Modern American Conservatism or Classical Liberalism: A Definition

[Foxfyre]

LOL! No. The statist's suppression of/impositions on the free exercise of the Christian's fundamental liberties are not freedom. These things are tyranny, and the Christian is not obliged to choose/tolerate these warts at all.

Got empathy? Are you blind? What is this bias of yours that causes you to lose sight of the distinction between civil liberties and civil rights when it comes to the Christian's plight in the face of an increasingly pagan nation where collectivistic statism is on the rise?

There's nothing stopping a homosexual marrying whomever he pleases. You're not talking about the freedom to marry. You're talking about the government's official approbation/recognition of homosexual marriage and the government's imposition of it on the public and private sector.

Hello!
______________________________________

So, you're not talking about inherent inalienable rights/unabridgible civil liberties at all. You're talking about civil rights/protections enforced by government against the free exercise of the former, based on sexual behavior that is obviously not compatible with the physiological/biological imperatives of nature or the natural law of classical liberalism.

Right?

So when government grants its official approbation for homosexual marriage, it necessarily imposes the acceptance of if in the public schools, for example, doesn't it? It necessary promotes/advances the notion of its legal and moral rightness and acceptability. And that now impacts the inherent inalienable rights/unabridgible civil liberties of others.

Right?

So you don't believe that fundamental liberties take precedence over the "rights" enforced by government that would suppress the former, and you don't really care if the government violates the fundamental rights of Christians in the public schools as pagans shove their morality on the children of Christians or when the government forces Christians to accommodate pagan behavior against the Christian's prerogatives of free-association and property in the private sector?

Right?

And you don’t care that Christians don't really care what homosexuals do as long as the latter don't violate their rights.

Right?

And you don't care that Christians have argued that the government needs to get out of the business of marriage altogether?

Right?

And you don't care that Christians are at the forefront of the fight for educational freedom, universal school choice for this very reason, among others?

Right?

And you don't care that statists (leftists, Marxists, progressives) are bent on using the government to suppress the free exercise of fundamental liberties, impose conformity and acceptance of paganism, materialism, secular humanism and the like, and, therefore, oppose getting the government out of the business of marriage or giving up their control of the schools?

Social Engineering.

The Christian is just supposed to roll over, surrender his fundamental liberties in the face of this tyranny?

Right?

So you're accusing the Christian of what exactly? For exerting defensive political force in the face of the statist's initial force against the Christian's prerogatives of free-association and private property? Against his parental consent and authority in the schools?

Why do you blame the Christian for the dilemma instigated by statists?

You're really not a very reliable defender of the fundamental liberties of classical liberalism or natural law at all, are you?

Okay, let's focus on the concepts, not each other.

Actually, based on my recollections of Two Thumbs posts on various topics over recent years, I am pretty sure he supports the classical liberal position fairly well across the board. In that post I took him as expressing one place he doesn't agree with conservatism is on the issue of gay marriage. In my response to him I tried to present what I believe the classical liberal (modern conservative) point of view really is about that. He may or may not agree with me about that, and that is okay.

The true modern day conservative, aka classical liberal, doesn't give a flying fig who marries who so long as the marriage is between consenting people who are at or beyond the age of consent.

But because our culture values children and we, as a people, are pretty much in agreement that children, who are denied many rights afforded to adults, are rightfully entitled to certain protections. The marriage laws in all 50 states are specifically designed to protect any children that result from husband and wife having sex. With very few exceptions, they serve essentially no other reasonable purpose.

So the issue should always have been how to provide important/necessary benefits to family units for whatever reason do not wish to or cannot marry under existing marriage law. In my opinion that can be done without changing a definition that has endured for all of recorded history.

Fox, the issue in this case goes to the difference between civil liberties and civil rights. The difference between, as you put, someone being free to be all they can be with impunity, as long as they don't violate the fundamental rights of others. A free people are not obliged to accommodate the life choices of others . . . or else there is no liberty. For me, the specific examples are irrelevant, merely illustrative of the pertinent distinction.

I agree. Which is why I made the argument earlier that the issue is not whether gay people should 'marry'. That is something for the gay people to decide for themselves just as heterosexual people decide that for themselves. That is the only view one can take if one believe in unalienable rights and liberty.

The issue of the definition of marriage goes a little deeper and does involve basic rights. Should one segment of society be able to demand that they get their way and whatever is important to anybody else be damned? Is a concept of civil rights to be the ONLY consideration when implementation of those civil rights violates somebody else's unalienable rights? What is more important? That gay people have the same rights and protections as everybody else, or that such rights and protections replace existing laws and policy that others see as important and beneficial to all?

These are not easy questions. But the basic principles involved can be applied to them.

People demanding that society give them what they want at the expense of the unalienable rights of others has created a whole lot of grief, suffering, and injustice for a great many people.

 

[M.D. Rawlings]

Okay, let's focus on the concepts, not each other.

Actually, based on my recollections of Two Thumbs posts on various topics over recent years, I am pretty sure he supports the classical liberal position fairly well across the board. In that post I took him as expressing one place he doesn't agree with conservatism is on the issue of gay marriage. In my response to him I tried to present what I believe the classical liberal (modern conservative) point of view really is about that. He may or may not agree with me about that, and that is okay.

The true modern day conservative, aka classical liberal, doesn't give a flying fig who marries who so long as the marriage is between consenting people who are at or beyond the age of consent.

