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Diogenes
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Re: Flags ...

Post by Diogenes »

kunkmiester wrote:Been a busy couple of days. Been wanting to type this post up on the desktop but haven't really had time. Probably tonight or tomorrow.


Will look forward to reading it. I enjoy a well thought out and well reasoned argument.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —

Tom Ligon
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Re: Flags ...

Post by Tom Ligon »

Confirmation bias ... an interesting concept I'm sometimes accused of having by people suffering from it.

If you believe that people are inherently horrible, no doubt you can confirm it. And no doubt you will conclude that only the imposition of strict laws with equally strict punishment will force them to obey the superior moral standard that its needed.

But who's moral standard? Kim Jong-un's? Putin's? Hitler's? The Pope? Abu Mohammed al-Adnani? Recall, the original topic here is flags.

Or do you believe, as Barry Goldwater did, that we're better off with less government and as much liberty as we can stand without stepping on each others toes?

Tom Ligon
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Re: Flags ...

Post by Tom Ligon »

Here's a little question that I think may shed some light the subject of libertarian thought.

What is the proper way to eat pizza?

Is this a trivial question? Every election cycle several candidates run afoul of the Pizza Police. While out and about and surrounded by the paparazzi politic, they stop for pizza. And one or more will have the audacity to take a knife and fork to their floppy slice. This will raise howls from those who say there is only one proper way to eat a pizza, and it is with your hands alone.

Now if they could just decide if folding a slice double is actually correct.

Me. I think it is criminal to serve a pizza with a crust so soggy that it sags like a wet dish rag, but as Jay Leno observed, even bad pizza is pizza. And if confronted with a floppy slice, I'll damned well cut the end off with a knife and fork and eat it anyway. Because I don't give a darn how anybody else thinks I should eat it.

I would be wearing New Balance Walkers with Velcro "laces" if I could still get them. The Shoe Police seem to have equated them with old people and gotten them banned. The one exception is cycling ... cycling shoes with laces are out of favor with anyone who ever had a lace wrap around a pedal. But cycling has its own police: Lycra shorts or no? Shave legs or no? Titanium or carbon fiber? They have a hoot when I show up on a 40-year old Schwinn singlespeed cruiser.

And then there are the people who think they can tell me what to think. The ones who accuse anyone who does not agree with them as a Republican/Democrat In Name Only. Or who tell the Duke boys they're being racist for flying the Stars and Bars. This week, someone wants a new name for Stonewall Jackson High School, because this particular brave, brilliant, and beloved military leader fought for the losing side. Or who expel children from school or accuse them with crimes for behavior depicted in Norman Rockwell paintings (a 5-year-old boy stealing a kiss from a 5-year-old girl cannot be a crime, because Norman Rockwell painted cute and charming, not criminal, behavior).

One of the latest trends is to judge politicians by how many pieces of legislation they have introduced and gotten passed. Me, I prefer politicians who do NOT introduce new laws, but maybe work to repeal a few of the dumber ones. Because I'm of the opinion that we have a surplus of them already.

Tom Ligon
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Re: Flags ...

Post by Tom Ligon »

How many of you believe our moral code should require:

That women should wear veils in public?

That women should keep their arms and legs fully covered, and that any proper woman must wear gloves so that she does not have to touch the skin of another human being?

That it shall be a crime to speak to a woman to whom you have not been properly introduced.

No, I'm not talking about backwards places in the Middle East. I'm talking about the US and Great Britain a little over a century ago, with some of these taboos persisting into the mid-20th century. Really ... watch an old episode of Perry Mason and see the veils and gloves! And just last week there was the woman who was told to go home and change her shoes ... the company dress code required her to wear high heels.

hanelyp
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Re: Flags ...

