#i'm really not religious i know i talk about religion kind of a lot who claims to not be religious but

[thefabelmans2022]

sometimes i think about pope francis saying he hopes hell is empty and i get. strangely emotional.

[morlock-holmes]

The Conspiratorial Mindset

So, I've always had a bit of an interest in scams and hokum, and what people call "Cults".

One of the common refrains when you talk about religious Cults is, "If you think about it all religions have beliefs that seem odd to outsiders" and this is true, but as I read more about cults I started to think,

"Wait, a lot of these groups aren't united just by having unusual religious or supernatural views; a lot of them also seem to have matching patterns of behaviors that have nothing to do with belief in psychic space aliens"

I'm talking about things like,

Having a leadership structure which is absolute, where the top leaders cannot be disciplined or even openly criticized by lower members;

Exerting tremendous control over the dress and behavior of adherents;

Telling adherents that outsiders are untrustworthy and that contact with outsiders should be strictly limited and heavily monitored by organizational leadership;

The extensive and common use of shunning and reprogramming in response to violation of any of the above rules.

In some groups, failing to adhere to the dress code and spending a lot of time with outsiders is, at worst, the subject of a few little jabs at family gatherings. In other groups, those same behaviors are treated as Defcon one crises and become the central issue of the adherent's relationship with everybody else in the organization until they can be bullied back into doing the organization's bidding.

It was gratifying to learn that other people have noticed these patterns (Some people prefer the term "High Control Group" to "Cult" because it highlights what the actual problem is)

I am starting to notice similar dynamics in what are commonly called "Conspiracy theories".

The thing about conspiracy theories is... Well, conspiracies exist, and sometimes groups of powerful people get together to do something in secret which would get them in big trouble if they were to do it openly.

But I am starting to notice a particular, I don't know, a particular way of conceptualizing the organization and purpose of conspiracies which is unique to some people and which characterizes the kind of conspiracy theorist who takes Alex Jones seriously.

I kind of think of it as a "Witch-Hunting mentality".

For certain people in more primitive times and places, if they, say, slipped off a ladder and hurt themselves, their first thought would be, "That must have happened because a witch cursed me. We need to find and punish the witch who cursed me."

And this isn't just the attribution of malice that characterizes this idea:

One malicious conspiracy that might make you fall off a ladder is a manufacturer who doesn't care about safety ratings. Imagine that the manufacturer is really deliberately malicious here. A subordinate comes to him and says, "Our ladders can't reliably hold the weight of a person and a lot of them will probably break and cause people to fall and hurt themselves." and he says, "I know that but who cares, by the time people figure it out it'll be too late to get their money back."

That's a malicious conspiracy, but, importantly, if Bob buys a faulty ladder and falls off, the conspiracy wasn't trying to hurt Bob; it merely didn't care whether Bob got hurt.

Now, this distinction doesn't take away the malice and hostility towards Bob, but if you go to the ladder manufacturer and say, "Hey boss, Bob bought one of our faulty ladders, but he's really skinny so the ladder didn't break" the manufacturer will go, "Who the fuck is Bob? And good, that's one less angry person."

Whereas imagine Bob's ladder has been cursed to break by a witch. The witch did it because she hates Bob, and wants him to fall, and if she finds out he didn't fall, she'll go, "Curses, I'll have to find some other way to hurt Bob."

Conspiracy theorists, it seems to me, are far more inclined to conceptualize conspiracies as acts of deliberate malice aimed at them rather than acts of negligent malice.

@loving-n0t-heyting posted this article from the New York Post which contains a good example of what I mean:

“I thought I was on the cutting edge of promoting rights for gay people,” Yang said. “But then I started looking deeper into where this was coming from and who was paying for it, and I started to get very disillusioned...

I assume the people paying for it are LGBT advocacy groups? Did you, uh, not know that the people you were working for were paying you to work for them?

“When you really dig down you can see how much of this comes from documents and plans at the United Nations,” Yang said, referring in part to the UN’s “Gender Equality” initiative. “It’s part of a global agenda to restructure society, re-structure our social norms and the economy,” Yang claimed. “They are undermining the sexually dimorphic nature of reality and breaking down the differences between the sexes to break down our identity. They are constructing identities for us and they want us to adopt them.”

Oh, I see.

This is exactly what I mean. LGBT rights efforts make Yang and others feel disoriented, like society is being restructured and that they are being left behind, like they aren't quite in control of social norms and that stable identity categories can't be relied on anymore.

Now, one kind of conservative might look at that and say, "These are bad second order effects of LGBT people trying to assert their lifestyle in public and that's why we should oppose them."

But another kind says, "These changes make me feel unstable. Therefore, the main purpose of the changes is to make me feel unstable. In order to understand these changes, I need to figure out who wants me to feel unstable and what they would gain from making me feel unstable."

The idea that Yang's feeling of instability is simply a side effect of a series of efforts mainly focused on LGBT rights is incomprehensible. Instead, she believes that there is a series of efforts focused mainly on making her feel unstable, with LGBT rights as a kind of side effect to the main goal of making her feel unstable.

This kind of thing is, to me, a big red flag that indicates that we are starting to float away from reasonable conspiracy thinking into crazy town.

I am particularly curious if folks can recommend any writers or researchers who have noticed this dynamic.

[wolfythewitch]

Wolfy I dont know if this ask will be okay to send or if it will be to heavy, but I want you to know that your religious posting has pretty much singlehandedly gotten me more comfortable with christianity + religion as a whole. I'm a pagan, but I have a lot of trauma and issues around the subject, and for a long long time it really triggered me. But the way you talk about it is extremely comforting, and seeing your posts and stuff about it (esp the silly ones and fanart but also the genuine discussions) have made me a lot more comfortable with it. Sometimes I forget that bigot christians are not a monolith and that this is just genuinely peoples religious beliefs same as my own, and your posts are a helpful reminder that there are good and kind christian folk in the world who arent hurting anyone and even a lot who are fighting for a better future for their own spirituality and beliefs and religious grounds. Thank you a lot, genuinely for what you do :) 🫶🩷

glad it helps!

[grison-in-space]

I'm genuinely sorry, I was really tired and couldn't think of the word that mad pride movements use. I'm new to all of this. I thought you would be more open to it because you've reblogged from radical leftists (anarchists and communists both) within the past couple of weeks and they're all for Veganism afaik. The argument that all brains are different but equal and should be treated the exact same is a primary aspect of mad pride from my understanding, and that speaks to me about animals just having different brains, and that they don't deserve to be exploited and killed for us just because they're different. I'm not spamming people with it, but I was inspired by an ask by a nonvegan and started asking popular bloggers why they weren't vegan to open up conversation and potentially change people's views on animals. If I've made you uncomfortable I'm sorry, though I admit I'm really confused by your standpoint. You do know that the only reason communism hasn't succeeded is because of America? Anyway, sorry again, I'm also autistic and I didn't mean to dismiss your legitimate dietary needs. Can I recommend acti-vegan's posts? While I understand that you can't go vegan, perhaps their blog will at least help you understand our points, they're much more well-written than my asks and they have plenty of legitimate science resources at hand. Thanks for listening, I'll take your advice into account. I'm not trying to not listen, it's just frustrating because so many people say they get it but they don't change, and if they truly got it they would, you know?

Okay, I get that you didn't mean to be offensive, and fuck knows I shouldn't throw stones when it comes to forgetting specific words. (This happens to me fairly frequently; it's a thing.)

The argument that all brains are different but equal and should be treated the exact same is a primary aspect of mad pride from my understanding, and that speaks to me about animals just having different brains, and that they don't deserve to be exploited and killed for us just because they're different.

So yesterday I actually wrote out and then deleted a whole paragraph to the effect of "part of my deep, deep frustration with animal rights activism hooks into my commitment to the phrase 'nothing about us without us,' because I frequently see the same kinds of emotional projection without making the effort to listen to animals on their own terms from animal rights activism groups."

