There’s a very loud contingent of religious people who still hold power for historical and structural reasons. It’s a shrinking demographic, though. This could be the death yells of an archaic system.
Or maybe not. While trends are going that way for now, religion tends to be on the uptake when times become more difficult. We’re headed into a period of more climate problems and capitalism making things worse for all but a few. That could reverse the trends and send people back into the pews.
The tricky part is when links have (…) in them. Then you gotta escape the parentheses with a \ but work on getting the links right before that, you got this!
I agree with the second sentence, but I really do not think this is a separation issue. She was elected to represent her constituents, a majority of whom are, presumably, also stunningly unintelligent.
So her “logic” (and I’m stretching that word to the breaking point) is that God said he wouldn’t destroy the world again with a global flood. Let’s say we accept that as fact: God will not destroy the world via a global flood.
The problem is that God isn’t destroying the world, man is. And man isn’t destroying the world via a giant flood. He’s destroying it by changing the global climate to the point that he can’t keep up. (To be technical, man is destroying his ability to survive in the world, not the world itself. The Earth would be here even if we decided to burn more fossil fuels.)
So even if we accept Genesis 8 as a valid “argument” (more word stretching), it doesn’t apply. Now, if scientists start saying that a deity plans on instituting a global flood via 40 days and nights of rain, then I’ll accept Genesis 8 as a counter-argument.
I always wonder how this works. Do we have free will, or does everything we do follow God’s plan? If it’s the former, then God is clearly either not all-powerful or not entirely benevolent, since there are many ways we make things worse for our fellow humans and other life on this planet. If it’s the latter, then God is directly responsible for everything bad that happens as well as the good, nothing else really matters.
Christianity has major figures who have argued for one or the other. Fundies these days seem to pick whichever one suits them for the current argument.
"Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that." -G.Carlin
i.e. half the country.
"Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups." -G.Carlin
enough of which have been spoonfed hate and stupid over the last many decades by fox "news", rush, some doofus with a spray tan, and others. and they vote.
Morality tales, there is a lot to learn from the Bible, just ignore the religious magic parts. It does examine human society during the bronze and iron ages.
Ah yes, many great moral things to learn, such as: how to punish your slave (make sure you don’t beat them hard enough that they die), and other fun rules around treating other humans as property.
Slavery 3000 years ago wasn’t quite the same as modern concepts would be viewed, but in the context of treatment, yes.
In Col 4:1, Paul advises members of the church, who are slave masters, to “treat your slaves justly and fairly, realizing that you too have a Master in heaven.”
Slaves of that era could buy their freedom and they did earn coin through second jobs. Treating slaves badly was never wise, slaves typically outnumbered the owners and were far more skilled and educated until the Roman era.
I always find it interesting to see which Christians will try to talk their way out of the slavery issue vs. the ones who are straight up cool with it and will do the most amazing mental gymnastics ever seen to defend the literal practice of buying and selling human beings.
Oh, they can buy their freedom! Did you hear that guys? It was ok for a child to be born into slavery back then because they could buy their freedom.
Let’s not think too hard about how an unpaid laborer, viewed as literal property with zero rights that can (biblically) be beaten within an inch of their life as “punishment”, is going to get money to “buy their freedom”?
You should be ashamed of yourself.
All of that is besides the point. Slavery is wrong, period. That is a true statement no matter what time period you’re in. The “times” are irrelevant, because your god is all knowing, all powerful, etc. Why would he be ok with a civilization where slavery is ok? Why would he allow that?
And further, why would you worship a god that is ok with slavery?
I’m atheist, I don’t support any kind of slavery, but I also study history and you have to see it from the perspective of that era. Judging history through modern interpretation of morals will prevent you from ever understanding why history played put the way it did. Slavery was common in humanity for 11,000 years and Slavery wasn’t illegal until 1948, 75 years ago.
Dude, I understand how historical context works. The point is, it doesn’t matter what point in time you are in, “slavery is wrong” is always correct. Just because it was happening everywhere, doesn’t mean that those people weren’t objectively immoral and incorrect for doing it. It doesn’t mean that people born into slavery suffered any less.
Not to mention that the southern slave owners in the US used the Bible to justify their chattel slavery. Making the fact that it’s in there even worse.
If someone has to think about the question, “is slavery bad” for more than a second or two, or if they begin their answer with something about historical context being important: that person is a piece of shit.
Blasphemy the Holy Ghost and deny the existence of Allah, please. As a self-declared atheist you should have zero problems with the two unforgivable sins.
You can learn anything about morality in the bible from watching children’s cartoons today. They all teach teamwork, respect, responsibility, and modern versions of it without the slavery! It is a cool historical analysis tool, but it is outdated in every other aspect. There is definitely no reason to end our habitability in that book. This is just plain and simple malice because the people in power would be harmed by this change
That one especially is out of date, written in 1450 BCE, nearly 3500 years ago. You had Moses running around the desert, the Greeks were importing copper and tin as it was peak bronze age for them (still 150 years before Northern Europe) and created a standard for weights for commerce. Letter writing had not even started, but early human writing was being taught in Greece. The first trading cogs were being used. But most importantly, they didn’t even have a concept of weather or climate for a thousand more years in 340 BCE. (Note: 3000 BCE Upanishads in India discovered that weather had predictable seasons).
Overall, the Bible shouldn’t be used in context for climatology.
So, is everything that comes out of this woman’s mouth bullshit? Even the examples of climate change policies that she gives are wrong. We aren’t banning new gas stoves due to climate change. We’re banning them due to indoor air quality issues and increased incidence of respiratory disease.
Even then I thought it wasn’t really banning of gas stoves, just updating/tightening regulations and all that jazz so they wouldn’t be leaking the fumes.
No, we’re not banning gas stoves, full stop. (In the US at least)
Literally the only story there was that a scientific study was published that suggests having a gas stove/oven can lead to an increase in asthma for children.
That alone was enough to set them off. Simply being told that we found something new out, and here it is in case you want to consider the pros and cons of having your kids around gas stoves.
They are literally triggered by the scientific method itself.
I mean, I love a gas stove (wish my apartment had one) but we are probably moving slowly towards a world where municipal gas is just not nearly as much of a thing. But nobody is ever going to stop you from setting up a propane or butane range in your house.
The deeper, and much messier problem, is that people like this are willingly voted into power by their constituents. One random idiot is whatever. A population of idiots looking at another idiot and truthfully saying "This represents us!" is a much bigger problem.
If you care, I'd more propose deeper investments in education and jobs in rural areas so that moronic populists aren't as appealing. I'm originally from rural Missouri; I'm a lot more familiar with these kinds of areas than I'd otherwise like to be.
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