Are your Politics / Religion converted ?

[one...two...tree 2,762]

[Alex & Rachel 78]

Online debate - though not here - definitely affected my views on religion, although I suppose it could be argued that I had already grown susceptible to change in that regard anyway.

[Captain Oates 910]

Online debate changing things? No.

My views are drastically different however. From about 23 and younger I was definately a conservative christian republican. Since becoming more exposed to the world, I have become much more moderate in my views. I would not say that I am a democrat however.

Unfortunately over the past couple of years I've been really jaded by the US government to the point where I feel like the United States experiment is an absolute failure and the voting public have lost control over the system. Maybe every generation gets this way at a certain age.

When I went to school the world map was pink (lets call it red) coz the brits owned it

Now the pakistanis own the UK..and it is still raining

So we have been through this. To some degree it self corrects as socialized medicine at 7% becomes all a country can afford - no more 17%

and the currency falls...the GBP is 1.65 USD - it was 1 gbp = 4 usd when I was a kid

That enabled the UK to compete again on price

It's all circular and it will settle at a reasonable level - but the empire is down

On the bright side, if the world hates the US because of it's bragging and use of military power, then the lessening of those things because of economics, will once again bring the affection of the world and people here will start to care and actually rate the rest of the world, and even think it's a good idea to know where Australia is

There are lots of benefits to being in decline - though it doesn't seem so during the decline

I lost my top job at 47 and retired at 54 and if I hadn't, I would have had a much lesser life with huge mountains of meaningless money and bland pastimes - meaningless.

So the US will find a gentler life when the military spending and adventuring stops and plastic kiss me frogs and halloween brooms made in china are no longer a necessity

The alternative scenario (scenario B) is that the republican rich will dig into their gated communities and invest their money elsewhere - and the brainwashed underclass will keep voting right wing while they get less and less every year and end up like the inhabitants of the bad part of Mogadishu

They say nobody ever got rich thinking that scenario B wouldn't happen but:

I look at the US from 1787 to now and I see nothing but the unbroken advance of social enlightenment:

Government Social security

Unemployment pay

Medicare

Medicaid

gay marriage

Slavery

Civil rights

A black President

The fastest growing religious belief is - none

It's a one way street and unstoppable - so that's a bright light and there is more than one way to be the tops - not just guns and god and dollars...

and the sun shines...

[mawilson 2,133]

Damn you met me too late

I suspect it was scandal who converted LI to Democratism.

[Bad_Daddy 2,209]

I gave up on religion back when I was in elementary school and it interfered with the NFL games on the tube...not that I was ever much of a believer.

Politics wise I'm a conservative Democrat...yes we do exist although I have voted Repub more than a few times for local and state elections.

[scandal 951]

I suspect it was scandal who converted LI to Democratism.

[Sofiyya 1,687]

I hate the GOP now, and this site, among others, did have something to do with that.

[Gary and Alla 3,694]

Of course not, I am not going to change from being right! Don't be silly.

[Ban Hammer 13,109]

I hate the GOP now, and this site, among others, did have something to do with that.

just one of the many services offered on vj.

[Captain Oates 910]

I hate the GOP now, and this site, among others, did have something to do with that.

Hooray a convert ! Now about this Muslim thing......

I am a selective convertee to leftism. For example I am a rabid lefty on health care bit when I read Aneurin Bevan's book 'In place of fear' where he describes how he swept away private medicine and bribed the doctors by "Stuffing their mouths with gold", I rejected all his marxist ideas about the means of production being in government hands, but I want all companies to be regulated free enterprise.

I want abuses by banks and credit cards and airline safety and food safety etc to be closely regulated.

Obama's health care act is ridiculously right wing with only private health care being offered via private insurers.

So I have had my pre-existing ideas strengthened or weakened by listening to other people - but no 180 degree conversions

I like slim being so honest and saying he is right wing and cares nothing for anyone else but him and his.

I would respect the right wing much more if they actually said that was the creed instead of pretending that vouchers were a great improvement for everyone.

