I've already violated that once, so what the hell - I'm going to do it again, and this time I'll violate BOTH of the first taboos. (The topic of red headed women remains sacrosanct).
What do they have in common? What George Will referred to as an "excess of certitude"; the view that the world can be viewed on simple terms, and that one's particular point of view is unshakably correct.
While being firm in one's convictions can be admirable, it seems that "my way is the right way" all too often leads to "my way is the ONLY way". (And in the case of religion, this all too often leads to "Our God can beat up your God").
What happened to mutual respect? The art of compromise? The willingness to accept someone else on their terms, though they may be different? Why does everything have to be an "all-or-nothing" proposition?
Politics seems to have degenerated into a test of political wills. Each side tries to ram it's agenda through, over the opposition, who dig their heels in and try to block anything and everything that their opponents try to do. The health care debacle was a perfect example. Rather than the Republicans accepting that the Democrats had the horsepower to push the bill through, and try to shape it into something workable, we got nonsense about "Death Panels!" and "Socialism!". What SHOULD have happened was the Republican party sitting down and saying "Ok if you change XYZ, and take this out, put that in and modify this, we'll vote for the bill". Why would it have been so horrible for a bipartisan party to sit down and say "Ok, we can all agree that our health care system needs reform..." and work from there? Why is "compromise" a dirty word? Why do we admire a shrewd bargainer in the business world, yet view politics in absolutist terms?
Politics has become all about "winning".... and you and I are the losers.
In the case of religion, I like to liken the world's religions to three blind men touching an elephant, and each describing what an elephant is, based on the part they're touching. The one touching the trunk has a very different picture than the one holding the tail, or the one touching the side, yet if you were to ask each of them what they thought an elephant was, they would be very adamant in their "picture". They would all be right, yet, in a way, they would all be wrong, because none of them can see the whole. Only Buddhism says "there are many paths". The rest, all too often, say "Our way is the only way". "Our God is the only God". "We're the Chosen People and you're not". I don't know about you, but to me, to say that you know unequivocally what God thinks/wants is at best arrogant, at worst, very, very dangerous. Too often that certainty leads to people thinking God has anointed them judge, jury and executioner.
People of faith seem totally unwilling to admit that "faith" by definition is "a belief in something that can't be proven" - because that opens the door to admitting that they might not be entirely correct. I see nothing wrong with that, and do NOT see it as a sign of weakness, but to many it's tantamount to blasphemy. To admit that maybe you don't KNOW exactly what God wants might mean you'd have to accept someone else may also have a piece of the puzzle.
As a student of history, I try to console myself by telling myself "This is nothing new. It's happened before and things have worked out", but last time we got so polarized, and let radicals on either end of the spectrum decide the fate of the country, there was a five year war that left about 700,000 Americans dead.
The Founding Fathers would no doubt understand, but I think they'd be very dismayed to see what we've become.
What do they have in common? What George Will referred to as an "excess of certitude"; the view that the world can be viewed on simple terms, and that one's particular point of view is unshakably correct.
While being firm in one's convictions can be admirable, it seems that "my way is the right way" all too often leads to "my way is the ONLY way". (And in the case of religion, this all too often leads to "Our God can beat up your God").
What happened to mutual respect? The art of compromise? The willingness to accept someone else on their terms, though they may be different? Why does everything have to be an "all-or-nothing" proposition?
Politics seems to have degenerated into a test of political wills. Each side tries to ram it's agenda through, over the opposition, who dig their heels in and try to block anything and everything that their opponents try to do. The health care debacle was a perfect example. Rather than the Republicans accepting that the Democrats had the horsepower to push the bill through, and try to shape it into something workable, we got nonsense about "Death Panels!" and "Socialism!". What SHOULD have happened was the Republican party sitting down and saying "Ok if you change XYZ, and take this out, put that in and modify this, we'll vote for the bill". Why would it have been so horrible for a bipartisan party to sit down and say "Ok, we can all agree that our health care system needs reform..." and work from there? Why is "compromise" a dirty word? Why do we admire a shrewd bargainer in the business world, yet view politics in absolutist terms?
Politics has become all about "winning".... and you and I are the losers.
In the case of religion, I like to liken the world's religions to three blind men touching an elephant, and each describing what an elephant is, based on the part they're touching. The one touching the trunk has a very different picture than the one holding the tail, or the one touching the side, yet if you were to ask each of them what they thought an elephant was, they would be very adamant in their "picture". They would all be right, yet, in a way, they would all be wrong, because none of them can see the whole. Only Buddhism says "there are many paths". The rest, all too often, say "Our way is the only way". "Our God is the only God". "We're the Chosen People and you're not". I don't know about you, but to me, to say that you know unequivocally what God thinks/wants is at best arrogant, at worst, very, very dangerous. Too often that certainty leads to people thinking God has anointed them judge, jury and executioner.
People of faith seem totally unwilling to admit that "faith" by definition is "a belief in something that can't be proven" - because that opens the door to admitting that they might not be entirely correct. I see nothing wrong with that, and do NOT see it as a sign of weakness, but to many it's tantamount to blasphemy. To admit that maybe you don't KNOW exactly what God wants might mean you'd have to accept someone else may also have a piece of the puzzle.
As a student of history, I try to console myself by telling myself "This is nothing new. It's happened before and things have worked out", but last time we got so polarized, and let radicals on either end of the spectrum decide the fate of the country, there was a five year war that left about 700,000 Americans dead.
The Founding Fathers would no doubt understand, but I think they'd be very dismayed to see what we've become.
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