The first thing I need to make clear to you is that this--veganism and animal rights activism (ARA) more generally--is not new to me. I am in my mid-thirties and I have never had a job of any kind that did not revolve around animals in some way, I've spent time in rescue spaces and vets and universities, I'm queer and I have spent most of my life in leftish progressive circles, so it's kind of hard to miss.

Essentially, you are proselytizing to me as if you were a newly baptized evangelical convinced I had never heard of Jesus, because if only I had heard and understood his holy word, I would be converted instantly to his light! It's not any less irritating when the belief system isn't explicitly a religion.

More under the cut, because this one is long.

Disclaimer one: Veganism isn't synonymous with ARA ideology, but it's deeply entangled with it, and ARA ideology drives the movement of veganism as a (theoretically non-religious) ethical decision. And I object very strongly to the framework imposed by ARA activists. When I say I am not vegan, I am saying that I have considered the ethical framework that underpins veganism as an ethics movement and I have deliberately rejected it.

The second piece of context you should know that when I talk about being a behavioral ecologist, I mean that I'm a researcher who works on animals and that my framework is rooted in trying to understand animals in their own natural ecological context, without necessarily comparing them to humans. There's a lot of ways to study animal behavior you might run into, including attempts to understand universal principles of behavior that transcend species (animal cognition) and attempts to understand how to better treat animals in human care (animal welfare). You know Temple Grandin? Temple Grandin is an ethologist (the field that gave rise to behavioral ecology, also focused on animals within their species context) who worked on animal welfare (finding ways to make slaughterhouses less stressful to livestock, among other things).

Third point: my profession also means is that I work directly with animals--in my case, currently mice--and that I do not think research with animal subjects is wrong as long as all efforts are made to ensure maximal welfare and enrichment for the animals involved. This is another major bone of contention politically between my entire field and ARA groups, and you should know that I have also spent my entire professional career under the shadow of, well, people who care strongly enough about those ideas to invade my workspace and potentially seize my animals and "free" them into a world they do not have the tools to survive in.

So there's where I am coming from. Let's get back to what you're saying. Here, I'll quote again in case you have the same crappy short-term memory I do.

The argument that all brains are different but equal and should be treated the exact same is a primary aspect of mad pride from my understanding, and that speaks to me about animals just having different brains, and that they don't deserve to be exploited and killed for us just because they're different.

Point the first: Even within humans, I don't think that all brains should be treated the exact same. Especially in a disability context! After all, what is an accommodation if not an agreement to treat someone differently because they need certain things to access a space? Accommodations by definition fly in the face of this "treating everyone the same" understanding of fairness. I think all (human) brains are equally valuable, and I think all brains are worthy of respect, but I do not think that it's wise or kind of me to assert that everyone should be treated in the same way. For one thing, I teach students. If there's one thing teaching has taught me, it's that a good teacher is constantly assessing and adjusting their instruction to meet students where they're at, identify failures of understanding, and keep the attention of the classroom.

Point the second: animals do have different brains from humans. That does not mean that animals are inferior, but it does mean that they are alien. There's a philosophy paper, Nagel, What Does It Mean to Be a Bat, that you might find illuminating on this front. Essentially, the point of the paper is that animals have their own experiences and sensory umwelts that differ profoundly enough from humans' that we cannot know what it is like to be a different species without experiencing life as one, and therefore we must be terribly careful not to project our own realities onto theirs. That is, our imagination cannot tell us what a bat values and what it experiences. That is why we have to use careful evidence to understand what an animal is thinking, without relying on our ability to identify with and comprehend that animal. I have watched ARA groups deliberately encourage people to shut their reasoning brains off and emotionally identify themselves with animals without considering within-species context for twenty years. This is a mainstream tactic. It is not an isolated event and for that reason alone I would be opposed to them.

Point the third: there is a definite tendency in lots of people to care deeply and intensely about both animals and people who are seen as "lesser" in status--children, poor people, disabled people, etc--just as long as those groups never contradict the good feelings that come from the helper's own assessment of themselves and their actions. In humans, when the "needy" point out that some forms of help are actually harmful, the backlash is often swift and vicious. This is why animals are such an appealing target of support and intervention. They can't speak back and say "in fact, you are projecting my love of this frilly pink tutu onto me, and I think it's uncomfortable and prevents me from walking." They can't say "I kind of like it better when I don't have to worry about getting hit by a car, actually?"

(By the way: this is also why it's offensive to compare disabled people to animals, because this is generally done at least in part to silence the voices of disabled people speaking for our selves and our communities. We have access to language, and we use it, thank you.)

All forms of animal welfare intervention going right back to the founding of the first RSPCA have been incredibly prone to being hijacked by classist, racist, and otherwise bigoted impulses. This is because animals offer an innocent face for defense that conveniently cannot criticize the actions taken by their champions, and they therefore provide a great excuse for actions taken against marginalized members of human society. Think about the very first campaign the RSPCA ever did, which was banning using dogs as draft animals: a use that is not inherently harmful to dogs, which many dogs actively enjoy, but also one that was specifically used by poor Londoners and which in fact immediately resulted in a great butchery of the dogs that Londoners could no longer afford to feed rather than allowing poor people and their dogs to continue working together. No one was, of course, challenging the particular uses of dogs or any other animal favored by the wealthy. This kind of thing is so, so, so common. Obviously it doesn't mean that all interventions to prioritize animal welfare are inherently bigoted, but it does mean that we have to be critical about our choice of challenges.

On top of everything, the animal rights activist movement's obsession with "exploitation" is a function of the idea that humans are sinful or otherwise Bad in how we interact with animals by definition. For example, take the chicken rescue near me that is so obsessed with the possibility that some human somewhere might benefit from an animal in their care that they implant every hen they adopt out with hormonal implants such that the hens no longer lay eggs--a function that is normally a natural byproduct of a chicken's reproductive system, fertilized or not. A mutualistic relationship involves both parties benefiting, and that is the case for an awful lot of human relationships with animals. In general, the idea that associating with animals is a thing that can only harm animals rather than being a trade between two species to enrich one another is all over these groups. It's just so myopically focused on human shame that it prevents practical interventions that might benefit everyone, and often promotes interventions that don't directly benefit animals but sure do make humans miserable. For example, this kind of thinking is why groups like PETA are absolutely awful at effectively rescuing unwanted dogs and cats: they think pets living in "bondage" with humans are an essentially sad outcome, rather than one that might be mutually enjoyed by all parties.

I'm tired and my meds haven't kicked in, so I'm not currently going to handle the communism thing except to point out that while the US absolutely did destabilize a number of leftist regimes in South America and Africa, Russia and China between them have certainly not treated their own people kindly, either (and more so their own client-nations, as with the former members of the USSR). Please do some reading about the Holodomor and Lysenko in Russia (and frankly all of the details of Stalin's regime) and the Cultural Revolution in China in particular. Khmer Rouge might be worth looking into, too. I am not saying the US's hands are clean, you understand, because they are not; they're as steeped in red as anyone else's. What I am saying is that for people living on the ground, communist revolutions have this nasty habit of turning into bloodbaths and arbitrary slaughters. Do not let your distaste for the US's bloodsoaked imperialism (which, yes, is and was bad) let you fall into the trap of becoming a tankie.

And if you don't know what a tankie is, you really, really should take some time to learn.

