re: #121 gander

We shouldn’t have a special protection category for religions. I prefer to call them Belief Systems. Many people who claim to not be religious are more dogmatic than those who ascribe to a religion (Think global warming). Islam or Buddhism shouldn’t be afforded certain protections because they are religions, but subject to the same scrutiny as any belief system.
Everybody has a belief system - except young children and sociopaths. Some are formalized and organized and can be called religions. But if that belief system is full of bad ideas or harmful concepts, it should be called to task.
It is people who need protection. Ideas can survive on their own. If you find a belief system abhorrent, say so.

Have you ever considered that perhaps instead of elevated, religions are shuffled neatly out of government by the First?
Imagine the difficulty of conducting (say) foreign policy if every treaty would have to be shown not to be the result of any particular not-religious belief system.