Question to Our Strident Atheists

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If elected to the highest office in atheism, how will you uphold our constitution? Do you believe it to be a sacred, unalterable document, a "living" text? There has been some controversy in the past over the concept of the Unitary Executive in Stridency and on Dawkins' Doctrine of Preemptive Argumentation.

And Grandma Betty has a question from the audience:

Each candidate has two minutes to respond.

The constitution is a convention, a set of rules decided upon by representatives of the adult population acting as a body politic. It is purely a human artifact. If we were wiser and smarter we would have a new constitutional convention every thirty years so that adults in each generation would have a direct or indirect (through representation) role in determining the basic law under which they live.

ruveyn

Your founding fathers should have written a document of responsibilities to go along with your constitution of rights.

I neither entered my name nor have any desire to become whatever the election indicates. It seems unlikely I will be chosen but be confident that if so I am I will initiate no actions or hold no responsibilities in he matter.

To NeantHumain, I do not intend on worshiping a constitution of any sort. Laws exist primarily for the people who use them, not for a bunch of dead people. Now, I am not so crazy as to believe that these laws should be altered every generation, and this is mostly because social relations are driven to a significant degree by norms, and economic actions (as well as many other categories of action) require the ability to make good predictions about the future. However, I do think that ultimately what matters is the spirit of the law, and that the law is working for the benefits of individuals.

Also, unlike Dent, I will not try to destroy our great society and constitution by starting a communist revolution, something that Marxists sometimes have an urge to do.

As for Grandma Betty's question: I am a compassionate strident atheist in very much the same way as George W Bush was a compassionate conservative. In all of my political engagements, I will try to say loudly and often that I am a compassionate strident atheist. Hopefully that answers your question.

Stride Pride topic

Grandma Betty and I thank all those who corresponded.

If I use the word Strident a lot, can I be one of the in-crowd too?

It is alterable through the amending process.

That is the function of Law. The Constitution is an enabling document on how Congress makes laws and how the executive and judiciary dispose of them. There is only one responsibility: obey the laws as passed by Congress and approved by the President.

ruveyn

When I get into power, I will create a WP Society of Strident Atheists, so that way yes, you can be in the in-crowd.

We're talking about the atheists' constitution here, not the Constitution of the United States.

The title should be Atheists' Strident Society so that the opposition would spread the acronym.

Like that?

There would be no way to enforce a community of any set belief without totalitarianism. Because faith is spiritual and not scientific, people's hearts will still be bonded to their faith, even those who listen and respect the facts. Unless you are willing to take the soviet approach to eliminating religion through aggression (which would be just as immoral and insane as persecution by religious justification) there is no way to remove religion.

The better way to go about it would be to create a society where different people of different faiths can come together and form a community that does its best to make everyone happy. That's why democracy is what's cool right now.

Ah Democracy! The ideal form of government for fools and asses.

The best form of government would be a loose defense confederation of self-supporting and productive communities. The last thing we need is Equality and Redistribution. Mankind is not a race of equals. The few feed the many because they are smarter and more productive.

ruveyn

The few feed the many because the few with money and power have squeezed out all competition.