[pangaeaseas]

The Problem of Religion in Harry Potter (or, what is Wizard God?)

tl; dr: I wish more hp fics did something with religion and the wizarding world

so to state my credentials up front: I've read a lot of hp fanfiction, a little on the Reformation and religious history--like, I have probably more background knowledge than the average person but I am very emphatically not an expert and have never actually taken a class specifically on any kind of religious history, and I'm an ex-Catholic who did ten ish years of religion classes. There are probably a LOT more people more qualified to talk about this than me but whatever I've never actually seen very much meta written out on this specific issue so I'm giving it a try. (if you have written or read such meta, please send me recs)

ahh the Problem of Religion one of the great unsolved mysteries of the hp world building (similar issues include What the Fuck is Going on with Ireland, How Does the Ministry Actually Work, What is the Population, etc) and I call it 'unsolved' because the fandom has no massively popular solution (like Lordships for the Problem of the Wizengamot) and in general tends to just not think about it, much like JKR originally did. Now IMO she probably intended most wizards to be, like, generically Church of England or whatever without much investment--basically copying the Muggle equivalent whenever it isn't spelled out how the two worlds differ, which is I think a lot of her un-filled-out world building is meant to be. Which. OK. You can do that, but, you know, religion is a very very important aspect of worldbuilding and in my opinion ignoring it and expecting it to be just the same as 1990s Muggle Britain is uninteresting and lazy.

This (wizards are meant to be some kind of Christian and probably Church of England just for simplicity's sake) is evidenced by things like Hogwarts having Christmas and Easter breaks, James and Lily having a Bible quote picked out by Dumbledore on their tombstone, and Draco Malfoy, most emblematically wizard of wizard characters who can be taken as a potential baseline, automatically saying things like 'Good God'. Which, you know, implies that the idea of a single God, and probably the Judaeo-Christian God because that's the same cultural background as the rest of Britain, is taken for granted by wizarding society. It doesn't necessarily imply anything about Draco's or even the Malfoys' personal beliefs, and of course you have other characters saying things like 'Oh my Merlin' and "Morgana" and things like that. Which in my opinion wasn't meant to be indications of some kind of Merlin or Morgana worship but more quirky and fun flavor things of the kind jkr loves to include without thinking out the implications. But you absolutely can take those statements that way--this post is absolutely not meant to dictate how people want to headcanon and I am absolutely here for giving wizards a well thought out pagan or Non-Christian religion, I just don't think that was the author's intent. There's also plenty of other things that imply Wizarding cultural Christianity that I'm not remembering off the top of my head.

And, of course, much better writers than me have extensively discussed all the Christian themes in HP. Of course, themes don't need to affect how people worldbuild in fanfic.

So: with HP canon, we are looking at a society that is probably culturally Christian and probably (key word) intended to be Church of England. But, because JKR wasn't putting much thought into it and basically just took a Chrisitian bedrock of society for granted, the implications of this are not really explored at all. So what I'm interested in is how fandom deals with it.

Mostly, that is...not at all, either taking cultural Christianity in the Wizarding World for granted the way JKR does or by ind of handwaving that wizards have evolved beyond the need for religion and that's just how it is. And that's perfectly fine! Not everyone wants to come up with a full, working, wizard society, and even if they are trying to worldbuild some aspects of wizarding society religion is often ignored, because people don't want to deal with it for often valid reasons (religious trauma, just disinterest, grew up agnostic, not Christian but thinks wizards probably are etc, etc, etc, ) Personally I wish more fics delved into what wizarding religious belief actually is, but to put it bluntly, that's just me. And I have never dealt with religion in my own fics. So don't takethis as judgement at all.

But there are interesting headcanons when people do choose to try and worldbuild religion in HP.

Fom what I've seen, one of the major ways to deal with religion in HP (aside from not dealing with it at all) is to give wizards, often pureblood wizards, some kind of pagan, often Celtic-inspired, religion. And this is quite defensible! Sometimes this is badly executed and/or turned into Death Eater apologia, but the idea of wizards having a different religion is really interesting and a good deal more interesting (IMO of course) than just not mentioning religion at all. Most fics that I've seen don't delve too deeply into, like the actual history and theology of these religions, but there are definitely some that do. (Also if you know any PLEASE send me recs). So if handled well, this is a great way to add some religion worldbuilding in the world of Harry Potter.

However, my personal favorite set of possibilities--obviously I have some personal bias as a history nerd with a long standing if never as deeply researched as I would like to interest in the history of Christianity and as an ex-Catholic--is that, well, we know the statute of secrecy started..when, exactly? 1690. So this much is obviously a result of JKR's Hollywood understanding of witch hunts (a subject for another time and someone far more qualified). For interested wrodlbuilders, we can take this as a guideline at best, as personally I think it would have taken a good deal longer than one year to agree on and implement something like the Statute and I tend to take 1690 as an end date, not a start. I also tend to take the Statue as a largely European phenomenon, at least at first. But, uh, what was happening in Britain at the time..oh, right...the Glorious Revolution....what was happening that created the conditions for the Glorious Revolution...oh, the English Civil War...which was because of...oh yeah, and what was also happening on the continent, maybe it involved, wait, thirty years..oooh, the Thirty Years War...wait weren't there a whole bunch of massive social shifts happening in Europe at this point in time isn't that funny but surely the stature of secrecy could be considered a part of these massive social shifts...all of which was heavily influenced by...you guessed it, the Protestant Reformation.

Wait. So. Maybe, the separation of Wizards from Muggles, at least in Britain, wasn't actually about Muggles hating wizards or wizards hating Muggles. Maybe it was about religion. Now personally I find this ABSOLUTELY FASCINATING. The possibilities, the possibilities...

Wizards had a massive religious civil war that created the blood status system in its modern form? Particular families have wildly different denominations? Excellent. Religion both in terms of level of religiosity and in terms of denomination is a blood status marker? Excellent. Purebloods are all Catholic (what does this do to both Catholic and not Muggleborns?) Excellent. Purebloods are all Puritans? Weird, but if you can pull it off excellent. Purebloods are all one of the wacky new denominations that sprung up after the Reformation and then either died out or conquered the world? Excellent. Pure bloods are all Lutherans who really hated Henry VIII? Excellent. One of my favoirite ways to create a wizarding religion was someone who had most pure bloods follow a denomination that split off from Catholicism in the Great Schism and then a small minority being Catholic, with the worlds splitting around the Reformation. Even the paganism headcanons can be incorporated: the Reformation could conceivably have made it much more difficult to keep practicing wizard paganism causing separation of the worlds.

Personally I would love to see a world that used the history of the Protestant Reformation super well, but it's not the only way to relate a Wizarding religion or a Wizarding religious history. I just wish more people tried to do that at all. Let wizards be religious! Or let them be irreligious but have thought about it, instead of just ignoring religion at all as something that might conceivably have influenced human societies. Maybe Wizarding Britain has state sponsored atheism. Just say that outright!

Another thing I'd like to see more fic doing is theology: how does having magic impact people's religious doctrine? Does every major religion essentially have a wizarding branch with its own theology because magic impacts their view of the world so much, or do most wizards simply follow the majority Muggle religion in their country with no modifications? if so, why? Do some wizards disagree, potentially violently, over how to incorporate magic into their religion? Do some people refuse to use magic because they think it goes against their religion? Etc etc etc you could go on forever. I've seen fic, which randomly enough was about Regulus Black, do this pretty well (or I thought so as a non-Jew) for Judaism, and I'd love it if done with other religions.

Anyway. Now I have to figure out how the hell religion works in the Wizarding Britain of my own headcanon.

[butchhamlet]

So re: Hamlet, purgatory, the reformation, etc.

I'm just about to start writing a my final paper for a Reformation History class at university. I'll probably focus on the English reformation because I'm already familiar with Tudor/Elizabethan context. And I got a hunch that talking about Hamlet and ghosts and purgatory would be a great way to talk about the impacts of the reformation on Elizabethan English life.

You wouldn't happen to feel like info dumping some more about religious themes and conflicts in Hamlet would you? And/or drop some more books/papers/scholars that I can research and cite?

