Please wait...
Actually - I think I nailed it there before I logged off last time I got this far.
I know what I am. I tend to be RIGHT leaning on the understood definition of political spectrums - though not NEARLY as Right as many on the Left perceive me. I'm a constitutional libertarian - I believe that change should be reserved and gradual - and that change isn't always PROGRESS - so it shouldn't be entertained lightly - that makes me conservative leaning on most issues. But - the actually conservative principle on abortion for example - is that we should NOT immediately overhaul abortion law. The extreme political Right is actually progressively activist on this issue in that they would enjoy overturning Roe vs. Wade overnight if they could, and damn the unforeseen consequences. Likewise, the Left is very CONSERVATIVE about things like repealing the Civil Rights Act of 1964. They think it should be left intact in perpetuity - that if it is repealed, traditional institutionalized racism would reassert almost immediately - despite a lack of evidence that that CRA 1964 is still necessary or effective at this point, and instead not a burden to the progress of equity and equality in the US. Both sides are conservative and liberal, as convenient, on their pet issues - wanting to see things they dislike changed IMMEDIATELY and wanting to see thinks they like remain unchanged for all eternity.
In cases like that, I see the written US Constitution as the ultimate framework given to us as a Republic to navigate those issues in a dynamic way - as a living document. It *can't* be changed - the first two are absolute - non-amendable - and the 2nd protects the 1st as a cornerstone of a free society - but beyond that, the constitution CAN be amended by design with the idea that some amendments may not work out, and that the 1st and 2nd ones are there to make sure that they ARE worked out if they fail.
A huge problem with the Right is that a lot of their planks and positions are informed by religious values - not necessarily actual *conservative* ones.
I realized early on in the gay marriage debate that my concerns were all with fiscal impacts if extending marriage benefits to gay couples. Eventually I realized that we really need to separate the idea of a spiritual WEDDING from a domestic partnership contract - a "marriage". If two (or more) consenting adults want to enter into a contractual partnership that conveys certain fiscal advantages - why prevent that? The argument from a fiscal perspective was "the additional costs that employers would have to extend to the partners in those contractual agreements." That is, things like health insurance offered to the partner of a gay employee. There is a certain truth to that. This small minority of a minority population that decides to get married would have a fiscal impact on benefits offered by employers. At the same time, there is actually a "marriage tax" that affects heterosexuals' couples who marry and do not have kids. It is by design, because from the Federal and State view - the benefit of marriage is that it is supposed to produce more future citizens that will become able bodied members contributing to the economic strength of the nation. Of the LGBT community, a minority group, the subminority that choses to marry - will have a subminority of THAT which choses to have children (and those children will almost exclusively be adopted children who were unwanted and previously a burden on the State). So, the MAJORITY of this super-minority group of same sex marriages will end up paying a tax penalty for being childless. When you look at it economically, allowing gay marriage is likely GOOD for the economy. Likely enough that we might as well give it a trial run and if no *solid* and conclusive evidence that it DAMAGES society or the economy greater than it benefits it - CONSERVATIVE FISCAL VALUES say it should be allowed.
Which pisses off people who THINK they're conservative and conflate conservative MORALITY with conservative fiscal values. I worry about my money, my ability to secure MORE of it, and the stability of my nation to encourage an economic environment that enables that. I could care less where Bill and Ted are putting their penises - unless that starts to affect the things I care about. Wrong or right - that is between Bill and Ted and God. Not my business.
And regarding gay WEDDINGS as a spiritual union - if a CHURCH decides to recognize the spiritual union of two members of the same sex, and that Church can be recognized as an official religion as protected under the Constitution of the United States - and your religion finds that abhorrent - all you can do about that is die mad and talk to your God about it. They're literally protected by the same CONSTITUTIONAL religious protections are your OWN religion.
That drives me nuts... if you live in an area where the majority wants a morning prayer in the public schools - that is constitutionally protected. If you live there and don't like it - you have the constitutional right to move and find a place where the schools do not ALLOW morning PRAYER (but moments of silence that are Don't Ask/Don't Tell prayer sessions that are not mandatory are still constitutionally protected there). If you're in a PRO prayer school district, you can't be COMPELLED to take part in the prayer - but you can't disrupt it either.
