Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

To: inquest
To take your objection to its logical conclusion, government employees should be prohibited from giving their own salary money to their local church, because it's "taxpayer money".

That's not a logical conclusion. There's a big difference between paying a private individual for his labor; and financing an organization. The US cannot prevent a federal employee from beiong a member of the KKK. Does that mean the US should give contracts to the KKK to, say, run child-care centers?

You first cited Turkey as an example of how democracy leads to religious control, and now you're saying it's an example of how to work against it

I said secularism works against it. Stop trying to distort what I wrote.

273 posted on 01/05/2006 3:33:51 PM PST by Right Wing Professor (Liberals have hijacked science for long enough. Now it's our turn -- Tom Bethell)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 271 | View Replies ]


To: Right Wing Professor
There's a big difference between paying a private individual for his labor; and financing an organization.

They're financing an organization in exchange for its labor - labor that serves a secular purpose, in accordance with the Lemon test (which takes the establishment clause to quite an secularist extreme to begin with).

[You first cited Turkey as an example of how democracy leads to religious control, and now you're saying it's an example of how to work against it]

I said secularism works against it. Stop trying to distort what I wrote.

Actually you didn't say anything about secularism when talking about Turkey. All you said was, "Turkey is the only one that has withstood - somewhat - fundamentalist pressure." And that was right after you got through saying, "Where there is an strong and active fundamentalist movement, the universal experience has been that democracy leads to imposition of religious control of public life. This is evident in Turkey, in Algeria, and elsewhere in the Islamic world".

Those two statements are in complete conflict with each other. The only one doing any distorting here is you.

274 posted on 01/05/2006 6:11:42 PM PST by inquest (If you favor any legal status for illegal aliens, then do not claim to be in favor of secure borders)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 273 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson