Also Peter Thiel.
He is just playing to the base. This weasel will say anything and turn on a dime if it suits his purposes. Remember what he said about Trump before he became vice president…
Crazy lunatic!
EOTWAWKI has always been a mythical fantasy, including the futuristic interpretation of Revelation regarding the second advent.
This is really the only way that cults in their late and isolated stages can hold together, not only that the end is neigh, but that it is imminent, a few month’s away at longest.
And that is because the devout are expected to be squeezed. They’re expected to toil to breaking for sake of the community and their leader.
In the cases of communes like Jonestown and the Branch Davidian compound, there’s always a dire labor shortage. There’s consistently more work to do than can be done by the labor force available to make sure everyone is fed, housed, treated for illness, clothed and so on.
Exploited labor cannot work under pressed conditions for super long, but giving them a hard deadline weeks or days away, helps a bunch. Doubly so if it comes with a guarantee of eternal bliss (or a UFO ride to join the space aliens).
Naturally, at least for all cases so far, the deadline comes and goes. This is usually when the prophets recompute and provide another deadline. Again it can only be a little bit longer. Even a year later and it’s too much to ask.
With each passing doomsday that doesn’t manifest, the cultists get more antsy like the crew of the Abraham Lincoln. Suicide and apostasy rates rise, then soar. Discontent heats up in the community, as each false apocalypse deteriorates confidence in the next one.
Eventually, something has to crack. In the 20th century US, reports leak to the authorities about the poor conditions and the abuse (there always is, in a large enough population), and in the face of intervention, the cult leader goes scorched earth like the Nero Decree.
In the meantime, the list of failed apocalypse predictions grows ever longer without any yet coming to fruition.
Keep your god out of the government you stupid brainwashed fucktard!
Traitors to humanity.
This is exactly why there needs to be a separation between church and state. How can you trust someone to run the country, when all their decisions are grounded in magical thinking?
Umm… we have that. What we lack is law enforcement.
Don’t you have to swear on the bible?
No, it specifically says you do not because of separation of church and state, you can swear on the constitution or a take out menu, whatever you want
You can swear on anything you want.
In the UK you can even make an affirmation if you are not religious or your religion forbids you from taking an oath. This as brought in originally for the Quakers but anyone who objects to Christian oaths has this option.
When I did jury service I took the secular route, though I wouldn’t have strongly objected to swearing the traditional oath either. I quite like the idea God is personally nosing into the daily business of HM Courts and Tribunals, although judging by the backlog he abandoned the justice system long ago.
Separation of church and state is different from separation of state and religious laymen. The majority of the population are religious so excluding them would be worse democratically than excluding women. What’s actually meant by separation of church and state is that people working in the church (priests, Bishops, popes) shouldn’t meddle with the running of the state. Nothing to do with religious laymen.
The down votes on this are insane to me. He just gave the original definition of the separation of church and state.
Every elected representative should only be bound by existing laws and their own conscience. That means that if someone chooses to listen to sky daddy or the flying spaghetti monster while in elected office, that’s up to them. It sucks, but you can’t have a democracy in which you tell people what the basis for their decisions must be. If the people elect an Astrologer to office that person should be free to base their decisions on the movement of Jupiter through Sagittarius or whatever.
Democracy is designed to empower the statistical average will of the people. Not produce “best” (by whatever measure) outcomes for the country. Just what people want.
Wow you think That is what democracy is?
Like vote to benefit yourself? It explains the state of some places in the world rn but that’s wild if you come from a democratic country.
No. Democracy is definitionally “Vote what you want to vote for.”
Ideally people vote for what they think is best for the country/the world/your peers.
But part of democracy (and a rather important part) is that NOBODY GETS TO TELL ANYBODY WHAT TO VOTE FOR AND WHY (within the legal confines of what allowed political expression is). So yes. A lot of people vote for what they think will be best for them. And people often make fun of people that vote for things that will be bad for them (see the whole leopards eating faces meme culture).
So “voting to benefit one self” can not be a crazy concept to you…
All advertising for elections are about this:
What to for and why
I have no problem with people having religious beliefs…in private. But, as far as I’m concerned, as soon as those religious beliefs start dictating your policy priorities…you have lost your ability to make objective decisions on behalf of the rest of us. That goes equally for “laymen” as well as “professionals”.
This case is a perfect example. Anyone openly saying that they’re just going to “follow their faith”, even if it leads us all to total destruction, needs to be removed from office. Yesterday. I wouldn’t even trust that person to drive a city bus, let alone guide policy for the entire population.
I don’t trust those who prefers afterlife to rule my life
I agree that if a religious laymen uses religion to make bad policies then he shouldn’t be in office. However democracy is supposed to represent the people and if the people want to elect a religious nutjob then that’s a failure of the people, not the democratic system. You can’t make a law that says religious people can’t run for office as that would be extremely undemocratic and go against religious freedom.
Man either you’re trolling (propaganda spreading) or you’re so dense it’s worthless to try to explain anything to you.
Separation of church and state isn’t that hard a concept. Even a child can understand it.
But u: sHoUlD wE BAN rEligious pEoPle??!!!
