Born This Way

[June 627]

What do you think this line means in this song:

In the religion of the insecure, I must be myself, respect my youth.

[ryansamonster 1,677]

I take it like this: Insecurities are the beliefs you have about yourself, thus making it a “religion” that pretty much every human being believes in. Don’t waste your youth being insecure, believe in yourself because you were born this way. 

[June 627]

Just now, ryansamonster said:

I take it like this: Insecurities are the beliefs you have about yourself, thus making it a “religion” that pretty much every human being believes in. Don’t waste your youth being insecure, believe in yourself because you were born this way. 

OMG. that was a cute way to interpret it. Thank u

[bxr 1,016]

Hm, maybe it echoes the “my religion is you…” undertone to her relationship with the fans, but more broadly that bond of the oppressed at the core of Born This Way being akin to a religion of the marginalized / insecure … so then, maybe “I must be myself, respect my youth…”  could echo, well, being Born this way, and respecting your most innate, natural-born, divinely crafted self … (or in parochial terminology … as you were born “in the image of God”) … and/or, at the most original point of you in a religion would be baptism, so, I guess, probably more abstractly, respecting that allegiance into that religion of the insecure — but, tbh, this is all just riffing on general association … it could also just be a harmonious lyric that fit the sequence

[imnotyourbabe10 6,081]

I like how ryansamonster and bxr have said it.
Have also thought of it from a societal point of view in that we live in a great deal of insecurity about ourselves and how we think about or view ourselves that is shaped by society's standards as well as insecurity about jobs, dating and perhaps other social issues.