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Would Jesus be a Liberal?

Which of these political leans would Jesus be?

  • Liberal

    Votes: 40 44.0%
  • Conservative

    Votes: 12 13.2%
  • Moderate

    Votes: 7 7.7%
  • Potato

    Votes: 32 35.2%

  • Total voters
    91
I have a question on this subject. A lot of conservatives will hear the "go out and feed the poor" commands from Jesus and talk about it being voluntary, as opposed to done with government. What is the moral difference between writing a check yourself and voting in favor of instituting a program to deal with the problem? You're still making the choice to make it happen. Your voluntariness is tested at the ballot and the voting booth. The point of the command wasn't ensuring that you have the choice whether to help or not. It's telling you to get off your butt and do it. So, isn't this whole voluntariness discussion about fighting for the right not to help people? Do what Jesus would have done. Vote to help the poor, even at some expense to yourself.
I think the difference is that when one votes, one is not voting on one's own behavior. One votes in order to coerce others. Thus one is voting to take away another's freedom, after which his aid to the poor is not voluntary, but occurs with tax money extracted from him against his will. That's the big difference I see.
 
Precisely. Liberals demand that others help the poor. Conservatives just go out and do it.
 
Precisely. Liberals demand that others help the poor. Conservatives just go out and do it.
They're all about using violence to make people behave as they wish. And the ironic thing is that these violent interventionists see themselves as more civilized as those who refuse to initiate violence against their fellow man. The cognitive dissonance is simply shocking.
 
I have a question on this subject. A lot of conservatives will hear the "go out and feed the poor" commands from Jesus and talk about it being voluntary, as opposed to done with government. What is the moral difference between writing a check yourself and voting in favor of instituting a program to deal with the problem? You're still making the choice to make it happen. Your voluntariness is tested at the ballot and the voting booth. The point of the command wasn't ensuring that you have the choice whether to help or not. It's telling you to get off your butt and do it. So, isn't this whole voluntariness discussion about fighting for the right not to help people? Do what Jesus would have done. Vote to help the poor, even at some expense to yourself.

He did not teach to extort money from others to give to the poor. He wanted us to give freely from our hearts.

In 2006, independently-registered researcher and author Arthur Brooks tackled the issue of political ideology as it pertains to giving. According to a 2006 ABC News piece by John Stossel and Kristina Kendall, Brooks’ research has shown that conservatives donate about 30 percent more than do liberals. Interestingly, on average, conservatives earn less than liberals.

Brooks also claims that financial donations aren’t the only difference at hand. When it comes to an issue as random as blood donations, conservatives are about 17 percent more likely than their liberal counterparts to donate blood! But, that’s not all. In 2008, George Will covered some of Brooks’ other findings. As it turns out, in 2004, George W. Bush carried 24 out of 25 of the states in which charitable giving exceeded the national average. According to Will,

“In the 10 reddest states, in which Bush got more than 60 percent majorities, the average percentage of personal income donated to charity was 3.5. Residents of the bluest states, which gave Bush less than 40 percent, donated just 1.9 percent.”


Read more: Surprise! Conservatives are more generous than liberals | The Daily Caller

It looks like conservatives get it.
 
I think the difference is that when one votes, one is not voting on one's own behavior. One votes in order to coerce others. Thus one is voting to take away another's freedom, after which his aid to the poor is not voluntary, but occurs with tax money extracted from him against his will. That's the big difference I see.

And yet if we all (or even just a fairly large majority) voted that way, no one would be forced to do anything. Everyone would be voluntarily supporting programs that will actually accomplish meaningful change for the poor, as opposed to the many private charities that don't. Most of the money a charity takes in just goes to overhead. Split that among the many many such charities, and very little of that money actually goes to help anyone in need.

Precisely. Liberals demand that others help the poor. Conservatives just go out and do it.

No, we say that everyone should. Ourselves included. And no one goes out and does it. Otherwise poverty would be gone, or at least abating, instead of getting worse. Conservatives are going to great lengths to avoid doing it.

He did not teach to extort money from others to give to the poor. He wanted us to give freely from our hearts.

So then why aren't you? Why aren't you doing everything you can to convince everyone you can to give as much as is necessary to raise everyone out of poverty? That would be along the lines of what Jesus actually told you to do.
 
So then why aren't you? Why aren't you doing everything you can to convince everyone you can to give as much as is necessary to raise everyone out of poverty? That would be along the lines of what Jesus actually told you to do.

When did this thread become about me? How do you know what I am or am not doing? I doubt you have ESP correct? Tell me what I am thinking now? Hehehehe.

Jesus told us to preach, not brow beat people into submission. We cannot reasonably raise everyone out of poverty, can't be done. We each do what we can. Your reply however has nothing to do with what you asked or my reply and is nothing more than an angry rant.

