In my LinkedIn news feed...

[darkstar3]

Now, I know a lot of people loved Thomas Kinkade. There's no accounting for taste. But it's not the fact that this guy loved Kinkade's art, or the fact that he felt the need to share about how Kinkade's art was so quintessentially Christian, that bothers me. If this were FaceBook, or Twitter, or his own blog, then whatever.

But this is LinkedIn. This is a website completely dedicated to working professionals, and networking between them. It is one of the very first things employers in the IT field (where I work) look for when they consider your application for employment.

Let's land the plane...

If I had shared a link to "The Blind Watchmaker" with some quotes that I found interesting...if I had shared a link to http://www.atheistconvention.org.au/ and stated that "I wish I could make it to Australia to hear some good speakers"...if I had done any number of things on LinkedIn to reveal my views on politics or religion, my public-facing profile would be an anchor around the neck of my career.

Think that'll happen for this guy? I don't.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is what atheists on this board mean when we talk about "Christian privilege."

[2ndAmForComputers]

1. DU Rec for truth.

I know the feeling.

You know why I tell it like it is here? Because nobody knows who I am.

I like being employable, thank you.

[trotsky]

2. The people who need to understand this, won't.

Sad to say. Or they'll deflect by saying we don't acknowledge the many privileges we enjoy in our lives. Because as I've learned over the years, Christians are absolutely positive they know more about what atheists think than we do ourselves.

[darkstar3]

17. I think there are different levels of need here.

You're right, the people who most need to understand this will blatantly refuse to do so. But I think there are many who need to see instances of this sort of thing in order to engage their inner empathy and understand where it is that we come from.

[rug]

3. Persecution is a terrible thing.

Feel free to discuss this art, secretly or openly, as you choose.



This was very hard to locate given the level of oppression in this country.

[trotsky]

4. So the fact that at least one person is able to use Photoshop...

and upload images to the Internet, means that no atheist anywhere will suffer repercussions in their professional and personal lives for making their disbelief known?

Thanks once again for the great example you provide of what Christians today are like, rug.

I look forward to your snappy one-line retort.

[rug]

7. Linked in is a breeding ground for persecution.

[Goblinmonger]

9. That's not the argument

The argument is that the example in the OP illustrates Christian privilege. Those are different things.

[rug]

11. Considering the very nature of linked in appeals to class privilege, it's not a very good argument.

You or I can come up with a half dozen examples of actual discrimination, or privilege, in the time it takes to register on that site.

[Goblinmonger]

12. Well, you admit that there is privilege involved with LinkedIn

now the step is just to realize that it could also be an example of Christian privilege. And I don't think the OP was saying this was the best, brightest, biggest, worst example of privilege. Just one that they saw as being pretty clear that a lot of people wouldn't think about.

[rug]

13. There are many privileges. You can't be tone deaf to the others.

This one strikes me as particularly unseemly.

[trotsky]

30. Do you believe that some atheists may be surrounded by strongly religious people in their lives...

ones who will react negatively if they were to find out that person's atheism?

Do you think this is possible, rug? Yes or no. No traps, no deception, just yes or no, is that possible.

[rug]

31. Sure, but "react negatively" is a far cry from persecution, indeed, even from privilege.

Which is not to say there is neither persecution nor privilege.

Humans react negatively - and positively - to all sorts of things.

Take this song for example.

Somebody's complaining about his hair. He's complaining about rules. You likely complain about his going into a church. I see a lot going on there but I wouldn't call any of it ptivilege.

This I would. Several privileges at work.



Either way, it's not Kinkade and linkedin.

[trotsky]

35. See you jump right into attacking. And that's wrong, rug.

And it perfectly illustrates what's been pointed out to you again and again, yet you refuse to see it.

No one here has claimed "persecution" to the extent that you apparently imagine they are. But our disbelief affects our real lives in such a way that most of us hide our opinions there.

You continuing to spit at anyone suggesting that fact is just another facet of the privilege you have that you cannot recognize.

