Originally Posted by Odin

Thanks for proving JPT's point make making all of us on the left look like politically correct authoritarian dicks who are terried of offending the backward beliefs of people in the 3rd World lest we look "racist" or "Neo-Colonialist". JPT mentioned that he is offended by Dawkin's, Hitchen's, etc. mockery of Christianity and considers it bigoted. I consider the attitudes and statements made by fundamentalist Christians like JPT about Atheists to be offensive and bigoted. If we made it illegal to say anything that someone might find bigoted then it would be impossible to say anything.

Perhaps there is hope for you after all.

There are apparently now violent anti-American protests spreading to 21 Islamic countries. I don't know what the deal is with this stuff. It's nonsensical. The big picture question that starts to come to mind is: I thought if we elected Obama the world was going to love us?

Most countries do not have freedom of speech in the way the US has. While in Italy this summer, I had a discussion with an Italian professor about it. It was very difficult for this highly educated person to understand the level of freedom of speech the US has. My US colleague and I did our best to convey it to him, but it was clear he didn't quite fathom it.

It made me realize how I take almost complete freedom of speech for granted. Witnessing the response to this dumb movie trailer has made clearer to me how we in the US can shrug off extremism. But citizens of the majority of other countries do not understand how the US gov't lets the kind of speech in this video get disseminated.

Originally Posted by Odin

Unfortunately JPT is correct for once, I've been fighting a losing battle over at DU.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021326268

So because of your expericene with one website so fringe left that I never go there your attempting to validate his fallacy.

You have a lot to learn about logical thinking Taylor.

As soon as you can take a statistics or research methods type class..

Originally Posted by annla899

Most countries do not have freedom of speech in the way the US has. While in Italy this summer, I had a discussion with an Italian professor about it. It was very difficult for this highly educated person to understand the level of freedom of speech the US has. My US colleague and I did our best to convey it to him, but it was clear he didn't quite fathom it.

It made me realize how I take almost complete freedom of speech for granted. Witnessing the response to this dumb movie trailer has made clearer to me how we in the US can shrug off extremism. But citizens of the majority of other countries do not understand how the US gov't lets the kind of speech in this video get disseminated.

The mentality is certainly nothing new, when you consider Salman Rushdie, the cartoonist who was forced to go into hiding, the filmmaker who was killed, etc. The question here is how a video made by a handful of people, out of a nation of 300 million+, that literally no one had heard of or seen, is being used as a pretext to foment violent protests against the U.S. as a whole. Somebody is manipulating these crowds. I don't know enough about the situation to know exactly who it is (Al Qaeda is the obvious assumption), but something strange is going on.

Originally Posted by Kurt Horner

Your math is in error. The pro-choice "Christians" aren't TRUE Christians, don't ya know?

Being pro-choice and Christian (or at least Catholic?).

It's certainly something to consider. Personally, I can't individually classify someone as being a "true" Christian or not - I don't know what is in their hearts - but as a Catholic when someone fundamentally disagrees with a dogmatic teaching of the faith it does give me pause to consider that if someone doesn't actually follow the teachings of the faith if they can really call themselves a member of that faith. It's a bit like saying you're a Catholic but that whole Jesus as God stuff just seems a bit silly but otherwise you're cool with everything else - or that you're a vegetarian but you make an exception for bacon (oh, but only bacon though!). Can you really classify yourself as something if you have a fundamental dogmatic disagreement with it?

Here's what the catechism has to say about it:

Abortion

2270 Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception. From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person - among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life.⁷²


Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you.⁷³ My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately wrought in the depths of the earth.⁷⁴
2271 Since the first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion. This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable. Direct abortion, that is to say, abortion willed either as an end or a means, is gravely contrary to the moral law:


You shall not kill the embryo by abortion and shall not cause the newborn to perish.⁷⁵ God, the Lord of life, has entrusted to men the noble mission of safeguarding life, and men must carry it out in a manner worthy of themselves. Life must be protected with the utmost care from the moment of conception: abortion and infanticide are abominable crimes.⁷⁶

2272 Formal cooperation in an abortion constitutes a grave offense. The Church attaches the canonical penalty of excommunication to this crime against human life. "A person who procures a completed abortion incurs excommunication latae sententiae,"⁷⁷ "by the very commission of the offense,"⁷⁸ and subject to the conditions provided by Canon Law.⁷⁹ The Church does not thereby intend to restrict the scope of mercy. Rather, she makes clear the gravity of the crime committed, the irreparable harm done to the innocent who is put to death, as well as to the parents and the whole of society.

