Christian Evangelism isn't a Political Party

[guacamole]

A temporary suspension of qualities a being has possessed in the past and which they will repossess in the future seems quite different to an instance of something that has never possessed those qualities but which might in the future.\

Your final sentence seems to be an outright falsehood: "Temporary suspension of awareness--as in the case... [for] infants". No, it is not the case for infants. They've never had awareness. It has not been "temporarily suspended" (unless you're endorsing some sort of pre-existence or reincarnation?).

I think you know well that an infant, in normal circumstances, will develop awareness. You may quibble with my inaccurate and inelegant prose, and you are probably right do so, but note that you are ignoring the equally important case on the other hand--the comatose and vegetative are still given human rights despite the fact that their suspension of awareness may not be temporary. The point about awareness being the thing that grants human rights is irrational.

[guacamole]

It is tragic to see that so many are either so stupid or so willfully ignorant as to fail to understand that "Pro-Life" means "Against targeted killing of the most innocent and defenseless." It's a convenient shorthand, you frickin' morons!

Are you trying to engage someone in conversation? Maybe try again.

[Starlight]

I am absolutely sympathetic to what you have to say. That said, I don't believe you (or I, for that matter) swim in the mainstream of Evangelical thought. There are too few evangelicals who are, imo, consistently pro-life, which is what my earlier comment to you was about--that one would be supposedly pro-life, but also pro-drone strike, pro-police impunity, etc. There are Christians who are absolutely okay with killing some infants in some circumstances so long as it serves some patriotic greater good. There are Christians who pay lip service to Christian ethics, but who believe nevertheless that the ends justify the means.

I'm not sure whether Adrift is just ignorant of politics, or whether this is about him trying to re-imagine the world as he wishes it were.

The simple fact is that US (white) evangelicals are a massively powerful political force in the US and have been since the 70s when the "moral majority" movement intentionally tried to draw US evangelicals en masse into politics. I think there's a lot not to like about that: 1. Evangelicalism is not, inherently, a political movement as WLC pointed out in the OP quote, so they probably ought not to be the political force that they are (prior to the 70s they weren't, and perhaps we should return to that time); 2. Voters, insofar as they let their Christianity influence their vote, ought to vote left-wing because the Bible has ~300 passages commanding caring for the poor which is above all what voting left-wing is about, whereas there's certainly no bible verse saying "let the poor starve and die without healthcare, and give tax cuts to the rich and corporations".

So it's entirely fair to argue that US evangelicals ought not to participate in politics in the way they currently do. Unfortunately, they currently do participate in the way they currently do. It's nice that Adrift would like to see that change, it's sad though that he seems to have his head in the sand with regards to the current reality of the situation, and that rather than critique his fellow evangelicals who are participating in politics on a truly massive scale in a way he doesn't agree with, he is instead throwing a tantrum about people like me who are unhappy with the way US evangelicals are currently participating in politics the way they are.

People who identify as both white and evangelical make up about 1/5th of all registered voters, and 76% of them also say they are Republican or lean Republican, and 80% of them said they voted for Trump over Clinton. Obviously that has a massive impact on US politics, and obviously Trump wouldn't have won the electoral college without that high rate of support, and obviously the Republican party is massively affected by the huge white evangelical voting bloc that they have. Their current effect on US politics is huge, and they are currently strongly aligned with with the Republican party and with Trump.

[Darth Executor]

Does that include being against civilians or first responders being killed by flying robots in middle eastern countries? Serious question, because it doesn't appear to. During the Obama administration, internal analyses found that 90% of the people they were killing with drone strikes were not the intended targets. Trump has quadrupled Obama's rate of drone strikes. I find that "pro-life" Americans are by and large supportive of the "War on Terror" (which I view to itself be terrorism in the sense that it terrorizes people in the middle east)

How is being a civillian inherently more worthy of protection than being a soldier? Wars aren't personal disputes between individual soldiers, they are massive disputes between groups of people, some performing different functions but all of them contributing to the war machine.

