This thread is a place for careful, clear, respectful discussions of difficult topics. It is not a place for having two-fisted no-holds-barred discussions.
MBers should be able to express their opinions without attacking others personally, and be able to listen to people who disagree with them without feeling personally attacked.
Easier said than done, of course. But MuseBlog is a good place to practice trying.
Continued from version 2010.1.
What do people think about minorities? (Think Fahrenheit 451. How the minorities got pissed.)
(first post?)
Loreena: What happened in Fahrenheit 451? A little more who/what/when/where, please.
1- oh, god, I hate that book.
Speaking of hot topics, I got enrolled in the OWL course at our UU by my parents. Meh.
Minorities? Well… I absolutely, of course, agree that nobody should be insulted because they’re a racial minority, but what about intelligence? And I’m not talking about mental disease, I mean people who simply don’t bother to apply themselves. Can you group them together and insult them?
We have a teacher who nearly got fired because she grouped everyone according to race or nationality, then sniggered at the fact that the Canadian group took up most of the class, and the rest of us were divided into groups of one or two.
WHYYYYYY?!
As to what happened: um. Firemen set books on fire, and then one of them’s (ugh!! bad!!) eyes were opened by a Stargirl-like girl next door.
BUT
what I’m really talking about here is the pre-story of the book. And that is: every book that some minority didn’t like was gradually considered bad, and “put up for” burning. And since there is always someone who will be offended by any particular book, it ended up being pretty much every book that was destroyed.
What does everyone think of this? How close do you think we are to this?
Speaking of OWL, I’m going to the second class tonight.
Fahrenheit 451 is absolutely genius. I think I used it in a paper for English at the beginning of the year about how much I hated America. Basically, I was saying that obviously we’re not that extreme, but our anti-intellectual sentiments could lead us in that direction.
As for the minorities, I think that if a minority doesn’t like a book, they should speak out against it, teacher their children that it’s wrong, etc, but book banning is never the answer. (And also, wouldn’t banning a book be offensive to some people too?)
I agree. Banning books doesn’t solve anything. Someone will inevitably have a problem with a book, and if they have enough power they can convince everyone else that there’s something wrong with it.
I dislike the whole concept of banning books. Isn’t there supposed to be freedom of speech in this country? (Keeping in mind that I’m just a measly 13 year old, and don’t know much in relation to most of you, but that’s just my opinion.)
Of course there is. America is such a ****hypocritical country. I want to move to Canada. Or Great Britain. Keep in mind, though, that at least where I live people make a conscince effort to read banned books… our libraries have banned book displays
Re: Minorities.
People sometimes get so fired up over protecting minorities that they don’t realise that in a few years, the stereotypical majority will, indeed, be a minority. Honestly, I don’t think anyone should be grouped by anything (however well-intented the grouper is) (race, country of origin, gender, sexual orientation, etc.) because everyone is a PERSON and individual. and, goddammit, we’re all supposed to be EQUAL so why in god’s name do people keep grouping other people? IT DOESN”T MATTER!! Anyway, it makes me mad.
I hate the idea of banned books. I mean, if someone doesn’t like a book, then don’t read it. Why stop other people from being exposed to other ways of thinking, even the racist ones?
Yeah, for example, I just read To Kill a Mockingbird. It is the best book I have ever read, but it has been banned for its language and racial slurs. The only problem with that is the fact that neither of these things are encouraged within the context of the book. If your parents told you not to do something specific, would it be bad if you even heard what they told you not to do?
Exactly! People can control themselves. Not other peoples.
Didn’t The Call of the Wild get banned sometime? But it was such an awesome book! *loves book*
Seriously. Its surprising that there are still books that aren’t banned.
The reason for banning books is the desire of the institutions and power groups to keep the rest of us ignorant of certain things.
How hot a topic is book burning, really? Is it something that affects your lives every day? Or ever?
Also, don’t forget that Fahrenheit 451 describes another reason its dystopia got rid of books: people lost interest in them. They got so involved in their iPods (earbud radios, but essentially the same thing — and not yet invented when Bradbury wrote the story in 1951), wraparound interactive reality TV shows (which don’t exist yet but can’t be far off), and comic books (which do exist in the novel’s future and are not banned) that their minds turned to mush.
7~ In my opinion, burning books isn’t really something that’s a big deal. I mean, the people who buy books in order to destroy them are really only inconveniencing themselves and wasting their money (and thus supporting the writings they’re against, which is completely ridiculous). However, it’s the sentiment behind that is sinister. That someone would want to destroy books, and the ideas contained in them. That does be bother me.
As far as banned books, when we stumbled across a big huge book fair in DC one time there was a huge wall with boxes of sharpies for everyone to write down a favorite book or one that influenced their lives. Well, I picked out a nice bright blue marker and proudly wrote “Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain” thinking back to my younger days when I worshiped them for their carefree adventures and tried to model some of my own after theirs.
Only to discover a moment later from a pamphlet nearby that those were both on the banned list. Why? because they use the term “nigger”. Okay, I’m not racist. I think people who are are seriously out of whack. But to ban a book because of a word that now has negative connotations? And truly, in the books Jim (a runaway black slave) was portrayed as, yes, a superstitious and somewhat simple person, but treated with dignity in the story. He was a far better person than some of the white characters, and one leaves the book with more affection for him than some of the others.
Anyway, after that incident I took the banned book list, and read several of the others off it, just because I wanted to see what the fuss was about, and they sounded like very good books. Guess what? They were.
Now, I understand that some people would wish for their children (or followers) to not be exposed to outside schools of thought because they believe it will take away their faith (in religious communities) or make them do the wrong thing because they’re seeing that there are other ways of thinking. However, it’s my opinion (again, this is me ranting on my soapbox) that it actually builds faith and understanding to challenge yourself and engage in dialogue with people who think differently. And if you realize that maybe someone else’s worldview makes more sense, is more consistent, etc. than your own, then maybe it’s time to reevaluate your own.
To me, the people who refuse to discuss things or interact with people they disagree with are afraid because they don’t understand where they themselves are coming from, and when they are challenged, they don’t know how to react, so they lash out and try to just condemn everything that they think deviates at all from their own beliefs or lifestyle. They can’t justify why they do something, and they refuse to confront their own weaknesses.
That, I do think is dangerous.
So, if someone has a different view than you, listen to them. If someone says a certain book is bad, read it. It doesn’t mean you have to accept everything, do be cautious, do constantly question it and yourself, but don’t fear other ideas will pollute you.
Them’s my tuppence. *clambers off of soapbox*
I agree with most of the points you made. I can understand adults wanting to keep the adult content away from their kids when they’re young, but there are better ways to do that then to ban the books from everybody – that is just ridiculous.
We read Tom Sawyer last year in school, and sure, we know n***** is a bad word with a bad connotation but it’s really not an inappropriate book overall. If you read it with the time period in mind it’s perfectly realistic actually. So why ban it? It’s actually one of the most loved books of all time, although I want to reread it now so I didn’t like it much the first time around so I feel like I would appreciate it more now. And now I’m getting off topic…
At my school, we not only read, but read and preformed To Kill a Mockingbird in 6th grade. We not only said n***** in our performance, but someone also had to say w**** in our preformance, and we didn’t get in any trouble.
We’re reading TKAM next year.
It’s a classic. No one should ban any classics.
Re: negative connotations, the literal definition of “fag” is “An English schoolboy” or “To perform long, wearysome labor”, and the definition of “faggot” is “Bundle of sticks”.
In Britain the term “fag” is currently used to indicate a cigarette.
I do not get how it came to its current (conotatively negitive) usual definition in the US…I mean, who thought that one up?
It was used as a derogatory term for homosexuals because they held their cigarettes (or fags) in a feminine manner.
That’s just odd.
now that is just….*searches for appropriate phrase* *can’t find one* please, people *rolls eyes and feels exasperated*
It’s interesting.
At the very least.
Hmm, that’s a little weird. All homosexuals held their cigarettes in a feminine manner?
reality check—some might, depending on what you mean by “feminine manner”, which, given the context probably refers to guys who like to dress in drag…but might not. Anyway, not all gay guys like dressing in drag, and you don’t have to be male to be gay, so I’m betting a very small portion of all homosexuals hold their cigarettes in a feminine manner, IF they smoke at all (not a good idea…) and honestly, the very phrase “feminine manner” is stereotypical anyway.
Well, then it’s a stupid nickname, anyway.
That’s just… wrong.
8.1~ I don’t agree to banning books either, at all. In fact, I would encourage the opposite, I’d encourage people to go ahead and read things they disagree with. Book banning can’t really even be fully effective, if someone wants to read a certain book they’ll get it somehow, despite bans. I think the only way to constructively handle differing points of view is to engage in dialogue and study all sides of an argument. It doesn’t mean you have to disregard where you come from, but I think challenging each viewpoint is always good. If it rattles what you thought previously, then maybe you need to reconsider. If it doesn’t, then I find it tends to deepen the previously held beliefs and give even more reason to hold onto them.
And yes, my example of Tom Sawyer was that when read in a historical context, and the way it was meant to be taken, it’s not offensive. And in so reading it one can have discussions on how times have changed (or not changed) and the significance of those changes (or lack thereof).
I think my brother read Farenheit 451. What’s so bad about it?
Nothing’s bad about it (actually, I really disliked it, but that might just be my LA teacher) It is being(sort of) discussed because it brings up minorities and censorship.
I hate how if boys stereotype women, they’re sexist, but if women stereotype men, they’re often not even considered feminists. Even if they are extreme, that’s the most they are, feminists. It seems so unfair to me.
Hear, hear. I like to consider myself a masculist–if feminism is fine, then masculism should be as well. The same concepts can be applied to race as well–think of the outrage there would be if someone was to build an all-white university or propose White History Month or give out scholarships to students for being white. People are ridiculous.
wow piggy are you for real
i’m pretty sure ladies wanting equal rights is not the same thing as white supremacy
I never said that. I said the basic concepts of gender relations can be applied to race relations as well.
Bull.
Race relations are more complex because different races imply different political, cultural or economical backgrounds. Within a single cultural context, men and women exist according to pre-established roles, which we could probably call stereotypes. But across different cultural contexts, ethnicity is irrevocably linked to different attitudes to violence, human rights, business models, etc.
I think it’s probably not due to race itself but to society.
like seriously i just keep reading that and i don’t get it. historical context? anyone? bueller? i mean if you want to talk about affirmative action that’s one thing but what’s wrong with a women’s college? what’s wrong with disadvantaged minorities getting help with paying for education? that’s whack piggy, i don’t even know
Oh, stop complaining. You defy ALL stereotypes I can think of. Even the geeky ones.
Isn’t that MB’s job? To defy all descriptions?
What about the stereotype of MuseBloggers being geeks?
That’s the problem. At least in my old school, (the school I was in at the time of the post) boys were very stereotyped by women, and since I didn’t fit those stereotyped, I was severely persecuted. Now, if it had been boys doing it to girls, I’m fairly sure people would have seen the stereotyping and put a stop to it. But since they were girls stereotyping boys, it was like it wasn’t happening.
(sorry I replied late, though.)
I understand, and I do agree with you that that’s the way most people see it.
However it is really frustrating when men stereotype women, especially teachers who treat us like little girls who can’t do anything for ourselves.
But on the flip side, guys are also expected to be macho and have no emotion – the point: we’re different. Women and men are not going to be treated equally. We can try as hard as we want, but I just can’t imagine that happening.
Of course I want for everybody should be treated equally, but it’s not going to happen.
I still agree that what you think is certainly unfair though. Stereotypically men are supposed to be the ones that take care of the women and look after them, women are supposed to sit around looking pretty. So when they stand up for themselves it’s all “Yay! You go get him!” But for men when they stand up for themselves it’s “What the hell are you doing to that poor little girl?”
It’s unfair.
there is scientific evidence that mens and womens brains are different, which I can believe, but I think everybody’s still equal….however, I fear people are starting the whole ‘seprate but equal’ thing again except for women and men, and we all know how well that worked the last time it was majorly acted on *coughjimcrowcough*
And the last thing I personally expect guys to be is macho…at times it seems like they expect each other to be more macho and “manly” than most girls do….
I know I’m nowhere near macho. I’d rather be a lucky coward than an lucky musclehead.
Women and men do have different chemicals in their hormones which is why they act differently. I still believe that everybody is equal too, however, my point was that I think it’s extremely difficult for humanity to truly act on that.
I wasn’t saying that about Musers on here. I was stating the general stereotype that I’ve observed. I don’t expect guys to be macho, in fact a lot of times…well, I don’t really know what I expect, but it’s not usually that. I think that you’re right though, it’s probably more likely for guys to pressure other guys to be macho than girls to guys. Good point.
your point, is my point, only more eloquent and more detailed.
You know, women are also sexist to other women. It’s been proven.
I know. I’ve seen it.
I hate how if a guy defies the male stereotype, people call him gay. (I don’t know how this is for you guys, but it’s mildly prevalent at my school.) The way I live, it seems to me that the guys I know feel peer pressure to be sexist towards girls. Both guys and girls are stereotyped ridiculously by each other and themselves.
The funny thing is that I tend to hang out with less macho-jock guys, or guys who act macho-jock, anyway, and more with the guys who actually stay true to their natures. And they’re pressured to be sexist anyway. I fixed the problem of sexist jokes when I hang out with them by hitting them (not hard) with my cloth hat whenever they do. So they started making yet more jokes, but they had stopped meaning them– it was just for fun. Which was nice.
And then for doing that, I was called “most likely to be a lesbian” by the macho-jock guys and the model-girly-girls. (Hell, let’s just call them Barbie and Ken; it’s easier.) Whereas guys punch each other and get physical all the time. Double standards piss me off. And stereotypes piss me off too, of any gender, race, religion, or anyone else.
The guys at my school, they don’t call me gay. They act as though it’s an established fact that I’m gay. I’m bi, by the way.
