Religion in Public Sphere
There are all kinds of public displays to attempt to eliminate the ones that seen religious would violate the First Amendment’s Right to freedom of religion.
The Government may not force a religion or any other belief on anyone. But having the Ten Commandments engraved more than once in the Supreme Court’s building does not force anyone to believe in them. Rather, it acknowledges how the Ten Commandments has been an important influence in our history.
Similarly, Christmas is a federal holiday that celebrates the birth of Christ again acknowledging the importance of Christ’s teaching on the history of America. Thanksgiving is a federal holiday in which we give thanks to God for our blessings. The White House traditionally has a Christmas Tree and the Easter Egg Hunt for children.
Anyone wants to pray in private or public should be allowed to do so. People who pray to god that have no evidence of there exist seems to be mental. Martin Luther King spoke not only just on racial freedom but also religious freedom. He spoke publicly about God in the same sentences as he spoke about equality of race.
The opinion that people should not express their beliefs publicly is oppression. It is equivalent of telling black people they cannot live in a white community.
Habermas developed a theoretical model of modern society which was accurate in its description of key modern social institutions, but which also encompasses a set of visionary normative ideas about how people should act in order to ensure a just and safe future.
His theoretical work was formulated in the context of a European Political Scene influenced by a legacy of war, fascism and social turmoil. Therefore one of Habermas main concerns was to identify how European Societies could develop towards a more stable, inclusive permissive, egalitarian and humane social order.
Part of his answer to this question was a theory known as the “disclosure ethic” which analyses the life of modern subjects as Anexus of two opposed spheres of social interaction
- The system world which is characterised by goal oriented policies (Fex work and other competitive arenas of social life)
- The life-world which is characterised by communicative practices where the aim is to understand other subjects (Fex through partnership, friendship political solidarity etc.)
Habermas saw that the system world is colonising the life-world of subjects in today’s society. Thereby reducing social life to more and more simple, binary relationships and endangering the cohesive power of society. Habermas formulated a recipe for people should act in order to avoid this development.
The main idea being that all communication between subjects should be conducted in a context free of power with an explicit aim to understand rather than to gain from each other. That ethic may be his greatest legacy. It is a recipe for peace.
To read Habermas, one requires a background in epistemology. So, one must read Immanuel Kant and his Thee Critiques ( 1780-1790)
One also requires a background in dialectics. So, one must read Friendich Schelling (1800) and GWF Hegel (1807, 1812, 1821, 1831)
One also requires a background a background in Anti- Capitalism. So, one must read Karl Marx and Herbert Marcuse (1941) and Theodore Adorno (1966)
One also requires a background in 20th Century Psychology.So one must read Jean Piaget (1923, 1947)
One also requires a background in pragmatism. So , one must read John Dewey (1902)
Even if one becomes bored with Habermas after reading all these authors, one will have gained a formidable overview of social theory. Any postmodern writer will seem a breeze read after climbing this mountain. As World War One begin upon Germany in 1914, leading to Communists believe that in the event of an outbreak of war , the workers will rise up and realise their ‘true’ class consciousness and favour Communist Revolution. The men of the belligerent nations signed up in their millions to fight for their beloved countries.
This was obviously a smack in the face to the communists. Their predictions had been proven wrong . The cold hard reality that they had to face was that their Rheoteric and Ideological Revolution was not going to happen as they would have wished.
With the widespread failure of Communist Revolution throughout the Rest of Europe (A as part from Russia) some communists sought understand why two Marxists Theorists, Antonio Gramsci and George Luckacs settled upon one definitive reason- Western Culture and Christianity were the reasons why the workers had come to reject communism.
Their ‘true’ Marxists Class interests had been ‘Blinded’ by the foundations of Western Society. Indeed in 1919 , Lukacks asked “Who will save us from Western Civilisation?”
The failure of Communism throughout Europe led to a group of German Marxists establishing a think tank in Frankfurt in 1922, known as the Institute for Social Research, which later came to be known as the Frankfurt School. The destructive criticism or the main elements of Western Culture including Christianity, Capitalism, Authority,The Family, Patriarchy, Hierarchy, Morality, Tradition, Sexual Restraint ,Loyalty, Patriotism, Nationalism, Heredity, Ethnocentrism, Conventional and Conservatism was to be systematic.
Setting aside for the moment the substantive contributions to political philosophy, ethics and sociology IMHO the most interesting area of Habermas work is his serious effort to incorporate the technical advances of Anglo Saxon Analytical Philosophy into his continental philosophy to system build. The most likeable work of his is it’s interdisciplinary and somewhat old fashioned German Style Grand Theorising. His conception or Philosophy which calls for close association of social sciences .
The most important idea is his passionate defence of reason is a force for a better world. He wrote an important criticism of Freud in knowledge and human interests. Recently he addressed Religion in “Where he discusses reason and tolerance in depth.” One of his best works is “Theory and Practice.” Where he analyses the difference between classical and modern forms of political thought, and the concept of Natural Law. Habermas is a centrepiece of political thought in 20th and 21st Century.
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