Whereas nation states where religion is part of the law of the land. Well look at those nations. These are isolated states that have remained in a development vacuum but got rich off selling oil. There is no freedom of speech or democracy in those states. The very fact that the first world deals with say OPEC allows the theocracy to be sustained in those nations.

Religion was a form of government for most of Europe. Then we had the enlightenment, democracy, revolution, kings, wars, history and so on. Religious denominations in Europe are now rapidly fading. This process never occured in the Middle East. Suddenly they have BILLIONS to spend on spreading their 'faith' as a form of government intervention. Saudi Arabia building schools in Pakistan that eventually created the Taliban was not an act of religious domination but a ham fisted attempt at geopolitics via religious doctrine. Because for some fucking reason the Saudis believed the Taliban would actually listen to them or something LOL. (Is this of course ignoring specific political issues of the time, USSR, evil empire, Regean, cold war, US allies with Saudi Arabia, fighting proxy wars, stinger missiles, Charlie Wilson and so on).

Saudi Arabia is cool because its such a fucking relic of government policy they have little room for any type of social policy because that is dictat by Religion. Thus their policies stem from it. They are like evil but religiously ahaha so they just fund fundamentalists everywhere thinking it will give them political clout and power when in reality it backfires. Kinda like this US thing where it's like FREEDOM FOR ALL... THROUGH FUCKING DAISY CUTTERS. To Save Iraq We have to destroy it. To save Afghanistan. We have to keep sending troops for a dubious objective. Oh wait let's pull out now. etc.

Fundamentally we have to appreciate the fact that religion is but a theory of the that explained things prior to science. With the rise of science, it tried to fight it. Finally slowly it's either merging or being eliminated or reconstituted in new ideological belief sets.

What I mean to say is that it's only through the evolution of man, knowledge and ideas that humanity has reached a point where it starts to doubt a very flawed perception of reality. First gods were manifest everywhere. Then they were nature. Then they are ghosts. Now we are supposed to believe or have faith.

Those of a stronger mental make up could possibly accept that we live and die and that is the end. Others cling to religion because it is safe. Others believe in living eternally through genes, about the only thing we consistently carry on through time.

Time will see the end of man man religions, into new constructs of stupidity, because science still, while providing much of the answers lacks many fundamental resolutions for most issues at the core of religious belief. Time will tell us all. But so far so good.

>> ^hpqp:

How did Christianity get to Europe? Conquest. To the Americas? Conquest and colonisation. To Africa? Colonisation, slave trade. To Australasia? Colonisation. Does that mean that these means have been taking place all the way 'till now? Of course not. After a few generations of growing up with the imposed religion, you forget it was imposed in the first place. Unless you were "cleansed", then there are no next generations.
Same story with Islam. Only eventual difference: violent conquest/conversion is directly condoned, one could even say "ordained", by the holy text (e.g. 2:191-3/2:216); oh, and the prophet was also a tribal leader and war general, unlike the possibly fictional Jeebs of the Christians.
I'm not saying people don't convert, just that the majority of religion's spread is through breeding and childhood indoctrination, and that the origins of the desert monotheisms' spread (especially Christianity and Islam) was conquest and colonisation so your original comment does not seem to be making any relevant point.
edit: add to that the continual use of majority pressure and intimidation, especially when religion is part of a country's legal and political system.
>> ^Farhad2000:
Naa. Islam reached 1 billion in the 21st century.
The assumption you are making is that it's been spreading at the knife edge from what the Moor times?
>> ^hpqp:
Uh, you do know that more often than not it was spread, like Christianity, at the edge of the sword, right? Conquest, colonisation, slave trade, same old same old.
>> ^Farhad2000:
Furthermore people forget that Islam represents 22% of world population. Much of it not in the Middle East. If the religion was so shit it wouldn't have taken every other religion out there.

>> ^KnivesOut:

Gearbox is a great developer, I hope this doesn't come back to bite them. I'm looking forward to Borderlands2.


Frankly, I don't think it will. The game is not really a Gearbox game, but rather a 3/4 finished game which they polished enough to release for historical reasons. I actually have MORE interest in the game since it is the dated POS it is than if they had scrapped everything and started from scratch.

The one thing that is evident from all the reviews is that this IS actually the game that took 14 years to get to market. As such, I'm just as curious as everyone else. That said, I just saw the Escapist review and they also panned it to crap. I think the main issue is that it isn't sexy, offensive, or funny... it is just stupid.

The best line from this video is the one where they comment of Duke responding "America, Fuck Yeah!" to some dialogue. That pretty much encapsulates it right there; it isn't clever, it isn't funny, it is just a piss-poor quote from a movie that was probably ten times as funny as this game.

All this said, it isn't Gearbox's fault at all. We all wanted to see this game for whatever it would turn out to be. The amount that has been written on the fiasco that was development alone is enough to interest non-gamers as to what this thing would turn out to be. In a strange way (as many reviewers have already stated), it is exactly what it should have been: a relic from a different time. Something that would have literally served as a good followup to Duke Nukem 3d.

