There are few people in America more ridiculous than Bill O’Reilly. He’s the very definition of an ignorant blowhard, especially when he goes off on a rant about “secular progressives” as he did again recently. He thinks we are the root of all evil and we must be stopped:
“On paper, the stats look hopeless for traditional Americans,” O’Reilly said. “But they can be reversed. However, it will take a very special politician to do that. By the way, Mitt Romney didn’t even try to marginalize secularism. He basically ignored it.”
Secular progressives don’t have the right approach, he argued, because they don’t want judgment on personal behavior. For examples, O’Reilly pointed to the issues of out-of-wedlock births, abortion and entitlements. Secular progressives “don’t want limitations on so-called private behavior,” he said.
The majority of Americans can be persuaded, O’Reilly said, “that the far-left is dangerous outfit, bent of destroying traditional America and replacing it with a social free-fire zone that drives dependency and poverty.” We need to confront that, he added. But too many of our politicians are too cowardly to do so.
Yeah, because Bill O’Reilly is all about judgment for private immoral behavior. You know, like wanting to rub a falafel on women who work for him. A clarion call for morality from a guy who cares only about money and his own ego.
68 comments
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dmcclean
November 18, 2012 at 11:06 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
What the fuck is a “social free-fire zone”?
This moon denialist really pisses me off sometimes.
Bronze Dog
November 18, 2012 at 11:10 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Sometimes I get tempted to use “Christian” as a synonym for words like “depraved” and such, but there are decent Christians out there. We really need to tear down the idea that “Christian” automatically means good, and wingnuts like O’Reilly help by being counter-examples.
dingojack
November 18, 2012 at 11:10 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
oh Billo – tell us about the strong correlation between religious belief and out of wedlock children, abortions and all the social ills you described. Seems like christians are the main perpetrators of these ‘crimes’, care to comment on that Billo?
Dingo
gingerbaker
November 18, 2012 at 11:36 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Yes! Yes! Yes! – That’s what progressives are ALL about – policies that drive poverty. What a putz.
roggg
November 18, 2012 at 11:40 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I sometimes think Bill is a much more subtle Colbert. I see glimpses of reasonable behavior and rational thought from time to time, so when he goes way out into outer space I suspect he’s more playing a character for money than expressing an opinion. I could be wrong though…he could just be an idiot.
Jasper of Maine (I feel safe and welcome at FTB)
November 18, 2012 at 11:41 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I wonder if Billy-O has considered running for office.
Gretchen
November 18, 2012 at 11:42 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Uh….abortions help prevent the need for “entitlements.” And unless Mr. O’Reilly is proposing that sex itself become illegal, I don’t know how he expects that limiting private behavior will stop people from having abortions or out-of-wedlock births.
You know what does prevent those things? Easily available contraception, and education on the fact that it exists and how to use it. But oh no, O’Reilly would never go for that.
machintelligence
November 18, 2012 at 11:45 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Bronze Dog
There are, but they don’t get much airtime.
timgueguen
November 18, 2012 at 11:52 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
But if there’s easily available birth control where is the cannon fodder supposed to come from? Why, they might actually have to make the kids of the O’Reillys and Romneys and other moneybags fight in the foxholes.
It’s funny how the right wingers of that sort talk about personal responsibility, but seem to balk at having it applied in regards to things like the environment.
Moggie
November 18, 2012 at 11:59 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
So I guess “traditional Americans” doesn’t mean Native Americans?
Which group has been more critical of, say, Newt Gingrich’s personal life, secular progressives or Christian conservatives? Hint: only one of these groups believes that ticking the Jesus box wipes the slate clean.
tommykey
November 18, 2012 at 12:08 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I have noticed over the years that whenever Bill doesn’t like something, he labels it as “far left” but never bothers to explain in substance what is wrong with the position he decries. Simply by applying the label “far left” to a policy position renders it in his mind, and presumably the minds of his viewers, unfit for consideration.