I will happily absorb any info you wish to dump!

i desperately wish i knew enough off the dome to burst into a monologue here, but most of what i know about hamlet and religion fits in the quote i posted from emma smith re: the catholic/protestant split. (apparently some people think shakespeare was a closet catholic? but i kind of doubt it.) not sure what your own religious background is, but it might be worth looking into general stuff about wittenberg/martin luther/protestantism during the time period--although if you're focusing on the reformation you may know a lot of this.

my first thought was stephen greenblatt's Hamlet in Purgatory, which i have not read but which is cited in the notes of my copy of hamlet. it's on jstor apparently but i don't have access. sad! but it seems to be honestly less about hamlet specifically and more greenblatt using hamlet as a wedge to explore conceptions of purgatory at the time, which sounds cool as fuck. (i'm not suuuuper familiar with greenblatt, but i remember liking his criticism in the norton shakespeare; YMMV.)

the ghost is the obvious Big Religious Issue of hamlet, but there's also the praying scene, the whole deal with ophelia's suicide, horatio coming from Protestant University R Us, and to be or not to be itself and what that speech implies about hamlet's religious view. i really like the lockdown shakespeare podcast about TBoNTB--i haven't listened all the way through because i'm awful but iirc they do touch on how weird it is that hamlet's musings about the afterlife seem to counter what you might assume about his religious opinions from the rest of the text.

the folger shakespeare library has further reading recs for every play on their page; skimming through this, you might be interested in richard mccoy's writing on memory in hamlet? emphasis mine:

McCoy examines the play’s four funerals (King Hamlet’s expedited obsequies, Polonius’s “hugger-mugger” burial [4.5.91], Ophelia’s “maimèd rites” [5.1.226], and the “somewhat incongruous” soldier’s funeral for Prince Hamlet) in the context of the ambiguity (“liturgical double-bookkeeping”) that marked the Elizabethan compromise over Catholic-Protestant funerary practices and intercessory rituals for the deceased. Informing the discussion is the doctrine known as “the King’s Two Bodies” (i.e., the Body natural and the Body politic), specifically the efforts of the “cult of Elizabeth” to continue what has been called “the migration of the holy” begun by Henry VIII’s reforms in which “ ‘the socially integrative powers of the host’ were transferred ‘to the rituals of monarchy and secular community,’ ” a shifting from the eucharistic real presence to the royal presence.

and also the roland frye book, though it is from the 80s (i am not up to date on modern shifts in historiography lmfao):

Among the events and documents Frye invokes are ... Protestant beliefs that ghosts were demons, beliefs shared by Catholics, who also believed ghosts might be souls from purgatory...

i do also recommend emma smith's book (and marjorie garber's. ack. so good) but those are less specific examinations of many plays, so idk how helpful they'll be. this is what i've got at the moment followers sound off if you have additions or comments

[obae-me]

I saw your post about the characters with a traumatized MC and the part about the angels made me start thinking about how they'd handle an MC who has religious trauma (because I thought that was where it was going in your post)

MC avoiding Simeon and Luke because everything related to heaven creeps them out (they're legit scared of angels, god, etc) and feeling way too comfortable living in the devildom and being around demons because they "always knew they were going to end up in hell when they died" because that's what was hammered into their head growing up or something

that would sure change the cast's views on human religion huh?

Yes, absolutely. I can't remember if I mentioned it before or just kept that brainworm tucked safely inside my skull, but I think about this a lot. Namely, because I have SO much religious trauma (yippie!).

I've thought a lot about how the Celestial Realm harbors a lot of the same toxicity that certain organized religions have the tendancy to exhibit here on good ol earth. I mean, we've seen some things in game that suggest that things aren't all rainbows and roses up there. The way that Luke talks early game suggests a lot. And so I'm sure a religiously traumatized MC would have SUCH a hard time around the angels at first. (I actually had my own reservations with the angels when they were first introduced and I even kind of disliked Luke a ton before I eventually took a step back and thought about the fact that he's just a BABY who is just spitting out ideals that were shoved into his head. It's not his fault, and I think his character development is something that the fandom does not address enough. I'm so proud of him!! Having your expectations of the world be broken and then having to relearn everything you thought you knew is actually SO hard.)

MC getting along well or feeling more comfortable with demons because they don't feel like they're being judged or under the watchful eyes of others.

MC talking about "not being as afraid to come back" VERY early on in game and the other characters taking WAY too long to realize they mean come to purgatory after they pass, and the demons themselves don't feel good about knowing that.

MC avoiding certain sins/pleasures/temptations due to the fear that's been embedded in them over it. Even if those things are COMPLETELY normal and harmless to enjoy.

All of the characters being extremely patient and understanding about this sort of thing and very slowly chipping away at certain stigmas they still hold onto, making the human feel safe while they do.

MC avoiding Simeon because of mixed feelings of shame and maybe a bit of resentment and then eventually learning that he's actually such a down to earth and sweet guy and spending more time with him just to learn that he's been in many similar situations is so...so good to think about. Learning that he'll never force certain ideologies onto them, that he doesn't see them as someone who needs to be "saved". A human and an angel sitting together and discussing what being "good" really means. Sharing confessions to each other that they've both held on their backs for such a long time because they've been too ashamed of themselves and confused to heal from it alone. They're not a sinner and a Saint, they're just normal people who make mistakes and want to do good in the world.

I do have many thoughts on this clearly...

[sheydgarden]

How do you feel about jewish supernatural creatures being portrayed in media? Is it okay if done correctly, since it is a closed religion? I'm really curious, especially since you obviously know so much about them.

I also want to say that I love your art! And I love being able to learn more about these creatures.

thank you for the kind words, i appreciate it!

i have to say i'm confused by the question, or possibly its framing - i'm not sure what Judaism being a "closed religion" has to do with portraying creatures from folklore in media. "closed religion" is a term people generally seem to use when they're talking about not appropriating the actual religious/cultural practices of a (usually contextually marginalized) religion that you don't belong to. recently i've seen some pushback against the term "closed practice/religion" for Judaism, as it's not literally true. yes, Judaism is for Jews, but anyone can convert to Judaism - it's just that it's a whole process that involves a lot of learning & then being accepted by a Jewish community. to my knowledge, "closed practice" as a term grew out of the pagan/neo-pagan community anyway & was used to describe any religion whose symbols, deities & practices weren't socially considered fair game for use in your own personal spiritual practice - i have a lot of thoughts on this odd sort of "restaurant view" of religion & culture, where some things are at a free-for-all buffet so you can just take what you want (who put them there?) while other things are only served at certain tables by reservation (is anyone else ever invited?), but that's a whole other post.

i'm assuming you're asking how i feel about non-Jewish people portraying creatures from Jewish folklore in various kinds of media, & the answer is that it totally depends on the thing & how it's done? i definitely don't subscribe to the idea that creators should never step outside their own experience/culture. i do think portraying (elements of) other cultures is something that should be done carefully & sensitively, ideally with input from members of that culture! unfortunately, it is very, very easy for creators to unintentionally fall into antisemitic tropes & stereotypes, because those ideas are so old & so pervasive, especially when it comes to monsters & other supernatural creatures (Jews having been literally demonized by Christian culture for centuries). i think if you're not Jewish, then making sensitive, educated work about Jewish monsters is probably hard mode, but that isn't to say it can't be done. i can think of plenty of bad examples off the top of my head, but i'm sure i could come up with some good ones too if given the time.

of course, this is all just my opinion, & should not be taken as a ruling on what's "okay"! other Jews will agree & disagree with me, which is fine & good. :)

[nabi-unveiled]

Tonight I'm pondering how easy it is to miss the mark as a parent sometimes.

I often feel like a broken record at work. I'm constantly reminding people that we need to consider how ALL people interact with our products when creating them. It seriously happens at least once a week.

It's why I love shows that call out some of the issues people face in a realistic way. Scenes like the one in I Hear the Sunspot (2024) where Kohei asks Taichi to repeat something quickly steal their way into my heart and most-watched scenes. It's these types of scenes that build empathy and awareness. I'm always grateful for them.

Because empathy is not a natural thing for me. Emotions are hard to understand and process, but I am constantly trying to improve. It may seem odd, but I've learned a lot about myself and others from watching shows. I've processed and learned to identify a lot of my own emotions, and I'm a lot better at reading other people now than in my younger days.

