Still Needing Explanation
Thank you for being a leader in a leaderless culture of Christian pieti . . . .ehh cowardice.
With all the talk of Government regulations, V requirements and passports, how would you currently reconcile, if it needs it if not a further explanation, this quote from your past blog post, “And Now a Brief Word on Vaccines” ?
“And if there is an outbreak of such a disease, and the government quarantines everyone who is not vaccinated, requiring them to stay at home, the name for this is prudence, not tyranny.”
Initial read, it seems to be a different mindset, unless there here lies a more foundational argument for mandatory government quarantining of healthy people.
Thanks Doug!
Ryan
Ryan, thanks. Here is a brief explanation of all that.
I am sure you have answered this question many times and so if you can just copy and paste something or point me to the link where you’ve already written about it, I’d be very grateful. My question is how you reconcile your current opposition to vaccine mandates (with which I agree) and your post here l from 2015 where you seem to concede the right of the magistrate to compel vaccination. I’d be interested to hear how the two things fit together. Thanks,
Graham
Graham, thanks. Here is a brief explanation of all that.
A Word To Your Younger Self
Pastor Doug, could you do a systematic write up on your biblical and exegetical case for the civil magistrate quarantining people by force and law to stop a contagion? And also answer, to the best of your ability as a pastor and theologian, the objection that the leprosy laws weren’t about quarantining lepers over public health and contagion, those laws were actually ceremonial to separate a ceremonial unclean person from the ceremonial clean community and therefore the Atonement covered those laws. Thank you. Feel free to take a few weeks (or however long you need) to study Scripture, doctrine, and the Law of God before you do the write-up.
Trey
Trey, no promises, but I will try.
You Tube Strikes Again
Greetings Doug and Team! I don’t have a letter, just a simple question. Doug, your recent YouTube video on fake vaccine passports was EXCELLENT! I’ve been passing it on to encourage my believing friends to apply some critical thinking based on Scripture to this topic. But it looks like YouTube censored you and pulled it. I can’t find it anywhere else. Finally to my question: Is there another location where that video can be accessed? Thanks for you do, and keep up the good work!
Luke
Luke, the video can be found on the Canon App. The text and the audio can be found here on this blog. And while I have you, let me point out something about what You Tube is doing, along with the other hall monitors of thought.
“It is the characteristic of the most stringent censorships that they give credibility to the opinions they attack”—Voltaire
And the dam didn’t break? Is 642,000 dead not a catastrophe? You were correct in 2015.
Scott
Scott, right. The dam didn’t break. Even taking that number at face value, we need to remember the denominator. Out of how many? What percentage of the population got it, and out of them, what percentage survived? What percentage survived with no difficulty at all? And then when you couple this with the public health establishment treating this whole matter, not as a medical and scientific question, but rather as a matter of orthodoxy, heresy trials, cancellations, and inquisitions, their credibility with me is almost entirely shot. I say “almost” because I still believe them when they say that viruses exist. They haven’t lost me there.
Private Sin
I would appreciate your thoughts on whether the Bible commands confession of “private” sin (for lack of a better phrase) to other believers. Certainly we are to confess our sins to God, no matter what kind they are. But as to “private” ones, that have no direct impact on anyone else, and no one but God knows about, does the Bible command us to confess those to other believers? James 5:16 is often used to support confessing all sin, but isn’t it more likely that this is just in relation to sin that we commit against our fellow believers directly? As a hypothetical, lets say I get deserted on an island all by myself, and then lets say I find some way to sin while I am alone. But then I repent and confess that sin to God. When I make it back to civilization, do I need to also confess that sin to my fellow believers?
And what’s the difference between the privacy of being deserted on an island, and the privacy of one’s own mind?
Thank you for your thoughts!
Anonymous
Anonymous, I don’t believe that James 5:16 means that we are to confess each and every sin to others. I believe we should confess when our sin has affected others, and also when we are in need of their help and support in fighting the sin. We should also keep in mind that we are all likely candidates for deceiving ourselves on the necessity of confession, and doing so in a direction that is easier on us. But with all that said, there are numerous sins and failings, particularly in our thought lives, that would be a really bad idea to confess to the body.
Transitive Verbs and Such
“The Nature of a Transitive Verb and the Failure of Conservatism, Inc.” Thank you for these principles. In quoting Dabney, you especially reminded me of your book “Rules for Reformers” where you hijacked Alinsky’s cultural strategy. Doesn’t matter who said it, if it’s true it belongs to God. In the spirit of quoting the cursed, dead or alive, who is your favorite person to read that you vehemently disagree with? I think mine is Nietzsche. He’d tear apart every evangellyfish in the pond.
God Bless,
Jackson
Jackson, actually my choice would be Nietzsche also. He was a total dweeb, but man, could he write.
Corporal Punishment?
I am a new Christian, a new parent, and new to your podcast. My spouse and I have been disagreeing on what constitutes Biblical discipline for our child, and I listened to your All of Christ for All of Life episode published June 10, 2021: “Christian Parenting and Disciplining.” You make a compelling argument. What I’d like to know is this: do we literally truly need to spank our children and make it hurt? Did the Bible say that it needs to hurt? I haven’t found any references to back that up, that it needs to hurt. I, and many other parents, would appreciate it if you would provide all the scriptural references and detailed word studies you can to back up your argument in this podcast episode, as well as any additional resources you’d like to share, so that I and other readers and listeners can confirm that your argument is biblically correct. I do not like the idea of spanking and hurting my child, but my first priority is to honor God and His Word, and if that is really what God wants, I will do it. Assuming your argument is correct, can you please provide more information on properly administering biblical discipline? In the podcast episode you stressed the importance of administering it correctly, and I would want to make sure my spouse and I use the right words, tone, facial expression, method, and so on. Should the spanking be always on the child’s bottom? Or on the hand that just pulled out several strands of our hair? Also, what age does this type of discipline start being appropriate? (Our baby is shy of a year old and has begun hitting, clawing at our faces, yanking off our glasses, yanking our hair out, and throwing tantrums at diaper changes and bedtime.)
