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I think as religions grow more and more fractious, more people will join the category of irreligious and non-religious. To simplify it greatly, say you have some popular religious sect called Whateverism. Somewhere in the doctrine of Whateverism, it's unclear how followers should respond to moral dilemma X, so argument breaks out and fails to be resolved. The Church of Whateverism splits into two factions, with some people following one faction and some following the other, and a third group of followers who become disillusioned with the whole thing because it failed to provide a clear and consistent worldview.

Christianity is going to get more fragmented and conflicted. People with fringe beliefs, due to the information age, will be able to find each other and make themselves into legitimate factions. And as those factions gain legitimacy, they will no longer seem so fringe. The borders of acceptability will get blurrier (or more eroded, depending on how you look at it) until the whole gestalt picture of Christianity includes weird stuff like my friend the Celtic-Christian-New-Age Witch.

I also agree with this. In the past, people may have stuck with the religion they were raised in simply because they were never exposed to alternate ideas that they liked. These days, it seems very unusual NOT to be bombarded with strange new ideas all the time, so more and more people have the opportunity to change their minds. And, of course, atheism, agnosticism, and plain old I-don't-give-a-rat's-ass-ism are among these ideas being circulated, so people are joining their ranks as well.

So I suppose my answer to #1 is that it is a trend. As for #2, I don't know.

Oh right, forgot to mention The last two lines are yoinked from a post made by TGRR, which pretty much inspired me to puke this whole thing out in roughly a half-hour.

There is no 'solution.' This crisis will not be 'fixed.' A few of its symptoms will be alleviated, a little bit. Maybe. For some people.

An uncaring and uncontrolled juggernaut of changes will run its course across the fields of humanity, leaving ruin, death, poverty, and confusion in its wake. No, it is running its course as I write this. It cannot be stopped, slowed, or hastened to its destination. It will have its way with us before the survivors are left to build yet another empire from the rubble.

And we shall make up a story or two explaining why it all happened, what we did wrong, and how to avoid such things in the future. But it won't make a lick of difference because it's too late and we're fucking hopeless when it comes to finding out where the next juggernaut is coming from.

This is not the end of days, nor even the end of civilization. Do not be so optimistic. Humanity has prophesied its own demise a thousand times in the hopes that the next big catastrophic clusterfuck will be the last one we have to struggle through. The doomsayers are the hopeful ones; once humanity is destroyed or reduced to barbarism it won't have to live with memories of the disasters it can't believe it didn't see coming, and the torturous knowledge that it will happen again. And again, and again.

But humanity is big, dumb, and resilient. It cannot be destroyed, not even by its own hands. It shall lumber along as it always has, clumsily and nearly-blind, crawling and drooling its way into the future.

There will be another huge fucking disaster; a maelstrom of blood, anger, and misery. And when the dust settles we'll have lots and lots of dead people and still no answers.

It's what we do.

[You are assuming anything will solve it.No, it is more likely we will all be embroiled in another huge fucking war, and when the dust settles we'll have lots and lots of dead people and still no answers.It's what we do.]

Same thing happened with terrorism.
Difference is, this really is just as bad as is being said.  No, it's worse. 

I have a feeling throwing money at the crisis will not solve it, nor will bullets at the other ism.  Do we only know how to (poorly) deal with the symptoms of this necrosis.  And necrosis may or 'may not be the right word, but it's the first that comes to mind.' C.P.

You are assuming anything will solve it.

No, it is more likely we will all be embroiled in another huge fucking war, and when the dust settles we'll have lots and lots of dead people and still no answers.

It's what we do.

Yoinked, and check OKM for the rant this just inspired.

The things they want us to be shitting our pants over is trite, pointless, and moronic.

The horrible troofs we ought to be shitting our pants over are so many, varied, and huge that one must learn to be a connoisseur shitter, or else suffer prolapse.

Oh sweet.

This sociopathic "hero" is celebrated and treated as a hero by the rest of the populace, I'm assuming? And the real protagonists are the ones who see him for what he really is?

I'm already chuckling.



Okay, quick brainstorm for the setting:

The "good" kingdom is Glamaria, while the "evil" kingdom is Atathraxis (here I'm attempting to satisfy the trope that good things have lilting names while the evil things have phonically harsh names).

Atathraxis is ruled by an evil emperor. Glamaria is ruled by a generally good king along with a well-intentioned but indecisive and petty council of nobles/elders.

Am I being generic enough?

NT:
I'll be Gahndi, quietly spinning on the porch...

