I am sick of hearing "we have to be nice and not insult the jesus freaks

so they will vote with us"

I am not really northern or southern because I am a military brat that moved all over the country. I now live in the south, NC- a red state. There are plenty of transplants here just like me but the born and bred religious white southerners are just not going to vote for a Democrat. Period.

I have heard over and over and over from many southern acquaintances that they would NEVER vote for someone who is not PRO LIFE.

Now with that said, of course it is not nice to make fun of people (that does go both ways ya know?). But the fact that so many vote against their best interest because of a couple of wedge issues... Well come on, it is just too hard not to point that out. And if pointing that out is making fun of them, then I guess I'm guilty of "insulting the religious".

hateful, bigoted and small minded.

We need some of the religious people on our side.

Most effectively we should point out that in the Bible Jesus stopped the stoning of a prostitute by saying, "You who are without sin, cast the first stone".

Red & Blue states again.....


http://www.princeton.edu/~rvdb/JAVA/election2004/

This site & maps posted by bigannie on another DU thread.



Middle-aged Democratic Christian, born and bred in Alabama.

not religious people. Religion is an invention of man.

I'm a Christian and a Liberal and I am definitely more left leaning than many Democrats. And I'm not the only one out here, either! :)

And on edit: Cliberty, these people aren't Jesus freaks. They can't give him even a passing thought and still do what they do and say what they say. ;)

and understand the first thing about what it means to be Christian. Harrassing voters at the polls as they did in Pensacola was not Christian.

He is gleefull about executing prisoners, and has no concern for the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians he is responsible for slaughtering.

I personally don't buy their line about protecting life. There is an irony in their cry that they are protecting the silent innocent: They love fetuses because they have no voice.

The ONLY reason they love fetuses is because fetuses can't argue with them. Fetuses can't disagree with them. Fetuses can't choose to not be like them. Fetuses can't choose to be gay. Fetuses can't choose to be atheists or secularists. Fetuses can't laugh in their faces at their religious insanity.

If they could -- they would want to kill fetuses too.

I share your sentiments. I hadn't thought of it in those terms before, but I think you are really on to something.

:kick:

If they were truly "pro-life" they would be consistent, as some Catholics are, and as many Buddhists are.

It's the authoritarianism.

Fetuses are, to this type of thinking, PEOPLE who no voice and no choice.

If the argument were universal, these authoritarians would also be rabid animal-rights activists. Oops. They're just animals.

Guess where this one is headed....


Mac in Ga.

that these fundamentalists seem to care far more about fetuses than the human beings fortunate enough to have passed through the birth canal. Where is their caring for the poor, the less fortunate?

I swear fundies are about the most selfish, petulant people you'll ever meet. And some say we need Democrats to try to appeal to these people? Fuggedaboutit!

The brainwashing from the right has been far more effective than reason from the , uh, reasonable, let alone the "left".

I KNOW people who are appalled by abortion. Abortion as something that some soul must consider sure bums me out totally. My difference with the fascists -- who are EXPLOITING this issue for covert political reasons -- is that there are more appropriate means to making it last resort or absolutely undesirable than demonizing the procedure, or harassing people who are in the desperate position to consider it as an option.

THESE thinking humans can be reached. We can engage them in devising solutions that make abortion unthinkable and unnecessary -- and may I dare claim that offering HOPE that you can provide for that child and offer it a liveable life is the biggest deterent of all, and always has been?

Punishing people for not having "hope" unrealistically just ain't gonna do it....

Not to mention the fucking HYPOCRISY of wealthy women who have ALWAYS had the option of ending an inconvenient pregnancy safely....

At least part of the "Pro-Life" movement is run by the "Support the Troops!" movement. In truth, they don't GIVE a shit about soldiers, or fetuses. They just exploit them for politics. Look what these people did to John Kerry -- here's a guy who VOLUNTEERED to serve (although he war rich) and had the good sense to see the war was a disaster, and who in his heart of heart did the American thing of speaking truth to power. We all saw how he was fucking CRUCIFIED for speaking the truth against power. The RNC proudly mocked his dissent of disastrous unncessary war and accused him of treachery -- when he was serving his country by fingering the liars and profiteers.

*THEY* say they "support the troops" -- but who is the FIRST to spit on them when they come home from foreign wars with terrible stories, and probing questions? The ReGODlicans. We have seen our veterans vilified and maligned, for begging to differ abou the conduct of the war.

