Only asking for some respect
I had an assignment in my Advanced English Class: I had to prepare a 3” rant speech about something really annoying me. Here are the exact words I said:
I’m going to talk briefly about religion, well religion in general, not a specific one. Everyone has their beliefs, whether your are a Christian, a Muslim, a Jew or an Atheist.
A few weeks ago, a catastrophe happened in Japan; there was a devastating earthquake and Tsunami that shocked the whole world. You also probably know about Twitter. Quickly the social network’s community began to tweet their support to Japanese. There was a Trending Topic at this time, which was #prayforjapan. It stayed in the first position for days. I was amazed by all the support and the thoughts people were sending. However I began to see some tweets in my timeline that I wasn’t happy with. They said something like “stop praying idiots, it’s useless, do something by donating”. I of course encourage donating to the Red Cross, I even did it myself because I know how much it can help. What saddened me is the reaction towards people’s beliefs. I have some beliefs, and I refuse to be called an idiot or a moron, because as far as I am concerned I am not one. Even though I don’t always agree, I respect everyone’s belief, whether they believe in God, or science or anything else. If I said that I prayed for Japan for example, it wouldn’t necessarily mean that I didn’t donated, it was just something extra. I must say I was really hurt by that, I of course took it personally, and a lot of people did.
What is paradoxical is that those people call themselves open-minded because for them believing in God is like living centuries ago; and not opening to a fully scientific spirit where everything is demonstrated by a+b is being narrow-minded. I find it paradoxical because in my opinion, being open-minded is opening yourself to different possibilities, and even if you chose only one of them, you can still accept the other ones.
Here I am only asking for some respect.