If you’re interested in hearing a potential counter argument, there is a webinar coming up on September 2, 2021 that addresses the opposing argument, which I am attending just to make sure I’ve done my due diligence in researching all sides. Here is the link:
Thank you for your consideration and your response. I would like to add that you are an excellent podcaster and speaker. I will certainly continue listening.
Mr. & Mrs Jones
Dear Mr & Mrs, thanks for writing. I would recommend my book Standing on the Promises for more, but when it comes to the need for discipline to hurt, I would cite just a few places.
“For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it” (Hebrews 12:11, ESV).
“Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you strike him with a rod, he will not die” (Proverbs 23:13, ESV).
This doesn’t pertain to one particular post, but the aroma coming from many of the recent posts—Tacticalcivics.com
I’ve been wading cautiously into this material, chewing on the idea, and I believe if taken up by faithful Christians it would be the ideal way to scour the Shire.
This would be a rallying point for Christians. It would be a righteous way for Christians to restore our freedoms and enforce that old forgotten Constitution.
One criticism has been, “This won’t work until people’s hearts are changed.” Well, of course. But does God not move to save until 51% of His people repent? If the church is repenting, what would that look like on the civic level? Must a remnant of repentant Christians wait for a certain percentage threshold of broad repentance to be met in the church before taking action?
No. Gideon moved forward by needing to recruit 10 men to help him tear down his own father’s idol.
Why not this? Why not now?
Thx
Greg
Greg, Gideon needed an angel to persuade him to see that the moment was right. We don’t have the angel, but we do have a situation (I believe) where such a moment is approaching. We need to pray for wisdom to see, and then we need to pray for courage to act.
Is Failure Built In?
I’ve been blessed to read and listen to your works for some time now and am very appreciative of it. It is helpful to have someone speaking truth and to gain glimpses of what is happening behind the curtain. You have also encouraged me to read the right books both for myself and my children.
Now to my question regarding your post The Nature of a Transitive Verb and the Failure of Conservatism, Inc.
If all institutions that we build naturally and consistently devolve into something they’re not meant to be, what are we to do about it? Surely, building another great institution wouldn’t solve that issue, but only repeat it.
I’m sure there are pieces I’m missing, please help me understand.
Thanks and God bless.
Mark
Mark, when the wineskins get old, as they necessarily do, the thing is to have the new wineskins ready.
Bottom Line Civics
I have a thought-experiment type question for you. Recently, my fiance and I had a brief discussion about what a Christian society should look like. We agreed on the basics: it begins bottom up and works its way into society. We went back and forth on the issue of freedom of religion as it is currently practices in an American context. I would love to hear your thoughts.
It is clear to me that any free society must, by definition, be a Christian one. We must have godly laws, godly magistrates, godly courts, and so on. Setting aside the assumption of God’s supernatural and sovereign work to accomplish this, would it be acceptable in a Christian society, following God’s Law, to have the freedom of religion that we have today? Would it be limited to only having it in your heart with no outward non-Christian forms of worship? What about holding an office? What is the rule of God on these things?
Sincerely,
James
James, such thought experiments are helpful, I believe. In an ideal Christian republic, I believe that office holders would be confessing Christians, the laws would be based ultimately on the Bible and secondarily on the Christian legal tradition of the West, only Christians would vote, but non-believers of every stripe would be welcome. There would be religious liberty, but not the kind we have today (e.g. neutrality-based pluralism, which is a sham anyway).
Sexual Desertion
In a past letter an individual asked you if persistent porn-use was a valid basis for divorce, as an example of porneia and you responded in the affirmative, if my memory serves me well. I am aware of a pastoral situation where a young lady refused to have sex with her husband for the first 15 months of marriage and only relented after threat of church discipline, and shortly after her and her husband’s consummation of their marital union, went back to her stubborn refusal to basically ever give to her husband his conjugal rights ever again.
If we made all the same assumptions which we would generally make for the wife of the porn-addicted husband, namely:
1) that every marriage has two sinners in it
2) that there are some cases where the relatively “innocent party” exists and the monstrous sin is largely unprovoked
And
3) that the sin is stubborn, hard-hearted and unrepentant with little hope of resolution
Would you also consider this type of sin to be a legitimate violation of the marriage covenant and an example of porneia of sufficient grounds to constitute a legitimate divorce?
Tim
Tim, in this kind of situation, assuming all the facts as stated, I would say there are definite grounds for divorce. But I would not catalog it under porneia, but rather desertion. I believe that a woman doing this should be disciplined by the church, and if she continues unrepentant, the husband should be told by the church that he has been deserted by an unbelieving spouse, and that he is therefore free to divorce (1 Cor. 7:12, 15).
Regarding This Video
Ref: Self Education: The Way to High Culture
Pastor Wilson, thank you so very much for your work for Christ. It is my fervent wish that my sons might be such industrious and erudite workers for our Lord.
To that end, it is a burning desire of mine that they be educated to the best of my ability. As you point out in the above referenced talk, I need myself to be better educated (which has been a goal for many years anyway). To that end, would it be possible, sir, to provide a list of books—perhaps in order of importance—Scripture being a given – with which I could approach this autodidaction in an organized manner.
