Guidelines re: Fundies & Fundamentalists

Goth, you’ve asked a difficult question but I’ll try to answer it. First of all I think that Commentator’s post of a couple days ago sums things up pretty well so I’ll repeat it here:

“This is a good reminder that GenX was designed as a place for people who are burned out on Christianity/religion to come to and not feel threatened with religious dialogue. Journeys was specifically designed for those who have faith and wish to sort their Christian beliefs from Bergism. Please folks, let's remember to post spiritual posts on Journeys and keep GenX a place for those who want to sort things out and find support, without religious content. Hope you find people you can connect with, Goth. And even if not, exmembers who are Christians have gone through the same experiences and can support you as a fellow survivor, while respecting your beliefs or lack of them.”

By creating Journeys where religious issues can be discussed we tried to free up the GenX board to fulfill its original mandate, to be a safe haven for those who have had enough of toxic faith or of anything that smacks of religion. Ex-members who have faith (however they define it) freely vent against Berg’s controlling religion and many Christians are outspoken against organized religion of any kind, so they should not mind if you vent against controlling religious institutions as well, including fundamentalism. I hope ex-members will understand it is not them you are referring to. So I see no problem with using the terms Fundamentalists or Fundies.

However, Bystander’s posts show that such terms can also be a sore spot with some ex-members. Perhaps it’s because they have had such labels unfairly applied to them in the past when they stood up for something they believed in. So please be considerate of their feelings. I trust they will be considerate of yours. My concern is that if terms like Fundamentalist are used in a way that could be misunderstood, posters will feel slighted and get into a religious debate on the GenX board — something we specifically wish to avoid.

Here’s a suggestion to help avoid misunderstandings: you might want to avoid generalities and try to give specific examples such as, “right-wing fundamentalist Christians who support Bush's war” or “the hypocrisy of fundamentalist preachers with prostitutes in the back seat of their car.” If you can, try to avoid things like, “I’m sure fundamentalists would disagree with me on this point.” That would tend to shut down posters from responding to you for fear of automatically being labeled a Fundamentalist.

I’m not trying to control your speech, just give examples and supply the guidelines you asked for. As Marina pointed out and it’s true, the demographics of first generation ex-members are predominantly Christian and the default is often religious, meaning that non-Christian or non-religious posters have more difficulty feeling they fit in. We hope you will feel free to express yourself on GenX, and that includes using terms such as Fundamentalists and Fundies. Our main concern is that GenX may be a safe and supportive place for all, be they Christian, New Ager, agnostic or athiest.