We don't need freedom of religion • Hacker News Board

Re: We don't need freedom of religion

#91

Post by anamax » Fri, Dec 24, 2010, 1:00 AM UTC

Semiapies wrote: post #85

anamax wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You're welcome to provide citations of gay individuals You cited your personal experience, so you don't get to complain when I do exactly the same thing.

So when you were claiming my gaydar was "broken", you knew you were lying? At this point, I simply don't believe that you've met gay people who argued against supporting gay marriage on the basis that we have to get government out of the business of marriage first. It's a highly dubious claim, and you seem less than entirely honest.

> So when you were claiming my gaydar was "broken", you knew you were lying?

Not at all. I believe that you have described things as you saw them. I'm suggesting that reality was different.

> At this point, I simply don't believe that you've met gay people who argued against supporting gay marriage on the basis that we have to get government out of the business of marriage first.

Good for you. I don't believe your claim either.

> It's a highly dubious claim,

Based on what? Your perception of the political uniformity of gays?

> and you seem less than entirely honest.

Based on what?

I'm not relying on gaydar. I'm relying on "I'm gay and I think ..." statements. How do you know that they were lying?

What's the basis for your "uniformly straight" claim? Did they all say "I'm straight and I think ...."?

Re: We don't need freedom of religion

#92

Post by anamax » Fri, Dec 24, 2010, 1:03 AM UTC

vacri wrote: post #87

anamax wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Religion is definitely a choice in countries where such subtle nuances of civil rights are being debated as in the main link. Since honor killings happen in countries such as the UK.... Even if you're going to argue "it's a choice because it's not civil-legal to kill apostates", it's certainly "civil-legal" to shun them.

Shunning is monstrously different to killing. It's silly to even compare them. Tons of people reject the religion of their parents and are estranged from them for life, while still having a great - and in many cases markedly improved - quality of life.

> Tons of people reject the religion of their parents and are estranged from them for life, while still having a great - and in many cases markedly improved - quality of life.

And tons don't, and other tons do, but have a miserable life as a result.

They'll be glad to know that you belittle their situation.

Re: We don't need freedom of religion

#93

Post by ars » Fri, Dec 24, 2010, 7:00 AM UTC

mingdingo wrote: post #90

ars wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's more humane if it's conscious because to make an animal unconscious you have to hurt it. I'd rather simply kill it instead of hurt it first, and then kill it. A captive bolt does not always work on the first try, and it doesn't always fully stun either. You can't just increase the power of the bolt or you get brain matter mixed into the meat, raising the risk of mad cow disease. So you have to carefully tune it…

It's not really "hurting" it if you make it deeply unconscious, which is the goal of stunning. Can it be botched? Yes. But just like medicine that sometimes doesn't work, or isn't administered properly, the solution is not to stop using the medicine, but to correct the mistakes made when delivering it. Consider this: When you use a stunner properly, the animal feels a split second of pain before becoming unconscious.…

The brain shuts down within seconds, not minutes.

It takes a few minutes for it to die, but it's totally unconscious for that time.

And I prefer to look at actual usage, not perfect usage.

For example: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.meatsci.2008.07.016 for this type of animal 53% of the time the stunning did not work properly.

And according to http://www.viva.org.uk/campaigns/slaughter/std4.htm 5-10% of captive bolt stunning does not work properly. There are plenty of other sources that say the same thing.

Re: We don't need freedom of religion

#94

Post by J3L2404 » Fri, Dec 24, 2010, 9:24 PM UTC

J3L2404 wrote: post #69

pkulak wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who's doing the forcing? Is it a job? Is the religious practice safe? Then fine. It's part of the job. Quit if you don't like it. My atheism may prevent me from dressing up as Santa because, maybe, I don't want to lie to kids, or something like that. That doesn't mean that I get to take that job and then sit down amongst the elves at the mall in jeans and a FSM t-shirt while little kids sit on my lap to be told that…

+1 for FSM mention. Ironically on their website a few years ago they were (mockingly) showing an inverse correlation between increasing CO2 and piracy just before the wave of Sudanese boat-jackings.

Oops, that should be Somali not Sudanese.