One of my sons once summarized my "beliefs" as kindness and respect when someone criticized my "lack of (religious) beliefs". But I don't think that's always true. I can be really mean - especially during a liveblog 😅. I can often be too blunt or get stuck in my own head. It's just that inclusivity and accessibility are two things that are incredibly important to me (as well as personal autonomy and identity).

It's why I adore characters like Shao Peng from See Your Love that are treated with respect within the narrative. It's more uncommon than it should be.

With that in mind, I've tried to expose my kids to and teach my kids about all kinds of differences in people - physical and mental abilities as well as differences in culture, religion, gender identity, etc.

But bias is a bitch. It rears it head when you least expect it. And it sometimes hides itself so well you don't even notice.

As I was getting ready to put my daughter to bed tonight, she went "Hey Mom! Guess what I learned in school today? (pause) People use hearing aids to help them hear!"

I chuckled a little thinking she was being sarcastic. "Well baby, guess you already knew that one huh."

She responded, looking confused, "No, I didn't."

It was at this point that I was confused. Why?

Because I WEAR a hearing aid. I'm hearing impaired. I should have two, but they're expensive. My daughter KNOWS I wear a hearing aid. This is the same child that has known since she was a toddler that she had to whisper into my "good" ear or walk on my "good" side if she wanted me to understand her. The child who knows to tap me and get my attention before talking. The child who, unless her dad is joining, automatically puts on subtitles for me if I'm going to watch something with her on television.

So I asked, "Huh? What do you mean? You know I have a hearing aid."

Her response. "Yeah, you do. But I just thought you were weird. I didn't know OTHER people wore them too."

And now I'm shook. Because she's right. I've never taught my children about OTHER people having hearing impairments. I've never sat us down to watch a show or read a book with a hearing impaired character together. It had never occurred to me to teach about that explicitly since they obviously deal with it daily. It had never occurred to me that the running jokes of "your mom's weird" and "your mom's just different" would be transferred to that aspect of me as well.

So apparently I've missed the mark. It's okay. We can remedy this. I'll cue up the burger scene and maybe one of the hearing test scenes from I Hear the Sunspot during our next bedtime snuggle.

But now, I'm also wondering. Where else have I missed the mark? What other gaps have went unnoticed?

And moreover, which characters or scenes speak to other people? Obviously Kohei and Shao Peng resonate with me personally. But what characters or scenes are other people's examples of "representation"?

That feels like a very important list tonight.

(Side note: Back in 2017, the movie version of I Hear the Sunspot was my very first Asian BL. It's far from perfect, but it is special to me for a lot of reasons.)

[greennoobartist]

Replying to these again bcuz yes :)

@lilyhatesthenumber4 @i-love-zelda-16 @thebackofmymind4 @nevermatchandscpsradadventures @blupeeblep

I don’t care about how old you are; if you���re going through this kind of stuff, it doesn’t matter. You need help. I am a Christian, so in a way, religion does matter to me, but it won’t stop me from trying to show you the love of Christ through our screens. I don’t know what to say to the rest of the post, except that stress and anxiety can definitely mess with your memory (personal experience, not trying to gaslight/anything), and you’ve been dealing with a lot. Definitely not discounting trauma-induced amnesia/whatever, just acknowledging what I do know. I will continue to pray for you through this and do my best to support you. God bless you - Nevermatch

<Gently grabs you and wraps my arms around you in a hug and rocks us back and forth> (if you like physical touch) I'm so sorry that that's happened. Healing is a long journey I've heard. I don't know the entire situation, but if you think you've been abused, that's probably what's happened. I know depression is a hard thing. My mom has it and still struggles with it daily. But that doesn't mean you should give up. Every day there's a chance of something amazing that you might miss. Look for the silver lining. It's hard, and even harder with depression, and I don't have it (I don't think), so I don't know entirely what to say. (And I have to go now, so... Rest of response a little later) You're not dumb and blind. You've been hurt, and a blindfold forced upon your lids. When you're used to something, it's hard to get rid of. It takes a while to adjust. Being honest to oneself is a very good step. It's hard. I, myself, still many times lie to myself. It's part of human nature. And trying to be open to oneself is a hard, but fruitful, journey. Idk for sure what the voice is, but it could be (forgive me real quick because I'm religious) the devil, Satan, trying to win you over and drag you down. He does that when he knows that you're a grand spirit who has a grand purpose. Don't let him win. Happily punch that guy in the face! (It'll be hard, but I believe in you, and have your back at best I can! You've got this!) It sucks that you have no backup in your family. I extend being able to be part of my hoard (dragon name for family that I use in my found family ^w^) if you'd like. Also, would totally kid nap you, fr. I don't know how to get away with it, or if we're close enough, but I would. I don't know your family situation, but if there was an adult that you know irl that you're close with, you might be able to tell them and get help there? Idk. (I may not be a professional (yet), but I am a friend, and friends help each other and make sure their mate knows they've got the others back. 🫂) Also, age and religion doesn't really matter to me. Age is a number, and religion is a view point of the world. You can be any age or any religion, and I wouldn't give two shakes. You can talk about either, you can keep it secret, I don't mind. I'll support you and be with you either way, no matter what. And crying is good and important. It's a release mechanism our body has for stress and such. It's part of the healing process. It's not weak. It's strength.

(Lmao Blep is the kidnapping part a good or a bad thing XD. Literally like paused and was like....whut? Should i be happy about it or freaked out XDD/joking)

Thx for support again, y'all. I am definitely planning to go to a therapist or psychologist or someone classified to help me. I think that keeping it under a rock will just make everything way worse than it is.

I don't think ill share it with my family, and idk if I should. Ill probably just go to the psychologist during school hours so that no one figures it out (and even if they do, my mom knows that im not alright, she just doesn't know that this is the matter)

I literally feel like what Nevermatch said, kinda like i was putting Mentos in a bottle of Coke and keeping it closed and then just snapped. I never usually rant like this but recently I just felt like letting it out anyhow cuz it started to physically hurt.

Until I figure out with the psychologist, i decided that I should probably do my part, which would be more self care. I think I neglected myself with everything that was happening and I think that i should do my part and take care of myself before seeking deeper help. I definitely did abandon my needs and both physical and mental health just bcuz of others, so I should, at least for this upcoming spring break, cheer up myself and take care. I mean like, if im not kind to myself, then I don't think that anyone can help me.

Now when I think about it, i was being a hypocrite recently. Always telling everyone else to be kind to themselves and rant whenever needed and seek out help while I was here bottling up everything and keeping it to myself and neglecting my wishes and health. I was literally doing the opposite of what i was telling to everyone else.

Thank you all for support, this would've probably been burning inside me for longer until it just.... ... Finishes me off....

Also, Lily, for those antidepressants. I actually didn't know what that was until I googled it, and i don't think I am. The thing is that im not professionally diagnosed with any mental illness for now so that's why I wasn't even taking those. If now being nice to myself and some self care counts as an antidepressant, then I am planning to and definitely should.

Im glad that none of y'all care how old i am or whats my religion, bcuz here's the thing. If I was in LU, i would fall in the same category as Four and Wind. We don't know how old Four is but he's the second youngest (according to that one post imma try to find) and Wind is nearly 14. So yeah actually if imma rank myself like that, i would fall in the same age group with them i think. Yeah, im that young 😶 (Four can't be older than 16 now can he???)

Again, thank you all sm. Your support means the world. I think that i would've committed smth horrible if I didn't snap like this *nervous chuckle* Anyways-

Since I said that i want to care about myself again in hope to retrieve what I lost, ill place the rants aside and focus on positive things about the world. If smth really bad happens that i have to then I might drop down a short rant but ill aim not to. I wanna retrieve what I lost and I think that self care should be my first steps.

Thank you all so much ❣️💖🫶

Now that ill take care of myself, ill do things that i like, which means rambling :D

[welldonebeca]

Identically Different (13)

WC: 1.9k words Warnings: Tension. Angst. Emotional Hurt/Comfort. Fluff.

