Forums » Off-Topic

The ten commandments...?

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Feb 21, 2004 UncleDave link
Warning: if youre strictly religious, you may find some of these offensive.

http://forums.fark.com/cgi/fark/comments.pl?IDLink=835931
Feb 21, 2004 Pyroman_Ace link
You need serious professional help....


THAT WAS AWESOEM!
Feb 21, 2004 SirCamps link
Well, I guess I fall under the "strictly religious" group, so yeah, I find it offensive. By tolerance, I mean that I won't kill you for disagreeing with me. That's life. Would have been possibly more funny if they spelled words correctly, however.
Feb 22, 2004 UncleDave link
You cant honestly tell me you found the 1337-speak one offensive.
Feb 22, 2004 SirCamps link
Lol, no, that was hilarious. What gets me about religion is that one side will set up a straw man argument about a religion he knows nothing about, and then blow it away.

This happens to many... for instance, Mormons still get bad raps about polygamy, even though that practice was abolished long ago. Some gung-ho Americans believe that all Muslims should be kicked out of the USA, because the Koran says some junk about dying and going to paradise. Nevermind that a lot of Muslims don't believe in violent jihad.

It's like the Bible, you would be hard-pressed to dig up a single Christian who believes that people should act today as those in the Old Testament (not leaving a single breathing thing alive when in a war). Different eras, different rules. Such as, "Thou shalt have no tolerance for others." Looking at history, tolerance can largely be defined as "we disagree but we won't kill each other/go to war over it." America was founded, by Puritans, I might add, on the basis of tolerance and freedom (worship God however you want). Every single commandment posted by "uncle eazy" was a straw man. The eighth one I found pretty funny, though. "Thou shalt not murder (except when commanded by the Lord thy God)." Murder, by definition, is the premeditated taking of life out of malice. If God says to do something, you're hardly doing it out of malice, but out of obedience. Were the American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan guilty of "murder," because they were being obedient to their superiors when told to open fire on the Republican Guard and the Taliban? No. Were the American soldiers in Vietnam guilty of murder when they went into a village and killed everyone? Yes.

OK, enough of a rant here....
Feb 22, 2004 Pyro link
It was good, but a couple of them were a bit tasteless...

/me likes the one that says NO in big letters... :P
Feb 22, 2004 roguelazer link
Jeez, don't say Puritans were tolerant. If they were, RI would be part of Massachusetts.

And which Puritans, anyhow? The Puritans of the Massachusetts Bay Colony were still members of the Anglican Church, but they felt it was impure. The "Puritans" of Plymouth Colony were a group known as the Brownists who separated from the Anglican Church because they felt it was not pure enough. And don't get me started about some of the other Separatist sects...
Feb 22, 2004 Magus link
Mass. Bay was founded by Puritans.

Virginia was founded by adventurers and businessmen hoping to strike it rich.

Georgia was founded as a penal colony.

Florida was founded by the Spanish.

Maryland was founded as a Catholic refuge.

It's a mistake to think the founding colonies had one mind. There was a plethora of reasons to come to the new world. Religion was only one of them. It is, however, ironic that the colonies that were founded based on materialism (most of the southern ones) are now the bastions of fundamentalist Christianity while the ones founded on religious extremism are today considered religiously liberal.
Feb 22, 2004 roguelazer link
RI was founded by people kicked out of Mass Bay

:P
Feb 22, 2004 raine link
For once something amusing on Fark
Feb 22, 2004 Pyroman_Ace link
It was very funny, but lemme make a point here.


Okay, many points made by SirCamps are rather porous. For instance, many people worry about Islamic people but they don't want them kicked out (there are about 8 of them in my high school and everyone likes them and hangs out with them).

I've never heard of Mormons gettign hit for the polygamy thing. Maybe in a few cases where a joke was made but the Morman's always laugh right along with us.

Also, when US Soldiers in Vietnam sacked and destroyed a village they were following rule #2 of the Vietnam Primer, never leave an enemy base intact. Quite frequently a child on a road would be planting a landmine or those handing out soda to troops laced them with shards of glass. Everyone not a US soldier was an enemy combatant. Including ARVN, our supposed allys. Many ARVNs were infact North Vietnamese or VC soldiers. Therefore, when Americans destroyed a village, they were saving their own asses. Not being picky about the targets, they killed everyone that could harm them.

Go educate yourelf by reading these:

Steel My Soldiers' Hearts- by Col. David H. Hackworth
&
Marine Sniper: 93 Confirmed Kills- by Charles Henderson
Feb 22, 2004 Magus link
"Go educate yourelf by reading these:"

-Go watch "Apocalypse Now." Two sides to every story. Bits of both are true.
Feb 22, 2004 Pyro link
Or Full Metal Jacket, for that matter. Hell, even Platoon has a bit...
Feb 22, 2004 Pyroman_Ace link
Steel My Soldier's Hearts is about the 4/39th Battalion, the HARDCORE. They went from Bust to Best in a few months under Col. Hackworth's command. They wanted to kill him at the start and had a price on his head, at the end that price was still there, but to get him back.

Marine Sniper in fact starts with the very struggle of a Marine killing a child without having a choice.
Feb 22, 2004 Magus link
And Apocalypse Now is an adaptation of Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" set in vietnam instead of the Congo. It talks about the horrors of war and what it does to your humanity, serving as a perfect illustration of Nietzsce's famous quote: "Do not fight with monsters, lest you become a monster yourself, for when you gaze into the abyss, the abyss also gazes back into you."

Now that we have ourselves a little "back cover marketing" lets go edumacate ourselves.

And yes Pyro, those are also good movies. Add those to your list.
Feb 22, 2004 Pyroman_Ace link
Movies:

Apocalypse Now
Full Metal Jacket
Platoon

Books:

Steel My Soldiers' Hearts
Marine Sniper: 93 Confirmed Kills
Feb 23, 2004 Magus link
You forgot Platoon and Full Metal Jacket.
Feb 23, 2004 Pyro link
Hmmm... I need to watch Apocalypse Now sometime when I've got free time...
Feb 24, 2004 SirCamps link
The problem with Apocalypse Now is that so much of it so bs. My father was in that war and can tell me what all is wrong with it. I'll have to ask him about it and report back to you guys.

At one point, they're in a place where in Vietnamese is "the foothills," but there's not a hill around. :-\
Feb 24, 2004 Magus link
Didn't you read my description of Apocalypse Now? It's not about Vietnam. It's "Heart of Darkness" superimposed on Vietnam. It talks about the dehumanizing effect of war. The story was just transplanted from the Congo River to Vietnam.
Part of it is supposed to be absurd (like the surfing bit) and part of it is supposed to be chilling. But none of it is meant to be historically accurate. It's a morality tale.