Here you go, gay nerd. http://www.videosift.com/video/Mum-Tasered-In-Front-Of-Kids-Arrested-Kids-Left-In-Vehicle#comment-837830

I am terrorist, Kaboom!

In reply to this comment by smooman:
I am Persian, meow!

*shake fist*

In reply to this comment by smooman:
You're still a poopface

In reply to this comment by detheter:
fuck humans

i hate you

In reply to this comment by smooman:
fuck cats

The idea that Jesus is fully human and fully God simultaneously is patently ridiculous on its face. That is simply doublespeak so that theists can try to win arguments such as this one. If he was fully God (even if he was also somehow fully human), he would not have feared the pain and death he knew was coming. I think that's all the proof anybody needs that Jesus was not divine. This is one of many cases where theists will twist words into unintelligible pretzels and come out of the argument claiming "faith" that their statements are true somehow trumps the logic that crushes their beliefs.

But let's set that aside for a second. Let's accept that Jesus feared pain and death, and that his crucifixion was as horrible to him as it would be to anyone else.

How exactly does that lift any burden off my shoulders? How can that absolve me of any portion of my guilt for sins against my fellow man? Of course, it's not supposed to be about my sins against my fellow man, but rather my sins against God.

(And the entire concept of a "sacrifice" is simply a throwback to a society that believed they had to "appease the gods". They pretended to assert some form of control over weather and natural disasters, which of course was pointless. That, of course, developed in the human world where a tribe would have to send a portion of their crop to the nearby dictator or risk being trampled by his army. And since their concept of God was simply an even more powerful dictator, they did the only thing they could think of that might make him happy: hurting themselves to show supplication.)

As I understand it, Christians claim that Jesus was the sacrifice that freed us from the burden of original sin. Even if that statement made sense, I refuse to accept responsibility for a mistake that was supposedly made by an ancestor thousands of years ago. I therefor reject any sacrifices (that I did not ask for) made on my behalf towards a debt that I do not recognize.

The bible is basically saying that God made man greedy, dangled money in front of his face (the Fruit of Knowledge), punished man for taking the money (expulsion from Eden), demanded regular payments (blood sacrifices before Jesus), sent his son to pay the debt with his own money (because Jesus is God), and commands us to be eternally grateful to Jesus for his sacrifice (which was not a sacrifice).

So even if every bit of Christian mythology is 100% correct, that would simply make us the unwilling slaves of a spiteful two-faced God, faced with the threat of eternal suffering, forced to put a smile on our face and sing praising songs, pretending to be grateful for the burdens and fear heaped upon us by our "loving" master.

I think it is pretty clear why I can't believe a word of it.


Theist: "Well Because of A we know that B happens."

Nontheist: "Sorry, try proving A before you derive anything from it."

By the way, thanks for letting me vent a bit. It's nice to get these swirling thoughts out of my head every once in a while. I hope they make sense to others as much as they do to me.

Peace.


In reply to this comment by smooman:
You have a different view of Jesus than I. The doctrine I hold to is that he was fully human and fully God. Not half-n-half or whatever. In that way, he experiences everything we do, from pain, to happiness, to mourning, to delight, to frustration (money changers in the temple for example). And because he was fully man, his suffering is twofold: the physical, the crucifixion, which most are familiar with even non theists, but then another, emotional, mental, and spiritual anguish and angst in the garden the eve of the crucifixion.

If dying on the cross is not that big of a deal, as you say, then why would Jesus cry out to God the Father "take this cup from me"? This is a man who knew what lay in store for him, and feared it, dreaded it, wanted a way out of it. It's important too that after he asks God to relieve him of this duty, that he wishes, "but Your will, not mine".

You say according to Christianity that Jesus wasn't a man but rather God in the form of man. This is where I would disagree. The mainstream doctrine on the divinity of Jesus in the Christian church is that he was fully man and fully God.

