I sat there pondering. I couldn’t help but feel I was caught up in a moment that could be somewhat farcical. If she had said she wanted to leave an area because she didn’t like that there were a group of Asian or Middle Eastern people, it would have been met with shock.
If she had said she was miserable because there were so many homosexual people she would have been heatedly challenged. If she had singled out any other group, even any other religious group, I think it would be seen as being narrow minded and intolerant, and she would have been put in her place.
In contrast, it seemed it was socially acceptable to isolate and attach negative stigma to people involved in the Christian faith. In essence, it was stereotyping and placing prejudice on a group of people without knowing or experiencing them as individuals.
Without getting into the nuts and bolts of whether the area is in fact a bible belt, I have felt uncomfortable about that conversation. It seemed to reinforce a trend, where people with a Christian faith in Australia are free game to be joked about or spoken of negatively in the paper, on the radio and in comic sketches.
Wait, one woman is a trend? And she states that other women disagreed with the crank (nothing more than a crank; she didn’t even make legitimate or heartfelt claims). I’m not seeing the “trend” or any sort of persecution. Only one mouthy woman whom none of the others seemed to like, by the writer’s own description. If she doesn’t like the other mothers then maybe she needs to wait outside or at a nearby cafe or bring a book.