No Cross for Me, Thanks Anyway

In the early 1980s, I was teaching at Stockton State College. At one point, I said something like, "OK, guys, let's get started -- and I mean 'guys' in the generic sense." Afterwards, a couple of the young women in the class came up to me and said, "You can't get out of being sexist by saying you don't mean what you said."

"'Guys' stands for everyone," I said, thinking that my embedded apology had been rather enlightened of me.

"Then next time try saying 'OK, gals, let's get started.'"

Got it.

Justice Scalia says of a cross on public land* honoring U.S. war dead: "It's erected as a war memorial. I assume it is erected in honor of all of the war dead ... What would you have them erect? ... Some conglomerate of a cross, a Star of David, and you know, a Muslim half moon and star?"

He's right that it's intended to honor all the war dead. The problem is the assumption that you honor all war dead by putting up the religious symbols honored by some.

Scalia should talk with the young women who set me straight 25 years ago.

---

--
^{*The case seems to be turning on whether the land was made private simply to skirt the problem with erecting religious symbols on public land.}

 

Follow David Weinberger on Twitter: www.twitter.com/dweinberger

Comments

[ESerafina42]

12:40 PM on 10/09/2009

The equivalent of the young woman's statement would have been for the lawyer to ask Scalia if a Star of David or a Muslim star and *crescent* (not half moon) in the same location would represent "everyone."

[seawolf77]

09:37 AM on 10/09/2009

Conservatives have a knack of making you feel inferioir if you don;t agree with them. It is probably their most annoying trait although those are legion. Liberals believe in change. Repulicans believe in no change. Funny there's no word for that. The conspiracist in me has his eyebrow raised. How are two such disparate groups ever get anything done. We need a party of semi change. We need a damn semi colon.

[Scriobhaim]

09:27 AM on 10/09/2009

Funny, the cross has been standing for something like a hundred years now, and suddenly it's a problem? Interesting: who NEEDED it to be a problem and why NOW? It's a cross standing in a desert. What conceivable law or principle of equality makes that WRONG? The fact that it doesn't represent all religions? Who said anything was supposed to represent all religions? The fact that it represents ONE religion? Who said anything representing one religion can't be publicly seen? It was put there by WWI VETS remembering THEIR fallen comrades. It's a part of history now. It should stay. If somebody wants to put a Star of David memorial or a Buddha or something somewhere else, go ahead. Maybe an Atheist memorial. Whatever. Of course, no one will want to, because the real objection here is simply against the mere existence of Christianity, which drives most progressives out of their gourd. Like it has no right to BE.

[HSC55]

10:39 AM on 10/09/2009

THAT is the problem. Some other people wanted to put up other religious symbols but were denied the right to. Hence, the lawsuit. All or none is there view.

[JohnFromCensornati]

05:18 PM on 10/09/2009

"Interesting: who NEEDED it to be a problem and why NOW?"

Why didn't you fill us in on your paranoid delusions? Who is it?

BTW - do you realize how long it takes for a case to reach the Supremes or who decides that the Supremes will hear the case? I didn't think so.

[MajorKong]

05:15 AM on 10/09/2009

If the cross "represents everybody" then the cross has no meaning.

You can't have it both ways Justice Scalia.

[kwinter]

03:06 PM on 10/09/2009

I'd be OK with the cross staying ... if Scalia would say that it has no meaning!

[independentcynic1228]

02:34 AM on 10/09/2009

Here's a simple solution to this. Just throw up a statue of a rifle planted in the ground and some boots and dogtags, no way to anger another religion that way. But oh wait, it might anger the anti gun crowd. I guess you really can't do anything these days without offending someone. Something to think about, but a reality now, everything you do can offend someone. Even the breath you take will offend some of the most extremist enviromentalists, since your adding to the carbon footprint. Seriously, people need to really just let and let live.

[Rogan]

07:34 AM on 10/09/2009

...People putting up crosses on public land, where they are an affront to people, like me, who find Christianity and all its symbols disturbing and disgusting, is not exactly "living and letting live," to begin with.

[Rmath]

08:21 PM on 10/08/2009

SonOf, you don't get to decide that "the cross is for everyone".

Read the title of Mr. Weinberger's post. Don't try to use compulsion to apply the cross to all people. That's presumptious and inappropriate on your part.

[Rmath]

08:19 PM on 10/08/2009

Scalia's presumption is that "everyone" is a Christian. Or ought to be.

Kinda reminds you of Ann Coulter's assertion that Jews may be "perfected" through conversion to Christianity.

