I get really irritated when people use inflammatory, derogatory terms towards one another. Recently, political commentator/humorist Ann Coulter referred to Presidential candidate John Edwards as a "faggot." That is so wrong. First, it's not true. [It is worth nothing that he seems to have demonstrated stronger personal traditional family values than some of his opponents (i.e. Gingrich, Guiliani)]. Secondly, it is an inappropriate term to be used in today's culture. Thirdly, it adds nothing of value to the important discussions we need to have on the actual issues and problems the country faces. This is not a partisan liability. If I had a dime for every derogatory comment made against President Bush I wouldn't have needed to post my previous lament on Social Security because I would be independently wealthy. Here's my point: focus on the real issues and don't just call people names. If you think that President Bush is a stubborn, ineffective leader with poor diplomatic skills, then say it. But don't call him "the devil" or a "bastard." They fail the three tests I outlined earlier (true, appropriate, valuable). In the same way, if you want to express a negative sentiment about John Edwards, you can point out the fact that a candidate who wants to raise taxes to help the poor was 4 months late on paying taxes on his $3.8 million mansion rather than calling him a "faggot."
While I think everyone is at fault who fails to demonstrate a certain civility and kindness to their political adversaries, as Christians we have a special responsibility. "You have heard that it was said to the men of old, You shall not kill, and whoever kills shall be liable to and unable to escape the punishment imposed by the court. But I say to you that everyone who continues to be angry with his brother or harbors malice (enmity of heart) against him shall be liable to and unable to escape the punishment imposed by the court; and whoever speaks contemptuously and insultingly to his brother shall be liable to and unable to escape the punishment imposed by the Sanhedrin, and whoever says, You cursed fool! [You empty-headed idiot!] shall be liable to and unable to escape the hell (Gehenna) of fire." Matthew 5:21,22
18 comments:
Wow. I didn't exactly know what Ann Coulter said, but wow. That's horrible. I don't particularly like John Edwards(as my lengthy row with Paula can attest), but you don't insult the man.
By the way, thank you Steve for pointing out that people do it every day about the current president. If you're going to complain about Edwards being bad-mouthed, then keep your trap shut when it comes to Bush, too.
"I've always paid my taxes," Edwards said shortly after leaving a town-hall-style meeting with constituents. "My taxes have been paid in full, and I take personal responsibility for any time that bills have been paid late."
1. He paid it. They were late because he and Elizabeth did not get the bill. That is entirely possible as he was working in Washington as a Senator and during many of the late tax fees while their kids were still going to high school in North Carolina. He paid the bill as soon as he knew about it and paid over $2000 worth of late fees and penalties. He didn't even really try to make an excuse for the late taxes. I wouldn’t pay my taxes on time if I didn’t get the paper bill because I lived in a different state most of the time either. We don’t get email reminders for taxes (yet).
2. I find it bizarre that Republicans are whining about Edwards' mansion. So he made a lot of cash as a lawyer, lots of us do. Should we compare the costs of the Texas ranch?
3. AC called Edwards a "faggot" because she had nothing legitimate to defame him with... I'd also like to add that whether or not Edwards is gay is totally irrelevant to her calling him a "faggot." I don't care if Edwards has slept with every man in America, the use of that word is utterly inappropriate. AC said it to imply that Edwards was a "wuss" or "soft."
4. There is a HUGE difference in a public figure, such as "Republican Mouthpiece" AC, calling Edwards anything v. a private individual calling someone a name. Public figures get published, they get attention, and their words get carefully considered. Private individuals don't do so much damage (especially when they are my 80 year old Granny who frequently calls President Bush a bastard.)
5. Is President Bush a bastard? No, I will concede that he is not a non-marital child. Is he an impetuous man with a history of alcoholism who got our country into an unnecessary war, angering the entire world, and who at this point at least 50% of America disagrees with? No, he is not the product of two unwed individuals, but what words should we apply to express our anger, frustration, and outrage over the unnecessary deaths of so many people and the complete dysfunction we currently have in Iraq?
