EPTOn September 10 2012 03:18 Defacer wrote:How could any intellectually honest person vote for him?
Luckily, this is the least important thing in american politics, for anybody.
President Obama Re-Elected - Page 471
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Hey guys! We'll be closing this thread shortly, but we will make an American politics megathread where we can continue the discussions in here. The new thread can be found here: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=383301 | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
Luckily, this is the least important thing in american politics, for anybody. | ||
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screamingpalm
United States1527 Posts
On September 10 2012 03:24 sam!zdat wrote: Luckily, this is the least important thing in american politics, for anybody. Heh I was thinking about how the Greens and progressives accuse the Democrat loyalists of the same intellectual dishonesty, and in turn the Dems accuse the Greens and independents for their own shortcomings and Gore's losing to Bush etc. | ||
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jdseemoreglass
United States3773 Posts
 But it's a pretty obvious notion. If there is no God then there is no absolute morality which means there are no inalienable rights. | ||
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JonnyBNoHo
United States6277 Posts
On September 10 2012 03:18 Defacer wrote: Mitt Romney just flipped on Obamacare ... or more specifically, his 'plan' is to keep Obamacare -- but without the individual mandate OR without paying for it. Keeping the Obamacare regulations without the individual mandate would make the cost of insurance skyrocket for individuals, or force the government to somehow subsidize insurers to offset the cost. So this is the fearless leader that Republicans insist is 'fiscally responsible' or knows more about the economy than Obama? Are you guys fucking serious? This guy that will obviously do or promise anything to be president? His policies defy logic. How could any intellectually honest person vote for him? I assume you mean people waiting to get sick to buy insurance? The individual mandate is just one way to solve that problem. | ||
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xDaunt
United States17988 Posts
On September 10 2012 03:52 jdseemoreglass wrote: xDaunt seemed to touch a nerve But it's a pretty obvious notion. If there is no God then there is no absolute morality which means there are no inalienable rights. I touched a nerve because it is so obviously true. Sure, not all democrats are anti-religious, but there is a significant liberal element that is. Just as an example, where do you guys think Obama's infamous "bitter clingers" comments came from? Hell, go ask any evangelical what they think of liberal "tolerance" towards religion. They'll definitely have a thing or two to say about it. | ||
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RavenLoud
Canada1100 Posts
If God = absolute truth, then religion = man-made institutions pretending to use "the voice of God". | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
On September 10 2012 04:09 RavenLoud wrote: As an Atheist, I'm not really anti-God, but I'm 100% anti-religion. If God = absolute truth, then religion = man-made institutions pretending to use "the voice of God". This is a mistake. The crisis of western civilization is in large part due to the collapse of the legitimacy of its traditional religious institutions. You should instead be in favor of better, more rational religion. | ||
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farvacola
United States18818 Posts
On September 10 2012 03:52 jdseemoreglass wrote: xDaunt seemed to touch a nerve But it's a pretty obvious notion. If there is no God then there is no absolute morality which means there are no inalienable rights. This could not be less true and displays a rather glaring lack of understanding when it comes to the foundation of political philosophy circa 1780 and on. While many people certainly concieve of a society in which religious ideas form the backbone of civically and societally "right" behavior, especially as it pertains to recognition of rights, an egalitarian society need not hinge its framework of individual liberty on the conceptions offered forth by the religious. If you are interested in reading up on the subject, I highly recommend Michael Sandel's Public Philosophy, he does a better job of explaining why inalienable rights as an idea can stand without notions of God than I can. | ||
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Derez
Netherlands6068 Posts
