[annatar1914]

There is no rational basis for morality, and even if there were it would merely be a glorified version of the grubby calculated self-interest upon which capitalism’s post-hoc justifications are based. The whole point of this thread, surely, is to explore alternatives to that mode of thought. As soon as we talk about morality in a non-rational sense, we enter the realm of religion and spirituality. The thieves you observed in that store were committing a sin, not merely a logical faux pas, which is why the thought of their behaviour is ‘persecuting’ you.

@Potemkin :

Indeed friend, I believe that you are quite correct. As much as I rail against our miserable modern ethics and morality which seems so positively indecent in itself, I encounter frequently the primordial malady by which I myself am a part of this same humanity.

And finding a way out is truly the message of this thread. People are dying for answers, people of good will.

[Potemkin]

@Potemkin :

Indeed friend, I believe that you are quite correct. As much as I rail against our miserable modern ethics and morality which seems so positively indecent in itself, I encounter frequently the primordial malady by which I myself am a part of this same humanity.

And finding a way out is truly the message of this thread. People are dying for answers, people of good will.

As Nietzsche pointed out, we grow to love our symptoms. When what we need is a cure.

[Tainari88]

There is no rational basis for morality, and even if there were it would merely be a glorified version of the grubby calculated self-interest upon which capitalism’s post-hoc justifications are based. The whole point of this thread, surely, is to explore alternatives to that mode of thought. As soon as we talk about morality in a non-rational sense, we enter the realm of religion and spirituality. The thieves you observed in that store were committing a sin, not merely a logical faux pas, which is why the thought of their behaviour is ‘persecuting’ you.

I would be interested in knowing your own moral code of ethics and what is moral for you Potemkin?

People ask me what my moral code or ethical code is all the time? Hoping to hear it is based on religion. It is not. It is based on humanism and love. Natural law for many is supposedly 'savage' but if you take the time to observe nature and natural law it has to do with certain rules that are endemic to living in this material world.

For me? I have known too many religious people who are the worst human beings on planet Earth. Everything is about sinfulness and they commit the worst sins on Earth and then go to God for forgiveness and for washing away their sins. Such as rape, murder, pedophilia, torture, cruelty, spiteful malice, lying on someone to make sure they get the blame for their own covetous behavior or sinful behavior, class power abuse, wife beating, murdering innocent animals, children, and other vulnerable people, stealing people's life savings with lies, stealing others properties worked with hard sweat and they want all of it to be able to live luxuriously, fraud, con games, gambling fevers where their mothers and wives and so on lose their homes and all their money because the stupid husband can't say no to gambling addictions. Stealing from their own mothers to stick some heroine needle up their arms, etc.

All of them can be the most religious pious people on Earth.

They all throw themselves down on their knees begging God and Christ to forgive them. Then they get up and do it all over again, because they just use their religious beliefs to wash themselves of the responsibility they have of CHANGING THEIR BEHAVIOR. I do not care about lip service. And prayers full of fake remorse.

So, what is a code one must adopt in this world and live by? A humanistic code, and one that is about true socialism. Respect other individuals and group's civil rights, and universal human rights. What does it mean to be human? To be humane. And socialism what is the creed?

What is your code of ethics Potemkin?

For me capitalism is the worship of Mamon above anything else. It is literally a Satanic system. Those who do not understand that are foolish in their supposed Christianity.

For me the Protestants with their crazy Protestant Ethic and God approves of you if you are rich and prosperous, and also do not go for bling is the epitome of nuttiness in Christianity. That is why I think these Televangelists and those moralists on the 700 Club are complete and utter hypocritical lying people with nothing to do with morality. They justify devilish behavior with some veneer of being true Christians. Fakes. All of them.

I detest religious false prophets. They are the most damaging people on every possible level. Probably worse than some banker cynical capitalist freak.

Jimmy Swaggart. Lol. A good example of who I speak of....

They make money, they live in luxury. They beg forgiveness. They sin. Lol. They sin again. They do not change. They keep going with the bullcrap.

Change? They do not really do that. Because they use Christ to say he has done the hard work of figuring out how much burden I do on my society....I give it all to Him. He really is saying, I am not going to do a damn thing. I am going to keep conning and asking for money, spend on a lot of bling and gaudy stupid consumer goods, and I will continue to keep going with the dumbness.

I do not like nor do I think they repent really. It is all an act.

These lying politicians all claim to be highly religious people. Men of Faith. It is all BULLSHIT. It is.

You know when my mother died, the priest that she had worked with creating a curriculum for Special Education students that he dealt with asked me if my mother was a true believer. A true Roman Catholic. I told him the truth. My mother was baptized a Roman Catholic. She never went to mass, she never confessed at all as far as I know, she never attended church at all. Nothing. He was stoic and did not know any surprise. He asked me, 'Do you think she believed in Christ and in God?' I told him the truth. My mother was scientific, a Marxist existentialist, and a socialist. She was an academic and also worked with labor studies and school systems and education of the poor and the oppressed. She believed in universal human rights. Was she religious¡ No, she was not. At all. She doubted seriously and thought the religious were strange. I was never baptized.

He thought about it and said, 'I want to present a special covenant to your mother. It means that those with education issues can pray to her and ask for her intervention. She is a lay person. But she is very special. We are giving her a special recognition for her to be prayed to and consulted.' I asked him why? He said, 'the people decide who is the Christian in action of all. It is not about what she might have had doubts about. Did she act like a follower of Christ in deed and how she treated her fellow human beings. As far as I am concerned she was the best Roman Catholic I could think of. Her actions were of a woman of deep faith. Action is what counts. Not words and not doubts.'

That was the end of it. The people whom my mother served were humble Roman Catholic working class and lower middle class Latin Americans. They insisted on her being given recognition. It was their choice to do so.

I found it interesting. Because the truth is ACTIONS are more important by far than proclamations of faith.

For me the false ones are out there. And they do not change this world. By their fruits you shall know them. That is in the bible eh?

That should be what anyone needs to know what is moral and who was moral and who was not eh? Rotten fruit. Rotten person. Good fruit. Good person.

Not a bunch of lip service! Fake damn religious hypocritical devils!

[annatar1914]

As Nietzsche pointed out, we grow to love our symptoms. When what we need is a cure.

@Potemkin :

I only have one answer, deeply humiliating to my proud nature, but.

[Potemkin]

I would be interested in knowing your own moral code of ethics and what is moral for you Potemkin?