There are theologies that we're discussing that go much deeper than what we've covered so far. I think that this may become a long running discussion. But I do enjoy it and look forward to more. Sala'am =)

also what I meant by "theistic points of view" is this: (this will be cheesy so bare with me)

Theist: "Well Because of A we know that B happens"

Nontheist: "well I dont believe in A so B would never happen because A doesnt exist"


I know that's really silly and such a trivial analogy but it's the best I could come up with =(


In reply to this comment by MaxWilder:
For any wrongdoings or mistakes I make in life, I expect to be punished for them during my lifetime. That may be in many different forms, such as the loss of a friend, the loss of respect from my community, the anger of someone seeking retribution, perhaps even a fine or punishment from the government that is set up by people who want to discourage such behavior. And I fully accept that because I am the only one who could have prevented the mistake or error in judgment.

If you made such an error in judgment, but the police caught somebody else by mistake, would you let that person take the punishment for you? Of course not, that would be completely immoral. Similarly, it would be completely immoral for anybody to be sent to hell for your sins. So exactly how is it acceptable for Jesus to suffer and die for your sins? Well, he was actually God, so he didn't really suffer, he didn't really die, he didn't go to hell. So he didn't really do anything for you anyway. Honestly, what sacrifice did Jesus make? If he was just a man, that would be the ultimate sacrifice. But according to Christianity, he wasn't just a man, so it wasn't really a sacrifice at all. Nothing was lost. Jesus came down, told people what he wanted to tell them, then went back to heaven. Ok, the method he used to go back to heaven was pretty brutal, but it wouldn't be that big a deal to someone who was actually an aspect of God himself.

So... Jesus didn't really sacrifice anything.

And... even if he did, I don't want anybody to be punished for something I did.

And... if God denies us entrance to heaven for making mistakes, the kind of mistakes that every human makes (because God made us that way), what kind of a bastard does that make God?

"Again its all from a theistic point of view so for someone who doesnt share that point of view, all of this will be pretty much hogwash."

Sorry, but a person's point of view doesn't change a line of logical reasoning. Either these points can be refuted or they stand. Please remember that I was raised Christian and started formulating these thoughts well before I completely rejected the church.



>> ^smooman:
Sorry it took so long to get back to ya. This is more along the lines of a theological debate but here goes. I personally, in my theological understanding, do not believe that simply being "good" will save you and the reason is this: Can you think of anyone, anyone you know, anyone you read about, anyone you ever met, anyone at all that has lived a blameless life? A life completely devoid of wrongdoing or a wicked thought or a anger fueled episode from the time of accountability to the time of separation (death)? Everyone does something "not good" in their life. They may regret it, it may be out of character, or they might not have meant it, but it happens. After all, we are only human.
Paul tells us that "all have sinned , and fallen short of the glory of God". I think thePinky had mentioned earlier that these sins or "mean things" or "slip ups" or whatEVER you want to call them cause us to be imperfect of our original creation and separate us from our Creator. Enter Jesus: the sacrificial lamb.
Again its all from a theistic point of view so for someone who doesnt share that point of view, all of this will be pretty much hogwash. But there you have it.
I DO appreciate your openmindedness (I totally just made that word up hehe) and your sincere respect for other belief systems unlike MOST sifters =)
In reply to this comment by MaxWilder:
It's tough to switch gears from arguments against fundamentalists to questions for moderates. But the last couple of days reminded me of my most important question for modern moderate Christians:
If there is a good person, who lives a good life, doesn't break any laws, contributes to his community and passes down a strong code of ethics to his children, would that person go to hell without Jesus?
As far as I can tell, that's what it says in the Bible, and that's one of the very first things that led me to reject Christianity. Most modern, compassionate Christians say you can still go to heaven just by being a good person. But that leads directly to the next question:
What is the point of Christianity if you don't really need to be a Christian to go to heaven?
I think you'll find that if you answer that question, none of your reasons will have anything to do with Jesus being an actual "Savior" or "Son of God".

