lulay

I agree very much with that author.
Take the awful activity of suicide bombing. let's analyze it a little. young people in the prime of their lives agree to blow themselves and others up. WHY?
beCAUSE of the dogmatic promise is why--of REWARD. of bleiving to be a 'good matyr' and to fly straight to a 'paradise' and be served by '70 virgins'
i mean it is so ludicrous one could cry. yet it is a belief that encourages these youths to go through with something as horrific and final as that. THAt is belief. it shows us dramatically what belief is capable of!

christians look aghast at it, and some say...'oh, WEEE, would NEVER do anything like THAT>>!...errr right. like christians have been reponsible for some of the worst blood letting atricities known to human kind, The Crusades....? etc......Hiroshoma, a big big list. it is no point claiming that in the modern world it isn't christianity. wrong. even those who don't confess to doing it for Jesus. ALL of that is still there, unresolved, under the semantic surface fueling motivation. leders like WBush blatantly include archaic religious shpeak in speeches. our idiot Blair is warned by his PR people NOT to. but it still fules him, like Bush

So religion. whats it mean? whys it all gone so wrong?

here's my opinion. That it started with the patriarchy. They prohibited REAL Direct experience. real ecstatic communal experience inspired with hallucinogenic inspiration. where we would commune with each other and Nature in a Deep and menaingful way. what replaced that is the utter sham we call 'religion'....and we are seeing and reaping the consequences of that oppression

reprise

It would help if you told us with which author you agree and with which specific comment they have made.

Vorkosigan

How is hallucinating communicating in a deep and meaningful way?

Chris Weimer

Er...I don't think you've got it straight. Hiroshima as a Christian attack? Um...no? Crusades, inquisition, Salem Witch Trials, HUAC, even Iraq and to some extent Cold War were religious, but religions aren't the only one's rewarding. The promise of freedom, safety, and independence from foreigners all inspire zeal and violence. If Hiroshima was bombed because they weren't Christians, then the USA could have bombed Nazi Germany without repercussions because Hitler was staunch anti-Christian. It's not religion, per se, but power and glory. All will die for glory in the battlefield and some will sacrifice all for ultimate power.

truthie

This is interesting, a Neopagan claiming that religion has gone wrong because of patriarchy, this makes me more skeptical about what you are saying since I have met enough Neopagan radical feminists saying the same statement.

And the unawareness is so great that they ignore the fact that ancient Pagan society in terms of religion was no perfect or better. In those ancient times, people were still taught to fear the gods and to follow the freaking religion whether you liked it or not, in many ancient Pagan societies you did not have free will. :banghead:

Have you read Oedipus?

Or tell me, religious brainwashing did not exist before patriarchal religions arose? Please, answer this question!!!

By the way, there is no evidence for the existence of matriarchal societies, so do not use that loophole to justify the claim you are making.

Let’s conclude, Neopaganism is not the same as Ancient Paganism, historically, religiously and societal speaking.

The people worshiped goddesses, but women still got the end of the stick.

Honestly, to me this seems like Christian/Abrahamic-bashing Neopagan trying to side with the atheists since "atheists hate Christianity too."
It reminds me of myself...the past.

That is one of the reasons that I say that religious people from a certain religion should be aware when criticizing the types of religions of others because after all, they (religions) come from the same boat and have more crappy things in common than they think.

T.

Chris Weimer

I don't see the comparison? Oedipus was about blindness, not being able to see what is in front of the eyes? A more god-aware story is Agamemnon, who kills his daughter for calm winds (Iliad).

lulay

FIRSt let me tell you that my original reply had been intended to join the other thread of this forum "Religion is the problem not the answer"...i must have hit the new thread button by mistake,...i've contacted the moderator and await his action...till then, lets try and crack on

Vorkosigan: "How is Hallucinating communicating in a deep way?"

first may i ask, have you yourself had hallucinogenic experience?
We have to understand what 'hallucination' means. strictly speaking, the psychdelics are not hallucinogens--if by that term you mean 'creating hallucinoations'....i use the term as Ralph Metzner defines it (sorry i've forgot exactly. sorry to be confusing. will try and find notes if you want)

when we imbibe hallucinogens it creates a deep feel of creativity. it is the SOURCe of creativity, and has been secretly referred to in various mytholgoies
what seems to happen is it disolves psychological boundaries between us and others and Nature. or at least makes tham much mor flexible. they also release deep emotions.
So experiences in an Earthy context they are the original communual ecstatic communion which the patriarchs--pagan and non-pagan, prohibited, either for special elites only, or outright. ever since we have been offered dry useless substitutes like cread and cheap wine or water and empty words

cweb 255: ""It's not religion per se but 'power and glory'..."
HAH! and where do you think that idea came from exactly?