It would be much easier if we were all so honest

Edited November 15, 2011 by Ashud Cocoa

[Captain Oates 910]

just one of the many services offered on vj.

Oi Charley it was ME ! She is in my spell and I am brainwashing her by cyber waves...

You are too nice to put anyone off rightos...you are like eisenhower and colin powell and they are yesterday's men to Rick Perry's brand

[Sofiyya 1,687]

I hate the Dimocrats, too.

[웃 910]

I hate the GOP now, and this site, among others, did have something to do with that.

Now we just need to open your eyes on religious dogma written in the prehistoric ages of man. A time when folks walked around barefoot, rode on donkeys, did not have electricity, had not a clue what was in the sky, I don't know if I can say science even existed when those prehistoric creatures roamed the earth clueless.

No medicine, no elements, no understanding of the age of the earth, sun, let alone universe. I give them some credibility on their fairy tales because they thought the earth and universe was young, maybe 1000 to 10,000 years old. We're talking double digit billions so they were off quite a bit!

The fact alone that these prehistoric animals were at least 1000 years away from realizing the earth was not flat and that if you sail a boat (if they had those back then) then you wouldn't fall of the edge should be 1 of the first red flags.

All the stories (not sure about the Crayon but) in the Bi-Bull do not make sense if you think about them for 5 seconds. Noah and the animal story, the Adam and Eve story, Walls of Jericho coming down by the sound of trumpets, Jonah in the belly of the whale. Many many more.

You can try as hard as you can to think inside your brain among billions of other people at the same time. Nobody but your brain hears you! And you can try your whole life but you will never get an audible response from God or even a clear documented provable sign that He is out there.

You have to realize you would be Christian if your parents were, Hindu if you were born with Hindu parents, an Aztec Warrior if you were born in Mexico in the 1400s, a believer in Greek Mythology if around in those times, or one of the many weird African tribal religions if you grew up in those parts.

Your religion is right but all the others are wrong. If all the others are wrong then how hard is it to connect the dots and add one more religion to the list (yours)?

You should at least take a look at what the other side has to say.

You are smart - pick up this book, and then follow up with this, this and this. You will see religion decapitated in each book.

[mawilson 2,133]

Good post, LI.

[Captain Oates 910]

Now we just need to open your eyes on religious dogma written in the prehistoric ages of man. A time when folks walked around barefoot, rode on donkeys, did not have electricity, had not a clue what was in the sky, I don't know if I can say science even existed when those prehistoric creatures roamed the earth clueless.

No medicine, no elements, no understanding of the age of the earth, sun, let alone universe. I give them some credibility on their fairy tales because they thought the earth and universe was young, maybe 1000 to 10,000 years old. We're talking double digit billions so they were off quite a bit!

The fact alone that these prehistoric animals were at least 1000 years away from realizing the earth was not flat and that if you sail a boat (if they had those back then) then you wouldn't fall of the edge should be 1 of the first red flags.

All the stories (not sure about the Crayon but) in the Bi-Bull do not make sense if you think about them for 5 seconds. Noah and the animal story, the Adam and Eve story, Walls of Jericho coming down by the sound of trumpets, Jonah in the belly of the whale. Many many more.

You can try as hard as you can to think inside your brain among billions of other people at the same time. Nobody but your brain hears you! And you can try your whole life but you will never get an audible response from God or even a clear documented provable sign that He is out there.

You have to realize you would be Christian if your parents were, Hindu if you were born with Hindu parents, an Aztec Warrior if you were born in Mexico in the 1400s, a believer in Greek Mythology if around in those times, or one of the many weird African tribal religions if you grew up in those parts.

Your religion is right but all the others are wrong. If all the others are wrong then how hard is it to connect the dots and add one more religion to the list (yours)?

You should at least take a look at what the other side has to say.

You are smart - pick up this book, and then follow up with this, this and this. You will see religion decapitated in each book.

These look like good books. I will get at least one for my flight to the UK at XMAS

If I don't post again, you will know I have been bombed out the sky by a religious person from the middle East or blown to pieces in London by a catholic from Ireland.

You can be sure it won't have been an atheist. They don't hate anybody.