June 7, 2012

Well, I do believe

you have hit a new high in low when it comes to sectarian demagoguery.

When you characterize our political opponents as following a faith that emphasizes "responsibility to the self", you are accusing them of Sociopathy. And when you attribute that sociopathy to their religion, you are calling them crazy because they believe something other than you. That is a particularly ugly and pernicious mixture of politics and religion that has been used by demagogues and tyrants for thousands of years. Shit like that is exactly what used to get people burned alive.

Republicans are not crazy, Charles. They are not evil. They are human beings who happen to have different political objectives than us. Their "religion", no matter how you care to characterize it, is not so diametrically opposed to the all encompassing goodness you claim to believe that it can be so easily dismissed and relegated to your narrowly narcissistic judgementalism. Your effort to attach your political objectives to your faith lead you to characterize your political opponents as mentally defective as surely as any Social Darwinist.

You are trading on the worst possible interpretation of conservative ideology and setting it against the best possible interpretation of liberal ideology to curry favor with liberals. Such pandering is in itself distasteful, but when you attach that kind of manipulative behavior to religion, of which you are an outspoken proponent and in which you are an active player, you are engaging in a Social Darwinist competition for religious domination. You are trying to leverage religion to gain political power.

Thankfully, this is just a political message board and the influence of something like this ugly piece of shit is almost nil beyond the outrage it inspires in those that read it here. You should be ashamed of yourself for such pernicious drivel.

June 6, 2012

Well

since you are unwilling to offer a starting point, I'll start. (Since I'm at a wifi hotspot with a laptop right now. I hate typing one fingered on a phone)

So here is the rule that defines the line between solicitous and sexist behavior: Don't be condescending. That's it. That is as close as we can get in any meaningful way to defining "benevolent sexism".

Condescension depends on the relationship between the participants in a given interaction regardless of its nature or the gender of the participants. Among the myriad variables that establish the context of the relationship, gender is only one. The people most able to tell if one is condescending are the participants themselves or perhaps those present at the interaction and who have a relationship with the participants.

It is certainly possible to be condescending in a gender specific way, and there is nothing benevolent about it. Whether or not one is being solicitous or insulting again depends on an evaluation of the person in question in the context of the interaction. The real question to ask is why would anyone even allude to something that might be mistaken for an a priori definition of "benevolent sexism"? Seeing the Unseen alludes to an empirical definition of the phenomena (seeing is believing) when it is little more than an exhortation to examine our feelings. The entire study piles all sorts and kinds of statistical analysis on top of the emotional impressions of undergraduate students. It gives the illusion of scientific analysis, when such feelings cannot be measured in any empirical way. Our feelings about another or some aspect of them, including their gender, determine whether or not we intend condescension. The other half of that equation is how our feelings are interpreted by the object of our solicitations. The context of the interaction is established by how we understand our feelings and how clearly others understand them. Such questions are better understood, and answered, with literature than science.

June 5, 2012

The "gunnies" have already won.

I don't think I've seen the slightest authentic concern for people above ideologecal purity, much less a cogent argument, from the anti gun contingent since I've been here. Most of DU thinks it's a right wing troll haven, and a good case can be made for that attitude. It also attracts ideologues on the left more concerned with thought crime than social justice.

Guns, like religion, will always be on the reactionary fringe. One value of discussing guns proper would be to educate others who are so unfamiliar with guns they can't intelligently discuss the issue. It also might help ground group discussion in reality and control the tendency toward emotional defense of ideological purity and the inevitable witch hunts that ensue.

Of course it might also attract a lot more right wing disruptors as well.

June 2, 2012

Just offhand...

First, Americans must shed the notion that the battle against violent crime has been won.

That's why they're buying all those guns.

Second, an alliance must be forged with gun owners.

Especially those who vote Democratic.

Random quotes:
I don't believe gun owners have rights.
Sarah Brady
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/s/sarah_brady.html#RCvY4EUPMeAe3WXS.99

Our main agenda is to have ALL guns banned. We must use whatever means possible. It doesn't matter if you have to distort facts or even lie. Our task of creating a socialist America can only succeed when those who would resist us have been totally disarmed.
Sarah Brady
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/s/sarah_brady.html#RCvY4EUPMeAe3WXS.99

Unless they're a fugitive or a felon, or adjudicated mentally ill, we're not against them buying guns at all.
Sarah Brady
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/s/sarah_brady.html#RCvY4EUPMeAe3WXS.99

For target shooting, that's okay. Get a license and go to the range. For defense of the home, that's why we have police departments.
-James Brady


Those took about two minutes. It's hard to form an alliance when you can so easily find people saying things like that.

Finally, the NRA has successfully argued that gun-control laws are ineffective while it also works to ensure there is little to no government funding for scientific research on the effectiveness of gun-control measures.

Moot point. Nobody cares what the odds are. They know the bookies in the ivory towers and the halls of power won't be there to help them if they get assaulted, even if the odds are slim. Any politician that campaigns on the promise that "You probably won't get assaulted, so you don't need a gun", will get a one way bus ticket to the political wilderness. And he will get on the bus sounding exactly like the liberal, elitist, academic, arrogant mandarin the Republicans have accused him of being all along.

May 31, 2012

How do you feel about

religions that practice human sacrifice? Are they protected?

The establishment clause is a wall between religion and the exercise of power. When a government claims the right to tell people what to believe, it is abusing its power of leadership. When a religion tells people how to run the country, even if the issues involved are legitimate and the methods for progress wise and prudent, religion is abusing its power to lead its believers.

