Quote:a belief in a continuous revelation, closely intertwined with human reason and intellect, and not centered on the theophany at Mount Sinai.
Quote:I was just informed today that it didn't matter that my medical decision on a particular issue was correct, because "the reality is the perception of the nursing staff" who were upset because I made them feel stupid by showing them the correct answer.
Quote:Millennials and Generation Z believe representation of all races and religions in the workplace is more important than hiring based on merit, according to a new survey.
Quote:It is strongly identified with progressive political and social agendas, mainly under the traditional Jewish rubric Tikkun Olam, or "Repairing of the World"
(04-20-2019 10:38 PM)AnonymousBosch Wrote: So, if they've been doing this for so long, why is everything around us objectively turning to crap, I suspect long having passed the tipping point where it possible for society to survive what it has become?
![[Image: eBvolvu.png]](https://i.imgur.com/eBvolvu.png)
(04-22-2019 05:28 PM)Dr. Howard Wrote: ^ Riding off of AB's posting of the Simpsons and Roosh's stream mention of the rise in atheism starting in 1992...
The Simpsons.
Is is possible that the Simpsons portrayal of Ned Flanders caused untold and unknown damage to recruitment into North American Christianity? Everyone watched that show religiously through the 1990s. Everyone knew who Ned Flanders was, and loved to hate him. I had never met an Evangelical Christian before but that was the Stereotype in my head from then on when i heard of, or met people who went to church.
Looking back, as an adult, how was Ned Flanders even a negative stereotype? Sure he was effeminate but he had zero problems, a not fat wife, loving kids. In the real world where a lazy alcoholic homer simpson would have been divorced raped by Marge at the end of Season one, we would all love to have a life as stable as Ned's.
Here is at least some article material referencing the subject https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religio...-sexy.html
https://www.*please contact roosh about this link*/2007/08/16/ned-flanders-hero/
![[Image: tenor.gif?itemid=5559440]](https://media1.tenor.com/images/6eb420501bac0040e82b666a64b7e021/tenor.gif?itemid=5559440)
(04-23-2019 12:22 PM)Leonard D Neubache Wrote:(04-22-2019 05:28 PM)Dr. Howard Wrote: ^ Riding off of AB's posting of the Simpsons and Roosh's stream mention of the rise in atheism starting in 1992...
The Simpsons.
Is is possible that the Simpsons portrayal of Ned Flanders caused untold and unknown damage to recruitment into North American Christianity? Everyone watched that show religiously through the 1990s. Everyone knew who Ned Flanders was, and loved to hate him. I had never met an Evangelical Christian before but that was the Stereotype in my head from then on when i heard of, or met people who went to church.
Looking back, as an adult, how was Ned Flanders even a negative stereotype? Sure he was effeminate but he had zero problems, a not fat wife, loving kids. In the real world where a lazy alcoholic homer simpson would have been divorced raped by Marge at the end of Season one, we would all love to have a life as stable as Ned's.
Here is at least some article material referencing the subject https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religio...-sexy.html
https://www.*please contact roosh about this link*/2007/08/16/ned-flanders-hero/
So how could they have portrayed him differently to not "cause untold and unknown damage to recruitment into North American Christianity"?
Everyone I knew back then liked the Flanders character even if we never dreamed of aspiring to his high standards of behavior.
(04-22-2019 05:19 PM)No More Mr. Soy Boy Wrote: The UK has had the page 3 semi-nude girl feature in their tabloids for ages and in Denmark they've had the same shit but it's called page 9. I don't know what it is but this girl just doesn't fit
(04-23-2019 12:22 PM)Leonard D Neubache Wrote: So how could they have portrayed him differently to not "cause untold and unknown damage to recruitment into North American Christianity"?
Ned Flanders is classic reverse projection. People that like Christianity like Flanders and people who don't like Christianity hate Flanders. Then there are people like me who are somewhere in the middle.
I think it was important to present Flanders as a borderline perfect "unoffensive" Christian. The alternative would have been tainted from day one.
The flip side to Flanders is Reverend Lovejoy who's obviously burnt out and simply playing the game by the numbers.
(04-23-2019 01:53 PM)Dr. Howard Wrote: ...
I'm not advocating that they portrayed Ned differently, I'm just wondering if it had any effect on church recruitment. They could have portrayed Ned molesting children every episode, its their show.
Second, you know people who liked the Ned Flanders character? Different perspectives I guess. I ran in punk rock/very anti christian circles in those days and so using Ned Flanders as a weak portrayal of a man to mock Christians was made easy.
(04-23-2019 10:12 PM)Paracelsus Wrote: ...
