#religious wacko's

[meandmybigmouth]

He should have never been added to the scotus or anyone else holding this belief!. Just another delusional cult following jackass!. and his wife a maga, coup plotting wacko!

[the-tenth-arcanum]

haven't been on insta in a while (apart from yesterday, when I fell into a sarah keyworth rabbit hole) but I found it funny (and a bit disturbing) how the algorithm seemed to think that, since I enjoyed wholesome couple videos and wholesome comedians, I must be a practicing christian

[scottguy]

Says the man who wants to indoctrinate every American into his twisted, backward, hateful, evangelical 'Christian' world, whether they want it or not

Colleges are not indoctrinating anyone. Indoctrination is belief without evidence. It's about submission to authority.

Colleges are all about evidence-based reality. You have to cite your sources. You have to document your work. You have to write oringinal papers and do research.

Colleges/CCs are creating spaces for learning, exposure to new ideas, meeting people from outside of their hometown, and crushing the stereotypes/fears passed down from parents.

Mike Johnson has it backward: he is upset that conservative indoctrination does not work with educated people.

[etz-ashashiyot]

So what’s the modern interpretation of the laws about keeping slaves? I’ve heard that said laws where a lot more kind to slaves then the surrounding nations but, like, it’s still slavery?

Hi anon,

With Pesach coming up, I'm sure that this question is on a lot of people's minds. It's a good question and many rabbanim throughout history have attempted to tackle it. Especially today, with slavery being seen as a moral anathema in most societies (obviously this despite the fact that unfortunately slavery is still a very real human rights crisis all over the world), addressing the parts of the Torah that on the surface seem to condone it becomes a moral imperative.

It's worth noting that the Jewish world overall condemns slavery. In my research for this question, I came across zero modern sources arguing that slavery is totally fine. I'm sure that if you dug deep enough there's some fringe wacko somewhere arguing this, but every group has its batshit fringe.

Here are some sources across the political and religious observance spectrum that explain it better than I could:

Chabad (this article is written by Rabbi Tzvi Freeman, a wonderful rabbi whose words I have learned deeply over the years. He is one of my favorite rabbis despite not seeing eye to eye with a lot of the Chabad movement)

Conservative (to be clear: this is my movement; it's not actually politically conservative in most shuls, just poorly named. We desperately need to bully them into calling themselves Masorti Olami like the rest of the world. It's [essentially] a liberal traditional egalitarian movement.)

Conservative pt. 2 (different rabbi's take)

Reform (note that this is from the Haberman Institute, which was founded by a Reform rabbi. Link is to a YouTube recording of a recent lecture on the topic.)

Chareidi (this rabbi is an official rabbi of the Western Wall in Israel, so in a word, very frum)

Modern Orthodox

I want to highlight this last one, because it is written by the Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshivat Chovevei, which is a progressive Modern Orthodox rabbinical school. They work very hard to read Torah through an authentically Orthodox lens while also maintaining deeply humanist values. As someone who walks a similar (if not identical) balancing act, this particular drash (sermon) spoke very deeply to me, and so I'm reposting it in its entirety**

[Edit: tumblr.hell seems real intent on not letting me do this in my original answer, so I will repost it in the reblogs. Please reblog that version if you're going to. Thanks!]

Something you will probably notice as you work your way through these sources, you'll note that there are substantially more traditional leaning responses. This is because of a major divide in how the different movements view Torah, especially as it pertains to changing ethics over time and modernity. I'm oversimplifying for space, but the differences are as follows:

The liberal movements (Reform, Renewal, Reconstructionist, etc.) view halacha as non-binding and the Torah as a human document that is, nevertheless, a sacred document. I've seen it described as the spiritual diary of our people throughout history. Others view it as divinely inspired, but still essentially and indelibly human.

The Orthodox and other traditional movements view halacha as binding and Torah as the direct word of G-d given to the Jewish people through Moshe Rabbeinu (Moses) on Mt. Sinai. (Or, at a minimum, as a divinely inspired text written and compiled by people that still represents the word of G-d. This latter view is mostly limited to the Conservative and Modern Orthodox movements.)

