Posts by Kyle Matthews
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do you have any actual history recommendations worth reading ?
Belich and King have both written on the topic.
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As Kyle Chapman points out here, the state benefits quite significantly from the charitable activities of religious organisations.
Please don't call me Kyle Chapman. Please.
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But I don't think we can take a naive consequentialist approach to the state's treatment of religion --- again, consider if Buddhism were `more beneficial' than Islam; would it be right to help Buddhism more? I rather think not.
Again, I'm not sure why the state has to make value judgements on the relative worth of various charities. I know my charity wouldn't come out very well in comparison to a hospice. The relative value of the charities is made by the givers, not the government.
But it is a tangible intertwining cause it goes on in a persons mind which is tangible.
tangible: capable of being touched; discernible by the touch; material or substantial.
Churches exploit the centuries of deference that comes their way for no other good reason, and hide behind their "good works" aggressively and for as much as it is worth.
I'm not part of any religion, but that's crap. Lots of people involved with religion do good work simply for that purpose. If they didn't, us atheists would be needing to spend a lot more time and money providing foodbanks, drug treatment facilities, halfway houses etc.
A little more recognition for that work, wouldn't go astray.
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I never made any bargain.
It's like watching the social contract get thrown out the window. How Lindsay Perigo.
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BTW: try filling a pump-up weedsprayer with kerosene, apply lighter & take 'em on like a man.
That's not very manly. Naked with a fly-swotter, as god intended!
Blues apparently like blue more because they can see ultra violet, which some colours show more of than others - blue makes uv purple. Bees can't see red at all.
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To ease my jaded soul can you think of courageous actions by governments in recent history approaching the arc of what "Slarty" is throwing out to us.
Internationally? The whole end of the cold war thing. China's move to its quasi capitalism model? For NZ, Treaty of Waitangi was pretty fundamental and significant internally.
They all have some wider public impetus though, but you need that to get it through.
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The sort who consider the past to be somewhere between boring, irrelevant, and inconvenient.
The comparison with the US constitution is apt. They're documents that have ongoing relevance.
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Because in fact I don't think religion is a Good Thing
I don't think the law makes such value judgements. Nor should it. The salvation army does good work, but hasn't always had a great public record on 'the gays'. Does that make them not a charity and liable for tax?
Some of those same community benefits apply to religious groups (communal activity and such) but that's not *because* they're religious; it's more an offshoot. I fail to see why there should be an exemption specifically for religious bodies on the grounds that their religiosity and promulgation thereof is of benefit to the community, when that in and of itself is not necessarily the case.
That's an argument you could make for any club, some of whom have very limited social benefits.
Poets attend to my spiritual needs, and yet the state insists that they pay their taxes. Go figure.
That's the wrong side of the argument. They pay income tax, same as any priest.
If there was a charity that was a poet's collective that employed a poet or poets, it would be a tax-free charity to give to. No different than a religion.
I say cancel every tax exemption currently extended to religious organisations, and make them reapply on the basis the portion of their income that goes into supporting their charity activities. Same as any old corporate body
In order to get a charitable status certificate you do have to apply already. We did it a few months ago, just had to send them a copy of our constitution.
I think you mean remove 'religious' from the law.
Groups promoting systems of thought that don't invoke deities, like the National Party, Greenpeace or the Wellington Anarchist Collective don't get charitable status.
I'd be very surprised if Greenpeace doesn't have charitable status, given that is how they fund much of their work.
I believe the missionaries were quite fond of land. What with all those delicious untaxed capital gains year on year, I imagine the leveraged income and the rents would be quite sustaining.
Those are mostly historical assets though, pre-dating gift tax, let alone tax exemption.
... unless someone wants to enlighten me as to exactly why Skippy cornflakes are more religious than Kellog's cornflakes, and thus exempt from income tax (which they are.)
It's a gift tax exemtion, not an income one. And the exemption applies to the giver, not the organisation that receives it.
It does encourage giving, by not taxing that money so the religion benefits by.... probably about 50%
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Yes. To the tune of $27k/year per trust. Multiple trusts with identical trustees will get the spidey-senses of IRD investigators going, too, so it's not a particularly easy restriction to get around.
I thought the tax was based on the giver, not the destination. So you can give away $27K tax free/year, to one or more things. You get taxed on anything over $27K, even if it goes to multiple destinations.
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Either way it was quite disrespectful of the TMO.
My understanding was that the TMO could not rule on anything before the goal line under the rules. Hence Lawrence's frustration with him stepping outside his job.
But that might be rugby league I'm thinking of.
I couldn't tell if it was a try or not from the 10 replays I saw, and was happy with it to be awarded in the interest of the referee having to just make a decision with the TMO not being at all helpful.