The abuses over copyright will be the death of this brief blip of freedom we like to call the internet. In the name of “property rights” real property rights (the right to control your own physical property and use it as you see fit) will be further eroded. The internet is not going to be regulated in the name of “socialism” or by a government takeover, it will be through private entities using copyright and intellectual property law to sue their competitors out of existence.
The Daily Paul, The Free Republic and Alex Jones have all been sued in a recent scam looking to use copyright to make a quick buck off of bloggers.
The only permanent solution is to end copyright and patent law as it currently exists.
While the spectacle that has received the buzzword title ‘Ground Zero mosque’ continues to rage, there seem to be a few points of fact that have been overlooked. It may be known that the address for the site (currently Park51 but previously Cordoba House) is 45-51 Park Ave. What is less known here is that 45 Park Ave is already a mosque — and has been since July 2009. It isn’t a new site ex nihilo but an addition or expansion of an already existing community. Further, the new site is two-fold: first is a community centre created by refurbishing the Burlington Coat Factory already at the site (which has been in disuse since 9/11); second is a separate prayer centre (i.e. ‘mosque’) within the community centre complex. The relationship between the prayer centre and community centre is analogous to the relationship between a department store and a shopping mall: independent while overlapping.
The second issue I wish to look at is the response to those who oppose the site. It has been said that it is being opposed because the site is taken as an offense. My primary concern is that this offense is based on an illusion. The common arguments on the offense is that it is because, ultimately, it is believed that the Muslim community behind Park51 is no different from al Qaida. However, there is little non-circumstantial evidence to this argument. In many cases, it would be a good idea to change location in order to show that the Park51 community is peaceful/non-threatening/sensitive. But the problem with that response isn’t that it’s wrong: changing locations will make the people opposing it feel justified/vindicated for having their perceptions based on illusions. At some point, someone needs to stand up for honesty (and dare I say truth, in a generalised sense). Feeding a bad, false impression is never a good solution, and it seems that no matter what the Park51 group does now, that bad impression will be fed: it’ll either be ‘see, they backed down because we were on to their schemes’ or ‘see, they are so bad that they do not even respect our opinions’.
It’s a lose-lose situation, and the biggest loser isn’t them nor the relatives and victims of 9/11, but the American people who will have let the media (left or right wing, doesn’t matter) think for them, decide for them, and act for them. It is the feeding of false perceptions that is the worst consequence, as it leads us further into our sollipstic relativism and disavowal of the public sphere. The false perceptions being touted as prima facie evidence is a radical form of individualism. It is a condition in which we’re sinking away into ourselves where the only things that matter are what we think and believe for ourselves, divorced from any kind of public sphere that mediates between the many individuals to create a kind of community. In other words, it doesn’t matter what is real and/or true but what “I” (here being used to mean anyone) think is real or true. “I” make my own reality and substitute it for the one in which we used to live. Such relativism, whether it comes from the left or the right, needs to be addressed. This case is all the more why a truly secularised society is necessary, as it creates a neutral public sphere in which false perceptions regarding religions can be righted.
At times, it’s slightly corny, but it delivers a rather poetic and reasoned response to the notion that libertarianism would be a shift which might require the dramatic restructuring of society. In short: yes it will, and this is a good thing.
I have some severe reservations about some of the coalition government’s policies and plans, but I have to admit that I have had more to applaud from this government than any I have lived under – including in the US.
Case in point, the government is now shutting off funds for speed cameras in many UK counties, many of them near my location.
The government could have done the wrong thing here and allowed local councils to keep the revenue from the cameras, which would have made local councils into legitimised groups of traffic thugs. Instead, it has simply shut off the funding and allowed councils to figure out the best ways to react – a solution which encourages more local control.
I have not been huge on Rand Paul in the past few months. He really, really went far more to the social/neo-conservative side during his primary campaign and to a degree, it broke my heart.
However, Paul has finally, finally issued a platform which gets back to the issues which got him where he is:
I will never, ever vote for a taxpayer bailout of a private industry. Whether it’s big banks, automakers, or any other industry — you succeed or fail on your own.
I will not vote for an unbalanced budget. I will not vote for a tax increase. Ever.
