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Aneristic Illusions / Re: General Trump hilarity free-for-all thread
« Last post by Hoopla! on Today at 10:17:56 pm »spade
News:
PD.com: We're like the bugs in the Starship Troopers movie: infinite, unceasing, unstoppable....and our leader looks like a huge vagina
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Aneristic Illusions / Re: General Trump hilarity free-for-all thread
« Last post by Juana on Today at 10:10:43 pm »the way the press just enables him is infuriating. call a spade a spade, dammit.
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Apple Talk / Re: Evangelical Atheism versus Religion, ROUND 666
« Last post by Juana on Today at 10:09:41 pm »thanks, i hate it. this is the exact shit that drove me out of the atheist community in like 2008.
that author is arrogant, condescending, badly argued, ill informed, w i l d l y fucking racist, and also antisemetic, ffs. the "primitive culture" thing is some real white supremacist logic and i have rarely seen so much protestant baggage in one place, either.
i'm not saying we need religion per se, but we do need ritual imo, like Cram said. humans are social creatures and doing things together is what binds us as a community. humans like rituals. you can take the ritual out of religion but not the ritual out of the person. every culture is going to develop a set of lore and accompanying rituals: the fourth of july or harvest, easter or holi - they're all social rituals, whether or not there's a (sometimes openly acknowledged) divinity involved. they are important moments in the communities we built and the history we write together, and they help foster a sense of community (a both necessary and potentially dangerous thing, i acknowledge). there's nothing artificial about rituals bc they're an organic creation of a culture.
i'd go further than just the secular feasting rituals like thanksgiving and argue that things like farmer's markets and blossom festivals are a kind of social ritual, too. there's a formula for how it unfolds, lots of food, we spend time with others in our community, and maybe there's some music or other display. those are imo important parts of ritual. also, js, a community with no social rituals sounds super boring and also like no amount of education about the benefits of cooperation would really cement them together. we need a shared history to care about other people on more than an intellectual level.
religion doesn't have to be violent and cutthroat and hierarchical, but in a culture that is violent, cutthroat, and hierarchical, that's what it's going to look like. not every culture is violently monstrous like that. if religion were unique in this tendency, we wouldn't have social darwinism or capitalism.
a note i'd add re discussing religion, belief in the divine or the lore surrounding it isn't necessary at all (certain types of buddhism, chinese religion, etc. don't care if you believe in the buddha or the king of heaven). what matters is that you do the rituals. religion is a means for community bonding, especially historically, and you don't necessarily need to believe in Adonai/the Buddha/Odin/Coyote/Kali Ma to cement bonds through participation in ritual.
jumping back to the shitshow article, insisting that participating in a religion and its rituals is insanity is incredibly fucking insulting.
that author is arrogant, condescending, badly argued, ill informed, w i l d l y fucking racist, and also antisemetic, ffs. the "primitive culture" thing is some real white supremacist logic and i have rarely seen so much protestant baggage in one place, either.
Quote from: the Johnny
To me religion is little more than the indoctrination that theres an all seeing all powerful judge that doubles up as executioner, and yes, that simulates empathy and generates social cohesion, but artificially... if people were actually educated to understand the basic benefits of cooperation instead of cutthroat egoism wed live in a different reality. So fuck all that brainwashing and social engineering.if it's indoctrination, it's no more indoctrination than any other aspect of socialization and we have to be socialized to engage with other humans at all. "an all seeing all powerful judge...executioner" is pretty specific to monotheist religions, or at least the abrahamic set (as problematic as that term is, idk what else to call judiasm and its offshoots). omnipotence and omniscience are not particularly common things afaik and a lot of other faiths have more "human" gods.
i'm not saying we need religion per se, but we do need ritual imo, like Cram said. humans are social creatures and doing things together is what binds us as a community. humans like rituals. you can take the ritual out of religion but not the ritual out of the person. every culture is going to develop a set of lore and accompanying rituals: the fourth of july or harvest, easter or holi - they're all social rituals, whether or not there's a (sometimes openly acknowledged) divinity involved. they are important moments in the communities we built and the history we write together, and they help foster a sense of community (a both necessary and potentially dangerous thing, i acknowledge). there's nothing artificial about rituals bc they're an organic creation of a culture.
i'd go further than just the secular feasting rituals like thanksgiving and argue that things like farmer's markets and blossom festivals are a kind of social ritual, too. there's a formula for how it unfolds, lots of food, we spend time with others in our community, and maybe there's some music or other display. those are imo important parts of ritual. also, js, a community with no social rituals sounds super boring and also like no amount of education about the benefits of cooperation would really cement them together. we need a shared history to care about other people on more than an intellectual level.
religion doesn't have to be violent and cutthroat and hierarchical, but in a culture that is violent, cutthroat, and hierarchical, that's what it's going to look like. not every culture is violently monstrous like that. if religion were unique in this tendency, we wouldn't have social darwinism or capitalism.
a note i'd add re discussing religion, belief in the divine or the lore surrounding it isn't necessary at all (certain types of buddhism, chinese religion, etc. don't care if you believe in the buddha or the king of heaven). what matters is that you do the rituals. religion is a means for community bonding, especially historically, and you don't necessarily need to believe in Adonai/the Buddha/Odin/Coyote/Kali Ma to cement bonds through participation in ritual.
jumping back to the shitshow article, insisting that participating in a religion and its rituals is insanity is incredibly fucking insulting.
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Aneristic Illusions / Re: General Trump hilarity free-for-all thread
« Last post by LMNO on Today at 09:47:31 pm »And the press called it an “impromptu” press conference.
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Aneristic Illusions / Re: General Trump hilarity free-for-all thread
« Last post by Doktor Howl on Today at 08:53:22 pm »Is that the one where he "spontaneously" walked out of infrastructure negotiations with the Dems, only to walk out to the rose garden where a podium had a placard of the exact talking points laid out on it as he complained to the press?
That's the one. And then said "No deal" on infrastructure, etc, unless they stop the investigations.
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Aneristic Illusions / Re: General Trump hilarity free-for-all thread
« Last post by LMNO on Today at 08:30:19 pm »Is that the one where he "spontaneously" walked out of infrastructure negotiations with the Dems, only to walk out to the rose garden where a podium had a placard of the exact talking points laid out on it as he complained to the press?
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Aneristic Illusions / Re: General Trump hilarity free-for-all thread
« Last post by nullified on Today at 08:18:47 pm »Anyone watching today's meltdown?
I’ll look when I get home. I expect I’ll have a few hours free.
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Aneristic Illusions / Re: General Trump hilarity free-for-all thread
« Last post by Doktor Howl on Today at 08:16:13 pm »Anyone watching today's meltdown? 
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RPG Ghetto / Re: Inventive Uses for Prestidigitation - 5e
« Last post by Hoopla! on Today at 08:02:10 pm »That’s not bad actually.
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Apple Talk / Re: Open Bar: Drinks are on the Supreme Court
« Last post by Juana on Today at 05:46:19 pm »i got my third letter of rec yesterday and now i can start applying to more teaching jobs. the new one mentions things that i was really hoping to see (kind but firm classroom management and always in control of the room, they complain i make them work and don't let them play with their phones, p good at working with students to improve their writing). i feel like all three letters i have speak pretty damn well of me as a potential teacher but bc i'll have an intern credential, i'm still bottom of the pile. hoping the letters bump me up bc i can clearly teach and i know how to run a classroom reasonably well, even though long term and short term classroom management are very different creatures.