Sermon for the Weird Times

[tyrannosaurus vex]

Religion, it turns out, is dying. In the last hundred years or so, it has been stabbed countless times by the relentless march of scientific inquiry, which has drained our ancient religions of all their mystery. There are no real questions left to ask, you see, because as soon as you ask a religious question you find out there has already been sixteen studies from Harvard that answered it three years ago.

As science rolls on, telling us why the Sun moves across the sky, where the summertime goes and why it comes back, and all manner of celestial mysteries, the serious student of spirituality is pushed farther and farther to the extremes of human experience. The religious seeker must content herself with answering the Really Big Questions, like "Is there life after death?" or "Why do bad things happen to good people?" or "What is the meaning of life?"

But historically, those questions were never the bread and butter of our religious lives. Sure, they were always there, forming the foundations of our religions, promising to comfort us at funerals and give monks something to think about all day while they toiled.  But those were not the religious questions that got us through the day. They didn't tell us when to plant the crops or when to harvest them. They didn't tell us how to make sure Summer would return after it vanished every Autumn.

Most of us never really cared about the Big Questions anyway. For most of humanity, religion was a simple, paint-by-numbers affair. You put in a quarter, you get a gumball. That's how it worked. Our ideas of morality were practically cartoons. But that's all gone now, replaced with the indifferent drone of cold, soulless science.

Could it be that millions of people who had been content to live their lives with the shallow and cartoonish ideas about the universe, robbed of the safe spaces of their mindless faith by a scientific age that only undermines the need and moral justification for religion, find themselves completely disconnected and confused, unable to function in a world where they can no longer just get away with painting by numbers? Are these Weird Times the result, at least in part, of a backlash by people who no longer have any identity, whose entire world is being continually invalidated by empirical evidence and real science? Of course, this is a truism. Our technological and social progress have so disrupted the ideological status quo of human civilization that half of us no longer feel tethered to anything. Not to common decency, not to charity, not to compassion, not to equality, not to anything. They have been set adrift, and are doing everything they can do to rebuild the world they feel they have lost.

This, I believe, is why they are immune to logic and impervious to facts. The act of following facts and logic is what got them to where they are to begin with, and they have resolved to undo that damage precisely by abandoning facts and logic. The world is too complex. There are too many variables. There are too many unseen forces outside of their control. There is too much to understand, too much history, too many words, too many different ideas, too many different people. It drives them mad. They can't think with all this progress going on. What happened to Sunday afternoons goddammit, what happened to drive in theaters, what happened to everything? It's all because of the facts and the logic and the respect, they figure. It all started with all those people who weren't satisfied like they were. The troublemakers. And now they've got to fix it, by God. They've got to Make America Great Again.

So it seems to me that trying to convince them out of that mindset can only make the problem worse. What they need is not a better understanding. They've already shown that any such understanding cannot help but to elude them. Whether they're too angry to understand, or too set in their ways, or just too dumb, it doesn't matter. They won't get it. So what will they get? What can they understand? What they need is something simple and straightforward. Something old-fashioned, familiar, and definite. A New Religion.

And what might this religion look like? It's got to be easy to recognize. It's got to draw a crowd. It has to have God in it, somewhere. It has to have a simple story that can repeat itself in the life of every believer. It has to be something they can share at the dinner table. There needs to be a struggle in it, a winner and a loser.

And I think... I think I have just the answer. It's not new -- not really -- it's based on an ancient tradition. It isn't a revolution (that's a good thing, remember). It's quick to pick up. Like all great arts, it's simple to learn but it takes a lifetime to master. It can be expressed in simple pictures and paragraphs much, much shorter than these. It's a revealed wisdom, handed down from ancient and learned generations of old. There is prayer. There is a sacrament. And it will definitely piss off the Devil. And you don't have to pay tithes!

So what is it? It's easy.

I call it the Holy Ancient Order of Punching a Goddamn Nazi in the Face.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

woop!

[bugmenоt]

Is it just me or has there been a strong game of openly advocating violence on PD lately? If so, is this wise? Because it is exactly what I'd go for if I wanted the community silenced and the forums taken down.

Just to be as clear as I feel comfortable with: I'm not saying that Nazis shouldn't be punched. I just won't be able to house more than two or three Discordian refugees from overseas.

[Junkenstein]

Nice preaching.

This, I believe, is why they are immune to logic and impervious to facts. The act of following facts and logic is what got them to where they are to begin with, and they have resolved to undo that damage precisely by abandoning facts and logic. The world is too complex. There are too many variables. There are too many unseen forces outside of their control. There is too much to understand, too much history, too many words, too many different ideas, too many different people. It drives them mad. They can't think with all this progress going on. What happened to Sunday afternoons goddammit, what happened to drive in theaters, what happened to everything? It's all because of the facts and the logic and the respect, they figure. It all started with all those people who weren't satisfied like they were. The troublemakers. And now they've got to fix it, by God. They've got to Make America Great Again.

