Religion in Irish politics

Hivemind187

I just spotted this in my mornings persual of the web;

John Francis Higgins

I am unfamiliar with these laws in relation to weapons and the interaction
between state and EU law. I would need to study it more. Would this be a tax
generated i.e. more tax liable to be collected from sales in Ireland? It
would immediately strike me, that EU law is dominant. I have stated in my
Election literature that we have moved from a defensive conservative society
to an aggressive secular domain. This is happening to have sad repercussions
because there are more and more people around with less religious scruples.
They have no fear and leads to a sad increase in gun related crime. The
authorities have to try and stop this sudden breakout of wrongdoing. This
manifests itself in the Big Brother Syndrome. Sadly the whole legal and
justice edifice is overseen by people who can´t remember, did not hear, and
were not there, when asked to account for their own actions. Yes in this
system it is the normal law abiding citizen who feels aggrieved. This need
not be the case if leaders have ideals and are prepared to step down from
office when they get things wrong. It really amazes me that our leaders put
themselves back up for re-election when they have turned us into a country
riddled with Debt.

I have highlighted the important section.

Deplorable isnt it? The question he was asked was "what is your poisition on recently proposed firearms legislation". His response was to attack the government and blame secularists for shooting up the place.

My wonder is how many other politicians or candidates are subject to allowing their religious prejudices and fanciful nonsense colour their judgement about right and wrong? Do we have a list somewhere that I can check which candidates are god-squad and which ones have joined the rest of us in the 21st century?

It might be a handy list to have should people feel the inclination to make a point of not voting for the religious caste.

(yes yes I know we shouldnt care what a persons religious beliefs are if their policies are sound but frankly I have yet to be convinced that those individuals like Higgins are capable of objective rationality).

Dave!

Will you commit yourself publicly to legislation banning embryo destruction and preventing any regulatory body from rubber-stamping embryo destruction?


Sean
My canvassers and I, have just come back from a two day campaign in Cavan-Monaghan. So, needless to say, I am delighted that you give me the honour of replying to your very relevant question. The major problem with the pace of modern day life is that social barriers are continually broken. This results in a breakdown of society. We now have daily murders.

Respect for life has been a precious grace within the Christian upbringing. If we do not have respect for life from conception; then it opens the gates as to lots of argument as to when life should be valued e.g. should abortion be not allowed at 14 weeks or near full term; at what stage should we introduce euthanasia; should we kill children who are not fully formed; should we saddle our youth with massive debt early on in life in a way that they will be slaves for the rest of their lives. Respect for life begins at conception. Nothing else should be even entertained. No WILL about it. I fully disagree with what Obama has done in reversing the Bush ban on embryo destruction.

getz

Dave! wrote: »

Will you commit yourself publicly to legislation banning embryo destruction and preventing any regulatory body from rubber-stamping embryo destruction?


Sean
My canvassers and I, have just come back from a two day campaign in Cavan-Monaghan. So, needless to say, I am delighted that you give me the honour of replying to your very relevant question. The major problem with the pace of modern day life is that social barriers are continually broken. This results in a breakdown of society. We now have daily murders.

Respect for life has been a precious grace within the Christian upbringing. If we do not have respect for life from conception; then it opens the gates as to lots of argument as to when life should be valued e.g. should abortion be not allowed at 14 weeks or near full term; at what stage should we introduce euthanasia; should we kill children who are not fully formed; should we saddle our youth with massive debt early on in life in a way that they will be slaves for the rest of their lives. Respect for life begins at conception. Nothing else should be even entertained. No WILL about it. I fully disagree with what Obama has done in reversing the Bush ban on embryo destruction.

at the risk of being banned,i do not think the religious body[already in disgrace in ireland]the, magdalen sistors prisons for young mothers who never comitted any crime,is still a shame on the irish people and church,never any more will i trust any goverment that alows religion to dictate to the people.

lostexpectation

ohmygod where did you get this from,oh i see http://www.candidatewatch.ie/john_francis_higgins-30374-22685.html, that just that crazy independent running in the northwest.

Galvasean

Generally speaking I tend to avoid voting for anyone who allows religious dogma to influence their policies. Unfortunately this rules out entire parties*. It's quite hard to find representatives that arent in some way influenced by such things.

*I won't name anyone now because I don't want to be seen as trying to influence people on poll day.

Dave!

http://www.candidatewatch.ie/john_francis_higgins-30374-22685.html

He's an independent

Acacia

That's unbelievable. Did he come out with this tripe before or after the report about child abuse emerged? Because I don't know how anyone could still defend our 'defensive conservative society' after that came out.

