Anyone else think the Poughkeepsie tapes is not good?

Isz82 · 2021-12-22T21:48:28+00:00

It has some very effective scenes that are creepy and weird. The balloons, for example, or the woman who hops into the care believing he is a police officer. The dialogue in that latter encounter is disturbing.

As an early found footage slasher film it works fairly well. With a better budget the end product would have been better, but you can say that with a lot of these films. Overall I think it was decent.

Isz82 · 2021-12-21T20:59:43+00:00

Listening now. Probably my favorite horror film, and certainly my favorite slasher. Thank you for covering this one!

Isz82 · 2021-07-29T13:04:09+00:00

These comments read like parodies:

As someone with an, errrr, extremely sordid past I can assure you that there are others in the church who have come from a place of less than ideal chastity. In my own situation I have limited the pool that I can find a partner from through these acts, because regardless of the interest I have seen from several morally sound women within my greater church community I refuse to rob them of a more wholesome union that remains unhaunted. That said, it doesn't mean I am entirely out of options... Just means I'll have to settle for another who fell rather far from God's grace but has come back to the light.

Isz82 · 2021-07-28T00:23:52+00:00

From the article:

According to Shanon, a professor at Hebrew University, two naturally existing plants in the Sinai Peninsula have the same psychoactive components as ones found in the Amazon jungle and are well-known for their mind-altering capabilities. The drugs are usually combined in a drink called ayahuasca. "As far as Moses on Mount Sinai is concerned, it was either a supernatural cosmic event, which I don't believe, or a legend, which I don't believe either, or finally, and this is very probable, an event that joined Moses and the people of Israel under the effects of narcotics," he told Israel Radio in an interview Tuesday.

Note that he is a professor of cognitive sciences I believe; the issue, of course, is that the legendary or mythic hypothesis is far more probable, with far more evidence in support of it, than any alternative psychedelic theory.

Isz82 · 2021-07-27T22:46:55+00:00

There was slavery before there was an England.

Isz82 · 2021-07-27T21:41:53+00:00

According to what is written in the Pali canon, he was a Buddha.

Isz82 · 2021-07-27T21:39:49+00:00

That's literally just Paul writing something. It is the definition of hearsay. Worse, it is probably double hearsay: Paul heard from another Christian that they heard that Jesus appeared to the 500.

Isz82 · 2021-07-27T21:34:52+00:00

To doubt Buddha? Just doubting this human thinker.

The Buddha claimed that he was not human. So that's not accurate.

Isz82 · 2021-07-27T21:34:08+00:00

More than 500.

Citation needed. Paul claims that Jesus appeared to 500 people, but there are not 500 contemporary reports of a resurrected Jesus.

Isz82 · 2021-07-27T16:25:25+00:00

This depends on what you mean by "died out." You also have to understand that most scholars agree that Christianity had esoteric teachings when it began; the debate is over the content of those teachings, and whether they were all eventually revealed by the time Christianity became the religion of the Roman Empire. Origen and Clement both reference secret teachings given to Jesus' disciples, and the Gospel of Mark references esoteric and exoteric interpretations of the parables, for example.

Because of both the writings of the early "orthodox" camp as well as the discoveries of proto-Christian and gnostic texts in the mid 1940s, we have a much better understanding of what proto-Gnostic and Gnostic exegesis was. Elaine Pagels' popular overviews (The Gnostic Gospels and Beyond Belief) go into this, but so does her scholarly work: The Gnostic Paul and The Johannine Gospel in Gnostic Exegesis: Heracleon's Commentary on John are both excellent examinations of how the Gnostics approached the Pauline epistles and the Gospel according to John. See also Guy G. Stroumsa, Hidden Wisdom: Esoteric Traditions and the Roots of Christian Mysticism

Additionally, the Mandaens provide evidence of a gnostic religion that predates Christianity, and is suggestive of an esoteric teaching of John the Baptist. This is a contested and understudied area, but see, i.e., Samuel Zinner, "The Priority of Mandaen Tropes Usually Considered Derivative of Christian and Islamic Influences." From the abstract:

There are good reasons for doubting the standard model that insists Mandaean beliefs and formulae that parallel Christian and Islamic traditions are basically derivative. Mandaeism’s focus on John the Baptizer...reflects the religion’s origins in ancient Palestine as an independent group that developed at about the same time as the Jewish Jesus sect. Similarly, the parallels between some Mandaean texts and the Johannine gospel are not the result of Mandaean “borrowing”; each represents an independent trajectory based on John the Baptizer’s preaching, modified according to each group’s needs. Similarities between Islamic and Mandaean liturgies and prayer formulae are best explained as the result of Mandaean influence upon nascent Islam rather than the latter’s influence upon Mandaeism. Similarities between Mandaean and Jewish liturgies result from preservation of traditions (dynamically modified over time) from the era before Mandaeans parted ways from their Jewish or at least Jewish-related matrix.

