Hmm, you have a point, Leti. I didn't consider it all the way to that ending, which would make sense. Though considering he's lecturing a prince, I'm inlined a little bit to doubt it, but.
I was crossing it with one of the more noxious type of "biblical literalist", who go from a line about "and Man shall have dominion over the plants and the beasts" and using that as justification for treating the world like crap. And then there's the guys who think the end of the world's coming, so why bother? But none of them were around when this was written, so it's not really fair to involve them. Just like it's not fair to compare the God Hates Fags people to... well, anybody sane, really.
On the other hand, the bits justifying the caste system still irk me, the "do what you're born to do as the highest honor" bit. The same as other things that say don't make waves, all this will be sorted out after you die, it strikes me as just encouraging people not to think or to bother and try and make things better now.
It's important to remember to make a distinction between people who are honest and sincere in their beliefs and are trying to be good people, and those just using religion as a cover or excuse for what they want to do anyway. I still think denying the world as real is problematic and dangerous, because it also helps people to cut themselves away from things and not try and help things be better. We're here, now, might as well make it as good as we can, no matter what happens later. Something we should all be happy to work with anybody else of good will to do.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2005-01-06 02:47 pm (UTC)I was crossing it with one of the more noxious type of "biblical literalist", who go from a line about "and Man shall have dominion over the plants and the beasts" and using that as justification for treating the world like crap. And then there's the guys who think the end of the world's coming, so why bother? But none of them were around when this was written, so it's not really fair to involve them. Just like it's not fair to compare the God Hates Fags people to... well, anybody sane, really.
On the other hand, the bits justifying the caste system still irk me, the "do what you're born to do as the highest honor" bit. The same as other things that say don't make waves, all this will be sorted out after you die, it strikes me as just encouraging people not to think or to bother and try and make things better now.
It's important to remember to make a distinction between people who are honest and sincere in their beliefs and are trying to be good people, and those just using religion as a cover or excuse for what they want to do anyway. I still think denying the world as real is problematic and dangerous, because it also helps people to cut themselves away from things and not try and help things be better. We're here, now, might as well make it as good as we can, no matter what happens later. Something we should all be happy to work with anybody else of good will to do.