"If you believe that what drug abusers need is to go into an effective detox program, then we should likewise put active homosexuals through an effective reparative therapy program.And to think my last post was on Anne Frank and the suppression of literature in our public schools. Today, I read that yet another ignorant demagogue wants to send homosexuals to prison for reparative therapy. Is the fact that the Nazis called for the same thing lost on these idiots? Apparently, or they wouldn't spout such nonsense.
The bottom line here is that, biblically, those "who practice homosexuality" should come under the purview of the law just as much as those who take people captive in order to sell them into slavery." --Bryan Fischer (emphasis mine)
My next question is, who the hell do these people think they are? Bryan Fischer is unequivocally calling for a theocracy, openly and without any sort of shame. Subject to Biblical Law as Civil Law?! In these United States? Bryan Fischer, if you read this, YOU CAN GO FUCK YOURSELF! And so can the rest of the fuck-tards who follow his thinking.
I daresay that I haven't been quite so angry and simultaneously annoyed over anything in a long time. I suppose it should come as no surprise. Oh sure, you read this sort of thing all the time from some crackpot troll on message boards, or blogs. But this guy is on the radio, people actually listen to him, he has a platform, and what he is advocating is an overthrow of our democratic system. Our Constitution doesn't allow the sending of people to prison for thought crimes, or crimes against a religion. If Bryan Fischer wants theocracy, he can go live in fucking Saudi Arabia. I keep telling these ignorant bastards that, but they don't get it. Probably because they have the critical thinking skills of a slug. And that's an insult to slugs!If you think this doesn't affect you because you're not gay or you don't know anyone who is, remember that in Germany, lots of people thought that what was happening didn't affect them because they weren't Jewish, until it was too late.
First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a communist;I've probably said it before, but I'll say it again, in the Middle Ages people were subject to civilian law for religious "crimes" which were what we would now call thought-crimes. We're talking like Orwell's 1984 here. Orwell wasn't writing solely about the future, he was drawing on the past. People could be dragged in before the Inquisition, in what amounted to a kangaroo court, convicted of heresy after interrogation, (see: torture) for not *believing* what they were told they should believe by the Church. They were then, in what amounts to a mockery of morality and justice, "relaxed" or turned over to the secular authorities for punishment. This meant burning at the stake in most times and places, though later it might amount to hanging.
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak out.
--Martin Niemöller
Make no mistake, this is exactly what people like Bryan Fischer want. They want to be able to kill people for not conforming to their version of Christianity. They will never say it outright, not until they're in a position to carry it out, but they're getting bolder and bolder all the time. When we're to the point that they're willing to openly push for incarcerating people for not believing as they do, we're on a dark and dangerous path as a country. We can't let the demagogues drag us back into the Dark Ages...
"As nightfall does not come all at once, neither does oppression. In both instances, there is a twilight when everything remains seemingly unchanged. And it is in such twilight that we all must be aware of change in the air however slight, lest we become unwitting victims of the darkness."
--Justice William O. Douglas
There are some very dangerous people on this planet, perhaps they should be herded into little cattle cars....
ReplyDeleteAV
The Children of Rushdoony and his unique [read crazy] brand of Christian Reconstructionism. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rushdoony His followers really truly want a theocracy. They are the Dominionists, and the Kingdom Now practitioners. They believe that Witches, Adulterers, Aspostates and Homosexuals should be stoned in a public square, like they do to women accused of crimes in the Middle East. They want to create a world not unlike that dystopic nightmare that Margaret Atwood wrote about in the Handmaid's Tale. These are the shitbirds behind Operation Rescue, behind Christian Coalition and the Moral Majority and a variety of other groups who would have an orgasmic reaction to the idea of being able to prosecute people for crimes against morality.
ReplyDeleteAnd when you run a country as a theocracy--then all crimes are violations against morality, since the very premise of government is constructed as a sacred cosmology. Violating that is violating the order of the Universe.