The other thing is his casting of the “good guys” as “traditional Americans.” It’s this notion that the Far Right seems to suffer from that there was a time when everything was right in America and that it has to be preserved like a fly in the amber.
What I can’t help but notice with these people is that their vision of America is by and large exclusionary in nature.
John Hinkle
November 18, 2012 at 12:19 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Yeah, because alienating substantial chunks of the population is a sure-fire path toward winning the presidency. That worked really well with the 47%.
Oh, and I thought Obama’s giveaways were the reason he won. It’s hard to keep these things straight.
haitied
November 18, 2012 at 12:27 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I find it both depressing and uplifting that anyone could accomplish what O’rly has. It just requires them being a completely morally bankrupt, lying, self promoting, antagonistic, poisonous, wretch of a human being.
I’m sure I left something out. . .
Ernst Hot
November 18, 2012 at 12:35 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I believe that there’s a word for the lack of “limitations on so-called private behavior.” What’s that word again? Oh, yeah, it’s called freedom! I heard it was kind of a thing in the US…
democommie
November 18, 2012 at 12:36 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
OT:
This has been driving me nuts for months. Why the fuck does the comments section get closed to me, if I go elsewhere (even while leaving this window open) and return a few minutes later, only to have to sign in again. This has been the default for most of the time since Ed switched from the old blog. Any ideas? (it makes no difference which browser I use).
Bill O’Reilly is nothing but a self-inflated lying fuckbag.
“Sometimes I get tempted to use “Christian” as a synonym for words like “depraved” and such, but there are decent Christians out there.”
When the “decent” christians start condemning assholes like Riley in print and on the air, depriving him of his undeserved and unearned bully pulpit I might give a fuck if they are tarred with the same brush as that piece of shit.
AsqJames
November 18, 2012 at 1:13 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Also, those progressive, secular liberals are evil because they’re trying to divide America.
raven
November 18, 2012 at 1:30 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Which are higher among the fundie xians. Bristol Palin anyone?
The far left all but doesn’t even exist.
O’Reilly would be more convincing ranting and raving about the UN-Bigfoot-Illuminati-Space Reptiles conspiracy.
democommie
November 18, 2012 at 1:34 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“O’Reilly would be more convincing ranting and raving about the UN-Bigfoot-Illuminati-Space Reptiles conspiracy.”
I’m pretty sure that in O’Reillian english, that’s the derivation of “Obama”.
Bronze Dog
November 18, 2012 at 1:56 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
To be fair, I doubt the media’s terribly interested in airing it when they do speak up. There’s probably a lot of fatalism discouraging them as well, since it’s often a thankless task and probably risks negative attention when the fundies notice and start spreading straw men to rile up the mob.
Essentially, I think it’s potentially much like our situation as atheists. Speaking up is the best thing they can do, but it’s an uphill battle just to be acknowledged.
F
November 18, 2012 at 2:28 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Higher among the religious right than among secular progressives. Bad example, Bill.
andrewlephong
November 18, 2012 at 2:52 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Nothing wrong with judging personal behavior if there’s actually a good reason to do so, as in it can be shown empirically that such personal behavior actually leads to real negative outcomes. Not the sort of non-empirical dot-connecting that O’Reilly is doing when he says abortion leads to dependency or out-of-wedlock births lead to poverty.
leni
November 18, 2012 at 2:59 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
The man has a television show in which he does almost nothing but pass such judgments, yet apparently this is not enough for him.
What exactly would be enough “judgment” to satisfy him? Denying public assistance to women who have children out of wedlock? Jail time for unmarried parents? (Still not preventative, but I can’t imagine he’d care about a detail like that when he’s clearly more concerned with punishment.)
So basically he’s saying the “right approach” is to advocate letting poor children of single mothers starve so we can all pat ourselves on the back for having passed appropriate judgment on them?
And these morons think free birth control is *the* reason women voted for Obama? Un.fucking.believable.
grumpyoldfart
November 18, 2012 at 3:02 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
It doesn’t have to be true – as long as the customers believe it.
