Whyand How I'm a "liberal"

[Socrates]

[quote name='Snarf' date='Feb 7 2006, 03:25 AM'][i]If the state does not submit to or respect the higher authority of God, it becomes a god unto itself[/i]

Again, any concept of God might be an a priori to the individual, but to the government its just impractical to assume unless the religious foundations of the State are absolutely homogeneous.  By your logic, the ideal government would make it illegal to sell meat on Fridays in Lent.[/quote]
Governments can respect the Ten Commandments and the natural law of God imprinted on the hearts of all men. The state need not give special sanction to immorality.

[quote][i]And the "violating free will" argument is just ludicrous. By this logic, the only acceptable system would be absolute anarchy, as any law, rule, or regulation would "violate" the free will of those who would oppose it.[/i]

I should have the free will to murder anyone I like, but since murder is socially reprehensible I should expect to be severely punished.[/quote]
And people should be punished for other "socially reprehensible" deeds as well.
What is the point of this? - "States must respect the free will of people to do evil deeds - but they must also be punished."
How would the state [b]not[/b] respect the "free will" of people to murder?
This becomes silly sophistry.

[quote][i]Socialism by its very nature requires an increase in the powers of government. If you think it does not, you are living in Fantasy Land.[/i]

Socialism is far too young to be judged by history.  Its main tragedy was that Marx hated it, and so lulled people into support for Communism as an alternative.  I admit and support the fact that socialism requires a support of increase in powers over the economy, but in a modern context the economy is far too dangerous to be left in the hands of those born into power.[/quote]
You can split hairs here, but Communism is an extreme form of socialism - not something in opposition to it.
Socialism has not only proved a failure wherever practiced, but has been repeatedly condemned by the Church.

Pope Leo XIII in [i]Rerum Novarum[/i], declared socialism "emphatically unjust" and said Socialism is "manifestly against justice."
For what Pope Pius XI said about socialism, read my signature.

I say the economy is far too dangerous to be placed in the hands of government beaurocrats!

The free economy is made by the choices and actions of free human beings. What people do with their money should not be under the control of the federal government. If the state must "not violate people's free will" in other things, why should it violate their free will in economic matters?

[quote][i]The only reason marriage is given any legal recognition and privileges is because marriage is the basis of family, which is the basis of society itself. If a marriage is completely opposed to the procreation and raising of children, then it is indeed purposeless and pointless.[/i]

So when a homosexual is in the hospital, the one person in the world who cares about him/her should be denied clearance to see them because they don't have children or blood relations?  I'd recommend reading Warner's [i]The Trouble with Normal[/i], but I don't want you to get an anneurysm.[/quote]
This is silly. Why should being in a homosexual "relationship" give anyone privileges unmarried "straight" people don't have?

[quote][i]Suppression of free speech can be the only real purpose of "hate-crime" legislation.[/i]
Disenfranchised blacks in the South would get a kick out of that, I'm sure.[/quote]
Obviously, somebody knows very little about the South!
How exactly would "disenfranchised" blacks benefit from "hate crimes" laws?
Murders, etc. are already against the law! Those idiots in Texas who dragged that man behind the truck got the chair! (What more do you want?)
And the majority of crimes in this country are black on black, and black vs white crimes greatly outnumber white vs. black.
All crimes ought to be punished with equal justice, without regard to the race or persuasion of the perp or the victim. Anything else is an attempt at thought control. All crime is "hate crime." I know precious few crimes commited out of love!

[quote][i]The Nazis were far from being devout Christians, and persecuted those Christians (including Catholics) who dared oppose their Satanic agenda[/i].

The vast majority of antebellum Germany were church-going Nazis, in the same regard as modern America comprises probably 90% of either Democrates or Republicans.  Associating an ideology exclusively with those directly in power is dangerous and counterfactual.[/quote]
Once again you get your history wrong. When the Nazi party started, they were originally quite unpopular, and in the last free election, they got less than 44% of the vote.
And not everyone who voted Nazi was an ardent believer in Nazi ideology, and most Germans were not aware of the full horror of the holocaust and other attrocities commited by the government.
I'm not sure where you got your statistics on the religiosity of Nazis, but Germans in more religious parts of the country (such as Catholic Bavaria) were actually less likely to support the Nazis than their more secular counterparts.
You have done absolutely nothing here to prove that religion or religious conservatism was the cause of Nazi evil.

Your insinuation that religion is somehow to blame for the horrors of Nazism makes as much sense as saying, "most Democratic voters claim to believe in God; therefore religious belief is to blame for the Dems' promotion of abortion!"

And the Nazi ideology is indeed best understood by looking at the philosophies of those in charge!
If you were trying to find "the true nature of the Bush administration," whose views would you find more important, those of Pres. Bush and his cabinet members, or the "man in the street" who voted for him?

Considering the Nazi government in Germany a Christian "theocracy" is quite a stretch, to say the least!

Again, the old Lefty tactic of painting the Nazi party as a conservative religious movement fails!

