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Author | Topic: Separation of church and state | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Taz Member (Idle past 3292 days) Posts: 5069 From: Zerus Joined:
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I believe others here have made it sufficiently clear that the founders did want to separate church and state. But let us suppose that you are right. Suppose the country was indeed founded on christian principles. Why couldn't it change to include more freedom for more people?
Even after the 14th admendment was ratified, it took several more legislations to make native Americans citizens. Why? Because the founders never intended for anyone but white men to be citizens. Even white women didn't have true citizenship. I've never understood this entire founding-fathers-were-christian-therefore-we-must-be-a-christian-nation mentality. I could just as easily claim that since the founding fathers had slaves we should reinstitute slavery in this country. And since the founding fathers didn't want native Americans or Chinese immigrants to be citizens, we should revoke all their citizenships.
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Taz Member (Idle past 3292 days) Posts: 5069 From: Zerus Joined: |
Marc9000, I still don't understand what all the fuss is about. The framers never intended for Native Americans or Chinese immigrants to ever become citizens. They never intended women to be able to vote. They never intended black people to ever be free. Hell, the three-fifths compromise was stamped into the constitution to allow partial head count for black slaves.
None of that is relevant today. So, I ask again. What the hell is your point? Do you even have a point? If you insist, I can start a whole new thread demanding we revoke all citizenship from Native Americans, Chinese Americans, and African Americans. I can even start a separate thread demanding we revoke women's right to vote since the framers never intended women to be able to vote. Yes, your line of logic is a double edge sword.
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Taz Member (Idle past 3292 days) Posts: 5069 From: Zerus Joined: |
subbie writes:
(1) The framers had slaves of their own. I'd be curious to see if you had any evidence to support these statements.(2) Even after the 14th amendment was passed, it took several more legislations to make Native Americans citizens of the US. I think that's abundantly clear. (3) Women were finally given the right to vote in the 20th century. Again, I think that's obvious enough. (4) Ever heard of the three-fifths compromise? I'm not aware of any specific information supporting or refuting any of your other points, but I'd frankly be very surprised if all the framers were of one mind on any of them.
I'm not talking from an academic point of view. In fact, I have no intention of submitting a paper to be published any time soon. That said, look at my list above. The other thing is this. There were in fact nazis that were against exterminating the Jews. So what if a few of them were against the general policy?
However, to the extent that your general point to Marc is that we should feel no particular compulsion to go beyond what the framers originally intended, you are obviously correct.
All I'm saying is marc seems to be strongly implying that since the framers didn't want to separate church and state therefore we should be a christian nation, I could just as easily say since the framers never allowed women to vote we should take away their right to vote and make them stay at home to make babies. And since Native Americans were never intended to become citizens, let's take away all their rights right now and ship them off to guitmo. I'm simply surprised not many people have called marc on this very faulty logic of his and his ilk.
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Taz Member (Idle past 3292 days) Posts: 5069 From: Zerus Joined: |
subbie writes:
Um, no. Of course. The fact that it was a compromise shows that not everyone agreed. It was the north that didn't want them niggers to be counted as people at all. The south wanted to be able to count them fully for representation. So, the compromise wasn't because of some people having a conflict of conscience. It was purely political.
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Taz Member (Idle past 3292 days) Posts: 5069 From: Zerus Joined: |
subbie writes:
I'm not sure I can make you understand what I mean, so let me try anyway. Your suggestion that it was racially motivated is belied by the fact that the 3/5 rule applied to slaves, not blacks. The 3/5 compromise allow us to understand how the framers were approaching the issue. The fact that they were able to compromise about treating an entire population of people should be very telling that they did not see these people as people. It's like me saying "I love niggers". If you're going to accuse me of being racist, I'd just respond "but I really love them, how can I be a racist?" In this particular case, we can't tell directly what the framers thought on the issue of slavery or human right, but we can tell from the way they approached the issue. As I said many times in the past. A human right is a human right. It's not up for debate. It's not negotiable. And it's certainly not up for compromise. The framers may have been ahead of their time, but they're certainly not ahead of ours. Edit. This is why I get such a hard-on on the issue of gay rights. This is one issue I will not compromise for. No, seperate but equal won't cut it. No, don't ask don't tell won't cut it. No, I will not budge. Nothing short of complete equality will cut it. Edited by Taz, : No reason given.