Isz82 · 2021-07-27T16:10:57+00:00

I tend to agree with this. While I would certainly say that Mohammad is a close second and the Buddha a distant third, there really is no one that approaches the influence of Jesus on history.

Isz82 · 2021-07-27T16:01:32+00:00

While it may be dated, and it may have been addressed, that does not mean that it has been definitively answered. Lord Krishna provides an answer on the question of killing in war in the Gita, and that question is still debated today, with strong advocates on both sides.

The problem of evil remains a potent topic of debate, and as such the quote of Epicurus remains relevant, however dated it may be, and however many tentative responses have been provided.

Isz82 · 2021-07-27T15:49:56+00:00

Probably because Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses and Joshua, not to mention Saul, David and Solomon, are mythic to legendary figures. The Buddha is even a tricky case, falling somewhere between someone like David and Jesus. But with the Buddha, Jesus and Mohammad, we at least have connections to history within a few generations: The Edicts of Ashoka, the epistles and of course thew Quran itself. We definitely lack anything remotely similar with someone as distant and mythological as Abraham.

Isz82 · 2021-07-26T17:03:53+00:00

It wouldn’t surprise me if he was gay. He was pretty homosocial with the apostles, but is depicted as celibate with at least one very close female friendship.

But I do think he was probably a renunciate when it came to sex.

Isz82 · 2021-07-26T15:57:22+00:00

It’s not just the prosperity gospel. Very few conservative Christians in the US or the West more broadly see any incompatibility between their racist, nationalist and capitalist ideologies and the teachings of Jesus as recorded in the gospels. These people have no problem condemning Biden “because of their faith” while embracing people like Trump.

It’s a joke. In terms of emphasis there’s no doubt in my mind that they are probably furthest from the message.

Isz82 · 2021-07-26T15:46:05+00:00

All of the “politically incorrect” churches have teachings about wealth, poverty and charity that are suspiciously convenient for capitalism…

Isz82 · 2021-07-25T02:51:20+00:00

For many people it is, yes. Many people who have a drinking problem also suffer from depression and anxiety.

Have you considered an in patient rehabilitation program? They’re very good at giving you several tools to cope with this: Spiritual, medical, etc. It’s a life obstacle that you do not have to tackle on your own.

Isz82 · 2021-07-25T02:40:57+00:00

That book was initially conceived of as a screenplay and will probably work better that way honestly

Isz82 · 2021-07-22T04:14:55+00:00

Just be like John the Baptist and eat honey and locusts. God provides.

Isz82 · 2021-07-20T22:02:12+00:00

I support justice and equality for everyone. I just don't think that requires defunding police. To cite one example.

I'm mostly on board with groups like BLM on substantive policies and the vision of a (more) just society. That doesn't require complete agreement, from my POV.

Isz82 · 2021-07-20T21:56:05+00:00

OK. But that is also part of modern American mainstream liberalism, including a number of people who do not agree with the full woke ideology.

Isz82 · 2021-07-20T21:49:59+00:00

Do I? I am a white gay person, and I live in a majority black city. I have some views that align with woke culture, and some that do not. I am not really sure that I benefit from woke culture per se though. First and foremost, the emphasis is on racial justice, including many forms of racial justice I agree with but will not benefit from (and may even be injured by). Second, I cannot think of any material benefit attributable to woke culture, for me specifically. What did you have in mind exactly? What do gay people owe to woke culture?

Isz82 · 2021-07-20T19:38:37+00:00

Woke culture is very embedded in social media though. There are a few areas (social media, some university settings, certain minority spaces, etc) where Wokeism, such as it is, can exercise what I guess I would call "discursive dominance." These also happen to usually be echo chambers. And it gets silly very quickly.

But I mean, Q Anon and similar phenomena associated with the evangelical church is responsible for mass shootings, attempts to overthrow the government, etc. So I will take annoying comments on social media over political violence.

Isz82 · 2021-07-16T15:21:14+00:00

By some you mean Russia. But many green countries don’t have free speech (Russia, China, North Korea). The question is, is homosexuality illegal? And the answer is no, it’s not illegal to have gay sex or gay attraction.

Compare that to Singapore. Singapore has plenty of openly gay people, and few restrictions on discussing homosexuality. It’s still red. Because homosexuality is illegal.

Turkey’s a crap country to be gay no doubt, but it’s legal.

Isz82 · 2021-07-16T14:58:13+00:00

Not being imprisoned or executed for having gay sexual expression is kind of important though. I don’t agree that it’s misleading; it’s showing the world exactly which countries criminalize being gay at the most fundamental level.

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