>> ^blankfist:

I bet if they opened the market up to first class mail, you'd see some rather great options being created. Maybe not all at once, but over time.
But as it is now it's illegal to offer first class mail services in the US unless you're the US Government. What kind of bum deal is that?


Ya, a relic of eras gone by. Perhaps a good idea when you needed a central network of ponies to run a country. Not so necessary nowadays. I think the Mayan's had a foot version of the pony express. But it really has outlived it usefulness. I remember some other stories of kids starting a local mailing route to be faster than snail mail for in city deliveries. They were subsequently shut down because it is a legal monopoly. If you want to stifle things, get government involved, it works! Speaking of, lets get the government to do the internet, that should work well.

You should pick up some of the later stuff. Some of those graphic novels are awesome. I like "the gift", "all his engines", "pandemonium", and "hard time".

>> ^ponceleon:
Actually, I disagree with Budzos... I enjoyed the movie a lot more than the comic. I found the comics very hokey and disjointed in comparison, whereas the movie really encapsulated what I would LOVE religion to be. To me Catholicism is empty just because it has claims to relics, spells, and traditions which are ineffective in our world but pretend to be powerful in the way they are presented in this movie.
Religion would kick ass if it was based on a reality like this... I'm not sure how else to say it, but religion (and Catholicism specifically) is like people playing a childish game in which they are trying to imagine a world like this movie portrays.
To get more specific, I liked the explanations and backgrounds of the characters much better in the movie than in the comics. The comic has John Constantine being an ex glam-rocker who is slightly psychic/mystic and who's "damnation" doesn't come from an attempted suicide as in the movie, but rather a botched exorcism which is just kinda stupid. The whole suicide thing is really well done in the reimagining in the movie and makes a lot more sense.
Papa midnight is another character which is vastly improved in the movie. In the book, he seems more like a reject from Live and Let Die, a blaxploitation stereotype, whereas in the movie they really brought home the idea of someone that lives between two allegiances.
As for the use of "guns" and other 007ny stuff, I really thought it worked a lot better than the way they present him in the books. Frankly I'd rather have Constantine wielding a holy shotgun with blessed bullets than looking for a tape of his music video in his trashy apartment.
I'll admit that I only got through three of the graphic novels before I stopped, but I just feel that the changes made to Constantine's development improve vastly over what I saw in the books. As for making him American, I hate Keanu in most of his performances and I thought he really brought it for this one. I was pleasantly surprised and this movie remains one of my all-time favs.

hey hey hey hang on there yahtzee you don't get the gas cloud relic until you kill galamoth in the inverted castle

Throughout human history every society has had their own definition of marriage. In many, even our own western civilization in the past, women were considered property and expected to obey their husbands much like slaves. The relics of this are still in the traditional vows. Women couldn't vote, and couldn't own property. But that changed over time. Women were recognized as equals, and society changed the definition of marriage accordingly.

Furthermore, gay marriage is already happening and has been happening for some time. Many churches will perform gay marriages even in states where they are not legally recognized. It's already happened. The definition is changed. GET OVER IT.

The only fight left is this pathetic vestige of religious homophobia.

@bcglorf - You are correct in your assertion that homosexuality is not a primary genetic trait, otherwise it would disappear within a few generations. It is likely recessive, triggered with some sort of environmental factor or other random variable.

But let's put the science aside for a second and talk logic. Did you ever "decide" to be attracted to somebody? No, you simply are, or are not, or find them somewhat attractive, or grow more attracted over time, or see them differently when you are buzzed. There is no decision factor there. I could not decide to be attracted to a man. In fact, if I find out I'm looking at a gorgeous woman who used to be a man, my attraction to her disappears instantly. It is not a choice, it is a subconscious reaction and I have no control over it.

So why do you think this is different for gays? Did you, bcglorf, decide to be straight? That means you could have decided to be gay. That was not a choice I was ever given.

@dystopianfuturetoday

I'll admit to sometimes using a loose definition of fascism for rhetorical purpose, but I flatter myself I understand political theory well enough not to need wikipedia's help this time.

I want an advance to post-democratic times.

Let's glance back first to dark history and the rise of the mob. If we want to imagine democracy as a response to plutocracy, we can hear the democrats' call to arms clearly: "We're tired of these plutocrats shitting on us. Let's all shit on each other instead!"

Where voters are held to no standard they vote their own interests and prejudices, at any cost to others, at any cost to society. Democracy necessarily admits no standard. No standard for truth, no standard for justice but what the electors, palsied twitching monkeys that they are, can conjure. What's more, oligarchy is inevitable in any system, and oligarchs inevitably reflect the system that created them. A culture of selfish idiots trying to rip each other off produces an elite of the same.

