| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Can Christians be Republican? Yep, but that doesn't make Republican issues into Christian ones.It does when the majority of your party are Christian and a lot of their proposed laws are explicitly stated to be based around protecting "good Christian values" and line up exactly what extremist Christians want.
Sure, Republican may not be synonymous with Christian but it's pretty damn close to it.
I know some Christian Democrats who would be angry with you over that remark
I feel that I may have given a wrong impression. The wrong party here is the first one to drag this into LAW. Everything was fine till someone decided to legislate the issue. Now you are caught in a catch 22 where you have to legalize harm to some group. It's a real mess.
I feel that I may have given a wrong impression. The wrong party here is the first one to drag this into LAW. Everything was fine till someone decided to legislate the issue. Now you are caught in a catch 22 where you have to legalize harm to some group. It's a real mess.Just to be clear on that wrong impression. Which law are you speaking of?
And I don't see how striking down those laws and allowing the preexisting situation to continue is causing harm to anyone. At least not anyone who wasn't being harmed before.
I'd say a more accurate description might be that trans people were largely flying below the radar before. As they are becoming more open and visible, there's a backlash from people who never would have known before, but are now horribly upset. This was going to happen and need to be addressed legally. Over bathrooms and everywhere else it matters.
The issue is that demonisation of an "other" has always worked well in advancing political careers. This tends to work best when that "other" is in a perceived minority with social stigma's attached.
The restroom thing isn't a religious thing. It is a republican thing.Also, this part. It is a religious thing.
It's not an "all Christians" thing, certainly. As I've said again and again. It's a Christian Right thing. It's a Republican thing, but that's largely because the Republican party has yoked itself to the Christian Right. It's largely the same religious groups fighting against same-sex marriage a decade or so back, when it was still a winning issue for Republicans.
I am unaware of any mention of restroom usage in the bible?
Can Christians be Republican? Yep, but that doesn't make Republican issues into Christian ones.
Would you call gay marriage a religious issue? I would say only if clergyfolk are being forced to perform the ceremony. There's a gray area for religious venues being used if they allow non-religious marriages otherwise. But I take people at face value on calling it this even as I think they're conflating two things.
Would you call same-sex civil unions a religious issue? I don't think the people who say it is are right, but the claim was made. It's also a significant intersection of people who draw a lot of religious lines drew the same one here. Civil unions definitely aren't mentioned in The Bible.
If you find it reasonable to call civil unions a religious issue, the same argument would put bathroom bills as a religious issue. It's certainly a Religious Right issue as a group of people, even if not all their issues actually stem from religion.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Let's see. 2/3s of one of my gaming group has had major surgery in the last 12 months. All with spines and kidneys. Not having to deal with this is a big plus.
While you give up food and sex, you get all of the time you spend dealing with eating, cooking, shopping, sleeping, exercising, doctor's visits. I can definitely fill the extra time with books, movies, TV and gaming.
As for spellcasting, heck, 0th level spellcasting is amazing. Think about it. Wouldn't your life be better if you could cast mage hand, mending and prestidigitation?
Higher level spells would be that much more awesome. Teleporting all over the world? Awesome. Since you have more time, you can have tabletop gaming groups on different continents. You can use divinations to get ahead of the stock market. (remember that your living expenses have just dropped, so you'll have lots of money to invest) There's plenty of ways to set yourself up with enough money and power to last your extended lifespan.
The restroom thing isn't a religious thing. It is a republican thing. Personally I understand why they are worried, republicans usually imagine the worst that could happen and try to prevent it.
I have never seen a guy try to use the ladies room under any pretext let alone the "I identify as female" one. I suppose it could happen if it became law... but I haven't been following that. Personally why not just use the restroom you have the equipment for. You have boy parts use the mens room, you have girl parts use the ladies room. Seems simple enough. The only ones that hurts are transvestites but I have met some of them and they seem to be the guys who get off by dressing as a girl more than "identifying as female" and I wouldn't want them watching me use the bathroom.
Some points:
1) It is absolutely a religious thing and is backed by religious conservatives.
2) Guys have never in the history of transgender rights laws tried to exploit those laws to gain access to women's restrooms. A guy who's going to break the law doesn't care about laws that keep him out of a restroom.
3) This isn't a worst case scenario. This is basically a never case scenario. It basically doesn't happen. Washington's had transgender protections for 10 years and in that time the only instance of a guy entering a women's space (locker room, I think) was someone trying to "prove" that the law would allow him to - but the law doesn't allow this.