Anyhow here is a large quote about Rushdoony and his influence on the Christian Reich:
"Rushdoony's most important area of writing, however, was law and politics, as expressed in his small book of popular essays Law & Liberty and discussed in much greater detail in his three volume, 1894-page magnum opus, The Institutes of Biblical Law. With a title modeled after Calvin's Institutes of the Christian Religion, Rushdoony's Institutes was arguably his most influential work. In the book, he proposed that Old Testament law should be applied to modern society and that there should be a Christian theonomy, a concept developed in his colleague Greg Bahnsen's controversial tome Theonomy and Christian Ethics, which Rushdoony heartily endorsed. In the Institutes, Rushdoony supported the reinstatement of the Mosaic law's penal sanctions. Under such a system, the list of civil crimes which carried a death sentence would include homosexuality, adultery, incest, lying about one's virginity, bestiality, witchcraft, idolatry or apostasy, public blasphemy, false prophesying, kidnapping, rape, and bearing false witness in a capital case.[8] Although supporting the separation of church and state at the national level, Rushdoony understood both institutions as under the rule of God,[9] and thus he conceived secularism as posing endless false antitheses, which his massive work addresses in considerable detail. In short, he sought to cast a vision for the reconstruction of society based on Christian principles."
He clearly lived in denial as do his demented followers. England was a Theocracy and an Empire. We fought against both of those constructs in order that we have an independent existence, as well as Freedom of Conscience. America, the religious penal colony--hello ring any bells {but then I am preaching to the choir here}
The influence of this man's writing has become ubiquitous. The explosion of literature echoing these thoughts, is everywhere from Focus on the Family, to various conservative media sites and shows, and in the heart of our highest offices in the land. {think back one president and look at our current Supreme Court}.
And yes, they are fuctards. Selfish, evil bastards who use God to cover their slash and burn style politics in the school boards and on the hill.
Its the old, Rights for me but not for thee crowd.
Its a real shame too. Imagine if all that energy were focused on something positive and productive for everyone who happened to be a citizen, and not just approved members of WASP churches.
SEC, I always said that if these idiots who were protesting at abortion clinics and the like would take their energy and put it elsewhere, like into feeding and educating the poor, the world would be a better place. But instead, they stand out on the street corners like Pharisees, and scream about things which a.) don't affect them and b.) of which are really none of their damned business. Indeed, it escapes them that if they put the time, money and effort into educating people, there would be less abortions, and I don't just mean educating them about safe sex, but educating them in general. It has been shown that the more education people have, the more likely they are to put off having children, and the more money they will have to support them. Whereas, it is also shown that if a woman has children before the age of 21 she is many times more likely to live in poverty than if she doesn't. There's a study somewhere that shows that, but I don't remember where I read it. Women don't usually have abortions just for the hell of it. I think most of the time, the driving factor is that they don't have the means to support another child.
ReplyDeleteAs for them wanting a theocracy, I'm sure they think they'd like one. Oh sure, that sounds great to them. However, who's theocracy? There are dozens of sects of Christianity, and none of them would ever agree on exactly what "moral" crimes would get punished or how. If you remember in Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, the Baptists in the Appalachian mountains were fighting the people who were in control in the main character's world. It stands to reason that there are many sects of Christianity that would either believe the theocracy was wrong, or was not hard core enough >.<
Yep the Christians would turn on each other like rabid dogs if they even thought that one church would be wielding all the political power, and determining which doctrine is to be accepted and which is to be rejected en masse. A celebrity death match on steroids.
ReplyDeleteAs for the obsession with women's bodies and freedoms--To me, its an abusive mindset. This feeling of ownership that they have over women's reproductive powers--and an attack on individual bodily integrity of females as well as their personhood. But those are big words that bounce off of small minds.
Its sad when you think about the dichtotomy that has been set up for women.
Put off having children til you are almost sterile. If you have kids as a teen you end up poor and ostracized. If you wait to long you are educated and childless. The teen mom is a whore and the educated white collar female a bitter elitist.
You cannot fucking win.
They think if you have kids that kids should be your whole world. And if you do not have kids its because you are entirely pathologically selfish even though the options offered culturally and financially suck.
These people are fuctards of the lowest order. I mean they don't even know if they are coming or going. They are the most glaring example I can think of in this instance of the opposite of mindfulness.
Do they ever stop and sit down and just think about how their actions and words affect other people--sometimes permanently?
If we really lived in a family friendly world, and if they were the pervayors of it, then Tea-Douche-baggers would be 110 percent behind Health Care Reform. Child Care would be regulated and subject to price controls and quality assurance, and public schools would actually teach and not just turn our children into future corporate drones.
If we lived in a truly family friendly country--there would be breast feeding stations for women everywhere. There would be a special place in public areas to wash baby bottles {that is not near a damn toilet}, and colleges would offer online education even in the purely academic fields so that SAHMs like me could finish their degrees and not be forced to get an MBA at the U of Phoenix or be forced to attend Reba's House of Hair.
They are total, pure, unadulterated Bullshit and they don't even know it. They say one thing and then do everything to bring the complete opposite results into being.
