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Where are you getting your information? Look at the theocracies of the Middle East, where it's discouraged and can even be dangerous to practice anything other than Islam. Many countries in Asia have reputations of suppressing religious freedom. China's government dictates which religions are okay for its citizens to practice - unregistered religious groups there are actively harassed. Three countries in Europe currently ban the wearing of burqas by Muslim women. Sure, the US isn't perfect in this but you are free to practice whatever the hell you want without interference from the government or other people.
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One American state after another is currently in the process of enacting criminal laws that prohibit constitutionally permissible practices that are not approved by influential churches.
Every Middle-eastern country has a Christian minority, that is perfectly free to practice their religion without hindrance. The same in China.
Here is an exercise for you. Name one character from one TV series who has ever openly represented himself as being an atheist or an agnostic. Censorship at work. Self-censorship is worse than government censorship, because it never gets tested. And religious self-censorship runs rampant in the US media. The American people police a State Religion more rigidly than the government of any Middle Eastern country.
I know someone who went to College abroad in Europe, and the first question there roommate asked them is
"do you think you good enough for us, your an American?
Here is an exercise for you. Name one character from one TV series who has ever openly represented himself as being an atheist or an agnostic. Censorship at work. Self-censorship is worse than government censorship, because it never gets tested. And religious self-censorship runs rampant in the US media. The American people police a State Religion more rigidly than the government of any Middle Eastern country.
Apparently you just don't watch TV and are at work making useless assumptions again.
Main characters from:
House
Bones
Scrubs
Greys Anatomy
Glee
Need the list go on? Jtur, come on... You put way too much effort into saying bad things about USA... why do you live here? Surely you'd be much happier living in one of your lovely middle eastern countries.
Oh wait, life is much better being able to sit behind your computer and complain about USA from Texas.
Apparently you just don't watch TV and are at work making useless assumptions again.
Main characters from:
House
Bones
Scrubs
Greys Anatomy
Glee
Need the list go on? Jtur, come on... You put way too much effort into saying bad things about USA... why do you live here? Surely you'd be much happier living in one of your lovely middle eastern countries.
Oh wait, life is much better being able to sit behind your computer and complain about USA from Texas.
First of all, I'm not so shallow that I would judge an entire country and its people on the basis of "religious freedom" or any other prevailing cultural superstitions. So my choice of country to live in is based on other criteria.
Second, I'm not so shallow that I see a lot of TV, but I have seen quite a few episodes of Scrubs, and I can't recall anybody on there saying he was an atheist and denied the existence of God. Which character was it?
Third, I DID live in a lovely middle eastern country, and a lot of my friends there were Christians, and they seemed perfectly happy there. I even went to their Christian weddings. In fact, I'd say they were overall happier people than most Americans I know.
Fourth, the stated topic of this thread is a perceived defect in the American psychology, so it's not me making all that up and hijacking the thread. It must be wonderful to live up there in Michigan, where America is perfect.
Fifth, do you disagree with anything I said in the first part of my post, or are you just picking on this paragraph?
Second, I'm not so shallow that I see a lot of TV, but I have seen quite a few episodes of Scrubs, and I can recall anybody on there saying he was an atheist and denied the existence of God. Which character was it?
Dr. Cox. on almost every episode I can remember. There is an entire episode based on his disputes with Laverne over God's existence. He's so in her face about how God isn't real, that he ends up making her break down and cry. It was one of the more powerful episodes I can remember.
Also, Brian from Family Guy is another fairly obvious one.
That's really the only thing I can say. We (most of us, there are some exceptions) only think that if it's done our way it's right pretty much, from politics to religion. Why are we just about the only nation on this planet that has to be that way?
Because people like that are stupid. Anyone who has lived overseas stops thinking this way, I think. We are less than 5% of the world's population. That provincial attitude is embarrassing and the basis for the concept of "the ugly American."
First of all, I'm not so shallow that I would judge an entire country and its people on the basis of "religious freedom" or any other prevailing cultural superstitions. So my choice of country to live in is based on other criteria.
Second, I'm not so shallow that I see a lot of TV, but I have seen quite a few episodes of Scrubs, and I can't recall anybody on there saying he was an atheist and denied the existence of God. Which character was it?
Third, I DID live in a lovely middle eastern country, and a lot of my friends there were Christians, and they seemed perfectly happy there. I even went to their Christian weddings. In fact, I'd say they were overall happier people than most Americans I know.
Fourth, the stated topic of this thread is a perceived defect in the American psychology, so it's not me making all that up and hijacking the thread. It must be wonderful to live up there in Michigan, where America is perfect.
Fifth, do you disagree with anything I said in the first part of my post, or are you just picking on this paragraph?
Sure, there are Christian minorities everywhere in the world, that is pretty normal I'd say. Let's see in Saudi Arabia all other religions besides Islam are not allowed. Don't get me started with Pakistan.. why exactly were there riots throughout Egypt and other parts of the middle east? Was it because they were so happy with how things were going? Sorry, I must have missed something there.