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Taz Member (Idle past 3292 days) Posts: 5069 From: Zerus Joined: |
First of all, I don't disagree with you. We're just arguing about very fine points... splitting hairs here.
you writes:
I never said all. I really really hate to invoke godwin's law, but I think it's appropriate in this instance. Not all of them, is what Subbie is saying, and he's right. John Adams (2nd President of the United States) was a lifelong abolitionist. Not all nazis were evil. Some really truly tried to help the Jews. Some honest to goodness were kind-hearted people. And yet I've never seen a single person, not even you, say "not all nazis were evil bastards". Why? Because there were enough of them to be evil for the general rule to work. Correct me if I'm wrong, but even the hardcore framers who were lifelong abolitionists didn't believe in equal rights for everyone. They all made it abundantly clear that they believed the black race were inferior. But as I pointed out in another post, it's not the 3/5 compromise itself that I want direct attention to. It's the act of coming to the compromise that we should look at. Like I said, compromises in regard to human right issues never make sense. Human right issues are not up for debate and they certainly are not negotiable. Suppose I want to slice off a man's flesh one little piece at a time to make him confess to a crime. You come in all righteous and say I can't do that because it's a violation of his rights. I don't agree because I pointed out that he raped and murdered 4 kids. Ok, so let's compromise. I'll only cut off his fingers and ears and leave the rest of his body alone. What kind of a person would you be if you accepted this compromise? This is why I won't budge on the issues of gay rights.
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Taz Member (Idle past 3292 days) Posts: 5069 From: Zerus Joined: |
hyro writes:
Wow, what a cop-out. We can't know exactly what they thought. All we have is their writings, and as best as I can tell, based upon the information, the one's I quoted did not believe that. If they really believed everyone is equal, they wouldn't have compromised. Just like if you truly believe it is morally repugnant for me to slice people up to get them to confess, you wouldn't compromise for me to only cut off their fingers and ears and nothing else.
I understand what you mean, but the fact of the matter is that it happened and no amount of piety is going to change it. I'm just not sure where this is tying in to the current discussion.
The current discussion entails what the founding fathers did believe and did not believe. Some people are taking the strict documentary approach while I'm trying to convince some of you to also consider their actions. Going back to slicing someone up for a confession, if you're willing to compromise with me so that I'm just gonna cut off his ears and fingers and leave the rest of his body alone, no amount of biographies and essays you can publish to convince that you're really truly against torture. Just like there is amount of writing by the framers to convince me that they truly believed everyone was created equal. Hell, right off the bat they never even considered giving women the right to vote. Quoting poetry from 1700s is great, but reality tells a different story.
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Taz Member (Idle past 3292 days) Posts: 5069 From: Zerus Joined: |
jar writes:
If what I said is nonsense, then so is saying some of them believed in complete equality just because they wrote a couple of poetic verses. Utter nonsense Taz. The goal of the folk trying to write a Constitution that had a chance of being ratified by all the states required a whole bunch of compromises. They understood that the goal was not to create something perfect but rather to create a Constitution that was "Just Good Enough" to get by; a Constitution where everyone could say "I may not like it but I can live with that." The point is that opinions on the nature of Black people varied among the framers and their constituents. Some, likely a small minority may well have thought Blacks and Whites were equal, others did not. The goal was to find wording that everyone involved could live with, nothing more.
I'll settle with what I said earlier as nonsense. But the fact remains that the framers hammered out something that clearly did not give equal rights to a lot of people. You can't sit there and tell me they believed in equal rights for everyone. In fact, I'm pretty sure if I was in their shoes I would have settled for a compromise that everyone could live it. But I wouldn't expect people 300 years in the future to believe I was some kind of saint. Again, poetic verses from the 1700s are great to read, but don't expect me to believe that's what they really believed. Edited by Taz, : No reason given.
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Taz Member (Idle past 3292 days) Posts: 5069 From: Zerus Joined: |
marc9000 writes:
Way the go to purposely misunderstand my point. But liberty and limited government is relevant, separation of church and state is relevant. The framers never had to deal with the combination of atheism and state to the degree that we do today. Slavery, women's rights, and a host of other things are relevant today, too. But what the framers thought about these issues aren't relevant today at all. Or would you rather we enslave the niggers and try to exterminate the reds again? Because if that's what you're saying, that because the framers were christians therefore we have to be a christian nation today, then might as well go back to whipping those niggers.
