Posted on 02/11/2015 8:40:02 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
I’m a Southern girl. Born in the South, raised in the South, and have rarely lived anywhere BUT the South. I actually love the South. I’ll die in the South. Being a Southern girl, I have more than my share of right-wing friends, neighbors, and family members — and some of you have in recent years crossed the line into nut-jobbery.
The fact is — I love you guys and that will never change.
I’ll admit that I’m disappointed and disturbed to see intelligent and/or educated people who are willfully ignorant. But while it does change my opinion about you on some level, more than anything I’m embarrassed for you. It hurts me to see you post conspiracy theories on your Facebook timeline, only to have them debunked with a quick Snopes link. It hurts me to see you expressing unapologetic and blatant racism and ignorance. It absolutely tortures me to see you being on the wrong side of history on so many issues.
Although I’ll always love you guys, I have had to quit — for my own sanity and for the sake of our relationships — attempting to engage in intelligent conversation about politics and social issues with most of you. From now on, we’ll talk about the weather, recipes, our mutual friends, our children, our illnesses, thrift shop finds, and our old memories. I want to know what’s going on in your lives. What books are you reading? What home improvements are you planning? Hell, I’ll even follow you on Pinterest!
I very much appreciate those of you who can still have an intelligent conversation and listen to another point of view. Hopefully this small group of sane conservatives never changes.
Here is why I have to abandon attempts at intelligent conversation with most of you.
1. You support revisionist history.
When I was in a high school history class, I’ll never forget one thing our teacher taught us: what you read in history books isn’t always accurate. The example she used was history books in the Soviet Union, now known as Russia. She informed us, to my shock and horror, that the Soviets pretty much included what they liked in the history books and left out everything else. As a result, she said, there were generations of Russian students who were misinformed.
Oh we were dismayed, my classmates and I! Those poor little Russian kids who were being taught false history. But wait….you guys on the right are trying to do the same thing right here in the Good Old U.S.A.
Last year, I wrote an article about Texas’ plan to revise history and include Moses as a Founding Father. When I shared the article with an educated Texas adult and asked “is this OK with you,” his response was:
“Why teach our children at length regarding the horrors of slavery as we have eliminated that curse from our society? We don’t deny it occurred here or anywhere else in the world, but, why dwell on a segment of our past that has been corrected? I don’t think it is appropriate to drag our dirty laundry through our history lessons at length.”
Because it’s HISTORY. You don’t get to just rewrite history books if it’s unpleasant. What are you thinking? Shall we rewrite the Revolutionary War? “A minor disagreement with Great Britain.” How about the bombing of Pearl Harbor? “A spat with the Japanese.”
2. You cite Jesus as your reasoning for rejecting marriage equality.
Yet the Bible only mentions homosexuality six times. Six. Times. 6. This many:
So why is this one of the biggest issues on your agenda? Why are you putting so much energy and hate into an issue that clearly wasn’t one of God’s major concerns?
As Christians who are pro-family, why would you deny people the right to the sanctity of marriage? If marriage strengthens families, why would you not want everyone to have this, even if you disagree with their choice of mate?
YOU (we) have destroyed the sanctity of marriage. There is no possible way that gay marriage can do more harm to marriage than heterosexuals have done. Yet we seldom hear a sermon bemoaning the divorce rate or people living together before marriage. Why is that? Because the pews would be empty.
3. You use Biblical scriptute to excuse yourself from feeding the hungry.
There is nothing you do that makes me more disgusted with you than your abuse and misuse of 2 Thessalonians 3:10.
For even when we were with you, this we commanded you, If any will not work, neither let him eat. 2 Thessalonians 3:10
You are deliberately taking the scripture — ONE VERSE! — out of context when you use them to justify your own hatred of poor people. And again, you’re showing your ignorance.
From Liberal America reader Eric Susee: “2 Thessalonians 3:10. are NOT the words of Christ. They are the words of Paul of Tarsus, a man who never met Christ.”
Biblical scholars have pointed out that the author of 2 Thessalonians was referring to Christians who stopped working in anticipation of Christ’s return.