Knowing full well that you have more than enough to do, I feel a hesitancy is placing this request, yet by virtue of my being 66 years of age, I do have a particular urgency in this matter.
Thank you very much for your time.
Sincerely,
In Christ,
Jay
Jay, in the back of my book The Case for Classical Christian Education, I have a couple of book lists, focused on general education and edification. Assuming here that your question is more theological in nature, I will give you a short list to start with—On Christian Doctrine by Augustine, Institutes by Calvin, Bondage of the Will by Luther, The Religious Affections by Edwards, and Christianity and Liberalism by Machen.
Never Really Thought It Through
On an unrelated note, why do you hyperlink to Amazon when you suggest/recommend books published by Canon Press instead of linking to them directly?
Just curious.
Todd
Todd, thanks for the question. No thought through plan, really. But if asked, as I guess I just have been, I would say that I have been assuming that just about everybody already has an Amazon account, and I am keeping the friction to a minimum.
Productivity and Ploductivity
Just finished Ploductivity. Thanks, great book, enjoyed, already putting to good use. I have a quick background and then a specific question.
I’m a surgeon, and this quote resonates: “So if you are one of those rare souls who can live for twenty-eight days running without any one of those days bearing the least resemblance to any of the others, then this advice about plodding will probably be ineffectual.”
Implementing your ploductive techniques garnered from reading your works over the past 10 years has resulted many classics digested, sermons written, and projects accomplished, all while completing (and of course always continuing) a rigorous multi-specialty surgical education. I often find that a little mental space to process and rest my brain for a few moments to be greatly desired while driving home, or working on a building project, or what have you. I’ve been slowly tackling audible’s version of Frame’s “Systematic Theology,” (37 hours left!) but recently have reached what appears to be a point of frequent mental saturation.
Now, the specific question: Should I just keep pushing to focus and continue assimilating with the expectation of eventual increased capacity, or do you think it is appropriate to actually stop inputting and just watch the road go by occasionally?
NS
NS, there is nothing wrong with, as Dylan put it, watching the river flow. The mind needs down time also. The brain needs sabbaticals.
Teaching Your Kids to Raise Kids
Thank you for all you do in edifying your audience!
My question is regarding what you had said about parents of adult children not intervening in the decisions of the adult children, saying specifically that the parents have already “had their chance” to teach them. My husband and I are wondering if you have any suggestions on how to pass on to one’s kids how to train their future young children as parents, since they may not consciously remember much of their own training. I’m thinking specifically of the baby, toddler, and preschool years. Did you and Nancy specifically take time to talk with your older kids or teens about this? If so, did you focus on principles, or get into the nuts and bolts of how you handled things (like the “liturgy” of discipline, playing the obedience game)? Or do you think this was more organically picked up by hearing the same phrases repeated over and over, reading the Bible, and hearing hilarious stories about their own toddler/preschool years and how mom & dad handled them? Thoughts are appreciated.
M
M, in our experience, it was very much the organic approach. We did not sit down to teach our children child-rearing. They picked up an enormous amount simply by having it done to them, and I have been astonished at how much wisdom they have in watching them with my grandkids. I am sure we gave instruction here and there, for example when it came to babysitting dilemmas and so on. But for the most part, it was informal and organic.
The New Israel Does It Right
I am a fan of your podcasts. It’s been several years now.
I have a question regarding applying God’s moral Law in the public sphere?
What type of encouragement we can have toward that goal knowing that Israel in the Old Testament didn’t succeed and many in Church history didn’t succeed (e.g Geneva). What were their faults and how can Christians avoid the same ? Blessings,
Puzant
Puzant, I would say their faults were many, and just as it always is with the faults of others, we tend to see them easily. But I would want to argue that their successes were more influential than we give them credit for, and that we are still living off the capital that was earned in Geneva.
An Accurate Post Mortem?
Have you listened to CT’s Rise and Fall of Mars Hill, and if so, do you have any thoughts on the podcast? It seems to be a remarkably sad and terrifying story, however, I’m not sure I’d trust CT to walk my dog, let alone teach me anything on “toxic masculinity.”
Anthony
Anthony, I haven’t listened to it. I am sympathetic with your views on dog-walking, and didn’t want any kind of semi-woke analysis.
What Is Scripture?
This isn’t a comment on any particular post, just a question.
A good friend and I have been discussing what “Scripture” means in 2 Timothy 3:16 and the validity of Paul as an author. How can we have assurance that Paul is the voice of God in the Word we’ve been given? Did the writers of 1 John 5:13, 2 Timothy 3:16, or Hebrew 4:12 consider what they were writing as Scripture in their letters?
Marco
Marco, I believe the thing referred to in 2 Tim. 3:16 (and other places) is what we would call the Old Testament. But there are places where the apostolic writings are placed on that same level. For example, Peter says that Paul’s letters have difficult parts in them, which ignorant and unstable people twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures (2 Pet. 3:16). And Paul says (1 Tim. 5:18) that you should pay your ministers, as the Scriptures say, before quoting Deuteronomy and Luke.
I am a man in central Birmingham, Alabama, who is much need of your advice. Why you? I will get to that. I will not long in this note to you and will cut to the chase. I am normally not a very laconic person, but I am tired. I am drained spiritually. I have been fighting the good fight for years, but the battle seems to have no end and actually grows in intensity. The church is a clown show. My wife and I are empty nesters and recently moved to this location, only to find that every church we visit is a watered-down, polytheistic, social agenda based . . . well, clown show. It breaks my heart and saddens me tremendously.