...and YOU can enlist my Indians as a stretcher-bearer corps in the Zulu War of 1906


NT:
I'll be inscribing a circle of mahdjiqual runes on the floor, wearing my robe and wizard hat...



Edit: Cram you Damnulus!

[Octomom just gives them someplace to go while they're squealing like a piggy.]

Ratatosk, I think you should seriously ask yourself how big the risk is that enough women will be insane enough and have the financial resources AND be able to find an unethical doctor to do it, that this could EVER potentially become a really-for-reals social problem?

It certainly isn't newsworthy, it's just another twitch to distract us from pondering the things that we should really be outraged about.

STUPID deserves derision.

If we lived in a more enlightened age, we would have more elegant weapons like rotten fruit to throw at idiots and assholes that behave stupidly and make our brains hurt. Alas, we no longer have the luxury of stating our opinion with month old eggs and half-black tomatoes. Don't misunderstand, I wish we had this venue for far more than just Octo-Mom. Everyone at Fox news, for example, should regularly be pelted with garbage. The CEO of GM, Merril-Lynch, Bear Stearns etc should be carted from one city to the next, so we can cover them with rotted fruit, then they can go get covered by our tax dollars.

If Octomom had Paris Hilton's inheritance, I would still consider her actions to be selfish and thoughtless. Fourteen children and one mother. Do you really think that she will be able to raise fourteen kids in a way that will be healthy and supportive? Teachers claim they can work best with a class of 20... and that's just a few hours a day on specific subjects.

The actions of Octomom, are the actions of a nation... writ tiny with frozen sperm. Octomom is living the life she wants, regardless as to the likelyhood that it is a life she can sustain. THAT, minus the in-vitro  bit... IS THE WHOLE FUCKING COUNTRY. WHY are we in the shithole right now? Is it all because of teh evil Bushies and the Damned Bankers? NO. It's because of selfish, thoughtless people, from the Commander in Chief to the Chief Executive Officer to Joe the Fucking Plumber and Octomom. Octomom is not a new trend, Octomom is just doing with fetuses (feti?), what everyone else was doing with money... multiplying it in a fake non-sustainable manner, that someone else will have to pay for.

Her's just happened to involve a vagina.

Maybe. Public humiliation for stupidity certainly seems like a reasonable treatment.

However, Nadya Suleman is actually enjoying all this attention, for one thing, and for another, turning her into a media circus act isn't going to help push Americans in the direction of taking responsibility for their own actions. It's just going to reinforce the already-existing general opinion that people shouldn't have more babies than they can support (for a given definition of support, of course).

All this brouhaha over one idiot and her ovaries teaches America one thing. It's something we already knew, but people need a refresher course in it every once in a while: If you do something monumentally stupid, especially if it relates to something that people have strong feelings about (i.e. childbirth), you will get lots of attention.

Real reason:  While you're busy being outraged by Octomom, Congress is making a special delivery to your bunghole.

Too trite.

Congress makes regular deliveries to bungholes across the world... even when there is no Octomom distraction. This Country no longer cares. Half the states no longer mandate Government in schools (So sayeth Ruth Bater Ginsburg). Only 25% of Americans can NAME the three branches of government. AND THAT was before Octomom. Octomom is not distracting America from the bunghole rape.  Octomom just gives them someplace to go while they're squealing like a piggy.

If it weren't Octomom it would be pantyless Paris. In the grand scheme of things, I think Octomom deserves more derision.

We're on the same page here.

THIS HAS GOTTEN OUT OF FUCKING CONTROL


THERE I WAS, TRYING TO BUY SOME GUM IN THE SUPERMARKET, MINDING MY OWN DAMN BUSINESS, WHEN ALL OF A SUDDEN THIS WELFARE QUEEN SINGLE MOM IN LINE IN FRONT OF ME WAS ALL LIKE "ENNNH I'M GOING INTO LABOR GIMMIE A MOMENT" AND THEN SHE JUST POPPED OUT LIKE TEN SPROGS ALL IN ONE GO AND GOT AMNIOTIC FLUID ALL OVER MY SHOES

AGAIN



I SWEAR IF I GET HELD UP IN TRAFFIC ONE MORE GOD DAMN TIME BECAUSE ONE OF THOSE BABY MACHINES DECIDES TO GO TO A FERTILITY CLINIC AND THEN SPEWS OUT BABIES ALL OVER THE INTERSECTION AND THUS MAKING ME WAIT UNTIL SOCIAL WORKERS MANAGE TO CLEAN THEM ALL UP, I AM GOING TO TAKE A SHIT EVERY DAY IN A MATERNITY WARD AND SWAP IT WITH A BABY BECAUSE THOSE FUCKING UTERI-WITH-LEGS PROBABLY WON'T BE ABLE TO TELL THE DIFFERENCE

I dunno... when people do something spectacularly idiotic I think its good to point and laugh. Hell, I think this woman deserves far more news attention than Paris Hilton's or Britney Spears' pantyless crotch. It is a microcosom of the sort of HORIFFIC DUMB that plagues America these days.