HEY - current soldiers! The ReGODlicans don't give a SHIT about how much you bled, or what limb your lost -- they are ready to assassinate your character if you do not subscribe to His Chimperial Majesty's war, or saw anything but soldiers helping old Iraqi ladies across the street. The fact that His Chimperial Majesty CROWS about how effective the slaughter has been - well, it's been all cut and dry killin' of evil terrierists....

Mind you -- if YOU saw something different than rainbows and hope, or disagree that Mr Rumfeld and Mr Wolfowitz are less than infallible strategists -- be warned YOU TOO will become the subject of mockery and character assassination. YOUR wounds will be examined and questioned, as have Viet Nam vets who have questioned the validity and conduct of the war in Iraq.

**WE** honor you. Don't let them lie to you. If we didn't love and honor you, we wouldn't be **fighting** here on the home front for you. We're fighting a war here on our own soil FOR YOU!

that logic to try to reach fundies. It doesn't work.

They don't digest facts or cause and effect, and cannot deal with morality that actually is based in ethics and logical consistency.

that always puzzles me...

They are pro-life and then they join the military to kill people and ignore the Sermon on the Mount. Christians? Yeah, right.

We have a winner!

These people have ignored Christ's words for years. Read them, fundies, then get back to us.

Any Christian who prays for judgment, who believes himself saved by grace, is in effect saying that he has exhausted his own capacity for mercy and grace. I'm sorry, but I don't see Jesus anywhere in that remark. I believe that a Christian who genuinely loves his neighbors asks for more time for them and intercedes for them in prayer and in deeds. For myself, I know what mercy is because I have received it from kind people when I didn't deserve it. Knowing this, I wouldn't be anxious to ask for judgment on anyone, even someone who persecuted me, because I know what judgment means, and it is far more horrible than anything we're putting up with now.

Any Christian in this country who believes himself persecuted for his beliefs needs to get a grip. Let these folks try being missionaries in, say, Afghanistan, Indonesia, Iraq, Haiti, or Sudan. (And let them reflect then on the effect of the policies of the people calling the foreign relations shots back here.) The bravest Christian missionaries on earth are about to find themselves in a Vietnam of their own - sent to fight a battle in faith, then hindered and left high-and-dry by the very leaders, if not the people who sent them, without adequate support in desperately hostile lands. May God help them, for most of them are genuinely kind, selfless and very giving people who honestly want to lift up the very people who threaten and despise them.

Any Christian who votes against aiding the poor and refuses to work with the poor in his community stands in violation of most of the New Testament and a good chunk of the Old Testament as well. Most Christians know what God did to the Philistines when David led them, but what they don't recall is that God delivered the Israelites up to the Babylonians - a people God Himself wasn't fond of - for 70 years. Why? Because every seventh year was ordained by the Lord as a year of Jubilee, in which debts were forgiven, slaves and prisoners freed, and old grudges reconciled. The Israelites ignored Jubilee for 490 years - 70 times. God got His own back - and he used the enemy of Israel to do it. Christians, ignore God's fiscal policies at your own peril!

Any Christian who believes it is moral to give to wealthy institutions while voting to increase the tax burdens on people who already teeter on the edge of poverty has no conception of what God wants for His people to be doing.

Last time I checked, the Book of James was still in the NT. If you read it, you'll see real quickly where this is headed.

And for those of you out there who are Christians, read I Peter 2:20-23: "Of course, you get no credit for being patient for being beaten if you are doing wrong. But if you suffer for doing right and are patient beneath the blows, God is pleased with you.
This suffering is all part of what God has called you to. Christ, who suffered for you, is your example. Follow in His steps. He never sinned, and He never deceived anyone. He did not retaliate when he was insulted. When he suffered, he did not threaten to get even. He left His case in the hands of God, who always judges fairly." There is a strong contracdiction between this admonition - which is in the middle of a passage of how Christians of all types should live - and the kind of reaction we see here now.

A teacher I had in Sunday school some years back once told me that when God acts in a nation, He begins by cleaning His own House (meaning His people). The far right would argue that the non-Christians are being swept out to make room for Bible-believers. I don't buy that, because you know people by their works. A leader who engages in a fiscal policy that aids the rich while burdening the poor, who spends money he doesn't have and passes the debt to his descendants, who attacks his neighbor without provocation, and who threatens all who oppose him, is not acting with direction from God. By their works shall ye know them.