That's why when Palin addresses "True or Real Patriots," she is really addressing Theocratic nutbags and assorted seccessionists.
You're absolutely correct. They aren't concerned about children or families, they're only concerned about clumps of cells and fetuses. After the child is born, well, they don't care about that. They want to remove all social safety nets. They don't care if people live in ghettos and nearly starve to death. More impoverished children means more uneducated workers they can pay measly hourly wages to.
ReplyDeleteIf they would pay people a living wage, people could afford to have children. It used to be that a couple could raise three children on one income. That is fucking impossible now. And it's because of the demise of the middle class and the rise of the Corporatocracy. You can't even really support yourself without a college education, nevermind children.
As for me, I'm a selfish bitch. I'll admit it. I don't want any children. They're too damned expensive and I have better things to do with my time. But at least I realize that. There are people who don't, who wind up with kids and they don't want them and they treat them like shit. I think if someone is going to be prone to verbally, mentally or physically abusing children, that birth control (and if that fails, abortion) should not only be an option for them, but that it should be strongly encouraged.
Of all that is going on in this world, I'll never understand how an individual can come up with who sleeps with whom as the #1 priority.
ReplyDeleteThis idiot probably also favors burning witches @ the stake as well.
I also loathe the practice of twisting the bible to fit one;s personal agenda.
I think Love one another is a big picture theme.
Yes Fran they would burn Witches. Look at Palin's little African Minister that was praying protection over her from Witchcraft. He is responsible for the torment of women and children accused of Witchcraft in Africa. Where they chain little kids up and beat them and starve them in an attempt to exorcise the demons out of their frail little bodies. Many die of dehydration and from injuries inflicted. Some are run off into the wilderness like the scape goats of old.
ReplyDeleteSad isn't it? Most of those people, like the accused in the Early Modern Witch hunts, are probably Christian. They are probably just ordinary people living in extraordinarily bad times, and they are catching the blame for some larger problem that doesn't have a solution. They are the equivalent of throwing virgins into a volcano in the hopes that *THAT will stop the eruptions.
Dumb. All of it. I go back and forth about how I feel about Christianity in general. I don't want to hate or fear anyone simply based on their faith. That would seem hippocritical of me under the circumstances. But then I get reminded frequently just how much these people hate and fear and want to hurt me and people like me.
People not like them--. I begin to despise their insistence on claiming every moral practice while rejecting every immoral practice--which is bullshit lies. While denying that anyone outside their narrow interpretation could be moral or have integrity simply due to a difference in theology or in the case of Atheists--a lack of theology. And how that is used to try and make me and others into second and third class citizens, walking targets for derision, insults, and even violence.
I know that moderate Christians are out there. But when they remain silent in the face of this shit, I feel like on some level they must be in aggreement with the crazies--you know, Silence means Compliance. And then I get really pissed.
Who do you trust in this world? Because the minute a person, no matter how nice, starts going on and on about giving all the glory to God, etc., My defenses go up. For me that is the first second in a long countdown til we both discover just what unconditional love/agape means in their personal exegesis of biblical scripture.
Fran, here are two pieces on the child witches of Africa
ReplyDeletehttp://apocalyptictheocracy.blogspot.com/2008/09/what-happens-to-people-accused-of.html
http://apocalyptictheocracy.blogspot.com/2009/10/what-would-jesus-do-seriously.html
The lawlessness and poverty and ignorance prevalent in Africa has allowed the Evangelical Dreams to come true. Look at this and understand this is what the Children of Rushdoony want here in the states.
"Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one." --Charles Mackay
ReplyDeletePeople, when they are persuaded by emotional pleas will do things in groups that they normally wouldn't do. There was an article I read somewhere, about a woman who survived the war in Bosnia. She said that neighbors, who prior to the war had been nice, turned into murderers and rapists. She watched the neighbors gang rape a young girl. After the war, she saw some of them later. They acted like nothing had happened. There is an article, not the one I read, but about the same thing here.
It was the same in Nazi Germany. Nearly an entire people went along with it. Oh sure, there were Germans who resisted Hitler and his regime. And most of them died as a result. Those who went along with it, feigned ignorance as to what was happening and pretended it wasn't. When you lie long enough to yourself, you begin to believe the lies to be truth.
And, SEC, you are completely correct. Silence in the face of injustice, is the same as perpetrating that injustice. It is the same with Islam. There are nice, moderate Muslims. I've met a few of them. But if they and the moderate Christians don't put their foot down, are not vocal in their opposition to the extremely noisy minority that misrepresents them completely, then when shit goes down, they are culpable.