ive noticed this and it has made me curious...?

Question

people came to america for various reasons. one of the main ones was for the freedoms it offers.

why do we have so many people so quick to remove freedoms? notice all the thumbsdown people get for saying abortion should be a choice, or homosexual marriage/partnership should be accepted?

i mean seriously, if u guys dont like the freedom to choose why do you even live in the states?

note: seperation of church and state, yet the only arguments against homosexual marraige is religious...

why do people want so desperately to control the lives of others?

to christians: is this what ur god put u here for? to control society? where is this spoken about in the bible?

Answer 1

People tend to want the freedoms that are most important to themselves. Those that affect others but they find morally wrong must be banned!! That is the mentality i've encountered many times. Personally, I think gay marriage should be allowed. As far as abortion and the such like goes, I don't agree with it. It's not something that I would ever be able to do (being a mom, I can't imagine killing one of my babies), but if we legalize it at least we'll have less occurances of women getting back alley coat hanger abortions causing infection, disease and death. But that's just my thought.

Answer 2

You are right on target with your comments. I completely agree. These are personal freedoms that should not be controlled by law. I think the rub comes when these freedoms infringe, somehow, on others. This is what has happened with abortion. Women who cannot pay want the taxpayer to foot the bill in free abotion clinics. I'm not sure, but perhaps married homosexual partners can file joint income tax and pay less. Some people see things like this as taking money out of their pockets.

Answer 3

These types of questions get me all fired up because I feel so strongly about it!!! I am agreeing with you on this point! People find things that they don't agree with and go to war with the idea and accuse folks who do this 'unacceptable' thing to be wrong! But who in the heck made them so 'right' in the way they do things! I wish people could tolerate everyone else's lifestyle and personal choices and get their noses out of everyone else's business. Who is someone to tell me that I can't have an abortion... what the heck does it hurt them any? Because they don't agree with it? Boo-hoo... I don't like their plaid shirt, but we didn't outlaw those, now did we?
It's not just the abortion issue that gets me, it everyone as a whole. Same argument for the christian points of views... why should we have to take down a monument to our founding (Christian) fathers because it offends some people of different religions? So we have to please the minority while suppressing the majority?
Everything is so "PC" now no one can say anything! I am not even going to get started on cultural/ racial intolerances....

Answer 4

It's ironic - this country was settled (i.e. plundered from the people who used to live here) by a group of Christians who had fled Europe because they were being persecuted by another group of Christians. So when modern-day Christians claim that America is a "Christian Nation," it begs the question: which brand of Christianity? They don't seem to understand that their freedom to worship Jesus along the lines laid down by their particular cult is bound up with everybody else's right to worship (or not) as he sees fit.

Some of them will say straight out that as Christians, they're the majority, and majority rules, and screw the rest. And that's actually true enough in practice if not in theory - that's why over half the states have written anti-gay bigotry into their constitutions, even though the only argument against gay rights is obviously the religious argument, even though we supposedly have separation of Church and State - even though it's indiscernible to rational thought how allowing gay people the right to "marry" (or whatever you want to call it) affects anybody other than the gay people in question!

The sub-argument that really gets me, though, is the one in which Christians claim that it's gay people who are forcing a lifestyle on them. I simply can't make any sense of that. If you're against same-sex marriage, then don't marry somebody of the same sex; otherwise, it's not your business. And remember that as far as our country's secular laws ago, what it says in the Bible doesn't matter. Nobody's asking John Q. Christian to give up his personal belief that gay people are going to hell. Whatever helps him sleep at night! We're talking about the civil rights of an entire class of people in a secular, democratic society.

Answer 5

Not that I disagree with you - because I see where you are coming from and somewhat agree with you...however, most Christians would accuse you of attempting to control them and their faith the same way that you are against them "controlling" the lives of others and stripping American society of individual freedoms. It's sort of a back and forth issue that you can never get out of. Also, coming from a Christian background - but I don't believe in it anymore for my own reason - I think they would point you to Romans in the New Testament for ALOT of their doctrinal beliefs. And alot of Christians would tell you not to be upset with them because "they" didn't make the rules "God" did - this is the kind of argument your coming up against. And while I don't disagree with you I think you have some tunnel vision if you think that only Christians have this point of view - their are alot of other people that have similar views that aren't in the Christian faith. I think you are going in the right direction but your bias is tainting what could be a constructive argument.

Answer 6

You asked: "Why do people want so desperately to control the lives of others?"

I see now more clearly than every before that even our greatest troubles spring from something that is as admirable and sound as it is dangerous -- from our impatience to better the lot of our fellows.
— Karl Popper

Every religion or cause grows out of a desire either to make one’s own life more effortless, or to control and manipulate other people in order to enforce behavior in conformity with the expectations of the true believers.
— Butler D. Shaffer

We preoccupy ourselves so much with changing the lives of others not out of proclaimed sentiments of selfless human charity, but out of our selfish desire to validate our own identities. There is, of course, enormous ego gratification in the exercise of power over other people, but such satisfaction is rooted in our need to have others believe and behave as we do.
— Butler D. Shaffer

Answer 7

I've often wondered this myself. In fact, I have a lively debate going with a christian right now via email. He finds me arrogant and ignorant. I find him amusing. I keep the debate going because the longer we converse, the more ridiculous his reasoning becomes.

Freedom of religion has no exceptions in the Bill of Rights, yet in 400 years, my people have only gone from prosecuted to persecuted. Hopefully, in the next 400 years, we will get some of the respect we deserve.

Answer 8

First off thumbs down mean nothing, who cares about em, do not base your answers on public opinion.

Second pro-lifers got just as many if not more thumbs down on the thread you are referring to.

Third, if everyone left the country because they did not like a certain law or freedom we would have no one. Sure I disagree with certain things about this country, but it is a hell of a lot better than my country of birth.

Answer 9

Yay! You get it chippy.

The US is ALL ABOUT freedom yet so many of her people want to limit the very thing that makes America the proud country that she is. They only want people to be free to believe what they believe.

Those people should move to some dictatorship somewhere. Maybe start their own. But not here.

Answer 10

They believe they have the divine right to impose their religious beliefs on others because they "know" the path to heaven, the same exact way a suicide bomber "knows" that his martyrdom will result in his glory in paradise. The belief that many people have that they are going to heaven and "sinners" are going to hell sets them up to feel superior. This gives them the delusion that they have the authority to dictate other's lives.
" Certainty about the next life is simply incompatible with tolerance in this one"
-Sam Harris