1) Woman is not married, nor does she have a partner, yet she wants a baby... why? Because she wants babies ever since she was a kid? This is immature and selfish.

2) Woman has multiple babies and can't work so the government pays for their care and feeding. This is also immature and selfish.

3) Woman HAS MORE FUCKING BABIES. and we GOTO 2.

Paris and Brittney are selfish, immature and thoughtless. However, their sort of actions aren't about to actually affect me in any way. If they ride around with no bra, or have their baby in the front seat or get a porn tape stolen... its net effect on the people of this country is 0, unless they're idiots that think TV is some sort of Oracular Deity. This lady, now has bunches of babies which she can't support, and which we all now get to pay for until they turn 18.

8 babies split over a few million taxpayers is not, a huge deal... but how many other idiot women like this might be out there thinking "I CAN HAZ 8 BABYES?!?!?! YAY I CAN BE MOMMY!!!!

She deserves whatever flack she gets.

And I'd say that to her face.

I completely agree that she's stupid.


But I don't care. I don't think she presents any kind of actual threat or that she's going to set a precedent or some bullshit. Everybody I know already thought that having a fuckton of kids that you can't support is a bad life decision; nobody needs to have a weirdo put up on stage like a circus freakshow so we can all self-righteously talk about how dumb she is.

This isn't a critical issue that requires all of America turn into a fucking ethics committee; it's an opportunity for people to say "LOL DUMBASS, boy it sure does help my self-esteem to know that I'm not that fucking stupid, and also it fills my vapid and boring existence to have something to get all judgmental over."

Cainad,
Trying, and failing, to stop being angry at everything for a few days

Real reason:  While you're busy being outraged by Octomom, Congress is making a special delivery to your bunghole.

Real reason:  While you're busy being outraged by Octomom, Congress is making a special delivery to your bunghole.

Annnnnd Roger nails it.

Ratatosk, I think you should seriously ask yourself how big the risk is that enough women will be insane enough and have the financial resources AND be able to find an unethical doctor to do it, that this could EVER potentially become a really-for-reals social problem?

It certainly isn't newsworthy, it's just another twitch to distract us from pondering the things that we should really be outraged about.

This.

lail

For a moment there I thought we were all about to learn that the Dutch are actually a backwards society that doesn't make use of freezers in typical households.

Wasn't one of Greene's 48 Laws against offending the wrong person?  It seems to apply here.

I just checked; #1 is a variation on this. "Never outshine the master"

Good point. It's too damn huge for anything to contradict the entirety of it.

Cainad,
Still hasn't read the whole book

I was kinda irritated when I saw Chilean Sea Bass on the menu at a wedding I attended.

But then I was REALLY annoyed when dad ordered it, despite the fact that I'd voiced my misgivings about it.

Orange roughy and Chilean sea bass are over here in CA in spades.  I need to look up if they are sold through hatcheries or what.

I don't think orange roughy would be raised in hatcheries, since it takes 30-40 years to mature.

...It just occurred to me how weird it would be to eat a fish that could easily be twice my age or more. They can live almost a century and a half.

Just like Terri Schiavo, the Octomom story is a media circus. It's nothing more or less than a cash cow for the TV and newspapers, and frankly it's (yet another) wretched disgrace to journalism.

Why do they do it? Why do they keep sending people out to dredge up every last damn detail about this woman's life and her fourteen children?

Because it's a "human interest" story, where in this case the humans are interested in flinging their shit, er, excuse, me, opinions (we aren't monkeys, of course!) at a pointless and insignificant spectacle because everyone is too chickenshit to fling their opinions at the people around them, or at the issues that actually matter. I'd bet my left testicle that 99% of the people who gleefully share their "strong opinions" about Nadya Suleman wouldn't make so much as a peep if they lived next door to her.

The media has put this woman on a stage, under the limelight, with a nice big sign that says "JUDGE THIS" because we humans absolutely love to pass shit, um, pardon me, judgment on other people, but most of us are too damn cowardly to do it to the people near us, or too lazy to do it to the issues that might actually influence their own lives.

And NOW look what you made me do; now I'm flinging shit right along with everybody else. Bob fucking damn it.