I don't really understand why you posted an adversarial response when I was defending your candidate. The only points I was trying to make with the post was to use facts and not vague slander, and to admonish everyone to season their speech with grace.
You weren't defending my boy. You pointed out the only real thing that could make him look bad.
Everything is adversarial with Paula, especially when it relates to southern lawyers running for office.
Paula is right that people in the public eye should weigh their words carefully. Stuttering over them is one thing, but using that vile word was inexcusable.
Thanks, David. :)
Steve, your point is well taken. We as Christians will be held to a higher standard. It seems part of our fallen nature to so easily gloss over our own sins (faults if you prefer -- I believe it to only be semantics) and to excuse them in those who we are entralled with, while parading and ridiculing those of our adversaries.
The words of Jesus that you quote from Mathew are particularly convicting. It is so easy to read the parts of the Word that align neatly with our preconceived and conditioned political leanings rather than to align our politics and actions with scripture.
It is just more apparent that are none who are righteous, least of all me. I have certainly harbored anger in my heart towards the president. However, no matter how much I may feel that my views and opinions are righteous, if the anger exists in my heart towards him, my brother in Christ, then I am guilty.
I so easily forget that it is not just my past sin that sent Christ to the cross. It is also the very sin that I commit at this moment that caused Him to be crucified.
If we truly care about the issues we advocate, then we need to be continually putting our old selves to death and submitting, with humility, to the transforming power of Christ. This is truly the best hope for the world.
The more recent comment was reasonable, however, I'm not sure that I feel that anger is a sin. Jesus got angry, real angry. He also got the angriest at hypocrisy. Half my rage at the President is based on my perception of his hypocrisy. I tend to be annoyed with people who lack consistency. I don't know how to reconcile being pro-life with the war in Iraq and the death row stats he had as governor of Texas. I don't know how to reconcile someone who speaks about Christ and cares so little for the poor or less fortunate.
I just can't apologize or feel guilty for being angry. I am angry. I think we need to be angry. I don't think we need to be humble or silent about our anger. I think we need to stand up for what we believe in and for what we don't believe in, and I don't believe in this war.
Yes, but I would continue to caution that anger can be a difficult beast to keep tame. "Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. And be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you. (Eph 4:31,32)"
Righteous anger is a righteous thing, but very rarely does it ever stay righteous. It has a tendency to slip into seething hatred and vehemence very quickly, and I ought to know. I am very much my father's son, and it is something that I have had to grapple with.
Generally speaking, it is a good idea to leave the righteous anger to God, because it doesn't blind Him the way it blinds us.
Nor can he twist it into something wholly evil.
I think this is whole "anger is bad leave righteous anger to God" argument is just something people who voted for Bush twice and are in denial about the consequences of that decision say so they don't have to embrace reality.
I have absolutely zero doubts that God is probably angrier about this war than anyone, including Michael Moore. I don't think there is anything wrong with being mad and I feel this whole dialogue is a poor use of scripture. God gave us anger. Jesus got angry. The disciples got angry. There are times when God wants us to express anger, that's why He gave us the emotion. This is one of those times.
I think anyone who feels we should just let go of the anger here is trying to find a method of not embracing the shame we should all feel over this entire situation. In fact, I wish I was angrier about it. I probably would be if I didn't have to go to work every day. Sometimes I wish I was angrier. There is no reason for the Iraqi's to be without power, for people on both sides to be slaughtered, and for the overall fiasco this has become. GET MAD!!
I am not in any way defending or advocating any of the President's policies. I hear what you are saying, and I agree that anger can prove to be an effective catalyst for positive change. For instance, anger at the brutality and injustice of what happened to my neighbor might have prompted me to attempt to stop it. But in the longrun I think it would be unhealthy and counterproductive for me to remain in that anger.
"There is no reason for the Iraqi's to be without power, for people on both sides to be slaughtered, and for the overall fiasco this has become. GET MAD!!"
Get mad at Sunnis and Shiites for perpetuating hatred and violence? Because they're doing most of the killing now, and we have nothing to do with that at this point.