On a not entirely unrelated topic, my friends and I enjoy using insults that require a degree of mental complexity to understand. It’s nice to when they ask you what a word means, and you say “Did you know that if you type define (word) into Google, it will tell you the definition?” and they go “Uhh.. you didn’t answer my question.” Sometimes it feels that my friends are the only people who understand subtlety. Oh well. It makes life a lot funnier.
I hate that too.
So, I was thinking the other day (dangerous, I know :D) and I realized that I’m not sure if people have souls….the cold, rational part of me scoffs and says “of course not”, but the emotional part of me isn’t so sure…ideas, anybody?
I know I have no soul. But that’s not saying much for the rest of humanity.
Ouch.
I’m recalling something I heard somewhere(specific, I know) where people were arguing about when something has a soul. Think abortion arguments. One person said that a baby had a soul when it was born. Another person said it happened when it was first loved. Don’t recall when I heard this.
I had a soul. Then I discovered…
logic.
A v ~A
A book called “Unwind?” The so very totally trustworthy Internet search tells me it’s by Neal Shusterman. The conversation sounds familiar to me, too, but if it’s not from the book I’m lost.
I read that book and was creeped out to infinity(but actually kind of liked it), but no. That’s not it.
Great book! It had some interesting themes and ideas.
Since I believe in other universes and reincarnation, I would say yes. I think your soul is kind of like a diary where you write down all the things you did during your life. If you were good, then you get reincarnated as something nice and vice versa.
“LeFou, I’m afraid I’ve been thinking! A dangerous pastime, I know!”
That was my first thought when I read her post.
With no evidence, there is no reason to believe anything.
The soul is completely undefinable, subjective, and should have no bearing in any rational conversation.
Well… my belief is that we all have Body, Mind, and Soul.
And I believe in other universes/multiverses, reincarnation(depending on which multiverse/universe), etc.
I think the Soul is the spiritual part of each person…something along those lines, anyways.
It’s okay, we all do dangerous things like that.
Re: sexism
I find that I hang out with boys of my age than with girls of my age. I think it’s because a lot of the girls that are in my classes are “Barbies,” or they’re just too sporty. I also think I like hanging out with boys because they seem to be more straight-forward than the gils at my school. That might just be me,though.
I haven’t really hung out with girls at my school for a long time… But that’s because they’re afraid (in a way) of me…worried I’ll start hitting on them or something ( I would never sink that low…and besides, they aren’t afraid of boys who are definately hitting on them, but that’s beside the point) They won’t admit it, but I can tell. Anyway, my friends at school (all guys) are pretty awesome, even if they don’t get “girl stuff” for example:
N: Clare, why are you so grouchy today?
me: SHUT UP *headdesk*
N: wow… okAy then
Me: sorry Nathan, I..I…
N: it’s fine.
but they’re pretty understanding
It interesting cause all my friends at school are guys, and all my friends outside of school are girls…But that’s beside the point.
I agree with you, but any time two people who are of the opposite sex start hanging out with each other, immediately rumors start to flare up. It’s so stupid because I don’t think that many people in my grade have quite grasped the concept that a girl and a guy can just be friends, and that’s ok. They don’t need to be romantically connected to hang out, and even if they were, it shouldn’t be a big deal, but it is.
So my friends and I all agree that a lot of people overreact if you try to become friends with a guy, which is so stupid. I just go ahead and do it anyway though and ignore the rumors – I mean, a lot of my friends who are guys are a lot easier to hang out with them my friends who are girls. They don’t seem to get as caught up in drama as a lot of the girls do, and they don’t really sugarcoat things as much, which is nice. Many of them are more straight to the point.
well, not with me.
Up to sixth grade, my best friends had always been boys… Boys always seemed to like more action .
A lot of the girls I met before sixth grade were just too spoiled in a way…
And then because I was hanging out with a bunch of boys, they basically ignored me… only one other girl hanged around in our ‘mixed group’. (we were the only ‘mixed group for anything XD)
what does this have to do with sexism, LBK? i don’t see a connection.
Well, I didn’t know where else to put it, I guess.
Sorry.
sorry,that was a bit harsh of me.i guess since we were kind of talking about gender relations it’s relevant~
Glory halleluj – It’s Lent. Anyway, I love Massachusetts. There’s this column in the Boston Globe Magazine where they send people on blind dates. Here’s the link to the one from today:
http : //www.boston.com/bostonglobe/magazine/articles/2010/02/28/a_tall_tale/
This thread is slightly more recent, so I’ll ask here as well–I am doing a report for school on atheism, so if anyone here who is an atheist would like to answer a few questions for me over on the Atheism thread (https://musefanpage.com/blog/?p=3059#comment-357499) it would really be helpful. I just want to know some basic things, and nothing you answer would be directly included in the project. But it would be helpful if people looked/answered some. Thanks!
Wow. this conversation/topic is SO very dead.
*racks mind for good topic*
Ah, the healthcare mess that is our country and how it’s currently progressing…..or not. Thoughts, anyone?
I’ve been raised a Democrat all my life, but I am so tired of both Democrats and Republicans that it ruined my faith in human nature all over again. And I didn’t think I even had any left.
Seems like the Republicans are just blocking the Democrats just to block them. And then I come home every night to my mom saying things like, “Life would be so much better if the Republicans just listened to us! No, honey, don’t watch Fox News, we don’t want to hear what they have to say.” Hell, I’m just tired of the people running the whole universe in general. Then again, this often happens when the schedule throws up my Social Studies class two days in a row. I end up looking at history and saying, “My God! humans are an entire species made of idiots.”
I’m majorly cynical at the moment. Can you tell?
I despise the partisan political system. The founders of this country didn’t want it, I don’t want it, quite a few people don’t want it. Life would be so much better, in my opinion, if we didn’t have any political parties.
Or we could just go back to being Democratic-Republicans.
Why would we do that? They’re just another party.
I hate how damned inefficent our government is… I mean, it was founded on good principals and might work well theorectically, and it’s a lot more fair than in many other countries, but that’s all beside the point because it never gets anything done.
It gets things done.
I’ve heard that this inefficiency, or thoughtfulness, depending on how one views it, is why American politics will never yield to a tyrant- but Pre-WWII Germany was democratic. I’m aware that this point has many flaws, but it’s important to remember, the balance between safety and progress.
there’s thoughtfulness and then there’s petty partisan bickering….which is part of what’s going on with healthcare reform, although I admit some of it is warrented.
Parimentary systems are also equal and fair, but because of the way they’re set up, they get stuff done a lot quicker.
Yes, because any Tyran will run away screaming. The pre-WW2 Germany argument can’t be used to prove the point because I’d like to see a government trying to keep control over starving masses. Considering those circumstances….
I would hardly call the Weimar Republic a democracy.
The Weimar Republic was a democracy, and quite successful for a few years too! (♥Bauhaus!) Economically not so much, but the chips were stacked against them, no? I believe Italy was also experimenting with building a democratic republic, before fascism. My point that any tyrant would have to battle enormous political opposition and beaurocratic drudgery in the U.S., whereas a weaker or faster moving government is more susceptible. As I see it, we can only assume that politicians want what’s best for the country, their constituents, and themselves (not necessarily in that order)- legitimate concerns arise when you’re faced with a bill that flies in opposition to your beliefs (not that, say, all Americans should be able to get healthcare, but how to pay for it).
If you’re counting the power being in the hands of a few well-off post-aristocrats bickering over ideals, then yes, it was a democracy.
Mmm, I think the same could be said of a number of modern nations.
Exactly. But in a modern context, we have a level of media and information distribution that would have driven most Weimar-era politicians into apoplexy. “What? The people can find out about my drunk driving after a night at a gay nightclub with a male hooker in my car? That will destroy my homophobic, right-wing, demagogic platform!”
Of course, networks like Fox are doing their best to revert the political process to this fantastic standard of “you need to know what we want you to know”, but Fox doesn’t own the internet (yet :S).
haha, yes, true!
It’s amazing he had to crash his car to get caught though.
That’s something I’ve been wondering about lately, the (internet) news. Where do MBers get their news? I’ve been using BBC, NYT, AJE. I used to use CNN but it’s not as good as those others. Also I’ve heard Deutsch-Welle is good?
The Guardian and the BBC.
I wonder whether FOX will just change the key in his name when reporting on this scandal. They’ve done it before, Republicans caught in this type of “scandal” being labeled (D) instead of (R).
They did it for Sanford, McCain, Foley, Toomey and Stevens, probably more.
I like The Guardian. Was it naive of me to assume that Fox’s errors with D/R labels and pie chart percentages were simply just mistakes?
Re:Fox:
I find both annoying and amusing their “polls” about things–“ONLY 50% OF PEOPLE STILL APPROVE OF OBAMA”
No, only 50% of FOX viewers who bothered to go to the site and take the poll approve/disapprove. But of course they don’t say that.
Other news companies are guilty of this as well, but I see it mostly on FOX (or a considerable amount for how little of FOX I really watch)
@ Vendaval: Very naive. They persistently make “mistakes” that result in giving more credibility to right-wing political movements or that condemn left-wingers.
Re: Jadestone
And 50% is still higher than many president’s approval ratings have been.
We don’t even watch the news anymore- we get anything important off the internet, and the rest is just political bickering. Republican politicians bore me to death too, but when you spend a half a religion lesson talking about how “Kevin Rudd is a modern-day prophet”, you don’t really care that Republicans can be idiotic too.
A. What the founders wanted is hard to tell, they were a pretty large and diverse bunch.
B. What the founders wanted is not always relevant today- most things have changed significantly.
B. As I’ve interpreted Fed. Papers 9 & 10, the founders knew political parties/interest groups would come about, and they did not like the idea, but they were committed to finding a practical solution. A large republic was the best solution found, one which allows for citizens to form groups to defend common interests, but also allows for minority preservation.
The U.S. is also anything but “one united people—a people descended from the same ancestors, speaking the same language, professing the same religion.”
I’ve done something wrong with the nested comments? That last comment (Vendaval in March 7th, 2010 @ 23:29 ) is in reply to 16.1.1.
Also, I posted ‘on’ March 7th, not “in March 7th”?
Perhaps I should get some sleep.
No, everything is ship-shape. Your comment was 16.1.1.3, which is the 3rd reply to 16.1.1. You posted “in” March 7th because a part of the software for MB was originally written in Portuguese and was not translated to English perfectly. That’s why you also “cancelar” a reply.
Ah, yes, the Portuguese. Mmm, I’d forgotten what comments nested that high are like.
Yeah. Often, congresspeople care more about their perception in the public eye than actually doing what they wanted to do.
An interesting point that I found in Newsweek is that it’s not always the congress people’s fault that nothing happens. It’s the fact that many Americans want everything, but aren’t willing to give up anything. How can you do anything with that attitude?
Ew, Newsweek? *barf* *puke* *vomit*
I heard from some interviewee I interviewed that if Frances Perkins had gotten her way, universal healthcare would have been integrated into the Social Security Act in 1935, and then we wouldn’t be arguing about it today. Too bad Roosevelt died before she could achieve this. Seriously, guys. Frances Perkins saved your life.
Re-political parties.
They’re vehicles of expression. In that sense they’re great.
Newsweek is not that bad. The economist is better.
Blocking other parties just because they aren’t yours isn’t a purely an american disease (hopeless without spellcheck, sorry!). Take the first austrian rendition of the PISA test- some schools are better than others, and only bad or mediocre schools made the list. All because the reds were trying to fowl up the blues- don’t ask. It’s just a shame that the healthcare system should fall prey to this. However, I think you have too few parties- if there was a third group coming up on the squabbling two, they’d have to resolve it or both fall. It’s just… aren’t any organizations with political power to stop this? The school reform I ranted about for months was efficiently wrecked by massive pupil demonstrations and their representatives. I think the duo-partieism is the problem (well okay, I know there are more, but those have the power).
Political parties…eh, personally I think we’d be better off without them. They’re just an inevitable thing in our government and political world, but if we didn’t have them, it would be better. It’s turned into a Democrat vs. Republican personal war, instead of actually focusing on people’s real rights. Same goes for any sort of election in the U.S. So, basically what Piggy said earlier in his reply.
The real problem is having a two-party system. Different parties are inevitable, as you need different parties to incorporate different ideals and ideologies and just give them names, but once it turns into a “this or that” situation, you’re screwed. Switzerland, for example, has a variety of parties, and none of them really have the obvious upper hand- motions introduced by any party have an equal chance of being passed by popular vote. Only a few people really identify with one party alone, and since parties have a habit of endorsing other proposals (to give a show of patriotic brotherhood) no one really has a monopoly. the People’s Christian Party, The Swiss People’s Party, The Green Party, The Radical Liberals, The Socialist Party, The Communist Party, The League of Ticino… It gets worse at a cantonal level.
I’m sorry to change the subject so abruptly, but did anyone hear about the violence against homosexuals in Uganda? It’s utterly despicable. I can’t believe that those preachers would dare to do say such horrible things.
Anyway, this is straight from the Vatican’s website:
“It is deplorable that homosexual persons have been and are the object of violent malice in speech or in action. Such treatment deserves condemnation from the Church’s pastors wherever it occurs. It reveals a kind of disregard for others which endangers the most fundamental principles of a healthy society. The intrinsic dignity of each person must always be respected in word, in action and in law.”
Too bad the Pope issued a statement condemning homosexuality as immoral and abnormal only very recently, and yesterday I read about an Italian Catholic priest barring homosexuals from entering his church. The Vatican might have to deal with the heritage of the Enlightenment, but Ugandan Christianity operates under no such restraints. The Vatican is as much to blame.
I did not, actually, even though I’ve been watching the news. The church, no matter what it says to pretend it isn’t, discriminatates against homosexuality the most, which is wierd, because, as I learned in 2nd grade sunday school, God loves EVERYONE and so does Jesus. Now, when ever I hear these phrases I’m forced to think “hypocrites” …..
So, this is a very old topic that I feel like talking about, but we’re learning about it in history class.
