Controversial Issues

[Queen Rachel]

While making a vague attempt to follow the US 2008 Presidential Election, I started thinking about controversial issues that often appear in legislation.
I am curious to know what our citizens' opinions are on some of these key matters. Here is the place to express and argue (civilly, of course) your opinions.

Issues:
Government/Religion
Illegal immigration
Euthanasia/assisted suicide/suicide in general
Sexual Orientation
Trans sexuality
Marijuana
Global Warming
Animal Welfare
Global warming and pollution
Prostitution
Health care
Polygamy
Death Penalty


Feel free to add to this list. These are just meant to be seeds of inspiration.

(Moved, because I'm dopey when I'm sick.)

[Derek Nahigyan]

Government/Religion
Ever since 1984 by George Orwell, I've felt the two are directly linked. I'm not saying they "most definitely" are but this is what I feel: There's a group called the thought police who supposably have the ability to read your thoughts, therefore, anyone who wishes to overthrow the government will be arrested and persecuted for thinking such things. They can't actually read your minds of course, but they say they can, and publish newspapers saying that "So and So" was arrested by the thought police. The purpose of the thought police is to get the citizens to obey the laws even when the government can't be watching them, which--again, to me--is not unlike commandments and such. Commandments and Laws merge together very often. There's also "Big Brother" who isn't real but is, again, supposably watching you at all times--G-D.
Anyway, I believe the two are conjoined twins, so I don't think separation will happen anytime soon.

Illegal immigration
It'll happen anyway, I don't think there's a way to stop it. I don't think they should get health care.

Euthanasia/assisted suicide/suicide in general
Suicide, although selfish, I believe isn't such a bad thing, around the world in general. Especially in today's society, many peoples parents are very demanding, as well as their teachers, friends, yadda, yadda, yadda. The amount of pressure placed on children is enormous and they learn--rather quickly--that they have the capacity to make it stop. Suicide is a relief of pressure, no need to worry about becoming famous, millionaire tycoon, world ending-kind of person; by killing yourself you can alleviate all the worries and be free--especially if you believe in an afterlife or reincarnation. I do believe there are those that do it for attention, such as cutting yourself or jumping from a building. If you leap off a bridge then the news media will be sure to pick it up, but if your life is so horrible that you need to kill yourself then I doubt the last thing you want to see is yourself failing.
"The greatest thing about suicide is that when you fall, you don't have to land."-Olivera Travels

Sexual Orientation
I'm a huge advocate of gay rights. I think they should be able to get married, why? Because it doesn't affect you. I know there's some economic issues involved but people are people, some will try to scam to gain extra cash or pay less, it happens everyday. As for the G-D not wanting homosexuals, there's a gay penguin couple at the San Diego zoo, clearly, it's not just humans, clearly, it's nature.

Trans sexuality
I don't know enough about this.

Marijuana
They should legalize it already, they're half-way there. THC is in a lot of medications, especially for Kimo patients to help raise their appetite. They've also made Marijuana vending machines in LA so that people can get their medication--all they have to do is swipe a card. www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22910820/ that's the article.

Global Warming
Find a way to slow it down. Barack Obama and John McCain support Cap and Trade, although I think a carbon tax would be really good. It'd motivate people to search for alternative fuels.

Animal Welfare
Animals need rights and crush films need to stop. Also, that tiger that was killed in the San Francisco zoo a month ago, I thought was entirely inappropriate, kids were more than likely doing something to taunt it.

Global warming and pollution
Cap and Trade or Carbon tax.

Prostitution
I watched that news report about... was it a city, where they legalized it. And they had the women get checked as well as the men and they make sure the sex is safe and, I don't know, it seemed pretty effective and safe, it doesn't really affect me though, I don't know what to say.

Health care
I don't know enough.

Polygamy
I don't know enough.

Death Penalty
It's just not right; I don't support it; I am against it.

[Nesslandria Haneh]

Government/Religion
As long as the government stays out of religion, I'm happy. That's the whole reason churches don't pay taxes.

Illegal immigration
There are plenty of people that wait and go through the process of immigrating legally. I know it isn't practical to 'kick them all out,' but it certainly isn't fair for them to be here and not paying taxes. Again, it's kinda hard to deny them health care, because they can go to an emergency room, but it's eating up our tax money and driving up our health care costs. We need to find all the illegal immigrants and either kick them out or get them registered and impose some sort of penalty. They're breaking the law. If we don't enforce the law, no one will follow it. Why wait a year or however long to enter legally when you can sneak in? I'd rather have skilled workers immigrating over than the masses of unskilled labor. Give those jobs to our high school or college students. We have enough unskilled workers that were born here without bringing in new ones. I don't buy this 'they do the jobs Americans won't' crap. I would have taken any job I could have gotten in high school. There are Americans that will do those jobs.

