darth_ender

Bingowings said:

Tuff.

Good boy.  I'm sure you're proud of yourself.  You've earned the right to be a bigot by dealing with whatever hardship you have.  You've earned the right to define everyone else's belief system and paint them all with a broad brush.  I thought that respect was important to you, and that when someone kindly asked someone else to stop doing something you found offensive, you hoped that such mutual respect would yield results.  It saddens me to see this side of you.

Bingo, I am sorry, but your persecution complex does not give you a free excuse to mock others' religious beliefs.  In the past I'd just laugh at your sardonic nature and esoteric comments, but at this point it is clear that you simply intend to be mean and offend wherever possible.  I've been mocked and criticized for my beliefs many times, so it's not like I can't take it.  But I really don't appreciate the ongoing level of disrespect towards the man I consider my Savior and your paper thin justification of why you can continue to do so.  I have never mocked you for your sexual orientation.  I have never advocated any mistreatment of homosexuals, and neither has any other Christian here.  While many Christians may believe you do not warrant salvation, many others, myself included, don't think that such is the case.  Have you ever been stoned?  Have I ever advocated anything like that?  Even in my youth when other teens mocked kids for being gay, I never joined in and often befriended them, and I've only become more understanding as I've aged.  You don't have to agree with a thing I say, and obviously the most I can do is put you on ignore, but quite honestly I don't want to read your disrespectful crap again.  I've usually thought of you as the gentleman of the forum, but lately you've come off as little more than the loquacious teenager making fun of people for believing what they do because it's "cool" and gets you attention.  This is a far cry from the Bingowings I had come to respect.

I have not been a faithful watcher, but I hope to eventually get through it all. If they do not give anything more than bonus content for now, I hope that Disney/LFL will at least provide a second feature film to wrap things up. Sure, the first CW movie wasn't so great, but other incomplete shows (e.g. Firefly) can still be tied up surprisingly nicely with a well written movie (e.g. Serenity).

Try and tone down the rhetoric and look what happens.  I was even providing compliments.  As much as I have to say (and as many posts as I would like to reply to), I think I'm better off sticking to my original plan for now and resuming my vow of silence.  I use my time better when I do.

Have I come off as painfully offended? Or have I perhaps come off as simply suggesting that we need not offend, because I assure you, the latter is my intent? I assure you, it is not your mocking of Christianity that has bothered me, and my initial comments were directed primarily at Puggo, with CP3S as a secondary thought, and at the time you had not entered my mind. What now bothers me is your feeling of entitlement to criticize using whatever language you desire, and then, it doesn't even exceptionally bug me--more like a mild annoyance. So let me get this straight: it is your theory that one may be insensitive and critique anyone else as long as the actions one engages in are by choice rather than by biological tendency? If so, I've already got a number of holes to poke in it.

And let me encourage you not to interpret everyone who disagrees with your sexual orientation as an attack. People can disagree with each other without attacking each other. I know there are Christians and other faiths that strongly condemn or persecute or even kill homosexuals. But there are also many (especially Christians) who perhaps oppose the practice while embracing the practitioner as a fellow sinner. Just because our sins are different doesn't make me a better person than you. I honestly consider you one of my favorite posters on this site, and I would be pleased if we ever had the opportunity to personally meet.

I love the excuse that because someone belongs to a group that has been historically persecuted, they have the right to be offended.  Is it because persecuting Christians is more of a rising phenomenon that we do not have the right to be offended yet?  What about the fact that Christians were horribly mistreated and executed by the Romans 2000 years ago? Perhaps I get a "Get Offended for Free" pass for that.  Or what about young, thin, white males who still get bullied? Do they get no such card because they don't fit any approved demographic? What about the fact that Mormons have historically been persecuted, even killed and illegally evicted from Missouri by the governor or had their property liquidated by the US government because they practiced an "alternative lifestyle" of plural marriage (illegalized after the practice was already going), and to this day are branded as non-Christians/cultists by the a large portion of believers? Even though my personal persecution has not been so harsh, do I have a special right thanks to the historical persecution of Mormons?  Or does the fact that I was often criticized and even threatened as a Mormon missionary in a very Protestant part of the country give me enough leeway to get offended? What about the fact that Christians are still persecuted in Islamic countries?  Surely that guarantees the right to get offended on the Internet.  Or what about the fact that in the most populous country in the world where (shockingly) atheism/agnosticism holds the highest number of affiliates, there is institutionalized suppression of religion? Surely I can get offended by proxy.

