This no true scotsman does not actually help anyone as it allows people to completely skirt the problems with religion by ignoring any symptoms as incorrect practices.
In reality, all religious people are cherry picking. Its inherent unless you want to live like a caveman. Can you imagine if people actually did all of the things prescribed at various points of the bible?
No cooking, washing dishes, doing chores on saturdays, no eating pork, no mixed fabric clothing, having slaves and concubines, not taking loans etc etc.
People like to pretend the bible is all well and good because they sanitize the hell out of it, only pay attention to very carefully worded and translated 10 commandments, ignore the first half, and then a huge chunk of the second half and call it good.
In reality, unless we dismiss basically every Christian as non Christian, we have no reason to dismiss bad people who are Christians as non Christians.
Theyāre just bad people who are also Christians, and a good chunk of the times, it is where that Christianity, the logic required to stay with it, and the social situations that occur as a result in weaker resistance to awful ideologies, charlatans etc.
I donāt feel that itās a very high standard to ask that Christians follow Jesus Christās example and demonstrate understanding of his teachings - especially if they are truly Christians, who accept Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.
Many of the practices and laws you mentioned are fulfilled in the New Testament and are no longer binding to Christians.
And there are surely many people (especially in power) who use Christianity as an accessory, as a tool to manipulate others into hate, and as a platform to grow their power. I wouldnāt be surprised if Mike Johnson was one such example.
This is just āI cherry pick differently for equally arbitrary reasons and am therefor the arbiter of what qualifies as truly Christianā. The fact you say mostly really hammers that in. Like you feel youāre more āChristianā than them to a degree that matters.
And there are surely many people (especially in power) who use Christianity as an accessory, as a tool to manipulate others into hate, and as a platform to grow their power.
Yeah, like literally the leaders of every sect out thereā¦
I wouldnāt be surprised if Mike Johnson was one such example.
Doesnāt mean he isnāt Christian though, unless you also donāt think the pope isā¦
In fact this is exactly why its important not to separate these people out. These are fellow Christians that the non wealthy and powerful ?Christians lower their guards to due to religious belief.
This is just āI cherry pick differently for equally arbitrary reasons and am therefor the arbiter of what qualifies as truly Christianā. The fact you say mostly really hammers that in. Like you feel youāre more āChristianā than them to a degree that matters.
I invite you to do more research on this. Itās not cherry picking, I assure you.
Yeah, like literally the leaders of every sect out thereā¦
There are plenty of denominations and sects of Christianity out there that donāt teach hate. Why wouldnāt there be? Jesus taught love.
Doesnāt mean he isnāt Christian though, unless you also donāt think the pope isā¦
Anybody can claim to be whatever they want to. If somebody is doing the direct opposite of what Jesus taught while deferring to the Bible like Mike Johnson, Iād argue that they arenāt following Jesus or are like him. Iād argue that Mike Johnson is closer to the Pharisees that Jesus notably had issues with, than a Christian.
Christ + ian (from, related to, or like)
I believe that the pope is a Christian though, and clearly other people do too - otherwise he likely wouldnāt be the pope.
Why are you defending Mike Johnson? Feel free to respond with a rebuttal, but you wonāt be getting anything else out of me.
I invite you to do more research on this. Itās not cherry picking, I assure you.
You quite literally confirm that you are cherry picking by acknowledging that indeed there are ridiculous rules and guidance that are in the bible that you donāt follow. You therefore would inherently be cherry picking if you did not follow every single one of them or, to give you as fair a shake as possible, the vast majority of them.
There are plenty of denominations and sects of Christianity out there that donāt teach hate. Why wouldnāt there be? Jesus taught love.
Thatās a nice idea in theory, but plenty doesnāt mean most, and I think most would be false which is why you went with plenty.
Most sects of Christianity, at some point, due to the fact their morals were roughly frozen about a millennia ago, will inevitably run into some pretty backwards points of view that donāt really have any basis in compassion or empathy and end up either creating out groups to be looked down upon, undue pressure on members, or discriminatory views against marginalized people.