I will close this post with a final warning from Zephaniah 3:1-4.
"Its leaders are like roaring lions hunting for their victims - out for everything they can get. Its judges are like ravenous wolves at feeding time, who by dawn have left no trace of their prey. Its prophets are arrogant liars seeking their own gain. Its priests defile the temple by disobeying God's laws."

Maybe it's just me, but when you consider the Carlyle Group, Halliburton, Guantanamo Bay, Abu Gharib, and some of the more strident leaders of the Religious Right, this sounds like what's happening now. Some decades after Zephaniah delivered this warning, Jerusalem was sacked by the Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzar, beginning the 70-year judgment. Oi vey.

Mac in Ga.

we are reaching a crossroads and a breaking point with the american taliban bornagainazis.

Fuck that Noise! I am a spiritual person, and I will be damned before that go along with their distorted view of spiritual guidance.

and i pretty much agree with you.
but then again my version of faith is not run by superstition.


ok non-believers -- stop chuckling.

These are not Christians. These are X-tians who forget nearly everything that Jesus of Nazareth said in His short but important life.

Would Jesus abhor abortion? Certainly. And the death penalty, war, corporate hegemony, Republicanism, Bush...

Look, I like those of faith who have their hearts in the right place on social issues and such, but YOU'RE STILL NOT GETTING IT.

There is an inherent problem with faith, it's not just some kind of aberration, it's a core, intrinsic, basic problem: certainty. I mean certainty to the dismissal of any contrary evidence, certainty to the priorities of whichever particular sect one elects to join and certainty of one's unassailable virtue.

You derive great strength from your faith. Don't think for an instance though, that it isn't a noxious brew for those of different mindsets. Christianity gave us Mother Teresa, but it also gave us Adolf Hitler. Those of faith are quick to dismiss the bad as not "true" or "real", but that's just conjecture. Maybe the net effect of Christianity is a parochial and greedy selfishness to secure one's own salvation, with all other "goodness" merely being the sucking up to the fiery overlord. Maybe you and the other good people are merely a nice side-effect of something that is inherently bad. I know you don't like to hear it, and I don't think it's THAT bad, but I think the net effect of all religions that claim complete certainty is a negative one for humanity.

Life is a package deal, and one has to take responsibility for the good and the bad. My greatest fear is that those who believe in an afterlife are the enemies of life: they kill, without the true understanding of ending a sentient being's complete and eternal existence, they are willing to kill themselves in attacks, which is so asymmetrical that it cannot be defended against and they consider themselves justified to subjugate others for their truth, that is nothing more than a guess.

There are many good Christians, but the net effect of Christianity on this country--and hence, the world--is not good.

I'm sorry you take heat on this board, and you can consider agnostics like me to be your friend, but you MUST accept that these are not diabolical perversions of the faith; these people are creatures of the mindset of faith and the particular faith of this religion, and it is the religion's--and the religious people's--fault for allowing it to happen.

If this country is to be saved, it needs to be saved from within by people like you. You owe it to the rest of us, and we'll help you, but there's nothing we can do. We are barely allowed to exist, and to the degree we are, it's with tolerant hatred and disgust.

This shouldn't get you to hate your faith, but it's intended to sober you up and accept that it's not all hugs and kisses and butterflies and warm spring days. The bad is not misinterpretation; it's inherent.

So, is the balance going to be good or bad? It's up to you, but it will continue to be bad if you don't admit--not to me, and not in public, BUT TO YOURSELF--that faith, and especially this one, has major problems that manifest themselves in intolerance and self-justified tyranny. At least Judaism doesn't proselytize.

I'm endlessly tired--as you can tell--of the god-concept that holds that everything good flows from it, while everything bad is not its fault at all. (I joke that this is proof that Junior thinks he's god.)

Okay?

Please organize decent Christians and take the battle to the fundies on the very subject of religion. The secularization of America is now dead, and woe be to us all for that.

That I would like to have a very long conversation with.
But not for what you think, to convince you of god, Jesus, or the truth of the bible, but that those things do have virtue and value, even though they have been used for many years for the exact opposite of what they were intended.
I would never argue with you that far more evil came out of the bible than any good, but it was not because good was not in there but that truth was turned on it's head by evil and used to justify the evil ones.

