Pray in church. Pray at home. Why do Jesus freaks think they need to pray everywhere?
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I think some need to really understand the Supreme Courtâs decision here. The decision stated that the people can open their meetings with religious prayer if they wish. Hereâs the first couple of clauses to the first amendment:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;
In simply opening up a meeting with prayer a townâs assembly isnât making a law respecting an establishment of religion. Theyâre practicing free exercise of their religion; prohibiting such is a violation of the first amendment. The decision was along these strict points. This isnât the first decision in this manner, either. Before you bite my head off let me explain further.
Us agnostics and atheists should accept there are people who practice varying forms of religion out there and should simply let them do it. When we donât pray weâre exercising our âreligionâ.
Justice Kagan was correct in her dissent because it would lead to a slippery slope because of how narrowly they based their decision (which is a common problem with this court). Today, the assembly has set up almost what amounts to a religion approval process. This should be unconstitutional and will lead to a lawsuit in its own regard.
Public officials can practice whatever religion they like even if the official might be Methodist and received votes from a large Orthodox Jewish population. Because of this members of a town assembly can pray at the beginning of meetings, but it cannot be an official act codified in law. If Christians want an invocation at the beginning of a session then they can have it, but if there are Jewish or other religious members of the assembly they can have theirs if they wish. However, if there are agnostics or atheists then they can simply ignore the invocations all together and begin work. Itâs how itâs worked in Congress since 1789. Most of the time there has been only Christian ones, but Jewish ones have occurred a few times in the past as well. If anyone has ever watched a beginning session on CSPAN the chaplain usually has to speak quite loudly to talk over the people in the room who are clearly ignoring everything heâs saying and getting on with work.
We could go the full hog and just ban them all together, but the more religiously diverse an assembly becomes the more ridiculous it would get to have invocations for all of them. Itâd simply become procedurally impossible. Itâll happen anyway.
This is sort of typical of the American version of âFreedom.â The writers of the Declaration and the Constitution strongly believed in freedom âfor allâ⌠but not their slaves, not their wives and not anyone else who wasnât a property owning white male of standing. It was a strange version of freedom.
Itâs now the twenty-first century and things are certainly better than they once were, but there are large numbers of remaining old guard stalwarts who believe in âFreedomâ as long as it means that they can pray Christian prayers in public meetings and they can teach creationism in schools, but that anything that you believe, can --and should-- be disallowed.
Again, It is a strange version of freedom that these people are demanding, a selfish version, but it is the one we have been forced to live with for more than two hundred years.
Atheists Get The Shaft In New York Town After Supreme Court Ruling
Why? Do they want to say a prayer too?
Check out the Ghosts previous posts and then have your snarkometer recharged.
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You forgot Global Warming.
Thatâs Ralphâs fault , too.
Pretty much everything is, now that I think about it.
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I agree with everything except Ralph Nader. Al Gore lost the election first by putting Joe Lieberman on the ticket.
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Blame Ralph has more holes in it than Scaliaâs worldview. Move past please.
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Four Justices believe in the rule of law, Four Justices rule based on their beliefs. One Justice waffles, and canât admit that the other Justices are not all playing by the same rules.
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This is the result of an âactivist conservative majority Supreme Courtâ with a well documented agenda. Hopefully, this will be brought back before the court and weâll see how they land on this kettle of fish they have open.
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Bushâs appointments were made in his second term, not his first. So really Gore losing canât be made to seem totally responsible for Alito and Roberts. You could blame Kerry, or you could blame Democratic senators who didnât make a better case against Alito (Roberts was a shoo-in). Hell you could even blame George W Bush for not making a better case for Harriet Miers, who would have been to the right but far less radical than Alito (and potentially even that closet moderate we occasionally get lucky with). But blaming Ralph Nader is kind of silly.
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The Ralph Nader myth is ridiculous, not supported by the data, and way past its time. For a brief run down of why it is a myth see: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/12/06/1260721/-The-Nader-Myth#
But to me the take away points are two fold, 1) Nader voters were not automatically going to vote for Gore, exit polls show that half of his voters would have stayed home if he wasnât on the ballot and the other half who voted for Nader would have split their votes 50/50 Gore/Bush. So Nader really had no impact on the race in Florida. 2) Nader received 97,000 votes, but 191,000 self described liberals and 308,000 Democrats voted for Bush. You want to blame someone for the loss of Florida; donât blame the left wing of the Democratic party, blame the centrists. Florida was lost because of centrist Democrats. I know it isnât as fun as hippie bashing, but every so often Democrats like to lay claim to reality.
Short version, blaming Nader for the loss in 2000 is lazy and not based in reality.
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BECAUSE WE DONâT WANT TO HEAR THE COMPLETELY ABSURD CRAP THAT COMES OUT UNDER THE PRETENSE OF âPRAYER!â Not any more than we want to be in a public meeting and have it begin with a salute to Ninja Turtles, or request for a blessing from Frosty the Snowman, or an acknowledgement that we all humbly worship Zorro! Does THAT give you a little perspective? I didnât think soâŚ
If you canât understand why normal people donât want to have to listen to religious stuff they donât believe in, then why do you object to hearing someone elseâs secular (NOT anti-religious, just non-religious) thoughts as an opening to a meeting about stuff like filling potholes and fixing bridges?
SHEESH! You are a thick one!
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Last-gasp sort of stuff. Demographics do not favor the foolish.
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Why have a prayer before a meeting? There is NO reason for this. People have all sorts of jobs, and they manage to get their work done just fine without starting off like a church service. Perhaps beginning with a summary of the agenda, and an introduction of any experts who were invited along with a statement of appreciation for all in attendanceâŚand then call the meeting to order.
Do you have a problem with that? If so, why?
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Why do you guys give Nader for something that the numbers fairly clearly show is not his fault, and yet give Teddy Kennedy a pass for his 1979 ego driven crusade to force Ronald Reagan on us? Not Teddy Kennedy, No Reagan. No Reagan, no compassionate conservatism, No W, No any of the crap the GOP has been responsible for for the last 35 years.
Oh, I forgot. Hippie bashing. Fun sport.
The policy continues the old problem of discrimination but atheists and agnostics do attend various âreligiousâ institutions so they are not specifically denied inclusion as broadly as this article suggests. Even Ethical Culture Societies have (including by their own members â see, e.g., NY Society of Ethical Culture) been labeled as âreligiousâ institutions. But, yes, the policy is discriminatory especially by singling out religious groups even though the non-religious can âsolemnizeâ events.
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If it makes you feel better, GhostofET is one of our resident snarkers. He isnât really believe this stuff, he, like Steven Colbert satirizes there crap to show it for how ridiculous it is. Once you are in on the joke, he is actually very funny.
Donât feel bad, he gets everyone once.
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I didnât give Kennedy a pass. Iâm sorry- I agree with Nadar on a lot of things- but itâs just sorta a mathematical type of fact that Nadarâs vote total allowed Florida to be close enough for the SC to get involved and throw the election to Bush.
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No it is not a mathematical fact. The exit polls show that 50% of Naders voters would have stayed home if he werenât on the ballot, 25% would have voted for Gore, and 25% for Bush. How about pointing to the over 1000 votes the socialist candidate got, considering the margin was 537 votes? Doubt any of them would have voted for Bush. Maybe it is her fault. Certainly a stronger mathematical case than Nader.
Of course this is all irrelevant, because had Gore actually requested the state wide recount he requested, he would have won, as studies since have shown. The person who really deserves the most blame for 2000 is Al Gore.