There's more to that as well I think. Few different ideas to run with, mainly the world being big and complex and the urge to reduce that potential experience down in favour of what's known. Lack of change = all is well. Ties into resulting political urges and strange bedfellows in political systems (guns and dope party - teabillies - alt-right).

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Is it just me or has there been a strong game of openly advocating violence on PD lately? If so, is this wise? Because it is exactly what I'd go for if I wanted the community silenced and the forums taken down.

Just to be as clear as I feel comfortable with: I'm not saying that Nazis shouldn't be punched. I just won't be able to house more than two or three Discordian refugees from overseas.

[bugmenоt]

That must be the complex cynicism you were describing.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

That must be the complex cynicism you were describing.

No, it's just a way of pointing out that you're an idiot.

You don't know you're an idiot, though, so it's pretty doubtful that you'd understand why what you posted was stupid, even if I explained it. I don't feel like arguing in circles with a moron today.

[bugmenоt]

That must be the complex cynicism you were describing.

No, it's just a way of pointing out that you're an idiot.

You don't know you're an idiot, though, so it's pretty doubtful that you'd understand why what you posted was stupid, even if I explained it. I don't feel like arguing in circles with a moron today.

Trying to fill in the blanks: You are, like any remotely decent person, concerned about the rise of Nationalism and White Supremacism in the Western world, or specifically in the US. You used to live in a tough neighbourhood, and those who went out to fight Nazis on the streets actually managed to make the area a safer place because the police wouldn't have done anything against them. You're not the type who hides their message behind fluffy euphemisms, so you have no problem telling people to be violent. You'd still proudly get yourself in trouble for it but, because this would also mean trouble for your family, you prefer kissing the asses of those who do instead, and declare yourself an enemy of anyone who expresses their concern about your preferred way of telling others to reduce the number of Nazis.

My original point: As far as I can tell, the PD servers are located in Germany. The laws there are equally strict when it comes to advocating violence against no matter whom, to my knowledge. Germany has been known for its legal and administrative cooperation with the US for a while now. Who's a terrorist from President Bannon's point of view?

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

That must be the complex cynicism you were describing.

No, it's just a way of pointing out that you're an idiot.

You don't know you're an idiot, though, so it's pretty doubtful that you'd understand why what you posted was stupid, even if I explained it. I don't feel like arguing in circles with a moron today.

Trying to fill in the blanks project like a true armchair psychologist: You are, like any remotely decent person, concerned about the rise of Nationalism and White Supremacism in the Western world, or specifically in the US. You used to live in a tough neighbourhood, and those who went out to fight Nazis on the streets actually managed to make the area a safer place because the police wouldn't have done anything against them. You're not the type who hides their message behind fluffy euphemisms, so you have no problem telling people to be violent. You'd still proudly get yourself in trouble for it but, because this would also mean trouble for your family, you prefer kissing the asses of those who do instead, and declare yourself an enemy of anyone who expresses their concern about your preferred way of telling others to reduce the number of Nazis.

My original point: As far as I can tell, the PD servers are located in Germany. The laws there are equally strict when it comes to advocating violence against no matter whom, to my knowledge. Germany has been known for its legal and administrative cooperation with the US for a while now. Who's a terrorist from President Bannon's point of view?

FTFY

[Faust]

He has a point. Someone has gone forwarding messages from the forum with intent to cause harm.

American freedom of expression rules don't govern here, though there are strict rules as to how this works:
The rules of the forum explicitly forbid illegal activity, if someone comes to me with an example of that I have to act on it, but if they don't come to me then I am not responsible (how can I do something about a problem that I have not been informed of).

With that said the message is clearly hyperbole unless you are saying there are literally Nazis to target for punching: it's quite clearly referencing the symbolic gesture of what happened to that bozo Richard Spencer, which was both culturally important and hilarious, its wrong for anyone to get punched, but it felt pretty good to see it on youtube.

Metaphor and hyperbole have a long established history here as has ranting, and it would be clear and demonstrable.

We try keep this a safe and clean place for everyone (we even try to keep it worksafe) and as far as I can tell, the only PD member in jail that I know of right now is Luka Magnotta, and you know, rightly so, he was a cannibal.

Obviously no one here advocates violence against anyone

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

He appears to be postulating that, because there have been discussions here in which many people advocated punching Nazis, the American government is likely to sweep in, shut down the forum, and prosecute the members.

Even if some toolbox decided to try to "turn us in" to the authorities, the authorities are unlikely (to the point of ridiculousness) to take it as a credible threat of any kind. Advocating the hypothetical punching in the face of hypothetical Nazis is simply not a prosecutable offense, nor a credible threat, nor subversive, nor dangerous. It's just silly.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I mean, GOSH, I wonder what the German government would do if it found out that some of its citizens and citizens of other countries were on an internet forum saying it's OK to punch Nazis?

[Cain]

At this point they'd have to shut down half the internet if that were probable cause.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

At this point they'd have to shut down half the internet if that were probable cause.

Look out Facebook and Reddit, the Nazi-puncher police are coming to shut you down.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I mean, sure, it's a totally plausible area of investigation to divert the FBI's resources to, why not? Or  maybe Homeland Security. Totally.