Flanders and Lovejoy are a one-two punch against American (if not general) Christianity. They represent a corrupt, spiritually bankrupt church hierarchy leading a naive congregation at best, no matter what the reality across every fucking town in America actually is or was.
Flanders' character was designed perfectly to destroy Christians via pride. This was partly because the West has turned to TV for instruction on how to behave - and remember how big TV assholes like the Bakkers were about 10 years before this - and what we get in Flanders is someone who provokes annoyance if not spiteful hatred from his neighbour, Homer Simpson.
Why? Because white men are meant to identify with Homer. They'll never admit it, of course, it's "satire" on working class, oops, sorry, middle class, America - but the intent and effect was clear. Homer remorselessly took advantage of Flanders, was annoyed by him (as were most people in the show).
This planted the seeds in every comfortable suburban father: in the Flanders types, who chuckled uncomfortably and thought "Shit, is that how the neighbours see me?" and in the Homer types, who thought "Fucking judgmental Christian, Homer's totally got the right idea, take advantage of that bastard, people will think it's funny."
Flanders' compassion towards his neighbours and his genial attitude are eventually explained in the show as a perversion due to shit upbringing as a child. They're explained as "repressed" anger - good old Freudian psychobabble (now featuring across America everywhere men are told that it's "bad" to "repress" or stifle their emotions, resulting in Bug Men bawling over fucking Star Wars trailers.) And the show was determined to put Flanders into a situation where he'd lose his shit and supposedly show the "real", hypocritical Flanders underneath.
Large proportions of Christians like Flanders? Course they do, and that's how the show's creators like it too - because Flanders is a representation of muscleless Christianity, a guy who substitutes standing up against homosexuality, paedophilia, corruption, or Islam with being genial and nonthreatening. That's exactly how most Christians prefer to fucking live in the West, because it requires no courage.
Put it this way: even if Christians like Flanders, would anyone ever argue his example is a reason to actually take up organised religion?
Remember, this show created the "Won't someone think of the children" meme. That meme was used to laugh off a sizeable large proportion of cultural and childhood destruction in America and all around the world.
The show had Michael Jackson as a guest star, for Christ's sake - when people already knew he was sleeping with children in a literal if not metaphorical sense.
Quote:Flanders and Lovejoy are a one-two punch against American (if not general) Christianity. They represent a corrupt, spiritually bankrupt church hierarchy leading a naive congregation at best, no matter what the reality across every fucking town in America actually is or was.
![[Image: tenor.gif?itemid=11607665]](https://media1.tenor.com/images/a4e7aebe14976297f75a68697cd4f7a2/tenor.gif?itemid=11607665)
(04-24-2019 12:44 AM)Leonard D Neubache Wrote: If this strikes a little close to the bone then that's not on the writers. It's on the Christians. I'm not going to go too deep down this rabbit hole again because I don't want to trigger anyone but what the writers conveyed is absolutely the case. You might be upset that they didn't convey the ins and outs of small town rural Christianity but what were they supposed to do? Put twenty something Christian characters into the show just for nuance?
Christians good. Churchianity bad. Regardless of what the writers intended this is the message they conveyed. It's accurate and insightful, even to this day.
(04-24-2019 12:44 AM)Leonard D Neubache Wrote: I don't think The Simpsons was some kind of unshakeable moral compass but I'm coming around to the unpleasant conclusion that all comedy is subversive. All of it. Personally I think that The Simpsons at least spread that subversion equally across all facets of society and made everyone the butt of the joke at some point or another. That's why it was so popular and universally loved. Reverent of nothing but at least equally irreverent against all.
(04-24-2019 02:46 AM)Paracelsus Wrote: ...
Similarly I don't want to take over the lounge, but I would suggest you might reflect on this possibility: if you're finding it "accurate and insightful", then it is entirely possible you have bought into the show as more than a satire -- and the writers achieved their agenda.
I can condense the two sentences "Christians good. Churchianity bad." down to one, and to two words: Moral relativism.
Because it's always easy to follow a God who looks just like you, acts just like you, and agrees on every one of your views. That's part of a church's function: to remind you that you do not, in fact, have the only correct relationship with God, and that you are, in fact, a part of a steadily-declining tribe that won't piss on fire to put out one of its fellow tribesmen, let alone a Samaritan dying in a ditch.
...
(04-23-2019 10:12 PM)Paracelsus Wrote: The show had Michael Jackson as a guest star, for Christ's sake - when people already knew he was sleeping with children in a literal if not metaphorical sense.The people thought they knew he was doing this deed. But I have been recently convinced of Michael Jackson's innocence by Razorfist: