Politics

[phgreek]

I'm expecting a 'the Christian Cross is a symbol of hatred' movement soon...

...Do a little test.

Put up a Shahada in your class for two weeks. Then The star of David. Then the Crucifix.

Gonna bet the one you get clipped for is the Crucifix...

 

[JughedJones]

I'm expecting a 'the Christian Cross is a symbol of hatred' movement soon...

I'll start it right now if you want.

It seems like there's a whole group of folks that just press F5 on their computers... just waiting for a liberal to ponder about how a book sounds racist.

That group then assigns some meaning to the one person's pondering.


Some dude hates "Gone With The Wind", all liberals want to take your books away.

Some dude hates 40 round clips in Bushmasters, liberals want to take your 20 gauge away.

Keep at it, duders. I'm sure you'll win these arguments... some time.

 

[wizards8507]

Some dude hates "Gone With The Wind", all liberals want to take your books away.

Some dude loves another dude... all liberals want to redefine the word "marriage."

 

[JughedJones]

...Do a little test.

Put up a Shahada in your class for two weeks. Then The star of David. Then the Crucifix.

Gonna bet the one you get clipped for is the Crucifix...

lulz.


Good grief you guys are paranoid.

 

[NDohio]

Here's NYT columnist Mark Oppenheimer arguing that, post-Obergefell, it's time to revoke tax exempt status for all religious organizations. As I mentioned previously, given the tight margins most of thems operate under, this would force huge numbers of churches and charities to close.

And here's Politico's Fredrik de Boer arguing that it's time to legalize polygamy. Many of IE's Progressives vehemently insisted that the logic of SSM wouldn't justify polyamory as well, so I'd be curious to get their reactions to it.

Prior to moving to SC I was an Elder at a church in OH. We went through a three year struggle of keeping tax-exempt status on a portion of our property that is a baseball field. It was formerly used as the field for our softball team, but the team disbanded and we began allowing a local select baseball team to use it as their home field. We did not charge them anything, we simply asked them to maintain it. The County wanted us to begin paying taxes on it as it was no longer used for "religious purposes". Eventually, we had to ask the baseball team to stop using the field. There is already a war on the tax-exempt status and The Church at large.

Finally, it must be emphasized that religions, and those who adhere to religious doctrines, may continue to advocate with utmost, sincere conviction that, by divine precepts, same-sex marriage should not be condoned. The First Amendment ensures that religious organizations and persons are given proper protection as they seek to teach
the principles that are so fulfilling and so central to their lives and faiths, and to their own deep aspirations to continue the family structure they have long revered. The
same is true of those who oppose same-sex marriage for other reasons. In turn, those who believe allowing same-sex marriage is proper or indeed essential, whether as a
matter of religious conviction or secular belief, may engage those who disagree with their view in an open and searching debate. The Constitution, however, does not permit
the State to bar same-sex couples from marriage on the same terms as accorded to couples of the opposite sex.

This paragraph from the opinion does raise some concerns for me from the standpoint of how Religious entities can respond if asked to perform a SSM. Yes, it says we can still teach our principles, but it doesn't say anything about the actions that can or cannot be taken if a SS couple want to use the church for a wedding. The final sentence really concerns me from that standpoint.

This comes back to the point - if churches are required to perform SSMs, but refuse, does the tax-exempt status go away? If so a lot of religious organizations will disappear.

 

[zelezo vlk]

I'll start it right now if you want.

It seems like there's a whole group of folks that just press F5 on their computers... just waiting for a liberal to ponder about how a book sounds racist.

That group then assigns some meaning to the one person's pondering.


Some dude hates "Gone With The Wind", all liberals want to take your books away.

Some dude hates 40 round clips in Bushmasters, liberals want to take your 20 gauge away.

Keep at it, duders. I'm sure you'll win these arguments... some time.

Your words are very uncharitable. Partisan political hatred breeds nothing but sorrow. Be cautious, lest you be damned for eternity to be entombed in a sarcophagus with Sarah Palin.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G900A using Tapatalk

 

[JughedJones]

Some dude loves another dude... all liberals want to redefine the word "marriage."

My favorite part about this is: We get to see who's who.

Bigots just start piping up... You don't even have to ask, they just tell ya.


Tell me more about how you hate the 14th amendment. Tell me more about how government should define marriage.


Please... go on.

 

[JughedJones]

Your words are very uncharitable. Partisan political hatred breeds nothing but sorrow. Be cautious, lest you be damned for eternity to be entombed in a sarcophagus with Sarah Palin.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G900A using Tapatalk

God damn right they're uncharitable. Nothing about this is pro-charity.

