Free Republic

So you wanna be a FReeper?

Ok, but:

1) You first must pledge to cease and desist from flaming, insulting, attacking, belittling, trashing, defaming or bringing any kind of harm or discomfort whatsoever to other FReepers and or to religious conservatives, anywhere, anytime, on this planet, or in any life hereafter, for all time and forevermore.

2) You must now and forevermore denounce any and all claims to the title "antifreeper" and cease and desist from dissing other FReepers or Free Republic from aforementioned Darwinian base camp or any other such place where antifreeping, stabbing in the back, and other equally unhonorable, unmentionable and despicable acts are conducted.

3) You must recognize that FR does not offer advanced degrees in the field of Evolutionary Science and shall therefore foreverafter swear not to attempt to title thyself "Evolutionary Scientist."

No, Jim. I am a freeper. I am neither a troll nor a disruptor, and I've been around a long time. I haven't been sarcastic, snide, or rude to you at all. Your response here to me is childish and petulant, just as nuking Patrick's homepage for no good reason was a childish and petulant prank. Frankly, I expected better of you, and you ought to be ashamed of yourself.

No, I'm not going to agree to those silly terms. They amount to 'I can hit you, but you can't hit me' law of the schoolyard type stuff.

I think you need to take charge of your site before it gets a reputation for being cranky.

Problem I have is first off the TEACHER'S UNION who keeps trying to get religion and conservatism out of the classroom and leave liberalism & a form of humanism in.

I read an article the other day how as part of a cultural sensitivity class that children were asked to dress up in turbans and robes and fast during the day in observance of the holy month of Ramadan. Hello? I will agree with you whole heartedly something is wrong with a school administration that green lights that while at the same time disallows student-run bible study group. I don't disagree that public schools need reform. A lot of reform, from management to funding to parental involvement.

As a Christian person, I have no problem in believing that part of the creation job of God was what we call evolution as creation moved forward.

This is the exact position of many people I highly respect, and I lean towards something similar myself. Thank you and bless you.

Thanks for the thoughtful reply. We haven't always seen eye to eye, you and I, but I'll try to return the favor.

I wouldn't say "fall apart" so much as to say our models become inaccurate close to the beginning of time. No one in science declares answes with the same kind of certainty and authority that a pastor or rabbi does. This is not to say that scientific answers aren't authoritative, only that scientific language is always qualified. The language of faith, on the other hand, is typically absolute.

The way I see it, science fills is what we can learn, and faith helps us find those answers that we can't learn (or maybe have a hard time learning) on our own. Science is good at hows and where, while faith answers why. I don't believe there is any conflict between science and faith, because I've worked with too many scientists and engineers who have it. The theological position of the mainstream of Christianity and Judaism is that the Lord exists beyond scientific scrutiny.

One thing I've been trying to say on this thread is that it is not only the Dems that want to drive a wedge between religious conservatives and secular conservatives. There are likely elements of both that are repelling each other. I have represented myself as a libertarian for a long time on these threads, and I have often spoken of the need for fiscal and social conservatives to close ranks. The Dems want to see us tear outselves apart. (They have their own internal pressures, too, but that's for a different therad maybe.)

One of the things I've been driving at for the past couple nights is need to recognize that there are some cranks on FR who would be plenty happy to see pro-science people like me banned and gone for good. I'd like to think I am not an outsider here, but a member in good standing.

My purpose for posting has been to get Jim and other readers of this thread to realize that it is not the mainstream Christians causing problems. What we have are some cranks who believe in things like the moon landing was faked, and doctors can't cure disease, and crop circles, and alien abductions, and geocentrism, man walked with dinosaurs, oil doesn't come from fossils, the earth used to orbit Saturn, man was created on another planet, far out stuff. Once you get a couple of nutballs they attract each other like a magnet attracts iron filings. They clump together. They have cloaked themselves in the mantle of mainstream Christianity, and are leading the charge against "evilutionism" and by playing on people's religious sympathies, hope others will join in. These nuts are driving good posters out, and ultimately playing into the hands of the Dems by driving a wedge between religious conservatives and secular conservatives.

So you wanna be a FReeper?

I am one already. I've been one a long time.

Hi CA Guy. Haven't talked to you in a long time.

No one says it is set in stone. Within its limitations, though, we can have a high degree of confidance in the answers we get from it. However, it doesn't answer questions of meaning and purpose. That's what faith is for.

, Jim Robinson wrote: Sheesh, it's hard to keep up with you evasive types. I was just using your own lingo or the lingo I find on the "crevo" threads you frequent. Ok, you're not evolutionists. And even though you call your base camp "Darwin Central" you wish not to be called "Darwinists" or "Darwin-idolaters." You prefer to be called "Scientists?" "Evolutionary Scientists?" I presume that means you all have advance degrees in Evolutionary Science?

Jim, how about freepers?

The Dems certainly do want to see the conservative movement fractured. I don't think there is any disagreement there. I've written many times on FR that conservatives and libertarians need each other, and should try to bury the hatchet. I've tried to bury the hatchet with a number of people on FR and have discovered shortly thereafter the hatchet buried between my shoulderblades. I tried to make peace with Cultural Jihad once and it turned out badly.

If we're going to stay united against the socialists, religious conservatives need to realize that modern biology isn't the enemy. None of us are "evolutionists". I don't "believe" in evolution in the religious sense. Calling us darwin-idolaters and evilutionists plays into the hands of the Dems, because it helps them portray the conservative movement as the party of luddites. I agree that some of the secular conservatives around here need to be more respectful of the beliefs of the religious conservatives. I try to be respectful of people's faith. I am not without some measure of faith myself.

Ann Coulter is a dear friend of mine and one of our very early FReepers. The insults you direct to her and her beliefs fall very close to home.

