Bunny Trails

[JohnH]

“Catholic” is essentially an ethnic identifier, one of the reasons I am unexcited about Catholicism.

[barnhart]

Another article. I know the direction Islam is compelled to take the world, heard it from their own mouths. I do not blame a governor for saying “not in my state will you push this”

https://americarenewing.com/issues/poli ... haria-law/

If there is a great concern about the influence of Sharia law in the US why not start by forcing accountability for the president for his lavish "gifts" in the 10's of millions from Sharia law countries or the 100's of millions from Sharia law countries invested in the real estate companies controlled by the president's family.

[joshuabgood]

Another article. I know the direction Islam is compelled to take the world, heard it from their own mouths. I do not blame a governor for saying “not in my state will you push this”

https://americarenewing.com/issues/poli ... haria-law/

If there is a great concern about the influence of Sharia law in the US why not start by forcing accountability for the president for his lavish "gifts" in the 10's of millions from Sharia law countries or the 100's of millions from Sharia law countries"invested" in the real estate companies controlled by the president's family.

He is part of our tribe. It is ok.

[Valerie]

Another article. I know the direction Islam is compelled to take the world, heard it from their own mouths. I do not blame a governor for saying “not in my state will you push this”

https://americarenewing.com/issues/poli ... haria-law/

If there is a great concern about the influence of Sharia law in the US why not start by forcing accountability for the president for his lavish "gifts" in the 10's of millions from Sharia law countries or the 100's of millions from Sharia law countries"invested" in the real estate companies controlled by the president's family.

He is part of our tribe. It is ok.

I don’t have an answer for that -I don’t know enough about that, that is THEIR religion. Just a part of THEIR religious laws that should not have courts here allowing it. In some areas it is happening which FL government had the foresight to nip it in the bud.

[ken_sylvania]

If there is a great concern about the influence of Sharia law in the US why not start by forcing accountability for the president for his lavish "gifts" in the 10's of millions from Sharia law countries or the 100's of millions from Sharia law countries"invested" in the real estate companies controlled by the president's family.

He is part of our tribe. It is ok.

I don’t have an answer for that -I don’t know enough about that, that is THEIR religion. Just a part of THEIR religious laws that should not have courts here allowing it. In some areas it is happening which FL government had the foresight to nip it in the bud.

If you don't know enough about it, then how can you be so certain that courts in the US should not allow people to choose to use Sharia law to settle disputes if they should so wish?

[Valerie]

He is part of our tribe. It is ok.

I don’t have an answer for that -I don’t know enough about that, that is THEIR religion. Just a part of THEIR religious laws that should not have courts here allowing it. In some areas it is happening which FL government had the foresight to nip it in the bud.

If you don't know enough about it, then how can you be so certain that courts in the US should not allow people to choose to use Sharia law to settle disputes if they should so wish?

I meant about Trump receiving gifts from countries with Sharia law, not about Sharia law.

[temporal1]

I don’t have an answer for that -I don’t know enough about that, that is THEIR religion. Just a part of THEIR religious laws that should not have courts here allowing it. In some areas it is happening which FL government had the foresight to nip it in the bud.

If you don't know enough about it, then how can you be so certain that courts in the US should not allow people to choose to use Sharia law to settle disputes if they should so wish?

I meant about Trump receiving gifts from countries with Sharia law, not about Sharia law.

As well, when presidents accept gifts for-the-U.S., that’s a different matter, too. Sharia or not.
Hasn’t this been done routinely in U.S. history? Without raising eyebrows?

[temporal1]

P.197 / i wrote:
In all these years since i became disillusioned with the Lutheran church*, the one church i was most interested in was Robert’s in Topeka, IN. i searched a bit to learn about Topeka, i thought it would be a good fit, and i wish were in Indiana, anyway. Many in Illinois have moved to Indiana, and several Illinois counties really want to merge with Indiana (unfortunately, not mine).