2273 The inalienable right to life of every innocent human individual is a constitutive element of a civil society and its legislation:
"The inalienable rights of the person must be recognized and respected by civil society and the political authority. These human rights depend neither on single individuals nor on parents; nor do they represent a concession made by society and the state; they belong to human nature and are inherent in the person by virtue of the creative act from which the person took his origin. Among such fundamental rights one should mention in this regard every human being's right to life and physical integrity from the moment of conception until death."⁸⁰
"The moment a positive law deprives a category of human beings of the protection which civil legislation ought to accord them, the state is denying the equality of all before the law. When the state does not place its power at the service of the rights of each citizen, and in particular of the more vulnerable, the very foundations of a state based on law are undermined. . . . As a consequence of the respect and protection which must be ensured for the unborn child from the moment of conception, the law must provide appropriate penal sanctions for every deliberate violation of the child's rights."⁸¹
2274 Since it must be treated from conception as a person, the embryo must be defended in its integrity, cared for, and healed, as far as possible, like any other human being.
Prenatal diagnosis is morally licit, "if it respects the life and integrity of the embryo and the human fetus and is directed toward its safe guarding or healing as an individual. . . . It is gravely opposed to the moral law when this is done with the thought of possibly inducing an abortion, depending upon the results: a diagnosis must not be the equivalent of a death sentence."⁸²
2275 "One must hold as licit procedures carried out on the human embryo which respect the life and integrity of the embryo and do not involve disproportionate risks for it, but are directed toward its healing the improvement of its condition of health, or its individual survival."⁸³
"It is immoral to produce human embryos intended for exploitation as disposable biological material."⁸⁴
"Certain attempts to influence chromosomic or genetic inheritance are not therapeutic but are aimed at producing human beings selected according to sex or other predetermined qualities. Such manipulations are contrary to the personal dignity of the human being and his integrity and identity"⁸⁵ which are unique and unrepeatable.

There are, of course, varying degrees of "pro-choice" - I don't mean to deny that at all as a matter of science. However, the catechism is again very clear that it's classified as from the moment of conception and doesn't make his scientific distinction at all. In essence, claiming to be a "pro-choice" Catholic, by default, is similar to the claimant saying they are a Catholic except for buying the whole Trinity bit about Jesus being God. And I'm not the one saying it - it's the catechism here.

j.p.

Originally Posted by JDFP

There are, of course, varying degrees of "pro-choice" - I don't mean to deny that at all as a matter of science. However, the catechism is again very clear that it's classified as from the moment of conception and doesn't make his scientific distinction at all. In essence, claiming to be a "pro-choice" Catholic, by default, is similar to the claimant saying they are a Catholic except for buying the whole Trinity bit about Jesus being God. And I'm not the one saying it - it's the catechism here.

j.p.

i'd seriously consider the possibility that the catechism missed the point of christ's teachings, all in the name of keeping women subservient to men.

now are you going to say that feminists can't be christians?

Originally Posted by the bouncer

i'd seriously consider the possibility that the catechism missed the point of christ's teachings, all in the name of keeping women subservient to men.

now are you going to say that feminists can't be christians?

Sure, you can certainly make that argument. Plenty of folks do. There are tons of folks that would argue that Catholicism as a whole misses the mark of Christ's teachings. Protestants would run rampant on the issue of Sola Scriptura all day long and argue that Catholicism's reliance on Sacred Tradition itself is flawed. I think you're right to question things. I'm not an expert on the catechism - but I try to review it when I have a life-choice to make that is pretty important as a matter of faith.

I don't say that pro-choice folks aren't Christians (in my post, I clearly said that, it's not my place to call what is in the heart of someone) - but it's pretty clear that someone who classifies themselves as "pro-choice" are indeed going against a dogmatic teaching of the faith. And it would apply to feminists as well.

j.p.

Originally Posted by JustPassingThrough

The mentality is certainly nothing new, when you consider Salman Rushdie, the cartoonist who was forced to go into hiding, the filmmaker who was killed, etc. The question here is how a video made by a handful of people, out of a nation of 300 million+, that literally no one had heard of or seen, is being used as a pretext to foment violent protests against the U.S. as a whole. Somebody is manipulating these crowds. I don't know enough about the situation to know exactly who it is (Al Qaeda is the obvious assumption), but something strange is going on.

It's not Al Quaeda (not their style). There is someone else in the region who has been engaged in an asymmetrical-type war with us (and other parties) for the past two years now and this is very much their style.

Originally Posted by Copperfield

It's not Al Quaeda (not their style). There is someone else in the region who has been engaged in an asymmetrical-type war with us (and other parties) for the past two years now and this is very much their style.

Stevens was a big advocate of diplomacy, especially when it comes to Iran.

So who has knowledge of the location of secret safe houses, and a desire to see us fighting with Iran? Yeah.

About a month ago, there was another well-timed attack on an advocate of peace with Iran. Rockets dropped on General Dempsey's plane just a few moments after he stepped off in Bagram - and just a few days after he said we weren't going to attack Iran over their nuclear power program.