But because our culture values children and we, as a people, are pretty much in agreement that children, who are denied many rights afforded to adults, are rightfully entitled to certain protections. The marriage laws in all 50 states are specifically designed to protect any children that result from husband and wife having sex. With very few exceptions, they serve essentially no other reasonable purpose.

So the issue should always have been how to provide important/necessary benefits to family units for whatever reason do not wish to or cannot marry under existing marriage law. In my opinion that can be done without changing a definition that has endured for all of recorded history.

Fox, the issue in this case goes to the difference between civil liberties and civil rights. The difference between, as you put, someone being free to be all they can be with impunity, as long as they don't violate the fundamental rights of others. A free people are not obliged to accommodate the life choices of others . . . or else there is no liberty. For me, the specific examples are irrelevant, merely illustrative of the pertinent distinction.

I agree. Which is why I made the argument earlier that the issue is not whether gay people should 'marry'. That is something for the gay people to decide for themselves just as heterosexual people decide that for themselves. That is the only view one can take if one believe in unalienable rights and liberty.

The issue of the definition of marriage goes a little deeper and does involve basic rights. Should one segment of society be able to demand that they get their way and whatever is important to anybody else be damned? Is a concept of civil rights to be the ONLY consideration when implementation of those civil rights violates somebody else's unalienable rights? What is more important? That gay people have the same rights and protections as everybody else, or that such rights and protections replace existing laws and policy that others see as important and beneficial to all?

These are not easy questions. But the basic principles involved can be applied to them.

People demanding that society give them what they want at the expense of the unalienable rights of others has created a whole lot of grief, suffering, and injustice for a great many people.

I agree. Live and let live. The problem is not unfettered liberty, and never has been. I don't know of any politically savvy Christians who oppose legitimate, unfettered liberty.

Do you?

Some people, and they ain't Christians, are demanding things from others they have no moral or natural right to demand, and the only way they think to get away with it is to empower the government to bully, penalize, rob, steal, impose, suppress . . . accuse, as they hide behind the banner of governmentally enforced civil rights predicated on behavior at the expense of live and let live.

It's tyranny and must be opposed.

Gays, for example, are free to marry whomever they please. Who's stopping them? Who wants to stop them?

But when they demand that others surrender their civil liberties to accommodate their lifestyles, they cross a line, the line where their rights end . . . and where the rights of others begin.

It's sheer narcissism.

If as a society we've suddenly decided 230-some-years later that homosexual marriage is a legitimate institution. . . . Fine. Marry away. But what's all this other garbage about forcing private adoption agencies to close up shop because they, on the basis of their religious convictions, reject homosexual couples or all this other garbage about demanding that photographers and bakers bow down before other gods?

The only just solution: the government needs to get the hell out of the business of marriage altogether, and others need to get their business out of the face of others. Problem solved.

Otherwise you have tyranny.

But the statists are not going to agree to the just solution, are they? Social engineering via the government. Live and let live? Both you and I know they're not going to do that . . . and some think to blame Christians.

Those who are being tyrannized, right now, by the way, are not obliged in any way, shape or form to support the statist's agenda; rather, they are justified to oppose it tooth-and-nail. It is their right and their duty to defend themselves and their children against the illegitimate agenda of thugs.

Bottom line: the violations of inalienable rights/unabridgible civil liberties will always be so-called civil rights based on behavior that is not politically essential and, therefore, none of the government's damn business.

That is my ultimate point. The rest is just illustrative.

Some folks need illustrations, or they're never see what the actual nuts and bolts of tyranny are in the hands of those bent on subverting our constitutional Republic . . . of live and let live. Some folks think the problem is the natural behavior or expressions or associations of some as opposed to those of others. No! The problem is the government taking sides against the "evil doers" who resist social engineering as it empowers itself in the name of benevolence on the behalf of the "victims" who go along with it . . . for not so honorable reasons at all.

Some people get sucked into that Orwellian jive as the just, live-and-let-live solution flies right over their heads; and they start imagining that what is in fact the politically legitimate behavior of some in the face of tyranny is evil, that those who tell the government to go to hell are baaaad people.

 

[Foxfyre]

Fox, the issue in this case goes to the difference between civil liberties and civil rights. The difference between, as you put, someone being free to be all they can be with impunity, as long as they don't violate the fundamental rights of others. A free people are not obliged to accommodate the life choices of others . . . or else there is no liberty. For me, the specific examples are irrelevant, merely illustrative of the pertinent distinction.

I agree. Which is why I made the argument earlier that the issue is not whether gay people should 'marry'. That is something for the gay people to decide for themselves just as heterosexual people decide that for themselves. That is the only view one can take if one believe in unalienable rights and liberty.

The issue of the definition of marriage goes a little deeper and does involve basic rights. Should one segment of society be able to demand that they get their way and whatever is important to anybody else be damned? Is a concept of civil rights to be the ONLY consideration when implementation of those civil rights violates somebody else's unalienable rights? What is more important? That gay people have the same rights and protections as everybody else, or that such rights and protections replace existing laws and policy that others see as important and beneficial to all?

These are not easy questions. But the basic principles involved can be applied to them.

People demanding that society give them what they want at the expense of the unalienable rights of others has created a whole lot of grief, suffering, and injustice for a great many people.

