Culture – Page 12 – Doug's Views

November 5, 2012April 18, 2020

Now All That Is Left Is The Voting

Whew! It’s the day before election day and I didn’t think it would come soon enough. It has been going on in some form or another for more than a year. There will be some last minute campaigning and a final deluge of TV ads then those who haven’t voted early will vote tomorrow. Even though I think our version of democracy is the best in the world, I still had issues with the whole process. As good as our system is, it isn’t perfect and it makes me nervous. Here are the major issues I had this cycle.

October 29, 2012April 18, 2020

Hidden Scout Files Show More Interest In Preventing Bad Publicity

A few weeks ago, as the result of a lawsuit against the Boy Scouts of America (BSA), files with names of people excluded from the Boy Scouts from 1965-1985 was released to the public. These “perversion files” list names and details of adults who were kicked out either because they abused the boys they were in charge of or were accused of abusing boys. The BSA attempted to keep these files hidden. One file for a man in my area illustrates why BSA and similar groups are on the wrong side of the child abuse reporting issue. Identifying abusers and protecting children is FAR more important than any bad public relations for doing so.

When the files were released I was interested in checking them out. I was a Boy Scout from the mid 70’s to 1985. Although I never experienced any abuse, I wanted to see if any leaders I might have known back then was on the list. Luckily there was no one from my area in the files.

October 13, 2012April 18, 2020

I’m White And Have A Penis – So What!

Self-portrait – Really!

Not since college have had been immersed in gender politics like I have recently. It’s weird that in the twenty plus years since I experienced diversity debates in college, the arguments haven’t changed. I think it’s because the young people who come up in the freethought movement discover biases based on gender and feel that this is one injustice they can overcome. I have to admit that I’m white and I have a penis – so what! I think we all need to work on those issue we can solve together and acknowledge that we can’t be perfect. I’m not going to pick a side and I’m not going to apologize for being white and male.

What sparked this blog post is the STILL burning Atheism+/gender identity storm in the freethought community. Each side of the debate are doing purity checks and using extreme gender politics in an effort to make a utopia in their own image. Instead of using our tools to make a better world all freethinkers, both sides want to burn down our own house and rebuild it how they assume it should look – opposing view points be damned.

October 6, 2012April 18, 2020

My Vote Is Open For The Highest Bid

created image showing a ballot with words For Sale on it

We all know that the US Supreme Court ruled in the Citizens United case that for the purpose of elections, corporations are people. That means laws that try to limit the amount of money a corporation spends to influence elections are unconstitutional. This has led to billions of dollars flooding into local, state, and national elections. With that in mind I want my share. Early voting has begun in my state and so my vote is for sale. I want a slice of the loot.

August 26, 2012April 18, 2020

Why I Won’t Be Watching The US Political Conventions This Year

image of 2012 Political Convention Logos

Monday August 27th starts the US Political silly season with the Republican National Convention in Tampa, FL followed on September 3rd with the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, NC. I will be barely paying attention to them as to me they are nothing but an expensive pep rally before the final three months of the campaign. Conventions lost their usefulness years ago and the only solace I have is the broadcast networks won’t be having gavel-to-gavel coverage. I’ve got better things to do.

I rarely agree with David Frum but on this issue I do: