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I am religious and believe in free will

71 (27.7%)

I am religious and do not believe in free will

10 (3.9%)

I am not religious and believe in free will

114 (44.5%)

I am not religious and do not believe in free will

61 (23.8%)

Total Members Voted: 251

[RedKing]

Does the bible condemn sex? Or make it like it's a necessary evil?

Depends on which part. Consider that the Song of Solomon is basically one big long erotic poem.

[Orange Wizard]

Does the bible condemn sex? Or make it like it's a necessary evil?

Not at all. The whole point of Song of Songs/Solomon is that sex is good and enjoyable. The Bible does condemn sexual intimacy outside of marriage, which may include le homogay sex depending on your definition of marriage.

Depends on which part.

IIRC Leviticus condemns a few sex acts (such as during a woman's period, or up the butt) because they're ceremonially unclean under Jewish law. It's mostly irrelevant to Christians.

Considering the text quite liberally (hah) has points where God told the Israelites to kill all men, boys, and women who have "known a man" and take the virgin girls for their own... Uses? I think the Bible doesn't have a problem with sex in and of itself.

The Israelites did many brutal things. None of them should be a guide for a Christian's conduct.

[Amperzand]

And honestly, I'd say the whole "Ya gotta be married" thing was largely intended to prevent rampant population growth/unplanned pregnancy with no legally bound backup, more than it was about sexual morality.

[Orange Wizard]

Most of the OT laws have some kind of practical benefit in that sense. Marriage laws keep families structured, restrictions on sex means fewer STDs, farming and land laws to provide for the poor, food restrictions to prevent food poisoning, and rituals to bring communities together.

[Amperzand]

Exactly.

To be clear, I'm hardly in support of the OT, or even religion in general, but I do find such things interesting.

[Loud Whispers]

Most of the OT laws have some kind of practical benefit in that sense. Marriage laws keep families structured, restrictions on sex means fewer STDs, farming and land laws to provide for the poor, food restrictions to prevent food poisoning, and rituals to bring communities together.

Most importantly, kids growing up with parents

[Orange Wizard]

Most importantly, kids growing up with parents

Stop trying to enforce sexist gender roles you goddamn chauvinist

[Frumple]

And honestly, I'd say the whole "Ya gotta be married" thing was largely intended to prevent rampant population growth/unplanned pregnancy with no legally bound backup, more than it was about sexual morality.

S'far as I'm aware it was more just to enforce existing social structures, maintain family lines and whatnot. Was mostly about property and inheritance, basically. Folks that wrote the books didn't really give a shit about overpopulation (frankly, too many kids died for it to be a meaningful issue), and there were rules in place for unplanned pregnancies.

And @OW's shitpost: Or at least acknowledge how often it is that's pretty close to the worst possible outcome. We've still got plenty of christians (among others, of course) killing (among all sorts of other things) their children and being basically let get away with it because that (and especially growing up with the biological parents) is seen as some kind of ideal state.

Christian counseling and whatnot also causes a frankly horrendous amount of fuckup in a number of countries regarding marriage counseling, child rearing, etc., etc. Bible wasn't particularly good regarding child rearing and family structures.

[Loud Whispers]

Most importantly, kids growing up with parents

Stop trying to enforce sexist gender roles you goddamn chauvinist

I find this very problematic as you're implying there's anything sexist about kids growing up with parents like literally I can't even right now LITERALLY like LITERALLY OMG can you just even like I'm gonna need you to check yourself because I'm going to lose my mind because of close minded bigots like you smh
#signalboost #doctorwho #savebrendan #shitlords #itsparentingstupid

S'far as I'm aware it was more just to enforce existing social structures, maintain family lines and whatnot. Was mostly about property and inheritance, basically. Folks that wrote the books didn't really give a shit about overpopulation (frankly, too many kids died for it to be a meaningful issue), and there were rules in place for unplanned pregnancies.

And @OW's shitpost: Or at least acknowledge how often it is that's pretty close to the worst possible outcome. We've still got plenty of christians (among others, of course) killing (among all sorts of other things) their children and being basically let get away with it because that (and especially growing up with the biological parents) is seen as some kind of ideal state.

