Amish Beard Trimming
I get no kick from the Campaign. Islamic jihad doesn’t thrill me at all. I get a kick out of Amish beard cutting.
Especially when the cutter’s name is Samuel Mullet.
Men normally allow their beards to grow as a symbol of faith in the Amish religion. The Amish pride themselves on being plain. Actually they hate pride, but they do like plain. Anyway, Mr. Mullet appointed himself police of plainness and ordered his followers to cut off the beards of those not deemed by him to be sufficiently plain.
This was too much for a federal court, which said Mullet was guilty of hate crimes because the beard cutting was motivated by a religious dispute.
That’s an interesting take. American courts now settle religious disputes. If someone drags you out of your house and cuts off your beard, without an appointment, I might think of it as an aggravated hair assault. Or a Mitt Romney high school high jinx. But a hate crime? That would mean you are guilty of a state of mind – hate – religious hate to be specific. It would be a thought crime, or a faith crime. Do we really want to go down that road?
What other religious practices could be determined to be hate crimes? – Beheadings, blowing up embassies, crashing airplanes into buildings?
Seems awfully intolerant.
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