Yes, we kicked the bee's hive. But the ball is in their court now. And they have chosen to respond very, very poorly.
The Iraqis have a chance to create a government in which everyone is represented, and one group is not flaunted over the others. Instead, they perpetuate the cycle of violence and kill their fellow countrymen more than they kill us.
Who in their right mind does that?
Oh, by the way, have you looked at the REST of Iraq? Did you ever notice that the OVERWHELMING MAJORITY of violence occurs in Baghdad? Golly, what a coincidence! Maybe it's an attempt by people who would rather us not be there to make people think the violence is worse than it is? Seeing as how the only place the media has its cameras turned on is in Baghdad?
Back to the anger that you want everybody to have: Misery loves company. I am not going to get angry over something I have no control over. "Despite all my rage, I am still just a rat in a cage," :D. Furthermore, what, exactly, do you DO with your supposedly righteous anger, other than murder a brother with your tongue?
And what, if your DID have the power, would you do? We are going to stay in Iraq. Because it's the right thing to do. We cannot abandon the country we have attacked to even worse chaos and death than what is going on already. IN BAGHDAD. That would be IRRESPONSIBLE. And we are taught, as Christians, to be responsible. So even though Mr. Bush may not have been "Christianly" in attacking Iraq, the way he is responding to what you feel is an error is very responsible.
Bush would the a monster everyone makes him out to be if he attacked Iraq, then said "I don't care about the mess this war has made, I've got the polls to keep in mind, and Paula's getting AWFULLY ANGRY down there in...wherever Paula is from, so I better cut American casualties by pulling out."
Do you remember the Korean War? Do you remember Vietnam? No, let me be specific. Do you know the FACTS behind them? On both occasions, we stepped in for another country, so that something worse would not take over. On both occasions, we tried to strengthen the local government. We partially won on one (the Korean War) and 'lost' the other (Vietnam). Vietnam was 'lost' not by us, but by the South Vietnamese. Why? Because we did a crappy job training them and equipping them for their jobs.
Now, we are in a the same situation, only we aren't combating the 'evils' of communism (some don't see communism as a good reason to fight a war...and to that I say "look at North Korea"), we're also fighting religious extremism that has specifically targeted our nation. If we fail to keep Iraq a free nation, there will be yet another enemy of the United States like North Korea, but it will also be right next to Iran, another problem state we are going to have an inevitable conflict with (unless things change quickly).
"Get mad at Sunnis and Shiites for perpetuating hatred and violence? Because they're doing most of the killing now, and we have nothing to do with that at this point."
Partially true, we need to get out now because they are perpetuating violence, refuse mediation, have no interest in working with each other, and this Civil War has been milleniums in coming. They want to have it out with each other. Let them fight it out and divide up their country as they wish. They do not want democracy. They are not going to embrace democracy. We have no business babysitting a war our C student president never should have started so let's get out now.
They don't have electricity in areas now because we bombed them and started everything. We shouldn't have started this at all, we need to publicly apologize to the entire world, and we need to get out and let them fight it out.
The overwhelming majority of the violence does occur in Baghdad because that is common sense. There are more people there and hence, their will be more violence. It's just like how their is more violence in Charlotte than in small towns outside it. That doesn't mean violence isn't happening in the other places, it just isn't as much because it isn't as populated. (AND by the way, that was the lamest argument ever. "It all occurs in Baghdad!" Well, no crap, that's where most people live.)
We also do have some control over this. It's called the power to vote. Clearly, we misfired in 2004.
We sit around and say nothing, do nothing, then we're no better than the Germans who stood around and were silent while their country did something truly evil. What we did and what we are perpetuating was and is evil. We should all feel ashamed.
Because, clearly, starting a semi-justifiable war, then dealing with people we have no control over who are killing each other OBVIOUSLY is totally equivalent to the INTENTIONAL genocide of millions of human beings, along with the body count of the ensuing war, (which reached into the hundreds of thousands).
Even including the number of Iraqi deaths, the amount of dead people doesn't even scratch the tip of the iceberg of casualties Nazi Germany inflicted on themselves and the world.