[Look at religion - lies piled on top of lies - and it has been making a fortune for thousands of years.]
Sastra
November 18, 2012 at 3:11 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
democommie #15 wrote:
Reverend Barry Lynn. The executive director for Americans United for Separation of Church and State, he speaks against the Christian theocrats as often as the media will let him. I’d say he was both a dreaded secular progressive AND a decent Christian.
So don’t forget Lynn. If nothing else, complain that there is only one. There are more, of course – but he’s the loudest.
andrewjohnston
November 18, 2012 at 3:26 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
For the record, that doesn’t appear to be true. Religiosity and abortion rates have a negative correlation, while the studies on out-of-wedlock births and teenage births are mixed. I realize a lot of you are going off state-by-state analyses (like the one Ed did a few years back), but these aren’t exactly methodologically rigorous studies.
Oh, and “Bristol Palin lol” isn’t evidence, either.
Modusoperandi
November 18, 2012 at 3:36 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
raven “Which are higher among the fundie xians. Bristol Palin anyone?”
But she doesn’t have to take entitlements. She’s a Maker, a Job Creator. She earned her fame and fortune. By being the daughter of someone who also earned it. By being a Hail Mary pass by a desperate old coot.
It’s called the Meritocracy.
scienceavenger
November 18, 2012 at 4:24 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Secular progressives “don’t want limitations on so-called private behavior
Says the small-government guy.
speed0spank
November 18, 2012 at 4:42 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I remember when Dave Silverman was on The David Packman Show (internet newsy show), he was talking about how smart and friendly Bill was off camera. Then when the camera went on, before the tide goes in nonsense, he “turned it on”. I can absolutely believe that he is a smart guy who knows exactly how stupid he sounds. Unfortunately there is big money to be made by feeding chum to the whackadoodles on the far right.
laurentweppe
November 18, 2012 at 5:01 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
And also give poor parents more available time per kids to raise them well: some people are terrified at the idea of the buttler’s kids becoming smarter than their own.
***
Yeah, and after repeating bullshit for years, the whackadoodles overlords ended up forgetting that these lieswere meant to keep the plebs obedient, not to inform the upper-class about the real world: cue the Romney campain starting to believe their own “unskewed polls”
Dalillama, Schmott Guy
November 18, 2012 at 5:05 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
He doesn’t always bother with the dogwhistle. Last week he was talking about how “people that want things” had taken power from the “white establishment.” His words.
raven
November 18, 2012 at 5:51 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Not true.
Oh really? Why?
An assertion without proof or data and may be dismissed without proof or data.
It’s also wrong.
I realize this is tricky thinking but it is quite common for pregnant teenagers to give birth in the state they live in.
raven
November 18, 2012 at 6:03 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
It’s not clear why this is.
A lot of ex fundies claim that they are less likely to use birth control because it is evil but no less likely to have sex.
Or they could just be dumber. Religion also negatively correlates with IQ. Source. Dennett cites a meta-analysis of 46 different studies on this point.
rbh3
November 18, 2012 at 7:02 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
It’s not clear to me that evangelicals have a high(er) abortion rate. According to this blog post, citing this research paper (to which I don’t have access), the abortion rate among evangelicals is just over 1/3 of that for those professing no religion.
momolevi
November 18, 2012 at 7:02 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
nice !
rbh3
November 18, 2012 at 7:07 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
That’s consistent also with the research summarized here. I think you need to look closer, raven.
raven
November 18, 2012 at 7:17 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I gave my source above. I even cut and pasted a few paragraphs.
Maybe you should read them instead.
The study I cited is recent, had a large sample size, was peer reviewed, and published.
From comment #32 once again.
I should note that the difference is likely to be higher than the paper reports. They are comparing private religious school and public school populations. Not all public school graduates are nonreligious. In fact most of them undoubtedly are religious.
democommie
November 18, 2012 at 7:20 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“Essentially, I think it’s potentially much like our situation as atheists. Speaking up is the best thing they can do, but it’s an uphill battle just to be acknowledged.”
