Comments on From My Personal Archieves:

Go to Religion is a ShamAdd a commentGo to From My Personal Archieves:

Well . . . .
Should we not strive for better "leaders"? Those percentages you mentioned, which you pulled from some dark place beneath your trousers, I'd wager, would be replaced by those who really were serious about doing jobs they were meant to do.

Also, you misinterpreted what I wrote by a wee bit (actually a lot) and I'll leave it to the interested visitor to point that out to you, Hemlocker.

posted by archiew on August 1, 2005 at 3:40 PM | link to this | reply

so, archie
when it comes to ministers or anyone in whom public welfare is entrusted, your position is zero tolerance. One has to admire your commitment, but I fear that if it was universally applied, we would lose 50% of ministers and priests, 75% of police officers and district attorneys, 35-40% of medical doctors and psychiatrists, and 95% of politicians. Hemlocker

posted by Hemlocker on August 1, 2005 at 2:18 PM | link to this | reply

I don't hate Jackson, Hemlocker
and, initially, I had no opinion of him one way or another; he was just another face in the crowd worshipping M. L. King, who was a great man, in my opinion. But, great as a Civil Rights leader, not as a minister.

Jackson, on the other hand, avoids the big issues and fights the small battles he thinks he can win. His position as a minister is a laugh, though, as was Kings. Ministers of the churches of our country should be above adultry, or they should give up their exhaulted positions as ministers. They, by their very callings to serve their gods, are held to higher standards.

Similarly, I am in favor of elevated punishements for law enforcement officers, judges, etc., who use those positions to break the law.

posted by archiew on August 1, 2005 at 12:30 PM | link to this | reply

archiew
Although it may be a cliche, I remember being taught that we can reject a child's behavior, without rejecting the child himself. Of course Jesse Jackson is not a child, and I do see your position. Sometimes, though, we can write off otherwise decent human beings for committing behaviors of which we disapprove. And consider what can happen to our selves when we fail to live up to our own rigid standards--which invariably happens at one time or another. Many suicides result from that dynamic. Jackson may indeed be a hypocrite, but are not most of us, in one degree or another? Was Jesse someone you respected, and by this behaviour, he caused you pain and made you lose respect, or was he someone you disrespected and disliked to begin with? Hemlocker

posted by Hemlocker on August 1, 2005 at 12:00 PM | link to this | reply

No, Hemlocker
Jackson is a hypocritical man who can't control his base instincts. I have little respect for those others you named either. Making the excuses you did only condones such immorality and indecency. That I will not do. I'll not lower my standards to "accept" Jackson's perversions.

posted by archiew on August 1, 2005 at 4:11 AM | link to this | reply

archiew
Martin Luther King had similar problems. FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover would have nailed him with them except that Hoover had his own strange private life. FDR had an affair with his secretary. JFK was a notorious womanizer. Then there is Bill Clinton. I agree that adultery is unfortunate and hurtful, but "moral authority" is a complex dynamic that cannot be defined by one's sexual choices or mistakes. Jesse Jackson is a good man with a compassionate heart. If he preaches that people who commit adultery are merely sinners who can never be redeemed, then he has forfeited any moral authority he might have had left. Some of the most important and creative people have led enigmatic lives and engaged in acts of commission and omission that have hurt themselves and others. Jesse Jackson is by no means the worst of them. Please don't lose faith in him. He does not need to be a paradigm of moral perfection. He is just a man.

Hemlocker

posted by Hemlocker on July 31, 2005 at 9:17 PM | link to this | reply

Numinous . . .
I have yet to figure that out.

posted by archiew on July 30, 2005 at 3:33 PM | link to this | reply

archiew
All that you say is true, and yet people still listen when he talks. Why? It beats the hell out of me.

posted by Numinous on July 30, 2005 at 1:42 PM | link to this | reply