I will fight for new rules like a Balanced Budget Amendment and Term Limits.
I will not take ANYTHING off the table in the fight to balance the budget. Anyone who says something like they will “freeze non-defense discretionary spending” is blowing smoke at you and hoping you won’t notice. That would balance the budget — MAYBE — in about 80 years.
We have to keep our promises to seniors and keep our country strong, but every area has things that can be cut. Every agency has things that are duplicative or that could be done better or cheaper.
I will propose and force a vote on an Enumerated Powers Act, to force Congress to point to the part of the Constitution that justifies their bills.
I will fight for the Bill of Rights. Democrats often love the 4th amendment. Republicans the 2nd. I will fight for them all, which means fighting for your free speech, gun rights, and civil liberties. Laws that infringe on ANY of these make the federal government more powerful, and we cannot continue to allow that.
I will not allow our troops to be the world’s policeman, and I will force a vote on a Declaration of War if any President seeks to commit our military to battle.
I can agree with every single one of these points. It is not going to be easy uniting conservatives, libertarians, the tea-party and libertarian democrats – but Rand Paul is finally making steps to do just that. And if he is successful, it could have large ramifications for future candidates.
I was speaking with a home-schooling mom in our church about economic resources for her children. Her husband is also a physics professor at the university where I am doing my research. These are people who have lived in several different countries, having children in Australia, the US and the UK. Basically, they have much more experience than I do!
This woman has a sick child who needed to go to the hospital recently. This is our exchange:
Mom: [Our two year old son] had his tonsils and adenoids out July 17 and for the first few days we thought he was recovering well but he then deteriorated and became quite ill, ending up back in hospital. This was our first real experience of the NHS other than having babies and it was surreal.
Met the surgeon who was to operate on [our son] half an hour before the procedure. No pre-operative medical AT ALL, just asked to sign on the dotted line to give consent.
[our son] had an allergic reaction to one of the drugs used during surgery and when I queried the very apparent rash around his eyes after surgery, the nurse told us it was due to tape put over his eyes during surgery. NO WAY. I may not be a doctor but that was not a band-aid rash. I demanded that he be seen by a doctor, waited several hours, then an ENT consultant walked in, looked at [our son]‘s eyes and declared that he was displaying classic signs of an allergic reaction to a drug commonly used in general anaesthesia and that he should never have it again.
The standard of care was worse than my memories of taking pets to the vet as a kid. We are still pretty shell-shocked by the ordeal.
I wasn’t surprised at all. After my experiences (1) (2), it wouldn’t strike me as odd that children’s surgery was also at a poor standard. I responded:
Colin: So sorry about your NHS experience. It is indeed the worst standard of healthcare in the industrial world I have ever seen. Sadie and I have basically stopped going to the doctor, the advice is that useless. And to get anything accomplished, one has to make monumental efforts for what would be considered standard treatments and practices other places. When she last went in, she sat with the doctor for five minutes while the doctor simply googled her symptoms and then read back to her what was on the internet. I can give you plenty of other stories, as I’m sure other expatriates can (just talk to [other woman in our church who was misdiagnosed, then had a screwed up surgery and was in pain for a month whilst on a waiting list] about her experience!). We will pray for your family today, both for these circumstances and for your faith and trust in God as you endure this trial.
This was her response. Remember, this is a normal, well-educated mother of five children who has experienced the healthcare systems of several different countries:
Mom: Well, I was pretty shocked 15 or so months ago when I took [our son] to the doctor with chicken pox only to have the doctor tell me he couldn’t diagnose it as he had never actually seen a case of chicken pox, but this hospital experience was beyond quackery and downright dangerous.
All of the children having surgery the same day as [our son] did not even wear a hospital gown to go to O.R.- they just walked into O.R. wearing their street clothes and had a bib placed around their neck!!!
Thank you for praying for us. It will only be by the grace of God that we will get over this barbaric, archaic butchery that we experienced.
The US already has a socialised system which is about to get much worse in the coming years. Enjoy it folks.
