I was having a discussion with this guy when all of a sudden my responses started disappearing. I’m going to rehash my response here just to be safe and ensure that it doesn’t get deleted again. It will be much shorter here because I just really hate rewriting something that got deleted, like I’ve had to do with comments to Paul Jub and angryxtian.
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Basically…
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Your main objection seems to be that I called conservatism oppressive, and that, by extension, it is unnatural for humans to try so hard to oppress each other. To show my statement as true, let’s examine some conservative and liberal views and who they oppress.
Conservative views: 1. No gay marriage, 2. No abortion, 3. Creationism & prayer in schools, 4. Religion in public places, like courtrooms, 5. No gays in the military, 6. Torture and unannounced detainment of suspected terrorists… et cetera
Conservative victims: 1. Gays, 2. Rape victims, 3. Atheists, agnostics, buddhists, etc., 4. Same as number three, 5. Gays, 6. Accused individuals
And that’s not including fundamentalist-conservative views, like killing gays and adulterers..
Now let’s examine some liberal views and who they oppress.
Liberal views: 1. gay marriage, 2. pro-choice, 3. science in science class, 4. governing under the constitution, 5. Gay and straight individuals in the military, 6. Innocent until proven guilty
Liberal victims: … I couldn’t come up with any. It might gross out a few conservatives, but that’s basically it.
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I maintain that conservatism is unnatural because I find it unnatural to work so hard to victimize people who are different from you. Being a bully can be natural, but most bullies have some limit.
If you mean liberal in the modern American sense (as opposed to the classical sense), then liberal views on affirmative action, health care, taxation, gun control, regulation of business etc are oppressive too.
Also, given the history of the world, irrational would have been a better word than unnatural.
I understand how gun control can be oppressive (I’m anti-gun control because of such), but could you elaborate on the others?
Unnatural… Eh, I hate how these little arguments get started over something I said in passing. lol
Librals want to taxed me for homosexual AIDES patients under Hillary Care and teach anti-Christ in schools pn MY tax money!
Aw, you’re making me cry. How awful for us libtards to hope you might have a shred of compassion.
Initiating physical force (or threatening to do so) on a person is oppression.
Affirmative action, health care, taxation, gun control, regulation of business etc are all government enforced policies. They involve the use of threats (and ultimately force) against people who have initiated no force.
Oppression certainly goes beyond just physical assault and physical threats.
It might if you want a broader definition. But physical assault and threats constitute the worst form of oppression.
I would say that oppression can LEAD to physical abuse, but I wouldn’t say they are one and the same.
I’d say oppression is keeping one social group in subjugation – making them like second-class citizens or non-humans or demons or whatever – for no good reason. Like racism. Racism isn’t in and of itself physical violence, but it quickly turns into physical violence.
Oppression does not lead to physical abuse. It starts with it.
Take your racism example. If by racism, you merely mean people of one race not choosing to deal with people of another, that is their business and no one elses. Racism is stupid and those who practise it are the ones who lose. As long as they do not initiate force on any one else, they have a political right to act as they please.
Could you elaborate on your thinking that it starts with rather than leads to physical abuse?
As long as an irrational purpose (say a racist) does not initiate force on those he scorns, he is not oppressing anyone. Nor has anyone anything to gain by forcing him to deal with them. His irrationality is his own problem.
It is only when he (or a group) resorts to violence, that oppression starts. Take the oppression of blacks in America as an example. They were oppressed by slavery (physical force), not by whites choosing to ostracize them. Of course, the results of this violence get perpetuated in future generations in forms such as differences in opportunity. You are choosing to call the latter oppression. But that was not where it started. That is merely a symptom. Treating it will not eradicate the cause. Tying to treat it by the means of laws such as affirmative action (involving threat of force against people who have not initiated it) is worse than treating the symptom. It is re enacting the cause.
Now, we’ve already discussed my views on gay marriage and I think even corporate prayer in schools. The government has no right to interfere in these matters, but they also have no right to intervene in issues of accepted or personal belief systems (such as private prayer in schools, presentations on Chritian viewpoints and the studying of Creationism as an alternative and respected understanding).
As to liberal “victims” if you want to put it that way, you have to list Christian students who are ostrisized and scoffed at for their beliefs? I mean, if teaching Creationism victimizes those that do not believe it, does teaching evolution not victimize the sector that does not believe in it? You also have to include unborn children who are denied the right to live don’t you? We have no greater civil right than the right to have a shot at life.
As to #6…that’s kind of a new one to me.
#6 was just thrown in to contradict the conservative one about torture.
Most of your other objections are ones angryxtian has raised (not to draw a comparison, as that would be just plain heartless). You have to understand that liberals are not necessarily atheists. Most are Christian. And it’s not like Christians are restricted from doing something that is fine for Muslims, Pagans, Jews, or any other religion that may want to get into the schools.
As for creationism, it is not science. Hell, it’s not even pseduoscience.
It has no place in a science classroom, unlike evolution which has been proven almost beyond a shadow of a doubt.
Is it oppressive to teach a history lesson on the Holocaust in a classroom that has some neoNazi Mel Gibson wanna-be in it, who says it never happened? His own worldview contradicting with reality is no reason to overlook the reality.