This is war. Let's start one. I'm on my side, you get on yours.

 

[woolybug25]

Prior to moving to SC I was an Elder at a church in OH. We went through a three year struggle of keeping tax-exempt status on a portion of our property that is a baseball field. It was formerly used as the field for our softball team, but the team disbanded and we began allowing a local select baseball team to use it as their home field. We did not charge them anything, we simply asked them to maintain it. The County wanted us to begin paying taxes on it as it was no longer used for "religious purposes". Eventually, we had to ask the baseball team to stop using the field. There is already a war on the tax-exempt status and The Church at large.

I'm not sure your example is a good example of a war on the tax-exempt status of churches. Sounds like you were offering your non-taxeable land to an outside party in exchange for services. How is that within the realm of church activity? The rest of society shouldn't have to be taxed so churches can have a baseball league. That's not within their core responsibilities.

 

[Emcee77]

Here's NYT columnist Mark Oppenheimer arguing that, post-Obergefell, it's time to revoke tax exempt status for all religious organizations. As I mentioned previously, given the tight margins most charities operate under, this would force huge numbers of churches and charities to close.

And here's Politico's Fredrik de Boer arguing that it's time to legalize polygamy. Many of IE's Progressives vehemently insisted that the logic of SSM wouldn't justify polyamory as well, so I'd be curious to get their reactions to it.

I understood the Court's decision to be about permitting same-sex couples to participate in the institution of marriage. Polyamory is not marriage, it's something else, and no one is permitted to participate in it. There is no exclusion happening, in the sense that some people can have a legitimate plural marriage and others can't. Plus, there's a long history of abuse that's wrapped up in plural marriage; most people in this country view the idea through the lens of polygamist Mormons or Islam. I just don't see it. Never have.

As for tax exemptions, the author never really spells out why the logic of the gay marriage decisions should lead to denying tax-exempt status to religious organizations that don't recognize it (the main purpose of the article seems just to be to explain why religious tax exemptions are generally difficult to administer and absurd in some cases, not to make any point about same-sex marriage or the same-sex marriage decision), and I don't see it. What is the rationale? Obviously a religious organization is not required to compromise its religious beliefs to comport with the Supreme Court's rulings on the 14th Amendment. It won't be required to celebrate same-sex marriages. No matter how you understand the religion clauses, they prevent coercion of religious practice. Are we worried about insuring a gay employee's spouse? BFD.

 

[woolybug25]

Jughed... you're all hopped up on Mountain Dew today. lol

Be careful, dude. We all have seen people go on IE rampages and they seemingly always end in the same result. Crossing the line and taking a direct turn into the ban-hammer.

 

[wizards8507]

Tell me more about how you hate the 14th amendment. Tell me more about how government should define marriage.

The government SHOULDN'T, that's my whole point. The government JUST DID.

The government saying "gay marriage is marriage" is just as much of an overreach as the government saying "gay marriage is NOT marriage." They have no business ruling on the matter whatsoever.

Jughed... you're all hopped up on Mountain Dew today. lol

Be careful, dude. We all have seen people go on IE rampages and they seemingly always end in the same result. Crossing the line and taking a direct turn into the ban-hammer.

He has to be drunk or something, right?

 

[JughedJones]

Jughed... you're all hopped up on Mountain Dew today. lol

Be careful, dude. We all have seen people go on IE rampages and they seemingly always end in the same result. Crossing the line and taking a direct turn into the ban-hammer.

I feel like I know the line.

If I don't, I've been wrong the whole time.


Folks like to talk like bigots, I get to talk for the other side.

(love ya though, thanks for lookin' out.)

 

[JughedJones]

The government SHOULDN'T, that's my whole point. The government JUST DID.

The government saying "gay marriage is marriage" is just as much of an overreach as the government saying "gay marriage is NOT marriage." They have no business ruling on the matter whatsoever.


He has to be drunk or something, right?

It's so cute how little you folks know about how the Constitution works.

Something's icky to you, and you think you get to re-write the whole damn thing.


You're wrong. Subjectively and objectively. But do go on.

 

[wizards8507]

It's so cute how little you folks know about how the Constitution works.

Something's icky to you, and you think you get to re-write the whole damn thing.

You're wrong. Subjectively and objectively. But do go on.

Are you even reading what I'm writing? I never, not once in my entire life, suggested that it would be appropriate for any town, state, or federal authority to rule "thou shalt not fornicate, sodomize, or lay with beasts."