Euthanasia/assisted suicide/suicide in general
Without doing any research into these, I'd say they're wrong. If a society promotes suicide, they're something wrong with that society. For the people that have legitimate mental conditions, we need to get them counseling. For the rest of us who are depressed and want attention, maybe we should work on improving our condition in life. Do we really need attention that badly that we'd harm ourselves? They're unhealthy thoughts. My thoughts on suicide branch out to assisted suicide. On the base level, I'd have to say that euthenasia is wrong, but I'd have to look more into it.

Sexual Orientation
Don't push your sexuality on me and I won't push mine on yours. If you can't get married through a church, don't say the church is wrong. It's their beliefs and they can do what they want.

Marijuana
Marijuana impairs your judgement and messes with the chemical signals in your brain. If it is ever to become legal, distribution is going to need to be controlled. Just as there is an age limit to drinking alcohol, maybe there should be an age limit for marijuana.

Global Warming
For love of all that is holy, no more taxes! Taxes are not going to fix the problem, if it even exists! There is not a consensus in the scientific community that global warming even exists, nor that humans have created the problem. Even if it is occuring, most of the ideas presented to 'correct' global warming don't even make a splash in the bucket. It's natural for the earth to go through warming and cooling cycles. Instead of punishing by imposing taxes, why not encourage by providing incentives? I don't want to be taxed and punished for something I can't help and am not even doing!

Prostitution
Society shouldn't encourage prostitution, therefore it should not be legal. I know that some may see this as me forcing my 'morals' on other people, but a society without morals will not last long. It's not mentally or physically healthy for the people working as prostitutes.

Health care
No nationalized health care, please. I don't need the government treating me like a child who can't make my own decisions. If the government could iron out the budget and incorporate a national health care plan without more taxes, then let's talk about it. But any national health plan should not restrict which doctor you can go to.

Polygamy
My morals and religion dictate one man marries one woman.

Death Penalty
I'm generally opposed to the death penalty, but I believe that it should be available for heinous crimes.

[Rook]

Gov. / Religion

Before you read the rest of what I have to say, know this: religion should never be government.

As much as I believe there should be no religion in government there are some realities one has to recognize. One, if public opinion has any influence in how government is formed religion is going to have its hand in how the government is formed because religion, like any creed, code or other method of conducting your life, shapes how people think. Sure there’s a difference between someone saying “X should be illegal because God says so!” and “X should be illegal because I think it’s wrong.” The first would be considered a religious zealot and biased. But 80% the time the second person’s perception of why things are wrong are because of religion. So how do you remove religion from government? You, sadly, cannot. The closet you can get is to remove religious figures from government positions, no Reverends or Rabbis running for office and strip the religious significance from public items. Christmas break is now called Winter Break in school. Does that change the fact that it always falls over Christmas? No, but at least now that’s not what the purpose of it specifically is. But in the end there really is no way to separate religion and government. Non-Christians might be offended by obviously religious mandates in American law, but in other countries where the dominant religion is not Christian there are different mandates involving those dominant religions. Until the dominant religion of America is anything but Christian, whether it is called Christmas Break or Winter Break, no one will go to school Christmas day. Is that because of religion? Yes. But no matter how offensive that might be to other religious individuals it doesn’t change that it’s also public opinion that the 25th of December should be a holiday.

So there are two methods after one accepts the above to be true. Either you can ignore religion completely and disguise all popular religious legislation, sentiment, etc. (taking into account that all cogs and wheels of the government machine are relatively moderate members of their particular faith) with generic terms. Example: if the dominant religion is Pastafarianism and the public wants July 17th, the day the Flying Spaghetti Monster created the world, to be a national holiday they would give it a generic bank holiday type name, like ‘I Need a Break Day’ so that all the Pastafarians can have their Spaghedeity’s day off and no one shouts about religious holidays.

The other method is acknowledging all religions, but considering the sheer number, and sometimes questionable validity, and some of the constant wars they have with other religions it is hardly a feasible option. Personally I think the first method is the easiest for keeping the peace. In the first example, if public religion eventually changes from Pastafarianism to Taoism ‘INB Day’ can be then changed to a Taoist holiday that makes the new majority happier.

Does it universally solve everyone problems? No, but that’s an impossible task. When there’s a majority’s vote, there will always be the minority who feels imposed upon. There will always be the guy in the corner who works on his holiday and is bitter about it. It’s an unfortunate side effect of individuality.

-

I will post on the others later. I wrote more than I expected.

