I don't get it - and I don't want to (re: Muslims)

[Dysole]

Yeah, I try to keep myself enlightened and aware of those who disagree with me. I try to see their perspective and why they think what they think. I deliberately have people on facebook I know I will disagree with but they expose me to rethinking what I was thinking.

BUT... it is so easy for me to just shut down and say "No, thanks. I'd rather go back to reading stuff that I agree with since it hits all the right spots in my brain" (Apparently there is research indicating that our brain's pleasure center is activated when reading stuff we agree with; I'd have to go dredge it up)

The fact that there is so much information and it is so easy to spread misinformation and that it is so easy to surround yourself with like minds means that tribalism becomes much more pervasive and easy.

~Dysole, trying to straddle both sides of the fence

[Tornado]

Originally Posted by Dysole

Yeah, I try to keep myself enlightened and aware of those who disagree with me. I try to see their perspective and why they think what they think.

Pretty much why I like to read Aldin posts but with a healthy dose of respect.
Though Ollie posts are still my fav.
DS has made my watch list.

[SpriteMichaeler]

Originally Posted by Owlman

On the contrary, I have come to the conclusion that a good many fanatical Liberal Democrats are some of the most rude, condescending, and frankly vicious group of people on the face of planet earth, especially the liberal media. Not all, mind you, but I've met too many than I needed to meet, that's for sure.

WARNING: RANT AHEAD. PROCEED WITH CAUTION.



God help you if you dare question the liberals on what's good for this country in the long run, or challenge the status quo.

We do indeed need major background checks for immigrants, and the gun amendment should be left alone. It is the right of the American people to bear arms, period. Shame on those individuals who try to take that away, or restrict it. I am stunned by people who think greater gun control will be a solution. It won't, and isn't. The bad guys don't play by our laws, and ultimately,

Planned Parenthood should be completely shut down. I hope and pray that that does happen some day. Unborn babies are still human, whether they are fully developed or not. My gut churns whenever I hear talk of "women's right to choose". While it is law, it is a horrible law, and women should NOT have the right to choose to abort a human life, unless their lives would be endangered by the birth of the baby. It's called adoption.

(And how about choosing NOT to have sexual relations until you are good and ready, because, oh, I dunno, you might get PREGNANT?? )

I completely identify with Carson in most cases, and Trump in quite a few as well.

As a conservative Christian, I am hoping for a change for the good of our country, and I am very tolerant, just not tolerant of a religion that urges the mass murder of infidels. Those Muslims who say that Islam is a religion of peace do not obviously believe in their entire religion, as one cannot and/or should not just pick and choose which sections of their religion they wish to follow. It's either all of it, or none of it.

I hear what Aldin is saying, but I am still on the fence about Muslims being denied access to our country. There should most CERTAINLY be a more stricter screening process, at least.

You have every right to believe in whatever religion you so choose, and I will defend that right. However, one of the fundamentals of our nation is separation of church and state. Religious logic has no place in the legislature. THAT is my major problem with the far right. You can't defend one American right (2nd ammendment) while at the same time subverting another. They want to reduce the size of the government yet want to tell individuals what they can and can't do with their bodies. It can't go both ways.

[Tornado]

It can as long as enough money and votes support it.

[Dad_Scaper]

Originally Posted by Tornado

DS has made my watch list.

That's fair. I've made my own watch list too. I'm highly suspicious!

[MegaSilver]

Originally Posted by Owlman

We do indeed need major background checks for immigrants

We already do. It's strenous. And it's worse for refugees. It can take up to two years and has multiple background checks and interviews.

Originally Posted by Owlman

and the gun amendment should be left alone. It is the right of the American people to bear arms, period. Shame on those individuals who try to take that away, or restrict it. I am stunned by people who think greater gun control will be a solution. It won't, and isn't. The bad guys don't play by our laws, and ultimately

I'm fine if you want to keep your guns, but shouldn't they be regulated? Like, you know, be kept track of? We do a better job keeping track of vehicles than guns:

https://progressivecynic.files.wordp...013/01/g17.jpg

But, you know, you can just buy and trade guns as you wish (especially in my area) with no tracking.