[Adrift]

I'm not sure whether Adrift is just ignorant of politics, or whether this is about him trying to re-imagine the world as he wishes it were.

The simple fact is that US (white) evangelicals are a massively powerful political force in the US and have been since the 70s when the "moral majority" movement intentionally tried to draw US evangelicals en masse into politics. I think there's a lot not to like about that: 1. Evangelicalism is not, inherently, a political movement as WLC pointed out in the OP quote, so they probably ought not to be the political force that they are (prior to the 70s they weren't, and perhaps we should return to that time); 2. Voters, insofar as they let their Christianity influence their vote, ought to vote left-wing because the Bible has ~300 passages commanding caring for the poor which is above all what voting left-wing is about, whereas there's certainly no bible verse saying "let the poor starve and die without healthcare, and give tax cuts to the rich and corporations".

So it's entirely fair to argue that US evangelicals ought not to participate in politics in the way they currently do. Unfortunately, they currently do participate in the way they currently do. It's nice that Adrift would like to see that change, it's sad though that he seems to have his head in the sand with regards to the current reality of the situation, and that rather than critique his fellow evangelicals who are participating in politics on a truly massive scale in a way he doesn't agree with, he is instead throwing a tantrum about people like me who are unhappy with the way US evangelicals are currently participating in politics the way they are.

People who identify as both white and evangelical make up about 1/5th of all registered voters, and 76% of them also say they are Republican or lean Republican, and 80% of them said they voted for Trump over Clinton. Obviously that has a massive impact on US politics, and obviously Trump wouldn't have won the electoral college without that high rate of support, and obviously the Republican party is massively affected by the huge white evangelical voting bloc that they have. Their current effect on US politics is huge, and they are currently strongly aligned with with the Republican party and with Trump.

You can stop pretending you have me on ignore Starlight. I went over most of this in posts #3 and #20. I know you read them.

[Starlight]

You can stop pretending you have me on ignore Starlight.

I had you on ignore, but this thread title interested me so I temporarily took you off ignore. Unfortunately TWeb's ignore feature seems partially broken and does not allow me to show individual posts by a person on ignore. I will put you back on ignore soon probably.

I went over most of this in posts #3 and #20.

Yeah you had a number of dumb, wrong, and beside the point statements as usual. I judged them to be so dumb as to be not worth the effort of refuting. But it's worth reminding people that in spite of your various attempts to deny reality, that unfortunately US white evangelicals constitute a very powerful and influential voting bloc in US politics.

[Starlight]

I think you know well that an infant, in normal circumstances, will develop awareness.

Sure. But I don't see an obligation to let it do so, any more than I see an obligation to have as much sex as possible in order to create as many new self-aware beings as possible. I don't believe we have any moral obligation to not-yet-existing awarenesses to cause them to exist or develop.

you are ignoring the equally important case on the other hand--the comatose and vegetative are still given human rights despite the fact that their suspension of awareness may not be temporary.

Eh? To the extent that we can determine the likelihood that someone will never wake up, I am happy with them being taken off life support / euthanized.

The point about awareness being the thing that grants human rights is irrational.

Maybe you are misunderstanding it? I am not advocating any one single criteria - eg "consciousness", but a wide variety of different qualities that occur together in entities with higher-brain functions. These include things like the ability to form memories; an understanding of oneself as a being that exists over time; the ability to find things meaningful; the ability to have goals and purposes; the ability to experience pain and pleasure; the ability to have abstract thought; etc.

Obviously when you are in a deep sleep or unconscious you do not currently have consciousness so you are not currently experiencing pain or self-awareness or meanings or goals or having thoughts. But you still are in full possession of the ability to have them. When you turn off your computer, it doesn't stop being a computer, it merely stops computing. So when you go to sleep you don't stop being an entity that posses all those higher brain functions you just temporarily stop using them. Your purposes and goals and memories are all still there, they aren't gone the next day and you don't wake up a blank slate. If someone kills you in your sleep, then it means you're not able to fulfill the goals and purposes you had, just the same as if they'd killed you when you were awake.