4) Your simplistic solution is what the law is aiming for, and would in fact harm transgender people - and would primarily harm transgender women. Given how many do not have access to surgery because they are too poor and insurance that they might not even have won't cover it - or they might not want surgery for other reasons. Basically, your solution would force women to use the men's room and that's not an acceptable outcome in a reasonable society.
5) Nobody watches you use the bathroom because stalls.
I feel that I may have given a wrong impression. The wrong party here is the first one to drag this into LAW. Everything was fine till someone decided to legislate the issue. Now you are caught in a catch 22 where you have to legalize harm to some group. It's a real mess.
Laws that guaranteed trans people access to the facilities appropriate to their gender have worked for years - even decades in some places - without harming anyone. There is no harm here, and there likely never will be. Making it illegal for trans people to use the correct restrooms does harm trans people.
Also, these laws are not just about restrooms, that's just the point where the people pushing these laws are scaremongering. These laws are about denying trans people all kinds of civil rights.
Re 1515 being religious right backed or not, here's the organization behind it: Family Policy Institute of Washington. Google them to see how religious they are.
Also, 1515 failed so yay for that.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Mekkis that is funny!
What I don't get is why people WANT to assign blame to a whole religion based on a few people's ideas. There are Christian liberals, they are in favor of this special protection for trans people. BUT it's the Christian conservatives SO it's a religious thing! As if to say everything these guys do is a religious thing from the time they get up to their choice of breakfast cereal. If right wing Christians are fighting left wing Christians on any issue it should be your first clue that it ISN'T religious, it is Right Wing vs Left Wing.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Mekkis that is funny!
What I don't get is why people WANT to assign blame to a whole religion based on a few people's ideas. There are Christian liberals, they are in favor of this special protection for trans people. BUT it's the Christian conservatives SO it's a religious thing! As if to say everything these guys do is a religious thing from the time they get up to their choice of breakfast cereal. If right wing Christians are fighting left wing Christians on any issue it should be your first clue that it ISN'T religious, it is Right Wing vs Left Wing.
People in the same religion disagree, but that doesn't mean it's not connected to their religion, either culturally or religiously. Some Jews keep kosher, while others don't. That doesn't mean avoiding bacon isn't a religious thing.
Baptists believe people should choose to be baptized while Lutherans believe in baptizing babies. Since segments of Christianity disagree on the age and agency required to be properly baptized, does that mean I would be misattributing to say that it's a Christian thing to baptize your newborns? Because if the threshold for saying that something proceeds from the religion is that all (or 90%, or half) of followers believe something, you're going to remove a lot of actual rites from "Christianity" much less cultural traditions.
Ok I see your point now... But let us put the his on the other side and you can see how it sounds.
If a few atheists felt that since they are the highest authority on right and wrong that killing or stealing from people they don't like is good. And then someone using that in an argument saying atheism is bad because it believes like that. See the parallel here, religion is bad because it fights against protected status for trans people is what I am hearing.
Ok I see your point now... But let us put the his on the other side and you can see how it sounds.
If a few atheists felt that since they are the highest authority on right and wrong that killing or stealing from people they don't like is good. And then someone using that in an argument saying atheism is bad because it believes like that. See the parallel here, religion is bad because it fights against protected status for trans people is what I am hearing.
And if there was an organized group or groups that represented atheists that were pushing these values, lobbying for these values, spreading these values to their members that meet every Sunday, you'd have a point.
The difference is, atheism isn't a religion. Atheists aren't an organized group with a hierarchy, rules and regulations for being an atheist, etc.
And then someone using that in an argument saying atheism is bad because it believes like that. See the parallel here, religion is bad because it fights against protected status for trans people is what I am hearing.
Your point is fair and something that I dwell on more than I probably should. I don't take that step. I say that religion is bad when it gives courage to people who attack marginalized groups (including trans people). If you're prefer "if" I have no problem with that substitution. I'm also fine if you'd rather phrase it as religion is "used for bad/evil" when... that works for me, too.
I don't believe these bias actually stem from Christianity but I believe they propagate through the organizational weight Christianity has. As a result, in my assessment, the best way to eliminate it is either to redirect that organizational weight (reframe the discussion as protecting the weak among us, a very Christian value) or reduce the power of that organizational weight (mostly by showing it has been used in a bad way and therefore not everything that comes through that channel can be trusted at face value).
