How much does someone have to disagree before they are no longer part of a movement?

Great Debates
1

To me, if someone is a part of an organization or grouping of people - whether that would be Southern Baptist, Democrat, Boy Scout or even some vague social classification such as “hippie” - they should be able to defend the views of those organizations/classifications and also agree with a good portion of them.

If you say you are a Republican, but then start telling me how you are pro-choice, against the death penalty, for Afirmative Action and for the banning of all guns, I have to wonder why you would still consider yourself a republican? I know that the leaders of the party sure wouldn’t.

If you say you are a Mormon, but you then go on to condemn a lot of what the leaders of the LDS church do and live your life in a different way, at what point should you reconsider your religion?

The latter one is tricky, because while a Christian who does not follow Joseph Smith’s teachings can make a switch from a conservative sect such as Southern Baptist to a more liberal movement such as Methodist, there are not any different sects of Mormonism, to my knowledge.

I might be wrong about that particular scenerio, but does it make a difference whether you actually have a similar group you can move to? What if that’s the only game in town?

Sure, someone can differ from an ideal of a group in some cases and still be a member in good standing. But where is the line drawn? And who draws that line?

I think that a person does endorse what a group they associate with does to a large degree. If you align yourself with the KKK, I don’t really care that you didn’t actually lynch any black people or burn any crosses: By being a member, you endorse those activities.

This thread was pretty much a bunch of analogies, and for that I apologize. But I hope you get the drift…

Yer pal,
Satan

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7553 cigarettes not smoked, saving $944.13.
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I slept with a moderator!*

2

I’m more interested in what brought this question on.

Some organizations may boot you if you don’t toe the party line 100%; others may vary by degree.

At the NRA’s Annual Conference Member’s Banquet, I shared a table with a Life Member who’s position on gun control was a slightly lighter version of VP Gore’s; yet he wholeheartedly supported the NRA.

Go figure.

I don’t think that there can be a hard-and-fast answer for this one; it too situational.

ExTank
“Mostly Harmless :wally”

3

I disagree.

4

It’s an interesting question. I’ve often thought the same thing about many Democrats from my neck of the woods (deep South). More than a few are against abortion, are pro-gun, anti-affirmative action, pro-death penalty, business over environment, etc… to the extent that they are aligned to the right of many Republicans (on a national level). I guess the only thing keeping them “Democrat” in name is the New Deal mentality that says the government can provide jobs in more difficult times.

Did you know that when David Duke ran for President the first time, he did so as a Democrat?

As far as what would get them kicked out of the Party, I don’t know. Pro-life democrat Bob Casey was denied a speaking spot at the 1992 Democratic convention, which was widely attributed to his stance on abortion. But to my knowledge no one ever put pressure on him to leave the party. In politics, numbers count more than core beliefs anyway.

5

Satan; this isn’t a glib answer, but I think a lot of it boils down to herd instinct. Or perhaps tribal instinct. People who agree with and adhere to the strictures of one group, and incorporate it as a definition of their personality, have a lot to lose if that structure comes into question. Especially if a good portion of their social contact is built around that identity. It’s much easier, when those questions develop, to hide them under the rug and only talk about them when you feel “safe”. To be excommunicated from the tribe equals shaky ground, and that threatens your existence. It’s much safer to mutter under your breath and yank on the tie, so to speak.

Not that I agree with that mode of living. Any group that doesn’t constantly examine their motives, and freely encourage a questioning mind among their members, is dead in the water. It’s just going through the motions. If you can’t ask a question and get it answered, or if you get indications that you have to be ushered, under approval, to a “secret room” to get the answer, then it’s non-functional BS, to my mind.

Unfortunately, to be generous; it’s a scary world, and much easier to try to color neatly in the lines, rather that deal with the terror of connecting the dots.

6

I think there are definitely different answers for different situations.

For example, what does the Reform Party stand for? What does it mean to say you are a member of that party? Beats the hell out of me! I have a feeling it’s different now, with Buchanan leading the ticket, than it was when Perot led it.

