Freedom of Conscience

Individual freedom of speech no longer exists in the US - a so-called democratic country. Two decades of political correctness have resulted in limited personal choices. Rugged individualism has died and the law gives no protection as a natural consequence.

The doctrine of antinomianism, opposing or denying the fixed meaning or universal applicability of moral law, has raised segregation and racial persecution to an ethical level with who judges impose draconian concepts.

By raising segregation and racial persecution to the ethical level of law, it puts into practice the antinomian rules of Orwell's world. Evil becomes good, inhumanity is interpreted as charity, egoism as compassion. (Elie Wiesel)

Scheming, greed, and sacrifice of principles have produced a generation of people intent on evading social responsibility. They acquiesce to the religious and racial orthodoxies that have pervaded society for centuries to the detriment of those without any power.

The individual can either accept dictatorial rule by ideologues or wander with a flock of sheep bleating unanimously in a politically correct group. Those special interest groups depend upon a single leader who generally feigns support of a just society then uses personal indifference and laziness of members to secure power. [Neo-Fascist Identity Groups]

Public outcry, with everyone establishing their own right to voice an individual opinion, provides the only real protection against demagogy. If individual apathy and lethargy lessens that outcry then tyrants will continue to persecute minorities despite laws that exist to protect them. As public opinion decreases so totalitarianism increases.

Race differs fundamentally from other diversity claims as an independent dimension. Outlawing discrimination does not mean that race no longer matters. Racial classifications used for more than three hundred years have deprived basic rights to millions of people and continue to do so. Color-coded stereotypes, suspicions, fears, and hatreds abound. At Council House, directors continue to discriminate in employment and their managers consistently demean people of color.

A long history of abuse continues to plague racial minorities (especially African-Americans and Latinos). Those with power and wealth use race to limit opportunities and to create a division that demeans everyone. To avoid prosecution, Council House now discriminates using race-sensitive employment and housing criteria that nuance racial differences instead of blatantly discriminating against minorities. Corrupt directors continue to deny constitutional rights to individuals to protect self-aggrandizing agendas and their own special interest group. Power politics kills any morality and sense of reality that they may have had in the past.

Traditionally, ideologues have led the masses to the abyss and self-interested group leaders have marched them rapidly forward. Nothing has changed. In a mindless society, the individual speaks his mind at his peril while some journalists play both ends against the middle to keep their jobs.

For centuries, those with power have used the term “nigger” to describe black and other socially, economically, or politically disadvantaged people. However, disparagement through denial of dignity or social standing can only destroy those who believe what their oppressors tell them. Niggerization results from oppression and acceptance of it. At Council House, niggerization does not only apply to black people. Speaking Yiddish does not veil bigotry and does not excuse it.

Tyrants exercise power in a cruel manner. As cowards, they oppress seemingly weak people in a harsh and arbitrary way. This becomes patently obvious from the behavior of the directors of Council House, Seattle, and their managers. Residents have lost their most fundamental constitutional and moral rights in this Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) financially-assisted, independent-living, residence for senior citizens in Seattle, Washington.

Council House administrators have engaged in a ferocious assault on the principles and basic human rights to freedom of conscience and religious liberty. Promoting condescension (patronizingly superior behavior or attitudes) toward black people, poor people, and elderly people, denies them their civil rights and religious freedom.

Conversely, each time a person acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, then he or she sends forth a ripple of hope. Those ripples create a current that eventually erodes oppression and resistance.

Taxpayers have financially supported Council House for more than twenty-five years and the directors (landlords) benefit financially without meeting their responsibilities to residents. They have centralized socioeconomic authority under Stephen M., an administrator who imposes a neo-fascist ideology upon residents (tenants) in this apartment block. This violates federal law. Judge James A. Doerty, Washington Superior Court, has placed his special interests above the law by giving them protection.

Doerty has constructively given Council House directors immunity from prosecution using censorship as a weapon. He has issued draconian harassment and contempt orders in attempts to stop media exposing racist activities. He has allowed Stephen M. to harass, discriminate, and retaliate against those people who have spoken out. Doerty has allowed him to use his power as a landlord’s representative to repeatedly threaten eviction without probable cause. This keeps elderly people in fear of having nowhere to go.

