Jesus Camp Trailer

[Xest]

Gandelf - with all respect...this movie is scary...they arent better than Hitler Jugend or any muslim fanatics. And the thought of 1/4 of US being like this is scary.

Edit: When kids say they are ready to die for jesus - something is definitly wrong Gandelf.

Edit2: I dont belive in god, but I don't think you should force your beliefs on children. They will decide what they belive when they grow up and can do perfectly well without brainwash.

Edit3: I know your a christian Gandelf, and Im not gonna insult your religion or talk shite about it...but I was chocked when I read your reply to this thread.

/Ankh

Yep, dunno if it's the same in other parts of the world but here in the UK a lot of schools are funded by various religions, the problem is then that the best schools are the ones with extra money coming in from those religions, so if you want your kid to get the best education they can due to the schools having the most funding you also have to accept that they'll be brainwashed and indoctrinated into some religion.

We really need laws against any outside funding to schools, or if religious institutions do wish to donate to the schooling system it should go to a central fund that is distributed evenly.

Brainwashing kids into beleiving story books like the bible, the koran or whatever are in any way factual as a form of controlling them is such a mediaeval idea. We have far to much of a global society now for control of people by stories, and far too high an average intelligence level for it to properly work, you have those intelligent enough to understand that religion is just that - an ancient form of control, rebelling against those who wish to use that form of control who are backed up by those naive enough to fall for this idea.

In some ways though they're not wrong, indoctrination could lead to world peace. Essentially there is two ways to acheive peace on a much larger scale than we have now - educating people enough so that everyone realises that killing and such is rather daft and pointless in the grand scheme of things rather than leaving that level of sense and education to only a small percentage of the population OR indoctrination of everyone into a single religion. The problem we have now is that you have a large part of the Middle East and Asia thinking everyone should be Muslims, Israel thinking everyone should be Jewish and Bush and Blair thinking everyone should be Christians, but deciding Jews are better than Muslims and helping Israel which indirectly helps their cause. Religious indoctrination is definitely the worse of the two options, the evidence is right in front of our eyes

[<ankh>]

But that's the point! If those people exist in the Western culture who would become suicide bombers, then where are they? I haven't seen any on the news bulletins.

Why would they? They got the strongest army in the world to do their job. Remove the army and I can assure you that you will see christian suicide bombers.

B
Another thing: you are confusing the issue by bringing the US Government into the debate.

Unless you didnt notice - we did talk about the 25% of US population.

You're pre-judging people by making that statement. You assuming that because the are Christians and are saying that they would die for Jesus, that somehow they are going to become suicide bombers in the future. That's a very regrettable statement and one that is out of order in my opinion.

Its NOT out of order. Do you honestly belive that the muslims knew 50 years ago that they were gonna be suicide bombers? FFS open your eyes and stop fooling yourself that your religion is so much greater than the rest. I do NOT expect you to ditch what you belive in - but with your IQ (was it 140?) I would expect more intelligent reasoning than this from you.

...and there is always ofc the crusades...but hey, they did it in the name of the lord so I guess it was ok with the 100 years of slaughter.

Religion sucks - more people have been killed by religion than by the commies/nazis. You can argue about whats right or wrong with my way of looking at religion - but you can't ignore this important fact.

/Ankh

[Gandelf]

While you may not intend to fight through violent means I bet a fair few of American (& possibly elsewhere) Christian fundamentalists do (George Bush & his neo-cons are backed by them so you could say they are already).

But that's the point! If those people exist in the Western culture who would become suicide bombers, then where are they? I haven't seen any on the news bulletins.

Another thing: you are confusing the issue by bringing the US Government into the debate. Whilst I don't necessarily agree with what the US (and for that matter, Britain) have done in Iraq and Afghanistan, I have to point out that the US and British governments were put into power by people from ALL religions/no religion and backgrounds. It is wrong for anyone to suggest it is Christians who are the only people backing those Governments! All those who voted those Governments in are to blame and I condemn myself by saying that because I voted for Tony Blair in the General Election that brought him into power!

That's different from the lot in the video (& what they could become) how?

It's an error for anyone to make a statement, which assumes that because a group of children who are Christians and are saying that they would die for Jesus, that somehow they are going to become suicide bombers in the future.

[Gandelf]

Why would they? They got the strongest army in the world to do their job. Remove the army and I can assure you that you will see christian suicide bombers.



Unless you didnt notice - we did talk about the 25% of US population.



Its NOT out of order. Do you honestly belive that the muslims knew 50 years ago that they were gonna be suicide bombers? FFS open your eyes and stop fooling yourself that your religion is so much greater than the rest. I do NOT expect you to ditch what you belive in - but with your IQ (was it 140?) I would expect more intelligent reasoning than this from you.

...and there is always ofc the crusades...but hey, they did it in the name of the lord so I guess it was ok with the 100 years of slaughter.

Religion sucks - more people have been killed by religion than by the commies/nazis. You can argue about whats right or wrong with my way of looking at religion - but you can't ignore this important fact.

/Ankh

Sorry, I'm tired and mis-reading things! I will shut up now.
I don't want another 3-day ban.

[Lairiodd]

Yep, dunno if it's the same in other parts of the world but here in the UK a lot of schools are funded by various religions, the problem is then that the best schools are the ones with extra money coming in from those religions, so if you want your kid to get the best education they can due to the schools having the most funding you also have to accept that they'll be brainwashed and indoctrinated into some religion.

We really need laws against any outside funding to schools, or if religious institutions do wish to donate to the schooling system it should go to a central fund that is distributed evenly.

