In a brilliantly funny move, Texas State Rep. James tell Rico turned the
tables on conservative Christian arguments by using Biblical scripture to oppose a bill requiring the
display of ten Commandments in public school classroom. Tall Rico, a Democrat,
calmly explain why the bill was not only unconstitutional and Unamerican, but also deeply
un Christian viral TikTok video. He questioned the contradiction of wanting parental consent for
values like empathy but pushing for religious commandments in schools. Tall Rico's witty remarks
left supporters of the bill searching for words, and although it's unclear if his
arguments influence the outcome, the bill's time expired without receiving a vote. With
lawmakers like tall Rico, the fight against conservative religious impositions in school gets hilarious
and a strategic edge. This article is from Yahoo News by Ariel Messman Rucker
from November twenty fourth, twenty twenty three. So yeah, this is a
continuing trend. We're starting to see Christians pop up and speak against their own
Aaron, what do you have to say about about this report? This?
This is an amazing video. If anybody hasn't watched it, you should.
I hate to I'm gonna get in trouble for saying this, but pause this
video and go watch it because this is an amazing more more people like this,
please, I'd vote for this guy whether he was Democrat or Republican,
Libertarian, Green Party, whatever. But he had some really he just he
just pointed out the hypocrisy between what christ what Christians proporty believed, but what
they're doing politically. Uh. And he said things like a religion, a
religion that has to force people to put up a poster to prove his legitimacy
is a dead religion instead of bringing a bill that will feed the hungry,
where instead mandating that people put up a poster. Loving your neighbor is the
most important law. But now we're they're putting up a something they want to
mandate that something that's put up that doesn't show love for Hindus or Buddhists or
atheists. They all they're all for parents. Parents, Uh, parents,
parental roles taking being the most important thing in the classroom, parents having the
best say. But there's no requirement for this bill to require parental consent to
have commandments in the classroom. That they're against having rainbow rainbows for supporting LGBTQIA
rights in the classroom, but they're not against having ten commandments in the classroom.
And lastly, he says, instead of living out the way of Jesus,
where instead imposing our beliefs on other people. Instead of leading by example,
we're leading by mandates. And that's I just think that's those are just
amazing, amazing things to confront people with. Richard Well, I think it
gets back to that whole the hypocrisy saying I'll sort of generalize it. I
mean, you just think about the kind of things that the people that are
trying to push that through. What they would have said a few years ago
about government entanglement in our lives. They were totally against that. And I
think, you know, I don't live in Texas. I probably never would.
I don't know if any of you do. I know it's some good
places in Texas, but what I see there and follow is that, you
know, the Texas legislature and school board never seemed to stop trying to profess
students into Christianity. The school books are very, very bad in terms of
the latest is that most of them that had something about climate change and it
got cut out. And the schools are trying to put pastors in to replace
school counselors. Pastors with no requirement for any counseling training. So there's just
this control mechanism, is what it is. They want to narrow down and
spoon feed people a certain ideology, it seems, through the legislative process,
through the school process, and it's scary because you know, young minds growing
up need to what's the old statement, You don't want to teach people what
to think, but how to think. And I don't think that's happening much
there in terms of the way they're trying to do these things like putting up
the Ten Commandments and not allowing, you know, a rainbow flag, which
is a very passive kind of thing, except if you hate what it stands
for, which many of them do. I watched the video and I was
like, wow, where have all the Christians like this? Guy? Been?
Right? I want more Christians like this and I have said many times
I even just said it again this week. There are a lot of Christians
out there that believe this radical Christian nationalist ideas are hurting the religion, They're
hurting the country, and we have a perfect example of a Christian standing up
to that in of all places, the Texas State House. I was just
so awesome, so brought up by that. You can see I'm tongue tied
right. All the atheist, Muslim, Hindu activists, all the activists of
other faiths that opposes wild right wing ideology aren't the only ones out there standing
up. And they shouldn't feel alone because there are good Christians out there,
like mister Tyler Rico that are fighting against it as well. He even says
it near the end of the video when of the verbal confrontation in the committee
hearing, when he says, I just worry that this is what gives us
religious people a bad name, that instead of living out the way of Jesus,
we're instead of imposing our beliefs on other people. Instead of leading by
example, we're leading by mandates. And so I'm very offended by this legislation.
And he should be offended, and he should be worried because that's exactly
what it is doing, and it's helping drive people out of the pews.
