Are we bigoted?

There are many ways to cheat in order to win an argument without having to actually defend your view. One is to call your opponent a “Nazi”. Another is to label them a “bigot”.

In an interesting blog this week, Ed West quotes a surprising turn of events. The National Secular Society’s attacking the Advertising Standards Agency (ASA) which asked a Christian blogger, to justify placing a Coalition for Marriage advert on his blog.

Here’s what they said:

The ASA is overstepping the mark and posing a rather sinister threat to freedom of expression. [So far, so good.] Let’s make it clear … that the NSS has no sympathy with the aims of the “Coalition for Marriage”—an ad hoc linking of some of the most extreme and unpleasant religious bigots in Britain.”

Notice the “bigot” card being played? The argument runs: you should have complete freedom of expression, but you are still a bigot. So I don’t need to listen to you (and no one else should listen to you). Your views are invalid, and don’t need to be dealt with on their own merits, because I have decided that they are bigoted.

Christians often get labelled “bigots”. And it finishes the conversation. If you’re a bigot, you’re wrong. There is, of course, “no room for bigotry” in our society.

There’s great irony in that, though. Because it’s worth asking: what does it actually mean to be “bigoted”?

The online Oxford Dictionary defines bigotry as: “Having or revealing an obstinate belief in the superiority of one’s own opinions and a prejudiced intolerance of the opinions of others.”

So bigotry is saying: “This is what is right: and since I know what is right I know without listening to you that if you disagree with me, you’re totally wrong”. And so it cuts both ways. Christians can be bigots. But anyone can be as well.

The irony is that as soon as someone labels someone else a bigot, rather than discussing their viewpoint with them, they are (according to the Oxford Dictionary) being, erm, bigoted.

How to respond? Three ways, perhaps:

1. Accept there will be conflict and misunderstanding. “Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light” (John 3 v 19). A Christian believes Jesus is the light, and opposition to him is “darkness”. Organisations such as Stonewall or the NSS see their own worldview as providing light, and Christians as being darkness (notice how regularly Stonewall spokesmen speak of their opponents as being “in the dark ages”, in a neat and no doubt unconscious reversal of John 3 v 19).
2. Make sure we’re not actually being bigoted! Bigotry isn’t about the view you hold: it’s about how you hold it, whether you’re prepared to listen and engage and change if someone (whoever they are) convinces you that your logic is false, or that you’ve not understood God’s word as well as you thought. Let’s be honest: we’re not always entering debates, or responding to media articles, with that mindset.
3. Suggest (gently) to someone labelling us “bigot” that it’s possible for anyone, with any view, to be “bigoted”. Ask them what they think a bigot is, and whether they’ve already decided that they’re right, and the Christian view is wrong. We might even (gently!) suggest they’re in danger of being a bigot…