I don’t think that the two groups are even close to being equal in numbers. There are many millions of silent christians whose “leaders” are the sort of scum that is O’Reilly. It is up to them to deal with their trash, I’ll deal with mine.
raven
November 18, 2012 at 7:21 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
BTW evangelical is not the same as fundie.
The evangelical movement is fragmenting and some of them are moving towards normal people.
20% of them voted for Obama.
Some of them accept modern science including evolution.
There is a lot of overlap though.
raven
November 18, 2012 at 7:38 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I couldn’t find a study on abortion rates among US atheists. That data might not exist since statistics are rarely collected based on religion. There is no religion question on the US census forms.
Atheists do have a low divorce rate.
And being a xian especially a fundie xian is correlated with higher teenage pregnancy rates.
If O’Reilly looked in a mirror, he would have a better idea of what is wrong with the USA and who is causing the problems. Or just ask Bush, the fundie president how well he left the USA.
kemist, Dark Lord of the Sith
November 18, 2012 at 8:28 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Sometimes I use it as an insult, as in “How very christian of you”.
I’ve even gotten christians angry at me using it.
If everybody started doing this, it could become viral.
Ichthyic
November 18, 2012 at 8:37 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
no.
THOSE studies are the ones confounded by location, not the other ones.
you will find abortion rates lower in communities dominated by extreme xian religions, not because of the religious principles, but because there is NO EFFECTIVE ACCESS to abortion for the vast majority of people in that community.
it has fuck all to do with religious ideology, and everything to do with circumstance.
rbh3
November 18, 2012 at 8:52 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Raven said
I read your quotations, along with the LiveScience article itself.
There are several relevant differences between the several studies of abortion rates mentioned above. The paper cited by raven, summarized here, assesses the abortion rate among already pregnant females of various religious persuasions. That study reportedly found that
In addition,
The paper I cited, summarized here, estimated the abortion rate for all women rather than just those pregnant:
In the data reported there, the abortion rate for the non-religious is 36.2 per 1000, while the rate for evangelical Christians is 13.4 per 1000.
So the samples are different (pregnant women vs. all women), and the age ranges are different, with the study cited by Raven sampling pregnant women from 14 to 26 years old while the study I cited used statistics (unintended pregnancy rates and abortion rates) describing all women from 15-44. Raven’s study used several measures of religiousity, including but not limited to attendance at a religious school. The several variables measuring religiosity yielded different results. The summary says
However,
That’s consistent with the data in the study I cited. Ichthyic’s abortion availability hypothesis may carry some of the explanatory weight.
The religious school attendance variable did have some effect:
In addition, “…rates of reported abortions were higher for young women educated at private religious schools,…”. So there’s some within-religious difference associated with the school attendance depending on age.
Given those patterns of results, and given the differences between the two studies, one cannot in good faith reach the general conclusion that fundamentalist Christians have abortion rates higher than the non-religious. One particular sub-group (teen-aged attendees of religious schools) may do so, but the general conclusion is not supported. Lending some more caution, note that even in that group, the specific kind of religious school–Catholic vs. others–did not affect the abortion rate.
Raven, I sympathize with your feelings, but don’t go the creationist route and quote mine and/or misrepresent the professional literature, please. That doesn’t serve our effort.
raven
November 18, 2012 at 9:45 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
The fundie xians are also leaders in child sexual abuse. The second highest predictor of child sexual abuse is parental membership in conservative religious cults. This seems to have been established in multiple studies.
Hmmm, I wonder why O’Reilly didn’t mention that.
Actually I know why. He’s just a paid liar for Fox News.
raven
November 18, 2012 at 9:48 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Oh gee.
Religious states have higher rates of teenage pregnancy. Which is well known.