Doerty’s decisions have resulted in suppression of dissent through terror and censorship - a hallmark of belligerent nationalism and racism. An uncaring and indifferent judge has forced his bigotry and ideology upon an entire closed society. [Judicial Madness]

To comply with HUD rules, the directors must open the building to all faiths and give them equal opportunity to use facilities. However, managers nuance that mandate then discriminate against some groups. Mainly they discriminate by ethnicity or religion against those residents who rebel against their neo-fascist policies. They deny basic rights and make their lives hell if they complain. Policies change daily and range from convent school rules to those in place in lunatic asylums.

This week (06 Feb 03), Audrey D., Council House rental agent, arbitrarily refused long-standing resident Gilda K. a computer line although she offered the same service to new residents. Three years ago Stephen M. announced he would instal lines in all apartments giving preference to those people who requested them by seniority.

Audrey D. recently had computer lines installed in about twenty apartments most of them occupied by residents with less seniority than K.. After an altercation with D. about her refusal, K. wrote:

It just does not stop. It’s just like high school or elementary school. We only let our ‘friends’ have a crack at the volley ball.

This goes far beyond petty dislike and childish behavior. K., among other residents, filed a declaration in a law suit claiming discrimination and abuse. Audrey D.’s action smacks of retaliation and witness tampering. Stephen M. has repeatedly intimidated other witnesses, in particular, Pola D. who also filed a declaration with the court. Both Pola D. and Gilda K. have recovered some of their individuality by retaining a lawyer to protect their rights.

The Council House directors use “diversity”, propaganda, and the police to silence residents and to retaliate against those who speak out. They have created an orthodoxy of dissent to suppress nonconformity and use thugs to enforce it. The public must soon bring these practices to an end - legally. [Heterodoxy or Orthodoxy of Dissent?]

The idea of pluralism in government-subsidized housing depends on voluntary association based upon chosen religious and secular goals. Council House managers ban non-Jewish religious groups because their views are incompatible with their own orthodoxy. They allow only functions tied to a Jewish religious mission and preclude residents of other religions and races from fulfilling their religious and cultural aspirations.

Council House depends upon taxpayer funding and must comply with the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights to protect both the free exercise of religion and legal equality. In short, laws prohibit managers of publicly-funded facilities from preventing Christians, Moslems, Jews, or members of any other faith or denomination, from practicing their religion where they live.

Prohibition becomes particularly pernicious when administrators ban religious activities because Jewish residents claim that they find the practice of other religions offensive. By this, the directors deny the constitutional right to freedom of expression, the free exercise of religion, due process, and freedom of association and assembly. They strengthen this policy by publicizing only Jewish events. They then deny use of bulletin boards for events promoted by other religions or political persuasions contrary to their neo-fascist ideology. [Censored!]

Audrey D. banned Christian gospel singers from mentioning the word Jesus in their songs. She must have forgotten that Jesus spent most of his life as a dissenting Jew. She continues this policy with full knowledge of the all-Jewish board of directors. Employed as rental manager, she uses religion as a criterion in the selection of entertainment. Witnesses, and a signed statement by a musician/vocalist, state that she told him:

To refrain from using the name Jesus or songs of Christian relevance in [his] repertoire because of its offensive nature to Jewish residents.

Requiring residents to agree with the directors’ beliefs constitutes impermissible curtailment of rights.

On another occasion, Audrey D. allegedly told a resident that he could not invite a gospel singer to entertain residents because the board of directors had decided that it would offend Jewish residents. This, despite frequent Jewish festivals and regular services in an orthodox synagogue established in the building basement. The rabbi rents an apartment although unqualified as a tenant under HUD rules. Moreover, D. rents public rooms for Jewish ceremonies exclusively.

That exclusivity has constructively forbidden non-Jewish residents from using the facilities for which they pay rent. Managers lock the elevators to some floors when outside groups rent the premises for bar mitzvah celebrations and other religious activities. The building becomes so crowded that residents cannot get to and from their apartments. They become virtual prisoners during these functions.

The directors allows these ceremonies not only contrary to regulations but also in contravention of fire marshal’s occupancy rules. About two hundred nonresidents held a bar mitzvah in the combined dining room and lounge. They held a religious ritual that some residents found distasteful and imposed their exclusive criteria upon all residents. By that they violated federal law.

The people who attended the bar mitzvah did not meet indigent criteria and probably could afford to pay for one of the many facilities that cater to religious functions exclusively. Perhaps they should in future use them instead of disturbing the quiet enjoyment of senior citizens in a retirement apartment block. They were not guests of tenants but paying clients of management.