There's an old saying out west: "If you like a video, you should upvote it"

In reply to this comment by smooman:
LOVE this movie. Great way to open the movie too, sets the pace real nicely

For any wrongdoings or mistakes I make in life, I expect to be punished for them during my lifetime. That may be in many different forms, such as the loss of a friend, the loss of respect from my community, the anger of someone seeking retribution, perhaps even a fine or punishment from the government that is set up by people who want to discourage such behavior. And I fully accept that because I am the only one who could have prevented the mistake or error in judgment.

If you made such an error in judgment, but the police caught somebody else by mistake, would you let that person take the punishment for you? Of course not, that would be completely immoral. Similarly, it would be completely immoral for anybody to be sent to hell for your sins. So exactly how is it acceptable for Jesus to suffer and die for your sins? Well, he was actually God, so he didn't really suffer, he didn't really die, he didn't go to hell. So he didn't really do anything for you anyway. Honestly, what sacrifice did Jesus make? If he was just a man, that would be the ultimate sacrifice. But according to Christianity, he wasn't just a man, so it wasn't really a sacrifice at all. Nothing was lost. Jesus came down, told people what he wanted to tell them, then went back to heaven. Ok, the method he used to go back to heaven was pretty brutal, but it wouldn't be that big a deal to someone who was actually an aspect of God himself.

So... Jesus didn't really sacrifice anything.

And... even if he did, I don't want anybody to be punished for something I did.

And... if God denies us entrance to heaven for making mistakes, the kind of mistakes that every human makes (because God made us that way), what kind of a bastard does that make God?

"Again its all from a theistic point of view so for someone who doesnt share that point of view, all of this will be pretty much hogwash."

Sorry, but a person's point of view doesn't change a line of logical reasoning. Either these points can be refuted or they stand. Please remember that I was raised Christian and started formulating these thoughts well before I completely rejected the church.



>> ^smooman:
Sorry it took so long to get back to ya. This is more along the lines of a theological debate but here goes. I personally, in my theological understanding, do not believe that simply being "good" will save you and the reason is this: Can you think of anyone, anyone you know, anyone you read about, anyone you ever met, anyone at all that has lived a blameless life? A life completely devoid of wrongdoing or a wicked thought or a anger fueled episode from the time of accountability to the time of separation (death)? Everyone does something "not good" in their life. They may regret it, it may be out of character, or they might not have meant it, but it happens. After all, we are only human.
Paul tells us that "all have sinned , and fallen short of the glory of God". I think thePinky had mentioned earlier that these sins or "mean things" or "slip ups" or whatEVER you want to call them cause us to be imperfect of our original creation and separate us from our Creator. Enter Jesus: the sacrificial lamb.
Again its all from a theistic point of view so for someone who doesnt share that point of view, all of this will be pretty much hogwash. But there you have it.
I DO appreciate your openmindedness (I totally just made that word up hehe) and your sincere respect for other belief systems unlike MOST sifters =)
In reply to this comment by MaxWilder:
It's tough to switch gears from arguments against fundamentalists to questions for moderates. But the last couple of days reminded me of my most important question for modern moderate Christians:
If there is a good person, who lives a good life, doesn't break any laws, contributes to his community and passes down a strong code of ethics to his children, would that person go to hell without Jesus?
As far as I can tell, that's what it says in the Bible, and that's one of the very first things that led me to reject Christianity. Most modern, compassionate Christians say you can still go to heaven just by being a good person. But that leads directly to the next question:
What is the point of Christianity if you don't really need to be a Christian to go to heaven?
I think you'll find that if you answer that question, none of your reasons will have anything to do with Jesus being an actual "Savior" or "Son of God".

I don't really have any negative feelings about you either way, I met alot of troops like you in Kuwait already, they were all pissed they weren't fighting a conventional military force under a very vague mission statement of bringing Freedom and Democracy. Its hard to do anything when you have no definitive objective or exit strategy. Surprisingly to me a lot of them fell in love with the place and went native, but that happened in Vietnam and other conflicts as well.

