[Saya]

Originally Posted by AshleyO

And my point is that religion was simply an accessory to the thing that happened; NOT the religion you owe fealty to just because Christians were the ones that did it. Perhaps without joining Canada, the proles would have rose up in conflict with the merchants and Newfoundland would be practically a communist state instead. History didn't play out that way though.

Its easy to talk in hypotheticals, but I doubt it would happen. With no education system, how would they have learned about Marx? How would they have brought down the RNC and the British army? With fishing nets? Today that era is actually very romanticized with wishes we would go back to that because joining Canada was a horrible idea, and the vote was rigged anyway. Regardless, religion wasn't the accessory, the revivals and conversion of fishermen was a huge push of social change as it empowered fishermen to be sober (alcoholism is a huge problem here, but it was even worse back in the day) and become educated. The push for schools didn't happen overnight as the merchants began deporting preachers who would try. The whole education movement was actually a big thing to the Protestants so people would be able to read the Bible. It wasn't that everyone thought education was a good idea and accessorized it with religion, its the other way around.

Well it certainly DOES depend, doesn't it. Admittedly, there wouldn't be an A+ if there wasn't a need for it, so they are wrought with their own problems. But right now; it looks to me like I'd put my eggs into the non-believer basket as far as that kind of attempt for equality is concerned. Maybe part of it is because religions seem to determine the politics of atheists. Many of us are set against religions, so it goes that if we're exposed more towards religiously motivated inequality towards a certain people, it would follow that we would be opposed to it, even if it's for crappy reasons as just sticking it to the papacy.

I think more than that is going on. I have to give atheism movements the side eye for being so white and male dominated.

It really does depend. To me, there's a certain point that I can't align myself with certain liberal notions. It's sort of a tit for tat thing. I'm not sure what their line is because I'm not familiar with them. But some things that DO cause me to take pause is when people talk about freedom and democracy and these sort of non-formed ideals that lack figure. Who's freedom? Why does the proletariat need bourgeois democracy? Why should the privileged have a chance to dominate those who have none? What kind of democracy is that but one that I can't imagine really benefits those that would be better off without such a kind? But that's really beside the point I guess because I've come to find that more and more, it's more expedient to admit that I myself AM a statist and an authoritarian. Sort of that... I like your freedom of speech, but only if I agree with it.

My problem isn't that they're liberal, is more their idolization of statism. I don't see how forcing people makes things any better, and that's probably a big reason why Communists states have failed.

Yes and those people are enemies to the people. I myself am not so convinced that religion is necessarily an opiate as Marx had asserted. I make a distinction between organizations, religious myth stories, and belief. The organizations are going to be there. But popularity doesn't make the divinity of Jesus real. Beliefs will be there. But this doesn't mean the beliefs are correct... just potentially useful.

And I say it doesn't really matter to me if its real or not, so I don't get my panties in a twist about it.

I find problems of white Jesus. I also think that it doesn't follow that one should say Jesus was black BECAUSE he was with the oppressed. That doesn't make a whole lot of sense except in a symbolic kind of way. Jesus could have been a red-skinned Jew for all we know. I don't think that his ethnicity should necessarily hinge on what he was all about. I equate Jesus to the same standings of Mao, Lenin, Stalin, Che, Sankara, and Tecumsah. They are good leaders to learn from of their people. I am convinced that Jesus was a revolutionary figure, not the son of God. And I also think it's problematic to hedge one's bets on the divinity of Jesus into a useless pacifism because one expects Jesus to do all the work for them. That's bad politics.

The black Jesus isn't a reflection of what Jesus's earthly body looked like, its how he would manifest himself now. He would not align himself with the whites. What came before was arguments that black churches are not authentic faiths, but poor reflections of superior white faith. The emergence of black liberation theology was partly reactionary to that, and also going along with the civil rights movement and then the Black Power movement.

At the very core of the Social Gospel Movement and Liberation Theology is that we can't wait for Jesus to come back and fix things, so I'm not sure why you bring that up.

Of course. Religion IS a political force. I would almost argue that religion is in some ways... a very common people's politic. But the "mysticism" or magical aspects of it are terribly problematic. Basically; Jesus aint comin' back yo.

Mysticism is religious practice that places less emphasis on dogma and more on one's experience. Hesychasm being an example of Christian mysticism, and Zen Buddhism being a mystic sect of Buddhism. Its not magical, yo.

I'm getting the impression that you're saying that it is, so I AM asking you that. Unless you don't think religion is necessary.

I just don't get the utilitarian approach. Why does it matter if religion is necessary or not? I'm not qualified, nor are you, to tell the people of the world what meaningful things in their lives are not necessary. Music isn't necessary, but I wouldn't think that it should be eliminated.

Yes. Absolutely. Do away with the west entirely. Let's say that tomorrow the west was gone. The rest of the world was free of its influence. The issue that I see is that certain attitudes and ideas... certain things that are objectively a good thing that non-westerners actually have in common with westerners becomes a thing of ONLY westerners. I honestly feel like it'd be pretty tragic if at the end of the day, the things that they had in the past with their equality and their secularism becomes forever the brand of their western enemy thus locking themselves strictly into a very severe brand of extremism. That'd be pretty unfortunate. Hopefully it doesn't play out like that.

Even if the West went away, it would take a very long time to heal. We've inflicted a lot of shitty beliefs and ideas on other nations, such as shadeism and anti-black racism. Its not just a matter if we went away, because they'd still be grappling with the effects for maybe centuries to come. Like in the native population of Canada, before colonialism, women often had leadership roles, I won't say sexism wasn't a thing because certainly there were gender roles, but not nearly as severe as the Western perceptions of gender. But colonialism introduced sexism, women lost their leadership roles, and to this day many men in the native community insist it is traditional that men be in charge and only men in the sweat lodge, and only the interracial children of native men are really native, etc etc.

So what you're saying is that we should avoid asking the question of "Can you prove it?" because currently it's in bad tastes because we're being the bullies right now? Hmm. I'm not one to go on a crusade of asking the question; but frankly if someone professes their faith to me, I can't help but simply ask to prove the claim. Most people don't go testifying their faith though, so it's rare that I ever have to ask.

What do you mean by professing their faith? Simply identifying as a faith is a profession, isn't it? Aren't Muslim women who wear the hijab, in the West at least, always professing their faith?

I just don't get sticking your nose into things that doesn't concern you, and again, it makes me side eye the whole thing because I suspect more than just atheism is at play, especially when it comes to faiths of people of colour.