Because of these differences, the liberal movements are able to address most of these problematic passages by situating them in their proper historical context. It is only the Orthodox and traditional movements that must fully reckon with the texts as they are, and seek to understand how they speak to us in a contemporary context.

As for me? I'm part of a narrow band of traditional egalitarian progressive Jews that really ride that line between viewing halacha as binding and the Torah as divinely given, despite recognizing the human component of its authorship - more a partnership in its creation than either fully human invention or divine fiat. That said, I am personally less interested in who wrote it literally speaking and much more interested in the question of: How can we read Torah using the divinely given process of traditional Torah scholarship while applying deeply humanist values?

Yeshivat Chovevei does a really excellent job of approaching Torah scholarship this way, as does Hadar. Therefore, I'm not surprised that this article captures something I have struggled to articulate: an authentically orthodox argument for change.

[lovelylunasnow]

About the books:

A lot of you asked me about the books and where I got them.

Seeing your curiosity I will tell you all the story, but I got to warn you, it’s crazy and long.

Let me start by saying I live in a small town in the middle of nowhere. (Not joking, nobody will come here as a tourist, if anything they drive pass us without giving my town a second glance). It’s a very old town, kinda charming in its own spooky way as the town was built waaaayy back then in the late 1880’s and a lot of the old buildings are still standing and in use.

One said building is our old “public” library, a focal point for locals as we went there to read or use the internet or pass time as there is not much to do.

Sadly this changed when the old library keeper died, the library while it was use by the public it was technically private property owned and operated by the old library keeper and his family for many generations. His kids without telling anybody sold the library to a group without telling anybody.

Had they known that the town mayor was willing to pay double for the building to keep it being run as it was they would have probably changed their mind.

Sadly this is when stuff goes from bad to worse. The people they sold it to was a cult.

I am not joking, they claim to be people of god but their not, they are extremist who do some…. Very bad things I will not say here… but if I had to compare them to anybody I compare them to Warren Jeff and his cult. (I am not exaggerating).

They let their plans know about how they were going to turn the library to sell books that are “religious” and “safe” and they were going to “purge out” all the evil.

Knowing what they were going to do the town band together to complain even the mayor got involved and offered to buy it back but they refused.

So me and a couple of others knowing what was coming we banded together and made a little group to hopefully save the books as we knew they were planning to get rid of them.

For a couple of nights our group grew and we planned. The first few plans failed…. That being that we tried to check out as many books as we could before they did anything. Sadly they caught on and would stop anybody from taking the books.

Then the staff got involved and grabbed and snuck out as many books as they could and snuck them out before quitting. (Their words “We are not working for those wackos” ) The most smart was the janitor who stuffed as many books as he could inside his janitorial cart and left. He did it several times before he was caught and had to run away with the cart while the crazy people chased after him. (He got away).

Sadly it was not enough and there was still a lot of books left.

Even worse the cult got smart and basically locked the building, not letting anybody in or out as they “Performef a cleansing and got rid of all the words of Lucifer and Lilith”.

There was a chance that we were too late to save the rest of the books and manga but we wanted to take a last chance.

So some of the most bravest, myself included made up an operation which we called “Operation saving Alexandria”.

Me and several others with their pick ups would sneak into the building in the middle of the night, climb up the fence and look around hoping to find where they trashed the books…. Secretly praying they were not thrown into a shredder before being tossed out.

I, another and the driver snuck in, the driver would stay by the car, my partner would help me look around.

Eventually we found this large roll off dumpster, I got in with the help of my partner, at first I thought the books were shredded cause all I saw was white till I opened a bag and saw that they were not shredded, but rather the book binding was torn off and the pages were scattered.

This was salvageable so I began to take garbage bags and throw them to my partner who in turn ran them over and threw them over the fence to the driver who caught and put them in the back of the pick up.

Once the pick up was full we drove away and then the second team was dispatched. Did the same process till their pick up was full and drove off.

