h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Cheer up hoo. It is not that bad.

>Cheer up hoo. It is not that bad<


Not remotely interested in slagging off believers, except in those instances where they have directly acted in complicity with the Church to ensure that certain things do or don't happen.

The Catholic Church has never publicly acknowledged or aopologised for its complicity in the Holocaust. Millions of faithful around the world allow that position to continue

The Catholic Church, after extreme pressure from outside bodies, has finally got round to acknowledging the wisespread problems of child abuse within its ranks. However, it's solution to the problem is to move the offenders round the Church, not to turn them over to the proper authorities. Again, milions of worshippers worldwide have allowed this to happen.

The Cathoic Church is now spreading lies about condoms to protect sacred doctrine on contraception. The response? 'Oh do you know this happening? It's a rumour?' Well, frankly, that's a disgrace. This policy, if true, may effectively amount to genocide in populations where education is poor and communication of new ideas slow. And your response is to criticize the whistle-blowers.

>Why aren't we reproducing madly?
Because I have enough trouble remembering to feed my dog, frankly. Any baby existing in my house would probably not go on existing very long.

Get too scared by the Jon Pertwee cut out figure...

That as well. Let's facce it, any child of mine would *not* end up a well rounded, fully adjusted person, now would they.

Hmmm . . . how many well-rounded, fully adjusted people do you actually know? I don't think I know any, which is just as well as I think I'd find someone like that rather scary.

az

I don't know any either, but any child brought up in my household would end up oblong and about as well adjusted as Channel 5 reception in Wales.

Liz and were talking about having children.

We spoke about: sleepless nights, the expense, the bed wetting, vomit everywhere, the bad behaviour, constant attention seeking and showing off. The mental and physical strain on us and on the whole I like my weekends like that and a baby would only get in the way.

Thats a bit glib sometimes I look after my neices or my autistic nephew. Aswell as giving up my free time to coach sports to children.

Just because we dont all sucumb to our biological urges in the way you have or become possesed by an overwhelmingly vain streak that makes us believe that the world needs our off spring does not make you right and us wrong Adele. Each to their own and I wish you and your children all the best.

I do think that I have the right to use my body for any recreational purpose I like in the privacy of my own home (nightclub toilet, cupboard at a party or vacant office at work) and if someone else wants to join in all the better. That I should not is a lie put about by hypocrites and liars, foremost amongst them is not the Pentagon but the church. The rules created by other people then written as "gods law" hold no more truth than any other book, but that really is for another thread.

Adele,

I didn't forward that link in order to 'slag off' believers. I did think it might start off some debate about the Vatican's anti-contraception stance, which is not an allegation, it's a fact. I'm curious because you have made references to using the pill in the past even though this is forbidden by your church. So in a sense, are you not also saying that the Vatican is wrong by taking this stance, since you do not follow it yourself?

It would also help if you put the name of the person you are replying to at the top of your posting as sometimes it isn't clear who you are talking to. I know we can click on 'this is a response to this posting' to find out but it would be simpler just to see the name on the posting.

az

Hoo,

<< (Hoo)


<> (azahar)


<> (Blues Shark)

You have chosen not to respond to this rather unintelligent comment you made and the two challenges on it that you received. It's all very well and good that you have documentary evidence of your intelligence but just being intelligent is not an excuse to say anything you like and assume people will take it as an intelligent comment.

az

I think it would be nice if we left intelligence out of this. Mainly because I tend to quickly grow to dislike people who think they know that they're intelligent. Especially when they try to back it up with examinations. I've been through enough of those to know what a load of tosh they are thank you very much.

hi Bouncy,

Quite right.

Intelligence - the capacity for understanding; ability to perceive and comprehend meaning.

This can mean having a good mental capacity for understanding but our bodies also have a lot of intelligence stored up inside them. I've never understood how this sort of thing can be measured properly as most mental 'intelligence tests' are rather biased towards a person's social position. I have never heard of a test that could gauge a person's emotional or physical intelligence, though no doubt these also exist somewhere.

