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Resistance Thinking Society
'Society' is a term used to describe a grouping of individuals and outlines the structures employed to ensure that the individuals within a society relate to each other in an appropriate fashion. Different societies may have distinctive cultural behaviours and different institutions. In this society section you will find news, articles and reviews that relate to Australian society, or more specifically, individuals who live in Australia.
Topics in this section will cover: science and technology - stem cell research, IVF, cloning, intelligent design, evolution etc.; politics - ideologies (communism, anarchism, totalitarianism, capitalism etc.), state and federal politics, the free market, the United Nations etc.; sociology - globalisation, prisons, welfare, government; environment - global warming, alternative energy etc.; and moral issues - poverty, homosexuality, euthanasia, abortion etc.
The role of the Christian within society is to stand for truth, for justice and most importantly, to represent God's agenda on the earth. As the Resistance Thinking journey continues, our aim is to stimulate engaging dialogue exploring the complexities of how followers of Jesus should engage with society in our day and age.
Please browse through the articles below
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Friday, 30 May 2008 23:08 |
The Family Court has ruled that a 12 year old girl can be put on sex change hormones at the taxpayers' expense. This is very concerning and heartbreaking.
Girl, 12, wins sex change
Herald Sun, Fiona Hudson, May 25, 2008
A JUDGE has allowed a 12-year-old Victorian girl to start a taxpayer-funded sex swap, despite objections from the child's father. The girl has begun court-approved hormone treatment in the first step toward a complete gender switch. The Family Court orders also permit the girl, who cannot be named, to apply for a new birth certificate, passport and Medicare card in a boy's name. |
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Read more... [Girl, 12, wins sex change]
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Saturday, 08 December 2007 00:27 |
Greg Donnelly examines our culture's preoccupation with sexually based advertising and reveals the results of an American Psychological Association study that establishes "ample evidence indicates that sexualisation has negative effects in a variety of domains, including cognitive functioning, physical and mental health, sexuality and beliefs."
Just sick of sexploitation
Herald Sun, Greg Donnelly, December 06, 2007
AS I pulled up at the traffic lights on a busy road, I happened to glance up at a billboard. Larger than life was a girl in red bra and briefs. She was cuddling a large fluffy animal and cheekily nibbling on one of its ears.
Next to her, in large letters, the billboard asked the question: "Horny?"
Humorous? Amusing? Sexist? Pornographic?
Probably not in the way the average Australian adult male is likely to understand the word in 2007.
Isn't it just a clever piece of advertising for a well-known brand of women's underwear?
Does it have any negative consequences?
Our popular culture would say "no". It would credit the ad as being "savvy" and "in your face".
As the lights turned green and I drove away, I couldn't help wondering if there was more to this advertisement than met the eye.
You can see billboards like this in Sydney and Melbourne and most big Australian cities.
Family groups are outraged at the increasing soft-porn content.
Australian Family Association president Angela Conway says highly sexual imagery is harming the development of children and teenagers.
The AFA is demanding that advertising standards codes be overhauled to protect impressionable young people.
The most disturbing research comes from the American Psychological Association, which released a report this year on the sexualisation of girls.
An APA task force of six psychologists and a member of the public took two years to produce the report, which covers 45 pages with 439 references covering another 20 pages.
It is a significant piece of social research and I believe the most comprehensive on the subject.
The task force was to "examine and summarise psychological theory, research, and clinical experience addressing the sexualisation of girls".
The report contains a number of recommendations, one of which states that the APA "work with Congress and relevant federal agencies and industry to reduce the use of sexualised images of girls in all forms of media and products".
The report looked at the issue across a number of media platforms: television, music videos, music lyrics, movies, cartoons and animation, magazines, sports media, video computer games, internet, advertising, products, clothing and cosmetics.
The report examines in detail literature and research relating not just to girls, but also to women.
Such a detailed report cannot have its content simply reduced to a few, brief sentences.
However, in my view the key observation is to be found on page 21, where the authors say about the consequences of the sexualisation of girls and women:
"Ample evidence indicates that sexualisation has negative effects in a variety of domains, including cognitive functioning, physical and mental health, sexuality and beliefs."
The language used by the authors of the report is candid and unambiguous.
Continue reading at herald sun |
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Friday, 23 May 2008 21:35 |
Richard Fletcher has called for changes to parental leave to allow fathers to take paid time to bond with their newborns. It is predicted that this will assist fathers in becoming more involved in their children's lives and reverse the stereotypes.
Fatherhood expert Richard Fletcher: Dads matter too
Daily Telegraph, Clare Masters, May 23, 2008
THE stereotype of the father being a bystander in his baby's life could be changed forever if paid paternity leave were introduced. Researchers told the Productivity Commission inquiry into paid parental leave that workplace practices need to change so fathers feel good about taking time off for their child. "This is a key issue that hasn't been tacked onto the discussions (about maternity leave)," said fatherhood expert Richard Fletcher, from the University of Newcastle. |
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Read more... [Dads matter too]
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Friday, 23 November 2007 21:28 |
A new discovery reveals that scientists can reprogram human skin cells to act like embryonic stem cells, removing the need to create and destroy human embryos for experimentation. The promises for salvation from the embryonic stem cell crusaders now sound very hollow.
