I would like to suggest a debate on the death penalty. I think E.H. brought in some very good points on another thread and would love to see E.H. debate this subject in more detail.

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May your awareness be perfection

You are correct, of course. As I wrote it (without finishing your original sentence) that would constitute a strawman.

Although it was not my intention, I do apologize for the error of omission.

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evangelicalhumanist: Greek "eu"=good and "angelos"=messenger. Spreading the good news of Humanism.

If my earlier comment came across as sarcastic then I apologise.
No, I still can't quite find the meaning of your post. Perhaps you'd be kind enough to spell it out to me in a clearer, less ambiguous way.

Tricky,

You weren't sarcastic? You really do think I'm charming? Well, gee, thanks!

So, are you Socratically feigning incomprehension of the entire post or just the Fascist/Confucian metaphor?

Actually, I can't understand it, either. The tone of this whole debate has been very good up to now. Let's keep it that way, please.

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InterfaithForums.com-Where your ideas and beliefs count.

Light keeper,

You make two points: First, you don’t understand my point. The following is the resolution of the debate and my point stated succinctly in the opening sentence of my post.

>>>Religious beliefs should be neither requested nor disclosed during a democratic election.<<<

The essence of this debate is censorship (neither requested nor disclosed) of an ideology (Religious beliefs). It is the advocacy for the suspension of the right to free speech.

Is it not quite simple? Do you not understand what “censorship of an ideology” means? I think it is especially clear because I referred directly to the debate resolution for the definitions of both censorship and ideology.


Second you state that the tone has been good up to now. Which implies my tone is not so good. Let me suggest that up till now both debaters were arguing nuances of the same position so the tone is intrinsically well mannered. My voice represents the true dissenting position and so is naturally strident.

I agree with Tricky that your post about Confuscious and facism is very unclear.

No pun intended, but this post appears to be grasping for straws.

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InterfaithForums.com-Where your ideas and beliefs count.

Perhaps you could throw the challenge out there yourself! It'd be good to see you take to the floor this time around.

I enjoyed it and found it very rewarding in many ways. Maybe you will as well...

I am more a lover than a fighter LOL I don't have enough knowledge about this subject, that's why I would like to see and learn from a debate : )

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May your awareness be perfection

OK. I’ll splain this one point. Here is the quote of unnamed origin and Tricky’s interpretation of its meaning:

>>> Confucius thought that government by laws and punishments could keep people in line, but government by example of virtue and good manners would enable them to control themselves (Analects II:3). "The way the wind blows, that's the way the grass bends" (Analects XII:19). <<<

>>> …I would like to see the kind of government he speaks of. Would you? Do you think it’s even possible? Are you content to let the wind blow and the grass bend or will you be reaching for your fan to blow the grass in the direction you think is best?<<<

In this metaphor a utopian government has established the standards of virtue and good manners, that is the wind. All the grass willingly (control themselves) bends with that wind. Tricky directs the final question of his debate to the individual: “Are you content to let the wind blow and the grass bend or will you be reaching for your fan …?” This question establishes a dichotomy of the good and contented people who agree with Tricky, and the malcontents, those outside political correctness, those who lack the virtue and good manners of Tricky's government.


The Fascists did many bad things but the thing that is unique about them is that they willingly gave up their liberties for the good of the State, they yielded to the wind. Both the Italian and German brands of Fascism arose with-in democracies. The recipients of those bad things that the Fascists did were for the most part those who wouldn’t bend to the wind, the obstinate individualist.

This debate established the “virtue and good manners” of removing religion from the political arena, something that everyone is expected to follow. It was agreed in the debate that this censorship was too unpractical to mandate by law but that it should be self-censored through what I called political correctness and that indeed in the more progressive societies of Canada and Britain this has already been accomplished. In this debate the individual, the one who fights against the wind, the heretic, is the preacher politician whom the group wishes to silence.

All three contexts have a similar theme. All three focus on the unity of the group to the exclusion of the individual.

The irony is found in the metaphoric symbolism of both Fascism and Tricky’s Confucian quote in that both use grass as the symbol for societal unity. The root of the word Fascism is bundle; a bundle of wheat was Mussolini’s symbol for Fascism.