(And the record of atheistic Communism is just as bad, yet it's a bit hard to blame religion for their attrocities!)

(And it's interesting that both of these horrendous ideologies came into power during a time of decline in Christian religious belief.)

[quote][i]Condoning and blessing sinful "relationships" is far from Christ-like[/i]

Nobody's asking you to "bless" or "condone" anything.  Treating all people like human beings would be a nice start, though.
[right][snapback]878569[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]
Nobody's talking about not treating people like human beings. Treating people like human beings does not require that we give them legal benefits for their sin. "Love the sinner, hate the sin."

[Snarf]

[i]Governments can respect the Ten Commandments and the natural law of God imprinted on the hearts of all men. The state need not give special sanction to immorality.[/i]

Some of the Ten pertain to society at large, some of them are exclusive to religion. By your logic, it should be illegal to worship any god other than ours. And if the state does not give special sanction to what some deem immoral, then it shouldn't "give special sanction" to religious marriages. If you really wanted, you could propose the same tax benefits to anyone cohabitating or anyone who raises children with no restrictions as to love or not.

[i]And people should be punished for other "socially reprehensible" deeds as well.
What is the point of this? - "States must respect the free will of people to do evil deeds - but they must also be punished."
How would the state not respect the "free will" of people to murder?[/i]

I don't really get what you're saying here. Is it that ALL immorality should be punished? Again, you're running the slippery slope.

[i]Pope Leo XIII in Rerum Novarum, declared socialism "emphatically unjust" and said Socialism is "manifestly against justice."
For what Pope Pius XI said about socialism, read my signature.[/i]

And Pope JPII declared the war against Iraq to be unjust.

[i]This is silly. Why should being in a homosexual "relationship" give anyone privileges unmarried "straight" people don't have?[/i]

That's what I'm saying, abolish governmental marriage and replace it with civil unions. Marriage as a sacrament should be exclusive to religion.

[i]Those idiots in Texas who dragged that man behind the truck got the chair! (What more do you want?)[/i]

Life sentence without parole, but that's a different subject.

[i]When the Nazi party started, they were originally quite unpopular, and in the last free election, they got less than 44% of the vote.[/i]

For a pluralistic system, that's a pretty staggeringly high number. What did Bush get in his first election? Less than 48%? Couldn't you call that "quite unpopular"?

[i]And not everyone who voted Nazi was an ardent believer in Nazi ideology, and most Germans were not aware of the full horror of the holocaust and other attrocities commited by the government.[/i]

[i]Mein Kampf[/i] made Hitler, not the other way around. And yes, I've expressed elsewhere that most people were oblivious to the holocaust. But that didn't make their political affiliations any less valid. That was my point.

[Socrates]

Sorry - I was going to respond to this last night, but some other things came up.

[quote name='Snarf' date='Feb 9 2006, 05:34 PM'][i]Governments can respect the Ten Commandments and the natural law of God imprinted on the hearts of all men. The state need not give special sanction to immorality.[/i]

Some of the Ten pertain to society at large, some of them are exclusive to religion.  By your logic, it should be illegal to worship any god other than ours.  And if the state does not give special sanction to what some deem immoral, then it shouldn't "give special sanction" to religious marriages.  If you really wanted, you could propose the same tax benefits to anyone cohabitating or anyone who raises children with no restrictions as to love or not.[/quote]

Ideally, the government's laws would be in accord with the truth of the Catholic Church, which contains the fullness of truth. Obviously, that is quite unlikely in modern America, but I still maintain that laws should conform as best they can to Christ's truth, or at the least, not contradict or uphold them.
The truth is, for a culture, a society, to exist, it must be build on some common principles or "values." And I doubt we'd agree which commandments are "exclusive to religion." This draws a false and artificial boundary between religious morality and public life, which is in reality not so clear-cut. All society would be better off if all 10 were heeded (much as this flies in the face of modern multi-culturalism and pluralism). While it may be at the moment impractical to forbid by law the worship of false gods, the government should do nothing to officially sanction or condone worship of pagan idols.

Radical pluralism cannot really stand for long as the basis of a society. Different religions and worldviews are indeed at odds, and often conflict.
If all "worldviews" are seen as equally valid, we simply have chaos.

Radical pluralism ends up with such insanities as the British Navy officially sanctioning the "rights" of an officer to perform Satanic rituals on his ship. (This was an actual recent case.)

[quote][i]And people should be punished for other "socially reprehensible" deeds as well.
What is the point of this? - "States must respect the free will of people to do evil deeds - but they must also be punished."
How would the state not respect the "free will" of people to murder?[/i]

I don't really get what you're saying here.  Is it that ALL immorality should be punished?  Again, you're running the slippery slope.[/quote]
And I don't get what you're saying. The "free will" argument is bogus - because for there to be [b]any[/b] law, there must be some restrictions on people's free will.
And I simply don't buy the argument that America is on a "slippery-slope" to a religious dictatorship. Just look around you! We're on a slippery slope to what Pope Benedict XVI wisely called "the dictatorship of relativism."