Between several of us we emptied out that container. Even though it took several hours and one of the group claims that his group got caught by the cops who then turned a blind eye and let them go, acting as if they saw nothing.

With all the bags placed in a neighbors house who was not only a former library employee but had a large storage barn we began the phase two.

Opening the bags we sorted out all the pages of the books and tried to figure out where they belonged to make the books whole again.

It was not easy work and it also further confirmed the cult was even more of lunatics than we thought as they literally threw everything away. All the history, science, math books ect, all of the manga and comics, fantasy, sci-fi, everything had been thrown out!

So ya, it took us a long time and the effort of almost the whole town (minus the cult) to piece the books back together, then we had a fund raiser to gather enough money to send the pages to bookbinders and such so the pages can be put together in proper hardcover books.

When it was done the storage barn was converted into local public library for all of us to enjoy. We even named the new building “Library of Alexandria” as a tribute for our operations with the people who used to work at the old library working there. (We even joked about how operation will eventually become local legend for us to share with our kids)

This hardcover Pokémon manga was one of the victims of the books that were thrown out and is now salvaged. Lovingly cared for everybody to read to their hearts content.

[fratricideknight]

i never really thought about this before, but when put through the lens of sam’s relentless queercoding, it becomes significant in a different sense that kubrick, the hunter who comes after sam in Bad Day at Black Rock, is explicitly religious. i get that it was probably just a funny gag, his misinterpreting the bad luck caused by the rabbit’s foot as God’s work, and it tied in with his evil antichrist themes, but sam was literally hunted down by a religious wacko who wanted to kill him for being “evil” according to word of mouth even when presented with no hard evidence to support the claim

[tomorrowusa]

Until this month, Bibi Netanyahu was a HŪGE fanboy of Hamas. Their relationship goes back decades. This is not some wacko conspiracy theory. Much of the information about this comes from mainstream Israeli media and high ranking Israeli former officials.

Here are excerpts from an in-depth article at the CBC – Canada's public broadcaster.

Israelis don't agree on much, especially lately, but polling shows they mostly agree that Prime Minister Benjamin "Bibi" Netanyahu is to blame for leaving Israel unprepared for Hamas's onslaught on October 7. The accusations aimed at Netanyahu go beyond merely failing to foresee or prevent the Hamas attack of October 7, however. Many accuse him of deliberately empowering the group for decades as part of a strategy to sabotage a two-state solution based on the principle of land for peace. "There's been a lot of criticism of Netanyahu in Israel for instating a policy for many years of strengthening Hamas and keeping Gaza on the brink while weakening the Palestinian Authority," said Mairav Zonszein of the International Crisis Group. "And we've seen that happening very clearly on the ground." "(Hamas and Netanyahu) are mutually reinforcing, in the sense that they provide each other with a way to continue to use force and rejectionism as opposed to making sacrifices and compromises in order to reach some kind of resolution," Zonszein told CBC News from Tel Aviv.

Bibi and Hamas could be called "frenemies".

Yuval Diskin, former head of Israel's Shin Bet security service, told the daily newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth in 2013 that "if we look at it over the years, one of the main people contributing to Hamas's strengthening has been Bibi Netanyahu, since his first term as prime minister." In August 2019, former prime minister Ehud Barak told Israeli Army Radio that Netanyahu's "strategy is to keep Hamas alive and kicking … even at the price of abandoning the citizens [of the south] … in order to weaken the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah." The logic underlying this strategy, Barak said, is that "it's easier with Hamas to explain to Israelis that there is no one to sit with and no one to talk to."

The Bibi-Hamas relationship goes back almost 30 years. In some ways, Hamas helped put Bibi in power in the first place.

Netanyahu first came to power in the 1996 election that followed the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin by an Israeli extremist opposed to the Oslo Accords. Early polls showed Rabin's successor Shimon Peres comfortably ahead. Determined to sabotage Oslo, Hamas embarked on a ruthless suicide bombing campaign that helped Netanyahu pull ahead of Peres and win the election on May 29, 1996. Today, some of the same extremists who called for Rabin's death hold power in Netanyahu's government.