I would point out that Jesus himself knew that it would happen. He told his disciples; "you think that I am come to bring peace to the world, but I have brought a sword" That was his prophesy and it surly came to pass.
And yet peace,love and understanding was his message.
No, responsibility does not fall to Jesus for the mess that we have created. If there is responsibility for it some of it must be born by the ones that love peace and have done nothing to help those that follow the truth teaching of Jesus by supporting them the way the atheist and agnostic republicans support the fundies.

Did I suggest that I have no shortcomings? My wife would certainly beg to differ!

The simple point is that Jesus' words don't have any bearing on what these people do. They thrive on hate and fear.

My religious faith is based in the Episcopal Church. In my whole life, it's never been suggested to me that I condemn, persecute, hate or fear anybody. I learned that my religion expects me not only to have faith, but to come to my own understanding of what God's will is for me.

I contrast that with the week I spent with my fundie aunt when I was 12 years old. I went to her church and spent two hours in a classroom with a youth minister. He was the closest thing I have ever met to an actual Nazi. When we acted up - as young teens always do - he threatened us with physical punishment, the "wrath of the Lord" and the "Lake of Fire." At the end of this surreal experience, he prayed that Gaaawwwdd would not send us to Hell for our misbehavior.

Two religious experiences, with two completely different bases in reality. I chose the former on which to base my life. I have no idea what drives fundamentalists and evangelicals to ignore what seems plainly obvious to me - that Jesus teaching was about love and service to humanity. I can tell you that I have argued my case with many of them and that it only serves to make most of them even more angry and judgmental.

On edit: spelling

You're one of those "right Christians" that Al Sharpton contrasted to the "Christian Right".

Faith is much like sexuality: you are what you are, and what you believe in a quiet dark room, with no self-consciousness, is what you believe.

We need your help, because this is a Faith-based war for the soul of the country; I, as an agnostic, have no say in this. Theocracy is here, and the only way to contain it is for the church to split along political lines and fight it out in religious terms. It's sad, but that's it, and if it isn't done now, they'll come for you right after they come for me.

I don't want to shame or blame those of faith into action, but action must be taken. This is why the founders kept religion out of government: establishment of religion makes all who aren't part of the proscribed religion(s) are not merely second-class citizens, they aren't citizens at all. So, citizen, go get these dicks...

eom

Fundevangelicans don't represent most Christians. Their ranks have been growing, but they still are a vast minority compared to the mainstream Christians who still vote for justice, equality and peace.

Suggesting that I am immoral, living a life that is an abomination, and society needs to be shielded from me and people like me.

...never said anything about gay people. I guess they just assume He would hate them...:eyes:

List the groups here for me please?

Groups Jesus told us to hate:

He said; "Anyone that looks on his brother with hatred is in danger of the judgment"

Scripture is really coming alive for me tonight. If you are an unbeliever, please understand that I know what you feel like, because I've been there. There is absolutely no condemnation in me for you and I don't want to try to shove anything down anyone's throat. You are free to believe whatever you wish under the laws of this country and according to your own free will.

Anyway...some translations of Luke 14 have Jesus saying "Unless you hate your father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters - yes, more than your own life - otherwise, you cannot be my disciple."
However, the implication is that you have to love Christ enough so that all earthly loves are put aside. Jesus isn't telling us to hate them, but to love Him. Assuming we are following his teachings, we then love others as He loves us. It sounds odd but it does work.

However, if you're looking for a point when Jesus is really denouncing someone, you might want to read Matthew 23. If you want to see a point where Jesus is REALLY angry, this is it. Who's he mad at? The lepers? The gays? The adulterers and tax collectors? The prostitutes? Nope. The RELIGIOUS LEADERS, the scribes and Pharisees.

Even better, look at Matthew 19:21-35 (too long to post). The admonition is obvious: if you receive mercy and are not yourself merciful, there is, um, hell to pay.

More still: Matthew 16:4-9. If give money to the church and don't care for your relations first, your worship is false and a man-made tradition (televangelists take note).

And last: I'd like to see those who are messing up in these areas fix them. Everyone, believers and unbelievers alike, would benefit. Also, it is a Christian's duty to warn other Christians when they are moving out of accord with Scripture. This is not a condemnation, but a definite admonition.

Mac in Ga.

"Jesus said gays are wrong!"

"Oh? Where? Can you point me to the scripture where he said 'Cursed are those men who like to do the baby elephant walk...'?"

"Uh...It's in there, I *KNOW* it is!"