I agree. Live and let live. The problem is not unfettered liberty, and never has been. I don't know of any politically savvy Christians who oppose legitimate, unfettered liberty.

Do you?

Some people, and they ain't Christians, are demanding things from others they have no moral or natural right to demand, and the only way they think to get away with it is to empower the government to bully, penalize, rob, steal, impose, suppress . . . accuse, as they hide behind the banner of governmentally enforced civil rights predicated on behavior at the expense of live and let live.

It's tyranny and must be opposed.

Gays, for example, are free to marry whomever they please. Who's stopping them? Who wants to stop them?

But when they demand that others surrender their civil liberties to accommodate their lifestyles, they cross a line, the line where their rights end . . . and where the rights of others begin.

It's sheer narcissism.

If as a society we've suddenly decided 230-some-years later that homosexual marriage is a legitimate institution. . . . Fine. Marry away, but what's all this other garbage about forcing private adoption agencies that reject homosexual couples, for example, on the basis of their religious convictions or demanding that photographers and bakers bow down before other gods?

The only just solution: the government needs to get the hell out of the business of marriage altogether, and others need to get their business out of the face of others. Problem solved.

Otherwise you have tyranny.

But the statists are not going to agree to the just solution, are they? Social engineering via the government. Live and let live? Both you and I know they're not going to do that . . . and some think to blame Christians.

Those who are being tyrannized, right now, by the way, are not obliged in any way, shape or form to support the statist's agenda; rather, they are justified to oppose it tooth-and-nail. It is their right and their duty to defend themselves and their children against the illegitimate agenda of thugs.

Bottom line: the violations of inalienable rights/unabridgible civil liberties will always be so-called civil rights based on behavior that is not politically essential and, therefore, none of the government's damn business.

That is my ultimate point. The rest is just illustrative.

Some folks need illustrations, or they're never see what the actual nuts and bolts of tyranny are in the hands of those bent on subverting our constitutional Republic . . . of live and let live. Some folks think the problem is the natural behavior or expressions or associations of some as opposed to those of others. No! The problem is the government taking sides against the "evil doers" who resist social engineering as it empowers itself in the name of benevolence on the behalf of the "victims" who go along with it . . . for not so honorable reasons at all.

Some people get sucked into that Orwellian jive as the just, live-and-let-live solution flies right over their heads; and they start imagining that what is in fact the politically legitimate behavior of some in the face of tyranny is evil, that those who tell the government to go to hell are baaaad people.

I can't really quarrel with this but am trying to keep the discussion on a philosophical level and as non combative as possible here.

Of course Christians can be just as wrong and intrusive on the rights of others as anybody else, and I certainly know groups that have done so by demanding that their preferences be observed at the expense of the unalienable rights of others. Back in Kansas, I found myself in the uncomfortable position of joining with the "Atheists" and a few other liberty minded Christians to protest a drive by the religious community to get some books removed from the school library because the content was not 'acceptable'.

We did prevail in stopping those religious groups from dictating what was and was not acceptable to be included in the school library. I had no problem with them petitioning to have certain books included. That was certainly their right to do as tax payers, citizens of the community, and parents. But I was certainly opposed to them trying to prevent my children from reading certain books that I thought were perfectly okay for my kids' reading list.

That is why this thread is intended to focus on the principles that should guide us as a society and try to avoid judging each other and pointing out each others' sins and error in the process.

 

[Spoonman]

I would like to focus for a minute on #1 on the list:

Liberty is the ability, with impunity, to be who and what we are in thoughts, beliefs, speech, and action that does not violate the rights of anybody else.

In the last year or so there have been so many cases of bruhahas and punitive measures taken against individuals who were simply being themselves at any given time.

Paula Deen
Phil on Duck Dynasty
Ellen Degeneres in a Penney's ad
The CEO of Chic-fil-a
That bakery that didn't want to participate in a gay wedding
And so many others including those currently on the front pages and being discussed at length on message boards. . . .

None of these people were doing anything to anybody. None were requiring any participation or contribution from anybody else in anything. None were in positions where they were teaching kids or otherwise able to impose their views on anybody else. They were simply being themselves and expecting to be allowed to be who and what they are. But there were those who presumed to punish them for just being who and what they are and who would have destroyed their reputations and means of making a living if they could.

My definition of conservatism sees punishing people for nothing more than being who and what they are, when who and what they are has absolutely nothing to do with us and is hurting nobody, as wrong and should be soundly condemned if not made illegal.

Liberty does not require us to appreciate, condone, agree with, or associate with those we find reprehensible. But liberty does not include license to punish people for no other reason than they hold opinions and beliefs that we don't share.

and this is one of the biggest areas where i feel we have lost our liberties. you can now be penalized for your point of view. you can now be penalized for your thoughts and speech.

 

[Foxfyre]

I would like to focus for a minute on #1 on the list:

Liberty is the ability, with impunity, to be who and what we are in thoughts, beliefs, speech, and action that does not violate the rights of anybody else.

In the last year or so there have been so many cases of bruhahas and punitive measures taken against individuals who were simply being themselves at any given time.

Paula Deen
Phil on Duck Dynasty
Ellen Degeneres in a Penney's ad
The CEO of Chic-fil-a
That bakery that didn't want to participate in a gay wedding
And so many others including those currently on the front pages and being discussed at length on message boards. . . .

