Re: US election
 

Like in the middle ages? Like in Iran? Like under the Taliban regime?

See HangFire's comment.

Besides, I find comments like these to be quite typical among more conservative-thinking people. Whenever there's the freedom to choose something, many conservatives react as if now everybody were forced to decide for the new alternative.

It was like that when laws concerning funerals were changed here in Germany. For example, these new laws allowed burials on specially reserved areas which do not belong to any graveyard owned by any religious community. Thus, many conservatives cried havoc and rejected these new laws. It is as if the government had decided to allow coffins being painted in pink. As a reaction to this, conservative circles would have protested that they'd never have their coffins painted in pink - but who would force them to do so? They could continue as they pleased, nothing would change for them! Still they protest against anything that allows more freedom...

This is the point where their attitude becomes hypocritical: On one hand, they reserve the right to do as they please, and they would revolt if that right were to be taken from them. On the other hand, they try to deny others the rights they claim for themselves.

Doing so, they deny one of the most fundamental pieces of common sense, general agreement and a precondition for a peaceful coexistence of all kinds of humans, which has found its way into all constitutions of those states that we call civilised: The principle of equality.

No liberal politicians would ever think about banning the conservative Christians' form of partnership - a Christian marriage. Even allowing an alternative form of partnership like some kind of gay marriages would not take anything away from Chrsitian people who want to live according to their belief.

But conservative politicians don't only think about banning other forms of partnership, they do it.

This shows an attitude that's quite common among people who belong to an organised religion: "We have God and the absolute truth on our side, thus we are superior and don't have to be equal. We can force others to live by our laws, but not vice versa. We demand that we and our belief be accepted, yet we refuse to accept other people and their respective beliefs."

If this is what they (and you?) think, then you should ask yourselves if it is truly a democracy you desire, or a fundamentalist theocracy - for inspiration, visit the Middle East. :|

If that's not what you want, then why not accept the idea that on this world, a state allows each man to live after his fashion (as long as it doesn't break other people's fundamental rights), and that it doesn't judge which way of life is the only true and correct one - if there is one at all ?

If you have decided for one and think it's a right decision, congratulations. But like you had the possibility to make that decision by yourself, why don't you leave it to others to decide for themselves in the same way ?

I think that making all these decisions possible without discrimination is the duty of a modern state. Judging which is the right way for oneself is reserved to each individual, and judging which is the right way at all is a question above all humans. If you really believe in God, trust in your God to judge, and leave earthly matters that affect all people (religious or not) to earthly institutions that benefit all people (religious or not) without anticipating a final judgement that is not yours to make and forcing this judgement onto others.


"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable [inalienable] Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness."

Re: US election
 

consider this post a glamorous and monumental reply (go **** yourself MarD :D :D :D)

Re: US election
 

consider this post as spam...

Re: US election
 

Heyyo,

Hahaha, I knew I'd have something like that comin' at me for my comment. :P

But yeah, remember TWrecks, there's like, different degrees of christianity, and people like Bush are like, the hardcores. It's either for or againstsomething, no middle, no comprimises. He gets heard by all and consider this to represent America, and christianity. So just remember, before getting mad at christianity in general, remember that no one thinks exactly alike, and that you can't really have 1 person represent millions upon millions of people cause yeah, each person's unique. (I've really gotta learn to word my opinions better...:D). I for one would've preferred having Kerry represent the country I'm gonna live in, but hey, decisions were made, and I just hope that they were for the better of the country...

Also, remember, there's people who are pretty dumb govenors too. Did you guys hear aboot the Govenor of alaska, and what he did with the cash for "federal homeland security funds?" he bought a private jet... yes, to fight terrorisim. 9_9

http://www.akdemocrats.org/index.php?con_id=5

Re: US election
 

Thats not that stupid. Whats stupid is giving Alaska funds to "Fight terrorism".

Re: US election
 

Heyyo,

Heh, HangFire, it gets worse dude, apparently Alaska has more security funds per person than NY. Yet again I heard this on the Daily Show with John Stewart on the "Back In Black," portion of the show, but he's usually pretty accurate. He said something like, "Every alaskan gets 40 cents per person for funds, and NYers get 22 cents per person." So yeah, with all those extra funds sittin' around any kindof idea (in this case stupid) was bound to show up. :P

Re: US election
 

nice post, wrecks... i generally agree with all of it, but i was just wondering about one thing: Is it ethical to force open-mindness upon other people? - what if they don't want to be open-minded?

Re: US election
 

@ MarD: I was referring to those "hardcore" Christians.

@ Exilibur: Interesting question, but I don't think it's a problem. Look, they don't need to be open-minded, and even if it were necessary, there would be no way to force them to be liberal. With more fundamentalist or fanatic people, there is not even a way to get them to see reality... they live in their own world and their own reality.

Take an example: In the USA, there's a certain (and not unimportant!) group of Christians who call themselves (or get called) "creationalists". Those are people who believe word by word what's in the bible. Evolution? Darwin? Physical or biological laws? Forget it. For them it's all in the bible. In some areas, schools no longer teach the creation of the world and its development according to widely accepted scientific facts - they teach the creation of the world etc. as written in the bible!

Some of these creationalists have even built a replica of Noah's ark according to the most exact dimensions they could extract from the biblical writings, and they believe that Noah took a pair of each species onto his Ark and thus preserved life.

You cannot get such a person to become open-minded. You can't even reason, discuss or argument with them; it's pointless. Say that the Ark wasn't big enough to hold animals of all species, let alone keep them away from each other so that the lions don't end up eating the zebras - such people will swear it was. Prove them wrong, and they will say that many animals have been transported as eggs or babies. Prove them wrong again, and they will shrug and say something like God has accomplished it somehow and it's not up to us humans bla bla bla.

Ask them why they don't believe that the stars are hung up in the sky and dangle down towards a flat earth. Ask them what they think where the space shuttles went and why the Earth looks so suspiciously spherical from space... you could beat them up and still wouldn't get them to accept anything. They are beyond any argumentation, you don't reach them.

So I guess it's absolutely impossible to force people to be open-minded.

The good news is that they don't need to be forced into more liberal thinking. All it takes is to prevent them from forcing others under their rule, and keep them out of public institutions. If they want to live in their world, fine. You could say that this is what we all do in one way or another. For them, liberal people live in a world of make belief and shut their eyes in front of the godly truth or whatever. All it takes is an earthly government that will keep groups with conflicting opinions from attacking each other. It's not required to achieve something by force that cannot be achieved by any force in this world. If they think that it's against God's will to have sex for any other purpose than reproduction, and that only married couples may have sex at all, no problem. It's their good right to believe that, and if I say I am for democracy, I say that I'm for their right to believe that, whether I like it or not. If they have children and teach them all that stuff, it starts to become problematic, however, because the poor children cannot choose and are too young to judge by themselves... but in the end I think we have to accept it. The limit is wherever they want to carry their opinion over into public institutions (= everything which doesn't belong to their church or their private life) such as "normal" schools etc... a government must take measures to prevent that.

I think that's a compromise both sides can live with (although they might not like it), but also one that's beneficial for all sides in the long run and most of all - possible.

Another interesting question, though: What makes people become like this? Is it the natural way people think, and have more liberal people moved away from the norm? Or is a more open-minded attitude the norm, and have those fundamentalists moved away from this norm? And if so, why?

Re: US election
 

Every country has a president which deserves for.

BTW - Don't forget, guys, about $7 of BU rules... :P

Re: US election
 

Ahhh!!! It's those damn commies again! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

J/K. The cold war is over. Or is it? BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU!!!