Even with the established parties, the same can be true. The Democrat who ran for Illinois governor in the last election was, in some ways, more conservative than the Republican. He was anti-abortion, pro-gun, wore his religion on his sleeve, etc. (Then again, he also supported the right to burn the flag.) Before his nomination was secured, I asked an acquaintance of mine, who frequently gives Democratic fundraisers, if he would offer to give one for this guy, should he be the candidate. He said he certainly would. I asked why, considering his views. The answer, in summary, is that the guy is a Democrat.

(To throw another wrench into things, the guy in question who does the Democratic fundraising works for the chamber of commerce to fight for business when environmental regulations come up!)

Now, moving on to religion – can you be a Catholic and not believe the Pope is the end-all, be-all? Can you be a Catholic and be pro-choice and pro-birth-control? I, personally, don’t understand how, but I know a lot of Catholics who are.

What it all comes down to, I guess, is what you consider yourself. The Log Cabin Republicans consider themselves Republicans. Who am I to say different? Do I understand it? No. But, hey, that’s their choice.

7

I was raised a Catholic, and attended Catholic grade school where most classes were taught by Jesuits. You have to have a Doctorate before they let you be a Jesuit. Technically now I’m excommunicated for failure to attend Church. My religious status is uncertain at best, but I feel I can discuss Catholicism with some degree of “athoritah!”

The end-all, be-all thing is hogwash and surprising coming from you.

The Pope’s infallibility applies only to matters of the Church. He can’t use it to pick tomorrow’s lotto numbers. (kind of like when you use your moderator hat, 'cept the Pope’s is bigger.) In and of himself he is only a man and subject to all of man’s failings, errors, and evils. He is not worthy of worship himself, though he gets some of that. He washes a poor man’s feet every year to symbolically keep himself humble, and remember that his capacity as Pope makes him everybody’s servant.

That’s a far cry from be-all, end-all

As for being pro-choice, and pro-birth control, it’s very simple. Everybody wears many hats, not all of them are in agreement. It’s a personal choice of which takes precedent.

For Example:
A given man might be a father first willing to subordinate any other roles to this primary one.

A husband second, a humanitarian third (thus unwilling to force a woman to carry a baby she doesn’t want,) and a Catholic next. The rules of Catholicism are subordinate to those of Husband father and humanitarian.

I feel much the same way. I think abortion is almost always a horrible and terrible thing. I think it is wrong, except in matters of medical need.

But, a fetus is dependant upon it’s mother until it reaches a certain stage of development. I don’t think you can morally compel a women to go through this if she is unwilling.

So, I’m basically an unhappy pro-choice. As a quasi Catholic, and a human being I loathe abortion. In a perfect world everyone would have the choice, but none would exercise it.

8

I’m going to suggest you have it backward.

The organization should reflect the beliefs of it’s constituants. When it appears not to, then perhaps the leadership is the one hearing a distant drummer, and not the “wayward” laity.

9

Well, I decided to just give up on the Catholic Church when I figured out I couldn’t find anything I could agree with them on. To wit:

  • Pope’s infallibility: even on just matters of doctrine, nah.
  • Birth control: nope.
  • Abortion: nope.
  • Priestly celibacy: nope.
  • Non-ordination of women: nope.

Really, not a whole lot left. About the only thing was that if you’re going to be a Christian, belonging to the church that’s able to claim it’s a direct descendant of the Apostles is pretty good.
What’s interesting is when you start questioning everything some of the answers surprise you. At this point I don’t think there’s much of a chance that Jesus was divine, although a little piece of me still considers it a possibility…

10

A little cryptic, Dr. F. Care to elaborate just a bit? Or do you feel that everyone else has pretty much covered the topic?

I got the impression that Satan tossed out religion and politics as an example, not as the specific point of his question; hence mine (and others) view that it really varies according to whatever group/organization/philosophy/et. al. that’s being discussed.

