I need a dose of sanity

[agtcovert]

I had lunch yesterday with someone I, until recently, considered a dear friend. This election cycle has been bitter for us and unfortunately it deeply impacted our friendship. In trying to catch up with him over lunch, I ended up walking away even more depressed. I keep trying to understand where this line of thinking comes from and can't figure it out:

He's Catholic, and he's vehemently against any abortion. Fine, whatever. He's fixated on the HHS mandate and feels it impinges his (and all Catholic's) religious freedom. He went so far as to say that they are building a new church but won't build a school they want to build because they don't want to provide employees with an insurance plan that includes provisions for contraceptives (since they are immoral).

I asked him -- given his beliefs -- wouldn't it be better to build the school and reap all the good that could come from it for their community? The answer is no, can't flex on any beliefs.

Then things got weirder. Apparently he and others are convinced the HHS "mandate" is only the beginning of the government stepping in and stopping all religion. Obama, according to him, has no morals at all and wants us all to be godless socialists. This mandate is the segue to the government shooting people for going to church. The government is going to step in and not allow individuals to discuss their religion. These are some of the reasons why Obama is terrible, evil, and must be defeated.

So I asked him if he had faith, given his religious convictions.
"Yes, of course."
So then my question was: "You have faith in something you've never seen, yet you have so little faith in your fellow people that you think our president is sitting in the Oval office hatching some diabolical plan to stop you from practicing religion? That he wants to literally kill people who practice religion?"
Without skipping a beat: "Yes."

I just can't wrap my head around this. How do people get to this point in their thinking? How did political discourse get to the point where we're hung up on birth control and abortion while real issues -- debt, education, taking care of our aged population, energy/environmental issues -- just slip under the radar of most people I talk to?

[JaneyVee]

1. Because ignorance on the RW has reached critical mass. Facts replaced with

confirmation bias

[mnhtnbb]

2. How do people get to this point in their thinking?

Fox News.

Propaganda 24/7.

[rurallib]

3. I notice you say "he." Does he know that nearly every female Catholic

who is sexual practices birth control?
Does he understand that preventing an unwanted pregnancy is much better than abortion?
Would he be willing to help pay for the upbringing of every unwanted child born of a forced birth policy?

My opinion - your chances of changing his mind are slim. It would probably take some shock to make him think.
I would stay away from him unless you enjoy being pissed off and unable to do things about it.

[agtcovert]

5. I think...

He ignores the fact that most women (including Catholic women) practice birth control. His wife used it for a long time before they decided it was immoral.

There's no consideration of the implications of unwanted/forced births. It's typical mentality: value (beyond reason) that which is unborn, but when born, f**k the kid. I say this because they're having trouble conceiving but won't consider adoption because it's too expensive. (Nevermind they have a >3000 sq. foot house and 4 cars between 2 people).

I don't know that I'm trying to change his mind--more try to get him to see that this stuff isn't black and white. I don't begrudge a different opinion on the issue--it's the extreme to which it's been taken for him that...well, breaks my heart really.

And I agree -- we don't see each other much anymore, because I don't enjoy being pissed off.

[porphyrian]

4. Blame religious leaders.

Someone is telling him to fear these things. Someone is telling him that abortion is child murder and that preventing it trumps women's right to decide what to do with their bodies. Someone is telling him that the President wants to kill people who practice religion (...really...?). Someone has trained him to accept these things, and others, on faith without question. It wasn't you. It wasn't me. It's the people he trusts as authorities, and he accepts their word as if it were the word of God, without question.

Faith is one of the most dangerous and destructive methods of thought control in the world today. Faith requires no evidence, proof or fact; it is belief regardless of these. Whenever someone points this out, bunches of people jump up to defend it. I'm sure the whole "Obama's gonna kill us for our religion" bullshit was invented by these same people.

I'm sorry you've lost a friend, but people like that largely have to come to their senses on their own.

[agtcovert]

6. Yeah

What you're saying supports my (unsupported ) theory that something's happened to him in the last year or so that's caused the extreme shift. I've known him for 10 years. What I've seen this year isn't the person I knew.

[JHB]

7. Why did people like him think liberals were "on orders from Moscow"?

These people create their own groupthink where they all reinforce each other and shut out anything that would make their opinions look silly -- a vein that talk radio guys like Limbaugh worked for years, with FOX icing the entire bubble-cake.

When a group of extremely flatulent people have walled themselves into a room for years, it's the person who walks in and starts gasping for air who looks strange.

[RagAss]

8. What level of education does your friend have?

[agtcovert]

9. Bachelor's -- 4 year college. nt

[treestar]

10. Isn't it strange?

I know some who are like this. You can even get the facts - like the health care act, ask them where they get the "death panels." Of course they can find no such thing, but they did find the part about making information available about living wills, and insisted that was the "death panel" part. Yet some of them having living wills themselves.

The Catholic Church could just stop insuring its employees if it wants to make sure no one of their employees gets birth control. Also, why do they hire people they are afraid will take advantage of it? It's all about controlling other people. To them, that's the only "freedom." Others don't get freedom, just them.