On September 10 2012 03:59 xDaunt wrote: I touched a nerve because it is so obviously true. Sure, not all democrats are anti-religious, but there is a significant liberal element that is. Just as an example, where do you guys think Obama's infamous "bitter clingers" comments came from? Hell, go ask any evangelical what they think of liberal "tolerance" towards religion. They'll definitely have a thing or two to say about it. No, you touched a nerve because the entire republican platform is hypocrisy incarnate when it comes to 'faith'. When (most) republicans talk about 'freedom of religion', what they really mean is the imposition of christian values over the entire population because it makes them feel morally superior. The proper place for faith is out of public life. It's a private choice you make, where you get to believe whatever you want as long as it doesn't interfere with what other people want to believe. The republican party knowlingly chooses to ignore that part of 'individual freedom' in order to mobilize the biblethumpers. | ||
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jdseemoreglass
United States3773 Posts
On September 10 2012 04:10 sam!zdat wrote: This is a mistake. The crisis of western civilization is in large part due to the collapse of the legitimacy of its traditional religious institutions. You should instead be in favor of better, more rational religion. More rational religion? I can't even interpret what that means. I'm guessing it's just another way of saying "secular humanism." | ||
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zalz
Netherlands3704 Posts
On September 10 2012 04:10 sam!zdat wrote: This is a mistake. The crisis of western civilization is in large part due to the collapse of the legitimacy of its traditional religious institutions. You should instead be in favor of better, more rational religion. Explain how the decline of religious insitutions is in any way part of the crisis? Let alone a "large" part. It sounds like nonesense, but feel free to dispell that appearance. | ||
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xDaunt
United States17988 Posts
On September 10 2012 04:10 sam!zdat wrote: This is a mistake. The crisis of western civilization is in large part due to the collapse of the legitimacy of its traditional religious institutions. You should instead be in favor of better, more rational religion. I am utterly shocked to hear this from you. That said, you are absolutely right. | ||
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sam!zdat
United States5559 Posts
On September 10 2012 04:18 xDaunt wrote: I am utterly shocked to hear this from you. That said, you are absolutely right. See? I am more complicated than you might think. I have to go right now, but if the thread has not moved too far by the time I get back perhaps I will attempt to expound further upon this thesis. My reasoning is a bit complicated, and not fully clear yet even to myself. Nevertheless, this is an idea to which I am heavily committed. edit: humanism, yes. Secular humanism, no. | ||
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screamingpalm
United States1527 Posts
On September 10 2012 04:13 Derez wrote: The proper place for faith is out of public life. It's a private choice you make, where you get to believe whatever you want as long as it doesn't interfere with what other people want to believe. The republican party knowlingly chooses to ignore that part of 'individual freedom' in order to mobilize the biblethumpers. This is exactly how I see it. Does that make me anti-religious? I just don't think religion should dictate public policy. | ||
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xDaunt
United States17988 Posts
On September 10 2012 04:27 sam!zdat wrote: See? I am more complicated than you might think. I have to go right now, but if the thread has not moved too far by the time I get back perhaps I will attempt to expound further upon this thesis. My reasoning is a bit complicated, and not fully clear yet even to myself. Nevertheless, this is an idea to which I am heavily committed. edit: humanism, yes. Secular humanism, no. I want to hear what you have to say anyway. | ||
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jdseemoreglass
United States3773 Posts
On September 10 2012 04:27 screamingpalm wrote: This is exactly how I see it. Does that make me anti-religious? I just don't think religion should dictate public policy. You don't think that religion should dictate public policy, but you DO think that morality should dictate public policy. For many people, there is simply no distinction to be made. Does it really make such a difference that their morality came from religion, and yours came from... Society? Because in the end, they both came from society, the religious AND secular moralities are derived from social norms, despite the religious and the secular convincing themselves that their beliefs somehow came from something "higher." Don't mind me, just thinking out loud. | ||
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RavenLoud
Canada1100 Posts