[Tassman]

People in a coma also have no awareness of their own state, emotions, or motivations. Shoot, people in a deep sleep have no awareness of their own state, emotions, or motivations. Temporary suspension of awareness--as in the case of the comatose, the deeply asleep, and yes, infants--is unreasonable grounds for the revocation of human rights.

People in a coma have already attained 'personhood' and are therefore entitled to their individual human rights. Brain function and self awareness is the criterion to determine the death of a person therefore it should also be the criterion for its beginning.

Are you trying to engage someone in conversation? Maybe try again.

Well said.

Extreme fundamentalists have this tendency to talk at one in the full knowledge that God is on their side and therefore everyone else is wrong.

[Adrift]

I had you on ignore, but this thread title interested me so I temporarily took you off ignore. Unfortunately TWeb's ignore feature seems partially broken and does not allow me to show individual posts by a person on ignore. I will put you back on ignore soon probably.

Nah, I don't believe you ever had me on ignore, and I'm certain you won't put me on ignore in the future. You lack the self control to do the things you say you will do.

Yeah you had a number of dumb, wrong, and beside the point statements as usual. I judged them to be so dumb as to be not worth the effort of refuting.

No, no one's buying that that's the reason you didn't reply.

But it's worth reminding people that in spite of your various attempts to deny reality, that unfortunately US white evangelicals constitute a very powerful and influential voting bloc in US politics.

The thread was never about "US white evangelicals". It was about Evangelical Christianity, period. Evangelical Christianity is not US-specific, nor is it strictly white. Nor is it strictly right-leaning or conservative. There are plenty of prominent people who identify as Evangelical who lean other than strict US "Moral Majority" conservative including Rob Bell, Edward Gilbreath, Jim Wallis, John Perkins, Andrew van der Bijl, NT Wright, Greg Boyd, Jimmy Carter, Roger Olson, Phillip Yancey, Ajith Fernando, Mary Poplin, Eugene Cho, Luis Palau, and so many others. There are whole Evangelical communities like the New Monastic movements, and Open Evangelicalism which seek to get right down in the dirt where the poor and the hurting are living. I don't agree with everything these people believe or preach, but Evangelicalism is much MUCH bigger than this goofy Moral Majority concept that you've built up in your head. As always, you're talking about things you don't have a clue about.

[Tassman]

I think you know well that an infant, in normal circumstances, will develop awareness. You may quibble with my inaccurate and inelegant prose, and you are probably right do so, but note that you are ignoring the equally important case on the other hand--the comatose and vegetative are still given human rights despite the fact that their suspension of awareness may not be temporary. The point about awareness being the thing that grants human rights is irrational.

Potential is NOT actuality.

[Tassman]

Ok, so mark you down as pro-infanticide too. Got it.

OH NO!!! Not that! <facepalm>

[Adrift]

OH NO!!! Not that! <facepalm>

Interesting to see the 180 you've demonstrated here. Within one thread you went from being against infanticide, and attempted a weak defense of Starlight on that basis, to accepting Starlight's arguments on the subject, and being pro-infanticide. I don't think that's anything to laugh about, but I guess that just demonstrates how weak your moral foundation was to begin with.

[rogue06]

Ok, so mark you down as pro-infanticide too. Got it.

Unbelievable what this world is coming to.

Slowly but surely the left has been embracing the concept of "after-birth abortions"

[Darth Executor]

Tassman and JimL are simply incapable of independent thought. They will absorb by osmosis the progressive opinions of the nearest liberal with slightly more neurons than they have.

[Tassman]

Interesting to see the 180 you've demonstrated here. Within one thread you went from being against infanticide, and attempted a weak defense of Starlight on that basis, to accepting Starlight's arguments on the subject, and being pro-infanticide. I don't think that's anything to laugh about, but I guess that just demonstrates how weak your moral foundation was to begin with.