I don’t think O’Reilly does much fact checking. Like about zero.
dingojack
November 18, 2012 at 9:55 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
rbh3 – “The paper I cited … estimated the abortion rate for all women rather than just those pregnant…” [emphasis mine].
Firstly – estimated. Extra confounding variable anyone?
Secondly – ‘the abortion rate for all women rather than just those who are pregnant’, now I’m no expert in gynecology* & obstetrics – but non-pregnant women are getting abortions now? Has anyone told Billo?
Dingo
—–
* ‘merely a gifted amateur [drumfill]. Try the shrimp & etc’. [/sarcasm]
raven
November 18, 2012 at 9:57 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Fundie xians have the highest rate of divorce of all xians. Atheists had the lowest rate.
Barna is BTW, a fundie xian polling organization.
If O’Reilly really cared about social problems, he would be ranting and raving about Oogedy Boogedy xians and how they are just baggage holding us back and being dragged along.
But he is part of that baggage being dragged along so it won’t happen.
bobo
November 18, 2012 at 10:44 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I keep hearing, from various christofascists, that abortion, pre-marital sex, and gay love will soon spell the END of the world. “it says so in scriptures’
This is why they want to curtail everyone’s rights, duh. To save us from ourselves!!!
dingojack
November 18, 2012 at 11:04 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
bobo – ever considered asking them where specifically*.
Dingo
—–
* or, on second thought, perhaps that’s not such great idea
bobo
November 18, 2012 at 11:16 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
America and Canada, but most likely they mean the entire world
First it will start with economic collapse (the gays were behind wall street collapse) and then various natural disasters (abortion caused hurrican sandy) and then eventually I believe we will end up in a situation like the flood + the destruction of sodom and gomorrah (all that pre-marital sex, divorce, and LIBERALISM)
This is what they seem to be implying on all of the rightwing forums that I read.
dingojack
November 19, 2012 at 1:07 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I meant where in the bible. But thanks.
Doesn’t all the standard RW bad guys (ie from every Rambo movie they’ve ever seen) attack Israel* first?
:) Dingo
—-
* why is anybodies guess. Who would want a undistinguished piece of desert?
laurentweppe
November 19, 2012 at 2:31 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Oh but they do condemn O’Reilly and his ilk, It’s just that, like the people who take “love thy neigbour and help the poor” seriously they’re very existence has really been ignored for years by the US media.
So tell me: are you completely ignorant of what’s happening outside your own tiny social circle or simply mimicking the american newstertainment industry pretending that they don’t exist so you can abstain from making the truly herculean intellectual effort of aiming before throwing rhetorical turds?
dingojack
November 19, 2012 at 2:56 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Laurent – “they’re very existence has really been ignored for years …”
Well until August 2011 anyway*. :)
This had me scratching my head: “And yet, we worked alongside the poor, remembering Mary, the mother of Jesus, a single woman expecting a child”.
Whew, I’m so glad to know that Mary, mother of Jesus wasn’t Legion. Ohhh you mean… wait now, hasn’t someone been airbrushed out of this picture? Joe someone-or-other?
Dingo
—–
* (If you ignore the obligatory Thanksgiving/Christmas ‘gee look how lucky you are, you schmuck’ story at the end of the news, brought to you from your local homeless shelter, women’s refuge or the like).
brianwood
November 19, 2012 at 6:42 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
O.K., I renounce my secularism. I hereby pray to the Lord Jesus Christ that Bill O’Reilly’s uvula catch on fire and that I am standing above the excrement filled gutter where he squirms in agony, and that I decide, as I would, NOT to piss in his mouth.
DaveL
November 19, 2012 at 6:45 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“Entitlements” is another one of those words that has been recently redefined by the right-wing media. When political analysts on both sides of the aisle first started talking about “entitlement programs” and “entitlement reform”, it simply meant “benefits that all qualifying individuals have a legal right to receive”, and they were talking about controlling costs from the two biggest entitlement programs, Social Security and Medicare. The right-wing noise machine has since redefined the term to mean, essentially, “benefits paid to lazy brown people because they don’t believe they should have to work.” I can’t tell you how many people I’ve run into in internet debates who insist until they’re blue in the face that Medicare and SS are not entitlements. “That’s not an entitlement,” they whine, “I earned that!”
