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Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
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You go off labeling people - especially those you don' t know - and you expect civility??
...
Trust me - that's almost as accurate as phrenology - to which my previous post aludes.
No response is needed for that little rant Cronus!
No, that is crap and I believe you know it. I have dealt with people like you who want to LABEL ALL politicians as being the same. Conservative republican voters say this a lot. I know some who do this.
Democrats have the interest of the poor, the working class,minorities, immigrants, gay people and anyone who is not out to feed the rich and think it will trickle down.
We have a terrorist fr a president right now and the christians are behind him 100 percent! Most suburban white people are too. So are racists and the very wealthy.
Obama was out to help all of the people I mentioned, but he was blocked by the republicans and trump who brainwashed people with that birther nonsense.
Republicans are not out to help atheists either. They would love to lock us up along with the gay people, the immigrants and anyone else they fear. Nice try, but you have no facts in this argument!
Hard to bring yourself to vote when neither of them represents you in any way, shape or form, and the third option - if there IS a third option- hasn't got a snowflake's chance in hell of getting its bum on a Congress seat, isn't it? You feel like you're just propping up the status quo so it can drop on you harder when it collapses under the weight of its own inequality.
Global financial deregulation fucked us. We cut the reins to let the runaway horse have its head and now it's dragging us off the cliff like lemmings. But the 1% will be ok. Maybe even the 10%. Maybe even the 20%, if the 1% need 'em. The 80% won't be. Hell, they're not ok now. And it's everywhere, Cronus. There in the States. Here in Australia. It's in the UK and the EU, too. It was never any different in the rest.
Well for me atheism certainly has nothing to do with politics.... As I don't have anything to do with politics, and don't put myself into any particular political categories.
Keep away from the categories, by all means, Fishy1. Don't be a Democrat. Don’t be a Republican. Don’t be a 'my party, right or wrong' fanboy, PLEASE! But watch what they do, especially how they vote - there's usually a gap between the rhetoric and the voting so fucking wide you could drive a fleet of 747s through it, wing tip to wing tip. And read the party policies. They're not a hard read any more. They're short - lots of three word slogans and motherhood statements that make nice soundbites, keep the pollies 'on message' and look nice on the telly. You don't even have to vote if you just can't stomach it, (Sometimes the choice between Thing One and Thing Two is just too hard. A lot of Americans felt that way in 2016. It was the lowest voter turnout in 20 years.) but watch what they do with a skeptical eye and tell people what you see.
@ Fishy 1
Maybe its time for you
"Martin Niemöller (1892–1984) was a prominent Protestant pastor who emerged as an outspoken public foe of Adolf Hitler and spent the last seven years of Nazi rule in concentration camps.
Niemöller is perhaps best remembered for the quotation:
First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me."
@Old Man it's the same old story.
It's very easy for people to believe the majority will vote against their own interests, but it's very hard for people to believe their government will vote against the majority's interest.
This thread started 15th January, but I thought this was worth adding, was noteworthy:
https://www.atheists.org/2018/02/cpac-rejection/
"Washington, DC—After appearing at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) as an exhibitor for the past four years, American Atheists was denied that opportunity this year."
Mr David Silverman responded:
"It has been our position since we first reached out to CPAC’s organizers that advocating for strict government neutrality in religious matters is not a partisan issue. Reasonable people can have reasonable debates about the size of government and its role in our lives, but having the government pick winners and losers in the religious arena is not small government, and it is not what our founders intended.
The numbers don’t lie: Half of atheists and non-religious Americans favor a smaller government. But almost 70% of non-religious voters cast a ballot for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. The only way to account for that difference is to acknowledge the fact that the conservative movement has lost its way and is more concerned with propping up a declining religious identity than putting forward small-government solutions to problems.
When CPAC’s leaders are ready to acknowledge the fact that the tidal wave of atheist voters is coming, and that a message of exclusion has pushed away million of voters, we’ll be ready to continue the dialogue. Until then, elevating religious voices who believe that religion—and, more specifically, a particular brand of religion—is necessary to be a real American will continue to be a recipe for disaster for the future of the conservative movement and will jeopardize the vitality of American politics."
I'm a conservative atheist. I don't particularly agree with Republicans on many issues, but Republicans aren't really all that conservative anymore. But, I thought I would hit some of your issues. If you get bored or grumpy about this, just skip to the last paragraph.