4. You lie when you say you value “freedom of religion.”
I had lunch with some conservatives a while back, and the topic of freedom of religion came up. They expressed concern at the “war on Christianity.” I cited a recent event that had occurred in which protesters interrupted the U.S. Senate’s first Hindu-led prayer. The response from my fellow diners? “Good.”
I don’t know how educated people can be so ignorant. Seriously. You can’t even see your own contradictions.
5. You claim God speaks to you and tells you to do things.
Over and over and over, we see right wing nutjobs in the news saying they’re doing this horrible thing or that horrible thing because God told them to. This is, to quote the Christian Courier, “a very convenient method of authenticating what you want to do.”
He does NOT do that.
God, having of old time spoken unto the fathers in the prophets by divers portions and in divers manners, hath at the end of these days spoken unto us in his Son. Hebrews 1:1
But conservatives believe these nuts. Here is what I think: not only should sensible conservatives not believe these nuts, you need to start speaking out against them. These are the false prophets that the Bible warns us about, in my humble opinion. Most of you lack the courage to take a stand against these idiots even when you know they’re nuts.
6. You question my faith.
“Christian Left is an oxymoron.”
Oh my, I’ve heard that so much from the right, and believe it or not, I often hear it from my “friends.” First of all, your questioning of my faith genuinely means very little to me. What it does is destroy my opinion of you; I now view you as self-righteous hypocrites.
Recently, I found out that a woman from my church questioned her teen son for spending time here at my home with my children. I believe her words were “why would you want to be around someone so liberal.” I’ve never had a conversation with this lady. We’ve never even made eye contact. But alas, her comment (and more that she said) has forced me to now see her differently.
Keep questioning my faith, though, my people, because you can be sure I’m questioning yours. One thing I won’t do, however, is accuse you of not being a believer as you do me. What I will suggest to you is that my faith may be stronger than yours. I’ve educated myself, dared to question all things, and STILL believe. Most of you are too afraid to even learn. It may, after all, test your faith.
I’ll pray for you! :)
7. You care more about your guns than you do about children.
After the Sandy Hook massacre, and following other similar tragedies, I asked many of you if you loved your guns more than you do children. I made the statement of “I’d give up my gun forever if it would bring back even one of those children.”
I asked you if you’d do the same. You admitted that you would not.
8. You get excited about people dying.
You really, really like to see death. And not just to terrorists. You love the death penalty. You love war. You love seeing kids like Trayvon Martin being shot. They deserve it, you say. But his murderer has shown — again and again — since his acquittal that he is a dangerous person.
9. You assume that everyone who needs help are losers and parasites who refuse to work.
Approximately 47 million people receive food stamps, and most of them are children or the elderly, in addition to people who are employed. The numbers, from a 2012 USDA report: •45 percent of SNAP recipients are under 18 years of age •Nine percent are age 60 or older •More than 40 percent live in households with earnings
10. You weren’t concerned about uninsured people– including me.
Most of you know that when I made the decision to become self-employed that I would be giving up my employer subsidized health insurance. I’m 47 years old, and like most people my age, have at one time or another had preexisting conditions that would cause insurance companies to deny me a private policy.
I didn’t want a free ride. I was eager to pay for my own insurance. Obamacare opened that door for me and millions of other hard-working Americans and disallows insurance companies from rejecting millions of Americans who were previously rejected. But without even knowing fully what the Affordable Care Act is, you chose the path of ignorance. You didn’t care.
11. The Creation Museum — that is all.
You think this is OK. It’s not. These people just make stuff up. Do you really think kangaroos floated from Africa to Australia on rafts? Why are you condoning this ignorance?
12. You’re liberal in youth, yet grow conservative in age.
I call this the Dead Peter Syndrome in men and/or the Formerly Hot Syndrome in women.
A couple of years ago, a man confronted me on Facebook about my liberalism. I knew him when I was growing up; he was a friend of my parents and his children were my playmates. He called me a stupid, misguided, amoral, liberal. Yes, those were his words. I had one question for him:
“When I was a little girl, didn’t I sit on your lap while you smoked a joint and drank beer?”
