turns out i may not be as tolerant as i thought?

The other day in the news there was a story about how a court had ordered a life saving blood transfusion for a baby of a Jehovah Witness couple.
News story here

Now their beliefs are not completely alien to me, I was in primary school with a few Jehovah witnesses, one mother who knows our family from the school and whose sons who are required to go to door to door has been sent our house for practice (that sort of evangelism is so non existant here it doesn't bother us), I have talked with Jehovah witnesses, laughed with them, some of their beliefs are a bit unusual to me but I have always respected their beliefs as they have mine. When I read this story, while I felt sorry for the parents who had already lost their baby's twin sister and who wanted their child to get the best medical care without it comprising their concept of their child's spiritual health yet I just couldn't in any way be outraged at having their religious beliefs interfered with because a baby will live, and theres no way I could be anything but happy about that.
I don't intend this post to be me downing on others beliefs but rather explore the idea that , as much as we want to respect and tolerate others beliefs is there always going to be a point where we go no sorry we can't accept that?

As much as we can live in harmony will there be always come a time where agreeing to disagree isn't enough where we have to step in? I have lived for many years with the understanding that my path is not others, and thats fine but in this case i believe it is right that the baby got what it needed to survive.

I realise while i can know the reasons intellectually for the belief, that I can never truly understand where the parents are coming from. But a baby will live and I believe wholly that is right, and though our society imposed imposed our priorities on others I believe it was right. I believe everyone should be allowed practice as they wish but a child should get what needs to live.
Is this intolerance?

I would never condone overruling an adult's choice about their own body, but childred get to live long enough to decide what they will believe when they are grown.

Tolerance is overrated. Treat behaviour as its nature warrents without reguard to what is the excuse for it. If the behaviour is worthy, it gets my praise reguardless of how I feel about the reasoning behind it. If it is acceptable, I defend the doers right to practice within the law, reguardless of how I feel about the faith, sexual orientation, or politics of the persons in question. If the behaviour endangers the lives of innocents, deprives them unjustly of property, privacy, dignity, or safety, then I support taking whatever steps are necessary to stop it, reguardless of how much I might support (or oppose) the reasoning behind it.

I heartily agree with both of you.

What I think unfortunate in the U.S. (and perhaps elsewhere also) is that so many people when they hear of court cases involving Christian Science parents who resisted or refused lifesaving medical care for their children think that that's simply following their faith's foolish beliefs.

It's not! Christian Scientists are told to use their best judgment about relying solely upon prayer and their practitioners for health concerns. There's no dogma at all forbidding them to consult an MD and then do what the doctor recommends when the situation becomes a matter of their faith's practices not being effective. Most I've known did not because they found that their own prayer or a practitioner's help was sufficient. However, I've also known those who consulted doctors and even agreed to ongoing treatment for certain conditions.

Such court cases typically are worst case and involve CS parents who stubbornly refused to consult a doctor or go to an ER or possibly misjudged the seriousness of the situation. None of us, of course, is immune from dire consequences of faulty judgment.

I thought it sad when I once observed the elderly lady who was the volunteer on duty in a Christian Science Reading Room clutch at furniture to walk safely a few steps from the desk to perform a task. None of my business, obviously, but that seemed to me an instance of her being able to lead a much more comfortable and secure life if she'd only had a cane or similar aid.

But then, how many other foolish people who obviously could benefit from such aids have I seen who I knew weren't Christian Scientists?

"What fools we mortals be," as the Bard opined.

I cannot and will not EVER be able to fathom how they can not see that God gave us the ability to come up with medicines, medical treatments, cures, etc... So how can it be bad to have your child saved BY medicine?

This was a life or death decision, and I can't be angry at the state stepping in.
Reminds me of the story about the man whose town was flooded. He was on his roof, a crew came by in a boat, "We're here to rescue you"...The man says, "No, God will see me through".
Later a helicopter comes by, "We're here to rescue you!"
He says, "No God will rescue me".
After the helicopter leaves this huge voice booms from the sky..."What do you want? I sent you a boat and a helicopter...What are you waiting for?"

