The Morality of Revolution

[notHagoth7]

Thinking back to the American revolution, I find it interesting that the American colonist were not British slaves. It was a feudal system that I believe was very similar to our modern capitalism. Brits born in America were viewed as having less rights than people in England although they were of the same race. Therefore Americans had little say in what their portion of taxes should be because they were not represented.

Sorry to shut down your thread, but:

How real is representation? And how much of it is a mirage?

I was reading this weekend how France, with a population of 65 million paid $1.25 billion to big pharmaceutical firms for H1N1 vaccinations.

Fully bowing to the claims of the big pharmaceuticals, France stockpiled 94 million vaccinations. The French citizens, however, have been nonplussed, and have taken only 5 million vaccinations so far - leaving an initial surplus of 89 millions vaccinations - well over $1 billion in expenditures. Meanwhile, just under 200 French deaths have been traced to that flu. France is now trying to sell millions of their stockpiled vaccinations to other countries, at cost. Did the initial expenditure reflect representation? At $250 per actual vaccination? Or was it an example of gov't ignoring the people's will, and bowing to the claims/demands of big firms? Barbarians at the gate.

Big industries like to create a blinding, urgent panic to shut down all discussion in order to railroad their agenda.

When a gov't bows to claims of pandemics, and spends billions on vaccinations against the will of the people.

When a gov't bows to claims of global warming, and spends billions trying to counter the supposed shift.

When a gov't ignores public skepticism and bows to claims of megabanks, investment firms, and insurance companies demanding hundreds of billions of taxpayer bailout dollars.

When congressmen can receive thousands of dollars for casting a vote in specific pending bills.

When a gov't nixes civil rights and spends trillions of dollars in response to a handful of terrorists.

Methinks we're beyond the point where the people are the ones being represented.

And to the point where big business is the tail that wags the dog.

[RadioFreeDeath]

Back on the original post. Wasn't this discussed in some detail by catholic priests in south america? Liberation theology or the idea that God will always be on the side of those who are oppressed seems like a legitimate point. We can look at Israel in Egypt or the Nephites in the land of nephi under their lamanite oppressors. In this case they weren't even slaves merely taxed heavily and kept under guard. The question of whether it is allowed to rise up and revolt, how about Gideon freeing the isrealites? Now chains of opression dont always have to literal as NotHagoth shows in the post on pharmecuticals but it would be hard to draw the line of where to revolt and where it is not legitimate.

[Droopy]

Back on the original post. Wasn't this discussed in some detail by catholic priests in south america? Liberation theology or the idea that God will always be on the side of those who are oppressed seems like a legitimate point.

RFD, liberation theology is nothing more than warmed over Marxism with a pseudo-Christian veneer. Its an attempt to make totalitarian collectivism and revolutionary violence (including against relatively free, democratic states) appear morally acceptable. There is perhaps no greater heresy of the Christian message, broadly speaking, in all the modern world.

We can look at Israel in Egypt or the Nephites in the land of nephi under their lamanite oppressors. In this case they weren't even slaves merely taxed heavily and kept under guard.

The Lamanites were never really the historic "oppressors" of the Nephites, save for a few times in which the Nephites had been conquered and subdued. For most of BofM history, they were historic enemies, in periodic war with each other, with the Nephites, so long as they remained essentially righteous, remaining with the upper hand.

The question of whether it is allowed to rise up and revolt, how about Gideon freeing the isrealites? Now chains of opression dont always have to literal as NotHagoth shows in the post on pharmecuticals but it would be hard to draw the line of where to revolt and where it is not legitimate.

According to our own founders, it is when the state becomes intolerably tyrannical. What is that point and when is it reached? Interesting question.