Common grow up, it’s actually a cool place here if you do want to discuss.
The original comment said: " How can you trust someone to run the country, when all their decisions are grounded in magical thinking?"
This in regards to the need to have a separation of church and state on a post about JD Vance being religiously motivated in the decisions he’s making. I interpret this as the person seeing the existence of JD Vance as a failure of “separation of church and state” and that this separation needs to become stronger. However JD Vance is not part of the clergy. He’s simply a religious layman. No church is running this government and therefore the current separation of church and state doesn’t apply.
So then my question to you is, how would you by law prevent another JD Vance from being elected, for the explicit reason that he uses religion to make decisions, without banning religious people from political office ?
I can’t find a good solution to this without making thought crime a thing. A religious person would be unable to see certain issues without some kind of perspective from their religion.
Holy fuck do you think separation of church and state only means that we can’t have the equivalent of the Holy Roman Emperor? Like You actually think the first amendment is about stopping the church from running the government?
That’s not democracy, that’s demagogy and ochlocracy.
You can’t make a law that says religious people can’t run for office…but you can make a law that says they can’t make policy based on their religious beliefs.
That’s what the 1st amendment is supposed to prevent.
I’m not American so correct me if I’m wrong. But wasn’t the first amendment about disallowing the government from establishing or favoring a specific religious establishment. Meaning it would be illegal to say make a law that favors or teaches baptism in school at the expense of another Christian flavor. What I understand of the history behind freedom of religion in the US was that people were sick of the UK mandating the very specific theology of the Anglican church and instead wanting a system where people were allowed to practice any flavor of Christianity that they wanted. From this it would be no problem being a religious person in office but it would not be okay for that person to give benefits or favor to their specific church while in office.
Not making policy based on religious belief would be impossible however. One’s religion would impact one’s entire morality and value system. So one could say we should enact policy X because the bible says so. But one couldn’t say we should enact policy X because the southern baptist Convention just made a ruling that policy X should be enacted and now we have to make a law that matches that ruling.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof
It is as you said…primarily as a freedom to practice whatever religion you want…but this also effectively prohibits any government official from enacting any policy or legislation that promotes their own religious beliefs over any other, since it may conflict with the free practice of someone else’s religion.
In essence, it prevents the state from getting involved in religious matters altogether.
prohibits any government official from enacting any policy or legislation that promotes their own religious beliefs over any other, since it may conflict with the free practice of someone else’s religion.
Okay, so Christianity says we can’t kill people. But jihadism exists in Islam. Then the law must allow killing by Islamists to avoid being based on Christian beliefs and restricting jihadists’ practice?
But I could in theory promote a secular policy based on my theoretical religious belief. Say I want to lower barriers to immigration and as motivation I quote the parable of the good Samaritan saying that even foreigners should be treated as ones neighbour. Now in doing this I’m letting my religious belief affect my policy making. However I’m not inhibiting anyone else’s free practice of religion since this is secular policy.
Are you saying it’s fine for elected religious laymen to force religion into our government and onto its people because they’re not church officials?
If a religious layman is motivated by his religion to make policies that you don’t agree with you should not vote for that person. If anyone else agrees with his religiously motivated policies then they should be allowed to vote for that person. I don’t think this is too crazy of a concept. Now if that specific religiously motivated policy happens to be unconstitutional that is a totally different matter.
Mmmm, no that’s what the First Amendment is partially for. The government shall pass no law respecting the establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. I have a right to be a Satanist in peace without yokels shoving their way of life down my throat
If a lawmaker bans satanism or enacts a law that otherwise discriminates against satanists. Then that’s not allowed. But what wouldn’t be a problem would be a religious lawmaker on a totally secular subject. Like the example I gave in another comment how one could in theory loosen immigration restriction by quoting the parable of the good Samaritan. That law would not be religious law, even if the law maker was motivated by his religious belief.
This is how you end up with religious persecution and pogroms.
This is how you end with child rapism being legal in islamic countries, or how you get anti-queer and anti-atheist policies in most places.
Is religious persecution and pogroms allowed in the constitution? Also systematically disallowing religious people from office is a form of religious persecution.
https://www.au.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/what-god-has-put-asunder.pdf
Read this, its from James Madison(he was one of your founding fathers).
Also:
https://www.au.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/madisons-memorial.pdf
And from Thomas Jefferson:
https://www.au.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/with-sovereign-reverence.pdf
Your “contitution” isn’t worth the paper it’s written on.
Go read a history book.
I see what you’re saying. You can’t exclude everyone from every religion from running for office.
Are you sure? I think maybe we should try that and see how it goes.
FUCKING LIES!
Separation of church and state is different from separation of state and religious laymen.
Fucking lies!. And it’s a bald faced lie that results in “In God We Trust” on our money.