Okay, I had to look back to see exactly what I wrote, just to make sure.

I wrote this: I've enjoyed Coulter's polemics in the past, but her latest book was crap.

I didn't say she was crap, I said her latet book was crap.

It stunk.

Period.

I like what I read in High Crimes and Misdemeanors, but Clinton is an easy target. I have mixed feelings on what I read from Treason. I like David Horowitz as an author, and I read Coulter's columns sometimes from Frontpagemag. I don't hate Ann Coulter, but after reading Godless, I was embarassed for her. In Godless, she was writing far out of her area of expertise, and it showed.

Saying that I think an author's book stunk isn't a personal indictment. Good grief.

When have I done any of that?

Friends don't always agree, and sometimes friends have to level with each other on a sore subject.

What was that old Ben said? We must all hang together, or most assuradly we will all hang separately?

You need to come to grips with the notion that it's not just one side of this debate who are planting barbs. There's some bull-baiting going on from the other side, too.

I am your friend. I've been trying to talk to you man to man for two nights now. I'm being your friend, because I'm not just telling you what you want to hear.

The GOP must be the party of reason and science. We cannot cede those positions to the Dems. There are some folks who say that modern biology diametrically opposed to faith. I don't buy that for a minute. I've known too many people in biology who are Christians and Jews. None of them had any problem with Darwin's theory of natural selection or Mendel's theory of inheritance or the rest of it.

The only conflict between science and faith is that which people manfacture, but there are some people on this board trying to manufacture conflict. Scratch some of these guys, and you find some real pieces of work. That that Ted Holden character (medved) is back posting again under a new nick. He's a fruit loop. I don't want the Republican party to become associated with his brand of idiocy.

What are you talking about? I was in the bookstore a while back and sat down and read about half of Godless while I was waiting on my wife. I've enjoyed Coulter's polemics in the past, but her latest book was crap. It exemplifies everything I've been saying on this thread about making the conservative movement hostile to modern science. Surely you are not say that giving her latest book the thumbs down is the same as destroying freedom of worship?

You're just flat wrong on this issue. Evolutionary theory is foundational to our understanding of biology. It is part of science's toolkit for understanding the physical world. It is no more hostile to Christianity or Judaism than a hammer or inclined plane. I mean, come on. The ACLU uses math. Does that mean algebra is part of the homosexual agenda?

The reason we're having this discussion is because of the friction between religious and secular conservatives, much along the lines of the National Review article.

The fact is, your people...

I am not a "you people" I am a freeper and have been for a long time.

...are seizing upon this issue to belittle and insult believers in God...

No. I do not belittle and insult Christians just for being Christians. I do not mock faith. I have long argued that faith and science are not in conflict. I have traded barbs with those people who call me an idolater, a nazi, etc. A lot of those kinds of people, frankly, don't belong in polite company. That's what I've been trying to tell you: you have more than just a few nuts.

...and to use so-called "apolitical science" as a means to deprive us of the truths we hold to be self-evident, ie, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

We're back to the Goldwater quote I posted upthread. The men and women who "strive to cure disease, subdue and make fruitful our natural environment" have done nothing of the sort. People who study evolutionary science help make the flu shots every year. People who study micropaleontology help find oil to keep the country running. The "inventive engines of production, science, and technology" add to our lives, liberty, and happiness in measurable ways every day, and have made this nation the envy of the world.

The theory of evolution is apolitical? Yeah, riiiight.

Sure it is. People who prospect for oil use geology and micropaleontology to understand the conditions under which petroleum is produced. The oil companies don't care what party you are, they care about dry holes.

I'm suggesting you should quit working with the leftists and or doing their dirty work for them. And you should quit insulting those of us who do believe in the Creator. If you guys want to prove the theory of evolution, more power to you. But don't use it as a tool to destroy our faith in God or to destroy our political and religious freedom.

The thing is that we aren't. The last ten years to fifteen years I worked in both geo-sciences (oil exploration) and in biology (DNA sequencing). Both of these fields were connected to the theoretical and applied sciences. The vast majority of people I worked had some measure of religious faith. Many of them were church (or synagoge) going people.

You are laying down friendly fire, because most scientists and engineers are conservative by nature. They are typically cautious, not prone to accepting a change without good reason, and desire results. They are patriotic people, generally pro-free enterprise people, many of them veterans too. They are *not* far-out Moveon atheist types that you would think they are from reading FR. The liberal arts may be filled with those types, but the physical sciences and engineering disciplines are not.

I generally had no problem talking politics with them, but they didn't want to vote Republican, because they perceived (wrongly or rightly, which seems to be the topic of this flamewar) that the GOP is filled with anti-science kooks.

Imagine yourself trying to talk to you coworker under these conditions, only to have him point you to a conservative site where scientists are labeled as maxist homosexuals. Boom. You lost him.

Tell us again, O wise one, how it isn't wrong to have slaves and the moon landings were faked.

Truly, thou art the vanguard of the conservative movement.

They get to be happy with their husbands.

Well, ok. It's late, and I'm punchy. Maybe that's why we got off to a bad start. I am making less sense than usual, which could be bad as maybe I don't much to begin with.

I can sense your frustration about the crevo wars. I do think they might be at the cusp of the issue touched on by the article. Sometimes, I am a guilty party to them, other times I stay away. It is an issue that is dear to me, though. It may not figure highly into this upcoming election, or even in '08, but I feel it could become an issue in the future. I've long been an advocate of patching up relations between libertarians and Republicans, especially since 911. I've said before that religious and secular conservatives need each other, and I still believe that is true and will remain so.

I'm not an old timer, but neither am I wet behind the ears. I don't post under false pretenses, or crash freeper funerals just to gain credibility among the posters here.

Thank you.

I have read about Eschoir and his lawsuit. Before my time, sure. But so what?