I would prefer something like a voucher system. You get £X per month in vouchers per child that you can spend at any school (that meets certain minimum standards at the state exams). This would allow parents to choose their own schools, without giving the government such a say.

I really doubt that many parents would stand for religous indoctrination and schools that tried would run out of students. Indoctination is not the same as providing some exposure to religion. There is ofc the issue of ensuring choice. In a small out of the way town, there might be only 1 school.

In any case, why go the indirect route, why not just ban religion in schools directly. Schools would be required to either provide no religion, or if they must, then all faiths must be provided the same level of coverage and a child's faith cannot be used against them.

That is kinda what happens in Ireland, the school I went to was Catholic and there was 1 hour a week "religious knowledge". However, children from other faiths went to a different class for the hour covered by someone of their faith. I am not sure how they would have handled athesists though and obviously, it was the child's parent's faith rather than the child's opinion that counted.

I also agree with your assesment about religion, but generally, it is more trouble that it is worth to try to force people to be athesists. (Most) People do have a need for some kind of religion, however, this doesn't mean that they lose all reason. Also, as time passes, people will likely tend to the more non-violent ones and also will tend to pay less attention to their religion.

On schools and religion here in Ireland, there was a minor controversy here a few weeks ago here. 2 Catholic children were going to a Protestant school and they were refused a spot on the school bus (which was a government provided bus) because of their religion.

The actual reason was that the rule for getting a free school bus pass is that you must live more than 3 miles from a school and you must travel to your nearest school. The 2 children in question were not actually travelling to their nearest school so therefore they weren't entitled to a pass. However, for the purposes of the bus pass, Protestants could claim that the nearest Protestant school was their nearest available school. What is funny that this explanation appeared on almost none of the media that covered the case. It was all discrimination against Catholics.

[<ankh>]

In my opinion Ankh, you are confusing those who call themselves "Christian" just because they live in a "Christian" country, with born-again Christians. The two are distinctly separate... the first group are not Christians at all, the second group are. Anyone who would call themself "Christian" and would commit acts of violence in the name of Christianity are not Christians at all, but godless animals... just like the Crusaders!

No, Im not confusing it. The one who ordered the crusades...would you say that he's not christian? Im pretty sure the pope is.
You say that I confuse - your the one that actually liked what you saw in the trailer for the movie...and without even checking deeper into it you started to defend them.
Your doing just like every group of christians do (or subgroup) they ALWAYS claim to know what a true christian is and ofc they are always true christians. It's amazing how all christians pick the stuff they like from the bible and ignore the rest.

[<ankh>]

Edit: 25% is only a quarter... who were the other 75%?... that's an even bigger amount of people.

260.000.000 citizens...25% fanatics...does it matter who the other 75% is? I think not..65.000.000 fanatics are way to much for a country as powerful as the United States to be good for the rest of the world.

/Ankh

[Lairiodd]

Why would they? They got the strongest army in the world to do their job. Remove the army and I can assure you that you will see christian suicide bombers.

Why do they have the most powerful army in the world ? It comes down to support of freedom and capitalism.

Religion sucks - more people have been killed by religion than by the commies/nazis. You can argue about whats right or wrong with my way of looking at religion - but you can't ignore this important fact.

There is a good arguement that communism and nazism (both forms of socialism) are bordering on religions anyway. They require that people ignore reality.

[Gandelf]

This is my last statement in this thread, because I know from past experience how these type of debates can make a lot of people "hot under the collar" and say things that only serve to whip up resentment and anger.

Everyone believes their point of view is correct. We all say and do things we regret. Surely, the goal is to acknowledge that whether we're black, white, red or yellow, male or female (or inbetween), religious, non-religious, old or young, Western, Eastern (or somewhere in the middle), we are all under the same curse... the curse of being human.

Rather than one group blaming the other for the state in which the world is in, why can't we put all our hatred to one side for a change and work together in peace and happiness to solve the world's problems? You know, even though I am a Christian, I sometimes despair at religion, for the tensions it causes, but that's probably also true for those who don't believe in a god. We are all in the same boat. We need to get our acts together, because one day we're going to have work together and put our differences to one side in order to ensure the survival of our race and the rest of the world!

[Xest]

I really doubt that many parents would stand for religous indoctrination and schools that tried would run out of students. Indoctination is not the same as providing some exposure to religion. There is ofc the issue of ensuring choice. In a small out of the way town, there might be only 1 school.

Really wish that was the case, but I've witnessed it first hand when doing 10mbps WAN rollouts to schools in the past, although I'm talking mostly primary, I don't know if it's the same story at secondary. it's not uncommon to see kids forced into religious practices such as prayers before they're allowed to eat their lunch, and also commonly at the end of the day before they're allowed to go home. Also, 30minutes of hymns daily, displays on entering the schools created by the kids saying things such as "Praise our Lord" etc. often classrooms will also be filled with similar displays. Seeing it first hand really is quite disturbing - what happens in our schools funded by religious insititutions is unquestionably indoctrination. I'd argue that in the UK at least it's this indoctrination alone that's the only thing ensuring religions have a viable following amongst the younger population.

About the only saving grace is that it's a legal requirement for religious education (afaik 1hr a week? maybe wrong here on the duration) to be taught, this must include discussion of various different religions, however the problem is it doesn't contain any guidelines on how it's taught, because of this therefore, you get teachers biased towards a particular religion teaching kids that other religions exist, but not that the kids should consider the ideas of these other religions as being equally viable.