As for your antichoice comment, I think it’s a little silly to act like aborting a baby that shouldn’t be born (wouldn’t be raised right, would be neglected or malnourished, was conceived during a rape, etc.) is the only time that eggs are neglected life. Menstruation cleanses a woman’s body of many unfertilized “potential lives.” Is it wrong for her to menstruate then, since some of those unfertilized eggs could have been little babies if she had just had sex more? Or what about the fertilized eggs that abort themselves in the womb? Basically, any waking, capable moment where you are not having intercourse, you are probably denying a baby life.
Dude…angry…really?
I realize that conservatism does not mean Christian. I actually posted that on the happyconservative blog, but I dont think that post is there anymore. I merely used Christian examples because those are the ones I see my students encountering. Youre right, liberalism also victimizes pagans, Jews, Muslims etc. hehe
As to creation, I’m not so sure that you get to be the authority on what is or is not science. There are many in the science field that hold to a creationist or I.D. view of the universe’s beginning. As to evolution being proved beyond dispute…really?
Concerning your discussion on abortion, don’t you think that the child should at least have a shot at life? Even a crappy one? Second, there is a distinct difference b/t a fertilized egg and and unfertilized egg. And for your examples of natural termination, I’m not so sure that’s a good road to travel. What about senior citizens that will eventually die of old age, couldn’t (and shouldn’t) we just kill them to help along the process? Since people die naturally everyday, is murder really all that immoral?
Nope, conservativism is only supportable with Christianity (or other faiths). Just like communism is only supportable with irrationality.
Liberalism does NOT victimize those people- it is a bit like claiming liberalism victimizers prisoners or Nazis. They choose that stance and action- actions and beliefs that are immoral and wrong.
Yes, evolution has been proved beyond dispute.
The origin of the universe has nothing to do with evolution.
Science does have to meet certain standards. Science refers to the process they use. It has to be testable, falsible, empirical, repeatable… these are the basis. ID fails ALL of these criteria.
No. Why should everyone get a crappy shot at life. Forcing someone to live in pain is NOT good.
No there isn’t. Fertilized eggs have more genetic material and start dividing. That isn’t a huge difference- most of the cells in your body are like that.
Murder is immoral. Just because people die doesn’t mean that helping them along is good. You are referring to a slippery slope, but the cutoff here is consent (or for coma’s and the like chances of recovery).
Actually, yeah, conservatism almost almost amounts to Christianity, or some form of theism
It’s not a science. This is the scientific method:
Ask a Question
Observe & Research
Construct a Hypothesis
Test Your Hypothesis by Doing an Experiment
Analyze Your Data and Draw a Conclusion
Communicate Your Results
Here is the method used by creationism:
Invent a conclusion
Observe things that at least seem to support your conclusion
Make false or fabricated observations
Communicate your results
It’s not science.
There’s a huge difference between a senior citizen with an active nervous system and a developing baby that can’t even feel anything or think.
Again, any time you aren’t having intercourse, you are probably dooming some poor “potential life” to destruction through menstruation. Murder!
Well, not really, but it’s the same irrational, silly mindset that makes someone fiercely antichoice.
I meant to discuss liberalism in relation to atheism, not Christianity and conservativism.
It’s a touch draining to discuss these things when the only responses that I receive are either generalizations or unsupported claims (i.e. evolution has been proven beyond dispute…really? and deeming opposing views irrational and silly just because you don’t agree, or butchering the Creationist view to make it appear illogical)
I wasn’t referring to a dynamic physical difference between the fertilized and unfertilized. The huge difference is the ability for the fertilized egg to become life.
And the slippery slope comes because you are taking the choice away from the choice-less. You stated that you don’t believe people should be forced to live a life in pain, but where do we stop? You said coma’s with the possibility of recovery, so why not unborn children with the possibility of a sucessful life? The start does not have to determine the end.
Samuel: I don’t believe liberalism victimizes anyone. I was simply using that to refute the idea that chillin presented that conservativism victimizes people. I am pretty moderate in the grand scheme of things, and really avoid politics at all costs. Really this has been a hypothetical discussion because I follow whatever laws are instituted by the government.
“And the slippery slope comes because you are taking the choice away from the choice-less.”
That is comic. How can anyone take away what is not there in the first place?
“I don’t believe liberalism victimizes anyone. I was simply using that to refute the idea that chillin presented that conservativism victimizes people.”
Both liberalism (note comments 5 and 11) and conservatism (as long as it is tries to institutionalize religion) victimize people.
I’m beginning to wonder if I should have even started this argument.
I’m libertarian, after all, not contemporary liberal.
Heh, I would probably fall to a more libertarian side of things as well, but the dialogue can’t hurt, right?
K.M.: Glad I can entertain you. Sorry for the mis-speak, but you get the point. So, if everything victimizes someone, what do you propose we do?
Chris Dills,
Liberalism and Conservatism are not the only two alternatives. Both are based on the same moral principles of altruism and that is beginning to show as conservatives become more in favor of big government. Here is a link that better explains what I mean.