I’m sorry, kevlaw, but does “we have agreed” mean the same thing as “I have said” in your language?
How about you answer some question kevlaw?
Do you honestly think the changed PoA was not devisive?
How do you interpret the word indivisible?
Do you consider the laws of the nation to take precedence over “God’s law”?
And last but certainly not least, where the hell do you get off calling athiests unpatriotic when the ones constantly attempting to pervert the spirit of the constitution are (a certain type of) Christian?
To answer your question, the spirit of the constitution is quite clear- if the judges are too cowardly to do the right thing that doesn’t change what is plainly obvious.
Sorry Minty Green - I should have made it clear that I was summing up the exchange that I was having with Tomndebb. Feel free to point out any errors though… or point out anything you disagree with.
I am not sure what I think has to do with the debate at hand.
I don’t believe I did.
Except to the people whose job it is to interpret it ?
kevlaw wrote:
IF the legal system says it is Constitutional.
It ain’t over 'til the fat lady sings.
You’re right kevlaw, you didn’t say you think athiests aren’t patriotic. I suppose you’ve made it abundantly clear that you aren’t a patriotic christian as your example stated.
Or even more simply kevlaw, do you agree or disagree with the statement you posted?
In general, people are pretty much alike, despite differences in belief. In this country, we actually have more to fear from the moderately well-organized theocrats of the Religious Right (not all Christians or all Fundamentalist Christians, but that small group of followers of Roberston and Falwell and company) than we have to fear from the not-at-all organized assembly of people who are not religious.
We have evidence that a pluralistic society that elects an atheist has absolutely nothing to fear regarding a political effort to destroy or outlaw religion, given that none have made any effort to do so. This sugests to me that calls from the Religious Right to “defend” ourselves from atheism are prompted by a fear thet they will lose power, not a legitimate fear that they may be outlawed. (The fear may be real, but it is baseless and silly.)
I certainly have a more legitimate fear (based on historical precedent) that the Religious Right will attempt to govern the way that I worship or interfere with what I may read or how my children will be taught in school than that some non-religious person such as Thomas Jefferson or Salvador Allende will attempt to prohibit me from worshipping or passing my faith to my children. And as a God-fearing, patriotic, Christian American, I make no assumptions that atheists would not be or are not already patriotic.
I don’t think he made any attempt to do anything which was related to religion. By the way, I’m not even sure he was atheist. More like agnostic, I’d guess. Anyway, there has probably been a lot of atheists elected in various countries. We would have to check the religious beliefs of every single leader and I guess we would find much more atheists than Mitterrand and Allende. The religious beliefs of foreign leaders seldom make it to the world news. Actually, in countries where religion isn’t a big issue, a lot of citizens may have no clue about their leader’s beliefs. For instance, I learnt only today, following a link provided in this thread that the former french prime minister, Jospin, was atheist. I knew his family was protestant, but I had no clue if he believed or not. And by the way, he didn’t do anything to ban religion, either.
Apart the communist dictatorships, are there any other example of governments trying to ban religion (as a whole…not a particular religion, since this is rather common…in particular when the said government is driven by its own religious beliefs)?
—So we have precedents for modern, pluralistic countries to elect atheists as their leaders and we also have a clear trend that modern, pluralistic countries are turning away from Christianity.—
Japan is a very unreligious society. Dunno about their prime ministers, but it’s nothing at all like in the U.S. where piety, true or feigned, is necessary to win majority support (since the majority often sees everything as a “with god/against god” issue)
If you take atheism as simply the lack of god belief, then trying to chalk up Stalin and Mao as evidence of “what atheists might do” is about as silly as chalking up Henry the 6th as an example of “what theists might do.” Since atheism is not a philosophy or a common belief system, it makes only marginally less sense than acting as if all “theism” was the same.
Can you name any atheist leader who tried to ban religion who wasn’t Communist?
Neil Kinnock did not come close at all. He was in the running, but at a time when Labour were as ineffectual as the Tories are now; he had as much chance of becoming leader then as Ian Duncan Smith does today.
Also, thank you for providing examples of atheist leaders (and non-leaders) who did not try to ban religion.
However, they are not the same countries. You’re collating different statistics to make a false conclusion.