Separation of Church and State - There is no Constitutional separation between church and state. There very concept is an attempt to redefine terminology used in the Constitution and a tax code called the Johnson Amendment that was passed in the 1960s to keep religious people from having a public voice in politics. Atheists like to screech about various founding fathers believing in it, and they were. Unfortunately, their personal opinions on the matter did not make it into the Constitution. In point of fact, for the overwhelming majority of American history, there has been rather a lot of religion in school and in public affairs.
As an atheist, I am not particularly worried about what the religious folks have to say. I'm not threatened by their beliefs or their lifestyles. I'm certainly not afraid of them. Many of their beliefs actually make a lot of sense when you look at them in the proper context, even if you take "God" out of the equation. Like.... marriage.
Marriage Equality/Gays, - Frankly, I could care less about what people do with their naughty bits. As a kind of brief overview: The religious concept of marriage is about family, and as reproduction goes, homosexuality is a zero-sum game. Gay sex produces no offspring, and that's a problem if you consider that the whole purpose of marriage for pretty much the entire history of mankind has been to produce offspring. Beyond that, if you look at marriage from a historic view, then it's a religious issue that centers around procreation and in that light it makes perfect sense that they would be against gay marriage.
If you look at gay marriage from a legal view than it's simply a contract. I never have had a problem with the contract aspect. I do have an issue with the notion that gay people have some kind of right to force religious people to pander to them though. It's petty and sad, and it makes atheists who go around screeching about it seem petty and sad. I don't know how old some of you folks are, but I've been alive long enough to remember when the gay community refused to accept legal recognition of gay partnerships without it being called marriage. So.... I just really haven't had any sympathy with them on forcing people to bake them cakes and use their property for weddings.
Guns - I support firearm ownership. I personally believe everyone should own one and be well trained in how to use it. If I had my druthers,anyone who refuses to own one would be shot. (This is just one reason I should never run for public office...)
Death Penalty - Some people just need to be killed. When you rape someones grandmother and set her on fire, you just need to not be around anymore. I'm willing to live with an acceptable margin of error, so I'm sort of fine with the fact that innocent people may get whacked by the state on occasion.
Abortion - I really don't care one way or another about this issue. It's cheaper than the alternatives, but (like the next subject) it should absolutely not be the responsibility of government to fund abortion.
Healthcare - Not a right. Neither is free birth control or free Viagra.That aside; if the government is funding your body, then they control your body. This is something only a complete idiot would want.
Climate Change - I'm not a scientist. However, scientists are not exactly doing anything to convince people that this is a pressing issue. I would argue that they are doing about the least they could possibly do.The argument goes that mankind is destroying the planet. Okay.... So, let's look at how this life or death issue is being approached.
- The Paris Agreement to tax countries for polluting so other countries could pollute more was a bad joke,
- So far the scientific communities technology solutions are worse than the problem. Windmills will never produce as much energy as it takes to make them, and making solar panels produces more toxic waste that we have to deal with. Oh, and how could I forget those stupid mercury filled light bulbs that are so popular in landfills now.
- Somehow, people like Al Gore and Leonardo Dicaprio flying around the world in their private jets telling everyone how pollution is changing the environment just isn't convincing.
Economics - The free market works. If it didn't work for you, then you've been doing it wrong. The free market is nothing more than the opportunity for every person to be successful, it is not a guarantee that they will be. Having opportunities to succeed and failing is still better than having never had opportunities. Free market economies are completely misunderstood by liberals, who seem to think that there is some finite amount of wealth that certain people don't have access to. In reality though, free markets allow everyone to become as prosperous as they are able.
However, these issues are just noise. If you really want to understand why an atheist might be a conservative I'll tell you why I am a conservative. I was stationed in West Germany in the 1980's before the Berlin Wall came down. My units task was to guard a part of the border between East and West Germany called "The Fulda Gap". Because of my units location, I was able to visit East Germany when it was still under communist control. Since my post was right there on the border I spent a lot of time in East Germany, and was able to see East Berlin a few times during my enlistment.
Nothing will make a rational person reject the pap that liberalism preaches more efficiently than having seen it already carried out to it's ultimate conclusion.
