Your thoughts on Satanism and the petition for a Satanic statue.

[Clueless Morgan]

To get back to the point of the whole thing, the 10 Commandments don't represent this nation's laws.  They're not the foundation of our laws or Constitution, and anyone who says otherwise failed US history in school.  Most Commandments aren't applicable to actual legislation or jurisprudence (idols, the sabbath, coveting (outside of actual theft), cheating, honoring one's parents, etc.), and the rest are not unique to the Commandments at all.  The proposed display - again, incorrectly - implies that the Commandments were the foundation upon which that state's laws were conceived.  And that is troublesome.  The message is "These laws are Christian laws.  Not Muslim laws, Hindu laws, Wiccan laws, Voodoo laws, Satanic laws, etc.  But Christian laws."

By approving the display of one particular brand of religion's symbolism, they've painted themselves into a corner.  Either the visual implication - that this is the Christian god's country - is true, which is incredibly exclusionary and unconstitutional to boot, or that all religions have value when it comes to creating, implementing, and judging based on laws, and we're not picky about where our inspiration comes from.

That's why the best, and only, solution is to not have any such display.

[My bolding throughout this post]

From HuffPost
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/sata...84e2765fd5

While the Ten Commandments monument is, in the words of Arkansas lawmakers, about honoring the Old Testament text as the "moral foundation of the law," The Satanic Temple said it wants to build a memorial to the "various historical witch hunts," the "persecuted free-thinkers" and the "'heretics' who helped inform American secular jurisprudence."

An inscription on the Baphomet statue would read, "Be it known to all that this statue commemorates the history of law in the United States of America. From the deplorable Satanic Witch Hunts, the cherished doctrines of due process, presumption of innocence and the protection of minorities from the tyranny of mob rule became part of the established foundation of American jurisprudence."

According to the AK lawmakers, the 10 Commandments monument is meant to make a direct link between the Christianity and the secular laws of the United States, stating in no uncertain terms that US law is "Christian Law."

Further:

In July, Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson ® spoke out against the wave of monument petitions, saying he doesn't "want just every group putting a statue on the Capitol grounds." He suggested that the legislative debate over the Ten Commandments monument meant that it was a more serious undertaking.

"We want it to be exclusive; we want it to be reasoned," said Hutchinson. "We want it to be reflective."

Tough noogies, Hutchinson; you opened the door to "just everyone" erecting monuments when you allowed anyone to erect a monument.

ALL abortion? No matter the circumstances? CL, you know I love you, but you say some fucking worrying stuff sometimes...

Like I said in a different post, once you acknowledge/accept the fact that an unborn baby is no less human than any of us, there is no justifying killing him/her, just as there is no justifying killing any other innocent person.

Even if you acknowledge/accept that an unborn baby is no less human than any born person, that still does not give them the right to impose themselves on someone else's body without that person's consent.

http://spot.colorado.edu/~heathwoo/Phil1...homson.htm

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I propose, then, that we grant that the fetus is a person from the moment of conception. How does the argument go from here? Something like this, I take it. Every person has a right to life. So the fetus has a right to life. No doubt the mother has a right to decide what shall happen in and to her body; everyone would grant that. But surely a person's right to life is stronger and more stringent than the mother's right to decide what happens in and to her body, and so outweighs it. So the fetus may not be killed; an abortion may not be performed.

It sounds plausible. But now let me ask you to imagine this. You wake up in the morning and find yourself back to back in bed with an unconscious violinist. A famous unconscious violinist. He has been found to have a fatal kidney ailment, and the Society of Music Lovers has canvassed all the available medical records and found that you alone have the right blood type to help. They have therefore kidnapped you, and last night the violinist's circulatory system was plugged into yours, so that your kidneys can be used to extract poisons from his blood as well as your own. The director of the hospital now tells you, "Look, we're sorry the Society of Music Lovers did this to you--we would never have permitted it if we had known. But still, they did it, and the violinist is now plugged into you. To unplug you would be to kill him. But never mind, it's only for nine months. By then he will have recovered from his ailment, and can safely be unplugged from you." Is it morally incumbent on you to accede to this situation? No doubt it would be very nice of you if you did, a great kindness. But do you have to accede to it? What if it were not nine months, but nine years? Or longer still? What if the director of the hospital says. "Tough luck. I agree. but now you've got to stay in bed, with the violinist plugged into you, for the rest of your life. Because remember this. All persons have a right to life, and violinists are persons. Granted you have a right to decide what happens in and to your body, but a person's right to life outweighs your right to decide what happens in and to your body. So you cannot ever be unplugged from him." I imagine you would regard this as outrageous, which suggests that something really is wrong with that plausible-sounding argument I mentioned a moment ago.

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But, alas, let's not derail this thread into one about abortion...