An earlier topic suggested this as religious propaganda. But since it shows religion in such a bad light and intolerant of different views I would say it has an atheist slant, if anything. But I doubt they were really trying to push anything serious anyway.
shareNot to point out the obvious, but atheists do not believe in souls, demons, or spirit possession. Compare with Frailty, which is indeed a faux supernatural thriller with an atheist, or at least anti-religious slant.
Nothing left except Clorox bottles and plastic fly swatters with red dots on them!share
Okay. All I'm saying is this does not put religion in a positive light, nor is it intended to. So it's hardly trying to sell religion or seen as religious propaganda
shareBut anyone who said they were an atheist (even little girls) were killed by demons. So it punishes atheists for being atheists. Many religions also believe the same. Jerry Falwell blamed 9/11 on god punishing the US.
shareJerry Falwell blamed 9/11 on god punishing the US.
Some people (such as Lars Von Trier and Walter Pater) are Christian agnostics. They remain unconvinced by the idea of God even as they accept the inevitability of punishment and the instrument of prayer.
Since the Shelter's filmmakers literally thanked God in the credits, they don't appear to be skeptics. But it's also possible they're skeptics who tried to treat Christianity respectfully.
The problem for me was the writer's lack of taste. I wouldn't be offended by this film if I were a Christian, but I might be if I were a poor person born and raised in a shack. The implication is that I'd have to be illiterate, superstitious and separatist to have been raised that way.
Michael Cooney seems to forget that someone like Abe Lincoln can be self-educated, come from lonely impoverished beginnings and still write some of the greatest American prose of the nineteenth century. He can also elect to get schooled by the great Frederick Douglass in times of mortal racism. The walking stereotypes described by Cooney wouldn't have allowed Douglass to sit at their dinner table in 2010, let alone heeded his political advice in the 1860s.
I'm a believer in the idea that genius can come from anywhere. Isolation, really a pejorative word for solitude, can provide intellectual sustenance for an original thinker. Robinson Jeffers devoted his life to that idea (see his philosophical position, which he called inhumanism).
The only twist to the familiar redneck stereotype was the idea that the most backward examples were anti-Christian and had a hypocritical reverend to goad them on. But then you have another stereotype -- backwoods types who mutated in the shadows due to their adherence to some obscure backwoods belief system.
I've never understood why Lincoln is so idealised in the US. He was a pragmatist, not a fighter for the emancipation of slaves. He went out of his way prior to the War Between the States to reassure the states that the Constitution would be unaffected by union, and he said he didn't care whether the blacks were emancipated or remained as slaves just as long as the South was not allowed to secede.
I do not believe that he was racist, but he was unequivocally a white supremacist:
"I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races-that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of Negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the 2 races living together on terms of social or political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race. I say upon this occasion that I do not perceive that because the white man is to have the superior position that the Negro should be denied everything. Abraham Lincoln, debating with Douglas in Illinois, 1858
“See our present condition—the country engaged in war! Our White men cutting one another’s throats! And then consider what we know to be the truth. But for your race among us there could not be war, although many men engaged on either side do not care for you one way or another. “Why should the people of your race be colonized, and where? Why should they leave this country? This is, perhaps, the first question for proper consideration. You and we are different races. We have between us a broader difference than exists between almost any other two races. Whether it is right or wrong I need not discuss, but this physical difference is a great disadvantage to us both, as I think your race suffer very greatly, many of them by living among us, while ours suffer from your presence. In a word, we suffer on each side. If this be admitted, it affords a reason at least why we should be separated. It is better for both, therefore, to be separated.” [bold face mine]
— Spoken at the White House to a group of black community leaders, August 14th, 1862, from COLLECTED WORKS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN, Vol 5, page 371.
You're actually making my second point.
However, my second point was only a detour en route to my first point: That a self-educated backwoods person can, if they have sufficient will and intelligence, become a formidable thinker and writer, which, technically, apart from all idolatry and backlash, Lincoln was.
