Don’t mock us for what we believe

What if, during the Grammy awards ceremony, celebrities used their spotlight to mock someone because she was a woman? What if actors stood on the stage and made jokes about someone specifically because he was black? And on top of that, the audience laughed and laughed because he’s black and they’re not! Or homosexual? Or Jewish? Make no mistake, that’s exactly what happens when they stand on stage and mock conservatives.

It is no different to trash someone who believes differently than to trash someone for what they look like. Why is it okay to mock someone for their beliefs, but not okay to mock someone for what they are? Isn’t what you believe more a part of who you are than what you look like? For example: If I tell a joke in which I mock a man for being Hispanic, is that worse than if I tell a joke in which I mock that same man for believing in God, for believing that cows are sacred, or believing he should eat only vegetables?

If anything, it should be more offensive to mock someone for their beliefs, as it’s more of a reflection of who they are than their looks. Isn’t that what MLK tried to teach us? We don’t have streets named after him because he cared what people look like. His message was, it’s the content beneath the skin that matters most. Look at who a person is, not what he is. Mocking someone for believing in conservatism is mocking who he is. In my opinion that’s worse than mocking what he is.

Detractors might say that you can’t change what you are (although Rachel Dolezal and Caitlyn Jenner might disagree). But if you believe in your gut, through and through, that abortion is wrong, for example, then that’s not something you can change either. If you believe in Christianity, then you base your life around it. It’s who you are and as unchangeable as what you are.

One more thing, if the Grammy awards are going to allow celebrities to bash right wingers, they should allow celebrities to bash left wingers too. We’re all about equality, right? So let’s have equal bashing time for both sides. James Woods and Tim Allen can stand up there and do their thing, then Alec Baldwin and Sarah Silverman can do theirs. Or, as an act of true tolerance and inclusion, they could allow neither, and show respect for beliefs of all kinds.