More than any of that, the very fact that its all based on belief based on faith, believing without knowing, means that a critical vulnerability is inherently open the second you allow that belief in.
If you can believe anything without any evidence, then its suddenly a lot easier to believe other things for the same reasons as well. After all, your indoctrination (as most people are indoctrinated as children), will have tried to disarm your attempts to reason your way out of believing without evidence.
Anybody can claim to be whatever they want to. If somebody is doing the direct opposite of what Jesus taught while deferring to the Bible like Mike Johnson, Iād argue that they arenāt following Jesus or are like him. Iād argue that Mike Johnson is closer to the Pharisees that Jesus notably had issues with, than a Christian.
I would argue most Christians, yourself included donāt actually qualify as Christians if we go down this line of thought to its logical conclusion.
I believe that the pope is a Christian though, and clearly other people do too - otherwise he likely wouldnāt be the pope.
Why do you believe a position that is in charge of covering up the sexual abuse of minors, and causing an aids epidemic in Africa is any more Christian than Mike Johnson, someone who is guilty of supporting the current American fascist regime?
They both have done heinous and reprehensible acts, yet we allow the Pope position to be qualified as Christian because they are traditionally good at weaponized civility?
Why are you defending Mike Johnson?
Not a single thing I have said could possibly be read to be defending Mike Johnson, and as such I canāt read what youāve written here as anything but the most clear evidence of bad faith.
Feel free to respond with a rebuttal, but you wonāt be getting anything else out of me.
This is to be expected behaviour with such a ridiculous strawman argument at the end there.
If your views are so fragile that you must lie about the point of view of the person you are arguing with, self reflection is the only remedy.
Not a single thing I have said could possibly be read to be defending Mike Johnson, and as such I canāt read what youāve written here as anything but the most clear evidence of bad faith.
You are defending his supposed faith and his identification as a Christian, when it couldnāt be further from the truth.
From my point of view, you are either following Christās teachings or you are not. A true Christian would resonate with Christās teachings and be demonstrating them - not demonstrating the opposite and twisting Jesusā teachings from a position of power. I donāt believe Mike Johnson is a sheep led astray or someone has been manipulated into hate, but someone who is empowered by hate, who thrives on his authority, and is a person who literally says he believes God elevated him specifically into authority.
You assume bad faith from me and good faith from Mike Johnson (by taking him at his word that he is a Christian) - a person who has shown they are not in good faith to anybody honestly looking.
You are defending his supposed faith and his identification as a Christian, when it couldnāt be further from the truth.
The fact you think or are willing to lie to pretend you believe that rebutting your no true scotsman argument is somehow a defence of this man is telling.
Itās either that you see being Christian as being a compliment, which by itself shows a feeling of superiority to those who are not Christian, or you feel that him being Christian somehow means something greater at large that you would rather not discuss.
From my point of view, you are either following Christās teachings or you are not.
That can be your point of view, but your point of view would be (by your own admission) cherry picked and based on whatever set of rules you decided fit within a book filled with rules and contradictions to those rules.
A true Christian would resonate with Christās teachings and be demonstrating them - not teaching the opposite and twisting Jesusā teachings from a position of power.
There are almost certainly people with different views than you who run the same line, in fact, I am sure of it, because Iāve seen it multiple times.
I donāt believe Mike Johnson is a sheep led astray or someone has been manipulated into hate, but someone who is empowered by hate, who thrives on his authority, and is a person who literally believes God elevated him specifically into authority.
What you let loose at the end, is the idea that you think that Mike Johnson holds his beliefs vehemently, and that you belief he thinks he is doing as is right by god.
How then, can you call him any more or less Christian than yourself or anyone else if from his point of view, picking and choosing what he sees fit, he is a Christian?
If there are no hard qualifiers, as you admit there are not, as the religion and the various sects are largely based on interpretations of a book translated and added to multiple times over thousands of years, how can you disqualify so easily when convenient to you?