In later parts, I will look at the present condition from different angles, however for now I wish to discuss the history behind what I will call ‘traditionalism’. Traditionalism takes a stand against secularisation because it wants to prevent corruption of the tradition and loss of the tradition’s stature. In other words, traditionalism does have good intentions; and this needs to be acknowledged upfront. My defense of secularisation rests not on dismantling traditionalism but arguing that secularisation attains the goals of traditionalism as well as does something more: secularisation creates more avenues for tradition to grow beyond its preservation.
The greatest problem with traditionalism is that it cannot achieve its intended goals. In order to protect tradition’s freedom, traditionalism requires its believers to enter the political realm and play the game of political power. This inevitably leads to disastrous outcomes. Two examples are: [1] the corruption of tradition’s goals by enforcing the tradition upon everyone, leaving it open to later overthrowing and [2] the subjugation of tradition to the game of political power. Whenever a religious tradition enters the political realm as a political power, it becomes subject to the political realm. It is important to read the last sentence as a critique of religion as a political force. Secularisation in the strictest sense is the separation of religion from the political realm as a political power. Secularisation is not the absolute separation of religion from the political realm, as two completely unrelated realms of participation. In other words, secularisation is a rejection of all religious traditions as unified political parties, allowing people to be religious and political participants without needing to be a particular kind of one to be another (i.e. without needing one to be of a particular political party in order to participate in a particular religious tradition and vice versa).
The greatest benefit of secularisation is that one is free to participate in both the political and religious spheres without one interfering with the other. Closely related to this is that each sphere can influence the other but to the extent that one is free to ‘pick the battles’. In short, one can preserve one’s tradition better if one’s tradition is not tied into the rise and fall of political power. This is strength that secularisation provides over traditionalism. While this post is largely a proof-of-concept demonstration, my following posts will analyse details secularisation entails.
Norman over at LibertarianChristains.com fielded a question today about gay rights. His answer is worth the read. In sum:
…not forbidding certain behavior should not be conflated with not approving of certain behavior. Being permissive of lifestyle choices does not entail me agreeing that the lifestyle choice is morally right before God. Such non-agreement is my religious perspective, and thus cannot be used as a rationale to coerce others. To me, this is the essence of being socially tolerant: though I disagree with a behavior I shall not raise an aggressive hand against it. I would use a similar argument to defend any non-aggressive behavior even if I believed it to be wrong.
This indeed is the linchpin on this issue between more statist Christians and Christian libertarians. Both views see homosexuality as a sin, an abomination before God of which we do not approve, condone and indeed as Christians we hate that sin (as we hate all sin). But only the former believes that we must (in order to be consistent) go a step further and engineer society by force, using the police and threatening to MAKE people conform to our religious views.
You have likely noticed that the site looks a little bit different. I assure you, the update is more than cosmetic!
Zeal For Truth has gone through a much needed update. The forums and blog are better integrated. There are new and better features for comments and blog posts. There are also new features for categorisation, organisation and access to enable users to get as much as possible out of the content of this site.
Christopher Roussel, has gone through and done this work for the site and has continued to keep the site afloat for many years.
Feel free to report any bugs here or any gripes you have, but also to thank Chris for the hard work that he’s done.
For Americans, today is the celebration of the American colonies declaring freedom from their European owners. The problem with this is that it has become a common thing to celebrate within the church. My main concern is that church worship is supposed to be dedicated to the worship of God and Christ, not a government.
Perhaps the most telling reasoning behind this marriage is one that confronted me recently. Recently, I commented that today I get to go to church without needing to worship the State. An old friend replied that one should be thankful to the State for the freedom of worship, even if it cuts into the time one spends worshiping God and Christ.
Yet this is exactly the kind of civil religion that ultimately harms the church. Over the next few posts in this series, I will argue that the separation of church and state that we find in secularisation. Through secularisation, Christians have greater freedom to worship God because there is no pretense to glorifying the State before, with, or after God. In other words, a secularised society is better than one in which State and Church is married.
In this respect, American Christianity is largely backwards in its love of civil religion. I wish to analyse the theological underpinning of this marriage, showing that the marriage of Church and State has developed out of a poor understanding of Christian theology. It is only through a secularised politics that Christian theology will grow.
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