I listen to you often. I know that you are a man of God. I pray for you and the ministry He has placed on your heart. I am a veteran and teacher by trade (in a government school), so I see first hand what you discuss in many of your blogs and sermons. Our nation is lost. I firmly believe that we are only living in the shadow of what use to be. I don’t believe there is a turn around point. My wife is a nurse [and] is now being threatened [she will] lose her job if she doesn’t comply to the shot. She has applied for a “religious exemption,” but it will be denied like many of the others nurses in the hospital. And she will be out.
In a nutshell, what do I do? I pray. I read God’s word. I meditate on what God has promised us. I am the leader of my home and the patriarch of my family, but I have no answers for many of their questions. I am fighting the urge to sit at home, read my Bible and let the world crumble around me. Church? where? No, I am not looking for a place that conforms to my beliefs, but a place that stands strong on the Word of God and does NOT submit to begging forgiveness for not having a racially diverse deacon body, a woman as an associate pastor, a gay outreach ministry, and on and on and on.
Thank you for your time.
Sincerely,
Scotty
Scotty, hang tough. There are seven thousand who have not bowed the knee to Baal.
Incrementalism
Re:Incrementalism and the Texas Abortion Law I’ve been a bit torn on this exact issue lately. I can appreciate the good points made by abolitionists about the “Pro-Life Industry” (Apologia pulls no punches) which should be receiving more attention from anyone who cares about the unborn.
However, I also think often (or am forcibly reminded) of the playbook of the cultural Marxists who are willing and alarmingly able to play the long game; and yet we maintain no illusions that they are anything like “compromising” in their goals. I went ahead and read your linked posts on Smashmouth Incrementalism and sure enough, that was a point you made there.
I suppose one could argue that there are certain weapons or tactics we do not use in a war. Just because it’s good enough for a Marxist does not mean it should be good enough for a Christian. But we also ought not forget Wilberforce. I’m not an expert on the man’s life and achievements, but it seems as though he was willing to act strategically and with sober understanding that the goal toward which he worked might not be realized in his own lifetime.
It seems biblical to acknowledge the reality that population-wide transgression necessarily results in a non-trivial logistical problem even when there is broad recognition of guilt, per Ezra 10: “Nor is this a task for one day or for two, for we have greatly transgressed in this matter.” The gradual nature of the Canaanite conquest also comes to mind here.
By the way, is similar big-picture thinking not echoed in postmillennialism?
Wesley
Wesley, thanks. Good thoughts. And yes, postmillennialism is the long game.
Justice
Re: Justice
I have been reading A Justice Primer and enjoying it. I was wondering about the idea of conflict theory or Marx’s dialectical materialism, where he sees all of history in terms of conflict between oppressed and oppressors fighting over resources. In the Primer you say, “The history of man is one of conflict—whether past conflict or conflict lying in wait. This conflict is but the fruit of the deep root of envy.” So was Marx right about his thoughts of conflict? Is all of life really explainable by this? Marx seems to be saying that conflict is the metanarrative presiding over all of history, determine all human interactions and turning the water wheel of history. Where would you agree with this and where would you disagree?
My church is starting a series on justice so Im trying to do a little pre-class work. As I was trying to find different ways to think about biblical justice, I thought one way to say it is justice is equally applying the law of God to the image of God. Think that works?
Thanks
Tim
Tim, first, yes, I think that works. And as for the conflict part of your question, I believe that the antithesis runs through all of human history. God established that antithesis in Gen. 3, and so yes, conflict is the name of the game. But unbelievers generally mishandle the antithesis in one of two ways. They either misplace the antithesis, as the Marxists do, or they deny the antithesis, as the Pollyanna liberals do.
A Justice Primer
A basic introduction to the principles of biblical justice, desperately needed in our time.
Pastor Wilson, your “explanation” for why you supported quarantining the unvaccinated isn’t an explanation, you just handwave it away. And it definitely doesn’t explain the earlier paragraph in the same essay, where you declared:
And this line from May 2020:
Jonathan, a Christian is baptized with blood and water. I am holding you to your baptism. You may not tell whoppers larger than anything Burger King sells and walk away. You many not attempt to hide answers in a three week old post that others will not see. You may not lie and deceive other Christians with your posts. The photo of Japanese in a train station you posted is a stock photo used in articles ranging from 2009 to the present SARS CoV-2. The articles had nothing to do with seasonal flu but rather dealt with Seasonal Allergy Rhinitus… Read more »
Dave, our main argument wasn’t even about “seasonal flu”. Our argument was about whether Asian folk often used masks to prevent illness, or whether, as you claimed, they were just “being polite”. I already proved in numerous ways that Asian folk wore masks during disease outbreaks in order to prevent disease, including indeed the flu. It’s over. You lost the argument. Get over it.
Jonathan, you are a Christian brother. Stop it!
Act as a Christian brother and not a social justice warrior who can’t follow a discussion. You run, change the discussion or try to shut down others when you are caught with your hand in the proverbial cookie jar.
It is dishonest to use stock photos to show masking — especially when they are during pandemic or allergy times.
It is incredibly ironic that you’re accusing me of changing the discussion.
And there is zero debate that many Asian folk masked for illness before 2020. No serious person would deny that. You claimed they only masked for politeness, and then claimed they masked for Covid only because it was mandated. You refuse to admit that you were proven wrong on both counts and keep moving the goalposts.
Jonathan, you have called many on this blog, including the host, liars, associated other names and such. In this case, you misrepresented the discussion, the actual facts, used file photos during pandemics or allergy seasons. You are a Christian brother. What you typed is typically called a lie. Stop lying. Stop it! Stop it! Act like a Christian. Yes, I said that Japanese wore masks to be polite, but that is also because they don’t get sick leave so they go to work with a mask on. I also noted that the vast majority did not mask and that the… Read more »
Another name Jonathan has liberally called people is racist.