DaveL
November 19, 2012 at 6:50 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Yeah, I’ll bet they were less likely to report it.
You’ll find that fundamentalists are quite likely to report the highest levels of marital satisfaction – while at the same time leading the pack in terms of divorce and domestic violence calls. Why? The former relies on self-reporting, the latter two are matters of public record.
democommie
November 19, 2012 at 7:33 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“So tell me: are you completely ignorant of what’s happening outside your own tiny social circle or simply mimicking the american newstertainment industry pretending that they don’t exist so you can abstain from making the truly herculean intellectual effort of aiming before throwing rhetorical turds?”
Laurentweppe:
I’ve spent over 60 years living in an overwhelmingly self-professed christian society. During these 60+ years I HAVE, rarely, seen a few christians of my own acquaintance who called out the haters and liars in their own ranks. Those few are out of many, many thousands of christians I have lived, worked, played and, for far too long, prayed with.
Your first link doesn’t work (503 error). Your second link is instructive in letting me know that one writer is criticizing the U.S. KKKristianist establishment. That is not even what I’m talking about.
The vast majority of U.S. christians of all sects are mute on the subject of their leaders’ politicization of the faith and on their pronouncements of doom and gloom for the U.S. because of our sinnin’ ways.
I don’t even care if they offer a vocal protest. They vote for the fuckers with their pocketbooks. Churches are not supported by gummint here (not to any significant extent) except by way of tax exemptions. Cut off the head, you kill the snake. Starve the tumor that is the KKKristian hierarchy (a large %age of church leaders who have influence in politics and the media) by cutting off their funding and you might just cure the body of Christ–not that I believe there is one.
It is not a matter of conjecture or of my being:
“ignorant of what’s happening outside your own tiny social circle or simply mimicking the american newstertainment industry pretending that they don’t exist”
They DON’T exist in numbers large enough to matter; if they did they would have done.
laurentweppe
November 19, 2012 at 9:37 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
That’s exactly what you where talking about: haven’t you heard the first commandment of the bullshiter?
Thou shalt never peddle bullshit when conspicuous it is that thou doth not believe thy own bullshit
‘Cause you’re breaking it, right now: when you play dumb and pretend that you were not talking about what you were talking about and when you you claim that:
This month, over 44 million of them voted for the boogeyman designated by their religious leaders as the devilish ennemy to be slain, thus deliberately disobeying their hierarchy. The groups which voted majoritarily for Romney were white christians, while christians from other ethnic backgrounds voted against the standard bearer of the religious right in proportions similar or superior to the “unaffiliated” heathens.
.
Not only does this belies your claim that the decent Christians are too few in number to be relevants, it also debunks the fallacious postulate upon which your shitty claim is built: that US society is divided between a monolithic horde of religious zombies preternaturaly submissive toward their clerical overlords and enlightened courageous irreligious rogues.
It outlines a society divided by ethnicity and de facto hereditary privileges. A society where already a non-negligible number of irreligious people cast their lot with the corrupt scions of the upper-class. A society where, pardon me for saying so bluntly, one should be more apprehensive toward an old white guy with a fuck the moronic rubes attitude than toward a religious person met at random.
jnorris
November 19, 2012 at 10:18 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
We must all remember that Bill O’Reilly said he may have to quit his TV show if Obama raises his taxes.
scienceavenger
November 19, 2012 at 11:01 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
DaveL said: I can’t tell you how many people I’ve run into in internet debates who insist until they’re blue in the face that Medicare and SS are not entitlements. “That’s not an entitlement,” they whine, “I earned that!”
