War on Christianity?

[enders-shadow.livejournal.com]

I flip on C-Span2 and it's S.E. Cupp author of Losing Our Religion: The Liberal Medias Attack on Christianity

Now, I stay on the channel, cause, well, to be honest with y'all, she's hot.
She's batshit crazy [at least what I saw her talk about made me think that], but she's physically appealing.

She made the argument that the media is having an assault on Christianity. She condemned Rachel Maddow for calling the National Day of Prayer "awkward" as well as a number of other media personalities for disparaging remarks about specific Christians or Christianity in general.

She very stupidly quoted Kant--she went so far as to suggest that Kant was *insulting* those who possess faith. Kant did no such thing and her hotness went down a bit when she made such a blunder. Pity. She lumped Kant with Marx and Marquis de Sade in their assault on the stupidity of Christianity/faith in general.

She then said that Sarah Palin got taken seriously--so seriously that her facebook page can alter policy. Wow, she's batshit insane. She's *wayyy* above the Vicky Mendoza diagonal on the crazy-hot scale.

A) Have any of you (or those that you know) read any books by S.E.Cupp?
B) Do you think that the MSM (Fox aside) is part of a "war on Christianity"?
C) Why did she have to go and butcher Kant? He was a believer and wasn't insulting faith. God damnit.

Comments

[sgiffy.livejournal.com]

B. Of course not. Its only a war if you assume everyone who doesn't share your beliefs is out to get you. Christianity is certainly losing some of its privileged position and many are not as religious as they once were, but that is not a war.

[enders-shadow.livejournal.com]

I dunno; maybe some watery-tart will throw a scimitar macro at you.

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

Meh, I've switched to this macro:

You rang?

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

And now for a reminder of what *real* oppression of Christians was like:



The USSR had a state atheist policy that really *did* amount to a war on any religion practiced in the Soviet Union.

For that matter here's another reminder of what a war on religion is actually like:



Talk of persecution of Christians in the USA of all places is simply a grotesque martyrdom complex with no basis at all in reality.

[mijopo.livejournal.com]

The notion of Kant as hostile to Christianity is a relatively common reading.

[enders-shadow.livejournal.com]

? I'm certainly no Kant scholar, but that's not what I've heard from anybody who is in the know. Wasn't Kant himself a believer?

[reality-hammer.livejournal.com]

Gratuitous Sarah Palin icon usage.

[chipuni.livejournal.com]

Sadness. Mine's not animated.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

She then said that Sarah Palin got taken seriously--so seriously that her facebook page can alter policy. Wow, she's batshit insane. She's *wayyy* above the Vicky Mendoza diagonal on the crazy-hot scale.

Why do you think she's wrong?

A) Have any of you (or those that you know) read any books by S.E.Cupp?

I've actually read this very book - it was lacking in a lot of ways, but probably because I had a different vision of what the book would be. She's a conservative atheist like I am, so I expected something different.

B) Do you think that the MSM (Fox aside) is part of a "war on Christianity"?

I think there's some merit to the concept, although "war" is not the word I'd use. It's the same reason the media is liberal - there's not a lot of diversity of thought, so no one questions how religion is covered in the press. It's all the same people with the same idea as to how religion (or, more specifically, how religion is practiced by the majority) is backwards or quaint. I posted something about my feelings on this last August (http://community.livejournal.com/talk_politics/195313.html) (forward the video to about 3:20), might give you some insight.

C) Why did she have to go and butcher Kant? He was a believer and wasn't insulting faith. God damnit.

She does have a masters in religious studies, so I'd honestly have to see what she said first.

[enders-shadow.livejournal.com]

Because Sarah Palin is lacking in knowledge and prowess. Why would anyone take her seriously?

[thies.livejournal.com]

I thought there had been an ongoing assault of conservative christians and the mass media against anyone who is not a christian.

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

You thought wrong. The mass media is anti-Christian.

[gifa.livejournal.com]

Christianity has been on the march since 500 AD... It has killed untold MILLIONS of people since...in actual waged wars against other groups, like... non-believers... So, I don't want to hear one word about any "war" against Christianity just because everyone doesn't want to hear Christian crap... at least not until someone starts screaming about how the polyester leisure suit's fall from favor aptly describes a "war" against leisure suits.

Just because people stop wearing that stupid thing doesn't mean the people wearing the other style of clothes are waging war against it... It means they realized they looked like a douche in a leisure suit and have moved on... presumably to something else that makes them look like a douche.

Where's your TOLERANCE NOW!?

[sjcarpediem.livejournal.com]

+1

[chron-job.livejournal.com]

And believe me... it hurts us.

But, Atheist or not, her comments seem to spring from a common conservative political trope. When conservative social politics is viewed as synonymous with Christian ideals, any resistance to the former gets spun as an attack on the latter. Thus varying political opinions become blasphemy and anti-Christian. The trope completely misses the possibility of Liberal Christian political opinion varying from Conservative Christian opinion, but it's very useful in marginalizing dissent.

Obviously, as an Atheist, she doesn't recognize any inherent ill in Blasphemy as such, but as a person aligned with conservative politics, I'm sure she sees the usefulness of the strategy.

