Have it down

Kind of
Eh
Absolutely not

Good afternoon, my name is Jessica Coker and my group topic is Human Rights and
my individual topic is centred around Religious Discrimination. I gathered my
evidence from a speech, an article and a poem. This presentation shall be presented in
the form of a speech (or poem) and will be primarily conducted in standard english

I am no stranger to religion. I am not a foreigner to the various stories, prophets and scriptures
of the Bible. All my life, I have been spoon fed God’s word, the verse “Love thy neighbour as
thyself, no commandment is greater than these.” was particularly ingrained in me at an early
age. My dad preaches it, the church teaches it and extremists love to ignore it.. A cross painted
on their chest,to present the illusion of a pure, harmless. god-fearing Christian. Yet, these same
“holy” people would terrorise mosques, temples and synagogues. These are sinners claiming to
be saints and saviours, hiding their transgressions like secrets behind their backs.
They attack these religions under the guise of saving humanity and spreading God’s word.
However they’d ignore him as they hurl slurs and use the act of attending church and repenting
as justification for their (sinful/sin-ridden) abusive behaviour. Beg for forgiveness not for
permission and the cycle repeats. These same people would preach about resisting temptation
not even recognizing that the words they claim are coming from the saviour, is the charmspeak
of the Devil himself. They don’t even see that each time they bow to their knees, the devil is
getting closer and closer to kissing their cheeks in false affection and latching onto their mind
like a parasite, flooding venomous thoughts into their system

I was raised with a thirst for knowledge by my mother. I was born with questions imprinted on
my tongue and the obsessive need to know how our society came to be. She brought me up
with an enthusiasm for history as African descendants. As such, I am no stranger to
proselytization. I have read the history books and watched the historical documentaries where
our ancestors worship a god unknown to them. I’ve seen how our culture was stripped, placed
into a chest and buried. A seed planted so deeply into us that the roots have stood for years, the
branches extended beyond generations and continues to grow. Some descendants of
“previously” colonised groups are the same ones attacking polytheistic groups not knowing that
indirectly they’re insulting the practices of their ancestors. That every time they spread hate to
the Jewish, Islamic, Hindu and other communities that those thoughts are generations of hate
colonised and implanted into their system. Hatred is sewn into the surface of our tongue and the
curves of our mind, the stitches so fine, that it’s invisible to our naked eye.

I am now 15 living with the religious knowledge given to me by my father and an epistemophile
mentality infused into me by my mother. I am no stranger to our archives. I’ve spent hours
dissecting how we’ve arrived to where we are. I am not a foreigner to the past events and
crimes of humanity.