I much prefer the former because I think it'll have a wider impact. If the negative that comes through that organization outweighs the positive, though, the latter might be the plan. I think the balance on that is different among the denominations and from congregation to congregation within the denominations and so on down the structure (or lack thereof).
|
Communist states, which most definitely cannot be called religious, harbored some strong homophobia. Likely on par with that found in capitalist countries and having known rather similar evolutions toward more acceptance in those that are still extant
This points to homophobia being a social issue rather than a political or religious one IMO
Extremists will drape their hatred in whatever clothes they can so that more people listen to them though
Also a communist would not try to justify his homophobia with religious reasons which are nonsensical to him but with arguments that make sense in his context, such as homosexuality being a bourgeois depravation harmful to the glorious communist society
|
Communist states, which most definitely cannot be called religious, harbored some strong homophobia. Likely on par with that found in capitalist countries and having known rather similar evolutions toward more acceptance in those that are still extant
This points to homophobia being a social issue rather than a political or religious one IMO
Extremists will drape their hatred in whatever clothes they can so that more people listen to them though
Also a communist would not try to justify his homophobia with religious reasons which are nonsensical to him but with arguments that make sense in his context, such as homosexuality being a bourgeois depravation harmful to the glorious communist society
I suppose since homosexuality is a minority of all social systems, it tends to be a target of the power structures in which it exists. However, I don't really separate religion and politics from social issues, they are all related aspects. The politics and/or religion just varies system to system.
If someone thinks A should be done because the bible says so, such as resistance to gay marriage motivated by the famous Leviticus quote, and the horrors of Sodom and Gomorrah, then it IS a religious issue for them. If someone speaks for an organization of a large number of christians about these same things, and those cristians largely support this because the bible says so, then it IS a religious issue for the person speaking AND for the organization.
I don't think you have to go further in this. See, gay marriage is literally only a problem on religious grounds.
The best situation you can hope for was hilariously demonstrated in the film "Death Becomes Her."
When you take away all of the drawbacks of a choice as the moving goalposts of this thread seem to do (presumably because the OP wants everyone to choose lichdom).... the choice becomes meaningless, or at least not the foundation for any sort of interesting story.
|
|
Communist states, which most definitely cannot be called religious, harbored some strong homophobia. Likely on par with that found in capitalist countries and having known rather similar evolutions toward more acceptance in those that are still extant
This points to homophobia being a social issue rather than a political or religious one IMO
Extremists will drape their hatred in whatever clothes they can so that more people listen to them though
Also a communist would not try to justify his homophobia with religious reasons which are nonsensical to him but with arguments that make sense in his context, such as homosexuality being a bourgeois depravation harmful to the glorious communist society
Communists states also suppressed religions. Which means that attacking religions isn't a religious issue. Of course, religions attacked each other long before communism was even a gleam in Marx's eye.
Prejudice against Jews, for example, isn't a religious issue and wasn't even when the Catholic Church was denouncing them as Christ Killers.So now we're at the idea that for something to be considered a religious issue it not only has to be supported by all religions, but by nobody else.
I guess this adds to my earlier bit about feeding the hungry, even as a church activity, not being religious. After all, non-religious people have also fed the hungry.
Is anything actually still a religious issue once we take this stance?
Or does it make more sense to take people at their word when they say they're doing something for religious reasons? (Barring blatant hypocrisy, like a televangelist raking in the dough and living the high life while preaching something entirely different.)
IMO, a truly religious matter would disappear with religions.
If tomorrow everyone decided to forego belief in god, would it rid us of, say, homophobia ?
The existence of homophobia in communist countries implies the opposite IMO.
Communism fighting against religions just as religions fight against each other is another matter, though very telling I think
If someone thinks A should be done because the bible says so, such as resistance to gay marriage motivated by the famous Leviticus quote, and the horrors of Sodom and Gomorrah, then it IS a religious issue for them. If someone speaks for an organization of a large number of christians about these same things, and those cristians largely support this because the bible says so, then it IS a religious issue for the person speaking AND for the organization.
I don't think you have to go further in this. See, gay marriage is literally only a problem on religious grounds.
In the USA, which is a strongly religious country, yes.
No so in communist China, for example, where gay marriage is still very much a problem AFAIK
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I have an unshakable suspicion that if I had an eternal lifespan I'd eventually screw up somehow and end up getting myself stuck in an And I Must Scream situation.
In fact it seems to me that as my lifespan approaches infinity the odds of my doing so would approach 100%.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
A lich doesn't have an infinite lifespan their lifespan is directly tied to how long the phylactery lasts. A metal amulet set with stone or crystal will last a very long time if cared for... But the chance of some catastrophe destroying the amulet approaches 100% as you get closer to infinity.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
But the chance of some catastrophe destroying the amulet approaches 100% as you get closer to infinity.
