Americans growing more anti-gay, religious

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Could these economic troubles be leading soon to the development of a major quasi-fascist movement?

http://www.thenewcivilrightsmovement.co ... r_politics

Hispanics are the fastest growing group, and they are the most religious, especially Mexican Hispanics.

The poll, however, says that 55% of Hispanic Catholics support gay marriage verses 29% opposed, which is more than white Catholics (50% vs. 38%). Opposition comes mainly from two groups: white evangelical (18% vs. 75%) and black Protestant (36% vs. 51%).

Sorry, I was just offering speculation as to why religion might be growing in the US.

IMHO, quasi-fascism [the idea that big business should be overruling popular rule concerning dictation of government policies] has been here since the 70s, in prototype form described in the infamous "powell memo" [a supreme court member at the time]. it kicked into gear during Reagan's term, and went into overdrive during shrub's term. below, are some defining traits of fascism's elephant that have at least in part snuck under uncle sam's big tent-

* Powerful and Continuing Nationalism - Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays.
* Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights - Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of "need." The people tend to look the other way or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc.
* Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause - The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial , ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc.
* Supremacy of the Military - Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized.
* Rampant Sexism - The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Divorce, abortion and homosexuality are suppressed and the state is represented as the ultimate guardian of the family institution.
* Controlled Mass Media - Sometimes to media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very common.
* Obsession with National Security - Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.
* Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts - Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts and letters is openly attacked.
* Fraudulent Elections - Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections.
* Obsession with Crime and Punishment - Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil liberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations.
* Rampant Cronyism and Corruption - Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders.
* Corporate Power is Protected - The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite.
* Religion and Government are Intertwined - Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government's policies or actions.
* Labor Power is Suppressed - Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed.

Yeah, I don't think we have to wait for the Christian Coalition to throw us into a quasi-fascist state. Corporate America beat them to the punch.

Of course, I either don't really believe that, or I'm awfully reckless. Putting it up on the Internet, and all. I figure at this point coming after me would be a PR nightmare. "Old lady, disabled woman, and four kids held hostage by SWAT team" wouldn't look real good on the TV news.

Can I offer one piece of advice?? In the last ten years, liberals have been losing the PR war. Please stop feeding the culture warriors.

-- Equal treatment under the law is enough, for now. Don't demand that everyone validate the existence of their LGBTQ neighbors by embracing them. I realize how much it hurts to be rejected (duh, really?), but nobody's life is exactly a bed of roses. Let the bigots have, and voice, their views. They're actually friendlier when they get to gripe, whine, moan, and complain.

-- In a similar vein, the crap Americans United pulls needs to go away. No more hissy fits about Nativity scenes in front of the court house, or Bibles being passed out in school, or religious clubs meeting on school grounds during school hours. Seriously, guys, I was Pagan for a decade (maybe I still am, I don't know any more), and that crap offended me then. Now, if the local synagogue wants to put up a menorah right across from the crèche, that's cool. If the local Pagans want to put up a Yule display with a pentacle the size of a Volkswagen, go for it. If the Student Atheist Association wants to meet in the library, they should pursue that. If the See You At The Pole kids start nasty evangelism, calling other kids names and badgering them will hellfire (as opposed to merely talking about salvation), that's bullying and should be treated accordingly.

-- The abortion rights movement needs to admit the truth: That is, in fact, a baby. A little human being. That doesn't mean that I think abortion should be illegal-- people are going to do it anyway; that being the case, it might as well be accessible, sanitary, safe, and medically supervised. In my personal life, I am pro-life, but politically I remain pro-choice. I believe it's a personal decision; I have driven friends to and from the abortion clinic, footed the bill, and cleaned up the resultant psychoemotional mess. An abortion should also come with access to grief counseling, and domestic violence counseling, and birth control. While we're talking about being realistic: It's time for NARAL, NOW, and the rest of the bunch to admit that it's a baby, that killing it (however necessary it may sometimes be) hurts mothers and fathers and other people too. Time to admit that people kill babies because they don't want to deal with Down's, or spina bifida, or a whole host of other problems-- that prenatal autism screening is coming, folks-- and start spending money to bring in more supports and agitate to change the social climate so that, should someone choose and abortion, it will really be A CHOICE, and not something they felt backed into. And that whole late-term, partial-birth abortion thing?? Give up on it. It's a bad practice that needs to go away. Twelve to sixteen weeks is, for the vast majority of people, time enough to realize that you're pregnant and that you can't go through with it. I don't want to see the orphan trains come back, and I know how many kids there are rotting in foster care. I also know how many people there are who are desperate to adopt.

-- Feminism needs to stop degrading those who don't agree with it. OK, I gave up a promising academic career because I got pregnant and it tore my soul apart to leave that little girl in a daycare center and go to class-- BIG FAT HAIRY DEAL. I made a choice-- it is neither more nor less valid than the choice some other woman in the same position made to push through that PhD and become a professor. Her choice worked for her-- she is not a heartless, selfish child-abandoner. My choice worked for me-- I am not a brainless breeder, a stupid sow, a leech on my husband's back, or a welfare taker (we're not even on welfare, for criminy sakes). OK, there are women out there who choose to be submissive to their husbands-- they're not all abused, and they're not all demanding it of you, too (even if it works so well for them that they do think it very good advice). Live and let live.