None of these people were doing anything to anybody. None were requiring any participation or contribution from anybody else in anything. None were in positions where they were teaching kids or otherwise able to impose their views on anybody else. They were simply being themselves and expecting to be allowed to be who and what they are. But there were those who presumed to punish them for just being who and what they are and who would have destroyed their reputations and means of making a living if they could.

My definition of conservatism sees punishing people for nothing more than being who and what they are, when who and what they are has absolutely nothing to do with us and is hurting nobody, as wrong and should be soundly condemned if not made illegal.

Liberty does not require us to appreciate, condone, agree with, or associate with those we find reprehensible. But liberty does not include license to punish people for no other reason than they hold opinions and beliefs that we don't share.

and this is one of the biggest areas where i feel we have lost our liberties. you can now be penalized for your point of view. you can now be penalized for your thoughts and speech.

This is true and I wonder if those on the 'left' and even some of the more extreme on the 'right' side of the sociopolitical spectrum are able to see that? Those lobbying for gay rights or decency or women's rights or Christian rights or whatever are not evil people because they want their rightful place in society. Ellen DeGeneres is a special, gifted, funny, intelligent person who happens to be gay. Anybody who would discriminate against her or try to attack her livelihood for no other reason than she is gay or that she wants legal recognition along with the protections that go with that for her relationship with another is far more wrong, even evil, than Ellen DeGeneres could likely ever be.

Liberty requires that Ellen DeGeneres be able to be who and what she is without fear that some angry group or organization will try to punish her for being who and what she is.

But while I think most modern day American liberals would agree with me about that, they don't see to be able to extrapolate that to a Phil on Duck Dynasty or the CEO of Chic-fil-a or a Christian baker being allowed to be who and what they are without fear that some angry group or organization will try to punish them for being who and what they are.

Some here are arguing that it is legal to organize and boycott anybody for anything. Indeed it is. But in my opinion, it shouldn't be legal to attack those who are just being who and what they are and not imposing who and what they are on anybody else.

 

[M.D. Rawlings]

I can't really quarrel with this but am trying to keep the discussion on a philosophical level and as non combative as possible here.

Of course Christians can be just as wrong and intrusive on the rights of others as anybody else, and I certainly know groups that have done so by demanding that their preferences be observed at the expense of the unalienable rights of others. Back in Kansas, I found myself in the uncomfortable position of joining with the "Atheists" and a few other liberty minded Christians to protest a drive by the religious community to get some books removed from the school library because the content was not 'acceptable'.

We did prevail in stopping those religious groups from dictating what was and was not acceptable to be included in the school library. I had no problem with them petitioning to have certain books included. That was certainly their right to do as tax payers, citizens of the community, and parents. But I was certainly opposed to them trying to prevent my children from reading certain books that I thought were perfectly okay for my kids' reading list.

That is why this thread is intended to focus on the principles that should guide us as a society and try to avoid judging each other and pointing out each others' sins and error in the process.

Fox, I'm not trying to be combative. I'm trying to focus our attention on the pertinent distinctions of the philosophical issue: (1) the distinction between inalienable rights/unabridgible civil liberties afforded by nature and the civil rights/protections afforded by the state, and (2) the distinction between the private sector and the public sector. If one doesn't keep the ramifications of these distinctions straight in one's mind, one's going to confound the matter.

You must bear with me here. You're overlooking something very important.

For example, the Christians you're complaining about weren't trying to trammel on your inalienable rights/unabridgible civil liberties.

First, you're talking about a dispute within the public sector, not the private sector.

Second, those Christians weren't trying to impose something on you, but preclude something that you wanted, something those Christians regarded to be an ideological imposition on their children within a forum they could not practically monitor otherwise. It's not unreasonable for any parent to insist that the impressionable minds of his children not be exposed to any number of works on any number of topics outside the context of his immediate purview and exegesis. With all due respect, the charge that your political opponents in this instance were not "liberty minded Christians" is disputable, not necessarily a fact at all relative to the pertinent distinctions of the philosophical issue.

They were defending their constitutionally inviolable parental authority against strangers, and it was the prevailing majority that trammeled on their inalienable rights and on their constitutionally unabridgible civil liberties . . . just like the government continues to violate the inalienable rights/unabridgible civil liberties of some by allowing evolutionists to impose their metaphysics of ontological naturalism in the schools, for example, as if the metaphysics of methodological naturalism were not equally valid . . . as if the government weren't violating the principle of the separation of church and state.

The Court deified the state, effectively and unconstitutionally declaring that ontological naturalism is true and that methodological naturalism is not, and that the latter, given its implications, constitutes an imposition of one man's religion on another man in the public schools. Well, if that's true, what does the former constitute given that neither one of these metaphysical presuppositions for science are scientifically falsifiable?

Hocus Pocus.

Also, the government allows secular progressives to impose their sexual morality on others in the schools as the latter absurdly claim that they are upholding the principle of the separation of church and state . . . not self-servingly lying. It's very strange how the secular progressive seems to grasp the imperative when the Christian demands that the former get his filthy boot off the Christian's neck and instead teach the Christian's sexual values in the same.

That's the problem with the collectivistic, one-size-fits-all configuration of the public education system imposed on us all by the Warren Court in accordance with a bastardized rendition of the constitutional principle of the separation of church and state!