Beyond the embryo fight
LA Times, Richard Hayes, November 22, 2007
The debate over cloning embryos for stem cell research has been one of the most divisive and unpleasant public controversies of the last decade. Partisans on both sides have sought to polarize the issue for political advantage rather than look for middle-ground positions that a majority of Americans would welcome.
In general, Republicans have equated medical research using single-celled clonal embryos with murder, while Democrats have promoted state ballot initiatives enshrining human embryo cloning as a constitutional right. They have committed billions of taxpayer dollars to a procedure that could open the door to socially pernicious applications, threaten women's health and exacerbate healthcare inequities.
Now we have a chance to put the cloning debate behind us.
Scientists in Japan and the United States announced Tuesday that they have successfully reprogrammed human skin cells to act like embryonic stem cells. The new techniques bypass the need to create and destroy human embryos. Research using these techniques would be fully fundable under current U.S. federal government policy. It can be supported by liberal, pro-choice Democrats and socially conservative, pro-life Republicans alike.
Response from all sides has been swift. President Bush's science advisors are enthusiastic about the new procedures. British scientist Ian Wilmut, who cloned Dolly the sheep, is abandoning attempts to use cloning for medical research and will henceforth work with the new techniques. Human embryo cloning, he said, is both technically inefficient and socially less acceptable than the new methods.
For the last decade, scientists in favor of cloning have been telling us that human embryo cloning was the key to the "stem cell century" and would revolutionize medical care for hundreds of millions suffering from intractable disease.
In 2004, California scientists appeared in television ads in their white lab coats promising cures for desperately ill children if voters approved Proposition 71, the $3-billion ballot initiative for stem cell research that prioritized embryo cloning. In 2006, more than $30 million was spent to persuade Missouri voters to approve a constitutional amendment that had little purpose other than to preclude possible restrictions on cloning-based stem cell research.
Continue reading at LA Times |
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Friday, 23 May 2008 21:29 |
Photographer Bill Henson's photographic exhibit featuring naked children is being investigated due to possible breaches of child porn legislation. There have been the predictable cries of censorhip which fail to grasp the gravity of the situation, thinking any progress is good progress.
Police investigate exhibition of teen nudes
The Australian, Matthew Westwood, May 23, 2008
ALARM about images of naked teenagers by acclaimed photographer Bill Henson has forced a Sydney gallery to cancel its exhibition. Police said they were investigating the legality of some of the photographs in the exhibition at Roslyn Oxley Gallery in inner-city Paddington. The opening of the show was cancelled amid complaints about the show's explicit content. Printed invitations to the private viewing featured a single image from the exhibition, depicting a naked 13-year-old girl. |
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Read more... [Police investigate exhibition of teen nudes]
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Wednesday, 21 November 2007 00:54 |
Does the political right represent God’s perspective better than the political left?
Emma Hughes, November 2007
As the election campaign draws to a close and we head off to the polling booths on Saturday no doubt you would have asked yourself ‘who should I vote for’? Having two Christians to choose from has spurred the debate about who will command the Christian vote this time around. Will it be Kevin Rudd with his strong views on social justice, or John Howard with his strong stance on issues of morality? Inevitably the question must be asked- which approach better represents God’s perspective?
Opposing visions
A little while ago Bill Muehlenberg posted an article where he analysed the philosophical basis of left and right using the terminology of Thomas Sowell where he pinpoints two competing ‘visions’: (1) the constrained vision which acknowledges that there are limits human nature, to what governments can do, and to what can be achieved in a society; and (2) the unconstrained vision which tends to downplay limits, viewing mankind as more or less perfectible; social and political utopia to a large extent achievable; and evil not endemic or inherent in the human condition, and therefore is able to be mostly eliminated.
Muehlenberg concluded: “The conservative vision tends to reflect the Judeo-Christian understanding that mankind is fallen, is limited, is prone to sin and self, and cannot produce heaven on earth, at least without the help of God. The left-liberal vision, by contrast, tends to see the human condition as innocent, malleable and perfectible, and tends to think that utopia on earth is achievable under the right social conditions.”
The Religious Right
Robert Meyer defines the political right in this way: “Conservative Christianity takes an approach that was highly refined in the Reformation. A biblical system that distinguishes between two kingdoms or realms of authority; the church and the state, in which both are under God. The church has the ministry of grace, while the state administers justice. Thus, the true understanding of separation is a functional and jurisdictional division of duty and responsibility.”