A reminder that the current Israeli government led by Netanyahu is the most far right in Israel's history. Netanyahu filled it with extremists, religious fanatics, and virulent ethno-nationalists in order to stay in power.

Just two weeks before Rabin's assassination, a young settler extremist posed for the cameras with a Cadillac hood ornament he said he had stolen from Rabin's car. "Just like we got to this emblem," he said, "we could get to Rabin." Today, that young man, Itamar Ben Gvir, is 45 years old and has eight Israeli criminal convictions — including convictions for supporting a terrorist organization and incitement to racism. Once he was rejected by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) for his extremist views. Now, Israel's police must answer to him as Benjamin Netanyahu's minister of national security.

Imagine how a second Trump administration would be and you get a hint of what Bibi's pre-October 7th cabinet was like.

The Bibi-Hamas connection only gets worse.

Netanyahu's hawkish defence minister Avigdor Liberman was the first to report in 2020 that Bibi had dispatched Mossad chief Yossi Cohen and the IDF's officer in charge of Gaza, Herzi Halevi, to Doha to "beg" the Qataris to continue to send money to Hamas. "Both Egypt and Qatar are angry with Hamas and planned to cut ties with them. Suddenly Netanyahu appears as the defender of Hamas," the right-wing leader complained. A year later, Netanyahu was further embarrassed when photos of suitcases full of cash going to Hamas became public. Liberman finally resigned in protest over Netanyahu's Hamas policy which, he said, marked "the first time Israel is funding terrorism against itself."

Yep, Bibi actually had a bag man deliver cash to Hamas.

The Palestinian Authority's Ahmed Majdalani accused the Qatari envoy of carrying money to Hamas "like a gangster." "The PLO did not agree to the deal facilitating the money to Hamas that way," he said.

Netanyahu fancies himself as a clever Machiavellian playing one side against the other. He has even bragged of this to members of his party.

On March 12, 2019, Netanyahu defended the Hamas payments to his Likud Party caucus on the grounds that they weakened the pro-Oslo Palestinian Authority, according to the Jerusalem Post: "Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu defended Israel's regular allowing of Qatari funds to be transferred into Gaza, saying it is part of a broader strategy to keep Hamas and the Palestinian Authority separate, a source in Monday's Likud faction meeting said," the Post reported. "The prime minister also said that 'whoever is against a Palestinian state should be for' transferring the funds to Gaza, because maintaining a separation between the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza helps prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state."

Of course Bibi was ultimately being too clever by half.

Netanyahu insisted that neither the money nor the construction material given to Hamas would be diverted to military purposes. But today, the IDF finds itself showing how Hamas has done exactly that — by diverting and converting civilian funds and materials to warlike purposes. The military tried to warn him at the time, former IDF chief of staff Gadi Eisenkot told the Ma'ariv newspaper. He said Netanyahu acted "in total opposition to the national assessment of the National Security Council, which determined that there was a need to disconnect from the Palestinians and establish two states."

A lot of radical chic Hamas fans in Western countries will undoubtedly try to obscure the fact that they are cheering the same group which a far right Israeli politician (until recently) has been lavishing with tons of cash.

And the Bibi-Hamas connection is a reminder that while far right politicians in many countries like to portray themselves as tough on security, they will usually put their craven lust for power above all.

[parasprite]

modern rise in tradwife and its related parenting fads comes as no surprise when you consider that mothers have always been held to impossible standards of maternal perfection and the rise of social media has them being more watched and scrutinised than ever, strangers picking apart their every single decision and calling them terrible mothers no matter what they do — no wonder they shape themselves for the approval of the Most vocal and Most sexist public opinions and end up treating little reighlynne's measles with organic no sugar granola because the keyboard warriors condemn any demon mother who has to resort to pharmaceuticals or whatever the fuck

