Well, this started with a bang. I implore readers to disagree and discuss in a civil manner. Otherwise, do not be surprised if your opinions are excised during periodic bowdlerizations….
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Meta
Tell you what: I promise to be civil in comments if you can get Derb to convince the rest of the crew at NRO to stop using “Ivy League” as an insult.
Deal?
Forgive any rudeness on my part–I tend to get worked up when it’s my Rights that are being tampered with or demeaned. I give you my assurance that going forward I will be perfectly calm, and drink less coffee. Great blog-interaction should come to NRO.
I have a suggestion for members of the secular right: become Democrats. Republicans don’t want you. They are very happy replacing their politics with theology. They fundamentally reject the idea of a division between church and state.
Prayer in schools anyone?
Evangelicals represent about 30% of the electorate, and that is also the approximate percentage which is comprised of Repubilcans. In other words, ther are about as many Secular conservatives as there are libertarians — and look at how much influence they’ve had on the Republican party — none.
There will never be a secular head of the Republican party (even Mormons are too heterodox for them).
Wake up and smell the coffee. They don’t want you, and now especiallyn that they are a permanent minority party, you should wonder whether you want to be asociated them. (You should have wondered this a long tme ago, but some learn moer slowly.)
Perhaps you might use the BoingBoing technique of “disemvoweling”? Posts may still be made out with effort, but there’s less room for accusation of “censorship”.
As a very conservative and very religious guy, I’d like to say I’m thrilled to see your website up and running. I hope your movement grows and that you find more folks who believe in limiting the power of the government while expanding everyone’s freedom.
Good luck to you all, and I’ll gladly be dropping in from time to time.
Your ally on the Christian right,
Ben
I’ll follow this blog for a while, but I’m afraid it will turn, enevitable, into the the usual snickering a Creationisits and God Botherers.
For the record, I am conservative and a lapsed Methodist. I’m still a believer, though.
We can be secularists in terms of political philosophy, Mesquito. I believe too, that is, I am a Theist.
Yay-boo, indeed. I’m as protective of the irreligious as I am of the religious, but I refuse to be enlightened in economics while averting my eyes from science. I’m a conservative because it works, mate. I’m as convinced by comparative advantage as I am by sexual selection.
Guess what? I’m a Republican because I agree with them on the overwhelming majority of issues. I don’t particularly care whether or not they don’t see much of a division between church and state, as that’s not a huge issue for me. Unlike so many atheists, and you apparently, I make my decisions over a wide range of issues, not just one.
Hey, I’m a minority in my party, I don’t expect them to cowtow to my wishes. I’d rather be in a party that agrees with me on the majority of the issues and isn’t filled with hate and rage. Religious people have always been respectful and personable to me…
unlike you Democrats, who are never short to insult.
I see. You think I should only associate with a winner, that in effect, my vote should be for who’s the most popular. That’s some serious courage.
It’s also amusing to me that after one or two lost elections you’re ready to assign them permanent minority status, something I’m guessing you didn’t do to Democrats even when they had losing streaks in the past.
Secular conservatives will never outvote the unions, which make the Democrat’s economic ideology.
Derb, a suggestion for the blog: discuss some less directly religious topics from time to time. That should keep the blog from devolving into yet another atheism vs. religion discussion, of which the world has far too many.
When the “Ivy League” allows its football champion to participate in FCS playoffs, then you can stop using it as an insult.
Pingback: Secular Right » From comments
I think you mean the BCS, Gerry? And it’s not a playoff system (yet).
Seriously, though: the anti-intellectualism that’s becoming rampant among conservatives is bizarre, stupid, off-putting, and wrong. I don’t care how well it fit the Obama candidacy (poorly, I would argue, based on the results) — we should not be ridiculing intelligence and education. That way lies madness.
I’ve been a long time atheist and former Republican, and I’m glad to see that there are atheists out there in the Republican community. The evangelical base pushed me away a long time ago, but it’s a relief to see secular arguments for conservatism.
Scott, your suggestion only addresses the religious portion the secular right equation. There’s still that whole thing of less government we’re fond of. I’m not sure it really even addresses the religious portion either as Democrats are known for pandering to the church vote pretty hard-often illegally with respects to non-profit status of churches. I think the difference being with most Democrats it’s all lip service to the religious types whereas Republicans might actually follow through. Not sure which is worse.
I’m more concerned both of those parties try to bring home the pork or pass legislation that is popular rather than what is right Constitutionally.
As Ben Franklin said: “Sell not virtue to purchase wealth, nor Liberty to purchase power.”
Not a football, eh, Andrew. FCS is the artist formerly known as Prince, er, I mean, the subdivision formerly known as I-AA.
I know that Andrew is not a football. The word “fan” was inadvertently omitted.
> Scott, your suggestion only addresses the religious portion the
> secular right equation. There’s still that whole thing of less
> government we’re fond of.
And the Bush Administration is small government how?
> It’s also amusing to me that after one or two lost elections you’re
> ready to assign them permanent minority status, something I’m guessing
> you didn’t do to Democrats even when they had losing streaks in the
> past.
It’s not the losses, it’s the demographics.
Republicans have made enemies of non-whites, the educated, professionals, urbanites, people tolerant of gays, and have now lost the votes of younger people.
You tell me who is going to lead the Republicans back into majority status. Palin? Jindal? Romney? Huckabee? Gingrich? Cantor? Boehner?
Gerry, FCS was never part of the subdivision.
What, no preview function?
I had a comment censored like that at BoingBoing. It included an excerpt from a well-documented article from “Skeptical Inquirer” that disputed the post’s point. They censored not just my own comments, but the excerpt as well!
Since then I realized such censoring indicates not just ignorant comments but facts the moderators can’t argue with. So I made the effort to read other censored comments because I figured they were the most important. At least, until I stopped going there entirely.
I’m not saying the moderators here would do something like that. But censorship is censorship.
You’re simply wrong, Emily.
I think the issue of civility is very important on a site that will attract a libertarian audience. I’m not making moral indictments of libertarians as a group but there is a small minority of frothing absolutists that make it their mission in life to shout down the opposition. The same is true of the religious right and some of the top conservative group blogs.
While I am a flaming liberal I believe the secular right will have more manners, seeing first hand the utter failure of such tactics and no doubt being of a more contemplative character overall. However I think you need to be on guard against a basic human error, ignoring the faults of those you agree with. Irrespective of political attitude it’s all too common for a someone with one good point couched amongst a dozen awful ones to be lauded as right by his respective partisans and it only makes them all look bad. Hopefully we can avoid any such ideologues here.
Good luck. I would rather be fighting against a secular right than a religious right.