I see no problem with asking for a greater level of consideration to others' feelings. I've seen it done a lot around here. In fact, if I were to point my finger at one person who stands far above the rest in urging restraint when it appears that tempers may be rising, a fellow who goes by Bing O'Wings (you'd think he's Irish with a name like that, but he's actually a Scotsman) seems to often be the one making calls for kindness.

No, I'm afraid that I and everyone else have the right to be offended on the Internet. I think I've read most who are presently participating in this conversation getting offended at someone else. You know, it's just one of those things that still matters, even if we are hundreds or thousands of miles apart, even if we never see each other's faces. I still respect each of you, no matter your distance or how depersonalized the Internet has made you. Therefore I'd expect to attempt to engage with each of you in a respectful conversation. I hope you will all agree with me.

@Bingo, c'mon, we've had discussion where others' views on homosexuality have offended you, and clearly you became defensive. I don't blame you. The Internet does offend. But I gave my comment in order to avoid a discussion that devolves into the simplistic religion-bashing. It's not at that point now, not even close, but I fear it could go that way. There is a lovely atheist thread where religion bashing can go on for all I care. But since I started this thread, I feel a certain sense of ownership, and part of that ownership includes a desire to enhance understand rather than stifle it. I have been having these discussions for years, I know that people who think from a purely logical viewpoint see faith as a childish concept, or perhaps willful ignorance at best. I don't agree, and I myself find them ignorant to a different form of seeking knowledge. But we can all get along, as long as all parties involved keep it civil. Mocking someone because he relies on faith or she feels deeply that there is a God or they interpret God differently may feel sophisticated, but really it's just childish. It is not reason or logic I critique, but rather mocking tones or the need to prove something. Someone can share why they don't believe, and perhaps challenge me to follow the same methods. But repeatedly saying that the reasons I do believe are a little silly or hilarious are rather counterproductive, both the the mutual relationship as well as in trying to win converts. I am not trying to prove God exists, but rather share my reasons. I've attempted to be respectful, even when I've disagreed. I think we all owe each other that courtesy. I'm not saying anyone is intentionally trying to offend, but I am urging caution that we do our best to avoid it.

@Puggo, I as a Mormon have a bit of a different interpretation of God's mercy and his willingness to forgive than most of Christendom: we tend to be rather liberal in our interpretation of God's grace. While we believe homosexuality to be wrong in itself, I have no doubt that God will be merciful and judge your friend more by his character than by his sexual preferences.

A quick interjection (breaking my vow of silence momentarily) to point out that this thread is not about proving any particular religion or simply a belief in God at all to be true or false. I don't wan this to continue as an argument about the validity of one's faith or another's atheism. I cannot prove an atheist is wrong (which I assure you was never my intent a few pages back), and an atheist cannot prove that God does not exist or that a person has not experienced a very personal experience. One's loss of faith in spite of previous spiritual experience does not equate its falsity in another. And just because 7 billion people have reached slightly to dramatically different conclusions from one another on one topic or another does not mean that all views (but the purely scientific) are false or close to it.

This thread was started to promote understanding, not alienation. What I hope to read about are things like the discussion on birth control, a perfectly valid discussion. Or perhaps we could hear more about why someone does not believe: that's very interesting and worthy of discussion. What I do not want to read about is why I shouldn't believe, or why someone else shouldn't believe. And what I want to hear least about are sarcastic comments about a someone else's spiritual experiences and how they falsely equate to Star Wars folklore. I sorta consider that in bad taste.

Didn't adhere very well to that last one.  Took my final today and did well, but not quite well enough to pass the course.  I've had some very bad exams this semester that are weighing me down, and now I am extremely close to the pass/fail line.  Fortunately the class does offer a remediation exam which I will take in the near future.  But for now I've got to take a break to try to pass nursing.

I'll have to get back to you.  I've got to take a hiatus for school reasons.  I'm so close to the pass/fail line, it's making me sick.  Gotta study!  Keep up the crusade ;)

^ :D

This has to be my last post of the day, but what does God get by receiving our prayers and praise? From them, nothing. Just the knowledge that we've turned to him, want to be with him, and have chosen to accept him. God is the epitome of altruism. Of course we all know of references to God as a "jealous God" and such, but in reality, his whole reason for asking us to worship him is so that we may learn to perfect ourselves and one day join him.

Besides, one day he is hoping we will pass the Great Barrier and bring him a starship ;)

Ah, can't respond fast enough. Walkingdork, not everyone who reads the Bible interprets that Ghandi will go to hell. And for you and Bingowings, the worship of God is for our benefit, not his. God's reasoning is far above ours, but that does not make him alien or unknowable--he is only as alien as someone you've never taken the time to get to know, perhaps never heard about. Once you invest the time, you develop a relationship, and though you cannot know all his purposes with everyone human, you can start to understand his plans for you.

