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Derail from Planned Parenthood video thread

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  • lilpixieofterror
    replied
    Originally posted by Sea of red View Post
    You didn't actually answer the question. I asked why you have the right to kill animals for your own gain or hunger and you've only replied that since we've always done it that makes it acceptable. The food chain is not exactly a good place to find morality, and with you being a Christian, I'm shocked you used the example.
    I take it that you cutting out my above point and making this red herring into your main post is you admitting that you're wrong or don't have an actual answer to my point? Second, you might want to try reading what I have said vs looking for flaws in what I said. For starters, I would assume that you know what the Bible says and I wouldn't need to repeat verses in it and it appears I do, so let me begin with this verse:

    The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them.
    Isaiah 11:6, NIV

    You can argue the theological implications of such a verse all day long, but the imagery only makes sense in light of the idea that some animals are the hunted and others are the hunters and this isn't the only verse. Several verses make such comparisons that only make sense in the light that some animals are pray and others are predator. Believe it or not, ancient people were aware of this element too. If you want me to, I can spit out verses with the best of them and if you want that, ask and I'll give you that. The point is that humans have been hunters for how long James? Are we herbivores, carnivores, or omnivores? We are omnivores and that means we eat both animals and plants and we have been doing this (according to scientist) for a very long time (some argue that humans populated the earth by following animal migrations). Why do we eat meat and have animals products? That's why James and I doubt it is going to change in the near future.

    Finally, I find it interesting how atheist try to chastise Christians upon theological views. I am using Christian principles and arguing though other means, to make my points James and I am in good company. Lots of people, of the past, used this style and this style is still quite popular today (think CS Lewis or GK Chesterton, who rarely quote verses of the Bible, but their writings are full of Christian philosophy and links back to the theology, much as mine is). See, I believe that the natural world is a created thing and can give us clues into the nature of God (again, I'm not alone on this at all, lots of people used this style). We humans are at the top of the food chain and we have bodies designed to process meat products as well as plant products. In fact, even today, a healthy veterinarian diet is recommended only with things like a B12 supplement and a possible iron one (from what I can find online). Our bodies are designed to process some meat, we've been hunting for hundreds of thousands of years, we've been raising animals since we've been raising crops, and we continue to find examples of societies that had an omnivore diet. If you want me to throw out Bible verses, by all means, I can do that, but it is pretty apparent; just by studying history and nature, that we are indeed given domination of the creatures of the earth (just as Genesis says).

    Now, try reading what I'm saying vs trying to find a reason to reject what I'm saying. It does help.
    Last edited by lilpixieofterror; 07-29-2015, 08:50 PM.

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  • One Bad Pig
    replied
    Originally posted by Starlight View Post
    Well as a trivial truth, that is definitely true. As a matter of educational and political policy applied to thousands or millions of children, in the form of "abstinence only sex education" this seems to fail hard in practice. Not even the advocates of it appear to be always capable of practicing what they preach. It also denies children knowledge about an important life subject to an extent that I believe seriously wrongs them. It also causes the education system to fail at its fundamental purpose of actually educating children. Fortunately, I have never heard of abstinence-only sex-ed being done in any Western schools outside of the US.

    One of the girls I've encountered who got pregnant without understanding the process had had some abstinence-only sex-ed from her mother. (I'm assuming the schooling system in her home country had either had no sex ed, or that she'd been opted-out of it.) It had apparently literally consisted of her mother saying "You know the thing? Don't do the thing!" in an angry voice while waving her finger. The girl hadn't known what 'the thing' was, and only after getting pregnant had she learned her mother had been referring to sex. This is why it's important not to leave it up to families... because some parents make atrocious teachers.
    No, this is why it's important to ask questions.
    So it's important that the school provides a baseline of knowledge for everyone. Parents can then supplement that knowledge in whatever ways they see fit.
    I'm fairly certain that if schools stuck to the baseline of knowledge (how the plumbing works and the consequences of using it), there would be little objection from the conservatives you decry to their children sitting through it.

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  • Psychic Missile
    replied
    Originally posted by Leonhard View Post
    I prefer, that the government, if it is so inclined, will provide a good education. However, what is to be standardized, is not so much the education, but the tests at the end. What matters ultimately, is whether you can perform and have an understanding of these subjects.