From my blog:

Apparently, the First Amendment's new meaning imbued federal judges with the omniscience to discern for the rest us the difference between those ideas that were religious and those ideas that were not. In other words, judges would direct the schools' curriculum, not the people. By this, however, the Court did not mean to suggest that it was legal for public school teachers to invade American homes and scream obscenities at children; they would just whisper them into children's ears in the public schools.

Hence, the Warren Court resolved a serious problem by further exacerbating it. After correctly observing that it was unconstitutional for state schools to impose the teachings of Judeo-Christianity on other-religious and non-religious persons, the Court decided to settle the matter by imposing a similar violation on all of us. Instead of simply recognizing that the people who pay the education system's bills should be free to educate their children as they see fit, at home or in a school of their choice, the Court opted to ignore original intent altogether, especially as it pertained to parental consent and authority.

Instead of allowing that a culturally diverse and changing society would require a new means of allocating funds for education in order to satisfy the requirements of the First Amendment for all, the Court elected to enshrine a one-size-fits-all scheme. Instead of requiring the nation's schools to honor the constitutional rights of all their students or close their doors, the Court chose to expel the "Miscreant," known as "God" to many, who had instigated all the hullabaloo in the first place. Hence, it would not be the state schools that would have to change their ways or go, it would be the people, millions of Americans, who would have to compromise their most cherished convictions under the new hegemony or take their convictions and get out.

The Court effectively and quite consciously established secular humanism as the official religion of the state and established the public education system as the state's "church".

But the Warren Court did not so much overthrow the First Amendment as much as it turned it on its head and, thereby, created a whole new legal conundrum, one that constantly pits faction against faction in an unending battle in which no one's rights or concerns can ever be fully realized. It is for this very reason that the increasingly heated and bitter debate over the content of our schools' academics continues to rage right up to this day. This fiasco is the direct result of the Court elevating what had only been up to that time a homegrown and locally operated system of education, one that was mostly non-existent before the 20th Century, to a federally mandated and administered regime. This "nationalization" of the education system subsequently alienated an even greater number of Americans from their rights and needlessly instigated a vicious cultural civil war.

But the irresponsible behavior of the Warren Court should not surprise anyone. Being that the leftist does not grasp the truth about human nature and about the nature of things, he's the consummate meddler who's forever jumping into the private affairs of others, never merely encouraging, but ever obnoxiously insisting upon their participation in the next, great utopian love fest. He does not have the good sense to allow that Americans should decide for themselves with whom they would sleep.

It is readily self-evident that no institution exists in an ideological vacuum. Thus, if the underlying ideology governing the academic fair offered in today's public schools is no longer Judeo-Christianity, what is it? Where in the Constitution is the federal government delegated the power to define for you or me what does or does not constitute religious training? How could such a power not effectively render the First Amendment meaningless? Does the First Amendment protect the individual's perspective or that of the state? —Rawlings, Revisions and Divisions

(The whole article is instructive.)


In short, those Christians had every right in the world to defend their parental rights; they were not obliged to accommodate you. It was not the exertion of their prerogatives of ideological free-association and parental authority that were contrary to the spirit of individual liberty. That was unbridgeable individual liberty pushing back against a majority in a collectivistic, one-size-fits-all system of education. It's the education system as currently configured in absence of universal school choice that is contrary to the imperatives of individual liberty and would be flat-out unconstitutional but for the Court's duplicity.

As I wrote in the above:

Some folks need illustrations, or they're never see what the actual nuts and bolts of tyranny are in the hands of those bent on subverting our constitutional Republic . . . of live and let live. Some folks think the problem is the natural behavior or expressions or associations of some as opposed to those of others.

No!

. . . Some people get sucked into that Orwellian jive as the just, live-and-let-live solution flies right over their heads; and they start imagining that what is in fact the politically legitimate behavior of some in the face of tyranny is evil, that those who tell the government to go to hell are baaaad people.

I don't accept anything less than unfettered individual liberty, and neither should anyone else. I thought that's what we we're talking about. I don't mistake the natural exertions of individual liberty for tyranny. I know who the culprits of tyranny are, just like I know that nonessential political rights and collectivist, ideological/cultural institutions of government are abominations.

There's no point in talking about the ontology of unfettered individual liberty if we don't grasp the ramifications of the distinction between inalienable rights/unabridgible civil liberties afforded by nature on the one hand and the civil rights/protections afforded by government on the other, and the ramifications of the distinction between the private sector and the public sector.

 

[Foxfyre]

and this is one of the biggest areas where i feel we have lost our liberties. you can now be penalized for your point of view. you can now be penalized for your thoughts and speech.

This is true and I wonder if those on the 'left' and even some of the more extreme on the 'right' side of the sociopolitical spectrum are able to see that? Those lobbying for gay rights or decency or women's rights or Christian rights or whatever are not evil people because they want their rightful place in society. Ellen DeGeneres is a special, gifted, funny, intelligent person who happens to be gay. Anybody who would discriminate against her or try to attack her livelihood for no other reason than she is gay or that she wants legal recognition along with the protections that go with that for her relationship with another is far more wrong, even evil, than Ellen DeGeneres could likely ever be.

Liberty requires that Ellen DeGeneres be able to be who and what she is without fear that some angry group or organization will try to punish her for being who and what she is.

But while I think most modern day American liberals would agree with me about that, they don't see to be able to extrapolate that to a Phil on Duck Dynasty or the CEO of Chic-fil-a or a Christian baker being allowed to be who and what they are without fear that some angry group or organization will try to punish them for being who and what they are.

