5 Popular Ideas Holding Humanity Back

[stromboli]

http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-popular-b ... nity-back/

Sometimes Cracked gets it just right.

#5: That We're fulfilling a prophecy

The headlines will make a lot more sense to you once you understand one simple fact: About 60 percent of Americans believe that Jesus Christ and his angels will descend from heaven and destroy the planet, and about 40 percent of Americans think it will happen within the next few decades.

Every decision they make, and every vote they cast, is done with this in mind. For instance, there is no reason not to drill all of the oil now, because who are we saving it for? The unsaved, who'll be left behind when the demons roam free? Those heathens can walk.

#4:That the ghost of a different person is living inside us

Nope, I'm not talking about demon possession here, or even belief in a soul. I'm talking about the thing you, the reader, believe in, regardless of religion (or lack of). Here, I'll show you.

Stand up, wherever you are, and describe out loud the worst thing you've ever done. OK, sit back down. Unless you were in public and have been asked to leave, in which case you'll need to progress to another location to finish reading the article. Now, I bet for most of you, the story sounded something like this:

"One time, when I was drunk, I cheated on my wife."

"A year ago, when I was short on cash, I stole from my roommate."

"During an argument in high school, I totally lost it and beat my best friend so bad, he had to go to the hospital."

"I ate another man's flesh while infected with a mind-controlling brain parasite."

Do you spot the key phrases there? "When I was drunk." "When I was short on cash." "I totally lost it." "Brain parasite." It's not just that we make excuses for our behavior, it's that we make a really specific excuse: That the person who did the bad thing wasn't the "real" us.

Very good. I agree with this list.

[Plu]

Holy crap, that's a good article.

[_Xenu_]

Let me guess. You were reading that thread 'Gday, Gday' where I linked to the Cracked article about Australia and found it from there? I read the same article yesterday.

[stromboli]

Let me guess. You were reading that thread 'Gday, Gday' where I linked to the Cracked article about Australia and found it from there? I read the same article yesterday.

No. I check Cracked every couple of days.

[Hydra009]

Strong disagreement with #1.

I'm not against people reacting with awe towards something.  I'm just not terribly happy when it's fundamentalist zeal about their imaginary friend as opposed to a hobby/entertainment.  One is intrinsically harmful, the other is not.

Needless to say, I'm not one of those "it's just a game" people.  Nor do I agree that all people "worship" something.

[AllPurposeAtheist]

What can you expect from people who believe nonsense like Jesus is making football players better tacklers or so much more violent than the next guy or able to catch passes better than others. Jesus not only arbitrarily makes some people better athletes, but definitely influences the outcomes of sporting events.
For the Lord so loved Tom Brady...until Sunday..
Pssst.. The Bengals were demonically possessed last Sunday..

[stromboli]

Not a coincidence that the picture is of Glen Beck. This built in "religion is vital to our nation" and we will pay the consequences, etc. is very much with us. We have gone from "progress is our most important product" to progressives are evil, and the religion of our forefathers is all that can save us.

[Plu]

I'm not against people reacting with awe towards something. I'm just not terribly happy when it's fundamentalist zeal about their imaginary friend as opposed to a hobby/entertainment. One is intrinsically harmful, the other is not.

You should see hooligans go at it. The same spectrum that exists with religious folks ranging from "yeah I believe but do little" through "I go to church every day" to "KILL ALL THE HERETICS" exists with fans of sports, from the "oh yeah I'll watch a game occasionally" to "I watch every game" to "You like club X? I will beat you senseless for that".

It's not the subject that makes it dangerous. It's how much you believe that it's the most important thing ever and worth hurting other people for.

[Hydra009]

It's not the subject that makes it dangerous. It's how much you believe that it's the most important thing ever and worth hurting other people for.

There we differ.  It's not mere ardor that's the problem, else any fandom would be an equivalent evil to the worst fundamentalists.

Despite the obvious similarities (passion, tribalism, and on occasion, violence), there are some pretty glaring differences between religious extremism and sports fandom (for starters, only one is set up as a series of directives on how to live one's life and how to treat others and is absolutely unquestionable) that make it a faulty comparison.

It's surprising (and a bit sad) that I'm seemingly alone in pointing this out.

[Plu]

(for starters, only one is set up as a series of directives on how to live one's live and how to treat others and is absolutely unquestionable)

While I'm not really into sports, from what I've seen about extremists, there are quite a few rules on how to live your life as a proper fan of your favorite team.

Sports-extremism really is just religion-lite. It's clearly not as bad, but it pretty much follows the exact same kinds of rules once you really go off the deep end.

[aitm]

yeah, I really don't get into #4 either as much. The point I guess is that to admit in public someones previous "crimes" make people find an excuse for it...because when we think about it I don't see me using any excuse, (actually I can't see me doing it in public either but that would necessitate the experiment). Meh, whatever.

[Hydra009]

Sports-extremism really is just religion-lite. It's clearly not as bad, but it pretty much follows the exact same kinds of rules once you really go off the deep end.

The way I see it, religions are just fandoms gone awry.  It's one thing to really like the Harry Potter books, quite another to think that Harry Potter is a real person.

[Eric1958]

I'm bugged by the author's assumption that "lots of non believers think we are living in the end times too". He pointed out several movies to illustrate his point, but such stories have always been popular. Think back 25 years to Mad Max, or 60 years to Fahrenheit 451 and many other such tales. Yes, there are a lot of them now, but I posit that it has more to do with the rapid growth of technology and their being the fad of the decade rather than us believing these are the end times.

If the end of our time does come because so many people believe that it was called for in the bible and so they make it a self fulfilling prophecy it will be incredibly ironic. Regrettably it will also be only a little surprising.

[SilentFutility]

(for starters, only one is set up as a series of directives on how to live one's live and how to treat others and is absolutely unquestionable)

While I'm not really into sports, from what I've seen about extremists, there are quite a few rules on how to live your life as a proper fan of your favorite team.

Sports-extremism really is just religion-lite. It's clearly not as bad, but it pretty much follows the exact same kinds of rules once you really go off the deep end.

Unwritten rules perhaps, whereas there are religions with codeified doctrines in writing expressly ordering people to commit atrocities towards fellow human beings.

[Plu]

I have no idea if the rules are written down, actually. They very well might be. Then again, maybe not. Does it really matter all that much whether they are put to writing, though?