Social programming + the collapse of religion and values.

daskakik

Sure, you can choose not to believe any of them.

As, of course, I do so choose, as do many others. The fact is that corporate mind bogglers have the bully pulpit and they use it to its fullest extent to sway the public perceptions.

You forgot churches.

So I did, but I think I clarified my rejection of that paradigm as well. Which is not to say that others should agree with my conclusions or that I hold them in contempt for not agreeing with me. To each his own, keeping in mind there are more options than yea or nay on any given issue.

frazzle
As, of course, I do so choose, as do many others.

Then why say that choice is an illusion?

daskakik

frazzle
As, of course, I do so choose, as do many others.

Then why say that choice is an illusion?

The point I was responding to was that I "should stop watching FOX news", giving tacit credibility to the rest of them. Its like the illusion of voting for candidate A instead of candidate B when both are pre-selected by the same corporate interests. YOU won't win, either way.

frazzle
The point I was responding to was that I "should stop watching FOX news", giving tacit credibility to the rest of them.

That was probably because you singled out FOX news.

I didn't see anyone imply that the rest of them where any more credible. I think that was just you.

daskakik

frazzle
The point I was responding to was that I "should stop watching FOX news", giving tacit credibility to the rest of them.

That was probably because you singled out FOX news.

I didn't see anyone imply that the rest of them where any more credible. I think that was just you.

Spin it however you like, I was told to stop watching FOX News, not that the media in general is not trustworthy.

And as I pointed out, FOX happened to be the corporation that challenged the previous court's findings, but the appeals court did not find in FOX's favor, they found that "there is no rule against distorting or falsifying the news in the United States. That wasn't "just me", that is the law. If no one believes their lies, why are they still in business?

reply to post by frazzle


So there it is. Believers vs nonbelievers. I should have guessed that would be the bottom line. This has nothing to do with spirituality. You're mad because your winning horse is old and dying.

@Krazysh0t....

So you are saying that because in the past, discriminating against homosexuals was the norm, therefore it is not only right but justified?

No. the norm was that marriage was defined as being between a man and a woman, like in many countries even today. It isn't the same as ''discriminating'' against homosexuality. Homosexuality not being accepted as a norm isn't exactly ''discrimination'', as often claimed.

.

Marriage isn't the sole domain of religion either. Marriage in one form or another has popped up in literally EVERY society in existence. Christians stole the idea of marriage and pretend like they invented it or something.

The world over ''marraige'' has traditionally been between a man and a woman. Christians dont act like they invented marraige (and nobody claims they did) and neither did they ''steal'' it. If anything at all, certain groups have succesfully been able to rewrite norms, and include gays in the definition of marraige.

Religion and government try to put their own "rules" into marriage, but all that does is obscure the true intent, that it is an act of love not religion or government. And if that love is shared by two individuals of the same sex, then so be it.

Being biased against religion, you will naturally object to its role in marraige. That is a subjective opinion. And the ''true intent'' of marraige... according to who or what? The media has been known to use fluffy buzzwords like ''love'' to promote certain concepts... its purely an appeal to emotion, often mistaken as a valid argument and repeated by many.

reply to post by sk0rpi0n


Men were getting married to men and women to women before any form of Judaism happened.

reply to post by frazzle

There is nothing to spin. You named a name and someone responded to that.

It was just you, assuming that the person telling you to stop watching fox news implied anything about any other news outlet. That has nothing to do with any decision handed down by the courts.

Krazysh0t.... You do not understand atheism or agnosticism if you think that we let the media tell us what to think. As an agnostic, I let skepticism, critical thought, and probability shape my world view. I look up as much information about a topic as I can (all sides of an argument) then using skepticism and playing the odds, I determine the most likely answer to the question. It's all quite analytical really and has nothing to do with letting someone else tell me what to think.

The media does its job rather subtly. No one is on your TV telling you ''x is right, and so accept it'', though its doing just that, only subtly. Keep suggesting the same thing over and over, and it becomes an ingrained part of your outlook...you think you arrived at it by yourself through ''skepticism'' and ''critical thought''...buzzwords which non-theists like to think are theirs. In reality, its the theists who look through media proramming and manipulation who are truly practicing skepticism and critical thought.

Your disconnect comes from the fact that you think that non-religious people behave like religious people and naturally want to fill the void of a preacher so turn to media, but if that were true they'd be religious.

Eh? I never said anything about anybody wanting to ''fill'' any void. Thats not even my argument. I have said that without religious influence, the media becomes even more powerful in influencing people. Especially people who lack a spiritual higher self and are driven solely by their lower instincts. The media takes on the position of a religion in dictating societal norms, as has been proven.