    The government has no business becoming the caretaker of the individual.
    The problem there is that tests are not necessarily capable of judging whether a student can perform and has an understanding of the subjects.

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  • Starlight
    replied
    Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post
    OK, I get it -- it's not so much that I'm pleased with not being a British Colony -- it's that you think it "worked out just fine" for you guys, so you think it's weird for me to... yeah, I get it.
    I am a bit envious of your 4th of July celebrations though... we obviously don't have an independence day here, and actually don't have a national day. (There are two holidays which people sometimes try and co-opt into serving that purpose: Anzac day and Waitangi day, which are essentially Veterans day and Indigenous Peoples' day respectively, and neither of which is positive in tone.) We need a "Democracy day" or somesuch that is actually a celebration.

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  • Leonhard
    replied
    Originally posted by Roy View Post
    ???

    How can gay marriage be associated with contraception? That's absurd.

    Roy
    I talked a bit more about in post #273.

    Leave a comment:


  • Roy
    replied
    Originally posted by Leonhard View Post
    Further more contraception is also wrong. Its the contraceptive mentality that's behind the legalisation of abortion and gay marriage.
    ???

    How can gay marriage be associated with contraception? That's absurd.

    Roy

    Leave a comment:


  • Starlight
    replied
    Originally posted by Adrift View Post
    Not every New Zealander has such a rosy view of British colonialism:
    I was talking about the founding of NZ in the 1820-1870 period. The nuances of the interactions between Britain and NZ in the early 20th century discussed by your article are well outside the scope of what I was talking about.

    There was a certain amount of social backlash after WWI regarding the questions of: 1) Remind us all again, why, exactly, we sent soldiers to help Britain fight in their own wars on the other side of the world? 2) Could the British please explain why they treated our soldiers so much like cannon fodder?
    As a result there was a limited amount of smoldering public resentment of Britain that lasted about a generation. That's about the worst the relationship ever got.
    Last edited by Starlight; 07-29-2015, 10:21 AM.

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  • Starlight
    replied
    Originally posted by One Bad Pig View Post
    I'm going to say ECREE here. Simply reading the biblical stories of, e.g., Jacob and David should make that rather obvious.
    You're assuming a level of education (and possibly literacy) higher than the people I encountered probably had had.

    And I find it interesting that the goal of sex education is to prevent pregnancy.
    Er, okay...? That's generally thought to be one of the main points of it. Is that news to you? Or were you making some sort of rhetorical philosophical point?

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  • Adrift
    replied
    Originally posted by Starlight View Post
    Oh I'm not denying that the US founding fathers had some reasonable grievances with the British monarch of the time and some quite decent reasons for wanting to be independent.

    I'm just saying that by the time NZ was being colonized 70 years later, the circumstances were quite different and the British government had no interest in a hands-on exploitative approach their new colonies (this was probably helped by the shipping costs between NZ and Britain being prohibitively high), and from the very beginning it was always assumed by everyone that the new colony would be a self-governing country. Britain never wronged us, and we never had to fight for our freedom. Everyone just took it for granted that we would be a democracy, and thus we were. No constitution. No declaration. Just 160 years of democracy.
    Not every New Zealander has such a rosy view of British colonialism:

    Source: Matt McCarten: ANZAC story a sordid tale of world domination and death by Matt McCarten, April 29, 2007 -- NZ Herald --

    When I was a kid at primary school in the 1960s, the whole school would get called out on Anzac Day and lined up to hear old geezers talking about Gallipoli. It seemed like we stood wilting for hours in the hot sun hearing how "our boys" died for King and Country. I remember thinking uncharitably that when all the old soldiers died of old age we wouldn't have to keep doing this every year. The best part was hearing the bugle which signalled the parade was over and we could troop back to class.

    Now, all the Great War veterans are indeed dead but it seems Anzac ceremonies have only got stronger. A lot has been made about the younger generations "taking the torch" from their great-grandparents and taking a day out to remember their sacrifice. Some right-wing politicians have got so swept up in this reverence that they are suggesting we should make Anzac Day our national day.

    I suppose the myth of Waitangi Day - celebrating the signing of a treaty between Maori and the British proclaiming partnership and equality for all - doesn't wash as well as it used to. So, having another day to celebrate our nationhood is rather attractive.

    But the Anzac Day story is just another myth that makes us feel warm inside. The truth behind Anzac Day is dirty and sordid.

