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Spam is evil, spam is bad, SPAM is tasty with honey-dijon sauce, and sometimes, spam is very eye-opening.
This spam that I received today is an advert for an inspirational video about George W. Bush, Man of Faith. They pitch W.'s reliance on religion, which I regard as one of the most troubling aspects of his presidency, as a trait to be emulated, and offer him up as a model of faith. This points to an alarming trend in American Politics toward returning to puritan-style theocracy and discarding such artifacts of the enlightenment as the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
( The e-mail is behind this cut so as not to clutter your friends lists. )
We would do well to remember: Afghanistan was a largely secular society prior to the rise of the Taliban and its implementation of Sharia law. Likewise, Iran was a very secular society prior to the 1979 revolution. We must not make the mistake of imagining that that kind of extremism is the exclusive province of Islam. All faiths are capable of engendering a dangerous provincialism if unchecked by a secular society. We must take note of the erosion of those checks in our own society, and oppose it at every turn if we do not wish to go that way ourselves.
This spam that I received today is an advert for an inspirational video about George W. Bush, Man of Faith. They pitch W.'s reliance on religion, which I regard as one of the most troubling aspects of his presidency, as a trait to be emulated, and offer him up as a model of faith. This points to an alarming trend in American Politics toward returning to puritan-style theocracy and discarding such artifacts of the enlightenment as the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
( The e-mail is behind this cut so as not to clutter your friends lists. )
We would do well to remember: Afghanistan was a largely secular society prior to the rise of the Taliban and its implementation of Sharia law. Likewise, Iran was a very secular society prior to the 1979 revolution. We must not make the mistake of imagining that that kind of extremism is the exclusive province of Islam. All faiths are capable of engendering a dangerous provincialism if unchecked by a secular society. We must take note of the erosion of those checks in our own society, and oppose it at every turn if we do not wish to go that way ourselves.
