Random Stuff XXVI: Politics and Religion Edition

[6_bleen_7]

I'm just wrapping up the first of two consecutive 70-hour work weeks, and thus have had very little time to devote to LiveJournal; but with the upcoming election drawing near, I'll sacrifice a few minutes of sleep to make this important announcement for all Ohioans and anyone else interested in the quality of public-school education in Ohio

Comments

[chillyrodent]

Interesting, but not surprising, about the correlation between religious fanaticism and questionable morals. I think when you have a leader (literal or literary) who takes violent action against dissent, you are set up to think the same way. Who Would Jehovah Torture? Pretty much anyone.

I've wandered in an out of an ex-cultist website for ten years now, and I can no longer remember how many times people have asked but, how can you be moral without God? Seems the logical question is the opposite. Thanks for the reference.

[6_bleen_7]

You're welcome! If you look closely at where people actually get their morals from, parents and community are the usual culprits; God is generally relegated to a secondary role as the imaginary enforcer.

I always like to ask people, "Who has the higher sense of morality: someone who doesn't murder people because he fears an eternal ass-kicking by a cosmic Big Brother, or someone who doesn't murder people because she knows it is an unkind and irresponsible thing to do?"

I really need an agnostic icon.

[samwibatt]

Huh. That Soul Sisters tract is pretty harmless, as far as Chick stuff goes - cloying, but not actively hate-spewing (I suppose the more vitriolic tracts wouldn't be as suitable for outreach).

I would have been tempted to write God's whiteness off as his blinding glow if they hadn't had the black faceless Jesus next to Him - so I agree with you that they weren't able to stomach having a black God. Though His palm is darker in the new one than in Best Friend (frame 10).

As for the artwork, a few things hint that it's a do-over (positioning of the facing girl's sleeve-cuffs in frame 2, part of her right arm is showing in the new one, not in the old) but in some places it looks like they just whited-out (so to speak) the people's faces and redrew them. The new artist is also certainly better than Chick himself (who I assume drew the original).

The oplates site is pretty neat. But I expected the "Fish Lake Erie" plate to look more like this.

[6_bleen_7]

Chick drew a whole bunch of the early ones; his hired goons are far better artists. Best Friend is one of the few non-hateful, non-paranoid Chick tracts (and is perhaps my favorite, if only because Psycho Dave modified the pictures and dialog to produce a lesbian-themed commentary on Christian hatred). The typical tract either follows the lives of two similar people, one of whom is saved because he repents at the last moment while the other burns for eternity in the lake of fire; or shows a conversation between God and a freshly-dead soul who thought he'd been doing good all through life, but is condemned to eternal torment anyway because he didn't accept Jesus as his One True Savior

[samwibatt]

That is a goodie.

It sort of works as a thumbnail for my angle on it all, which is that while religious belief itself is often harmless or beneficial, organized religion can act as a center for the craven, authoritarian suck-up-to-power system that usually underlies mass bloodletting. I imagine the same sort of attitude kept (e.g.) Stalin in charge, so it is possible to pull it off without a God-based religion - it's just much more popular, historically, to use the religious approach.

I have a feeling that thinking non-atheists like me wouldn't find it especially offensive, but maybe a bit of overgeneralization. (I'm an agnostic, so I can't claim to "know God" but neither would I say there isn't one [or more]).

[6_bleen_7]

I'm also an agnostic, albeit a militant one (as per the adherents of Slag-Blah); I think of "knowing God" in this context as claiming to know God, as many religions do.

The special thing about religious authority is that to the unquestioning, invoking absolute authority appears to grant absolute power. There's no appeal once God has spoken. I could go on for hours about all the factors that enabled Stalin and Hitler to weild such phenomenal power.

[samwibatt]

The special thing about religious authority is that to the unquestioning, invoking absolute authority appears to grant absolute power.

Agreed. I believe this principle is what led the nation's founders to require separation of church and state - and up until then, there hadn't (AFAIK) been any secular dictatorships. I think the separation of church and state is still essential - but needs to be broadened to include separation of any power-worship and state, including business. I'm no Thomas Jefferson, someone like that is going to have to come up with the kynd words.

IIRC Hitler did lean on religion until he had enough power sewn up - and then he had the crosses replaced with swastikas.

[kayigo]

You will like this religious argument between Steve Carrell and Steven Colbert. It captures the boneheaded illogic of the whole thing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkCw5Jcn9vs

[6_bleen_7]

That's excellent! I'll save that one.

[chillyrodent]

That is fucking hysterical. I had to watch it twice.