is no hope for salvation.

3. Leaders who claim to have a mandate from God, to speak for God. (The FLDS leader claims to be a prophet.)

4. Separation from those who do not believe as you do.

5. Teaching that obedience to the laws of the cult will result in personal transformation

Cults exist and have existed in small scale and in large scale throughout history. This isn't the first and it surely isn't the last. Plenty of cults exist and go unnoticed because members are not overtly breaking secular law. Yes, even cults are guaranteed freedom to practice their religion.

Now that I think about it, in some ways the Texas authorities who broke up the compound were acting much like Martin Luther. :-)