The entire moral landscape has changed

[imbondz]

So now the standard of how to live a life is to copy the beliefs of pro football players.


Good to know Plaxico.

no, my point is that just because you believe in Jesus Christ, doesn't mean you are a 2000 year out of touch freak. But I'm assuming you being a teacher you got my point.

[imbondz]

Well this thread at least at one time had potential, then the usual happens. Christians play the victim card and all possible positive discussion goes out the window.

not playing any victim card, just showing alot of not out of touch, normal people who profess faith in Christ. that's all.

[DraftBoy]

no, my point is that just because you believe in Jesus Christ, doesn't mean you are a 2000 year out of touch freak. But I'm assuming you being a teacher you got my point.

And again you miss the point. What you believe is fantastic, but what you believe does not mean it should be forced upon others. You don't want me to tell you what morality is and I don't want you to tell me. Efforts by the GOP to legislate morality is beyond disgusting and as a Christian myself I'm ashamed and embarrassed.

[Ralonzo]

Secularists generally do not fear that which does not exist.

So what weighs 21 grams?

[EricStratton]

Professing a belief if god is one thing, trying to legislate that belief is another completely.

That seems to be what was rejected during this election cycle.

[DraftBoy]

not playing any victim card, just showing alot of not out of touch, normal people who profess faith in Christ. that's all.

Which as always is not the point.

[imbondz]

And again you miss the point. What you believe is fantastic, but what you believe does not mean it should be forced upon others. You don't want me to tell you what morality is and I don't want you to tell me. Efforts by the GOP to legislate morality is beyond disgusting and as a Christian myself I'm ashamed and embarrassed.

but that's not what i'm doing at all. i'm not trying to convert you at all, just showing Bills players and NFL players who profess belief in Christ, because the point of this thread was to show that all us conservatives are out of touch freaks, and Christian beliefs are outdated and only the dangerous far right profess them. I disagree completely.

[imbondz]

Which as always is not the point.

so you're going to tell me what point i'm trying to make. awesome.

[DraftBoy]

but that's not what i'm doing at all. i'm not trying to convert you at all, just showing Bills players and NFL players who profess belief in Christ, because the point of this thread was to show that all us conservatives are out of touch freaks, and Christian beliefs are outdated and only the dangerous far right profess them. I disagree completely.

Many of those beliefs are outdated, specifically those about Gay Marriage and a Woman's Right to Choose.

[Bellowing4DaBills]

i suggest you relearn your history. Ben Franklin was many things... secular was not one. His christian credentials were questionable at best... but at heart he was a deitst. As in he believed in god, no... more then that, he believed with all his heart the worlds existence was proof of a god, he just wasn't sure what god was. Thomas Jefferson was in the same boat, though he leaned much more Christian then Ben Franklin, if you read his writings it's clear at points in his life he was a full hearted christian, in others he doubted... generally though like Franklin, he had no doubt in the existence of a God... he just wasn't willing to say what form that God took.

Do not confuse secularism with atheism. Ben was definitely a secular American as Joe described him.

They were deists but they obviously believed in the principle of separation of government from religion.

[imbondz]

Many of those beliefs are outdated, specifically those about Gay Marriage and a Woman's Right to Choose.

I disagree 100%.

[imbondz]

And again you miss the point. What you believe is fantastic, but what you believe does not mean it should be forced upon others. You don't want me to tell you what morality is and I don't want you to tell me. Efforts by the GOP to legislate morality is beyond disgusting and as a Christian myself I'm ashamed and embarrassed.

it'll always go back to this point, all forms of legislation, is legislating one's belief. all legislation that has ever been passed is someone's belief forced on you and me.

[Ralonzo]

Many of those beliefs are outdated, specifically those about Gay Marriage and a Woman's Right to Choose.

Just a quick take:

1) "Marriage" is institutionalized as the fundamental atomic unit of the civil society with the goal of perpetuation of same. "Gay Marriage" is an oxymoron, since there is no fulfillment of the institutional goal of propagation. It carries as much validity as "Goat Marriage." It is not incumbent on the civil society to break with established tradition, belief and wisdom, to accomodate this definition. This is not to say the civil society wishes to abolish the practice - just that it is not "marriage."

