Poll of TAW for rule

[prodromos]

If it's for the entire movement, TAW is making a rule that at least one Archbishop participated in an anti-Christian march holding an anti-Christian sign.

Archbishop Elpidophoros of America joins march in Brooklyn - Keep Talking Greece

As has already been shown, the good Archbishop was also marching alongside a politician who has openly supported abortion clinics. Do you believe the Archbishop is correctly leading his flock with the associations he is making?

 

[All4Christ]

I have debated on how to respond to this. I don’t agree with many goals of the organization Black Lives Matter, but I know many who use the phrase but don’t mean to associate with the organization itself. Certainly, the premise that black lives matter is 100% true, as does all life. I can see the problem with having people associate with an organization that holds tenets against our faith. However - if we are consistent - we need to determine how to handle the same concept for a wide range of organizations.

My proposal is that any discussion regarding this type of organization should be done in the St Justin Martyr’s forum. Politics in general don’t belong in TAW, and the BLM organization is highly politicized. Promotion of the tenets that are not compatible with our faith should not be allowed.

Regarding moderating avatars - if we say that using BLM as an avatar violates the rules, then we essentially block many from even visiting the forum.

If this rule is implemented, I think we should consider modifying it some and taking some things like this into consideration.

 

[Michie]

The young woman was not shot for merely saying All Lives Matter. She engaged confrontationally with the group and her comments escalated into racial slur, the "N" word. That does not justify what happened, but your comment is not based on truth.

24-year-old mom ambushed and killed after saying ‘all lives matter’: Family

 

[Xenophon]

Regarding moderating avatars - if we say that using BLM as an avatar violates the rules, then we essentially block many from even visiting the forum.

How?

 

[Davidnic]

I have debated on how to respond to this. I don’t agree with many goals of the organization Black Lives Matter, but I know many who use the phrase but don’t mean to associate with the organization itself. Certainly, the premise that black lives matter is 100% true, as does all life. I can see the problem with having people associate with an organization that holds tenets against our faith. However - if we are consistent - we need to determine how to handle the same concept for a wide range of organizations.

My proposal is that any discussion regarding this type of organization should be done in the St Justin Martyr’s forum. Politics in general don’t belong in TAW, and the BLM organization is highly politicized. Promotion of the tenets that are not compatible with our faith should not be allowed.

Regarding moderating avatars - if we say that using BLM as an avatar violates the rules, then we essentially block many from even visiting the forum.

If this rule is implemented, I think we should consider modifying it some and taking some things like this into consideration.

The edit earlier today to the image portion should help that. It adds a grace period and the ability to refine it.

 

[All4Christ]

How?

Most times, people are able to come to our forum and post in fellowship as long as they don’t teach against the statement of faith. If we consider having an avatar that is a logo of BLM to be a violation of our community rules, then people with those avatars are not able to post here without automatically violating the rule, no matter what they are posting.

 

[rusmeister]

Well, I think it's important to not be pharisaical about this topic, as I've seen recently in a few Orthodox FB groups that, imo, are sad and terrible to see.

My problem is also the logo issue. There can be the words written on colored background that aren't part of the original organization. Are you going to investigate and police the origin of the picture the person used as his/her avatar? I mean really. What I see here is that NOBODY--NONE of us Orthodox are for the mission statement the original organization uses per what's been posted showing this. So, I don't see why there needs to be a vote at all.

It's not about niceness and pleasantries. It's about rigidness and seeing other people's interests in human events as wrong in one's eyes, and I explained why in the previous paragraph. And the way I see it, to be blunt, which is one of my characteristics (good or bad), is another form of this idiotic "cancel culture". It's not heretical to believe that black lives matter too. It's common sense and I know we all agree with this. So, again, I don't see what the huge deal is, other than a narrowed view on an organization that we all agree doesn't align with our Orthodox beliefs. The rest is about caring for our fellow humans. And that is Christ-like.

I agree on caring for our fellow humans.
But sometimes care means telling hard truths. Sometimes care means even turning away from a fellow Christian who refuses to correct himself, aka incorrigible.
From the side of faith, I have already laid out what is wrong with the movement in general, why it is senseless for Christians to involve themselves in it, (my “Holiness matters!” example), as well as why it is wrong to insist on forms that give the appearance of association.
From the secular side, it poses an existential threat to the nation that will make fighting racism impossible. If your country falls into anarchy, and the inevitable tyranny that follows, then you can’t very well protest much of anything, can you? The movement is altogether evil, however well-intentioned even a majority of its “outer ring” adherents are.
I don’t mind your being blunt. Offense is something we can refuse to take.

 

[prodromos]

Is anyone here Black? Not rhetorical, genuine question.

Only in my sins.

 

[rusmeister]

Most times, people are able to come to our forum and post in fellowship as long as they don’t teach against the statement of faith. If we consider having an avatar that is a logo of BLM to be a violation of our community rules, then people with those avatars are not able to post here without automatically violating the rule, no matter what they are posting.