You must stop presuming that anyone who mentions Lincoln's better qualities is blind to or ignorant of his faults. No one who brings up Frederick Douglass is unaware of Douglass's role in correcting Lincoln's formerly "pragmatic" approach. If you'd read even a little American history, then you'd be familiar with Douglass's famous response to Lincoln's suggestion that he and other black people form a colony just beyond U.S. borders.
And while you're at it, I'd appreciate your reading the actual post you're responding to instead of railing at the ghost of your cliché idea of Americans.
No one has held Lincoln up as the paragon of social justice. My entire point was merely that it is wrong to presume people who live in backwoods isolation are stupid. Lincoln was self-taught, became president, wrote prose so exemplary that it is still studied as a kind of model, and knew enough during his presidency to rethink the very positions you've quoted after listening to a man as wise as Frederick Douglass.
And let's get one thing straight: the term "white supremacist" as you've used it meant something very specific in Lincoln's time. No white supremacist of that period would bother appealing to a black audience or attempt to negotiate with black people. Lincoln's views in the beginning, though fairer than those of his opposition, were unconsciously racist -- that's the point of mentioning Douglass.
But the test is never whether a person begins their life free of racism and superstition. The test is what that person does after having their illusions shattered. It is no secret that Lincoln began with primitive notions of how to deal with slavery and discrimination. Every modern historian I've ever read has pointed that out. So have endless documentaries on PBS.
No offense, but if you're going to preach to people from another country about their own history, then it's time you yourself read the next few chapters of that book.
"He was the first great man that I talked with in the United States freely -- who in no single instance reminded me of the difference between himself and myself, of the difference of color."
-- Frederick Douglass, on his first conversations with Lincoln
Thank you for your revisionist and lengthy reply. I feel so honoured to be patronised by ::gasp:: an American. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for lowering yourself to my level.
shareSince your only response to a detailed refutation of your assertions is to resort to the most reflexive kind of sarcasm, your post prates volumes about exactly how "low" your "level" -- in your words -- really is. We seem to be talking Hellraiser-sequel-low (but do enjoy the rent-boy leather).
And by the way: *Revisionist* is only a pejorative epithet if you believe that history is a rote doctrine rather than a collection of source materials to be examined and reexamined objectively.
Besides which, your attempt to scandalize an American -- any American -- by shouting phrases you hope will pass for sacrilege is breathtakingly unimaginative.
You've come to IMDB hoping to score points by shattering some blind patriot's belief in the buzzwords of American history. You end by showing that you yourself are blind to the people you would correct -- blind to what you read and blind to the people to whom you respond -- and all because you cling to nationalist prejudices in exactly the same way that the stereotypical American in your head grips his bible and flag. You still believe in the idea of nations defining individuals. You still believe in us and them -- in the idea of "foreigners."
Do leave it out sunshine; who do you think you are impressing? I did all this stuff 45 years ago and I don't need some pretentious little wanker correcting my English or my useage of my language.
If you're going to use old-fashioned words like prate then I suppose it should be a given that you don't know how to use them. The word is used of the spoken language, not written.
You, as an American, should understand the connotations of the word revisionist. Your so-called leadership spends half of its time revising the past, mainly because they screw it up so comprehensively as it's made.
I couldn't give a badger's armpit whether or not you are scandalised, and I certainly wouldn't waste my time coming to this site to do that. Besides, it's like shooting fish in a barrel anyway, and gets tedious after a short time. Kindly show me the bit where I was "shouting phrases you hope will pass for sacrilege".
Again, you as an American should know that the stock-in-trade of most Americans is a highly-developed sense of xenophobia overlaid with jingoism. Why do you imagine you are among the most reviled people on this planet? 4.6% of the earth's population using 25% of its resources and wanting more and more...
Most people still believe, to a greater or lesser extent, in the idea of nations defining individuals. How else could you explain Americans who believe with every fibre of their being in Manifest Destiny, the shining beacon on the hill and the rest of the nationalistic BS? How else does the US live with the dishonour of murdering small brown people who have never harmed them, all around the world?