People ask me what my moral code or ethical code is all the time? Hoping to hear it is based on religion. It is not. It is based on humanism and love. Natural law for many is supposedly 'savage' but if you take the time to observe nature and natural law it has to do with certain rules that are endemic to living in this material world.

For me? I have known too many religious people who are the worst human beings on planet Earth. Everything is about sinfulness and they commit the worst sins on Earth and then go to God for forgiveness and for washing away their sins. Such as rape, murder, pedophilia, torture, cruelty, spiteful malice, lying on someone to make sure they get the blame for their own covetous behavior or sinful behavior, class power abuse, wife beating, murdering innocent animals, children, and other vulnerable people, stealing people's life savings with lies, stealing others properties worked with hard sweat and they want all of it to be able to live luxuriously, fraud, con games, gambling fevers where their mothers and wives and so on lose their homes and all their money because the stupid husband can't say no to gambling addictions. Stealing from their own mothers to stick some heroine needle up their arms, etc.

All of them can be the most religious pious people on Earth.

They all throw themselves down on their knees begging God and Christ to forgive them. Then they get up and do it all over again, because they just use their religious beliefs to wash themselves of the responsibility they have of CHANGING THEIR BEHAVIOR. I do not care about lip service. And prayers full of fake remorse.

So, what is a code one must adopt in this world and live by? A humanistic code, and one that is about true socialism. Respect other individuals and group's civil rights, and universal human rights. What does it mean to be human? To be humane. And socialism what is the creed?

What is your code of ethics Potemkin?

For me capitalism is the worship of Mamon above anything else. It is literally a Satanic system. Those who do not understand that are foolish in their supposed Christianity.

For me the Protestants with their crazy Protestant Ethic and God approves of you if you are rich and prosperous, and also do not go for bling is the epitome of nuttiness in Christianity. That is why I think these Televangelists and those moralists on the 700 Club are complete and utter hypocritical lying people with nothing to do with morality. They justify devilish behavior with some veneer of being true Christians. Fakes. All of them.

I detest religious false prophets. They are the most damaging people on every possible level. Probably worse than some banker cynical capitalist freak.

Jimmy Swaggart. Lol. A good example of who I speak of....

They make money, they live in luxury. They beg forgiveness. They sin. Lol. They sin again. They do not change. They keep going with the bullcrap.

Change? They do not really do that. Because they use Christ to say he has done the hard work of figuring out how much burden I do on my society....I give it all to Him. He really is saying, I am not going to do a damn thing. I am going to keep conning and asking for money, spend on a lot of bling and gaudy stupid consumer goods, and I will continue to keep going with the dumbness.

I do not like nor do I think they repent really. It is all an act.

These lying politicians all claim to be highly religious people. Men of Faith. It is all BULLSHIT. It is.

You know when my mother died, the priest that she had worked with creating a curriculum for Special Education students that he dealt with asked me if my mother was a true believer. A true Roman Catholic. I told him the truth. My mother was baptized a Roman Catholic. She never went to mass, she never confessed at all as far as I know, she never attended church at all. Nothing. He was stoic and did not know any surprise. He asked me, 'Do you think she believed in Christ and in God?' I told him the truth. My mother was scientific, a Marxist existentialist, and a socialist. She was an academic and also worked with labor studies and school systems and education of the poor and the oppressed. She believed in universal human rights. Was she religious¡ No, she was not. At all. She doubted seriously and thought the religious were strange. I was never baptized.

He thought about it and said, 'I want to present a special covenant to your mother. It means that those with education issues can pray to her and ask for her intervention. She is a lay person. But she is very special. We are giving her a special recognition for her to be prayed to and consulted.' I asked him why? He said, 'the people decide who is the Christian in action of all. It is not about what she might have had doubts about. Did she act like a follower of Christ in deed and how she treated her fellow human beings. As far as I am concerned she was the best Roman Catholic I could think of. Her actions were of a woman of deep faith. Action is what counts. Not words and not doubts.'

That was the end of it. The people whom my mother served were humble Roman Catholic working class and lower middle class Latin Americans. They insisted on her being given recognition. It was their choice to do so.

I found it interesting. Because the truth is ACTIONS are more important by far than proclamations of faith.

For me the false ones are out there. And they do not change this world. By their fruits you shall know them. That is in the bible eh?

That should be what anyone needs to know what is moral and who was moral and who was not eh? Rotten fruit. Rotten person. Good fruit. Good person.

Not a bunch of lip service! Fake damn religious hypocritical devils!

I don’t judge a faith or an ideology by its hypocrites, @Tainari88. Time and again, throughout his ministry, Jesus lambasted the hypocrites who try to make God serve them rather than serving God. If Jesus hated anybody, it was religious hypocrites. As Jesus said, “you have made the house of my father into a den of thieves!” And I notice that you condemn the religious hypocrites using the same standards and even the same language as Jesus himself. As Nietzsche said, God may be dead, but he lives on in our grammar. Our language, even the structure of our thinking itself, is infected and inflected by religious faith, even despite our conscious atheism. And almost everybody’s moral judgements are religious ones, not rational ones. We don’t condemn thieves or murderers for their irrationality or their faulty logic, we condemn them for committing sin, for doing wrong. And if you reduce wrong-doing to simply a faulty calculation of self-interest, then how is this different from Ayn Rand’s idea of ‘morality’?

[Tainari88]

I don’t judge a faith or an ideology by its hypocrites, @Tainari88. Time and again, throughout his ministry, Jesus lambasted the hypocrites who try to make God serve them rather than serving God. If Jesus hated anybody, it was religious hypocrites. As Jesus said, “you have made the house of my father into a den of thieves!” And I notice that you condemn the religious hypocrites using the same standards and even the same language as Jesus himself. As Nietzsche said, God may be dead, but he lives on in our grammar. Our language, even the structure of our thinking itself, is infected and inflected by religious faith, even despite our conscious atheism. And almost everybody’s moral judgments are religious ones, not rational ones. We don’t condemn thieves or murderers for their irrationality or their faulty logic, we condemn them for committing sin, for doing wrong. And if you reduce wrong-doing to simply a faulty calculation of self-interest, then how is this different from Ayn Rand’s idea of ‘morality’?

This world we live in would be totally transformed if the religious hypocrisy were lambasted and condemned strongly. Also political hypocrisy.

Both have rotten fruit results for sure.