[Mira O'Halloran]

Government/Religion
Should never EVER have anything to do with the other. There is so much evil done because of the government and church being intertwined

Illegal immigration
That depends. For the main part, I'm of the opinion no, unless they go through stringent processing - knowing the local language, culture, basic history, etc.

Euthanasia/assisted suicide/suicide in general
Suicide is a big no no to me. There are exceptions. You put a pet down when they're too sick to recover, when they're too old and can't look after themselves, or when they're dying from something and are in a great deal of pain. I think the same should apply to people. But again, stringent processing

Sexual Orientation
Who cares!! As long as no one decides to get pushy.

Trans sexuality
I don't know anything about this subject.

Marijuana
Should be legalized already. It's because it’s illegal that anyone cares. I use it for medicinal purposes when needed as a last ditch attempt to deal with whatever I have (like Pharyngitis, flu, Gastroenteritis)

Global Warming
I honestly don't know. Make people do more environmentally sound things, and remove all off road vehicles from suburbia. Unless you need it for your farm or job, you don't need an off road vehicle!!!

Animal Welfare
This is the one subject that has me up in arms the most. Particularly since I rescued the newest addition to the household from becoming shark bait... There need to be much stricter animal cruelty laws. And all pets should be registered, including puppies and kitties at 8 weeks. But that’s the tip of the iceberg.

Pollution
Reduce, reuse, recycle much? Their needs to be more education about this and more company's need to be recycle friendly with their packaging.

Prostitution
To be honest, as long as everyone gets a health check every year, takes every precaution available, its not so much an issue. Again, it’s only an issue because the church is up in arms over the procreation thing, and most governments draw from the church as most politicians full into the mainstream religion groups.

Health care
Needs an upgrade...

Polygamy
No. I find it too emotionally destructive and creates underlying resentment towards a particular sex.

Death Penalty
In a way yes, in a way no. Repeat offenders of severe violent crimes perhaps maybe yes.

Edited by the King to comply with the Law of Literacy.

[Rook]

Illegal Immigration: In one word - unacceptable. But that is not the greatest crime. The reasons for immigrant workers to be here, and the reasons against, can be argued until ears bleed. The true crime, the reprehensible action, the true source of the illegal immigration question is allowing it to happen and feeding entitlement. As with my opinions on government vs. religion, you will never get 100% of the people to follow the rules. You will always have those who haven't the patience, money, inclination or intelligence to follow the rules and get into the country using the established system. The crime is not the immigrants, its the indigenous Americans who are allowing the immigrants to gain such power. I realize how firm that comment was. What irritates me about illegal immigration is not that they are coming, let them come or not, it's that we are facilitating their entitlement to special treatment. If I were to move to Germany, I would learn German. Even though English is spoken in Germany I know that the major language is German. But immigrants from Mexico who don't know English don't have to learn it in America. Signs and products are written with Spanish translation, employees are encouraged to learn Spanish to interact with their clientelle. We give them every tool they need not to assimilate well into society. That and they exploit human decency. They know that no hospital is going to turn them away if they are injured. That's wrong and they know it. They don't care if they are a drain on the system because they send their money to Mexico anyway. There is no reason to spend time and money to inconvenience yourself by following the rules when it's easier to break them and there is no retribution. That's what infuriates me about the illegal immigration issue. It's not the government that's helping them resist American culture, it's not the strapped law enforcement, it's the public. The harder establishments are against illegal immigrants the worse they are represented by the media and the worse public opinion is of them. Sometimes I get the feeling it's wrong to feel the way I do about illegal immigrants, and it's that kind of weak willed thinking that's being brainwashed into us that is causing this mess to begin with. If they knew they couldn't survive without speaking English in America they would learn English or stay home. If they knew there would be no cure for their ill unless they paid they would either take the risk, or stay home. It's as simple as that. They come because we make it easy for them to.

[Queen Rachel]

I agree on Ari's opinion of illegal immigration here, with the exception that I don't blame society over government for facilitating it. The laws are not enforced, and though there is the pressure of the public opinion not to enforce them, they need to be enforced. Someone will always disagree. The government has allowed these people to muck up the system to no end. Not cool.

[Rook]

Bump

[Mira O'Halloran]

It's been a couple of years since I last discussed the issue of illegal immigrants, and my stance has changed. Yes, it has a lot to do with the fact that Australias current Labor/Greens government has reduced border control to mere words on paper in the book of Australian Law, overturning the previous Liberal Governments stringent border control and strict policies on illegals.
Personally, I feel that if there is a boat load of illegals coming, it's tresspassing and the military should do what they're supposed to be doing: blowing the boat to smithereens and letting any survivors drown. I am sick to death of the Labor/Greens governments soft coddling response to illegals, and more so, the jumping to every demand that happens when they start burning down the very buildings that were constructed to give them protection from the rain and wind.

