I am reminded of the old arguments from back in the day about marijuana.
There is a matrix you can make from Smoked Marijuana and Thinks it should be Legal.
If you smoked marijuana and you think it should be legal, your opinion can obviously be dismissed because you just want your hobby to be legal.
If you smoked marijuana and you think it should be illegal, your opinion can obviously be dismissed because you're a hypocrite who wants other people thrown in prison for stuff that you did.
If you've never smoked marijuana and you think it should be legal, your opinion can obviously be dismissed because you have no idea about how dangerous the reefer is.
If you've never smoked marijuana and you think it should be illegal, your opinion can obviously be dismissed because you have no idea about how much more harmless marijuana is than alcohol or any number of recreational substances.
The point of the exercise is to point out how the other side can, no matter what, point out how your position can obviously be dismissed because of your life experiences.
Make a matrix of "support public unions" and "have relatives who work for the public sector". You'll be able to quickly and easily come up with reasons why others have positions that can obviously be dismissed.
Jimminy Crickets, dude. If you didn't want to talk about how the Republicans haven't exactly crowned themselves in glory with regards to the DEA, you could have said so.
I'm a guy who considers himself fairly libertarian with anacap sympathies who, if he had to be pigeonholed, might shrug at the idea of Minarchism. Just a night watchman state.
What jobs ought Maribou not be allowed to take because I have this belief system?
If I believe in the personhood of chicks, does that go in conflict with my beliefs at all? Should I be more like the father in the story that Knapp talked about the other day and does it reflect poorly on me that Maribou is her own person (I originally wrote "allowed to be her own person" but I don't "allow" that... she *IS* one and that has nothing to do with any allowance of mine).
Should I have married someone more subserviant who would work for places that fit in better with my belief systems?
I'm a fan of "we won't pay for the statue, but we'll make room if we can".
Let the church shell out for the Crucifix, you can shell out for your Dragon cult abomination, and the Mormons can put a plaque on a block of stone and say "this block of stone is similar to a block of stone that held the gold plates once".
Everybody's happy and it takes no taxpayer dollars.
I think I do technically... but it'd involve a whole lot of irritating decisions to make. (One thing we do is pay all of our bills about a month beforehand, those that we know we can, anyway... this gives us at least a month of slack should anything awful happen.)
At the end of the day, the whole TEAM RED/TEAM BLUE/TEAM GOLD thing is bullshit. All that matters is you and yours and I hope that you and yours come out of this okay.
Given the part of the country in which you currently live, I can't imagine that your situation is anywhere near uncommon.
more important i’m willing to state what i would do in response
Really? You not only care, you're willing to say something?
Would that more people were willing to not only care but say things, Greg.
Truly, you are an inspiration to us all.
As for the rest of your post, I'd settle for the automatic assumption on your part being something other than "I am the only one who cares enough to talk".
There's an old Snickers commercial that has a coach yelling at his team that "This year we gotta be a little more 'politically correct' with the team prayer."
There's a Catholic priest, followed by a Jewish rabbi, followed by a Native American Shaman, and you see a football player in the front row narrow his eyes a little and look all the way down the line of more than a dozen "holy" folk preparing to give their various blessings before the game. "Not going anywhere for a while?"
This strikes me as far, far, far more interesting and wonderful than any attitude that says that we shouldn't have people give speeches before a football game.
There are any number of people who object to prayers given before official functions. As if God is listening and the prayer will undo the latch that will finally allow him to intervene just! This! Once! Do you need me to find examples of this for you?
What about the religion I just started believing in only a few seconds ago and that no one but me knows about?
I'm sure there's paperwork out there for you to fill out. Go for it. Look at California. I'm pretty sure that you can establish a church of whatever you want within a month or two and officially be able to marry people. (I am not kidding.)
Are you saying that you should *NOT* be able to do this?
If the government isn’t prepared to extend these benefits to every imaginable religion possible (and they’re not) then I see no way that they can extend them at all without violating the 1st Amendment.
From what I understand, anybody can register as a 501(c)3 tax exempt organization with the IRS.