There is either a separation or there is not. There is no in between. It is binary and that’s the end of it. Anyone who attempts to negotiate an in-between is a FUCKING LIAR
E PLURIBUS UNUM
And if you have a problem with that, then you have a problem with democracy
It’s not a lie. That’s how the very inventor of the term “separation of church and state” defined it and how it has been used for hundreds of years after. Roger Williams, who first used the term, was a puritan, later baptist, pastor. What you’re describing would be an innovation and expansion of what separation of church and state means. It seems what you really want is a separation between religion and state. That is a totally different issue. In the future it would be advantageous for you to be clear on that and explicitly say that it’s religion, not just church, that you want to exclude from the state.
I’m curious though. Which people would you want to exclude from the government. Church goers are obvious. But what about the “spiritual but not religious” people? Or people who believe in ghosts but not god? What about natives who believe their native religions? The non god believing buddhist? Who would define if someone is religious enough to be disallowed from running for office? Whoever that person was, that person would get immense power.
Simple definition: anyone that believes in anything not falsable, nor empirically and scientifically demonstrable.
It’s not a lie.
lol, nice try, fuck bag. That bullshit doesn’t work here anymore.
I’m fine with you insulting me. However I’m still interested to learn where you would draw the line between the non religious and the religious in your proposed ban of religious people in political office.
Noone advocated for banning religious people. We want to prevent religious policy
If I’m fine with having religious laymen in government and you’re also fine with having religious laymen in government then I’m not sure on what we disagree.
Am I understanding you correct that you think no person with religious beliefs should be allowed to hold office?
E pluribus unum
As long as none of the pluribus hold any religious belief?
Am I understanding you correct
No
Do you want to help me understand you or are you just trolling?
You feing learning so you can keep proselytizing; you are the troll you accuse others of being.
Also no
*E Pluribus Unum
And I agree, LIES!! But christians are hypocrites.
Which makes a lot of sense when you remember a lot of the North American population hailed from families who had a specific beef with a specific church and state; the role of bishops was one of these many axis of opposition during the conflict in Britain and Ireland.
The English Civil War and its aftermath is barely taught on either side of the Atlantic, yet it’s so important to understanding both countries’ history. The per capita casualty rate was worse than WW1, no wonder people felt rather strongly about religion and in some cases still do
Because in the end of world situation it kinda pointless to ask for accountability , responsibility , or something related to those pos which they like because they do that every time.
The unknown is scary. Prophecy fills in that anxiety. Religion, especially the Abrahamic religion, is for the spiritually lazy. The jewish God (YHWH, God, Allah) is a usurper, a thief, and dominator of the material. We’re all spiritual beings and we don’t need lesser gods to connect with each other within this universe. I know it sounds kinda cheesy, but loving kindness should be our spiritual path in this material world.
The unknown is scary.
Skill issue tbh
We’re all spiritual beings
Speak for you damn self, my world view has no place for spirituality and the supernatural.
You don’t have a soul/spirit? Do you not have the ability to develop a feeling of connection with anything of this world?
Nobody has a soul. It’s just a comforting thought. If we had souls science would have found it by now.
Soul is a gestalt word that points to various conscious experiences and behaviours. Science still hasn’t been able to find out what consciousness and qualia are. These are things that exist, yet can’t be quantifiable. If you don’t want to use the word “soul”, that’s okay, but to me it’s a beautiful word that sometimes bites off more than it can chew.
If I wanted to “feel” a connection to the world I’d do drugs, but I’d much rather “understand” things empirically. Ecology is fascinating and important and I don’t need a guru to see how everything is interconnected.
I’m not talking about wishy washy woowoo. I simply mean the connection from the external world to the inner. Even empirical data needs to connect and pass through your “soul/essence” to make any sense of it. You can use different words if you want to, but it’s simply our own personal consciousness and behaviours that interact with existence.
I’m not talking about wishy washy woowoo.
You are though, there is no soul. The concept of such is wishy washy woowoo. Consciousness is an emergent phenomenon of electrochemistry.
A Gnostic in the wild?
Not quite. I prefer the word “source” than “monad”. I try to practice buddhist-like non-dualism in my meditations.
You sound like my kind of people.
Hard agree with you on this. YHWH was just a god of war and thunder before the other gods of the Judean pantheon got dropped. YHWH is violent, mean, needlessly cruel, and seems to genuinely relish in death and destruction. Death and destruction is pretty much the only tool YHWH knows how to use for the entire OT, and employs a “chosen people” to simply go about doing YHWH’s killing for him. I have no idea where all the “love and peace” stuff is supposed to come from, it’s a total 180 from YHWH’s entire existence up to Jesus being some grassroots radical hippie. Who is, let’s recall, killed in a needless cruel and terrible way because that’s what suits YHWH’s needs. No other reason.
Every religion and therefore every god forbids killing babies. If you worship anything, it is ultimately Satan that you worship.
I say let him meet his god early.
Because religion is a mental illness.
It baffles me how many people don’t realize this
We’ve never been closer to it and it’s all their fault.
I hate the world we live in.
its an evangelical boner, they conceptualize the rapture, and it has pervaded in media that portrays christians in anyways.
Yeah, they never say something like, “if that leads to peace on earth, so be it.”
They are really looking forward to the killing off of the people they hate
Maybe because they have some buried understanding in their subconscious of how history will remember them, and they’d prefer that there was no one around to know