Identically Different - Masterlist

Sam didn’t ask you any questions as he walked you off, holding your purse and your jacket for you, and you were burning of embarrassment as you two walked out into the cooler air.

God, what a scene you had made!

"I'm sorry," you muttered, covering your face with your free hand. "I didn't mean to embarrass you."

"Embarrass me?" Sam responded, sounding genuinely surprised. "That's what you're worried about?"

You exhaled and glanced at him with your chin tucked down, expecting some form of disapproval. Yet, all you found on Sam's face was genuine concern.

"I was worried about you," he continued, gently. “I still am.”

You lowered your hand, breathing out, relaxing. About you.

It made something in you feel so calm it was… new.

Sam was a good guy — too good for someone like you, to waste his goodness and his time on you.

He reached for your hand, taking it and squeezing it.

“Come on,” he tugged you along.

He stopped by the car, setting your things inside and locking it up, giving you your water bottle back and guiding you with his hand firmly clasping yours, and Sam took your right to the park, not seeming to direct you anywhere, but just over the path.

He was right, the wind on your face felt really good.

It was a really pretty park, with big trees and some kid friendly areas.

You walked together quietly, and he didn’t say anything for a while, just walking without any expectation, any goal, seemingly.

Or any judgement, either.

It made you relax.

You’d never met anyone this nice. You’d never seen so much kindness.

“You know,” he spoke slowly. “I’m really different from my family.”

His words made you turn to look at him, but Sam was staring forward.

“My parents are very conservative, very… Texan ranch owners,” he told you, squeezing your hand. “I never… got hungry, or didn’t have something I needed, but I always felt stifled. Like I couldn’t be myself because I was different. I was always out of place.”

You could see that. Sam and Cordell were very, very, very different in everything that wasn’t appearance – and even visually! Sam kept his hair longer, Cordell had it short; Sam was clean faced, Cordell had a big beard… they were a little visually different.

“Our personalities always clashed,” Sam sighed, and you could feel how much that bothered and hurt him. “They always expected me to put them above everything else, even when they weren’t that supportive of me.”

You stayed quiet. That wasn’t something you would know much about that feeling, Mum was always home to you, you never felt like you couldn’t be yourself with her.

“They are religious, and I’m no that into religion,” he told you, exhaling. “They things in certain ways I don’t… and it was always a problem.”

Oh, religion. You could absolutely see how that would be the origin of a problem.

“It’s not that I don’t believe in a higher power,” he added, finally looking at you. “It’s just… I don’t see it the way they do. I think there’s more out there than just a God that punishes you for being who you are or wanting a different life.”

That made you smile.

“Yeah, I agree,” you spoke softly.

He got into silence for a moment, and you could see there was more, but he didn’t say it.

“And, of course… I could never compare to their perfect son,” he looked away from from you, to the side. “Perfect Cordell, doing everything right, never making a mistake.”

You squeezed his hand. Yes, you’d seen his old pictures. You’d seen a lot of the tension in them.

“So when it was time to go to college, of course I went to California,” Sam chuckled, and it sounded a little forced. “And I didn’t talk to them for a while, I kept my distance and worked on myself and made sure I was as independent as possible. I made sure I didn’t need them.”

You exhaled.

“Yeah, I get that,” you told him.

Sam looked at you, and you looked away from him, focusing on the floor.

“I got this ex-boyfriend,” you exhaled.

He made a little sound of surprise.

“We were both on the road, we were both running away,” you explained. “Not to the same place, but he had a car. It did wonders to my feet, I don’t think I would be that far.”

That was a big stretch. You wouldn’t have made past you state without his help.

“He… sucked,” you told him. “Real scummy guy. Exactly what I deserved,” you chuckled sadly. “Deserve.”

Sam squeezed your hand.

“Hey-”

“He wanted to go down to Cali and make it big,” you continued your story, not letting him stop you. “Not as a lawyer, thought. He thought he had the looks for TV, probably still does.”

You breathed in deep. It was incredibly easy to forget Adam when your life changed. You had a lot to think about and worry about, you couldn’t waste time with stupid memories.

“We fought all the time,” you swallowed down. “For the stupidest thing. Everything was a reason to fight, everything... everyday was a pain to go through.”

You fucking hated him. Yet, because life sucked, Adam was all you had, the one to watch over you when you slept, the one who made it possible for you to get out and have a place to sleep on.

It wouldn’t get better!

You couldn’t find anything better then, just like now.

“So one day I had to stop by the pharmacy, and I don’t know what I needed,” you swallowed down. “But when I came back, his car was gone, and my backpack was the only thing left there. And the rest is history.”

He’d been through that part already. You were starving, stealing, arrested, met him, got out, got into his house, got a job at target, almost fucked his brother, broke down in the middle of a restaurant, and was now dumping your story on him.

"The life of a scumbag," you attempted to lighten the mood. "You know."

But to your surprise, Sam halted, holding your hand tightly and in place, and you turned to look at his face when you realised it.

“You’re not a scumbag,” he correct you.

You scoffed, but Sam was too busy pulling you closer to him, locking eyes with you.

“I mean it,” he insisted. “You’re not.”

Your cheeks flushed hot.

“Sam...”

He put his hands on your shoulders, rubbing your forearms gently, and you couldn’t help yourself from leaning on him, resting your head on his shoulders, crossing your arms, and moved his touch, rubbing your back, and his arms were so warm you just wanted to bury yourself in them and never leave.

"You're great," he affirmed. "I know that."

Great? That last thing you were was great.

“I’m not.”

“You are!” he insisted.

It made you look up at him, still close so close to his face his eyes were right there.

“Sam, you don’t know me,” you whispered, trying not to be harsh.

He’d just met you such a short time ago, in fucking prison, and he was a really good person, a good guy, who believed people were good, with too much faith in his judgement.

“And what if I want to?” he asked.

The question caught you off guard, and you stared up at him, surprised and confused.

What?

“I want to know you,” Sam declared very simply, his face as blank as it came, with soft eyes but so much intensity it made you weak on your knees.

You swallowed hard.

Sam was beautiful. He had the most beautiful and sweetest eyes you’d ever seen, the sweetest smile… and he was hot, of course. Not a single thing in that man looked less than beautiful.

"Well, and what would you want to know?" you asked, crossing your arms and feeling the blush creeping down to your neck. “My favourite colour?”

Sam scoffed playfully.

“Oh, no,” he waved a playful hand at you, letting your go a little bit. “That’s way too personal!”

Unable to contain it, you burst into laughter, the release of tension relaxing your body, and it was exactly what you needed.

He stepped back, and you took a deep breath as he glanced around the restaurant and then back at you.

"I mean what I said," he declared at last. "I also promised lunch. I think we've earned some comfort food."

You gave him a half-smile. Yeah, the two of you kind of did.

"I don't want to go back there," you confessed, a hint of sadness in your voice. "It's... not my kind of comfort food."

His face softened, and he raised his eyebrows.

“Well, where can we find your comfort food?”

You smiled a little, swinging on the balls of your feet.

“McDonalds,” you whispered.

Sam grimaced.

“I’m not surprised,” he chuckled. “Though it’s not my thing.”

You chuckled, looking at him from top to bottom. Well, that was clear.

“And what would it be?”

He shrugged a little bit.

“I like some special salad,” he told you simply.

Salad?

“Well, they have salads,” you reminded him. “I’m sure it’s really good.”

Sam squinted at you.

“Not really, no,” he shook his head. “They don’t.”

You giggled.

“No, I’m very sure they do,” you insisted. “I’ve seen it on my way to work, it’s all green and red and... something something.”

It was a nice-looking salad! 

But he was still sheepish.

“I like making my own salad,” Sam said simply. “With fresh fruit, all the colours… you know. Things you can get in a ranch.”

You nodded, trying not to look tense. Well, you knew when you were meant to shut up. He didn’t want to go, you were not going to force him to do something just cause you wanted to.

