LGBTQI+ artists have been targeted for ‘insulting Christianity’. To queer people, this feels particularly cruel
A priest and two nuns walk into a bar. In Sydney this week, this wasn’t the setup for a bad joke but for a fiery culture war.
The bar in question is within a long-deconsecrated church, and the City of Sydney is considering an application for its redevelopment into luxury apartments. Divine Playhouse, which opened to the public last Wednesday, is a year-long queer-friendly and inclusive arts pop-up, supported by the New South Wales government and the City of Sydney.
The venue was conceived as an affordable and accessible space for Sydney’s artists, promoters and performers to create, experiment and find an audience. But Christian groups met the launch party with protests outside and, since images were shared of some of the performances – drag queens dressed as nuns, for instance – campaigners have demanded the return of $100,000 in state arts funding; an open letter calling on the government to apologise to the Christian community has gathered more than 5,000 signatures; and the venue’s Instagram account has been taken down due to complaints.
Now its lease is under threat, after the venue was issued a breach notice complaining that Christian beliefs have been “insulted and mocked”, and that Divine Playhouse must cease operating on the grounds of “offensive trade” and to prevent “public protests [that] are almost certain to occur and are likely to endanger members of the public”.
But beneath the debacle is a much more fundamental debate: a question about who gets to speak and, perhaps most importantly, whose offence carries the power to silence another’s voice.
We also know what it is to be offended. I was offended, for instance, when Lyle Shelton of the Family First party – who has added his voice to the protests – compared children raised by same-sex couples to the Stolen Generations. I was offended by his talk of “rented wombs and eggs for sale”, accusations that queer people are grooming children to believe in gender fluidity, and being told, yet again, that children need a mother and a father.
These are not isolated views. Some groups now campaigning against Divine Playhouse celebrated Israel Folau after he warned homosexuals that hell awaited them. They have amplified rhetoric describing queer culture as perverted.
I find those views profoundly offensive but I have never demanded church doors be closed or tried to control what is said from their pulpits. I have never suggested Shelton should be denied the taxpayer-funded salary he is seeking in the NSW parliament because I find his politics offensive. Nor have I demanded that religious organisations return the immense tax concessions they receive because I object to the speech they enable.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...uel-ntwnfb
A priest and two nuns walk into a bar. In Sydney this week, this wasn’t the setup for a bad joke but for a fiery culture war.
The bar in question is within a long-deconsecrated church, and the City of Sydney is considering an application for its redevelopment into luxury apartments. Divine Playhouse, which opened to the public last Wednesday, is a year-long queer-friendly and inclusive arts pop-up, supported by the New South Wales government and the City of Sydney.
The venue was conceived as an affordable and accessible space for Sydney’s artists, promoters and performers to create, experiment and find an audience. But Christian groups met the launch party with protests outside and, since images were shared of some of the performances – drag queens dressed as nuns, for instance – campaigners have demanded the return of $100,000 in state arts funding; an open letter calling on the government to apologise to the Christian community has gathered more than 5,000 signatures; and the venue’s Instagram account has been taken down due to complaints.
Now its lease is under threat, after the venue was issued a breach notice complaining that Christian beliefs have been “insulted and mocked”, and that Divine Playhouse must cease operating on the grounds of “offensive trade” and to prevent “public protests [that] are almost certain to occur and are likely to endanger members of the public”.
But beneath the debacle is a much more fundamental debate: a question about who gets to speak and, perhaps most importantly, whose offence carries the power to silence another’s voice.
We also know what it is to be offended. I was offended, for instance, when Lyle Shelton of the Family First party – who has added his voice to the protests – compared children raised by same-sex couples to the Stolen Generations. I was offended by his talk of “rented wombs and eggs for sale”, accusations that queer people are grooming children to believe in gender fluidity, and being told, yet again, that children need a mother and a father.
These are not isolated views. Some groups now campaigning against Divine Playhouse celebrated Israel Folau after he warned homosexuals that hell awaited them. They have amplified rhetoric describing queer culture as perverted.
I find those views profoundly offensive but I have never demanded church doors be closed or tried to control what is said from their pulpits. I have never suggested Shelton should be denied the taxpayer-funded salary he is seeking in the NSW parliament because I find his politics offensive. Nor have I demanded that religious organisations return the immense tax concessions they receive because I object to the speech they enable.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...uel-ntwnfb
teachings of the Bible are so muddled and self-contradictory that it was possible for Christians to happily burn heretics alive for five long centuries. It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed outright (Aquinas). Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches. - Sam Harris, "Letter To A Christian Nation"