"No, it's not. Believe me, I've read the book, and the only 2 places homosexuality is even mentioned is in Leviticus, and the story of Lot." Jesus didn't say shit about homosexuality. It's NOT in there. Look it up."

She goes to bible study 2X a week, but hates Bush and voted for Kerry and a straight Dem ticket.

Also, maybe some DUers can help me on this one-there is a passage stating that homosexuals, in addition to a lot of other groups, cannot enter heaven.
BUT
you are absolutely right, Christ did not condemn homosexuals. Paul did, but there's a lot of biblical scholars that contend that Paul was a redneck wackjob. He also condemned women that wear red dresses.

That Paul never knew Jesus.
Paul's job was to arrest them and persecute them before he was struck blind on the way to Damascus and healed of it by a Christian.
The Letters of Paul in the bible are ones he sent to the churches to try to unify Christianity as a religion well after Jesus was dead and gone.

And I thought I had said that in my original post. Sorry.

I think you've hit on the most important thing about (on edit) right-wing evangelical Christians that a lot of never-Christian or non-evangelical Christians don't understand.

Some of these evangelical churches need to get a dose of honesty and stop calling themselves after Christ when, at the root, they're more Paulists than followers of Christ.

For anybody who's actually read the bible, not just heard selected verses on Sunday, Paul actually saw the desire to marry as a moral failing. We shouldn't have sex outside a marriage, and we shouldn't want to marry -- if we want to marry so that we can have sex under the blessings of God, we've failed somehow, morally, by giving in to our carnal natures.

You take anything you hear from these churches about sex with that in mind -- Paul saw the desire to have sex as a moral failure, even if people were married in the proper Christian way -- and you understand their attitudes about many of our leftist 'sacred cows.'

Sadly, many of them screw the tops off their heads every Sunday when they walk into their churches, and just let some conservative bible college-educated boy wonder spoon that junk in, without ever reading the scriptures or historical analyses themselves, so they don't know the whole ball of wax.

Good point -- I hadn't pulled it together that way, thanks.

I am no biblical scholar, but I have also heard that Paul may have been a repressed homosexual. If true, that would certainly color his writing too. Might indicate why it is that so many homophobes focus so much on Paul...

but he also was clear that the viewpoints were his, when they were.

Example: the UPC (United Pentecostal Church) has strict laws about women cutting hair because of a passage in I Corinthians. What ISN'T considered in this doctrine: there was a lively cult of temple prostitution in Corinth, and the women of the temple who converted to Christ were pretty obvious when they showed up - because to work in the temple, they had to shave their heads. This was definitely a distraction to the rest of the flock ("so, what have you been doing lately?") and liable to cause poisonous gossip and thought. Paul's advice was that women cover their heads if they were shaved or if hair had only recently started to regrow. However, Paul pointed out that in his own area, "we have no such custom."

It is dangerous to assume that all of Paul's advice was general. Many instances are very time- and place-specific, this being one of them. If someone tells you to "Jump!" and you're on the edge of a cliff, that's bad advice. But when you're in a first-floor window of a building that's on fire, that's another matter.

Mac in Ga

(on edit: clarification of the head-covering custom)

to justify their desire to cut the religious out of their lives when Jesus never advocated doing that.

?

that when Jesus' words can be used to support a position they endorse, there are those who will not hesitate to use Jesus' credibility to support their cause, but these very same people (not you) will also call on people to reject people who are religious, which is something Jesus' never advocated.

Look what's going on this thread. People are obviously happy to use Jesus' words to support their position, but do you think they would do the same when Jesus' words counseled them to do something they objected to.

People are trying to use Jesus' authority, but it won't work if they don't believe in that authority themselves.

I see your point. It's easy to quote Scripture, but it does ring rather hollow to use the words of a holy man with whom you disagree.

OTOH, anybody - even a non-believer - can easily understand Christ's words. His message was pretty clear, and it is plain to see that those who shout about how much they love the Lord don't seem to have figured out what Jesus was actually talking about.

In fact, this all looks like a horrible re-run of Jesus' times. The leaders of the fundamentalist movement - Falwell, Robertson, etc. - have become the very Pharisees that Christ railed against.