the parenting advice industry is huge and filled with unqualified opinions, but it's Always been the most extreme, most controversial, most wacko religious parents who rise to the top and get the most attention. and now with tiktok and instagram it's easier than ever for a mommy influencer to get in on this grift, even (or especially) if she forewent formal education, married a rich man and started having babies young. you don't need to know shit about photography or business to point a camera at your biege playroom and make millions going tiktok viral. no matter what a mom does, people are gonna be angry; rage drives engagement and makes more money, so the wider social media trends are always gonna follow whatever pisses people off the most. the christian mom with the Most kids, with the Weirdest names, with the Most uncomfortable cryptofascist messaging is gonna get the most attention. and women who are just struggling and looking for easy parenting advice are going to get funneled into that echo chamber no matter what. and feminist mothers and child psychologists and doctors with anything actually useful to say are going to be underrepresented because they don't have a cloth nappy and peasant dress brand deal in their caption.

tradwife influencers are, at the heart of it, advertisements; they exist to sell products and ebooks and a romanticised, oversimplified lifestyle to their followers, while they simultaneously profit off spectacle, shock and rage from their detractors.

there's a reason why conservatives love the nuclear family so much. it's a multi billion dollar industry.

[girlactionfigure]

🔅Sunday morning - ISRAEL REALTIME - Connecting to Israel in Realtime

PASSOVER is Monday night!

❓SHIITE ATTACK CLAIM.. The Shiite militias in Iraq claim that they attacked a “vital target” in the Golan early this morning using a UAV.  (( No air defense alerts in Israel. ))

❓IRAN ATTACK CLAIM.. "In the attack we carried out on Israel, we destroyed a large intelligence center in one of the Zionist cities." - Iranian general Rad.  (( Lying liers lie. ))

▪️FOLLOW UPS ON IRAN & IRAQI ATTACKS.. satellite photos show an S-300 Russian air defense system completely destroyed in Iran by the Israeli attack.  In Iraq, heavy weapons depots were destroyed - “Iraqi officials claim the base was attacked with laser-guided bombs”.  This is somewhat unlikely as ‘laser-guided’ means someone is nearby marking the target with a laser.

▪️GAZA.. Heavy attacks this morning by the Air Force in the Nusirat camp and the surrounding area, the center of the Gaza Strip. The Israeli Navy has also been firing on terrorist targets since the early hours. According to reports from Gaza, warships are firing along the coasts of the central and northern Gaza Strip.

🇺🇸 AMERICAN POLICY IS WACKO.. the Biden administration policy contradictions: US blocked the UN vote of recognition of Palestine's membership in the United Nations, the president openly supported  the passing of the Ukraine / Israel / Taiwan aid package, but now intends to impose sanctions on distinct units in the IDF, in this case Netzach Yehuda (which is the primary charedi draft unit).  By statements from US Sec State Blinken, there is intentional subversion of Israeli society involved - separating the “extreme right wing” Otzma and Religious Zionism factions - though a miss as Netzach Yehuda is not their segments (but if the US comes after the Hesder Yeshiva units next, then it will be clear).

▪️AID SHIPS FROM TURKEY.. Humanitarian flotilla set to sail for Gaza from Turkey this week, and Israel is negotiating with Turkey to reroute the aid through Egypt to prevent repeat of deadly 2010 flotilla raid.  The three-ship convoy will carry humanitarian aid for the residents of Gaza and 1,200 people from 30 countries on board. Also on board will be pro-Palestinian members of parliament from Spain, Norway and Canada. The plan is for the ships to sail to the Egyptian port of El-Arish and continue from there to Rafah.

▪️TERROR TRAP - KOHAV HASHACHAR.. An Israeli civilian injured as a result of an bomb near the Samaria town off Kohav HaShahar. The man was trying to remove a Palestinian flag on the side of the Route 458 highway when it exploded.

▪️WEEKEND PROTESTS.. The “Kaplan” protests (Kaplan intersection, Tel Aviv) this weekend focused on demanding elections.  Size estimate from online crowd estimation tools - 80,000. 

▪️FAKE - ILLEGAL PROTEST ON HIGHWAY 1 RESULTS IN 2 DEATHS..  we previously shared a report of an illegal protest on highway 1 resulting in deaths, but found no confirmations, so must consider this fake.