The drug problem in Afghanistan is economical, when the Taliban took over they banned the drug trade with their usual heavy hand tactics, when chaos began the drug trade began all again. Culturally alot of people cultivated it for medicinal use, which explains my own rather liberal views towards drugs. But now mostly its a cash crop, for most its a means of survival though there are farms that are solely created to feed back funds into the Taliban movement and other warring factions. The old "its okay to grow this because it only destroys the infidel" ignoring the large drug abuse levels in the local population, Pakistan, Uzbekistan and many other nations through which it makes its way.

In terms of imposing culture I think alot of US military and political planners, coming from the top down Bush belief that "democracy will simply flourish given the chance" implemented alot of very silly political and economical ideas. I remember reading about the imposition of democratic elections in Iraq in rural tribal areas, the US civies where then shocked to find that everyone voted by tribal alliances and background. It's again a failure to read the human terrain of the battlefield in the same way we had occur in Vietnam.

This aspect is covered very well in several chapters of Dexter Filkins The Forever War - http://www.amazon.com/Forever-War-Dexter-Filkins/dp/0307266397
Showing the disparity of understanding between coalition forces and the local population, I recommend it as unlike many books it stays politically neutral with no preaching on either side but rather an account of a journalist who went through Afghanistan and Iraq during the opening stages of the war.

In reply to this comment by smooman:
As per our last "discussion" you probably dont like me much but I think i just found some common ground =)

In reply to this comment by Farhad2000:

Given the last 8 years, I believe the Western world needs to engage the Arab world in dialog but it must respect the cultural background of the region and not just think that it can westernize ideas through brute force and seemingly endless criticism of it's religion.

I, for one, absolutely HATE the idea of westernizing Arab and Persian nations (namely Iraq and Trashgan....I mean Afghanistan). One of the platoons in my unit, while we were in Afghanistan, went out on a mission with the objective of demolishing a cannabis field. I was livid when I found out. These are a people who have been a nation far, far longer than we (the USA) and here we are telling them, forcing them even, to be like us while completely disregarding centuries of culture and history. Fuck that!

Congratulations!

In reply to this comment by smooman:
yay my first sift!

Son of a nutcracker! You are SO RIGHT! I would upvote this comment 500 times if I could.

Yes. Rock on.

In reply to this comment by smooman:
I'd hate to create a blanket statement, but almost all of the time theism (specifically Christianity) is "debunked" or ridiculed or debated or what have you, the fuel for those arguments are immature theologies that dont belong outside of children's Sunday school.

Oh, well music videos are nearly impossible to sift around here.

In reply to this comment by smooman:
ya the one i got is an older vid. Sorted through the ones here on the sift and its not a dupe. It just shows the cycles of rates of fire and at the end shows the decimation, in various frame rates just to be more awesome, of a small structure at the hands of this beast

but damnit i just cant get my music vids to sift........you non music appreciating jaggofs!

In reply to this comment by MarineGunrock:
That gun you're referring to is called "Metal storm" do a search for it, you'll see a couple already posted.

In reply to this comment by smooman:
I've got some great infantry porn vids (like the experimental US Military 1,000,000 rounds per minute box gun) but I cant get any of my damn vids sifted. Gonna give my current one a week before I scrap it and start posting the fun ones

That gun you're referring to is called "Metal storm" do a search for it, you'll see a couple already posted.

In reply to this comment by smooman:
I've got some great infantry porn vids (like the experimental US Military 1,000,000 rounds per minute box gun) but I cant get any of my damn vids sifted. Gonna give my current one a week before I scrap it and start posting the fun ones

That arrangment is from his album "One Quiet Night" which is all recorded on a Baritone Guitar so it's lower than normal. Hope that helps...

In reply to this comment by smooman:
wow, i think those are bass strings stringed in where the low e and a are.

And thats a wound string where the b would be.

Interesting. Love to know how he's stringed up and tuned. That is certainly not standard to be sure.