 

[NDohio]

I'm not sure your example is a good example of a war on the tax-exempt status of churches. Sounds like you were offering your non-taxeable land to an outside party in exchange for services. How is that within the realm of church activity? The rest of society shouldn't have to be taxed so churches can have a baseball league. That's not within their core responsibilities.

The church didn't have the baseball league. We had no affiliation with the league whatsoever. There weren't even any players/coaches on the team that attended our church. Because we were no longer using the field, a baseball team came to us and asked if they could begin using it as there was a shortage of baseball fields in the town I lived in.

You really think we were gaining some sort of a service by asking them to simply maintain the field they were using as their home field?

The outcome was that this team had to go elsewhere and begin paying to use a field causing their fees to rise. All we were attempting to do is be good to the citizens of the community. Not sure what our "gain" was.

Now that piece of land is a parking area so it can be used for "religious purposes"(parking for people attending church). It's so far away from the building it hardly ever gets parked on. Wasn't it more useful as a baseball field for kids in the community?

 

[Whiskeyjack]

I understood the Court's decision to be about permitting same-sex couples to participate in the institution of marriage. Polyamory is not marriage, it's something else, and no one is permitted to participate in it. There is no exclusion happening, in the sense that some people can have a legitimate plural marriage and others can't. Plus, there's a long history of abuse that's wrapped up in plural marriage; most people in this country view the idea through the lens of polygamist Mormons or Islam. I just don't see it. Never have.

Did you read the de Boer article? Bans on same-sex unions are relics of a Christian understanding of marriage. So are bans on polygamy. SCOTUS just threw out the former as incompatible with the Equal Protection clause, so why not the latter as well? Polyamorous groups are being excluded from the tax and legal benefits of publicly recognized relationships.

As for tax exemptions, the author never really spells out why the logic of the gay marriage decisions should lead to denying tax-exempt status to religious organizations that don't recognize it (the main purpose of the article seems just to be to explain why religious tax exemptions are generally difficult to administer and absurd in some cases, not to make any point about same-sex marriage or the same-sex marriage decision), and I don't see it. What is the rationale? Obviously a religious organization is not required to compromise its religious beliefs to comport with the Supreme Court's rulings on the 14th Amendment. It won't be required to celebrate same-sex marriages. No matter how you understand the religion clauses, they prevent coercion of religious practice. Are we worried about insuring a gay employee's spouse? BFD.

From the 2nd paragraph of Oppenheimer's article:

In the 1983 Bob Jones University case, the court ruled that a school could lose tax-exempt status if its policies violated “fundamental national public policy.” So far, the Bob Jones reasoning hasn’t been extended to other kinds of discrimination, but someday it could be. I’m a gay-rights supporter who was elated by Friday’s Supreme Court decision — but I honor Sen. Lee’s fears.

So if opposition to marriage equality comes to be seen as a violation of "fundamental national public policy", then religious organizations that profess orthodox Christian sexual ethics will be ripe targets for having their tax exempt status revoked. Oppenheimer goes on to make a laughably poor argument about how society would be better off if we just went ahead and forced all religious organizations to be treated as normal corporations anyway. But he basically concedes my argument in the first paragraphs of his article.

 

[woolybug25]

The church didn't have the baseball league. We had no affiliation with the league whatsoever. There weren't even any players/coaches on the team that attended our church. Because we were no longer using the field, a baseball team came to us and asked if they could begin using it as there was a shortage of baseball fields in the town I lived in.

You really think we were gaining some sort of a service by asking them to simply maintain the field they were using as their home field?

The outcome was that this team had to go elsewhere and begin paying to use a field causing their fees to rise. All we were attempting to do is be good to the citizens of the community. Not sure what our "gain" was.

Now that piece of land is a parking area so it can be used for "religious purposes"(parking for people attending church). It's so far away from the building it hardly ever gets parked on. Wasn't it more useful as a baseball field for kids in the community?

Did you read what you wrote? "Do you think we are gaining a service by having an outside party provide a service"? Your gain was the team taking care of a field that you otherwise would have had to care for. That is a service gained.

Your tax break wasn't intended for the purpose of providing a baseball field to the local little league and it doesn't matter if you didn't have another use for it. If the church isn't using it for church activities, then they shouldn't get a tax break on it. The outcome of the team playing elsewhere and incurring cost is of no interest to me, and if it is to your community, then that is their decision. Not your churches. Your community shouldn't have to subsidize a random baseball team because a church wants their field mowed by them.

Mow your own dang grass. It's not the team playing on your field that has them threatening you, it's getting a service in return.

 

[phgreek]

I feel like I know the line.

If I don't, I've been wrong the whole time.


Folks like to talk like bigots, I get to talk for the other side.

