Simon Borchardt’s derisive piece on Jaco van der Westhuyzen’s (pictured) antics after the Super14 final offers a suitable case study on a trend of religious intolerance in the media.
It seems that Borchardt had two main problems with the said scenario. Firstly, the white T-shirt with “Jesus is King” scrawled on it, was politically incorrect by virtue of it being a religious text shown at a public sporting-spectacle. Secondly, there seem to be ‘theological’ problems with the context. I’ll focus on the former.
Borchardt cuts to the quick in his lambasting, but gives little substance as to the reason for his outrage. Near the end, he breathlessly rasps, “…South Africa is a secular state and Van der Westhuyzen’s actions were grossly inappropriate”. Sadly, this shows an unmitigated distortion of the concept of a secular state. It seems the only part Borchardt correctly grasped is that South Africa happens to be one.
A secular state is officially neutral on matters of religion, neither supporting nor opposing any particular religious belief, practice or expression. Hence there is no state religion or equivalent. All citizens are treated equally, irrespective of their religious persuasion, with none gaining preferential status due to their faith (or absence of it). Was Jaco – playing for the “Blue Bulls” franchise – representing government? Did Jaco’s action result in a religion gaining government preference? Was there a law altered giving the “Jesus-group” special privileges? No. Then for the life of me, I can’t see how this has diddly-squat to do with South Africa being a secular state.
The outrageous aspect is that ‘secular state’ is brazenly extrapolated to infer a relegation of religion from all public arenas to the private. Not only does this beg the question of the validity of such a bold public/private distinction, it assumes government interference and opposition to all public expressions of religion – a tenet incompatible with secularism. This is a two-edged sword: it protects the state from religion, but equally protects religion from state meddling. It seems that Borchardt had interpreted freedom of religion to mean freedom from religion.
Borchardt further implies that the tender egos of non-funky-Christians were shattered at the exhibition. I’ve just about had it with the Politically Correct crowd. To demonstrate, let’s say Jaco wore a bright pink T-shirt saying “Pronutro is King” – or perhaps one saying, “Aliens Exist”, or “They arrested me for being the ugliest man alive – could your dad come to the local jail to prove them wrong”. The first is a statement of preference. We all know Pronutro… but I might personally prefer iphalishi. Big deal. The second is an unproven statement which could be either right or wrong. The last, is an insult to every humourless cretin that reads it. Jaco’s T shirt lies somewhere between the first and second and is agonizingly innocuous as far as T shirts go nowadays. If he had scrawled a four-letter verb followed by “…you, sharks!” it would probably have been converted into a lucrative clothing brand.
It seems that Borchardt had two main problems with the said scenario. Firstly, the white T-shirt with “Jesus is King” scrawled on it, was politically incorrect by virtue of it being a religious text shown at a public sporting-spectacle. Secondly, there seem to be ‘theological’ problems with the context. I’ll focus on the former.
Borchardt cuts to the quick in his lambasting, but gives little substance as to the reason for his outrage. Near the end, he breathlessly rasps, “…South Africa is a secular state and Van der Westhuyzen’s actions were grossly inappropriate”. Sadly, this shows an unmitigated distortion of the concept of a secular state. It seems the only part Borchardt correctly grasped is that South Africa happens to be one.
A secular state is officially neutral on matters of religion, neither supporting nor opposing any particular religious belief, practice or expression. Hence there is no state religion or equivalent. All citizens are treated equally, irrespective of their religious persuasion, with none gaining preferential status due to their faith (or absence of it). Was Jaco – playing for the “Blue Bulls” franchise – representing government? Did Jaco’s action result in a religion gaining government preference? Was there a law altered giving the “Jesus-group” special privileges? No. Then for the life of me, I can’t see how this has diddly-squat to do with South Africa being a secular state.
The outrageous aspect is that ‘secular state’ is brazenly extrapolated to infer a relegation of religion from all public arenas to the private. Not only does this beg the question of the validity of such a bold public/private distinction, it assumes government interference and opposition to all public expressions of religion – a tenet incompatible with secularism. This is a two-edged sword: it protects the state from religion, but equally protects religion from state meddling. It seems that Borchardt had interpreted freedom of religion to mean freedom from religion.
Borchardt further implies that the tender egos of non-funky-Christians were shattered at the exhibition. I’ve just about had it with the Politically Correct crowd. To demonstrate, let’s say Jaco wore a bright pink T-shirt saying “Pronutro is King” – or perhaps one saying, “Aliens Exist”, or “They arrested me for being the ugliest man alive – could your dad come to the local jail to prove them wrong”. The first is a statement of preference. We all know Pronutro… but I might personally prefer iphalishi. Big deal. The second is an unproven statement which could be either right or wrong. The last, is an insult to every humourless cretin that reads it. Jaco’s T shirt lies somewhere between the first and second and is agonizingly innocuous as far as T shirts go nowadays. If he had scrawled a four-letter verb followed by “…you, sharks!” it would probably have been converted into a lucrative clothing brand.
Borchardt’s offense at some bloke expressing his religious belief is just an indication of his bald-faced intolerance and prejudice against religion. However, as much as I will defend Jaco’s right to show off his shoddy handwriting, I’ll defend Borchards gold-plated drivel. He’s as much entitled to his opinion as the next person – only he shouldn’t pass it off as unbiased ‘sport’ reporting.
2 comments:
and a T shirt proclaiming the Jesus is Dead? Would you have tolerated that.
I was in a meeting the other night where I got boo'd by the christian majority for proclaiming that it was unreasonable for all to have to put up with praise to their God if people of differing religions were in the audience.
Further to this a public meeting was turned into a prayer meeting. I guess you are all for this kind of tolerance.
The point is that the content of the said T shirt is immaterial -- my beef is with the hypocrisy of sledging it purely on the grounds of it being religious.
I would not condone all content, but I'll tolerate it by the same modicum that I expect mine to be.
I'd certainly not support the hijacking of a public meeting, unless it was convened with that purpose -- then those who don't like it can change the channel: walk out.
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