Lon
Well-known member
Fence jumper.
OK Supreme Court: 10 Commandments must come down
- Thread starter Jose Fly
- Start date
It wouldn't be to a religion exactly.
TH was talking about the historical significance Christianity had on the US so I was trying to run with that. A simple display of the 10 Commandments lacks context to make the purpose clear but if the display incorporated information about the founders with some explanation then it couldn't as easily be construed as the establishment of Christianity.
Thanks for explaining.
I agree with the part in bold. I'm skeptical that any of these Decalogue displays is an innocent attempt at showing history. At the same time, I don't think the calls to have it removed are all innocent either. I don't have much sympathy for either side.
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Pretty close. Perhaps even worse: it would be a monument to the supposed intertwinement of the American identity with Christian doctrine. As if Christians don't already feel overly entitled to the whole of this country:
http://www.wweek.com/2016/01/02/mil...tern-oregon-because-the-lord-was-not-pleased/
gcthomas
New member
How did that militia group get so radicalised? Perhaps they need deporting to the Yemen or somewhere that sort of roaming armed militia behaviour is expected from radicalised religionists.
More specifically it would be the intertwinement of the founders and Christianity. As founders, there could be some extension to the American identity as a whole but America isn't interchangeable with its founders.
While Bundy believes he has a divine mandate, his cause is not really about Christianity. There could be, and probably are, non-Christians who support the Hammonds like Bundy does and the cause they are fighting for is not specific to Christians or about the establishment of Christianity.
PureX
Well-known member
We can thank the republican party for that. They couldn't get elected on their own merits, so they had to find a group of voters who were in the habit of believing things in spite of the evidence to the contrary, that they could convince to vote for the republican candidates, and against their own best interests. And there they were: the Bible literalists. Folks who have devoted their lives to believing things that are countered by the evidence.
All the republicans had to do was start playing on their fear, ignorance, and prejudice, which are considerable, and they had an easily manipulated and very "motivated" voting block to help put them over the top and get their toady-for-the-rich candidates elected. All they had to do was tell these "believers" that the queers were brainwashing their kids in the schools, or that the democratic candidates want to take their guns, or is a Muslim, or that the opposing candidate has sired interracial bastard babies (as they claimed about John McCain), or some other slanderous idiocy, and the Bible-believers would run to the poles in droves to vote against them, and thereby to vote for any sorry candidate the republicans put forward. And they're STILL falling for this trick 25 years later!
Now, they all believe the nation is being destroyed by queer-loving, gun-hating, terrorist-supporting, baby-killing, liberal democrats. Because these people have believed all the idiotic slander the republican party has thrown at them. And with all that fear and animosity building up in them it's no wonder they're "radicalized". The problem is they're also insanely ignorant of the truth of things, and they just don't care. Because the facts of reality have always been their 'enemy'. So all their anger and energy is completely misplaced, and they don't even care that it is. Believing what they believe is all that matters to them. Belief is truth for the terminally self-righteous.
It's a sad saga in American history, for sure. Now these folks are so crazy, and so seething with misplaced anger that the republican party can't control them, anymore. And they're beginning to tear the party apart with their insanely radical rightist attempts to turn America into some theocratic fantasy "Bibleland" while the republicans themselves are busy trying to rob the nation blind for their wealthy patrons. It'll be a miracle if we survive the onslaught of greed and stupidity.
I assume you mean post #310. Here is part of it.
These examples are about laws that involve action by the government or people. I'm not sure how comparable those are to a display. Monuments can't establish anything by itself. These are also largely about what happens in schools. I can understand a greater concern about requiring or providing prayers/religious displays in a school because of the impressionableness of children. A monument at a court building doesn't seem very similar. Even the one that seems most relevant, Engel vs Vitale, involves children praying in school. And the one that did involve the 10 Commandments was a law that required them to be posted in all classrooms.
The part that I find most important is this from Lemon vs Kurtzman:
While I don't think the monument establishes Christianity I do think it can and does create contention in the political environment we have. Because of that and because I do question the motives of many of the monument's supporters I'm not sure it's worth the battle.
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