Elon Musk is an undemocratic disgrace

[Jamiet99uk]

She's an absolute looney tune.

As I understand it, even a lot of mainstream Christians think she is a crazy, dangerous person. I have seen many comments from Christians calling her a heretic, etc.

I believe she subscribes to some ultra-right religious philosophy that says that lusting for money is holy and the most fervent evangelical people deserve to be the richest. Or some utter shit like that.

I believe very strongly that Government should be secular.

[Jamiet99uk]

In the past few days a member of Elon Musk's core DOGE team, Marko Elez, had to resign after he was publicly exposed as a racist, fascist, white nationalist. He is a friend of Musk and former SpaceX employee, who had been granted access to high-security US Treasury systems while working for DOGE.

Here are some of the Twitter / X posts that led to Elez being fired:

- "You could not pay me to marry outside of my ethnicity"

- "Normalize Indian hate"

- "Just for the record, I was racist before it was cool."

- "I just want a eugenic immigration policy, is that too much to ask?"

While he has been removed from his post, J.D. Vance and Elon Musk have suggested he will be re-hired in the future (i.e. when the fuss dies down).

More evidence that actual extreme white nationalists are being brought into the US Government instead of being barred from holding any form of public office (as a bare minimum), as would happen in any decent society.

[flash2015]

She's an absolute looney tune.

As I understand it, even a lot of mainstream Christians think she is a crazy, dangerous person. I have seen many comments from Christians calling her a heretic, etc.

I believe she subscribes to some ultra-right religious philosophy that says that lusting for money is holy and the most fervent evangelical people deserve to be the richest. Or some utter shit like that.

I believe very strongly that Government should be secular.

While I agree in principle to this, I also think you can go too far with this separation. The USA I argue does go too far with this which leads to a lot of its problems.

In the USA, because of the first amendment, funding of any religious organization is very limited. The place where this is the most painful is schools.

To my understanding, in many Western countries there is at least some funding for religious schools. If you want to send your child to a religious Muslim/Christian/Buddhist school you will likely have to pay some fees...but you won't have to pay all the cost.

In the US, this is not true. As well, the US education system is a bloated mess where every school district (which may have as little as one high school) has its own BoE and has its own curriculum/tests etc. Schools are also primarily funded by property taxes so wealthy districts have lavish public schools. Where I am the property taxes can be like taking a second mortgage. Mine are relatively cheap ($10K a year - we have a tiny house and live in a modest neighbourhood) but they can be $20K/$30K /$40K or more.

So this makes it very hard for religious parents to send their kids to religious schools as they effectively need to pay for their kids education twice, once through the expensive property taxes and once through school fees so this forces a large percentage of religious kids to go to public schools. So clashes inevitably come when schools teach very progressive values or if religious orgs try to setup a time to take kids out of school for religious instruction.

There is a push for charter schools where the school is run privately but the government pays for it. Up until now governments have not allowed any funding for religious schools through charters...though there is a court battle in Oklahoma which is trying to change this (Oklahoma Charter School Board v. Drummond and St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School v. Drummond). I am hoping the Supreme Court rules in the favour of the Church here. As long as students are following a standard curriculum (i.e. you can't teach Creationism and get state funding) then it is far better for social cohesion if this type of funding is allowed.

There is a second part of this too. Religion is made up of two main parts:
1. The mystical belief in an afterlife etc.
2. An ideology/set of moral values.

1. definitely should be no part of government. 2. I am not so sure of though. As long as (2) can be defined without relying on (1) I see no problem with people potentially expressing these views through government. I think it is wrong to treat moral values that are expressed by a religion as lesser or should be automatically merrily because a religion endorses them. No one, whether religious or not, should have a monopoly on defining society values.

[flash2015]

"automatically *ignored" - I hate it when I leave out a word.

[CaptainFritz28]

I believe she subscribes to some ultra-right religious philosophy that says that lusting for money is holy and the most fervent evangelical people deserve to be the richest. Or some utter shit like that.

Health and Wealth philosophy, as it is commonly referred to. A rather common heresy, and rather annoying.

I'm curious what you mean when you refer to it as ultra-right... it's not associated with any political philosophy, it's just heretical.

[Esquire Bertissimmo]

I believe she subscribes to some ultra-right religious philosophy that says that lusting for money is holy and the most fervent evangelical people deserve to be the richest. Or some utter shit like that.

Health and Wealth philosophy, as it is commonly referred to. A rather common heresy, and rather annoying.

I'm curious what you mean when you refer to it as ultra-right... it's not associated with any political philosophy, it's just heretical.

Surely you recognize that this facet of Protestantism is quite deeply associated with the Republican party and small government types. In fact, it certainly seems like this theology was designed with the purpose of contorting Christianity to fit the capitalistic, materialistic, and individualistic worldview held by the American right in particular.