[Cold Steel]

Rebellion is a serious business. Men have the right to be free and to shed blood to either gain or maintain that freedom. At the same time, any government, righteous or unrighteous, will act to preserve itself, even to the shedding of blood. Although the South had embraced slavery, it was not the primary reason the war was fought. In both the Revolutionary War and the War of 1861, the reasons were very much the same. The North had largely abandoned slavery and no longer needed it. Although the South still had it, economists in the South (and all over the world) were figuring out that hiring people for almost nothing was far and away cheaper than buying them, feeding them, housing them, caring for them when they became ill and watching them, so they wouldn't escape. Thus, slavery was a dying institution. Slaves who ran away often found that they weren't welcomed with open arms in the North. In fact, they were exploited and were on their own. Even Abraham Lincoln was against them fleeing from their masters and, in his law practice, even represented southern slave owners who were trying to reclaim their "property." Once president, he also personally intervened in behalf of the railroad companies and ordered the deaths of 30 American Indians who had sold their land to the railroad owners and rebelled when the companies wouldn't pay. When the media learned of this, Lincoln hastily canceled the executions, hinting in his correspondence that they should be dealt with individually and discreetly. We also know how the railroads treated the Chinese and the blacks who worked for them.

Lincoln was in the back pockets of the railroad and, during the war, administered highly unequal mandates for military conscription based on the money individual states had contributed to his political campaign. More $$$ meant less conscription in states that had not played the game. As a result, tens of thousands of rebellious New Yorkers were hewn down in the streets by troops returning victorious from Gettysburg. In ports throughout the North, ships were met by military recruiters and immigrants inducted as they disembarked. After the war, Lincoln cranked up the printing presses and almost started another war by paying back the country's war debts in worthless paper money known by its green ink -- greenbacks. As in the rebellion of the South, he was willing to spill blood to keep the government working.

In the days of Vietnam, people again rebelled against the system by refusing to submit to the draft. The war, the revolutionaries argued, was illegal, having never been declared by Congress. Again, the government was willing to resort to bloodshed to preserve itself. So many escaped the draft by going to Canada and other countries where they could wait out the military action.

In the Sixties, Blacks across the nation rebelled against the way they were being treated and, still again, troops kept the peace with the threat of violence.

And these are only a few examples. President Hoover put down the famed rebellion of the bonus marchers following the First World War, and Douglas MacArthur used disproportionate force to, in his view, save the nation's capital.

In our own day, anger is again brewing for various political reasons. Where does one draw the line and either rebel or not rebel? The church has always advocated that the people be subject to their respective governments but often leaving enough wiggle room for some to peacefully push back. It never explicitly told its youth to fight in Vietnam, but merely said to obey the laws of the land. It never addressed the idea of what if those laws were, themselves, illegal? No one that I know of was ever disciplined by the church for not going to fight in Vietnam (and I wouldn't have gone, myself). But rebelling by shedding blood is another matter, entirely. Church prophecies state that in the future, rebellion will spread throughout the cities and lands of the United States. It will be so violent that government will not be able to long contain it. These rebellions will be either precipitated by, or accompanied by, natural disasters. Either people will rebel against the government, or government will simply cease to be able to keep the peace. Church leaders also have stated that if we, as a nation, lose our constitutional liberties, the only way we'll regain them is through the shedding of blood. I believe during these times that the church will oppose rebellion in any way, shape or form. Its solution will be to replace anarchy with order. The violence in the rest of the country will result in a collapse of social order to the extent that all manufacturing and farming will cease. Only by replacing disorder with order will society reestablish itself. Thus, the church will never drive or be complicit in any rebellion against government. Even during the days of persecution, the church counseled compliance with the law even if it was horribly unjust. But some prophets have said that the saints will not have to do this again -- that this time the Lord will fight in behalf of His people.

So we have a right to rebel as a people against unjust laws, but we never have the promise the Providence will be with us. History has shown that, with but few exceptions, that the governments of the world are greatly adapt at putting down rebellion, just or not.

Confederate dead after the battle of Chancellorsville.

.

[Droopy]

What is a noble savage? That is a European Colonial Mentality description.

That was certainly a part,or form of it at one time. The real father of the idea was Rousseau, and a popular version of it was indulged in during Victorian times.