2) Nowhere in this nation is a woman's right to choose to not get pregnant being denied.

The civil society indeed legislates morality, or murder would be legal and I'd be allowed to strangle people who cannot form a cogent argument. (No inferences toward anyone here)

Now here follows the outlier examples, exceptional cases and sundry strawmen...

[imbondz]

Just a quick take:

1) "Marriage" is institutionalized as the fundamental atomic unit of the civil society with the goal of perpetuation of same. "Gay Marriage" is an oxymoron, since there is no fulfillment of the institutional goal of propagation. It carries as much validity as "Goat Marriage." It is not incumbent on the civil society to break with established tradition, belief and wisdom, to accomodate this definition. This is not to say the civil society wishes to abolish the practice - just that it is not "marriage."

2) Nowhere in this nation is a woman's right to choose to not get pregnant being denied.

The civil society indeed legislates morality, or murder would be legal and I'd be allowed to strangle people who cannot form a cogent argument. (No inferences toward anyone here)

Now here follows the outlier examples, exceptional cases and sundry strawmen...

lol. well said!

[Albany,n.y.]

Just a quick take:

1) "Marriage" is institutionalized as the fundamental atomic unit of the civil society with the goal of perpetuation of same. "Gay Marriage" is an oxymoron, since there is no fulfillment of the institutional goal of propagation. It carries as much validity as "Goat Marriage." It is not incumbent on the civil society to break with established tradition, belief and wisdom, to accomodate this definition. This is not to say the civil society wishes to abolish the practice - just that it is not "marriage."

Following this logic, any straight couple that is infertile due to something physical or the fact that the woman has past menopause or the man has had a vacsectomy that gets married has the equivalent of a "goat marriage". So basically you are against any heterosexual couple that are both over 50 getting married.
Have you ever heard of groups of people protesting marriage of infertile heterosexuals? I doubt you have.
When you use procreation as the cornerstone to define what you feel is a legitimate marriage, that cornerstone crumbles.

[Albany,n.y.]

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/10/us...=fb-share&_r=0

Christian conservatives, for more than two decades a pivotal force in American politics, are grappling with Election Day results that repudiated their influence and suggested that the cultural tide — especially on gay issues — has shifted against them.........

“Millions of American evangelicals are absolutely shocked by not just the presidential election, but by the entire avalanche of results that came in,” R. Albert Mohler Jr., president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, in Louisville, Ky., said in an interview. “It’s not that our message — we think abortion is wrong, we think same-sex marriage is wrong — didn’t get out. It did get out.

“It’s that the entire moral landscape has changed,” he said. “An increasingly secularized America understands our positions, and has rejected them.”

Conservative Christian leaders said that they would intensify their efforts to make their case, but were just beginning to discuss how to proceed. “We’re not going away, we just need to recalibrate,” said Bob Vander Plaats, president and chief executive of The Family Leader, an evangelical organization in Iowa.

There is hope for us yet. The change is slow, we will suffer setbacks, but it is rolling inexorably on. It is that arc of justice thingie

Pat Robertson has to be beside himself. Back in January, he spoke to God & God told him who would win the election. Pat then proclaimed he knew, sounded very happy about what the outcome would be & then proceeded to support Mitt Romney and demonize President Obama.
So now with the election over there are 4 ways to interpret Pat Robertson's statements.
1) God lied to Pat either because he is not infallible or because he hates Robertson so much he wants to screw with him.
2) Pat Robertson thinks he hears the voice of God when instead he himself is mentally ill.
3) Robertson knows that he doesn't talk to God and that his lies are wearing thin
4) Robertson really doesn't even know if God exists, but as long as people believe, there's money to be made & he's sure as hell (?) not going to stop taking their money.

[MikeInRoch]

1) "Marriage" is institutionalized as the fundamental atomic unit of the civil society with the goal of perpetuation of same.

While that may be *a* goal, it is certainly not the *only* goal.

"Gay Marriage" is an oxymoron, since there is no fulfillment of the institutional goal of propagation. It carries as much validity as "Goat Marriage." It is not incumbent on the civil society to break with established tradition, belief and wisdom, to accomodate this definition.