A few days ago, a white woman in a gorilla mask threw an egg at a black man seeking to become the first non-white governor of the largest state in the union.
Jonathan’s response?
Crickets.
A Christian would have the moral fortitude to condemn this clear-cut case of racism.
FP,
Your insistence that people comment on your pet issues, which haven’t even been brought up on this board, is bizarre. Probably just garden variety narcissism.
I love it. Every time I point out your ilk’s double standards, you get your panties in a twist. Never gets old.
Say, while you’re here, care to condemn this clear-cut case of racism? It’s teed up for you, ready to go. Don’t whiff it.
FP, there are certainly many hundreds of incidents of racism occurring every day. I don’t recall bringing up any of them unless they were already in the context of the topic being discussed – if I did then it is certainly a rare event. Unlike some people, I don’t need to create constant deflections to avoid the subject.
So, you won’t be condemning this clear-cut case of racism, then?
Thanks for proving my point.
Ha, my ilk. Thanks.
There was a Christian killed in Myanmar yesterday just for attending service. And what is FP’s response? Crickets. Nothing. Nada.
Your silence on this is deafening. Clearly you hate Asians. QED.
I don’t know anything about the tabloid story you seem to want to discuss. I am tentatively in support of Elder winning (though I haven’t followed the race at all). And I’m categorically opposed to racist invective and political violence, and assault with ovum.
Of course you don’t know anything about it. Your precious media keeps you ignorant, and you like it that way.
If it had been a Republican attacking a black person — which almost never happens — it would have been front page news, 24/7. Jussie Smollet and Bubba Wallace got more coverage, and those were hoaxes.
If I had a dollar every time you freaked out at your double standards being pointed out to you, I could add a new wing to my house.
Now, if you want to discuss the point, let me know.
FP, You would be a lot more interesting to talk to if you didn’t regularly imply deep insight into other people’s psyche, which you apparently learn from your oracular reading of their comments on a message board. Nearly everyone one of your comments has some idiotic statement like this: “Your precious media keeps you ignorant, and you like it that way.” Or this: “If I had a dollar every time you freaked out at your double standards being pointed out to you, I could add a new wing to my house.” You are nearly indistinguishable from Bulverism bot, and it’s… Read more »
And yet, here you are, talking to me, reacting whenever I post. Every time I ring that bell…
Now, if you’d like to discuss the point, let me know.
FP,
I’ve never shrunk from communicating when it is unpleasant. I have written extensively with white supremacist and our local village atheists. And I have often engaged with you even though you are focused on corresponding in a foul and ungainful manner.
If you want to discuss you point then discuss it!
Looks like you’re not above insulting those with whom you disagree. Talk about corresponding in a foul and ungainful manner.
If you don’t want to be seen as a hypocrite, then stop acting like one. Really is that simple.
Pssst: Don’t look now, but we have yet another example of you-know-who acting out of a persecution complex, right here in this very thread:
Here’s your chance. Don’t blow it.
fp, wouldn’t you normally find it rather bizarre for someone to go so wildly off topic in a discussion of Asian masking or non-masking and the accuracy of the COVID death count? At no time in the last several months have we been discussing the California recall election or whether the campaign against Elder has focused inappropriately on his race. (It has.) I am happy to condemn anyone who throws eggs at a candidate of any race and to call any white person who wears a gorilla mask to taunt a black man a racist of deepest dye. I felt… Read more »
I can’t believe you can spend all of this time writing without even acknowledging the crazed gunman that shot up a parking lot in San Antonio today! A real Christian would call out this example of property destruction and poor trigger control.
You are really showing your true colors, Jill!
I won’t even mention your silence on other pertinent and highly relevant news items, like Queen Latifah’s poor dog being killed by Caesar Milan’s pit bull. Your lack of commitment to our four-legged friends is noted!
If it comes to that, where is your denunciation of Pablo Escobar for releasing two hippos into the Colombian countryside in the early 1990s? Now there are at least one hundred hungry, hungry hippos going walkabout and devouring all the grass. Not content with stealing luscious fruit from the trees of bemused villagers, they are also poisoning the rivers with hippo poop that is toxic to the fish. Not one word have I heard you say. And how can you be silent about Kraft producing Mac & Cheese ice cream at $12 a pint? As luridly orange as the packet… Read more »
Jill,
In contrast to your silence regarding San Antonio street lights and Her Majesty Latifah’s dog, I am willing to confront evil where I see it.
Hippos should keep their foul poop on their own continent, and ice-cream should never (ever!) taste like macaroni and fake cheese.
Mr. Kraft and Mr. Escobar: Stand back, and stand by!
I am second to none (well, that’s a bit of an overstatement but I do love pandas and parrots) in my concern for all our animal friends (except snakes–when I first read the verse about putting enmity between serpents and women, I took it to mean that I can’t help needing to have my movies pre-screened for footage containing images of legless reptiles). Which of us refrains, at great personal sacrifice, from EATING animals large and small, the hardship being particularly acute when I walk past the local In-N-Out and catch the aroma of 100% ground beef (with the 25%… Read more »
Jilly, this is an open thread. Says so right in the tags. I can talk about whatever I want.
Dave wasn’t discussing Asian masking or non-masking so much as he was talking about Jonathan’s lack of character.
I merely buttressed Dave’s point. So no, it isn’t off-topic, much less wildly so.
fp, of course you can talk about anything you like. I wasn’t suggesting otherwise. But you seemed to be saying that Jonathan was remiss in not mentioning and then condemning the attack on Larry Elder. My point was that it would have been wildly off topic for Jonathan to bring that up when it was not relevant to anything under discussion. I don’t think it’s entirely fair to judge people for failing to comment on current news that, although troubling and horrible, is unrelated to the topic at hand.