[rug]

36. You have as much difficulty recognizing an actual attack as you do actual privilege.

Life is too myriad for a single prism.

[trotsky]

38. I'd like you think about one question, rug.

Would you respond to a gay person in the way you are responding to atheists here?

I mean, there's lots of gay people out & proud, both online and in real life. So no LGBTer has any right to claim persecution or discrimination, right? It's just people with opinions and that's that, eh?

Act like a compassionate Christian for once, rug. Drop the attitude and listen to what other people are telling you. Can you do that, or will you respond with another snipe?

[Goblinmonger]

5. Didn't take long for someone to prove #2 correct. n/t

[rug]

8. The humanity.

[darkstar3]

14. If there was one person I expected it from...

[darkstar3]

16. This thread isn't about persecution. Run along.

I was fully aware this would go over your head, since you and I have had such wonderful conversations regarding privilege before. You are the very embodiment of trotsky's point in post #2, and further proof of my point in the OP.

[rug]

32. No, it's about embracing victimhood.

Particularly when it's not there.



Boo!

[Goblinmonger]

33. Are you saying that Kinkaid isn't religious

and hasn't made it very clear that his religion impacted his "art."

[rug]

34. What I said is quite clear.

[eqfan592]

37. Oh, indeed it was.

But clear doesn't equate to accurate or logical.

[cbayer]

6. I'm confused.

Is this a comment left by someone else about Kinkade? (not familiar with linkedIn at all)

Also not really familiar with Kincade either, but other members here apparently thought his religion was an important enough part of his public persona to post an article about him in this group.

If you were an atheist, writer and journalist who covered religion, would it be inappropriate to note that at linkedIn?

I would think that no one would crow about their religion or lack of religion on that site unless it was tied to their career, so I guess I am missing the point about privilege.

[Goblinmonger]

10. The point it, as I take it

that is someone who is an atheist did the same thing with their atheism, it would possibly hinder them in their career while the posting of Christian thoughts as in the OP will not hinder them.

[darkstar3]

15. It is a WordPress blog post written by the LinkedIn member and linked to his public profile.

"I would think that no one would crow about their religion or lack of religion on that site unless it was tied to their career, so I guess I am missing the point about privilege."

No, you see the point exactly. Religion or the lack thereof has absolutely nothing to do with his IT career. Knowing that, go back and read the OP again. You do see the point, but it seems you just haven't realized it yet.

[cbayer]

18. Again, when Kincade died, someone posted it in this group saying it was

appropriate to do so because his religion was an important part of his public persona and his art. I thought he was a painter, not an IT guy.

Or are you saying that a completely different linkedin member posted something about Kincade in their own profile?

FWIW, I wouldn't think it would be a good idea to post your religious or non-religious convictions on that site at all unless it had some pertinence to what you were trying to accomplish. I would be just as turned off by someone who posted that they were a christian or someone that posted that they were an atheist. It just seems irrelevant. So I still don't see how it represents privilege.

Maybe this is just a bad example, as I do agree that privilege exists, just as it does in lots of areas.

[iris27]

19. "Or are you saying that a completely different linkedin member posted something about Kincade

in their own profile?"

Yes.

The screenshot in the OP was written by an IT professional who somehow thought it appropriate to comment on religion and Kincade on a professional networking website.

The privilege comes in because it IS completely irrelevant, yet he is unlikely to face professional repercussions for it. Whereas an atheist or a member of a minority religion who made a similarly irrelevant post about their own religious views WOULD be extremely likely to have tanked many options in their career by having done so.

[cbayer]

21. He'd face professional repercussions from me, and I suspect from many others.

I don't want to hire someone who does that. I think the only people who would hire him would be those of similar mind, which might be true for an atheist as well.

Bottom line, it's inappropriate whoever does it, unless they want to limit their choices to those who agree with them.

[iris27]

23. The law of numbers is on his side, though.

It doesn't gel with my past experiences that he actually would face any repercussions, but even if he did, there are a lot more folks who agree with him. Enough that it doesn't even twig in his brain that it might not be a smart professional decision to broadcast religious (and, honestly, also political, because TK was a fundie) views on a site of this nature.