Fill out your paperwork and, tah-dah, you're a church.
Is there another definition that matters, assuming no God?
You say: You know one gigantic reason why we have foster homes and child protective services. Because some dads fuck their kids, some moms burn their infants with cigarettes, some dads yank on an infants arm so hard in breaks in multiple places, some parents are collapsed on the floor drunk while their babies sit in shit for 24 hours. So what is the solution Jay? Are you going with keep the evil gov out of peoples lives?
I say this:
Foster care has a staggeringly high rate of abuse (higher than is found in the country, ironically).
So saying "well, we're going to take kids out of their parents homes, where they are abused, into Foster Care!" with tears streaming down your face at your own moral fortitude while you ignore that foster care has hugely high rates of abuse is, at best, obtuse.
I know, I know. At least you care about The Children... by putting them in systems where they will be abused by strangers and shuffled from stranger to stranger to stranger.
But, of course, at least you care.
Some of the numbers I've looked up indicate that kids die in foster homes at a rate five times that of kids who aren't in foster homes.
But, of course, at least you care.
You preen and smile at your own fortitude in knowing why Foster Care was created without really giving a shit about what happens to The Children after they're shuffled off to strangers.
Your argument for bombing Libya is that Kadhaffi is killing his own people and that if someone "really cares" about Kadhaffi killing his own people, they'd support shooting missiles into Libya and putting boots on the ground to *PROTECT* the children of Libya who, may I point out, Kadhaffi is killing.
If you are opposed to shooting missiles into Libya, mind, you are, objectively, supporting the murder of children.
Sure, Greg.
You people firing missiles are the only people who care about children.
My problem is that, in the absence of a deity, most stuff that gets qualified as "religious establishment" looks a lot like "speech" to me and I'm not a fan of saying "YOU CAN'T SAY THAT!"
I'm a fan of saying "if you say that, you have to allow room for others to say stuff too", of course... but I don't like the idea of someone saying "you can't say this because it's an establishment of religion" because that seems pretty identical to saying "you can't say this" which strikes me as a violation of the Right of Free Speech.
I mean, a public prayer is just a public speech. That's all it is. It's not like there's a god listening to it. Saying that so-and-so shouldn't give a public speech because it's directed to a god that isn't there strikes me as far, far more offensive and dangerous than the offense and damage done by allowing it.
I don't mind idols in public places.
If I believed in god(s), maybe I'd feel differently... but, from here, it's a statue. It's art.
Now, I am down with the idea of not being forced to pay for the statue out of my own wallet... but you wouldn't believe some of the dumb shit that the government makes me pay for and bland art is pretty far down the list of stuff that gets me riled.
(But I don't know how representative of atheism I am.)
I've stood in line behind enough folks to know that... I've seen people be told that this particular item isn't covered but this other one was... so the guy and the cashier were shuffling the food on the belt like they were doing a math problem (well, that's exactly what was going on).
All to make sure that this particular cut of meat was bought with his own money.
Do food stamps get food at a discount from a grocery store?
I mean, if it would cost me 98 cents for a can of red beans, does the grocery store trade in food stamps to the gummint worth 98 cents for giving that exact same can to folks with a food stamps card?
If so, I think that you could argue that Grand Union, Safeway, and Kroger all benefit from taking food stamps in the same way that schools benefit from taking vouchers.
(Assuming, of course, that food stamps are the equivalent of money when it comes to accounting time for the guys in corporate.)
Yeah, I'm not particularly interested in the voucher debate at this particular Time t, but maybe Time t + tsub1 would be good.
The main thing I was hoping for was an analogy that would get people to understand how, even if they agreed in some particular end, that a particular government program that ostensibly provided this end would be something that they'd be willing to fight tooth and nail against while, at the same time, they could very well still support the particular end.
(Anyway, one of the threads you may be pleased that you missed can be found here. In it you can see me try, and fail, to get people to agree that society, in general, doesn't like the idea of food stamps being used for cigarettes. I was trying, and failing, to say many of the things you successfully said here.)
We restrict the type of foods that may be purchased with food stamps, resulting in regulatory capture of mammoth proportions.