[noel]

Government/Religion
Where should I start? Maybe I should start by echoing Ari and say that people will be influenced by their religion. Or maybe I should start with how religion should not be a part of government. But then, a majority of people believe that the majority should rule and there should be equality? I don't know. I do know this. I find most religion's messages to be contradictory, their history to be full of holes and their purpose superfluous in the role of government.

As Ari and I have discussed often, churches should be the place for "handouts." I don't agree with that mostly because of personal convictions but I don't think church's need to be free from taxes. It's deplorable that people hand out money to the church, and the church utilizes it for whatever message they want. If they are going to sit on the soil, if they are going to utilize utilities, they should be under the same burden as everyone else. Of course, this is assuming people are going to be treated equally regardless of their religious followings.


Illegal immigration
I'm torn. On one hand I see that this country has a lot to offer and I personally would not pick my own corn, lay my own roof or mow my own lawn given the chance. I say they fulfill a needed sector of society, one that I am not willing to fulfill myself. It's my stance on the military as well. Call it laziness, call it entitlement, call it whatever, I think they are useful. To put it more...bluntly, Mexicans are the new Negro. The social majority don't like them but they are extremely useful.

On the other hand I understand where Ari is coming from. They do drain the resources of hospitals. But I also disagree on his points of language. That fact that people who sell things want their products sold to a sector of society means they will put whatever language they have to on the packaging. If they make money then who cares right? It would seem that passing legislation against this bilingual assimilation culture only reveals the racism that lurks just beyond the thin veil of civility. Personally I would love for this kind of legislation to come to the forefront as it would help people realize their own hypocritical nature. Equality for all, except these people.


Euthanasia/assisted suicide/suicide in general
I don't know why this is even an issue. If people want to check out of life who cares? The value people imagine on human life is exactly that, imagination. Simply imagine they(suicideal people) mean nothing and move on. Why is that so difficult?


Sexual Orientation
I don't understand why this is an issue either. People who claim "procreation" as a reason against homosexuality have a meter that is hidden from the rest of the world. That meter being what they are measuring things usefulness with. Who is to say sexual orientation is "useless" and thus "bad." I would like for this yard stick they use to measure everything to be made public otherwise they are only blowing hot air. By that I mean, what are you using to rate things usefulness as? What is that based off of? Then, why is that meter of measuring even important?


Trans sexuality
I see nothing wrong with this. People express themselves differently. I don't know why this is an issue with so many people. Maybe someone can enlighten me.


Marijuana
People are allowed to do what they will with their bodies. If they chose to pump it full of toxins, poisons, muscle relaxants or whatever, it's their choice. But this situation boils down to whose will is stronger. Who is willing to put the man hours into making sure people don't do whatever they want their bodies. I don't see why this is an issue either. Personal choice and all that.


Global Warming
The loaded term seems to be hearkening to some sort of doomsday where the ice caps have melted and the world is drowning. This probably also has to deal with a survival instinct. If they really were concerned about their life and how their children were going to live wouldn't they consider suicide a helpful option? But for those who have allergies, it's their will against the producer's will. Who has more clout? The producer conglomerate or a group of citizens?


Animal Welfare
I don't care about this topic. What meter is one using when they state that a dog's life equates to something meaningful? Especially when everything is simply imagined. I would imagine that the solution here is let people do what they want. I don't really care either way as long as I get my hamburger. And if not, I guess I will start growing my own food.


Global warming and pollution
See Global Warming Up - but also I like places to look neat and clean. I guess there could be laws enacted to stop people. But what good would it do when they can't catch everyone and the punishment is so weak?


Prostitution
I'm not sure why this is an issue. People will submit themselves to whatever they can to make a dollar. I say let them. And tax them for more income!


Health care
I think it should be wide spread but I can't exert my will over others in masses.


Polygamy
What's the issue with this? If people are happy in a relationship with only one hot dog for every seven buns more power to them. I personally don't understand the appeal but I wouldn't stop people for exploring their desires.


Death Penalty
I am all for it. Totally and 100% People only, truly, respond when their own mortality is put in front of them. I don't think the death penalty is harsh enough. Death shouldn't be a private quiet matter. It should be mass televised so crime-doers see where they will end up. Imagine for a moment if from the moment one grew up, they knew that if they broke a major(wow how subjective) law, their own mortality would be ended and televised to millions? It's embarrassing enough I would imagine for some people not to do crimes.