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Freedom of Religion gets the axe
- Thread starter Covertibility
- Start date
Quote from AAAintheBeltway:
Then there is the problem of when does nonbelief or belief in some alternative deity become protected religious activity. Is extreme environmentalism, which becomes a form of nature worship, protected religious activity? And if it is, why are the schools allowed to indoctrinate students into it but a kid is sent home if he has a Bible?
You strive so hard to sound credible, AAA, but when you make statements like this you place yourself firmly in the right-wing whacko camp.
m
Quote from MackieMesser:
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Quote from AAAintheBeltway:
Then there is the problem of when does nonbelief or belief in some alternative deity become protected religious activity. Is extreme environmentalism, which becomes a form of nature worship, protected religious activity? And if it is, why are the schools allowed to indoctrinate students into it but a kid is sent home if he has a Bible?
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You strive so hard to sound credible, AAA, but when you make statements like this you place yourself firmly in the right-wing whacko camp.
m
makes sense to me......... there is a double standard. can't have your cake and eat it too.
Quote from ratboy88:
not exactly. i just think it is comical to imagine the authors of the constitution/bill of rights witnessing a debate as to whether we should afford satanism 1st amendment protection.
Well I'm trying to understand how you think *exactly* because that is how i learn from people.
So are you saying that you don't believe in satan? In your detailed explanation of his connection to wicca it sounded to me like you were pretty seriously concerned about people being fooled by the deceiver.
Why is it comical to you? Because satanism should not be taken seriously as a religion?
I'm trying to understand your desire to overturn the first amendment and I guess i was hoping that you would have what you consider serious reasons for it.
As I said before, i see wicca as benign to mildly positive. If you see it as some kind of threat from satan, I could understand your desire to see it exempted from protection.
But if its just because you find their religion humorous I'm not really understanding your thinking which is why I ask.
For me, christianity seems equally comical with the mock cannibalism and blood drinking, etc. But it gives meaning to a whole lot of people so i'm pretty sure i'm just missing something and that's why i consider it important that christianity is protected by the first amendment. This is also how i feel about wicca. It seems kind of bizarre to me, but a lot of people find meaning in it. So i want to see wicca protected by the first amendment. etc.
Anyway that's how i think. The way you are looking at things doesn't really make any sense to me right now, but i'm really trying to understand your belief system because in my experience that is how progress is made.
In the same vein:Quote from Rearden Metal:
Pay attention to the method the government uses to confiscate our rights. At first they come after the unpopular & weak. Joe Public reads this news story, shrugs and thinks: "Well, it does kinda violate the First Amendment, but I don't like witches. None of my friends are Satanists or witches, so screw 'em.
And a couple years ago : "Well technically Jose Padilla is entitled to due process as an American citizen, but they say he's a crazy terrorist, so screw him. The Fifth and Sixth amendments don't really apply to those people."
Once Joe public realizes why he <b>should</b> care, it's too late.
__________________
"The smallest minority on earth is the individual.
Those who deny individual rights cannot
claim to be defenders of minorities."
~ Ayn Rand
_________________
First they came for the Jews and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Communists and I did not speak out because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak out for me.
~Pastor Niemoller
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.". -- H. L. Mencken
One step further:
"By means of shrewd lies, unremittingly repeated, it is possible to make people believe that heaven is hell -- and hell heaven. The greater the lie, the more readily it will be believed." - Adolph Hitler
For those who still don't get it, could read a fable about it all:
"Animal Farm", George Orwell
Quote from Cutten:
Not believing something is not equivalent to "practicing" a religion, in any meaningful sense of the term. When someone says "I think politicians are liars", you don't say they are "practising" their "religion" of scepticism. They are simply being sceptical. Scepticism of elected representatives is not a religion, it's just a belief about the veracity of politicians. Equally, atheism is not a religion, it's just a belief about the veracity of religions and their advocates.
Quote from Cutten:
Just because X is granted the same legal protection as Y, does not mean that X is identical to Y or even of the same category. Atheism is not a religion by any accepted definition of the term. Atheists don't gather at places of worship, they don't have a fairly uniform moral code that they preach to atheists "non-believers", they don't worship a divine being, they don't have any sacred texts, they don't have any centralised institution or religious leaders whose teachings they follow. The only thing atheists have in common is a belief that there is no divine being or beings. By definition, something that denies the truth of religion cannot be a religion.
All religions are beliefs, but not all beliefs are religions. Atheism is a belief, and not a religion.
Nice theory. True possibly for a few oddball cases.
Exercising some common sense and guided by the obvious universal validity of the 'useful idiots' principle, the line between self professed atheists and agnosticists can only be called hazy and blurred (it suffices to read a few lines of ET chit-chat). If you are a bit more avantgarde and being aware that 'useful idiots' have always been unwittingly in the service of some crafty ruinous character, it will not be that difficult to spot the missing link. That's what you have a brain for. Querens Querendi.
Historical evidence suggests that most of those who got themselves stuck in the 'useful idiots' category, will share in its fate.
nononsense
I'm going to hate myself in the morning but ....
I would suggest, atheism means without theism for the reason that there is ..... "insufficient data to determine the truth or falsity of that concept" (third option)
You tell someone who has not considered the matter in any way previously that there is a giant sky fairy. He doesn't understand, as the suggestion has no meaning or coherency associated with it to enable comprehension.
