Post by puddintane on Jul 10, 2015 1:09:49 GMT -4
LOL -- wow. As was said earlier about observing someone with a flag, this sure tells anyone reading it what sort of person they're dealing with, doesn't it? If you truly believe that millions of people over thousands of years have come up with not one single thing that some smart modern in today's secular society could possibly benefit from... well, my, aren't you the smart one. No wonder "modern secular society" wishes to erase history. What a colossal waste of time, right? What could anyone possibly learn from the past?
The bible is full of debunked myths that people once believed to be true, and some still do. This is not even debatable. The global flood, Adam and Eve, creation in Genesis, Exodus, etc... These are all myths.
As I already said, there are good moral lessons in the bible. There's also some pretty terrible stuff in the bible too, and people like matapeaker use it to project their bigotry and hatred while hypocritically preaching love and tolerance. That is not relevant in a modern secular society. You don't need the bible to be a good moral person. In fact, I'd be wary of someone that truly believes that they need the bible in order to be a good person.
Practice what you preach. Love your neighbor, don't discriminate against someone because you don't approve of what they do in the privacy of their own home. Luckily for us most Christians are pretty good at cherry picking the good things from the bible while ignoring the bad stuff. Unfortunately the fundies have a tendency to be louder than the moderates.
I agree that you don't necessarily need the text of the Bible in order to be a good person. But I would say that the ultimate sources of most of the good moral lessons that you mention had their roots in the past history of all ancient religions, which ideas are essentially organized and repeated within the Bible. Many people, like myself, have no problem learning from various sources and are open-minded enough to be able to see how one theory being true does not necessarily preclude another from also being true. Hence, to say something "is not even debatable" strikes me as a colossally arrogant attitude.
How does this relate to the original post about the Confederate flag? Thinking that a 2000-year-old book is irrelevant (and can be full of some terrible stuff) is not that different from thinking that a symbol from 150 years ago is irrelevant (and can bring back memories of some terrible stuff) -- they are both historical, and it appears to assume that neither of them is important or has any value to offer to today's world. My point is that when you start going around making fun of the past, belittling contributions from the past, trying to cover up the past, or trying to erase the past, you are eliminating a very valuable source of information and guidance that is anything BUT irrelevant. We learn from history -- both the good and the bad -- it's ALL relevant. It guides us and guides our future. Not everything about history is old/stale/bronze-age/irrelevant/bad, and not everyone has the same viewpoint about things, even such things as symbols like, say, flags for example, or say, 2000-year-old books. But we can learn from history (whether books or flags), and we can recognize that there are some good things to be seen in each, right alongside some bad things. We can appreciate that history instead of hiding it under a rock or ridiculing it. Personally, I think flags flying over government buildings should be the flags that represent that building's government, but I also think that the likely (and already demonstrated) accompaniment of hysterical "oh, we have to eradicate EVERYthing while we're on a roll here and that will make the world all better" is ridiculous, short-sighted, and arrogantly assumes that a) we can fix the world's problems with feel-good, knee-jerk reactions; b) we know what everyone else is thinking so our judgment is bound to be appropriate, and c) one single viewpoint is the be-all-end-all and anyone who doesn't agree is just wrong. (and "hateful. Can't forget that word "hateful" that gets thrown around so lightly. Anyone these days who doesn't agree has got to be full of "hate.")
Practice what you preach, do unto others as you would have them do unto you, respect others' viewpoints, and don't take offense where none was intended. And learn -- always learn.