A hallmark of this view is passion for morality (such as encouraging sexual abstinence, exclusively heterosexual marriage, zero drug use and banishing corruption), life issues (ie. the protection of the vulnerable being expunged by the strong such as in abortion, euthanasia, and the use of embryos for scientific experimentation), and a healthy cynicism of fashionable ‘human rights’ policies such as a Bill of Rights and extended discrimination/vilification legislation. All of these issues demonstrate that humans have the capacity for evil and the vulnerable in society must be protected accordingly. They also demonstrate that free will is paramount (unless it harms others or society), that free speech is valuable (political correctness is merely symbolism) and that individuals should be free to make decisions and take up opportunities as they see fit (demonstrated in the use of the budget surplus for tax cuts rather than government spending on services, funding for both government and independent schools, and the greater choice and flexibility evidenced in WorkChoices). The political right also values democracy highly in that it is loathe to allow unelected judges to have the final say on legislation (ie. via a Bill of Rights), nor will it refer everything to a ‘committee’ for inquiry before coming up with a policy response.
The Religious Left
A common hallmark of a political left approach to issues is a micro, emotional one. Explained this basically means that those adhering to such a philosophical commitment tend to view issues idealistically and connect with people and faces who are affected (think David Hicks, Cornelia Rau etc). This is then extrapolated out into policy recommendations with the thought in the back of one’s mind that there are thousands others like these people, all deserving of government help and assistance.
You may have heard someone proclaim that compassion, tolerance and social justice are the ends that Jesus was clearly trying to achieve on the earth. Key issues for this approach are identified as foreign aid, abolishing discrimination, getting rid of ‘unfair’ industrial relations laws and opening up our borders to refugees. Proponents of the political left tend to marginalise morality and life issues as personal, while arguing passionately that social justice is too important to be left to individuals, but must be meted out by the government.
Whilst compassion and mercy appears to be the top note in these policies, what is not so often heard is the undertone of socialism/humanism (or per Sowell’s description, the ‘unconstrained vision’). When this is raised those of the political left tend to laugh dismissively and accuse you of ‘fear politics’ or plainly failing to care for the disadvantaged as they do.
The problem with this dismissal, however, is that socialism and humanism are complete worldviews in themselves, both opposed at their very foundation to Christianity. Both are convinced that society is at fault, not the humans that run it and that money and resources must be co-opted by a centralized government in order to properly distribute the wealth to those ‘in need’. Individual responsibility to look out for our struggling neighbour is minimized as this is simply not taken into account when determining how ‘charitable’ a country is. You will have read of Bob Geldof’s remarks that ‘Australia is one of the stingiest countries on the planet’ in relation to our foreign aid commitment. Yet such a comment fails to take into account individual giving (indeed we rank second in the world in this respect), whether foreign aid is a valid approach, or how to combat problems of corruption when the aid arrives at the intended destination.
So often during this campaign I have heard friends proclaim that the Greens are the closest in ideology to what Jesus is on about, because they care about poverty, climate change, refugees and the environment and are against the war in Iraq. Yet they seem to be unaware of the fact that the Greens blatantly support euthanasia, abortion on demand, the porn industry, legalization of drugs, homosexuality, vilification legislation and view the environment as more important than human life (contrary to the hierarchy that God set up in Genesis). One point to note is that some issues in the Bible are anything but grey and these include the value of human life, the command not to murder, the exhortation to stay away from sexual immorality, and to turn from homosexuality; whereas issues that can arguably be addressed in different ways are poverty, border protection, care for the environment and war.
The political left accuses the right of ‘not caring’ about issues such as refugees and poverty, but to frame the debate in these terms misses the point entirely. As Muhelenberg states: “Both sides are concerned about the poor and their plight. But they differ on the causes and the cures. The conservative vision, reflecting the Judeo-Christian worldview, seeks to distinguish between the deserving and undeserving poor. That is, some are poor due to no fault of their own, but may be victims of exploitation and injustice. But some are poor by choice, that is, they are lazy, irresponsible, refuse to work, and so on.”
A Coalition policy released this week shows this distinction where it promised that those convicted of drug offences would have their welfare payments suspended for a year. As for refugees, the political left often fail to see how the issue can be broader than the micro plight of an individual refugee arriving on our shores only to be thrown into a detention centre. The broader perspective such as the need to be economically and socially responsible with border control as well as the need to properly screen anyone who enters the country due to terrorism risks is often lost in the accusations that anyone opposed to completely open borders is selfish, ignorant, and heartless.
Conclusion
This issue is one that will raise the passions of those on both sides of the political spectrum because ultimately we all believe that we are seeking to view the world the way we think God would, and react to issues in a way that is consistent with that belief. One question we might ask ourselves is whether our political ideals influence our religious beliefs or vice versa. Are we seeking to understand the wholistic Christian perspective and apply that to politics, or, is our passionate ‘one-eyed’ support for an ideology adapted to suit our religious lingo? Is all that links us to Jesus our strong belief in ‘compassion’ and ‘social justice’? Are we forgetting to care about our neighbour in our pursuit of wealth and opportunities? Both sides of the spectrum must ask these questions respectively if we are to have integrity in this journey.
READ more about the religious left
DEBATE this issue on the forum
COMPARE policies of different parties
FIND your electorate
INVESTIGATE your candidates |
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