I’ve also had them say the same thing about unemployment benefits. Entitlements are what those people get, real Merkins earned theirs.
bobo
November 19, 2012 at 12:21 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
#50 dingo
Sorry dingo, I completley misunderstood your question. It seems to me that they love to quote the book of revelations, and also a bunch of stuff about how ‘they will cannibalize their own children’.
And I do not think they have any proof of this, anywhere, but I have read over and over again how ‘socialism is the greatest evil ever leashed upon mankind’.
democommie
November 19, 2012 at 12:26 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Laurentweppe:
You are talking about two different things.
I did not say that christians might not vote for a democrat. I said that they DO NOT in any meaningful numbers make criticisms of their leaders or those who use their religious beliefs as a weapon against those who are not christians.
You cite one author’s contribution. I’m sure that there are dozens if not hundreds of them out there, those numbers are pissholes in a glacier compared to the number of self-professed christians in this nation. Estimates vary but they consistently run to over 75% of U.S. residents when polled. They do not speak out in numbers that approach 1/10th of 1%, afaia, of that figure. That they choose to quietly ignore their asshat “leaders” on those issues that they find personally inconvenient/repellent is good–especially for them, as it relieves them of having to do that which they consider silly, stupid or onerous. That they do so, while attending, sitting mute under the “teaching” of the bigots and KKKristian reKKKonstructionists who run their churches and TITHING to those churches is much more than “unfortunate”.
IIRC, you don’t live in the U.S. and I don’t know that you spend oodles of time here. I live in central NY and I’ve lived in five other states. Christian dogma and KKKristianist cant are so entertwined in many places in which I’ve lived that they are virtually indistinguishable to the flock. My own family will tell me that they are opposed to one or another of the RCC’s prohibitions but they still go to church, they still follow those rules that they like and they still PAY the kiddiefuckers that run the show.
dingojack
November 19, 2012 at 12:38 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
jnorris – your mouth to “God’s” ear.
bobo – no worries. I don’t blame you for confusing what is easily confused. Indeed I apologise for being so unclear.
Notice that the specific details are conspicuously absent.
Dingo
bobo
November 19, 2012 at 12:52 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
#62 dingo, this is the best they can do, regarding abortion
Leviticus 26:29
29 nYou shall eat the flesh of your sons, and you shall eat the flesh of your daughters.
Deuteronomy 28:53–57
53 And fyou shall eat the fruit of your womb, the flesh of your sons and daughters, whom the Lord your God has given you, gin the siege and in the distress with which your enemies shall distress you.
Lamentations 2:20
20 Look, O Lord, and see!
zWith whom have you dealt thus?
aShould women eat the fruit of their womb,
the children of btheir tender care?
Should cpriest and prophet be killed
in the sanctuary of the Lord?
—————-
they quote the above
and say ‘look, this is God talking about abortion in the year 2012′ and it will result in ______bunch of quotes from revelations, talk about the end times etc.
Ichthyic
November 19, 2012 at 8:47 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
this is because the driving force behind religion is authoritarianism.
simple as that.
laurentweppe
November 20, 2012 at 4:50 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
And when I pointed toward exemples of christians actually criticizing their leaders and the bourgeois propagandists who hide behind their beliefs, you just declared that you did “not care if they offered a vocal protest“, basically admitting that you always intended to not make the effort of aiming before throwing rhetorical turds: that’s quite the admission of intellectual sloth.
***
You’re a fucking hypocrite: you’re using media exposure (people whose writtings are published by a major medium) as an argument, despite knowing full well that the “news are entertainment” complex will overexpose religious whackjobs because they know that freaks will always attract a bigger audience than boring, mundane, well adjusted people.
***
And how does that makes you different from the petty would-be tyrants who claim that people who do not cravenly submit to their every diktats should be bared from entering their churches. Because you’re pretty much saying that you’re angry at your catholic relatives refusal to self deport themselves from their church.
dingojack
November 20, 2012 at 7:02 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Bobo – I would have thought of:
Again, not really about abortion, more accidental miscarriage.