I’m afraid I burned the bridge of that friendship — and good riddance.
Similarly, many women who embraced the sexual revolution are now taking a stance against women’s rights and suggesting that I’m killing babies with my IUD.
You don’t get to live it up as a young person and then try to take a moral high ground when you get old and aren’t interested in living anymore.
13. You don’t want people who disagree with you to vote.
Oh, Gerrymandering, you ugly devil, you. But do we question why this is so common and seldom questioned by people on the right? It’s because you, my conservative voter loved ones, agree with it. You think it’s perfectly acceptable (and necessary) to suppress the vote. It’s for the “good of the nation.”
I once heard someone tell his wife to not inform her Democratic friend how and where to vote. “She’ll cancel out your vote.”
There you have it.
14. Some of your best friends are black. Or Mexican.
A conservative I know professes that “my best friend is black” and balked when I called him and his wife racist. Why did I call him racist? Because my little girl — at that time about 12 — went to a movie with one of her African American friends and his mother. The conservative and his wife were “very concerned” about me allowing my little girl to consort with “blacks.” But oh, no, they’re not racist, are they?
I don’t care how many black or Hispanic friends you have. If you think that mentality is OK, then yes, you’re racist.
15. You scream about undocumented immigrant children at the border, but you hire Mexicans to do your dirty work.
I live in Texas. Duh! Every single upper-middle-class or wealthy person I know has at one time hired cheap labor to do their menial tasks like home repairs, yard work, housekeeping, and childcare. They actually seek out Hispanic people because they know that they do good work and that they’ll work for cheap.
16. You insist on calling undocumented immigrants “illegals” and “aliens.”
They are human beings. They are undocumented immigrants. Many of them are children. It reallyyyyy makes me furious to see you deliberately depersonalizing these human beings who are doing nothing but seeking the American Dream that you are so proud of.
And you do this on purpose. You know what you’re doing. You’re proud of your very unethical and un-Christian attitude towards these human beings.
17. You don’t mind using force against “lesser” groups to get what you want.
Case in point, protesting outside of abortion clinics.
Or protesting at the funerals of gay people. And yeah, I know that is Westboro Baptist Church and not you, but if you refuse to speak out against them, then you’re a part of the problem.
18. You love war, death, and destruction.
And why do you love war, death, and destruction? Because ‘Murica. Because you think this somehow makes us superior. We may be militarily superior, but we are ethically inferior.
Even when confronted with the lies, now confirmed officially, that got us into the Iraq war, you don’t care. You like for America to be the world’s largest terrorist organization and the world’s most formidable bully.
19. Speaking of war, you think draft dodging is OK and military service is for the little people.
Why doesn’t it bother you that Dick Cheney et al are draft dodgers? Or that Mitt Romney has an entire baseball team of sons and not one of them served in the military? Or that none of the current generation of Bush children have served in the military. Let me tell you in one sentence, as was told to me personally by a wealthy draft dodger:
“Wouldn’t you get out of it if you could?”
Dying for your country is such a noble cause — if you’re not one of the elite. Right?
20. You claim to care about the Constitution, but in reality you don’t.
Oh yes, you scream “CONSTITUTION” at the top of your lungs, but when idiotic Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) recently tried to strip the Constitution of the 5th and 6th Amendments, where were you? Where was your outrage?
You love the parts of the Constitution that please you personally — NOT the entire Constitution.
21. It’s impossible for you to see your privilege.
If you were born into a family and a place that allowed you to thrive, you’re blessed and fortunate. This isn’t the norm. A lot of success and stability depends on the structure that we have during our formative years. The vast majority of young Americans have not had your advantages and I can’t seem to make you understand that. I’ve stopped trying.
22. You don’t care about children.
You care about fetuses. Once those fetuses begin to breath outside the womb, your concern is gone if they’re born into a poor family that needs help.
Or how about poor children who are in school? Most of you want to do away with free and reduced lunches, for God’s sake. And let’s not even talk about free breakfasts for kids. What is wrong with you people??? There is no better investment that we can make as a nation than in the early childhood health of our children.
