Vanderbilt University, in Nashville Tennessee, is currently facing an issue related to non-discrimination policies on campus and their affects on religious groups. According to the school’s non-discrimination policy; any student can be a member or run for office of any student run group.
The Catholic group on campus, Vanderbilt Catholic, begs to differ. Their current president claims that anyone running for an officer position should share the same beliefs as the group. However, this slowly sinks into quicksand with the university’s anti-discrimination policy. Vanderbilt is not the only university facing the same issues.
Vanderbilt is using the defense of Christian Legal Society v. Martinez. In this 2010 Supreme Court case, the courts “required the groups to accept all students regardless of their status or beliefs in order to obtain recognition.” Vanderbilt is obviously not the first university to tackle this problem. Colleges in North Carolina, California and New York also have experienced identical or similar concerns.
Ayesha Khan, Legal Director, American United for Separation of Church and State, weighs in on this contested debate and more specifically the Christian Legal Society v. Martinez case.
Professionally, I want to work in diversity public relations. I do not understand why discrimination, especially faith-based discrimination is still relevant. Why can we not look past insignificant details and realize the bigger picture of interconnectedness? This is not just a “Catholic issue”; this applies to all religious groups, regardless of faith or doctrine. Someone’s religious background should not be a determinate in their abilities to perform certain tasks, or any tasks for that matter.
The Catholic group on campus, Vanderbilt Catholic, begs to differ. Their current president claims that anyone running for an officer position should share the same beliefs as the group. However, this slowly sinks into quicksand with the university’s anti-discrimination policy. Vanderbilt is not the only university facing the same issues.
Vanderbilt is using the defense of Christian Legal Society v. Martinez. In this 2010 Supreme Court case, the courts “required the groups to accept all students regardless of their status or beliefs in order to obtain recognition.” Vanderbilt is obviously not the first university to tackle this problem. Colleges in North Carolina, California and New York also have experienced identical or similar concerns.
Ayesha Khan, Legal Director, American United for Separation of Church and State, weighs in on this contested debate and more specifically the Christian Legal Society v. Martinez case.
Professionally, I want to work in diversity public relations. I do not understand why discrimination, especially faith-based discrimination is still relevant. Why can we not look past insignificant details and realize the bigger picture of interconnectedness? This is not just a “Catholic issue”; this applies to all religious groups, regardless of faith or doctrine. Someone’s religious background should not be a determinate in their abilities to perform certain tasks, or any tasks for that matter.
I think that Vanderbilt is doing the ‘right’ thing in this situation. Not only is the university upholding their non-discrimination policy, but they are also trying to prevent further occurrences of this. Cases like Christian Legal Society v. Martinez prove to be beneficial for the support of the university and general support of anti-biases. I agree with Vanderbilt. I think someone’s religious background or lack of religious background is not sufficient support in denying them the right to participate in activities, or to run for a position within the organization.
I am involved with several organizations on campus and I cannot imagine the backlash that would come from someone being denied to participate due to their involvement in a particular religious group.
As I mentioned before, this is not just a Catholic issue. This problem is broad reaching and has larger implications for religious groups, not just Catholic, and not just college affiliated. We need to steer away from religious persecution of minorities. To be completely honest, I’m sick of this being something we discuss. We need to make more strides toward a hyper-inclusive American culture.
As I mentioned before, this is not just a Catholic issue. This problem is broad reaching and has larger implications for religious groups, not just Catholic, and not just college affiliated. We need to steer away from religious persecution of minorities. To be completely honest, I’m sick of this being something we discuss. We need to make more strides toward a hyper-inclusive American culture.
Preston L.
11 comments:
This is a very impressive post the choice of article, its correlation with of present issues and the way that you address this issue all worked in nicely. I agree with the statement you made saying that "Someone’s religious background should not be a determinate in their abilities to perform certain tasks, or any tasks for that matter.". This is exactly why the university made the anti-discriminatory policy because they wanted that message to be understood.