The modern version popular over the last several decades has been that of the noble eco-savage, the "indigenous peoples" who live free of all the vices and problems of modern, industrial civilization in a state of innocence and peace, living in harmony and "balance" with "the rhythms of nature" and having "traditional wisdom" to teach us regarding how we should live out lives. The romanticization of primitive lifestyles and values, the idea of the natural world as a peaceful, benign garden, and the idea that primitive people and societies are morally and culturally superior to modern one's by virtue of their "simplicity" of life, are all aspects of this mentality.

In its multiculturalist incarnation, it posits early Amerindians living in an edenic state of peace, bounty, and social felicity, in harmony with each other and with the earth, only to have the entire utopia upset and destroyed when the evil, rapacious, and marauding (and if there was one set of things the Amerindians never were in this view, it was evil, rapacious, or marauding) European whites arrived. In this view, war, conquest, slavery, greed, and colonization were things completely outside the experience of the Amerindian noble savage. He was shocked - shocked - by the very idea of wars of conquest and the taking of others land by force.

[LeSellers]

if you are LDS then surely you follow the scriptures, including the Doctrine and Covenants, which states religion and government should not be mingled.

I believe you are misinterpreting the passage. Please explain how the scriptures say we should not let religion influence government, rather than not letting government interfere in religious matters (which, by the way, is what Thomas Jefferson meant in his letter to the Baptists when he coined the phase "wall of separation between church and state, r"

[Droopy]

Sorry to shut down your thread, but:

How real is representation? And how much of it is a mirage?

I was reading this weekend how France, with a population of 65 million paid $1.25 billion to big pharmaceutical firms for H1N1 vaccinations.

Fully bowing to the claims of the big pharmaceuticals, France stockpiled 94 million vaccinations. The French citizens, however, have been nonplussed, and have taken only 5 million vaccinations so far - leaving an initial surplus of 89 millions vaccinations - well over $1 billion in expenditures. Meanwhile, just under 200 French deaths have been traced to that flu. France is now trying to sell millions of their stockpiled vaccinations to other countries, at cost. Did the initial expenditure reflect representation? At $250 per actual vaccination? Or was it an example of gov't ignoring the people's will, and bowing to the claims/demands of big firms? Barbarians at the gate.

The H1N1 scare, like Avian Bird Flu before it, Y2K, and the myth of heterosexual AIDS, were the creation of our popular news media, not corporations, but I wouldn't expect corporations not to step up to the plate and attempt to profit from such things. Everyone wants onto the "green" gravy train at present.

Big industries like to create a blinding, urgent panic to shut down all discussion in order to railroad their agenda.

There is a traditional axis comprising government, the mainstream media, academia and the entertainment community that is the historic driving force behind most scares, hysterias, and panics that also involves corporations seeking to profit from the dynamics in play at the time (GE is going to produce "green" light bulbs regardless of whether or not there is any scientific or economic reason for their existence - especially if the state mandates their usage), but it is disingenuous to single out corporations as the sole culprits. The primary, if not sole purveyors of the AGW hysteria of the prior two decades is government, supranational IOs, and the west's mainstream media, not corporations. The present green technology craze is the caboose on the AGW train.

When a gov't bows to claims of pandemics, and spends billions on vaccinations against the will of the people.

When a gov't bows to claims of global warming, and spends billions trying to counter the supposed shift.

Are you actually claiming that corporations seeking profit created and fueled the AGW idea since the eighties? AGW is wholly the creation of the CRU at the University of East Anglia, NASA, the IPCC, and the MSM in North America, the UK, and across western Europe. All I can say here is "huh?"

When a gov't ignores public skepticism and bows to claims of megabanks, investment firms, and insurance companies demanding hundreds of billions of taxpayer bailout dollars.

Excuse me the these taxpayer bailout dollars were offered, in a number of cases in no uncertain terms. That they were taken is another matter.

When a gov't nixes civil rights and spends trillions of dollars in response to a handful of terrorists.

