I remember hearing somewhere that comedy equals tragedy plus time. While not entirely true, it's far easier to laugh about something horrible that happened long ago than it is to actually do it. These kids would probably never be able to eat again if they ever saw it happen, but to them, since it's so long ago, it's more safe. Think how many of them probably play violent games like most first-person shooters, etc, too. They would never act it out, but it's fun to imagine sometimes.
Also, I've occasionally thought of inventive ways to torture people, but of course, I would never do it. It was just a mental exercise.
tl;dr, just ignore them. They're not laughing seriously (if that makes sense).
Do these people really not understand the concept of fiction? Do they honestly believe the actor actually drinks human blood? I sincerely hope not, or the last hair-thin thread of hope I had for humanity just broke.
Most Christians are not bad people, and those that do try to convert you are in the minority. Hint: if you can quote the bible verses about peace, love, and tolerance at them when they preach at you, you can probably annoy them into leaving. I have noticed through personal experience that quite a few of the most vocal Christians don't know that much about their own religion, aside from what their pastors have read to them.
It seems pretty obvious to me that if something is proven not to exist, then we should not continue to believe in it's existence despite said proof. For instance, the existence of a universal "ether" that holds the planets in place like a viscous liquid (at least, as I understand the theory) was disproved long ago, and because of the overwhelming evidence against it, no one believes that space is a liquid anymore.
Now, it would, naturally, be incredibly hard to disprove the existence of a supreme being, due to the loopholes he (or she) can exploit (because said being has the cheat codes to the universe) - creating the universe 6000 years ago, but making it look much older, for instance, or manipulating nature as we know it and erasing our memory of the previous reality, etc etc. It may not even be possible.
I would rep you, but I haven't repped others enough yet. These kids who claim their lives are crappy haven't even SEEN crappy yet. Most of them live in a comfortable suburban home with a computer and a good school system. The people they claim to be would cream themselves if they had even half as good a life.
It is official. I have been on the internet for far too long. I didn't even flinch when I saw his face.
Don't get me wrong, I feel sorry for the guy. I flinched when I saw him hit the water. I thought to myself "Ouch. That's not gonna end well". It's sad that it happened. I've just been desensitized to gore thanks to the internet.
I'm going to assume that this was at least partially related to my last post.
The original Hebrews, starting with Abraham, if you follow the historical "paper trail" (while translating Abraham into Babylonian, which I forget what his name was in that language) came out of the Saudi Arabian desert into Babylon, where the historical Abraham lived for quite some time before leaving for the Canaan area. By the time he left, most historians think that a good deal of his family had strong ties to the city of Ur, where he was living. So the question remains, what is so significant about a minor family group out of Babylonia that god wants to clean up after their messes and keep them alive when, according to Darwinian theory, they should have died in quite short order, according to how the bible puts it.
^These. Earth would be screwed until some of them grew up and took control, and then we would be back to the old forms of government - the strongest rule, and the weak die. That is, if they don't all die from hunger or disease first.
Also, what happens to the bodies of the adults? If they just drop dead, the chances of disease are even higher.
Facts can indeed prove an opinion wrong, and if humanity is to move forward, people need to learn to let disproved opinions go. Look at fundamentalists - many of them stick to the 6000 year old earth, yet we have fossils dating to 2.something billion years, rocks dated to 3.something billion years, and evidence of a 12-14 billion year old universe. Or the (thankfully few) people who continue to believe that the earth is flat when we can see the bloody orb from space. (p.s., not trying to offend anyone if you actually DO have those opinions, but I sincerely hope no one here does.)
So, in my opinion, once an opinion is proven to be based on irrelevant or disproven facts, that opinion becomes irrelevant and should not be held any longer.
Really, IMO, most individual animals don't matter, especially if they're being bred, unless they have some emotional connection with a human (pet, etc), and then they really only matter to that person. The animals that do matter, to me, are the endangered ones, since if the wrong species goes extinct, the repercussions could be massive and would be unforeseeable.
As for human life, I don't think I'm qualified to judge, since I was able to take the news of 3 grandparents dying without much change in emotion at all, despite my lack of knowledge of an afterlife. I've tried to contemplate someone I know dying before, and I never felt a thing.
Seriously, Faleh Hassan Almaleki, learn it, love it. You're in America, you don't get to do honor killings. You want your kids to remain good Muslims, stay in Iraq. I'm not being racist or anything - when you live in a western country, you end up becoming more western. It's just what happens.
Have you ever seen anyone over 25 delivering pizzas? I haven't :D. Those jobs are designed for students to take so they can pay for college. Anyone older than student age doing a low-paying service-sector job (pizza delivery, fast food, waiting tables, etc), IMO, is a failure. Factory jobs, as you mentioned, are one way to go, but very few factory workers truly enjoy their lives working in a factory (and good luck finding one that's still in the US... -.-). Also, if you're a manager or higher, you've at least made it somewhere, but still, most of them are just wage slaves chained to their job, and loathing every second of it.
I'm in college now, as I believe I mentioned earlier, going for an Archaeology degree, and couldn't be happier. I'll be doing a job I love every day for the rest of my life, and gettign paid far more than if I didn't have a college education, while also cutting out a lot of the ass-kissing and office politics of corporate jobhood.
You know, I've always wondered, what's so special about a minor tribe of Canaanites out of Babylon that "God" would go to all that trouble to save them every time they were too incompetent to do so themselves?