On September 10 2012 04:10 sam!zdat wrote: This is a mistake. The crisis of western civilization is in large part due to the collapse of the legitimacy of its traditional religious institutions. You should instead be in favor of better, more rational religion. Please elaborate, I'm seeing a very twisted understanding of cause-effect. The ability to speak out against religion is very central to the reason why Western civilization went from the Dark Ages to Enlightenment. It's thanks to freedom of speech, secularism and enlightening philosophies that the West managed to advance so fast and so far. If Vatican had their way of obfuscating all free thoughts, we'd probably be a lot more like the Middle East. The Founding Fathers were secularists, were they not? I could say that the current crisis in Western civilization is due to crony capitalism and a generation of entitled baby boomers not leaving enough children and slowly destroying the values that made them so great to begin with. I personally see this over-arching conservative sentiment of going back to the old days as evidence of a decline. Although I do admit that there hasn't be a clear and concise replacement for the rapid demise of these institutions, and sometimes people put too much faith in science and objectivism. | ||
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zalz
Netherlands3704 Posts
On September 10 2012 04:40 jdseemoreglass wrote: You don't think that religion should dictate public policy, but you DO think that morality should dictate public policy. For many people, there is simply no distinction to be made. Does it really make such a difference that their morality came from religion, and yours came from... Society? Because in the end, they both came from society, the religious AND secular moralities are derived from social norms, despite the religious and the secular convincing themselves that their beliefs somehow came from something "higher." Don't mind me, just thinking out loud. Secular morality isn't derived from "something higher." That would make it distintly not secular. Does it matter? Yes, it matters a lot. People perceive religion as a personal choice. You choose not to drink alcohol, or eat meat, that is your choice. You can dance naked under the moonlight, I really don't care. All I ask is that you don't draft laws declaring that once a month I must meet the national quota of naked moondances. Now, as ridiculous as you might consider the practice of dancing naked under the moonlight, so ridiculous I find the notion that a god is going to tell me who I can and can't have sex with, or marry. The main point why having religion dictate religion actually isn't because the believer/atheist split. The danger is that "the religious" don't exist. Christians, or Muslims, are also words without any real meaning. An evangelical Christian and a mormon don't have much to talk about. A sunni muslim government has little problem throwing a suffi or shia muslim off a cliff. The religious have shown, over the years, a great inability to not murder one another, or otherwise abuse the power of government to punish those they feel aren't part of the "proper" religion or denomination. The separation of church and state is the greatest thing to ever happen to religion. By blocking religion from climbing onto the seat of power, the religious groups are unable to abuse the government to get themselves favors, or to strangle their enemies with government sanctioned force. So why is it important that we keep religion from dictating morality? Because it won't be "religion" sitting on the seat of power. It will be mormons, catholics, protestants, evangelicals, methodists, baptists, and none of them will be able to control themselves. So, we split government and religion, allowing every denomination to exist, and each of them have equal rights, and none of them possesing any motivation to be king-of-the-hill. Secular morality applies to all people, regardless of whether they believe in it or not. Religious morality holds no value if you don't believe in it, because it is grounded on divine mandate, which is meaningless if you don't acknowledge the existence of the divine. | ||
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Defacer
Canada5052 Posts
On September 10 2012 03:52 jdseemoreglass wrote: xDaunt seemed to touch a nerve But it's a pretty obvious notion. If there is no God then there is no absolute morality which means there are no inalienable rights. Elaborate. Are you saying that there is no morality without God? Or that religious dogmatism has the benefit of being uncompromising and absolute? And if it's the latter, why is that a good thing? Why should one religion have a monopoly on morality and define it for everyone else? Ahhhhhh fuck it. No good can come from this conversation. | ||
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Defacer
Canada5052 Posts
On September 09 2012 13:00 BluePanther wrote: I DEMAND HOLISTIC MEDICINE TO BE COVERED BECAUSE ITS MY RIGHT! FREE ACCUPUNCTURES AND YOGA AND HERBS AND SPICES FOR LIFE! YAY RIGHTS! User was temp banned for this post. I think Blue Panther would be happy to no that Canada's clearly superior healthcare system does not cover holistic medicine, however many employers offer extended healthcare benefits that include such perks. Just because your have socialized healthcare doesn't mean it has to be moronic. | ||
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