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[Teneb]

Not that I wouldn't believe a terrorist group that targets Catholics and Christians couldn't or even doesn't exist...

But... Yeah that... definitely isn't ISIS.

Boko Haram is a prime example, actually.

[Flying Dice]

Spoiler:  May contain a incoherent ramble (click to show/hide)

*inhale*
When I heard a Christian mate, different denomination to me, say that Muslims hate the idea of Christ.


Some sun-touched Muslims may hate and abuse Christians, but Christ himself is a large part of Islam. Including his divine birth, his rank as a Messiah and his resurrection. 

I shiver when I hear it because either the espouser is complaining out of lazy ignorance or out of the purpose of spreading misinformation. I have no interest in the proselytisation or ringfenceing of any religion despite being a member of such an organisation, but I at least respect the actual prose and verse of that religion for at least its place in history, its background and it as a possible source of inspiration.
I mean before Mohammed died and his successors waged great wars of conquest, the state of Arabia was a political 'paradise' where Jews, Christians and Arabian Pagans worked and worshipped along side the growing Religion of Islam in a proto-socialist nation state that was developed enough to sport a basic income for all citizens.

I know the importance of current events in the perception of a people and creed and that that sporting past events as a true Scotsman like fallacy in the face of current events is equally dishonest, but saying things out of ignorance or venomous spite just seems 'wrong'*.

*struggling to word that how I want to.

uueueueueaagh.
*exhale*

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Same shit that happened to Christianity after Jesus bit the dust, really. That's what happens when you get a bunch of people hopped up on highly specific moral righteousness and then lose the guiding element that keeps it focused on doing good rather than punishing others for perceived ills. In a general sense you can see the same pattern in authoritarian takeovers where the initial dictator might actually be half-decent, but as soon as they die it all goes to shit. And in newly democratic countries which foolishly adopt the presidential model and backslide into authoritarianism after a decade or two because shitty presidents consolidate power in the executive.

That's the fundamental reason why the systems for organizing people which tend to be the most effective and long-lived are the ones which make it very difficult to change things, very difficult for a small group of people to wield major influence, and designed to force cooperation and moderation. Doesn't matter if it's political, religious, or whatever else, a system that relies on a single individual or small group as a leader and/or moral compass is infinitely more fragile; the highs may be higher, but the lows are truly atrocious.

It's a big part of why neo-pagans bother me far less than most any other religious group: they're highly fragmented, unorganized, and generally unconcerned with how other people live and believe.

[Tack]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Plus human sacrifice is illegal now

[Loud Whispers]

inb4 neopagans reform and gain access to great holy war casus belli

[hector13]

Not enough holy sites.

[Baffler]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Plus human sacrifice is illegal now

What measure are the laws of man when they go against the will of the gods?

[smirk]

Not enough holy sites.

all holy sites are pagan sites

remove filthy abrahamic usurpers

[Kot]

Spoiler: Did someone say... remove filthy abrahamic usurpers? (click to show/hide)

AHHHHHHHHH

SLAVAAA! THE ALTARS WILL RUN WITH THE BLOOD OF HEATHEN INVADERS! DEFENSIVE PAGAN, HUH?! WELL, OFFENSE IS THE BEST DEFENSE, IF YOU CATCH MY DRIFT, DOGS. IMPALE, TEAR INTO PIECES, FEED TO THE PIGS! YOU HAVE STEPPED ON THE HOLY GROUND OF THE OLD GODS!

Jokes aside, I sometimes actually regret that a lot of cultures and religions were wiped out by Abrahamic religions. Be it whatever was in Middle East before Jews (nowadays the best mentions come from Bible and those usually reduce the Old Gods to deamons and purely evil enities, if not outright supersitions), everything that Muslims wiped out (Zoroastrians still exist but Zunbils?) and possibly the biggest and baddest of them all - various Christians. Slavs, Germanic religions, various others, not to mention Americas...

Make note that the human sacrifice is basically a meme when you're talking about Slavs. Only sources that claim human sacrifice are Christian and considering that the same sources usually claim that Jews did it too really says a lot about their credibility. I mean, sure, there is this one halfway-competent chronicle that claims it being widespread but it's a) Russian (and Russians are Russians) and b) written by a Christian monk.

[Silverthrone]

A lot of old cultures did get absorbed and merged-in with the new religion, though. Particularly in cases where it'd been impossible to impose it with force. Even if it isn't done on purpose, it's very rare to defeat and absorb a culture without some of its traits making a mark. Of course, it often leads to fundamentalists further down the line trying to iron those out, but hell, being a fundamentalist is its own punishment.

[Flying Dice]

*triggered*

Oh my gawd stop glorifying cultural appropriation, how dare you all celebrate Halloween and Yule you shitlord Christian dogs! D:

[Silverthrone]

*triggered*

Oh my gawd stop glorifying cultural appropriation, how dare you all celebrate Halloween and Yule you shitlord Christian dogs! D:

Ah, cultural appropriation, or as I like to call it; Gibben sie EVERYTHING! _{The sentiment doesn't quite come across without a Fraktur font, but still.}

Of course, the Norse beliefs that got metabolised by the church were also a result of absorbing something earlier and revising the results now and then as new influences rolled in. I imagine that's usually the case.

[Flying Dice]

Yep. Syncretism is one of the oldest and most common patterns of human behavior. It's precisely why people whining about cultural appropriation or the War on Whiteness (or whatever they're calling it these days) are so annoying.

Granted, you've got to be careful. The Amerindians absorbed too much from Euroamericans while abandoning too much of their own (and were simultaneously rather nastily blocked from integrating with Euroamerican communities, while free/escaped blacks and whites who bailed on their settlements to live with local tribes were generally welcomed). The Euroamerican colonists and later settlements absorbed lots of the good bits of Amerindian knowledge and culture, but wholly destroyed the origin cultures partly by accident, partly through intentional economic warfare and genocide.

Note: No, the biowarfare was (probably) not intentional. Germ theory was only really starting to gain widespread acceptance in the 1800s. That said, there are plenty of primary sources of Europeans and Euroamericans praising god and shit for plaguing Amerindian groups with all their juicy diseases. They didn't entirely know how it happened, but they weren't sad and were plenty willing to exploit it.

Uncomfortablehistoryman, h'waaaaaay!

[Silverthrone]

Weren't a significant portion of the natives dead when the colonists moved inland? I've heard it, but I'm not sure. It'd be pretty difficult repelling the invadors while undergoing a huge pandemic ripping across the land.

Of course, all history gets uncomfortable at some point, and it goes unexpected places, at times.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Until World War II, there was probably not a single real war where humans killed more than disease and famine.

Not that the colonists didn't totally genocide the natives literally and then culturally, but they would have lost that conflict if not for the pandemics. Hell, the US nearly got in trouble as it was, fighting the western natives and the Seminole.

[Silverthrone]

Heh, the Vikings should've brought some more filth and yuck to Vinland if they'd wanted to win that fight. (Well, good thing generally they didn't, and they weren't invested enough in 'murican real estate to keep trying)