#moral teaching

[iamentertainmentclub-blog]

Proverbs Daily Reflection – January 10, 2025

This chapter further delves into themes such as integrity, honesty, and the value of diligence. It reminds us that righteousness is a shield, preserving life and guiding us away from destruction. #josephmekaelpageministries

Proverbs 10:1 (KJV)A wise son maketh a glad father: but a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother. Reflection Proverbs 10 is rich with wisdom about the contrast between righteousness and wickedness, diligence and laziness, wisdom and folly. It serves as a spiritual compass, urging us to align with God’s will in every decision. The opening verse highlights the impact of our actions on others,…

[aesthetic-uni]

Miles “Who’s Morales” vs Gwen “Gwwwwanda” vs Pavtir “You seem like a nice young woman I do not know” FIGHT

[edelweissacermacrophyllum]

Children, more rich people, and a very long curse

Deuteronomy 28:15-68, Psalm 47:1-9, Luke 18:1-30

I am really comfortable with the bible and religion just as good moral teaching. Jesus's sermon on the mount is perfect. It's a bunch of rules for living the sort of life I grew up wanting to live. It sets high standards so that we can feel good about striving for them and also so that we always have more to do. I don't think humans handle stagnation very well in general.

But every Christian teacher/class I've had has been very adamant about the fact that Jesus was not just a moral teacher and that the bible was not just about moral laws but about salvation. I think this is selling moral laws short. I think there is a lot to be said for a rigorous code of ideals and morals for the way that we live. Now, if there is a God who wants to interact with their people then the way we do that in our pre-heaven lives will have principles and best practices. Much of the Torah is involved with giving ways for humans to interact with God.

I don't know if it's helpfully reductionistic to separate the rules for living that concern the world as it is and those that concern heaven and the afterlife. But if it is, I will entirely ignore the latter. The thing is that if new creation is like this world but entirely good, then we can assume that anthing that would be good in heaven would also be good on earth.

My theory is that there is only good moral advice. What is a good way to treat yourself? What is a good way to relate to God? What are the myriad rules for interacting with other human beings and the rest of creation.

I encountered some Christian once who tried to convince me that the joy of Jesus was the type that brought tears to your eyes and I wanted to shake him and say, "NO! Why would I follow a God that wants me miserable!" I have respect for aesetics only because they posess self control in measures that I do not, but I suspect that they are entirely missing the point. Our religion is not for some heaven far away but to build the kingdom here. Will we live forever? Yes, according to Jesus. But eternity began yesderday. If you were miserable then, something is going to have to change. Maybe you need a saviour.

Jesus tells us that we have to approach God and the kingdom of God like little children, I think he's talking about the enthusiasm, joy, humility, earnestness, and authenicity that children posess. I work with kids a lot and they have no guile. It's so refreshing to interact with people who say what they mean and mean it with such intensity.

Anyway, the rich young ruler comes to Jesus and asks what he must do to inherit enternal life and Jesus gives him a list of the things he has to do. He ticks each box and Jesus tells him to give away all his stuff and become poor. And, credit to the guy, he doesn't argue. He just goes away sad.

Keep in mind, I'm not saying we can be saved by actions. That's a heresy to which even I won't stoop. Besides, it violates our normal earthly rules of relationship too. It's like the neck-beard trope of keeping track of the times one has respected women and expecting to cash them in for a romance. On earth, as in heaven, we are saved by relationships which are fostered by genuine interactions, openness, trust, and listening. There are rules governing these things but they are complex and must be inutited rather than studied. They must be practiced.

When they are not practiced, the curses come and the passage in Deuteronomy outlines a huge curse, foreshadowing the exile of the Jewish people. When people break the traditional wisdom and the good moral teaching, suffering is the result. Does God cause it? Does God want it to happen? Does God allow it? Get back to me once you know the answers to these.

So no, do not reduce Jesus's words to good moral teaching. But also, do not be cynical about the value and scope of good moral teaching. We need good habits of relationship and practice. Your habits show what you believe. Everything else is just belief in belief, and that is worthless.

[nightowl374art]

just some Gwen and Miles 42 thoughts

[asubakaa]

Like a father, like a son.

[incorrect-spiderverse]

Miles: "You know archaic Latin?"

Hobie: "I got bored with classical Latin."

Gwen: "You know normal Latin?"

Hobie: "Yeah, someone from my knitting club taught me."

Pavitr excitedly: "YOU HAVE A KNITTING CLUB?!"

