Nikolai

Im not really following you, how does alot of homosexuals coming out of the closet drive other people deeper into the closet? If you think outing is ethically wrong why do you propose it for atheists?

Autonemesis

"Outing" is dragging someone out of the closet publically, by announcing their orientation without their consent. Tends to make those in the closet even more careful about whom they reveal themselves to, for fear of having their confidence betrayed.

[ August 06, 2002: Message edited by: Kind Bud ]</p>

Caverdude

An update:
I looked into the Supreme Court stuff that Buffman gave sites to. This is the gist of it: In any Supreme Court ruling, there are several components, one is the holding which establishes rule of law and sets precedents. Another is called "dictum" which are opinions written by a justice that are non-essential components THAT CARRY NO PRECEDENTIAL VALUE. When my bible toting friend quoted to me that the Supreme Court ruled that this is a Christian Nation, he either was mislead by liars or is a liar himself (probably the former). To my knowledge (from research so far) there never has been any official RULING of that type. The statement "this is a christian nation" has appeared in dictum writing on a couple of cases, which means nothing. Once again, religious groups are trying to impose their views through deceit. Thanks again Buffman for the illuminating sites.

JohnR

Caverdude, show your friend this.
It came from here.
<a href="http://www.earlyamerica.com/review/summer97/secular.html" target="_blank">http://www.earlyamerica.com/review/summer97/secular.html</A> Along with a lot of other interesting facts.

hezekiah jones

Which reminds me of the following little exchange from elsewhere (the names have been changed to protect the guilty). Enjoy.

America Founded as a Christian Nation?

Absolute nonsense.

The author of the opinion, in a completely irrelevant postscript to the decision itself, refers to a couple of state charters, the preambles to a few state constitutions, and a bit of early American history to reach the startling conclusion that most Americans were Christians in 1892.

Sheer and utter rubbish.

There is absolutely no mention of any debates having anything to do with the Constitutional Convention of 1787 nor any mention of the circumstances surrounding the drafting and ratification of the Bill of Rights. How could 10 paragraphs of an obscure Supreme Court opinion, having little if anything to do with the decision itself, written by a forgotten Supreme Court Justice, count as "the biggest examination of founding documents in the history of this country" without once mentioning even one framer of the Constitution or Bill of Rights.

Your statement is possibly the most ridiculous thing I have read today (but it's early).

This phrase appears nowhere in the opinion. What it says, following a self-serving compendium of largely irrelevant citations compiled from sources that predate the Constitution and more importantly the establishment clause, or, for that matter the Treaty of Tripoli, is:

"These, and many other matters which might be noticed, add a volume of unofficial declarations to the mass of organic utterances that this is a Christian nation."

Please note: "unofficial declarations."

Obviously not as much as you are missing. It would help to actually read an opinion before making such inaccurate, outrageous, and simply absurd claims about it.

The case is Church of the Holy Trinity v. United States 143 U.S. 457 (1892).

Incredible. More complete garbage and utter lies from Ankerberg and company. Typical.

The above quotation does not appear anywhere in the referenced opinion.

These people should be ashamed of themselves, unless of course bald faced lying is acceptable when it's bald faced lying for Jesus.

I don't know where the text of Church of the Holy Trinity appears online. I use Lexis-Nexis, so a link here would not work. I guarantee you that the quotations provided by both [Christian A] and John Ankerberg do not appear in the text of the opinion, nor is [Christian A]'s analysis of the case anywhere near correct.

Certainly. Church of the Holy Trinity has been cited by the Supreme Court 65 times. Three of these citations appeared in establishment clause cases.

In Scalia's dissent to Lee v. Weisman it is referred to as an "aberration." That's right, Scalia, not known as a defender of the wall of separation, referred to its "Christian nation" pronouncement as an "aberration," in his dissent to an opinion that enforced the First Amendment's ban on laws respecting an establishment of religion.

It is cited in Brennan's dissent to Lynch v. Donnelly as follows: "By insisting that such a distinctively sectarian message is merely an unobjectionable part of our 'religious heritage,' the Court takes a long step backwards to the days when Justice Brewer could arrogantly declare for the Court that 'this is a Christian nation.'"

Not quite an endorsement of Brewer's view.

It is cited, but not quoted, by the majority opinion in Marsh v. Chambers, upholding the practice of prayer and the office of the chaplaincy in the Nebraska legislature.

The balance of the 62 citations quote either in its entirety (one case) or in part (all the others) the following excerpt from Brewer's opinion:

"It is a familiar rule, that a thing may be within the letter of the statute and yet not within the statute, because not within its spirit, nor within the intention of its makers. This has been often asserted, and the reports are full of cases illustrating its application. This is not the substitution of the will of the judge for that of the legislator, for frequently words of general meaning are used in a statute, words broad enough to include an act in question, and yet a consideration of the whole legislation, or of the circumstances surrounding its enactment, or of the absurd results which follow from giving such broad meaning to the words, makes it unreasonable to believe that the legislator intended to include the particular act."

