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Originally Posted by uke_master
Okay? I'm totally lost on what your point is. At different points in your posts you have come to dramatically different views and at the time didn't make note of any shred of tension between these "multiple conclusions". So what - exactly - is your criticism?
Are you an idiot or just pretending to be? I'm not "criticizing" anything!
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Originally Posted by me
So atheism wants a something or another that religion has access to. That's fine. But then you made the following assertion:
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Originally Posted by you
The basic principle here is that legal treatment of theists and atheists should be the same. So I wouldn't want governments able to make laws privileging athiests, for instance, either by, say, preaching athiesm in schools or whatever.
And this is what I'm exploring.
As far as I can tell, the law does *NOT* actually treat theists and atheists the same. We *DO* have these legal categories of "religion" in which "atheism" can fit if we narrow our concept to a particular application of the law, and we continue to have the asymmetry of "church" and state.
Interestingly, in your response to me you managed to not quote this part. I initially took it as tacit acceptance and understanding, but this recent post really makes it look like willful misrepresentation.
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This is your great example of the advantage of athiests?
It's an actual example of your hypothetical consideration. It has not gone through the legal system because it's not actually part of our actual legal structure to take atheism to be like a religion in every meaningful way. And that's the thing that you wanted to assert and the thing that I'm exploring. Atheists seem to have access to things (money for speaking, a government sponsored platform) that theists don't have access to. If you think that atheists and theists ought to be treated the same, then this would be a problem.
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From what I can tell, the main thrust ITT is that you think there is a problem that athiests are being giving protections as religious people, but the government isn't being restricted from supporting athiest views the way they are religious views.
No. I never claimed it was an actual problem. I'll let you try to find a place in which I assert that it's an actual problem. Go for it. The only way you can make such a conclusion is if you're a moron.
My only affirmative claims are that I think it's hypocritical to want atheism to not be a religion but to want to seek religious protection and that the distinction creates a tension between legal and social constructs. And it seemed that I was given a precise demonstration of the latter on a silver platter:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0...n_3791314.html
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“We are not ministers,” she said. “We are having to tell the government the obvious: We are not a church.”
This is exactly the tension I'm presenting, stated in absolute clarity by an atheist.
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What are you talking about? The bolded is exactly accurate. RFRA is a law that demands strict scrutiny (a legal standard) on questions of whether the first amendment has been violated by a government actions. Hobby Lobby was about that RFRA applies to "closely held corporations". If you think I am saying something wrong, be very explicit about what it is.
Here's where the rabbit trail started:
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Originally Posted by you
Recall the quote from the previous case you brought up:
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Without venturing too far into the realm of the philosophical, we have suggested in the past that when a person sincerely holds beliefs dealing with issues of “ultimate concern” that for her occupy a “place parallel to that filled by ․ God in traditionally religious persons,” those beliefs represent her religion.
...
But that is what the legal canon is for and over centuries it has accepted some types of things as being legally classified as religious and others not; so too is it here.
I raised a particular challenge to your claim:
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Originally Posted by me
Exceptions on the basis of religious beliefs apparently includes beliefs about contraceptive technology on a Biblical basis. Suppose an atheist objected to contraceptive technology. Without having a "Bible" (or other religious text) or a particular historical basis for belief, how can the atheist describe the belief as being religious?
And then I challenged you on attempting to use that quote from the case law as having any meaning whatsoever with regards to the statement I'm raising.
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Originally Posted by me
As for trying to quote the case that I quoted earlier in defense of your statement here, I really think you ought to understand case law better than that. A ruling that is explicitly narrowly construed to be about a first amendment right to assemble cannot possibly be reasonably applied to a case in which first amendment grounds were not even addressed.
To which you admitted that there was no first amendment ruling. But yet you wanted to insist that the case had first amendment implications that somehow relate back to your claim.
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Originally Posted by you
Yes, yes, I'm very aware that hobby lobby was an RFRA case not a first amendment one. Ironically, it is the only case I have a physical copy of as I happened to be in washington and toured the supreme court around that time and they gave me a copy of decision. But this law increases the level of scrutiny to be applied to alleged violations of the first amendment. The first amendment doesn't vanish when talking about this, nor does the legal canon that has repeatedly established that for first amendment purposes atheism is considered as a religion just vanish.
But it's not about the RFRA. It's not about "increasing scrutiny." The fact of the matter (and it seems Louis Cyphre agrees with me) is that there are some beliefs such as those with regards to contraception that are religious beliefs for actual religions but are not beliefs for "atheism as a religion (as defined for first amendment purposes)."
If anything, this only continues to highlight the fact that atheists and theists simply are *NOT* treated the same in reality, and that your claim that that they should be must *NECESSARILY* be in the realm of the hypothetical and hence we should *NOT* expect rulings in the actual legal canon to be providing much guidance.