Some here are arguing that it is legal to organize and boycott anybody for anything. Indeed it is. But in my opinion, it shouldn't be legal to attack those who are just being who and what they are and not imposing who and what they are on anybody else.

I can agree with most of this. I certainly don't hold to boycotts or refusing service on the basis of identity or sexual orientation alone, or any other frivolous nonsense contrary to the spirit of individual liberty.

But I'm not willing to lend any assistance to the political agenda of officially recognizing homosexual marriage as long as lefty insists on imposing his sexual morality in the public schools in the absence of universal school choice and exerting civil rights protections against the free exercise of the prerogatives of free-association and private property in the public and private sectors. The homosexual agenda is not merely about equal rights; it's about governmentally imposed social engineering, the destruction of the family and the suppression of religious liberty.

DeGeneres, unlike a few homosexuals I could name who happen to be classical liberals, has enjoined herself with statist, political hacks who do not honor liberty. She is indeed "a special, gifted, funny, intelligent person who happens to be gay", but she is also a person who mindlessly supports statist politicians who are violating the civil liberties of "special, gifted, funny, intelligent" people who are not obliged to up with the crap that she and her fellow travelers are dishing out.

Does she support politicians fighting for educational freedom and oppose the imposition of civil rights protections on the basis of behavior against the free exercise of civil liberties? No! She supports politicians who are rabidly opposed to educational freedom, openly denounce the inviolability of parental authority in that regard, and aggressively seek to impose sanctions on Christians bakers and photographers who would stand on their prerogatives of ideological free-association and private property.

There's nothing "special, gifted, funny, intelligent" about any of that.

As for your other idea, are suggesting that organized economic boycotts, protests and verbal/written attacks be outlawed?

We may have to agree to disagree on the library thing. In that particular case, the Christian group was objecting to books that my children had read and enjoyed, as did I. Now you have a strong point if the library includes "Heather Has Two Mommys" but excludes a book on the traditional family because it doesn't include same sex marriage as a traditional family. Here I would be joining with the Christians to object to such a policy because in my view, a public library whether in the school or open to the general public should include a wide variety of acceptable literature offering a wide variety of points of view about everything. The content should never be dictated by ideological or political leanings.

Toward that end, a free society might see John Locke and Thomas Jefferson along with The Communist Manifesto and Mein Kampf in the same stack of books to be checked out at the library. All of my major college papers were on sociopolitical or socioeconomic themes and I checked a lot of strange combinations out of the library when I was doing the research for them.

I don't have a clue what Ellen Degeneres' politics are, though I would assume she would more likely be liberal. Most folks in Hollywood or television entertainment or music industry are. Some are the absolutely bonkers ultra radical wacko type, but that doesn't affect my enjoyment of the special gifts they share with us.

And for you last question, yes, I would like for it to be 100% socially unacceptable and illegal for an angry mob or group to organize to physically and/or materially hurt a person for no other reason than the person holds a point of view the group doesn't like. I cannot find a rationale for how such a group would not be violating that person's unalienable rights.

 

[Spoonman]

This is true and I wonder if those on the 'left' and even some of the more extreme on the 'right' side of the sociopolitical spectrum are able to see that? Those lobbying for gay rights or decency or women's rights or Christian rights or whatever are not evil people because they want their rightful place in society. Ellen DeGeneres is a special, gifted, funny, intelligent person who happens to be gay. Anybody who would discriminate against her or try to attack her livelihood for no other reason than she is gay or that she wants legal recognition along with the protections that go with that for her relationship with another is far more wrong, even evil, than Ellen DeGeneres could likely ever be.

Liberty requires that Ellen DeGeneres be able to be who and what she is without fear that some angry group or organization will try to punish her for being who and what she is.

But while I think most modern day American liberals would agree with me about that, they don't see to be able to extrapolate that to a Phil on Duck Dynasty or the CEO of Chic-fil-a or a Christian baker being allowed to be who and what they are without fear that some angry group or organization will try to punish them for being who and what they are.

Some here are arguing that it is legal to organize and boycott anybody for anything. Indeed it is. But in my opinion, it shouldn't be legal to attack those who are just being who and what they are and not imposing who and what they are on anybody else.

I can agree with most of this. I certainly don't hold to boycotts or refusing service on the basis of identity or sexual orientation alone, or any other frivolous nonsense contrary to the spirit of individual liberty.

But I'm not willing to lend any assistance to the political agenda of officially recognizing homosexual marriage as long as lefty insists on imposing his sexual morality in the public schools in the absence of universal school choice and exerting civil rights protections against the free exercise of the prerogatives of free-association and private property in the public and private sectors. The homosexual agenda is not merely about equal rights; it's about governmentally imposed social engineering, the destruction of the family and the suppression of religious liberty.

DeGeneres, unlike a few homosexuals I could name who happen to be classical liberals, has enjoined herself with statist, political hacks who do not honor liberty. She is indeed "a special, gifted, funny, intelligent person who happens to be gay", but she is also a person who mindlessly supports statist politicians who are violating the civil liberties of "special, gifted, funny, intelligent" people who are not obliged to up with the crap that she and her fellow travelers are dishing out.