What do people think about the Protestant Revolution? Was the Church wrong? Why do you think Martin Luther was one of the first people to rebel? Do you think it was moral for Henry VII to make a new church because the Catholic church wouldn’t bend to his will? Was John Calvin’s idea a good one?
I’m not the most knowledgeable, but I’ve got some opinions:
The Protestant Revolution was a good thing.
People have always rebelled against organisation. Luther wasn’t so much challenging the foundation of the Church, but the legality of its current actions (selling indulgences).
If hypocritical is wrong, then yes, the Church was wrong. That’s heresy though, so the Church was right. Isn’t the Church always right?
Henry VIII was pretty sketchy, but his creation of a new church seems fine with me. State religion, however, was and still is bad.
I mostly disagree with Calvin. How ‘good’ his ideas were is subjective though.
I have to say, I disagree with how Calvin derives what we should do. Yes, if God exists and is omniscient and omnipotent then he knows where we’ll go when we die but we don’t know where we will go.
After Monday’s “3000%” comment by President Obama, I’m starting to wonder if he paid much attention in math class.
Hyperbole isn’t always restricted to the realm of the possible.
That’s very true, but if he wanted to use hyperbole, 300% or 1000% probably would have sufficed.
Hm. I don’t know the details of this particular speech, but the “3000 percent decrease” figure does sound too specific to be hyperbole. (Hyperbole isn’t this president’s style, anyway.) I think it must have been a slip of the tongue. Anybody who gives as many speeches he’s been doing lately is bound to space out from time to time. Could he have meant 3000 dollars?
Anyway, I’m disinclined to play “gotcha” with somebody whose job is a lot harder than mine. The arguments for or against health-care reform don’t stand or fall by one moment of weirdness.
Obama has an academic record that is probably more prestigious than what anyone on this blog could ever hope to achieve.
I was joking about the math class comment, OK?
Anyways, let me see if I get this straight. A group of people (many of whom are still in high school or earlier) do not have the academic potential to go into college, become a Senator, or any of the other such things that Barrack Obama did, because… you said so? When did you become a Dean of Admission simultaneously at every college, university, or post-grad school in the US?
Hey, I believe that anyone on this blog is totally able to achieve Obama’s academic record, with the necessary intelligence, dedication, and money. With added charisma and values and whatever else makes people vote for a certain candidate, I believe that anyone on this blog could become President of the United States. That’s one of the few things I love about America’s system of government– anyone can become President, or Senator, or Representative, or Judge, with enough hard work. Unfortunately, there’s also inevitable Washington dynasties and aristocracies like the Kennedies and the Bushes. (It should be made clear here that I actually do support the Kennedies.) And there’s the fact that everybody gets a vote, which is definitely a mixed blessing. But anyone, anyone at all, can become President if they have what it takes.
Pigasus for President!
Or Kokopelli for President!
What are the thoughts on the health care bill passing?
I don’t really get politics, and I have no real position in the whole thing.
Although, I don’t necessarily think that Obama did the right thing with this whole Health Care bill. Besides, Health Care might still be as bad as it is currently, no matter what this bill is supposed to do.
I believe Obama is entitled to his opinions, and he is the president. If I could do something about it, or if I was in his position, I would have thought the bill through a little bit more before rushing to get it passed.
In my parent’s opinion, especially my dad’s, Obama is on the right track and is going to save the USA from plummeting to its demise. That’s their opinion, but mine is that Obama may have done the right thing, and may do the right thing in the future, but he’s gonna mess some things up. He’s going to learn from his mistakes, but his mistakes are most likely going to bring us down.
If he does and up fixing everything, that’s great. He’s not going to be the president forever, and he can’t set the future in stone so that it stays nice, and everyone is safe and happy. There are going to be presidents after him that are going to bring us right back down to where we are. Obama’s hard work to help the environment, and the people is going okay so far, but it’s not always going to be okay.
That’s all I have to say right now.
I find it to be extraordinarily unconstitutional. I know that at least eleven states are suing the federal government as soon as Obama signs the bill into law. Hopefully the Supreme Court will actually do its job instead of trying to shape the country to fit its own beliefs.
However, it will be a step toward something like almost every other developed country has in terms of a healthcare system. Some may regard it as Socialism, but it’s more like progress. And, I’m a socialist, so I can’t say it’s not.
I must say that I agree.
Like Keiffer, I’m no politics expert. In fact, I know very little about politics on a whole. However, my parents are both very outspoken believers in politics, so I’ve picked up a lot from them, the news, reading, my history class (where we do a lot of debates about current issues, instead of history, go figure) and the like, so I have developed an opinion on certain topics. But enough about that.
The way I see it, this is one example of how the government is getting their hands into something they shouldn’t – or at least, getting their hands into it in the wrong way. There is no “perfect” solution to the health care issue, but, in my opinion, I think there are better ways to do it then the way Obama is.
I use to live abroad in places where the government has pretty much total control of the hospitals and doctor practices. In those places, the doctors don’t have as much motivation to do well, because they no longer are competing with other companies for patients. Instead, they’re unmotivated to work – they don’t study as hard, and the overall quality of the average doctor goes down because of this. Not only that, but it can take a long time to get even one appointment and the prices for the medical care is much higher because the industry lacks the competition.
I know there’s much more to the bill than that, but there’s my basic look on it. I don’t think that most Americans realize that that is what happens when government takes over something, but that’s the way I see it.
I live abroad. In austria. And here, the system works. Actually, a few years ago there were serious problems because so many people wanted to study to become doctors and you’d have to wait a year or so before a spot was open for you. I’ve never had any problems with demotivated doctors before- more like the opposite. This summer, my sister had a toothache and had to see a dentist in Sweden (which has a similar system). No-one in my family speaks a word of swedish but the receptionist was very friendly and helpful. It turns out that the tooth was only loose and nothing needed to be done about it, so we didn’t have to pay a cent for the checkup. I’ve been to a public hospital in America once and was charged 200$, even though I only needed an aspirin.
We lived in England and Spain when I was younger, so I don’t remember much, but according to my parents all of the systems we had were pretty bad. We ended up flying back over to the U.S. for all of our doctor appointments or just scheduled them when we would be back in the states.
But England and Spain are different somehow *goes off to look it up*
who will pay for the lawsuits though? :/
in states like north carolina it is definitely a hard thing to pay for. but i’m sorry i find it a waste of money to sue when they will obviously not win and will only waste more taxpayer money on fees.
“Obviously not win”? How do you figure that? The main reasoning behind the lawsuits, from what I’ve heard, is that forcing individuals to buy insurance (as this law will do) is unconstitutional in that it infringes upon states’ sovereignty. And it appears I may have had my number wrong: at the moment, ten states have announced they will file lawsuits, with another nine states considering it.
i dunno piggy,i do see what you’re saying but even if i totally agreed with you i don’t see it being struck down. here i go with my quotes, apologies in advance but i am not particularly articulate right now having slogged through pages on this stuff
“But constitutional scholars suggest that such cases would likely amount to no more than a speed bump for health care legislation.
The reason, they say, is that Congress has framed the mandate as a tax, which it has well-established powers to create. And Congress’s sweeping authority to regulate the nation’s economy, they add, has been clear since the 1930s. ”
“Erwin Chemerinsky, a constitutional scholar and dean of the University of California, Irvine School of Law, said the argument that people should have the right not to buy health care was “rhetorically appealing†because of its paean to personal freedom. But “individual freedom not to purchase health care, I think, has no basis in Constitutional law.â€
In fact, Professor Chemerinsky added, “there is no case law, post 1937, that would support an individual’s right not to buy health care if the government wants to mandate it.†”
nyt once again….commerce clause, basically.
So people are free to get sick without insurance? Yep, sign me up to be free.
23- It’s done, now let’s work on something else. (Finally)
how about some facts
Six months after the legislation is enacted, many plans would be prohibited from placing lifetime limits on medical coverage, and they could not cancel the policies of people who fall ill. Children with pre-existing conditions could not be denied coverage.
EXPANDED MEDICAID More lower-income individuals under the age of 65 would be covered by Medicaid, the federal health insurance plan for the poor. Under the new rules, households with income up to 133 percent of the federal poverty level, or about $29,327 for a family of four
honestly i am exhausted by this, i don’t understand why anyone would oppose helping out sick people, it baffles me.
starr — i have heard many more stories of quality care and easily accessible doctors. i would like to hear from elias who live sin switzerland and therefore benefits from a universal healthcare system.
those are from the new york times ~*by the way
Like I said, I don’t know many cold, hard facts so thanks for pointing some of those out.
Like starr, I don’t know many hard, cold facts. And I believe that helping out sick people is a very good idea.
However, I don’t believe that the Obama administration is going about it the right way. Here’s an interesting fact I read about in the Wall Street Journal:
The cost of the new legislation will amount to $940 billion over the next 10 years. In the same time period, it will reduce the deficit by $143 billion. At a time where the US national debt is worth 88.2% of the GDP – and the debt is increasing about 5 times as fast as the GDP – that doesn’t sound like a good idea for our generation.
So really, my problem with it is financially, for the people who don’t require extra health care. It’s sort of like the basic premise in Repo Men: The Union allows people to buy artificial organs on credit, but if they can’t make their payments, the repo men are sent out to surgically retrieve the organs. Instead of repossessing health care, however, Congress and the President are just going to pass the bill onto themselves, and therefore onto tax payers.
So what would you have someone do to fix the system? It will cost money, but there are some things that are simply necessary.
Yes, exactly. I get that the national deficit is so big, but I blame that on Bush. ( I know someone will argue with me here. ) We have been trying to get health insurance at LEAST since the Great Depression when the Social Security Act was passed. Come to think of it, I think people said the same things they’re saying about healthcare in 1935 when the SSA was passed, and Social Security seemed to work out pretty well. Who’s complaining that they’re receiving at least some amount of money when they’re old, taking care of children, or disabled? And who’s going to complain when they get better health coverage and better options for care than they could previously afford?
Social Security has worked out well? I suppose you could say that, up until right now. But it’s run out of money, or will have very, very shortly. People that have been giving money to Social Security for decades will get nothing in return–the government found a way to waste it instead of using it for its intended purpose. As the government always does. The post office is failing, lobbying is practically required by law, Congress ignores the opinions of the people–all in all, the government has been failing at everything it has done. Health care will be no exception. We’ll give more of our money to a system whose only function appears to be wasting money, yet people expect rainbows and unicorns. I’m a tad more realistic.
As for the deficit, there is no one entity to blame. Bush did indeed play a rather large role, yes. But so did Clinton. And bankers. And underhanded deals on Wall Street, idiots buying too many houses, credit card companies with complete disregard for reality, the collapse of the dot-com bubble, the inevitable rise-and-fall pattern of general economics. Basically, it’s everyone’s fault.
I did hear about that. But it was FRANCES PERKINS’S idea. They just weakened it with all those laws. Universal healthcare was her idea too, and that makes it beneficial.
I think we should make health care available to the people who get sick/injured/ill fairly often (say, once a month or so) and do actually need it and, if they really need the following, provide an option for the government to pay for some or all of it.
We shouldn’t just force health care onto a majority of the country, regardless of whether they need it or not, and give them all an option to get government payment for part/all of it – that’s basically equivalent to forcing financially responsible people (i.e, people who pay their taxes) to support irresponsible people (i.e, people who buy color TVs and beer at times when they could afford un-purchased HC) for their irresponsibility.
Can someone please explain the whole thing, in BASIC terms, to me? I don’t really understand…
Ha, it’s quite difficult to perform that task. The bill was over 2000 pages.
Sounds like a lot of fine print.
Not to mention, numerous references to other bills and pieces of legislation.
Healthcare is required for almost every legal person. For those who can’t afford it, the government will offer an option. (I’m not sure on that part.)
Googling “reuters healthcare summary” will yield a summary I found very straightforward.
25- Hey, I’m all for helping sick people. But aren’t Medicaid and Medicare going bankrupt?
26- Well, basically, the U.S. government is forcing everyone in the country to get health insurance, even if they are already sick. This will likely prove to be bad news for the health insurance companies, and they will probably go bankrupt and add to the piling federal deficit. Who will pay for the insurance then? The taxpayers, of course.
I’ve noticed that U.S. health care is always being compared unfavorably to that of universal health countries. Just out of curiosity, has someone ever measured up the quality of the health care of those who do have insurance here?
I don’t know about having insurance in America, but I know that I never have to worry about getting hurt here. And the whole point is that a lot of people can’t afford healthcare, which is sick and wrong in my opinion.
The numbers you may have read are probably misleading, in regards to how many Americans don’t have health insurance. The numbers reported by the president and liberal media sources usually describe everyone here, including non-Americans and people who choose not to buy health insurance even though they can easily afford it. A New York Post article breaks down the numbers and finds: “Only 5 percent of Americans are uninsured and making less than the median income. (And many among that 5 percent are already eligible for government programs).”
The NY Post is good for three things: Gossip, Sports, and Entertainment.
I never said the NY Post was a good publication. But its logic in this column was sound.
5% are uninsured and making less than the median income. Which means, that there can be many Americans that are uninsured but not making less than the median income. Oh yes, and 5% of 307,006,550 (According to US Census Bureau) is 15,350,300 or so people. Percents can’t mean much when you don’t state what it’s a percent of.
I do agree that people should be helped if they can’t afford health care – as long as they actually need health care. Like I said in my above comment, giving the option to get government payment to people who don’t need health care and who don’t need government payment for it is pretty much a disaster waiting to happen.
27.1- Hmm. What’s the income tax in Austria?
A big and entirely unaddressed in government problem w/ american healthcare is that a lot (though by no means all) americans want access to hospitals when they are sick, but don’t make an honest effort to stay healthy or fit, either by lack of education or willpower, so they end up getting more sick more often costing more people more time and money.
While we’re still talking about the health care bill, here’s a thought puzzle for everyone: If the government is correct, and 127 million people are dying every day from illness or health-related problems, why are we waiting months or even years to put certain provisions of the bill into effect?
