This bill, which was introduced to the Missouri House of Representatives, aims to prevent publicly funded educational institutions from taking action, small or large, against belief-based school clubs who openly use discrimination when elected or appointed club presidents. Basically, if a Christian club wants, they can make it a club rule to refuse an Atheist or a Muslim from becoming the club president. The bill is specifically in reference to institutions of higher learning, which means that the clubs in question are likely collegian sororities, young republicans clubs, or the equivalent there of.
This may seem like a self evident ruling. Why would a Christian club have a Muslim president to begin with? Simple: education. A school affiliated club should, by way of it being SCHOOL affiliated, be based off of education. And whether you like it or not, belief has had an unquantifiably large influence in history. This influence is certainly the type of subject which one could find important to learn.
Of course, not all clubs are school affiliated, nor do they have a focus on education as opposed to hardening a preconceived set of values which may or may not have already been held by the members. This lack of cultural diversity, in my opinion, can only serve to damage the ability for people to gain certain levels of life experience which they might otherwise embrace with open arms. I personally believe clubs of this nature are a collective deficit to the community, but that’s just my opinion.
That being said, a Christian president of a Christian-oriented club may have the biased approach of wanting to lead the club activities in such a way that the belief itself will always be seen in a positive light. Bringing a person of a different belief into the leadership position may help to balance the scales and allow the club topic to be seen in as neutral and balanced a way as possible.
Obviously there may be a Christian student who finds no harm in analyzing the in-depth history and potentially undesirable modern life-style of their belief. As well, there may be a person outside of the belief structure who makes it their objective to only show the belief system in a negative light. But this is why the club president should be elected or appointed with scrutiny.
But should a club be allowed to disqualify a person from becoming club president based on their belief system? In short, yes. If I own a tech company, why couldn’t I make a rule that people who are anti-tech can’t become CEO? An organization should be allowed to run itself in nearly any respect that it wants as long as it’s not discriminating against people of a protected class (race, disability, etc.).
If a Muslim student wants to become president of a Christian club and is disqualified for their belief, then they should be afforded the access to creating their own club where that isn’t an issue. The Muslim student isn’t being prohibited from partaking in the club (the law explicitely cites protections only in regard to the club president), nor are they prohibited from creating a competing club with different rules.
This might seem as though I’m oversimplifying, after all, creating a new club isn’t easy or inexpensive, especially if your goal is to make that club last. However, it’s simple economics, if there is a high enough demand for a Christian club to have a Muslim or Atheist or Buddhist president, or if there are enough people who find it unjust that the discriminatory rule is in place, then you should at least be able to get your footing with a new club.
The fact of the matter is that a club is not made of rules, it’s made of people. And if people don’t like the rules, they can either fight to change them from within or they can create an alternative organization. But again, if it isn’t clear enough, within the guidelines of this bill, a club still cannot discriminate it’s membership based on belief, only it’s president.
In sum, I agree with the heart of the bill, however, I would love more of a commitment to preventing members of different ideologies from being barred from associating with these clubs outside of leadership positions and assisting new clubs to be built in opposition to the discriminatory rules. The only issue I find is that this bill even has to exist in the first place. Belief is not a protected class. Yet institutions have sought to prohibit clubs from making such rules rather than affording benefits to those without said rules.
This should only ever have been an issue for the clubs and their members to decide. The reason I’m in favor of this bill is that it doesn’t encourage this behavior within the clubs, it only ensures that authoritative action cannot be taken against the clubs. There is no part of the bill preventing the members of the clubs or the community en masse to influence the club into changing their rules.
While I disagree with the very concept of religious organization, it is a fundamental right that these organizations should be allowed to exist. It is not a fundamental right for an Atheist to be the leader of a Mormon church. If the Mormon church decides to elect or appoint an Atheist as their leader, then that should be protected as much as their right to only elect or appoint only Mormons. I don’t believe this should be legislated, but since it has been an issue litigated by courts in the past, perhaps legislation is the appropriate action.
One might argue that this opens the door to discriminatory acts against the community or non-members of the clubs, but that is not relevant to the bill itself. Those are criminal or civil cases that can be litigated in state courts or with the educational institution itself. If a club poses a clear and present danger to the physical or emotional well being of others, there already exist institutions which can remedy this issue all the way up to and including the full dissolution of the club.
Galvanic Ink 