“Sounds nice,” you agreed, though, cause it did. “You can make me one of those someday.”

Having access to fresh stuff, trees where you could just pick the fruit from… yeah, it was very dreamy.

“We should get inside,” you looked away from him. “They might now have a table for us if we wait too long.”

Were there more cars parking up?

“I think there’s more people arriving,” you squinted, covering your eyebrows to see better in the sun.

But Sam surprised you again, taking your hand, and you turned to look at him.

“We can get you something there,” he offered. “And I’ll… get a fish patty?”

He grimaced, but you softened anyway.

“You don’t have to,” you shook your head. “It’s not your thing.”

Sam smiled, squeezing your fingers.

“We’ll take it back home,” he told you. “And I’ll eat it with my salad.”

You grinned.

“Thank you, Sam,” you celebrated. “I’m gonna get myself a happy meal!”

He chuckled, shaking his head.

“That’s great,” he said simply. “No judgment here.”

Sam pointed your way to the car, and you skipped happily.

…

“Identically Different” was posted on my Patreon in 2023 and is fully available for reading. Subscription is only $2 a month for early access to everything I do and exclusive access to some works, and I promise you won’t regret it.

…

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Identically different: @foxwinchester83

[crimsonender]

Hey man, you white washed a genocide by calling it a conflict, maybe have some reflection on your own biases before assuming everyone else is just being antisemitic. /Even you're learning about religions post you brought up your fascination with Christianity and Judaism, during Ramadan, you left out Islam.

Okay, I'll bite.

Yeah I believe that what's happening in Palestine is a genocide. I was being vague because I'm uncomfortable talking about it, and I am sitting my ass down and listening people who know more about this than I do. There are smarter and more influential people with direct involvement in what is happening and I encourage you to look to them for guidance. Not me.

Moving on to the other thing.

I give less of a shit about Protestantism and especially Evangelicalism, and have more of an interest in Catholicism specifically because of the mythology, and I have a lot of Jewish friends that speak to me about certain cultural beliefs and have taken interest in what they have to say, especially where it compares and contrasts with my Evangelical Protestant upbringing. I have one Muslim friend right now, and we don't really talk about Islam, though I do check in with her whenever I have questions. Islam is just not something that personally grabs me. I believe it's just as valid as any other religion or spirituality, it's just not one that I have any personal interest in. I'm not religious. So when I say I'm interested it's more in a intellectual capacity than anything else. Emotionally it holds the same weight as my other intellectual interests. (Paleontology, Primatology, Geometry, Astronomy, Phylogeny, Mythology, etc etc)

I have exchanged greetings and offered support to my friend and people in my Discord whom I speak with regularly that are practising Ramadan. But you don't get to decide to what capacity I engage with a culture and it's practices. That's my personal decision.

If you're Muslim and are practising, then Ramadan Murbarak, anon. Stay safe and healthy as possible and be kind to yourself. I don't really wish to engage with the religion in any capacity beyond what my friend invites me into to support them, and while I am welcoming and dedicated to making my Discord and Youtube a welcome and safe space for Muslims (and any religion) to practice and express themselves, that does not mean that I "have" to do anything, or that I'm even obligated to split my interest evenly between the three major religions. I'm not an institution, I'm not a corporation, I'm just some guy. I like what I like and I get curious about what I get curious about.

[dross-the-fish]

Okay, so, I know you said kinda jokingly that, if Adam was asked, he could give an insufferably long presentation on a book he likes, but personally I would lowkey love it because I did read paradise lost and my first thought after finishing it was, "oh, I might be too stupid for this."

Like, I didn't really "get it" and felt like i was missing something and that annoys me, so, someone really enthusiastically explaining their own love and opinions on it? Hell yeah, I'm in and bringing snacks and a note pad 😤

(also like, listening to someone who genuinely likes a subject they are talking about is like a thousand times more fun than googling literary analysis pdf's)

Full disclosure I have only read parts of Paradise lost, it is an extremely long and difficult read. I am slowly forcing myself to read all of it just because it might be good background information to have for Adam. Adam's breakdown of it would be to explain how he personally relates to Lucifer and feels that he himself is something like a fallen angel. He'd also wax philosophical about Adam and Eve in general and what the intrinsic value of trying to earn God's love is when God's love is so heavily conditional. A lot of people would find Adam's perspective to be blasphemous as he does not have any kind of reverence towards the religion and he does not have any inclinations towards worship. He would also put forth the suggestion that God should understand that it is better for Adam to eat the fruit and share a mortal life with Eve than an eternity alone in the garden when God himself insists on being distant from those he has created. A few people have asked about Adam's religious alignment and I do want to confirm that as I write him he is not a Christian. He does not actively believe in "God" as a physical or existing entity in the way that he is described in the bible but rather considers it to be an abstract concept who is only as real as people allow it to be. Adam is not religious, he is intellectually curious, he is highly philosophical but he's too prideful to ever worship anything and even in a universe where devils and angels exists he does not see merit in treating them like gods or currying favor with forces either divine or infernal.

[tanadrin]

The Gish Gallop was a term coined I think on the 2000s internet for a rhetorical maneuver where to buttress an argument you provide a ton of low-quality evidence; that the evidence is bad means it should be easy to refute, but the very large volume means it will take much longer to explain why it's all wrong than it did to copy-paste a bunch of links, and to a certain kind of very naive onlooker, it looks like the galloper is winning--after all, the one interlocutor has presented a ton of evidence! The second interlocutor has to spend so much time bending over backwards to refute it! Surely the first guy is more knowledgeable and authoritative. You aren't going to look at all that evidence yourself, of course--who has the time?

But listening to Dan McClellan talk about the Gospel of John this morning, it occurs to me that I don't think this is disingenuous. Not entirely. I think this is just the style of argumentation a lot of Christians (of a particular religious flavor) are used to. And I'm not just talking about in non- or para-religious matters like evolution. This is how Christianity understands the Bible.

This week's Data over Dogma is about the theology of John, and why it is non-trinitarian (because the Trinity is a much later doctrine developed as a kind of political compromise, maintained only because it had state backing) and does not actually identify Jesus with God (the theological developments are more complicated here; but suffice it to say it was not at all a given that "authorized bearer of the divine name" and "actually God" were the same being in 1st century Hellenistic Judaism, and indeed the distinction between the two had developed in Jewish thought precisely to avoid the awkwardness of anthropomorphic figures proclaiming themselves God in some of the older sections of the Hebrew Bible).

The funny thing is, there are a ton of passages in John that get trotted out as proof texts that Jesus is God. There are very good reasons in the case of each one to doubt that that is actually the correct reading; but of course, if you don't know anything about Greek, all you have are modern translations produced under the assumption of the dogma of the Trinity--mostly for devotional readers of the Bible who would be outraged if the Trinity wasn't in the New Testament--and you have been raised in a cultural and/or educational milieu where it is simply a default assumption about the way the world works that the Trinity is a timeless concept that has been in the Bible from the beginning, it sure looks like one side is spinning up tendentious arguments based on silly semantics that have nothing to do with the religion you learned as a kid.

But this exegetical approach (really, eisegetical) is common to many topics in traditional Christian theology. There are a ton of passages from the Septuagint that the Gospels warp to be about Jesus, even though, in their original context, this doesn't make any sense; sometimes even they're based on obvious mistranslations, like having Jesus ride into Jerusalem on the back of two animals simultaneously because you don't understand appositives. And you can poke holes in any individual bit of this exegesis, but psychologically having a ton of low-quality evidence for a thing is a pretty effective bulwark against thinking critically about that evidence; for every individual argument you knock down, the person you are arguing against is probably thinking, "yeah, but what about all that other stuff," even if they can't actually name all that other stuff in the moment.

