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34 sats \ 30 replies \ @jbschirtzinger 4h \ parent \ on: Anyone else going down the rabbit hole on the Charlie Kirk Assassination? news
Eh. It isn't that controversial. Trans people are unhinged as evidenced by the fact they are trans and think kids ought to be too. They don't want people speaking against the trans agenda, which is what he finished talking about when he was shot.
People hating on Israel are in for a rude awakening.
What is the rude awakening going to be, do you think?
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That their hatred of Israel is really hatred of God.
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Israel is a secular state. Nations are people, not governments. The confusion about this has led to so much bloodshed. Just as we have had and still have corrupt politicians in the US, Israel does as well. There are a lot of misguided people on this Israel situation. People that literally hate Jews and think they are Christians and people that support every action of the state of Israel and think they are supporting Christian values.
Its all so tiresome.
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What drives me up the wall is the level of ignorance about the Israel government. Most conservative Christians that blindly support that government have no idea what it is like. Israel is not a government that conservative Trump voters would support if it were a party in the US. They do not know their theological history. They don't know that the popular positions on Israel are new and novel theological positions not shared by the orthodoxy of our faith. They have listened to modern preachers telling them they need to support the Israeli government for the US to be "blessed".
I'm fine with people taking Israels side in this. What I'm not fine with is blind allegiance to a secular government based on bad theology.
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Charlie said in this interview - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2qn0mvSCig&ab_channel=MegynKelly "I have less freedom to criticize Israel than Israeli citizens have. And that's weird, very weird".
As a matter of fact, I checked out a semi-mainstream Israeli newspaper (https://www.haaretz.com/), and it was full of articles that would cause you to be called anti-Semitic, in the US. You can read some articles via archive.vn if you want.
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Kirk and many on the right are starting to see that there are massive problems with how we talk about Israel. I don't think he was anti-Israel but he was making a point that there is this ridiculous double standard about even questioning the actions of their government and military.
The issue to me is that there is no room for grey areas. There is this you are with us or against us mentality. With some people you can't even be a little bit critical of what that government does or you are a Hamas supporter. Its absurd.
Many years ago I started to wonder why American Christians were so blindly supportive of that government. I started asking my family. Not because I disagreed. I didn't. I just wanted to know where it came from. People got very defensive and combative with me. So I had to do my own research.
Like many things, most people just kinda go along. They don't question. Its one reason we are in this current mess. People like Kirk that push back and do it in logic based arguments are gonna make people angry. Even if they are kind and respectful. Many times that makes people more angry.
Then you have the other side in this. The other extreme. Its a small number but they just hate Jews. Everything is the JEWS. Or, everything is an Israeli plot. Its dumb. Israel political parties do control many US politicians and try to gain support. Its not even a question really. But Israel does not run the US. Its the other way around.
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I think, if anything, Kirk revealed how truly powerful open debate is.
So powerful, that everyone agrees that multiple factions around the world, of all different political persuasions, are willing to kill to silence it.
We can't give in to those threats. We need to have more open dialogue and more open debate.
Those who can't tolerate speech are losers. They are losers who don't deserve any respect.
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I have had multiple people that I know - that I have never talked politics with - mention recently in the course of standard conversation how there's so much "anti-Semitism" around now.
I didn't challenge them. But I think to them, absolutely any commentary about the war in Gaza that isn't completely pro-Israel is anti-Semitism.
Apparently much of Charlie Kirks financial support came from the deep-pocketed Jewish donors, very closely allied to Israel. That's why he was (originally) uncritically supportive of Israel.
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have had multiple people that I know - that I have never talked politics with - mention recently in the course of standard conversation how there's so much "anti-Semitism" around now.
You probably have a lot of low information "voters" around you as I do. That's what the TV says. But its not a single message anymore. You have people promoting Hamas mixed in with people that think both Hamas and the Israeli government are in the wrong.
They seek to divide us. That's how we are controlled. We should talk about these things like humans. Not be told to shut up or killed.
But I think to them, absolutely any commentary about the war in Gaza that isn't completely pro-Israel is anti-Semitism.
The sad reality is that these types of attitudes are leading to and will increase anti-semitism.
I remember in the early 2000s realizing that the far left was going to far in their claims that the tech industry was full of hate. In the 2010s they were making stuff up. A nazi thing here. A white supremacist there. Movements that were present in my youth had been marginalized at this point. But they kept calling people Nazi that weren't. They kept calling people white supremacists because they were against quotas for speakers at conferences. I said to many of my friends that they are going to create what they claim to fear and hate.
I think this is what we are seeing. When you call people names like this for long enough some people are just wired to lean into it and say. Yeah, I am. And here's why. Its a human pattern outside of this political conflict. Its a rebellious nature in some people.
The same people that mock the left as snowflakes are doing the same thing on Israel. There are Jew hating people. Plenty of them. But far too many on the right and in Christian circles are lumping everyone into the same bucket because they are lazy and do not want to have a reasonable dialog. They have allowed fear and anger to overpower their ability to reason.
I'm really not who you want to have this debate with. Our Church was smeared by people who were Anti-Semitic leftists in 2017. Charlie is the latest version of this problem in an upside-down way. Free speech is fundamentally broken in multiple ways.
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How is free speech broken?
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In our case, it allowed people to make false claims and threats that the institutions that should be guarding against that do nothing about. This then allowed them to magnify their attacks which resulted in the loss of our business and home and a sizable chunk of our Church.
When you say "Our Church", which church are you referring to?
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It was/is a small Church based on James the Just--which was the original Jerusalem Church.
Israel is a secular state.
Israel was formed as a fulfillment of Prophecy, post WWII. I'm not going to get into the specifics, but reading your Bible carefully should show you how this is so.
Nations are people, not governments.
Nations have governments since without them they cannot be nations.
Just as we have had and still have corrupt politicians in the US, Israel does as well.
Of course. When Israel had Kings, there were corrupt Kings. The Bible doesn't refer to those corrupt Kings as not Israel. Indeed, Israel is punished as a whole.
A work of God in Gaza is trying to be politicized. People might not like the fact that Prophetic Israel is larger than the current nation, but to them I'd say take the matter up with God. If you want a different solution, start praying for peaceful recognition of the authority of Israel in God and that He has mercy on those who are there.
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I'm wondering what aspects of your biblical understanding of Israel suggest anything specific regarding US foreign policy with regards to the current State of Israel?
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I'm not talking about US foreign policy. I'm talking about Prophetic fulfillment. The size of Israel is much larger than its current surface area. This is how God starts to make what He has spoken come to pass--just as WWII caused the land to be populated again.
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Then, based on your biblical understanding of Israel, do you have an opinion on what the US foreign policy should be on the current situation in Gaza? Or how Christians should vote / communicate on the issue?
Context: I am a dispensationalist by default, meaning I attend a dispensationalist church but haven't studied the issue much for myself.
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Then, based on your biblical understanding of Israel, do you have an opinion on what the US foreign policy should be on the current situation in Gaza? Or how Christians should vote / communicate on the issue?
I think Trump has been steering a middle path on the issue with the re-location of the Gaza folks. Of course, the US tried that with the African American population previous to the Civil War, and that did not work out. Instead, everything became about blood and the outcome has been a still not full integration of African Americans. Politics show up all over the place if you are black, yellow, red, or neon. So, I'm hopeful that solution might work, but history shows it to be an often doubtful endeavor.
In terms of Christians voting, I'd ask for my eyes to discern clearly and to vote for the best choice that does the Will of God. Between Biden and Trump, that shouldn't have been a hard choice.