Re: Utah anti-evolution bill filed

CreateThis wrote:
> John Wilkins wrote:
>
>
>>ck19bla@xxxxxxx wrote:
>>
>>
>>>the utah legislature is 90% mormon. believe it or not before the
>>>legislature meets every january the leaders (all mormon) of the
>>>majortity (republican) go to the leaders of the mormon religion and get
>>>their o.k. on which legislation can be voted on. you have heard of
>>>islamic republics. utah is a mormon republic.
>>>
>>
>>But is there any reason to think that they do not represent their
>>constituency?
>
>
> Do you believe there are only Mormons in Utah? Even if so, the church
> leaders weren't elected to govern; the politicians were.
>
> Everybody eats. Does that make it OK for our political leaders to get
> their marching orders from the food industry?
>
> CT
>
Understand that I am not in favour of religious leaders dictating polity, but
given that Utah is a democracy, it is entirely reasonable to expect that those
people who are elected will tend to represent the religious convictions of
their constituents. I would *hope* that an elected representative would choose
their own votes, but under a party system that rarely happens, so why the
objection to the lack of vote choice by individual representative for
religious reasons?

The only answer is that you think, or subconsciously assume, that
representatives ought never take into account religious ideas when making
their choices about policy. Catholic politicians ought never follow the
Vatican on abortion, Protestant politicians ought never follow their church's
policy on homosexuality, and Quaker politicians ought never consider their
pacificism when voting on defence.

If that is your view, then I say to you you do not want democracy, you want
something else. In a democracy, the values of the representatives are shaped
by the values of the consituent community. This is not only inevitable, it is
a *virtue*, no matter what you might think of the values in any given case,
and it is a virtue because the alternatives include religious represssion
(both from and of), restriction of the freedom of thought and assembly, and
loss of free speech. That Utah politicians represent the Mormon consensus is
very much the lesser of the evils on offer.

--
John S. Wilkins, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Biohumanities Project
University of Queensland - Blog: evolvethought.blogspot.com
Servum tui ero, ipse vespera

.

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