In any case, why do people try to apportion blame on secularists , especially for crime issues? It's as if they assume of you don't follow a book of rules because somebody told you to, you're automatically an immoral violent thug. Scape-goating, anyone?

Of course, violent crime never existed in Ireland before it became more secular...

non-violent ireland.jpeg

Latchy

John Francis Higgins

I am unfamiliar with these laws in relation to weapons and the interaction
between state and EU law. I would need to study it more. Would this be a tax
generated i.e. more tax liable to be collected from sales in Ireland? It
would immediately strike me, that EU law is dominant. I have stated in my
Election literature that we have moved from a defensive conservative society
to an aggressive secular domain. This is happening to have sad repercussions
because there are more and more people around with less religious scruples.
They have no fear and leads to a sad increase in gun related crime. The
authorities have to try and stop this sudden breakout of wrongdoing. This
manifests itself in the Big Brother Syndrome. Sadly the whole legal and
justice edifice is overseen by people who can´t remember, did not hear, and
were not there, when asked to account for their own actions. Yes in this
system it is the normal law abiding citizen who feels aggrieved. This need
not be the case if leaders have ideals and are prepared to step down from
office when they get things wrong. It really amazes me that our leaders put
themselves back up for re-election when they have turned us into a country

Jeeze, the biggest can of worms opened in the states history involving the religious institiutions and this tuplip comes out with this .

Peoples religioius beliefs should not obstruct putting the right people in to do the right job ,regardless of their own beliefs .

Urizen

It's a typical mistake. He doesn't realise that corrolation doesn't necessarily mean causation. Just because both are happening doesn't mean one causes the other.

DTrotter

Urizen wrote: »

It's a typical mistake. He doesn't realise that corrolation doesn't necessarily mean causation. Just because both are happening doesn't mean one causes the other.

Didn't prevent it either, doesn't the abuse scandal show the danger of what happens when you put an organisation on a pedestal due to their self proclaimed moral superiority?
Obviously because someone is a christian/priest doesn't mean they are more likely to abause children but if a paedophille sees an organisation that is almost beyond question and knows if they are in that organisation they can have access to children and get away with a crime then they will join it. Much in the same way as corrupt guards.

Schumacher1

People who have religious convictions should not be allowed to hold any office or position in the state. How can I take a person seriously when they believe this rubbish.

Religion is a mental illness.

studiorat

It would appear there's no shortage of headbangers running in that particular region.

markopantelic

think he was on WB last week, he said 'ireland has changed from a conservative defensive society into a progressive circular(:D) society''

hahah

Urizen

Schumacher1 wrote: »

Religion is a mental illness.

That's a bit harsh, no?

Hivemind187

Urizen wrote: »

That's a bit harsh, no?

No.

coffee_cake

I don't know about mental illness, but I don't think I want people in charge who would be perfectly happy shooting up the place/wouldn't see anything wrong with it, if it wasn't for an omnipotent being threatening eternal punishment. As opposed to, say, a general sense of right and wrong.

robindch

Schumacher1 wrote: »

Religion is a mental illness.

Religion in general is not a "mental illness" in any reasonable sense of the term, and you've been carded for ten days for using inflammatory and unhelpful language.

Schumacher1

robindch wrote: »

Religion in general is not a "mental illness" in any reasonable sense of the term, and you've been carded for ten days for using inflammatory and unhelpful language.

I have to disagree.

It is a complete delusion. It is a proven delusion.

These people seriously believe that there is a
(1)guy
(2)girl (not the catholics)
(3)thing
(4)omnipetent being
(5)smoke monster
(6)something unexplainable

that can see every single living thing, in all the billions of galaxies and billions and billions of planets in those galaxies

AT THE SAME TIME.

If you f*ck up once then you will be punished.

Number of possible habitable planets

1,000,000,000,000 (this figure represents only a fraction of them)


Can life start on its own ... YES
Did god make us ... NO we evolved from bacteria


All you have to do is read Jakass posts or watch the intolerence of the mods in Crhistianity to see the delusion.

I can say that religion is a form of madness. Madness is a mental illness.

Benhonan

Would you equate ignorance to madness? Be realistic in fairness.

Schumacher1

Benhonan wrote: »

Would you equate ignorance to madness? Be realistic in fairness.

Religion wants people to be ignorant. Otherwise there would be no religion. I have very briefly described the delusion of the religious teachings, only a madman could believe they were true.

Religion brainwashes, has no proof, stems from superstition. It has broken every one of its own commandments and is responsible for more death and destruction than anything else in human terms.