Huh. Guess who called Obama after midnight on Tuesday, for a "Long, frank" conversation:

"We are facing great challenges. As prime minister of Israel, it is my duty to uphold the vital interests of the State of Israel, to ensure its security and its future. The greatest interest today is to prevent Iran from continuing on its clear steps to achieving nuclear weapons, this from a country that calls for our destruction and intends to achieve its goal. I uphold these interests, not that it's easy, because leadership is tested in upholding them even if there are disagreements with friends, even the best of friends. This is what I have done and this is what I will continue to do for the State of Israel and the security of its citizens."


The telephone conversation between Obama and Netanyahu after midnight on Tuesday was, according to an Israeli source, "long [and] frank, and dealt with all of the essential issues."

And now...left wing anti-semitism. Great. Goodnight.

Originally Posted by annla899

Most countries do not have freedom of speech in the way the US has. While in Italy this summer, I had a discussion with an Italian professor about it. It was very difficult for this highly educated person to understand the level of freedom of speech the US has. My US colleague and I did our best to convey it to him, but it was clear he didn't quite fathom it.

It made me realize how I take almost complete freedom of speech for granted. Witnessing the response to this dumb movie trailer has made clearer to me how we in the US can shrug off extremism. But citizens of the majority of other countries do not understand how the US gov't lets the kind of speech in this video get disseminated.

Italy had a vastly-different experience with Hard Right politics than America has ever known -- outright rule. Consequences of fascism in Italy included a war that went badly, political persecutions, and even culpability of the Fascist regime in the Holocaust. Italian fascism, unlike Nazism, was a slow degradation of public life until Italy was completely undemocratic even in form (when the Chamber of Deputies voted itself out of existence in 1938). As part of the agreement that allowed the continuation of Italian statehood the Italian government that the Allies accepted outlawed Fascism, the Fascist Party, and symbols and behaviors unique to Italian Fascism. The German criminal code has a long list of organizations, symbols, slogans, and gestures, and phrases illegal in Germany. Certain books and films are available to Germans except under some rigid controls.

The closest thing that America has ever had to European fascism is the Ku Klux Klan which in many of its manifestations and permutations remains legal. Discreditable? Of course. But there has never been a KKK government in America (although that was one possible trajectory of American history in the 1920s). Just imagine how the last Crisis would have turned out had the good-guy and bad-guy sides been inverted from reality. Figure that had a democratic Germany and a democratic Japan, eventual hegemons of Europe and the Pacific basin with some cease-fire line going through Lake Michigan, a divided Chicago, the Illinois River, and the Mississippi River. America might recover its independence and unity, but the federal code would have a long list of proscribed organizations, slogans, symbols, songs, gestures, and even articles of clothing.

That said, the Klan is a disgraced organization even though it has never been associated with a military defeat, let alone any large-scale atrocities. Some Klansmen have been convicted of terrorist attacks (like the lethal bombing of the 14th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham). Unlike the Italian Fascist Party or the German Nazi Party the Klan did not die in a military defeat.

It can be assumed that just because it might be legal to swim in a sewer does not mean that people frequently swim in sewers. An American is free to be a Nazi or a Klansman -- not that many Americans so choose.

Originally Posted by JustPassingThrough

anti-semitism

I don't think that word means what you seem to think it means..

Originally Posted by JohnMc82

I don't think that word means what you seem to think it means..

Were they behind 9/11 too?

Pope urges religions to root out fundamentalism For discussion purposes...

Originally Posted by Benedict XVI

"Religious fundamentalism seeks to take power for political ends, at times using violence, over the individual conscience and over religion," the Pope said.

"All religious leaders in the Middle East [should] endeavour, by their example and their teaching, to do everything possible to uproot this threat, which indiscriminately and fatally affects believers."

Anyone think that will help?

Originally Posted by JustPassingThrough

Were they behind 9/11 too?

Doubtful... They gave us the list of the 19 hijackers beforehand. That shows they wouldn't want to spoil their own operation, but it also shows that their intelligence gathering ability might be even better than our own. Here's a Fox documentary on how easily they've been able to spy on us and acquire military info/technology. Enviable really, but it puts them on a short list of actors who could get info on our consulate safe houses.

Anyway, means and motive is enough to go on a suspect list, but it's a long way from the certainty of a conviction.

But I think you're right that something strange is going on. It doesn't fit the typical modus operandi of Al Qaeda. AQ typically relies on improvised weapons - this attack was carried out with military-grade rifles & mortar. AQ attacks obvious and public targets then quickly vanishes before the element of surprise wears off - this was a two-part attack that went beyond the symbolic embassy itself and tracked the (secret) movements of specific diplomatic staff members over a several-hour period.