🍞SELL your Chametz, Passover is almost here! -> https://www.chabad.org/holidays/passover/sell_chometz_cdo/sc/passover_home_button

[soup-mother]

Can you post your map with broadcast locations you've heard or would that doxx you?

oh yea sure! just keep in mind this map is from 1996, zaire has not returned.

mostly from china and south east asia, only 4 from the USA and they were all either weird religious wackos or trying to convince cuba to overthrow their government. i sometimes pick up stuff from Algeria :)

i also hear shortwave HAMs but haven't put them on as pins because I can't google where they're from. but I've heard ppl from England and france

[laluzdejesusofficial]

Established in 1986 La Luz de Jesus Gallery is the brainchild of entrepreneur and art collector Billy Shire, considered primarily responsible for fostering a new school of California art and prompting JUXTAPOZ Magazine to dub him “the Peggy Guggenheim of Lowbrow.”

Showcasing mainly figurative, narrative paintings and unusual sculpture, the exhibitions are post-pop with content ranging from folk to outsider to religious to sexually deviant. The gallery’s objective is to bring underground art and counter-culture to the masses. Past shows have been groundbreaking, exhibiting artists, such as Manuel Ocampo, Joe Coleman, and Robert Williams.

Hello Tumblr, I am happy to start bringing you news on current and upcoming exhibitions from internationally renowned to up-and-coming artists, as well as La Luz De Jesus and WACKO history.

[argumate]

Since January 16, priests have been conducting prayers and performing rituals as workers move the idol into the temple’s complex. Senior leaders of the BJP have given numerous television interviews about the events, with Indian news channels running 24/7 coverage about the temple’s festivities.

The ceremony is also expected to be aired abroad in Indian embassies and on huge TV screens in New York’s Times Square.

Ahead of the event, Modi has been fasting and praying in an 11-day ritual steeped in Hindu religious symbolism.

“The Lord has made me an instrument to represent all the people of India during the consecration,” he said in a recorded message on his YouTube channel.

“I seek blessings from all of you,” Modi added.

it's just great that the prime minister of the biggest country in the world is a religious wacko

[amateurmonastic]

Sort of a personal credo

What I believe, as a (not very orthodox) Anglican, Episcopalian, Christian:

The Episcopal Church is my spiritual home

I can trust the priest at my parish as a reliable, helpful authority figure

Truth is best grasped through story, poetry, and music

The story of Jesus is the primary story I want to tell myself about the world (but not the only story)

Anglican Christianity is The Right Way for me, but not necessarily for everybody

God is good, is creative, is loving, and as Julian of Norwich teaches, there is no anger in God; anger is something we project onto God

The Trinity is actually an important doctrine

The Incarnation is the most important doctrine

The Plan A Theory of the Incarnation: God always intended to become human in order to make humans divine. Even if we had not fallen, God would still have incarnated. (There just wouldn't have been that whole horrible public execution thing.)

What I don't believe:

That Christianity or any other religion has an exclusive claim to the truth

That being queer is against the will of God or in any way sinful

That sexual sin is worse than pride, greed, envy, or the other three deadlies

That most of what we call sexual sin is even sinful (I personally think sexual sin is mostly disregarding consent or breaking promises about sexual fidelity)

That there's any religious institution free from people who are there to get power over others and abuse it

That Jesus is coming *any minute now* to punish punish punish

That the Rapture is even a legit Christian doctrine, American fundamentalists are all wacko heretics in my book

[the-hype-dragon]