You have to understand that I am generalising; the majority of people - even Americans - are not like this at all. I know a number of you who I am proud to call friends. But unfortunately the ignorant make such a noise that they overwhelm "normal" people.
Now kindly bugger off. I've had enough of talking rubbish to a clown who imagines his orotund scribblings confer some kind of intellectual superiority on him.
what a strange and whining reply! Bogwart, FYI Europe is markedly more Xenophobic than the US.
Your sewn post is an exhibition of xenophobia and absurd generalizations!
You made no valid or rational points, answered no raised points and simply went ad hominem.
And you completely missed the point on revisionist. Revisionism when it comes to history is not a pejorative.
Lastly are you British? Your country is made up of people wanting to be Americans, wanting to be anything but British. The most famous things from in your own museums are all stolen from somewhere else
Be quiet, you stupid little man. Who was talking to you anyway?
What is a "sewn post"? Did you have knitting again for your special classes today?
You are either very disturbed or in dire need of mental treatment. I can't believe that even such a doofus believes that we want to be American. Why would that be? You live in a third-world country that has no freedoms and no regard for its people. You are at the bottom of the pile as far as OECD criteria are concerned. What is desirable about that?
Now, again, go away. You're taking up my time; it's like being in charge of the worms at the Zoo.
Most people still believe, to a greater or lesser extent, in the idea of nations defining individuals
You're both a little loopy.
People use the term revisionist in different ways, of course. Thus, among conservatives, the term means leftist historians who see history through their leftist, anti-religious, anti-capitalist, anti-American ideology, changing or even twisting and distorting the facts of history to suit their ideology. An example of that would be Howard Zinn's warped book A PEOPLE'S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES, a leftist proctologist's view of America.
On a side note, the attack on Jerry Falwell was totally wacko. He stood up against the Neo-Fascist Party of Death that the Anti-Christian liberal establishment, including the radical "gender" ideologues, has become and has been pushing down the people's throat, and indoctrinating young people with thru tyrannical gov't-run schools, for the past 75 years. Like David Horowitz, I used to be part of that establishment, so I know how their insidious minds work.
Another schmuckified post from you. The condescending schmuck.
On the other hand... there's a glove
You're kidding, right? Did you watch Frailty to the end?
share[deleted]
Atheists don't believe in god(s). They might well believe in souls, demons, or spirit possession. For example, someone could be an Aristotelian or a Platonist and believe in the Aristotelian soul but not anything like the Christian God.
share'Compare with Frailty, which is indeed a faux supernatural thriller with an atheist, or at least anti-religious slant.'
You do realize of couse that the 'religious nuts' were right in Frailty, right?
+++by His wounds we are healed. - Isaiah 53:5+++
I read this topic after the other one "Religious propaganda"
and this is a copy from my opinion
___________________________________The movie was great without the religious and faith part cause it's completely away from religions teachings...
in my point of view it's anti-religions
it shows religions and believing in God in a funny way that is completely against religions and logic
i think you would agree with me that when you teach some one wrong things and tell him that it is like this so you are misleading him. or making him hate those things. even he doesn't know anything about the reality of those things
_________________
back to the point a lot of things that is really strange from a religious point of view
things that is against the religious teachings ( Judaism , Christianity and Islam )
1- no human knows how to deal with souls this way ( the soul that make the body living body and when it leaves it turns to be a dead body no living in it )
taking it out and get it in some one else was so funny to put it such a movie that speaks about faith and believing in God
2- God gives us our life with mind and free will so we can choose what we believe in as well as our actions we will be judged for both when we die
and the believes think that even if you left your faith , you will remain alive till your time comes so you get a chance to go back if you like or not , any way you choose what you want. at the end you will be judged. the point is you don't know when will you die.
3-no one ends the people's lives cause they lose their faith ( wrong teachings that exists every where or people doesn't understand it right with simple logic ) cause when you kill him as soon as he lose his faith , you are taking his chance to get back again. his time will come eventually.