The religious will never vote for us. I live in a red state and forget about it. But this is larger than red state vs. blue state. It is rural America vs. the cities. The only hope is to go after fiscal conservatives in Ohio, Nev., Colorado,Ariz.N.M., and Fla. We have to appeal to there fiscal conservatism and separation of church and state.
Rule out the other states

""Are too!"..."Am not"!..."Are too!"..."Am not!""
Author daldem    

Date Fri Nov-05-04 10:25 AM
  

        


My conversation with my republican stepson this morning.
Daldem: "Congratulations, you evangelicals pulled it off"
Stepson: "I'm NOT an evangelical".
Daldem: "Yes you are"
Stepson: "I am not, I'm a Methodist"
Daldem: "Maybe so, but deep down you're an evangelical".
Stepson: "I am not !"
Daldem: "That is okay if you are, I still love you"
Stepson: "I am NOT an evangelical"
Kids, I think we have a new dirty word. It is even better
than Liberal. From this day forwad every republican that
I know will be addressed as an evangelical. After many
"are toos and am nots" I ended the conversation saying that
apparently he needs to find out more about his own party's
base.
http://bartcopnation.com/dc/dcboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=2&topic_id=335611&mesg_id=335611&page=

I'd love to try that on my Catholic buddy who voted for Bush because of the anti-choice issue. Amazing how they pick and choose when to agree with their pope. I pointed that out to him, how his pope is anti-war, but he never did get back to me with a reply on that.

It doesn't matter anyway, I haven't communicated with him all week, and since I'm eliminating all Repubs from my life, I don't intend to worry too much about it. However, I like your idea and intend to use it if I ever do have the misfortune to run across a Republican again. From now on, I want to know upfront if someone is an R or a D, because it will tell me everything I need to know about that person. I hate being that way, but I've been given no choice in the matter. That's what it's come down to. If they want "you're either with us or against us," they've got it.

and I am removing them from my life.

They did call Lucifer the great deceiver after all.They don't want to know who they are actually praying to.

I've got several nieces and a nephew who are Limbaugh loving losers. I can hardly tolerate being around them. For years I merely shrugged off their comments. Now I don't put up with it.

I'll get the last laugh when they read my will!

Said he was pro-choice and resents the implication.

a plane out of the sky. I hope the Pro-Lifers and anti-gay love it when planes start falling out of the sky. Grrrrrrrrr

hippies in the 60s and 70s. I WISH we had the jesus freaks back instead of these evangelicals.

Well, I'm not so sure about the "freak" part - but wouldn't it be nice if liberals had an organized effort to actually "spread the actual word of Jesus?"? I would volunteer for this effort in an instant - I am so sick of hearing about these violent misrepresentations of who Jesus was and what he said!

I don't consider myself a Christian, probably not. But more power to ya.

Jesus was one of the greatest liberal leaders in our history. Martin Luther King was another. We need to stop falling for the bullshit that the real RW freaks are promoting and get back to reality here. Jesus was a LIBERAL!

In fact, since SOOO many feel Christianity is such an inherent part of America, and that it is the founding principle, we should also show them what our founding fathers thought. Show them the Jefferson Bible, that sort of thing.

"Here's what Jefferson felt was applicable to our nation. The actual teachings of Jesus."

"Where's the part saying dudes can't hold hands?"

"Jesus never said that."

"What about the "Take no word, or add no word?""

I would then educate them as to the nature of the bible and the paganistic approach to Christ the modern religion has.

And if we're going to spread a message like that, well, bring on the persecution, brother!

I'm not perfect and I'm not going to act like it. I'm what God made me. If you don't like that, go talk to Him about it.

The logical conclusion to the current "values" debate might well prove to be true Christians being martyred by false ones. I have all faith the God will not stand still for that. Last time that it got really out of hand, we received the Enlightenment and the Reformation.
Worth the price of admission to me.

Mac in Ga

The ones you are talking about may very well be freaks, but it is not and will never be because of Jesus.
None of what Jesus taught is being followed by the fundies none. And to use his name to describe them is at best doublespeak.

I remember what it meant in the 60s and I embrace the word. It means independent, set apart, different from all the others. Evangelicans aren't Jesus freaks. They are automatons programmed to believe that hate and fear are the true manifestations of Christ's love.

And good and caring people all.

They can quote the Book of Leviticus and all those quaint "laws" word-for-word, but I'll bet they can't get halfway through the Sermon on the Mount.

I have never once heard a fundie preacher get past the beatitudes in the sermon on the mount.
It is usually at that point they switch to the letters of Paul. Paul is quoted more than anyone by the fundies, and that is telling sense Paul never new Jesus and was a persecutor of the early Christians before he saw the light.
Fundies are e very vulnerable to being proved wrong by the bible itself, but there are few who have the platform or resources in which to do it. So they continue to lie to the masses with impunity.

