Thank you. Now back to work!…

…

You have stated an interesting premise. That God’s greatest gift is free agency. It is, of course, but it is not well understood by the general run of humanity.

Thanks for giving it voice.

My first encounter with this particular kind of fantasy occurred when I was in college in the late sixties. A friend of mine and I got into a heated argument. Although we were both opposed to the Vietnam War, we discovered that we differed considerably on what counted as permissible forms of anti-war protest. To me the point of such protest was simple — to turn people against the war. Hence anything that was counterproductive to this purpose was politically irresponsible and should be severely censured. My friend thought otherwise; in fact, he was planning to join what by all accounts was to be a massively disruptive demonstration in Washington, and which in fact became one.

My friend did not disagree with me as to the likely counterproductive effects of such a demonstration. Instead, he argued that this simply did not matter. His answer was that even if it was counterproductive, even if it turned people against war protesters, indeed even if it made them more likely to support the continuation of the war, he would still participate in the demonstration and he would do so for one simple reason — because it was, in his words, good for his soul.

What I saw as a political act was not, for my friend, any such thing. It was not aimed at altering the minds of other people or persuading them to act differently. Its whole point was what it did for him.

And what it did for him was to provide him with a fantasy — a fantasy, namely, of taking part in the revolutionary struggle of the oppressed against their oppressors. By participating in a violent anti-war demonstration, he was in no sense aiming at coercing conformity with his view — for that would still have been a political objective. Instead, he took his part in order to confirm his ideological fantasy of marching on the right side of history, of feeling himself among the elect few who stood with the angels of historical inevitability. Thus, when he lay down in front of hapless commuters on the bridges over the Potomac, he had no interest in changing the minds of these commuters, no concern over whether they became angry at the protesters or not. They were there merely as props, as so many supernumeraries in his private psychodrama. The protest for him was not politics, but theater; and the significance of his role lay not in the political ends his actions might achieve, but rather in their symbolic value as ritual. In short, he was acting out a fantasy.

It was not your garden-variety fantasy of life as a sexual athlete or a racecar driver, but in it, he nonetheless made himself out as a hero — a hero of the revolutionary struggle. The components of his fantasy — and that of many young intellectuals at that time — were compounded purely of ideological ingredients, smatterings of Marx and Mao, a little Fanon and perhaps a dash of Herbert Marcuse.

I dare say our current crop of “activists” are cut from the same cloth. Throw in some serious psychological denial and displacement, and you have a pretty good profile of the way they “think”.

On January 1st, 2008 at 2:51 pm, Dr. Lead Based Paint said:
I think the injection of “religion” into the political scene is a disgrace.

Our founding fathers would not only disagree, but would have had no idea how able men could be steered from the corruption of office without it. Swearing an oath on the Bible, ensuring that the spectre of an invoved and present God – these were the things that partially motivated them and things they wanted to ensure all men were mindful of to ensure honesty and motivations that were borne of a sense of the common good. Take God out of the political arena, and you strip a society of both it’s soul and it’s higher conscience. Our founding fathers knew that. The character of mankind has barely changed an ounce in all of the 10,000 years of recorded history. The world still has power-seekers, haters, liars, thieves and alturistic saints. It has philosophers and clowns, men of war and men of peace. Do we assume that having plasma TVs, ipods and the internet has substantially changed the basic natures of men? Of course not. Anyone who believes that God should be taken out of the political arena pits their wisdom against that of the founding fathers. Fair enough then, but let them prove it. Let then prove it as our forefathers did, not with hypothetical talk but with deed. And then we shall see. In the meantime, until someone can prove otherwise, we should continue to govern and choose those who govern with God very much in the forefront of our thoughts and discussions. Unless someone knows better than our founding fathers, of course. But let them prove it before they say they do.

The USA is NOT a Christian nation and therefore, anything blatantly religious in politics is completely irrelevant.

Beg to differ … over 80% of the Americans refer to themselves as Christian when asked about their beliefs. However, …”anything blatantly religious in politics is completely irrevelevant” inappropriate. Now that I completely agree with.

Then we have the rabid fundamentalists mouthing off about it as if what Jesus would or would not do has any impact on the pending electoral disaster of 2008.

So in this case, both sides are both hypocritical and wrong. The USA is NOT a Christian nation and therefore, anything blatantly religious in politics is completely irrelevant.

Like I care.

Personally, I can’t wait to have a smelly protester spit on me. My liberal mandated, pre-proscribed PTSD is gonna kick in all over their dirty selves….

…not my fault.

You are a fool, and it didn’t work troll boy.

Now, back to the subject which you refuse to adress because you DO believe in it, support it, identify with it etc., unllike us, who do not support what you presented spin master…

The only Jesus these morons are aware of, is the “Surfer Jesus”. He’s the one depicted in pictures always staring off into space, long wavy brown hair blowing in the breeze, looking like he just did a bong hit. They are only aware of certain teachings which they either remember from when they were in kindergarten and the Sunday School teacher would tell some cute story, or something they have heard that has been over used a million times out of context. They know the myth of Jesus being a man of peace, yet completely reject the religion behind Him, reject the Trinity, reject the whole Son of God, rject God period.

Maybe the use of theological quandries would men more, would actually have an effect on people of faith, if they came from both other people of faith AND people that did not defend an opposing alleged religion that has sworn to, and has been slaughtering members of their religion. MAYBE these religious questions would carry more weight if the people asking them didn’t spend the rest of their time mocking and making the practice of Chritianity such a nightmare and battle in this country and indeed, the very nature of these quesions alone slap people in their face by mocking the moral crusade for teenagers which asks them to think before doing anything stupid like having pre-marital sex at 15 or stealing to think “What Would Jesus Do”

So you see, even the very nature of it slaps Christians in their face. You wouldn’t see these hypocrites asking “What Would Mohammed Do” now would you? Of course not. That would offend their favorite murderous scumbags.

On January 1st, 2008 at 12:08 pm, lgm said:
8 protesters, 30 reporters, 100 conservative bloggers, no harm done. Any thoughts about the arsonists visiting abortion clinics and threatening to murder the staff?

Any thoughts about those calling for the murder of President Bush and Vice President Cheney?