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

I love how asking a secular society to remain secular amounts to a "war on Christianity", they sure do have a persecution complex don't they? (seems to be endemic in the Abrahamic traditions).

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

A. No
B. Yes
C. No idea

[wc-helmets.livejournal.com]

I'm confused as to why you kept it on C-SPAN to watch a hot chick, but just a few weeks ago, you were appalled and wanted to boycott Reebok for objectifying a woman's derriere.

Anyway:

1) No.
2) No.
3) I'm not sure her motivations, but individuals have been butchering Kant for centuries. Philosophical exegesis requires some butchering before one can arrive at the truth of the matter. That's how the movement of thought and truth works. As to why she seems to have Kant's point wrong on religion, I'd have to see the quote to say, but all I've ever read is the Prolegomena, and I've been quite the Kant butcher before as well.

[enders-shadow.livejournal.com]

I am only human.

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

S.E. Cupp = Vox-like typing detected.

Dilemma resolved. So even as an atheist, the author is deferential to the principles of patriarchal authority based on notions of preserving traditional values. Conservatism in practice is all about protecting one's power and privilege and by extension, denying it to others.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Bollocks. The Christian church in the USA is not and never has been persecuted. Any claim it is represents merely one of the most grotesque examples of the Right-Wing Martyrdom complex.

[dukexmachismo.livejournal.com]

But these days, saying that someone isn't persecuted is seen as persecution, so things get surreal pretty quickly.

[dukexmachismo.livejournal.com]

She's batshit crazy , but she's physically appealing.

Politically or otherwise, that's one of the most dangerous possible combinations.

At any rate, we NEED a preemptive war against Christianity, because it's known to have WMDs.

[torpidai.livejournal.com]

At any rate, we NEED a preemptive war against Christianity, because it's known to have WMDs.

Church leaders with a penchant for small boys I think is enough of a wmd, let's not get started on the grotty wine in shared cups :S

[eracerhead.livejournal.com]

Christianity is responding like any majority when they start getting treated like everyone else.

[op-tech-glitch.livejournal.com]

Christianity is responding like any minority assuming itself to be in the majority when they start getting treated like everyone else.

^ Fixed for ya.

[torpidai.livejournal.com]

Who, can really ever take religions seriously? from 5 Major religions and many smaller, more insignificant ones, we're told to assume only one can be correct. I'll take my chances and not believe.

It matters not a jot to me, except when those who believe try to push their beliefs on me, especially when most of them doing the pushing have failed to read the relevent religios texts themselves!

Most of them I'll assume just have way too much time on their hands and rather than use their time in a productive manner to benefit their community, or discussions of the errors in the aformentionned texts, they prefer to go meet up with others of a like mind. Bigots, the lot of them!

[the-rukh.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately most are pretty mutually exclusive. So, I did the rational thing and pulled one out of a hat and now I'm a Sikh.

[the-rukh.livejournal.com]

Her face has the strained look about the eyes that all television conservatives seem to have. I'm still figuring out what causes it.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

It's from years of facial ticks from trying not to react with a "wha...you honestly believe that?!" to our lefty friends.

[malasadas.livejournal.com]

I'm beginning to feel sorry for the people who actually believe there is a "War on Christianity" in America. This is to distinguish from those, like Bill O'Reilly, who are shamefully exploiting the paranoid and the dumb for profit.

Want a "War on Christianity"? Try being a priest in Sudan.

The war on Christianity...

[sophia-sadek.livejournal.com]

This is nothing new. Christians have been attacking Christianity since the days of the Nicene Council. I especially enjoyed the story of Jesus being persecuted by the Inquisition as told by some proto-Communist Russian author in the nineteenth century.

[anosognosia.livejournal.com]

No, there's plainly no sort of conflict in American culture against Christianity.

*looks up at preceding comments, keeps straight face*

And plainly there's never been any Christian group which has faced systematic intolerance at the hands of the American majority.

*looks at early history of immigrant relations in America and its consequences for American culture since, stridently keeps straight face*

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

A) Have any of you (or those that you know) read any books by S.E.Cupp?

Thankfully, no.

B) Do you think that the MSM (Fox aside) is part of a "war on Christianity"?

Not until they start shooting Christians.

C) Why did she have to go and butcher Kant? He was a believer and wasn't insulting faith. God damnit.

They eat their own. Watch your bedfellows.

[ineedsleepy.livejournal.com]

A) Have any of you (or those that you know) read any books by S.E.Cupp?
Nope and I don't really plan to. I saw her on Real Time on HBO once and the examples she gave seemed to be out of context or if appropriate not to interesting.

B) Do you think that the MSM (Fox aside) is part of a "war on Christianity"?
Well here is the thing, many members of the MSM are Christians and amongst many atheist on tv and in the MSM (eg Hitchens), many bash Islam and Christianity as well.

C) Why did she have to go and butcher Kant? He was a believer and wasn't insulting faith. God damnit
I read Kant many years ago and I really didn't understand him but from the little i know of him he seemed to believe that the human mind was inevitable lead to the idea of a god. If one can criticize his second and third critic though perhaps they might get something resembling a criticism maybe...? lol Marquees de Sade was a cool cat, too cool for the MSM