It's not really a choice. It's "the way things are supposed to be".
The argument is not unrelated though, because it's relative the nature of our society. And that nature is what makes this hack so juicy to people that would have otherwise have ignored that as they ignored many other data leaks in the past.
Freedom of choice is important, but you're not really free to choose polygamy when education and morals are still mostly driven by archaic religious beliefs.
Just like homosexuality "was not a choice" a mere few years ago: yet people did choose to be open about their homosexuality and did choose to fight for their rights as homosexuals. Look where we are today: the American courts now lawfully recognize that choice in marriage.
> archaic religious beliefs
So far as advanced societies go, believing in higher power(s) is a choice. It is certainly not archaic to those who choose to do so and in the somewhat broken world today, possibly more relevant to them than ever. I've never understood why those who are discriminated against have discriminated beliefs. It's not right when their force-feed their beliefs down people's throats, but that doesn't make it right to force-feed Atheism/Agnosticism down theirs.
> So far as advanced societies go, believing in higher power(s) is a choice.
Is it? That must be the reason why all recent U.S. Presidents were all fervent atheists...
Is it a choice in a society where swearing on a religious tome is still considered a rational way to induce people to tell the truth in court?
I know that's just theater (otherwise perjury would not be a felony). Still, I think it's a telling detail of how far you would go without believing in something in contemporary American society.
Let me finish off by agreeing with you about eliminating the Bible in court. Not only is it out of place, but a person who doesn't believe in such things could swear on it and proceed to lie simply because they don't believe that they will go to Hell. This means that not only is it completely ineffective, but if an actually Christian person comes along they would be at an unfair disadvantage: being unable to lie like everyone else can.
The "wrong place" isn't HN, rather: it's text. A lot of nuance is lost in text and this is an incredibly nuanced subject. We'd most likely end up having a fierce fight 50 comments deep, where in person we'd probably land up agreeing on most things after 2 minutes.
I've got to strongly disagree with your stance about not discussing this in text form. Nuance is even more subjective than text. I'll go much further and say that if you can't express your view in text, you need to think about your view more because it isn't well formed.
I think the problem is that complex ideas can't always be expressed in soundbite form. HN is better than Twitter but it's just not the forum for rational debate.
>if an actually Christian person comes along they would be at an unfair disadvantage: being unable to lie like everyone else can //
You may not be aware that the NT says that people shouldn't take an oath instead let your "yes be yes"; ie just tell it straight, be honourable. It's never come up but I'd be unwilling to swear on the Bible in court as it's against my faith as a Christian.
I like how you applied pure logic to the Bible problem.
That was just an example for how even the court system, in the U.S. takes religion as the de facto standard for setting moral ground. :)
I do not agree though that text isn't the right form. We will probably never talk to each other in person, but we had a text-mediated prolific and mature discussion that, in the end, enriched both of us.