[quote][i]Pope Leo XIII in Rerum Novarum, declared socialism "emphatically unjust" and said Socialism is "manifestly against justice."
For what Pope Pius XI said about socialism, read my signature.[/i]

And Pope JPII declared the war against Iraq to be unjust.[/quote]
And what does that have to do with anything?

1) I never mentioned the Iraq war (which I tend to think was unnecessary - and which many "paleo-cons" oppose).

2) That was a judgment on a particular event - which does not fall under Papal infallibility. Several Popes have condemned the principle of socialism (which is a principle, not a particular application), writing in official encyclicals. It has been repeatedly condemned as intrinsically unjust.

Again - No one can be at the same time a true Socialist and a sincere Catholic!

You obviously do not have a correct understanding of the dogma of papaI infallibility. I suggest you discuss this with one of the Church Scholars here -they could help straighten you out.

3) There is enough wrong with socialism to oppose it even if the Church had said nothing. It is an unjust and tyrannical system which denies man's right to private property, and puts everyone's property under the control of the government.
It also is a failure economically, and in the long run creates more poverty, rather than eliminates it.

[quote][i]This is silly. Why should being in a homosexual "relationship" give anyone privileges unmarried "straight" people don't have?[/i]

That's what I'm saying, abolish governmental marriage and replace it with civil unions.  Marriage as a sacrament should be exclusive to religion.[/quote]
Originally, the idea was simply that government acknowledge the natural-law institution of marriage - which began with Adam and Eve, and is by its very definition only between a man and a woman.
I realize there are problems when the modern state creates marriages, but even if we abolish government recognition of marriage, I am still opposed to "civil unions" of any kind - as they do nothing but reward immorality.

If you want to debate this further, all sides of this issue have been debated at length in past threads. Run a search on "gay marriage" or "civil unions," etc. I'm tired of endlessly repeating myself.

[quote][i]Those idiots in Texas who dragged that man behind the truck got the chair! (What more do you want?)[/i]

Life sentence without parole, but that's a different subject.[/quote]
Whatever - you've still done nothing to show the need for "hate crimes" legislation.

[quote][i]When the Nazi party started, they were originally quite unpopular, and in the last free election, they got less than 44% of the vote.[/i]

For a pluralistic system, that's a pretty staggeringly high number.  What did Bush get in his first election?  Less than 48%?  Couldn't you call that "quite unpopular"?[/quote]
I'm not condoning those that voted Nazi. But this still contradicts your statement that 90% of Germans were "Church-going Nazis." (whatever that's supposed to prove).

And what Bush's popularity or unpopularity has to do with this topic is truly beyond me.

[quote][i]And not everyone who voted Nazi was an ardent believer in Nazi ideology, and most Germans were not aware of the full horror of the holocaust and other attrocities commited by the government.[/i]

[i]Mein Kampf[/i] made Hitler, not the other way around.  And yes, I've expressed elsewhere that most people were oblivious to the holocaust.  But that didn't make their political affiliations any less valid.  That was my point.
[right][snapback]882232[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]
I have no idea what your statement about Mein Kampf "making" Hitler is supposed to mean, or how any of this does anything to prove your assertion that religious "conservatism" is to blame for Hitler's murderous ideology.

[Socrates]

Correction: The last sentence of my first paragraph in the last post should read: " . . . but I still maintain that laws should conform as best they can to Christ's truth, or at the least, not contradict or [b]oppose [/b]them "

~ oops!

[ironmonk]

Liberalism is condemned by the Church.
[url="http://www.phatmass.com/phorum/index.php?showtopic=47523"]http://www.phatmass.com/phorum/index.php?showtopic=47523[/url]

Being a liberal is not bragable.

[Snarf]

[i]The truth is, for a culture, a society, to exist, it must be build on some common principles or "values." [/i]

Society can have all the values it wants, I fully agree and support that. It is society's responsibility to impose the image of Christ upon its members. But people should be endowed with the right, however erroneous, to stand against society. When you LEGISLATE such impositions, it's nothing short of thievery of liberty.

[i]the government should do nothing to officially sanction or condone worship of pagan idols.[/i]

What exactly are you saying here? I could posture several guesses, but that'd just fill up too much space.

[i]If all "worldviews" are seen as equally valid, we simply have chaos.[/i]

And if just one is legally imposed, we have fascism.

[i]Radical pluralism ends up with such insanities as the British Navy officially sanctioning the "rights" of an officer to perform Satanic rituals on his ship.[/i]

Some people choose to be Satanists. A crime against God, yes. But a federal crime? That's just bigotry.

[i]for there to be any law, there must be some restrictions on people's free will.[/i]

In a practical sense, yes. If I demonstrate the desire and purpose to kill, then I should be thwarted. However, the desire and purpose demonstrate an act of the will. What you're saying, however, is that people should conform to consensus morality just because it fulfills a certain group's religious leanings. That borders dangerously on the lines of fascism.

[i]1) I never mentioned the Iraq war (which I tend to think was unnecessary - and which many "paleo-cons" oppose).

