this post was submitted on 19 May 2024
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politics

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[–] Phegan@lemmy.world 107 points 11 months ago (3 children)

We are on the path to ruin.

[–] someguy3@lemmy.world 66 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

I know what will help, I will not vote in protest! (/s)

[–] TexasDrunk@lemmy.world 31 points 11 months ago

You could vote for RFK because he's totally got a chance to win and isn't a weirdo conspiracy theorist at all! (Also /s)

[–] ChickenLadyLovesLife@lemmy.world 15 points 11 months ago

We are on the path from ruin to annihilation.

[–] marx2k@lemmy.world 4 points 11 months ago (1 children)

We're on a road to nowhere Come on inside Takin' that ride to nowhere We'll take that ride

[–] nilloc@discuss.tchncs.de 3 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

There is a time and a place for David Byrne and the Talking Heads, but this isn’t it.

Also adding 2 spaces at the end of the line before the new line
Will allow
Proper
Formatting in markdown.

[–] Boddhisatva@lemmy.world 76 points 11 months ago

Welcome to the Republic of Gilead.

[–] gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works 47 points 11 months ago

Yeah and we can all see it, and the fact that precisely zero appellate courts are proactively eviscerating any rulings with that sort of shit attached to it is fucking appalling.

[–] tsonfeir@lemm.ee 44 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I didn’t actually expect the Handmaids Tale to be the successful dystopian future.

[–] Default_Defect@midwest.social 18 points 11 months ago (1 children)

You haven't been paying attention then.

[–] tsonfeir@lemm.ee 7 points 11 months ago (2 children)

I’m glad that made you feel better…

[–] Default_Defect@midwest.social 5 points 11 months ago (1 children)

How is being a snarky bitch working out for you?

[–] tsonfeir@lemm.ee 6 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I learned it by watching you.

[–] Default_Defect@midwest.social 2 points 11 months ago

Fair enough.

[–] Zier@fedia.io 44 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Christianity, the mental illness everyone ignores.

[–] riodoro1@lemmy.world 23 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Religion in general. You need to ignore logic to be religious and that is a dangerous precedent.

[–] pigup@lemmy.world 11 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (2 children)

Worse, you need to literally deny actual reality and instead believe that magic is real. What could possible go wrong?

[–] chemicalprophet@lemm.ee 10 points 11 months ago

It makes me feel crazy that I’m just supposed to accept religion as normal and that naturally it’s protected by law.

[–] Valmond@lemmy.world 4 points 11 months ago

And accept a sort of ruler that decides quite literally everything.

How unsurprising that every narcissist power hungry evil person want's to be in "gods" place.

[–] xhieron@lemmy.world 17 points 11 months ago (4 children)

Eh... this is kind of nothing. Jurists quote religious texts all the time. Judge Ho--the topic of the article--doesn't quote the Bible in a particularly eloquent fashion, but he's far from the first US judge to use a biblical quote to make a point.

And yes, they quote the Quran too--just not as much since not as many of them are familiar with it. Law is a reasoning profession, and people who practice it like finding analogies and drawing distinctions. If they see that a set of facts is like or unlike something from ancient history, they're likely to bring it up. They'll bring up song lyrics, mythology, popular proverbs, ancient legal texts, moral fables--anything with any reasoning or legal thinking in it.

Trump appointees are deserving of criticism for horrible jurisprudence, terrible judgment and insight, and piss-poor qualifications. There are plenty of things to hate about lots of them, but "they quote the Bible sometimes" isn't one.

[–] njm1314@lemmy.world 31 points 11 months ago (1 children)

You say that like the fact that America's long history of religious tyranny isn't a problem. Like yeah I know people in the past have used religion to justify their horrendous and monstrous rulings. Yeah I know the Bible was used to help commit the genocide of the native peoples. Yeah I know the Bible was used to justify slavery. Yeah I know the Bible was used to justify murdering striking workers. Yeah I knew the Bible was used to brutalize and subjugate women. Yeah I know the Bible was used to justify the extermination of the handicapped. Etc.. However, I don't give a fuck about that because the Bible is nonsense written by a bunch of Bronze Age goat fuckers. I don't want it shaping my life in any way whatsoever.