Take my previous example of the NRA guy whose beliefs are to the left of the NRA’s party line: the guy’s a hunter, sports (competition target) shooter, a firearms and hunting safety instructor, and a police consultant.

He can very easily be within the NRA, and support it’s overall mission of “defending gun owner’s rights” and still have his legitimate beliefs.

Politics covers an even wider spectrum, as has been noted; Log Cabin Reps. and Southern Dems. probably being the most egregious examples, but by no means any less valid.

And I don’t wanna even think about religion.

I think I’m going to adopt a friend of mines (yes, I have friends!) philosophy on politics.

He views politics like religion: he’ll believe in it if/when it works.

Moral reltivists will claim that every conceivable permutation is possible, whereas absolutists will claim just the opposite: our way or the highway.

Bottom Line: You have to decie for yourself if the group you’re in truly representsd your interests; if not, whether or not you can convince others to your platform to sway the group, or go your separate way(s).

Pyrex hit upon something interesting; if there were more Log Cabin Reps., or centerists Reps. who were sympathetic to them, then the Rep. party would probably shift more center in its politics (I think personally that this would be a very good thing to have happen).

I’m a little disillusioned with the NRA; I think that they peddle fear just as bad as any politician running for a hotly contested office. I’ve written and e-mailed them several times (with no reply) that I thought that they need to dial back the inflamatory rhetoric and the fear pandering, in order to present a more moderate face to mainsteam America and fence-sitter gun owners (as well as those other gun owners who are as turned off by the hype as I am).

There have been several doctrinal schisms w/in the NRA in the last 20 years or so; mostly hardcore purists who feel that the NRA wimped, and went off to form their own groups.

Does the NRA scare some non-gun owners? You should hear some of the fringe groups.

They scare me!

ExTank
“Mostly Harmless :wally”

11

Scylla said:

C’mon, man, what did you think I was talking about? You say it’s hogwash and then verify that it’s true as far as religious issues are concerned, which is precisely what I was talking about!

I mean, isn’t abortion, birth control, the ordination of women, etc. within the realm of “matters of the Church”?

Ha! Says you.

Which is kind of the point of this thread. How can you wear different hats like that and still call yourself a member of Group A? If your religion flat-out teaches that X is wrong, yet you believe X is okay, how can you still be a Truly Believing member of that religion?

12

good morning friends,

having belonged, and then left some of the organizations mentioned, i would like to chime in here with an opinion. it seems to me that the change is gradual, but eventually you realize that you disagree with more than you agree with.

i was an n.r.a. member back in the days when their primary mission was hunter safety couses. the more emphasis placed on “second amendment rights” the less i seemed to agree with. when the n.r.a. attempted to defend our rights to fully automatic weapons with teflon cop killer ammunition, i found that i could no longer support the ideals the organization stood for, so i left.

i was a cub scout at age 8, a boy scout at 11, and an adult leader from age 22 to 35. at first it was difficult to see, but there has been a gradual shift to the right through out the scouting movement. once open to boys of all faiths, our local council was decidedly protestant christian. at the national level, a boy was expelled from the scouts because of his atheism. i saw an increasing amount of politics in the upper levels of leadership. soon the local republican campaign and the scouts advertising campaign were using the same slogans and catch phrases, so i left.

i was baptized a catholic. i attended catholic schools from kindergarden through my first year of college. the priest at my church also served as chancellor of the arch dioces, which essentially makes him the arch-bishop’s right hand man and leagal advisor. when there was a potential scandal of a pedophilic priest, my priest was the first person contacted. rather than contact the authorities, he sent the offender to a treatment center 1500 miles away, then stonewalled the investigation. when i pointed out that this, in the secular community, would be considered obstructing justice and aiding and abbetting a felony, i was told “maybe you should consider worshiping elsewhere.” i took that as a rather informal excommunication, and i left.

i have taken a long winded approach at answering the original post: sooner or later, the ideals of the oganization force you to either change your views or leave.

