From: nate@psygate.psych.indiana.edu (Nathan Engle)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.rush-limbaugh
Subject: Re: A few quotes from a few years ago
Date: 3 Sep 92 21:22:13 GMT
Distribution: world, usa, na
Organization: Indiana University

dpage@ra.csc.ti.com (Doug Page) writes:
>nate@psygate.psych.indiana.edu (Nathan Engle) writes:
>|> dpage@ra.csc.ti.com (Doug Page) writes:
>|> >It is impossible to not teach morality in schools.
>|> 
>|>     I'm not sure how valid it is to equate moral instruction with 
>|> compelling students to follow a set of rules. If they only refrain 
>|> from breaking the rules when they think they'll be caught then I would 
>|> hesitate to compare those rules with moral beliefs. 

>I suppose that this could also be said of drug dealers, murders, and rapists
>as well.  The prisons of this nation are full of convicted criminals who
>thought that they would not get caught.  Listen to the interviews with
>inner city gang members and you find this to be especially true.  (BTW, all of
>these crimes are taught as wrong (i.e., immoral) in most public schools
>today.)  Don't mistake the teaching/preaching of morals with the
>learning/practice of those morals.

    Oh, I'm definitely not doing that. That's why I questioned the idea 
that making kids follow rules in order to graduate is somehow equivalent
to moral instruction. I would say that it's extremely possible for the 
schools to not teach morality, and I would go so far as to add that it's 
happening this very moment. Kids are not being taught to follow the rules 
to protect their mortal souls. They're being taught to follow the rules 
so that they'll present the least possible trouble to the school teachers 
and administrators. If that's morality at work then I've been badly mistaken 
about just what morals really are.

>Whether they are learned or not, there is an attempt to teach them to 
>students.

    There's a tiny, wee little difference between morals and rules.

>|>     For instance, imagine that some maggot-invested, dope-smoking, long-
>|> haired FM rock n' roll type manages to conform to the rules long enough 
>|> to reach his high school graduation, but the only reason he's doing it 
>|> is for the short term material reward. Would you say that the conferment 
>|> of that diploma implies any sort of moral reaffirmation?

>Personell departments certainly think so.

    I would bet you a nickel that they'd change that opinion after a very 
brief interview. A hoodlum with a diploma looks very much like a hoodlum 
without a diploma. There might be a couple professions in which personal 
grooming habits can be overlooked, but in general it's distracting for  
customers to see maggots crawling around on their sales representative.

>|>The Puritans were easily "fundies", and yet it was they who founded 
>|>the first school of higher learning in this country in 1638.
 
>|>     That's great, but this country was not founded exclusively by or for 
>|> Puritans. IMHO the thing this debate all boils down to is the question 
>|> of what you think this country was founded to accomplish. If you ask the 
>|> Puritans they would probably say religious freedom. If you asked the 
>|> merchants, the answer would be freedom from the British mercantile 
>|> system. If you asked the rogues and radicals it would be freedom from 
>|> British rule. There were a lot of reasons people came to America, and 
>|> not all of the new arrivals wanted to step into yet another repressive 
>|> religious regime.

>I did not say that Puritans founded this country.  I said that they founded
>our first school of higher learning (Harvard).  I posted quotes from the
>founding fathers which quoted them as saying that this nation was founded on
>Christian ideals.

    Hmmm, and what religion were those Puritans? Perhaps I should restate 
my comment in more general terms:

    This country was not founded exclusively by or for Christians. Some 
of the founders were extremely devout Christians, and some of them were 
just as opinionated in the other direction.

>  I am not propasing a represive religious regime.  I am
>simply pointing out that the historical facts.

    You are simply being extremely selective in which "facts" you read.
Try browsing through some works by Paine, Jefferson, or Franklin and tell
me how Christian they were.

>It is interesting to note the response to these facts.  Rather than 
>discussing those facts the response has been to address what my views are 
>presumed to be.

    Well, ok that's fair enough. You've found the works of several 
Christians amongst our founding fathers and you've correctly stated 
that *they claimed* that the US was founded as a Christian nation. 
I concede on every point; they *did* say that. Argument concluded.

    Now then, I busily bustle off to stage left where I've left my copies 
of the works of Ben Franklin and Thomas Jefferson. Just as an exercise, 
let's also read what *those* guys said about the founding of our nation.
It's a fact that there were both men who said that the US *was* founded 
as a Christian nation, and also men who said that it was *not*.

    Just as a simplistic measuring stick, I suggest looking at the laws 
specified by those founders, and I can't help but notice that those laws 
were not copied verbatum from the Bible.

>When I point out the illogic in the arguments against 
>those presumed ideals and point the thread back to its origin, the facts 
>are sidestepped with more comments of how I want to create repressive 
>religious regimes.

    Now it's you who's trying to place words in my mouth. Please notice 
that I never accused you of wanting to establish a repressive religious 
regime. I *did* intend to imply that it would be a mistake to embrace 
Christianity as the one state religion of the US, and that it would be a 
mistake to assume that the US was founded as a "Christian" nation. There 
were a lot of reasons for the foundation of the US, some of which (but not 
all of which) were religious.

>  Do you believe that murder is wrong? Why?

    Yes, I believe it's wrong to deprive others of their lives without 
some really compelling reason.

>Do you intend to force your view with regards to murder on me?

    Absolutely not. That's what the police are for.

>|> >The fact still remains that this nation was founded on Christian ideals.
>|> 
>|>     At least from some peoples' point of view, I guess. At any rate, 
>|> it sure didn't take long for our laws to deviate from those Christian 
>|> ideals, eh? We did, after all, adopt the US Constitution and not the 
>|> Bible as the highest law of our land.

>The key issue here is that this country was founded on Christian ideals from
>the point of view of those who founded it.

    Some of them anyway.

>You may disagree with their view, but you cannot ignore the historical 
>facts.  

    Nor can you. Some of the founding fathers were *not* Christian 
and did *not* want the US to be founded in the image of the European 
theocracies from which they and their ancestors had fled.

>What deviation?  I refer you to the 1892 Supreme Court decision in 
>my original post.  Disagree with what the justices wrote if you like, but 
>stop pretending that they did not write it and stop pretending that the 
>precedent that they based it upon did not exist.

    Hey, keep your shirt on, Methuselah. I have never denied that 
there were a few Christians amongst the founding fathers. All I've really
tried to convey is that the founders of our country and the framers of 
our constitution were not unanimous in their Christian faith. Some of our
founders were irreligious in the extreme, and I think they would choke if 
they heard you talking about how the US was founded as a "Christian nation".
The US was founded as a *free* nation, no matter whether the citizens are 
Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims or even Christians.

--
Nathan Engle                        Software Juggler
Psychology Department               Indiana University
nate@psygate.psych.indiana.edu      nengle@copper.ucs.indiana.edu
Newsgroups: alt.fan.rush-limbaugh