Personally, I donāt think most of the people leading any given religion actually believes in the core beliefs of said religion, as doing so would make it harder to change as needed, but you seem to think opposite, which oddly conflicts with the whole angle you are going for of them not being real Christians.
You assume bad faith from me and good faith from Mike Johnson, a person who has shown they are not in good faith on many different occasions.
I donāt assume bad faith from you, the evidence demonstrates it. Here you are again, outright lying about my point of view because you canāt really argue on the other points; the points of contention.
To assert that I, someone who you can see clearly is progressive, supports progressive policies and finds what is happening abhorrent align with Mike Johnson in any way, just because I did not let your fallacious dismissal of that which you think āhurtsā your religion slide canāt be be seen as anything else.
Dude, it isnāt a stretch to say that somebody who doesnāt follow Jesus and does the exact opposite isnāt a Christian. It takes basic critical thinking to arrive at that conclusion. Do you truly believe he hasnāt been exposed to the many verses where Jesus teaches the exact opposite of the types of polices he advocates for and the rhetoric he uses? I really find it hard to believe that, but I could see how regular people could be manipulated.
I consciously chose to not counter your arguments or āpoints of contentionā because they were not worth my time to address and I specifically warned you that I wouldnāt engage further. You only got further engagement because you claimed bad faith on my part - which I specifically addressed and you did not sufficiently counter.
There are no shades of gray - either you are a Christian or you are not and Iām sure in his heart of hearts he is using religion as a tool for his own personal gain. Iāll trust that almost every word out of his mouth is a lie, and you are free to take him at his word that he considers himself a Christian in good faith. Have at it.
With this latest reply youāve opted to go the route of simply saying āIām right, youāre wrongā while not responding to any criticisms or flaws with your reasoning because itās ānot worth your timeā meanwhile you have the time to be increasingly aggressive in restating the same things.
It would seem to me that youāve proven that itās not about time at all but a lack of merit to the primary point that you are asserting so strongly.
I have to wonder why you are so invested in believing that bad people canāt truly be Christians when youāve already acknowledged that other bad people can indeed be Christian and youāve acknowledged further, that being a Christian has no hard definitions given the highly intepretive nature of this religion (as can be seen via the many sects, readings, translations, breakoffs and more).
Its almost as if you badly want to associate being Christian with being supirior to non Christians and allowing awful people to correctly declare their religious statuses hurts your wanting to denigrate others by asserting that your faith makes you a better person.
Thatās just one plausible explanation. Of course I wouldnāt need to hypothesize if you engaged honestly and actually covered any of the many holes in your reasoning but you ~ādonāt have the timeā (as your multiple comments avoiding answering oh so clearly show).
Thatās a pretty broad brushing of a diverse religious group. It sounds like youāre clumping in Catholics with everyone else. Catholics are all about casting people out of the church for not being catholic enough and not so much for sexual predators. But thereās so many small churches based on Christianity, so many different practicesā¦. You just lumped them all together with your grievances with the Catholic Church. It gives intolerance, kind of hypocritical.
Thatās a pretty broad brushing of a diverse religious group.
Thatās a ridiculous assertion. Iām sure the follow up sentence ought completely clear up what you must mean here
It sounds like youāre clumping in Catholics with everyone else.
What in the world???
Are you really taking my very obvious example of a person no one would argue is not Christian, to imply that every Christian must somehow be Catholic?
I cant even begin to see how you misinterpreted my comment in that way.
You just lumped them all together with your grievances with the Catholic Church. It gives intolerance, kind of hypocritical.
I did no such thing, and I refuse to believe that you think I did, given that this example couldnāt be any clearer.
Its especially ridiculous given my example is used as a means to establish that the definition of Christian is indeed far wider not narrower than the poster I responded to.
This is precisely the opposite of your claim of me narrowing the definition of Christianity with that example. Itās uttterly backwards.