Hobie: "You guys don't know everything about me. Now, do you guys want a sweater or a scarf?"

[uncanny-tranny]

Another bonus to learning a fiber art is being able to speak to others in a Lovecraftian language that nobody else understands...

...and also being able to read things like THIS:

[thejakeformerlyknownasprince]

Reading Visser One’s book she always strikes me as one of those white women settlers that wanted to “save” Native Children from their culture.

This led to the Stolen Generation in Australia and residential schools in North America.

Heck when we see her in the series she is literally piloting a women of color’s body and cosplaying motherhood.

She thinks she is so much better then the colonist that want to just burn up villages.

She’s a white women liberal putting on a gentler face to what is at its end brutal colonialism.

It’s worth noting that alien invasions have been metaphors for colonization since War of the Worlds

I completely agree. There's a blog post I can't now find about older white women reacting to The Help by talking about how their housekeepers, nannies, cooks, etc. were "part of the family." Which — first of all, no. Your employee is your employee. The rights and respect you owe to your employee will always be different from those you owe to your family. Do not devalue their work, and thus the traditional work of women, by pretending that it isn't labor. But secondly...

"We're friends" or "we're family" sure is easy to say from a position of power. Anyone short on power but long on common sense understands the importance of ingratiating yourself to those in charge. Anyone in charge can choose to delude themself that this time when the kid goes "I love you, Miss Hannigan" they mean it. Such is the nature of power.

Like, one I think about all the time: my professor whom we called Professor Trelawney behind her back because she would constantly spout pseudoscience in class. She's not the least favorite teacher I've ever had, but she's on the short list — and on the day I graduated, she introduced herself to a family member as "Sol's one of my favorite students, and I'm probably Sol's favorite teacher." Why? Because I got her to think that. Why'd I do so? Because the semester before, Dr. W had knocked down my grade for "irrelevant discussion" after I argued with his statement that Ireland should still be ruled by England. I keep Dr. W, and the subsequent effect on Prof Trelawney, as my touchstone when I'm handling student conflict. Because. Such. Is the nature. Of power.

As people pointed out after watching Crash: any rich lady can hug her housekeeper any time she's feeling sad, and the worst the housekeeper can do is quit. Most housekeepers with any grasp of social norms wouldn't hug even their favorite boss even on her worst day, at least not without first getting explicit permission. Such is the nature of power.

And these are all softer examples, of positions that you have the legal right to walk away from. (Whether or not you can afford to quit your job is obviously a whole other ballgame.) When it's not just school or work, but it's your guardian or the person who literally owns you... Fuck. Kiss ass or die, I guess.

And if you want concessions, you'd better put in all the emotional work to get them. You have to be sad about being less powerful than the help-giver, but not too sad. You have to be completely helpless in the face of random misfortune, or else you don't deserve help. You have to be grateful when the help arrives, in such a way that makes it clear the helper mad your problem all better but that your problem was completely intractable without their intervention. Most of all, you better do it with a smile: I love you, Miss Hannigan.

[scrambledslut]

being delusional about middle aged men is my roman empire

[chaoticallyfluffy]

Ok consider:

A new hero emerges and the Justice League watches him for a while who make sure he’s not a threat. They see this giant clumsy man who moves like he’s not used to his body, smiles goofily every time he saves someone, and is clearly inexperienced with his powers and they’re all just like. Ah. This is a child.

Except they don’t think he’s a ten year old or however old Billy is at the time, no no. Clearly this hero came into existence shortly before his first appearance, just a few months ago. They don’t know how or why but It’s not the weirdest thing they’ve seen so it’s pretty easy to believe.

But they can’t just leave this toddler with the powers of a god to stumble around and potentially hurt someone by accident, nor go down the wrong path and become a villain. So of course they decide to ‘subtly’ guide him without alerting him to the fact they’re onto him.

They introduce themselves but instead of inviting him to the league they pop by every once in a while to ‘subtly’ teach him about responsibility and power, but also about love and humanity. They try to teach him to enjoy life and that he doesn’t have to act like an adult around them, instead encouraging him to enjoy his childhood even if it’s not an ordinary one.

(Too bad the Justice League suck at subtlety.)

Billy is certain they somehow found out he’s a kid before they even met him, probably because of Batman’s freaky know-it-all powers, but he isn’t very worried as they seem nice and don’t treat him like he’s dumb or fragile. They respect him as a hero despite his age so he lets himself act like a kid around them after a while.