Originally Posted by Owlman

Planned Parenthood should be completely shut down. I hope and pray that that does happen some day. Unborn babies are still human, whether they are fully developed or not. My gut churns whenever I hear talk of "women's right to choose". While it is law, it is a horrible law, and women should NOT have the right to choose to abort a human life, unless their lives would be endangered by the birth of the baby. It's called adoption.

(And how about choosing NOT to have sexual relations until you are good and ready, because, oh, I dunno, you might get PREGNANT?? )

Alright, now this one's a kicker. Planned Parenthood is not an abortion clinic, unlike the news may tell you. Yes, some locations may provide that service, but it's not all of them. It's main goal is to: "delivers vital reproductive health care, sex education, and information to millions of women, men, and young people worldwide" and provide affordable reproductive healthcare (As from their website).

Contraceptives help more than just being birth control. Lots of women have hormonal imbalances that can be treated with contraceptives. They also reduce the severity and duration (and in some cases stop) periods. I'm not sure if you were aware of that or not, but it seems like this misconception is spread a lot.

As to sex, since time began people have been having sex as soon as they wanted, you're not going to change or stop that. So, because of that, it's better to teach them how to have safe sex rather than having them stumble through it and make things worse (like spreading STDs or generally have lots of kids they can't even raise properly or at all).

You want Planned Parenthood to stop abortions? Ok, fine, I disagree on that with you for various reasons (despite me not liking them myself), but shutting down Planned Parenthood is not the solution. You're be hurting more people than helping, since it does more than you may have been aware of. [/quote]

Originally Posted by Owlman

As a conservative Christian, I am hoping for a change for the good of our country, and I am very tolerant, just not tolerant of a religion that urges the mass murder of infidels. Those Muslims who say that Islam is a religion of peace do not obviously believe in their entire religion, as one cannot and/or should not just pick and choose which sections of their religion they wish to follow. It's either all of it, or none of it.

Religions and their interpretations change. There are around 40 different Christian sects currently worldwide, and they each have a slightly different interpretation of the Bible. Some are more conservative than others; and within those groups, like Westboro Baptist, their are radicals who use religion as a platform to spread intolerance and hate. This is the same deal with these terrorists. They claim to be Muslim, following the old laws. Even if this may be true, it is not the way of 99.99% of Muslims of the world.

The terrorists use Islam as an excuse and means to justify their actions, and spread fear across to the world, so that ignorant people turn their fear into hate and direct that at innocent Muslims and anyone who looks like them. A few of these people then begin to hate everyone who prosecutes them injustly, and decide to join their ranks to punish the punisher. This is how the terrorists gain numbers. Most terrorists attacks come from the inside, not immigrants.

Over 99.99% of Muslims are innocent, and despise and hate the terrorists just as much or more than we do, because they are being misrepresented by a very small but very loud and powerful minority. And the terrorists are winning too, because fear seeps so easily into the United States, and they know it. We've done it to the Native Americans, Scots, Irish, Jews, Africans, Communists, Catholics, Latinos, and now the Muslims. All because ignorant people direct their fear and hate at the wrong person, and or have it when they shouldn't have it at all.

[wriggz]

I'm agnostic, but it is time to follow the teachings of Jesus or any profit that teaches acceptance, forgiveness, understanding, generosity, and to overcome fear. Control, greed, fear mongering and judgment are the tools of evil (secular and religious). I think there are a lot of people who invoke God (Jesus), but they don't care about the teachings that go along with the figure.

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.

Denying suffering people assistance for any reason is fear. Judging women and telling what they can do is fear. Holding on to your gun when they can be accessible to those who would do evil is fear. Fear is the tool of evil, and begets suffering and hate. Do not fall into fear.