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Taz Member (Idle past 3292 days) Posts: 5069 From: Zerus Joined: |
Hyro writes: 1. It wasn't poetry2. Are you calling them liars? 3. Are you saying they were insincere? If you haven't noticed, politicians have the tendency to write down about themselves in a different light than what they actually believe. We make fun of Bush now, but in a couple hundred years I'm sure they will praise him as god's chosen one from all the rhetoric he's been writing and people have been writing about him. Since when did you believe politicians are completely honest people about themselves and others?
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Taz Member (Idle past 3292 days) Posts: 5069 From: Zerus Joined: |
Hyro writes:
Yes, that's right, ignore common sense and their actions. Hitler wrote in mein campf that he had the german people's best interest in mind. Nevermind that at the end he ordered the complete destruction of his country. He was a good man who had everyone's best interest at heart because he wrote it down. So in other words, the Founding Fathers were politicking liars, of which you have no evidence for? Don't you see how silly you sound by ignoring history and just look at what those politicians wrote about themselves? Edit. Watch the following video. I'm sure in his biography somewhere he's going to write down that tax breaks paid for themselves. Look at how many times the republican dodged the question. In other words, he doesn't even believe his own political slogan, that tax breaks pay for themselves. Hyro, when people write down about themselves knowing future generations will judge them based on those writings, don't expect them to be completely honest about their flaws. I know that no matter how many poems and biographies the republican leaders publish claiming they believe tax breaks pay for themselves, I will never believe that even they believe in this philosophy. Edited by Taz, : No reason given.
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Taz Member (Idle past 3292 days) Posts: 5069 From: Zerus Joined: |
Hyro writes:
(1) No, I'm not saying by the sole virtue of them being politicians they have to never tell the truth. Are you being serious? Are you saying that it's a fact that all politicians, by the sole virtue of them being politicians, are destined to not ever tell the truth? It's literally impossible that John Adams never owned slaves, and was disturbed by the practice of slave ownership? That is impossible? (2) The issue isn't about owning slaves or not. The issue is about whether they actually believed all men and women were suppose to be equal. (3) Lincoln was didn't believe in slavery but he freely admitted that the "black race" was inferior to the "white race". There, I just proved that it's possible to not believe in slavery and still be a bigot. (4) My video is relevant. It proves that it is possible for people to claim they believe one thing but not really believe it. (5) Just because it was 200 years ago doesn't mean man's nature was different. People who knows their name will ring in the history book will try to put themselves in the best light possible. This isn't anecdotal. This is a fact of life. I am not saying that I believe those framers who didn't own slaves were bigots solely because they said they weren't. I'm saying I believe them to be bigots because of their actions in history. As I said before, Hitler could have published 100 different versions of mein campf telling the world how much he loved Germany and it's people. The fact of the matter is at the end he ordered the complete destruction of the country's infrastructure. Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not dissing the framers at all. If anything, I think they were way ahead of their time. That said, I'm not naive enough to think they truly believed in equal rights for all. Hell, almost 300 years later and people still don't believe in equal rights for all.
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Taz Member (Idle past 3292 days) Posts: 5069 From: Zerus Joined: |
Bikerman writes:
Depends on what you mean by subtle. President Bush, god bless his soul, and his ilk kept saying they wanted equal rights for gay people yet kept trying to pass a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage and any form of civil union for gay people that resembled marriage. They keep telling everyone they believe in equal rights for all, yet their actions tell us a completely different story. I know what you are saying, with regard to politicians, but it is too extreme. The art of politics does not depend on not telling the truth. It is far more subtle than that and any politician who lies frequently is a bad politician and will probably suffer for it. I'm more than sure that in Bush's biography he will stamp the phrase "I believe equal rights for all" at the beginning of each chapter. But frankly, his actions told us a completely different belief system. Again, I am not naive enough to believe the framers actually believed in equal rights for all. Hell, even the KKK from time to time have said they believed in equal rights for all. It's a fashionable thing to say, but few people actually believe in it.
OFF TOPIC - Please Do Not Respond to this message by continuing in this vein. AdminPD Edited by AdminPD, : Warning
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