Religion in Politics

[boatsnguitars]

There is a common phrase: "Separation of Church and State, for the protection of both."

This is obviously rejected by Christian Nationalists, but also many other religious sects, denominations, groups, cults, and even groups beyond religion. Usually Conservative, Authoritarian groups that feel that they need to police moral activity, or even be Thought Police.

There is a thread called "What's wrong with being gay?" This question is flawed, as it depends on the context. There is certainly nothing wrong with being gay in a free society, as there is no reason for it to be considered wrong.

So, there are - at least - two implications to the question:
1. What's wrong with being gay according to some supernatural force that some people believe exists?
2. What's wrong with being gay with respect to laws and social mores in a society?

Many Religionists believe their answer to #1 informs their opinion of #2. However, there is no direct connection to #1 and #2 other than people who vote with them in mind. That is, we have no idea how supernatural entities feel about the matter, as they don't interact with us. All we have are the beliefs of people.

Now, this is where it gets tricky. Clearly, all we each have - individually - are our beliefs. We can drill down to Justified True Beliefs, etc. - but let's not.

The thing I'm curious about is how people feel about the following:

What role do we have in a pluralistic society to both voice, defend and support our beliefs and how we best voice, defend and support other people's beliefs so that we all feel we are living in a fair, equitable, healthy, (whatever) society that we can say is "Best." (Best being the best outcome we can realistically expect given that there are a wide range of beliefs, but we aren't giving 'aid and comfort' to truly horrible people.)

This is, I believe a discussion that - if we are being good citizens - would include reading Locke, Rousseau, Hobbes, Montesquieu. I'm not sure where we all stand on that, but I'd encourage people to get a decent understanding of the differences and the key thrust of each writer to get a gist of what is at stake. We are, after all, talking about the world we live in and the people we interact with daily.

There is no mystery that we live among people who would, if they had their way, would impose laws on us in an effort to make the world better - as they see it. Myself included.

There are more meek people who would "live and let live" and, while admirable, has it's drawbacks.

There are, after all, people who would argue that their happiness depends upon the suffering of others. And, in fact, this is what many Religionists argue.

So, my question is:

What's wrong with being "X" in a world where we have political freedom?

How does one defend a moral or religious idea in a secular, democratic, post-modern world?

[Purple Knight]

What role do we have in a pluralistic society to both voice, defend and support our beliefs and how we best voice, defend and support other people's beliefs so that we all feel we are living in a fair, equitable, healthy, (whatever) society that we can say is "Best." (Best being the best outcome we can realistically expect given that there are a wide range of beliefs, but we aren't giving 'aid and comfort' to truly horrible people.)

This is, I believe a discussion that - if we are being good citizens - would include reading Locke, Rousseau, Hobbes, Montesquieu. I'm not sure where we all stand on that, but I'd encourage people to get a decent understanding of the differences and the key thrust of each writer to get a gist of what is at stake. We are, after all, talking about the world we live in and the people we interact with daily.

There is no mystery that we live among people who would, if they had their way, would impose laws on us in an effort to make the world better - as they see it. Myself included.

There are more meek people who would "live and let live" and, while admirable, has it's drawbacks.

There are, after all, people who would argue that their happiness depends upon the suffering of others. And, in fact, this is what many Religionists argue.

So, my question is:

What's wrong with being "X" in a world where we have political freedom?

How does one defend a moral or religious idea in a secular, democratic, post-modern world?

This is why we can't have moral pluralism. Every moralist (even atheists) believes they are simply right and justified to mould society to their liking. This is why we have to decide things like whether an unborn baby is a human being with full rights or not: Because the people who blow up Planned Parenthood are doing a totally reasonable thing in their view, which is defending human rights, and they ought to attack what is immoral, even if that's endorsed by society as permissible.

In other words, if people disagree on fundamental issues like who gets rights, we either can't allow them in society, or we have to let them attack people who they deem to be violating those rights. We can have pluralism and morality, but there will be a lot of justified violence. If you want peace, either pluralism or morality has to go.

I am not a moralist. Frankly I just want to live in a world where people care about what's fair, and ignore what is right. Society can be made up of infinite versions of me who all disagree and we can work it out within whatever fair system is set in place to help us do so. So if the goal is to have a pluralistic society, nobody can believe in morality. Nobody can believe they are actually right to the point that they ought to hurt or kill people over it. Everybody has to be an authoritarian and defer to the law. The law is right, and we should follow it, even if we dislike it or disagree. Unfortunately that's not what the American Constitution says - it says rights are fundamental and the government is a flaccid turd nurgler with no real moral power that exists only to bow to those rights - so I'm going to kind of enjoy it while all the moralists kill each other over different beliefs about rights which was always inevitable.

Pick2.png

Something to note is that the moralist can only be happy in the theocracy, where society legally enforces his morality, even if it's not fair. He can't be happy in a barbarian world because if he loses the fight, to him that's morally outrageous and should not have happened. And he can't be happy deferring to the law if he disagrees.

The non-moralist can be reasonably happy anywhere, though in barbarity, he might be a little depressed that he doesn't believe in anything to the degree that he'd hurt someone over it. And he's the only one who can be happy in barbarity as neither of the moralists killing one another are, and neither is the pacifist. So if he's the only one who can be happy there, because he can be happy anywhere, maybe we should not have barbarity.

So that just leaves theocracy (here meaning, enforced morality, not enforced religion) or authoritarianism.