Post by hanelyp »

KitemanSA wrote:Hey folks, any body here ever slavered to go out and kill and enslave? Isn't that mainly the provence of government?
Government commonly reserves such activities to itself, brutally stomping on those who infringe on it's exclusive purview. But absent social norms and a means to enforce them (aka government) you'd find a lot more killing and enslaving taking place at the hands of people not nominally part of government. The difference between misconduct of government and misconduct of individuals frequently is little more than the means at their disposal and capability of those in opposition.
The daylight is uncomfortably bright for eyes so long in the dark.

Diogenes
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Re: Flags ...

Post by Diogenes »

Tom Ligon wrote:Confirmation bias ... an interesting concept I'm sometimes accused of having by people suffering from it.

If you believe that people are inherently horrible, no doubt you can confirm it. And no doubt you will conclude that only the imposition of strict laws with equally strict punishment will force them to obey the superior moral standard that its needed.

You must have skipped over reading the part where I mentioned that laws and police are not a workable solution; That the only workable method is a system whereby everyone has generally agreed source for what constitutes right and wrong.


Tom Ligon wrote: But who's moral standard? Kim Jong-un's? Putin's? Hitler's? The Pope? Abu Mohammed al-Adnani?
Seriously? Western Civilization is founded on Judeo-Christianity and you are suggesting we look at socialist dictators for moral guidance? Why would you say that?


Tom Ligon wrote: Recall, the original topic here is flags.

Thread drift happens. Especially when you put in a caveat regarding social conservatism. It is the bedrock foundation of our society, and a financial system cannot endure long without it.


Tom Ligon wrote: Or do you believe, as Barry Goldwater did, that we're better off with less government and as much liberty as we can stand without stepping on each others toes?

Barry Goldwater was right about some things, and wrong about others. I agree with him where he is right, and I disagree with him where he is wrong.


Libertarians are a lot like atheists in postulating how society would be just fine without the influence of that annoying moral stuff, but in fact none of them ever seem to take into account that we got to this point by being floated on this annoying Moral/Christian stuff, and so our current semi-atheist, semi-libertarian society is just running on the inertia left over from the moral system they currently disdain.


In other words, what little societal functionality that remains is the consequence of what they are trying to toss out.


A few generations later when most of that annoying moral stuff has been forgotten, people will resort to their default values of morality, which is basically tribal/genetic.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —

Diogenes
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Re: Flags ...

Post by Diogenes »

Tom Ligon wrote:
One of the latest trends is to judge politicians by how many pieces of legislation they have introduced and gotten passed. Me, I prefer politicians who do NOT introduce new laws, but maybe work to repeal a few of the dumber ones. Because I'm of the opinion that we have a surplus of them already.

And here I agree. We are 240 years a nation. One would think most necessary laws have already been here for a long time.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —

Diogenes
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Joined: Mon Jun 15, 2009 3:33 pm

Re: Flags ...

Post by Diogenes »

As if on cue, this shows up today.

The liberal West has been driving on the fumes of Christianity for about a century now and the car won’t go much further.
We think all that matters is being tolerant, kind, compassionate, forgiving and by that what we mean is that we let anybody do whatever they want however they want because personal freedom is all that matters and “who am I to judge?” The problem with this is that without the Christian faith there is soon no Christian morals. Why should a person be good if there is no God? As Dostoevsky said, “If there is no God everything is possible.” When the only virtue left is tolerance and tenderness everybody gets away with everything and there’s no one to put on the brakes.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —

Tom Ligon
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Re: Flags ...

Post by Tom Ligon »

Regarding Judaeo/Christian morality, I'd like to point out that this particular moral reference does require a bit of filtering. We, as a society, have been forced to re-evaluate and cherry-pick this body of history and find those things which we can concur are good and wholesome, and reject those which are abhorrent.

For example, stoning these days is more metaphorical than physical, although we do observe it happening. Physical stoning is abhorrent to western civilization these days, and we condemn it when we see it carried out by Islamic cultures.

And we've pretty much rejected sacrifice of animals and humans on an alter, although sacrifice is still a core belief of Christianity: the regular symbolic cannibalism of God is a pretty bizarre feature for a modern religion.

