Is it really about religious freedom?

Last week I wrote Gov. Nathan Deal to thank him for vetoing House Bill 757, the so called Religious Freedom Bill. Though I wish the veto had been totally motivated by the desire to simply do what is right, I have to conclude that it came because several of Georgia's major sources of revenue vowed to leave this state if the bill became a law. However, I am thankful for the veto no matter what moved the governor to such action.

Along with my note of gratitude was my plea for him to veto that outrageous Campus Carry Bill as well. I hope that many of you who read this column will call or write with a similar request because all of us who are thinking clearly know that young people on college campuses do not need to be encouraged to have weapons.

But, back to the notion of a bill to help maintain religious freedom. I am dumbfounded by this notion. In the first place, I believe that the U.S. Constitution gives all of us the right to believe and practice whatever religion we choose. Of course, it does not give us the right to try to make others practice our religion. But when one goes into business that is not the same thing as practicing one's religion. There are a different set of rules. There are rules in this country that stipulate that the business owner cannot discriminate against others.

So this is where my confusion arises. How is it that it is illegal to discriminate against me as an African American woman, but our Legislature passed a bill saying that someone could discriminate against me if I were a gay person? It is difficult for me to discern the difference between those two situations.

As we know, both North Carolina and Mississippi have passed such legislation. I imagine there will be others. These actions make me wish to ponder what is really going on. Actually it seems fairly clear that there are some folks in this country, mostly white men, who feel their power is being diminished in significant ways and they are scrambling in every way possible to regain it. It began a long time ago when people of color and women began to gain more freedom. The old paradigm of white male rule started on its descent. Many different types of strategies were put into place to slow down the freedom train which was carrying blacks and women, but then in 2008 the train gained an extraordinary amount of speed and the country elected Barack Obama to the presidency.

How frightening must have been the notion of "change coming to America," because change was fine as long as it could be contained and managed by the old games of the past. The sense of losing control made the leaders of Congress declare they would do what they could to make sure the president failed and that he only served one term. What an amazing stand to take when the people have elected you to serve the common good. And when the Supreme Court decided to declare that same-sex marriage was legal, that was yet another blow to the white, male, capitalist patriarchy way of doing business.

This is a democracy, or at least we have proclaimed that we are, though often falling short of living up to that claim. All people have a right to live their lives without having others attempting to impose their religious ideas upon them. It was not that many years ago that the idea of blacks having freedom was viewed as an affront to some people's religion. As a nation we declared that to be wrong. I don't think we can turn around now and find a new group to discriminate against just because change is so frightening.

This column by Catherine Meeks, Ph.D., appears twice monthly. Meeks is also a contributing writer for the Huffington Post. Email her at kayma53@att.net.

This story was originally published April 5, 2016 at 6:25 PM with the headline "Is it really about religious freedom? ."