"Bwahaha! You're no better at guessing than at telling the truth. Wrong twice."
Ok, fine. I'm wrong twice ... if you are telling the truth.
But, quite frankly, something doesn't click here. You don't sound like a middle child, and you definitely would qualifty for last born spoiled brat, but you are too disciplined w/ language for that.
Thus, in the birth order, you were the '1st' one to really take seriously the idea of being responsible.
Perhaps there is a large gap between you and the next oldest. Or, as likely, the next oldest was a reprobate, and you filled in the moral gap. Oh well, you likely not going to provide a detailed biography. It would help however, in figuring out why you detest Protestants so much. (Clearly the term Christians was simply not precise enough; your S. Baptist comment reveals much).
The point is, you sound a lot like an oldest.
"If they get Biblical literalism and the subservience of women in the style of the Southern Baptists, yes I do feel sorry for them."
So you think women should not be subservient? The bible is pretty explicit about how women fit into a family government structure. The book of Timothy comes right out and states stuff that is just plum awful.
Your standard left-wing elevate-wive-over-husbands worldview is unsurprising RW Professor; it is consistent with all your other arguments (except that you love the GOP). This suggests you probably own a copy of the Matrix. Trinity (HA!) is not subservient in that movie...; in fact, like many movies, including Sabrina w/ Harrison Ford, the story is always the same ... SHE, whoever she is, leads the man out of the boy. She is the one who redeems and saves the 'guy' from guydom. (At the end, Ford, in Paris, says "Save me Sabrina Fair"; then cue the kiss).
Now you are really starting to make some sense. And so, to extend the logic, a 'man' wouldn't cheat on his wife, not b/c he is to be faithful to God, but b/c he is to be faithful to her; he has to be, b/c she, not God, SAVED him. It is perfectly reasonable.
Basically, if God was not a "Father", you'd likely have a far different reaction to the whole creation story I am guessing.
It always boils down to the same story ... some Dad screws over his own kids (a drunk, a lout, a philanderer, or worst, just missing) .... and godlessness results.
All varities of it, but the common denominator between Marx, Freud, Rand, Sartre, etc, etc, etc, is a weak/absent father figure.
All those academics I met in college, esp Grad School ... all those weak/absent Dads. The correlation and significance were overwhelming. It is quite interesting RWP. I had a Dad who wasn't absent; I'm beginning to fully believe that all these fights are merely a huge noise over how crummy life can get when Adam is a silent wimp.
But all this is immaterial to you. Let's address what you care about: the spiritual emancipation of women. Given your main argument, that we Christians, esp Baptist types, are bad for the GOP, do you have any evidence that the liberated, 'partnership oriented', cul-de-sac craving, risk-averse, women tend to vote MORE along GOP lines?
I'm interested in reading how wresting the training of girls out of the dirty fingers of Southern Baptists is going to create a better crop of Republicans. I mean, you are here at FR, a GOP stronghold. Surely you can provide some reliable data. I can't wait to see this ... but again, you'll ignore this as you have ignored all else ...
Wait; correction, getting back to the opening now .... You didn't ignore my call for your 'reasons' for being honest. But, what you did do was piggy back on someone else's ideas (from the Catholic Ency.
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03432a.htm):
Categorical Imperative
A term which originated in Immanuel Kant's ethics. It expresses the moral law as ultimately enacted by reason and demanding obedience from mere respect for reason.
But that will alone is good which acts not only conformably to duty, but also from duty. And again the will acts from duty when it is determined merely by respect for the law...
Therefore the first fundamental principle of morality is: "Let the law be the sole ground or motive of thy will." Kant further finds that the law is capable of inspiring respect by reason of its universality and necessity, and hence lays down the following general formula of the moral law: "Act so that the maxim [determining motive of the will] may be capable of becoming a universal law for all rational beings."
Necessity and universality, he declares, cannot be derived from experience, whose subject matter is always particular and contingent, but from the mind alone, from the cognitive forms innate in it. Hence the moral law originates in pure reason and is enunciated by a synthetical judgment a priori--a priori because it has its reason, not in experience, but in the mind itself; synthetical, because it is formed not by the analysis of a conception, but by an extension of it.
Reason, dictating the moral law, determines man's actions.
Yet it may do so in a twofold manner. It either controls conduct infallibly, its dictates being actually responded to without conflict or friction--and in this case there is no obligation necessary or conceivable, because the will is of itself so constituted as to be in harmony with the rational order--or it is resisted and disobeyed, or obeyed only reluctantly, owing to contrary impulses coming from sensibility.
In this case determination by the law of reason has the nature of a command or imperative, not of a hypothetical imperative, which enjoins actions only as a means to an end and implies a merely conditional necessity but of a categorical imperative, which enjoins actions for their own sake and hence involves absolute necessity.
While for God, Whose will is perfectly holy, the moral law cannot be obligatory, it is for man, who is subject to sensuous impulses, an imperative command.
Accordingly, the categorical imperative is the moral law enacted by practical reason, obligatory for man, whose sensibility is discordant from the rational order, and demanding obedience from respect for its universality and necessity.
RWP, you have GOT to be kidding. Your expectation is that KANT, KANT!!! is going to be our savior if we just get reasonable enough? These are your 'compelling' reasons, which happen to be better than 'the 10 commandments', for being honest? Tell me, please, that you are joking. By this logic you would, if you were open and honest, agree that society should devise a 'rationalism' mental test; those not suitably rational would be denied the vote. (At the least).
Not only do you want us all to love scientists, but we are to bow down low to the likes of John Edwards and the rest of the folks who are inventing laws right and left out there.
Do you have any good reasons for being honest that you are bright enough to think up on your own? Or was that bold crack about 'compelling' reasons simply a reference to the fact you're a Kant disciple.
BB and AG, I'm not well trained in the masters of Philosophy; but somehow, this appeal to Kant, as a understructure for justification of this marathon fight over how little kids should be exposed to ToE teachings, .... I find this appeal to have some major flaw. Help please if either of you are of a mind...
Hilarious! First you tell 'em "So you think women should not be subservient? The bible is pretty explicit about how women fit into a family government structure. The book of Timothy comes right out and states stuff that is just plum awful." . Then you ask the subservient ones to bail you out!
Pathetic!
I can't believe I am seeing FReepers spout New Age Yuppie crap. Next we'll have someone quoting from "Plants Are Like People" and claiming plants learn.