We've rejected burning witches. We've outlawed polygamy. We've gotten rid of slavery. Our system of justice is more Roman than it is middle-eastern. When we say "Thou shalt not kill", we have a very different meaning than the ancient interpretation that "Thou shalt not murder members of your own tribe, but have at the Other Guys." Although I will admit, our actions are often more in line with the ancient interpretation.

The uniquely American concept is our First Amendment. The idea that this freedom is part of our very Constitution is not supported by Judeo/Christian heritage. Yet we cherish it, because this country was founded by religious refugees from a century of turmoil in Europe over the emergence of Protestant religions. So we mixed Catholics, Protestants, and smatterings of other beliefs, not to mention inventing a few of our own, such as the Mormons. They all thought the others were damnably wrong. And they all thought the Government should damned well stay out of establishing a State Religion. This essential liberty to chose own belief system is the foundation of our national identity.

Jefferson was hard to pin down on having a formal religion (as was Lincoln). Jefferson wrote quite a bit about the subject. He seems to have been a closet Unitarian, and was a friend and admirer of Joseph Priestley. He responded to critics who claimed he was not a Christian. His responses claimed he was, although he rejected much of biblical teaching as myth, no different from pagan myths such as those of the Greeks or American Indians. He was sure these would be rejected in time by an intelligent population capable of making their own judgements. What he thought would prevail was the underlying ethics of Jesus, which he thought were "excellent". He thought a lot of people purporting to teach Christianity were usurpers of the name, and blowing hot air.

http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/presidents/th ... efl239.php

Or see various letters to Dr. Benjamin Waterhouse or pastors of various congregations.

My point in this is that, while we do, in fact, derive morality from the Judaeo/Christian heritage, we do so selectively, after identifying those portions which we know in our hearts are abhorrent. Some of the parts we find abhorrent are, in fact, portions of Judaic law adopted and retained by Islam. So we are not "off the hook" by simply blindly observing some body of moral law that goes back 4 millennia into the sorts of tribal history that is full of the very tribal social failings that are being condemned by almost all posters on this thread.

Diogenes
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Re: Flags ...

Post by Diogenes »

Tom Ligon wrote:Regarding Judaeo/Christian morality, I'd like to point out that this particular moral reference does require a bit of filtering. We, as a society, have been forced to re-evaluate and cherry-pick this body of history and find those things which we can concur are good and wholesome, and reject those which are abhorrent.

For example, stoning these days is more metaphorical than physical, although we do observe it happening. Physical stoning is abhorrent to western civilization these days, and we condemn it when we see it carried out by Islamic cultures.
I believe stoning is old Testament stuff. Not much of a bible reader, but I seem to remember that bit.



Tom Ligon wrote: And we've pretty much rejected sacrifice of animals and humans on an alter,
Also old Testament stuff.

Tom Ligon wrote: although sacrifice is still a core belief of Christianity: the regular symbolic cannibalism of God is a pretty bizarre feature for a modern religion.


Religions start where they start. We would be fine with a religion that incorporate elephants standing on turtles if it brought with it the same established moral doctrines that Christianity produced.

Image


But i'm thinking an essential requirement to the story has to be something within the range of what people will regard as plausibly miraculous.




Tom Ligon wrote:
We've rejected burning witches. We've outlawed polygamy. We've gotten rid of slavery. Our system of justice is more Roman than it is middle-eastern. When we say "Thou shalt not kill", we have a very different meaning than the ancient interpretation that "Thou shalt not murder members of your own tribe, but have at the Other Guys." Although I will admit, our actions are often more in line with the ancient interpretation.

Actually, that commandment is interpreted incorrectly by most Christians. The correct meaning is closer to "thou shalt not murder". Killing is fine. Murdering is not. (Also the "thou shalt not commit adultery" commandment is incorrectly interpreted.)


