Preferential Treatment. Again.

Nan Christianity, Coronavirus, Religion, , ,

shh

As many of you know, I live in Oregon. I mention this because I don’t know how other states are handling reports of the Corona-19 virus cases — so what I’m about to report could very well be commonplace.

An article in the local newspaper related to the virus indicates that the “public health network” is following several current church outbreaks. It goes on to say that at one church, more than 15 people have been infected and “secondary cases from that outbreak have been found at several local businesses, health care facilities and schools.”

Sidenote: Definition of secondary in this instance would be “depending on or incidental to what is original or primary.”

The article further states that the county “will not publish the names of the churches with outbreaks.” 

Yet in all other instances, the names of the workplaces, nursing homes, and schools experiencing outbreaks have been provided! According to the article, this non-disclosure of religious entities is a ruling by the Oregon Health Authority.

Need I point out this is just ONE MORE incident where “religion” has received preferential treatment?

The First Amendment to the Constitution (just like the Second Amendment) is repeatedly used to support fallacious ideals. Contrary to what many claim, the Amendment was never meant to be the Defining Principle for U.S. citizens. Its primary goal was/is to allow people the freedom to worship. Period. It was NOT to allow preferential treatment to individuals just because they claim some religious identity!

Yet again and again this tends to be the standard course of action. 

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(BTW, it’s probably best that you don’t share this post because it addresses religion and may fall under a “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy established by some overzealous bureaucratic entity!)  *Snark!*

42 thoughts on “Preferential Treatment. Again.”

  1. The numbers are up here in WNY, too. Everyone acts like it’s all over & let’s get back to normal already. Almost everyone I know has been to Florida or some other southern state for spring break. My sister, who is an RN, whose son just got over COVID, said, “It’s a virus, you get it, you get over it.” OH, OK. Except the people who DIE. I didn’t argue with her, it’s not worth it. But I’m tired of hearing, “It’s just a virus”.

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    • It’s not so much that the virus continues to spread, but that our state authority won’t let the names of CHURCHES –who are “super-spreaders”– to be named. As I said, just one more example of preferential treatment.

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      • We had a hospital and a medical center shut down, on their own authority. When we were notified of local positive tests and hospitalizations, we could not find the actual locations. This was last fall. My wife and I canceled all our routine appointments. We don’t know if that was the county or Virginia state regulation. It is still hard to understand the logic behind that, but at least it was across the board. At least it caused common-sense endowed people to take extra precautions.

        “Ignorant men always imagine that he who speaks to them of things which they do not understand, is a very wise and learned man. This is the true principle of the credulity of nations, and of the authority of those who pretend to guide them.”
        baron d’ Paul Henri Thiry Holbach. Superstition In All Ages (1732) / Common Sense (Kindle Locations 1450-1451).

        We haven’t changed much. That quote from the sixteenth century is true today: Otherwise intelligent people yield to the ‘wise and learned’ grifters who have no qualms about exposing them to this virus. Your point about the medical authorities yielding to religious leaders to keep the public unaware of where the virus may be coming from is nationwide and comes down from the Supreme Court. The SC makes it impossible to have a reasonable plan to end the pandemic. And the Christian leaders, rather than take a responsible stance as would be expected of prominent civic individuals, choose to prove that ignorance is the most prominent characteristic of the church.

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  3. Well, here on Ontario, it’s almost the other way around. On the one hand churches with outbreaks are widely and often reported, updated, and then referenced. School districts, on the other, had to be forced into naming specific schools but, even then, an ‘outbreak’ was reported to the media without any relevant or meaningful details other than the name of the school.

    In either your or my case, I don’t like seeing preferential treatment and the public as a whole would be much better served, I think, if the facts were made readily available.

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    • It is really helpful to know what places to avoid or to be able to take extra care in those places we cannot avoid.
      Human beings seem to do everything they can to screw up the world.

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  5. My first though was ” Why protect the deluded, priviliged, fanboys, of the uber religious club?” Then I realized it probably really doesn’t matter. Every singe church in Oregon, or in the states for that matter, is alike.

    They are all deluded, priviliged, fanboys of their invisible friends.

    Moral of the story, if you want to stay away from the kind of stupid that can kill you, don’t go to church!

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      • Well, yeah. There is that 😉

        You can often spot them though, by the gold plated execution devices they wear, the babble verses on their cars/shirts, or by the haughty superiority complex they exude.

