We Reserve the Right to Refuse Service...

Faithful readers,

You've seen the signs, right?

I don't mean the "No shirt, no shoes, no service" ones. Those are right at the front entrance, and are placed at the order of the Health Department. Those are for the good of everybody.

I mean those little signs, behind the counter. They read something like this: "We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone, at anytime, for anything." Ostensibly, they mean to let you know that if you are going to act like a jerk, you run the risk of being "86-ed". (Anyone know where that term came from?). But tell me, in a multi-cultural melting pot as America claims to be, don't those signs sound slightly discriminatory?

I made a mistake the other day at the Diner. Normally, I think of this as a place I can go to get away and just be myself. After all, everything and everybody is supposed to be tolerated, accepted and loved here at the Diner. And so it may be, except for...those who criticize the menu.

When the server listed the specials of the day, I said,"Oh my gosh, no I don't want that! Don't you know that stuff will kill you?" Immediately, the management gave me the opportunity to eat somewhere else for the evening. The shame of being kicked out of the Diner! In effect, they said my money was no good there, and neither was I.

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Were the Nazis wrong to murder millions of Jews? Is it wrong to practice human sacrifice? These questions may seem like obvious no-brainers. But prepare yourself for a shock. Many young people today consider genocide, human sacrifice, abortion, murder, and suicide open questions. (Does anyone remember the story The Lottery?)

Lately teachers have noticed a troubling trend: Up to 20 percent of students are unwilling to say that mass murder is immoral. Oh, they usually say they disapprove of what the Nazis did—but they consider this merely their own personal taste. "Of course I dislike the Nazis," a student may say. "But who is to say they were morally wrong?"

This moral malady is not new, but let's give it a name-- "absolutophobia"--the fear of making absolute moral judgments.

How did we reach a point where young people refuse to condemn mass murder and human sacrifice? The answer is that, as children, these kids were spoon-fed moral relativism along with their Gerber and their ABCs.

In grade school, they were probably subjected to various forms of "values clarification," a idea that teaches kids that morality is merely a matter of personal preference—that no value judgments are right or wrong.

When these kids reached high school, they were doubtless taught the philosophy of multiculturalism, in which moral truths are reduced to cultural values, none of which is morally superior to any others.

And when they reached college? There they would have been exposed to postmodernism, which teaches that values are all relative to race, gender, and ethnicity, and that any statements of moral truth are merely attempts to exert power over others and oppress them.

Clearly, many of today's students have learned their lessons well: They exhibit a severe case of absolutaphobia when they can't even bring themselves to raise moral objections to genocide and human sacrifice. They reject all moral absolutes as restrictions on their freedom.

But what they don't realize is that moral absolutes are our only guarantee of freedom. Without a set of transcendent moral truths that are above individual cultures and preferences, it is impossible to protect human rights.

Christians are getting kicked out of all of the Diners these days. You're getting kicked out of the classrooms, the courtrooms, TV land, proper social and academic circles, and politics. You're even getting kicked out of prisons! It seems like you are no longer wanted, because the perception is that you believe in absolutes, that some ideas and choices and lifestyles are better than others, and that you should say so.

The Christian doctrine of general revelation tells us that we all share a common human nature. As a result, you can often agree with nonbelievers on basic principles, such as honesty, courage, and respect for others. But talk about a God behind those principles, and you're out of line, mister.

You and I ought to support efforts that teach our kids the values on which most citizens can agree. We must help our neighbors and our children understand that without moral absolutes, there is nothing to stop the culture from drifting back toward human sacrifice… or from embracing another Holocaust.

Your Hungry Apatheist,

~Bill

It's an interesting thing that Google did recently. You see the Google ads everywhere, their searchboxes are on almost every website. One can, so I've heard, even visit the porn sites, and find Google. They seem to have no problem with this. Maybe I shouldn't, either. What I find interesting is that, though Google supports porn as long as Google gets paid, they refused to allow a Google ad to be placed on talk-show host Michael Savage's website; they say he is too "controversial".