Er, when did the government say this? This is almost half the population and cannot be correct.
That’s why I emphasize the word “are”. At that rate, the country would be dead in 2 days. They probably meant 127 thousand people. But still, that’s a lot of citizens – why are we waiting months or even years to put provisions of the bill into effect?
Because this country likes the concept of change but is afraid to actually see it happen.
Vote Ron Paul!
Because he’s for replacing the income tax with a sales tax. ^^)
Ron Paul’s a cool guy. I’d like him better if he’d abandon political parties, but he’s still a pretty cool guy.
That sounds like a terrible idea. I’d rather pay a percentage of what I earn, and thus Rich pay more the Poor, then everything equal and we pay it on sales tax.
Beside, RP’s racist.
Vote GREEN PARTY!
But the point is that most liberal politicians think that the rich should be taxed at a higher rate than the middle class, thus “spreading the wealth”. (coughcoughmarxismcough)
And yet everyone likes Robin Hood.
That’s because all the poor people in Robin Hood worked as hard as they could, but they became poor out of bad luck. That’s not the case with all poor Americans.
They used to teach people that poverty was always a result of laziness, alcoholism, or bad morals. Isn’t that sick? This is like in the Industrial Revolution –
I’m not saying that all poverty is a result of laziness, alcoholism, bad morals, or the like – but it’s not the other way around either.
And it’s not the case with many rich Americans that they became rich through hard work.
And, Piggy, what’s wrong with Marxism? Yes, it usually doesn’t work, but that’s because all the attempts so far have been through dictatorship. How do you know a democratic Marxist state won’t work?
That’s because he wore green tights. You can’t not like green tights, I think.
31.2.1.1.1.2- A democratic Marxist state is an oxymoron. The reason that every attempt at communism has ended up in a dictatorship is that humans are, well, human. In small groups–such as ancient monasteries–communism is perfect and works marvelously. But get an entire country into the system and corruption, power-hoarding, and inequality are completely and undeniably inevitable. Every country that has attempted communism was indeed brought to that state by the common people–in a sense, democracy. But after that, dictatorship always takes over. To take the step from capitalism to communism, socialism must first be introduced to redistribute the wealth. Not a single country in the history of the world has made it past that first step–the people in charge of moving the wealth around figured out that “Hey, this whole ‘power’ thing is pretty nice. I think I’ll keep it.” America would be no exception. And I, for one, do not feel like being a lab rat for a doomed and extraordinarily dangerous experiment to which I did not agree.
*Note to self: When president, figure out how to wear green tights*
If the world at once jumped to Communism it would work.
Why is that a bad thing? It’s not like they work more, or even harder.
They’re being, in a way, punished for being rich. Whether you personally feel they’re “justly” rich, or whatever, they are singled out and forced to pay disproportionately.
But they can afford to pay more.
Yes, they can. They can pay the same percentage as everyone else. They would, with that system, be paying more money.
but the money is actually less valuable to them/they have more disposable income. if a person who makes 25000 a year has to pay the same percentage as someone who makes 200,000+ it will hurt them more because they spend it on necessities almost exclusively.
Well, I’ll let you go around to every rich person and explain that A. they don’t deserve their money and B. that you know how to manage it better than they do anyway.
But isn’t justice what society is all about?
It would be unfair to be taxed more, yes. But that inequality is nothing compared to the stupendously large gap between the rich and the poor, especially when placement in the economic strata is not based upon the amount or quality of work done. “Justly” rich is not whatever I feel, it’s a fact that the richer one becomes the easier it is to accumulate more money.
But if being richer makes it easier to get more money, you had to get rich (not richer, just rich) at one point. So being “justly” rich or not is important for consideration.
GO GRACE ROSS
Problem w/ the green party….they aren’t big enough to compete w/ democratic and republican parties, so they won’t ever actually win anything significant and many votes (such as votes against Bush in the 2004 election) are essentially wasted.
Not only wasted, they spoiled it for the Democrats.
From The Economist-
Dr Henrich also, however, found that the sense of fairness in a society was linked to the degree of its participation in a world religion. Participation in such religion led to offers in the dictator game that were up to 10 percentage points higher than those of non-participants.
World religions such as Christianity, with their moral codes, their omniscient, judgmental gods and their beliefs in heaven and hell, might indeed be expected to enforce notions of fairness on their participants, so this observation makes sense. From an economic point of view, therefore, such judgmental religions are actually a progressive force. That might explain why many societies that have embraced them have been so successful, and thus why such beliefs become world religions in the first place.
If you think this is out of context-
http://www . economist . com/science-technology/displaystory . cfm?story_id=15717188
If you doubt the source-
http://www . psych . ubc . ca/~henrich/pdfs/Henrich%20et.%20al.%202010 . pdf
YES! THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT I THINK! Now Elias comes on and argues about the terrorists, but I think that if religion makes at least one person be more fair or kinder or less inclined to do harm to people or whatever, it is a good thing. Just to counteract all the terrorism.
So if one person is nice their whole life it makes up for a war started because a terrorist killed thousands of people? That does not make sense.
Yes it does.
It is a good thing, yes, but it does not “counteract all the terrorism”. Not even close.
There’s a concept in economics called the Multiplier Effect that applies here. One act of kindness has a small multiplier: you smile at someone, they smile at someone else. One act of terrorism has a large multiplier: you crash a plane into a building, millions of people suffer. They’re not comparable.
I totally, absolutely disagree with this, and not just on the basis that I completely disagree with the idea that people with a religion (such as, as you said, Christianity) posses any more morals than people without a religion.
It just seems like utter ******** to me when people spout out that, partially because it’s a discrimination I’ve been through hell for.
The societies Henrich uses are never going to give a fair representation based on religion. The societies that are pointed out with “less” religion are probably actually responding to the dictator game (which in itself does not seem like a very valid test to me–it’s only based on personal decisions, which can be effected by so many outside factors; and also the participants know that is only a game and will not really matter–they would doubtless respond differently if they knew they were supposedly representing their societies) based on the fact that money is not as important in those places.
Quote: “Notions of fairness increase steadily as societies achieve greater market integration (see chart).”
The less market integration there is in a society, the less likely it is that money is as highly valued (“highly valued” is not quite the term I am looking for, it is used less and matters less to the people) and so it wouldn’t seem as “unfair” to the people who kept more for themselves.
“Fair” is a term that can’t be truly defined with a set of parameters. I find it unlikely it can truly be measured in any way that would provide concrete reasons for behavior.
The bit about religion at the end seems totally out of the blue to me. Correlation does not imply causation. It seems like Henrich was grasping for straws at the end there to stick in something to make religion seem justifiably better than lack of it. This section made me very angry when I read it, so if I’m going to respond to it I’ll do so later when I am more mentally level on this subject, for the GAPA’s sake.
A)The main point of this experiment was to show that fairness is a social invention. That said,
“The societies Henrich uses are never going to give a fair representation based on religion. The societies that are pointed out with “less†religion are probably actually responding to the dictator game (which in itself does not seem like a very valid test to me–it’s only based on personal decisions, which can be effected by so many outside factors; and also the participants know that is only a game and will not really matter–they would doubtless respond differently if they knew they were supposedly representing their societies) based on the fact that money is not as important in those places.”
I think this is more in response to market integration, since it doesn’t have anything to do with religion.
“The bit about religion at the end seems totally out of the blue to me. Correlation does not imply causation. It seems like Henrich was grasping for straws at the end there to stick in something to make religion seem justifiably better than lack of it.”
He was testing partly for religion. This is also one of the many misuses of ‘correlation does not imply causation’. It’s the manipulated variable. This is science.
I would like to note that the Economist is rather anti-religion.
Piggy, there is a hole in your argument that the health care bill is unconstitutional:
US Constitution, Article VI:
“This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land”
Obama knows how to govern the United States. He inherited a large debt from Bush, who inherited a surplus from Clinton. I trust him to do the right thing.
Besides, the Republicans are acting childish. “He took our presidency, so let’s make sure he can’t do anything useful.” They aren’t trying to get health care for the American people. They’re trying to make Obama look bad. It was actually kind of funny watching them try to make sure Obama didn’t use reconciliation when they have used it far more then Democrats.
On a different note, did you see that the Texas Board of education is making textbooks tell (innocent little) children that evolution is a theory, not a fact?
Er, how does that prove the HC bill is constitutional?
and did anyone see that texans tried (and might have succeded) to remove Thomas Jefferson from textbooks because of his critical role in establishing the separation between church and state? Or that they attempted (this one failed, by the way) to, legally, have Pi be equal to three?
And, w/ evolution, they’ve been trying to do that for YEARS….there is a really excellent NOVA documentry about it…
Yes, I saw that. It’s hardly new, and not just in Texas. *coughscopesmonkeytrialcough*
But having pi be equal to three? That’s ridiculous, and we can all agree on that, I think(hope)
I did see that; I was very upset over that article. It just shows how people are afraid of their beliefs being challenged, but instead of facing the challenges they try to pretend they don’t exist. On a personal level this is none of my business, but when it affects hundreds of thousands of other people, who trust their schools to provide them with accurate and unbiased information, then it is outrageous.
It’s things like that that make me really disappointed in America.
I think it was Indiana that tried to pass a mathematical bill… And it wasn’t Pi= 3, I think it was supposed to make it legally possible to square the circle.
Mhmm, All of the reports from legal scholars that I’ve read have agreed; the bill has solid footing Constitutionally. The Elastic Clause and Commerce were both cited, as well as the matter being a mandated tax.
Evolution is a theory, but this is where the definitions of scientific terms become important.
That phrase can not be used to prove that the HC bill is constitutional because it uses the words “this constitution”. That means that if the bill is in check with the other articles, then it’s the supreme law of the land.
Evolution is a theory, not a fact. Admittedly, it’s a completely plausible and logical theory (and one that I happen to accept as fact), but it is still just a theory and not a fact.
Now, if they are wanting to teach creationism as a legitimate theory in public schools, I can see the concern. Afterall, in my opinion, creationism is totally absurd….
As is gravity. It’s all just a theory.
If they want to say that it’s a theory, they have to explain the scientific definition of theory. That it is an explanation for a natural phenomenon that is extremely well backed up by evidence. Which is pretty much the case for everything in science.
Oh, I’m not saying that they shouldn’t explain the scientific definition of a theory, but to call evolution a “fact” would be incorrect. Them calling it a theory is perfectly legitimate (yes, provided they explain what a scientific theory is).
In science, a “theory” is much more important than a fact.
But theory in science is as close as you can get to a fact. As I’ve said, if you’re going to emphasize that evolution is a theory, you have to do the same for gravity, germ theory of disease, etc.
The conterversy was over the difference between casual theory and scientific theory…casual theroy are often near-guesses, scientific theory has been repeatitively PROVEN and never disproven,
What follows is a conversation from English class today, following a class discussion about genocide and whether the United States should intervene to prevent it in other countries:
Sub: So, what are your opinions on genocide?
Student: It’s…bad?
Sub: Oh, come on. Surely you have a strongly held opinion.
Another Student: I have a strongly held opinion that genocide is bad…
Sub: So, do you guys think that genocide could ever happen in this country?
Student: *mentions Native Americans*
Sub: Well, in the future.
*class starts talking to each other about the possibility*
Sub: Well, I don’t know if you guys have heard about the health care bill that’s been passed – actually, you don’t, because you haven’t been following it, but, basically, if your Grandma got sick and needed 5 tests to get better, the government would only give her 1 test. So, shouldn’t we consider the possibility that there might be a genocide against the elderly very soon in this country?
*incredulous stares from class*
First of all, genocide isn’t based on age. That would be, I dunno, eldercide or something. But not technically genocide. Secondly, it’s a little ridiculous to randomly interject a random, controversial opinion to people who (as far as you’re concerned) don’t even know anything about politics (not exactly the truth, but whatever). Finally, it’s exactly this sort of sensationalism/scare politics that has really bothered me about this whole health care debate. I understand that some people are scared of change, and the bill is definitely not perfect, but there is NO reason to make up/exaggerate facts just to confuse and frighten people.
Also, RE: Texas Textbooks, I think it’s crazy that such a small committee has such influence on textbooks across the country. They are literally trying to rewrite history.
(33 and its subsidiaries) About Texas, Thomas Jefferson, and pi:
Fact-check time.
That’s a little like asking teachers to analyze and evaluate whether Einstein’s general theory of relativity can explain life, the universe, and everything. It’s an ongoing area of research, and even the world’s top biologists don’t know the answers yet. But even if science were to grind to a halt right now and never find out the answers, relativity and natural selection would still be scientifically useful ideas. Telling teachers they have to decide how well natural selection explains cell structure right now strikes me as pointless (as well as cruel to the teachers).
Think about the theory of relativity, which ties together observations about everything from how long it takes subatomic particles to decay to the way light from other galaxies appears to bend as it travels through space. For that matter, think about music theory: All those descriptions of chords and keys and intervals have nothing to do with whether music is a fact.
So, yes, people who say that evolution is “just a theory” are misusing the word “theory.” But that wasn’t part of the recent decision by the Texas State Board of Education.
*apologizes for inncorrect info…I was misinformed and didn’t check it*
That makes me feel a bit better… But still, some of the things they want to do are ridiculous.
31.2- Well, a sales tax might decrease the Federal Deficit. No rich crooks could hide their money in Swiss banks. Also, we could get rid of the IRS.
31.2.1.1.1.2- Hey. So some people don’t deserve their reward. But most people–at least where I live–do. Would you take away that incentive?
31.2.1.2.1.1- Not always. Don’t make that generalization.
31.2.1.2.1.2- Since when was that true? The only rich people who make easy money are the dishonest ones. Do Bill Gates and Warren Buffet make “easy” money? And since when was “placement in the economic strata…not based upon the amount or quality of work done?”
I think it is more of a crime to take money from people who worked hard for it. And there are rich people who work hard, you know.
Yes, it is. But are you going to go around, sticking your nose into every single rich persons affairs to finally judge if they worked hard or not? The world isn’t fair and you can’t just make money out of thin air, better to take from the people who can afford to survive without it.