But, contradictions like that of dialectical materialism? I see it as a form of Buddhist philosophical convergence there. We as human both have the light and the darkness present in both of us. How we choose to use both in this world is the definition of who we are really.

I have never met in my lifetime a perfect human being that never makes mistakes and is a person of perfect choices in life. Without real defects in thinking, ideas or choices. But, I have met people who are consistent in personal values in life.

Change is inevitable Potemkin. Life changes us. Changes our circumstances and conditions, attitudes and wisdom or ignorance...it is all confronted.

But if you are not living your life with a code of ethics and fail to really understand why you think the way you do? You lack self awareness or fail to do self reflection? You will continue to be consistent in those failures. Always.

Life is about change and transformation. That is why I never liked conservative thought. It is about lack of change and remaining steadfast, often in the face of real need for change. Usually about holding on to power because of fear and of wanting to remain with money, power and prestige. Not caring about what is best for the least in this world. It usually is about thinking that if you are rich and powerful, you are RIGHT in your position. A very strange, arrogant and intransigent way of thinking. It reflects a deep inability to self reflect.

Dick Chaney was asked in an interview if he ever thought deeply about how his decisions affected many people over time. How those decisions might affect those who have to pay for those decisions. Like going to war. Let me see if I can find the clip. He sums up the issues I have with the Right wing in religious thoughts and in political thoughts.

It all goes down the tubes. Millions of Iraqis who are innocent civvies died there. I met a guy on my old website who was an Iraqi engineer. The man lost his wife, and children in the first bombings of Baghdad. Innocent people. The guy who's first name was Amir stated he was politically against Saddam Hussein's reign. But, the occupation killed millions of Iraqis who were not there as enemies of anyone. How do they justify this? With bullshit. Sheer lies.

Killing off Puerto Rican civvies in Vieques using the beaches and contaminating the beaches and the people of PR in order to invade and for what ultimate result?

Left behind a mess. A total chaotic horrific mess. Civil wars, instability, hunger, deprivation, destroyed lives. Violence and the inheritance of violence, destroyed great art works and valuable cultural legacies destroyed.

Why? They never come clean ever.

You ask these pastors and leaders of Evangelical churches in the USA that have fancy homes, fancy cars, and airports and bling and then fleece everyone, they break every rule of behavior, and go on and on the prosperity will come to you if you just continue to believe in capitalism and Christ.

It is ridiculous in the extreme and offensive. Really. They have a very strange lack of conscience about sending people to die for an ambition that they think is worth human lives. I would really really be questioning my decisions if they might even slightly have negative effects on a single person--imagine the lives of thousands or millions? He wound up being responsible for the death of many Iraqis. Including sending in troops who died there and who also tortured Iraqi civilians.

Democracy was not the goal. But somehow the lies continue. Just tell the truth. You send people to die and get their heads blown off so that some powerful creepy callous investors and politicians can control a region they can't allow out of their control. Got to control all of the nations on Earth. They do not learn. You can't do that. It is impossible shit.

[Potemkin]

This world we live in would be totally transformed if the religious hypocrisy were lambasted and condemned strongly. Also political hypocrisy.

Both have rotten fruit results for sure.

But, contradictions like that of dialectical materialism? I see it as a form of Buddhist philosophical convergence there. We as human both have the light and the darkness present in both of us. How we choose to use both in this world is the definition of who we are really.

I have never met in my lifetime a perfect human being that never makes mistakes and is a person of perfect choices in life. Without real defects in thinking, ideas or choices. But, I have met people who are consistent in personal values in life.

Change is inevitable Potemkin. Life changes us. Changes our circumstances and conditions, attitudes and wisdom or ignorance...it is all confronted.

But if you are not living your life with a code of ethics and fail to really understand why you think the way you do? You lack self awareness or fail to do self reflection? You will continue to be consistent in those failures. Always.

Life is about change and transformation. That is why I never liked conservative thought. It is about lack of change and remaining steadfast, often in the face of real need for change. Usually about holding on to power because of fear and of wanting to remain with money, power and prestige. Not caring about what is best for the least in this world. It usually is about thinking that if you are rich and powerful, you are RIGHT in your position. A very strange, arrogant and intransigent way of thinking. It reflects a deep inability to self reflect.

Dick Chaney was asked in an interview if he ever thought deeply about how his decisions affected many people over time. How those decisions might affect those who have to pay for those decisions. Like going to war. Let me see if I can find the clip. He sums up the issues I have with the Right wing in religious thoughts and in political thoughts.

It all goes down the tubes. Millions of Iraqis who are innocent civvies died there. I met a guy on my old website who was an Iraqi engineer. The man lost his wife, and children in the first bombings of Baghdad. Innocent people. The guy who's first name was Amir stated he was politically against Saddam Hussein's reign. But, the occupation killed millions of Iraqis who were not there as enemies of anyone. How do they justify this? With bullshit. Sheer lies.

Killing off Puerto Rican civvies in Vieques using the beaches and contaminating the beaches and the people of PR in order to invade and for what ultimate result?

Left behind a mess. A total chaotic horrific mess. Civil wars, instability, hunger, deprivation, destroyed lives. Violence and the inheritance of violence, destroyed great art works and valuable cultural legacies destroyed.

Why? They never come clean ever.

You ask these pastors and leaders of Evangelical churches in the USA that have fancy homes, fancy cars, and airports and bling and then fleece everyone, they break every rule of behavior, and go on and on the prosperity will come to you if you just continue to believe in capitalism and Christ.

It is ridiculous in the extreme and offensive. Really. They have a very strange lack of conscience about sending people to die for an ambition that they think is worth human lives. I would really really be questioning my decisions if they might even slightly have negative effects on a single person--imagine the lives of thousands or millions? He wound up being responsible for the death of many Iraqis. Including sending in troops who died there and who also tortured Iraqi civilians.

Democracy was not the goal. But somehow the lies continue. Just tell the truth. You send people to die and get their heads blown off so that some powerful creepy callous investors and politicians can control a region they can't allow out of their control. Got to control all of the nations on Earth. They do not learn. You can't do that. It is impossible shit.

I agree with every word of that, querida. But what has this to do with Christian morality? Should Christianity be judged by its hypocrites? By people like Swaggart, who are heretics already in the eyes of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches? Should Communism be judged by the actions of Josef Stalin or Pol Pot? Should Islam be judged by the actions of the Taliban or Osama bin Laden? The central point, the main driving force behind Jesus’ teachings was his hatred of religious and moral hypocrisy. He was on a mission, and that mission was to expose the lies and hypocrisy of the powerful and the respectable. And he died for it. Will he forgive the likes of Swaggart or Dick Cheney, if and when they come before him at the Pearly Gates?