Does she support politicians fighting for educational freedom and oppose the imposition of civil rights protections on the basis of behavior against the free exercise of civil liberties? No! She supports politicians who are rabidly opposed to educational freedom, openly denounce the inviolability of parental authority in that regard, and aggressively seek to impose sanctions on Christians bakers and photographers who would stand on their prerogatives of ideological free-association and private property.

There's nothing "special, gifted, funny, intelligent" about any of that.

As for your other idea, are suggesting that organized economic boycotts, protests and verbal/written attacks be outlawed?

We may have to agree to disagree on the library thing. In that particular case, the Christian group was objecting to books that my children had read and enjoyed, as did I. Now you have a strong point if the library includes "Heather Has Two Mommys" but excludes a book on the traditional family because it doesn't include same sex marriage as a traditional family. Here I would be joining with the Christians to object to such a policy because in my view, a public library whether in the school or open to the general public should include a wide variety of acceptable literature offering a wide variety of points of view about everything. The content should never be dictated by ideological or political leanings.

Toward that end, a free society might see John Locke and Thomas Jefferson along with The Communist Manifesto and Mein Kampf in the same stack of books to be checked out at the library. All of my major college papers were on sociopolitical or socioeconomic themes and I checked a lot of strange combinations out of the library when I was doing the research for them.

I don't have a clue what Ellen Degeneres' politics are, though I would assume she would more likely be liberal. Most folks in Hollywood or television entertainment or music industry are. Some are the absolutely bonkers ultra radical wacko type, but that doesn't affect my enjoyment of the special gifts they share with us.

And for you last question, yes, I would like for it to be 100% socially unacceptable and illegal for an angry mob or group to organize to physically and/or materially hurt a person for no other reason than the person holds a point of view the group doesn't like. I cannot find a rationale for how such a group would not be violating that person's unalienable rights.

i feel people have a right to agree or disagree openly. What they should not have a right to do is impose. No person or group of people should be able to impose there will or force legislation against another person rights. For example in the whole gay rights issue, what i think or believe should be of no consequence. And we don't need a law making it legal. What there should be is no law against it or even about it in the first. Government oversteps its bounds on way to many issues.

 

[Foxfyre]

I can agree with most of this. I certainly don't hold to boycotts or refusing service on the basis of identity or sexual orientation alone, or any other frivolous nonsense contrary to the spirit of individual liberty.

But I'm not willing to lend any assistance to the political agenda of officially recognizing homosexual marriage as long as lefty insists on imposing his sexual morality in the public schools in the absence of universal school choice and exerting civil rights protections against the free exercise of the prerogatives of free-association and private property in the public and private sectors. The homosexual agenda is not merely about equal rights; it's about governmentally imposed social engineering, the destruction of the family and the suppression of religious liberty.

DeGeneres, unlike a few homosexuals I could name who happen to be classical liberals, has enjoined herself with statist, political hacks who do not honor liberty. She is indeed "a special, gifted, funny, intelligent person who happens to be gay", but she is also a person who mindlessly supports statist politicians who are violating the civil liberties of "special, gifted, funny, intelligent" people who are not obliged to up with the crap that she and her fellow travelers are dishing out.

Does she support politicians fighting for educational freedom and oppose the imposition of civil rights protections on the basis of behavior against the free exercise of civil liberties? No! She supports politicians who are rabidly opposed to educational freedom, openly denounce the inviolability of parental authority in that regard, and aggressively seek to impose sanctions on Christians bakers and photographers who would stand on their prerogatives of ideological free-association and private property.

There's nothing "special, gifted, funny, intelligent" about any of that.

As for your other idea, are suggesting that organized economic boycotts, protests and verbal/written attacks be outlawed?

We may have to agree to disagree on the library thing. In that particular case, the Christian group was objecting to books that my children had read and enjoyed, as did I. Now you have a strong point if the library includes "Heather Has Two Mommys" but excludes a book on the traditional family because it doesn't include same sex marriage as a traditional family. Here I would be joining with the Christians to object to such a policy because in my view, a public library whether in the school or open to the general public should include a wide variety of acceptable literature offering a wide variety of points of view about everything. The content should never be dictated by ideological or political leanings.

Toward that end, a free society might see John Locke and Thomas Jefferson along with The Communist Manifesto and Mein Kampf in the same stack of books to be checked out at the library. All of my major college papers were on sociopolitical or socioeconomic themes and I checked a lot of strange combinations out of the library when I was doing the research for them.

I don't have a clue what Ellen Degeneres' politics are, though I would assume she would more likely be liberal. Most folks in Hollywood or television entertainment or music industry are. Some are the absolutely bonkers ultra radical wacko type, but that doesn't affect my enjoyment of the special gifts they share with us.

And for you last question, yes, I would like for it to be 100% socially unacceptable and illegal for an angry mob or group to organize to physically and/or materially hurt a person for no other reason than the person holds a point of view the group doesn't like. I cannot find a rationale for how such a group would not be violating that person's unalienable rights.

i feel people have a right to agree or disagree openly. What they should not have a right to do is impose. No person or group of people should be able to impose there will or force legislation against another person rights. For example in the whole gay rights issue, what i think or believe should be of no consequence. And we don't need a law making it legal. What there should be is no law against it or even about it in the first. Government oversteps its bounds on way to many issues.