When he gets comfortable enough to detransform Billy thinks that’s his identity reveal. The league thinks that he magicked himself a body that’s more of a representation of his true self and fits his developmental age better, possibly as a way to blend in with humans and experience what it’s like to be a normal child. Good for him!

Basically Billy gets a bunch of super powered parents and the Justice League get a newborn man that they think they’re raising from scratch lol

[dennisboobs]

i'm seeing videos on tiktok about the crossover (which yeah my first mistake is being on tiktok) but it's making me feel crazy when people keep saying "dennis should not be allowed in a school" specifically implying that he's a threat to children any more than the rest of the gang who have a worse track record

Bad Dad but a dad nonetheless

[fairysbrew]

its honestly so fucking heartbreaking seeing keath (yaelokre's creator) so upset when all they wanted to do was share the world and characters they've built with others i think there's a serious conversation that needs to be had about entitlement in fandom, especially within indie fandoms, because the way some of y'all treat artists and their creations is genuinely repulsive there are real people behind the things we watch, listen to, and consume, and to ignore that or pretend there aren't is gross

[hippydippydruid]

Francis went from having a moral crisis about what is right and wrong and the power he had to do bad things to people and his desire to keep doing those things while knowing they were objectively evil because they gave him a rush of joy unlike anything he’s experienced in his life to hard swerving into thinking he’s a god with the power to change the trajectory of people’s lives for the better and that says something about him. I don’t know what, but it’s definitely saying something.

[lord-squiggletits]

One of my favorite parts of phase 2 (and indeed one of the few moments I resonated with IDW Prowl) was when the neutrals were coming back to Cybertron and Prowl said that he refused to let Autobots be pushed aside and overruled after they were the ones who fought for freedom for 4 million years (the exact wording escapes me atm).

And I mean, that resentment still holds true even once the colonists come on bc like. As much as it's true that Cybertron's culture is fucked up, and as funny as it can be to paint Cybertronians as a bunch of weirdos who consider trying to kill someone as a common greeting not important enough to hold a grudge over.... The colonists POV kind of pissed me off a lot of times, as did the narrative tone/implications that Cybertronians are forever warlike and doomed to die by their own hands bc it just strikes me as an extremely judgemental and unsympathetic way to deal with a huge group of people with massive war PTSD and political/social tensions that were rampant even before the war?

Like, imagine living in a society rife with bigotry and discrimination where you get locked into certain occupations and social strata based on how you were born. The political tension is so bad there's a string of assassinations of politicians and leaders. The whole planet erupts into an outright war that leads (even unintentionally) to famine and chemical/biological warfare that destroys your planet. Both sides of the war are so entrenched in their pre-war sides and resentment for each other that this war lasts 4 million years and you don't even have a home planet any more. Then your home planet gets restored and a bunch of sheltered fucks come home and go "ewww why are you so violent?? You're a bunch of freaks just go live in the wilderness so that our home can belong to The Pure People Who Weren't Stupid And Evil Enough To Be Trapped In War" and then a bunch of colonists from places that know nothing about your history go "lol you people are so weird?? 🤣🤣 I don't get why y'all are fighting can't you just like, stop??? Oh okay you people are just fucked up and evil and stupid then" ((their planets are based on colonialism where their Primes wiped out the native populations btw whereas the Autobots and OP in particular fought to save organics. But that never gets brought up as a point in their favor)) as if the damage of a lifetime of war and a society that was broken even before the war can just magically go away now that the war is over.

Prowl fucking sucks but he was basically the only person that pointed out the injustice of that.

And then from then on out most of the characters from other colonies like Caminus and wherever else are going "i fucking hate you and your conflicts" w/ people like literal-nobody Slide and various Camiens getting to just sit there lecturing Optimus about how Cybertronians are too violent for their own good and how their conflicts are stupid, with only brief sympathetic moments where the Cybertronians get to be recognized as their own ppl who deserve sympathy before going right back to being lambasted.

Like I literally struggled to enjoy the story at multiple points because there was only so much I could take of the characters I knew and loved being raked over coals constantly while barely getting to defend themselves or be defended by the narrative so like. It was just fucking depressing and a little infuriating to read exRID/OP

[silverthelovebug]

You guys remember DinoSquad?

Just me?

Look, it even has its very own Kenji !!

(Dumbass who cares about social status and his looks)

[interiorlulus]

The day people understand that the themes & tropes of a story are chosen by the writer to suit its specific narrative needs and not necessarily bc they are Universal Truths Unchallenged is the day I will be set free.