My mans youāre like 30 paragraphs into arguing that Mike Johnson is a Christian and that he should not be narrowed out of that category. You then listed a bunch of grievances that categorized a lot of good critiques on Catholic Church. As a Catholic weāve always been extremely strict on who gets called that title: thereās a bunch of boxes to check. As far as Christianās go, thatās anyone with faith in the Bible. People who believe, study, and embody the words of Jesus. That canāt be Mike Johnson.
Itās very fair for someone who was raised in many Christian churches to decide the virtue of another Christian. There are plenty of good Christian churches out there that produce good Christianās. Mike Johnson has never been near one of them.
Thanks for coming to my ted talk. I will not be reviewing your arguments as I found them impotent angry and biased.
As far as Christianās go, thatās anyone with faith in the Bible. People who believe, study, and embody the words of Jesus. That canāt be Mike Johnson.
BS No true scottsman business. This is exactly what the pope example was. You think a person who helps an organization propagate heinous crimes falls under that definition?
Your definition is arbitrary, based on interpretation.
Itās very fair for someone who was raised in many Christian churches to decide the virtue of another Christian.
So then Its fair for me too right? Suddenly crickets.
Thanks for coming to my ted talk. I will not be reviewing your arguments
Seems like that Christian spirit Iāve heard so much about.
This no true scotsman does not actually help anyone as it allows people to completely skirt the problems with religion by ignoring any symptoms as incorrect practices.
In reality, all religious people are cherry picking. Its inherent unless you want to live like a caveman. Can you imagine if people actually did all of the things prescribed at various points of the bible?
No cooking, washing dishes, doing chores on saturdays, no eating pork, no mixed fabric clothing, having slaves and concubines, not taking loans etc etc.
People like to pretend the bible is all well and good because they sanitize the hell out of it, only pay attention to very carefully worded and translated 10 commandments, ignore the first half, and then a huge chunk of the second half and call it good.
In reality, unless we dismiss basically every Christian as non Christian, we have no reason to dismiss bad people who are Christians as non Christians.
Theyāre just bad people who are also Christians, and a good chunk of the times, it is where that Christianity, the logic required to stay with it, and the social situations that occur as a result in weaker resistance to awful ideologies, charlatans etc.
I donāt feel that itās a very high standard to ask that Christians follow Jesus Christās example and demonstrate understanding of his teachings - especially if they are truly Christians, who accept Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.
Many of the practices and laws you mentioned are fulfilled in the New Testament and are no longer binding to Christians.
And there are surely many people (especially in power) who use Christianity as an accessory, as a tool to manipulate others into hate, and as a platform to grow their power. I wouldnāt be surprised if Mike Johnson was one such example.
This is just āI cherry pick differently for equally arbitrary reasons and am therefor the arbiter of what qualifies as truly Christianā. The fact you say mostly really hammers that in. Like you feel youāre more āChristianā than them to a degree that matters.
Yeah, like literally the leaders of every sect out thereā¦
Doesnāt mean he isnāt Christian though, unless you also donāt think the pope isā¦
In fact this is exactly why its important not to separate these people out. These are fellow Christians that the non wealthy and powerful ?Christians lower their guards to due to religious belief.
I invite you to do more research on this. Itās not cherry picking, I assure you.
There are plenty of denominations and sects of Christianity out there that donāt teach hate. Why wouldnāt there be? Jesus taught love.
Anybody can claim to be whatever they want to. If somebody is doing the direct opposite of what Jesus taught while deferring to the Bible like Mike Johnson, Iād argue that they arenāt following Jesus or are like him. Iād argue that Mike Johnson is closer to the Pharisees that Jesus notably had issues with, than a Christian.
Christ + ian (from, related to, or like)
I believe that the pope is a Christian though, and clearly other people do too - otherwise he likely wouldnāt be the pope.
Why are you defending Mike Johnson? Feel free to respond with a rebuttal, but you wonāt be getting anything else out of me.