As you have now insulted my intelligence to the point at which I would be a clear glutton for punishment were I to continue, I'll not respond any further to these claims.

[Droopy]

n the days of Vietnam, people again rebelled against the system by refusing to submit to the draft. The war, the revolutionaries argued, was illegal, having never been declared by Congress. Again, the government was willing to resort to bloodshed to preserve itself. So many escaped the draft by going to Canada and other countries where they could wait out the military action.

The church has always advocated that the people be subject to their respective governments but often leaving enough wiggle room for some to peacefully push back. It never explicitly told its youth to fight in Vietnam, but merely said to obey the laws of the land. It never addressed the idea of what if those laws were, themselves, illegal? No one that I know of was ever disciplined by the church for not going to fight in Vietnam (and I wouldn't have gone, myself)

Whether knowingly or not, Cold Steel has made a very important point regarding the history of the Vietnam war, and that is that opposition to it among the general population of those most likely to go to war (outside of the hardcore ideological opposition of the anti-war groups of the era) had very little to do with high minded principle among the vast majority of its opponents, but only with a very narrow self interest, an interest in avoiding military service. The truth of this can be seen in the fact that, after the draft was repealed, this marked the end of the overwhelming majority of demonstrations and protests against the Vietnam war.

While the war was never declared, this does not make it illegal, only undeclared. The Constitution gives Congress the power to declare war, but nowhere claims that such declaration is legally necessary for a state of war to exist. The Korean conflict was not declared either, and a failure to declare war against Germany and Japan would not have altered anything regarding America's response to Pearl Harbor. At that time, America had prior treaty agreements with South Vietnam (a peaceful, sovereign nation, it must be remembered) to come to its defense in the case of an attack from the North. Both America's credibilty with its allies and will to resist Soviet imperial "wars of national liberation" in the Third World was at stake in Vietnam. There never was, regardless of what popular media and public school mythology has taught us, an American "Vietnam war" that would not have existed without America's involvement and which would have "ended" when America existed from it. There was a war of imperial conquest waged against South Vietnam by North Vietnam under the bloody totalitarian dictatorship of Ho Chi Minh. The entire South/North (as with the North/South Korea partition and the East/West German bifurcation) split was an artifact of both WWII and Stalin's plans to use the dynamics in play at the time to his own advantage in the immediate aftermath of the Japanese occupation. The "Vietnam war" begin as soon as the Japanese left the region (in earnest, roughly around 1947).

I think the most likely reason the Church has never made any point of disciplining members who fled their own country to avoid military service (leaving, it should be noted, someone else to go in their place), is precisely because of the high tensions, deep social divisions, and complex forces pulling, tearing, and savaging the country at the time. It was not, for many, a clear cut, black or white decision that could easily be made but a decision that had to be made within a boiling cauldron of moral relativism, a nihilistic, self indulgent hyperindividualism, and a dark, cynical loss of faith in the very foundations of American civilization. The same forces at work at that time within the anti-war movement were the same forces at work in promoting the above value shifts, and worked together in tandem.

It should be noted in passing, however, that Richard Nixon, in the midst of the Vietnam war and Watergate, won what at the time was the largest landslide in history with a major portion of his support coming from precisely that demographic most likely to find themselves in the rice fields of Vietnam, 18 to 24 year old males. Opposition to the war was not nearly as widespread as modern media mythology would have us believe (as polls taken at the time show), and in any case, general opposition really didn't develop widely until about 1970. Before that, support was strong among the general population.

[frankenstein]

lesellers i am pretty certain you are aware of what verse i could use; clearly it is you misrepresenting.

[mbh26]

(there could only have been a few million Amerindians across the America's when colonization began)

A few million in North America seems realistic I agree. South America had more correct? Even so, the point is that the lifestyle that the Indians lived required a lot more land to live comfortably. Less technology meant fewer people were needed to overpopulate an area.

[mbh26]

Methinks we're beyond the point where the people are the ones being represented.