Tom Ligon wrote:
The uniquely American concept is our First Amendment. The idea that this freedom is part of our very Constitution is not supported by Judeo/Christian heritage. Yet we cherish it, because this country was founded by religious refugees from a century of turmoil in Europe over the emergence of Protestant religions. So we mixed Catholics, Protestants, and smatterings of other beliefs, not to mention inventing a few of our own, such as the Mormons. They all thought the others were damnably wrong. And they all thought the Government should damned well stay out of establishing a State Religion. This essential liberty to chose own belief system is the foundation of our national identity.

I encounter this claim a lot. It is historically incorrect. In 1787, there were official state religions in several of the states. (Seven, I think.) Virginia had but recently done away with it's own official state religion (Anglican) but the understanding that other states had not yet done so was prevalent among the founders.

For example:
Delaware State Constitution Oath of Office, 1776: “I _______, do profess faith in God the Father, and in Jesus Christ His only Son, and in the Holy Ghost, One God, blessed for evermore; and I do acknowledge the holy scriptures of the Old Testament and New Testament to be given by Divine Inspiration.”

The intent was not one of creating a blanket religious freedom, the thinking was more along the lines of "How do we insure that 13 states, many of which have different denominations for their official state religions, work together in a coalition government? "

"I know. We will specify that there must be no religious tests for office." In 1787, it was self evident that the nation would be explicitly Christian, (The constitution itself refers to "Our Lord".) but the various states were concerned that a particular denomination of Christianity would impose doctrinaire requirements on other states of differing denominations.

But this history has been deliberately obscured and overwritten by people who do not like it. They are history revisionists with an agenda.



Tom Ligon wrote: Jefferson was hard to pin down on having a formal religion (as was Lincoln). Jefferson wrote quite a bit about the subject. He seems to have been a closet Unitarian, and was a friend and admirer of Joseph Priestley. He responded to critics who claimed he was not a Christian. His responses claimed he was, although he rejected much of biblical teaching as myth, no different from pagan myths such as those of the Greeks or American Indians. He was sure these would be rejected in time by an intelligent population capable of making their own judgements. What he thought would prevail was the underlying ethics of Jesus, which he thought were "excellent". He thought a lot of people purporting to teach Christianity were usurpers of the name, and blowing hot air.

Jefferson was pretty much a Deist, and a deliberate Troublemaker, among other things.


Tom Ligon wrote: My point in this is that, while we do, in fact, derive morality from the Judaeo/Christian heritage, we do so selectively, after identifying those portions which we know in our hearts are abhorrent.

Such as?

Tom Ligon wrote: Some of the parts we find abhorrent are, in fact, portions of Judaic law adopted and retained by Islam. So we are not "off the hook" by simply blindly observing some body of moral law that goes back 4 millennia into the sorts of tribal history that is full of the very tribal social failings that are being condemned by almost all posters on this thread.

Such as?


Anyways, beside the point. Since Roosevelt appointed his collection of kook judges to the Federal judiciary, the state has become officially hostile to what used to be the normal expression of religion by the people and their governments.

You cannot rationally claim that Prayer must be banned from Public schools when Officially sanctioned State religions existed before during and after the ratification of the US Constitution. Obviously it does not preclude official state religions, or else they wouldn't have existed concurrent with the adoption of the US Constitution. (Which does itself exempt the President from working on Sundays.)

This business of separating the US Government from non-interference or even advocacy for religion (Military used to be required to attend services every week) is a recent phenomena. (Roosevelt and subsequent courts)

Here's a bit of proof to demonstrate that by 1862 (four score and six years later) the Nation still regarded itself as an expressly Christian nation.

Image


It just doesn't fit the modern fiction that everyone wishes to believe.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —

krenshala
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Re: Flags ...

Post by krenshala »

Diogenes wrote:As if on cue, this shows up today.

