Could the 71% of Americans who claim they're willing to die for their God or beliefs please just go and do it, quietly in the corner?
ooof. unfair there.
What's this or beliefs bit? I want to know what questions they asked. I'd likely be willing to die for my belief that, for instance, my family should be left unmolested. That doesn't make me a religious zealot.
I was assuming "or beliefs" should have said "or nontheistic religious beliefs", and that's the spirit in which I made the comment.
From being prepared to die for one's faith, to seeing virtue in that preparedness, to seeing virtue in dying for one's faith, to advocating dying for one's faith, is a series of pretty small and insidious steps. That kind of extremism shouldn't be condoned or encouraged; the next small step is suicide bombings.
Hence, if people are interested in the idea of dying for their faith, I really would like them to just go and do it without harming anyone else by indoctrinating them into the same belief or by persecuting them for a contrary one.
I'm only a little more happy about willingness to die for non-religious ideals. Yes, there are things I might, perhaps, in extremis, give my life for, but I'd scarcely be willing. Sacrificing one's own life should be a measure reserved for desperation, not something to be flaunted as part of one's ideology.
I took this question to mean "if someone said to you 'recant or die', would you take the 'die' option?". For me the answer is yes (mostly because I'm stubborn, and no one is going to threaten me into saying anything I don't believe), but I wouldn't be prepared to kill anyone else for my beliefs, meaning I would have answered yes to this question, but would never be a suicide bomber.
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(no subject)
Date: 2004-02-26 03:12 am (UTC)ooof. unfair there.
What's this or beliefs bit? I want to know what questions they asked. I'd likely be willing to die for my belief that, for instance, my family should be left unmolested. That doesn't make me a religious zealot.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-02-26 04:34 am (UTC)From being prepared to die for one's faith, to seeing virtue in that preparedness, to seeing virtue in dying for one's faith, to advocating dying for one's faith, is a series of pretty small and insidious steps. That kind of extremism shouldn't be condoned or encouraged; the next small step is suicide bombings.
Hence, if people are interested in the idea of dying for their faith, I really would like them to just go and do it without harming anyone else by indoctrinating them into the same belief or by persecuting them for a contrary one.
I'm only a little more happy about willingness to die for non-religious ideals. Yes, there are things I might, perhaps, in extremis, give my life for, but I'd scarcely be willing. Sacrificing one's own life should be a measure reserved for desperation, not something to be flaunted as part of one's ideology.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-02-26 06:21 pm (UTC)