Message 1 of 17 (614004) 04-30-2011 7:02 AM

Korea has been divided by North and South, and the special circumstances considered, ideology is an important determinant of voting decisions for Korean citizens.

During the presidential election period, Myungbak Lee, a presidential candidate from the conservative side, publicly stated that the poverty of his family made it extremely difficult for him to get into college, and that's what enabled him to have much empathy with the poor in Korea.

He also publicly acknowledged how difficult it is to get out of poverty in South Korea, and he pledged to stop the vicious cycle of poverty by fostering public educations for the poor.

To make a long story short, he suggested the prerequisite for the conservatism, at least moderately equal opportunity for all individuals, absent in South Korea, and therefore, argued against his political position as a conservative.

Myungbak Lee also, during the election period, publicly made a bizarre statement that he would pursue pragmatism transcending ideologies.

Pragmatism highlights the preference for the observable data over theories missing such data, and pragmatism is what liberals generally value more than conservatives do.

Many politicians and scholars on the conservative side as Myungbak Lee made public criticism on his statement such that he was not conservative at all, and they didn't vote for Myungbak Lee. Nevertheless, Myungbak Lee, who showed a bizarre political position where he showed himself as supportive of both conservative and liberal ideologies, won the presidential election by a landslide.

It was bizarre that the leaders in many religious organizations having the same religious belief as Myungbak Lee's didn't make any comments on his bizarre political position, and Myungbak Lee was mistaken for a politician strongly supportive of the policies for the poor, and many innocent followers in the religious organizations, during the election period, suddenly started showing a favorable attitude toward Myungbak Lee.

The christian churches in South Korea kept individuals from choosing what they want, and thus, undermined democracy.
What do you think of it?

Which of the two do you think is more responsible for this kind of corruption in human society, christianity? or collective interests?

Edited by AdminPD, : Spacing

Message 3 of 17 (614007) 04-30-2011 9:05 AM

Reply to: Message 1 by Solomon18 04-30-2011 7:02 AM

As best I can understand it, you are claiming that Myungbak Lee fooled people into voting for him by making bizarre statements that nobody seemed to find bizarre. You hold the churches responsible for staying out of politics, which is what churches should do, in my opinion.

It sounds to me like the electorate got exactly what it wanted.

Message 4 of 17 (614008) 04-30-2011 9:10 AM

Reply to: Message 1 by Solomon18 04-30-2011 7:02 AM

Still lost.

What bizarre political positions?

How can a church keep people from choosing what they want?

Message 5 of 17 (614147) 05-02-2011 11:21 AM

Reply to: Message 4 by jar 04-30-2011 9:10 AM

The basic theory of convervatism:
there is equal opportunity for all,
and each individual is responsible for his or her own poverty,
and the governmental intervention for the poor is not necessary.

When there is no equal opportunity for all,
we cannot claim each individual should be responsible for his or her own poverty,
and it cannot be justified that the governmental intervention is unnecessary.

Therefore, the very basic prerequisite for the conservatism is there is equal opportunity.

MyungBak Lee sort of claimed that there should be no equal opportunity in Korea, suggesting that he should be a strong liberal in opposition to conservatism.
However, he was from the conservative camp, and he also pledged to develop the conservative party.
he publicly stated that he would offer Seoul City to God, and so on.

Many leaders in the churches in Korea recommended their followers to vote for Myungbak Lee, explicitly telling it is the will of God.

Message 6 of 17 (614148) 05-02-2011 11:32 AM

Reply to: Message 5 by Solomon18 05-02-2011 11:21 AM

What bizarre political positions?

How can a church keep people from choosing what they want?

Message 7 of 17 (614249) 05-03-2011 4:32 AM

Reply to: Message 6 by jar 05-02-2011 11:32 AM

Very easy and goes on all the time, in some way or another. You see, it's not "choosing what they want", rather "defining what they think they want". Do not underestimate the power of the pulpit in an organized religion.

In Malta, where the Catholic church has a very strong presence (in fact Catholicism is enshrined in the Constitution as the "religion of the Republic of Malta"), the Church is taking every opportunity to make its position known on an upcoming referendum on divorce - fair enough, as far as that goes, but one high-ranking prelate even came out as saying that voting in favour will be a mortal sin. To be fair, he was quickly shushed by the Church authorities, but one feels that this was more because of the predictable reaction from the more liberal media than any disagreement with the principle.

And going back a bit further in our history, in the sixties the Church twice issued interdicts on people who dared vote for leftist parties (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interdict) - and the leftist parties lost on both occasions. It may have been a good thing for us at the time, since the Labour Party at that time was quite extreme with Communist tendencies, but the action was reprehensible and certainly divided the people, a division whose effects we are still feeling forty years on.

Message 9 of 17 (614263) 05-03-2011 9:55 AM

Reply to: Message 6 by jar 05-02-2011 11:32 AM

Hello, Jar, Do you really think it's not bizzare to speak such things as "pursue prgmatism trascending ideologies?"
pragmatism is also an ideology, and it's like pursuing ideology transcending ideologies, which is essentially absurd.

"how can a church keep people from choosing what they want?"

Many church members wanted to vote for a candidate who would support the poor.
However, they ended up voting for a candidate who would not support the poor.
There were many in the churches who were highly educated and knew how politics are going and what political theories are,
but they kept their mouth shut, which caused the innocent voters to choose something they didn't want.
I think it might also be called "diffusion of responsibility" by social scientists.
among the highly educated christians, nobody volunteered to speak openly about his bizzare position.
Unlike diffusion of responsibility in general in social science,
this case can pinpoint who was responsible by a group though not by an inividual.
I think the highly educated christians were responsible.

Edited by Solomon18, : spelling error.

Message 10 of 17 (614266) 05-03-2011 10:03 AM

Reply to: Message 9 by Solomon18 05-03-2011 9:55 AM

But you still have not shown any bizarre positions, just pretty normal rhetoric, or how the church undermined democracy.

Message 11 of 17 (614270) 05-03-2011 10:28 AM

Reply to: Message 6 by jar 05-02-2011 11:32 AM

People seek answers. They seek information and belief from other people whom they trust. Far too few people have been taught how to think, question, evaluate and discriminate information. Fact is, we usually don't want to find the tough answers that we didn't really want to appear anyway. I would say that a church can keep people from choosing, period. As a group, it provides the answers for them and causes them to choose not to choose.

Message 12 of 17 (614272) 05-03-2011 10:33 AM

Reply to: Message 9 by Solomon18 05-03-2011 9:55 AM

I guess that these people might learn not to trust their church on political matters and to research the candidates themselves.

I see nothing bizarre here, politicians often climb up on the religion soap box and use church as a way to gain votes. What I find bizarre is the politicians who want to do away with the very social programs Jesus would've supported, and screaming to all who will listen, " Christian family values and morals!!". Thats bizarre to me.

Ad astra per aspera

Message 13 of 17 (614282) 05-03-2011 11:10 AM

Reply to: Message 8 by jar 05-03-2011 8:33 AM

Where did I say that? I'm not telling anyone how to vote.

Do YOU think Church leaders know what the people want better than THEY know what they want?

Message 15 of 17 (614316) 05-03-2011 1:52 PM

Reply to: Message 13 by fizz57102 05-03-2011 11:10 AM

And I still see no evidence of undermining democracy?

Were elections held?