The liberal West has been driving on the fumes of Christianity for about a century now and the car won’t go much further.
We think all that matters is being tolerant, kind, compassionate, forgiving and by that what we mean is that we let anybody do whatever they want however they want because personal freedom is all that matters and “who am I to judge?” The problem with this is that without the Christian faith there is soon no Christian morals. Why should a person be good if there is no God? As Dostoevsky said, “If there is no God everything is possible.” When the only virtue left is tolerance and tenderness everybody gets away with everything and there’s no one to put on the brakes.
I'm curious why you consider liberal and libertarian to be the same thing?

Tom Ligon
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Re: Flags ...

Post by Tom Ligon »

Diogenes, you keep asking "Such as ...", but brushed off the answers because they were from the Old Testament. You are using the filter of which I spoke, eliminating the Judaeo from your Judaeo-Christian morality.

Which is fine. I'd hope you do not buy into the Genesis creation myth.

You seem to confuse libertarian with liberal. You also seem to think libertarian means anarchist. Or maybe antichrist. Or both.

I don't usually push my particular take on Christian morality, but I think it is well summarized in Matthew 22:37-40, a discussion between Jesus and a another Jew.

Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

So that's Christianity in a nutshell. Its all about love. If it is not about love, it is a poor substitute for the real thing. And with you, sir, I'm just not feelin' the love.

Tom Ligon
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Re: Flags ...

Post by Tom Ligon »

Was Jefferson a Troublemaker? Oh, yes, and with a capital T. And what the heck is wrong with that? It was pretty much a hallmark of those radicals and revolutionaries who got us started.

You got a problem with that?

hanelyp
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Re: Flags ...

Post by hanelyp »

krenshala wrote:...
I'm curious why you consider liberal and libertarian to be the same thing?
The term "liberal" in a political context has been greatly abused. A century ago it denoted favor of liberty and limited government. Since then it has been hijacked by leftists who favor quite the opposite. The only liberty favored by the leftists who hijacked "liberal" may be better describes as license, or libertine, dismissal of social norms that allow a nation to survive and prosper.
The daylight is uncomfortably bright for eyes so long in the dark.

Betruger
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Re: Flags ...

Post by Betruger »

Diogenes wrote:Even nowadays, if you are in the wrong parts of the world, the brutality of man is still manifesting itself in all sorts of cruel ways.
You have NO idea who you said this to. This is typical of your arguments. Presuming so much. It's so not even close to my POV that like so many other times reading your posts I reread them a second time to make sure I read them right.

Yes the world is dirty and even williatw in the other thread, re: curing aging, sounds way too simple and optimistic to me. That doesn't mean there is nothing between his extreme and yours, or that the answer must be as simple as either of those extremes. The world didn't get to this peaceful lull or to its current state of science & tech, etc, by brownian motion.

Tom Ligon wrote:Diogenes, you keep asking "Such as ...", but brushed off the answers because they were from the Old Testament. You are using the filter of which I spoke, eliminating the Judaeo from your Judaeo-Christian morality.

Which is fine. I'd hope you do not buy into the Genesis creation myth.

You seem to confuse libertarian with liberal. You also seem to think libertarian means anarchist. Or maybe antichrist. Or both.

I don't usually push my particular take on Christian morality, but I think it is well summarized in Matthew 22:37-40, a discussion between Jesus and a another Jew.

Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

So that's Christianity in a nutshell. Its all about love. If it is not about love, it is a poor substitute for the real thing. And with you, sir, I'm just not feelin' the love.
If I'm allowed to admit my own private POV about a religion I'm neither believer nor disbeliever of, that is exactly it. GIT and other people who are so far gone they forget that, all sound that way. No love.
Diogenes wrote:Dostoevsky had this stuff figured out 150 years ago.

If there is no God, everything is permitted.
Fyodor Dostoevsky
All roads lead to Rome.
IE
If there is love, there will be God; even if unwittingly.
You can do anything you want with laws except make Americans obey them. | What I want to do is to look up S. . . . I call him the Schadenfreudean Man.

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