The above refers to statutory construction, that is, the means by which the courts go about interpreting the meaning of legislation, whether by deferring to the plain meaning of the text, or failing that, attempting to glean the legislature's intent. This is such a fundamental component of constitutional jurisprudence that Brewer's statement seems almost painfully trivial today. In fact most of the 62 remaining citations predate World War II, and many predate the depression.

Furthermore in the landmark 1978 decision Tennessee Valley Authority v. Hill (not by any means an establishment clause case, incidentally), Chief Justice Burger, in reference to the continual use of Brewer's statement on statutory construction, wrote for the majority:

"This Court, however, later explained Holy Trinity as applying only in 'rare and exceptional circumstances ... And there must be something to make plain the intent of Congress that the letter of the statute is not to prevail.' Crooks v. Harrelson, 282 U.S. 55, 60 (1930)."

Having said all that, Church of the Holy Trinity, far from having any bearing on establishment clause jurisprudence, dealt with the importation of foreign laborers. It was summarized in a 1917 case called Scharrenberg v. Dollar Steamship Company as follows:

"The purpose of this alien labor legislation was declared by this court almost thirty years ago, in Holy Trinity Church v. United States to be, to arrest the bringing of an ignorant, servile class of foreign laborers into the United States, under contract to work at a low rate of wages, and thus reduce other laborers engaged in like occupations to the level of the assisted immigrant."

As I had noted earlier, and hopefully demonstrated definitively above, Brewer's gratuitous reference to a "Christian nation" is entirely irrelevant and obscure.

[Hopefully this will be useful to anyone that comes across Christians trumpeting this case in the future. If this is the best they can come up with, they're in a sad state indeed.

P.S. Needless to say neither Christian A nor Christian B ever responded.]

[ August 07, 2002: Message edited by: hezekiah jones ]</p>

hezekiah jones

It's tempting to be charitable and merely refer to them as extravagantly ignorant, but in David Barton's case especially, since he puts himself about as an expert and thus presumably knows better, "liar" would appear to be perfectly appropriate.

[ August 07, 2002: Message edited by: hezekiah jones ]</p>

capsaicin67

Alonzo writes:
[/QUOTE]We are, in part, responsible for this.

Yes, I agree.

AF:Gay/lesbian rights groups showed statistically that the best counter-weapon to this type of propaganda was to simply let people know that somebody that they know is gay.

I think that there is truth to this. I would only wonder about one thing. I am not at all sure that the mainstream public would have changed it's perception based on just the people that it heard about or encountered in everyday life. I have absolutely no statistical evidence or proof of any kind, but I wonder how much the visibility of celebrity gays in particular, and the acknowledgement and "humanizing" of gays through the media [including sympathetic fictional representations]actually pushed it over the top into the mainstream consciousness. I think that the latter [the media message] was the critical catalyst, though they worked in tandem. I guess I don't think that perhaps either method could have done it alone, but I would argue that the media portion of the puzzle is what helps create the climate in which more solitary or isolated individuals can safely "out" themselves. But, yes, both are helpful and essential ultimately.

AF:People who know somebody who is gay is much less susceptible to this type of propaganda than somebody who can accept it as a pure theological postulate and ignore the human element.

Yep. Or people that simply feel they can *identify* with a character that is gay, or atheist, or alien or xian, or whatever. I'm not so sure but that there are not as many people in this country that feel they "know" and are "close to" Tom Hanks/The Rock/Homer Simpson as there are people that feel they value or know their own children [or insert relative/neighbor/co-worker of your choice.....]. I think I could be really scared if I knew for certain which category was esteemed most highly by the bulk of the populace-----but I suspect I know.

However, I am entirely in favor of encouraging people to let their atheism be known -- to friends and family members, members of whatever group one belongs to, neighbors. Because the more people who discover that they actually KNOW an atheist, the less effective this campaign will be.

Sure, that's a good thing. I see the cultural ignorance and prejudice increasing exponentially, daily, making me more concerned than I even used to be about the risks involved in such an undertaking. I have done it, and I still do it, but I am acutely aware that the popular media is bombarding people more than I recall in the past with messages that are the atheist equivalent of "faggot" [excuse me, all---and please correct me if that is not an accurate example of a derogatory reference to homeosexuals], not acceptance. I am afraid that we are about to live in some pretty interesting times.

[ August 07, 2002: Message edited by: capsaicin67 ]</p>

Alonzo Fyfe

Probably not. The statistical research showed only that this was the most potent weapon in countering the literature of the religious right. Not that it was 100% effective when used, or that this this alone was sufficient.


I see the cultural ignorance and prejudice increasing exponentially, daily, making me more concerned than I even used to be about the risks involved in such an undertaking.

I, too, see a dangerous spiral. We are villified, so we hide. Because we hide, the villification becomes more effective. So we hide some more.

Not good.

However, I believe that the trend you have noticed is caused by two reversible factors.

