Quote Originally Posted by Philipvs Vallindervs Calicvla View Post
I didn't say they had to follow Moroccan culture, I took issue with HoreTore's claim that there was a cultural difference between women who want abortions and those who don't - rather than a personal difference.

If Moroccan law states that women should not be allowed abortions because Moroccan culture conceives of such a thing as wrong then providing Moroccan women with access to abortions is interfering with Moroccan law because we don't agree with their culture.
One way to look at a culture is that it's an aggregate of opinions and behaviour of a large amount of individuals.

But you're right, I don't agree with their culture in this case. I don't feel any need to show deference to "culture", this one or anyone elses. Like I said, the way somebody thinks about the organisation in my OP is determined largely by how that person thinks about abortion. We don't think that cultural differences are an excuse for gender inequality or wife beating either. So why should "it's their culture, we shouldn't interfere" be a valid line of reasoning in any other case?

Here - people keep asking me if I believe in evolution and certain members do not take me seriously or give intellectual consideration to my opinions because they believe they are contaminated by religious thought.
Well, this is the backroom. Please don't tell me you ever felt intimidated by the atheists bullies here.

At work - Someone made an inappropriate comment regarding the Archbishop of Canterbury and child molesters (and Anglican priest in general), and then refused to see the comment as offensive or to apolagise even when I told him I felt the comment was inappropriate and uncalled for, and that I had friends who were priests - this was so offensive that it affected my working relationship with said person and management had to intervene and force him to apolagise.
Well, jokes like that are funny (to most people, anyway) because they are unappropriate on some level. To be honest it sounds like you're quickly offended. Do you feel the same way about jokes about lawyers, Irish etc?

I realize you have to be more careful with jokes in a work environment, but I've never met anyone who was offended by a priest/bishop joke. Then again catholics are pretty rare where I live and work, most are either godless or protestant.

I vaguely recall how someone (Idaho I think) posted a spoof article in the backroom that was about Tories but framed in such a way that it reminded the reader of radical muslims. You were pissed off then. To be honest I think you're quickly offended.

Socially - several times friends of friends have openly abused me or my religion in public for their own amusement. One particularly nasty individual kept this up for about 20 minutes while I was trapped at the table in a crowded pub, and drunk to boot.
I most certainly don't approve of that behaviour, but it sounds like you just had the back luck of running into obnoxious bigots a couple of times. That's a long way from concluding that you live in an opressive society that's hostile towards your religion, which is how I interpreted your post.

...

Because I can't resist the urge, I'm ending this post with a bishop joke. Don't worry, it's in spoiler tags.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 
Did you hear the bishop quit his job?

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 
He wanted to spend more time with the kids