Prayer may help, but, when my daughter had her asthma attack, and since then, I have put my faith in good ol' modern medicine. Because of modern medicine she is healthy and able to live a normal life unimpeded by her asthma. I believe God had a hand in it, the attack happened at just the right time, when the perfect doctors (for us) were on call.

I'll take medicine over prayer, and have no problem with the state (or applicable authorities) stepping in when a CHILD is placed in danger by the "parents" idiotic beliefs. I know that, if it were my child -- hell, even if it were just a beloved pet -- I'd want to do EVERYTHING in my power to save its life; god, faith, and an afterlife be damned.

We went through this with Andy, and ultimately had to have her euthanized -- kidney failure is a painful way to go. If there had been any possibility of a life-saving transplant, or dialysis, I'd have been pushing for it. HARD. She was my baby girl.

I am certainly intolerant of religions that mutilate a little girl's sexual organs, who give young girls into what amounts to slavery and/or marriage at an early age for debts or money or power, keeping young people (or older) in a situation that is more or less slavery, the denial of education and opportunities to women and many other things that I feel are just plain wrong. I don't care if you say your religion or culture says it's okay to treat people in ways you wouldn't want to be treated yourself. I'm old and I have the right to be intolerant.

I've gotta say, it takes a lot of self-control to keep me and my girls from saying something to many of our neighbors. We see the women walking around all covered up, and positively SCURRYING to get away if we walk toward them. It makes me want to scream "You are in the UNITED STATES NOW. If he doesn't like you being HUMAN and having friends of all races then kick him out and take half his shit!"
I'll be honest...It's very VERY hard to be tolerant, religiously and racially, in these apartments.
Their kids will talk to mine at school then act like they don't even SEE them here.
It's hard to tolerant of .......people who hurt your kid's feelings over BULLSHIT like religion or culture.

I agree so much with you all.
I may not like the idea of being intolerant of someones beliefs but at end of the day I have no problem with being intolerant of injustice, ignorance, sexism racism or actions that harm those that are vulnerable, so maybe intolerance isn't always a bad thing.

I can't believe that those kids do that to yers tmarie, thats really sad, as you say bullshit!
Older i get more i appreciate that I went to that multi-dominational primary school, there was no us or them, only us, differences in culture and religion were shared and celebrated sure,but in the playground or after school there was never any sense that these differences ever existed. By time i was old enough to realise some people treated each others differently on things like income, style, religion, culture etc..it all seemed just silly, as long someone was a good person that didnt matter, i took all this for granted sadly in secondary school (high school) I discovered some others didnt.

the article said the couple had agreed tvo give their child blood parts- I'm wondering if that and artificial blood had been tried before the Court order was given

also reading between the lines-it seems the couple was engaged in a conspiracy against their conscience-because otherwise past orders with other children would not seem to be relevant

Nothing like letting someone else make the decision and therefore "you" are blameless to your god and fellow worshippers.

kind of reads that way

when I read it I wondered myself if they were secretly happy to have the judgement go the way it did.

Feinics, the kids go to a multi-racial public school. The kids are fine at school. But, here, at home in the apartment complex... For get it.
One woman actually left the pool last summer, every time we got there, she'd pack up her kids, 2 boys, little boys, who LOVED to play with Charlie. She made them leave one day before they even got in the pool. I told her..."You can't catch white!" She practically ran out the gate. LOL

is it racial or religious?

omg thats so incredibly rude! yer poor kids must be so hurt by that!bless yer patience, i dont know how you keep from losing the head with them must be hard!

You know, one day, years and years ago, I read a story about the whole artificial blood thing, I went over to one of the jw boards on B'net -- I want to say it was the learn about board, but if there wasn't a whole lot of talk there, it might have been the debate board, and asked them if the artificial blood thing would work for them religiously since it wasn't coming from another person.

It was at that point I decided they were just a another Christian Sect who followed whatever their pastor told them to without wanting to think about the hard issues, because I never got even one of them pinned down with a yes or a no answer. It was a lot of hemming and hawing and then telling me to go down to my local Kingdom Hall to get the right answer. They didn't care that I was asking THEM, not their church leadership. They didn't want to answer.