(1) Proximity to the millenium. Many hard-core religious types are expecting, or at least entertaining the possibility, that this is the apocolypse. This is the time to get their spiritual house in order.

(2) Sept 11. There is a strong sense of fear out there -- that God let this happen because God is unhappy with us. So, something must be done in order to make God happy again. One way to do so is through human sacrifice. Cutting out hearts is old-world, but the psychology behind this type of behavior is still a part of our makeup.

As these events fall behind us, and people calm down, I expect the situation to improve -- unless there are further significant shocks. This would not be a good time, for example, to have a large comet splash into the Pacific.

During that time, I think we need to propagate a set of moral principles that will keep us from risk the next time some significant set of events puts us at risk.

Returning back to the main point of this post: The most potent weapon available is to simply let people know who we really are.

capsaicin67

AF:As these events fall behind us, and people calm down, I expect the situation to improve -- unless there are further significant shocks. This would not be a good time, for example, to have a large comet splash into the Pacific.

Yeah, we can skip the comet/asteroid splashdown as far as I'm concerned, too. And that goes for supervolcanoes, plagues and just about any other calamities. Those would not be helpful.

As for the millenium, IMHO, I don't see that still being a big factor, specifically---- that kinda blew over with y2k hysteria I think. But it did get them prepped/energized for all the other "biblical prophecies" being fulfilled in the Middle East etc [What?! There's still war?!! There are still big things that go wrong?!! People are still power hungry and hateful and intolerant?!!!! How could the prophets have known? They were obviously divinely inspired to foresee such things! ]. Or perhaps that is what you mean.

Anyways, I wish that I could share your optimism. Not only will there most likely continue to be various minor/moderate hardships and shocks to the system, but this process has been a gradual but persistent decline from the McCarthy era. It has been moving glacially, until now, but we never recovered the ball that was dropped then, and I think we will steadily move the direction that they are steering us without a much more *dynamic* intervention on our part. I don't think I have the patience to wait out a Dark Age----yuk! Anyways, I think that the cultural story of the country is being altered in a way that it will get profoundly more difficult to reverse. I will be pleased as punch if this works itself out within my lifetime!

AF:The most potent weapon available is to simply let people know who we really are.

I'm with you, but I don't think that *simply* doing it is going to do it. [attn conservation notice: that's pretty much my primary point]

The 1:1 method is important, and I spend hours and hours with the fundies in my immediate vicinity. In circumstances that illuminate what I'm about in a way that flies in the face of the negative stereotypes of atheists. And I would still say that if Pat Buchanan were to point a crooked finger at me, and spit, "Atheist!", that special way he does,-----they'd all be casting lots for my robes before he finished the word. Maybe not all, but many would.

I guess all I'm saying is my familiar rant: its not *if* it should be done, but *how* and on *what scale* that we're doing it that concerns me.

The Newdow coverage keeps getting more negative every time I see it. I fear that his legal joyriding/driveby [though essentially correct in it's main point] has really given energy to the Fundy Horde, and as we've discussed elswhere, I think that the Godless March could be going straight into a subsequent ambush.

The silver lining is that at least we have this place to talk about it and compare notes.

AF:During that time, I think we need to propagate a set of moral principles that will keep us from risk the next time some significant set of events puts us at risk

Please elaborate on this at your convenience......

Alonzo Fyfe

That was what I mean. I think that there are some who look at the middle east conflict, the West Nile outbreak, 911, and at least have some fret that, perhaps, the end of the world might actually be near.


...this process has been a gradual but persistent decline from the McCarthy era. It has been moving glacially, until now...

I am not entirely in disagreement here.

I do believe that the adoption of "in God" in the pledge, and "In God We Trust" as a motto, in 1954, with its continual recitation by students, has had an effect -- slowly -- over time. The millenial and 911 events served to move things more quickly.

This is why I think that the pledge and motto issues are core.

But I do believe that there is room for a near-term bounce -- a counter-reaction -- in the near future that should be exploited to the best of our ability.


AF:The most potent weapon available is to simply let people know who we really are.

I'm with you, but I don't think that *simply* doing it is going to do it.

It is not sufficient, no. Saying that it is the most potent weapon does not imply that it alone is sufficient. Only that any other set of options, absent this one, will not likely produce anything near the desired results.


The 1:1 method is important, and I spend hours and hours with the fundies in my immediate vicinity.

Actually, I do not thing that spending time with fundies is vital. Martin Luthar King could not credit his success with having converted any KKK members to his cause. Rather, he won the battle for the moderates. Which is what we must do. The fundies will remain fundies, out for our blood at any opportunity. But once the moderates know who we are, then the fundies look more and more like extremists they are.

AF:During that time, I think we need to propagate a set of moral principles that will keep us from risk the next time some significant set of events puts us at risk

Please elaborate on this at your convenience.

Not on this thread. Elsewhere.

[ August 07, 2002: Message edited by: Alonzo Fyfe ]</p>