America & World IV: Trump's Taxing Day

[Asura]

It would be hilarious if the complaint against the Bible is upheld

It almost certainly will be.

I grew up in a Catholic environment in the UK, and we weren't really supposed to read the bible outside of guided study, or special annotated versions for young people. I suspect if I'd been found to be reading it, it would've been taken off me and I'd have had one of those annotated versions thrust into my hands.

(in weak defense of those people, the annotated versions are unabridged; they just have heavy-handed extras to provide context in places)

Most Christians have never read the bible outside of services, and out of those, most only read excerpts.

The Catholic church has a thing called the "Lectionary". It's a list, which contains readings for two solid years of services, so that a Priest etc. knows which parts of the bible they have to read on a given day at a service (they can't just choose). Now, the Catholics are obviously going to be rigid about this because that's kinda their thing, but many other brands of Christianity have similar things.

This is important to understand, re: Christians and the bible, because the Lectionary is carefully curated. It artfully misses out all of the stuff that's, and I'm being nice here, bat**** mental. There are loads of bizarre things in the bible that most Christians have never even heard of. Some of this stuff could challenge beliefs, but much of it is just confusing and/or nonsense, derived from multiple translations.

Obviously it also removes much of the explicit sex and violence.

Like, did you know that in the bible, there are two sets of ten commandments? Not just one? This kind of thing. Some of the really foundational stuff "that everyone knows" is just a simplification to streamline the stories, often removing things that, if you read them, are kinda important.

[Neon Ignition]

Always loved the simplicity of the Dwarf line that would be amazing if it happened in real life:

"Historians have today confirmed the discovery of a missing page from the Bible. If true, the page is said to read: To my darling Candy, all characters and events contained within this novel are fictitious and any similarity to events or persons living or dead are purely coincidental.

Religious Leaders have condemned the discovery..."

[Cassius_Smoke]

Always loved the simplicity of the Dwarf line that would be amazing if it happened in real life:

"Historians have today confirmed the discovery of a missing page from the Bible. If true, the page is said to read: To my darling Candy, all characters and events contained within this novel are fictitious and any similarity to events or persons living or dead are purely coincidental.

Religious Leaders have condemned the discovery..."

Well there is already a load of cut gospels from the bible anyway. One of the stories has jesus turning a stick into a dragon. I'm not even kidding.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Testament_apocrypha

[Neon Ignition]

No more than a year before Netflix does an adaptation of that
Just nuts that the human race can explore the moon or genetically engineer life yet still believes in such blatant manmade fiction

[Neon Ignition]

Gary Busey charged with sexual offenses at New Jersey convention | US news | The Guardian
Gary Busey under investigation for events at a fan event last weekend

[eastyy]

Starting to think if Six million dollar man was made now its just about someone having to pay Hospital fees

[kryss]

...yet still believes in such blatant manmade fiction

The need to believe that there is a reason for things is much stronger for some.

[Brad]

I’ll sometimes think “why am I here? What’s the point in any of this?” but I pretty quickly just go back to doing what I’m programmed to do.

[Asura]

The need to believe that there is a reason for things is much stronger for some.

For me, I'm always torn.

On the one hand, I also turned away from any religion when I was much younger and now get very worked up when people challenge the separation of church and state.

But I've spoken to that many people over the years who have literally said "but if you're an atheist, how do you judge what's moral?" and you realise these people genuinely don't do bad things because they think their sky deity is going to punish them if they do, either tomorrow or when they die. That makes me think that maybe we need a decent chunk of people to believe in divine retribution because it'd be anarchy otherwise.

[Neon Ignition]

The immediate problem with the 'how do you judge what's moral?' question from them is that it instantly assumes a position of moral superiority and also an open admission of sheep mentality which are both arguably immoral angles to be coming from and have been steered into thinking are acceptable things to have.

The cross religion open demonstration through history and even today as to how things are actively much, much worse the more control a religion has makes it an open shut case. It's one of the reasons why the necessary change in society will be glacial across hundreds of years at best. Religion is the enemy of progressiveness.

[Neon Ignition]

Russia's at it, China wants at it so of course North Korea is stirring again too

US and South Korea begin largest military drills for years as North ramps up tensions | South Korea | The Guardian

[fishbowlhead]

Russia's at it, China wants at it so of course North Korea is stirring again too

US and South Korea begin largest military drills for years as North ramps up tensions | South Korea | The Guardian

Pffffffft, north korea, they may have a lot of troops but most of those would desert at the drop of a good meal away from the actual country and its state control, I don’t believe they would last a week as an effective fighting force.

[wakka]

I’ll sometimes think “why am I here? What’s the point in any of this?” but I pretty quickly just go back to doing what I’m programmed to do.

[charlesr]

If Russia and China could do whatever they wanted without fear or reprisal, what would they actually want?

Russia would presumably want back all the eastern block countries. But would it want to go further and push the communist ideal to the rest of the world?

What does China want?

Bit of a weird situation that - China makes half* of the world's stuff. "Made in China" is everywhere. When Russia invaded Ukraine, in terms of sanctions, we haven't lost much apart from the ability to trade in Russia and although it has hurt Russia, it can probably cope. But if China did something similar, sanctions would be devastating. We'd lose access to vast portions of supply chains. It would cripple China, but also everywhere else too. We'd be screwed. Plus Hollywood would drop off the face of the earth - so many big films seem to be bankrolled by China at the moment. If China is the enemy, why do we keep giving them our money? (We, being big companies). I'm rambling now.

[Neon Ignition]

The world at the mercy of a handful of men's inferiority complexes