May 31, 2012

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion..."

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_House_Office_of_Faith-Based_and_Neighborhood_Partnerships

The separation of church and state was noted as one of major issues with the Faith- Based Initiatives laws. Critics have claimed that millions in government grants have gone to ministries operated by politica supporters of the Bush administration, or have been given to minority pastors who recently committed their[ 7][ 8][ 9][ 10][ 11] support.[ 7][ 8][ 9][ 10][ 11] support.

Established by executive order, which has the force of law. Surely no more controversial or potentially dangerous than the codification of corporate personhood using the fourteenth amendment. Which, in the true spirit of corporate synergy, would benefit large religious organizations as well.

This office was renamed and maintained by Barack Obama. Why? For political support from organizations representing people of faith. And in return for that support they get to attach themselves to the government teat.

According to ABC News, the office would seek "to expand the role of this office as it relates to policy ssues where religious and local leaders can be effective. DuBois will coordinate with faith-based and community organizations on social service outreach and will work to utilize these organizations' efforts to advance the administration's policies, with a primary focus on poverty."

It's just another example of the privatization of public services to the aggrandizement of organizations that have the right to call themselves people. And in a country where a great many citizens, especially poor undereducated citizens, can't name their congressional representatives, where do you think their loyalties will go when they see religious organizations contributing to their daily survival with their own eyes? Getting credit for food and shelter, not to mention emotional support - that's power.

If I could guarantee Barack Obama a million votes on election day I could sleep in the Lincoln bedroom tonight - and get rich doing it. That's because I will have established myself as a provider of aid to the poor on the one hand and a bundler of votes on the other.

May 30, 2012

Hey,

You can't tell me how I feel either. I'm being nice, but I don't have to continue to do so.

I feel impelled to speak out against religious involvement in government. Like I said I dont have a problem with religion or its adherents. In fact, as I've said before religion is unavoidable if not indispensable to human survival. Some religions, most notably Christianity, are much too powerful and given its history and current role in society I don't see how it can survive as a viable faith. I expect we are in for another axial age and when that happens the Abrahamic religions will go the way of the dodo.

Ease up with the accusations before this gets ugly.

May 30, 2012

No society can last for long

without compassion. Certainly no society that calls itself civilized.

Did you know that you can patent an idea? In this culture ideas - thoughts - are property. We can, and do, profit from the production if ideas. That profit comes from consumers and investors. Those ideas are distributed through various forms of media. It is the oldest and easiest way to get rich. There is very little capital investment and the unlimited market of human desire for self validation as the source of a revenue stream. And all you have to do is tell people what they want to hear. It kept preists in a good living a thousand years ago and it keeps scholars, pundits, preachers and publishers in air conditioning and iced Scotch today.

Those kids, the value of their work notwithstanding, got their religious convictions from someone who made a living producing and distributing them in a very competitive marketplace of ideas. They bought books, listened to presentations, and paid tuition for those ideas and did so because they liked them. They made an emotional investment in them.

There is no difference between Christian compassion and Muslim compassion. The difference to the believers is who gets credit for fostering those feelings. I think civic duty, which includes compassion and justice for every member of society, should be nationalist inspired compassion. Because when we share, on that most basic and human emotional level, compassion for one another from a common source we will be able to exercise political power to make this a better country in which to live.

Religions gain power by bundling votes. If a religious organization can command enough followers to impact society any politician with half a brain will court the organization rather than the voters it represents. That gives the religion political power, and that relationship always ends badly.

May 30, 2012

Sorry, nope.

Somebody made a living generating and promulgating those ideas. They have university chairmanships, publish books, and speak at conferences.

If those kids want to make a difference they should be doing it as red, white, and blue United States citizens. That is the only acceptable religion to associate with one's civic duty.

There is a saying in psychology circles that goes, "you can't tell people how they feel". Any number of studies seem to indicate that the more strongly someone feels about something the more they dig in their heels to defend their beliefs then presented with contrary evidence. Faith and religion are emotional experiences and any organization that becomes the facilitator of that experience has considerable control over its followers. It's very difficult to separate oneself from that control - and that dynamic is the same for religious belief and simple brand loyalty. The most unscrupulous religions are those who most exploit the latter, and in a capitalist society any organization has to depend on the profit motive at least a little. The emotional bonds we create with shared ideas, including the profit motive, are at the root of all human civilization and has ensured the survival - and tragedy - of our species.

The latest and best effort to foster cooperation and support among groups of people has been a nationalist form of government, which replaced religion in that role. The transition has been a barbaric and bloody one. And it will never be complete if we allow civic activity defined by faith in anything other than ourselves.

Having said all that, I'm sure those kids will do just fine. There is a big difference between a specific situation and an overall cultural trend. I'm the first to admit that I don't know how to parse the role of religion in government - because I can't tell people how they feel. But I know people are only human and I don't think there's any reason to believe any religious organization or leader will judiciously exercise the considerable power that the faith of believers will give them. I haven't seen one succeed yet.

May 30, 2012

I feel i should add...

I'm not "anti religion" and I don't think religious people are crazy because they believe. It's just that there is no justice in politics. Kindness and compassion have nothing to do with it. Politics is the art of who gets what. Make no mistake, it's about resources, plain and simple. When it comes to politics working people cannot afford to divide our loyalties or lose sight of our objective. I'm not trying to pick on you or TMO but I see no reason to sub contract my understanding of civic duty to an organization that exists to produce ideology for profit. And they all do or they won't last long.