I think they guy was insane, or at the least was in the closet and hated himself.

"Let those who have wives live as though they had not wives..."

Old boy was ALL ate-up sexually....

in the south. The best way to decrease abortion is not to ban it, it is to provide social programs to poor, young and abused women. Yet no one ever talks about that on our side. We just yell at them about keeping abortion safe and legal.

I have many friends and acquaintances who voted for Bush. None of them are 'jesus freaks', but all are deeply christian. Admittedly, they do not think independently. But we are not talking their language, either. Ironically, the 'jesus freaks' I know voted Kerry. They were able to get past the spin and see the Iraq war for the abomination against god that it is.

We can talk ourselves blue in the face but racism is a core "value" of their religious belief, and they do not want social programs for poor, young, abused women because some of those women will be black. I'm from the south too and it really is that simple.

Black Christians overwhelmingly vote Democratic already.

No one in the south is in doubt about which party is in favor of social programs. What you're missing is that huge, huge numbers of white fundamentalists hate blacks and minorities. They are "pro life" because they think white women will stop breeding unless forced. It really is that simple and that crude.

I've wasted years of my life talking nicely to these people. It is a waste of time.

You can't reason with hate. You can only make fun of it, hold it in contempt, and make those people ashamed to offer their hateful views in public. Unfortunately, we are going the wrong direction. It is the people who are kind and tolerant who are too often afraid. I know that there are situations where, if I speak out, I risk physical or economic punishment just for being a decent person.

You are right, they are too racist and too homophobic.

The people I am talking to are not hardcore, but they are christians, they relate to Bush and they voted for Bush. Most don't agree with Bush's policies. Some are even pro-choice, although only weakly. (Side note, I live in Charlotte NC. My county went for Gore and Kerry, although by small margins. So this is not the hyper-conservative rural south. Think of us as a mini-swing state.) I would characterize most as uncomfortable with blacks and minorities, but not overtly racist. Also, not overtly homophobic.

I would, first, cast the pubs as the party of big business who will screw the little guy for profit every time they get a chance. Which is true. And the dems as the people who will defend them. Also true.

And we need to talk to them about religion and family in a better way. I really think that with the problem with getting the moderates is one of communication, not message.

This is just what we're talking about when we say don't insult people. There are a few fringe racist fundamentalist sects, yes. But I implore you to go through every denomination and show me where they have racism elucidated as a core religious belief in their creed (their set of "fundamentals", from which their philosophy gets it's name), and I impore you as well to explain how black fundamentalist denominations exist, and I implore you to explain why there are black people in some mainly-white fundamentalist churches. It is flippant, cavalier lies like this that I talk about stopping - no one will trust a party full of people who are telling lies about them that they already know aren't true. CAN IT.

I have lived in the south lifelong and in real life I do very little talking and a great deal of listening. White fundamentalists may not have it written down on a convenient "cheat sheet" for all to read that they are working to keep the blacks "in their place," but get in a back room and listen to them talk, and this is what they say, and in words of so many syllables.

It is flippant, cavalier lies like this that I talk about stopping - no one will trust a party full of people who are telling lies about them that they already know aren't true. CAN IT.

If you think my factual accounting of what I have heard with my own ears is a lie, what can I tell you? I think people are delusional if they don't understand how much of today's religious hysteria is based on race and on controlling women. I am not going to "can" what I have heard and experienced in my own life, I will continue to tell it like it is.

There is no point in reaching out to bigots. If people are aware that you are on the left and hence they conceal their bigotry around you, I think it's great up to a point -- but if it allows you to be fooled about what a great many fundamentalists stand for, then it becomes a negative because you waste time trying to change minds that can't be changed.

We have to deal with the world as it is, not as we wish it would be.

White fundamentalists may not have it written down on a convenient "cheat sheet" for all to read that they are working to keep the blacks "in their place," but get in a back room and listen to them talk, and this is what they say, and in words of so many syllables.

This is much different than a "core value" of their religion. Plus you didn't do anything that I implored.

And I have seen bigotry from someone in a church before. But you still know what's wrong with what you said.