To suggest he is now "Ignoring with intent" and therefore ""practicing" " atheism, doesn't suggest you used the word appropriately...in my opinion of course.
So what happened to the..... "insufficient data to determine the truth or falsity of that concept" ?.(third option)Quote from ZZZzzzzzzz:
.(my alteration)
Either to accept that concept as true, (first option) reject that concept as false, (second option) or to admit that there is insufficient data to determine the truth or falsity of that concept.(third option)
Theist believes the concept of God is true. (first option)
Atheist believes the concept of God is false. (second option)
I would suggest, atheism means without theism for the reason that there is ..... "insufficient data to determine the truth or falsity of that concept" (third option)
I don't agree. To me that is an exclusion of more subtle and sophisticated meaning which forms understanding.Quote from ZZZzzzzzzz:
Ignoring with intent to ignore is a practice, as is dismissing something. These mental activities take some effort of the mind. It is done with intent, with purpose, with direction and forethought.
Consistently doing something with intent is a practice...in my opinion of course.
You tell someone who has not considered the matter in any way previously that there is a giant sky fairy. He doesn't understand, as the suggestion has no meaning or coherency associated with it to enable comprehension.
To suggest he is now "Ignoring with intent" and therefore ""practicing" " atheism, doesn't suggest you used the word appropriately...in my opinion of course.
My suggestion is, a missing or ignoring of a particular aspect in all this.
One can choose to reject, accept or...accept nor reject.
In other words, on matters which are perhaps glossed over with contradiction, absurdity, woeful insubstantialities and which are based only on meaninglessness - as say for instance watching paint dry, basketball and religion - it is reasonable not to have any belief or any non belief in such subjects.
They become by their own standards of pointlessness....irrelevant for the purposes of holding a 'for or against', 'belief in or not belief' position. (Except perhaps for paint watching.. green especially)
So it isn't just a case of atheist, agnostic or theist. It is also a case of the subject, religion in this case, containing no reason enough to make the time for considering any of those positions as substantive.
As religion has no significantly plausible conjectures, making itself inconsequential by a sheer ludicrousness embodiment of outrageous propositions embedded within a wide range of nonsensical ideas, dismissing the notion of it, as one would dismiss the notion of fire breathing dragons as no more than a fictional product of an imagination, is not to then hold a belief in non belief as was suggested.
Rejection of the inconsequential, is neither a belief or non belief in the inconsequential.
Atheism, I see it, is by definition without theism and by that finds no cause in the first place to believe or not to believe in a preposterous abstraction. As I understand it, the atheist would find no cause to bother with either.
One can choose to reject, accept or...accept nor reject.
In other words, on matters which are perhaps glossed over with contradiction, absurdity, woeful insubstantialities and which are based only on meaninglessness - as say for instance watching paint dry, basketball and religion - it is reasonable not to have any belief or any non belief in such subjects.
They become by their own standards of pointlessness....irrelevant for the purposes of holding a 'for or against', 'belief in or not belief' position. (Except perhaps for paint watching.. green especially)
So it isn't just a case of atheist, agnostic or theist. It is also a case of the subject, religion in this case, containing no reason enough to make the time for considering any of those positions as substantive.
As religion has no significantly plausible conjectures, making itself inconsequential by a sheer ludicrousness embodiment of outrageous propositions embedded within a wide range of nonsensical ideas, dismissing the notion of it, as one would dismiss the notion of fire breathing dragons as no more than a fictional product of an imagination, is not to then hold a belief in non belief as was suggested.
Rejection of the inconsequential, is neither a belief or non belief in the inconsequential.
Atheism, I see it, is by definition without theism and by that finds no cause in the first place to believe or not to believe in a preposterous abstraction. As I understand it, the atheist would find no cause to bother with either.
Quote from market_hacker:
Well I'm trying to understand how you think *exactly* because that is how i learn from people.
So are you saying that you don't believe in satan? In your detailed explanation of his connection to wicca it sounded to me like you were pretty seriously concerned about people being fooled by the deceiver.
Why is it comical to you? Because satanism should not be taken seriously as a religion?
I'm trying to understand your desire to overturn the first amendment and I guess i was hoping that you would have what you consider serious reasons for it.
As I said before, i see wicca as benign to mildly positive. If you see it as some kind of threat from satan, I could understand your desire to see it exempted from protection.
But if its just because you find their religion humorous I'm not really understanding your thinking which is why I ask.
For me, christianity seems equally comical with the mock cannibalism and blood drinking, etc. But it gives meaning to a whole lot of people so i'm pretty sure i'm just missing something and that's why i consider it important that christianity is protected by the first amendment. This is also how i feel about wicca. It seems kind of bizarre to me, but a lot of people find meaning in it. So i want to see wicca protected by the first amendment. etc.
Anyway that's how i think. The way you are looking at things doesn't really make any sense to me right now, but i'm really trying to understand your belief system because in my experience that is how progress is made.
i repeat, the authors of the bill of rights more than likely did not have satanism in mind when they were constructing protection of religion. can anyone truly argue otherwise. i am not even saying they were right, just that they were much less tolerant of satanism than modern society. it is their writings that you guys so virulently refer to, yet you would find their beliefs disgusting today.
also, one need not believe in satan to have disdain for his followers. it is funny how you posed as an open minded inquirer in the beginning and now your true colors have come out. are you a witch? an atheist? have you ever participated in wiccan rituals with your friends?