The truly held belief in magical things is dangerous to all of us sadly. Just look at the new age/yoga mom to Qanon pipeline.
Again, that’s a statement taking an exception (individuals from specific branches of “new age spirituality”) and extrapolating it to all Pagan faiths, ignoring how there are cases in which the opposite pipeline happens.
Also, the OC’s wording, the use of the adjective “immoral” for “all religions” (which includes non-Abrahamic faiths), is what triggered me and further led me to my earlier comment, because I live in a mostly-christian country, Brazil, where there’s recurring religious intolerance from many (notice I’m try to avoid the “all” generalization) evangelical churches against Quimbanda and other Afro-Brazilian faiths, the Romani people, and other non-Abrahamic faiths, with practitioners from such faiths being mocked, ostracized, even physically harmed and killed by intolerant evangelicals… and this very word, “immoral”, is the argument such evangelicals often use to “justify” their attacks, as I myself grew tired of hearing this same wording from in-person evangelicals regarding my Lilith-centered belief; statements such as “The devil makes you commit «sins» [a broad umbrella word for anything said evangelicals don’t like, including but not limited to, Gender Affirmation, with me having discovered and became very fond of my Queer me thanks to Lilith], that’s immoral”…
Look it’s great that you’ve got some imaginary being in your head that has helped you accept yourself as you are.
It’s honestly great and I’m sorry that you grew up in a very religious society which can be intolerant of behavior that does not conform to tradition. Do you think that this upbringing could be the reason that you want the blessing of an imaginary* being, one that you can tell yourself is superior to humans, especially those who have hurt you?
* By imaginary, I mean only existing in your mind, otherwise invisible, leaving no clear trace in the physical world. For religious people, these attributes make that being special, and full of potential. Think of what such a being could know or accomplish, unrestricted as it is by the laws of our mundane everyday reality! But for non-religious, can you not see that these same qualities make such beings irrelevant, and even dangerous, because we can create them as we want them, and use them to justify our own shitty behaviour? This is where the concern about immorality comes from - the abdication of responsibility for one’s own beliefs and actions.
As a nearly lifelong atheist who was raised by an abusively religious Catholic and lapsed Jew who never met a scrap new age nonsense she didn’t immediately graft into her personality, I about I have an exceptionally dim view of all forms of magical thinking. Even more to the point, my mother left me with lifelong issues by intentionally ignoring the effects of a severe TBI I received as a child.
That said, I am at best indifferent to the panoply of paganistic creeds. I view them as the absolutely least dangerous of this spectrum.
The truly held belief in magical things is dangerous to all of us sadly. Just look at the new age/yoga mom to Qanon pipeline.
To be fair, I’d take a Wiccan or the like over an adherent of the Abrahamic faiths every day, and twice on Sunday.
Again, that’s a statement taking an exception (individuals from specific branches of “new age spirituality”) and extrapolating it to all Pagan faiths, ignoring how there are cases in which the opposite pipeline happens.
Also, the OC’s wording, the use of the adjective “immoral” for “all religions” (which includes non-Abrahamic faiths), is what triggered me and further led me to my earlier comment, because I live in a mostly-christian country, Brazil, where there’s recurring religious intolerance from many (notice I’m try to avoid the “all” generalization) evangelical churches against Quimbanda and other Afro-Brazilian faiths, the Romani people, and other non-Abrahamic faiths, with practitioners from such faiths being mocked, ostracized, even physically harmed and killed by intolerant evangelicals… and this very word, “immoral”, is the argument such evangelicals often use to “justify” their attacks, as I myself grew tired of hearing this same wording from in-person evangelicals regarding my Lilith-centered belief; statements such as “The devil makes you commit «sins» [a broad umbrella word for anything said evangelicals don’t like, including but not limited to, Gender Affirmation, with me having discovered and became very fond of my Queer me thanks to Lilith], that’s immoral”…
!news@lemmy.world
Look it’s great that you’ve got some imaginary being in your head that has helped you accept yourself as you are.
It’s honestly great and I’m sorry that you grew up in a very religious society which can be intolerant of behavior that does not conform to tradition. Do you think that this upbringing could be the reason that you want the blessing of an imaginary* being, one that you can tell yourself is superior to humans, especially those who have hurt you?
* By imaginary, I mean only existing in your mind, otherwise invisible, leaving no clear trace in the physical world. For religious people, these attributes make that being special, and full of potential. Think of what such a being could know or accomplish, unrestricted as it is by the laws of our mundane everyday reality! But for non-religious, can you not see that these same qualities make such beings irrelevant, and even dangerous, because we can create them as we want them, and use them to justify our own shitty behaviour? This is where the concern about immorality comes from - the abdication of responsibility for one’s own beliefs and actions.
As a nearly lifelong atheist who was raised by an abusively religious Catholic and lapsed Jew who never met a scrap new age nonsense she didn’t immediately graft into her personality, I about I have an exceptionally dim view of all forms of magical thinking. Even more to the point, my mother left me with lifelong issues by intentionally ignoring the effects of a severe TBI I received as a child.
That said, I am at best indifferent to the panoply of paganistic creeds. I view them as the absolutely least dangerous of this spectrum.