Total Casualties inflicted by the Second World War (including military, civilian, holocaust and POW camp related deaths):
63,000,000.
Iraqi+Coalition Deaths, including Iraqi deaths due to lack of infrastructure, insurgency activity, and prettymuch anything related to our invasion (the most liberal estimate possible):
946,636
So, assuming that we toss on another 50,000 by the end of the year, the Iraq war is still (according to the most liberal Iraqi casualty estimates) 63 times smaller than that of the Second World War. In case you don't understand math very well, that is a HUGE difference. Not to mention the absolutely insane comparison you made between America now and 1930's Germany. Tell me, what programs of genocide have we been enacting lately, other than that of abortion? I would love to know.
Now, just because the war we are in now is only 1/63 of the size of the second world war doesn't mean it should be taken lightly. Which is why we are still there to try and keep things from getting worse.
Another thing is, you make the bold statement that the Iraqis do not want democracy. Pray tell, how do you know that? Are you privy to the minds of the nation of Iraq? I would argue that the majority of the violence is perpetrated by a proportionately ignorant few, and that most Iraqis would want peace.
What you're saying is that the squeaky wheels should get the oil, and I say screw the squeaky wheels. The psychotic few who are willing to go out and slaughter people for a sectarian and racist Iraq don't deserve that chance, and I am glad that we aren't giving it to them.
I'm sorry that you're willing to give in to a minority group that deserves NOTHING in terms of concessions, but I am not, and I am glad that my president is not either.
Should the criminals, because they enforce their opinions with violence and death get their way? Or should they be resisted because of their refusal to go through humane channels to achieve their goals?
Why is it that we go to war in the first place, Paula? I don't mean this war, but any kind of war in general? Because evil people are unreasonable, and the only way they know how to bring their ideas about is through violence. Hitler did it, the communists did it, and every purely evil cause in the world has done it. Now these radicals in the middle east are doing it. Did we back down from Hitler? No. So why are we considering backing down from these rebels who haven't even inflicted 1/100th the casualties Hitler did?
We have done our share of negotiation. We have given our warnings. The Iraqis have shown the radical groups that they are willing to create a forum in which things can be discussed peacefully by electing a leader and others. It has become BLATANTLY OBVIOUS by the Iraqis turning out in the millions to vote that they want democracy. The radical groups continue to be violent regardless. For that, they should be opposed and destroyed. And America should stand beside the Iraqi government and aid them in whatever way possible to defeat them.
You do not father a child, and then toss it in the dumpster. Likewise, America has, legitimately or illegitimately, fathered a democratic government in Iraq, and it is our DUTY as the creator of this new nation to protect it and foster its growth until it has become strong enough to be independent.
The "1/100th American Casualties cause by WWII" is actually incorrect.
1,017,000 Americans, military or otherwise, died in WWII.
Comparatively speaking, In the Second Iraq War, 3,201 casualties have been inflicted. By now, it is probably more than what my source was telling me, but still, that is ...approximately 1/300th the amount of casualties the Second World War inflicted. So you're telling me that America today, with it's larger population and more potent military, can't take 1/300th the number of casualties suffered in World War II?
Furthermore, we have been in Iraq for 3 years. WWII took 1 year more than what we are currently clocked in at, and inflicted 300 times the casualties. I often wonder if the current generation would ever have the spine to follow through on a war as titanic as the Second World War? More and more, my answer is 'no'. Why? Because given the current 'polls' on the Iraq war, and 'popular opinion', we would have pulled out before we found the death camps which would have justified our war with Germany/Japan.
As far as Pearl Harbor goes, well, we could have avoided that. Mr. Roosevelt went to great lengths to piss off the Japanese. So it's no surprise that they decided to blow up one of our major posts as a retaliation.
Oops, made a mistake. We've been there for 4 years, not 3. Still. 1/300th the casualties. And you're acting like this is somehow equivalent to or worse than WWII, AND that we are equivalent to Nazi Germany.
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