Today’s opinion is the product of a Court, which is the product of a
law-profession culture, that has largely signed on to the so-called
homosexual agenda, by which I mean the agenda promoted by some
homosexual activists directed at eliminating the moral opprobrium that
has traditionally attached to homosexual conduct… [T]he Court has
taken sides in the culture war, departing from its role of assuring,
as neutral observer, that the democratic rules of engagement are
observed. He cited the majority opinion’s concern that the
criminalization of sodomy could be the basis for discrimination
against homosexuals as evidence that the majority ignored the views of
most Americans: So imbued is the Court with the law profession’s
anti-anti-homosexual culture, that it is seemingly unaware that the
attitudes of that culture are not obviously “mainstream”; that in most
States what the Court calls “discrimination” against those who engage
in homosexual acts is perfectly legal. He continued: “Let me be clear
that I have nothing against homosexuals, or any other group, promoting
their agenda through normal democratic means.” The majority’s
“invention of a brand-new ‘constitutional right’”, he wrote, showed it
was “impatient of democratic change”
…Lawrence v. Texas
Morality, based on a particular religion. Scalia wanted the slow democratic process in this case, because the issue was something contrary to his religious beliefs, but in direct contrast to the First Amendment. Even if the country is predominately Christian, it is not proper for those beliefs to trump the beliefs or non-beliefs of others. We are not a Christian state.
Q: What is the greatest miscarriage of constitutional justice during
your tenure?
A: "Oh, there are many candidates. … The most disreputable area of our
law is the establishment clause. (Congress shall make no law
respecting the establishment of religion.) … A violation of the
establishment clause that does not affect someone’s free exercise -
there is no reason why you should have standing.
So Scalia doesn’t believe in separation of church and state. This is a guy who claims to be a textualist. Isn’t thinking the text of the constitution to be “the most disreputable area of our law” kind of a contradiction for a textualist? He also claims to be an originalist but in Raich he ruled that federal drug law overrides California state law because of the commerce clause. An originalist claims that the commerce clause applies to activity that is neither interstate nor commerce.
This is from his dissent in the DOMA hearing:
That is jaw-dropping. It is an assertion of judicial supremacy over
the people’s Representatives in Congress and the Executive. It
envisions a Supreme Court standing (or rather enthroned) at the apex
of government, empowered to decide all constitutional questions,
always and everywhere ‘primary’ in its role.
The very same guy voted to overturn both the Voting Rights Act and the Affordable Care Act, both of which were passed by – that’s right! – “the people’s Representatives in Congress and the Executive”.
In the prop 8 hearing Scalia asked attorney Ted Olson when it became unconstitutional to exclude gay folks from marriage. Olson’s response demonstrates Scalia’s hypocrisy:
When – may I answer this in the form of a rhetorical question? When
did it become unconstitutional to prohibit interracial marriages? When
did it become unconstitutional to assign children to separate schools?
Scalia has already stated those two cases were rightly decided and so his notion that it should be constitutional to exclude gay folks from marriage is pretty obviously based not on careful judicial analysis but on his completely arbitrary antipathy towards gay folks.
I think this all demonstrates Scalia’s hypocrisy and the inconsistency of his reasoning when it comes to “stuff conservatives like” vs. “stuff liberals like” in SCOTUS hearings but if you’re not satisfied I’m sure I could dig up more examples. These are just prominent recent examples.
[quote=“NathanHornby, post:100, topic:11575”]
Please show me the citation that states that 65% of Americans believe that the Devil is a crafty trickster manipulating the world for his own ends. [/quote]
Is this your litmus test on whether one is delusional in their belief in the devil? Because Scalia didn’t say any of that.
[quote=“NathanHornby, post:100, topic:11575”]
The beleif that there may or may not (this qualifier is kind of important for any credible discussion on the matter) be a higher intelligence is perfectly reasoned - you could make an argument for that and not sound like a crazy person.
The devil, however, is not a logical construct; it’s a manipulative tool used by organised religion to scare its members into performing certain actions; as far as I’m aware this is documented fact.[/quote]
First off, most sects don’t preach hell or the devil as something to coerce one’s behavior. You’re lumping everyone in with the “fire and brimstone” preachers.
If your belief is some sort of vague, agnostic idea that there is/might be some “higher power” then your assertion that the concept of the devil is an illogical construct has merit.