2) That was a judgment on a particular event - which does not fall under Papal infallibility. Several Popes have condemned the principle of socialism (which is a principle, not a particular application), writing in official encyclicals. It has been repeatedly condemned as intrinsically unjust.[/i]

I mentioned the war on Iraq because it was an embarassing moment for Catholic conservatives. Am I wrong in my belief that an encyclical is only infallible when declared Ex Cathedra? Am I wrong in my belief that moral guidelines are only pertinent to the faith when outlined in the Catechism? Speaking of which, here are some gems:

"[b]2424[/b]A theory that makes profit the exclusive norm and ultimate end of economic activity is morally unacceptable."

And here's what She says about Socialism:

"[b]2425:[/b] The Church has rejected the totalitarian and athiestic ideologies associated in modern times with 'communism' or 'socialism'. She has likewise refused to accept, in the practice of 'capitalism', individualism and the obsolute pirmacy of the law of the marketplace over human labor. Regulating the economy by centralized planning perverts the basis of social bonds; regulating it soleby by the law of the marketplace fails social justice, for 'there are many human needs which cannot be satisfied by the market'. Reasonable regulation of the marketplace and economic initiatives, in keeping with a just hierarchy of values and a view to the common good, is to be commended."

So, since i reject totalitarianism, my breed of socialism doesn't defy the Catechism. As for being "atheistic", I can't see you applying that to say that the State should be a moral body; it simply affirms that historical communism's association with Marxist godlessness is deplorable. It is SOCIETY'S responsibility to employ a concept of God. I personally think that centralized planning is a bad idea, and most post-1980 liberals agree with me. I see conservativism as being far more in violation of this entry than social democracy could ever hope to be.

[i]3) There is enough wrong with socialism to oppose it even if the Church had said nothing. It is an unjust and tyrannical system which denies man's right to private property, and puts everyone's property under the control of the government.
It also is a failure economically, and in the long run creates more poverty, rather than eliminates it.[/i]

Socialism doesn't deny the right to property, it merely affirms the responsibility to give back to the society from which you draw life. I'm an extremely moderate socialist to whom putting "everyone's property under the control of the government" seems self-centered and paranoid.

WIth the Industrial Revolution in mind, I think capitalism has failed far more by dominating lives than socialism ever could, lest it become inundated by totalitarianism.

[i]Whatever - you've still done nothing to show the need for "hate crimes" legislation.[/i]

Say a homosexual gets beat up in a bar. Normally, the wrong-doer would be sentenced as merely someone who had the impulse to commit the crime of battery. That does nothing to address or correct the problem of bigotry within the perpetrator. Where injustice lies in the mind, it must be reprimanded accordingly.

[i]I have no idea what your statement about Mein Kampf "making" Hitler is supposed to mean, or how any of this does anything to prove your assertion that religious "conservatism" is to blame for Hitler's murderous ideology.[/i]

Hitler was voted into office because he wrote a rampantly popular book. He did not write a book because he was voted into office. Conservative folk saw in Hitler his antisemitic ideology, and they loved him for it. Does that mean they wanted six million jews to die? Of course not. But they DID render it possible.

Ironmonk, the term "liberal" in the economic sense has changed drastically since that work was drafted. You might want to do your research better.

Edited February 11, 2006 by Snarf

[Socrates]

[quote name='Snarf' date='Feb 11 2006, 04:11 AM'][i]The truth is, for a culture, a society, to exist, it must be build on some common principles or "values." [/i]

Society can have all the values it wants, I fully agree and support that.  It is society's responsibility to impose the image of Christ upon its members.  But people should be endowed with the right, however erroneous, to stand against society.  When you LEGISLATE such impositions, it's nothing short of thievery of liberty.[/quote]
Then people should be endowed with the right, however erroneous, to murder, rob, rape, abuse children, scream hatred of Jews, homosexuals, and liberals, or whatever else their twisted minds can think of. After all, legislation of such impositions is nothing short of thievery of liberty!

[quote][i]If all "worldviews" are seen as equally valid, we simply have chaos.[/i]

And if just one is legally imposed, we have fascism.[/quote]
A meaningless statement. "Fascism" is that favorite old epiphet of the Left, used to refer to whatever they disagree with.
So any state that upholds Christianity, rather than Islam, atheism, or some other "worldview" is automatically "fascist"?

[quote][i]Radical pluralism ends up with such insanities as the British Navy officially sanctioning the "rights" of an officer to perform Satanic rituals on his ship.[/i]

Some people choose to be Satanists.  A crime against God, yes.  But a federal crime?  That's just bigotry.[/quote]
The government need not do anything to officially sanction Satanism - such as that case involved.

And opposing crimes against God, such as satanism - the worship of evil and hatred of God as a principle - is "simply bigotry"?? LOL
Actually, it's sad that people even think this way.
This really deserves no comment, other than that it's obvious why you have that "hello I don't rep the Church" tag!

(ps - I wonder if you'd feel the same way regarding "people who choose to be racists" or "people who choose to be homophobes"!)

