If you haven't heard of SOPA/PIPA yet, they're two bills that the US Congress is
trying to pass. Basically, these bills will give the American government the
right to censor any website worldwide, on the guise of anti-piracy laws. The FBI
has already killed MegaUpload and could shut down any website that has a link
posted ANYWHERE to a pirating website, including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube,
Tumblr, Flickr, Photobucket and a ton of other user-host websites. The odds of
smaller websites like Blogger or FFN being shut down are pretty good as well.
All I would need to do to shut down this blog or even this website would be to post a link to The Pirate Bay (popular free-download site) or another torrent site. Legislation such as this WILL kill Facebook, Google+, Twitter, or any other user-content website. We can't let this happen.
Wikipedia and Reddit (as you should all know) did a 24-hour blackout in protest of the
bill, and other sites such as the Cheezburger Network, NotAlwaysRight and
various others have had banners looming on their web pages.
Due to fierce
public opposition, the bill has been halted. But it's still alive and the US
Congress could still attempt to pass it, or replace it with an equally-devastating bill. We need to get this plague killed
NOW.
This petition by Avaaz has already gotten the support of over three
million people to kill the bill. Go sign this bill, then post it to your
Facebook/Twitter/email/whatever else and get your friends to sign it. http://www.avaaz.org/en/save_the_internet_...on_center_b/?fp
Sunday, January 22, 2012
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Ponderings...
Our school (which is heavy in the Social Sciences department) does Soc Movie
nights occassionally. Tonight's movie was called "For the Bible tells me so", a
2007-ish documentary on the Christian parents of gay or lesbian chlidren.
This was a very pro-gay standpoint. Before I get too far into this, please understand that I come from a fairly conservative Christian background. My thoughts before watching this movie were that gay folks are people too and deserve to be loved, although I cannot force myself to fully approve of their life choices.
Right, we're all friends here? Excellent. Moving on.
This documentary pointed fingers at evangelical Christians/Catholics for discrimination and hate crimes against gay folks. I'm ashamed of Christians for doing that, although I do wish that the documentary had been a bit more objective and given people (Christians specifically) a chance to defend their own beliefs. But meh.
My thoughts after this movie? Homophobia sucks. Period. I still can't forsake the beliefs I've grown up with and say homosexuality is not a sin, but I believe that gay folks are people who deserve the same love and respect we give to straight people, and the hate crimes against them are unexcusable. I'm not a deep theologian or a pastor and it's not my gift to completely understand Scripture as it relates to current life or to other people around me- and frankly, that's not my right. It's not my call to judge who is holy and who is heathen- I've got enough problems of my own without worrying about the LGBTQ people around me. I'll let God do the judging, since He is the only one without his own issues to deal with first.
Besides, as one guy pointed out in the talkback after the movie, there's bigger problems to worry about in the world besides homosexuality. There might be huge rows here about gay marriage legalization, but that's not going to help a starving child in Africa or a woman being trafficked for sex slavery or a Christian getting killed for his faith or the thousands of babies who get murdered pre-birth before they can even see the light of day because their mothers refuse to consider adoption as a plausible option to unwanted parenthood.
That's my thoughts, as of now, anyway.
This was a very pro-gay standpoint. Before I get too far into this, please understand that I come from a fairly conservative Christian background. My thoughts before watching this movie were that gay folks are people too and deserve to be loved, although I cannot force myself to fully approve of their life choices.
Right, we're all friends here? Excellent. Moving on.
This documentary pointed fingers at evangelical Christians/Catholics for discrimination and hate crimes against gay folks. I'm ashamed of Christians for doing that, although I do wish that the documentary had been a bit more objective and given people (Christians specifically) a chance to defend their own beliefs. But meh.
My thoughts after this movie? Homophobia sucks. Period. I still can't forsake the beliefs I've grown up with and say homosexuality is not a sin, but I believe that gay folks are people who deserve the same love and respect we give to straight people, and the hate crimes against them are unexcusable. I'm not a deep theologian or a pastor and it's not my gift to completely understand Scripture as it relates to current life or to other people around me- and frankly, that's not my right. It's not my call to judge who is holy and who is heathen- I've got enough problems of my own without worrying about the LGBTQ people around me. I'll let God do the judging, since He is the only one without his own issues to deal with first.
Besides, as one guy pointed out in the talkback after the movie, there's bigger problems to worry about in the world besides homosexuality. There might be huge rows here about gay marriage legalization, but that's not going to help a starving child in Africa or a woman being trafficked for sex slavery or a Christian getting killed for his faith or the thousands of babies who get murdered pre-birth before they can even see the light of day because their mothers refuse to consider adoption as a plausible option to unwanted parenthood.
That's my thoughts, as of now, anyway.
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