In a pluralistic society of different beliefs, does the Christian have the right to impose their religious beliefs on those who do not believe?

  • Thread starter Thread starter IWantGod
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
MPat said:
Um, then you should talk not about “majority”, but about “supermajority”.

For “majority” is just 50% and one.
Click to expand...
I just did a search on “majority” and the only time I used it without a qualifier was when I was talking about a minority imposing its views on “a majority.” The only term I used when talking about a group making its own views legal was “consensus,” and I twice I pointed out that you could debate exactly what that would mean. I also said it certainly would NOT mean 51%. OK?
 
From billboards and going door to door. Advocates for gay marriage did whatever it took to ‘get the numbers up.’ After being voted down at the voting booth, twice in California, the advocacy groups did an end run around the people and went to the US Supreme Court.
 
You’re talking about a consensus in congress, or any other legislative body- they don’t necessarily reflect the desires of the people they represent, and they’re imposing their own beliefs whenever they make a decision for the millions of us.
 
Erikaspirit16 said:
I just did a search on “majority” and the only time I used it without a qualifier was when I was talking about a minority imposing its views on “a majority.” The only term I used when talking about a group making its own views legal was “consensus,” and I twice I pointed out that you could debate exactly what that would mean. I also said it certainly would NOT mean 51%. OK?
Click to expand...
That does not explain your position one bit.

So, when exactly, in your opinion, is “consensus” necessary, and when exactly, in your opinion, is “majority” sufficient?

It would be nice if you could also explain why it is so.

Perhaps even why anyone else should care, if that would not be clear from the previous answer.
 
Last edited:
Thom18 said:
You’re talking about a consensus in congress, or any other legislative body
Click to expand...
No I’m not. Read what I say, not what you think I say. To me a “consensus” is a large (how large? open to debate) majority of the population. Has nothing to do with Congress, Supreme Court, etc. except insofar as they represent the consensus of the population.
 
There are two concepts people should be aware of: “engineering consent” and “perception management.” When making decisions about who or what issue to vote for, I do all the research I can. Consensus doesn’t interest me and I know the media is sending mostly biased messages. I evaluate what I find and look at the reasoning. In too many case, decades of manipulating public opinion becomes obvious. I then vote based on knowing that. Just because an idea is labeled “mainstream” does not automatically make it immune to criticism or rejection.
 
MPat said:
So, when exactly, in your opinion, is “consensus” necessary, and when exactly, in your opinion, is “majority” sufficient?

It would be nice if you could also explain why it is so.

Perhaps even why anyone else should care, if that would not be clear from the previous answer.
Click to expand...
My personal opinion is that you shouldn’t pass a law without a “consensus” of public opinion in favor of the law. What % approval that would be would, it seems to me, depend on the issue. If it’s a technical matter (how many miles of roads will we re-surface this year?) or a matter only a few people really care about (shall we have 7 people on the board of education or 9?), then I would say a simple majority of the relevant legislative body should pass the law.

However, if it’s a contentious issue (abortion! Brexit!), it seems to me that 51% would simply invite more problems, not solve them. You could, of course, use direct democracy and have a referendum, like Brexit. And in that case, it was a relatively small majority (51.9%!) that carried the day–and you can already see the problems, which any idiot could have foreseen (what if Scotland votes to stay in the EU (they did) and England wants to leave? What will happen to the Irish land border with N. Ireland if the UK leaves? Etc. Etc.) So if I had been in charge, there would be a lot of conditions–you would need a 60% yes vote, and for the UK to leave, it would have to be approved by 60% in England, Wales, Scotland, and N. Ireland. But that’s just my opinion. But it does show the problems of not having a consensus on a major contentious issue.

Now let’s take gay marriage, which a lot of people here are saying was foisted on an unsuspecting public by the Supreme Court. Nonsense. The court simply reflected public opinion. http://news.gallup.com/poll/210566/support-gay-marriage-edges-new-high.aspx A 2017 Gallup poll: “Should gay marriage be recognized by law?” 64% said yes. To me that’s a consensus. Esp. when the “yes” side is gaining strength every year. So you may not like it, but 64% think it’s OK, and of course it’s not forcing anyone to marry someone of the same sex, it’s simply allowing those who want to to do it legally.

Now look at abortion. Another Gallup poll, http://news.gallup.com/poll/1576/abortion.aspx covering 1975-2017.
Legal under any circumstance: 1975–21% 2017–29%
Legal only under certain circumstance: 1975–54% 2107–50%
Illegal in all circumstance: 1975–22% 2017–18%
no opinion: 3% in both 1975 and 2017

So. Those here who are all for imposing their morality on the country make up 18% of the population of the US. And in fact, instead of convincing others they are right, they have actually LOST ground–down from 22% in 1975!

Meanwhile those in favor of allowing abortion went from 75% in 1975 to 79% in 2017. In my mind, that’s a consensus of opinion. It would be WRONG for the 18% to impose their values on the 79%.

I’m sure all of you anti-abortionists are gung ho for your cause. Guess what? I even agree with you on a personal level–abortion is wrong. But am I about to inflict my personal beliefs on someone else? No.
 
