What a fantastic essay that includes an excerpt from a speech delivered in 1875 by President U.S. Grant on the importance of church-state separation and secular schools. Thom's piece linked below is worth your time.
Here's the entire Grant speech, which for some unfortunate reason, isn't too common on the web.
The context was his desire to promote secular public education as a way of preventing the recurrence of a second civil war. It's prescient.
There's often talk of "Two Americas" as if it's about Republican/Other or Vaccinated/Unvaccinated.
Those divides exist but they spring from a much deeper divide, between people who understand deductive reasoning and those who don't. This divide largely originates from religion.
As Grant said, people who cannot understand that their religious beliefs are opinions rather than facts.
"The free school is the promoter of that intelligence which is to preserve us as one Nation."
The idea that morality is a matter of opinion rather than of fact is the foundation of the American republic.
Democracy cannot long exist when large portions of the body politic believe they are God's personal servants and their political opponents serve Satan.
American conservatism was started as an angry reaction of Christian fundamentalists against secular pluralism. The majority of us who don't agree need to realize this, even if it makes people uncomfortable to contemplate.
I'll be writing and podcasting much more in the future about this topic.
It is something that @ParkerMolloy and I discussed on this week's @TheoryChange episode. Put it on in the background and have a listen or watch if you're interested:
I wrote something last month about the epistemology crisis that is engulfing America over at @DiscoverFlux if you prefer to read something instead: flux.community/matthew-sheffi…
Please let me know of anyone else you'd like me to chat with about these issues! /end
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#FartsAreFascist is the ultimate in far-right non-humor. They really think that progressives are insulted by a half-hearted and halfwit parody hashtag.
Basically, the only thing they seem to think is funny is offending people. They're so desperate to do it that they'll even concoct things that make themselves look like idiots, but they can't perceive it at the time
The Turning Point USA diaper debacle is a great example.
As stupid as this hashtag and the catturd account is, however, it's a great illustration of the utter collapse of conservative intellectualism.
You don't have to think John Oliver is funny, but he doesn't name himself after cat feces.
1/x Conservatives constantly rage about "liberal media bias" but when you see the material they call journalism, it's much, much more biased. Here's a great example from a RedState article covering the doomed CA gubernatorial recall campaign of a state rep with no chance
Recalling Gavin Newsome has never polled more than 40%. The guy who just launched his campaign has no chance of becoming governor. But according to RedState, "Hope Is Calling in the Air." WTF?
The article doesn't mention the Newsom polls at all. But the author does make sure to quote from her colleague claiming that "There’s an air of hopefulness I haven’t seen in a while."
Mini-thread: Mike Lindell and the right-wing plutocrat network
The MeinPillow guy's never-ending spew of lies and delusions about the 2020 elections have damaged the country, but his craziness does provide a great example of how insane your average right-wing donor is.
The fat cats who bankroll the GOP (even pre-Trump) are lunatics, pure and simple.
The biggest right-wing donors out there are Robert Mercer and his daughter Rebekah Mercer. They are outright Christian supremacists who also are in love with the atheist Ayn Rand.
To a normal person, these two worldviews are utterly irreconcilable because they are diametrically opposed. But if you're crazy enough, they blend perfectly!
One thing I'd like to see tech journalists declare independence from is their blatant pro-Apple bias.
I'm going to review this iPad pro review to show you what I mean, and why most tech sites' star ratings are utterly worthless laptopmag.com/reviews/ipad-p…
The iPad Pro 12.9 has some nice aspects, but it has a lot of negatives. But you never see tech sites ding Apple for the negatives.
The biggest negative of iPads is that they are drastically overpriced for what they can do. You have to pay a minimum of $1,000 US for...
A tablet that comes with none of the following:
-Storage card slots
-Upgradeable internal storage
-Keyboard
-Stylus
-A headphone jack
-More than a single port
-An OS that can actually open files
-An ability to boot third-party OSes
Since Joe Biden became the president, Republicans consultants and politicians have been desperate to find a way to attack him. But nothing has worked, his approval rating has consistently been above 50%. So instead, right-wing elites have decided to completely embrace trolling.
The important thing to realize is that GOP elites are trolling everyone, including their own supporters. This is vital because as Biden has embraced stimulus spending and family support, he's forced the right to defend its greatest weakness: their anti-government views