• Welcome to Religious Forums, a friendly forum to discuss all religions in a friendly surrounding.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Access to private conversations with other members.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

Search results

  1. gsa

    Should Germany censor anti-migrant hate speech in light of Cologne provocative sexual assaults?

    The problem is that the left accuses non-racist critics of Islam of racism, and also tends to conflate the separate if intersecting issues of racism, anti-Arab and anti-Muslim bias, and "Islamophobia," a vague term that itself conflates criticism of a religion with hostility to individual...
  2. gsa

    Left & Right "Racism"

    I do not see why unwarranted love of one group of strangers/foreigners necessarily implies hatred, dislike or phobia of the groups that do not fit that group, though. It can, of course, but what about the feeling itself, however irrational, produces some amount of irrational prejudice, hatred...
  3. gsa

    Should Germany censor anti-migrant hate speech in light of Cologne provocative sexual assaults?

    Which explains the surge in support for the Swedish Democrats, for example, which would have been unthinkable just a few years ago. The situation in Europe is disconcerting for a few reasons. First, in multiparty democracies it does not necessarily take a voting majority to put these groups...
  4. gsa

    Should Germany censor anti-migrant hate speech in light of Cologne provocative sexual assaults?

    I think Laika is talking about how to specifically deal with racists and ethnic nationalists, though, not suggesting that there are no problems with immigration policy.
  5. gsa

    Should Germany censor anti-migrant hate speech in light of Cologne provocative sexual assaults?

    If it has any Islamist connections, I think that the more appropriate example is the Reichstag fire. An attack with this scale and deliberate provocation has to be serving some other purpose.
  6. gsa

    Should Germany censor anti-migrant hate speech in light of Cologne provocative sexual assaults?

    I think it prudent to include the Islamists in this campaign as well.
  7. gsa

    Should Germany censor anti-migrant hate speech in light of Cologne provocative sexual assaults?

    I really think that the US has the best standard here when it comes to regulation of speech content (whether we have the best ideas about money as speech is a different question). Unless it is directly threatening, why prohibit it? Judging by the comments that have been removed from social...
  8. gsa

    Should Germany censor anti-migrant hate speech in light of Cologne provocative sexual assaults?

    Spielgel Online has obtained a copy of a police report that details just how bad the backlash from this could get in light of Germany's ongoing immigration debate: The report lists several examples of police officers' experiences: Officers were hindered from pushing their way through to...
  9. gsa

    Star Wars, Episode VII - Caution! Spoilers

    Just saw it last week. I agree with your overall assessment: Fun, but not great. Good I guess. Better than any of the prequel films. A major problem with the film is the extended unrevealed backstory. Kylo Ren seemed believable as a dark side character, but only because I did not have to...
  10. gsa

    Pride in heritage?

    These identities are contextual, in other words. Which is fair enough. But some of these identities are more political than others, and some are more susceptible to politicization, and political contexts matter.
  11. gsa

    Pride in heritage?

    Yes, but how much do you see yourself as white? Or even as a member of a group defined by your ancestry? I suspect that you have a number of self-identifications that precede that one, were you to prioritize.
  12. gsa

    Pride in heritage?

    Although it seems that with taking pride in ancestry, it is often the case that they are searching for a "we." As is often the case with religion. A sense of self can only be maintained by differentiation from something outside of it. That's not really what people who are looking to align...
  13. gsa

    Pride in heritage?

    And to defend. Which is one of the key components not yet mentioned in this thread, and yet it is the heart of tribalism. It is all well and good to take pride in positive aspects of your ancestral background. But the same process creates imagined communities tied by family and usually...
  14. gsa

    Are Jewish holidays better?

    Pagan holidays. By which I mean, ancestrally European holidays. But being ancestrally European, I'm probably biased. Sukkot and Ramadan don't do much for me, and I don't really care about Jesus. But I love Halloween and Christmas, and to a lesser extent Easter, as long as they are divorced...
  15. gsa

    The Rise of the "Alternative Right"

    The racial connotation is I believe a pornographic one. Specifically, a genre of interracial pornography in which a white married woman spurns her white husband for sex with a black man. When you read the materials produced by the altright, it is clear that they believe it has racial...
  16. gsa

    The Rise of the "Alternative Right"

    Or shifting towards it... That's something that is a little frightening about the alternative right podcasts. Listening to these guys, I have a sense of white, middle class familiarity. Their backgrounds suggest that they are being pulled from the same crowd that often finds libertarianism...
  17. gsa

    The Rise of the "Alternative Right"

    I certainly think that is part of it. Although I don't know that it is the only thing that explains the surge in interest. Overarching fears of finding yourself an ethnic or racial minority might drive more self-conscious racial identity and identity politics, though.
  18. gsa

    The Rise of the "Alternative Right"

    If you have never heard the phrase "alternative right," you are probably not alone. I am not sure that I was aware of this phenomenon before reading more about Donald Trump's online support. But it is an interesting phenomenon. Benjamin Welton of the Weekly Standard offers a taxonomy of the...
  19. gsa

    What is the Point of Judaism?

    This would probably have gone a lot smoother if you had not assumed I made a reference to sects. Indeed, in your initial comment, you seemed to be aware of that, because you responded by saying: As an ultra-Orthodox Jew, I don't know a single Jew (ultra-Orthodox or otherwise) who rejects...
  20. gsa

    Universal religious sexual taboos... How stupid can one be?

    Not all religions, or at least sects within given religions, agree on this. While I think that you would be hard pressed to find anything apart from a deviant sex cult that supported sex with infants, traditional religions across the world approved of marriage (and hence sex) to post-pubescent...
Top