There is no point in reaching out to bigots. If people are aware that you are on the left and hence they conceal their bigotry around you, I think it's great up to a point -- but if it allows you to be fooled about what a great many fundamentalists stand for, then it becomes a negative because you waste time trying to change minds that can't be changed.

Here you've already gone to a "great many" from the "core value" rhetoric. You capitulate. You got caught. I'd really like us to be serious when we talk about these things. I don't like when the religious right calls us communists, and I don't like this.

Racism is a core value of a great many fundamentalists. It is the truth whether we like it or not.

When you get in a back room with liberals, and they assume you are another liberal because you are a white female, they do not suddenly start in with the little jokes and comments to let you know that they are really communists.

But when you get in a back room with fundamentalists, and they just see your race/gender but don't know your inner thoughts, they start in with the n-word jokes.

These people are indefensible. I don't capitulate. I think you are probably a very nice person who has been very fortunate not to see through to the other side of your fundamentalist friends and relatives. But they are racists nonetheless.

That's totally ridiculous, you don't know them, and I doubt I can glean much else of value from this conversation, so it's over with.

They require complex thinking. I've become convinced that the American people don't WANT to think. Which is why they chose Bush as their president.

That is why we need to package our message more simply.

It is hard for me to accept, too. I like complex, nuanced discussion of policy. But most people don't. Most of my friends and acquaintances don't even get a newspaper. They vote based on who looks good on TV and what their friends and family say. Sad, but reality. We need to deal with it.

These people have a sick slant on reality.

They think they know morality when they have no morality

yes, the care about fetuses
BUT - they are appalled at the sight of gay marriages & public displays of "bare breasts"
AND while they were at it, they want PRAYER back in SCHOOLS.

so it's not just abortion - it's several things that ADDED UP.
The things that ADDED UP for us FAR OUT WEIGHED their list.

We gave priority to INTEGRITY IN GOVERNMENT - they are brainwashed and believe EVERYTHING faux spews gives them. In other words, they already believe that they have integrity in government.

We shouldn't waste our time pandering to religious hysterics and bigots. They aren't on our side and never will be.

And he's despondent about the results of Nov. 2. He's severely depressed. He truly follows the teachings of Jesus and is a model for all of us (and I'm an atheist saying that!). What this administration is doing to everyone sickens him.
Sabriel

sigh...

:-(

It is not the one I have. Mine has nothing about hate and intolerance being good public policy. I suspect they will fall the way of the Know Nothings or the Ku Klux Klan - both having significant polital power for short periods of history.

They memorize excepts from it that makes their point. If you ever talk to them in detail about the bible you will soon learn that they know very little about the bible as a book.
And I do think you are right that they have power for a short season, because truth always wins in the end.

David Duke's good buddy David Vitter was just elected Senator in Louisiana.

It has to play behind the scenes because decent people won't tolerate it...but a large minority of people aren't decent. I'm guessing around 20 percent of humans are hardened evil bigots and there is no getting around it. On a bad day I guess that around 30 percent are bigots.

Anti-Christs who are following the spawn of Satan. All of them.

All my life - ALL MY LIFE!!! - I've been nice to them.

They don't appreciate it. They call me and my friends nasty names. They make fun of us for being the "snobby elite." All my life I've turned the other cheek and worked to help them.

They turned their backs on themselves in this election. Fuck em. They're on their own. I'll continue to work for the poor and downtrodden and I won't ever turn my back on my ideals, but I'm through being nice to narrow-minded assholes.

Skinner, I apologise for the language. I just can't help it right now.

accept by those who keep telling me "God is a Republican."

THAT is what offends me. I do now have to bow to the beliefs of the religious right.

And I know a church full of heartbroken Lutherans who would agree with me. We live in the heart of a very Red county. I was never so proud of my fellow ELCA-ers than I was during this election. Old, young, former military, lawyers, teachers, union people: we well represent a wide swatch of Americans. We have nothing to be ashamed of or to apologize for.

Furthermore, I did not deserve to be called a Communist merely for supporting John Kerry. John Kerry is a better man and a better patriot than most of these people can even dream of being.

And a 70-year-old former Marine didn't deserve to be called unpatriotic and unworthy of being a Marine for the mere fact that he did not support the war in Iraq from the very beginning. When his Bush-supporting neighbors came up to him recently to apologize, he told them to go to hell.

Good for him.

jesus would rip 'em a new one! Jesus was a liberal and the freaks are giving him a bad name, if you ask me.

They are trying to destroy the planet on purpose.