Left must stop crucifying voices of dissent - The Centre for Independent Studies
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Left must stop crucifying voices of dissent

Easter is the perfect time for protest and dissent.

It’s when Christians celebrate the resurrection of Jesus. But the Galilean teacher was put to death on a cross because he had provoked anger and dissent.

Jewish religious authorities were angry that Jesus stirred up opposition to religious traditions; and the Romans were angry that the famous pax Romanum was being disturbed by violent protests.

So, Jesus was executed, but Christians believe he rose to life again — and that’s why Easter has been celebrated ever since.

Anger and protest led to death, and death led, in turn, to new life and hope.

It’s a powerful sequence which has brought hope to billions. But at Easter it is important to remember that before the hope there was anger, intolerance, and hatred. What has changed since then?

Not much, to judge from the angry tone of public debate these days in Australia. We like to think of ourselves as tolerant and decent folk — and for the most part, we are. But intolerance is on the rise.

Militant vegans decide that the provision of all animal products must cease, and invade homes and businesses — with apparent impunity — to impose with violence their views on the rest of us.

A top sporting figure holds strong religious views about LGBTIQ+ people — and repeats them on social media — only to find that his job as a rugby player is under threat because of his theological views.

Or a public intellectual invited to speak on a university campus — where free speech and inquiry are supposedly valued — is “de-platformed” their views are thought to represent power and not truth.

Views about meat, God, or gender — to name three topics — that upset the progressive identity warriors of the Left are quickly choked off by confected outrage; and those who hold these views are hounded.

For many people, this is not the kind of society they want to live in: but the reality is that that’s the kind of society we’ve now got. The Left’s new gender-fluid, identity morality claims to be tolerant and fair.

The truth is very different. In the progressive moral universe of the Left, anger, hatred, and intolerance are the weapons deployed supposedly in the name of compassion and inclusiveness.

But they are weapons that divide and harm. At one time, diversity was used as a shield to protect people from the bad behaviour of others: now it is used as a sword to cut down any voice that dares to dissent.

And fundamental freedoms we all take for granted — the freedom to work, the freedom to believe, the freedom to speak — are also under serious threat from identity warriors wielding the sword of diversity.

Rules and sanctions are slammed on anyone who claims the right to think, speak, and act for themselves in accordance with their conscience. Today it’s Israel Folau: but tomorrow it might be you.

At one time, tolerance meant tolerating those you didn’t like. But now, tolerance is seen as weakness. When a dissenting view is said to be “hate speech”, “tolerance” now means immediate silencing.

Respectful disagreement about so many topics is no longer possible. A former time when different points of view were exchanged in the pursuit of truth has been replaced by a tyranny of tolerance.

You don’t have to believe in God to see that the Easter story is a message of hope for us. Jesus was hated as a dissenting voice; and that hatred led to his death. But hope was not destroyed by hate.

Nor must we allow the hate spouted by today’s progressive identity warriors, who silence dissent and shame the dissenter, to destroy the democratic and social freedoms we prize in our country.

Peter Kurti is a Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies and Adjunct Associate Professor of Law at the University of Notre Dame