Samantha Bee walks us through the process by which evangelical Christians in the US in the 1950s shed their deep disdain for engaging in politics to becoming a powerful political force by the 1980s especially within the Republican party, to then subsequently declining in influence. The Republican choice of Donald Trump this year over the many more religious alternatives such as Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and Ben Carson who all explicitly highlighted their religiosity shows the extent of the decline, though they are by no means reduced to insignificance.
Mano Singham
Just another Freethought Blogs site
Yeah, sad the Christians changed their position with respect to political involvement.
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Jesus is reported to have said, “My kingdom is not of this world”.
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How can someone who claims to follow the Prince of Peace support the concept of government (statism) which is absolutely dependent upon theft and violence for its perpetuation?
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Even the Atheists bow themselves to the principles of theft and violence in order to sustain the perpetuation of the state. Without even realizing it they too have given themselves over to the religion of the state.
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Too bad Christians, other religions and Atheists alike don’t see themselves for the control freaks they actually are. The following short video makes it as plain as day.
Ahhh, anarchy. Another wet dream fantasy for mostly white men who have figured out all the problems in the world by not giving it much thought. Like Libertarianism, it’s a perfect solution for everything!
Samantha Bee has been absolutely hilarious. I feel like Samantha Bee and Jon Oliver have both upped their game since the Daily Show.
@1 Randall Lee
Oh I found a great video of Stephan Molyneux you should check out! I think you’ll really like it. Unfortunately it’s only like 5 hours long. He’s really got to be more longwinded and rambling in his speech. That’s what I watch him for!
You should look into joining the rest of us in reality some time! Though, it’s an acquired taste, and you clearly haven’t acquired it.
Awesome episode by Samantha Bee! I loved this segment, especially when she brought the whole thing full circle by showing that right-wing evangelicals were getting back to their racist roots by supporting Drumpf. Watch the whole episode for the Seattle Seawards!
doublereed writes,
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I have recognized the reality of violence you so readily embrace. Not ready to join however. The taste of blood is one I would rather not acquire.
@PDX_Gregg Teaching others and living in accordance with the principle of non-violence is the perfect solution for everything. Teaching them that its ok and necessary to ignore the principle when it comes to the ideology of statism, i.e. collectivism, is hypocritical.
#5
Without a governing body there is no rule of law, and without some form of taxation -- the collectivism you so revile -- there is no governing body. Taxation of some form is quite simply necessary for a nation to exist. Additionally, your idea that we simply ‘teach’ people to behave nicely, and in doing so do away with the need for a government, is purest fantasy.
@6 Holms
Oh no, it’s much worse than pure fantasy. It’s based on kangaroo courts, witch hunts, and rule by force. The alternative to “implicit violence” is, in fact, explicit violence. The alternative to public accountability of violence is zero accountability for violence. Pure vigilante justice.
Also, let’s face it, the whole anarchist/libertarian notion of violence is just a bizarre redefining of violence however they want to define it at the time. They like to pretend their hands are clean, when what they really support is violence against people who can’t fight back, and ensuring that they have no legal recourse.
I mean, Randall Lee’s libertarian buddy Stephan Molyneux is a big supporter of Trump. Trump, a guy who has incited violence at his rallies by saying he would pay for the legal fees. Think about that for a moment. Beating the crap out of nonviolent protesters, and getting away with it. Many of the right-wing libertarians and anarchists clearly love this prospect and are supporting Trump. Outright fascists.
These guys don’t hate violence. What they hate is the state that takes their tax dollars but doesn’t let them beat their wife. All of their violence is justified.
Ahhh … the classic Libertarian canard about how what you have is rightfully “yours”. Never mind that the surrounding society has made every thing you have, and everything you are, or will ever be, possible.
That you are more or less healthy because a government has made it possible for you to be so by demanding that the doctor your mother went to was trained and that the water your mother drank was relatively clean. If you grew up in the last 35 years and were poor the government made sure your family had food, and some minimal healthcare, you likely qualified for school lunches. But it only just starts there. You likely have a job because the industry was made possible by government backed basic research and publicly funded infrastructure.
No, I’m not saying that everything that government does is good and right, or effective. But the same can be said about private initiatives. Private prisons are far more notable for their profit margins than their cost-effectiveness, humanity, or record of rehabilitation. Even the best of them barely meet the standards of the governmental organization they replaced.
It also helps to keep in mind that much of the worse of what the government does has been pushed for and actively promoted by the wealthy and influential entrepreneurs so frequently cited by the Libertarians as exemplars. The very same people who had made their money playing on a field kept more or less civil and level by concerted government actions paid for by the collective.
Of course, once they had made their money they quickly forgot about the roll collective will manifest through government action played in their success. The fact is that the prosperity depends on the power and effectiveness of the government. The government is an arm of the people. A government of, for , and by the people is the ideal. A great and powerful nation and people need and deserve a great and powerful government.
Taxation is not tyranny. Taxes are the individual cost of citizenship in a society that endeavors to manifest the will and good of the collective while protecting individuals.
Well, libertarianism and anarchy are almost indistinguishable. Libertarians are just anarchists with a couple special pleading exceptions, often government courts and police.
Well, with Steveor gone, we now have a new complete and utter jackass to fill his place in Randall.
PDX_Greg@2, EnlightenmentLiberal@10,
Randall Lee is a far-right “anarcho-capitalist” i.e. a particularly stupid and hypocritical variety of libertarian (have a look at the putrid views of Murray Rothbard if you want a fair sample -- “free market in children” anyone?). It’s worth distinguishing anarcho-capitalism from anarchism proper (as propounded by e.g. Peter Kropotkin, Emma Goldman, Noam Chomsky), which is an anti-statist form of socialism. Still impractical, in my view as an ex-anarchist, but proposes bottom-up confederal-collectivist organisation of society and the economy.
@12 Nick
Well, that was the most disturbing Wikipedia article I’ve read in a while.