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xvxvx

Not shady at all. Can’t have the public see what’s going on.

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You don't understand. You must always respect authority. Trump is the highest authority in the land, put there by God.

I no longer know if it's sarcasm

It depends on what team you’re rooting for in the sports game that has become politics in the US.

This has been the case for a long time. What's new and weird with this "sports" game is that the side with the umpire in their pocket has suddenly decided the game is bloodsport.

Oh from their point of view it always was. You can't explain the last decades in any other way. It's been brewing over time and as long as the blood spilled was mostly foreign blood on foreign soil it was all fine. Now the masks are dropping and suddenly it is plain to everybody what was plain to outsiders looking in for a long time.

If you’re a minority in America then it’s been a blood sport for a while. It’s only recently that the majority demographics are now at risk.

While the danger has increased recently, the targeting of minority groups in America has always included targeting those outside of the group perceived as defending the group (including simply by opposing the discriminatort targeting.)

And often the biggest reactions against the targeting of minorities are not triggered by acts against the minorities directly but by the acts against majority-demographic activists working on their behalf.

People believing the president of the United States has been ordained by God, and can therefore do no wrong, should be extremely concerning to EVERYONE, no matter what team your rooting for.

  Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they're sure trying to do so, it's going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise. I know, I've tried to deal with them.

  Barry Goldwater

He had a few more pertinent quotes on the issue, but he recognized the very problem he was courting. You cannot have a debate with God.

Correction: you cannot have a debate with people who have set up their politics as a God.

In the scriptures God is depicted as someone who sometimes is willing to have a debate, and reason with people, of course not to learn anything, but to explain why things are (or must be) the way they are.

In some instances, God is even depicted as willing to listen to man and do things he otherwise would not have done, so long that they don't deviate from his fundamental purpose.

God hates being anthropomorphized.

The preachers lost control of the Republican party in 2016. And if me from 10 years ago could hear me from today saying that I wish they were still in control, he would have a stroke, but I do.

That's because this is a pretty mainstream opinion now. I'd say... a quarter to a third of the population holds such beliefs.

If you ever shook your head at theocratic regimes such as Iran, well maybe look a little closer to home. "But... the people in charge of Iran are hypocrites, they do nasty stuff at home behind closed doors."

Again, may I point to Mom: "we have mullas at home".

This is the real danger of religion. When you train people from birth to turn off their brains and submit to authority without question, this is what happens.

Not quite. Religion, when taught properly, can serve as an innoculant against corrupt states, as it ingrains a kernel of understanding that man, and all his works are flawed, falling short of the perfection only attainable by the divine. There is always something higher worth maintaining loyalty toward. Like most things though, practicing that doesn't make you super popular with "leaders of worship" who wield their position in a human institutions as a tool to their own ends.

I agree wholeheartedly. Religion, practiced as designed, is extremely positive in my experience. I think the issue is that religion is and has been abused throughout history. I’m really not sure how to deal with this issue though. It seems the Abrahamic religion are quite vulnerable to this kind of abuse, likely because a core part of the doctrine is submission to authority.

I’ve never seen a Buddhist led genocide for instance, and I think a big part of that is the emphasis on looking inward for answers instead of outward.

I don't know if it ever was labeled a genocide, but Sri Lanka has a long history of Buddhist lead attacks against Tamils and other minorities.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhism_and_violence

Fair enough. Seems like the common thread is religion + government = atrocities

The common thread is groups of people = atrocities. Religion and government are two common properties that emerge from groups of people, but there are also countless examples of atrocities that involve neither.

Centralized power + sentient beings who occasionally produce sociopaths = atrocities.

This is why no one person should have so much unilateral power.

Not in the real world.

Religions are inherently centralized, and sociopaths are always drawn to centralized power.

I’m sure they said the same about Obama…. Right?

Each time that Obama expanded a domestic policing organization that then went to American cities and executed citizens, the same thing was said about him, yes. All zero times.

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