I keep saying this honestly, I'm not opposed to that, to that outcome
of people not being in the pews, but I fear the danger and the
damage that these people can do as they lash out like a wounded animal because
they feel like they're losing their America, not ours, just theirs. Jimmy
yep. So this is, like I said, a trend that we are
seeing grow. We have this representative and then, Kelly, you have spoken
before about Christians fighting Christian nationalism. Read an article. I read an article
recently about an author who is challenging the community his own community where politics and
religion are into are intersecting, and it's nice to see that this is becoming
more of a trend, or at least I'm starting to hear about it more,
and I think more people may very well be getting comfortable standing up to
what is actually wrong with their organization internally. But when we ask where have
these people been, They've been afraid of being ostracized, of being losing everything,
losing their relationships because quite frankly, they're stuck in a dogmatic regime that
will take everything away from you, and it's done that for centuries. We
know that just because so many of these people believe it. You know,
it doesn't necessarily make it true. But at the same token, we know
that there's a danger in those numbers all throughout the Middle Ages, you know,
the sale of indulgences, the excuse me, the Salem witch trials,
the castration for the purposes of putting somebody in the choir. I mean,
these dogmas can make people do horrible, horrible, ugly things, and they're
not on the right side of what is consideredane. And I think the people
that are stuck inside of it know it, and so that's why we don't
really see too much from them. So it's refreshing to see somebody or many
people with the guts enough to stand up and be the voice of reason within
their own communities. Aaron I thought, I mean, you stole my quote,
not my quote, but maybe Tallarico's quote religion of yeah, yeah,
right. The poster quote that it's not legitimate if you need to push it
on people, that it is a dead religion was absolutely brilliant. And the
other thing that's brilliant is that this guy is using their very own message to
point out the flaws in the people that are using their very own message.
If that is not an indication that there are so many more flaws in Christianity
than most people think because they're busy being stuck on one side. Then I
don't know what is. But it's definitely eye opening for people who are interested,
I think, to learn more about where they come from and what it
is they've been told they have to believe. This guy is a testament to
the fact that you don't have to believe it, and in fact, you
could make it better. So Aaron, we'll kick it back over to you.
No. That's one of the fascinating things about the video is if you
watch it, it seems the representative that he is debating, she's hung up
on the fact that in nineteen eighty there was some decision. I don't know
if it was a Supreme Court decision or if it was a law passed in
Texas where the Ten commis. It seems like they had to come out of
the school right, and what she was focused on we have to correct this
wrong. We have to correct this wrong of the Ten Commandments coming out of
schools. But it seems like she didn't stop to think is like, should
they be in schools right? And what we can't be looking at the we
could look at the We should look at the past to inform us. We
should look at the past to prevent us ourselves from making the same mistakes over
and over again. But other than that, we need to look at what
our needs are today and what we want our country to be today. I
want to live in a country where people's religion is just something you don't talk
about anymore. It's it's it is, it is private, you keep it
to yourself, and and we find other things to talk about and relate about.
I think one of the most one of the more dangerous things in Christianity
is the call to preach it as the call to God and share the Gospel,
preach it and convert people. If Christianity wasn't wasn't didn't have that,
I think we'd be in a in a much better place. And he says
in the in his in his speech that he's embarrassed to be a Christian,
and to be honest, when I was a Christian, I was kind of
embarrassed to be called a Christian too, because it seems like the more the
loudest Christians are the ones that are the most hateful or the most bigoated and
and but the unfortunately they have the biggest and the loudest voice, and so
they just give everybody else a bad name. Even though I am positive that
there are more, there are more Christians out there that support lgbt q A
rights, that aren't bigoted, that want to help, that wanna make the
world a better place. Then there are non uh Christians that are out of
that of the opposite. Just they don't I don't know why they don't speak
probably fear, probably I don't know, But I wish they would. They
wish they'd speak up more. I wish they'd come out and challenge these views
that hey, this is not the Christianity we want, this is not the
country we want to live in. It takes one person to stand up,
and then it takes one more person to join that person. You have to
the second person is almost the most important person to stand up, because lone
voices are great, but you need that second person to stand up and share
the spotlight Richard, and then the third, and the fourth and the fifth,
and it keeps going. You know. I saw that whole story a
little while ago, but it wasn't just happening, and I thought it was
so interesting how the proponent of that rule just excuse my friends, but she
got her butt kicked in the debate. I mean she just you know,
I mean she and then to say that, well there was this old lot
should be turned around the other way. When was the last time she read
the First Amendment to the US Constitution. It says there's this nice bright line
between you know, religion and government. But it's like they totally ignore that
part and act like they're you know, being prejudiced against because they're not allowed
to dominate. That's the thing that scares me. That's their whole thing,
you know. And there are parts of the New Testament that encourage them,
in fact, demand that they go out and bring everybody to God, you
know. So you know, there are so many I mean, you think
about it, there are a lot of what there's two or three thousand different
brands of Christianity in the United States. Some of those who become very liberal,
and they have gay preachers, and you know, they allow women to
do a lot more in the church. So there are good people out there
that have a certain amount of belief in some of the doctrines. But they
also I think they put humanity and compassion and empathy before the dogma. And
to me, that's what makes a good person. You know, if those
are front and center in what you're doing. I mean, what's scaring me
also about what's going on with these things groups of people is two words book
bands. They really don't want kids to learn anything they didn't. You know,
they're afraid if they get exposed to ideas, they won't do what their
parents want them to do. They won't do what the preacher wants them to
do. They might go, wait a minute, I read about you know,
gee, isn't it true that ten percent of people naturally were born homosexual.