13

I will suggest that most organizations won’t boot you and that when it is done it is only under extreme circumstances. It is in the interest of the organization to maximize its membership. The larger the membership, the more able the organization is able to say, “look at how many people agree with us; we must be right!”

Using the NRA as an example, they don’t care whether you are a member because you think that everyone should be wearing a holster at all times or because you agree that handgun restrictions are a good idea but oppose legislation because you believe it will trickle down to affect your right to hunt. They want numbers.

There are plenty of quasi-Catholics like Scylla out there, many of whom continue to attend church because it is an important part of their lives that they are unwilling to give up despite their disagreement with some of the doctrine. The church isn’t going to ferret them out and excommunicate them; you have to do something really bad to get an official boot. We can be charitable and claim that the reason the church allows “imperfect” members is that its mission is to save souls, but a large membership base doesn’t hurt either.

The onus is on the individual to decide whether he agrees with or accepts the organization’s tenets. I think elelle’s comment about herd mentality is important. We are social animals. It is very difficult for us to break from the pack. (Consider the college student sporting the latest “rebellious” form of clothing/hairstyle/body modification: “I want to be different, just like everyone else!”) On a more serious note, most people find great comfort in a group of individuals who share their ideals.

For me, the decisions has boiled down to whether or not the views that I am questioning are actually harmful (in my opinion) or merely a difference of opinion in an area of basic agreement.

I have long been a supporter (and member) of La Leche League. They have been a great support to nursing mothers. But there was one time, while I was attending meetings, that I disagreed with the leaders’ response to a question. A new member showed up with her barely-one-year-old baby, explained that she was going back to work soon, and asked for advice on weaning her son. Of course, the leaders went into their usual speech about how she could continue to breastfeed, giving her advice about how to approach her boss, etc. If she had, after this pep talk, looked all fired up and ready to go, I would have had no problem. But she didn’t. She looked confused and worried. She nodded her head in all the right places, but I’m sure she went home thinking she had wasted her time. (She didn’t come back.) What they could have done is pointed out that some women successfully bottle feed with formula during the day and breastfeed at night. It doesn’t always work (some babies decide they prefer the bottle, some women can’t keep up their milk supply with infrequent nursing) but it’s better than nothing. They could also have given her advice on weaning in a way that would be easiest for her and her baby. Maybe she wasn’t ready to be a crusader. Maybe she had simply decided that weaning was the best thing for her situation. The leaders could have told her, “of course we think that continuing to nurse is best, but there are also some half measures you might consider, and if you decide otherwise, here is how best to wean.” But they didn’t; they have an all-or-nothing approach that I think does some disservice to some people who might otherwise benefit from their wisdom and experience. However, I don’t think that their approach is actually harmful. While I might do things a little differently (and therefore could never be a leader) I continue to agree with and support the basic beliefs of this organization.

On the other hand, I won’t allow my son to join the Boy Scouts. Certainly, the organization does some good things on a local level. But by supporting them, even at a local level, I feel that I would be tacitly supporting the anti-gay stance they hold on a national level. There is no grey area here; they are, in my opinion, wrong, and I cannot support an organization that discriminates.

14

Any organisation needs to have some level of dissent or disagreement if it is to continue to be relevant.

Once everything is set in stone, so to speak, there is no flexibility and the whole thing starts to stress and creak.

Political parties in the UK have had to look at their long and dearly held ideologies and have either modified or ditched them in order to get elected.
This may seem cynical but I see it as responding to the electorate.
Unions have had to do similar things and recognise that without cooperation then a bancrupted company is not going to be able to provide union membership of its workforce.

Similar things have happened with religion many times which lends itself to the question which comes first, the church or the peope ?
Unity at the cost of integrity is not worth having but splitting up into inneffectual shards of opinion is useless too, which is what makes this a subject with no definative answer.

