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The great Hobby Lobby artifact heist

meghanboilard.substack.com

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Re: The great Hobby Lobby artifact heist

#61

Post by amanaplanacanal »

emchammer wrote: post #31
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Completely agree. I think the author's tone in this article, in a nutshell, exemplifies what was a huge driving force of so many evangelical's in the US now being firmly in the MAGA camp, even though that seems paradoxical to many of us. For a long time now, many people who's religious values are deeply important to them have felt disrespected and looked down upon by "the left" (yes, I'm obviously painting with a bro…

A lot of it is just about maintaining healthy boundaries. I am a transgender person of faith. It’s not really a big deal except for the assholes.

Unfortunately those assholes are now in power, and you are now an un-person.

Re: The great Hobby Lobby artifact heist

#62

Post by 34679 »

michaelsbradley wrote: post #52
flocciput wrote: post #50

Is it just me or has HN as a whole become... more Christian lately? A lot more defensive comments here than I would've expected, and I've seen in other threads people actually openly recommending religion/Christianity specifically as something that solved their problems. What's the deal here? I would've thought this would be a relatively atheist/agnostic community, if not one that eschews discussion of religion entir…

> I would've thought this would be a relatively atheist/agnostic community, if not one that eschews discussion of religion entirely. Briefly, why?

I can't speak for OP, but for me it's because this place is full of engineers who place their faith in evidence-based reasoning.

Re: The great Hobby Lobby artifact heist

#63

Post by armchairhacker »

themaninthedark wrote: post #29
smithkl42 wrote: post #7

I wish the author was a little less over-wrought in her descriptions of the Green family's religious commitments. I've heard complaints before about the Green's artifact acquisition process, and they've had to return some manuscripts: it's a story worth investigating and telling. But it distracts from the author's main point when she's making snide comments about their faith. Yes, they're Christians who are successfu…

The author's tone is...definitely not neutral and it make it hard to believe them when they put pure conjecture in: "Between the high demand and likely paying workers a subminimum wage" with footnote "...While this practice was completely legal (current federal law permits employers to pay disabled workers a fraction of minimum wage), it’s certainly questionable practice coming from a guy whose entire schtick revolve…

Although it sounds very bad, there’s actually a good argument for paying disabled workers below-minimum wage:

- Disabled people get paid (what is supposed to be, but not actually, a living wage) by the government, so they aren’t living on the wage.

- No company would hire them if they were forced to pay minimum wage, because companies are greedy and would always hire a more productive non-disabled worker.

- Many disabled workers want to work not for the pay, but because they enjoy the work and/or want to feel productive. As stated, they get paid by the government, so in theory they don’t have to work if they don’t want to.

With the caveat that disability payments outside of work should be raised, so that nobody (disabled or not) feels like they must work a too-boring or too-hard job to afford a decent standard of living (unless absolutely necessary for society to subsist, but that’s another discussion)…I think it’s a great practice.

Maybe there are good arguments against it, but a good argument needs to provide the full context.

Re: The great Hobby Lobby artifact heist

#64

Post by worsethanhitler »

flocciput wrote: post #50

Is it just me or has HN as a whole become... more Christian lately? A lot more defensive comments here than I would've expected, and I've seen in other threads people actually openly recommending religion/Christianity specifically as something that solved their problems. What's the deal here? I would've thought this would be a relatively atheist/agnostic community, if not one that eschews discussion of religion entir…

[dead]

Re: The great Hobby Lobby artifact heist

#65

Post by bloomingeek »

zdw wrote: post #47
beedeebeedee wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For a long time now, many people who's religious values are deeply important to them have felt disrespected and looked down upon by "the left" (yes, I'm obviously painting with a broad brush here). In subtle and not-so-subtle ways, the elite left essentially said "you all are backwards and silly" Most of the criticism that I have heard and read is not about evangelicals being "backwards and silly" but is about thei…

The problem is that in the 70's when conservative/libertarian economics and the religious right had a shotgun marriage which spawned Reagan and most of the "government is the enemy" schtick, usually the former group actually was driving the agenda, using a carrot of "we'll get rid of abortion" to lead the latter. The problem is that this almighty dollar worship is far more corrosive and destructive to society and eth…

Along with the almighty dollar worship was the super patriot worship, which some say was started by W Bush to support his war effort. Both are, from a christian view point, hypocritical. The current administration is full steam ahead on the former and busy killing the second with the tool of embarrassment.