Jilly, it’s not off-topic when the topic is Jonathan’s lack of character, which Dave reiterated shortly after I posted. And it is entirely fair to judge people for their hypocrisy, especially when it comes to their favorite hobby horses, which, in Jonathan’s case, is racism. You see, it’s OK for Jonathan to scream “racist” at anyone, from Doug’s father (why Doug never kicked Jonathan to the curb for that one mystifies me) to other commenters here, whenever they do, say, or even merely link something with which he disagrees. Yet when it comes to real overt racism, from Black Lives… Read more »
FP, you obviously do not have any ideologically issue with making accusations of racism, in fact you do so in this very comment. And you spend far more energy yourself calling others racist or claiming I’m a hypocrite on race issues than I have ever spent calling others racist. So what is your actual issue? If you think pointing out racism is wrong, why do you do it?
And your claim that I screamed “racist” at Pastor Wilson’s father is categorically false. The person who made the direct racist accusation in that conversation was JP Stewart, not me. JP Stewart claimed that participating in the Black Panthers made a person a “Black Supremacist” and thus meant anything that man’s son wrote (even a completely unrelated statistical fact) could be dismissed offhand. I said the accusation was as ridiculous as claiming that Pastor Wilson’s father having participated in Southern Segregation somehow made him a “White Supremacist” and invalidated everything his son wrote. I explicitly said that calling Pastor Wilson’s… Read more »
Please. You’re obsessed with racism. Implying someone is a racist is tantamount to coming right out and saying it.
Just like implying someone is a liar is the same as saying it out loud.
Once again, FP, you have called more people racist than I ever have, and you bring up race issues all the time. So if you don’t think it’s wrong to call others racist, and you don’t think it’s wrong to discuss race issues, then what is your actual issue here? How is this anything more than vague off-base personal attacks for the purpose of deflection?
I am friends with Jonathan on and off this board. I don’t agree with all his opinions, nor he with mine. I have no qualms about his character and I have never known him to post information that he knew, or reasonably ought to have known, to be false. The fact that it comes from media sources you view with suspicion is not actual proof that the information is wrong. When you disagree with that information, I don’t automatically assume that you are calling Jonathan a liar. Similarly, when Jonathan says that information posted by anyone else here is untrue,… Read more »
Dave, how would “used file photos during pandemics” be an issue? Why would Asian folk mask during a pandemic if they only did it to “be polite”, as you claimed?
Not to mention that I already disproved your claim with multiple pictures and articles that were explicitly during flu season, as well as such masks literally being labeled “flu masks” in pictures, as well as Hong Kong doctors explicitly saying that the reason mask adoption was so quick for Covid was because residents had experience wearing masks for SARS and flu.
Now, while you accuse me of “fibbing” just for stating reality, why have you still not acknowledged that you falsely claimed Hong Kong residents only wore masks for Covid cause they were mandated, when there wasn’t any mandate when they masked up?
Why haven’t you acknowledged my personal experience seeing Asians mask up in multiple countries and Jill’s personal experience seeing Asian immigrants mask up in Vancouver?
https://www.vox.com/2020/5/18/21262273/coronavirus-hong-kong-masks-deaths-new-york
This is interesting and certainly conforms to my pre-COVID experience of Asians living in Canada.
https://www.voanews.com/science-health/coronavirus-outbreak/not-just-coronavirus-asians-have-worn-face-masks-decades
Why do you ignore the Hong Kong doctors themselves?
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/eclinm/article/PIIS2589-5370(20)30100-0/fulltext
Jonathan, you are missing the forest. Your Christian character is lacking. You are not a reliable source of information, nor are you a reliable source for applying scripture to every day life. Count how many times in the past year you have called others liars when your arguments failed. That is not proper Christian behavior. File Photos: For years, the photos were used repeatedly without reference to the actual date or place and for different topics. In a college of academic excellence, if the author of a paper misuses a source to further a point, the paper receives a failing… Read more »
Dave, you spent all that energy arguing that Asian mask-wearing was triggered by SARS and pandemics and seem to ignore that we’re currently in a pandemic.
The only one who tried to reduce this discussion to “but seasonal flu!” was you. It was your attempt to move the goalposts after your other claims were proven wrong. And it failed.
Even your quotes show that Asians wear masks to stop disease.
And I encourage you to count all the times in the past year that I have “called others liars”. Just like FP’s claims about me calling everyone racists, the actual evidence you’ll be able to come up with is far more meager than the picture you paint. Then compare it to the # of times that you and FP have called me a liar. I have no doubt which number is going to be much greater.
Past year? How about the past 3 weeks? Here are 10 instances — 9 of which are from one blog post alone — of Jonathan implying other commenters are lying, which is functionally equivalent to outright calling them liars: 1 day ago: “…you still not acknowledged that you falsely claimed…” Note: All the following are from one blog post: 11 days ago: “You and Harry should apologize for falsely calling him…” 11 days ago: “Your claim about Florida hospitalized being almost all vaccinated is completely false.” [Note: The claim was, “But what I’m hearing from all my friends in the… Read more »
Yes FP, pointing out that a statement is false is not the same as calling that person a liar. Are we not supposed to dispute false statements? That would be ridiculous, you and Dave and most everyone here calls out statements you perceive as false.
And predicting that someone will make the most obvious objection to your clearly faulty argument is simply an indication that you already know you don’t have a case.