23. You’re greedy and miserable.
You spend more time bemoaning what is being taken from you that you do in being thankful that you have enough to share.
24. You think our religion is the only one.
I’m a Christian — a proud follower of the most amazing man I’ve ever studied. Most of what is good about me comes from the teachings of Jesus. I love my religion and my Holy Book. I use the Words in Red as a compass. But who am I to look at other people who feel exactly the same way about their own religions and judge them?
We’re all on this earth doing the best we can, making the best decisions that we can.
And we’re all taking our best guess. The evidence for and against their religion is no different than the evidence for and against ours.
25. You are lazy and you refuse to read.
I provide sources for you that will debunk most of your BS, or at least help you to see it a little differently. You refuse to read it. You stick to Fox News, World Net Daily, etc…You refuse to ever entertain another point of view.
I have a conservative friend who I adore. He and his wife grew up with me. I think he’s awesome because he did something amazing for me: he recorded Rachel Maddow for a week and watched her show. Did he agree? Meh, not really. But him being willing to even listen to another viewpoint won him favor in my book. Thank you, Michael.
26. Your misfortune is God’s blessing.
When something bad happens to you, you sanctimoniously think it’s God testing you and making you stronger. When something bad happens to me (or gay people or atheists or etc…), you think it’s God punishing them.
Really?
27. “Everyone has their lot in life.”
Except you, of course. Well, no….you do have a lot. Your lot is to have every privilege and entitlement and make sure your children have the same.
28. You think you’re the only one working and paying taxes.
“My tax dollars….” Here’s a clue: you’re not the only one paying taxes. Liberals pay taxes, too. Just how far do you think your $2,000 a year in income taxes goes? Or your $10,000, or even your $50,000? No matter how wealthy you are and how much income tax you pay — and most of those complaining aren’t paying that much — you’re actually probably paying more for wars (that you love) than for food stamps for children in poverty.
So anyhow….tell me, my loves, what are you cooking for dinner tonight?
All of this said, let me say this: I’m very grateful and appreciative of my sane conservative friends who can actually participate in an intelligent and respectful discussion. To name just a few (and if I leave anyone out, I’m sorry — these are just the ones I interact with the most on these issues): Michael, Laura K., Whitney, Laura M., and my pastor, Brent.
Thank you, my dear ones, for being sane. For understanding that things aren’t always black and white. And for disagreeing with me without belittling my very existence. And for not rubbing midterm losses in my face. And for never once calling me stupid or amoral for being a liberal.
10. She is a liar regarding her health insurance.
If she claims health insurance is now affordable for individually insured people, as she claims to be since she lost her employee paid plan, she is LYING.
I am one who responsibly paid my affordable premiums until this Unaffordable Care Act became law, and now health insurance is beyond my budget. SHE IS A LIAR.
She is a left wing progressive loon.
In her signoff, she indicates that even her pastor is one of those conservatives (with whom she disagrees) in her life.
Heh, I read more than anything else I do. Granted, a good chunk of that is forced due to me (and others) trying to comply with this freakin' oppressive, heavy handed gov't and the repercussions of it....
Does yours (insurance) actually cover anything? Post ACA, mine is essentially worthless (at $960 a month premium.)
She calls conservatives lazy and says they refuse to read.
Cue the Democrat excuse about not reading the Obamacare bill before voting on it.
Tiffany obviously has not met any FReepers.
I thought - murder is wrong - one only needs to say it ONCE - so if the Bible says it 6 times in her opinion - then it went beyond the ONE time it needed to be said five more times...
She’s one of those, “If I pen it - then it’s true!” people....much like Obama....
Tiffany; you need to get away from those people in Texas. May I suggest Red Hampshire? You would be surrounded by your fellow Communists, and you would be too busy shoveling snow to annoy conservatives on the net with your stupefying bullsh*t.
“Yet the Bible only mentions homosexuality six times. Six. Times. 6. This many:"
The same-sex marriage fight is indeed a serious issue and can best be fought in the states with the support of the Church. The Obama Regime is poised to de-normalize heterosexual monogamy in order to normalize same sex marriage. We now know that Obama has been working to these ends for a long time.