[Tainari88]

I agree with every word of that, querida. But what has this to do with Christian morality? Should Christianity be judged by its hypocrites? By people like Swaggart, who are heretics already in the eyes of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches? Should Communism be judged by the actions of Josef Stalin or Pol Pot? Should Islam be judged by the actions of the Taliban or Osama bin Laden? The central point, the main driving force behind Jesus’ teachings was his hatred of religious and moral hypocrisy. He was on a mission, and that mission was to expose the lies and hypocrisy of the powerful and the respectable. And he died for it. Will he forgive the likes of Swaggart or Dick Cheney, if and when they come before him at the Pearly Gates?

We get into the slippery slope of mythologies about justice and religious paradigms. For the Hindus who believe in the Bhagavad Gita and the Vedas the truths, it is about karma and reincarnation. You keep reincarnating paying for your bad decisions and lack of a higher consciousness level until you are released from the wheel of incarnations. Until you finally get it right.

Then the Roman Catholics think, that unless you truly repented and did the rituals necessary to cleanse yourself of guilt and sin? You go to hell or purgatory. You live with being judged constantly. The fires of hell burn. But Christian grace and God's grace is the answer to your lack of consciousness.

Encyclopedia Britannica says that Muslims go for this:

The religious obligations of all Muslims are summed up in the Five Pillars of Islam, which include belief in God and his Prophet and obligations of prayer, charity, pilgrimage, and fasting. The fundamental concept of Islam is the Sharīʿāh—its law, which embraces the total way of life commanded by God.

Buddhists believe in self-reflection and changing yourself through your own volition and soul power you transform yourself. But that varies, you have Zen Buddhists, etc. It is about right thought, right action, right behavior. No killing, stealing, lying, etc. Very similar to what most religions advocate as ideal behavior. Yet, they do not think an external force or savior is going to solve your guilt or sin for you. You must self-realize and self-transform.

You have agnostics who do not know if they are the best at knowing if God is there or not. Doubters. Professional doubters.

Then you have atheists who think the important thing is to be accountable to ethical and considerate human values. Not in the belief of an unknown God that is going to judge you forever. But, be decent so that human society can be a place where all people have rights.

So all these moral and religious and nonreligious solutions to the dilemma of the judgment of human behaviors and values eh?

Still, how do you reconcile that variation of thoughts and diversity of thoughts out there with human cultures and societies Potemkin? How do you fit in that puzzle eh?

¿Dónde colocas el sistema tuyo personal en todo ese mosaíco de pensamientos y filosofías humanas Potemkin adorado?

For me in the religious paradigm the most important aspect of morality and ethics is living a life of righteous example. As close to Jesus, the Prophet Mohammed, by the Vedas, by Buddha, by Christ, by the precepts of the church without being hypocritical and betraying the principles. Ever. Faithful like Job that was tested for his faithfulness to God's laws. If you do so? You earn your reward. If not? You failed. And thus you struggle for a better way. That struggle for existence can be applied to a struggle for a higher consciousness if you are a real believer of a religious discipline.

For politics? How faithful and true are you to your political philosophy. Do you truly see truth in it? If so why? And what does that look like on the ground. How you live day to day? How do you become a consistent liberal, consistent conservative, consistent Communist, consistent libertarian, consistent socialist, consistent anarchist.

Religion is more narrow in focus. Politics is much messier. Since religion is about the soul or spiritual overall efforts of the believer it is a lot more intolerant of varying in the principles. Politics? You can vary a lot with certain aspects of it. Or question it since it is not coming from God or a Divine Being, it is coming from a secular series of laws and or proposals that are very mutable over time and space.

Science is not God's Law is it? How does one become scientific with the rules for a human society? Without pissing off all the religious believers. Something the academics in both science and religion have wrestled with eh?

[Potemkin]

We get into the slippery slope of mythologies about justice and religious paradigms. For the Hindus who believe in the Bhagavad Gita and the Vedas the truths, it is about karma and reincarnation. You keep reincarnating paying for your bad decisions and lack of a higher consciousness level until you are released from the wheel of incarnations. Until you finally get it right.

Then the Roman Catholics think, that unless you truly repented and did the rituals necessary to cleanse yourself of guilt and sin? You go to hell or purgatory. You live with being judged constantly. The fires of hell burn. But Christian grace and God's grace is the answer to your lack of consciousness.

Encyclopedia Britannica says that Muslims go for this:




Buddhists believe in self-reflection and changing yourself through your own volition and soul power you transform yourself. But that varies, you have Zen Buddhists, etc. It is about right thought, right action, right behavior. No killing, stealing, lying, etc. Very similar to what most religions advocate as ideal behavior. Yet, they do not think an external force or savior is going to solve your guilt or sin for you. You must self-realize and self-transform.

You have agnostics who do not know if they are the best at knowing if God is there or not. Doubters. Professional doubters.

Then you have atheists who think the important thing is to be accountable to ethical and considerate human values. Not in the belief of an unknown God that is going to judge you forever. But, be decent so that human society can be a place where all people have rights.

So all these moral and religious and nonreligious solutions to the dilemma of the judgment of human behaviors and values eh?

Still, how do you reconcile that variation of thoughts and diversity of thoughts out there with human cultures and societies Potemkin? How do you fit in that puzzle eh?

¿Dónde colocas el sistema tuyo personal en todo ese mosaíco de pensamientos y filosofías humanas Potemkin adorado?

That’s a conundrum, isn’t it? It’s the search for an objective truth among things which are clearly socially and historically conditioned - world religions. It’s impossible, of course; if for no other reason than the fact that one cannot derive an ‘ought’ from an ‘is’, as David Hume put it. The fact that something exists tells us nothing about whether it ‘should’ exist, or whether we ought to emulate it or not. This also applies to any attempt to derive a system of morality from the natural world, by the way. And any search for a personal ‘system’ of morality is itself going to be conditioned by the culture and society in which one grew up. Someone brought up in a Christian culture, even as an atheist, is going to produce a ‘personal’ system of morality which looks remarkably like Christian morality. Likewise, someone brought up in a Muslim society will produce a ‘personal’ system of morality which looks remarkably like the Islamic Sharia. And so on. How can it be otherwise?