    The New Zealand ruling establishment last century couldn't wait to snap to attention to support Imperial Britain. In 1900, in New Zealand's first imperialist adventure, they sent their sons off to South Africa to kill the Boers who were fighting an independence war against Britain. New Zealand troops were part of the invading army which set up concentration camps that caused the deaths of thousands of women and children. When the call came again from Mother England to fight the Germans, we couldn't volunteer our sons fast enough.

    Ordinary New Zealanders who declined to slaughter other human beings on behalf of European feudal rulers were imprisoned. Some were even shipped off to war anyway.

    The combining of Australian and New Zealand soldiers into the same army corps was a decision made in England. Anzacs were sent to the French trenches to replace the hundreds of thousands of young Europeans already slaughtered there. But on the way there, the British Generals let the colonials in on their true destination - Gallipoli.

    Trench warfare in France and Belgium is what most of the world remembers about World War I. The purpose of the war was which European countries would win global domination. The war was fought to get control of the collapsing Ottoman Empire; an empire including most of what we call the Middle East. Why? Because that's where the oil was. It seems nothing much has changed in 100 years. Western meddling in the Middle East has a long and tragic history.
    So the British sent the Anzacs, with hundreds of thousands of other allied armies, to invade Turkey. Of course, as we know, it was a complete disaster, and "Little Johnnie Turk" kicked our butt hard. Eventually our soldiers slunk off to France where the incompetent members of the British ruling class continued to send them to pointless deaths. In fact, New Zealanders were among the top casualties per head of population.

    When our politicians lay claim to the sacrifice and bravery of our soldiers on Anzac Day, let's not forget most of these men didn't have much choice. New Zealand troops were a conscripted army and our then government allowed British firing squads to execute New Zealanders who wouldn't fight. Many members of the first Labour Cabinet in 1935 actively opposed this war and went to jail for it. Several prominent Maori leaders were also imprisoned because they actively campaigned to stop Maori being conscripted. Much of the bravery shown was by people who refused to join this insanity and suffered mightily for it. It's a reflection of the real mood of New Zealanders when, after the war, they elected these war opponents to Government.

    Even the folklore of Gallipoli of Kiwi and Aussie mateship didn't become part of the agreed story until after the war. After all, our political masters needed New Zealanders to think something good had come out of Gallipoli and to feel better about allowing stupid Brits to get us killed invading someone else's country.

    In the end, our sacrifice helped our colonial masters come out of the war reasonably well. Britain and France divided the Middle East up between them into specially designed new colonies. New puppet rulers were then imposed on the local inhabitants once they had signed oil deals with the victors. Almost all the current mess between rival communities in the Middle East can be tracked back to this point. The sad thing is, Britain and the US are making the same mistakes that were made 100 years ago.

    Don't get me wrong though. Remembering the fallen in pointless wars is a good thing. I recommend a good dose of Wilfred Owens' poems to really honour the dead and the fruitlessness of war rather than scripted platitudes of politicians we get on Anzac Day.

    If we really take the Anzac message seriously we should be campaigning to get Western troops, including ours, out of the Middle East now. Ninety years ago we supported an invasion of the Middle East for oil. We still are.
    Lest we forget? Get real; we never got the story correct first time.

    © Copyright Original Source

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  • Starlight
    replied
    Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post
    OK, so you'd be for unrestricted internet access for the child?
    Oooh. Now that's an interesting question. And one I haven't given much thought to in the past, so this is off the top of my head...

    Firstly, I would express some skepticism about the ability of parents to prevent a sufficiently determined child from achieving unrestricted internet access in the modern world. Parents who think they are successfully doing this are probably naive.

    But that's kind of dodging the question... so let's give a not-very-thought-about answer that is coming to my mind at 3am in the morning (hmm, I should go to bed now)... yes. I think that children definitely ought to have internet access, there is no question in my mind about that. The question of whether it should be at all restricted or not is a more difficult one... maybe a case potentially might be able to be made for particular clear and limited restrictions...? Overall I think the best course is that it be unrestricted, but that parents may reasonably want to monitor their children's online activity and discuss it with their children if they have concerns. The thing I would be most concerned about is the ways children might interact with potentially dangerous strangers online and not have the social skills to understand potential pitfalls... but I question to what extent internet filtering software can truly protect against that.