However, for the billions of people following Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) the foundation of their beliefs is presented in their holy texts ( Old Testament, New Testament, Koran). All three of these texts mention the devil, with him cropping up the most in the New Testament. They describe him having some power and influence in the moral realm. It would be illogical if one believed these were holy texts written by the prophets and disciples of you god, and then refute the existence of something clearly described within the texts. There are also analogous beings to the devil in Buddhism and Hinduism. It is a very old and widely practiced belief.
It’s not a completely arbitrary replacement. One is actually in the texts, describing it doing evil, and the other is not.
Have you seen evidence of the Devil lately? You know, it is curious.
In the Gospels, the Devil is doing all sorts of things. He’s making
pigs run off cliffs, he’s possessing people and whatnot. And that
doesn’t happen very much anymore.
No. It’s because he’s smart.
So what’s he doing now? What he’s doing now is getting people not to
believe in him or in God. He’s much more successful that way.
Scalia’s use of scripture is probably consistent with his “originalist” interpretation of the Constitution which relies heavily on “natural law.” According to the idea of natural law, the most important parts of the Constitution are the parts that nobody bothered to write down because supposedly everyone agreed on them and felt no need to record them.
In this way the “originalist” who promises to not tinker with the Constitution is free to ignore it because it is nothing more than a Ouija board for summoning the spirits of the Founders.
Scalia pulled off another great trick when he cofounded The Federalist Society, which helps bring radical judges into the judiciary. A Federalist is someone that believes in a strong federal government, like Abraham Lincoln did. The highwater mark of the anti-Federalists was the Confederacy. And in fact the Federalist Society exists to promote **anti-**Federalist neoconfederate constitutional bullshit.
And like any conman or sociopath, Scalia made a career of promising to save us from the very thing he was creating, specifically “activist judges that legislate from the bench.” In the Voting Rights Act case, Scalia said that it is the Court’s job to overrule the legislature’s decisions and rewrite the law from the bench.
Of course the “originalist” can justify anything he wants, because the Constitution is only about 4000 words and is mostly a calender and rule for how to govern but not an actual agenda. For instance there is no actual right of habeas corpus in the Constitutuion, nor is there any right to vote.
I think your definition of “fundamentalist” doesn’t match the mine. Fundamentalism is a modern protestant movement primarily by evangelicals. They disagree with the Catholics more than just about any other sect.
What I like about Catholics is they actually use reasoning in their approach of dogma. For example, no protestant group recognizes the Immaculate Conception (of Mary), but they have a good reason to do so. So belief in god, not crazy. Belief in the devil as presented in the Bible is crazy. Got it.
Not quite unrelated, if not exactly equivalent. There is a more straightforward explanation that better fits the facts: nonexistence of satan as a personified being, and non-factual status of biblical stories about satan. Scalia doesn’t want that explanation, so he is reaching for a more complex and implausible one. Which he wouldn’t do if he believed he had real evidence.
But you’re right: he isn’t positing anything as evidence for satan’s existence. He has compartmentalised the need for evidence as something only relevant to his old day job, and doesn’t think it applies to anything important.
I guess it’s the nuisance nuance of language. When one says “manipulating the world for his own ends.” I think of some grand master Illuminati like scheme, which I don’t think Scalia is talking about.
No, fundamentalism isn’t a modern protestant movement. Part of the modern protestant movement is described as “fundamentalist” because:
Fundamentalism is the demand for a strict adherence to orthodox
theological doctrines usually understood as a reaction against
Modernist theology, primarily to promote continuity and accuracy
There are plenty of Catholics who could be described similarly. I certainly think of Bill Donohue as one. There are plenty of Catholic creationists who I would likewise consider Catholic fundamentalists. (One can also coherently talk about Islamic fundamentalism.)
You talk about Catholics like they’re a hive mind. Not every Catholic uses reasoning in their approach of dogma. Many Catholics ignore the dogma altogether. Many take it very seriously. Some analyze it rationalistically as you mention. Others accept it uncritically. There is a huge diversity of belief within the Catholic church and I don’t think you’re doing any justice to that diversity.
Yes, arbitrarily believing some particular text of dubious provenance containing a great many supernatural claims to be perfectly true is crazy. Thanks for catching up with the rest of the class.