As your official Indiana consultant-
The bill did not seek to redefine pi(as 3.2). It just said that Indiana schools would not have to pay to be able to square the circle, while everyone else would.
If the Wikipedia article on the Indiana bill (en . wikipedia . org/wiki/Indiana_Pi_Bill) is accurate, it’s not clear exactly what the author of the bill was trying to accomplish, apart from having himself officially declared a genius. It was a strange way to go about it.
Wouldn’t it be nice if pi were 4? An even number with an easy square root — life would be better. Not in our universe, unfortunately.
32.2- Religion seems to work for some countries. Like Bhutan. We should all become Buddhists.
Unrelated, but I wish the United States wasn’t the only half-capitalist country in the world. We’re quickly turning into socialists, and then capitalism will be dead. Maybe all capitalists should move to Antarctica; where they can live happily with no political rift.
What are you talking about? There are other capitalist countries!
Yeah, Buddhism sounds like a great religion. *is not Buddhist*
OMGeorge, that sounded SO sarcastic. I promise I didn’t mean it sarcastically.
www . agecon . purdue . edu/crd/localgov/second%20level%20pages/Indiana_Pi_Story . htm
Sorry. I put the wrong quote in. (33.1) I saw something that proved that the bill is constitutional and I thought that it had something along the lines of “Law of the Land.” I was wrong, but the health care bill is constitutional and necessary.
If the health care bill is constitutional, then there must be something in the Constitution about health care. Is there? (I’d look myself, but I’m busy with school work)
And about it being “necessary” – I agree, health care reform is necessary for people who get sick a lot and are very poor. But the government shouldn’t be punishing the rich people and supporting the poor people solely because they are rich or poor, respectively.
So being being poor is not a justified cause for support? What is then? Some people are more prone than illness than others, especially where age and so on comes in, but it’s equally unfair to punish them for the way they are.
Much of the healthcare bill is quite unconstitutional; what comes to mind first is the section in which every American is required to buy health insurance. How is forcing people to buy something remotely constitutional? The politicians who support that clause are citing the interstate commerce clause. But not buying insurance isn’t commerce. It’s a lack of commerce. It would be like fining anyone who does not utilize their right of habeus corpus. Completely illogical and utterly unconstitutional.
A Rasmussen poll taken the two days after Obama signed the bill shows that 55% of Americans support repealing the healthcare bill entirely.
Mmm, we’ll see how far those suits get in court.
Rasmussen is biased.
Well, another report my mom read said 49% supported it, and 40% didn’t. This was on NPR. (National public radio)
Ah, it was a Gallup poll.
this is only slightly related to current conversation (its sorta related to discussions about the healthcare bill being unconsititonal) and we were talking about in school.
During the cold war The House of Unamerican Activites was set up to rid goverment and the film industry of potential communist. Has anyone else noticed how unamerican the name “House of Unamerican Activites” is? that struck me as ironic…
Slight correction: it was the House (of Representatives) Committee on Un-American Activities.
Ah, thank you…
39.1- Name one country that is like the U.S.
Well, most Western countries economies are based on capitalism,…but, because of post 45, I guess I’ll shut up. Capitalism is just a word, anyway. Who cares?
Richer People Get Richer Easier
It’s a fact. Once you’re not living paycheck to paycheck you can invest, first in things like cars and houses. Your health improves. Financial planners, stock portfolios, sending kids to better schools, owning companies…
I’ve got a book that has tons of facts concerning this, if it would be helpful. I think a factory owner makes something like 500 times what an employee makes, and certainly not by working 500 times harder.
Yes, richer people do get richer easier. That is a fact. However, the notion that that is 100% a problem and 0% good relies on the assumption that every single rich person was dishonest or got lucky or inherited a fortune or something, and therefore don’t really deserve to be rich. That’s definitely not the case with America.
Regarding the factory example – you need to look at the big picture. Even if a factory owner does make 500 times what an employee makes, it’s not like every single factory owner got that kind of pay by being dishonset or lucky or inheriting a fortune or something like that.
the point isn’t dishonesty or corruption. money is less valuable to a person who makes 200,000 than it is to a person who is making 25,000 a year. This does not mean that wealthy people are bad. If I am making 200,000 paying a 25% tax or what have you (pulled that number out of nowhere fyi) is not as big a deal as if I’m making 25000 because I’m not spending it just on necessities. if you have more disposable income taxes don’t hurt as much.
none of this devalues any work someone does.
I’m not saying that fortunes are always founded on unethical practices, but I do believe that accumulating tremendous wealth at the expense of others is unethical.
Axa sums up the differences between income levels nicely, but is making a slightly different point than I am. Most fortunes made today are at the expense of others. This doesn’t mean that rich people are bad people, but their actions are often (unwittingly) for the worse.
Mindful Economics, by Joel Magnuson is a great book I’m drawing on. The factory example (ch. 10) is not just an hypothetical: CEOs in manufacturing in the US earn on average 531 times more than their employees. They are not 531 times as skilled, and they do not work 531 times as hard. Their workers, however, are stuck in the lower class. I’m saying that this pay difference is unethical. More progressive tax bracketing would address this; there is actually some regressive tax bracketing today.
To be quite honest, a lot of stuff people do for themselves or a small group is at the expense of others.
That doesn’t mean it’s right, or should be accepted.
But that’s the way it is. Not all rich people become rich at the expense of others, and it’s not right to generalize like that.
SFTDP
See – it’s just that regarding “spreading the wealth”, I don’t think that all poor people should be pitied and all rich people scorned solely because they’re rich/poor. Just my personal opinion.
I’m not talking about pitying or scorning, I’m talking about bridging the inequality gap. The Civil Rights Movement, for example, was not about feeling sorry for African-Americans.
An opinion is fine, of course, but when there’s little logic behind it and we’re faced with such socio-economic disparity, I don’t see why you stand by it.
I stand by my opinion because there is good logic behind it. “Bridging the inequality gap” is, again, dependent on how you got where you are, and you just can’t ignore the reasons why people are rich or poor.
Suppose you are a wealthy multi-millionaire who became rich by investing in stocks and starting a home business, and stayed wealthy by making sure your money worked for you instead of vice versa. At the same time, suppose I’m a lazy bum who is homeless, jobless, and in poverty because I didn’t apply for a job or didn’t invest in a stock or do anything at all to further my life. Do you honestly think that you – and other hard-working wealthy people like you – should be forced to pay more to support me – and other lazy bums like me?
I think that If I was the hard working wealthy person, that I would try to help the lazy bums get a job. However, some wealthy people aren’t hard working.
See, that’s different – you’re choosing freely to help them and you’re helping them to get a job. In terms of my question, if you were a rich person who was rich because you took advantage of life’s opportunities, and I was a lazy bum who just sat on my a** and did nothing and got poor, and the government forced you to pay more money so they could give it to me – and, in some cases, so I could burn it up smoking or drinking – would you still be so keen to do it?
And I know some wealthy people aren’t hard working. I wasn’t implying that. My point is that the government can’t make generalizations about why/how rich people are rich or poor people are poor.
Yeah, but should the less lazy poor people who actually need the money get less money because some other poor people are drug addicts and slackers? That’s unfair.
No, I think the people who actually need the money and deserve it should get it. The government, when thinking about “spreading the wealth”, is making too many generalizations.
But how do we decide who “deserves” it and who doesn’t? And even if we did, how would we made sure the “right” people got the money?
To become rich by investing in stocks is great, but not possible unless you’ve got a large amount of liquid assets to invest. Staying wealthy by making your money work for you is not hard. This hypothetical lazy bum is a rare case, because most people aren’t fine living in poverty- and when they are trapped there it’s often because they have a mental illness or addiction, conditions you can’t really blame them for having (addiction is debatable, yes, but that’s another issue. Once you’re addicted you can’t just decided to quit). This impoverished person might be doing all that he can (and many, many people are), but he can’t escape poverty living on minimum wage. That’s not even going into the circumstances that surround each person’s life, thing like being born into poverty versus being born into privilege. While it’s possible to overcome situation there is obviously a huge gap there. I don’t think that the hardworking should support the lay, but researching systems like the Nordic Model, as well as looking at the truly amazing inequality in America have shown me that there are few people who are truly lazy and worthy of their position, and that there are also few people who are truly industrious and worthy of their success.
Eep. I see this thread hasn’t changed much.
Re: Healthcare: It was only a matter of time. I hear the 10% tax on tanning got through. This brings me much amusement. I am, however, not pleased that the administration is going to continue to fund abstinence-only education. But I guess I’m supposed to be trying to prove that either it makes us all dirty commies, or makes us all better people.
Re: Spreading the Wealth: I like to view it as being akin to a grading curve. As poorer folk having to pay less than richer folk, rather than the rich being punished.
Re: THE CONSTITUTION: I don’t think there’s anything in it about healthcare. But it’s been years since I last read it. I think the general idea was that the founding fathers made it vague and mutable so that it could be easily changed to suit the needs of a changing country. I would also love you all forever for pointing exactly what, in the constitution, makes the HCB constitutional/unconstitutional. Rather than “this seems so utterly wrong to me that surely the constitution says ‘no.'”
Robert: Thank you ever so much for being a diligent, yet detached fact-checker. You are lovely and amazing.
Cromwell: Do you even have any idea what you’re typing/quoting, ever? Unless confusing your fellow MBers into agreement was what you were going for…
Anyway, can anyone link to a full text of the bill? I take it that no one here, including myself, and possibly excluding our trustworthy GAPA, has actually read the entire thing. I searched, but mostly I got links to PDFs that wouldn’t quite load, and the White House site wants me to view a gallery. Useless!
Thanks, Mel. I try to set a good example to MBers and — well, the universe, I suppose.
Getting the full text is tricky partly because there’ve been many revisions.
opencongress.org/bill/111-h3590/show
(The full official bill text is a link on the right.)
Thanks for the Constitutional reminder! I think we all need it sometimes.
You can’t judge how many people like it by polls because
a) If Fox News says, “Text your answer to blank!” then a fraction of people watching Fox (which is predominately Republican) will give their opinion. Then if a more Democrat favored news show does the same survey, they’ll get different results.
b) Only people who are vocal with their opinions get counted.
Also, Republicans have put out so much misinformation that most people’s view of the bill is distorted. And, not to be critical, but don’t you think the president would have noticed if the bill was constitutional or not. You’re just repeating the Republican’s rallying cry.
The Republicans, the Democrats, the White House, the Tea Parties–everyone puts their own spin on everything.
Not all polls are equal. It’s very hard to conduct an accurate poll, but some firms like Gallup do a good job (and they’ll tell you how good of a job they’ve done with margin of error).
By the same token, you’d think the President and Congress would have noticed that the provision regarding children was missing from the bill before they signed it.
44.1.2 – Welcome to the 1870s – 1890s (The Gilded Age).
45-Well, let’s see. The only possible confusing thing I might have said on this thread was about the Economist article. If anyone had read the article or the paper, then they would have understood what I said. I fully understood everything I said. I don’t see what you’re talking about. If you want to elaborate, that’s fine. If you don’t, that’s also fine.
cromwell: I think that what Melpomene was complaining about (not very diplomatically) was a couple of times on this thread when you gave a link to something published somewhere else and then started talking about it without describing what it said. Someone who didn’t feel like leaving MuseBlog to read the original article would be confused. That’s all I think she meant: that introducing topics for discussion in that way puts her at what she considers an unfair disadvantage.
Melpomene: The idea behind this thread is to treat hot topics in ways that avert flaming and bad feelings, not ways that provoke them. Be careful, please.
I assumed anyone who wanted to discuss it could look at the article. If they didn’t, that’s fine too.
(So it looks to me like no real discussion is going on on this thread right now. If there is one in the nesties, you can ignore this comment.)
I have a younger friend (she’s in fourth grade right now), let’s call her A, who has lesbian parents. Semi-recently, she was being teased by one person because of this. The bully, who I will call B, was basically telling her a bad person because her parents were both women. A and her friends, one of them being my sister, gave B a bit of a hard time about this. B got upset, and the teacher told A and her friends that they couldn’t tell B that she was wrong because it was one of her religious beliefs. I understand we have to respect people’s religions, but this doesn’t seem right to me. Sure, maybe it was B’s beliefs, but she was being honestly cruel to A. Just because you are religious doesn’t give you the right to tell people if they are bad people, especially not based off of that person’s parents’ sexual orientation. I know that we’ve pretty much exhausted the topic of GLBTQ, and this post may not get any replies, but I just wanted to get a second opinion, or a different point of view, if anyone has one.
did the teacher also tell B not to taunt A about her parents? If not,then the teacher is at fault. The teacher should have told both parties not to bother each other unnecessarily. While your sister and friends should not have retaliated so hard, the ultimate fault is indeed with B. B is fully entitled to believe what en believes, but en is not entitled to channel those beliefs in negative ways that make another person feel bad.
and of course there’s absolutely nothing wrong with having two loving parents, what a strange thing for someone to say.
It is my personal belief that if religious views are meant to be challenged. If it turns out that, after they’re challenged, whoevers beliefs were challenged held true to the belief, I think that’s probably a beneficial experiance for the person who believes whatever. Challenging belief is a way of growing, and for many people, a primary force in maturing. Telling anyone that they are a “bad person” for any reason however, is wrong. There aren’t bad people, only bad choices. Which is perilously close to saying that there aren’t small parts, only small actors, but whatever.
Out of curiosity, how did the teacher respond?
It’s a conundrum, all right. On the one hand, if you believe that tolerance of other people’s beliefs is good, does that mean you have to be tolerant of their intolerance? On the other hand, if other people are behaving in a way that you sincerely believe is bad, shouldn’t you be allowed to say so?
I suspect you could discuss this problem for months without reaching a wholly satisfactory solution.
On one hand, B. is right to have her beliefs. On the other hand, I think that B. is not allowed to verbally attack A. no matter what she believes (though she is allowed present her opinions to A. in a non-offensive way).