Dingo
democommie
November 20, 2012 at 9:33 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“And when I pointed toward exemples of christians actually criticizing their leaders and the bourgeois propagandists who hide behind their beliefs, you just declared that you did “not care if they offered a vocal protest“, ”
Laurentweppe:
I searched for your “quote” and didn’t find it. Does that mean I probably never actually said, that I did “not care if they offered a vocal protest“?
“You’re a fucking hypocrite: you’re using media exposure (people whose writtings are published by a major medium) as an argument, despite knowing full well that the “news are entertainment” complex will overexpose religious whackjobs because they know that freaks will always attract a bigger audience than boring, mundane, well adjusted people.”.
This blog and the hundreds (thousands, hundreds of thousands?) like it, where non-christians and honest christians (of which there are many) and people of no faith or scant faith criticize religions–pretty much without regard for their particulars is NOT mirrored by a like number of critical blogs amongst religious groups–feel free to prove me wrong with some data.
You seem to be conflating part of my original comment:
“When the “decent” christians start condemning assholes like Riley in print and on the air, depriving him of his undeserved and unearned bully pulpit I might give a fuck if they are tarred with the same brush as that piece of shit.”.
with an opinion (which I do not hold) that there are no, or not very many, decent christians and, amongst them, some number of individuals willing to speak out against their batshit KKKrazzee elements. You also seem to have missed this bit:
“in print and on the air,”
and no, this:
“you’re using media exposure (people whose writtings are published by a major medium)”
is not a counter-argument with any legs.
I said that they don’t do it in sufficient numbers. I did not say that they don’t do it. The vastly larger number of practicing/self-professed christians compared to any other group living in the U.S. would dictate that in order for your premise to be correct that MILLIONS of them would be speaking out in criticism–that is simply not the case.
“And how does that makes you different from the petty would-be tyrants who claim that people who do not cravenly submit to their every diktats should be bared from entering their churches.”
Really? do you honestly think that?
Say the church I went to most recently (Unity, New Thought, Prosperity Gospel types) said that I should eschew wearing cosmetics or perfumes to a worship service–it actually did–would I be required to follow their “suggestions” or should I simply ignore them and not be critical, because they are, after all, making this suggestion because some people have allergies to cosmetics and perfumes*?
Conversely, say the church of my youth, the RCC said that I should ignore womens’ rights issues, racial issues (they sure did where I went, until they had no choice but to get involved) and, well, sacrifice my first-born son or eat another parishoner’s babies, what then?
Well, I could safely ignore the first two and still be a member of the “in group” by just keeping my mouth shut most of the time**. Otoh, the human sacrifice thing, even if it wasn’t against the law is so morally wrong and repugnant that simply refusing to participate in the practice while still adhering to the sect WOULD be hypocritical.
“Because you’re pretty much saying that you’re angry at your catholic relatives refusal to self deport themselves from their church.”
I am not angry at them–at least not for that, their politics, which are also informed by their “faith”? now that can piss me off a bit–I just think that they are silly and somewhat hypocritical in their cafeteria catholicism. They are all pretty decent folks, even the ones I love but don’t particularly like. Their faith is their business and at this point they know better than to try making it mine.
I don’t know what put the bee up your ass on this subject but your characterization of my stance is simply wrong. I do not think that there are NO good, honest christians (I also don’t think that their faith has a lot to do with their moral standards–I surely hope it doesn’t). I am very much convinced that they are unwilling or unable to criticize the precepts or the prelates of their chosen faiths in order to effect change on social issues except at a glacial–which is to say–unacceptable pace.
* Parfums de democommie are, unfortunately, only available in one scent, “L’aire du Speedstick by Mennens”
** Yeah, I know, not gonna happen.
bobo
November 20, 2012 at 10:54 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
#66 yeah dingo, that makes more sense
and therein you have the problem!!! :P
talk of ‘cannibalizing’ is far more inflammatory, isn’t it?
so they choose the most violent, emotional texts to get everyone hot under the collar about those satanic abortions!