[Terez]

Cold Iron, on Aug 30 2009, 12:54 AM, said:

The evils of religious manipulation is a common argument theme for the militant non-religious. Dumb is a pretty accurate description of those who would try to blame a religion for isolated cases of manipulation.

Like people said, it's obviously a combination of all of those elements. You can't leave the religion itself out of it because it contains so much justification for wrong in it (institution aside), but neither is it exactly constructive to try to 'blame' something non-sentient for anything.

But it's sort of like the gun argument. 'Guns don't kill people; people kill people.' It's true, but it doesn't mean that firearm restriction laws don't prevent a lot of murders.

[Asheroth]

Silencer, on Aug 30 2009, 04:20 PM, said:

Civility and no personal attacks, people.

As an aside, Mushroom's current sig is win:

Quote

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God? (Epicurus)

As to the topic, well, I find that despite my dislike for religion - in that it encourages certain things - it is true that it's merely a tool used by some people, while the values expressed are admirable. But the institution itself is the issue, imo. Without rungs, the values can be taken by anyone, but by implementing a system, it becomes open to manipulation.

If that made sense...

Agree with your assessment of manipulation. Institutionalising anything always carries the risk of people exploiting the power positions which are always inherent in such structures I think the church would probably do itself a pretty big favour by decentralising, although TBH I'm totally unsure how that could effectively be done.

Also as an aside about Mushroom's sig, I think your standard Christian response is to choose the third option, and then rely on a variety of explanations for why suffering exists. Often these explanations are insufficient or unconvincing ('God just allows suffering and we don't know why'), or offensive ('Suffering exists because people - yes, including you - are bad').

We probably shouldn't derail the thread by talking about the problem of evil though

Also:

Cold Iron said:

The evils of religious manipulation is a common argument theme for the militant non-religious.

I think it's a pretty silly argument theme TBH. Surely the evils of manipulation through any strategy are more condemning of the people doing the manipulating than the structure they use to do it. Of course we should prefer structures that minimise the risk of manipulation, but in any other case other than religion we tend to focus on the manipulating parties rather than the systems. For example, if a large company was exercising undue influence on a certain market, you'd blame the company involved, not capitalism. You could, of course, blame capitalism, and many people do, but the point is that our first port of call is to condemn the manipulating parties, and possibly call for reform of the system that they operate in. Very rarely would we jump immediately to 'THE ENTIRE SYSTEM IS BROKEN AND MUST BE DONE AWAY WITH!' Why do we treat religious manipulation differently?

P.S - Not trying to justify religious manipulation, it's just as bad and probably worse than any other kind, but I think maybe people treat it differently when it probably shouldn't be.

[Adjutant Stormy~]

Fair point, Asheroth. Institutionalized manipulation exists, let us not except Religion from the good company it so deservingly earned.

But to the OP, All of the above.

The Institution (the faith), that the parties subscribe to forms a bedrock of belief, and is instrumental in framing their examining of the world around them. The philosophical, epistemological, and dogmatic tendencies of the institution express themselves in the people. One of the tendencies that stands out to me is the "One True Faith" doctrine.

If you're a Christian, dyed in the wool, or a Muslim, or a Marxist, nobody can convince you otherwise, because your philosophical grounding is one of absolute belief in the foundation. It engenders stability, yes, but I doubt there is a greater force in the world for vehement, adamant, zealous ideological conflict. Since yours is the One True Faith, this fairly excludes grounds for compromise. This doesn't necessarily end at conceptions of God, or religious themes, but it is a pattern of thought that leaks out into the wider region of intellectual intercourse. In short, the staunchly faithful are often hard to argue with. I've never become furious or frustrated in conversation with a Buddhist, or a Zoroastrian (I know one!) because I couldn't get them to see things from my point of view. I've said this rather inarticulately, but I hope the gist is right.

The Leaders are responsible too. In rising to the top of the Institution, they have largely been shaped by it. But insofar as the decisions, motivations, and culpability of a given leader are involved, I'm a bit of a fan of personal responsibility. If you choose to use the manipulative ability of your office, well meaning or no, you own it.

But the People, I blame the people most of all. I blame the people who are just too lazy to see more than one side of an issue, or to read a book, or to make an effort to learn the facts themselves. I blame the naive ones. The people who are guileless, who do not see doubletalk, backroom dealing, and lying to one's face for what it is. The people who, when hearing someone of power speak, do not immediately wonder what his or her aims are, motives, goals; and how this is related. The people who let themselves be manipulated. We're all guilty.