There are undoubtedly very few Liberation Theology adherents or early Christian socialists promoting the message that God will make you materially wealthy if you just pray hard enough.

[Jamiet99uk]

I believe she subscribes to some ultra-right religious philosophy that says that lusting for money is holy and the most fervent evangelical people deserve to be the richest. Or some utter shit like that.

Health and Wealth philosophy, as it is commonly referred to. A rather common heresy, and rather annoying.

I'm curious what you mean when you refer to it as ultra-right... it's not associated with any political philosophy, it's just heretical.

I'm glad even you find it annoying.

I regard it as ultra right wing because lots of people on the extreme right claim that what this mental bitch stands for is "Christian".

https://spssi.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/sipr.12081

[Jamiet99uk]

If God exists, and these people are taking his name in vain:

a) Why doesn't he stop them?
b) Is it our duty to kill them, like in the Old Testament?

[Jamiet99uk]

In the USA, because of the first amendment, funding of any religious organization is very limited. The place where this is the most painful is schools.

To my understanding, in many Western countries there is at least some funding for religious schools. If you want to send your child to a religious Muslim/Christian/Buddhist school you will likely have to pay some fees...but you won't have to pay all the cost.

Fuck off.

You want to send your child to a religious school instead of a secular state school, let me tell you how that should work:

a) You should not be allowed to do that because all schools should be secular state schools, or:

b) If your country is so backward that religious schools still exists (which obviously they should not), you should pay 100% of the cost, if you want your kids to go there.

Fucking simple.

[Jamiet99uk]

The state should not pay for your backward beliefs being pushed onto children.

[Esquire Bertissimmo]

Eh, several Canadian provinces have a pretty good system of accommodating religious education. As long as there is a high quality secular option and a good common core curriculum I don't particularly see why it matters. Seems to me unnecessarily dogmatic to tell anyone who might want to educate their kids in a certain community or worldview to fuck off.

A secular/liberal/materialist worldview also has all sorts of values embedded in it that are not strictly factual — even though I think this approach is best on average, I don't think anyone should be comfortable thinking it has some monopoly on capital T Truth.

[Jamiet99uk]

Children should not be indoctrinated religiously at public expense. Want to preach religion to your kids? Do it within reason, outside school hours.

I do not think this is even slightly extreme.

[Jamiet99uk]

School is for learning, not for preaching.

[Esquire Bertissimmo]

In secular elementary school I was taught Aristotle's virtue ethics as a way to introduce ideas about morality, to encourage being mindful in my interactions with other students, etc. A kid at the Catholic school across the street would have got basically the same lesson with a Jesus flavour. We both would have had the same math lesson. Does seem a little extreme to view this as some terrible outcome.

[Jamiet99uk]

If they're the same, then nobody should complain if only the secular version receives a penny of tax funding. You appear go agree with my conclusion, just expressing it in weird way.

[CaptainFritz28]

I believe she subscribes to some ultra-right religious philosophy that says that lusting for money is holy and the most fervent evangelical people deserve to be the richest. Or some utter shit like that.

Health and Wealth philosophy, as it is commonly referred to. A rather common heresy, and rather annoying.

I'm curious what you mean when you refer to it as ultra-right... it's not associated with any political philosophy, it's just heretical.

I'm glad even you find it annoying.

I regard it as ultra right wing because lots of people on the extreme right claim that what this mental bitch stands for is "Christian".

https://spssi.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/sipr.12081

Annoying doesn't even begin to describe what I think of it, I just put it that way so as not to start down the rabbit hole of its ridiculosity. It's entirely contrary to right Christian theology.
I can see what you mean by that definition. The Republican party has, more and more as time goes on, associated itself with more heretical branches of Evangelicalism.

[CaptainFritz28]

The state should not pay for your backward beliefs being pushed onto children.

Funny, I could say the same thing about Atheism.

[CaptainFritz28]

Children should not be indoctrinated religiously at public expense. Want to preach religion to your kids? Do it within reason, outside school hours.

I do not think this is even slightly extreme.

What's ironic is that I agree with most of this, but not at all for the same reasons or in the same ways.

[CaptainFritz28]

If God exists, and these people are taking his name in vain:

a) Why doesn't he stop them?
b) Is it our duty to kill them, like in the Old Testament?

If you really want to talk about this, start another thread. Unfortunately, I've got two exams tomorrow and a project due Thursday so I won't be able to engage.

[CaptainFritz28]

A secular/liberal/materialist worldview also has all sorts of values embedded in it that are not strictly factual — even though I think this approach is best on average, I don't think anyone should be comfortable thinking it has some monopoly on capital T Truth.

Good point. Even though I believe that Christianity is the only true worldview, I would be remiss to claim that it and it alone should be studied or that the government should force families to have their kids taught Christian theology at every public school, teaching all other worldviews as silly nonsense with no basis. Certainly not with the American system of education, and not even in a purely Christian society.