If this is "faith", none for me please

[red750]

I know I'll get pilloried for this, but there are some a##eholes who should never see the light of day again.

[old man emu]

4 minutes ago, red750 said:

I know I'll get pilloried for this, but there are some a##eholes who should never see the light of day again.

True, but how many of that sort do you reckon make up theprison population? The majority are the dumb buggers who were not at tehe top of the heap. They are mostly the foot soliders.

[Old Koreelah]

On 18/11/2022 at 4:40 PM, old man emu said:

My opinion is that the US criminal justice system is purely punitive with no intent to rehabilitate. At least what the impression is from their songs, which can influence their movie scripts. It seems that for  anything that we would punish by fine, they get 30 days in the slammer…

I suspect that’s part of voter supression. In America huge numbers of minorities can never vote, because they’ve served time- often for minor drug crimes that many whites seem to get away with. 

[red750]

On 18/11/2022 at 5:02 PM, old man emu said:

The majority are the dumb buggers who were not at the top of the heap.

That's because the pissweak judges lock the minnows away and let the sharks run free to do it again and again and again.

[facthunter]

The Judges are "BOUGHT"  Nev

[Jerry_Atrick]

Appointed dependently by politicians. Like this one appointed by Trump who has blatantly exceeded her authority and acted illegally in appointing stays of investigations by the DoJ on investigating possible crimes with respect to removing classified documents: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aileen_Cannon

 

Also, if you want to live as a law enforcer, you have to remember America is armed and the ones likely to inflict violence on you are the fanatic ones who are brainwashed by those you pursue.

 

 

[Marty_d]

While doing some plastering in the shed this evening, I was listening to "God Forbid" on ABC RN.  The discussion was religious instruction in State schools.  Apparently QLD still has an hour a week RI (done by volunteers from a church, not a qualified teacher).

One of the guests was a parent and teacher who is leading a group trying to get RI out of State schools.  I'm not sure if the presenter James Carleton was fervently on the opposing side, or whether he just enjoys playing devil's advocate, but at times he seemed to be getting a bit hot under the collar.

Quite rightly, the guest was pointing out that there's a vast difference between a class on world beliefs, run to a curriculum by an actual teacher, and religious instruction which is presented by a congregation member with no teaching qualifications at all, and, it could be argued, their own agenda for wanting to sell their church's version to a new audience.  Plus there's the problem that the education department seems to think that they don't have to bother teaching any kids that opt out of RI for that hour, so they're often just left untaught for that time.

 

My position on this is, unsurprisingly, church and state should be well and truly separate and there should be no RI in State schools.  In defense of this position I offer the following:

• The Ricky Gervais argument - there have been almost 3000 gods so far.  If you're going to have RI in one of them you'd better be fair and do it for all, and I don't think there's enough school hours for that.
• Religion is a choice - an extracurricular activity if you like.  They don't have strippers come in and give classes in pole dancing, so why let churchgoers provide instruction in their religion?
• Kids should be taught how to think and critically analyse information in school.  Religious dogma requires the opposite.  So if you're going to allow a god botherer to come into class and teach, surely you should provide an atheist at the same time to debate each point?

 

Interested to hear any arguments!

 

 

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

37 minutes ago, Marty_d said:

They don't have strippers come in and give classes in pole dancing,

Shame, though. Be a great way to get fathers more involved in their kids' education

[Old Koreelah]

9 hours ago, Marty_d said:

While doing some plastering in the shed this evening, I was listening to "God Forbid" on ABC RN.  The discussion was religious instruction in State schools.  Apparently QLD still has an hour a week RI (done by volunteers from a church, not a qualified teacher).

One of the guests was a parent and teacher who is leading a group trying to get RI out of State schools…

I wish them success! As the product of a christian upbringing it took me decades to completely cast off the chains. Too often I’ve seen how religion has crippled people’s potential.

 

Towards the end of my state school career I retrained as Teacher-Librarian and absolutely loved the job. One of my favourite roles was to help groups of kids sent to me for diverse reasons; these included seniors with study time, juniors working on research projects and remote-learning kids following vocational courses via electronic links.

 

The school bent over backwards to accomodate the visiting religious instructors; They got the best timeslot and our school sure made it hard for kids to opt out of religious lessons- they needed a convincing letter from a parent and were then sent to my library. The school policy, as explained to me, was that they were NOT to do school work during Non-Scripture periods.