Yes, I do live in Michigan and things are good.. what does that have to do with anything?
If you are not shallow enough to watch TV, please refrain from making shallow comments about "American censorship" that don't hold any ground.
I chose to single out the second part of your post because it was flat out ridiculous. The first part is just a fact.. there are christian minorities in parts of the middle east. But why don't you ask how things are in Lebanon or Yemen? How about in Iran, with converting religions being punishable by death?
One American state after another is currently in the process of enacting criminal laws that prohibit constitutionally permissible practices that are not approved by influential churches.
Prove it. To which laws are you referring?
Every Middle-eastern country has a Christian minority, that is perfectly free to practice their religion without hindrance. The same in China.
Minus the part about middle-eastern countries having Christian minorities, this statement is demonstrably untrue. Persecution of Armenian Christians, Baha'i and others are well-documentedin many middle-eastern countries.
Here is an exercise for you. Name one character from one TV series who has ever openly represented himself as being an atheist or an agnostic. Censorship at work. Self-censorship is worse than government censorship, because it never gets tested. And religious self-censorship runs rampant in the US media. The American people police a State Religion more rigidly than the government of any Middle Eastern country.
Looks like others have already provided a pretty solid list here, so this rant about censorship is pretty much rendered pointless.If anything, the outwardly religious are portrayed as less intelligent and reasonable (see: Laverne in Scrubs, Booth in Bones, Shirley in Community, Kenneth in 30 Rock). I don't really see the point in having an issue with it either way, I'm just pointing it out.
There's a difference between us and the middle east. Their governments don't accept those religions, our people don't accept them. Our government is supposedly "open-minded", but our people aren't. Since I've never been to the middle east I can't say rather their people are as open or closed minded as ours; but anytime I've met a Islamic person they are generally open-minded, maybe bc we only let the open-minded ones in or maybe it's something else I can't say.
Addition to that anything that happens in those countries is their business, we don't have to bully them into becoming a democracy that's why I'm saying we're egocentric. Yes I say its wrong to punish anyone for their religious beliefs but its those nations that decide to do so. We shouldn't have a say so, unless it's actually affecting us.
Someone said something about riots in Egypt I read up very briefly on it a while back; is it because of religion? If so then most likely we (the western world) were in our egocentric ways and decided to sell them our religion(s). Yes our religions are nice (I don't have a religion now but I believe in God) but why should we attempt to convert their citizens into Christians when we already now how all those nations are? There people and governments are tough on religion so us telling them about religions we have is wrong on our part unless their govt decides to tell them about it. Before I say this next sentence know that I'm not anti-gay but I Know plenty who are: It's like what if all your life you've been trying to prevent your kids from knowing about gay culture and you've done well at it but then when your kid gets into high school and he/she has a gay teacher who is always telling them about being gay culture and your kid decides to turn gay, what would you do knowing your Christian? That's what those middle east nations go through but instead with religion.
Btw; I Love America, don't think I hate it anyways but like someone said "our policies suck."
There's a difference between us and the middle east. Their governments don't accept those religions, our people don't accept them. Our government is supposedly "open-minded", but our people aren't. Since I've never been to the middle east I can't say rather their people are as open or closed minded as ours; but anytime I've met a Islamic person they are generally open-minded, maybe bc we only let the open-minded ones in or maybe it's something else I can't say.
Addition to that anything that happens in those countries is their business, we don't have to bully them into becoming a democracy that's why I'm saying we're egocentric. Yes I say its wrong to punish anyone for their religious beliefs but its those nations that decide to do so. We shouldn't have a say so, unless it's actually affecting us.
Someone said something about riots in Egypt I read up very briefly on it a while back; is it because of religion? If so then most likely we (the western world) were in our egocentric ways and decided to sell them our religion(s). Yes our religions are nice (I don't have a religion now but I believe in God) but why should we attempt to convert their citizens into Christians when we already now how all those nations are? There people and governments are tough on religion so us telling them about religions we have is wrong on our part unless their govt decides to tell them about it. Before I say this next sentence know that I'm not anti-gay but I Know plenty who are: It's like what if all your life you've been trying to prevent your kids from knowing about gay culture and you've done well at it but then when your kid gets into high school and he/she has a gay teacher who is always telling them about being gay culture and your kid decides to turn gay, what would you do knowing your Christian? That's what those middle east nations go through but instead with religion.
How are you qualified to make that claim? Have you done a study? How are you quantifying that? That's a ridiculous reductionist view of the world, not to mention untrue.
The riots in Egypt were not about religion, they were about economics and liberty in general. There is absolutely zero evidence that the US is now trying to 'sell' Egypt on Christianity; in fact, it's looking like the new Egypt gov't will be Islamist, which aims to follow Islam more closely in gov't policy. Again, it seems like you're making lots of assumptions without knowing the facts.
You're starting to drift from a discussion on American egocentrism to a religious discussion, which is fine but probably belongs in that forum.
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