I don't object to laws that require equal access in the PUBLIC sector. There is a little nagging concept that sticks with me that the federal government errs when it starts naming those who cannot be discriminated against. The law should simply specify that no citizen will be denied access to any federal, state, or local public building that is open to the general public, and all citizens are eligible for all government services on an equal basis.

But the federal government should be imposing no such laws in the private sector.

 

[editec]

Over on PoliticalChic's liberalism thread--that I don't believe has received a single favorable review by anybody identifying themselves as 'liberal'--I posed a question to illustrate a conservative point of view.

Somebody had commented that conservatives are only for the rich and greedy because most conservatives do not support increasing taxes on the very rich.

So my question was something to the effect:

Why should the guy who started with little or nothing, but who put in the time, effort, and took the necessary risks to become very wealthy, who provides hundreds of jobs for others, who makes it possible for other businesses to prosper who in turn provide jobs for still others, who donates his money for museum exhibits, new hospital wings, a new science lab for the university, and sponsors Little League teams and buys Girl Scout cookies. . . .

Why should he pay taxes at a higher rate than the guy who works for him who only puts in just enough effort to keep his job and get by?

So far nobody identifying himself/herself as liberal has even acknowledged that this question is asked, much less attempted to answer it.

Will anybody here, liberal or conservative?

Speaking as a modern American conservative/classical liberal/libertarian (small "L"):

The reason people haven't answered your question is because you put poison pills into it.

We must first buy into the theory that all self made men are sweetie pies (pill 1) (I don't, and neither do you, really) and also that anybody who is not wealthy "..only puts in just enough effort to keep his job and get by?"(Pill 2)

Now as to why the more affluent OIGHT TO pay a higher rate of taxes?

Because they have the money to support the nation and can pay taxes without experiencing much pain.

The very poor on the other hand do not have enough money in the first place, let along after paying taxes.

It's not about justice or fairness, its PRAGMATISM.

When the rich do not pay in to their wealth and the working classes must make it up?

We end up with an economy like the one we have right now -- stagnating because the working classes are basically too poor to buy enough stuff to keep the economy healthy .



Do you understand that, Fox?

That is why progressive taxation makes sense in a capitalistic economy,

 

[Foxfyre]

Over on PoliticalChic's liberalism thread--that I don't believe has received a single favorable review by anybody identifying themselves as 'liberal'--I posed a question to illustrate a conservative point of view.

Somebody had commented that conservatives are only for the rich and greedy because most conservatives do not support increasing taxes on the very rich.

So my question was something to the effect:

Why should the guy who started with little or nothing, but who put in the time, effort, and took the necessary risks to become very wealthy, who provides hundreds of jobs for others, who makes it possible for other businesses to prosper who in turn provide jobs for still others, who donates his money for museum exhibits, new hospital wings, a new science lab for the university, and sponsors Little League teams and buys Girl Scout cookies. . . .

Why should he pay taxes at a higher rate than the guy who works for him who only puts in just enough effort to keep his job and get by?

So far nobody identifying himself/herself as liberal has even acknowledged that this question is asked, much less attempted to answer it.

Will anybody here, liberal or conservative?

Speaking as a modern American conservative/classical liberal/libertarian (small "L"):

The reason people haven't answered your question is because you put poison pills into it.

We must first buy into the theory that all self made men are sweetie pies (pill 1) (I don't, and neither do you, really) and also that anybody who is not wealthy "..only puts in just enough effort to keep his job and get by?"(Pill 2)

Now as to why the more affluent OIGHT TO pay a higher rate of taxes?

Because they have the money to support the nation and can pay taxes without experiencing much pain.

The very poor on the other hand do not have enough money in the first place, let along after paying taxes.

It's not about justice or fairness, its PRAGMATISM.

When the rich do not pay in to their wealth and the working classes must make it up?

We end up with an economy like the one we have right now -- stagnating because the working classes are basically too poor to buy enough stuff to keep the economy healthy .



Do you understand that, Fox?

That is why progressive taxation makes sense in a capitalistic economy,

Okay, let's set aside the 'poison pill' analogy for a minute and focus on the question. I was not referring to ALL wealthy or ALL poor. I was referring to two people and specifically attached the criteria to use for evaluation. Look at the question again:

Why should the guy who started with little or nothing, but who put in the time, effort, and took the necessary risks to become very wealthy, who provides hundreds of jobs for others, who makes it possible for other businesses to prosper who in turn provide jobs for still others, who donates his money for museum exhibits, new hospital wings, a new science lab for the university, and sponsors Little League teams and buys Girl Scout cookies. . . .

Why should he pay taxes at a higher rate than the guy who works for him who only puts in just enough effort to keep his job and get by?
​

So focused on those two guys only, your argument is that the guy who worked hard for what he has and makes a huge contribution to society and provides opportunity for hundreds of others to earn a living should be taxed at a higher rate than the guy who does just enough to keep from getting fired? And he should be taxed at a higher rate because he has more and therefore paying at a higher rate will hurt him less than it would the less ambitious guy? I'm pretty sure that was your argument.

And thank you for addressing it. You are the first person who has done so.

So now we are taxing him at a higher rate. And no it doesn't 'hurt' him personally all that much. But to compensate for the extra expense he doesn't give the donation for the new hospital wing and he lays off that unambitious employee and scaled back plans for an expansion that prevented some contractors from hiring people they had intended to hire for that project.

If you know that will be the result, would you still favor assessing him at a higher tax rate?