@walkingdork, yes, the phrasing was a joke, calling Obama a Communist was a joke, referring to his constituents as disciples was a joke (for most), and saying that Hollywood never has Communists as the enemy is a joke (e.g. Indy 4). It follows a couple of previous jokes. However, to say it was all a 100% joke is untrue. In Hollywood today, anyone can get away with making the villains Nazis because, let's face it, no one like 'em. It's harder to get away with Communists because there are many who do sympathize, and far more of our nation is part of a Communist-related party than a Nazi-style party. I remember a conversation with several coworkers at a former behavioral health job where one said, "I think Communism is a great idea and I would be a Communist except that it doesn't ever seem to work," to which there was much agreement. I know there are purer (if overly-idealistic in my estimation) ideals to Communism (equality for all and such), but the ideology is also historically tied to several abominable acts and the stifling of independent thought and religious expression. In order for it to truly work (as my coworker pointed out, it doesn't) would require the forcible allocation of resources and suppression of individual expression and ambition. That's the only way such "equality" could be obtained, of course imposed by an elite group of above-equal dictators. Aside from all this, it is a lot harder to criticize them on film without blowback.

Everyone is entitled to his/her own opinion.  No one can please everyone.  What did you not like about it in particular?  Is it mostly because you came to this site seeking the very Original Trilogy, completely untampered?  If so, then of course you won't like this.  I personally think it's an improvement in every regard, if I'm aiming for a special edition.  But I also enjoy watching the true Original Trilogy.  It simply depends on my mood.

Bingowings said:

If you allow that level interpretive plasticity into scripture the whole thing is up for discussion.

You are as likely to find the truth of God in Star Wars (Gnosticism again).

This is why the Society Of Friends largely dismiss the Bible as legacy software and rely more on direct revelation from God.

My description of a cosmic tyrant is aimed at the Biblical literalists not people with a personal relationship with what they call God.

If you see scripture (and by that I mean all scripture) as myth and propaganda, not history the levels of author's intention become an obvious shield against literal reading of the text.

You should reread my most recent discussion with CP3S and see why I see things the way I do, with sort of a duplicate view.  Of course the Bible has plasticity in its interpretation, else we wouldn't see so many different denominations and takes.  Historically speaking, many biblical scholars see it as an inaccurate history.  To try and fit it to one mold or another does it and the reader a disservice.

As I stated earlier, it sounds like at most, God gave the go ahead, and I don't believe they would have gotten any kind of message without a prophetic leader, so that is completely suspect to me.  More likely they prayed, got the answer they wanted, and went ahead with the attack.

The latter sounds like the early Hebrew view that all things, good and bad, were what God allowed.  If a conqueror killed an entire city of the Lord's people, the Lord caused (or allowed) such to happen.  I would attribute this once again to a primitive understanding of the nature of God..."mankind's grubby fingerprints," as it seems to have come to be known.

Note the difference in the telling of 2 Samuel 24:1 vs. 1 Chronicles 21:1.  It appears in Samuel (the earlier written book) that God told David to do something that later made God angry when David followed through.  Meanwhile in Chronicles, we get the same story except that Satan told David to do it, and when David listened, God got angry.  The conceptual development of the Devil came later down the road, and therefore everything in this world, good or bad, was once attribute to God because the world was before God and everything was in his hands.  But the bad, or at least temptation, was later blamed on the Devil.  God may still allow bad things to happen, and thus one might still say "The Lord had made a gap in the tribes of Israel," but this does not mean that God actually commanded people to be wicked.

Wow!  I hadn't checked out the samples on the Spleen just yet, but that comparison really is quite impressive!

Bingowings said:

The text claims that God himself plans the battle and the rape solution.

So either the text (oral tradition written down long after the event) is written by men and reflects how they distort the truth to legitimise the eventual take over of the throne by David or it's directly translated by angels in the service of God in which case God's really weird in a bad way.

I can agree with the underlined quite easily, as I've stated in this thread before.  But I failed to interpret the text that such was God's solution.  Please provide a quote, as perhaps I am misreading it.

Leonardo said:

darth_ender said:

TV's Frink said:

I can't imagine God knows something about Hitler that we don't.

I assume this means that if God had foreknowledge and thus allowed or commanded that the wicked be killed before they brought destruction the righteous, then why didn't he have Hitler killed, well the answer is obvious: he clearly wanted the History Channel to have something to talk about from 2002-2006.

