Re: Do you believe in God?
PFSS:
These days, with the exception of *** Marriage and Abortion rights it's not so much the government restricting people to enforce a moral code but more commonly people in the governments employ (mis)using government power to promote religion.
Pretty big exceptions, but let's forget about them for the moment. For every instance where you can cite a case where the religious right is trying to get the Government to promote religion, I'll cite three where the secular left is trying to eradicate religious expression with anything that has any dealings with the Government. And, unfortunately, that encompasses more and more each year. I also bet that in a large percentage of the cases you cite you'll find that the religious right is just trying to re-establish something that used to be the norm.
Again, I must stress, I am making no comment on whether or not this is a good thing. I'm just stating that the belief that the religious right is in a full battle to force religion on a historically religion-free society is a gross distortion of the facts.
Also - Why is it the Secular "Left"? Can't economic "Right Wingers" also be secular? I realize that there is a as stronger trend for the non-religious to be left-wing, though I suspect that a portion of the cause of that is the taking over of the Right by religious groups. I know a few people who are very economically right wing, but can't support the republican party in it's current state as they feel it has a far too socially restrictive and moralistic stance.
I call it the secular left as a tongue-in-cheek response the phrase "religious right". Certainly there can be religious people on the Left; but, just as certainly, there can be secular people on the Right. (
Example.)
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Dondrei:
False, it [the court requires witnesses to swear that they are telling the truth by taking a vow with their hand placed on a bible] never required that.
You're correct. Too many old movies, no time spent in court.
Again, that's "moral survival" versus physical survival. Pretty weak attempt at equivocation.
Nope. Jaded societies collapse physically as a result of the collapse of their internal code of ethics. Dying is dying. A country ruined by climate change is no worse off that a country ruined by invasion, corruption, or rampant lawlessness.
And your opinion is more laughable than usual.
Care to elaborate? Exactly why is my opinion on Climate Change laughable?
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WildBerry:
We're talking what one can say in a college campus area, yes? What's prosecution got to do with that, anyway? It's not really a State jurisdiction matter, or is it?
And I still argue that when I tell my little pupils to stop calling each other foul names, it's not because they've taken slight - it's the assumption that one will take slight. Nor do I often bother finding out the exact intent for reaching for those names. I assume it to be evident from the choice of words alone, for some words are meant to hurt, and are to be treated accordingly.
Bad choice of words on my part -- "prosecution"; change that to "punishment" or "persecution".
I'm not talking about being punished for using obviously derogatory words or phrases in speech. I'm talking about using otherwise innocuous words or phrases that people chose to be offended by. Let me direct you to a website that I find fascinating.
. TheFire.org Specifically, read some of the cases listed on
this page. I've taken excerpts from four particularly egregious examples.
Columbia Law School: Professor George Fletcher, a renowned and respected legal scholar, taught an introductory criminal law class in the spring semester of 1999. In one exam, he presented his students with a hypothetical case-based in part on several real cases-that involved a woman who was grateful for a criminal assault that resulted in a miscarriage. Several faculty members and students objected to various aspects of the examination, finding it demeaning to women. The dean of the Law School, David Leebron, informed Professor Fletcher that the complaints he received constituted "a plausible contention of liability an[d] unlawfulness," and that he was "required to consult with the University's office of legal counsel" about the matter.
At Central Michigan University, students who hung flags and other patriotic articles on the doors of their dormitory rooms were told by a resident assistant to remove them because they might be "offensive" to other students.
According to the Columbia [University] Spectator, the University initially suspended its club ice hockey team for offending the campus community by posting bawdy recruitment flyers. In addition to their suspension, not only was the team to be placed on probation for two years, but they were to submit a written apology to the community based on “the offensive nature of the recruitment poster.†The flyer’s recruitment message, meant to attract strong athletes to their hockey team called “The Lionsâ€, simply read “Don’t be a pussy.†As in pussycat.
Student government presidents of the four undergraduate colleges at Columbia signed a letter to the administration demanding the insensitive hockey team be reprimanded for their flyers; one of the presidents was quoted as saying the flyers “espouse offensive ideologies.†The jury is still out on how the flyer has anything to do with an ideology when the “offensive†phrase in question is a common slang term for young adults of all political persuasions.
The allegedly discriminatory flier advertised an upcoming speech by Daniel J. Flynn, author of the book, Why the Left Hates America. The flier, which Gonzaga had pre-approved, contained the title of the book in large letters with the words "left hates" emphasized. Some members of the Gonzaga community complained about the fliers to administrators, and many were torn down—in violation of Gonzaga's own rules.
In fact, at least two were torn down by administrators. "When I saw the poster," explained Director of Student Activities David Lindsay to The Gonzaga Bulletin, "I took one down because our publicity policy says that we don't allow hate speech to be posted around campus."
Instead of punishing the censors, however, Gonzaga's administration forced the College Republicans to change the wording of the flier to make it clearer that the words were part of a book title. When the complaints from offended students continued, administrators chose to place a disciplinary letter in the group's file for using the words "the left hates" on the fliers, suggesting that that use of the word "hate" was "discriminatory" and might constitute "hate speech."