(love ya though, thanks for lookin' out.)

...Looks like you know the line all right...right through the middle brah.

 

[pkt77242]

Did you read the de Boer article? Bans on same-sex unions are relics of a Christian understanding of marriage. So are bans on polygamy. SCOTUS just threw out the former as incompatible with the Equal Protection clause, so why not the latter as well? Polyamorous groups are being excluded from the tax and legal benefits of publicly recognized relationships.



From the 2nd paragraph of Oppenheimer's article:



So if opposition to marriage equality comes to be seen as a violation of "fundamental national public policy", then religious organizations that profess orthodox Christian sexual ethics will be ripe targets for having their tax exempt status revoked. Oppenheimer goes on to make a laughably poor argument about how society would be better off if we just went ahead and forced all religious organizations to be treated as normal corporations anyway. But he basically concedes my argument in the first paragraphs of his article.

Bans on polygamy pre-date Christianity. They are from Roman (and Greek) laws before Christ. I do not view them as a Christian understanding of Marriage.
Here is an interesting article somewhat on topic.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/darwin-eternity/201109/why-we-think-monogamy-is-normal

 

[Rack Em]

According to the poll at the top, I voted for Romney.

I'm contributing to this thread.

 

[woolybug25]

According to the poll at the top, I voted for Romney.

I'm contributing to this thread.

You ever notice that a ton of people voted after the election? Romney gained like 5 votes this year.

 

[phgreek]

lulz.


Good grief you guys are paranoid.

When you get back from your time out...

Paranoid or not... I'm willing to put my opinion to the test...if it comes out the way I expected, am I still just paranoid, or is that another instance of "Some Dude"...?

How many "Some Dudes" matter? Seems like anything approaching 1% these days...especially when you have a SCOTUS unable to get its head around the intent of the concept of equal protection.

 

[phgreek]

You ever notice that a ton of people voted after the election? Romney gained like 5 votes this year.

Buyer's remorse?

 

[EddytoNow]

Originally Posted by JughedJones
"Tell me more about how you hate the 14th amendment. Tell me more about how government should define marriage."

Originally posted by Wizards8507
"The government SHOULDN'T, that's my whole point. The government JUST DID.

The government saying "gay marriage is marriage" is just as much of an overreach as the government saying "gay marriage is NOT marriage." They have no business ruling on the matter whatsoever."

So you're saying that the government has no right to define marriage? Well, then you must agree with the recent Supreme Court decision. They ruled that the state governments had no right to define marriage as being "between a man and a woman". That is exactly the position you argued in the bolded section above.

In this particular instance, the Conservatives/Republicans are defending an intrusion into a citizen's private life. The federal government/Supreme Court just clarified that states had no business defining what does and what does not constitute a marriage. The federal government has left it for the individuals to decide. It's a handful of state governments and ultra-conservatives like Wizards8507 that insist on intruding into what should be one's freedom to choose whom he or she will love.

The Supreme Court did not define what constitutes a marriage. They just ruled that state governments do not have the right to define marriage. The definition is left up to the individuals involved, which is as it should be.

 

[woolybug25]

Buyer's remorse?

Except that you cant vote twice or change your vote. So it was people that didn't vote originally.

 

[woolybug25]

I feel like I know the line.

Apparently not... lol


See ya on the flipside, homie. Enjoy the GD50!

 

[phgreek]

Except that you cant vote twice or change your vote. So it was people that didn't vote originally.

Can't they still be remorseful and vote in an act of defiance...

ok I really have no idea why that would be...

 

[Whiskeyjack]

Bans on polygamy pre-date Christianity. They are from Roman (and Greek) laws before Christ. I do not view them as a Christian understanding of Marriage.
Here is an interesting article somewhat on topic.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/darwin-eternity/201109/why-we-think-monogamy-is-normal

A few points:

• That article doesn't refute my contention that monogamy is a relic of Christianity. He explicitly endorses the importance Christianity played in its spread throughout the West. Yes, the Romans and Greeks were "officially" monogamous for socio-economic reasons, but those cultures were still very sexually exploitative. Monogamy didn't gain any sort of normative force until Christianity became the state religion.
• Monogamy's relation to Christianity is irrelevant to the argument. The logic of marriage equality necessitates polyamory as well (see the article by de Boer linked above). The socio-economic reasons for its rise are just as anachronistic and unpursuasive today as the Christian arguments for it.
• Roberts explicitly points out in his dissent from the Obergefell opinion how the logic of Kennedy's argument necessarily entails legalized polygamy as well.

 

[ACamp1900]

My guess is it's posters who joined after the election...