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> The novelty of a "religious idea" shouldn't be a factor as to whether it should be regarded as valid. This would lead to effective anarchy and defiance of lo

> The novelty of a "religious idea" shouldn't be a factor as to whether it should be regarded as valid. This would lead to effective anarchy and defiance of local and national law. It must be regarded as a 'strongly held' belief.

efitz 3y ago
Courts have pretty much ignored trying to define religion and instead treat any strongly held moral-based belief as a religion. If you think about it, having the courts try to decide what is nor is not a religion is a big part of what the first amendment intended to avoid. “Anarchy” won’t result. Courts and employment law have settled on “reasonable accommodation”. If an employer can spend a reasonable amount of time and effort (“reasonable” is defined in legal precedent) to make the employee productive, then they have to, otherwise they part ways. The question here is whether it’s reasonable effort to support a managed Linux desktop in the same way as they support Windows. Probably pretty situational based on how much management/monitoring they have in place, whether their systems support Linux, etc.
- linuxftw 3y ago
  > Courts have pretty much ignored trying to define religion and instead treat any strongly held moral-based belief as a religion This is not correct. The courts have indeed ruled on criteria that defines what is and is not a religious belief. Here's one such case: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/380/163/ https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/380/163/
  - efitz 3y ago
    Read Seeger (the decision you linked to). Here's an analysis [1]. The decision is specifically about expansion of "religion" to not require belief in a supreme being. Seeger supports my position. Again, they're not trying to define what is a religion, they're trying to set criteria for what falls under the 1st amendment. From the legal analysis linked below: "The Court rejected a distinction between beliefs derived externally (that is, from a religious tradition) and internally (that is, from purely personal beliefs). In Seeger the Court moved definitively away from requiring theistic belief — that is, belief in a Supreme Being — as a necessary condition for a belief to be religious under the First Amendment." And further, in 1970, Welsh v. US went even farther: "In Welsh the Court made explicit its rejection of a distinction between personal belief and affiliation with, or practice of, a recognized religious tradition." [1] https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/240/united-states-v-seeger https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/240/united-stat...
    - linuxftw 3y ago
      This case might appear to support your position, but other cases do not. My intent was to show that the courts have indeed ruled on what is and isn't a religious belief generally, which is contrary to your position. In any case, beliefs have to be religious in nature, not personal or based on reason or 'science' or what have you.
      - efitz 3y ago
        That is literally the opposite of what the supreme court ruled.
ndsipa_pomu 3y ago
Usually, laws don't allow exceptions due to religious beliefs so it's unlikely to make much difference as the laws would still exist and be enforced. More likely would be if juries decide to return an innocent verdict for crimes against laws they consider to be immoral or unjust and this already happens for non-religious reasons (e.g. a person using excessive force defending their property).
- Rimintil 3y ago
  I can't say I've seen <random state law> written with a "there's no exception to a strongly-held religious belief" within the text. I'm not aware of a general-blanket language that would apply to any and every law in my state, either (and I'm in one of those states where the 'unaffiliated' make up a sizable portion of the population). Have any of the abortion ban laws been written with any language that would invalidate challenges based on religion, i.e. The Satanic Temple.

efitz 3y ago

Courts have pretty much ignored trying to define religion and instead treat any strongly held moral-based belief as a religion. If you think about it, having the courts try to decide what is nor is not a religion is a big part of what the first amendment intended to avoid. “Anarchy” won’t result. Courts and employment law have settled on “reasonable accommodation”. If an employer can spend a reasonable amount of time and effort (“reasonable” is defined in legal precedent) to make the employee productive, then they have to, otherwise they part ways. The question here is whether it’s reasonable effort to support a managed Linux desktop in the same way as they support Windows. Probably pretty situational based on how much management/monitoring they have in place, whether their systems support Linux, etc.

linuxftw 3y ago
> Courts have pretty much ignored trying to define religion and instead treat any strongly held moral-based belief as a religion This is not correct. The courts have indeed ruled on criteria that defines what is and is not a religious belief. Here's one such case: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/380/163/ https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/380/163/
- efitz 3y ago
  Read Seeger (the decision you linked to). Here's an analysis [1]. The decision is specifically about expansion of "religion" to not require belief in a supreme being. Seeger supports my position. Again, they're not trying to define what is a religion, they're trying to set criteria for what falls under the 1st amendment. From the legal analysis linked below: "The Court rejected a distinction between beliefs derived externally (that is, from a religious tradition) and internally (that is, from purely personal beliefs). In Seeger the Court moved definitively away from requiring theistic belief — that is, belief in a Supreme Being — as a necessary condition for a belief to be religious under the First Amendment." And further, in 1970, Welsh v. US went even farther: "In Welsh the Court made explicit its rejection of a distinction between personal belief and affiliation with, or practice of, a recognized religious tradition." [1] https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/240/united-states-v-seeger https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/240/united-stat...
  - linuxftw 3y ago
    This case might appear to support your position, but other cases do not. My intent was to show that the courts have indeed ruled on what is and isn't a religious belief generally, which is contrary to your position. In any case, beliefs have to be religious in nature, not personal or based on reason or 'science' or what have you.
    - efitz 3y ago
      That is literally the opposite of what the supreme court ruled.

ndsipa_pomu 3y ago

Usually, laws don't allow exceptions due to religious beliefs so it's unlikely to make much difference as the laws would still exist and be enforced. More likely would be if juries decide to return an innocent verdict for crimes against laws they consider to be immoral or unjust and this already happens for non-religious reasons (e.g. a person using excessive force defending their property).

Rimintil 3y ago
I can't say I've seen <random state law> written with a "there's no exception to a strongly-held religious belief" within the text. I'm not aware of a general-blanket language that would apply to any and every law in my state, either (and I'm in one of those states where the 'unaffiliated' make up a sizable portion of the population). Have any of the abortion ban laws been written with any language that would invalidate challenges based on religion, i.e. The Satanic Temple.