Lot of people on here seem to assume that the US military is basically as bad as US police when it comes to “being totally dominated by frothing MAGA freaks.”
This is absolutely NOT the case.
people forget that the military specifically targets poor kids for recruitment, using benefits/stability as a big draw, and therefore you have a lot of people in the military who would not otherwise choose to be there
and of course there are people who will moralize that decision by saying that folks don’t have a right to live comfortably through that route, but I just also don’t believe that folks born into situations they cannot control should be forced to suffer to ensure their morality remains pure
yeah there’s quite a bit of “leftism” that doesn’t seem to be built on the idea of community, and I don’t like that at all! and I think that’s why fuck ups are deemed “unacceptable” by some
like i have many bad things to say about organized church and the catholic church in specific but the idea that sin is universal and that concrete actions can redeem it is one that is often lost in leftist spaces imo
Yeah the idea that everyone makes mistakes and moral compromises is something leftism occasionally makes lip service to (no ethical consumption under capitalism!) but there's a lot of "no but this thing *you* did is beyond redemption" purity test shit.
Agree. I think it's more accurate to say those leftist spaces are evangelical: you need to accept [fill in the political position] as your personal savior.
I did not have this day as my Defend Some of the Ideas of the Catholic Church day, but I would defend the idea of change and redemption to my last breath.
To be human is to fuck up. To be human is to learn. To be human is (hopefully) on some bright day to fuck up a little less.
They kind of lost me at 7yo when they said unbaptised babies went to limbo. Turned 55 last month so it wasn't THAT long ago. They bled a lot of their congregation due to the molestations, the anti LGBTQ, & suffering purifies you deal. A lot of the helpers ran & found other areas which lost them $.
I think it's a consequence of online movements. It's hard to for some people to really accept the people in the computer as being human, with human foibles, so when something does happen the people must be monsters who have been hiding it all along (which is easy to do online, and bad actors do do.)
There's no religion in my family going back generations, but I'm culturally Jewish enough that the basic premise of "you fucked up, you make reparations" is what makes sense to me.
The Protestant thing of "faith without works is the only way to go" baffles me and is a lot of the problem
It’s also why “leftist” politicians are abandoned by the left as soon as they’re elected. Governing is compromise even under the most ideal of circumstances and that is treason.
The only politicians continuously supported by the left are incapable of using their power.
Oooo as someone who grew up with a perfectionist parent I promise that instilling the fear of doing anything wrong in a person is the best way to guarantee that this person will go through their life getting absolutely nothing done. They will be too terrified of fucking up to do anything.
Biden’s domestic agenda, the best by FAR in my lifetime, is canceled by the sin of the Gaza War. He and everyone who supports him must be punished for that sin with a Trump return.
A certain irony is a lot of right callousness can be seen as a similar impulse to avoid aiding evil people.
Since avoiding this is so vital, helping based purely on need is bad as nothing stops it from going to evil-they need charity only to go to the trusted: church members, relatives and so on.
Agreed. There's just no pleasing leftists who are more obsessed with purity. It's better to work with those who are more open to forming pragmatic coalitions.
I think part of the problem is that our extremely Individualistic society is so ingrained in people that when you try to organize you often end up with just a group of individuals, not a community. People are only there for themselves, not for any greater good
I think about this a lot. when someone posts something insensitive without realizing, they're often dogpiled and exiled. people can change for the better if they were unaware of their mistakes.
then they're driven to the right where they're welcome and encouraged to be MORE insensitive.
Worse, I think it’s thought of as a “chosen” community both in the sense that the individual chooses to associate with like-minded believers (until they don’t) and in the sense that the community is “chosen” to be special (until it’s not). Either way, it’s a recipe for disaster.
as a Catholic this is my main criticism of whatever exactly you want to call secular culture right now. No one is repentant and it wouldn't mean anything if they were because there is no absolution.
Evangelicals are more like as long as you believe in jesus - their version of jesus - you can be as shitty and evil as you want and still be saved. There are some strains of leftism like this as well
I think a lot of it is Calvinism: the world, including all of humanity, is inherently fallen/irredeemable (total depravity) AND only the elect can be saved - and any good works you do don’t matter at all.
Honestly Catholicism has a fairly robust model for freedom and culpability—a person coerced to do evil hasn't committed a mortal sin in Catholicism.
Leftism is its own thing.
This is interesting - can you expand? My initial sense is that everyone is supposed to suffer in various ways to be validated/accepted. But I haven't really thought about this before.
one of my favorite colleagues was raised by social justice catholics and apart from a few years in our little consulting operation has dedicated her career to abortion activism
i will always beat the drum that leftists should the bible even if they're not at all religious, just simply as a morals guide and/or to see how badly propagandized conservatives have made it