Religion makes its money through coercing its patrons to tithe every week. In reality they are paying for religion so that religion can tell them what's "acceptable."

differences explained in previous posts. In the case of media, the people behind it are unknown and unelected powers...who have rewritten societal norms and made money off it.

Still want to see what the difference between religion and media is.

I've expanded on this subect in great detail in previous posts.

edit on 16-2-2014 by sk0rpi0n because: (no reason given)

reply to post by sk0rpi0n


I don't watch the news. ATS is as close as I get to any mainstream station. So what's your rationale for my case? Because if you wanna become famous debunking standard psychology, biology, geology and world history textbooks, good luck.

krazyshot... Your disconect comes from.....

(continued from previous post)Eh? I never said anything about anybody wanting to ''fill'' any void. Thats not even my argument. I have said that without religious influence, the media becomes even more powerful in influencing people. Especially people who lack a spiritual higher self and are driven solely by their lower instincts. The media takes on the position of a religion in dictating societal norms, as has been proven.

Religion makes its money through coercing its patrons to tithe every week. In reality they are paying for religion so that religion can tell them what's "acceptable."

differences explained in previous posts. In the case of media, the people behind it are unknown and unelected powers...who have rewritten societal norms and made money off it.

Still want to see what the difference between religion and media is.

I've expanded on this subect in great detail in previous posts.

reply to post by sk0rpi0n


What if my "spiritual higher self" doesn't feel right with the moral authority or guidance of the spiritual services you're selling?

AfterInfinity
reply to post by sk0rpi0n

 

I don't watch the news. ATS is as close as I get to any mainstream station. So what's your rationale for my case?

Others have also claimed they don't watch TV or even own one....but I have made it clear that the media is just one aspect. Living in a society that accepts ''x'' as normal can also be influential in shaping your views. When everybody else around you defines carrot as a fruit, you'll start calling carrot a ''fruit'' as well.

reply to post by sk0rpi0n


Ok if marriage is an act of religion, can two atheists get married? We'll keep the question simple and say that they are different genders. One would think that two atheists getting married would be just as blasphemous as two gay people getting married. After all, the atheists do not believe in a god or gods and therefore utilizing an institution that is based in religion would be blasphemous to that religion.

If it is ok for two atheists to marry, then it is ok for two gay people to get married. I mean at least the gay people could possibly be religious themselves. But I don't see waves of Christians putting forth an endless battle trying to prohibit atheists from marrying each other.

Also, yes Christianity has stolen the idea of marriage. They are the ones who come out and say that gays are destroying the sanctity of marriage. But since when did Christians get sole say in what the sanctity of marriage is in the first place? You say that traditionally marriage has been between a man and a woman, but I say in response that the reason for that is a combination due to religious bigotry, gays being a natural minority in the gene pool, and social stigma.

reply to post by sk0rpi0n


Being black or Jewish was also not considered normal in society either......and we already know the steps those societies took to deal with these "diseased freaks".

Just because something is or is not a social norm doesn't mean anything in regards to whether it is natural or morally right.

Slavery was once an accepted norm in every society.
Pedophilia was once an excepted norm in society.
Mob justice was the norm in many societies.
Execution for petty crimes was once a social norm in society.
Shoving blacks into the gutter, or treating them as subhuman was once a social norm.
Spousal abuse was once a social norm.
Forced marriage was once a social norm.
Child Labor was once a social norm.
Illiteracy was once a social norm.

You wanna support these social norms? If so, we are done talking.

We change what constitutes the social norm as we learn and discover more. Nowadays homosexuality is slowly becoming a social norm, and the only people whining about it are the religious bigots. The same people who were whining that de-segregation and interracial marriage would bring down society and be the end of civilization. 50 years and millions of mixed race people later, western civilization still dominates the world. In fact, we are doing better than the backwards countries like Iran, Uganda, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Russia and Zimbabwe where homosexuality is persecuted by anything from jail time to grisly death sentences.

If you want to live somewhere that espouses your view of proper social norms and healthy families, feel free to move to one of those lovely countries listed above. They are chock full of "traditional man-woman healthy" families and religious zealots who are totally on board with your line of thinking, and want to see it enforced by any means necessary. And even better yet, they haven't been "brainwashed" or "poisoned" by the evil leftist agenda on tv......probably because a lot of them can't afford tvs. Or couches. Or electricity. Or food. Or workable infrastructure. The rest live in countries where the government insures that no evil gay-lovin western propaganda gets through, and makes sure that only state approved media is passed around.

From what I hear, the cost of living is great in those countries if you have dollars. I'll even pay for your plane ticket to one of these gay-free utopias. Just whatever you do, don't drink the water. Or eat the food.

sk0rpi0n
differences explained in previous posts. In the case of media, the people behind it are unknown and unelected powers...who have rewritten societal norms and made money off it.