Re: The great Hobby Lobby artifact heist

#66

Post by kortex »

Beestie wrote: post #51
Beestie wrote: post #12

Unclear as to the intent of the word "Heist" in the title. Seems they are paying top dollar if not more for collections sometimes not even authenticating them. As long as they make everything available to the public and to researchers, I don't see anything wrong with it. Also unclear on why this is a two-part story. Is there some big shoe to drop? Trying to avoid the impression that the author is not terribly fond of…

Appreciate the informative replies and citations. So, I'm a bit of a n00b in such matters so will politely ask how this situation (how to get ill-gotten artifacts of great anthropological value back into the public domain) typically gets resolved. The idea cited in a reply that such purchases are funding ISIS (chilling to say the least) kind of implies that ISIS (or a stooge acting on their behalf) is the seller so a…

The complexity lies in the fact that there is rarely a bill of sale like "Priceless scroll taken from tomb under ancient church before it was demolished - ISIS". There's a lot of laundering and changing of hands before they even go up for sale by these brokers whom HobbyLobby purchase from. This is completely antithetical to the ideal process for the sake of scholarship and preservation, which is meticulous and slow, documents all of the context before even touching anything, maintaining a chain of custody so that context is preserved even after removing artifacts from the site, etc.

Re: The great Hobby Lobby artifact heist

#67

Post by dangus »

smithkl42 wrote: post #7

I wish the author was a little less over-wrought in her descriptions of the Green family's religious commitments. I've heard complaints before about the Green's artifact acquisition process, and they've had to return some manuscripts: it's a story worth investigating and telling. But it distracts from the author's main point when she's making snide comments about their faith. Yes, they're Christians who are successfu…

It sounds like you are intentionally leaving out the meat of the article’s criticisms, which is that the schemes involving “charity” and “giving” are essentially tax dodging.

> Less evident these charitable contributions equate to sizable tax breaks. These tax write-offs are calculated using the highest appraisals possible, which is not necessarily indicative of the actual sum of money paid out by the Green family for the land. Counterintuitive as it may seem, this practice frequently allows the Greens to save far more money than what they spend via hefty deductions.

Hobby Lobby is, according to this article, taking advantage of the nebulous valuations of artifacts to minimize tax burden in a way that is morally questionable at the least.

Matthew 19:24

Re: The great Hobby Lobby artifact heist

#68

Post by boesboes »

flocciput wrote: post #50

Is it just me or has HN as a whole become... more Christian lately? A lot more defensive comments here than I would've expected, and I've seen in other threads people actually openly recommending religion/Christianity specifically as something that solved their problems. What's the deal here? I would've thought this would be a relatively atheist/agnostic community, if not one that eschews discussion of religion entir…

Not sure, but the less technical a story, the more brigading and gaslighting you get in the comments it seems. It is a bit like when there is something about apple, the entire comment section is people complaining about the fanboys in the comments. Who are not there. I exaggerate a bit of course, but in general it is the same with any 'divisive' topics such as AI, crypto etc. Technical discussion is minimal.

Either it's bots, or we are all just tired and frustrated. I know I am and it doesn't help to stay civil..

Re: The great Hobby Lobby artifact heist

#69

Post by alabastervlog »

KPGv2 wrote: post #60
duped wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What exactly do you find "snide" or "sarcastic?" The thesis of TFA is that their faith motivated the crimes. You can't tell the story without talking about how they choose to practice their faith.

> What exactly do you find "snide" or "sarcastic?" I haven't read the article, but certainly the phrase "whose entire schtick" doesn't belong in journalism that purports not to be sarcastic or snide. That's the kind of thing that goes in a Tumblr post.

1) It's just a substack post...? Where the hell is all this "this is poor journalism" stuff coming from? This substack post is also a really bad if we judge it as a children's picture book.

2) I take it HN is not familiar with a whole major subgenre of journalism in which "whose entire schtick" would be perfectly at home?

Re: The great Hobby Lobby artifact heist

#70

Post by yannis »

mock-possum wrote: post #17
smithkl42 wrote: post #7

I wish the author was a little less over-wrought in her descriptions of the Green family's religious commitments. I've heard complaints before about the Green's artifact acquisition process, and they've had to return some manuscripts: it's a story worth investigating and telling. But it distracts from the author's main point when she's making snide comments about their faith. Yes, they're Christians who are successfu…

Isn’t the hobby lobby crew also notoriously queer bashers? I would think the issue is not so much that they’re Christian, it’s that they’re hypocrites who use Christianity as a smokescreen for bigotry. (The relevance being, they’re using Christianity as cover for capitalism in a way that Jesus himself, as depicted in the Bible, would certainly never have sanctioned.)

But ... He adopted a Christian capitalist worldview centered around personal wealth as a precision tool to carry out God’s. F..ng nonsene!
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