You want proof?

All you disbelieving, communist heathens are going to shit yourselves when you see this!

Godcast

Its a miracle! He has shown himself to us! Quick, let us burn this large pile of leftist literature! :lol:

Left a comment ;D

This is almost as "real" as the bible!

Why the hatred brotha's?

whitch special effects on computer he use?
paintbrush? :D

Go refill your bong!



(not that I'm against drug use, of course :P )

yet another example of leftists with their priorities out of wack, you shits need to read my posting in this thread:

http://www.revleft.com/index.php?showtopic...entry1292401756

I'm too tired to bend you all over the counter in here too....

suffice to say by setting up yet another meaningless divide between workers (religious and non-religious ones) you are acting in a counterrevolutionary manner ....

Garbage like this belongs in chit-chat as the intention was obviously not to have a serious discussion concerning god(s) or religion ...

so Jazz, once again get off your ass and clean out these troll posts so we can have some serious discussions.

What workers?

Fuck off. We're tired of your bullshit, you're clearly some pissed off little kid that has about as much connection to the working class as you do to the rest of reality. The left and most other progressive forces throughout herstory have been opposed to religious institutions for all kinds of reasons.

Boom. Headshot

It's on par with most of the religious "proof" we get in here and it is more likely to get some of the trolls like freakazoid, Edric or yourself enraged enough to argue.

As lovely as it would be to go and delete all your posts I think it would cause some other members to kick up more fuss than it's worth.

That chapter always seemed like it was a reference to Jesus and his crucifiction, to me. But then, Jesus was opposed to religious institutions too, according to Matthew.

Because, as we all know, the working class is overwhelmingly atheist... right?

I always thought it was a savage attack on religious institutions and a good reason for opposing them (and a rather poor caricature of the education system.).

To be fair Berkman is not the best source to use when attacking religion (see chapter 9 of the same book) but I always found anarchists were a lot more progressive of the question of religion, as can - of course - be summed up in the slogan "No Gods, No Masters".

Proudhon and Bakunin also had some interesting things to say on the matter of God. (and women and jews respectively, but you can't have everything :( )

The class conscious section certainly is. That's part of the problem with religion, it is used to keep the bulk of the proletariat docile and prepared to believe the outrageous lies of the bourgeoisie.

Right. Among non-agricultural and urban countries where it makes sense to talk of a working class, in only a few backward shitholes like the U$A and $audi Arabia is this not the case. Even Israel for crying out loud is basically secular, as is increasingly most of Latin America.

Serious religious sentiment among workers is a uniquely American problem. It is either gone or going away in every other industrialized society, with the possible exception of the Vatican.

Secular is not the same as non-religious. A society may be secular (meaning that religion plays no role in political discourse) even while a significant proportion of its population holds religious beliefs.

Now the only part of the world where large numbers of people are actually atheist (meaning that they actively identify themselves as non-believers, as opposed to not going to church but still holding some notion of religious belief) is Europe. And you could not possibly make the argument that the global working class is concentrated in Europe.

It is true that increasing numbers of people in all industrialized societies are taking religion less and less seriously. But they still identify as religious believers, and still perceive attacks on religion as attacks on their way of life. That is the great irony of revolutionary anti-religious propaganda: It achieves nothing (since most of the people it targets have already stopped taking religion seriously) and only serves to alienate large numbers of workers who are de facto agnostics but still consider themselves religious.

The idea that religious belief is a tool of the ruling class is frankly a relic of the 19th century. The bourgeoisie is increasingly abandoning religious propaganda (with some exceptions, most notably the United States of course).

Quote:

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Jazzratt

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The class conscious section certainly is. That's part of the problem with religion, it is used to keep the bulk of the proletariat docile and prepared to believe the outrageous lies of the bourgeoisie.[/b][/quote]
I think the class conscious section of the proletariat in Latin America would strongly disagree with you. The only way you could pretend that class conscious proletarians worldwide are overwhelmingly atheist is if you tautologically define class conscious proletarians as proletarians who reject both capitalism and religious belief.