In all seriousness, both in the Bible and outside of it, God still allows wicked people to live and do wicked things, even nearly wiping out God's people.  God does give the most wicked the freedom to choose, and seems to only intervene when absolutely necessary to preserve the righteous.  Often many do die.  But God still gives the wicked their freedom of choice most of the time.

Besides, who is to say how many wicked tyrants God did remove before they actually became tyrants?  We only have hindsight.  He has the foresight.

I'll just say this: if God had killed Hitler, we would have missed on so many funny jokes... Chaplin, the Stooges, Mel Brooks.. Jeez, I'd say 40% of the internet revolves around nazi humour.

Not to mention another 40% of Hollywood villains.  It's dangerous to make a Soviet or Communist baddie nowadays for fear of offending some Obama disciple, but you can cut up Nazis like soft cheese because each and every one of them deserved it ;)

Bingowings said:

The prologue to the Battle Of Gibeah is astonishing reading which mirrors the last night of Sodom And Gommorrah.

A Levite in an effort to save the man who is having an unmarried sexual relationship (concubine) with one of his neighbours daughters from being gang raped, chucks both his daughter and the concubine to the mob.

They rape the women to death and in anger the man cuts up his concubine's corpse and mails the bits to the other tribes who gang up on the whole tribe of Benjamin and kill all the males and non-virgin women (and a large number of innocent aliens).

The victors have a prayer meeting and then after consulting God hit upon this rape orgy scheme to keep the rump tribe active.

Forget Game Of Thrones.

The Bible is real X-rated stuff. 

Yes, much of the Bible, particularly the OT, is pretty graphic, both sexually and violently.  That is certainly an interesting story, and one I don't know all the answers to.  I am not a skilled biblical apologist, nor do I take everything literally, so I can't claim to speak for a majority of Christians.  However, let's look at what we do have in these verses.  The consultation between God and the already unrighteous Israelites involved no prophet, as the people had none at the time.  It was their own interpretation of God's will that led them to attack, though  the author of Judges makes no dispute of their interpretation.  Second, assuming God was really speaking to them, what did he command?  Well, he told them the order to attack and gave them the go ahead, not the degree of ferocity, not any sanction of rape, no, nothing more than the go ahead.  Third, the Bible still is not clear that rape of the Benjamite women took place, only that they were captured.  It could be taken as forced marriage, and many marriages in those days were without any regard to the desires of the women, but that still does not mean a single woman was raped.

As for the man who offered his concubine to the rapists and then cut her corpse into a dozen pieces, I don't think the Bible justifies his actions either.  The Israelites are horrified when they learn about this, and look for the sicko who cut her up until he blames the Benjamites, and they then attack the whole town.  I don't think the Bible every suggested that God was pleased with this man's course of action either.  It does sound very much like the tale of Sodom and Gomorrah with Lot's less than admirable offer of his daughters.

Well, you may be right.  Then again, the Death Star may have been completed in deep space, lightyears from any system. ;)

By the way, I love how the options are numbered.

1: 1
2: 2
etc.

So we know that option 1 refers to one system, option 2 refers to two systems, etc. ;)

Tobar said:

In this case it would be the EU save-ifing a concept. =P Also, Sabaac is wholly an EU creation so how could it ruin itself?

Alright, perhaps I'm being too harsh.  I give the earliest EU much more legitimacy in my own mind than the later stuff--not saying that's right, but I tend to.  When younger, I considered Sabacc a legitimate part of Star Wars lore, but when I finally got around to reading the Jedi Academy Trilogy, I was deeply disappointed at the "rules".  Oh, and "Sabacca" was initially developed in the ESB 2nd draft, which also lends it legitimacy in my mind.

As for EU, I really like the idea of the Kaiburr crystal, as it's truly a mystical, magical gem, and it brings the Force more to that level.  The lightsabers are fairly common and need no Force enhancement to be used.  As much as I like a number of ideas from TCW, I don't like that it turned this rare magical stone into little more than a glowing quartz.  I hope Mr. Chee, with whatever godlike powers George has granted him, officially declares that to be hogwash, but if not, I will choose to disregard it.

In any case, I worry enough about VII-IX adhering too closely to existing EU.  I hope it will create its own mythology.  If they were to choose to use the Kaiburr Crystal (though my guess is they will not), then the idea that there are many dime-a-dozen crystals might be preserved for the new films.

You know, now that you've said that, I think I just gave up my favorite new running gag :(

I'm glad my reputation remains intact at least.

Sounds like somebody needs a taco ;)