[Asheroth]

Agree with what I think is the core of Stormy's post - faith at its worst is an extremely effective tool for manipulation. Whatever faith *should* be, all too often it's taken to mean that one must trust blindly in what the institution tells you, and closes you completely to anything that anybody else might have to say. Needless to say, this is a Bad Thing.

[Gem Windcaster]

I blame scientists. If they hadn't come along with their ideas of proof and evolutionistic idealism, we would have already extinguished each other fair and square by now. There's nothing like nuclear, biological, and other advanced weaponry to resolve the worlds problems... Wait, what was the question?

Allright enough with the jokes. ----- I have to agree with Terez that the question is not the best - but for other reasons I suspect. For one thing blame doesn't lead anywhere, doesn't point at a solution, because it only highlights one aspect; this can easily be illustrated by switching the question: who should be credited for all the good things that supposedly comes from faith? Almost equally irrelevant question, I don't even see the point of asking it.

Just like all of humanity's inventions, both good and bad comes out of most of them. As for the Nay Sayers of our generation; they need to remember that civilizations were never build on conformity but diversity and learning.

ps. lots of stuff to catch up on around here, please be patient with me - crazy life is crazy.

This post has been edited by Gem Windcaster: 16 September 2009 - 08:30 PM

[Cold Iron]

Gem Windcaster, on 16 September 2009 - 08:29 PM, said:

civilizations were never build on conformity but slavery and exploitation

fixed

[Gem Windcaster]

Cold Iron, on 16 September 2009 - 09:42 PM, said:

Gem Windcaster, on 16 September 2009 - 08:29 PM, said:

civilizations were never build on conformity but slavery and exploitation

fixed

Really? You call that civilization? In my mind, civilizations were build despite those things you mentioned. But maybe that's just me.

Edit: oh, btw, I could go on about just how horribly wrong your statement is, on more than one level, but I'm simply not up to it. Secondly, since I outed everyone on their hypocrisy regarding blame of the bad things in this world, I would appreciate a comment on it. I am so heartily sick of hearing "it's religions fault" when some idiot drags around some other idiots in some cult like state. It's like blaming nuclear war on the scientist that invented the science behind it. It's wasn't exactly their intention to give humankind the potential to destroy itself. But there it is. But maybe you feel like blaming that on religion too, what do I know. I am sure there were some jew involved right, oh wait, most likely someone called himself a Christian. Yes, lets blame religion for nuclear bombs too. Yeah.

This post has been edited by Gem Windcaster: 16 September 2009 - 11:39 PM

[Cold Iron]

Gem Windcaster, on 16 September 2009 - 11:26 PM, said:

I would go on about just how horribly wrong your statement is, on more than one level, but I can't

fixed again. trolling is fun

[Vengeance]

Mankind is to blame. If we didn't have a need to assume that there is something greater then ourselves then we would have no need for religion to start with. However in answer to your question it is the followers who give leaders power and allow them to lead. This is because the majority of people are sheep.


A person is smart and capable, people are morons...Vengeance

[Gem Windcaster]

What Venge said. ^

(Any other argument is nothing but a covert (or rather not so covert) agenda from losing battles in other threads. Not that I am against agendas, in fact I am all for them, but I like mine overt on purpose, as opposed to overt by accident. Also I don't feed trolls, I only feed monkeys. )

[Cold Iron]

It was a clearly-too-subtle way of saying that you were being, and generally are, a troll.

Constantly opposing whatever argument is put in front of you with nothing but gibberish and then emotionally shouting down anyone who attempts to engage you is not "geometrically thinking", it's trolling.

There I said it.

[Gem Windcaster]

Cold Iron, on 17 September 2009 - 01:23 AM, said:

It was a clearly-too-subtle way of saying that you were being, and generally are, a troll.

Constantly opposing whatever argument is put in front of you with nothing but gibberish and then emotionally shouting down anyone who attempts to engage you is not "geometrically thinking", it's trolling.

There I said it.

If I oppose and argument it is generally because I think that on some level it's not hard to shoot down, i.e. that I don't agree with what the argument says or the way it's performed. If there's something you don't understand, I should be able to explain it to you, if you're willing to listen. Unfortunately, you rarely comment on what I actually say, but rather wants to tell me how stupid I am, wanting me to explain why I keep being stupid. Just take a look at your reaction in this very thread - it speaks volumes. On the contrary to what you think I don't let negative emotions dictate when I discuss - but I am aware that I usually create an emotional response in the person I discuss with. I am sorry if you feel like I've been shouting you down, but it's nothing personal. Btw, it's not very convincing to claim someone is a troll while trolling excessively yourself.