The battle needs to be waged in the states through court action, since the initiative process has been nullified by court action. What needs to be established is the fraudulent nature of "marriage equality" as they are now calling it. The Bible touches on it in ten places:
Genesis 2:18, 22, 23:
18 And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him. 22 And the rib, which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man. 23 And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.
If God thought a man was a better mate for Adam, he would have made another man.
Genesis 19:1-9:
1 And there came two angels to Sodom at even; and Lot sat in the gate of Sodom: and Lot seeing them rose up to meet them; and he bowed himself with his face toward the ground; 2 And he said, Behold now, my lords, turn in, I pray you, into your servant’s house, and tarry all night, and wash your feet, and ye shall rise up early, and go on your ways. And they said, Nay; but we will abide in the street all night. 3 And he pressed upon them greatly; and they turned in unto him, and entered into his house; and he made them a feast, and did bake unleavened bread, and they did eat. 4 But before they lay down, the men of the city, even the men of Sodom, compassed the house round, both old and young, all the people from every quarter: 5 And they called unto Lot, and said unto him, Where are the men which came in to thee this night? bring them out unto us, that we may know them. 6 And Lot went out at the door unto them, and shut the door after him, 7 And said, I pray you, brethren, do not so wickedly. 8 Behold now, I have two daughters which have not known man; let me, I pray you, bring them out unto you, and do ye to them as is good in your eyes: only unto these men do nothing; for therefore came they under the shadow of my roof. 9 And they said, Stand back. And they said again, This one fellow came in to sojourn, and he will needs be a judge: now will we deal worse with thee, than with them. And they pressed sore upon the man, even Lot, and came near to break the door.
These passages reveal the wickedness of Homosexual rape as well as the practice of homosexuality.
Leviticus 18:22:
22 Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination.
Leviticus 20:13:
13 If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.
Deuteronomy 23:17-18:
17 There shall be no whore of the daughters of Israel, nor a sodomite of the sons of Israel. 18 Thou shalt not bring the hire of a whore, or the price of a dog, into the house of the Lord thy God for any vow: for even both these are abomination unto the Lord thy God.
Deuteronomy 22:5:
5 The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman’s garment: for all that do so are abomination unto the Lord thy God.
Romans 1:26-27:
26 For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural , 27 and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error.
I Corinthians 6:9-11:
9 Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders 10 nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
I Timothy 1:8-10:
8 We know that the law is good if one uses it properly. 9 We also know that law is made not for the righteous but for lawbreakers and rebels, the ungodly and sinful, the unholy and irreligious; for those who kill their fathers or mothers, for murderers, 10 for adulterers and perverts, for slave traders and liars and perjurers--and for whatever else is contrary to the sound doctrine.
2 Peter 2:6-10:
6 If he condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by burning them to ashes, and made them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly; 7 and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man, who was distressed by the filthy lives of lawless men 8 (for that righteous man, living among them day after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he saw and heard)-- 9 if this is so, then the Lord knows how to rescue godly men from trials and to hold the unrighteous for the day of judgment, while continuing their punishment. 10 This is especially true of those who follow the corrupt desire of the sinful nature and despise authority. Bold and arrogant, these men are not afraid to slander celestial beings;
On the perversion of the family issue, we need to formulate a clear message that defends monogamous heterosexual marriage. We have a huge electorate who does not know the implications of normalizing homosexual relationships and has been dumbed down by the Hollywood media. You see them clapping on shows that promote homosexuality and same sex marriage. Most American have no clue what the battle is about. This is because "marriage equality" has been redefined as a civil rights issue on the level of racial equality. The media indoctrination for "marriage equality" has been irresponsible and non-stop as it relives the intrigue of a civil rights struggle that was played out with race. How we stop the propaganda campaign of redefinition will be a challenge.