For me in the religious paradigm the most important aspect of morality and ethics is living a life of righteous example. As close to Jesus, the Prophet Mohammed, by the Vedas, by Buddha, by Christ, by the precepts of the church without being hypocritical and betraying the principles. Ever. Faithful like Job that was tested for his faithfulness to God's laws. If you do so? You earn your reward. If not? You failed. And thus you struggle for a better way. That struggle for existence can be applied to a struggle for a higher consciousness if you are a real believer of a religious discipline.

For politics? How faithful and true are you to your political philosophy. Do you truly see truth in it? If so why? And what does that look like on the ground. How you live day to day? How do you become a consistent liberal, consistent conservative, consistent Communist, consistent libertarian, consistent socialist, consistent anarchist.

Praxis. This is truly the only way to achieve consistency - by practicing what we preach. We are what we do, and a Christian (or Muslim or Buddhist &c) morality which is not put into practice, which is not lived out in everyday life, is just a lie and a fraud.

Religion is more narrow in focus. Politics is much messier. Since religion is about the soul or spiritual overall efforts of the believer it is a lot more intolerant of varying in the principles. Politics? You can vary a lot with certain aspects of it. Or question it since it is not coming from God or a Divine Being, it is coming from a secular series of laws and or proposals that are very mutable over time and space.

Science is not God's Law is it? How does one become scientific with the rules for a human society? Without pissing off all the religious believers. Something the academics in both science and religion have wrestled with eh?

Marx attempted this, of course, with his development of ‘scientific socialism’, and he was clearly more successful at this attempt than any other thinker before or after him, in my opinion. And central to his approach was the concept of ‘praxis’ - the dialectical interaction between theory and practice. Without it, we are stuck in the realm of abstract theory or ‘moral principles’ which are never put into practice - in other words, we are stuck in the realm of hypocrisy.

[Wellsy]

https://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/pdfs/macintyre2.pdf

What’s Next?
So, how to proceed against liberalism, against the way of life in which human relations are governed by the world market? As remarked above, MacIntyre advises each of his readers to look to their own tradition for the resources to take such a challenge forward. For his own part, MacIntyre will look to his own Thomist tradition of ethical and rational enquiry.

I agree; the significant contribution MacIntyre has already made as a Thomist What’s Next?
So, how to proceed against liberalism, against the way of life in which human relations are governed by the world market? As remarked above, MacIntyre advises each of his readers to look to their own tradition for the resources to take such a challenge forward. For his own part, MacIntyre will look to his own Thomist tradition of ethical and rational enquiry.
I agree; the significant contribution MacIntyre has already made as a Thomist scholar, has proved the point. For my part, I also believe that I should look to my own tradition for the resources to fight against liberalism, that is, Marxism in particular, and more generally the whole range of interconnecting currents of radical opposition to capital which have flourished or floundered, as the case may be, continuously over the past 170 years since the Chartist rebellion in England and the 1830 revolution in Paris.
So, what’s new?
I believe that the case is proved, that rational, or “instrumental”, politics cannot by itself be successful without ethical politics, and vice versa. That is to say, if we correctly understand what MacIntyre has demonstrated for us, ethical conceptions are not immutable, but subject to change, and, being intimately connected with rationality, ethical politics is to change the way people conceive of their own life and their reason for living. Rational debate based simply on interests and personal aspirations cannot succeed however.
Secondly, any of us who wish to take this struggle forward, should advise others, not simply to jump aboard one’s own bandwagon, but rather, as MacIntyre advises, look to their own tradition, their own vocation, how it must change and how it can contribute to change.
But also, none of the processes of ethical change which MacIntyre investigates deal with the prospect that, as pre-supposed by liberalism, no shared way of life, no single world-wide community of shared values and meanings, is attainable. If we leave out of account for the immediate future at least, any prospect of any substantial portion of the modern world committing to a genuine shared ethos, then we still face the problems of multicultural nature of the modern nation- state and the domination of the world market over social life, the two characteristic challenges of modernity.
It may be possible to educate the followers of liberalism, and dissuade them of the delusion of objectivity and transcultural rationality, to make them aware of the impoverishment of the conception of meaning as “reference as such.” Notwithstanding the fallacies of perspectivism and relativism, the good for one community is not the good for another. And yet we all share the same world. The unification of the world effected by the world market is something that most of the enemies of liberalism want to sustain just as much as do the supporters of liberalism, even if by other means. In the main, few want to return to village life.
The condition of life essential to the ancient polis, according to MacIntyre, is that all the activities which were meaningful within the life of the polis, were carried out for the sake of some other good, all such activities making up a chain of for the sake of relationships, serving the good of the polis. For the citizen of an ancient polis, it is therefore rational to do what one ought to do. On the face of it, the functional institutions of modernity, the corporations, institutions, universities, health services, townships, voluntary organisations, unions, clubs, churches, societies, and so forth, which to a significant extent continue to co- exist with the market, can be visualised as a viable environment for an ethical life, much as the ancient poleis.
In the ancient polis, for example, “everyone” was restricted to the free, male citizens of the given polis; foreigners, women and slaves were not part of

“everyone”. One of the gains of Christianity and later of modernity was the extension of the constitutive ideal of “human being” across which notions of equality and citizenship extend, to cover really all human beings.
This notion of universality, which is really the product of the world market, has to be brought together with the opportunity that every person must have to participate in a particular practical institution whose good is for the sake of the good of humankind. As MacIntyre pointed out in After Virtue, in the modern world, the same institutions which provide the opportunity for such participation invariably also corrupt people by rewarding effectiveness by satisfying people’s desires, that is by providing external rewards for effectiveness, as opposed to the rewards internal to the practice itself.
The site of the struggle against liberalism cannot then be the “public domain” of media debates, election campaigns, academic journals and so on, addressing itself to “citizens of nowhere” who speak all languages but understand none. For here, MacIntyre has shown, genuinely ethical dialogue confronts almost unsurmountable difficulties within such a domain. The site of struggle must be within the institutions of practical life.

[Tainari88]

Yes, @Potemkin, the reality is that the praxis is the key to being true to your own philosophy about life.

Many people think philosophy is sheer bunk. Like Henry Ford believed about history eh? But the truth is that every human being does possess a philosophy. All of us do. Even children.

Even babies. For all of us are in the mix of praxis every single day. Praxis is what makes the world of philosophy work.

You got theory and then you got praxis. Actions. Like the priest told me, where are the actions? In the praxis.

