Rev. Falwell is dead

[somerfrost]

Originally Posted by DaHoss9698

To be honest with you I don't know the specifics of it. I just remember seeing a part in the movie about it and figured it might help Scavs realize who he was. I think it did have something to do with his mother and maybe even a sheep.

Baaa baaa, I wish Papa was here...but I think that was one!

[GenuineRisk]

Let's let Rev. Falwell speak in his own words, shall we?

“Christians, like slaves and soldiers, ask no questions”

“AIDS is not just God’s punishment for homosexuals; it is God’s punishment for the society that tolerates homosexuals”

“Billy Graham is the chief servant of Satan in America”

“The idea that religion and politics don’t mix was invented by the Devil to keep Christians from running their own country”

“If you’re not a born-again Christian, you’re a failure as a human being”

“The ACLU is to Christians what the American Nazi party is to Jews”

“God continues to lift the curtain and allow the enemies of America to give us probably what we deserve”

“(re: 9/11 attacks) “...throwing God out of the public square, out of the schools, the abortionists have got to bear some burden for this because God will not be mocked and when we destroy 40 million little innocent babies, we make God mad…I really believe that the pagans and the abortionists and the feminists and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way, all of them who try to secularize America…I point the thing in their face and say you helped this happen.””

“[homosexuals are] brute beasts…part of a vile and satanic system [that] will be utterly annihilated, and there will be a celebration in heaven.”

“I think the Moslem faith teaches hate.”

I myself don't think a rigid adherence to one's principles/idealogy is necessarily a character asset- one could say that about Hitler, too, after all. And the current feller in the White House. He's doing a heck of a job, isn't he?

[GenuineRisk]

So you admire Hitler for his rigid adherence to his idealogy, B? I'm confused as to what that roll of the eyes means.

The selective quoting of me, however, was an excellent example of taking things out of context. Which a lot of right-wing Bible thumpers do like to do with their book, too.

I actually left out Falwell's comment that:

Is the Antichrist "alive and here today? Probably, because when he appears during the tribulation period he will be a full-grown counterfeit of Christ. Of course he'll be Jewish."

Tempting though it was, because I do really believe, after reading all his comments on it, he really didn't intend that particular comment to be anti-Semitic. But out of context it's pretty inflammatory, huh?

Even in context, it's still pretty silly, but hey, it was Falwell. Here are some more highlights from his "principled" career:

<<February 1993: The Internal Revenue Service determines that funds from Falwell’s Old Time Gospel Hour program were illegally funneled to a political action committee. The IRS forced Falwell to pay $50,000 and retroactively revoked the Old Time Gospel Hour’s tax-exempt status for 1986-87.

March 1993: Despite his promise to Jewish groups to stop referring to America as a “Christian nation,” Falwell gives a sermon saying, “We must never allow our children to forget that this is a Christian nation. We must take back what is rightfully ours.”

1994-1995: Falwell is criticized for using his “Old Time Gospel Hour” to hawk a scurrilous video called “The Clinton Chronicles” that makes a number of unsubstantiated charges against President Bill Clinton — among them that he is a drug addict and that he arranged the murders of political enemies in Arkansas. Despite claims he had no ties to the project, evidence surfaced that Falwell helped bankroll the venture with $200,000 paid to a group called Citizens for Honest Government (CHG). CHG’s Pat Matrisciana later admitted that Falwell and he staged an infomercial interview promoting the video in which a silhouetted reporter said his life was in danger for investigating Clinton. (Matrisciana himself posed as the reporter.) “That was Jerry’s idea to do that,” Matrisciana recalled. “He thought that would be dramatic.”

November 1997: Falwell accepts $3.5 million from a front group representing controversial Korean evangelist Sun Myung Moon to ease Liberty University’s financial woes.

April 1998: Confronted on national television with a controversial quote from America Can Be Saved!, a published collection of his sermons, Falwell denies having written the book or had anything to do with it. In the 1979 work, Falwell wrote, “I hope to live to see the day when, as in the early days of our country, we won’t have any public schools. The churches will have taken them over again and Christians will be running them. What a happy day that will be!” Despite Falwell’s denial, Sword of the Lord Publishing, which produced the book, confirms that Falwell wrote it.>>

[brianwspencer]

Originally Posted by Bababooyee

Oh, and as far as I can tell:

a) He never advocated killing anyone; and


b) Unlike many on the far left, he never celebrated or made light of the death of anyone he disagreed with.

To be fair, while it may not be hollering, arm waving celebration, or a one-liner as direct as "we should kill gays," there is certainly strong approval of God creating and then using AIDS to kill gays and those who just can't bring themselves to hate gays with every fiery ounce of their soul.

That's pretty nasty any way you cut it, and sort of does advocate killing people.

[brianwspencer]

Originally Posted by Bababooyee

Saying X comes from God is hardly ADVOCATING any action...let alone any overt action on the part on any human.

What about those who hear messages from God telling them to blow up abortion clinics? Dubious as it may be, that "comes from God" and advocates action. (And yes, I know this is a ridiculous example, you needn't point it out. Intentionally so, since for whatever reason, talking about Falwell makes me somehow completely extreme and entirely irrational. His spirit rubbing off, I guess.)

Falwell's case is semantically different, because he could just sit back and revel in others' diseased misery without having to "do" anything, but the implicit approval of it is no less sickening.

[brianwspencer]

Originally Posted by Bababooyee

Still grasping at straws.

It is not semnatically different. It is actually different. Doing something vs merely stating something is done by another (by God, no less).


And, again, unlike those on the far left, I am not aware of him celebrating and reveling in the death of anyone. Though, he made some quite dubious leaps of "logic", similar to yours above!

Well, in my edit that came after you quoted me, I admitted to being completely irrational when discussing Falwell and it must be that I am finally learning something from him in his passing -- that it to say making absolutely no sense while pretending I know what I am talking about.

Plus, you're trying to indict an entire group "leftists" in comparing them to one man in saying that some people are rejoicing over his death and he never did so, which somehow elevates him to a moral higher ground than the entire group of people that those rejoicing belong to. Pick your bone with the people rejoicing, not with a foolish blanket indicitment of all "lefties."

That logic (yours remember, not mine) says that some Christians bombed an abortion clinic. My gay friend did not. Therefore, my gay friend is better, or morally superior to all Christians.

[brianwspencer]

Originally Posted by Bababooyee

Still grasping at straws...

Using the term "many" is not quite the same as indicting an entire group of anything. I am certain I didn't need to repeat "many" everytime given the context. When I intend "all", I will say "all" - that's how I roll.

Nice straw man attempt though. I'll chalk it up to more emotionalism and irrationalism because you are discussing Falwell.

B,

You know I like you so I'm not going to sit here and carry on with you, having more than enough evidence from your conversations with namely S2S, but not limited to him, and mostly including....everyone -- that you're incapable of thinking outside of what you've already decided is "right."

With that said, you call YOUR logic a straw man on my part. I will disprove that immediately with two sentence, just to prove my point that you're trying to talk your way out of being wrong instead of just admitting it.

Some Christians bombed an abortion clinic.
Christians are murderous, insane a$sholes.

Those are two separate thoughts, like you've made several times. You say "many" once, but the second you don't say many, some, a few, etc, you then jump to indicting an entire group...much like I did in my second sentence. I did not say "some," and therefore I was lumping an entire group in with the awful portion of the larger group.

With all due respect, please don't try to say that your lack of clarity can be explained by some psychosis on my part. If you mean some, you say some. If not, you don't.