[–] xhieron@lemmy.world 2 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Not what any of this is about, but okay.

[–] njm1314@lemmy.world 13 points 11 months ago

That's exactly what this is about.

[–] gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works 22 points 11 months ago (1 children)

They quote the Bible in the context of a court ruling implicitly backed by the full force of the judicial branch, unless and until a successful appeal is made.

There is no context in which including religious references in US court decisions is acceptable, and that’s specifically because of the Establishment Clause:

The Establishment Clause is a limitation placed upon the United States Congress preventing it from passing legislation establishing an official religion, and by interpretation making it illegal for the government to promote theocracy or promote a specific religion with taxes. The Free Exercise Clause prohibits the government from preventing the free exercise of religion.

Emphasis mine.

[–] clutchtwopointzero@lemmy.world 4 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Is there a similar limitation placed on the judiciary?

[–] gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works 7 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

It’s pretty obvious to anyone with more than a few brain cells that it’s intended to apply broadly to the government in general.

But of course, the “originalists” love selectively interpreting parts of statements to be the the statement in entirety (in the context of the particular issue they’re trying to opine judicially upon). Which directly implies an absurd level of cognitive dissonance, considering how much those very same judges enjoy bitching about “liberal judicial activism”. They’re 100% ok with judicial activism… as long as it’s not liberal.

[–] henfredemars@infosec.pub 21 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

Just because a thing is common doesn’t make it correct, or even harmless. It just makes it common.

Our legal system is not based on religious belief, and it’s a reflection of poor judgment to quote meaningless and legally-irrelevant texts.

Would you respect a judge that quotes Harry Potter in official documents on a regular basis? It’s unprofessional, and it suggests a poor decision-making process which produces the actual harm.

[–] xhieron@lemmy.world 18 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (2 children)

Would you respect a judge that quotes Harry Potter in official documents on a regular basis?

YES! If the judge used the Harry Potter quotes to advance sound legal reasoning, I'd consider it a potentially clever and humorous way to inject some levity into something that's otherwise likely mundane and dry. Also I guarantee you a judge has quoted those books in opinions, along with every other popular piece of literature.

I'm sorry to remind everybody incensed here, but the professionals in the profession get to decide what is and is not professional, and the legal profession has a long history of quoting material that's non-germane. You can be upset about it if you want, but we're fortunate that judges explain their reasoning at all.

Quoting a book you don't like doesn't make a decision bad. A decision is bad if it's wrong on the law, and as I think everybody in this thread knows, the Bible isn't the law of the land! Quoting non-law in order to bolster a line of reasoning isn't good, bad, harmful, or harmless by itself, because the reasoning is the important thing. The Bible has been used to stand for many bad positions--but if it hadn't been, those positions would still have been bad!

While you lot are pulling out your pitchforks because a judge quoted the Bible for the billionth time in the last 200 years, did any of you even bother to find out what the decisions actually were?

[–] henfredemars@infosec.pub 5 points 11 months ago

Good points.

[–] kae@lemmy.ca 3 points 11 months ago

Appreciate the reasoned response. It was my thought in reading the article as well too.

[–] Snapz@lemmy.world 16 points 11 months ago

sneaking, the same way a toddler just closes their eyes during hide-and-seek and they think they are hiding.

[–] Ohi@lemmy.world 9 points 11 months ago

What I find most comical about this situation is just how little Trump actually cares about Christianity, yet his base completely ignores his track record. He'll sell Bibles because it makes him money. He'll do the Christian dance just as much as what is needed to fool his base into thinking that's a part of his moral compass.

Power and money is what drives that man, and everything else is an illusion to gain the first two.

[–] Fedizen@lemmy.world 7 points 11 months ago

Weird how they never quote the beatitudes.

[–] Suavevillain@lemmy.world 6 points 11 months ago

Sneaking is doing some heavy lifting in that title.

[–] goferking0@lemmy.sdf.org 6 points 11 months ago

Only surprised they're being sneaky about adding in Bible passages