        You would think, since they carry around with them the god given right to do x, that they might find it a god given right to show some common sense and the stay the bleep home. But I know I expect too much.

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  6. If they start publishing the names of the churches, people might stay away. Then enjoying the extra sleep on Sundays, they might stay away permanently and inadvertently doom themselves to eternal hell. So, keeping the names hidden might be shortening mortal life spans but that’s of very little consequence when you are planning for infinite time.

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  7. I’m with you on this, Nan. ‘Twould be interesting if some independent blogger found out which churches and published the names. But, an aside here … I can’t feel much, if any, empathy for those churches or those who were infected as a result of demanding their freedom to attend church despite a deadly pandemic … they got what they deserved. Cold? Harsh? Yeah, but then I’m sick and tired of the religious right demanding their ‘rights’ and attempting to shove their ‘values’ down our throats. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

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        • Grace Life Church in Stoney Plain, Alberta is one such, though so far they claim they are virus free. The pastor spent a month in jail for breaking health rules–he will be in court May 3rd to face the charges. But the Sunday after getting out, he was back preaching to a crowded church, no masks.

          And then there is the whole Mennonite town of La Crete, Alberta, where you can be shunned for wearing a mask. God is more powerful than a virus, you know!

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          • The world, it seems is filled with fools. If they care so little for their own lives, then so be it, but they do NOT have the right to risk the lives of the rest of us! A thought I used in my p.m. post today is … why do people trust in their god to protect them from the virus, but yet they feel they need a gun to protect themselves from whatever?

            Liked by 1 person

          • For once, Tildeb, I completely agree with you! It goes back to that “men are superior and should have dominance over women and their bodies” line of thought that should have died out long ago.

            Liked by 1 person

          • I think you’ll find, Jill, whenever you are in complete agreement with me, you are probably 100% correct! Coincidence? I think not!

            All joking aside, now with both Nan’s and your surprised agreement with me in the space of a mere week, I have to wait for two shoes to drop. This is foreign territory for me….

            Liked by 2 people

  9. Here in British Columbia church services are banned. Several fundamentalist congregations in conservative ridings defied the order – they were slapped with hefty fines, offending places of worship named, reporters in place the following Sunday to film repeat disregard for public health orders.

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  12. Then I assume it is all churches.

    The irony is that we see the privileged status, but they see themselves as discriminated against because of their religion. And it is not both sides. This is them being crazy.

    I live in Texas. It has been nuts here, it is nuts here, it will continue to be nuts.

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    • Yes, they name other places (lumber yard, dairy, even hospitals!), but they put a ban on naming churches.😠

      I DO NOT envy you living in Texas!!! At least, for the most part, Oregon’s leaders are somewhat sane!

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  14. Hello Nan. The SCOTUS has been giving the Christian religion not only a free pass to be above the publiclic health laws lately but to cement the idea of the Christian religion being regarded as the most favored in government decisions. I listen to a podcast with the lawyer Andrew Torrez who is very good at breaking down the law and how court cases work and effect us. I also like for those that do not hear well they provide a transcript. On a recent show they had on Andrew Seidel the constitutional lawyer to talk about the privileges that SCOTUS was giving to religion. Here is the link for those who wish to read it or listen to the audio version. Thanks. Hugs

    https://openargs.com/transcript-of-oa483-scotus-grants-absurd-privilege-to-churches-in-new-ruling/

    https://openargs.com/oa483-scotus-grants-absurd-privilege-to-churches-in-new-ruling/

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  15. I’ve seen warnings both ways: you are 90% protected if you get the vaccination, and the implication is, you can throw away your mask. Then along comes a friend who has had the virus, recovered, got the vaccine, threw away her mask, and guess what…
    No. I prefer to go masked for awhile yet.

    Here in NH we have vaccinated over 2/3 of the population, more than a million people, at least once and in some instances twice. We’re due for our second shot in about three weeks.

    I was very impressed with the efficiency, and the ease of it all.

    I do know of some people who have had the virus, got better, got the shots, and apparently flang away their masks–and are now battling their second covid infection.

    I think you also have to take into account how numbers, stats, and graphs can be juggled to show what you want it to show. Years ago a very useful drug was yanked from the shelves because “20% of women in a blind study in England died”…turned out it was one woman in a study of five middle aged women. sigh. No mention of any preexisting condition, which she may have had for years.

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