[annatar1914]

@Tainari88 , @Wellsy , @Potemkin , @Godstud , @Verv , @Political Interest :

So, the question remains going forward, the nature of " Altruism" and indeed, of " Praxis" in the context of Theism, of the Eternal and the problem of Evil in the world.

Someone might say that the best Praxis in the world to express one's love for mankind, to demonstrate a true kenotic emptying of oneself to live for God, is prayer. Prayer to God as a petition that " His Will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven", and all the rest.

And including prayer, living a whole way of life that demonstrates that such a life is informed by God: " oh Lord, teach me Thy statutes"....Not just a kind of hobby one does on Sundays or holidays or whatever.

What does God want? Find out and go do it, and then all the rest falls into place.

This is why I am a Socialist for example, even though my aim is not just Socialism. Socialism for me is just what I believe people "do" when they love one another, are filled with God's love expressed on a social level. But before that happens, we have to deal with people as they are, not just as we'd have them be. Not everyone can live as an ascetic or in a Monastery, yet.

Nor is love of God fully and entirely just expressed as love of neighbor. Ultimately we must look to our own selves and with God's help by healed of the evil within, caused by the disordered passions. But because we are all sick, we should try to help each other bear the burdens. But still, we have to want to fix what is broken inside of us, so we can be better to each other.

[Tainari88]

@Tainari88 , @Wellsy , @Potemkin , @Godstud , @Verv , @Political Interest :

So, the question remains going forward, the nature of " Altruism" and indeed, of " Praxis" in the context of Theism, of the Eternal and the problem of Evil in the world.

Someone might say that the best Praxis in the world to express one's love for mankind, to demonstrate a true kenotic emptying of oneself to live for God, is prayer. Prayer to God as a petition that " His Will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven", and all the rest.

And including prayer, living a whole way of life that demonstrates that such a life is informed by God: " oh Lord, teach me Thy statutes"....Not just a kind of hobby one does on Sundays or holidays or whatever.

What does God want? Find out and go do it, and then all the rest falls into place.

This is why I am a Socialist for example, even though my aim is not just Socialism. Socialism for me is just what I believe people "do" when they love one another, are filled with God's love expressed on a social level. But before that happens, we have to deal with people as they are, not just as we'd have them be. Not everyone can live as an ascetic or in a Monastery, yet.

Nor is a love of God fully and entirely just expressed as a love of neighbor. Ultimately we must look to our own selves and with God's help by healed of the evil within, caused by the disordered passions. But because we are all sick, we should try to help each other bear the burdens. But still, we have to want to fix what is broken inside of us, so we can be better to each other.

Annatar1914, if one were honest about what is wrong with our human societies, I would say it is a lack of awareness of our own subconscious actions. People must have a quiet space to self-reflect. For a religious person, this is prayer, meditation, and introspection. Whatever that might look like. Without that as a daily practice, it is hard to really gain any perspective on where one stands in life. A loving partner, wife, husband, or friend, can also help us in self-reflection and self-awareness.

People sometimes have distorted self-images. They discount themselves or distort their own human potential, with negative self-images. The opposite happens as well, self-aggrandizement and egos being overblown thinking they have a right to more than they do. All those false lies swirling inside the individual's head need to be calmed and reflected back at them. Only through that discipline can one gain a good perspective that helps them understand what they need to do to progress in self-awareness.

I am amazed at the ability the very corrupt, and the very powerful have in avoiding that first need to be disciplined at self awareness. I was recently watching videos of Condi Rice the former Secretary of State for the Bush Jr. administration. She grew up in a very religious, conservative Southern (Birmingham, Alabama), household. Her father was a coach for college or high school American football, and her mother a schoolteacher and homemaker. She never married and became a professor and academic. For Stanford University among other universities. She attended the University of Denver, shaped by highly conservative professors from ex Soviet block Eastern European traditions. He thesis was based on predictions about the ex USSR that was totally false. Turned out all her predictions on the USSR were found out to be wrong. I was fascinated how she got the gig of Secretary of State by being wrong on all fronts. She did not see the collapse coming, and did not understand the inner workings of the USSR at all.

She also did not understand Lybian culture or what Mohamar Qaddafi was about. At all. She was tunnel visioned on her own perspectives on many things and lacked what a cultural anthropologist understands perfectly. I was very interested in that. That the ones making heavy decisions about national policy are people with a total lack of ability to go beyond their own experiences and perceive differences and diversity with some depth and analysis. It is really about a selfish sense of univision. And that is a result of the lack of real dedication to the first practice there of self reflection.

[annatar1914]

Annatar1914, if one were honest about what is wrong with our human societies, I would say it is a lack of awareness of our own subconscious actions. People must have a quiet space to self-reflect. For a religious person, this is prayer, meditation, and introspection. Whatever that might look like. Without that as a daily practice, it is hard to really gain any perspective on where one stands in life. A loving partner, wife, husband, or friend, can also help us in self-reflection and self-awareness.

People sometimes have distorted self-images. They discount themselves or distort their own human potential, with negative self-images. The opposite happens as well, self-aggrandizement and egos being overblown thinking they have a right to more than they do. All those false lies swirling inside the individual's head need to be calmed and reflected back at them. Only through that discipline can one gain a good perspective that helps them understand what they need to do to progress in self-awareness.

I am amazed at the ability the very corrupt, and the very powerful have in avoiding that first need to be disciplined at self awareness. I was recently watching videos of Condi Rice the former Secretary of State for the Bush Jr. administration. She grew up in a very religious, conservative Southern (Birmingham, Alabama), household. Her father was a coach for college or high school American football, and her mother a schoolteacher and homemaker. She never married and became a professor and academic. For Stanford University among other universities. She attended the University of Denver, shaped by highly conservative professors from ex Soviet block Eastern European traditions. He thesis was based on predictions about the ex USSR that was totally false. Turned out all her predictions on the USSR were found out to be wrong. I was fascinated how she got the gig of Secretary of State by being wrong on all fronts. She did not see the collapse coming, and did not understand the inner workings of the USSR at all.

She also did not understand Lybian culture or what Mohamar Qaddafi was about. At all. She was tunnel visioned on her own perspectives on many things and lacked what a cultural anthropologist understands perfectly. I was very interested in that. That the ones making heavy decisions about national policy are people with a total lack of ability to go beyond their own experiences and perceive differences and diversity with some depth and analysis. It is really about a selfish sense of univision. And that is a result of the lack of real dedication to the first practice there of self reflection.

