symbols are not the thing that they represent

[miriam_e]

There is a bit of stupidity being blown out of proportion at the moment by our creepy little prime minister John Howard. The Big Day Out people don't want people to bring flags to the event because of the way they can be used by thugs and bullies to dominate and antagonise others... the way racists produced the Cronulla riots. So what does our nasty PM do? He gets in on the act in typical divisive fashion to make out that the Australian flag is something special, almost holy. Yes, he is using it to divide, antagonise, and bully. This is exactly the kind of behavior the Big Day Out people wanted to avoid!

Howard is such a fool if he believes his rhetoric. Flags are nothing but fairly empty symbols. If someone tears up, burns, a symbol it doesn't affect the original thing. He is one of those kind of bullies that indulged in the race riots.

What passes for mass media here in Australia cravenly scurries after him, lapping it up, fostering the division of course... and they wonder why people are getting sick of them. They remind me of Gollum in Lord of the Rings, but without his charisma.

Comments

[slave-driver.livejournal.com]

I think I may have told you before I was raised catholic, but rejected the faith in my early teens. I went to a catholic school and I recieved such a good education that they actually gave me the intellectual tools to doubt the faith. I think that's a good thing. When my mother had to go on welfare because my dad kept beating the shit out of her, we had a lot of food donated to us by the church, that was good too. And there wasn't anyone pulling our arms to get us to come to mass in exchange for our taking their food. I truly believe the food was given out of the goodness of their hearts and they were actually listening to their religion when it told them to take care of the poor.

No offense taken by what you said about the U.S. I've often despised this country myself for those very things.

Over all I agree with you that MOST of the time nationalism is bad, religion too. But there is some good there too, even though it can be very hard to find sometimes. I will never forget those people who fed us back in our welfare days and I'm very thankful for that. I don't know if they would have been so generous if their religion hadn't told them to be. I find the message of most major religions to be good, do unto others as you would have them do unto you. The problem lies with the lying, evil bastards who distort that message into, "kill everyone who doesn't believe as we do."

[miriam-e.livejournal.com]

That is an interesting point about Catholic education and religious charities. My oldest, best friend feels the same way about his Catholic upbringing. He feels it equipped him the mental toolset to become an intelligent atheist.

The problem with this is that it ignores the fact that you can just as easily grow up with a secular education, but without the risk of poisoning the mind with religion. Does a mousetrap qualify as part good because of its cheese?

I also understand the temptation to think religion is involved in charity, given how they trumpet it so. But so are non-religious people (like myself). There is religion and there is charity. As far as I can see, they are totally separate items. Take away the religion and you still have charity, therefore I don't think charity qualifies as a good aspect of religion. It is simply something that people do. Sometimes they are religious, sometimes they're not. I don't think it has anything to do with religion, just like I don't think it has anything to do with atheism.

I don't see the message of most major religions as being do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Such a morality is simple good sense and practised by most sane people, religious or not, and is actually negatively correlated with religion.
http://moses.creighton.edu/JRS/2005/2005-11.html

Considering how religion likes to take the credit for all the good in society it is perhaps surprising that in actual fact the reverse is true. The research cited above clearly shows that the major ills of society are directly related to and worsened by religion. The more religion, the more dysfunctional a society is. Murder rates, abortion, sexual promiscuity, teen pregnancy, divorce, violence, child mortality, shortened lifespan, sexually transmitted disease -- they all correlate directly with religion.

[slave-driver.livejournal.com]

I do agree with most of what you say, but I also disagree with some of your points. But I won't belabor it any further, since were on the same page most of the time anyway.

Good discussion. Thanks

[miriam-e.livejournal.com]

(Oops. Sorry. I tend to get a bit carried away. As you say, we are pretty-much of a similar mind anyway. Truth be told, I wasn't trying to convince you so much as using the discussion to clarify points to myself. Thanks for being patient with my thick head.)

[slave-driver.livejournal.com]

Not a problem, I enjoy a good debate.