Where's Stillwater?
In any case, I think that the attitudes toward food stamps, or the war on drugs hitting hardest in "welfare" neighborhoods, or drug testing for recipients of help is an unintended consequence of the attitude that "We, as a society, have interconnected responsibilities to each other!"
This particular cudgel has been used to get folks to help others for so long that, I suspect, the "helpers" have internalized it and see that the "helped" have a whole bunch of responsibilities of their own.
And if you add into the equation that money is fungible...
Sure, you can have food stamps, but you have to buy healthy food.
Sure, you can have a government check, but you shouldn't have cable or smoke cigarettes and you *CERTAINLY* shouldn't do drugs! If you have enough money for weed, you don't need my money. Use your own money.
And we get the cops involved because of the interconnected responsibilities that the "helped" have to us. Kick in the door. Shoot the dog. Get child protective services involved to take kids away from moms who smoke pot. (We're doing this for the children, remember?) So on and so forth and so much intrusion into the lives of others... why?
Because we, as a society, have decided that we all have interconnected responsibilities to each other.
Yeah, I know. That wasn't the original intention. The original plan had the best of intentions. "How did we get here from there?" "One step at a time."
On “A Confession of Bias, Followed by a Bunch of Stuff You Should Probably Ignore”
I am reminded of the old arguments from back in the day about marijuana.
There is a matrix you can make from Smoked Marijuana and Thinks it should be Legal.
If you smoked marijuana and you think it should be legal, your opinion can obviously be dismissed because you just want your hobby to be legal.
If you smoked marijuana and you think it should be illegal, your opinion can obviously be dismissed because you're a hypocrite who wants other people thrown in prison for stuff that you did.
If you've never smoked marijuana and you think it should be legal, your opinion can obviously be dismissed because you have no idea about how dangerous the reefer is.
If you've never smoked marijuana and you think it should be illegal, your opinion can obviously be dismissed because you have no idea about how much more harmless marijuana is than alcohol or any number of recreational substances.
The point of the exercise is to point out how the other side can, no matter what, point out how your position can obviously be dismissed because of your life experiences.
Make a matrix of "support public unions" and "have relatives who work for the public sector". You'll be able to quickly and easily come up with reasons why others have positions that can obviously be dismissed.
"
Jimminy Crickets, dude. If you didn't want to talk about how the Republicans haven't exactly crowned themselves in glory with regards to the DEA, you could have said so.
"
What do I think that they should have done differently when it comes to the DEA?
Well, there's Reagan and his "War on Drugs" (a term first used by Nixon).
Um, we're in topsy-turvy land, dude.
It wasn't the democrats who went nuts over Doug Ginsburg. It was the republicans. That's why we have Kennedy on the Supreme Court.
"
Team Red hasn't crowned themselves in glory when it comes to either, Koz.
And there are more options than Team Red or Team Blue.
"
I'm a guy who considers himself fairly libertarian with anacap sympathies who, if he had to be pigeonholed, might shrug at the idea of Minarchism. Just a night watchman state.
What jobs ought Maribou not be allowed to take because I have this belief system?
If I believe in the personhood of chicks, does that go in conflict with my beliefs at all? Should I be more like the father in the story that Knapp talked about the other day and does it reflect poorly on me that Maribou is her own person (I originally wrote "allowed to be her own person" but I don't "allow" that... she *IS* one and that has nothing to do with any allowance of mine).
Should I have married someone more subserviant who would work for places that fit in better with my belief systems?
These are important questions!
"
I was asking Stillwater if he paid the Clinton tax rates he wishes he had, rather than the lower Bush ones that he does.
"
I am unsurprised.
On “Closed Front Doors, Open Back Doors”
I'm a fan of "we won't pay for the statue, but we'll make room if we can".
Let the church shell out for the Crucifix, you can shell out for your Dragon cult abomination, and the Mormons can put a plaque on a block of stone and say "this block of stone is similar to a block of stone that held the gold plates once".
Everybody's happy and it takes no taxpayer dollars.