Sorry, but your weak, pathetic excuses aren’t going to fly, especially when you yourself equated the two: Roger Hill, responding to Mike Freeman: Sorry if I do not believe you… but I don’t, at least not this tale about a robbery victim with six bullet wounds awaiting surgery for a week “because the Covid patients” are taking up all the available resources. Covid patients are generally not stacked up outside of surgery wards, awaiting an available surgeon. I suppose it could be that his surgery would automatically land him in the ICU afterwards, and this is the concern. Yet it… Read more »
Strange how you made the accusation that I constantly call others “racist”, but have found yourself incapable of defending that accusation. So you switch to weakly swinging and missing at Dave’s accusation instead.
“I don’t believe you” implies that one thinks the person is making something up. That’s not the same as simply repeating a false claim. The fact that this conversation has devolved to “but you have said someone’s claim is false!” shows how little you have against me when asked for actual evidence.
“You lost the argument. Get over it.”
Is that a Christian response?
I have no idea why you’re suddenly bringing up one line in a three-day-old comment rather than responding to either of the challenges I just made to you hours ago or any of the evidence I posted proving that your previous claims were wrong. Well, check that, I do know. Your opening statement that I was replying to there, attacking me with absolutely no relation to anything in this thread, included: You may not tell whoppers larger than anything Burger King sells and walk away. You many not attempt to hide answers in a three week old post that others… Read more »
Those who declare themselves the winner of an argument usually aren’t.
Last week, someone asked about the merits of the dispensationalist premils. One thing that wasn’t mentioned is that most of the Wycliffe NT translations have been done by baptistic premils. We are talking about several thousand languages.
If everyone in the United States has contracted SARS-CoV-2, which of course is not the case, the 649,198 deaths listed on Johns Hopkins’ COVID site would imply an infection fatality rate (i.e. everyone who’s got the virus, not just people who are sick and have been tested) of about %.195, or roughly 2 in 1,000. This seems like a pretty high number to me, frankly. Nearly a 1 in 500 chance of death? Yikes. (I realize this risk is not evenly distributed, obviously.) As far as “Lots of these deaths aren’t really COVID deaths,” I would note that the CDC’s… Read more »
I think you will appreciate this.
https://rationalground.com/covid-is-not-a-hoax-but-the-numbers-are-a-look-at-the-first-flu-season-with-covid/
COVID is being counted as no other cause of death ever has been. The numbers are not comparable. This is public knowledge. The question then is what is the magnitude of the difference.
This article also addresses excess deaths and makes a strong case than many are attributable to delayed medical treatment arising from fear of the virus.
It is entirely possible that fear of COVID has led to as many or more deaths than the virus itself.
And much of the delayed medical treatment wasn’t from fear in the patient, but the fears of the medical establishment restricting access, and planning for “Covid capacity” that ultimately wasn’t needed.
Even now, most reports of hospitals reporting full wards are due to shortages of medical personnel reducing the number of beds that can be served rather than higher numbers of patients served.
And of course, many hospitals have brought this on themselves by requiring their doctors and nurses to be vaccinated or fired.
https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/2021-09-07/idaho-enacts-crisis-hospital-care-standards-amid-covid-surge
What is the source of your information ?
No, Covid is not being counted “as no other cause of death ever has been.” If you actually look at the death tolls each year for seasonal flu, the death estimates are typically much GREATER than the actual counted numbers. No informed person ever believes that they could catch every flu death, so they look at excess deaths and other data to come up with an estimate much greater than the counted deaths. Just as Covid has almost certainly killed far more than the counted numbers
Nathan, you claim:
If that was true, then why do places with high Covid counts but little lockdown response (like South Dakota) have FAR higher death counts than places with low Covid counts and strict lockdown response (like Oregon)?
Why is it that the excess death #’s in every state and nation have almost perfectly tracked the Covid case #’s (typically trailing by about 3 weeks), but have not tracked with the lockdown starts/stops at all?
Are vaccines the only solution? Among other reason to avoid them, some Christians have an issue with drugs developed or tested using fetal cell lines.
India’s “Crushing” of the Curve In States Using IVER and HCQ | Religio-Political Talk (RPT) (religiopoliticaltalk.com)
You say “I do not believe that all of the rank and file of the CDC are conspiring to put over grossly false data. ”
What do you think would happen to one of those “rank and file” guys if they said something contrary to what their boss said? In this political climate? In this job climate? Do you think “rank and file” guys even *can* be trusted with, potentially, a proverbial gun to their head?
I disagree with the idea that we can trust them simply because they go along with it.
“One”? This would require hundreds of people to be covering up. Implausible.
Heidi, how many folks covered up four decades of the Tuskegee Study? How many covered up the CIA drug studies on American citizens?
No one in government is going to rock the boat at all. They want their easy jobs and steady paychecks. It doesn’t matter if it is legal, illegal, unethical, or immoral.
Very, very plausible.
Dave, the # of people involved in the Tuskegee study was many orders of magnitude lower than the # of people involved in diagnosing Covid. And Tuskegee wasn’t even “covered up”, reports on its progress were openly published through the entire duration of the study.
Mr. Todd, Have you ever worked at a place like this? The staffers compiling the reports might be subject to a politicized work environment, but they have no gun to their head. They are basically impossible to fire, they are very difficult to replaces and in most cases their bosses are very solicitous toward them. If they have management telling them to fudge the numbers they can force it in writing and then leak it, or give an interview to a sympathetic organization, there is absolutely not the climate of top down control that you imagine. Also, to fake the… Read more »
The death totals have been fudged in plain sight. And yes, the coroners were not happy about it.
Nathan,
The total death totals nor the excess death totals are fudged, and they would be very difficult to fudge. 2020 had the largest increase in excess death (percent and absolute) of any year since numbers have been kept. There are good estimates of the breakdown of those deaths. I would link a JAMA article here, but every link gets eaten.
