A lot of words about why the American perception of religion pisses me off, open to people telling me why I'm wrong or whatever.

I was recently flipping through my history book when I say a picture of a Sikh guy in a uniform with a large beard proudly standing among other like-uniformed police officers, who did not have beards. Apparently this guy is a hero because he was let into the police force and not made to trim his beard. He did not stand up for his beliefs, the police let him in to show how mulitcultural they are. This guy refuses to shave because he believes that hair is part of the body God gave him and he has no right to alter it. That's a great belief and I stand by him 100% in believing it. However, I do not stand behind the fact that the only reason he was ALLOWED to believe it was because he was a Sikh.

Muslim girls cover their hair so that they are not ogled by men. This was advice from Muhammed iirc, I may be wrong. Again, I stand by their right to do this. Schools allow them to do it even if it's against dress code because they strongly believe it is right to cover their hair. The problem I have is that if a white girl covered her hair and dressed modestly because she didn't want to be ogled her teacher would say "take the hat off!" Even if she said she didn't want to be ogled she'd be forced to take it off. The only reason Muslim girls are allowed to is because "it's part of their religion."

Guess what, guys? Religions are not giant identical blocks handed out to people. Everyone gets to believe whatever they want. We ARE allowed to pick and choose what we believe.

I recently had this conversation with my mom. She said I wouldn't be allowed to wear a beard because "I'm not Sikh." I told her that although I am a nontheist I could very well believe that shaving a beard is wrong. "You're not Sikh though, so you can't do it. If you want to pray to the Sikh gods every day and wear a turban you can wear a beard all you like!"

Discuss.

EDIT: If it wasn't clear, I'm not saying "they shouldn't let the Sikh guy wear a beard" I'm saying "if they are willing to let a Sikh guy wear a beard because he believes God wants him too they should let anyone else with similar beard-based beliefs wear beards regardless of their other beliefs."