On “A Confession of Bias, Followed by a Bunch of Stuff You Should Probably Ignore”
Idaho? Hells yeah.
San Francisco? Meh.
"
They do enjoy their schadenfreude.
"
Do you pay the tax rates you think you ought to have?
I suspect the thing you notice in others is something that is closer to ubiquitous than not.
"
I think I do technically... but it'd involve a whole lot of irritating decisions to make. (One thing we do is pay all of our bills about a month beforehand, those that we know we can, anyway... this gives us at least a month of slack should anything awful happen.)
"
At the end of the day, the whole TEAM RED/TEAM BLUE/TEAM GOLD thing is bullshit. All that matters is you and yours and I hope that you and yours come out of this okay.
Given the part of the country in which you currently live, I can't imagine that your situation is anywhere near uncommon.
Best of luck to get through this.
On “Playing God with the Poor”
more important i’m willing to state what i would do in response
Really? You not only care, you're willing to say something?
Would that more people were willing to not only care but say things, Greg.
Truly, you are an inspiration to us all.
As for the rest of your post, I'd settle for the automatic assumption on your part being something other than "I am the only one who cares enough to talk".
On “Closed Front Doors, Open Back Doors”
There's an old Snickers commercial that has a coach yelling at his team that "This year we gotta be a little more 'politically correct' with the team prayer."
There's a Catholic priest, followed by a Jewish rabbi, followed by a Native American Shaman, and you see a football player in the front row narrow his eyes a little and look all the way down the line of more than a dozen "holy" folk preparing to give their various blessings before the game. "Not going anywhere for a while?"
This strikes me as far, far, far more interesting and wonderful than any attitude that says that we shouldn't have people give speeches before a football game.
"
There are any number of people who object to prayers given before official functions. As if God is listening and the prayer will undo the latch that will finally allow him to intervene just! This! Once! Do you need me to find examples of this for you?
What about the religion I just started believing in only a few seconds ago and that no one but me knows about?
I'm sure there's paperwork out there for you to fill out. Go for it. Look at California. I'm pretty sure that you can establish a church of whatever you want within a month or two and officially be able to marry people. (I am not kidding.)
Are you saying that you should *NOT* be able to do this?
If the government isn’t prepared to extend these benefits to every imaginable religion possible (and they’re not) then I see no way that they can extend them at all without violating the 1st Amendment.
From what I understand, anybody can register as a 501(c)3 tax exempt organization with the IRS.
Fill out your paperwork and, tah-dah, you're a church.
Is there another definition that matters, assuming no God?
On “Playing God with the Poor”
And there is something that I want to point out:
You say: You know one gigantic reason why we have foster homes and child protective services. Because some dads fuck their kids, some moms burn their infants with cigarettes, some dads yank on an infants arm so hard in breaks in multiple places, some parents are collapsed on the floor drunk while their babies sit in shit for 24 hours. So what is the solution Jay? Are you going with keep the evil gov out of peoples lives?
I say this:
Foster care has a staggeringly high rate of abuse (higher than is found in the country, ironically).
So saying "well, we're going to take kids out of their parents homes, where they are abused, into Foster Care!" with tears streaming down your face at your own moral fortitude while you ignore that foster care has hugely high rates of abuse is, at best, obtuse.
I know, I know. At least you care about The Children... by putting them in systems where they will be abused by strangers and shuffled from stranger to stranger to stranger.
But, of course, at least you care.
Some of the numbers I've looked up indicate that kids die in foster homes at a rate five times that of kids who aren't in foster homes.
But, of course, at least you care.
You preen and smile at your own fortitude in knowing why Foster Care was created without really giving a shit about what happens to The Children after they're shuffled off to strangers.
But, of course, at least you care.
At least.
least
"
And so we come back to Libya.
Your argument for bombing Libya is that Kadhaffi is killing his own people and that if someone "really cares" about Kadhaffi killing his own people, they'd support shooting missiles into Libya and putting boots on the ground to *PROTECT* the children of Libya who, may I point out, Kadhaffi is killing.