@Tainari88 :

Self reflection is difficult, and takes a lifelong effort. And we have enemies who don't want us to reflect and change too. It's sad that people don't take advantage of the all powerful and loving resources that we all have within our grasp.

There's a cosmic war going on, we see some of the Seen, but rarely sense much of the Unseen, so it is easy for some people to take the wrong side of they're not careful, or confuse a battle for the whole war.

I have a number of litmus tests as I've said before. I don't mention most of them because it's not my place to do so. But one of them is Socialism. If you are an ideologue against Socialism ( an not just some unthinking person parroting ideas)under whatever label one calls it, then I simply don't trust you in any other way besides a discussion on Socialism, either. With this and other litmus tests, I know when people and things have changed, and thus why.

I don't expect others to agree with me 100%, but this ideological blindness that manifests when talking about finding solutions to socio economic problems shows a spiritual, not natural, lack of basic common decency. They don't understand others because they don't want to.

Now that is not to say that there aren't psychopaths on the " left", there definitely is. But they're a different kind of psychopath usually, most often a demented incendiary that wants to set fire to everyone and everything. But all should be prayed for, because we're all psychopaths compared to the Angels who pray for, protect,and watch over us.

How much then should we watch over, pray over, and protect each other!

[Tainari88]

@Tainari88 :

Self reflection is difficult, and takes a lifelong effort. And we have enemies who don't want us to reflect and change too. It's sad that people don't take advantage of the all powerful and loving resources that we all have within our grasp.

There's a cosmic war going on, we see some of the Seen, but rarely sense much of the Unseen, so it is easy for some people to take the wrong side of they're not careful, or confuse a battle for the whole war.

I have a number of litmus tests as I've said before. I don't mention most of them because it's not my place to do so. But one of them is Socialism. If you are an ideologue against Socialism ( an not just some unthinking person parroting ideas)under whatever label one calls it, then I simply don't trust you in any other way besides a discussion on Socialism, either. With this and other litmus tests, I know when people and things have changed, and thus why.

I don't expect others to agree with me 100%, but this ideological blindness that manifests when talking about finding solutions to socio economic problems shows a spiritual, not natural, lack of basic common decency. They don't understand others because they don't want to.

Now that is not to say that there aren't psychopaths on the " left", there definitely is. But they're a different kind of psychopath usually, most often a demented incendiary that wants to set fire to everyone and everything. But all should be prayed for, because we're all psychopaths compared to the Angels who pray for, protect,and watch over us.

How much then should we watch over, pray over, and protect each other!

I normally do not read much about conservative Secretaries of State. Lol. I often do not find the time for that. But for Condi Rice I did. I found her to be interesting. Because her father was considered a very educated man and a good man.

How could she become what I considered a sellout Oreo Cookie to Bush? So, I did a little digging into her. And what I found out is interesting.

Birmingham, Alabama was a place where African Americans had to live with severely segregationist laws and policies. And it had battles with the police like Bull Connor and MLK jr. How could Condi Rice and her parents not be leftist radicals witnessing all that brutality and violence against African Americans?

Birmingham Alabama was a place in the African American community where education and emphasizing education was absolutely CRITICAL. In every way. So that neighborhood were Condi Rice's parents lived, Angela Davis the Communist Leftist academic emerged from as well, and Alma Powell, Colin Powell's spouse....all of them emerged from that middle class Titusville neighborhood.

Some became extremely conservative and I read Condi's own words about how she thought. She considered herself patrician--in other words, she was classist. She considered herself from the best background. Like a bourgeois person. The education and the breeding for her had to do with what she and her family had attained. And for her the most bourgeois version of white Southern culture was her legacy. Her identity.

Angela Davis in contrast had parents risking their lives every day against the dogs, and hoses and violence of Bull Connor's police force and racist segregationist laws. She became a Communist. Even though she was raised religious as most African Americans were Southern Baptists and other Protestant Christian African Americans were in those days.

Why some African Americans became like Condi and others went the opposite direction? It has to do how each individual responds to values and what the path forward is for oppression.

For me, the easiest path is Condi's. You go along with the system. And you are not really a token Black woman Oreo Cookie used by the Right. No. You are a sincere believer in the value of assimilating the power group's culture, and value system and you follow the rules of behavior of success.

You are a patrician. It makes sense. Condi is not from the uneducated, and working-class rabble creating all those waves on the streets. You fight the system by being a success in every way, spouted by the powers that be and who shape the standards of American culture. You assimilate hook, line, and sinker. A sense of rooted history is important. Hers though was about what the Southern white Middle Class Protestant Religious power group dictated as the qualities most respected. She adopted those.

The truth is that African Americans are the most American of any group. They never had a choice about choosing to integrate into American culture or not. It was integrate or be whipped and killed, or bought or sold. Life or death. No choice.

The hellish part of American culture was that they assimilated into the new National paradigm but were never fully accepted and treated as equals. Always remained in the margins of acceptance. Because in the end, they were painted with the brush of lower class and working class, peasant class, and zero real status. In order to have a united nation once a group integrates and assimilates they need to have acceptance. If they do not? You cause a rift that if that individual of the marginalized group does not see progress? They break off and want to become independent and apart. And the African Americans did. They went and founded Liberia in Africa.

Or they became like Booker Washington. The more or less school of thought that rules people like Condi Rice.

Not radicals. Not like WEB DuBois who founded the NAACP. Another brilliant African-American Communist. Who wanted a separation from the USA. A hostile nation that would never have the capacity to accept the contributions of the African-American community because it is about capitalism and exploitation. And it will lead to that nation's demise. Full of contradictions. And lack of real justice. For anyone.

Spiritually unless people come together and look beyond what the elites try to accomplish which is strip fellow humans of their humanity and make them commodities only?

Unless that is resisted? We are destined to lose all that is most valuable. That is the truth.

[annatar1914]

I normally do not read much about conservative Secretaries of State. Lol. I often do not find the time for that. But for Condi Rice I did. I found her to be interesting. Because her father was considered a very educated man and a good man.

How could she become what I considered a sellout Oreo Cookie to Bush? So, I did a little digging into her. And what I found out is interesting.

Birmingham, Alabama was a place where African Americans had to live with severely segregationist laws and policies. And it had battles with the police like Bull Connor and MLK jr. How could Condi Rice and her parents not be leftist radicals witnessing all that brutality and violence against African Americans?