2024 has been so enlightening, I didn't realize how many people were still living in the dark ages where simply being romantically involved with a woman gives a man the right to demand sex from her or outright rape her. there were the neil gaiman apologists but now the stomach-turning avignon rape case. or sometimes you encounter this attitude in the wild, occasionally with the twist that a woman is abusive if she says no to sex. e.g. this post. but I've seen this sort of rhetoric repeated all over rightwing twitter where men have effectively bullied women into thinking that having any shred of self-respect or solidarity with other women makes one a feminazi

like where the heck do these freaks come from and why is it that this attitude is so widespread not only among the usual crowd but among secular society too? the way some feminists talk you'd think it's only the wacko religious wingnuts saying this but no, it seems to be just about everybody. even a lot of women think women aren't entitled to have ANY boundaries whatsoever, especially not in intimate relationships. even leftists seem to agree that women expecting to be treated with kindness and decency by their bfs or husbands is unreasonable. I don't get it

[snixx]

Hey .. I'm new on tumblr but I'm also desi like you (I'm from Delhi) and I'm just confused. I love being a Hindu, I wholeheartedly believe in my religion and you could consider me moderately religious. But recently, after seeing BJP and Hindu supremacists and their actions I feel guilty to be Hindu. I'm scared that people will look at me like I'm the bad person. I believe in secularism I really respect other religions too but sometimes I feel so bad that I'm happily following my religion but others cannot. And I feel like I sound like a bigot and a hypocrite everytime I practice my religion at the expense of others. :(((. Just a rant lol

ok so firstly no one is going to think you're a bad person just for being hindu lol. any indian who thinks that is going around hating 80% of the people around them by default so tell me if that sounds like a plausible way to live in a society to you (not to mention that 80% of people are literally hindu themselves)

religion is a really personal thing that means different things to different people. and what we think of as hinduism today is an amalgamation of so many different belief systems. and the most popular interpretation of it which is how most people perceive it is a deeply flawed at least partially man-made system. unfortunately organized religion pretty much always comes with a lot of horrible baggage + bigotry, meaning it's always gonna be a breeding ground for really shitty people. that makes it hard to separate from said shittiness for a lot of people (like me personally for example; i believe that if the gods exist i dont like them very much for all the hell they allow on earth in their name), which is valid. but it is obviously possible to follow any religion you want and be a good person as long as you critically engage with it and are compassionate to people outside your religion and their experiences with being persecuted for not following said religion. there are lots of cool things about hinduism. embrace those, discard the bad stuff, and keep your eyes open and stand up for the people who are systematically hurt by the popular wacko fascist interpretation of it that's destroying our country. it counts for a lot. people are always more willing to listen to people like them, unfortunately. feeling bad about being part of a majoritarian/oppressor demographic ultimately helps nobody. do something about it. read about caste and the fight for its annihilation. talk about these things with other more radicalised hindus and get them to see the harmful stuff theyre complicit in. it could go a long way.

personally im so used to interacting with bhakts IRL im just really glad to meet religious hindu people who don't blindly condone bigotry lol

[magicalgirlagency]

Sorry for asking something personal, but do you have bad experiences with belos-like christians? Considering the fact that you're christian(albeit name-only) and the way you talk about him.

Well, to my luck, I didn't grew up with bible-thumping lunatics in my family, and my mom personally had issues with evangelicals and absolutely refused to sign me and my brother up to catholic schools. I was baptized catholic as a baby, but I've changed religions after finishing high school, and I'm now a spiritist (a small and obscure branch of christianity with a strong belief in reincarnation).

However, my issues with those nutjobs are more external, outside of my family; like how there are literal politicians and priests who have used the word of God, who shove their backwards beliefs down other people's throats, use brainwashing/fear-mongering tactics, shamelessly supporting extremists and being responsible for strenghtening the right wing movement.

And I'm everything that those wackos hate, so you must imagine how awful it must feel being targeted by being who you are, and your perception of the world is instantly shattered once you leave the comfort of your home; no matter what you do, you're relentlessly judged and treated like a pariah.

I was lucky to have had a proper education growing up. I still believe in God, but it's hard for me to have a good vision of religion when there's a minor but vocal group committing crimes and spilling innocent blood in His name. Even the simple act of praying to God is a herculean task for me.

I may do my best to follow God's teachings and help others in need, but if I'm going to Hell for just being myself, then so be it. I know very well who I am. If Heaven is where all the right-wing politicians and religious freaks go after they die, then I'd much rather side with Satan.