orpheus last chant

yesterday i had the pleasure of going to a used book store and finding broca's brain by sagan. what was so unlikely was that i live in romania and finding anything witht the remotest link to a non-theist is very very unlikely. even though now we're a democracy. it's just no market for those books.
not to mention that it was at the money value of a coke. (and there went half of my lunch)

also, yesterday i had the horror of hearing live and right next to me all the stuff debated here on the net. yep. young earthers have reached romania, and reached my school. there here. it's spreading.

imagine, sitting in my desk enjoying my first book by sagan and suddently hearing stuff like " but how do you explain the complexitiy of the eye" " fossils are tampered with" etc.
so i started asking the guy for info of where he head it. there were people giving books for free translated in romanian.

when i got the internet connection. 1 year ago...and started researching the stuff that i doubted (yes internet IS evil...it made me an atheist) i found creationism. i never had head of it...and it seemed bizzare at least. thank...um....uh.... probabilities that i had a doubting mind and read both sides.
the worst part is that here in my country...religiosity is on high levels. the market of minds is ripe for picking. from the religious friend of mine i read a book that debunked all sorts of heresies like (hahaha) bioenergy parapshychology freemasons latter day saints all from a eastern orthodox view.and atheist was considered just another name for freemason, anarchist satanist
hater of any type of authority etc.

:boohoo:

SLD

Interesting story Orpheus. I have a question for you: Did the Communists suppress the church and promote Atheism before the fall of Ceausescu? If so, are we seeing now a backlash against such a repression?

I have often argued (especially with American Fundies) that complete and utter separation of church and state is helpful to the church and what has allowed religion to thrive in this country. That if we break down that wall, you will see a serious decline in religion in the U.S.

I wonder if something similar has happened in Romania and other former Communist states that promoted Atheism as the state religion.

But then again, I don't know that much about Romania.

SLD

Gnomelord

I'm more interested in how stable a network Romania could possibly have.

I'm not trying to insult Romania, I am of Romanian blood after all. But is the internet something relatively new to the nation as a whole?

Not so much new as a concept only recently implemented?

orpheus last chant

well communism came in romania after the second world war. russia won it and we lost. so russia gained a lot of control over us. the people never really wanted this, but the sistem was well based on Security ( the despotic police) no one could talk to anyone, including relatives about anyting that remotely attack the ruler's character (although underground he was the laughing subject of most jokes) or about the Party. if anyone went ot the police and jsut gave a statement(it didn't require to be suported by any facts or evidence) that you , let's say, said a joke involving ceausescu....they would call you there....and it would be a happy thing if you would get out. there were about three leaders before ceausescu....
the church still existed, but no officials were to be seen there, regardless of their personal beliefs...ordinary people could go...
but the blocking of it gave a sense of martyrdom to religion...and now it's blooming.

so the very fact that religion was banned...made religion much more of the sole alternative to communism...in most poeple's minds. they still call the old regime, in newspapers, the atheist regime.
now we have (uhh) religion in public schools from first class to the twelvth, (every class exept college) adn guess what....they teach orthodox christianity...they make you pray at the beggining and end of each class....you can skip this class if you are of another cult or religion but i don't know if you can by reasons of being an atheist. i still feel funny and hypocritical for sitting there while they all pray thinking .....strange ....strange...

the bad part is that the fact that i am an atheist makes them looka t me like i'm some kind of freak. not becasue the youths are over religious...but that they cannot comprehend that a clear position. my best friedn who is a fundie in the eastern orthodox kinda way has been very cold lately, adn soem days ago she insulted me in a very hurful way (not names, but i confided in her a lot and she threw some worries of mine at me, in public) htere goes the myth that religion makes you better, that it's a noble lie, at least in this case.


adn gnome lord....what kind of network are you talking about?

Gnomelord

internet is said to be the network of networks

orpheus last chant

yes, one could say it is new. but the youth population is all to familiar with it. that in the major cities. few have internet at home, but many go regularly to internet cafe (who are really cheap)
now that there is the major mobile phone company that gives internet for free (through dial up) and that mobile phones have spreaded in the last period that they are the fastest growth rates of europe, internet will soon be not so "new"