Right. Their cause is making sure no one in the military is free to express religion, outside of a designated chapel.
John Derbyshire noticed this trend in deceptive names for radical policy organizations way back in 2003.
The Santorum business brought to the fore an outfit called "The Human Rights Campaign." You would never know from its name that this is a homosexualist lobbying organization. I have no problem with HRC's existence — homosexuals have as much right to organize and lobby as the rest of us — but I do have a problem with that name — viz., it's dishonest. The name of an organization ought to give some clue as to what the organization is for. Why don't they call themselves "The Homosexual Rights Campaign," or "The Campaign for Tolerance of Alternative Sexuality," or something like that? If they want to be a little more in-your-face, they could go for something with a defiant or humorous twist: "The Sodomite Sodality," perhaps. Don't they understand that this straining at bland respectability just makes them look shifty?Of course, in the ensuing twelve years, the Human Rights Campaign went on to win everything their hearts desired -- while John Derbyshire was exiled to the outer darkness, precisely for being direct and honest about his more radical views.
Readers, I have decided to launch a movement for the legalization of dog meat as a marketable foodstuff. My movement will be named: "The Campaign for Truth, Justice, Harmony and Peace." Everyone OK with that?
Yep.
ReplyDeleteLet me tell ya, when the "Peace and Justice Act of 2016" comes out, I'm reflexively against it unless I have very good reasons otherwise. No one chooses names like that for causes that can stand on their own.
From the link:
ReplyDelete"Themis is untranslatable. A gift of the gods and a mark of civilized existence, sometimes it means right custom, proper procedure, social order, and sometimes merely the will of the gods (as revealed by an omen, for example) with little of the idea of right."
I did not know that "Themis" means "due process." This fits with something I learned as a kid.
The patron saint of the USA is the Blessed Virgin Mary in her role as the Divine Advocate. I always got a kick out of that: Mother Mary is the patron saint of the US and lawyers.
Valerie
"Military Religious Freedom Foundation". Here's a hint. Freedom has absolutely nothing to do with telling someone else what they cannot do. Period. Freedom is about not being told what to do. Absolute freedom is no virtue (as under absolute freedom, we could murder, rape, and pillage to our satisfaction, without consequence... and be murdered, raped, or pillaged with no consequence; it's hardly a desirable state of living). But to claim that they want "religious freedom" but mean they want to make everyone else shut up and hide their religion is repugnant.
ReplyDeleteAnd also, AVI is totally correct. The louder someone screams about their virtue, the less likely it is that they actually possess it. After all, what do countries with "Democratic" or "People's" in their nation's names all have in common? The answer is, obviously, that they're oppressive dictatorships. See North Korea, East Germany, China, Laos, etc. Where you really need to be afraid is when you see them start piling them on (the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria, for example).
https://petervojtek.github.io/diy/2015/05/19/countries-with-democracy-in-name.html
Democrats for Patriotism and Justice law coming into effect soon. Get ready for it.
ReplyDeleteSJWs all around.