It also seems to involve a highly-coordinated media campaign that left Americans divided and bickering over our most fundamental right to free-speech.

Maybe AQ is evolving, and integrating itself in to existing states' militaries. Maybe Mossad is sending Obama a message about his stance on Iran. Maybe this is just the remnants of well-armed and well-trained Gaddafi loyalists.

Maybe it really is just a random group of religious fundamentalists who were pissed off about a movie that ten people saw in LA... but honestly, that last one seems like it takes the biggest stretch to fit the facts.

A comparison between the current reaction to Innocence of Muslims and the reaction to the 1988 film The Last Temptation Of Christ is mighty instructive - now isn't it?

Originally Posted by JustPassingThrough

There are apparently now violent anti-American protests spreading to 21 Islamic countries. I don't know what the deal is with this stuff. It's nonsensical.

Yep. Pure nonsense that people might get het up over a little bit of killing-their-kids. What is with those crazy wogs, amirite?

The big picture question that starts to come to mind is: I thought if we elected Obama the world was going to love us?

It turns out (or, rather, it was very clearly predicted by those of us who paid attention with out brains, instead of being distracted by shiny things and cute chants) that Obama gets off on killing darkies just as much as the last guy did. Change, perhaps, the fuzzy-wuzzies would have been happy with. More-of-the-same-only-harder... not so much.

It's really pretty clear.

Originally Posted by JustPassingThrough

And now...left wing anti-semitism. Great. Goodnight.

"Semites" are arabs-hebrews-assyrians-etc... Nobody's got a problem with them. Fascist killers (even if they happen to hold Israeli passports), on the other hand? There's where we get to a problem. Their race and supposed-religion isn't even a factor.

Originally Posted by '58 Flat

A comparison between the current reaction to Innocence of Muslims and the reaction to the 1988 film The Last Temptation Of Christ is mighty instructive - now isn't it?

I have read The Last Temptation of Christ, practically an alternative story in a dream sequence, in which Jesus gets to live a 'normal' life with a family... and a job enforcing Roman cruelty by building... crucifixes... and thus becoming complicit in Roman oppression.

Originally Posted by JustPassingThrough

Perhaps there is hope for you after all.

Unlike many of my fellow leftists I haven't succumbed to the mental disease of Postmodernism.

Originally Posted by JDFP

Being pro-choice and Christian (or at least Catholic?).

It's certainly something to consider. Personally, I can't individually classify someone as being a "true" Christian or not - I don't know what is in their hearts - but as a Catholic when someone fundamentally disagrees with a dogmatic teaching of the faith it does give me pause to consider that if someone doesn't actually follow the teachings of the faith if they can really call themselves a member of that faith. It's a bit like saying you're a Catholic but that whole Jesus as God stuff just seems a bit silly but otherwise you're cool with everything else - or that you're a vegetarian but you make an exception for bacon (oh, but only bacon though!). Can you really classify yourself as something if you have a fundamental dogmatic disagreement with it?

What if the nature of life and reality is that it doesn't always fit into a formula or a catechism? What if human "teachings" and formulations of the "truth" are not as absolutely true, as the truth itself is? Should someone be told they don't have a relationship with God or Jesus, because they think some of the teachings of church authorities are not absolutely accurate, and need to be adjusted?

I wouldn't make an exception for Francis Bacon though; he was a duncehead.

Originally Posted by B Butler

Pope urges religions to root out fundamentalism For discussion purposes...

Anyone think that will help?

I wonder what JDFP would say here? And what about his own fundamentalism? Some Catholics are very dogmatic, and seem to demand that people "follow their teachings" or they are not really Catholics.

Originally Posted by Justin '77

Yep. Pure nonsense that people might get het up over a little bit of killing-their-kids. What is with those crazy wogs, amirite?
It turns out (or, rather, it was very clearly predicted by those of us who paid attention with out brains, instead of being distracted by shiny things and cute chants) that Obama gets off on killing darkies just as much as the last guy did. Change, perhaps, the fuzzy-wuzzies would have been happy with. More-of-the-same-only-harder... not so much.

It's really pretty clear.

I wonder if these mobs are reacting to US killings of Muslims in the wars, or to someone "insulting" their faith. I even wonder if killing justifies more killing in turn.

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

I wonder if these mobs are reacting to US killings of Muslims in the wars, or to someone "insulting" their faith. I even wonder if killing justifies more killing in turn.

"Justifies" implies a values question. It would depend on an individual's or culture's values. However, wishing to kill someone who is killing one's own is very human. Many to most human cultures accept or embrace violent response to violence. For example, see the US response to September 11, 2001.

Personally, I would avoid escalating spirals of violence if possible. I don't claim to have a system of morality which trumps all other systems of morality, though.