4- the little girl !!!! any one on earth believer or not can agree with me that this girl is not yet mature to be able to say that i believe or not for real
she hasn't learn enough from life experiences that we get from parents , relatives , situations , science , philosophy , ethics , schools , worshiping places like churches , temples , mosques .
she is not yet responsible for her actions not just her believes . she is so young for that ...
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those points i felt that they are serving the other side more in a sneaky way or unintentionally that they are against the religion cause they say things that are not from the religion at all . so people would hate religions and faith and believers may be although it's not like that at all it's the opposite in fact.
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I'm thankful for the time you spent reading my opinion , and i respect all of your opinions who agrees with me or not it's not the issue , we exchange ideas here respectfully :)
4- the little girl !!!! any one on earth believer or not can agree with me that this girl is not yet mature to be able to say that i believe or not for real
she hasn't learn enough from life experiences that we get from parents , relatives , situations , science , philosophy , ethics , schools , worshiping places like churches , temples , mosques .
she is not yet responsible for her actions not just her believes . she is so young for that ...
would you like to discuss it ?
you will have to presume what you don't believe in. in order to get the meaning.
from your words it's obvious that you don't believe in One creator of this universe what ever people are calling different names.
you don't believe in all religions.
and yet you are discussing a religious point of view... I've no problem with that at all, you are free to think and talk long as you don't make fun of others , ask and say what you are thinking of.
my dear brother (if you excuse me to say so)
imagine for a while so you can understand my point, it's not your point it's mine, I'm just explaining so we can understand each other better.
Imagine for seconds...
that there is a God and he is Just and Merciful.
while we (humans) are intellectual beings, we are born with no knowledge, kind of pure creature that's us when we are born.
we grow up to learn and find hardship so we are to choose among various choices, right stuff and wrong stuff.
(for example it's time to confess doing something wrong that will bring punishment unto you, so your choice is to tell the truth or lie)
I think you get the example, it's simple one.
the little girl is too young and she is not really responsible for her actions. continue your imagination that I told you to do for a while, that the One creator of this world is Just and also Merciful.
so from this point I said that, The one Creator of the universe wouldn't punish a kid this way even though the kid said "I don't believe in him".
in most of countries, the kid is not able to give away one of his body organs to help some one even if he likes him and wants to without his guardians approval.
he is not yet mature enough to make such a decision.
close idea here, that The Just and Merciful one Creator to this world knows very well that the very young un-educated un-wise kid , can't make the decision to believe in him or not.
he will get old to be able to decide, or die young and then This one Merciful Just creator is not going to punish a kid for a choice he is not yet able to make.
I hope my Idea was clear and that you got it.
and that you are not offended by any of my words.
I never said I do or don't believe in divine beings, I just don't believe in organized religion and I find the whole prospect ridiculous.
And I really can't understand what you're trying to type here...
Light travels faster than sound,
that's why people seem bright,
until you hear them.
I tried to illustrate. and I'm sorry I couldn't make it easy for you to get.
and if you excuse me to say ...
since you believe in divine beings but not religions, keep searching for more knowledge so you may find what you are searching for.
Just wanted to say that I completely understand what you said in your initial post. I thought you explained it well, if that means anything to you.
I would have thought they might have taken that into consideration as well, but then again, what would have been the cutoff point?
Rest in Peace Jim Kelly, you will be missed.
I agree. People are claiming that because the curse was real, this is religious propaganda...WHAT? Nonsense.
The fact that this hag was religious and putting curses on people obviously shows that she's the evil villain here, not that atheists are somehow doomed. It shows that religion has power...and evil power, when in the hands of fanatics.
People take this movie way too seriously. Nothing in this movie is true or represents truth. I was entertained by it, but I consider it as meaningful as an X-Files episode. It's pure entertainment and nothing more. The actors probably giggled in between scenes.