[quote][i]for there to be any law, there must be some restrictions on people's free will.[/i]

In a practical sense, yes.  If I demonstrate the desire and purpose to kill, then I should be thwarted.  However, the desire and purpose demonstrate an act of the will.  What you're saying, however, is that people should conform to consensus morality just because it fulfills a certain group's religious leanings.  That borders dangerously on the lines of fascism.[/quote]
There it is, that old "f-word" again! LOL
I've heard that "fascist" means simply one that is winning an argument with a liberal.
Obviously, no law can control the inner act of one's will. You haven't really given an argument here - just decried supporting "religious" morality as somehow "fascist" (read "opposed to liberalism").

[quote][i]1) I never mentioned the Iraq war (which I tend to think was unnecessary - and which many "paleo-cons" oppose).

2) That was a judgment on a particular event - which does not fall under Papal infallibility. Several Popes have condemned the principle of socialism (which is a principle, not a particular application), writing in official encyclicals. It has been repeatedly condemned as intrinsically unjust.[/i]

I mentioned the war on Iraq because it was an embarassing moment for Catholic conservatives.  Am I wrong in my belief that an encyclical is only infallible when declared Ex Cathedra?  Am I wrong in my belief that moral guidelines are only pertinent to the faith when outlined in the Catechism?  Speaking of which, here are some gems:

"[b]2424[/b]A theory that makes profit the exclusive norm and ultimate end of economic activity is morally unacceptable."

And here's what She says about Socialism:

"[b]2425:[/b] The Church has rejected the totalitarian and athiestic ideologies associated in modern times with 'communism' or 'socialism'.  She has likewise refused to accept, in the practice of 'capitalism', individualism and the obsolute pirmacy of the law of the marketplace over human labor.  Regulating the economy by centralized planning perverts the basis of social bonds; regulating it soleby by the law of the marketplace fails social justice, for 'there are many human needs which cannot be satisfied by the market'.  Reasonable regulation of the marketplace and economic initiatives, in keeping with a just hierarchy of values and a view to the common good, is to be commended."

So, since i reject totalitarianism, my breed of socialism doesn't defy the Catechism.  As for being "atheistic", I can't see you applying that to say that the State should be a moral body; it simply affirms that historical communism's association with Marxist godlessness is deplorable.  It is SOCIETY'S responsibility to employ a concept of God.  I personally think that centralized planning is a bad idea, and most post-1980 liberals agree with me.  I see conservativism as being far more in violation of this entry than social democracy could ever hope to be.

[i]3) There is enough wrong with socialism to oppose it even if the Church had said nothing. It is an unjust and tyrannical system which denies man's right to private property, and puts everyone's property under the control of the government.
It also is a failure economically, and in the long run creates more poverty, rather than eliminates it.[/i]

Socialism doesn't deny the right to property, it merely affirms the responsibility to give back to the society from which you draw life.  I'm an extremely moderate socialist to whom putting "everyone's property under the control of the government" seems self-centered and paranoid.

WIth the Industrial Revolution in mind, I think capitalism has failed far more by dominating lives than socialism ever could, lest it become inundated by totalitarianism.[/quote]
Catholics are also required to heed the Church's teachings in the Ordinary Magisterium - which includes encyclicals. Encyclicals have as much authority as the CCC. Whoever tells you otherwise tells wrongly.
Where the encyclicals teach on Faith and Morals, they are to be heeded.
Socialism is decried repeatedly as contrary to justice.
Personally, I think the Popes knew what they were talking about here more than you do!

And you do decry the state's making almost any legislation imposing moral values as "fascist" and contrary to "free will," yet you would trust state beaurocrats to tell private citizens what they must do with their money? Again, glaring contradiction!

[quote][i]Whatever - you've still done nothing to show the need for "hate crimes" legislation.[/i]

Say a homosexual gets beat up in a bar.  Normally, the wrong-doer would be sentenced as merely someone who had the impulse to commit the crime of battery.  That does nothing to address or correct the problem of bigotry within the perpetrator.  [b]Where injustice lies in the mind, it must be reprimanded accordingly.[/b][/quote]
Whoa! Now there's a good one!!

Is this really coming from the same guy who claimed earlier that "[b]people should be endowed with the right, however erroneous, to stand against society. When you LEGISLATE such impositions, it's nothing short of thievery of liberty[/b]."???
Or did somebody else take over the typing here??

Why should someone who beats up a homosexual at a bar be punished differently than someone who beats up anyone else at a bar??

Should he be punished more harshly than any of those who have commited brutal and sadistic homosexual rape?

I'm sure if someone suggested that government authorities should do anything legislative to address or correct the problems of immorality within the perpetrators that lead them to murder, rape, vandalize, and rob, etc., you would immediately scream "fascism"!

However, the state is to "reprimand" the "injustice in the mind" which supposedly leads to crimes against gays??

People are to be punished by the law for their inner thoughts??
Talk about "fascist"!!
Wouldn't that just be "bigotry" against homophobes?