Jesus did not teach fear. Embrace your brothers and sisters for we are all the sons and daughters of creation (God or Stars - does it matter)?

[Son of Arathorn]

Originally Posted by Owlman

As a conservative Christian, I am hoping for a change for the good of our country, and I am very tolerant, just not tolerant of a religion that urges the mass murder of infidels. Those Muslims who say that Islam is a religion of peace do not obviously believe in their entire religion, as one cannot and/or should not just pick and choose which sections of their religion they wish to follow. It's either all of it, or none of it.

If @Owlman , the conservative Christian, had read his bloody Bible, he'd know that it gives specific instructions for how to conduct a holy war (Deuteronomy 20:10-20).
As in jihad. As in:

Originally Posted by Owlman

the mass murder of infidels-

which entails killing the men, enslaving the women and children, rape and murder, so on and so forth. So while we're barring the every Muslim from entering the country, should we also deport every Jew? What about Christians who accept the Old Testament as the word of God? Hmm? Can we trust them not to follow every part of their holy text? I wish somebody had an opinion on this that could guide us... like this maybe:

Originally Posted by Owlman

Those Muslims who say that Islam is a religion of peace do not obviously believe in their entire religion, as one cannot and/or should not just pick and choose which sections of their religion they wish to follow. It's either all of it, or none of it.

I'm not even going to go into how ridiculous the notion that you can't pick and choose which parts of your religion you want to believe in is. I'll just leave this here.

[wriggz]

@son_of_arathorn I know you want to fight against ideas that go against wise teachings of compassion and tollarance. Heck my blood boils at the thought of such fear and hate. but @Owlman either is doing his best and finding his way towards being a good person the only way he knows how or is an agent of fear.

in either case fighting with him will not work. kindness compassion, understand and education is the only way we can all win. If he is a follower of Chistianity hopefully one day the teaching will make their mark.

[Son of Arathorn]

Originally Posted by wriggz

@son_of_arathorn I know you want to fight against ideas that go against wise teachings of compassion and tollarance. Heck my blood boils at the thought of such fear and hate. but @Owlman either is doing his best and finding his way towards being a good person the only way he knows how or is an agent of fear.

in either case fighting with him will not work. kindness compassion, understand and education is the only way we can all win. If he is a follower of Chistianity hopefully one day the teaching will make their mark.

Fair, wriggz. More than fair, really.

You're right, using compassion and education will always get better results than being compulsively snarky.

(although that doesn't mean the latter isn't useful in the right circumstances- damn satisfying too)

I'll work on reining in my irritation. Thanks for the reality check.

[Aldin]

Originally Posted by Son of Arathorn

If @Owlman , the conservative Christian, had read his bloody Bible, he'd know that it gives specific instructions for how to conduct a holy war (Deuteronomy 20:10-20).
As in jihad. As in:

which entails killing the men, enslaving the women and children, rape and murder, so on and so forth. So while we're barring the every Muslim from entering the country, should we also deport every Jew? What about Christians who accept the Old Testament as the word of God? Hmm? Can we trust them not to follow every part of their holy text? I wish somebody had an opinion on this that could guide us... like this maybe:

Would you accept mine?

You're making a couple of mistakes here which are very common on the internet. The first is in judging ancient cultures by modern standards. We shouldn't expect anyone to live in anything other than the time and place they live in. The second is in taking a Bible reference out of context. If needed, I can give the long version of this, but the short version is that the passage referenced was in relation to a specific government existing thousands of years ago and has very little bearing on what a Christian should be doing today. The challenge then, from Owlman's perspective would be for Islam to demonstrate a similar separation.

~Aldin, contextually

[Son of Arathorn]

You're right Aldin, most Christians don't follow that part of the Bible, because we can pick and choose which parts of our religion to follow- which was my point. Not all Muslims should be judged by what the self-proclaimed Islamic state is doing in the Middle East, just like all Jews should not be judged by what the Jewish state is doing in the Middle East (who are arguably following the passage I cited, but with a better PR spin on it).