You quite literally confirm that you are cherry picking by acknowledging that indeed there are ridiculous rules and guidance that are in the bible that you donāt follow. You therefore would inherently be cherry picking if you did not follow every single one of them or, to give you as fair a shake as possible, the vast majority of them.
Thatās a nice idea in theory, but plenty doesnāt mean most, and I think most would be false which is why you went with plenty.
Most sects of Christianity, at some point, due to the fact their morals were roughly frozen about a millennia ago, will inevitably run into some pretty backwards points of view that donāt really have any basis in compassion or empathy and end up either creating out groups to be looked down upon, undue pressure on members, or discriminatory views against marginalized people.
More than any of that, the very fact that its all based on belief based on faith, believing without knowing, means that a critical vulnerability is inherently open the second you allow that belief in.
If you can believe anything without any evidence, then its suddenly a lot easier to believe other things for the same reasons as well. After all, your indoctrination (as most people are indoctrinated as children), will have tried to disarm your attempts to reason your way out of believing without evidence.
I would argue most Christians, yourself included donāt actually qualify as Christians if we go down this line of thought to its logical conclusion.
Why do you believe a position that is in charge of covering up the sexual abuse of minors, and causing an aids epidemic in Africa is any more Christian than Mike Johnson, someone who is guilty of supporting the current American fascist regime?
They both have done heinous and reprehensible acts, yet we allow the Pope position to be qualified as Christian because they are traditionally good at weaponized civility?
Not a single thing I have said could possibly be read to be defending Mike Johnson, and as such I canāt read what youāve written here as anything but the most clear evidence of bad faith.
This is to be expected behaviour with such a ridiculous strawman argument at the end there.
If your views are so fragile that you must lie about the point of view of the person you are arguing with, self reflection is the only remedy.
You are defending his supposed faith and his identification as a Christian, when it couldnāt be further from the truth.
From my point of view, you are either following Christās teachings or you are not. A true Christian would resonate with Christās teachings and be demonstrating them - not demonstrating the opposite and twisting Jesusā teachings from a position of power. I donāt believe Mike Johnson is a sheep led astray or someone has been manipulated into hate, but someone who is empowered by hate, who thrives on his authority, and is a person who literally says he believes God elevated him specifically into authority.
You assume bad faith from me and good faith from Mike Johnson (by taking him at his word that he is a Christian) - a person who has shown they are not in good faith to anybody honestly looking.
The fact you think or are willing to lie to pretend you believe that rebutting your no true scotsman argument is somehow a defence of this man is telling.
Itās either that you see being Christian as being a compliment, which by itself shows a feeling of superiority to those who are not Christian, or you feel that him being Christian somehow means something greater at large that you would rather not discuss.
That can be your point of view, but your point of view would be (by your own admission) cherry picked and based on whatever set of rules you decided fit within a book filled with rules and contradictions to those rules.
There are almost certainly people with different views than you who run the same line, in fact, I am sure of it, because Iāve seen it multiple times.
What you let loose at the end, is the idea that you think that Mike Johnson holds his beliefs vehemently, and that you belief he thinks he is doing as is right by god.
How then, can you call him any more or less Christian than yourself or anyone else if from his point of view, picking and choosing what he sees fit, he is a Christian?
If there are no hard qualifiers, as you admit there are not, as the religion and the various sects are largely based on interpretations of a book translated and added to multiple times over thousands of years, how can you disqualify so easily when convenient to you?
Personally, I donāt think most of the people leading any given religion actually believes in the core beliefs of said religion, as doing so would make it harder to change as needed, but you seem to think opposite, which oddly conflicts with the whole angle you are going for of them not being real Christians.
I donāt assume bad faith from you, the evidence demonstrates it. Here you are again, outright lying about my point of view because you canāt really argue on the other points; the points of contention.
To assert that I, someone who you can see clearly is progressive, supports progressive policies and finds what is happening abhorrent align with Mike Johnson in any way, just because I did not let your fallacious dismissal of that which you think āhurtsā your religion slide canāt be be seen as anything else.