In this day and age its not acceptable or possible to believe unless you are suffering from a mental illness..

Hivemind187

Schumacher1 wrote: »

Religion wants people to be ignorant. Otherwise there would be no religion. I have very briefly described the delusion of the religious teachings, only a madman could believe they were true.

Religion brainwashes, has no proof, stems from superstition. It has broken every one of its own commandments and is responsible for more death and destruction than anything else in human terms.

In this day and age its not acceptable or possible to believe unless you are suffering from a mental illness..

Mate, I agree with you in principal if not in aproach, but you are light-years away from the original point.

Húrin

Hivemind187 wrote: »

frankly I have yet to be convinced that those individuals like Higgins are capable of objective rationality).

I have yet to be convinced that any human is capable of objective rationality.

I disagree if he claimed that gun crime was caused by secularism. He doesn't have the guts to admit that the gun crime is really caused by the prosperity of our society. Which is also the cause of our secularism.

Unfortunately I gave this guy a preference at some point.

Still I would be happy about it if it got him elected instead of Ganley or SF.

Dades

Schumacher1 wrote: »

In this day and age its not acceptable or possible to believe unless you are suffering from a mental illness..

You sound like you are suffering from the early stages of atheius angstious.

That to you, and many of us, belief in religious stuff seems bizzare, doesn't make us the only sane people in a madhouse. You really need to delve more into the reasons why people believe rather than throwing about daft generalisations that encompass many of our wives, partners, families, friends etc.

ShooterSF

bluewolf wrote: »

I don't know about mental illness, but I don't think I want people in charge who would be perfectly happy shooting up the place/wouldn't see anything wrong with it, if it wasn't for an omnipotent being threatening eternal punishment. As opposed to, say, a general sense of right and wrong.

This would be my concern with what he is saying. I get nervous of people who see god's vengeance as a reason not to go around killing people.

nyarlothothep

One is on very thin ice when you apply a blanket explanation for a social problem, as its usually multifaceted, involving a lot of complex interactions, the one answer fits all approach isn't very reliable.

Hivemind187

Húrin wrote: »

I have yet to be convinced that any human is capable of objective rationality.

I disagree if he claimed that gun crime was caused by secularism. He doesn't have the guts to admit that the gun crime is really caused by the prosperity of our society. Which is also the cause of our secularism.

Gun crime is caused by affluence ...

Well that's a head scratcher. I thought it was caused by criminals ... but maybe I'm old fashioned.

Dades

What would be interesting would be a poll amongst 'gun crime' offenders as to whether they believe in (a) God, or whether they ever, say, wrote letters to the papers denouncing the proposed blasphemy laws.

I'm oddly not convinced 'secularism' is a priority amongst any of them, or indeed, how it could be seen as a factor in criminal life.

Húrin

Hivemind187 wrote: »

Gun crime is caused by affluence ...

Well that's a head scratcher. I thought it was caused by criminals ... but maybe I'm old fashioned.

Gangland Gun crime of the type we have got used to is typical in societies which undergo economic booms. Simply saying that it's criminals wot done it is laughably simplistic. Criminals exist in every society, but cocaine shootings don't.

Zombrex

Schumacher1 wrote: »

Religion wants people to be ignorant. Otherwise there would be no religion. I have very briefly described the delusion of the religious teachings, only a madman could believe they were true.

Mental illness and being "mad" implies that the brain is not functioning normally or has been damaged in some fashion.

Given that religion stems from instincts that appear to be quite normal and in fact helpful from an evolutionary sense it is some what inaccurate to say that religion is a form of mental illness as that implies that it is the product of a defective brain.

Religion is a by product of the way our brains have naturally evolved to view the world around us by modeling the world through human like interactions. It is an instinct to help us with human to human interaction but it has lead to a lot of people seeing "humans" where none exist, in natural interactions and objects (rain, the sun, big bang etc)

sliabh

Dades wrote: »

What would be interesting would be a poll amongst 'gun crime' offenders as to whether they believe in (a) God, or whether they ever, say, wrote letters to the papers denouncing the proposed blasphemy laws.

I'm oddly not convinced 'secularism' is a priority amongst any of them, or indeed, how it could be seen as a factor in criminal life.

My memory is that every time a gang member is gunned down in Limerick they seem to go all out to outdo each other with the most over the top ostentatious tack religious funeral they can manage.

It isn't exactly conclusive evidence that they are theists, but I have yet to hear of any Collopy, Keane, Dundon or McCarthy getting a secular or humanist ceremony.