-- Public education needs to back off a little bit. Those are still MY KIDS. I am their MOTHER, not an incubator, wet nurse, and diaper service for the state. Seven hours a day, five days a week is ENOUGH. If people are having a hard time finding care for kids in the evenings, we need more affordable, volunatary afterschool programs (with transportation provided), not a longer mandatory school day. Five-years-old is early enough to take them. I'm all for free voluntary pre-K, but it needs to stay voluntary, not go the way it did with kindergarten (which started out as a voluntary program, then a mandatory part-time program, and is now a mandatory full-time program). The frog realizes that it is being boiled, OK?? SO STOP!! About homework-- other than make-up work or the occasional project, TEN MINUTES PER GRADE LEVEL, FOUR NIGHTS A WEEK. NO MORE. I reserve the right to look at my watch, realize that my seven-year-old has been doing homework for an hour and that that time hasn't been spent fighting with him or dragging him back on-task, and howl ENOUGH. Kids need to play. Families need to spend time together. And GET OFF THE HOMESCHOOLERS' BACKS!! !!

Do those things, do them quickly and do them well, and you'll see the tide turn back the other way, as the radical right proceeds to make as big of asses of themselves as the radical left has done in the last 10 or 15 years.

[Thread moved from News and Current Events to Politics, Philosophy and Religion]

Dear Buyer Beware,

I think that yours was THE best post I have read in my years here.

And I agree.

AND I believe that 'Torch Song Trilogy' and 'The Birdcage' did more for acceptance than all the screaming, threats, and lawsuits ever will.

I bugged a couple of people into seeing both films, years apart, of course...one made everyone cry, one made everyone laugh and fall in love with those two.

Why are so many Americans adopting foreign children?

Six months of pregnancy, a safe, sterile birth; people are begging for, and basically buying healthy newborns......is that not worth saving a life?

I have always felt that we should have crosses, Stars of David, statues of the Sacred Heart, lovely big Buddha statues, etc in our PUBLIC parks.....not take away anyone's symbols of belief, but appreciate everyone's path to God.

Or Goddess.......have you seen any of the exquisite Kuan Yin statues?

Or even Kali, though perhaps not overlooking the children's playground.

Thanks for the chuckle. A necklace of human skulls might be a bit much for the delicate sensibilities of western kids.

I'd suggest a huge shiva lingham, but I'm just being a dick.

BuyerBeware - agree with a lot of what you have to say. As a non-Christian, the problem I have with all the church / state stuff and why I feel we have to remain vigilent about it is the combination of a) slippery slope and b) at least from where I sit, there are people out there who would, without any hesitation at all, turn our country into a Christian theocracy if they had the opportunity to do so. So does a nativity scene on the courthouse steps really bother me for its own sake? No. On the other hand it does bother me because I see the purpose of such things as having a lot more to do with saturating us "non-believers' with Christianity than it has to do with practicing their own religion. Combine that with the fact that something like 70-75% of the country is Christian, and there are large segments of the Christian population who believe in conversionism, and you might begin to see why those of us who are not Christian, and who want to continue to be so, might not want to have government institutions used as a vehicle for their beliefs. Honestly I might feel different about it if we had maybe 5 major religions with 18-19% of the population each, and a small group of other religions, that would be different - no one dominant religion to take over as soon as the barriers between church and state are reduced. But as it stands right now....

I think the evidence shows the contrary, homosexuality is and will continued to become more tolerated as time passes. You can't read as much from polls from year to year, what changes are the political winds not so much the deeply held core beliefs. This political season seems to favor the GOP and conservatives, unsurprisingly you'll probably see a disproportionate amount of people supporting conservative positions than say 2008 or 2006 which were Democratic wave years or even 2012 which Democrats made a strong showing. Americans are fickle and will continue to be, they do not like either party or ideology particularly and switch back and fourth to express their frustration with this system.

Does anybody think the Religious Right is more powerful today than it was in the past over our political system or culture? I certainly don't.

How about a seven-foot tall Coatlique, Tallyman?

She is one of my favorites in the Aztec pantheon.....would not her benevolent image be a great comfort to the little ones as they play in the park?

I found this ...

"According to Pew Research's data, it seems many of the US's 35 million Hispanics are leaving the Catholic Church, and are either losing any religious affiliation, or are joining Evangelical Protestant churches" [source 1].

Hispanics are the largest growing group so with them converting to evangelical churches then that may explain the growth in religious people, and the increase in the above cited anti-gay marriage rights opinion poll.





sources:
1. http://www.christiantoday.com/article/u ... /37287.htm
2. http://www.pewforum.org/2014/05/07/the- ... ed-states/

Seconded.



The culture warriors are serving only to push the more moderate liberals further towards the right. The left has never looked less unified in the USA than it does right now.

You might be a little late to the party. We already have Christian conservatives.

Already?

Jerry Falwell started the Moral Majority way back in the 80's, I believe.