Dude, it isnāt a stretch to say that somebody who doesnāt follow Jesus and does the exact opposite isnāt a Christian. It takes basic critical thinking to arrive at that conclusion. Do you truly believe he hasnāt been exposed to the many verses where Jesus teaches the exact opposite of the types of polices he advocates for and the rhetoric he uses? I really find it hard to believe that, but I could see how regular people could be manipulated.
I consciously chose to not counter your arguments or āpoints of contentionā because they were not worth my time to address and I specifically warned you that I wouldnāt engage further. You only got further engagement because you claimed bad faith on my part - which I specifically addressed and you did not sufficiently counter.
There are no shades of gray - either you are a Christian or you are not and Iām sure in his heart of hearts he is using religion as a tool for his own personal gain. Iāll trust that almost every word out of his mouth is a lie, and you are free to take him at his word that he considers himself a Christian in good faith. Have at it.
With this latest reply youāve opted to go the route of simply saying āIām right, youāre wrongā while not responding to any criticisms or flaws with your reasoning because itās ānot worth your timeā meanwhile you have the time to be increasingly aggressive in restating the same things.
It would seem to me that youāve proven that itās not about time at all but a lack of merit to the primary point that you are asserting so strongly.
I have to wonder why you are so invested in believing that bad people canāt truly be Christians when youāve already acknowledged that other bad people can indeed be Christian and youāve acknowledged further, that being a Christian has no hard definitions given the highly intepretive nature of this religion (as can be seen via the many sects, readings, translations, breakoffs and more).
Its almost as if you badly want to associate being Christian with being supirior to non Christians and allowing awful people to correctly declare their religious statuses hurts your wanting to denigrate others by asserting that your faith makes you a better person.
Thatās just one plausible explanation. Of course I wouldnāt need to hypothesize if you engaged honestly and actually covered any of the many holes in your reasoning but you ~ādonāt have the timeā (as your multiple comments avoiding answering oh so clearly show).
Thatās a pretty broad brushing of a diverse religious group. It sounds like youāre clumping in Catholics with everyone else. Catholics are all about casting people out of the church for not being catholic enough and not so much for sexual predators. But thereās so many small churches based on Christianity, so many different practicesā¦. You just lumped them all together with your grievances with the Catholic Church. It gives intolerance, kind of hypocritical.
Thatās a ridiculous assertion. Iām sure the follow up sentence ought completely clear up what you must mean here
What in the world???
Are you really taking my very obvious example of a person no one would argue is not Christian, to imply that every Christian must somehow be Catholic?
I cant even begin to see how you misinterpreted my comment in that way.
I did no such thing, and I refuse to believe that you think I did, given that this example couldnāt be any clearer.
Its especially ridiculous given my example is used as a means to establish that the definition of Christian is indeed far wider not narrower than the poster I responded to.
This is precisely the opposite of your claim of me narrowing the definition of Christianity with that example. Itās uttterly backwards.
My mans youāre like 30 paragraphs into arguing that Mike Johnson is a Christian and that he should not be narrowed out of that category. You then listed a bunch of grievances that categorized a lot of good critiques on Catholic Church. As a Catholic weāve always been extremely strict on who gets called that title: thereās a bunch of boxes to check. As far as Christianās go, thatās anyone with faith in the Bible. People who believe, study, and embody the words of Jesus. That canāt be Mike Johnson.
Itās very fair for someone who was raised in many Christian churches to decide the virtue of another Christian. There are plenty of good Christian churches out there that produce good Christianās. Mike Johnson has never been near one of them.
Thanks for coming to my ted talk. I will not be reviewing your arguments as I found them impotent angry and biased.
BS No true scottsman business. This is exactly what the pope example was. You think a person who helps an organization propagate heinous crimes falls under that definition?
Your definition is arbitrary, based on interpretation.
So then Its fair for me too right? Suddenly crickets.
Seems like that Christian spirit Iāve heard so much about.