The Constitution almost always already has the answers to these societal challenges - but people want to IGNORE the constitution when it doesn't do what they want, and want it applied when it serves their purposes.
This seems to be the basic political, partisan dysfunction in our society today. They want everything interpreted so that the answer is ALWAYS the one they want to hear, and NEVER the answer that suits their opposition.
Hypocrisy - neither side has that market cornered.
Not to dismiss the rest, as you did put a lot of effort .. But i totally agree with this greatly, and its the one thing that most irritates me about a lot of the 'right'.
Many of them will flat out dismiss me as 'you cant be moral or a good person, you have no god" This is totally untrue, as i simply treat others as i want to be treated. its not a hard concept of how to be a 'good person', i just dont need the fear of angering some magical being to act 'right'. Its just the right thing to do. ( or some book to tell me how to be a good person. its really quite simple.. )
And i agree with the pieces i cut off, in that often times their 'faith' gets in the way of being a good person. Just as much as the far left really. Both are agendas, both are as wrong, tho for different reasons.
And also, i do agree that even several of our founders were religious, we really were not founded 'on' religion and they did try to not let their faith(s) interfere with what they were doing. They were being logical about it all and did their best to keep it out of the foundation, other than acknowledge people's right to believe and practice their own way, even if it wasn't their way... ( and ya that pisses off far right too, if i bring that up )
Tue Apr 12 2022 06:14:46 PM EDT from ParanoidDelusions
A huge problem with the Right is that a lot of their planks and positions are informed by religious values - not necessarily actual *conservative* ones.
I guess the problem I have with the labels and the reason I wish we could be more clear about it is because there is a tactic of trying to lump your enemy in with disreputables using a common label, and then it can be used as a smear to effortlessly discredit opposition. Specifically, "if we can convince everyone that nazis are right-wing, then 'far-right' becomes an effective and plausible smear." The right does it, too, we try to smear all of the left as commies and anarchists (which also doesn't make sense to me because I see anarchy better represented by right-wing principles, but whatever).
I'm sure it's been this way for a long time, but I think it was only a recent realization that the battleground for the cold civil war is in language. The left is doing a good job of apropriating and controling language. I wish we could put up a better fight in that space.
As a side-note on that subject, I'm 100% convinced that's what this fluid gender non-binary stuff is all about. It's not about personal identity or boys who like playing with dolls and girls who like climbing trees. It's about controlling language. It's obvious when you think about it. If the goal were really about gender identity and social norms as stated, then it would be acceptible for a boy to wear a dress and it wouldn't be so important to him that you use female pronouns, because the point is that he wants to paint his nails and wear a dress, not that he be female. But that's not what the iron fist enforcers care about. What they care about is that they can distort your understanding of what the word "female" means and your perception of reality. I honestly can't even fathome the degree of brainwashing democrat voters must have to not see this twisted scheme for what it is.
I'm sure it's been this way for a long time, but I think it was only a
recent realization that the battleground for the cold civil war is in
language. The left is doing a good job of apropriating and controling
language. I wish we could put up a better fight in that space.
As a side-note on that subject, I'm 100% convinced that's what this
fluid gender non-binary stuff is all about. It's not about personal
identity or boys who like playing with dolls and girls who like
climbing trees. It's about controlling language. It's obvious when you
think about it. If the goal were really about gender identity and
social norms as stated, then it would be acceptible for a boy to wear a
dress and it wouldn't be so important to him that you use female
pronouns, because the point is that he wants to paint his nails and
wear a dress, not that he be female. But that's not what the iron fist
enforcers care about. What they care about is that they can distort
your understanding of what the word "female" means and your perception
of reality. I honestly can't even fathome the degree of brainwashing
democrat voters must have to not see this twisted scheme for what it
is.
Actually, the letter-soup brigade is about tagging people as allies or foes. The Chinesse kew this tactic and there is a fable/legend about it.
Long story short: if you are a popular leader, the best way to know who are your friends and who are your foes is to make a divisive declaration that has NOTHING to do with how you carry out your regular politics. Your supporters will RUN to endorse you, because you represent them. Meanwhile, the rest will remain silent or oppose you.