According to the study it shows self identified conservatives are not just a little, but allot more giving privately and voluntarily. That is what our father preached, not extortion or government redistribution of wealth.
 
He wouldn't be anything. He was a fictional, not a historical, character.
 
He wouldn't be anything. He was a fictional, not a historical, character.

How do you know? His name was pretty popular back then. So please fill us in on how you went back into biblical times and saw that a man written about many, many times and was so influential still affects us to this day did not exist? Now he may not have been God or godlike, but that does not mean he did not exist or is fictional at all.

So lets see the proof? Or are you just making **** up?
 
And yet if we all (or even just a fairly large majority) voted that way, no one would be forced to do anything.
You are correct. If the vote were somehow unanimous, then nobody would be forced to do anything.

If however, the vote is not unanimous (much more likely), the minority are forced to comply with the wishes of the majority.
 
How do you know? His name was pretty popular back then. So please fill us in on how you went back into biblical times and saw that a man written about many, many times and was so influential still affects us to this day did not exist? Now he may not have been God or godlike, but that does not mean he did not exist or is fictional at all.

So lets see the proof? Or are you just making **** up?

That's about like: Many people wrote and talked about a boy named Harry Potter. Let's see some proof he does not exist.
 
I've met Jesus.
how many people have met Harry Potter?
 
Yeah, sure.

Sure indeed.




Look, it's a debate for the Religion or History forums, perhaps, but the actual historical evidence for the general accuracy of the NT texts is pretty thorough.
 
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That's about like: Many people wrote and talked about a boy named Harry Potter. Let's see some proof he does not exist.

Harry Potter is not an historical figure and is a known work of fiction. The same cannot be said about Jesus. Even critics like John Remsburg and Richard Dawkins agree the odds are Jesus did exist, even though they see the Gospels as no more historical than any other myth.

We also have evidence from none Christian sources...

Nero fastened the guilt . . . on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of . . . Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome. - Emperor Nero's decision to blame the Christians for the fire that had destroyed Rome in A.D. 64, the Roman historian Tacitus

So As soon as you can point out the same or similar for Harry Potter, you will have a point.
 
Look, it's a debate for the Religion or History forums, perhaps, but the actual historical evidence for the general accuracy of the NT texts is pretty thorough.

Many people existed in the past. As normal humans. There very well may have been a scam artist in the past that passed himself off as 'son of god'. In modern times people would see such a person as the nut job their are.
 
interesting. so it is an a priori argument for you on this that everyone who disagrees with you is insane?
 
interesting. so it is an a priori argument for you on this that everyone who disagrees with you is insane?

Huh? People are allowed to believe in fantasy. A belief in such does not make them insane. If you re-read my post you will see I said that anyone in modern times that would come forward and announce himself the son of god, would be found by most people, to be a nutcase.

There is no less scientific fact that zombies may rise up and attack us than there is that there is a god or that jesus was his son.
 
Just looked at the poll results. I can't believe the landslide.

Who had more rules than Jesus??
 
Huh? People are allowed to believe in fantasy. A belief in such does not make them insane. If you re-read my post you will see I said that anyone in modern times that would come forward and announce himself the son of god, would be found by most people, to be a nutcase.

true. until, of course, he proceeded to produce unexplainable miracles capped by rising from the dead and then continuing to interact with people for two millenia. millions of Christians alive today claim to have interacted with the Risen Christ - are we all insane?
 
Just looked at the poll results. I can't believe the landslide.

Who had more rules than Jesus??

it's because you are misreading who votes. Liberals tend to think that Jesus was a liberal, and Conservatives tend to think that Jesus wouldn't fit inside of a 20th century western culture political ideology. add in "potato" to the other end of the ledger ;).
 
true. until, of course, he proceeded to produce unexplainable miracles capped by rising from the dead and then continuing to interact with people for two millenia. millions of Christians alive today claim to have interacted with the Risen Christ - are we all insane?

Him having existed as an actual person is one thing. Him having produced 'miracles' is a different one.

Perhaps it would have been best if I never commented. Sometimes I forget how the 'faithful' can not be reasoned with WRT religion. That's what happens when the brainwashing starts in childhood.
 
Him having existed as an actual person is one thing. Him having produced 'miracles' is a different one.

Perhaps it would have been best if I never commented. Sometimes I forget how the 'faithful' can not be reasoned with WRT religion. That's what happens when the brainwashing starts in childhood.

Yea that's why you ignored my response, because I was brainwashed. :roll:
 
Him having existed as an actual person is one thing. Him having produced 'miracles' is a different one.

Perhaps it would have been best if I never commented. Sometimes I forget how the 'faithful' can not be reasoned with WRT religion. That's what happens when the brainwashing starts in childhood.

:lamo so people raised in Christianity are brainwashed, and only adult converts are insane. :mrgreen: got it.
 
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