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Christian Nationalists Team Up on Illicit Push to Get Churches to Campaign for Trump
(www.rollingstone.com)
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this post was submitted on 17 Jan 2024
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politics
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Remember, if you see or hear a church actively campaigning for any sort of politics you can report them and get their tax free status taken away. 👍
Helpful Link: https://www.irs.gov/charities-non-profits/irs-complaint-process-tax-exempt-organizations
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That’s the brilliant thing about the making politics about cultural issues. Churches can campaign for culture shit all day long. They just can’t say “vote for _____.”
But that's exactly what they're doing.
Even when they do, and I have sent in photos of a local church with "Trump 2020" on their placard, nothing at all happens to them.
They aren't even contacted as far as I can tell.
Maybe cc a news organization or three on the email to the IRS next time and they can do some follow-up reporting on it?
Failing that, there ought to be some way a lawsuit could get filed that could force the IRS to do their job, though that'd be an expensive and time consuming thing
I didn't know that was a thing that could happen
I've got to do some research because my grandparents church has been doing this since Bush Sr.
Not a single church ever has had their tax status taken away for politics. It doesn't happen
It happened in 92, but that's the only publicly known instance.
I mean, it’s supposed to work that way but that's extremely rare.
If enough get reported, especially since now it's been vocalized and reported. They're going to be forced to do something about it. I acknowledge it is wishful thinking, though, but don't give up. Report these fucks either way.
Doing something about it has a non-zero chance of success.
Doing nothing about it has a guaranteed chance of failure.
Can I report a church I don't attend, just so they become paranoid about who snitched?
Yup, as long as they're campaigning for Trump or campaigning for political figures in general, have at it.
Someone with some cyberintelligence background could have a lot of fun setting their software to search for social media posts from pastors/churches looking for explicit political messaging.
Maybe talk to the local news about it.
Record it happening so you have evidence to back it up. Get it onto social media so everyone can help report it, too!
Nothing at all will happen. I doubt you can find a single "legitimate" (with a real congregation & actual employees) church that has had their tax free status challenged, let alone removed in the last 30 years.
Branch Ministries in New York had it done in 92 after taking out a full page political ad in the newspaper.
Lol that'll be the day. Has that ever happened? Ever?
Has that ever happened?
So your answer is to do nothing and be apathetic?
I've reported a church, with photo evidence from multiple angles. Literally nothing happened.
That law has never been enforced against a "legitimate" church.
We totally believe you random internet stranger. Totally.
Edit:
A quick Google search shows you're full of shit.
It's more pointing out how the suggested action is bullshit. It's like if you had a leaking roof and someone said to blow soap bubbles on it. And then when you point out that's a nonsensical solution that has no chance of working, they reply "oH, so YoU juSt waNT to Do NotHinG anD bE apaThEtic?"
Pointing out that someones suggestion is a non-solution is not an endorsement of doing nothing. It's pointing out that the suggestion is not helpful and distracts from actual solutions.
Pretending the IRS would actually go after a church is ignoring the reality of the situation. I don't want suggestions that would only work in some deluded made up fantasy world.
Then, by all means, what do you suggest since you obviously know more?
Jump on one foot and whistle.
What's that? You don't think that will do anything and it's an unhelpful suggestion?
Unfortunately you just established that you can't criticize dumb ideas unless you offer a working alternative, so I guess we'll all just have to stupidly go along with my jump-on-one-foot-and-whistle strategy until then.
/s
Again, you provide nothing of substance other than your apathetic bitchy attitude. Provide an alternative if not shut the fuck up because you provide nothing to the conversation.
Lol, playing the world's smallest violin for ya, champ. You love to dish it but can't take it.
How many ways do I have to say it? I don't need to know or provide an alternative to be able to recognize the current suggestion as bad. How tf are you not grasping this?
Let me try ANOTHER metaphor. Let's say someone asked us both what the square root of 294,797 was without using a calculator. I say "I don't know" and you say "I think it's 4". I don't have to know the correct answer to know that your answer is wrong. And it doesn't magically become worth considering just because it's the only answer that was given. It's still wrong.
It takes little effort. You're saying to not do it, while also not suggesting anything to do. Your suggestion has an even lower chance of success than the OP, so if anyone shouldn't be listened to it's you.
Collect evidence and submit it. Also work on getting better elected officials, unionizing, protesting, and whatever else you can do. If your suggestion is to stop doing something and not replacing it with something more effective then you should just keep your mouth shut.
How about we throw a bunch of birthday candles in the nearest lake?
And remember, you can't tell me that's stupid and unproductive because by your logic, that would clearly mean you are advocating for doing nothing.
Are you starting to see how nonsense your argument is?
No, their logic is that we should pursue the thing with the highest chance of success regardless of whether that chance is very good or not. Reporting to the IRS might only have a 1% chance of success, but that's better than nothing's 0% and birthday candles in a lake's 0.00001% chance.
It doesn't have a 1% chance, it has essentially a 0% chance. The IRS has NEVER gone after an established church, and they never will because of the massive can of worms it would open. While astronomically speaking, nothing is impossible, there comes a point where something is so improbable that attempting it is wasted effort. In this instance, it distracts from people coming up with actual solutions because they're led to believe that the false solution is worth pursuing.
I listed several other things people should also be doing. However, the IRS thing does have some amount of utility even if it does nothing at the moment. The IRS doesn't have enough employees (on purpose) to look into everything, but if they get enough complaints and enough evidence they may. It at least creates a paper trail of they try anything bigger.
And remember, that report will go nowhere and you'll accomplish nothing! The IRS has never gone after a church for this. Never. Reporting them is just as effective as quietly whispering "please tax them" into your pillow at night.
I wish people would recognize the failures in our system and stop suggesting others do shit that doesn't actually work.
I also wish people would stop saying there's no hope so do nothing.
No, record them and send it to the IRS. If nothing happens then fine. Nothing was lost. Along with that work towards change. Telling people the system is broken so do nothing is not going to get you the change you want.
Then what do you suggest? You obviously have better ideas? Or do you prefer to just bitch about things and not try to make a change?