theyeti

There's certainly some truth to that, but in general I think it's much more simple. Christian fundamentalists tend to identify themselves with far right-wing politics, and they can't admit to being wrong about anything. Therefore, they simply rationalize right-wing ideology as best they can, which includes pro-gun, anti-abortion, pro-death penalty, anti-tax, etc. None of these stances flow logically from their religious beliefs, it's just that they have a knee-jerk emotional reaction to some of them (e.g. abortion, the death penalty) and they defend the others to maintain the facade of an "inerrant" political philosophy.

Edited to add: this sort of simple-minded "follow the leader" hasn't been lost on the neo-conservative movement, which is more than happy to use populist politics to achieve its ends. They have made extensive use of the religious right, and have convinced them that the Bible favors things like tax cuts for the rich, no government regulation on businesses, scaling back environmental protection laws, etc., none of which make any sense coming from a purely religious world-view per se, but they've been convinced that they've got to take the whole nine yards or else they're not a "True Christian" or whatever.

theyeti

[ August 18, 2002: Message edited by: theyeti ]</p>

Ether

The xtians are retards. The problem is that if you refuse to give your gun you will probably go to jail or have a couple of cops over your shoulder. In this country anyone who oposses the xtians or simple says "I don't believe in God" has some big trouble to deal with. They will label you as a criminal, ignorant, anti-social, satanist or any label of the sort.

Good Day
Ether

[ August 18, 2002: Message edited by: Ether ]</p>

Ron Garrett

There will always be someone who wants to make me do something against my will or take something from me that I don't want to give up. Whether its religious nutcases or political ideologues makes no never mind to me. As long as there are human beings that will never change, and thus I will never be disarmed.

Alonzo Fyfe

I think I may need a few more details on this.

From what I can tell, this is a voluntary program. All discussion of state particiption seems to be purely speculative. As a voluntary issue, if people wish to exchange guns for bibles, I can see no wrong in that. (Though I would like to know what is going to happen to all the guns.)

It is no different than if a bunch of rationalists went around exchanging logic books for guns.

Which might not be a bad idea.