And if someone commited a murder as part of a Satanic ritual, or inspired by Satanism, would we also be obliged to punish the satanic "injustice of the mind" which led to this crime?

Or what about the disordered lust that leads to a sex crime?


[quote][i]I have no idea what your statement about Mein Kampf "making" Hitler is supposed to mean, or how any of this does anything to prove your assertion that religious "conservatism" is to blame for Hitler's murderous ideology.[/i]

Hitler was voted into office because he wrote a rampantly popular book.  He did not write a book because he was voted into office.  Conservative folk saw in Hitler his antisemitic ideology, and they loved him for it.  Does that mean they wanted six million jews to die?  Of course not.  But they DID render it possible.[/quote]
Just as left-leaning folk made possible the murderous reigns of Lenin and Stalin and the 75 million deaths under atheistic Communism.

Blaming the holocaust on religious conservatism is just absurd.
It would make just as much sense (well, more actually) to blame liberalism and atheism for the horrors of Communism. Nobody on the American right supports Nazism or anything similar, while many on the Left have been sympathetic to Communism.

I think this thread has run its course. If you want to debate any of the specific points in this debate further, start another thread, or search for one of the many old threads on these topics.

[jmjtina]

[quote name='sraf' date='Feb 4 2006, 07:44 PM']*claps*
[b]Snarf[/b], it's good to find someone who agrees with me here. It's been lonely.


So, in short, I understand why you do not support abortions. But I am trying to give you my set of glasses to see how I view the situation - that is, you cannot take away this practice now that it has been instated.  If you want to change it completely, find a time machine and go to the 1920's and stop the first Sexual Revolution.  But until then, you must accept that people are going to have sex and you must give the woman thorough facts and a choice.
[right][snapback]876010[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]


You ride on the fence. The "it's their choice BUT I don't like it" line. The fact is women DON'T have the facts of what abortion entails. The dangers of post abortion, physical, spiritual and emotional. You are "for the right's" of the women, yet you FAIL to give her all the facts there is about the abortion and what society you claim to protect about "choice" does NOT tell her. In fact you ENCOURAGE society from allowing the mother from making an informed "choice" if "[b][i]choice and rights"[/i][/b] is what you truly believed. Is that truly giving her an informed choice as you would like, keeping the information of what the abortion truly entails, from depression to infertility, nevermind that a baby, a complete seperate person, is being murdered in the cruelest ways that you wouldn't even do to a puppy?!

I invite you in disscussion sraf, instead of just posting what it feels like to see from your "glasses". Yes, you CAN take this law away, and you don't have to travel back in time to stop the murder that happens everyday in our own country.

and Snarf, you didn't set off to debate, because if you did you would have picked one topic to debate. INstead you wrote a "who am I" paper with erroneous mistakes in it. It makes it hard on where to start because there is so much. I agree with Socrates, it would be appreciated if you pick one topic, start another thread, and begin.

Edited February 12, 2006 by jmjtina

[sraf]

Okay, [b]jmjtina[/b] did you even read the rest of my post?
[quote name='sraf']So I came up with an idea of a Pro-Balance movement - one that strives to keep the number of abortions in the U.S. below 5% of what it is now, by a combination of[b] 1. thorough sex education in schools (teaching about consequences, STDs, etc. as well as financial difficulties of childrearing) 2. 'Crisis Pregnancy Clinics' that do not promote either abortion, adoption, or keeping the infant but somewhere that a woman can go to in need and find guidance to see which option is really best - usually adoption.[/b] 3. In all public schools and Catholic ones, a class that teaches children to make moral decisions and understand various moral codes around the world and 4. Widespread sale of contraceptives, because in today's day and age, you are being foolish and impractical to think that people are going to stop having premarital sex if you deny abortions and contraceptives. You cannot take away both abortions and contraceptives, so you have to leave one option - in this case, contraceptives are the lesser of two evils.[/quote]
I do want to give women an informed choice. But going through an adoption process could be humiliating or difficult, and abortion looks so much simpler. One surgery and you're out of there. This is why we need to teach about sex in our schools, and about the resulting consequences.

[ironmonk]

[quote name='Snarf' date='Feb 11 2006, 06:11 AM']Hitler was voted into office because he wrote a rampantly popular book. He did not write a book because he was voted into office. Conservative folk saw in Hitler his antisemitic ideology, and they loved him for it. Does that mean they wanted six million jews to die? Of course not. But they DID render it possible.
[right][snapback]883746[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]


Hitler was voted into office because when he was on trial for treason, it was all over TV, and Hitler turned the tables on the very government that was accusing him of treason by accusing the government of treason for loosing World War I. The people loved him for it because their society did not like the fact that they had lost. What rocketed him to power was not a display of hatred for the Jewish people.

[ironmonk]

[quote name='sraf' date='Feb 4 2006, 10:44 PM']*claps*
[b]Snarf[/b], it's good to find someone who agrees with me here. It's been lonely.

Allow me to chime in my two cents, please?

