one nation, under god

We have a draft in case o say some crazed maniac with a huge army attacks another country or declares war on us.

 

It's also so we're not caught off guard by UFO invasions, don't forget those.

DarkLunacy, I'll respect your fervently principled stands. To me, the pledge just isn't worth all the fuss of protesting it. I do think the whole pledge is pretty dumb, and the "under God" phrase is annoying, but not enough that it's much of an issue. If someone tries to draft me, that's a totally different case.

 

What the hell? People like him are the people fighting creationist retards. "Under God" was added to the pledge as an attack on communism and atheism which were falsly believed to be synonimous as a way of saying "you have to believe in god to be a truely loyal american." It's a relic of christian privledge and McArthyism and its a shame so many Americans buy nationalist rhetoric like its on sale.

People like him are the ones defending the rights of the minority from a tyranny of the majority.

 

So creationism is retarded eh? Do you have any proof of the Big Bang? or any other scienitifc theory? Hell no you don't. Let me ask you something else, is it ok to take rights away from a majority in order to make the minority"equal"?

 

What rights are being taken away from the majority?

 

he is defending the rights of the minority..wait let me say that again..HE IS DEFENDING THE RIGHTS OF THE MINORITY?! show me where in the constitution it says that you are "free from religion."

He is trying to DENY the rights of the majority from saying that in their pledge. No one is forced to(or if they are, they are done so illegally)

Trying to defend the rights of the minority from the tyranny of the majority, what a joke.

The fact is, 3 of the supreme court justices released a statement saying that the view on the pledge being a violation of seperation of church and state was a gross misreading of the clause.

He is defending nothing, he is trying to force his athiestic views on the rest of us.

Once again, NO one is forced to say anything.

Not only is he wasting the courts time, he is wasting our time, our money, and ontop of all that(and worst of all) he is a horrible, horrible father for bringing the suit in the name of his daughter when it was HIM who had the problem with the pledge, not the kid. I hope his mother gets full custody, we dont need a whack job like him raising a kid.

 

Well, there is that little part on religious freedom... which can include freedom from religion, my own chosen path.

The way that's put, it seems like someone's will always be forcing something. If there's no mention of God in the Pledge... then we're having atheism forced upon us? If there is, then we're having Christianity/religion forced upon us...

 

Nothing is forced on anybody, because no one has to say the pledge.

 

True, there isn't "free from religion" in the constitution, there is however an establishment clause. "Under God in the pledge" establishes that in order to be a true american, one has to believe in god.

This is something that is used to indoctrinate children, children who in refusing to say the pledge (do you really think there are that many grade school constitutional scholars) are marginalized in the classroom.

You can say anything you want to. You can pledge allegance to Soviet Russia or The United Federation of Planets but to have the government endorce this pledge is an establishment of religion.

If he was trying to do that he would be asking to add "Godless" or "Under no god" to the pledge.

 

"In separate, concurring opinions, Chief Justice William Rehnquist and justices Sandra Day O'Connor and Clarence Thomas argued the court should have addressed the constitutional issue.

The justices said that the pledge does not violate the First Amendment, which prohibits the establishment of religion by the government.

"To give the parent of such a child a sort of 'heckler's veto' over a patriotic ceremony willingly participated in by other students, simply because the Pledge of Allegiance contains the descriptive phrase 'under God,' is an unwarranted extension of the establishment clause, an extension which would have the unfortunate effect of prohibiting a commendable patriotic observance," Rehnquist wrote."

Thats from the first page. It seems you are in the minority in thinking its a violation of th establishment clause.

Where do you get the idea that to be a "true american" you have to 1) say under god, or 2) even say the pledge? Where are you getting this idea? DarkLunacy is as much an american as i am, and he refuses to say the pledge.

It doesnt matter if there are no constitutional scholars in grade schools, no one is forced to say anything. If they are, they can sue the school system, its as easy as that.

He wants the phrase "under god" removed from the pledge, which is a spit in the face to a lot of americans. What religion exactly is being established? just a religion? Is the government forcing anyone to adhere to any particular religion? NO, so there is NO violation of seperation of church and state.

 

Freedom of Religion is exactly that. You can be a catholic, a jew, a muslim, a hindu, or whatever. That also includes the right to not believe in a god. It does NOT mean thta we are to erase all images/references of god from public life.

 

Forcing people who don't believe in God to say "god" is just one more way for ultraconservative hate-filled people who use Xianity as a reason to hate to shove their religions down other peoples' throats.

 

who is forced to?

 

Kay, basically it comes down to this: I have run into my fair share of asshole teachers who don't quite get that it is illegal to force someone to say the pledge. KAY! there are people out there forcing kids to say it. Secondly, we should obliterate all traces of the word god from everything the government does for two reasons 1: The seperation of church and state is a very good thing, and 2: I don't know much about the christian god, but in the old testament he can get really pissy for what seems like no good reason, and I think that having children say that god somehow endorses this heathen nation (no offence to the asatru/druids/wiccians) is likely to inspire his ire.

nextly: the universe is expanding, (this is a proven fact, almost all stars are 'red-shifted' i.e. the light coming from them is elongated, it is called the doppler effect) so it follows that it is all expanding from a single point. Also, there is a uniform backround radiation everywhere that is the remnants of the big bang. It fits the current model of the universe and explains a whole lot.

That and admit it, the science in the bible is bullshit at best, and it contradicts itself a couple of times.

The big bang is a much more believable explanation.

Lastly: the 'it's just a theory it's just a theory' thing is bullshit. In laymans usage people use theory to describe an untested hypothesis, while in physics usage it is used to describe a large body of information. Einstiens theory of relativity doesn't mean that it is unproven, most of it is, it means that there is more in it than just e=mc2.

Kay.

 

Ok ok so how does an expanding universe disprove creationism? Also, where did this radiation come from? Just curious because it couldn't have just been there, it had to come from something.

 

If you want a full explanation of e=mc2, go read a book. I'm no scientist, but a basic explanation is that, if enough energy exists in one place, then that energy can become matter (of course, you would need a thousand dump trucks full of energy to create a ham sandwich, much less the entire universe). It's a lot of speculation and there are plenty of holes to be filled in, but it works. Can you prove Creationism with any evidence besides a 2,000 year old book that has been translated numerous times by several questionable (or unknown) individuals?

 

I don't think he ever said scientific universe theories disproved creationism, he just said they sound more believable and have more realistic grounding (relatively) than creationism.

Who says it couldn't have just been there? Maybe it could have, maybe it couldn't. Who knows? And if it came from something, did that something have to be a divine being, and specifically divine beings depicted in any religion? You can't prove anything about theories that are entirely faith-based (that's why I became agnostic, technically "agnostic-humanist"). Are scientific theories proven to be true? No, course not. But at least they present information and try to win their case on thought and calculation, instead of demanding acceptance based entirely on simple faith.

 

Just checking for arguements i'm agnostic as well but i refuse to take the Big Bang as totally true.

 

i have a hard time believing that something can come out of nothing.....but the circumstantial evidence for the big bang does point to it. Creationism has no place in the classroom IMO....the bible should only be taught in a literary or historical context and not as a science textbook in any mandatory class.

 

Well it's not really coming out of "nothing," because there has to be enough energy there for "something" to materialize. I believe that's basically how nukes work (although on a much smaller scale).