If you are opposed to shooting missiles into Libya, mind, you are, objectively, supporting the murder of children.
Sure, Greg.
You people firing missiles are the only people who care about children.
On “Closed Front Doors, Open Back Doors”
I suppose I am an atheist, or close enough.
My problem is that, in the absence of a deity, most stuff that gets qualified as "religious establishment" looks a lot like "speech" to me and I'm not a fan of saying "YOU CAN'T SAY THAT!"
I'm a fan of saying "if you say that, you have to allow room for others to say stuff too", of course... but I don't like the idea of someone saying "you can't say this because it's an establishment of religion" because that seems pretty identical to saying "you can't say this" which strikes me as a violation of the Right of Free Speech.
I mean, a public prayer is just a public speech. That's all it is. It's not like there's a god listening to it. Saying that so-and-so shouldn't give a public speech because it's directed to a god that isn't there strikes me as far, far more offensive and dangerous than the offense and damage done by allowing it.
I don't mind idols in public places.
If I believed in god(s), maybe I'd feel differently... but, from here, it's a statue. It's art.
Now, I am down with the idea of not being forced to pay for the statue out of my own wallet... but you wouldn't believe some of the dumb shit that the government makes me pay for and bland art is pretty far down the list of stuff that gets me riled.
(But I don't know how representative of atheism I am.)
On “Playing God with the Poor”
I've stood in line behind enough folks to know that... I've seen people be told that this particular item isn't covered but this other one was... so the guy and the cashier were shuffling the food on the belt like they were doing a math problem (well, that's exactly what was going on).
All to make sure that this particular cut of meat was bought with his own money.
"
So food stamps don't get exchanged to the government 1:1 for food items?
Interesting. I didn't know that.
"
Do food stamps get food at a discount from a grocery store?
I mean, if it would cost me 98 cents for a can of red beans, does the grocery store trade in food stamps to the gummint worth 98 cents for giving that exact same can to folks with a food stamps card?
If so, I think that you could argue that Grand Union, Safeway, and Kroger all benefit from taking food stamps in the same way that schools benefit from taking vouchers.
(Assuming, of course, that food stamps are the equivalent of money when it comes to accounting time for the guys in corporate.)
"
Yeah, I'm not particularly interested in the voucher debate at this particular Time t, but maybe Time t + tsub1 would be good.
The main thing I was hoping for was an analogy that would get people to understand how, even if they agreed in some particular end, that a particular government program that ostensibly provided this end would be something that they'd be willing to fight tooth and nail against while, at the same time, they could very well still support the particular end.
I'm pleased that I found one.
"
(Anyway, one of the threads you may be pleased that you missed can be found here. In it you can see me try, and fail, to get people to agree that society, in general, doesn't like the idea of food stamps being used for cigarettes. I was trying, and failing, to say many of the things you successfully said here.)
"
We restrict the type of foods that may be purchased with food stamps, resulting in regulatory capture of mammoth proportions.
Where's Stillwater?
In any case, I think that the attitudes toward food stamps, or the war on drugs hitting hardest in "welfare" neighborhoods, or drug testing for recipients of help is an unintended consequence of the attitude that "We, as a society, have interconnected responsibilities to each other!"
This particular cudgel has been used to get folks to help others for so long that, I suspect, the "helpers" have internalized it and see that the "helped" have a whole bunch of responsibilities of their own.
And if you add into the equation that money is fungible...
Sure, you can have food stamps, but you have to buy healthy food.
Sure, you can have a government check, but you shouldn't have cable or smoke cigarettes and you *CERTAINLY* shouldn't do drugs! If you have enough money for weed, you don't need my money. Use your own money.
And we get the cops involved because of the interconnected responsibilities that the "helped" have to us. Kick in the door. Shoot the dog. Get child protective services involved to take kids away from moms who smoke pot. (We're doing this for the children, remember?) So on and so forth and so much intrusion into the lives of others... why?
Because we, as a society, have decided that we all have interconnected responsibilities to each other.
Yeah, I know. That wasn't the original intention. The original plan had the best of intentions. "How did we get here from there?" "One step at a time."