Liberals are just secular Christians

[Conservationist]

Seriously, other than the existence of god, what differences in belief do they have?

* We're all equal under the skin
* The meek shall inherit the earth
* We are judged by moral rectitude not competence
* We can make our society more godlike/progressive.

It's the same shit, in different packaging. Glad I'm not either, although as a Hindu I am technically also Christian.

[Sammaellofi]

Just like a religion, it requires that you accept unnatural facts as truth in order to understand the rest of it.  When you hear them say they are going to fight wars to "bring democracy" to other nations, it's really just the extended crusades.  This is just the new religion, and this is what people who believe in it will do to make other people agree with them. 

The Romans were selfish, but at least their wars were over dominion and not over bizarre belief practices that have nothing to do with nature. 

[mandrake]

considering that liberalism is essentialy a liberty based political view, those who call themself liberals nowadays are just a "special" form of socialists, indeed, cause they consider state power as tool of social progress, and i'd suggest concentrating on this aspect: using state authority to make a change is like asking god on earth to make things better. Missdirected, naive and with disastruous effects: both liberals and socialist (with all their subspecies) do this. (maybe exept the anarcho-socialists...but they are as useless, considering other aspects)


(institutionalizing christian beliefs is evil, not the christian belief in itself, wich, as any spiritual point of view, is optional.)

[Time Curator 23]

... It occured to me that many of the "great ideas" of history have been little more than excuses to withhold empathy. And when I look around, so are many contemporary political arguments. This is why everybody, to the right and left, bashes liberals. I'm using the American definition, basically nice people who are left of center but not radical. Liberals extend their love farther than any other political group, but their intelligence and knowledge are only average, and they make their share of mistakes. People with other ideologies could go beyond liberals by expanding themselves emotionally while correcting the mistakes, but instead they usually attack the mistakes to justify their habit of contracting themselves emotionally.

- Ran Prieur

El oh el.

[Light Emitting Diode]

The Romans were selfish, but at least their wars were over dominion and not over bizarre belief practices that have nothing to do with nature. 

So cruelty is fine, normal and natural but kindness is not?

[Forza Romana]

AH the Roman Empire! Everyday I see this,  it perks my interest.

Naturally, the Romans fought for land domination, and other nations either accepted it or resisted it. We know that the Germanic tribes did not like this, neither did the British tribes as well.(Of others who resisted, I do not recall at this moment) But it seems that once these tribes seen what the Romans had to offer, it sure made them think twice!

Indeed it is true the Romans could be cruel, and at the same they were kind to offer other Romans and the empire all of its innovations.
For example, look at Haidan. It brought back purpose and discipline back to the troops building the wall.

PAX ROMANA!

[Sammaellofi]

The Romans were selfish, but at least their wars were over dominion and not over bizarre belief practices that have nothing to do with nature. 

So cruelty is fine, normal and natural but kindness is not?

What is kind about the crusades?

AH the Roman Empire! Everyday I see this,  it perks my interest.

Naturally, the Romans fought for land domination, and other nations either accepted it or resisted it. We know that the Germanic tribes did not like this, neither did the British tribes as well.(Of others who resisted, I do not recall at this moment) But it seems that once these tribes seen what the Romans had to offer, it sure made them think twice!

Well when the Germanic tribes "got a taste of it", they didn't like it and kicked it out, via Arminius.  The only Roman Empire the Germans put up with is The Holy Roman Empire of the Middle Ages and Rennaisance, which was basically just modern Germany.  Once the Germans (Saxons in this case) came to England, Rome was already leaving due to being spread too thin.

[Light Emitting Diode]

What is kind about the crusades?

I made no mention to Christians or Christianity only to kindness.

[scourge]

So cruelty is fine, normal and natural but kindness is not?

Here's why I believe you have a strawman argument. I'll even play devil's advocate in the interests of audi alteram partem.

The Romans were kind as such toward their own, the imperial in-group. Cruelty as such was for the out-group like degenerated Carthage, the barbarians, etc.

But the idea that all of it was cruelty, or all of it was kindness is itself absolutist, perhaps also deconstrictive. A culture arrives at a set of standards and treats those who meet, exemplify (hero), or defy (enemy) these standards accordingly. For the Romans and others, it is a values judgement having different outcomes depending on a given instance.

[Sammaellofi]

What is kind about the crusades?

I made no mention to Christians or Christianity only to kindness.

Exactly I said "At least the roman wars were about dominion and not backwards belief systems" and you said what you said, so therefore, I only concluded that you said Christianity is about kindness.

[Conservationist]

I expected more from Ran Prieur, but he's just repeating what others have told him.

I first heard that "people just want to deny empathy" line back in high school. Then Kurt Cobain used it, before he blew his own jug.

It's crap.

Empathy for individuals doesn't mean you give in to every stupid impulse they have. If you've ever had to care for a drug addict, or save a drowning person, you know how true this is.

It means you do what is right.

What is right is what fits into a natural order, like the laws of physics and probability, and does best by what we have in common: an ideal of humanity rising out of the muck of monkeyness.

Ran Prieur is just repeating the message of The Crowd: "I never want anyone to deny me anything, so I'll create a mob united by the idea that no one can deny anyone anything." If you have something We don't, We deserve it. You can justify that with empathy or even make up some pseudoscience, but that's its essence.

[My AIDS, Your Arse]

as a Hindu I am technically also Christian.

Good thread, but can you explain your reasoning behind this, out of sheer curiosity?

[scourge]

Empathy for individuals doesn't mean you give in to every stupid impulse they have.

Right on. Empathy isn't synonymous with sympathy. Empathy means you can read people's motives and desires. It doesn't go further in definition into appeasement and capitulation, or an opposite reaction of revulsion. It's a gift for having a means for understanding what drives others.

Dumb people seem to confuse revulsion with a lack of empathy, when in fact it could mean someone is gifted with it. They'll insist that appeasement means empathy and other responses are a lack thereof. They're conflating means and ends.

[Conservationist]

as a Hindu I am technically also Christian.

Good thread, but can you explain your reasoning behind this, out of sheer curiosity?

In the Hindu worldview, all religions are describing the same truth, so should be viewed as different interpretations of the same Ur-religion, which is Hinduism, because it is the most abstracted and most universally applicable. Further, Hindu thinkers believe that if you extend any religion to its logical conclusions, you end up at Hinduism. Meister Eckhart, Arthur Schopenhauer, Ralph Waldo Emerson and other Christian thinkers bear out this truth.