Of course there are a few atheists who feel that way - but are they people with power? Are they of anything like the same status as, say, Senator Richard Byrd? Or are they just a few individuals on the street?
Ah, thanks for the sarcasm. I used Yahoo and it did take ages. I take the time to double check a fact, concede that you were right, and you take the piss. Next time I’ll just state my opinion regardless of the facts - something you might well be familiar with.
EchoKitty said
quote:
I don’t know where you get that athiests want to outlaw religion.
Then Kevlaw said,
“I didn’t say that all atheists want to outlaw religion. But it doesn’t take all of them. It only takes some of them. Do you believe that there are no atheists who want to ban - or at least restrict religion ?”
Athiests AS A GROUP don’t want to outlaw religion. They just want it taken out of government. What is so difficult about that statement that you and so many christians find impossible to understand? It’s not that tough!
Yes, I’m sure there are rebel athiests out there that can’t wait for a moment to burn all the bibles and chop off the church steeples, but I hardly think it is a threat. The big threat lies in religion mixing in with goverment. You’ll see we were right when a religion OTHER THAN YOUR OWN starts running the show. Don’t say we didn’t warn ya!
Queen Al
Ah - sorry for that. It seemed funny at the time - but churlish now. I apologise.
And when the fat lady sings, tracer, what will your opinion be then ? Or will you wait for another fat lady to come along like Tomndebb ?
We’ll have to wait for non-learning impaired justices to take office and re-read the constitution and determine how America could POSSIBLY allow “under god” in the PoA.
The Guardian (a left-leaning publication) didn’t seem to think so at the time
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/Politics/gallery/image/0,9353,-10804389507,00.html
Nor did the Sun (right-leaning)
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/Politics/gallery/image/0,9353,-10104389507,00.html
Or the BBC
http://www.bbc.co.uk/election97/background/pastelec/ge92lab.htm
Personally, I remember being extremely surprised that Kinnock didn’t win
I believe it is not a great leap for a god-fearing, patriotic christian american to assume that atheists would want religion banned.
What do you think czarcasm ? Agree or disagree ?
I also believe that there is a growing atheist sensibility in this and other countries that is become more organized.
Also, Tomnedebb,
I would say it depends on who you who mean by we. If we are the atheists you are right. If we are the god-fearing christians, I have to disagree.
And when the not-at-all organized assembly becomes the some-what-organized assembly and, say, marches on Washington ( http://www.atheists.org/whatsnew.shtml ) god-fearing christians will have even more reason to be be concerned.
Would it be fair, EchoKitty, to characterize this as waiting for the fat lady to be replaced with another fat person who sings the song the way you think it should be sung ?
I checked for you clairobscur
Nope. I am a God-fearing Christian and I have lots of historical precedence to show me that my worst fears are for some group of religious people to take over the making or enforcement of laws. Every anti-religious movement that the U.S. has seen has been an assault by some self-professed group acting “for God.”
Thomas Paine never endangered my rights.
Thomas Jefferson never endangered my rights.
Heck, Gus Hall never endangered my rights.
Good “Christians,” however, are threatening the quality of my childrens’ education by insisting on selective presentation of history and the corruption of biology classes. Good “Christians” burned down churches in Baltimore in the 19th century because my denomination wanted to use a translation of the bible different than the KJV in the public school classrooms where all the children were taught. Good “Christians” made it necessary for the properties of the churches in both towns where I was raised to be purchased through an intermediary because no one would sell to an official of my denomination. I have read the original deeds to my parents’ houses that originally declared that people of my denomination (along with Jews, blacks, and some other “undesirable” elements) were forbidden to buy the property. (The three later examples are historical and would not occur today, but they are clearly examples of the actions of “god-fearing christians.”) And a good “Christian” in Congress tried to prevent the U.S. Army from providing chaplain and support services to Wiccans in the Army a year or so ago–I have never seen an athiest call for the chaplaincy of Christians to be removed from the military.
Now, we have both Presidents Bush declaring that an atheist could not be a good citizen or that they should be barred from serving as judges (in violation of the Constitution).
Nope. We (i.e., all thinking Americans) have much more to fear from the religious than from the irreligious or even anti-religious.
Thanks for the heads up on the march. I’ll have to get some time off and think of a good supporting banner to display.