It's not like they're you know, this whole thing of they adopted that.
I mean, how many people are going to say in our society,
I grew up in the San Francisco Bay everyone and grew up there, but
I've been living there for a long time, you know, and very very
gay friendly. But you know, it's like, how many people are going
to say to themselves, oh, gee, I want I'm going to take
on this sexual identity so I can be prejudiced against. I mean, I
hear these Christians say that all the time about you know obill you know you
you decided to become No, come on, give me a break. That's
where they're conflict with science always hits bottom because they can't accept reality that they're
dogma back from the Old Testament was totally wrong because they were ignorant. They
didn't know anything about medicine, they didn't know anything about genetics, they didn't
know anything about the different ways people can be naturally, and so they have
to, you know, make them another because they're not the same as them.
And that's the stuff. All of that just is very scary. Yeah,
And to your point about book bands, I read Moby Dick and I
didn't become a whaler? Are you sure? And earlier this week, we
talked about how your religious views affect how your politics affect your religious views,
and I thought this story was like a really good example of that because you
have two people on different political ends of the spectrum, and they're both believing
in the same religion, but they're both only picking and choosing the parts of
it that fit their politics. And I thought that was kind of an interesting
contrast since we were talking about it earlier this week. The fact that these
people are willing to stomp on the US Constitution by breaking that the first Amendment
and make this dare America. I think that says a lot about who they
are, and it reminds me of that famous quote from the Vietnam War,
because these people seem to think that to save the Constant, that they have
to destroy the Constitution in order to save it, at least to save it
for them. They don't care about anybody else, but they want to save
it for them. And honestly, I think if all Christians felt like the
same way as mister tall Rico, I don't think that we would have a
lot of people that have a problem with religion as much as we do today.
And they probably I keep saying it, they wouldn't be losing people out
of the pews, and I'm pretty sure a lot of other people wouldn't mind
them hanging around either. And I'm hoping that as time goes on, we'll
move away from these more militant Christians to a more forgiving, caring Christianity,
you know, the ones that Jesus actually taught people to be, the kind
of people that the kind of people that mister tell Rico are. And it
isn't interesting that we always hear from Christians that when we use when we use
Old testamentment arguments, they'll always say the Old Testament doesn't count. And here
we have these two people with two political views and one spout in the fire
and brimstone of the Old Testament and the other ones actually quoting Jesus, and
what sides of the political spectrums are they on. It's kind of interesting,
I thought, so, Jimmy. Just one final thought. I don't think
people like Tariko are ever going to be pushing for you know, Christian nationalism
or right Christian theocratic government. I just don't see it in him. He
seems to be, like you said, a more straightforward person who understands that
there are other things in the world that need to be taken care of besides
pushing your dogmatic ideology. I think that this whole article, this video,
and the debate that takes place within serves as a microcosm for what it looks
like and how damaging it can be for religion when somebody thinks for themselves.
On one hand, we have a dogmatic and very traditional Senate and their leaders
pushing for laws or pushing for violations of the Constitution, for really no good
reason, right, and then we've got somebody else who thought creatively to challenge
that. And so that is why I like to say, and I don't
just like to say it, but of course I've heard this many, many
times. The quickest way to become an atheist is to read the Bible.
And I think the greatest threat to establishment religion is for somebody who is a
free thinker. And so that is really evident in this case here when you
can take an argument for the Ten Commandments and compare it to an argument for
homosexuality and they cancel each other out. You're using the same kind of mechanics,
the same tools, the same Bible to do the same thing. And
it just goes to show you just how shitty of a source it is.
Excuse my language, but it really has no leg to stand on, does
it, Aaron? Yeah. I just I'd like Christianity and Christians to get
their story straight, and it has too many legs to stand. It's been
in two thousand years and they don't even have the same they don't have the
same story. They've got different stories there. Even their book contradicts itself.
Everybody's preaching different things and different laws, supposedly what God says. Uh.
If if God is so powerful, why is there so many different messages?
I don't, I don't. It doesn't make sense to me. Yeah,
it doesn't make a lot of sense to me. If you can make sense
out of this, give us a comment below,