And that's where the privilege comes in, because it is so fundamentally different from the experience of a religious minority. If this were a guy on my LinkedIn, let's say he was someone I worked with, my immediate reaction would not be "wow, that was stupid of him to broadcast his religious and political beliefs...that's going to end badly for him". It would instead be, "Oh, shit, have I ever said anything around this guy about not being part of a church?" My reaction would be to make sure I am 100% in the closet to him where my beliefs are concerned, out of a sense of self-protection. But that stems from past experiences of seeing a loved one get mysteriously laid off right after being asked about his beliefs by a Christian supervisor, and answering honestly.

[cbayer]

25. So your reaction to him would be negative as well.

So negative that you would have concerns that he was a religious bigot and that your job would be at risk.

I think your first paragraph makes a lot of sense, though. I can see that if you are in the majority, it is much safer to announce your status than if you are in the minority.

Having worked in deeply republican places, I get that.

[darkstar3]

27. In my experience, those who inject their religion into different facets of their lives

have invariably been religious bigots.

[cbayer]

28. I tend to agree and that is why I think there would be repercussions.

Maybe not from people who feel the same way, but from many others.

[darkstar3]

26. +1 for the reaction part.

[darkstar3]

20. What the fuck? Where did I even imply that Kinkade was an IT guy?

Of course this was a post by a completely different LinkedIn member talking about Kinkade for no prompted reason. Where was that unclear??

If you don't see how this represents privilege, then you aren't putting any thought into the questions I've asked. Do you really, honestly think that posting overtly Christian messages as part of your public profile on a professional development and networking site would cause negative repercussions? Do you think those repercussions would be anything remotely close to the repercussions of posting overtly Muslim, Wiccan, Satanist, Hindu, etc., messages?

Come on, don't play. This couldn't be clearer if it were made of glass.

[cbayer]

22. Yes, I do think it would have repercussions.

I would eliminate them from my list right away.

It's irrelevant and inappropriate. It says something about them that I don't want in an employee.

Same goes for any of the other categories you list. Unless it was something pertinent to their ability to do the job, it only means one thing - this is something they feel their contacts should value as well.

I just think this is a bad example.

I don't deny christian privilege at all. Politics is by far the most glaring example of this.

[darkstar3]

24. And there you go again, assuming that others are like you.

This is a frequent problem you and I have in conversation. You are constantly projecting onto others the qualities of your own personality that you believe (baselessly) are universal.

The facts are very different. The very existence of this LinkedIn post shows that. This man has been in IT for over a decade, and his WordPress blog that I have now found says that he's been doing his Bible education thing for 20 years. Don't you think that if he had experienced any repercussions for injecting his faith into his professional life that he might, you know, refrain? Don't you think that if he felt anything like you do, or if the people that he has worked with over the last decade felt anything like you do, that he would keep his professional and his religious lives separate?

The very fact that he posted such a thing is proof of his privilege. The fact that most people I have worked with in the past don't feel like you is another. Perhaps you might go back and look at a few posts from Lazarus on this site to find out just how frequently religion gets injected, with impunity, into the workplace. Or perhaps you might look back on the few times I've told my story of religion mixing, with impunity, with the workplace.

Majorities of every form, whether they be racial, religious, or sexual, enjoy a privilege that they often cannot even fully grasp. If you really think that this "is a bad example," then you seriously need to re-evaluate your ability to look at things through the eyes of others. You need to step back and realize that the many qualities you project onto other people are strictly your own.

[cbayer]

29. I don't assume they are universal at all. I do assume, though, that I am not the only

one who feels this way.

Your points are valid and I understand after reading another poster that the majority group does have privilege in this case, as they are less likely to suffer repercussions.

Again, I ask that you not make this personal. I am trying to understand this and trying to look at if from a different perspective. I would only ask that you do the same in terms of projecting qualities onto others that are strictly your own.