Birmingham Alabama was a place in the African American community where education and emphasizing education was absolutely CRITICAL. In every way. So that neighborhood were Condi Rice's parents lived, Angela Davis the Communist Leftist academic emerged from as well, and Alma Powell, Colin Powell's spouse....all of them emerged from that middle class Titusville neighborhood.

Some became extremely conservative and I read Condi's own words about how she thought. She considered herself patrician--in other words, she was classist. She considered herself from the best background. Like a bourgeois person. The education and the breeding for her had to do with what she and her family had attained. And for her the most bourgeois version of white Southern culture was her legacy. Her identity.

Angela Davis in contrast had parents risking their lives every day against the dogs, and hoses and violence of Bull Connor's police force and racist segregationist laws. She became a Communist. Even though she was raised religious as most African Americans were Southern Baptists and other Protestant Christian African Americans were in those days.

Why some African Americans became like Condi and others went the opposite direction? It has to do how each individual responds to values and what the path forward is for oppression.

For me, the easiest path is Condi's. You go along with the system. And you are not really a token Black woman Oreo Cookie used by the Right. No. You are a sincere believer in the value of assimilating the power group's culture, and value system and you follow the rules of behavior of success.

You are a patrician. It makes sense. Condi is not from the uneducated, and working-class rabble creating all those waves on the streets. You fight the system by being a success in every way, spouted by the powers that be and who shape the standards of American culture. You assimilate hook, line, and sinker. A sense of rooted history is important. Hers though was about what the Southern white Middle Class Protestant Religious power group dictated as the qualities most respected. She adopted those.

The truth is that African Americans are the most American of any group. They never had a choice about choosing to integrate into American culture or not. It was integrate or be whipped and killed, or bought or sold. Life or death. No choice.

The hellish part of American culture was that they assimilated into the new National paradigm but were never fully accepted and treated as equals. Always remained in the margins of acceptance. Because in the end, they were painted with the brush of lower class and working class, peasant class, and zero real status. In order to have a united nation once a group integrates and assimilates they need to have acceptance. If they do not? You cause a rift that if that individual of the marginalized group does not see progress? They break off and want to become independent and apart. And the African Americans did. They went and founded Liberia in Africa.

Or they became like Booker Washington. The more or less school of thought that rules people like Condi Rice.

Not radicals. Not like WEB DuBois who founded the NAACP. Another brilliant African-American Communist. Who wanted a separation from the USA. A hostile nation that would never have the capacity to accept the contributions of the African-American community because it is about capitalism and exploitation. And it will lead to that nation's demise. Full of contradictions. And lack of real justice. For anyone.

Spiritually unless people come together and look beyond what the elites try to accomplish which is strip fellow humans of their humanity and make them commodities only?

Unless that is resisted? We are destined to lose all that is most valuable. That is the truth.

@Tainari88 :

Indeed if we don't resist, we will lose all that is truly and integrally human. While this was always the case with sin, what is now truly unique is that we have a Modern society that has enshrined Money as it's God, and everything has been commodified including our wickedness, as a means of generating more Money.

And the envy of the Poor! To lust after material goods and desire to live as one of the Rich, who are the epitome of Wickedness...

Because Money too demands an exclusivity in its kingdom, because there is only so much wealth to go around. Sometimes lesser people are unwillingly let into that otherwise closed circle in order to better control the remainder who are excluded, by having some lesser help hold the rest down because they have a golden ticket, a stake in the game, themselves. And the lesser is always one who (whatever that lesser makes!) makes an enormous amount for the already-wealthy they are " partnered" up with. That's the condition, besides being a sell out and selling their soul for 30 pieces of blood money.

[annatar1914]

@Potemkin , @Rich , @Godstud , @Verv , and @Political Interest :

I started seeing patterns indicating war between the West and Iran a long time ago, but lately I pushed back against myself: " oh no, not this stupid". But everyone is preparing for it, I'm certain. Including Iran and Iraq:

https://libertarianinstitute.org/news/t ... d47c3884db

Preemptively striking the Kurds is a smart move.

Is anyone else seeing war with Iran, soon?

@Potemkin , @Godstud , @Verv , @Political Interest , and others of my contributors:

So we can surely see that there's a goal of shutting Iran and Russia out of the Caucasus region, activating the Kurds, Baluchis, Taliban, etc ... Around Iran, all preparatory to the war against Iran and it's Islamic Revolution. Armenia is and will be the casualty of this conflict.

Sunni Islam is fracturing on the Palestinian issue and the normalization of relations with Israel, and I see the pan Islamic resistance to this easily leading to conversion to Khomeinism/Twelver Shia Islam. Behind Hezbollah and Hamas are the Quds Force and Iranian Revolutionary Guards, etc ....

And the Ukraine is already talking about striking against Russian allies in the Middle East and elsewhere.

This is one war. Even if one side is the only one that seems to know it or one side even actively covers up attacks to keep up the illusion of denial, denial of reality:

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.foxnew ... ooting.amp

Another revisionist view:

http://tenc.net/iraq-iran.htm

[annatar1914]

A brief excursus on Zionism and Israel, considered from my personal perspective.

I thought it necessary to tread somewhat on ground that at least fallen angels fear to walk, and write on this matter. I shall strive to make strictly objective statements.

Most Zionists would not be considered as observant Jews by the Orthodox Rabbinical authorities. With Zionism they have a kind of broad secularized identity that is actually very Western assimilated and indeed Israel should be considered as a Western outpost.

However, while Israel was a project set up by largely assimilated secular ethnic Jews who many were otherwise pretty Leftist just as most in the Diaspora, and many believe observant Jews will inherit, I will go out on a limb and contrarily say that whatever unity I believe that the Western world will have, will also have Israel as a part of that coming Imperium.

[annatar1914]

@Potemkin , @Godstud , @Verv , @Political Interest :

Some things at least initially can only be shown, then explained as much as can be explained even if on an esoteric level:

This is one of those moments. How can it be reconciled with the rest of what I've said I believe? Easily.

[Potemkin]

@Potemkin , @Godstud , @Verv , @Political Interest :

Some things at least initially can only be shown, then explained as much as can be explained even if on an esoteric level:

This is one of those moments. How can it be reconciled with the rest of what I've said I believe? Easily.

Another relevant Stravinsky ballet, @annatar1914…

In my view, it is Les Noces rather than Le Sacre du Printemps which is the most deeply Russian of his works.