They may be unknown to you, but a simple Google search will tell me who owns the various media companies. Here Media Giants. You can also Google those companies to get the shareholders as well. Though I fail to see how a social brainwashing tool (media or religion) is dependent on whether we know the names of the people in charge or not.

You keep claiming that you've explained the differences between the social brainwashing that is religion and media, but you really haven't. All you have done is say that religion has a moral high ground because it is based in divinity. Though that premise is flawed because the only proof of this divinity is contained within the religion. You are also giving more credence to the messages of religion because it has been around longer. This is also a flawed premise since, just because people have always believed something, doesn't make it correct or true. That is a bandwagon fallacy and results in another flawed premise. If you remove the flawed premises, then all that remains of religion is just another social brainwashing tool of the elite to get the masses to obey their twisted views of the world. Think of it like this, the Bible or Qur'an are just the CNN or Fox News of the ancient world.

Krazysh0tp.....Ok if marriage is an act of religion, can two atheists get married? We'll keep the question simple and say that they are different genders. One would think that two atheists getting married would be just as blasphemous as two gay people getting married. After all, the atheists do not believe in a god or gods and therefore utilizing an institution that is based in religion would be blasphemous to that religion.

If it is ok for two atheists to marry, then it is ok for two gay people to get married. I mean at least the gay people could possibly be religious themselves. But I don't see waves of Christians putting forth an endless battle trying to prohibit atheists from marrying each other.

Christianty doesn't ''own'' marriage. And atheists getting married would not be ''blasphemous'' to anybody.

Also, yes Christianity has stolen the idea of marriage. They are the ones who come out and say that gays are destroying the sanctity of marriage.

Who exactly did christians ''steal'' marriage from? How is it even possible to ''steal'' the idea of marraige, when male-female unions is what got humans this far? Ridiculous.

/11.

AfterInfinity
reply to post by frazzle

 

So there it is. Believers vs nonbelievers. I should have guessed that would be the bottom line. This has nothing to do with spirituality. You're mad because your winning horse is old and dying.

edit on 16-2-2014 by AfterInfinity because: (no reason given)

Mad? Hardly. Saddened, disgusted and a whole lot of other adjectives, but getting mad is useless. True this old warhorse is about through here and leaving this godawful quagmire couldn't happen any too soon to suit me because watching the people of this planet being murdered over resources is death to the spiritual notions of any thinking person, anyway. That's what lies do, they eat us up from the inside and leave nothing but an empty crater where our hearts should be.

Remember? Bin Laden did 9/11. The news chanted "we found a passport, we found a car with a Koran in it, they hate us for our freedoms" OVER and OVER and OVER while dumbed down idiots screamed USA USA USA. And then Mueller very quietly added to the FBI website that there is NO evidence linking Bin Laden to the attack. But by then we were knee deep in Afghan blood. Over lies. And 12 years later we're still there, killing and blowing things up. Over lies.

Remember Al Qaeda was in Iraq, weapons of mass destruction, they hate us for our freedom, it'll be a cakewalk. USA USA USA.

Damn fools. Spiritually dead damn fools.

sk0rpi0n

Krazysh0tp.....Ok if marriage is an act of religion, can two atheists get married? We'll keep the question simple and say that they are different genders. One would think that two atheists getting married would be just as blasphemous as two gay people getting married. After all, the atheists do not believe in a god or gods and therefore utilizing an institution that is based in religion would be blasphemous to that religion.

If it is ok for two atheists to marry, then it is ok for two gay people to get married. I mean at least the gay people could possibly be religious themselves. But I don't see waves of Christians putting forth an endless battle trying to prohibit atheists from marrying each other.

Christianty doesn't ''own'' marriage. And atheists getting married would not be ''blasphemous'' to anybody.

Also, yes Christianity has stolen the idea of marriage. They are the ones who come out and say that gays are destroying the sanctity of marriage.

Who exactly did christians ''steal'' marriage from? How is it even possible to ''steal'' the idea of marraige, when male-female unions is what got humans this far? Ridiculous.

edit on 16-2-2014 by sk0rpi0n because: (no reason given)

If atheists can get married, then why can't two gay people get married? I'm really at a loss for the logical breakdown. If marriage isn't the domain of religion, then religion shouldn't have a say on who can and cannot get married. If it is the domain of religion then religion is being hypocritical by saying that gays cannot get married while giving a free pass to atheists who are non-believers.

Also, if marriage isn't the domain of religion, then give me a GOOD scientific reason why gay people shouldn't get married. Science is showing that homosexuality is a natural act of nature. Also if two gay people can show love for each other, then it is only natural that they'd want to spend a long period of time with each other. Where does living together stop becoming living together and start becoming marriage, especially without religion?