And it's not mendacious! This is the stuff of true belief; this is how you get breathless Christian commentators saying the Bible couldn't possibly be written by human hands, because it so perfectly predicted Jesus even in the Old Testament--and the evidence they point to is, to anyone not steeped in traditional Christian exegesis, and especially to Jews who have their own exegetical traditions, absolutely barmy. Like really pants-on-head crazy stuff. But of course even now it is still being processed, in many parts of the world, through a two thousand year old tradition trying to reconcile it all and to normalize it all, and--to bring it back to discussions of evolution on the internet in the 2000s--I can't help but think of all those people who talk about the experience of thinking evolution was so obviously nonsense, because all they were exposed to was the fundamentalist strawman of it. When they finally sat down and began to read about it on their own, from unbiased sources--often with the intent of criticizing it--they realized how distorted their understanding was, and how limited their supposed outside view.

(If there are general lessons to be wrung from this situation, I think it's simply "beware of echo chambers." Social consensus in a bubble can make bad arguments feel much stronger than they really are, especially if you are not exposed to the actual opposing view. Be on guard against mistaking "quantity of evidence" for "quality of argument," especially if you're not gonna evaluate that evidence yourself. Also all religious traditions are fundamentally eisegetical, because in order to keep holy writ relevant to the community its meaning has to be constantly renegotiated. So, uh. If you want high-quality exegesis, ask an academic, not a theologian.)

[my-unorthodox-life]

okay can i vent for a minute? get real personal with all y'all?

i've been a tumblr user since i got my first tablet at age 12, over a decade of having at least one active blog (usually more) so it's safe to say i've both gotten my fair share of hate and found ways of using this app to benefit me and keep me detached from this hate

currently i have 4 active blogs, my main where i do the typical reblogging and updates on my fanfics, this one where i post like a proper blog and reblog jewish things that matter to me, my mental health recovery blog where i talk about my eating disorder and ptsd, and my adult one where i reblog fun sexy stuff and chat about the struggles of dating as sex positive people with trauma.

all very important to me and all have various levels of anonymity when it comes to knowing about me as a person. some have my name, some a nickname, one just my age. plus various tidbits so people know what to expect from my posts and what we can chat about, basic blog rules essentially

in the past few months as antisemitism has gotten more and more common place i of course get more anon hate, i don't turn of inboxes since i do get nice stuff from time to time, and that's kind of the territory of running a blog (i had a trans rights one in the age of kalvin garrah, i think i'll live)

out of those four blogs the one that gets the most antisemitic messages, i mean full paragraphs of truly vile ramblings that read like a nazi fever dream, is the one for my mental health recovery. a blog that i block all but mutuals on, meaning either a stranger or someone i've interacted with is sending these messages

i've started replying to them, cause i feel if they want to be mean and make a fool of themselves i might as well let everyone see (poor guy keeps sending me weird reviews of "my" wattpad fics. i've never had a wattpad account but this doesn't seem to stop him), but what gets me is that blog has the least personal information on it. no name or nickname, no hobbies or interests listed, nothing about what i do for work beyond "pet care", and the only mention of my religion or politics was one post that joking about how my mental health often gets worse around the high holy days (very demure, very mindful)

and yet that's the blog that gets straight up death threats, not even disguised as anything else, just straight up calling me a pig who deserves to burn. not the personal blog where i've posted about israel and palestine, or about dating while religious, or hell even this one that might as well be a "i'm a sensitive jewish minded person! thoughts?" blog.

no the one blog that people feel safe harassing is the nondescript recovery and relapse blog. that's where people feel comfortable.

and it makes me sad, not because of what was said, but because it *was* said. that there's people out there comfortable enough in their bigotry to go up to someone and spew vile hate like it's nothing, but only of course if they can't put a name or face to the person they're talking to

what this reminds me of is when i was in high school i had an art teacher who didn't stand for antisemitic jokes, and there were a lot in my school. one day a kid just asked him "Mr.Dexter, are you a jew?" and his response really stuck with me. he said "It doesn't matter, maybe I am, maybe I used to be, maybe my wife is. But you shouldn't not say mean things just because you don't want to get in trouble, you shouldn't say them because you know it's wrong. If you didn't know, you wouldn't ask."

and i think that really sums up all these trolls i've seen running through jewish blogs or even ones that casually mention it, they know it's wrong but the aren't saying it to a jewish face, they're just saying it to the idea of judaism

these people wouldn't walk up to you on the street and look you up and down and say half of what they feel comfortable typing, but here where they can not only hide their face, but seek out a target that has hidden their own they've found a way to give themselves free reign to say and do whatever they want. to them it's not a person on the other side of the screen, it's the strawman caricature of a jewish person, out here just for them to yell at to get whatever anger they have out of their system

of course there are some people who would say truly despicable things to a random person on the street, but cmon is that person really on tumblr hunting through buzz words to send hate?

anyways i know the compassionate thing to do would be to pray for them to heal what's hurting them so bad, but yanno what, they can suffer a bit first

[liesinmyeyes]

hey, so I'm a new pagan witch and one who has barely practiced anything yet/ has only like 10 pages filled in their book of shadows

i am seeking advice on what to do with myself and my craft and practices, or just hoping someone has felt/currently feels the same way I do because I'm the only pagan witch I know irl and have no one to tell this to.

practicing witchcraft makes me anxious? I haven't really done anything aside from wearing crystal necklaces and sleeping with an amethyst below my pillow, but i'm lowkey afraid to do much more than that because whenever I do research across the internet (don't worry, I don't only take one pinterest source at face value, I make sure to look at other sources on the internet and always check with multiple witchy forums/threads or just simply history sources if the practice is closed/appropriated or should be done as a beginner) - but here is my issue. There's soooo many sources on the internet that tell you so many differing opinions. Some sources will say "NO WAY DON'T EVER DO THAT" while others will go "it's okay and totally safe". I haven't ever read a book abt witchcraft because I know how much TERF-y and culturally appropriate-y agendas they have and the amount of misinformation in a lot of them. I almost got radicalized once before and I told myself "never again", so i'm too afraid to pick up a book half the witches praise for being so good and accurate and half condemn for including TERF bs. I know I should form my own opinions on magic(k) and how I percieve witchcraft but i just get this BOUT of anxiety whenever I see a post anywhere on the internet saying "DONT EVER DO THAT AS A WITCH" or something along those lines... i can never tell what's just gatekeepy fear-mongering and what's an actual closed/dangerous practice anymore and it makes me too afraid to pursue anything because I fear bad things happening to me more than anything. I think it's a side effect of my neurodivergent self wanting to be told exactly what I can and can't do (considering my ethnic identity) and how and when to do it, what moral code to abide by, which is a tough ask in something like witchcraft.

i often feel swayed and get these bouts of guilt for NOT being christian. I grew up areligious in a very christian country with an added sprinkle of shaming people for being religious (which i dont agree with obvs). When I was agnostic and not giving any thought to religion at all, it was fine and dandy. But now that I identify myself as a pagan who worships the greek gods, I often feel, idk, ashamed of it? I'm friends with some very devout christian gals and whenever they talk about going to church or getting their sins forgiven I just feel so guilty and kind of like I'm sinning myself. I feel like I shouldn't be believing in the Gods and should be christian instead, even though SO many of my world views don't align with christianity's teachings and frankly, I don't want to be christian? I want the Gods to be real and I want to worship them. But I often doubt my faith in them and feel the guilt of not being christian like everyone else in my country. Is this a faith issue? On some days I won't doubt the Gods existing at all and feel all happy and uplifted and sure in my faith and on other days I'll be sitting around all day, questioning all my morals and beliefs and questioning whether I'm going to hell for praying to the greek gods. Maybe it's because of all my sorroundings (multiple churches in my town, Jesus statues everywhere, very christian friends) that I feel that way, but if anyone could tell me how to stop these thoughts I'd give ANYTHING to do that. (Not that there's anything wrong with christianity or finding comfort in it, its just that whenever I think about it I get anxious because the concept of eternal torture just for enjoying life on earth scares me. On the other hand, I DO find comfort in worshiping the greek gods. I feel more beautiful, inspired to write, so on and so forth...)