[boatsnguitars]

What role do we have in a pluralistic society to both voice, defend and support our beliefs and how we best voice, defend and support other people's beliefs so that we all feel we are living in a fair, equitable, healthy, (whatever) society that we can say is "Best." (Best being the best outcome we can realistically expect given that there are a wide range of beliefs, but we aren't giving 'aid and comfort' to truly horrible people.)

This is, I believe a discussion that - if we are being good citizens - would include reading Locke, Rousseau, Hobbes, Montesquieu. I'm not sure where we all stand on that, but I'd encourage people to get a decent understanding of the differences and the key thrust of each writer to get a gist of what is at stake. We are, after all, talking about the world we live in and the people we interact with daily.

There is no mystery that we live among people who would, if they had their way, would impose laws on us in an effort to make the world better - as they see it. Myself included.

There are more meek people who would "live and let live" and, while admirable, has it's drawbacks.

There are, after all, people who would argue that their happiness depends upon the suffering of others. And, in fact, this is what many Religionists argue.

So, my question is:

What's wrong with being "X" in a world where we have political freedom?

How does one defend a moral or religious idea in a secular, democratic, post-modern world?

This is why we can't have moral pluralism. Every moralist (even atheists) believes they are simply right and justified to mould society to their liking. This is why we have to decide things like whether an unborn baby is a human being with full rights or not: Because the people who blow up Planned Parenthood are doing a totally reasonable thing in their view, which is defending human rights, and they ought to attack what is immoral, even if that's endorsed by society as permissible.

In other words, if people disagree on fundamental issues like who gets rights, we either can't allow them in society, or we have to let them attack people who they deem to be violating those rights. We can have pluralism and morality, but there will be a lot of justified violence. If you want peace, either pluralism or morality has to go.

I am not a moralist. Frankly I just want to live in a world where people care about what's fair, and ignore what is right. Society can be made up of infinite versions of me who all disagree and we can work it out within whatever fair system is set in place to help us do so. So if the goal is to have a pluralistic society, nobody can believe in morality. Nobody can believe they are actually right to the point that they ought to hurt or kill people over it. Everybody has to be an authoritarian and defer to the law. The law is right, and we should follow it, even if we dislike it or disagree. Unfortunately that's not what the American Constitution says - it says rights are fundamental and the government is a flaccid turd nurgler with no real moral power that exists only to bow to those rights - so I'm going to kind of enjoy it while all the moralists kill each other over different beliefs about rights which was always inevitable.

Pick2.png

Something to note is that the moralist can only be happy in the theocracy, where society legally enforces his morality, even if it's not fair. He can't be happy in a barbarian world because if he loses the fight, to him that's morally outrageous and should not have happened. And he can't be happy deferring to the law if he disagrees.

The non-moralist can be reasonably happy anywhere, though in barbarity, he might be a little depressed that he doesn't believe in anything to the degree that he'd hurt someone over it. And he's the only one who can be happy in barbarity as neither of the moralists killing one another are, and neither is the pacifist. So if he's the only one who can be happy there, because he can be happy anywhere, maybe we should not have barbarity.

So that just leaves theocracy (here meaning, enforced morality, not enforced religion) or authoritarianism.

I completely disagree with this reductionist view. I certainly don't think Theocracy deserves to be indistinguishable from Authoritarianism. If anything, Democracy, Socialism, or some other construct should take it's place.

After all, Theocracy is only as good as the authorities who enforce it. There is no God, only people who claim to speak for God.

[Purple Knight]

I completely disagree with this reductionist view. I certainly don't think Theocracy deserves to be indistinguishable from Authoritarianism. If anything, Democracy, Socialism, or some other construct should take it's place.

I am distinguishing theocracy and authoritarianism. In fact they're kind of polar opposites. Theocracy (as I'm using it) believes some specific morality is above the State, and the State should bow to that morality, while authoritarianism believes the State and its laws are above morality and that they should arrest you for breaking those laws, even if following them violates your conscience or religion.

America is, believe it or not, a very strict theocracy, one that tries to enshrine all religions and/or moralities as sacred, which actually means other people should bow to them. They enshrine tolerance without it technically being a religion, but attempt to enshrine other belief systems as well.

It becomes obvious how insane and absurd "freedom of conscience" actually is when a Christian who is not pro-homosexuality is forced to bake a gay cake. Both people can't get what they want here, because both people want their conscience bowed to (hint: it was never about the cake) and they can't both have that. This insanity is enabled by the vast sea of people who don't or can't ask for their consciences bowed to, and just bow to the troublemakers to get by. When two troublemakers meet, you get a gay cake incident.

I believe it's justified to use my definition of theocracy, that enshrines morality and not specifically religion as superior to the State, because what would be different about an actual theocracy such as a Muslim one, if they chucked God in the rubbish bin, but still believed the State should submit to every tenet of that morality? Well, nothing. It would be functionally identical.

When the founders said rights were given by God and the Sate should respect them, America became a permanent theocracy, not just by my definition but the actual one. It is not different if they had simply said, rights are above the State and the State should respect them.

[boatsnguitars]

theocracy
/θɪˈɒkrəsi/
noun
a system of government in which priests rule in the name of God or a god.
"his ambition is to lead a worldwide theocracy"
the commonwealth of Israel from the time of Moses until the election of Saul as king.


This is the usage I am familiar with. America isn't a Theocracy, thank gods.

Perhaps you can find an existing word with the appropriate meaning to make your larger point?