Dave, it could be both. Doesn't matter, we have never been anything but polite to the bitches and they still scurry away like rats.
Well, I did tell the guy right upstairs that if he didn't take his loud-talking ass back inside off his balcony and wake up his OWN damn kid while yelling into the phone at 1 a.m. to what ever "mooolalala" jerk he was yelling at I was gonna call the cops. But he's the only one I've ever been downright rude to.
Actually, Feinics, the kids aren't hurt. It's only Charlie, there don't seem to be many Indians (or whatever the hell they are) at Marti's high school. Charlie couldn't care less. She actually went up to one man and said, "Would you PLEASE tell your kid that I don't want him to EVER talk to me? He wants to talk at school then at home he acts like I don't exist. I am as good as YOU and any other brown person in this place and if I ain't good enough to talk to ALL the time, YOU ain't good enough to talk to me EVER."
She's a fireball. LOL She could have slapped that dude and not shocked him more.

sacrificialgoddess wrote:You know, one day, years and years ago, I read a story about the whole artificial blood thing, I went over to one of the jw boards on B'net -- I want to say it was the learn about board, but if there wasn't a whole lot of talk there, it might have been the debate board, and asked them if the artificial blood thing would work for them religiously since it wasn't coming from another person.

It was at that point I decided they were just a another Christian Sect who followed whatever their pastor told them to without wanting to think about the hard issues, because I never got even one of them pinned down with a yes or a no answer. It was a lot of hemming and hawing and then telling me to go down to my local Kingdom Hall to get the right answer. They didn't care that I was asking THEM, not their church leadership. They didn't want to answer.

Because it's a cult and they don't KNOW why they do anything. They are brainwashed.

That does not surprise me. I have limited experience with gods - I've only met 3 of them - but none of them have cared what kind of clothes I wear or if I take medicine or what I eat. Possibly there are gods out there who care about such things, but my money is on humans.

tmarie64 wrote:
Actually, Feinics, the kids aren't hurt. It's only Charlie, there don't seem to be many Indians (or whatever the hell they are) at Marti's high school. Charlie couldn't care less. She actually went up to one man and said, "Would you PLEASE tell your kid that I don't want him to EVER talk to me? He wants to talk at school then at home he acts like I don't exist. I am as good as YOU and any other brown person in this place and if I ain't good enough to talk to ALL the time, YOU ain't good enough to talk to me EVER."
She's a fireball. LOL She could have slapped that dude and not shocked him more.

Wow thats brilliant she was dead right to say that! really feel like giving her around of applause after reading that what a cool kid!

Davelaw wrote:is it racial or religious?

I've no clue, Dave, and no real opportunity to find out since the Indian men who live in our apartment complex will greet me or return my greeting but the most the traditionally dressed women will do is smile briefly if they look at me at all. The men won't speak beyond a greeting or returning one.

On the other hand, the one Indian woman (perhaps American or naturalized, no way to know) who wears American clothing speaks as would any polite American, male or female.

I can recall only once in the two years we've lived here that one of the Indian-attired women said hello to me, and that was all. She scurried on past as if her mother was calling. No idea if that's cultural, religious, racial or what.

Most of the Indians living in our apartment complex are legal aliens, I've learned, so who knows why they appear to be quite social among themselves but act like the rest of us largely don't exist.

Added thought: I truly don't get it. If I went to visit or live temporarily in another country, I'd research what the customs are beforehand and learn as much as I could about what is regarded as polite behavior there...and then do it as best I could.

I can't comprehend a culture or religion either one that would compel people who were resident aliens to act as though the citizens of their host country only marginally exist. Perhaps, I'm revealing my superficial American friendliness as a B-net poster referred to it.

I was taught that one endeavors to be a polite guest wherever one may be. I should think that would be even more necessary in a foreign country.

If they live here it's not "foreign". I don't want to be friends with them. I've found that, with very few exceptions, neighbors do not make good friends. But, polite costs nothing.
I have to say I try very hard to be tolerant, but the Indians and Afghanis who live here make it VERY hard. They, every one, are rude and think that it's perfectly all right to stand outside and yell into their phones at all hours of the night or day. It's very hard to be tolerant when the assholes don't show the smallest of courtesies.
I mean, hell fire, a SMILE is free and the easiest thing in the world to give away.

When in rome...