People are entitled to their beliefs, but they are not entitled to make other people feel bad as a result.
Besides, isn’t religion supposed to be about loving everyone?
So what do you guys think about the Axial Age? It’s hard to believe that the ideas of morality and identity changed in 400-600 years, but there’s plenty of evidence to back it up.
Okay, so I am glad that Obama passed that bill that gave gay and lesbian couples hospital visiting rights. I thought of another perspective on it all, which is that you can’t deny a group of people that makes up [ insert statistic here ] percent of the population rights, because one religious book says it’s wrong. Completely ridiculous. These laws are left over, like, from colonial times, and today they’re completely outmoded. Rargh.
Here I am again to get angry about a bill. So, in Massachusetts, they’re trying to pass a law that will make it illegal to discriminate – in terms of employment, etc. – based on “gender identity,” which will basically get more equal treatment for transgenders. I’m angry that people are opposing it. It’s for EQUAL RIGHTS. Are they STUPID?! Last time I checked equal rights were a GOOD thing. They claim that it will create unisex bathrooms, and/or sexual predators will dress up as women and enter women’s bathrooms. DUH, don’t give them the IDEA to do that. I really don’t think the bill will encourage that. And I will be angry if it doesn’t pass.
*stomps off*
I love massachutes and it’s legislatures! If I can’t imigrate to Canada, I hope to move there.
YES!!! FINALLY HOSPITAL VISITING RIGHTS!!! i would be pissed that it took so long, and I still am kind of pissed that full rights aren’t around everywhere, except that progress is being made so it’s hard to be pissed.
*sighs* on the topic of religion v.s. equal rights, last time I checked Jesus loves EVERYONE, so how can he hate people for loving? (also you can make some interesting jokes off that, but said jokes could be really insulting to the religious right so are not being repeated here)
Yeah, I know. Like, I think ( correct me if I’m wrong ) that most of this “No homosexuality” stuff is in the Old Testament, and I don’t know about Protestants, but I think Catholics pretty much follow Jesus’s teachings in the New Testament. And yes, he was preaching “love your neighbor as you love yourself.”
Oh it’s just one or two passages in the Old Testament-Don’t lie with man as you would with a woman. It’s only for Jews though, and a lot of people, me included, like the later parts later, like Jeremiah.
Turns out that in the Letters of St. Paul, he decries homosexuality. Whatever. I still think it’s wrong to discriminate.
Yeah, I was just talking about the Old Testament. And I agree.
That said, are you named after Oliver Cromwell, and if so, why? Because I was just reading a book in which he was a character.
Ummm…Yes. I didn’t know much about him when I chose it, but know I read some of Firth and he looks like a pretty good guy. I like democracy, I like guys who rise out of their own merit, and yeah.
Still the majority of the obvious stuff is new testament—Levaticus and Romans are the classicly cited passages.
But, then, per levaticus, women have to do all this ridiculous stuff while on thier periods, and you can’t eat shell fish, and esentially all of france would be damned. All of france is not damned, and levaticus is a bit of jerk, and people read him selectively just to get what they want.
Also, you couldn’t wear clothes woven from two different materials ( 95% cotton, 5% spandex, and the like ). See, all this stuff is really outdated, and I think it’s unethical to go by some of the laws but not all of them, because no one is going to tell you they go by ALL the laws in the Bible, since it’s just not possible.
What you’re refering to is called Shatnez – a mixture of linen and wool. Jew are not allowed to wear fabric where these two linens are mixed because – according to several commentators – one of the garments of the Cohen Gadol – High Priest – was made of that mixture. Therefore it is set aside.
Old Testament is pretty angry at everybody. But Jewish scholars do seem to be under the impression that the whole “do unto others” schtick is totally legit. Part of my Yom Kippur Torah portion was “V’ahavta l’reacha kamocha”, or “And you shall love your neighbor as yourself”. So social justice, mutual friendship, happiness and butterflies, etc. is in the Old and New Testament. I’m pretty sure there’s some stuff about it in the Qur’an, too. And most religions, really. Yay for people actually, you know, making an effort to make the world happier! (Tho the way I figure it is, the people who hate each other would hate each other anyway. Religion’s just an excuse. And the people who help each other would help each other anyway. Religion’s an excuse for that, too, and a really good one. At least, from my atheist POV.)
It really annoys me how the Bible is so awesome and stuff about “Do unto others,” but then it’s kind of telling people that the Jews are not worthy to be saved and that people who don’t believe are evil. It just doesn’t make sense to me.
Yes I know! Christianity is all like “Jesus and God love EVERYBODY!!!!! oh yeah, and you’re born into sin and going to hell unless you repent, repent, repent not to mention if you love someone within certin categories, like say, someone of your own gender, then never mind, Jesus doesn’t love you and you are SO going to hell unless you repent triple time.”
That’s one of the reasons that I became an atheist. The contradictions in the Bible, to me, suggest that it was written by multiple people with conflicting views. It seems to me that each person holds a different idea of what God is like in their head: whether He/She/It’s male or female, loving or hating, one or many, personal or uncaring. And, surprise surprise, those who think God loves them personally and focus less on [insert evildude of choice here] tend to do good deeds. And those who go “God hates you and you and you and you just CAUSE” tend to be less tolerant and hate more.
So I’m a fan of the people who say God loves you personally and wants you to do good deeds. Not only can it cause people to do good deeds, but belief in a God has saved at least two people I know from depression and really low points in their lives. Just because I know there isn’t a God doesn’t mean I’m a horrible enough person to take that idea away from those who need one, or from those who make the world better from their belief in one.
And anyway, the people who think God loves you also seem to not pay too much attention to the contradictions in the Bible. It’s so confusing that it’s basically pick-and-choose for everybody. So hey, God loves you, no matter who you love. Or God hates you, no matter who you love. Which is why I tend to listen to philosophers, my peers, and my parents instead of the Bible. People are easier to argue with than books.
I also don’t believe in god, but unlike many of my friends, I’m not proud of it. I used to be really religious, but then my friends started dying and I sort of gave up, not on god specificly, but in general. Then I grew older, read through more of the bible, said “this doesn’t make sense” thought through my own experiances and my belief in god and said “this just doesn’t line up” and officially terminated my belief in god. Or so I thought.
Every now and then, I almost believe in God again…and I saw how much a belief in God helped my friend after her little brother died, how much it helped her whole family. I watched a House episode where a paitent said “No one can be angry at god and not believe in Him at the same time” and I realized the truth in it, and re-evaluated a bit,(funny what can cause you to re-think religion…) eventually decideding that perhaps I do believe in god, just not actively, and I wasn’t quite sure of the particulars but decided not to care. Not yet, anyway.
People are SO much easier to argue with than books, but no matter how hard you try it is very hard to change what someone believes, leading me back to the “Truth and Belief are a stallion and a mule” qoute I just posted on the qoutes thread.
I believe that if God exists, He has quite a lot to answer for. Besides, believing in God requires a lot of irrationality on my pot, which ordinarily I’d totally be willing to have, but I’m kind of saving that for baseball. I don’t have a lot of irrationality in me, and I’d rather believe that the Giants WILL win the World Series than that there is a God. And it gives me a bigger warmfuzzy to think that the goodness people do comes from within themselves, and makes more sense to me, so… plus points.
I really dislike arguing with people who just plain BELIEVE something. When someone has an opinion they refuse to change, you can’t have a real argument, just a shouting match, or a quieter equivalent. The problem is that the other person isn’t listening to the other in order to add to the discussion, but in order to find a way to disagree with what they said. If one person effectively proves the point and wins the argument, the other may just refuse to concede, which can get pretty annoying.
yeah, as i explained to a friend in a poem once, either god doesn’t exist, or god is evil or I hate god, and since I can’t live with the later two, I usually go for the former. And I dislike religious fanatics…..which is random(ish) but whatever.
I must agree with you there. I’m Christian, I plan to always be one, but the rest of my religion should quit with the threats and start showing all the benefits and luring people in with love. You know, love everybody, like it says in the Bible? Catch more flies with honey, and all that.
Just like the XKCD?
*xkcd. not an acronym
But my caps lock got turned on.
Don’t know, I didn’t read that one.
357.
Everyone – I’m pretty sure the Bible was written by different people with conflicting views. I like being Christian, but I’ve recently decided just to listen to myself and not the Bible. I mean, there are some good parts to the Bible, but it feels like, kind of hypocritical to just listen to some parts, doesn’t it? I don’t know. Anyway, a lot of great religious people are really helping people…Medical Missionaries of Mary and stuff.
I think it would be awful to live in … well, any time, really, when they interpreted the Bible really literally. Just seems so miserable.
I admire Buddhists, from the little I know about them.
End long, thought-skipping post.
PM- If you consider all the different sects, then Buddhists have just as much disagreement. There’s Therevada Buddhism, which doesn’t believe in any sort of supernatural beings, but also there’s a bunch others that do. And don’t forget remembering past lives is another part of some Buddhist traditions.
Buddhists seem to be good sports about their disagreements, though. Fatwas and Inquisitions don’t figure prominently in their history, as far as I can tell.
Yeah, which is nice about them. Although there were so many splinters, there was never any hard friction.
the last time I tried to post this it was taking a really long time to moderate, so I tried another de-linkifying method.
So, I just saw a trailer for a documentry called “8: the Mormon Proposition†Here’s the link, which I’m not exactly sure how to de-linkify but I’ll try.. trailers.apple.com /trailers/ independent/ 8themormonproposition/ about the involvement of the mormon church on prop 8. It made me nearly cry, and it’s only the trailer.
Clare: It took a while to moderate because we had to watch it first. Moderating an ordinary comment takes just a few seconds, and I can do it on my cellphone wherever I am. Moderating a linked video takes minutes, and I need to be on a computer. That’s one reason we discourage even “delinkified” links.
I had just finished watching the video when your second message (this one) arrived, so I was able to moderate it right away.
Thank you. Since hardly anyone (myself included) actually looks at links, might I ask what your opinion was?
On deviantArt, I saw a parody of the “Yes On 8” posters. I said:
Yes On 8
Help Spread Hate!
www. hateandintolerance.com
What are peoples’ opinions on the Arizona “police-can-check-for-ID” bill and the controversy?
Personally, I think that the bill does have a few problems to work out, and it probably will result in a few lawsuits on the basis of stereotyping. However, the basic idea (enforcing the fact that illegal immigrants are illegal) seems to be fine, and some of the reactions (such as the Chicago school refusing to let their Girls’ Basketball team play a championship game in AZ) are for ridiculous reasons.
(came from the random thread)
The problem is mostly that police will consciously or subconsciously use ethnicity or race to decide who’s an illegal immigrant. I get the ‘illegal immigrants are illegal’ idea, but what, exactly constitutes ‘reasonable suspicion’ that someone is an illegal immigrant, versus, say, a just-arrived legal immigrant? How can you ensure judgment is made without resorting to race?
There’s also the fear that legal immigrants or even people who have lived there for generations will have to start carrying around their papers all the time just to prove they’re not illegal, and travel under a cloud of suspicion.
Then there’s the police officer who sued on the basis that it would take time away form cops trying to solve crimes and destroy relationships wit the Hispanic community, so that witnesses won’t come forward, etc.
There needs to be a solution to illegal immigration, but this isn’t it. (My own pessimistic opinion is that people will always try to get into the country as long as there are more opportunities here than where they came from. The problem needs to be tackled at its roots, not at its aftereffects. Reforming complicated immigration laws or supporting development in Mexico seem to be more long-reaching solutions. Though the last one I mentioned has its own set of problems and is probably unviable…)
About the basketball game boycott–are you saying that the reaction was ridiculous, or the reason for boycotting was ridiculous? Irregardless, I don’t think all of Arizona needs to be boycotted. There are plenty of people protesting there as well. If the school they were playing at was specifically in support of the law, the reaction might make more sense. Then again, if the won, they could use it to make this huge statement…
Sorry. This was a really rambling post. I didn’t write it to persuade anyone, there are probably tons of logic flaws and fact checks needed. (Really hard to get any hard facts. The news is completely taken over by pundits). I just wanted to express my general opinion surrounding the issue.
You definitely make some valid points.
In spite of what Piggy said, judgement could be made on the basis of behavior – if a cop spotted someone dashing from dumpster to dumpster and hiding behind them, that might be reason for him to check (not just for the person being an illegal immigrant, but for crime in general as well).
About the basketball game boycott – I can understand if the law “disagrees with our [the school’s] values” or something and if that annoys the school. However, refusing to let a group of girls (who don’t necessarily share the school’s opinion) go to the state where this is being considered, when they had been preparing for this game for months with bake sales and everything… that’s just being either ridiculously paranoid or ridiculously overbearing with their beliefs.
SFTDP, but I read what I said about the basketball game boycott, and I’m not sure it makes sense. So I’m going to summarize what I think:
If the school’s administration has a problem with the bill, that’s fine. However, it seems incredibly… belief-imposing?- of them to keep the girls’ basketball team from going.
I think the bill is insane. The whole basis of it is basically that the police can check the IDs of people who aren’t caucasian or have accents. If I went to Arizona, I could legally be pulled over so some policeperson could demand to see a proof of my immigrant status.Even though they claim it isn’t, the whole point of the bill is racial profiling. How else do you determine if someone might be an illegal immigrant?
My personal opinion is that the new law is unconstitutional. As FantasyFan mentioned, there are far more effective, less destructive, and kinder ways to discourage illegal immigration. I know that the police can’t just pull you over, but do you think they’re going to check the immigrant status of a white guy with an American accent and jeans who’s been caught shoplifting? No. They’re going to check the status of the woman in a sari who parked illegally.
Then what are some of those more effective, less destructive, kinder ways? Please, enlighten me.
And I personally think that automatically assuming that all policemen will use the law for racial profiling is a bit stereotypical in and of itself.