truthie: (o helo truthie)"...or tell me, religious brainwashing did not exist--before patriarchal religions arose? Please answer this question!!!"

o dearie, CALM down. chill. i am guessin you choose your user name 'truthie' cause you think you are telling the turth the whole truth and nuthin...etc, right? right

first, don't make presumptions about people. i am not a "neo pagan". i am an explorer....
you are confused about paganism per se also. there are many forms of paganism. are you one? your mate sven is, and look at her/his views!

there is such a thing as PATRARCHAL paganism. look it up with that thingie computer in front of you
for example, the Olympian Greeks were pagans, yet patriarchal, and yes brainwashing. next question...

REAL EAARTh oreinted paganism---all that word really means is 'country dweller' those close to the Earth. the Greek Athenians were more ...city??

yes, real Earth centred pagansim wasn't brainwashing but inclusive. take Dionysianism, including women and slaves into their orgiastic ritual........ok truthe

Shven

1. 'Letting' slaves participate or forcing them to?

2. Well not everyone wants a homosexual orgy do they?

Shven

jbernier

If it is secret how did you figure it out? Did a hallucination tell you?

Or the brain chemistry misfires causing one to see what is not there.

btw, hate to point out that there is actually zero archaeological evidence for a general, worldwide, patriarchial suppression of a previous idyllic non-patriarchial religion. None. It has been, btw, self-identified feminist archaeologists who have been the biggest critics of this myth (which is what it is, no more, no less). Their thinking is that a genuinely feminist archaeology must, first and foremost, be good archaeology.

Uhmmmm...history, perhaps.

I think we need to challenge three terms here: Pagan, patriarchy and brainwashing.

First, pagan. Exactly what does an archaic Greek and, say, a pre-contact Ojibwe (Chippewa) shaman have in common that justifies putting in the same category? Is it simply that they are not monotheistic? Sorry, does not cut it. These two individuals would have considered the other's religion incomprehensible; the epistemological, the pragmatic, the ontological, etc., bases are completely different. I think that the category "pagan", when applied to anything other than those contemporary groups who self-identify as pagan, is meaningless.

Second, patriarchy. The term obscures the complexities of social reality. For instance, one can look at many examples of social contexts in which, yes, men occupy formal positions of power and authority. However does that mean that we have "father rule", to use a more or less precise translation of "patriarchy"? Not necessarily. First of all, we often find that women will have a great deal of informal or indirect power. The Iroquois come to mind immediately; yes, men occupied the formal positions of power and authority but it was women who held the sole right to appoint men into those positions. Is this patriarchy? No, not in the classic use of the word. Is it matriarchy? No, not in the classic sense of the word. I think that gender relations within any society are far too complicated to use vacuous terms like "patriarchy."

Third: Brainwashing. Perhaps slightly more vacuous than patriarchy. Brainwashing and mind control are, imho, decent B-movie fare but lousy social analysis. Really a claim is being made about free will here: That all people have free will but one person or group of persons can take away someone else's free will thereby turning them into a will-less automaton who does the controller's will instead of their own. Instead of being a wilful subject who acts of their own accord they essentially become an will-less object who acts only as an extension of a wilful subject.

Now, what does this do to such moments as 9/11 or suicide bombers? Can you actually hold those who hijacked the planes or those who blow themselves and others up in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem culpable if they are (as you suggest) brainwashed and thus will-less? If they have been reduced to an automaton, a living zombie, controlled by another can they be held responsibility at all? This has huge implications for those who commit acts of terror but do not die in the process. 'Hey, judge, I was brainwashed by the Big Bad over there. I am not guilty by reason of brainwashing.'

Like "pagan" and "patriarchy" I think that "brainwashing" is simply an empty term, full of sound and fury and signifying nothing. I think that it obscures social realities, becoming a barrier to understanding rather than a statement that makes sense of the world as it is.

Uhmmm...then why call them "pagans" at all?

Shven

There's a reason i define myself as a neo-pagan

Shven