And to the point where big business is the tail that wags the dog.

Amen to that. Is a republic really possible in such a large and factionalized empire? That's part of why I keep getting back to the idea of states rights and keeping government small and close to the common people.

[mbh26]

Church leaders also have stated that if we, as a nation, lose our constitutional liberties, the only way we'll regain them is through the shedding of blood.

I couldn't agree more. Perhaps the founding fathers understood this when they wrote the second amendment. I really don't believe that they had hunting and bolt action rifles in mind. And yet the situation now seems far different from the 18th century. The rebels coming out of the fields with a musket and a will to be free seemed to have stood a better chance against professional mercenaries at one time than they do now.

the church counseled compliance with the law even if it was horribly unjust

Sometimes they do and sometimes they don't. The Church seems to get very political when it comes to gay marriage. But they hold a don't ask, don't tell policy on illegal immigration.

So we have a right to rebel as a people against unjust laws, but we never have the promise the Providence will be with us. History has shown that, with but few exceptions, that the governments of the world are greatly adapt at putting down rebellion, just or not.

Agreed. Sometimes I think the North even understood that the South had a right to revolt. Of course they believed that had a right expand and extend the power of the federal government as well.

But this opens up a whole new question for believers. What do we believe about death? For those who see death as the worst that can happen, a stern sovereign can push and tax the people more severely without fear of reprisal. People who are willing to die in an effort to assert and protect their rights are much harder to conquer. In that respect, Christianity would seem to empower people to an extent. Yet Christianity also says to turn the other cheek and put up with the mistreatment, so some say that Christianity doesn't offer incentive to make this world a better place.

[mbh26]

He was shocked - shocked - by the very idea of wars of conquest and the taking of others land by force.

That does seem to be the moral of every Hollywood story. I'll admit that I watched Avatar and that seemed to be the same theme. The question that came to my mind was, "Are these people brave for being willing to fight an enemy they can't defeat or are they foolish because the fight ended up costing them more than they would have had to give up originally?

Seriously though, this line of politically correct crap being shoved down my throat from grade school on up has had a really negative effect on me. I want to lash back with so much fury that they'll understand not to try to control my mind again. But I'm trying to realize that this isn't who I'm about and stop their bad attitudes and crummy morals from taking me down to their level. I wish they new that these attempts at inculcation are just making the tensions worse. But I guess they just don't care to understand it that way. Maybe they're not even capable of it.

[LeSellers]

Whether knowingly or not, LeSellers has made a very important point regarding the history of the Vietnam war ...

That was Cold Steel.

But, please, call me "Lehi", as my mother-in-law does.

Lehi

[LeSellers]

lesellers

Just as everyone else, I invite you to call me Lehi. It's the name on my military enlistment and commission papers, my retirement orders, and the deed to our house.

i am pretty certain you are aware of what verse i could use; clearly it is you misrepresenting.

Well, if it's this one, I believe you are wrong.

9 We do not believe it just to mingle religious influence with civil government, whereby one religious society is fostered and another proscribed in its spiritual privileges, and the individual rights of its members, as citizens, denied.

If the sentence had just stopped at the comma instead of continuing, you might have a case, but, alas, it did continue, did it not?

There is nothing in the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, nor in scripture that even hints at a two-way wall of separation. It's all one way: government should (and must) keep its ugly, blood-stained hands off of religions and churches, but churches can (and must) use all their influence to affect the kind of government people have, If they do, they will enjoy the protection of a legitimate government, if they do not, the people will be government's slaves (with the approval of the gods of prytaneolatry).

Lehi

[Droopy]

That was Cold Steel.

But, please, call me "Lehi", as my mother-in-law does.

Lehi

Opps. A standard problem with me here. I'll correct that in the post.

[thesometimesaint]

mbh26:

Does might make right?