People can change their avatars with no difficulty. I could change mine, and if it were established that we thought ourselves to BE the people in our icons or whatever rather than being what we love and admire, I could imagine myself having to change my avatar, which was originally a separate thing from the avatar, if you remember the little people we clothed for our avatars in the old days. They can even put up words in gold on a blue background saying “black lives are sacred, too”, and that would already be expressing the temporal concern while disassociating from the wicked movement that has deceived many good people.

 

[rusmeister]

This was probably already said somewhere (haven't been on TAW much in the past few days), but I think if we pass this, then we have to also start passing rules about all sorts of political organizations -- conservative and liberal -- that are not Christian and promote non-Christian beliefs. At which point, this isn't really about the Faith. It's about politics, looked at through the lens of Orthodoxy.

This has already been said, but the very public and loud evil that has been committed in the name of BLM has forced this particular one to a head. I have known about BLM’s support of sexual anarchy for several years. The other non-Christian organizations are not doing what is very publicly being done. Should we begin the litany of evil actions openly done in the name of BLM, or do you admit that they have done them?

There comes a point when, in the affairs of this world, we cannot pretend that they do not affect us. Indeed, the whole issue was raised here because of members who use their avatars to make politics the lens through which to look at Orthodoxy, and now these avatars are solidly associated with the evils, and the refusal of members to loudly condemn those evils, and “loudly” is absolutely necessary if you are in danger of being seen as in alignment with them.

 

[rusmeister]

One principle I have learned in life: Law arises when the common sense fails (and I mean "The sense of what is common" as well as the common meaning, pun intended . It is true of many things. The "Defense of Marriage Act" of 1996 is a perfect example. So was the addition to the pledge of allegiance to the flag "under God". It was people who still had the sense of right reacting too late. In such cases, law is a dam hastily constructed to stop a flood. But laws usually don't hold out for long. Unless the common sense is recovered, the dam will fail, the rule changed back, the law repealed. Unless people come to the common understandings that ever made a more-or-less Christian country capable of producing a land the world had never seen, and where all desire to immigrate to, for its principles of freedom as much as affluence, then no rule here, no law passed, will long stand.

 

[All4Christ]

People can change their avatars with no difficulty. I could change mine, and if it were established that we thought ourselves to BE the people in our icons or whatever rather than being what we love and admire, I could imagine myself having to change my avatar, which was originally a separate thing from the avatar, if you remember the little people we clothed for our avatars in the old days. They can even put up words in gold on a blue background saying “black lives are sacred, too”, and that would already be expressing the temporal concern while disassociating from the wicked movement that has deceived many good people.

I wouldn’t want a guest who wants to post in fellowship or with a question about Orthodoxy who is visiting to have to change their avatar just to visit. It’s not as clear of a problem with the current write up as it was with the original rule, but it still isn’t very clear in that.

Side note: I think I still have a snapshot of my little avatar person from back in the day

 

[Platina]

I also think there's a big difference between a non-Orthodox visitor sporting BLM and Orthodox members sporting it BLM, giving the impression that it's kosher within Orthodoxy to support BLM.

 

[rusmeister]

I wouldn’t want a guest who wants to post in fellowship or with a question about Orthodoxy who is visiting to have to change their avatar just to visit. It’s not as clear of a problem with the current write up as it was with the original rule, but it still isn’t very clear in that.

Side note: I think I still have a snapshot of my little avatar person from back in the day

I think we’re agreed here. There’s no problem with non-Orthodox people displaying whatever CF allows. We’d only have a problem if CF went iconoclast on us.

 

[Davidnic]

So it seems most regular members have voted. Friday is the day where I generally step back from electronics and social media.

So I'm going to close the thread for now. It seems like we're starting to go in circles just a bit.



So Monday I will open this up for any final comments and see if anyone wants to change votes.

If approved the rule will take effect on Tuesday.

Have a blessed weekend and Divine Liturgy.

May the Lord heal divisions between you that this conversation might have brought about, and may He build on any understanding that has grown.

 

[Davidnic]

Opening back up for final thoughts

 

[archer75]

I still don't understand how or whether the current proposed rule affects avatars.

 

[Justin-H.S.]

I still don't understand how or whether the current proposed rule affects avatars.

I hope not. I like mine.

 

[rusmeister]

I think it’s about what we represent as most important to us in a place where we claim to represent our Church - affairs of this world or of the next. I think abortion more important, a greater injustice than any other, and an imminent evil in this world, but I don’t think I should make the issue the main hill to die on or for, and wouldn’t, in a place like this, choose an anti-abortion symbol as my chief representation of the Orthodox Faith.

 

[All4Christ]

What would you think about having another sticky and link to it from the Statement of Purpose to Topics of Special Consideration? This way, we keep the primary point of our Statement of Purpose while not making 75% of it being about two subjects (discussions of homosexuality and BLM if it is added) besides our original SoP. Every other belief we have is linked from the SoP, not listed there directly.