I understand your frustrations as we continue to see discrimination towards religious groups. As progressive and pluralistic as we want to pride ourselves in being, it is difficult to fully embrace such as there are still issues going on as such. I am glad that you address this issue at a larger scale, because you are correct, this is not just a Catholic issue. While I can understand that certain religious groups would want "like minded" individuals to run for office positions, I find it horribly discouraging for our culture for there to be discrimination in people participating activities. Very interesting post. Thank you for sharing!
Preston I can fully understand your frustrations when dealing with this case. I believe that it is interesting to note that Vanderbilt has be in the news multiple times with its enforcement of its nondiscrimination policies. One of the first cases that dealt with this university is when a Christian fraternity kicked out a male who disclosed to his organization that he was a homosexual. Again, this is is an issue of how religious attitude should be expressed in the public sphere. Does the religious tradition have the right to be discriminatory due to its beliefs in a public forum? I do not know if I can see why they claim they have this right. Student organizations are funded clearly by the State and I believe to challenge a non-discrimination policy is to try and break down completely the metaphorical wall that separates the Church and State.
This article actually gives me hope. From a lot of readings we have done about religious discrimination, it was honestly getting depressing to see all the hate among "true" Christians. It is nice to see a public institution making a stand against it and to stick to what they mean. This policy seems to be truly effective.
This article actually gives me hope. From a lot of readings we have done about religious discrimination, it was honestly getting depressing to see all the hate among "true" Christians. It is nice to see a public institution making a stand against it and to stick to what they mean. This policy seems to be truly effective.
Although I can understand the frustration one may feel with with religious groups wanting those that are running for office within their organization to share in their beliefs, is it really wrong for them to want that? Could a person of different faith or belief effectively run an organization if they do not share the belief or even know what they stand for. Could a Christian effectively run a Muslim student organization? What complicates this issues is that they are funded with state funding so that being said I see why it should be open to all.
Although I can understand the frustration one may feel with with religious groups wanting those that are running for office within their organization to share in their beliefs, is it really wrong for them to want that? Could a person of different faith or belief effectively run an organization if they do not share the belief or even know what they stand for. Could a Christian effectively run a Muslim student organization? What complicates this issues is that they are funded with state funding so that being said I see why it should be open to all.
This issue is one that is near and dear to my heart for many reasons. I could write an indept and through comment about my view but I would just say I enjoyed the article.
I understand the description of the issue you bring up in this blog.But there are other things which need to be considered in addition to the participants rights and morality, and that is the groups' rights. Just as any students shouldn't be denied participation in any group as a result of their religious affiliation, race, gender, etc, the student run groups also have a right to progress and promote the message that they intend to spread through the group. Participation of any student should definitely be allowed, in fact it should be encouraged. But the members should agree with the message of the student run group they wish to join, because their disagreement can harm the group overall. For example, say you have started a student group which is primarily Muslim which promotes secular values. If Hindu or Buddhist members wish to join this group, they have the right to do so without interference due to the non-discriminatory policy.But you can imagine a situation where at a certain meeting a Hindu member of your group gets up and makes secular moral remarks which most of the group doesn't agree with. this you would agree, is problematic because that Hindu member may be spreading that same message out in the student body and this is not representative of your student group or the message which you wish to send. This will clearly harm the progress of your student group and it can also be argued that by making it mandatory that any student can be a part of your group, it is hurting your own rights to progress your ideas and the ideas of your student group. So these cases do get quite sticky in terms of whose side to take or to prevent from taking a side when deciding on the case.
I'm slightly torn on this debate, I like that equal opportunities are given despite race, gender, and religion differences, but ultimately these organizations have to do what is best for them, and that may not coincide with giving everyone an equal opportunity. These organizations take the election of their officers and leaders very seriously,and they should not be forced to admit people who do not share the organization's beliefs. These organizations are collections of people who all submit to a single belief, if someone does not share that belief, well, there are plenty of other organizations to join.
Yes, there should be no religious discrimination at least on college campus for student groups or president or whatever. But the question here is not whether the religious beliefs of a person matter when performing tasks. Rather it is, why are always Christians the one wanting someone of their own belief? Why do we always want and believe in a christian leader?I have never seen any other minority religious group say they want some one of their own beliefs. It shows somewhat religious discrimination from Christians aspect.
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