As a Catholic, as a biology student in high school, I don't [i]like[/i] abortion. In the early days of my political awareness, when I was starting to be aware of what issues in the world were, I openly opposed it, seeing it as a way to have sex and escape consequences and responsibility. And in my heart, I still don't like it. Whatever you say, at the moment that the egg and sperm join, you have got all the chromosomes needed for a human being.  There isn't anything else except for the rapidly dividing cells and the blastospore, but it is still as human as you or I.
However, as I grew more aware, I realized that to fight for the [i]rights [/i]of the bunch of cells and ignore the rights of the mother is cruel to both of them.  I can't decide whether or not a life lived in poverty with a mother who never wanted you is better or worse than not living at all.  But I think it is best if the responsibility for the choice was given to the person whom it really matters the most - the mother.  But here's the key: she has got to decide on behalf of herself [i]and [/i]the fetus.  If she chooses to abort the fetus, I would not agree with her. It is something I would never do to my own child.  I might try to persuade her against it and I might succeed or I might not. But I will not take away the woman's right to decide for herself.

But I still want to keep the number of abortions down.  So I came up with an idea of a Pro-Balance movement - one that strives to keep the number of abortions in the U.S. below 5% of what it is now, by a combination of 1. thorough sex education in schools (teaching about consequences, STDs, etc. as well as financial difficulties of childrearing) 2. 'Crisis Pregnancy Clinics' that do not promote either abortion, adoption, or keeping the infant but somewhere that a woman can go to in need and find guidance to see which option is really best - usually adoption. 3. In all public schools and Catholic ones, a class that teaches children to make moral decisions and understand various moral codes around the world and 4. Widespread sale of contraceptives, because in today's day and age, you are being foolish and impractical to think that people are going to stop having premarital sex if you deny abortions and contraceptives.  You cannot take away both abortions and contraceptives, so you have to leave one option - in this case, contraceptives are the lesser of two evils.

So, in short, I understand why you do not support abortions. But I am trying to give you my set of glasses to see how I view the situation - that is, you cannot take away this practice now that it has been instated.  If you want to change it completely, find a time machine and go to the 1920's and stop the first Sexual Revolution.  But until then, you must accept that people are going to have sex and you must give the woman thorough facts and a choice.
[right][snapback]876010[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]


Ensoulment happens at moment of conception. Christ was God in Mary's womb at the time of conception. The mother has no right to kill an innocent baby in her womb. If sperm and egg meet and conception occurs, it is a human being.

You have alot of misconceptions and missing many facts.

You are not Catholic if you support abortion. I hope you do not take communion. Any person who thinks themselves Catholic and supports abortion is not allowed to have the Eucharist.

Get educated:
[url="http://www.catholic.com/library/Abortion.asp"]http://www.catholic.com/library/Abortion.asp[/url]
[url="http://www.catholic.com/library/morality_ethics.asp"]http://www.catholic.com/library/morality_ethics.asp[/url]


Saying that we should allow contraceptives because people will have pre-marital sex is a lazy cop out. Before contraceptives were widely available pre-marital sex was much much lower.

If you go against Catholic teachings you are not of the Catholic Faith that was established by Christ. Are you wiser than the Church that is never to be overcome and directly guided by God?! That is what you are saying when you say the Church is wrong.

You also should check out this website: [url="http://www.ScriptureCatholic.com"]http://www.ScriptureCatholic.com[/url] and read the New Testament daily... at least one chapter a day and pray about it.

There is no excuse for a Catholic with a computer on the Internet to not know the teachings and reasonings of why the Church teaches what it teaches.

[Socrates]

[quote name='sraf' date='Feb 11 2006, 07:39 PM']Okay, [b]jmjtina[/b] did you even read the rest of my post?

I do want to give women an informed choice.  But going through an adoption process could be humiliating or difficult, and abortion looks so much simpler.   One surgery and you're out of there.   This is why we need to teach about sex in our schools, and about the resulting consequences.
[right][snapback]884253[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]

Murder should never be given as an option, no matter how simple it is, or how "humiliating or difficult" the alternative may be. This kind of talk is simply madness - human life weighed against convenience!

And do you really think any of the vast increase in "sex education" in the schools over the past couple decades has done anything to decrease sexual activity among teens?
Kids need to be taught virtue, not just more "information" about sex!

[Cow of Shame]

[quote name='sraf' date='Feb 11 2006, 09:39 PM']I do want to give women an informed choice.  But going through an adoption process could be humiliating or difficult, and abortion looks so much simpler.  One surgery and you're out of there.  This is why we need to teach about sex in our schools, and about the resulting consequences.
[right][snapback]884253[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]
Is this an excuse for abortions, or are you simply stating your understanding of why they might look appealing to some women?

Only Democrats think that simply educating people will lead them to make the right decisions. Heh

We've had plenty of sex ed, condoms are available practically anywhere...yet we have an exploding teen pregnancy problem. Are you saying we need to expose kids to [i]more[/i] sex? Hell, I've known [i]nursing students[/i] that have gotten pregnant outside of marriage. You can't get more 'aware of the consequences' than that.

