I don’t buy that bullsht chicken-and-egg whitewashing of the fact that blockbuster movies and popular entertainment totally DO shape and direct the opinions and values of vast amounts of people.
I haven't argued that it doesn't. I've argued that they don't
care whether it does or not.
If Hollywood could make more money by selling a different message, they would do it in a heartbeat. The bottom line is what matters to them. Thinking otherwise is what's bull.
I again cannot drink the Kool-Aid of this bullsht whitewashing you’re trying to peddle, tearing down any organized system for enforcing moral behavior in favor of “individual opinion.”
Except, once again, you're arguing against an opinion I haven't voiced and don't hold.
What I actually SAID was, the presence of religion claiming to be based on some absolute moral authority has not in fact prevented poor behaviour from happening throughout history.
I don’t think you’re seeing the bigger picture. I think human history is a long string of massacres and wars which religion is kind of incidental to, not a cause.
That's exactly what I'm arguing! I'm not saying that religion causes massacres and wars, but rather that it's incidental - meaning, it does nothing to STOP them.
If the massive prevalence of religion in history is entirely incidental to all the massacres and wars, then by definition religion is pretty much useless as a force for preventing bad behaviour. You're nullifying your own argument.
Religion has been turned into a boogeyman by nihilistic, jejune yahoos like yourself who are horrified that personal freedom must sometimes be sacrificed if we want to enjoy a society with far less suicide, divorce, and mental illness than the one we have today.
Actually I'm perfectly happy with the idea that personal freedom must sometimes be sacrificed for the good of society (and individuals for that matter). Once again - I have no idea who you are arguing with, but it certainly doesn't appear to be me.
Oh my God you’re making my brain hurt. I’m being a hypocrite by criticizing the consequences of these actions? WTF?? YOU CANNOT HAVE A CONSEQUENCE WITHOUT THE ACTION THAT CAUSED IT.
Of course. Once again, I didn't say otherwise. (I'm beginning to think you have a really low reading age.)
My actual point is, there are two different arguments here for why people should act moral. Let's use theft as an example :
1) Theft is wrong, because if everyone stole all the time society would be a mess and we'd all suffer.
2) Theft is wrong, because god says it's wrong.
Now ostensibly, what you're arguing here is position 2 - that we have to have god as some moral authority to be able to say that theft is wrong. My point is that every time you start going on about how awful the world is because we've given up on god or religion or whatever, you're ignoring position 2 and going to position 1 instead.
If you say "people have given up on god's word, and now everyone steals and the world is shïïty!" then you've invalidated your own argument that god's word is necessary! Because if everyone stealing has made the world shïïty, then right there we have a non-religious reason not to steal - "hey people, if we all steal, the world will be shïïty! So stealing is a bad thing! Let's not do that!"
That's the point - if you appeal to
consequences to argue that we need god for morality, then you've automatically invalidated your own argument because the consequences exist whether we appeal to god or not. And if the consequences show whether actions are good or bad, then we don't actually need the god part.
Wrong. Just fcking wrong. 90% of people are morons who need absolute authority or else they’ll go astray following their cocks around, both literally and figuratively, which is the most natural thing in the world (and not necessarily a GOOD thing).
No, people do not need "absolute" authority. They certainly do need authority, but it has no need to be absolute.
Look at you, for instance. You’re parroting the secular-modernist party line because it makes you feel edgy and hip and everyone else in your life will wank you off for it – not because it’s true.
No, actually I'm making arguments because I believe those arguments are true.
See I believe people are not good or bad, but they are PEOPLE. And people, to varying degrees, lust for power and sex and material wealth. Absolute Authority is the BEST way to redirect this potentially malevolent animal magnetism away from psychotic and short-sighted pleasure-seeking towards building a sustainable and happy society for the largest amount of people.
Again, no. Absolute authority is not required at all - authority is.
And only then for some, actually. Personally I wouldn't be raping or stealing or murdering one way or the other. I doubt most would, actually.
You fail to connect the dots that God’s Word has endured in the human consciousness for so long because it WORKS.
I understand that fine, thank you. But as I've said, if "this moral code WORKS" is an actual valid argument, then there's no NEED to call it god's word or claim it has authority. "this moral code works" is all the argument we need - and frankly, all the argument most people actually concern themselves with on a day to day basis anyway.
Even the vast majority of religious people are like this. They look through their bibles or korans or whatever, and they go "Hmmm, this bit about not killing sounds sensible, I'll follow that, but that bit over there about not wearing mixed fabrics, not so much, so I'll just ignore that one." Which is a
secular process. Then they take whatever they agree with and declare that since it came from the book they are following it because it's "god's word".
Here’s a few. The bible says “homosexuality is an abomination.” Why? Well, look at modern culture. Most gay guys I’ve known had some kind of difficulty getting with women, and so turn to homosexuality instead.
Um, no. That's not the truth.
The retards reading this will scratch their anencephalic little heads and bleat “how is that bad?” between the runnels of drool. It’s bad because promiscuity (especially anal sex) spreads disease like crazy.
And there we go - the point at which you invalidate your own position.
If it were true that "promiscuity (especially anal sex) spreads disease like crazy", then that is the reason why promiscuity and anal sex should be immoral and/or banned.
Which completely removes any need to refer to "god's word" as the reason.If you really believe that god is a moral authority - whatever the fück a moral authority is supposed to be - then the ONLY argument you can ever make is "X is wrong because god says it is, period."
If god were a "moral authority", then it would be possible to have something that was morally wrong because god said it was - even if that thing resulted in nothing but good and happy outcomes. Or, alternatively, have something that was right because god said it was - even though it caused nothing but misery and destruction.
But nobody ever argues this, because nobody is really willing to face up to the consequences of the absurd concept of basing morality on any kind of "authority".
Instead, we argue consequences. Because in reality, we all know that this is what morality is really about - constructing a set of behaviours that results in good outcomes rather than bad ones. It's literally nothing to do with god.
But the masses of people can’t be bothered to think about moral choices – they act in their immediate self interest.
Yeah, this is the worst kind of nonsense.
--
Christianity : A god who loves you so much that he'll set fire to you if you don't love him back
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Navaros
7 years ago
the presence of religion claiming to be based on some absolute moral authority has not in fact prevented poor behaviour from happening throughout history.
That's because yourself and legions of other people like you don't obey God.
If everyone obeyed God, then there would be no evil in this world.
So you have only yourself and others like you to blame for the things about which you complain.
Personally I wouldn't be raping or stealing or murdering one way or the other.
Oh yes you would, O hypocrite. You, graham, have expressed support for the mass murdering of babies via 'abortion,' therefore at the very least you are an accomplice/enabler to those murders.
"this moral code works"
Obviously you are too insane/psychopathic to know when a 'moral code works' or not, seeing as you are fine with brutally murdering babies en masse.
the absurd concept of basing morality on any kind of "authority".
Nothing in the universe is more absurd than a baby murderer masquerading as a noble champion of morality.
It's literally nothing to do with god.
...and yet you represent a token example of what happens when someone tries to be 'moral' without God: he/she becomes the epitome of evil and the antithesis of morality.
"Science creates fictions to explain facts" – Gilman
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