Christian counseling and whatnot also causes a frankly horrendous amount of fuckup in a number of countries regarding marriage counseling, child rearing, etc., etc. Bible wasn't particularly good regarding child rearing and family structures.

I CAN'T EVEN RIGHT NOW

[Orange Wizard]

#itsparentingstupid

basically

And @OW's shitpost: Or at least acknowledge how often it is that's pretty close to the worst possible outcome. We've still got plenty of christians (among others, of course) killing (among all sorts of other things) their children and being basically let get away with it because that (and especially growing up with the biological parents) is seen as some kind of ideal state.

Eh. Having two parents (or at least more adults in the house so it's not one parent doing anything) is a positive for everyone. Trying to raise kids on your own, and work for a living is hard. It's hard on the kids too, who don't get as much time with their parent.
I do agree that keeping a nuclear family intact in spite of abuse, etc. is a terrible approach, but breaking it up to pre-empt that is also foolish.
And, yeah. Biology is basically irrelevant when it comes to parenting, so it's kinda dumb that people think that's important.

Christian counseling and whatnot also causes a frankly horrendous amount of fuckup in a number of countries regarding marriage counseling, child rearing, etc., etc.

Christian counselling is basically terrible, yeah. Along with any other ideologically-driven counselling (unless that ideology is "a secular approach to arrive at the best outcome" but that doesn't really count).

Bible wasn't particularly good regarding child rearing and family structures.

I dunno, it gets the basic points in order. OT has a very... traditional(?) approach to family structure, which to be fair is about as good as it was going to get at the time. A traditional approach that generally works is vastly easier to maintain, at least.
In the NT family structure is a minor point, but there are strong themes around marriage of working towards closer understanding and agreement. The husband is the head of the household in the style of Roman law at the time, which today should be mostly irrelevant when the couple is in agreement, and is a waste of time when they're not.

Finally, the moral imperative of "In all things, work for the good of those around you" is plenty of justification IMO to give plently of leeway in family structure for the people involved to be happy and healthy.

[origamiscienceguy]

The bible tells parents to raise children with love and children to obey parents. I know that people don't always do that, but I can't think of a better upbringing for the children or the parents.

[Frumple]

I do agree that keeping a nuclear family intact in spite of abuse, etc. is a terrible approach, but breaking it up to pre-empt that is also foolish.

Didn't say anything about preemptively breaking anything up, heh. Basically just noting that the important part isn't the kids growing up with parents, it's them growing up well _{with a side of fuck the parents if they get in the way of that, which is incredibly goddamn common in everything I've seen in life. Not a majority, perhaps, but far too damned often.}

And to an extent OSG. It is good if the love is good and what they're being asked to obey is as well, and the both of them aren't getting in the way of various other important things. Just seems that in practice christian culture et al is pretty damn bad at actually inculcating that, y'know?

[Orange Wizard]

The bible tells parents to raise children with love and children to obey parents. I know that people don't always do that, but I can't think of a better upbringing for the children or the parents.

Ye. The problem's not in the rules, it's people sticking to them even when it's actively working against the point of the rules

Didn't say anything about preemptively breaking anything up, heh.

I may have been pre-emptively striking down the strawman

[Teneb]

I may have been pre-emptively striking down the strawman

"And the LORD said: strike down the strawman!"

Anyway, why is it that traditional often gets automatically equaled to "good"? Is it something inherent of human psychology?

[Frumple]

Weeellll, no, the problem's kinda' in the rules too when they have that nasty tendency to lead people to sticking to them even when it's pissing all over the spirit of 'em. Coulda' stood to spell things out a bit more specifically, y'know?

And sorta', T. It's mostly a sort of "Old people did it, they've lived longer and accumulated more experiences, their wisdom should be heeded" sort of thing, s'far as I'm aware. It just kinda' forgets that age doesn't actually necessarily correlate with wisdom, and that the situation changes with time.