[Osx-nutters] American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War On America

[Patrick Coskren]

On Feb 9, 2007, at 6:08 PM, Chris Gehlker wrote:

> On Feb 9, 2007, at 3:35 PM, Jeffrey Hergan wrote:
>
>> Anyway, yeah.  I can see a huge segment of the US population that  
>> believes ardently and perhaps to the death that they are saved,  
>> and only they and the rest of us are damned sinners.  That is,  
>> sinners who are damned and not saved.  Since they are 'right' they  
>> believe they should rule.  They should vote their beliefs into law  
>> (re: Roe v Wade, for example).[1]  Think "Footloose" town, except  
>> enlarge the town to include the entire US.  And then the world?
>
> This kind of intolerance is as American as Apple Pie.[1] Sure it  
> permeates Christian Fundamentalism despite being  antithetical to  
> the teachings of Jesus. It also animated the prohibition movement  
> in the past and the current anti-smoking movement.
> I know a couple of 'born again' atheists that would gladly outlaw  
> all religion if given the chance.

I'll give you prohibition and some athiests: I know one of the latter  
myself who's *deeply* anti-religion.  Positively religious about it,  
imho.  And I'm sure there are some anti-smoking types who are in it  
as a moral "do as I do" crusade.

But speaking as someone who's close to a person with severe tobacco- 
triggered asthma, and who finds the stuff none too pleasant myself,  
I'm all for smoking bans.  Smokers can pick a habit that doesn't  
require the people around them to imbibe, too.  I hear some of them  
carry on about, oh, just don't go into the bars, to which I say,  
nope, you stay home, I'm not the one spewing toxins by choice.

It's not a moral thing: I've got no problem with people smoking if  
they do it without affecting me.  It's just that smoking's a habit  
that makes that requirement tough to satisfy without public smoking  
bans.  I'd be happy to accept smoking helmets as an alternative.  :-)

-Patrick