Also, appleman’s fellowship / church.
There was some discussion about which churches were growing, esp wrt NMB, there were several members who described vibrant conservative groups with NMB. Encouraging, interesting, welcoming. Canada would be a harder decision. Even years ago.

RZehr was involved in church planting, unfortunately, a tech glitch lost his posts. That was sad to lose those posts.
GaryK shared about his church plant, too.

- - - - - - -

*Lutheran church. should clarify, our experience was with ELCA.
Lutherans have other synods i’ve read about, but not visited. Not all are ELCA.
Our pastor in ELCA was special. He tried very hard to prevent many problems. (Maybe like Robert?)
We didn’t grasp the extent of what was going on until moving to another ELCA church ..

[JohnH]

Being self sufficient with one’s own military, nuclear arsenal and so on is a big undertaking. The Kim family in Korea is the only one I can think of that has achieved it.

[ken_sylvania]

I feel like you don’t like any pushback against certain opinions you hold, and feel frustrated when someone else comes in with solid facts and evidence. That’s not “telling imaginary stories”.

Likewise, quoting someone isn’t “putting words in their mouth”.

I agree, in both cases, especially when you quote someone with enough context that it's clear what they meant, asking questions of clarification if you aren't sure what they meant. These are both constructive things to do. And I don't think I object to posts that do these things - if I do, please point it out at the time.

It does mean that your view can’t predominant simply because you are good at rhetoric and at writing seemingly well reasoned arguments for things. On this particular topic, I’ve simply asked if people held Jimmy Carter’s statue to the same standard as this one, and there isn’t even any engagement on that topic. The topic is simply another “orange man bad” from people who don’t like a certain President, and then it’s agreement with me from people who do like a certain President.

I should add:

3. Defending your posts as reasonable and constructive in response to three people raising concerns about them, without addressing the concerns at all.

I disagree with your description of your posts - I don't think that's a fair description of what you did in that thread.

1. Tell stories, real or imagined, about what is wrong with the person who expresses a view, and insisting on making the topic about your accusations, not the topic.

That's what your first posts in the thread did. "Let's not discuss the topic, let's focus on accusing people who disagree with my view on the topic". Without any real discussion of the topic at all.

• https://forum.mennonet.com/viewtopic.ph ... 93#p304493
• https://forum.mennonet.com/viewtopic.ph ... 98#p304498
• https://forum.mennonet.com/viewtopic.ph ... 04#p304504

This one starts to discuss the actual topic somewhat, in response to a thoughtful post from QuietlyListening. Then back to personal attacks against people who disagree with you:

https://forum.mennonet.com/viewtopic.ph ... 25#p304525

At this point, I had not posted anything. But most of the above posts seem toxic to me. They do not focus attention on the topic, they draw attention away to personal attacks of various kinds, or claims that people like you are the good people, or whatever. To me, that is hijacking a thread, making it hard to discuss the topic of the thread or to let others express themselves safely.

2. Put words into someone else's mouth, as though they had said it, mocking them for saying or something that you wrote, and insisting on discussing that instead of what they actually did say.

There are some really good examples of this at the end of the thread:

• https://forum.mennonet.com/viewtopic.ph ... 91#p304791
• https://forum.mennonet.com/viewtopic.ph ... 94#p304794

Also, "orange man bad" and "TDR" are clearly examples of this. It implies that the other person is less than rational, less than human, unable to think for themselves. And it rather implies that criticism of "He Who Must Not Be Criticized" should be treated differently than criticism of anyone else. Political sacred cows.

Instead of responding to what the other person actually said. Or clearly expressing your own view, as your own view, without barbs. You can always just not answer a question, or ask me to express my own views about something I said without putting words in my mouth, or express your own views.

That's what I normally think of as discussion.

Ya know, if I did this in one of your threads you would complain about how I'm derailing the conversation and preventing discussion. I guess if it's someone else's thread it's OK behavior?