Effective ways: Spend less money on war and more money on helping developing countries, well, develop (I know, I know, I’m an idealist, but it could happen). Start policies that prohibit immigration unless you have a job offer in America (they do that in Singapore, which is why they have no beggars and a LOT of construction). Require employers to outsource some jobs to skilled foreigners (for lack of a better term). Again, it’s worked in Singapore. I don’t think it could hurt to try it.
I don’t think all policemen will abuse their power. Not at all. However, now that the law allows them to check people’s immigrant status just by arresting them, certainly many of them will see it as their duty to check the immigrant status of people they arrest. But would it not take far too long to check everyone’s status? Yes, it would, and that is where I predict racial profiling coming into effect.
Just try to imagine being an illegal immigrant, having your entire life built on shaky foundations, and living in constant fear of being arrested and sent back to whichever nation you came from. Having to pretend to be happy in public while concealing your identity. Shivering every time a cop car goes past your street (I know I’m stereotyping here, but wouldn’t you??). Living in some form of poverty (again, stereotyping) and knowing that unless you get a scholarship, there’s no way you can go to college and get out of the rut. Now add the burden of knowing that you’re endangering your entire family by doing an illegal U-turn and you have one heck of a miserable life.
That does sound like a good solution.
I agree, it would suck for life to be like that, and if (say, as an example) I tried to enter this country legally and was always rejected, I would probably try to enter illegally sooner or later. But when I did that, I would expect to have at least some of those miserable aspects of life and I would expect to be punished if I was caught, because seriously – I’m breaking the law in the process of entering this country. Should I get a luxury penthouse on a coastal 5-star hotel or something?
I’m just going to throw this out here: to many immigrants (legal or illegal) police are bad news. Just in general, they’re afraid of what they might do, especially if their home country had governmental problems.
I can agree with that, but it seems a little irreverent here.
Well, if you were a police officer, and didn’t know this, and you saw somebody who looked like an immigrant running away from you, then wouldn’t you chase after them and inspect them?
Well, having immigrants isn’t a bad thing at all per se. But if areas start to turn into ghettos and there is no cultural integration, it’s not good.
Agreed.
I can agree with that. When my uncle first came to the US from India, he got arrested on suspicion when he fled a policeman who walked up to him and apparently only wanted to ask him to jump-start his car. In India, and a lot of other places I gather, you can just walk up to a policeman, give them a few hundred rupees, and tell them to arrest someone you don’t like and give them a one-year jail sentence, and it’ll happen.
It definitely feels like they’re going to start racial profiling to me… I know that in history class (yes, I actually pay attention in history on occasion), we studied one Chicago anti-drug bill, which allowed cops to pull people over and check their cars for drugs if they had “reasonable suspicion” that the person had drugs. The overwhelming majority of people pulled over for drugs were black even though the majority of drug users in the Chicago area are white.
Well, it’s all well and good saying that the fact illegal immigrants are illegal will be enforced. But I don’t really see a way racial profiling could be avoided. Out of everyone who will be asked for identification, how many do you think will be caucasian? The point of the bill, given that this is Arizona we’re talking about, doesn’t seem to be to stop illegal Canadian immigrants, or illegal Japanese immigrants. It’s to check for illegal Mexican and other Hispanic immigrants, who do generally tend to fit a racial profile. (I say GENERALLY. Not every single one, obviously.) And what if a natural-born Hispanic citizen was raised speaking Spanish at home? They’re not immigrants at all, but they’d be under suspicion because of their looks and accent.
I just trust that there’s a better one than this law.
Illegal immigration is bad, but there’s got to be a better way to discourage it than this. Do I have any suggestions? Well, no. Which is why I don’t plan to run for office any time soon.
If the immigration law is what we’re discussing, I’d like to make known that cops can’t randomly pull people over if they “look like” an illegal immigrant or whatever. The person has to have been apprehended for another offense.
Not quite.
“For any lawful stop, detention or arrest… where reasonable suspicion exists that the person is an alien and is unlawfully present in the United States, a reasonable attempt shall be made, when practicable, to determine the immigration status of that person…”
(SB1070 Section 2 B. Pulled from the Arizona Legislature (azleg.gov), emphasis mine. I also haven’t read the whole bill, but I think that this is the most important part for now. Please fill me in if it isn’t!)
So as I see it [in the end it’s all in both the interpretation and application], a police officer could stop cars to check to see if, say, seatbelts are being used, and then ask for papers if en’s got “reasonable suspicion”. If racial profiling is acceptable for “reasonable suspicion” then there’s the issue. I’m not sure how it’s being applied, but people will always push boundaries, yah?
On a personal note I disagree with racial profiling, and I just read that Palin is surprised we don’t do it already.
I wonder how the police feel about having to do all this extra work. Their jobs were probably hard enough beforehand.
I don’t think all of them are obeying the new policy.
I’ve read articles with apparently contradictory information, so I’m not sure which unions, but many police officers’ unions are just as divided as the rest of us over the worth and applications of the law.
As I understand it, the law doesn’t actually take effect until August or so. First the police officers have to be trained in how to apply it.
To answer Enceladus’s question: no, the police have not been responsible for checking the legal status of immigrants. That has been the job of the federal (national) Immigration and Customs Enforcement, part of the Department of Homeland Security.
So who did it before the Department of Homeland Security was formed?
From 1870 to 2003, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, part of the Department of Justice.
While we’re on the topic of the Arizona immigration bill, I would like to mention something that really cracks me up. It just seems funny to me that the Mexican president would come here to lecture us about immigration when, in fact, the laws already in place regarding illegal immigration in Mexico are pretty damn strict.
Just saw this today. The theme has been mentioned on this thread, but the facts, being recent, (and location) were very interesting.
(nytimes.com/2010/05/13/nyregion/13frisk.html)
“Blacks and Latinos were nine times as likely as whites to be stopped by the police in New York City in 2009, but, once stopped, were no more likely to be arrested.
…
The most common reason listed by the police was a category known as “furtive movements.â€
Excerpts from the immigration law:
“A LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICIAL OR AGENCY OF THIS STATE OR A COUNTY,
CITY, TOWN OR OTHER POLITICAL SUBDIVISION OF THIS STATE MAY NOT CONSIDER
RACE, COLOR OR NATIONAL ORIGIN IN THE ENFORCEMENT OF THIS SECTION EXCEPT
TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY THE UNITED STATES OR ARIZONA CONSTITUTION.”
And later:
“THIS SECTION SHALL BE IMPLEMENTED IN A MANNER CONSISTENT
WITH FEDERAL LAWS REGULATING IMMIGRATION, PROTECTING THE CIVIL RIGHTS OF
ALL PERSONS AND RESPECTING THE PRIVILEGES AND IMMUNITIES OF UNITED STATES
CITIZENS.”
So basically, racial profiling is specified as illegal, as is infringement on civil rights. To say that this law encourages racial profiling is to say that this law encourages violating itself. In any case, immigration control is a duty of the federal government, not state governments, so I believe the law to be unconstitutional.
I think that while the law specifies that racial profiling to be illegal it would happen anyway, based upon that article I just read, but it’s good to see that in the law.
Also, Amnesty International says that Arizona has no racial profiling ban.
Just to ask- how else (aside from racial profiling) does one form a suspicion of illegal immigration.
Behavior comes to mind. If I were a cop and I found someone hiding behind dumpsters, and discovered that person couldn’t speak English or didn’t have an American accent, I would probably be at least somewhat suspicious.
Curious example. Do you mean that you wouldn’t be suspicious of an English-speaking, American-accented person hiding behind dumpsters?
I think I would be suspicious of them for some crime, yes. That was probably a bad example, but my point is that most of the police officers involved probably do have some common sense and they would probably be suspicious of someone on more than just racial profiling.
This might or might not belong in Hot Topics, but I thought I’d share a mildly wallbanging quote from my mom that just occurred:
She: “But the anti-Idols, the really good people on American Idol, they never win.”
Me: “Yeah, I know. I wonder why that is?”
She: “Well, it’s because the people in the red states never want to vote for them!”
Me: “…It’s the Republicans’ fault that the wrong people win on American Idol?”
She: “Honey, people in red states just won’t vote for the sort of people who make runner-up on American Idol. Even if they’re actually better than the winners.”
Me: “…”
Yeah, no offense to your mother, but that sounds kind of crazy and ridiculous.
Depressing (very) fact, on a poll conducted by the non-profit, non-partisan group Marist Institute For Public Opinion, and reported by the Washington Post-
26% of Americans couldn’t identify which country America got it’s independace from. 205 weren’t sure, the other 6% answered: Spain, China, Japan, Mexico or other.
that is just sad.
Oh, wow.
A lot of people I know think the below:
Japan is part of China
China=Asia
China is the only Asian country that exists, the others are all part of China
Japan is a country that only exists to create anime and manga
and so on. -_- This is why I say USI instead of USA. (United States of Idiots)
(Implying all Americans are ignorant and all ignorant people come from America.)
Wow.
Most of my friends don’t thinks anything of the sort- probably because most have them have gone to Japan on a student exchange trip. Or if not most, enough so that knowledge of Japan has spread through my group of friends. Of course, that doesn’t say anything about the rest of the student population.
Yes… people here think sushi came from China, haven’t even heard of Korea, and assume that India is still ruled by England. It’s sad. Really sad.
WOW. That is sad.
Anyone want to talk about the race issues in The Last Airbender?
I, for one, don’t think it’s a big deal. I mean, people are mad that this American movie has white actors, but do Americans get mad because Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon has only Chinese actors? Seriously, I don’t get why people are making such a big fuss over it. It’s just a movie. It’s not going to make little kids racist.
-shrug- For me it’s a bit strange that a story that was at least partially based off of Chinese and other Asian mythologies has a mostly Caucasian main cast. The fact that many of the supporting cast are Asian just makes it a tad bit more weird to me, because the white actors just stand out in comparison.
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was originally a Chinese movie, and it’s also a movie about Chinese culture. Thus, it makes sense that it would have Chinese actors simply because a) there really aren’t that many Chinese-speaking foreigners in China, and b) movie about China = Chinese actors.
I don’t think it’s really as much of a big deal as some people have made it been, but logically I just think it’s weird, since the cultures and the actors don’t entirely match up. Then again Prince of Persia didn’t exactly star any Persian people, and there wasn’t much of a fuss.
Oh, and for disclosure: I still haven’t seen The Last Airbender, and I never actually watched the original series (gasp!). It just so happens that I read the newspaper too much and absorb things.
Personally, I don’t think it’s racist so much as disrespectful to the series. The show was HUGELY grounded in and influenced by Asian culture, and to me, only 2 or 3 actors who are even part-Asian is a bit lacking for that.
Also, for the record, I think the movie is going to be bad as a TLA movie, not because of the actors, but because it doesn’t look like it has any of the charm from the show (i.e, Sokka’s endless well of humor).
Yes, it does have an 8% Rotten Tomatoes rating.
And I thought it would be good!
From what I’ve heard, the acting’s also not very good, but judging solely by the trailers, it looks rather pretty.
you’re misunderstanding the issue. it’s not that it’s an american movie, it’s that the characters were clearly asian but caucasian actors were cast because Hollywood doesn’t believe anyone wants to see asian americans in leading roles or that asians can carry a movie. it’s the same with the dragonball movie, it’s insulting.
it is a big deal. :/ i am so tired of this kind of thing happening. the crouching tiger thing is totally unrelated, i don’t understand what you mean about that. a movie about china has chinese actors. if this was a movie about the america revolution i guess i could understand but look at it as a movie essentially about asia with mostly caucasian actors. it’s like the movie version of the good earth which is LITERALLY about china and had all white actors in yellowface. awesome.
it’s not just a movie. why do you think they purposely didn’t cast any asian-american actors for major parts? this isn’t about the kind of racism you’re thinking about. it’s an assumption that okay these characters are asian but asians don’t bring in the big bucks, only white actors will bring in an audience. i mean GOD jackson rathbone’s response to him playing sokka (who is clearly inuit or native american by the way) was that he’d just have to get some kind of tan. REALLY?
it’s insensitive and insulting. if you read up more on this you’ll see it’s not just about avatar but really a general thing that has been going on for a long time and this is kind of the straw that broke the camel’s back for a lot of people.
Yes, the Waterbenders should definitely be Inuit.
*expects Dr. Horrible fans to start singing the Commentary! Song “Nobody’s Asian In The Movies”*
I don’t think that “Hollywood doesn’t believe anyone wants to see asian americans in leading roles or that asians can carry a movie.” I think it’s just a casting issue – maybe they thought the guy was the best actor for the part, or something….I know nothing about this movie or series, so I don’t know his name. I doubt it’s a racist issue. It just seems kind of implausible to me.
they actively sought out white actors for asian parts.
here’s the casting call paramount put out:
[ AANG ]
12-15 years-old, Male, Caucasian or any other ethnicity. We are looking for a young man to play the lead role in a motion picture franchise. […]
[ KATARA ]
14-17 years-old, Female, Caucasian or any other ethnicity. She is Sokka’s younger sister. […]
[ SOKKA ]
16-20 years-old, Male, Caucasian or any other ethnicity. He is Katara’s older brother. He is intelligent but awkward, and very funny […]
[ ZUKO ]
16-20 years-old, Male, Caucasian or any other ethnicity. He is a brooding, intense young man who wrestles – not always successfully – with being good. […]
why? why say that? these characters are ASIAN.
conversely the casting call for minor characters:
[ EXTRAS ]
Physically fit MEN & WOMEN 18-85 yr. Old – Boys & Girls 6-16 yr Old.
NEAR EASTERN, MIDDLE EASTERN, FAR EASTERN, ASIAN, MEDITERRANEAN & LATINO ETHNIC GROUPS….
No experience necessary – Martial Arts & Military Training a PLUS!
[…]
Come to our OPEN CASTING CALL, dress casually, OR in the traditional costume of your family’s ethnic background. We’ll take your photo and information –
do you see the problem here? it’s not traditional “racism” it’s assumptions. traditional costume?! really? don’t you see how insulting this all is?
i’m leaving in like two second but i will come back and post more, i really want everyone to understand why this matters.
