Which is worse?

[Burtsplurt]

The act does not procreate, therefore it is purely for the fulfilment of the animal desires. - Besimudo

I'm sure that 99.9% of the time males and females get together it's because of animal desire rather than reproduction. We should ban that as well.

Besides this, the idea of marriage comes from the holy sacrament (and earlier pagan religions) and it was between man and woman. - Besimudo

Yep, and we used to make tools out of rocks. That's the way it was done before, so let's continue to do it now! The idea that we should do things solely because of tradition is just silly. We'd still be crawling around on all fours if that was the case.

Most women agree that fulfilment is in their children. - Besimudo

As do many men.

[The Man]

Burtsplurt summed up most of what I'd have said.

In interpreting what the Bible says, one needs to consider that what is presented in the Scriptures has often been heavily edited and censored. There are surviving Church documents that explicitly state that there were sections of Mark's Gospel that were removed from the 'canon' editions. As Pickett and Prince write in The Templar Revelation, a copy of a letter from the second-century Church Father, Clement of Alexandria, to someone called Theodore who had apparently written for advice about a heretical cult, admits that the alternative Gospel of Mark was authentic and "contained the esoteric teachings of Jesus that were not intended to be revealed to the average Christian." Clement "was prepared to lie to prevent such material from becoming more widely known: although he admits to Theodore that Mark's Secret Gospel does exist, he advises him to deny it to everyone else."

The letter goes on to describe two events in which the Scriptures were edited: In the first case, an account of the rising of Lazarus pretty much similar to the account of John's Gospel is included, although notably, there is a follow-up to the miracle six days afterward, in which Lazarus, as Pickett and Prince write,

came to Jesus "wearing a linen cloth over his naked body" and remained with him for a night, during which he was "taught... the mystery of the kingdom of God." Rather than a miraculous resurrection, therefore, the raising of Lazarus seems to have been some kind of initatory rite in which the initiate undergoes a symbolic death and rebirth before being given the secret teachings.

The second case is merely a sentence which appears after Mark 11:46, namely: "Ands the sister of the youth whom Jesus loved and his mother and Salome were there, and Jesus did not receive them." Speculation indicates that "the youth whom Jesus loved" was Lazarus, and as this phrase is also used to describe the disciple upon whose testimony John's gospel is based, it's quite likely that Lazarus likely is John. (Also, Lazarus' sister, Mary of Bethany, is believed to be one and the same as Mary Magdalene).

The Virgin Mary is a rather poor representative for all females simply because she is presumed to be abstinent for life (which is a load of rubbish, since Jesus is explicitly stated to have brothers and sisters on several instances in the Bible... half-brothers if you believe in the Immaculate Conception). While I'll admit that she has her own qualities worth admiring, women couldn't really look to her as a source of guidance on sexual matters simply because she was presumed to be abstinent. Of course, Jesus was also presumed to have been abstinent (although in fact there is no evidence even in the Gospels themselves to indicate this; the subject of whether he was married is completely avoided throughout), so I suppose the idea of sex is supposed to be completely separate from religion. Okay.

[Shadow Nexus]

One week gone and this is already about religion. Anyway, I haven't read it all, but I just read a lot of "Jesus" around there.

Anarchy the way that you describe it is intriguing, and I'm going to look into it a bit further. It still seems a bit too idealistic for my taste, but it may just be that I don't have a good grasp of the concept.

"yo prefiero hablar de cosas imposibles
porque de lo posible ya se sabe demasiado"
-Silvio Rodríguez

Basically, it's either hope or giving up. As the May 1968 graffiti said: Be realist, ask for that wich is impossible. It may be hard to get, but accepting what we have now despite the injustice is just...forgeting humanity is meant to be Prometheus, not Narcisus.

Extreme Liberalism is the world I have grown to know...
Cars commuting into work, work that men have no care for and would rather wished they had died. This is a world ruled by many, with no direction, no form so that they may live as pigs with immense appetites.

You are describing capitalism here.

[The Man]

One week gone and this is already about religion. Anyway, I haven't read it all, but I just read a lot of "Jesus" around there.

Basically, to summarize, it's me saying most of Catholic doctrine is made-up misogynist crap that has nothing to do with the way things actually happened in the First Century and Besimundo arguing that it doesn't matter, I guess

And yes, I agree with you that that Besimundo quote is capitalism, not liberalism xD

[Shadow Nexus]

And yes, I agree with you that that Besimundo quote is capitalism, not liberalism xD

Funny though, liberalism can work in capitalism. Examples are socialdemocrats, they are liberal but keep the capitalist means of production. Liberalism is a rather vague term.

[The Man]

the stereotypical liberal viewpoint isn't exactly pro-unrestricted capitalism, though

[Shadow Nexus]

the stereotypical liberal viewpoint isn't exactly pro-unrestricted capitalism, though

What about neoliberalism? That's extreme capitalism.

[The Man]

I've never even heard of neoliberalism, but if it's anything like neoconservatism, keep it far, far away from me.

[DocFrance]

Avoiding anything with a "neo" tacked on the front is usually a good idea.

Neon is particularly toxic.

[Shadow Nexus]

I've never even heard of neoliberalism, but if it's anything like neoconservatism, keep it far, far away from me.

It's probably the same under different term. Neoliberalism (in a nutshell) believes that all that has succeeded of the modern project is capitalism, and believes we should go back to traditional values. Neoliberalism applies to many people at the Bush administration, some democrats too. Well, it is the ideology of free trade and capitalism, with moral conservadurism.

[The Man]

"Neoliberalism" isn't liberalism at all then, as far as I'm concerned. What a crock.

[Shadow Nexus]

Yes it is, it is liberalism in the market. Free trade, IMF, NAFTA...everyone's invited! The less goverment interference, the happier neoliberalists are. It is economical liberalism! Hail anarchy in the market!

[DocFrance]

So a command economy, where prices are heavily dictated by the government, would be neo-conservative? I think I get it.

[Shadow Nexus]

So a command economy, where prices are heavily dictated by the government, would be neo-conservative? I think I get it.

As far as I know, offer and demand determines the prices. The least goverment interfierence in the multinationals, the better. The more capitalism, the better. Thats basically neoliberalism. I have read some books written by neoliberalists, I like to get pissed or something. I'm stupid. But everyone knows that already.

[eestlinc]

the world tends toward chaos and disorder anyway, so it takes huge efforts in oppression to hold society together for long. I think the US will break apart into many smaller countries in the not too distant future.

I figure humanity will either start figuring out how to live better or it'll just die away. Either one is fine with me, although I support those who push for more enlightened life, and thus I tend to align more with "extreme liberalism"