Democracy isn't the ultimate development of government, as you seem to believe, it's its ultimate collapse.

So, the future. Less important to define a superior system than to recognise the corruption of our current thinking, but the path seems clear. Democracy is evil and evil is stupidity. The antidote to both evil and democracy is wisdom. Establish a sovereignty of reason and power flows to the rational. Selfishness, all forms of corruption are irrational, could only be opposed by such rulers. Plato, relatively fascistic though he was, agreed with me even a couple of thousand years ago. After all that time you're still trying to hold us back. All that time wasted.

You have never lived in a society with a constitution. Not if you live in the US you haven't. Your hated plutocrats long since overcame that last remnant of wisdom left by founders who presumably believed they wouldn't be needed so many years later. Imagine if the constitution were living thinkers rather than a dead relic; an active body to oppose corruption rather than a rotting, passive corpse waiting pathetically to fall to dust.

Are you a coward? Do you want to better society or cling to the sense of virtue your own corporate media narrators have fed you?

The truth is no one informs my political thought. It crawls implacably from the sludgy depths of hatred I've cultivated for the world in which I live.

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

We've been through the wringer a couple times on the tech channel concept - the upshot is that it's very, very broad - and almost all cases covered by geek. I'd rather not go down that path again.>> ^Hybrid:

I think there are other channels that should be renamed/clarified too.
I mentioned the 'geek' channel above... but also catsanddogs, should that not become animals, as it basically encapsulates them all right now? Should a video of an elephant go into catsanddogs? If not, maybe animals would be a good channel to have?
@dag and @MarineGunrock, what are your current thoughts on a tech channel?
>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:
While were at it. Maybe waronterror should go away, since it's a relic propaganda term from the Bush era and we already have a military channel.
Also, election08 should become elections and joedirt should change his screenname to Mr. Belvadere.

I think there are other channels that should be renamed/clarified too.

I mentioned the 'geek' channel above... but also catsanddogs, should that not become *animals, as it basically encapsulates them all right now? Should a video of an elephant go into catsanddogs? If not, maybe *animals would be a good channel to have?

@dag and @MarineGunrock, what are your current thoughts on a *tech channel?
>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:

While were at it. Maybe waronterror should go away, since it's a relic propaganda term from the Bush era and we already have a military channel.
Also, election08 should become elections and joedirt should change his screenname to Mr. Belvadere.

I liked *tech back when mg first suggested it. If you can get his blessing - and dags - you should be able to have the channel, imo. Middle East would be good too.

While were at it. Maybe * waronterror should go away, since it's a relic propaganda term from the Bush era and we already have a military channel.

Also, election08 should become *elections and joedirt should change his screenname to Mr. Belvadere.

NASA is a cold war relic created to one up the Russians who one uped us. I have several friends that work with NASA (they employee an army of contractors), so I am close to the issue on wanting them to stay around in current form so they keep their jobs. BUUUTTT (and you knew it was coming), rockets are hardly buses or trains. It is hardly the backbone of infrastructure like he was referencing. Rockets, and space in general are a bold and interesting place for science to be conducted, but shouldn't be forced. If people are convinced by his argument (and I am) I would give hundreds of dollars to a commercial, benevolent space organization. If the entity that was NASA went "public", I know I would invest it its future, more than I am currently forced to.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'relic entertainment, homeworld, higara, adagio for strings, agnust dei, barber' to 'relic entertainment, homeworld, higara, adagio for strings, agnus dei, barber' - edited by calvados

>> ^gwiz665:

Heh, a bit lower production value from what I'm used to from Relic and their Dawn of War series... they even re-used part of the video from there (the warping ships).


SHUT UP YOU SHUT UP! IT'S GOING TO BE AMAZING.

whoa... sorry, don't know what came over me.

I'm looking forward to this game.

Heh, a bit lower production value from what I'm used to from Relic and their Dawn of War series... they even re-used part of the video from there (the warping ships).

>> ^Throbbin:

I respectfully disagree. I loved starcraft, and it's expansions, but I like SupCom better. Korea is alot of things - it isn't the standard by which I measure quality.>> ^mentality:
>> ^Throbbin:
Looks interesting. Wanna play the game before I pass judgement. Better be damn good if it wants to knock SupCom off the RTS podium.

If there is a podium for RTS, the reigning king for the past 12 years is Brood War. And no game, including Starcraft II, is going to topple that for a while.
You don't get this with SupCom:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpS99Si11p4



I also don't use Korea as a standard measure of quality. I use the fact that only Starcraft has enough depth and balance to have a wildly successful professional scene 12 years after release. It is also one of a handful of games that have transcended into popular culture.

Nothing else comes close, not Warcraft, not SupCom, and not one of Relic's finely crafted RTSes. Starcraft II may take the throne one day, but not until it gets 2 expansions and years of fine tuning.

But of course, you are free to subjectively prefer any game you wish.