When I said fundamentalist, I was referring to Fundamentalist Christianity ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_fundamentalism ) which Catholics are not part of. In fact you will find many of them don’t even consider Catholics to be Christian.
You’re right that not every Catholic is in lock step with the “official” beliefs. You find that everywhere. But when I am talking about their dogma, I am talking about what their official dogma is, which in some cases is from reasoning, not purely from scripture.
I think you need to read Scalia’s words again - he most certainly does believe in a pig possessing, free-will taking devil. Just because some guys wrote about him a few thousand years ago doesn’t make Scalia any less crazy for believing it.
And hey, people are more than free to believe in such a thing (they’re still nuts, but they’re allowed to be nuts if they want) - but he isn’t just a person, he’s an important, decision making person.
It was pointed out to me above though that he likely see’s over less relevant (to his world view) decisions than I originally thought - so it likely has a little less impact on his ability to do his job.
Well my mate Jim says unicorns control his thoughts, so I guess it’s a stalemate (I can get him to write it down, if you want).
With regards to your assumption, yes I suppose that I am technically agnostic - but I restrict that quite specifically to a god as a ‘higher intelligence’, i.e. a creator. I don’t actually think that there is one, but I can’t claim there definitely isn’t, not for such a high-level philosophical principle, who could? Scripture based theory is entirely different though - organised religion takes a philosophy and re-packages it under a set of man-made (and often rather silly) rules. It’s apples and pears.
My father met my mother while he was a third bird in the US Army, building the Long Lines network with tax dollars for the Bell Telephone Company. It is the original system of microwave relays and coaxial cables that made up the long distance communications backbone in North America, and is one of the first instances of the US government gifting unbelievable amounts of tax funding and public property to a telephone company and permitting them to charge the public for the use of it. (Not that that’s at all unusual nowadays, of course.)
It is not particularly unusual for a person Of A Certain Age to use the term “long lines” to mean the North American long distance telephone infrastructure, even though the microwave links have mostly been superseded by fiber optics and satellites and their Hogg horns and elephant ears replaced by CDMA antennas (some of the coax is still in use, but eventually it’ll all be converted to glass). I know the Long Lines department of Ma Bell existed at least from the late 1940s until the 1970s, and possibly into the mid-80s.
Having not seen the comments by Scalia you’re referring to, I couldn’t say whether he was using the term “long lines” correctly or not, though, and I find it easy to believe that he really meant land lines - as you say, he’s not very technically savvy!
Edit: found at least one instance of Scalia using “Long Lines” accurately. I still think he’s a dangerous nutball who should never be allowed to wear black dresses under any circumstances!
Right, but when I said “fundamentalist” I was using it in its more general sense not referring to specifically fundamentalist christianity (but inclusive of it). I’m well aware that many protestants don’t believe Catholics to be Christians. There are plenty of hard-line traditionalist Catholics who, based on the more general meaning of the term “fundamentalist”, would qualify as “fundamentalist Catholics”. I’m not the first to use the term.
As far as “reasoning” goes, GIGO. You can base as much “reasoning” on iron age mythology as you want but the conclusions aren’t going to be sound even if the logic is.
But then I’ve already presented pretty good evidence that Scalia’s logic isn’t sound in the first place.
“Fundamentalist” in the United States means “I’ve never actually read the Bible and I just make up my strident beliefs as I go.” Their beliefs are a dogs breakfast of Sunday school stories not in the Bible, Star Trek, Lord Of The Rings, The Left Behind series, Ayn Rand, and other pop culture references. And that’s why American “Fundamentalism” changes wildly from decade to decade.- It’s popular because it’s not in the least bit “fundamentalist.” Individually they tend to randomly grab bits from other fundamentalist sects, but their ministers let that slide rather than saying “Nooo! You do not believe that!”
My neighbors were all into fundamentalism and politics, but they were church hoppers. They believed one thing as hard as they could, but next year they would be in a different church. The wife taught Bible classes but knew nothing about the Bible. I asked if they were premillenial dispensationalists, and they were like “Whaaaaaat?” And I was like “Well you’re either a premillenialist or a postmillenialist, and that means - you know what, just never mind.” Because I can’t be bothered to explain the basics of their own religion to them if they didn’t care in the first place.
then, in 2008, quickly whispered to themselves (not realizing their mic was still hot):
“but if those babies really gave a shit, they would’ve tried a liiittle harder to hang on until they were baptized”