Also, see my reply to MarxSchmarx. Religion was used to keep the bulk of the proletariat docile. Fewer and fewer sections of the ruling class are using it today. It is my prediction that the global ruling class will abandon religion entirely by the mid-21st century. You are fighting yesterday's war.

Religious belief is declining among all sections of the population, true, but it seems to be declining much faster among the bourgeoisie than among the proletariat. I believe there will come a time when the bourgeoisie has abandoned religion but large segments of the proletariat are still religious (or at least quasi-religious in the sense I described above). In the future, religion will become less of a tool of oppression and more of a tool of liberation - provided, that is, that we revolutionary leftists do not squander the opportunity to draw religious believers to our side.

Yeah. The bourgeoisie are realizing that they need to make rational decisions in their own self-interest. Religion is not capitalistic... it's feudalistic. If capitalism continues for another century, I'm thinking the majority of all first-world countries will have abandoned religion. And I'm also thinking we should help it along!

How exactly do you propose we use lies as a tool for liberation?

I suggest we become savage truth-tellers! When people consistently tell the truth, you're more likely to trust them to tell the truth in the future, ja? And if I know anything about lies, it's that they always end up exposed. I've told enough.

-A lie cannot be believed by the liar; if it is a mutually held belief, it is simply a false idea.

-All major social organizations which have sustained changes have followed with their times. That is, religion in Israel, Iraq, and America each take on their own characteristics due to the prevalent cultural and political movements.

Israel is threatened by terrorist attacks and loss of power in the former Palestinian region; therefore, much of Zionism has turned into a militant, xenophobic ideology. However, it started as a simple, humanist - and socialist - movement.

The U.S. has little need for religious adherance; in fact, it threatens the God of Money. But religion is a good outlet for emotion, so the prevalent concept of religion in the U.S. is that, if you call yourself a Christian and perhaps go to church each sunday, you are not just religious, but ready to go to heaven. This is a secularization of the religion itself; it has become little more than a pacifier.

In Iraq, the situation is dire. So religion has taken a very grave character: because life is destitute, life has lost meaning, and only a mythical "afterlife" can replace the culture in Iraq, which rotates around death at this point. So we see a myriad of people who are "martyring" themselves (despite the fact that it is not condoned by scripture). It's not a religious creation, it's a religious reference.

In Poland, Solidarnosc was a predominantly Catholic organization. Many of the Priests were in the labor union.

In south america, many of the priests turned to liberation theology, not because they believed in Marxism, but beccause much of their congregation did. This doesn't mean they were lying, but that they were influenced by their congregations.

Religion WILL follow the people. It may develop a more realistic character, and will probably eventually die out in its current, magical incarnation, but for now and the near future, religion is clearly a force that won't just stay with us, but change with us.

Well, personally, I don't believe they are lies - but you already knew that.

You, of course, do believe that they are lies; therefore, from your perspective, I am trying to persuade you that lies may be useful to the revolutionary cause. You may consider this to be an immoral proposition, which would explain our diverging opinions...

Except, if I recall correctly, you once argued that there is no morality apart from class interest. So, assuming that a certain lie would promote the interests of the working class more effectively than the truth, why should we tell the truth?

The idea that all lies are eventually exposed is simply incorrect. A lot of our knowledge of history (particularly ancient history) comes from propaganda issued by the ruling classes of the time. I'm sure official Roman historians told plenty of lies, but we are not in a position to ever discover them.

In any case, as long as you hold the position that there is no morality apart from class interest, you cannot say that we should tell the truth for the truth's sake - you must bring arguments that telling the truth will be more beneficial to the revolution than lying.

To summarize my argument:
1. If I am correct and religion is true, we should support it.
2. If I am wrong and religion is false, then we should still support it if and when it benefits us to do so.

what a shitty video they got <_<

i&#39;m LOL at it :lol: can he help me with my lack of money problems? :lol: :lol:

That&#39;s what I just asked you in my previous post - How do you think lies could ever benefit the working class?

From my experience, teamwork is much easier if all parties know the same things.

Which begs the question, when could it possibly do so in the long run?

And in the Information Age...

One of the reasons communism can only rise out of capitalism is the information technology that comes with capitalism&#33; Without information to counter lies, we&#39;re screwed.