 

Despite this, Non-Scripture group expanded rapidly under my care; the word quickly spread that I allowed them to do private study in the comfy lounge I’d set up. This resulted in the religious supervisor visiting to try to coralle a few more victims. The kids were pretty safe with me, especially after a few told me how disturbed they were by the traumatic stuff a scripure teacher had subjected them to.

 

 

[nomadpete]

I hear you, Old K.

My mum followed the same pathway. She felt that her library was a safe haven for the kids. Probably did a lot of good mentoring wayward ones. And introduced many to the positive value of recreational reading.

[Bruce Tuncks]

Gosh I wish you had been around when I was a kid old K. We had a batty old woman who told us of her nightmares, and in later years, we anglicans were told how wicked the catholics were while the catholic kids heard about how anglicanism was only invented so some king could murder yet another wife. They obviously didn't think we talked to each other. It never occurred to us that we could opt out, we would have been too scared of getting bashed (I reckon) if we tried that.

Edited November 22, 2022 by Bruce Tuncks

[facthunter]

It's positive coercion all right. Can't be seen any other way if they're not given alternative work. Apparently anyone can form a new religion and not have to Pay tax and claim rights to discriminate.. You'd have to be mad not to get in with the mob and get some of the spoils. Where does this lurk stop?  It's prone to abuse and needs to  be looked at.  Non theists seek no concessions and free trips and spruik self righteousness.   Nev 

[Old Koreelah]

1 hour ago, facthunter said:

Apparently anyone can form a new religion and not have to Pay tax and claim rights to discriminate…

[onetrack]

I saw a report recently where the Mormons had collected $100B in tithes (yes, that figure is correct), supposedly for use in charitable giving - but it is funnelled into a massive investment fund that benefits only the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. 

No wonder they shot Joseph Smith, the Mormons were hated even when they first cranked up. Every Mormon I have ever dealt with in business, has been a real money-grubber.

[facthunter]

They aren't very smart. Believing in having more than one wife.  Nev

[Bruce Tuncks]

By far the most expensive building in Craigmore was the Mormon church. If ever I was in danger of thinking there was some hope for the human race, I only needed to go past that church to get fixed.

[facthunter]

Wherever a group are gathered in my name , there am I in the midst of them.( New Testament). Doesn't mention expensive buildings and fancy lifestyles and tax free wealth.  Thank god I'm an atheist.  Nev. 

Edited November 23, 2022 by facthunter

[Marty_d]

On 23/11/2022 at 10:33 AM, facthunter said:

They aren't very smart. Believing in having more than one wife.  Nev

More than one wife isn't great (although in a fictional story I read, an African chief said that 4 wives were the perfect number - so busy fighting each other that they left him alone).  

But it's the whole "heaven is full" thing that really amuses me.  Are they the mob that believes there's only 144,000 places in heaven?  In which case it would have filled up long ago and there's really no point in following their religion now.  Not the smartest thing to do, putting a limit on your imaginary destination!

[facthunter]

Does HELL have a capacity limit as well?  OR is SATAN the most powerful?  IF some of the people  WHO are going to heaven get there It will be hell anyhow, Glad I don't really have to answer this $#!t . It defies logic.  Nev

[Marty_d]

Hard to believe, but there are theologians who spend their lives arguing this shit with each other.  

[Jerry_Atrick]

16 hours ago, facthunter said:

Does HELL have a capacity limit as well? 

It always has capacity for one more.. I am often told 😉

 

[old man emu]

3 hours ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

It always has capacity for one more.. I am often told 😉

 

Would Sir prefer the Helliday Inn or the Conrad-Hellton?

[nomadpete]

2 hours ago, old man emu said:

Would Sir prefer the Helliday Inn or the Conrad-Hellton?

Wouldn't they have a Mar-a-Largo option?

[facthunter]

The Flamin Char a Largo. Weeping & Wailing & Gnashing of Teeth Bar.  Nev

[onetrack]

I've never forgotten a shot of a 1950's rear window warning decal from the U.S.

 

It featured a cartoon of a "redneck" blokes head, fuming and red-faced - and the attached caption read, "SPEED ON, MAD FOOL!!! HELL AIN'T FULL YET!!!

 

I always come out with that statement when SWMBO is in the car, anytime some revhead races past me with a bellowing exhaust, and 20 kays over the speed limit.

It gives me great pleasure to repeat it, but she's not impressed.