[Droopy]

There is nothing in the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, nor in scripture that even hints at a two-way wall of separation. It's all one way: government should (and must) keep its ugly, blood-stained hands off of religions and churches, but churches can (and must) use all their influence to affect the kind of government people have, If they do, they will enjoy the protection of a legitimate government, if they do not, the people will be government's slaves (with the approval of the gods of prytaneolatry).

Lehi

Quite correct. The "separation of church and state" is a fiction, and that fiction really should be understood to mean 'separation of religion and state", which is how it has been interpreted by the powers of secular humanism over the last half of the 20th century.

The separation clause precludes a state religion or state gratuities to specific religions bodies. It claims nothing regarding religions influence upon governance in a free society.

[Droopy]

mbh26:

Does might make right?

It seems to have worked fairly well against Hitler and Tojo.

[thesometimesaint]

Droopy:

So said every dictator, and petty god that has ever benighted this planet.

[notHagoth7]

....As you have now insulted my intelligence to the point at which I would be a clear glutton for punishment were I to continue...

Since no insult/offense was intended, I'm of the opinion that you choose to take offense much too readily.

(Hopefully that doesn't also offend.)

Beyond that, I don't know how else one explains away a one-billion-dollar mountain of unused vaccinations, tens of millions of them, other than to acknowledge that it clearly depicts a government that no longer represents the will of the people. Although people can call such a government a republic if they wish, they should be clear whose interests such a "republic" is actually set up to represent/promote.

If that is an accurate portrayal, it then begs an important question:

What reasonable things can be done to modify such a condition?

(As a hint, I'm of the opinion that the pen is mightier than the sword.)

[frankenstein]

but churches can (and must) use all their influence to affect the kind of government people have, If they do, they will enjoy the protection of a legitimate government,

what "church"? what religion? some religions support gay marriage. and as i stated earlier herein, if we believe the conspiracies then the US President is a muslim, should he take heed to shira (sp) law?

Quite correct. The "separation of church and state" is a fiction, and that fiction really should be understood to mean 'separation of religion and state", which is how it has been interpreted by the powers of secular humanism over the last half of the 20th century.

i'll take your supposed fiction anyday, over a false religion, as it most certainly was not the God the LDS worship, to whom governments forcibly obliged its citizens to pray to, until the Court had to step in a stop exactly the wrong the Constitution is meant to prevent. and as i have stated before on this board it was a mormon who most recently went to the United States Supreme Court to remove state enforced religion, by way of Born Again types praying over PA systems at school games.

[Droopy]

name='notHagoth7' date='03 January 2010 - 04:38 PM' timestamp='1262561916' post='1208780368']

Since no insult/offense was intended, I'm of the opinion that you choose to take offense much too readily.

That response was to this statement:

When a gov't nixes civil rights and spends trillions of dollars in response to a handful of terrorists.

This represents complete intellectual vacuity, in my view, and is insulting to any educated person of average intelligence. I have then chosen not to engage you any further on this subject (as it will end, I guarantee, in a locked thread).

[LeSellers]

Droopy

Why can you not quote the message you're responding to? It's really not that difficult.

So said every dictator, and petty god that has ever benighted this planet.

What did every dictator and petty god say?

Lehi

[Droopy]

i'll take your supposed fiction anyday, over a false religion, as it most certainly was not the God the LDS worship, to whom governments forcibly obliged its citizens to pray to, until the Court had to step in a stop exactly the wrong the Constitution is meant to prevent.

You see, this is the problem of the decline and fall of American public education and fluff and Puff media. The courts had no business sticking their porcine, meddling fingers into school prayer in the first place, at least, not according to the Tenth Amendment, which for all intents, no longer exists.

and as i have stated before on this board it was a mormon who most recently went to the United States Supreme Court to remove state enforced religion, by way of Born Again types praying over PA systems at school games.

If a "born again type" wants to pray over a school PA system at school games, if the local school system is OK with that, and if a majority of the kids there do not object, that's constitutionally their business, not the states and most certainly not the courts.

Your problem with the Constitution as written is only that it does not reward your particular friends and punish your particular enemies.