[SonnyRice]

08:06 PM on 10/08/2009

One nation under God. Where have I heard that before. Sounds familiar for some reason. Anyone have a clue? Help a guy out. Oh that’s right you can’t say or the ACLU may come after you. I guess back then American’s had a different outlook on who’s liberties they took advantage of by daring to place a cross in so many places across this land. I hope the flag will be ok longer. That to may offend someone. Neither bother me as an American all my life, and till my death. We don’t say under Allah or any other here yet.
Some student collected over thirty thousand from school because he was expected to have to stand up for the Pledge of Allegiance, imagine the nerve of that school. What a great citizen he is for standing up for his rights, I would have given him a few lefts to the head as I stood proudly. I would get someone to protect my right to have my country honored by any citizen or person on this or any soil. Sorry for the rambling but enough is enough. God bless America, and honor our flag, and our freedom. Believe it or not, many died for those who now dishonor us

[Patrick Garies]

09:00 PM on 10/08/2009

"One nation /under God/" should not be in a state-sanctioned pledge predominately used in secular public schools. It's obvious that this is a reference and favoritism toward "God" as he appears in Christianity. I would argue that it's absurd to have a pledge of allegiance in the first place, but that's another story.

No one's arguing that you can't say that; just that it shouldn't be in a *state-sanctioned* pledge.

No one is attacking the American flag as a religious symbol either. You should really stop making stuff up.

Saying "Allah" would be just as bad: it would be state favoritism toward a religion except that religion would be Islam in this case.

As for your rights being protected, you and anyone else can already honor your country via religious symbols. You just can't get a secular government to do it on behalf of people that may not subscribe to your religion. Congress effectively gave away taxpayer-owned property on the terms that a religious symbol be maintained on it.

[Mindbullet]

10:11 PM on 10/08/2009

The words "under God" were officially added in 1954. The change was suggested by a Presbyterian minister to President Eisenhower. He argued that the "American way of life" is to be an America "under God" as Lincoln had stated long before in his Gettysburg Address. By the reasoning of the governing body at the time, to include "under God" in the pledge would have it reflect that sentiment.

Considering the atheist and agnostic citizens in the U.S. the current version of our national pledge is in conflict with the first amendment. As the U.S. Constitution now stands, our nation has an obligation to provide a national pledge that citizens who worship no gods can also be proud to make should they so choose.

Advocacy of religion belongs in the house of the family, if indeed it belongs anywhere. In any case it certainly does not belong in the House of Representatives.

[SonofLiberty1]

06:39 PM on 10/08/2009

The assumption here is that Christ is not God,God does not exist and the hereafter is just a fairy tale...

BUT....

WHAT IF YOU ARE WRONG?

[addisonsteele]

06:51 PM on 10/08/2009

What does the cross have to do with the figure called Christ (for whom, it must be noted, there is no contemporaneous historical evidence whatsoever)?

[Patrick Garies]

09:02 PM on 10/08/2009

BUT....

WHAT IF WE ARE RIGHT?

[flacon]

04:16 PM on 10/08/2009

People are attempting to sanitize history. I would not support a cross being erected on public land to honor the heroes of the Iraq war. Such an act violates TODAYS standards. 100 years ago a cross was a fitting tribute.

Thomas Jefferson, if alive today, would not own slaves. Ben Franklin would, presumably not be the womanizer he was. The point is we should view history in context. Doing so would not validate that which we now eschew, but rather honor memories of long ago.

Revisionism, taken to the extreme, gives us idiotic efforts such as the current campaign against Columbus because of his presumed role in european domination of the new world.

[SonofLiberty1]

06:35 PM on 10/08/2009

You my friend ARE A REVISIONIST

[MajorKong]

05:13 AM on 10/09/2009

Columbus was a murdering, enslaving, hand-chopping SOB who just happened to be a great navigator.

Just because he lived in a time of murdering, enslaving SOBs doesn't make him less of one.

[jhamm1]

04:13 PM on 10/08/2009

Agreed, although I make no apologies for making "you guys" a generic substitute for "y'all" in trailer park circles or "yuns" in Pittsburgh.

[TryToBeFlexible]

03:57 PM on 10/08/2009

Religion is a bunch of claptrap and superstition, supported by violence, and believed in by the weak minded.

[COPerez]

03:48 PM on 10/08/2009

Sometimes we don't even question our own - seemingly enlightened - assumptions. That young woman provided you with one of life's head-smacking moments.

Turns out they're good for you!

[BarryS]

03:42 PM on 10/08/2009

Christians like Scalia think everyone is a Christian. No not tru. We are not all represented by the cross, and we do not all celebrate christmas.

[SonofLiberty1]

06:37 PM on 10/08/2009

Barry, you may not be christian that's ok with me but in my book the cross is for everyone, whether they believe or not.

Let's wait to see who is right....

[Patrick Garies]

09:08 PM on 10/08/2009

I've been waiting for concrete evidence for why Christianity is real or why it's better than any other mythology for awhile and I'm still waiting... Where is it, SoL1?

[ariveria]

12:21 AM on 10/09/2009

to mean the cross stand stand for the spanish inquisition which caused my family so much pain.

i have no idea how you can claim it is for everybody

"a lie repeated often enough becomes the truth"
glenn beck
information czar fox news
the view 5/20/09