    Whereas the thing I am assuming motivates your question, and which I suspect motivates most religious parents' fear of their children and the internet is online porn... which is causing me to giggle in your general direction again, because well back in the day when people lived in one room houses, and the children got to be bystanders to sex ed up close and personal from their parents at a very young age, and the children didn't melt when it happened. And children on farms probably see animal porn at a pretty young age, and I've not heard of farm children fainting at the sight. I think that if children have matured sexually enough to be motivated to be interested in that topic and want to know / see answers, then frankly they will likely find ways to get those answers regardless of how well the parents think they are filtering the internet. Everyone has different questions they want answered at a different age, and everyone matures sexually at different ages, so there is no 'right' answer about exactly how much children in general should be 'allowed' to know at a given age - the child themselves is the only one who is in a position to know what questions they are ready to ask and seek answers to. I feel this sort of concern comes from a place of Victorian prudishness rather than any actually justified concern for the child's well-being... I've never yet heard of a child who died from too much knowledge or from seeing a pornographic image at 'too young' of an age.
    Last edited by Starlight; 07-29-2015, 10:15 AM.

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  • JonathanL
    replied
    Originally posted by kiwimac View Post
    IN your opinion.
    Apparently I'm not alone.

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  • Cow Poke
    replied
    Originally posted by Starlight View Post
    Oh I'm not denying that the US founding fathers had some reasonable grievances with the British monarch of the time and some quite decent reasons for wanting to be independent.
    OK, I get it -- it's not so much that I'm pleased with not being a British Colony -- it's that you think it "worked out just fine" for you guys, so you think it's weird for me to... yeah, I get it.

    Leave a comment:


  • Starlight
    replied
    Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post
    The list of usurpations of the Crown can be found in the US Declaration of Independence. It's interesting reading.
    Oh I'm not denying that the US founding fathers had some reasonable grievances with the British monarch of the time and some quite decent reasons for wanting to be independent.

    I'm just saying that by the time NZ was being colonized 70 years later, the circumstances were quite different and the British government had no interest in a hands-on exploitative approach their new colonies (this was probably helped by the shipping costs between NZ and Britain being prohibitively high), and from the very beginning it was always assumed by everyone that the new colony would be a self-governing country. Britain never wronged us, and we never had to fight for our freedom. Everyone just took it for granted that we would be a democracy, and thus we were. No constitution. No declaration. Just 160 years of democracy.

    Leave a comment:


  • Abigail
    replied
    Originally posted by Starlight View Post
    In the US Christian opposition to sex-ed takes a pretty extreme form - they often advocate what is called "abstinence only" sex-education (which Jacep acryonymized as AOSE) where children are simply told "don't have sex until marriage" and are not supplied with an actual education on the subject. Now us, non-Americans might giggle at the very idea of that. But even in our countries, where people generally think that the purpose of schools is actually to educate children, there are still plenty of "concerned parents" who have their fears about "what schools might be teaching" reinforced by fear-mongering churches. And it's a fear that at root seems to boil down to wanting to actively withhold knowledge from kids... wanting the schools to teach kids less, and wanting kids to be less informed, in order to try and force them through ignorance to make the choices in their lives that their parents want them to make rather than to allow them to make informed choices themselves.

    Regardless of what well-intentioned parents want, in the real world, teenagers are horny and want to try things out. And what the well-intentioned parents imagined to be the chaste and non-existent sex-life of their teenage child is often something very different in reality. So it is almost always more sensible to equip those kids with knowledge and understanding, so that the choices that they (and not their parents) make for themselves will be wiser ones. I think the current amounts of sex education being taught to children at schools in much of the Western world could stand to be increased by an order of magnitude. Nor do I think parents should get to try and opt them out of classes... the children have a right to knowledge and I consider it to essentially be child abuse for parents to try and prevent their children learning basic information about essential parts of life.
    People like you seem to be the only ones wanting to teach kids less. Many people believe homosexuality is sinful and yet such opinions will never get a voice. If you can't give a full picture of the different opinions, accepting that some kids may ultimately wish to believe that homosexuality is ..gasp... sinful behaviour, then you shouldn't be harping on and should rather say nothing or you become worse than the church schools who are up front about declaring their own bias.

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  • Irate Canadian
    replied
    Originally posted by Chrawnus View Post
    People like Starlight is the reason /b/tards exist.
    Yeah... I really want to hear SL's thoughts on this.

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