Basically, same-sex marriage violates the natural parent-child bond in every family, and the right of the family to protection by society and the state. It discards the fundamental understanding that the family, based upon the heterosexual marriage, is the very foundation of society. Same sex-marriage will de-naturalize the family by rendering in their entirety familial relationships as ever changing expressions of law. Such a changing set of laws will crush the monogamous heterosexual marriage with instability. It will be like forcing one to drive though an intersection without traffic lights. That universal understanding for thousands of years, that the family is a small society (a sovereign state) with unique rights and responsibilities independent of the state will end. Instead, the family will become mere policy relationships, defined and imposed by arbitrary resolutions of the state. The family (this society) founded more immediately in nature--the proles (procreation or fruitfulness)--will no longer have the distinction of sexual difference, with its distinctive quality of generative power. It is the civil right of the family to continue as the natural and fundamental group unit of society. With a change in the definition of marriage, the family will have no direct connection to nature. This leaves the parent-child relation open to increasing intervention by the state. And with the possibility of the state being influenced by foreign forces, the definition of the family could be expanded to include such barbarous practices as marriage to children and polygamy.
With the definition of marriage redefined, the state with its new found power, will undermine further the sovereign nature of the family; and the sphere of the church or religious community as well—the two spheres where divine and human rights, independent of the state, are located. This will come as an all out assault on hetero-sexism, or anything that seems to privilege the male-female binary or the nuclear family. It will enable the state to indoctrinate children and deprive parents of the power to intervene. The individual--men, women and children--will be reduced to be subjects of the state with no divine rights. We must understand the serious nature of this fight. There will be no peace to be had by capitulation.
This fight must be be vigorously taken up by Christians who can boldly declare that marriage is a gift—something we receive with creation, not something we invent—and that only what is capable of being a marriage act is natural sex. I believe that this issue can be fought on the moral level as it presents itself to the sovereignty of the family. Then it can be perceived as a real human rights issue. When the real issue of human rights, as it pertains to nature's law as ordained by God, then the real human rights case can be made. The human right of the monogamous heterosexual marriage should supersede the false case made for human equality as promoted by the "marriage equality" deceivers.
“She’s certainly a good proponent for her “voluntary simplicity” thing. Rarely in my entire life have I ever read such simple-minded garbage.”
By the numbers
nearly 3,200 words
avg # of sentences per paragraph is 2.5
Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level 6.5
She knows her audience.
I could visualize her living as a Dallas suburbanite.
No. It is worthless. It takes my money and offers me nothing. Redistribution of income.
At $508 per month (now a bronze plan?), the deductible is so high that if I were to become ill enough to make use of my insurance, I would not be able to work and no longer pay my premiums. So essentially, it is worthless. I will be penalized. This is not America.
Anything close to my previous plan, which had inched its way to around 330/month, would now cost me $806 per month for 2014, and still not close to the original plan. To top that, the premium would be increasing in 2015. This plan was for ME ONLY! I am 60 years old, and have always been very healthy.
Well she is a single mother at 47.
You have serious mental health issues and only Jesus can/will set you free.
So, she doesn’t want to discuss politics with conservatives any more.
Sounds like a capitulation to me.
I have liberal friends, and all they wanted to discuss was politics there for a while. Now that liberalism is put into law, and failing on every front, as we conservatives predicted, they don’t want to talk politics any more.
I love getting into political discussions with them now. They can’t win the argument on any front.
I take great comfort in this person’s screed. We’re winning the argument, so she doesn’t want to talk about it anymore.
Moses (the ‘law giver’) was not a founding father of this country, but the 10 Commandments were at least one time recognized as coming from a tradition of law.
Without exploring the textbook controversy, I have not context of the reference... only have her rant to go by.
I know I’ve seen greater over-reach in Common Core course materials.
Heck, the speaches of Barack Obama “I exist because someone marched at Selma!” are full of false history.
Tiffany probably comes down with a case of the vapors every time she hears Mrs. Cleaver refer to God on the telly...
Too many of them 'homasexuals?
Dallas/Ft.Worth area. I pegged it.
And that's exactly why I hate talking with lefties. Their arrogance is overwhelming. Disagree with them and all of a sudden you are "willfully ignorant."
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