Moreover, I think this notion that atheists are all supposed to have the same political opinions is patently ridiculous. Why on Earth would a thinking person free their mind from the chains of religion and willingly take up another ideology that enslaves the mind? I'm not accusing anyone here of it, but I've observed that many atheists blindly follow certain talking heads with a zealotry that shames the most pious godmongerers. If atheism requires a person to follow a certain moral ideal because Sam Harris wrote it in a book, and if we must all revere and hail the holy prophet Dickie Dawkins, then atheists are just exchanging one set of chains for another.
@Maketakunai: The free market is nothing more than the opportunity for every person to be successful
At it's best, the free market is a global information system that tells us what people want and how much they're willing to pay for it, so we can use our resources to get the best results for everyone.
Unfortunately it's rarely allowed to function in that way, because politicians are like little children tinkering with a clock until you have a useless pile of springs and cogs.
You didn't have to go to East Berlin to see the messes they make. In New Zealand politicians nearly bankrupted the nation by meddling with agriculture. They paid minimum prices for lambs, so farmers produced millions of lambs that nobody wanted to buy. They subsidized milk so heavily that dairy farmers bought bottled milk from the local store to feed to their calves so they could sell milk from their own cows to the government. To protect the butter industry, they made margarine a prescription drug.
The funny thing is, when governments create these chaotic systems, most people don't blame them for doing it, but for not doing it enough.
That is not what I was taught in Anthropology.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
sidenote:
that does not seem like a zero sum game
@ Nyarlathotep: I'm sure you can find an opposing definition somewhere, but this was the top search result when I Googled "Anthropologist definition of marriage"...
“Notes and Queries on Anthropology” defines marriage as follows (Kottak 2002: 214): “Marriage is a union between a man and a woman such that the children born to the woman are recognized as legitimate offspring of both partners” (Royal Anthropological Institute 1951: 111).
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
On the "zero-sum game" thing. Frankly, I found your comment puzzling.So I looked it up. Turns out I've been misusing that phrase for about 30 years or better. So, thanks for that! I'll rephrase my comment.
Since gay sex produces no offspring, it's relevance is extremely minimal within a social construct. It is neither detrimental or beneficial. So, redefining marriage to include homosexual unions does not impact a society enough to even be worth the bother. By the same token, there is no harm in it either. Which is why, as a straight man, I really just don't give a whooping fundt about gay marriage...
The phrase "Not my circus; not my monkeys." comes to mind.
@Maketakunai:
You told us the whole purpose of marriage was to produce offspring. Then cited a source saying the purpose is for the children to be recognized as legitimate. That contradicts your claim right there since the recognition of children is not the production of children.
Read the quote slowly. Try to comprehend what it says. Do you even realize that your whole point appears to be that I'm wrong about the point of marriage being to create offspring because I've cited an anthropological source that says the point of marriage is to create offspring???
“Marriage is a union between a man and a woman such that the children born to the woman are recognized as legitimate offspring of both partners”
The entire point of having legitimate children hinges on the need to have children in the first place. In order for the children to be recognized as "legitimate", they must be the offspring of the married couple. So, the point IS to produce children. Those children are afforded the benefits of "legitimacy", which historically include (but are not limited to) inheritance such as generational wealth, family lands and titles, filial benefits and responsibilities, etc..
Your objection is pretty silly...
My whole take is that no one has ever been worthy of my vote. Well, one person has: Abraham Lincoln. But, alas...
I have never voted because there has never been any person worthy of my vote. They are all Absolutists crooks anyway. And if they ain't, like my dad always said, "Even if they go in straight as an arrow, in less than two years they are crookeder than the Mississippi."
rmfr
@arakish "Even if they go in straight as an arrow, in less than two years they are crookeder than the Mississippi."
Or as we Brits say, the last person to go into parliament with honest intentions was Guy Fawkes.
This thread is so relevant to my current dilemmas.
Folks are starting to push back on the lefts appropriation of the culture.
I predict the current or next generation of kids will be the most right wing conservative generation ever seen.
You only need to look at the exponential rise of anti-SJW YouTube channels created by young men and surprisingly a few young women. Older women in small but growing numbers are deserting and opposing the left and feminism as defined by the left.
The left is now the "establishment" and the right a youth led counter culture.
Atheists need to be seen for what they are which is not a subset of the left wing political agenda.
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