Religious liberty bills favor one precise creed over all others

Evidence

The emotional impact of bills like these really has two sides: It singles out a target population as worthy of state-sanctioned contempt, and it identifies another group as worthy of state-sanctioned respect. That privileged group consists of those who adhere not to any religion but to a specific variety of religion, just as the despised group consists of those that offend the privileged group. In HB 1523, as in the Blitzers’ model bills, the variety of religion is indicated with some precision as that which involves a belief in the primacy of heterosexual relationships and the fixity of gender. Those whose religion might sanction a different or more complicated set of beliefs will find no representation in these bills. — Katherine Stewart, The Power Worshippers, 646

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Religious liberty is deployed as a temporary tactic toward theocracy. — Katherine Stewart, The Power Worshippers: Inside the…, 481; Symbolic religious bills are deliberate steps toward discrimination laws — Katherine Stewart, The Power Worshippers: Inside the…, 626; Religious freedom rhetoric means privilege for one sanctioned creed — Katherine Stewart, The Power Worshippers: Inside the…, 659 (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• A secular state must grant equal treatment across all religious communities #qualifies (0.75) — Neil DeVotta, Sinhalese Buddhist Nationalist Ideology, 312
• A state’s own legal-institutional move can be a religious judgment on a faith’s essence #expands (0.70) — Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular, 675