surely a fellow Thomas Paine fan wouldn't be beholden to personal feelings over critical thinking

It is your duty to be offended. But the main idea is that anything so sacred that it can't be criticized is the equivalent of a deity. So, you've proven my point. When you really want to question everything, there are no ridiculous questions, unless there is some ulterior motive as in a filibuster.

@treepolitik It is not my ‘duty’ to be offended, rather it is simply an extension of my experience or perhaps even my persona—call it, my identity or tribe, if you prefer. Were you to insult my wife or children by impugning their character in a comparable fashion, my reaction would be predictably similar. This has nothing to do with religion!

Now don’t get me wrong; I belong to the George Carlin line of reasoning—nothing is sacred or beyond reproach! But my point here is this: Just criticism and false equivalency are not synonymous. Whoever said, 'there is no such thing as a stupid question,' needed to have his/her head examined!

If it is an identity or tribe, then it is a culture. But I think it's a system-manufactured culture rather than a natural culture. We sometimes speak of worker culture or a military-industrial complex. We sometimes speak of traditional values, but this is based on capitalism as well. It's just that something built for war that clamps down on other cultures, doesn't seem like a well developed culture. To be fair, this means I'm also putting down Britain, France, and Rome, despite military power being central to them maintaining a stable culture for thousands of years. I also admit that if man is in a state of nature, military culture is necessary to allow development of non-military culture. I advocate for the world to leave the state of nature by creating an abundance of resources so there is no need to fight for them, and so there is no crime.

@treepolitik
I can agree with some of what you say, however I ask you to consider that all cultures are manufactured, and are therefore a choice. Just as an individual may choose to abandon their culture, so can society forge a new one.

The way the elites are running it, it feels like a foreign takeover. It doesn't feel like the people have any power.