You can argue whether there have been 575,000 or 750,000 covid deaths. But you can’t credibly argue that it is under 500,000.
It’s not difficult at all. And I think you should concede this point. The decisions was made to just say “hey, we’re going to count these deaths differently from any other cause of death we’ve ever recorded, because reasons.” This avoids the nasty business of leaks and whistleblowers and non-compliant staff because it’s already public knowledge.
The article I linked above notes that reviews of COVID deaths certs in Minnesota found COVID was not the underlying cause of death 40% of the time. A similar review in Florida indicated 18% overcounting. Using the Florida number as an estimate of overcounting would put 2020 deaths from COVID pretty much on par with non-COVID excess deaths in 2020.
Nathan, I read about 1/3 of that article and there is no nice way to put it, it is pure B.S. There are untruths littered throughout, and the parts that are true are badly cherry picked. The below section is an example of the articles “rigor:” CDC data currently indicates 30.8% of COVID-19-labeled deaths occur at a nursing home or long term care facility, a hospice facility, or the decedent’s home. Removing 97% of these deaths from the CDC total under the assumption that these patients were severely frail and had pre-existing comorbidities that rendered COVID-19 treatment undesirable reduces the… Read more »
And you know this how?
M&M, A minute of googling would have shown that it was well reported last spring. It would help if you tried to contribute something rather than just troll! Coroners and medical examiners in several states stated that the deaths were likely overcounts because people who tested positive but died of other conditions were counted as covid deaths. On the other side of the ledger it is well known that many people died in nursing homes that were never tested. Some of those people were estimated in later, but excess death figures imply that it is still an undercount. Also, we… Read more »
What do you mean by “excess deaths?” And what say you to the various accounts, reports, and whistles blown about “covid related deaths” being defined as “someone who died for any reason, but tested positive for covid within 2 weeks of the incident?” I think a lot of trust is lost from the system. And for good reason. Game theory, plus the immutable fact that security clearances exist, mean that a “massive conspiracy” is not unlikely at all. It is part and parcel of working with sensitive information. It does nobody any good to dismiss things just because a few… Read more »
Dear Mr. Todd, esq., Excess deaths are a measure that compares all cause mortality (read: every death, no covid designation needed) against the typical total deaths for that time period. The CDC generally reports weekly because that captures seasonality around winter infection diseases (especially ILI) but they provide the raw data and with a bit of know-how you can construct whatever intervals you want. The CDC also uses a conservative measure (makes the excess deaths low) because they predict an upper bound for deaths for each week that is well above the average number of deaths. Any deaths beyond that… Read more »
To Mr. & Mrs. Jones — Just remember that there’s a difference between “hurt” and “harm” or “damage.” The point of spanking is that it’s short-lived pain, not the life-long suffering, or even death, you’re setting the kid up for if you don’t lovingly discipline him. Proverbs 19:18 gets at this. Here it is in lots of English translations.
Excellent point. Painful spanking is brief and effective. Not only does it not physically harm the child it avoids the all too common psychological harm of extended conflict between patent and child. Spanking creates much less distress than does arguing, pressuring and fighting with a child. And spanking without delay avoids the insidious harm of parents merely tolerating their children. In short, spanking works with the child’s nature. Especially at very young ages, they are constantly modifying their behavior based in feedback from their environment. They understand gravity when they topple over. They understand how to respect and harmonize with… Read more »
Scotty, consider visiting Trinity Presbyterian Church in Birmingham which is part of the CREC (the denomination Christ Church Moscow is a member of).
Mr and Mrs Jones, you should check out the book Shepherding A Child’s Heart by Ted Tripp for a complete, convincing Biblical case for traditional spanking. I didn’t like it as a form of discipline either but after having my 3rd child I was exhausted by trying to coax/bargain my older 2 children into obedience (which I knew the scripture required of them) . Tripp shows how it harms the child more to withhold physical discipline than to lovingly administer it.
Thank you for the cute chinchilla getting combed this week rather than the usual near-death-experience gifs!
Indeed. Witnessing a cute chinchilla in a near-death experience would be off-putting.
😆
The Mexican supreme court ruling on abortion is illegitimate. With only four qualified justices voting, it has no real moral standing.
Please explain and direct us to your sources.
The decision of the eleven-member Mexico Supreme Court was unanimous. Eight justices ruled on Monday that it is unconstitutional for the law to punish women who have abortions and the three other justices joined in the opinion the next day. I don’t know if this ruling affects abortionists which may be why most news services are referring to the decision as decriminalization rather than legalization.
Pastor Wilson, many folk have asked you to clarify why you changed your stance on vaccinations and the link doesn’t answer the question. On at least three occasions from 2015-2020 you stated that it was okay for the state to regulate based on people’s vaccination status. Your linked response simply hand-waves away one of those instances without addressing WHY you think differently now. You can’t pretend that it was just a writing error when you repeated it several times.
Uncle Dougy (if I may),
Regarding the answer you game to my question of a Christian state. What kind of religious freedom would we have? Would we allow Mosques to be built? Mormon temples? Only let them meet in houses? I’m genuinely wondering where we draw the line, and what the biblical data we draw from tells us here. Thanks for helping me to see the truth of Christ as King in space and history.
-James
James,
There was a troll on here a few years back that used to refer to Doug Wilson as Dougy. It was condescending and rude. You may have not meant it that way but it certainly comes across that way.
Hmm, I’m trying to remember who that was…?
I can get behind Dougie Fresh, but just Dougie, or Uncle Dougie, not so much.