[jmjtina]

Yes I did read it all sraf. Thanks for asking.

All of it. And I disagreed with you on many points and paraphrased your whole post with the sentence, "I choose to sit on the fence". Your informed choice means giving them options. My point was, you give them the facts of all the harm that could be done, mental, emotional, sprititual, and physical. Who in their right mind would jump out of a plane with the parachute having only 75% chance of working?

Here is longer version. I'm blue.



[quote]However, as I grew more aware, I realized that to fight for the [i]rights [/i]of the bunch of cells and ignore the rights of the mother is cruel to both of them.  [/quote]

[color=blue]You say it’s cruel to both of them but how is killing one of them less cruel? If you leave those cells alone, they become a baby. Also, in a choice between saving lives or infringing upon lives, saving lives must always be chosen.
[/color]

[quote]I can't decide whether or not a life lived in poverty with a mother who never wanted you is better or worse than not living at all. [/quote]

[color=blue]The fact is that you are taking the worst case scenario. Again, how is killing them better? It's not like abortion is a small pill a baby takes, but done in the most inhumane way possible. [/color]

[quote]But I think it is best if the responsibility for the choice was given to the person whom it really matters the most - the mother.  [/quote]

[color=blue]The fact is, the choice isn’t hers to kill her own child. Murder is wrong no matter WHO does it. [/color]

[quote]But here's the key: she has got to decide on behalf of herself [i]and [/i]the fetus.  If she chooses to abort the fetus, I would not agree with her. It is something I would never do to my own child.  I might try to persuade her against it and I might succeed or I might not. But I will not take away the woman's right to decide for herself. [/quote]

[color=blue]This is the “sit on the fence” statement I am talking about. [/color]

[quote]But I still want to keep the number of abortions down.  [/quote]

[color=blue]So it’s okay with you with only a “little” bit of innocent children being killed?[/color]

[quote]So I came up with an idea of a Pro-Balance movement - one that strives to keep the number of abortions in the U.S. below 5% of what it is now, by a combination of 1. thorough sex education in schools (teaching about consequences, STDs, etc. as well as financial difficulties of childrearing) [/quote]

[color=blue]This is already in place and has done nothing to drop the “abortion rate”. [/color]

[quote]2. 'Crisis Pregnancy Clinics' that do not promote either abortion, adoption, or keeping the infant but somewhere that a woman can go to in need and find guidance to see which option is really best - usually adoption.[/quote]

[color=blue]So they can have the options given to them, but none would be promoted? Unfortunatly, we already have one of those places, planned parenthood. But they went with what they thought was their best option, abortion.[/color]

[quote] 3. In all public schools and Catholic ones, a class that teaches children to make moral decisions and understand various moral codes around the world and [/quote]
[color=blue]Fine there….[/color]

[quote]4. Widespread sale of contraceptives, because in today's day and age, you are being foolish and impractical to think that people are going to stop having premarital sex if you deny abortions and contraceptives.  You cannot take away both abortions and contraceptives, so you have to leave one option - in this case, contraceptives are the lesser of two evils. [/quote]

[color=blue]Contraceptives? That’s throwing out your number 3 out the window isn’t it? A double standard with your own “balance”? Contraceptives are an abortificient and there is a high link between infertitlitiy and other dangers harzardous to women. [/color]

[quote]So, in short, I understand why you do not support abortions. But I am trying to give you my set of glasses to see how I view the situation - that is, you cannot take away this practice now that it has been instated.  If you want to change it completely, find a time machine and go to the 1920's and stop the first Sexual Revolution.  But until then, you must accept that people are going to have sex and you must give the woman thorough facts and a choice.[/quote]

[color=blue] Yes, it can be all summed up in one sentence. "I choose to sit on the fence. " [/color]

Edited February 12, 2006 by jmjtina

[jmjtina]

Here are some resources:
[url="http://www.prolife.com/"]http://www.prolife.com/[/url]

[url="http://www.prolife.com/FETALDEV.html"]http://www.prolife.com/FETALDEV.html[/url]

[url="http://www.prolife.com/SARAH2.html"]http://www.prolife.com/SARAH2.html[/url]

[url="http://www.prolife.com/EVERETT.html"]http://www.prolife.com/EVERETT.html[/url]

[url="http://www.priestsforlife.org/"]http://www.priestsforlife.org/[/url]
graphic pictures (America will not reject Abortion until America sees abortion) and great information!

Rock for life
[url="http://www.rockforlife.org/html/index.html"]http://www.rockforlife.org/html/index.html[/url]

[url="http://www.lifedynamics.com/"]http://www.lifedynamics.com/[/url]
Life Dynamics is great...doing work, reports and studies. This one is a must to go to. Check it out.

Virtue Media
[url="http://www.virtuemedia.org/television.htm"]http://www.virtuemedia.org/television.htm[/url]
great ads......download some.

Silent Scream.org
[url="http://www.silentscream.org/"]http://www.silentscream.org/[/url]
The true horror of abortion

Edited February 12, 2006 by jmjtina