So just because someone happens to have a clever mind does not make them 'intelligent' per se, in the broader sense of being aware and understanding in both mind and body. And especially with being able to feel compassionate towards others.

A truly intelligent person would not ever feel a need to use his or her supposed intelligence as a weapon against someone they deemed to be less intelligent than themselves.

In fact, a truly intelligent person would never think that people who had not had the benefit of their own personal education were somehow beneath them in terms of intelligence.

And finally, a truly intelligent person would try and educate others if they found them to be lacking in any sort of particular practical knowledge without trying to make them feel stupid for not having known this previously.

I do agree with you. Intelligence snobs, as with all snobs, are totally boring and unpleasant.

az

>> I think it would be nice if we left intelligence out of this.

I'd second that. Mainly because the discussion should be about the quality of various arguments, but also because the nosiy geniuses give us modest ones a bad name.

"it would be nice if we left intelligence out of this"

Good call. It's a depressing waste of time talking about it in any case, because those who have it KNOW they have it, those who don't have it don't know they don't have it, and almost invariably get either intimidated and/or snotty and indignant when they come up against those who do.

It's not, in the main, about intelligence in any case. It's about ignorance. The Catholic church is trying to maintain its hold over its followers the only way it can - by keeping them ignorant, and the more ignorant the better. It's doing so because the church knows well that the lesson of the Western world is that free education is the enemy of religion, or at least organised, Abrahamic religion. Tell people the truth, and they will turn away from the myth of the irrational, vengeful, capricious, evil deity told of in the Christian bible. Keep them ignorant and afraid, and almost regardless of their intelligence and potential you've got a captive customer for life. Only the brightest and strongest characters would be prepared to question their priests, especially given the stories they'll have been told about what happened to heretics in the past. Why is anyone even slightly surprised?

H.

Hi Az,

" << (Hoo) "

While the greatest risk to human life is in those countries where HIV is more prevalent than education - and Hoo knows that - could I venture to suggest that Hoo's point was more about backward and superstitious people in the more 'enlightened' West?

Already the most noticeable reaction from the Christian Front to the Panorama programme has been "it's not true". Followed, disturbingly, by some support for the Catholic Church's suggestion that condoms are not effective at preventing HIV transmission. These are defensive reactions by the faithful and are natural enough of course. If the allegations prove to be true - particularly with regard to Vatican support for these lies - it will demonstrate an indefensible position of dogmatic inhumanity on the part of the Catholic Church.

Whether it will be noticeably damaging I wouldn't like to guess.

F

Sorry Hoo - simulpost.

F

hi Fathom,

>>While the greatest risk to human life is in those countries where HIV is more prevalent than education - and Hoo knows that - could I venture to suggest that Hoo's point was more about backward and superstitious people in the more 'enlightened' West?>>

Yes, you can venture to guess anything at all you consider Hoo's point was actually meant to be, but he still has not actually confirmed this himself.

az

But by deciding for yourself that he meant what you wanted him to mean, ie the exact opposite, you are (gasp!) guilty of exactly the same crime.

>>The Catholic Church has never publicly acknowledged or aopologised for its complicity in the Holocaust.<<
The Church has never acknowledged its complicity, because that complicity is a lie! See the albushra website (Palestinian Christians) for the facts.
<<The Catholic Church, after extreme pressure from outside bodies, has finally got round to acknowledging the wisespread problems of child abuse within its ranks.<<
I said on another thread, (and pubbed some statistics) that the instance of child abuse by priests amounts to fewer than 1% of priests. (0.7% in fact)Just yesterday, here in NZ, a man was convicted of fraud because he had claimed a huge sum as compensation for 'abuse' he had invented. The church is *too* ready to apologise and compensate, many times on the accusation alone. Hoo would be hysterical if any other body paid out $$ to *women* who claimed abuse, on their unsupported word, but no doubt that's good enough for him when it's men claiming to have been abused by priests.
I am *not* a Catholic, I am simply blown away by the bigotry of some people here... Potholer, note that I said *some*...