"Established tradition" is a BS reason to legislate (or not legislate) anything.

[MikeInRoch]

There is no reasonable non-religious argument to not allow gay marriage, and preventing others from doing something because of your personal religious beliefs is wrong. It's such an easy argument it boggles my mind that anyone could be against it.

[IlluminatusUIUC]

So it is now my civil right to marry 6 different women???

Awesome, I can get used to the new "anything goes" society...

What?

Gilly's been whining about strawmen ever since election night.

So what weighs 21 grams?

Did you read your own link?

What to make of all this? MacDougall's results were flawed because the methodology used to harvest them was suspect, the sample size far too small, and the ability to measure changes in weight imprecise. For this reason, credence should not be given to the idea that his experiments proved something, let alone that they measured the weight of the soul as 21 grams. His postulations on this topic are a curiosity, but nothing more.

What's being marked "True" is that those experiments actually took place, not that the results were accurate or revealing.

Just a quick take:

1) "Marriage" is institutionalized as the fundamental atomic unit of the civil society with the goal of perpetuation of same. "Gay Marriage" is an oxymoron, since there is no fulfillment of the institutional goal of propagation. It carries as much validity as "Goat Marriage." It is not incumbent on the civil society to break with established tradition, belief and wisdom, to accomodate this definition. This is not to say the civil society wishes to abolish the practice - just that it is not "marriage."

This is a post hoc justification marriage that is applied to no one except homosexuals. The elderly, the sterile, those uninterested in kids, and even criminals on death row who can never even touch their spouses are all allowed to marry without protest.

Also, homosexuals can procreate, just not with each other.

2) Nowhere in this nation is a woman's right to choose to not get pregnant being denied.

There are, however, many places where people fight against any sort of fact-based sex education and work to prevent the distribution of contraceptives. The staggering ignorance some people display over how to get pregnant is a result of that. My friend is a doctor, and during one of her rotations a woman asked her if she could get pregnant from giving her boyfriend a handjob in a jacuzzi.

The civil society indeed legislates morality, or murder would be legal and I'd be allowed to strangle people who cannot form a cogent argument. (No inferences toward anyone here)

We do legislate morality, but murder is the dumbest example you could have picked. Crimes with victims will always be illegal, that's not "morality" that's just building a society that doesn't crumble into chaos. Murder is the most grievous violation of someone else's body and rights that one can perform. Criminalizing gambling and public nudity are actual examples of morality laws with no express victims.

[Ralonzo]

Following this logic, any straight couple that is infertile due to something physical or the fact that the woman has past menopause or the man has had a vacsectomy that gets married has the equivalent of a "goat marriage".

And predictably the outlier example comes. A little disappointed that you didn't also pile on with polygamy, or rape and incest for #2, but at least we're going somewhere.

So basically you are against any heterosexual couple that are both over 50 getting married.

Strawman #1. Posit something I did not say, then argue against it.

Have you ever heard of groups of people protesting marriage of infertile heterosexuals? I doubt you have.
When you use procreation as the cornerstone to define what you feel is a legitimate marriage, that cornerstone crumbles.

Strawman #2. Second verse, same as the first.

We are simply discussing the definition of "marriage," and I recounted the etymology; that is to say, what it means and where it comes from. It's held different meanings in different societies at different points of history. In our own, it has traditionally carried the particular meaning of one man and one woman. This has occurred over time for numerous reasons. Let's not get into those right now, since I'd like to tie this back to the thread title:

If the moral landscape has changed, why has the moral landscape changed?

To get the discussion rolling using the topic at hand: You might liken this to Obama's position on gay marriage - it has "evolved". What an accurate word. As Darwinism has served to unmoor most people nowadays from belief in Biblical creation, so it occurs with the Biblical definition of marriage. We have outgrown such myths and stories, and in dismissing them as superstitious lore, we also lose the lessons passed to us from collected history.

To me, the underpinnings of the collapse of most civil societies comes down to hubris - the collective belief that your generation is exceptional, with special knowledge and insight, and thus gives impetus to the rejection of the mores, practices and ideals that built the civil society to begin with. It's not a big surprise, it's who we are. The conflation of knowledge with wisdom is a mighty thin line.