Religion has no power. Politics have no power. It's all about people fvcking around with people they hate and controlling the people they love.
i am irreligious, i believe in god, but i found the movie stupid.
for example if u believe in a God that will punish the unfaithful ones after their death, whats the point to kill them with a magical possessed freaky guy?
even for the religious ones this is stupid.
it is like has a personal attack on the atheists or even irreligious people.
freaky movie as a moral teaching, which it is totally immoral, but as a plot is not bad, at least in my opinion.
i would definitely prefer if in the beginning was showing it was supernatural and in the end it was like one serial killer from the beginning,or one who became a serial killer after he witness the death of the boy in the wheelchair.
The movie works if you accept it as Christian propaganda. If characters deny God, some curse by an evil demon witch will take them before their time, where they are reduced to a time share of a body in a mental hospital. This is well within the realm of Christian belief in the US. All you have to do is meet a few and ask them. (By the way, it's stated clearly in the New Testament, such as in Matthew 12:31-32, that denying the Holy Spirit is the only unforgivable sin... a slight modification to the plot so the characters did this would have helped this interpretation).
On the other hand, it certainly makes no sense at all if you're an atheist. Bones that fuse and unfuse? No. Re-en-soulment? No. Magical curses? No. Programming a computer to decode a sound wave from a low-resolution video, in a matter of minutes? No.
And it probably makes no sense if you're pagan of some variety. I doubt any would have much reason to steal souls of atheists just because they don't believe in the Christian God. Granny wanted revenge on Christians who secretly hedge their bets, not on out and proud atheists. Oddly, she didn't want revenge also on her own people, who didn't save anyone from the flu either. It just makes no sense.
Are you for real? Your second paragraph says that you identify the target audience for >horror< movie because of their beliefs in the paranormal stuff going out there. Your actually saying that >HORROR< movie doesn't make sense for the atheist because there are some implausible events going on.
Ad your first sentence, poor "Night of the Living Dead" rated by you (1) as zombie propaganda.
This movie only works if you accept is as created by people with absolutely no devotion to theirs beliefs (religious or atheist).
Cause if one have the second one it's like you. The bad thing is killing people for not having faith, so if you're atheist you would be killed. Is there a horror movie that justify killing people and presenting the evil force doing it as a good thing? No. Atheist's uproar on this movie is like Jews being mad about Shindler's List. It's antilogic. People murdered are always victims, how blinded you have to be to not seeing this? One could say that you have to be fanatic to rely that heavily on emotions in perception of presented reality.
And there is christian view. In which case mashing their religion with some paranormal stuff or what you call it "magical", is quite unwelcome - i bet. It's like saying that their beliefs are falling under horror theme. In this movie there was a character that was a "christian shaman". Actually christianity was equaled to some hillbilly magic. That's not seems like religious propaganda to me. Besides that presenting ideas of christianity in unforgivingness, vicious rampage of killing the infidels is kinda mistaking two major religions with each other. But one is somehow untouchable in the US, so it's not a surprise. As of the third one, I could not imagine US movie where anything is murdering people for not being a Jew. I'm quite sure that for christians this movie have to be either stupid or anti-christian propaganda.
For me this movie is just ignorant Hollywood flick and in this view it's pretty watchable. But I respect your opinion. I was just intrigued by it.
I don't feel as though it is religious or anti-religious. The plot and dialogue are as if someone took a book that mentioned witchcraft and souls and just added a scary old lady.
If they were trying to push anything, is if you know the right people...they will make anything. Not any religious statement.
Editing: I'm absolutely sure it was a Christian film because the first person thanked at the last credits at the very end of the credits was God. I noticed that all the good and intelligent men in the picture die. This was another scare movie for God. Has Jullianne Moore fallen under the lords of darkness and superstition...the Christians?
This is very old Christianity in that even children go to hell if they don't believe.
Yes, the ARE pushing religion and pushing hard. What supports this opinion is mainly the plot itself (atheists are "righteously punished") but also the fact that it was produced by Icon (Mel Gibson's company) and the credits that say: "The filmmakers wish to extend their personal thanks to the following: GOD, American Standard Brands, [...]". Don't tell me, that filmmakers who are thanking god in the credits and make punishing atheists one of the most important plot points are not pushing religion!
shareeat crap you xan moron watch little house on the prairie maggot
share