Until you add in magic, then the chance goes down really low.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
But the chance of some catastrophe destroying the amulet approaches 100% as you get closer to infinity.Until you add in magic, then the chance goes down really low.
Does it? Is there a spell that makes something indestructible? Say a war starts that sees the use of nuclear weapons, if your amulet is in one of the vaporized cities then it's gone. Say in a million years the sun goes supernova Earth (and your amulet) are gone.
But... we know magic exists somewhere,as your phylactery was granted by a non-you entity. Hence: magic (at least as we'd consider it, though perhaps not exactly PF's definition).
That said, such presumptions are outside of the basic premise, and we don't know if making us liches are not are the sum of magical abilities said entity possesses.
It still seems unlikely that, after everything collapses, we won't.
Also worth noting that, in PF lore, these things exist from ennui or introspection. So it's not unheard of that something goes wrong, even if no one does anything bad, and you still have your phylactery. We might not be talking about Golarion liches, but we are talking about PF liches, as applied to our own world. And while things like the astral plane might or might not exist, but we can't really presume, one way or the other - liches are 11th level spellcasters, and those don't exist in our world to the best of our understanding or beliefs, either. Beside, even if it doesn't exist, the concept remains the same - whether projected by astral projection, or something else, a lich may well leave its existence, and decay.
That said, I do suspect that, while there will definitively be moments of great ennui, I'd be able to find something to entertain myself (either through actual entertainment or otherwise) - and if not, I'd be able to do such good for the world on my way to boredom-torpor that it'd still be worth it. :)
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Communism is a religion. It has the same appeal to "goodness" (obedience), the same transcendent Vision (the Classless society), the same unbridled dogmatism and fragmentation, the same disdain for outsiders, the same moralism and suppression of sexuality, and the very same violent aggression toward competitors (other religions) just as soon as they become the dominant part in a society.
Communism being atheist is very old by now, and still just as useless.
Does it? Is there a spell that makes something indestructible? Say a war starts that sees the use of nuclear weapons, if your amulet is in one of the vaporized cities then it's gone. Say in a million years the sun goes supernova Earth (and your amulet) are gone.But the chance of some catastrophe destroying the amulet approaches 100% as you get closer to infinity.Until you add in magic, then the chance goes down really low.
The billions of years before the Sun grows into a giant and expands to consume the inner planets is functionally equivalent to infinity, especially in human terms.
Furthermore, there's a pretty simple answer: extra-dimensional space. Extra-dimensional space isn't affected by changes to real space. At worst, if it's connection point to real space is destroyed it either reverts contents to real space or to an alternate plane. If a one off event like an atomic blast destroyed the container the amulet would either be deposited into the world having missed the blast or would be drifting in the astral or some other plane.
To say nothing of simply storing the amulet on an alternate plane to begin with.
Thinking back to the OP's question, I have to go with the non-lich route. Frankly, eternity is not an appealing prospect once I give it thought. I'm in my 30s now, so I could reasonably get 50+ years of good work done, especially if my first act is to create a Ring of Sustenance to reclaim all the time I currently spend sleeping and eating.
Re: caster class, I'm torn between cleric, druid, and shaman.
It's not literal eternity though, it's just "until I'm done being alive". Which could be anywhere between forever and a second from now. All you have to do is smash your phylactery and it's game over.
There's not really any chance of being trapped in some kind of "And I Must Scream" scenario. The highest chance of that is being stranded in space somehow, but I struggle to see how that would happen without the planet exploding or something. Just make sure to always keep a casting of "Undeath to Death" prepared and smack yourself with it if you get in trouble.
Hell just imagine what would happen if you snuck into political debates with Greater Invisibility and Zone of Truth.
But if you really wanted to control the world, you would have item crafting. A Shackle of Durance Vile on them world leaders and now you don't have to re-Dominate them every day.
Hell just imagine what would happen if you snuck into political debates with Greater Invisibility and Zone of Truth.
Politicians, I imagine, have pretty good will saves. And if you have that Balseraph-like ability to believe your own lies, as many seem to do, the spell would be useless.
|
Think about it a moment and be honest with yourself.
Do you do it?
Once you have completed your initial transformation what do you do initially then in the long term?
The way it is set up, I have to say yeah, I'd do it.
Then for real fun, I'd pick Life Oracle as my class. Practically custom made baelnorn.