Last edited:
More emotion words, like “inflict.” That is not the goal. The goal is to persuade. The amount of lobbying being done by LGBT activists around the world is just a numbers game. “Get those numbers up” and use a combination of standard lobbying tactics mixed in with certain key words to convince those ‘on the fence’ to change their minds. The media, on many levels, supports this. This is called 'manipulating public opinion," including half-truths and leaving out the full picture. As it stands, this experiment will yield results that everyone who takes the time to examine it, that will affect popular opinion.
 
edwest211 said:
More emotion words, like “inflict.” That is not the goal. The goal is to persuade.
Click to expand...
As I keep saying, “Go for it.” But as you can see from the Gallup poll, public opinion is going the other way–those who want to legalize abortion are up 4% between 1975 and 2107. Your side is DOWN 4%. So persuade away. You’ve got a lot of work to do!
 
I’m not interested in public manipulation, just getting the truth out there, no matter how long it takes. I know people who believe things because they don’t properly evaluate what they are being told by the media. Social engineering can only go so far. And I encourage people to not automatically trust the media. Listen. Determine the whole picture and take it from there.
 
Erikaspirit16 said:
My personal opinion is that you shouldn’t pass a law without a “consensus” of public opinion in favor of the law. What % approval that would be would, it seems to me, depend on the issue. If it’s a technical matter (how many miles of roads will we re-surface this year?) or a matter only a few people really care about (shall we have 7 people on the board of education or 9?), then I would say a simple majority of the relevant legislative body should pass the law.

However, if it’s a contentious issue (abortion! Brexit!), it seems to me that 51% would simply invite more problems, not solve them. You could, of course, use direct democracy and have a referendum, like Brexit. And in that case, it was a relatively small majority (51.9%!) that carried the day–and you can already see the problems, which any idiot could have foreseen (what if Scotland votes to stay in the EU (they did) and England wants to leave? What will happen to the Irish land border with N. Ireland if the UK leaves? Etc. Etc.) So if I had been in charge, there would be a lot of conditions–you would need a 60% yes vote, and for the UK to leave, it would have to be approved by 60% in England, Wales, Scotland, and N. Ireland. But that’s just my opinion. But it does show the problems of not having a consensus on a major contentious issue.
Click to expand...
So, what, in your opinion, should happen if you have an important question with no consensus one way or another?

Which, by the way, is what often happens.

It is not as if there is a “neutral” option. One opinion ends up winning one way or another. So, which one should, in your opinion?
Erikaspirit16 said:
But am I about to inflict my personal beliefs on someone else? No.
Click to expand...
Actually, I get an impression that you are quite willing to “inflict your personal beliefs on someone else”, just different ones.

But anyway, what exactly, in your view is wrong with “inflicting personal beliefs on others”?
 
Last edited:
0Scarlett_nidiyilii said:
40.png
Dan123:
So when Dawkins or anyone says they don’t believe in universal absolutes of morality,
Click to expand...
Dan, I don’t know your religious beliefs, but Imma go out on a limb and say that virtually everybody does believe in moral absolutes.
Ask a person who claims there are no moral absolutes what they think about torturing small children…
Click to expand...
You are confusing something to which all normal people would agree and absolute morality. The two are different. Otherwise you could replace ‘torturing small children’ with ‘drinking beer’ and if everyone agreed then, according to you, drinking beer would be absolutely morally wrong.

In any case, absolute means not qualified in any way. You need to unpack any example you want to give to check to see if we think it’s wrong or not.

Is causing harm wrong?
To who?
Small children.
In what way?
Sticking needles into them.
For what purpose?

If the answer is ‘my personal enjoyment’ then almost everyone would agree it’s wrong. But you have started out by asking if causing harm is wrong and then qualified it to describe a specific scenario. And note the word ‘qualified’. Something that is qualified cannot, by the very definition of the word, be described as absolute. It is relative. To the specific situation.

Nothing in regard to morality can be absolute. You need to qualify it in some way, which makes it relative to the situation. Everyone agreeing with you does not make it absolute
 
Last edited:
“There are no moral absolutes!”

Are you sure about that?

“Absolutely!”
 
There are broken people or mentally sick people who have no moral lines.
But aside from them, all healthy people have a sense of “absolute”–some moral line they either will not cross, or if they do for whatever reason (stress, force), they will suffer some internal conflict because they know it was wrong.
People are free to adopt any philosophy they want . But at the end of the day, nobody really believes that there are no moral absolutes. They only pick and choose the ones they want.
Hopefully, their picking and choosing is based in objective reality.
 
Have you spent much time around smart philosophers in universities?

I spent four years with them. We didn’t have any error theorists or moral nihilists in our department. In fact they spent a good deal of time showing counter-arguments against them because it’s popular for flippant college juniors who think they’ve got all the answers to ethics after one Intro to Phil class.
 
Well said. No important decisions can be made, no important actions can be performed, without some inner beliefs regarding what to do. The origins of those beliefs may vary, but in most cases, people are aware of at least some of the possible consequences. I know a few people who think they can influence outcomes to their liking without looking at the problem or desired goal, correctly. One person has continued this way for years and rarely got what he wanted. Sometimes, people just need a little encouragement.
 
This if you believe that abortion isn’t imposed on society.

Fact is, a woman does not make the choice alone, when she decides to have an abortion.

She must have support from doctors who’ll perform it and the society who’ll tolerate it.

Even the man delivering the oil to the abortion clinic, provides tacit support for abortion.

The same is true for gay marriage and transgender issues.

As the title of Thomas Merton’s book goes, "No Man Is An Island.’

We are connected to each other and the choices we make have an impact on everyone.

The lost of moral core values has created a subculture of barbarians who have no scruples about murdering people.

This is how society has digressed as morality is viewed as relevant to the individual.

Jim
 
Last edited:
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top