15

Robinh:

No argument there, Robinh; ordinary rank-and-file opinion is beneath the executive-level’s notice. But some of my aforementioned “schisms” originated as member-movements to try to “change the agenda” or “tone”, with the net result of these folks taking their toys and going to play elsewhere (like Idaho, Montana, Wyoming and Alaska).

Ironically, I may now be in this category. I don’t want be divisive in the face of opposition, and recognize the need for a coherent defense, but the NRA is beginning to get on my nerves as well, what with their rhetoric and confrontational attitudes.

Not that I don’t support their overall mission(s), but the manner in which they are doing so (I think) will not help attract more members or bring the issue to a rational national-level discussion palatable to main-stream Americans.

I don’t want this to seem like a pro/anti hijack, just an illustration from my personal experience addressing the OP as to how far can a person drift from the larger group’s meaning/message w/o having to reconsider and possibly go their separate way.

As far as religion goes, it would be very hard to split doctrinally from the UCC, the denomination that I was raised up and confirmed in; they’re a very tolerant, moderate denomination, with a wide range of views among their members, who are suprisingly tolerant of other views and generally seek compromise and concensus.

Being from a tolerant Protestant doctrine, the whole religious intolerance thing kinda bewilders me.

I have met people of other religions who have spanned the entire range of their respective faiths, but still consider themselves one thing or another, regardless of the official positions of their organizations. Who am I (or anyone else other than their fellow members) to argue what they want to call themselves?

Their fellow members may take exception, but it certainly is none of my business how others seek to define themselves, as long as it doesn’t harm me or my interests (and, not [generally] being the defensive/paranoid type, I don’t see too many interests directly threatening to my worldview/way of life).

ExTank
“Mostly Harmless :wally”

16

Satan said

To me, it depends on the organization. I don’t understand how you can identify yourself as a member of a religion,political party or certain organizations (NOW, etc) without agreeing with their core views, since that’s sort of the reason for belonging. However, many organizations aren’t like this. I doubt anyone joins the AARP,unions, or fraternal or civic organization because they agree with all or most of the organization’s political or social views.

David B said

David, it’s a bit more specific than “matters of the Church”. It only applies to doctrine, not tradition,so it doesn’t apply to the ordination of women,just as it didn’t apply to the prohibition on girls being altar servers ( previously “altar boys”). I believe that when the birth control encyclical was issued, infallible authority was not claimed.

17

Responding to the OP-

Well, Satan, I don’t know about other organizations, but I can tell you about the Catholic Church.

As long as you believe in the Church’s dogmas and teachings on faith and morals, you can disagree with a lot of matters of church discipline and still be a faithful Catholic.

For example, you can think the idea of a celibate priesthood is a crock. Indeed, the Eastern Catholic Churches will ordain married men to the priesthood. I know one married Catholic Priest, and briefly met another.

You can believe that women should be ordained to the diaconate, but not to the priesthood. There is scriptural precedent for deaconesses…

The Church really doesn’t care if you’re politically liberal or conservative, as long as you don’t violate any of the moral teachings. I personally think abortion should be legal, not because I believe in the concept of a woman’s “right to choose”- she had the option of keeping her legs crossed- but because I know that if a woman wants an abortion, she will obtain one no matter what the law says, and I personally don’t want to go back to the days of coathangers and back-alley butchers. If a woman dies as the result of an abortion, it’s a double tragedy. I still believe that the unborn child is a living human being, and the mother has no moral right to kill it, except for cases where the mother’s life would be endangered if she bears it, and I’m a little iffy there…, but I’m also aware that human nature is what it is, and I don’t believe in punishing the mother for her sins…

Fundamentalist protestants, on the other hand, will call your Christianity into question if you disagree with their political views…

18

Thea said:

Um, so will some “fundamentalist” Catholics. Or did you forget the movement by some priests to encourage excommunication of Catholic politicians who were pro-choice?

19

Some.

Key word. It’s not a denomination wide thing.

20

And the same is true of what you said – you just neglected to include the word “some.”