It gets worse. They actually say in the ‘dress in traditional clothing’ bit, “If you’re Korean, wear a kimono…” Truly did not do the research.
FAIL.
For some reason, nobody knows about Asia…
No kidding… It seems that every Asian is either Japanese, Chinese, or Korean. As I live in Minnesota that’s slightly broadened to Vietnamese, but – “The Philippines? Is that in Asia? I thought it was part of Mexico.” *headdesk* While I was living in Tennessee, I was asked if I was “black”. Uh?(I look fairly Asian – black hair, almond-shaped brown eyes, tan skin…)
O.o
I’m not sure that I understand the phrase “Caucasian or any other ethnicity”. Do they mean “any other ethnicity that looks Caucasian”? If not, then why not just say “any ethnicity”?
I think they mean “any ethnicity, but Caucasian will be the first pick.”
I think that’s less due to active racism than to an unwillingness to deviate from the normal. Which under some circumstances could be attributed to racism, I guess.
I hated that movie. I had to see it with my mini-cousins. not that I thought it was racist- just that it was so dreadfully written and filmed and everything.
One reason to love (for some of us) Iceland:
Iceland’s (female) prime minister became the first head of state to enter a gay marriage.
OH MY GOD I LOVE ICELAND SO MUCH NOW!!! THANK-YOU ENC!!! *is happy*
My reaction. Sort of sad that it happens in 2010, and not earlier.
Quite sad. What’s sadder is that some countries (particularly most of Africa) have extreme punishments for people being gay, including, sometimes, the death penalty.
I read about this in the Economist and I was sad and a bit scared.
What’s odd though is that in some places it’s legal for women (not marrage or anything, just sex) and death penalty for men. I was confused.
Another sad thing: In Britain people who seek asylum from places that have extreme homophobia are denied it, and encouraged to go back, and just cover it up.
Grrrrr….
And last I heard there was only one openly gay male athlete. He plays rugby.
Probably an awkward sport for a gay dude. Power to him, I must say, and there must be more who just aren’t out… At least they’re bettter than the vast majority of the US—marriage isn’t legal (i don’t think) but more rights are granted and instead of “don’t ask, don’t tell” they activelly recruit gays and lesbians, though other than pregnancy not being an issue (and less women going AWOL in WWII) I honestly don’t know why they do that….
Did you see the replies I added at the bottom of this comment stack? I’d expect you’d be celebrating.
DADT- If there’s a draft and it’s still active, I could use it as an excuse to get out… Which is why I’m hesitant (for purely selfish reasons) for it to be repealed. I don’t think it should be a major focus right now. If we allow gay and lesbian marriages, then the rest of the stuff will fall into place.
I would love for DADT to be repealed. So here’s my rant. If it is repealed, gay people will be able to fight(and possibly die) for their country, but can’t get married. Am I the only one who finds that a little twisted?
It’s the government. It’s more than a little twisted. I too would love for DADT to be repealed, I would be more hesitant for the same reasons as Enc except that my vision sucks, I’m flat-footed, my skin REALLY sucks (though it’s getting better), my kidneys aren’t fully functioning and I have seasonal allergies but am allergic to allegery medication, so they would probably take one look at me say “you’re a trainwreck” and encourage my running from the room.
Yay!
Whoa. Revolutionary. Somehow I can’t see that happening here. Well, in Massachusetts, maybe a gay governor, but DEFINITELY not a gay president. I have the feeling that southern states would reject. I mean, we don’t even have gay marriage in most of the country. *ranklerankle*
I know the feeling. One of my friends says “Well perhaps some day in our life time we’ll have a native american/asian/middle eastern lesbian president! (this was near Obama’s inaugeration) And I said that I would be extremely happy were that the case but I doubted it. I mean, I don’t remember the exact number, but a (minimalistic, still, nonetheless) frighining quanity of americans believe Obama is the antichrist, so….anyway.
I LOVE ICELAND NOW!
Oh CAKE yeah!
I LOVE ICELAND!
Yayz
Yet another reason why Iceland is awesome!
Another thing to be hapy about- There was almost no Scandinavian outcry/ unhappiness.
*happy
Another amazing thing- In Boston, a US district court declared unconstitutional a 1996 law that prohibited federal recognition of same- sex marriage.
Source- Boston.com (The news site for the Boston Globe)
I <3 scandinavia
Yes. Sweden was also one of the first countries to legalize gay marriage.
It’s really sad that we’re celebrating the fact that civil rights that had been taken away have been added back in. But what else can you do?
Yay Sweden! Yay Iceland! More reason to target Iceland as the first place to invade when we take over the world!
The unfortunate thing is that, in many cultures, we didn’t have them to start with. Come on, folks, here in America we’ve eriadicated (though the constitution and multiple civil-rights movements) almost as much injustice as we legally can (although some of those laws could use a little work….) It’s not that hard to give a group who has ALWAYS existed their rights, is it? I mean, it’s been…forever. Literally. with the exception of pocket cultures and times.
Unfortunately, the Puritans had a more lasting effect on American culture than European (part of why they laugh at us…) I mean, in many parts of Europe and also nearer to the equator (not so much in traditonally muslim countries, though) people walk around darn near naked, if not actually naked, and there are nudist beaches all over the place, and all the sodomy laws didn’t last that long, and people swear more on TV without getting a higher parental causion. But here we sort of look away even if we’re only changing and we’re only with people our own gender, not to mention the outcry at nudity, and I think in some states sodomy laws might still be in place. And some of those that were eriaciated were gotten rid of less than 100 years ago.
Okay, so that turned into a bit of a tanget, but whatever.
I love Iceland so much.
This might be too luke-warm for Hot Topics, but there’s really no other place on the blog, so-
Has anybody else heard about the teens who are biting each other as some sort of Twilight-inspired (particularly the new movie) fad?
…
HAHAHAHAHAHAH!
…Wow. Just wow.
Hummanity has sunk to an all-time low.
“The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for
authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place
of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their
households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They
contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties
at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers.”
-source unknown, attributed to Socrates by Plato
See? Old people complaining about the new generation isn’t a new thing. We don’t behave any worse than our ancestors did!
To actually reply to I-Man’s post–Ew. Don’t they know how unhygienic it is? How stupid do you have to be…
I know, it’s crazy and ridiculous.
Wow. *loses most of the faith in humanity he had*
Of course, I’m not one to talk. My friends and I do both Time Lord and Vulcan mindmelds with each other.
Oh…………………………………………….. sigh. Little else can be said.
Perhaps the Rants and ‘Plaints thread?
*has also lost much of her faith in humanity*
Plus, that’s rather unsanitary…
So I live [snip! We’ll allow “near San Francisco” –Admin.], which has had kind of a bump in the news lately. The reason? A black man was shot on BART by a police officer. A lot of people seem to think it was murder, but the jury just ruled that it was involuntary manslaughter, and people are getting mad. They’re gathering downtown and protesting right now, and the city is afraid there’ll be riots. My dad was sent home from work early, and pretty much all public buildings closed early because people are afraid. There’s been nothing in my area so far, but we’re all still pretty worried.
Your thoughts? Your wishes of good luck to me? Help?
Wishes of good luck, always. Let’s hope things calm down.
*hugs* That sounds absolutely terrifying. Like Robert said, I hope things calm down soon, with little to no rioting etc in the meantime…
I hope you don’t get hurt. Those who live in interesting times never get to study them.
*more hugs* Stay safe, Cat.
I can see why you can get mad at that ruling, but why would riots solve anything. I hope things calm down. Be safe.
Stay safe! And good luck to your whole family… I live a little farther away from SF, so I’m safe.
Cat’s Eye- That sounds really scary.
I hope it dies down soon… Best of luck.
Cat’s Eye— I was a little kid during the WTO and, latter, the Mardi Gras riots….they scared the crap out of me. Hang in there, stay out of the riot zones etc. *Hugs* and as I’m sure you’re aware, no riot lasts forever.
Re: Racism in The Last Airbender: It all sounds pretty bad to me, but I’m certain this happens pretty dang often. That’s right, everyone, the world is a worse place then you had dared to presume!
My baseline assumption is that the world is a worse place than I dare to presume. This is mainly because, living in a liberal area, there aren’t many vocally anti-LGBTQ groups/organizations (though a few religions…) and so I watch a video clip in a trailer for a documentary where a Mormon elder calls gays “the worst threat to america” and I go “oh. That’s right. people randomly hate me for no reason at all. In this country. And many others. In fact, I’m lucky to live where there isn’t a death penalty for being who I am. Wow. The world is not so cool.” (actually, that last sentance was an understatement. But I’m not currently in a bad enough mood to self-snip what it would be otherwide.)
Yeah. Why can’t we all get along?
If only we had time machines. Or a paralell universe. (Or world Domination)
in short—if only we had Doctor Who.
But if you’re assuming the world’s a worse place then you presume (and we take “assume” to roughly mean the same thing as “presume”, as is common usage), then doesn’t your assumption loop back on itself unceasingly–that is, aren’t you assuming the world is an infinitely bad place?
Presume means think something on the basis of probability. Assume means to think something without proof. Given those definitions, the sentence makes sense.
And even if the sentance didn’t make any sense at all it would still hold. I’m fine with paradoxies. Especially when they actually occur.
RE: Racism in Airbender.
I haven’t seen the movie or the tv series. I think I understand the issue, but then again maybe not. I’d like to understand. From the little research I’ve done, it looks like the show drew from Asian and Native American cultures. Characters were largely racially ambiguous. Did the movie have mainly Caucasian actors in leading roles? Shyamalan seems to say that he put a lot of work into making the cast on the whole racially balanced, even in ways that the show wasn’t.
Ughhhh Maybe I’m missing it. If it were set in China and Asian actors played parts, there would be no problem. If it were set in China and Caucasian actors played parts, it would be strange, but racist? Can you adapt the story to a different audience?
Hpftgv bed time now.
Racebending.com is very helpful on this matter. I haven’t seen the movie either (and don’t plan to for a while), but I just started to watch the animated series. It’s the best thing ever associated with Nickelodeon.
Isn’t the Supreme Court challenging the constitutionality of Proposition 8 this week? I thought I saw it in the Boston Globe but couldn’t find the article again.
Wait, I’ve got it. It was in the Movies section – “Last month, final arguments were heard in US District Court in San Francisco over the legality of Proposition 8.” Does anyone know how that turned out?
it was in the MOVIES section?
Maybe it was a review of the movie Clare mentioned in comment 53.
Judge Vaughn R. Walker heard the closing arguments in Perry et al. v. Schwarzenegger et al. on June 16. He has not issued his ruling yet and has not said when he expects to. You’re sure to hear about it when he does. Meanwhile, the official website for the case is at https :// ecf. cand. uscourts . gov/cand/09cv2292/
That makes sense…thanks Robert!
prop 8 – the ruling on the case still isn’t out. I’ve read though that no matter what the ruling is it is likely to go to the Supreme Court.
avatar stuff
princess magnolia, you asked what it means by “caucasian or any other ethnicity”. The phrase expresses a preference for white actors. Basically “we would like caucasians for this role but are considering people of other ethnic groups as well”
Casting calls can be as specific or as broad as the role calls for. Why not say “actors of any ethnicity”?
vendy– while racially ambiguous may be true in the sense that it takes place in a fantasy world, it’s really an amalgamation of several different asian cultures (and inuit, as i mentioned before)
There’s a lot of use of chinese characters, for one thing. The characters all have names that are clearly asian influenced (aang first of all, haru, mai, suki, zhao)
So why not cast asian actors for this? The three leads are all played by caucasian actors. The main villian/angsty anti-hero is played by dev patel who is south asian. i’ve read what shayamalan has to say about it, how it’s the most racially diverse film ever. He doesn’t seem to understand that having a diverse cast of EXTRAS is not the point. In fact it just accentuates the awkwardness of the casting. You have the two caucasian actors playing sokka and katara surrounded by actors of mostly inuit descent from greenland. There are many south asian actors in the movie but they’re also all villains…
I think you guys are approaching this from a different definition of racism than what this is. I don’t believe the casting staff went out there with big signs that said “ASIANS CAN’T ACT” or that this movie actively enforces some kind of racial message. There are so many talented asian american actors, why not give them a chance? because it’s all about money and big names.
Avatar is different from a remake of a foreign film– something like The Departed which was originally a chinese movie or The Ring, whatever. Those are all out and out REMAKES of something, reinterpretations.
Are you guys familiar with the movie 21? It was about counting cards in las vegas and is based on a true story with a group of students from MIT. In real life the students were mostly asian-american but in the movie they cast is mostly white. Again, why do this? last airbender is not the first movie to do this. But it should be the last. The issue extends far beyond this movie but it’s such a good example of what shouldn’t happen, that’s why people are making a big deal out of it.
I agree that racebending.com is a very god resource for understanding why this is a problem.
Where I live gay marrige is now illeagal. Up until the voting, my friends and I had taken to cheering when we saw NO ON 1 signs, and booing when we saw YES ON 1 signs. Also, I think that the movie Avatar is a piece of cake.(If that makes any sense at all, which it doesn’t…Oh well.)
Hmmm. Dead thread.
*revives*
What does everyone think about what happened with Shirley Sherrod?
I think people made assumptions without actual evidence, because people do that, and it cost the poor woman her job, which someone ought to give her back.
It might be a good idea to recap what happened, so that everybody agrees on the basic facts before interpreting them.
Okay. As I understand it, Shirley Sherrod(who is black and works for USDA in Georgia) made a speech at a NAACP meeting. Someone took a video of part of that speech, which took it out of context to imply that she was racist. (and had discriminated against a white farmer. She was denounced by the NAACP and was fired from the USDA.
Feel free to add/correct that.
It should be added that in context and per Sherrod, the speech was actually about overcoming racism and prejudices, and was relating to a personal experiance from before she worked for the USDA. Also, the NAACP admits to having been “snookered”