The directors apparently think that they have the power to demand allegiance to their own values and beliefs. They perpetrate a close-minded and intolerable outrage exacerbated by expecting residents to acknowledge an Israeli flag prominently displayed (probably illegally) in the dining room.

They do not accept the loss of the privilege to operate Council House as an exclusive Jewish establishment the day that they accepted millions of taxpayer dollars: money that most residents have paid to the US government over many years. They also agreed to conform to federal law regarding race, religion, national origin, and freedom of expression. They consistently violate those laws.

Leon H., a black man, long-term activist, former aide to an Oregon governor, and Council House residents' association past president, complained to Stephen M. about racist language. M. did nothing when a resident reportedly use of the term "shvarzer" (Yiddish - nigger) in the dining room. He also ignored H.’s complaint about the incident. Similarly Donald J., another black resident, claimed that he heard a Jewish resident looking at predominantly black children playing in the T. T. Minor school yard across the street from Council House say: "What is this - the planet of the apes?"

H. complained about public use of racist language at M.’s monthly meeting (15 Aug 01) with residents. M. has a history of not addressing resident complaints, instead, he uses bizarre kill-the-messenger techniques. M. hysterically objected to H.’s complaint and publicly threatened him. He then scripted and filed a frivolous lawsuit. He took H. to court using a straw woman to try to evict him on trumped-up charges of rudeness. M. lost the case, however, he has since constructively evicted (railroaded) him.

M. retaliated against H. for winning the lawsuit. He constructively evicted him on racial and religious issues especially on the incident now known locally as the "Jesus Affair." The directors, in full knowledge of these and similar bigoted occurrences in which they have participated themselves, turn a blind eye. Instead of acting according to law, they condone kill-the-messenger techniques. They have done nothing to address the issues or to answer resident complaints." [Trials of Leon Harris]

Several Council House directors met as a search committee to discuss hiring a replacement for an administrator. They voiced concerns about advertising nationally because it would result in black people applying for the position and conspired to exclude them. They designated the building Jewish. By planning to manipulate employment criteria they violated both the spirit and intent of federal equal opportunity laws. Those laws preclude discrimination in both housing and employment. They require the directors to advertise in a way that provides equal opportunity to all qualified applicants notwithstanding race, color, creed, national origin, gender, age, or familial status.

The directors must by law make their selection based on merit without ethnic or racial prejudice. They must advertise nationally for a competent, permanent administrator or management company according to HUD regulations and publicly show that they have complied with all state and federal laws. This means that any qualified resident may also apply for the position. Residents have reported these discriminatory or ethnically preferential policies but HUD has done nothing to correct them. Moreover, Council House remunerates black employees by paying them wages without fringe benefits while white people holding equivalent positions receive salaries with benefits.

H.’s complaint inflamed the inherent feelings of ethnic minorities both inside and outside the project. By continuing to exhibit the Israeli flag in the dining room the directors pour more fuel on the fire. HUD must recognize the appalling abuses of power and restore individual rights to residents. Their neglect to act denies liberty.

Justice Robert Jackson’s said:

If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what will be orthodox, in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein.

That defines the voice of a free people.

The directors consistently violate HUD regulations and misappropriate government funds. The reportage exposes that corruption. It does not construe as a crusade or struggle against infidels or a religious war as a Council House spokesman complained. Religious beliefs remain incidental to unlawful practices despite the directors use of religion exclusively to enforce their will.

Two decades of political correctness have resulted in limited personal choices. Rugged individualism has died and the law gives no protection. Individual freedom of speech does not exist at Council House. Freedom can only prevail if the Fourth Estate remains independent and watches over the three branches of government that work together to protect neo-fascism.

Liberty depends upon the right to tell people what they would rather not hear. The media should provide a voice for those whom political correctness has silenced or ignored. The maxim propounded by a black journalist more than a century ago still holds:

Where justice is denied, where poverty is enforced, where ignorance prevails, and where any one class is made to feel that society is in an organized conspiracy to oppress, rob, and degrade them, neither persons nor property will be safe. [01]

Society conspires to oppress and degrade minorities by robbing them of their constitutional rights while keeping them in poverty and ignorance to maintain control over them. Then judges, part of a ruling cartel, jail journalists who write about the abuse to silence them. Thus, racism proliferates without much hope of change.

Nmesis.

© Copyright 2002 by Paul Trummel
All Rights Reserved: 22 Nov 02/10:00 GMT
Edition: #801-23-00/06-1229-06:57
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