What this means in practice is that you can gather your Winter Court in your palace and throw in the idea that Jack is a woman who happens to have a big, big dick. You can then know who are your alies by telling some minion of yours to ask each noble his opinion, discretely. Since the question "Do you think Jack is a woman?" is a yes or no matter, then nobles can only a) say they agree despite the fact the notion is absurd b) declare themselves against you by declaring themselves against the notion that you may be a woman with a dick and c) try to remain silent or evade que question, which is equivalent to saying no.
Language deformation is just part of it. NOwadays you can tell who somebody endorses because a Democrat will say "Affirmative Action" and a Republican will call it "Possitive Discrimination".
George Orwell used to say that tyrants trying to deform language, because that deforms what people thinks, and while that is very true (I think in a very different way when I think in English than when I think in other languages) I think the prime objective is to force people to declare themselves for or against a particular faction.
Once the word liberty is stripped from the language, its hard to talk about and understand what it means. It becomes an abstract thought that you cant easily convey or discuss with others.
2022-04-15 11:30 from Nurb432 <nurb432@uncensored.citadel.org>
Once the word liberty is stripped from the language, its hard to talk
about and understand what it means. It becomes an abstract thought
that you cant easily convey or discuss with others.
2022-04-15 13:00 from zelgomer <zelgomer@uncensored.citadel.org>2022-04-15 11:30 from Nurb432 <nurb432@uncensored.citadel.org>
Once the word liberty is stripped from the language, its hard to talk
about and understand what it means. It becomes an abstract thought
that you cant easily convey or discuss with others.
God dammit whose idea was it to bind "save" and "stop" to the same key??
I have the same issue with mutt. Can't tell you how often I accidentally quit the program because "q" is both "stop reading this email" and "terminate the application" depending on contexts which are immediate neighbors..
Got this far and it is too late. I'll be back.
Good stuff here - and expansion on the "what do you mean by WE" discussion that adds clarity to the point being made. I want to address that.
But, I want to be alert and coherent when I do.
(By the way ... wanting to beat Whoopi Goldberg into a bloody pulp
with a crowbar doesn't make you a white nationalist; it only makes you
a good person who loves humanity.)
Outside of her likeable role on Star Trek, she is a longtime SHIT and has been a shit again recently. That is even relevant to this room...
I realized early on in the gay marriage debate that my concerns were
all with fiscal impacts if extending marriage benefits to gay
A lot of people recognized that. There are two dimensions to it, a moral dimension and a legal dimension.
From the moral side, consenting adults must be permitted to do what they want, as long as it doesn't impact anyone else. That is the very core of liberty, and it must be defended. (Naturally, this does not apply to children.
People who attempt to sexualize children because it's part of their pervert agenda need to be thrown into a vat of acid along with whoopi goldberg.)
On the legal side, it's simple. Get the government the hell out of the marriage business. Get rid of all the existing baggage and reduce it down to one rule allowing you to declare a domestic partnership for tax purposes. That person can be the MOTOS you married in church around the same time, or it can be your rainbow pal who has thousands of pronouns, or it can be your roommate.
But that's just me with 100% objectively sensible ideas. And you know what THEY do with sensible ideas.
Agreed, government has no business supporting 'marriage' as such in ANY form. Get out of the way and just make it a simple partnership contract for tax, property ownership and liability concerns. No different than a business partnership.
However, ideally the tax code would be simplified; no brackets, no deductions, just a flat (and low) tax on either income or consumption (but not both).
After enacting this change, make it mandatory to stab anyone who suggests changing it.
I got back.
Just hit Matt Walsh with this basic argument on Twitter. His fans did not care for it at all.
"It erodes the sanctity of marriage!"
Nothing anyone else but what I or my wife does erodes the sanctity of our marriage. If the gay couple next door makes you feel that your marriage is less sanctified - that is a personal problem in YOUR marriage and its relationship with your God.
agreed
Wed Nov 09 2022 01:56:23 PM EST from ParanoidDelusionsI got back.
Just hit Matt Walsh with this basic argument on Twitter. His fans did not care for it at all.
"It erodes the sanctity of marriage!"
Nothing anyone else but what I or my wife does erodes the sanctity of our marriage. If the gay couple next door makes you feel that your marriage is less sanctified - that is a personal problem in YOUR marriage and its relationship with your God.