/end OT

[Cold Iron]

My dear telling me that you could go on about how wrong I am if only you were up to it is trolling. What I did was pose legitimate points in a trollish fashion, in order to draw your attention to your own trolling and coax you into actually engaging me. If you think my argument is easy to shoot down, then do so, if you don't agree, then explain yourself, you can hardly accuse me of not being willing to listen when you've offered me nothing to listen to - and I've never once called you stupid, or inferred it beyond rephrasing your own words back to you. Your emotions are clear for all to see when you begin to attack people on the grounds of allegedly assuming your arguments are influenced by your faith.

This is a discussion board. Please - give me something to discuss beyond YOU!

[Silencer]

Keep it on topic, and civil, you two. Official warning - you get into an argument again and both of you are banned for a week.

[Morgoth]

@Gem - CI told me you were silly and immature. You should respond

[Gem Windcaster]

Ooookayy!

Cold Iron, on 16 September 2009 - 09:42 PM, said:

Gem Windcaster, on 16 September 2009 - 08:29 PM, said:

civilizations were never build on conformity but slavery and exploitation

fixed

This is the only comment on my initial post that I could find, so lets start there. You seem to be saying that civilization was in fact built on slavery and exploitation. My definition of civilization is different from yours. By definition slavery and exploitation is not civilized, and therefore cannot build a civilization. 'Civilization' in my book is not about subjugation or even size, necessarily, but advancement. Taking the early Greek society as an example, or the roman empire, theories dictate that what made those societies so great was their contact with diversity among other things. Personally I think that the subsequent power the Romans had was the reason it all collapsed in the end. Having big armies and technology to move people around in the world to subjugate people is a method of having contact with diversity and new learnings. But violence in itself cannot build a civilization. Spreading knowledge and technology is a far superior way to subjugate a people or a culture than violence ever could be. Today, the internets are the best civilization builder ever created. Because of the diversity and learnings it contains, on several levels. But as always, the good comes with the bad, and it's up to us to build the civilization we want.

[Terez]

Technically, 'civilization' is about a social system where people are dependent on one another, as opposed to self-sufficient farmsteads where the people who live there have no need for the outside world. It has little to do with being advanced, other than the fact that technological advancement and improving the quality of life means that you have to depend on other people outside your farmstead. The more technology advances, the more we depend on each other. This connotation that being 'civilized' means you are acting like proper moralistic humans is a bad connotation, I think.

PS - Tell your crazy brother happy b-day, from the crazy Malazan people.

This post has been edited by Terez: 18 September 2009 - 03:05 PM

[Malaclypse]

Terez, on 18 September 2009 - 03:01 PM, said:

Technically, 'civilization' is about a social system where people are dependent on one another, as opposed to self-sufficient farmsteads where the people who live there have no need for the outside world. It has little to do with being advanced, other than the fact that technological advancement and improving the quality of life means that you have to depend on other people outside your farmstead. The more technology advances, the more we depend on each other. This connotation that being 'civilized' means you are acting like proper moralistic humans is a bad connotation, I think.

PS - Tell your crazy brother happy b-day, from the crazy Malazan people.

This is so wrong. So very wrong. From where do you find your justification for speaking about civilization in this way as if you invented it? Just for starters, 'self-sufficient farmsteads' = civilization. Problem is they never have been self-sufficient. That's just to begin. You clearly don't know the first thing about the subject and yet you pontificate like a deaf German professor. Rein yourself in lest you incur my wrath.

[Terez]

Excuse me? Can't you counter a point without being an asswipe about it? Also, if you're going to attempt to counter a point, then use something substantial. Ad hominem attacks don't count as evidence.

[Malaclypse]

Terez, on 18 September 2009 - 05:39 PM, said:

Excuse me? Can't you counter a point without being an asswipe about it? Also, if you're going to attempt to counter a point, then use something substantial. Ad hominem attacks don't count as evidence.

You never had a point to be countered. My obligation is to the uneducated others who may be viewing this thread and thinking you might have the foggiest notion about the subject you presume to comment upon and not to you Ad hominem attacks? If I thought you understood the Latin properly I might respond in specific but in the current circumstances...*shudders*