What if Christianity never was? (short)

Now, I know I’m not nearly as qualified as one has to be to talk about this sort of thing, but I want to speculate about it anyway because the more I think about it the more interesting it seems. I also can’t really be bothered to flesh this post out into something that resembles a half-decent essay, so I’m just gonna ramble on about shit.

Consider for a moment that Jesus of Nazareth slipped and fell into a river as a child, drowning himself (heh, I’m going to hell for this) and Christianity never existed. There would be no Bible, no crusades, no warring between Catholics and Protestants in England and Ireland, no Roman persecution, no missionaries running off to all corners of the globe trying to convert people to Christianity.

I’m not trying to point out all the negative things, I’m really just trying to grasp how different the world would be today. The Romans would have still invaded Britain, the African slave trade would have almost certainly happened and the American War of Independence is something I would still have expected to see.

It is unclear how or when Christianity came to Britain (most guesses point towards Roman influence in c. 200-400 A.D.), but without Christian influence wouldn’t the native peoples remained pagan? Wouldn’t that be the same for most places in Europe too? I don’t really know a lot about pagan religions, other than that they tend to be a lot more gender-equal. Perhaps modern Western society would be greatly influenced by beliefs similar to Wicca or other neopaganist religions.

Come to think about it, maybe it wouldn’t be THAT different, irrespective of the “butterfly effect” that would no doubt make more than its fair share of significant changes throughout history.

If that were the case, perhaps we’d all be a promiscuous bunch of amoralites living in a society sculpted by our own decadence and lacking not only what I would like to call “civilized laws”, but any form of art or culture (thanks Huxley). But then again by saying that, I’m implying that Christianity is the basis for where a lot of our morals come from. And I don’t believe that.

You see, I’m a firm believer that religion does just as much, if not more, harm than good. For every well-established charity or young students’ group building schools in Africa there’s a war or act of religious prejudice to balance it out. You don’t need religion to mould you into a good person because you naturally develop into someone who knows the difference between right and wrong as long as you’re raised properly (I know, I know... “right/wrong” = subjectives, I’m not the divine person who establishes these cross-culture principles, but you see my point).

I kinda like the idea of a society based around atheism, if only because logic and science would remain largely unhindered by religious (not just Christian) objections and people would be little less ignorant...if only in one way. Deism is an interesting theology because it teaches that there is a supreme being that created the universe out there, but that he basically fucked off somewhere along the line and everything around us can be explained rationally and by observing our natural surroundings. No miracles. No revelations. Just a mysterious, incomprehensible creator and logic.

But what would that society be? More compassionate? Smarter? Would its lack of religion be detrimental to our mores and culture? I dunno, I doubt it. I think we’d be a lot more genuine in our love of things because it wouldn’t be ingrained into our beliefs that we HAVE to love everything. I think we’d have a lot more initiative to look, see, hear and explore because religion wouldn’t be trying to tie us down to something that doesn’t change.

Because everything changes; it’s how we get better. We see, we do, we fail and we learn. I don’t see why this can’t be applied to our beliefs either – we believe something, it gets disproven or something else makes more sense, and we believe that instead. Kinda like evolution I guess, or perhaps I’m just being retarded now.

Meh, no one man can understand it all anyway. We’re all just cogs turning in the great gestalt of society, constantly being replaced by newer and better parts. I’d love to see the day when society lets people act like people, but perhaps society will change what it means to be a “person” before that day becomes. I’ll keep my love in a box and bury it until the day the soil moves it under the feet of someone who cares in any case.

Quid me nutrit me destruit. "What nourishes me destroys me."

Stereotypes and how to not beat them

I think we can all agree that, with the exception of all English ones, stereotypes are very funny things indeed. The image of an overweight, bearded man clad in lederhosen with a beer in one hand and a sausage on a fork in the other while chanting in something vaguely resembling a language would cause most of us to burst out in hearty guffaws and affirmations of “that’s Jerry!”

Stereotypes are a prime example of something I’ve always firmly believed in: “if it’s not offensive, it’s probably not funny”. The herzblut of good international relationships is on the one hand the ability to ridicule your neighbour’s culture (the potency of which usually in direct proportion to number of alcohol units per mL of blood) with your fellow compatriots, and on the other hand the grudging respect to admit to yourself that they do make fine cheese or have cool moustaches or whatever, and compliment them for that.

I like stereotypes. I’m not racist enough to think that most people fit them (except for in the case of suave, mysterious Englishmen who all talk like James Bond and suffer from chronic satyriasis), but at the same time I’m also not hippy enough to deny that there are quite a few people out there who do fit those stereotypes. You know who you are, Hans.


I think exposing people to stereotype clichés is a pretty good starting point for learning about other people’s culture too. I mean, imagine you had to tell someone about Indians and their culture, someone who had not an inkling of what an “Indian” was or whether or not they could eat one; for the sake of this argument, let’s say an Eskimo from the planet Mars. If you try to explain all about them in the...*shudder* “PC way”, you’re only gonna confuse them as to where the differences lay between them and us (and let’s not pretend that’s a racist statement). Saying things like “Indians are just like us, except with a darker complexion, although they come in loads of different races and ethnicities actually; also they live in India, a country which Britain used to rule, and so over the centuries both cultures have intertwined like the fingers of like two primary school children discovering the fuzzy feelings in their tummies for the time, etc etc” – it’s needless.

You can play on stereotypes without being offensive because you’re talking about traditional culture and that’s more often than not where stereotypes stem from. That and rape statistics *cough*. But there’s nothing wrong with telling people that they’re the brown-skinned natives of India, most of whom adhere to Hinduism and revere cows, or about the bindi (little spot on the forehead), half-naked tribal dances, dome-like architecture and families with truckloads of kids. You make things a lot more interesting that way, and besides, any intelligent person will already know that’s it only a small percentage of people (particularly the country bumpkins – oops!)* who fit the total stereotype like Cinderella’s slipper.


But then, like father with two children and only enough money to take one on holiday with him, we come to a problem. Some countries just don’t have stereotypes. Countries who haven’t invented anything remarkable enough so that we all associate them with the electric vibrator, not infamous enough for us to portray them as austere, soulless beings, and not big enough for us to care about them.

Countries like these make me angry, and so with a globe in one hand, a mouse in the other, and deviant, sleep-deprived mind acting as a malicious driving force, I sought to purge a few of them of their blissful anonymity. Let this be a lesson to the rest of you.

Luxembourg: Okay, this kinda sounds like “Sucks-‘em-bad”, so I’m thinking this is a country full of prostitutes that France and Germany occasionally visit when their wives aren’t looking. Sucks-‘em-badders take it deep!!

Faroe Islands: These people toil around a river all day and worship Tutankhamen. Millennia of warring with neighbouring tribes has made them distrustful of foreigners and so the gates to their settlements are guarded by hulking, 7 foot tall sentinels, specifically chosen from birth to serve the current ruler and protect the people.

Eritrea: This country is home to anomalously hairy folk who spend most of their time playing the piano and cart wheeling to their next destination. Known to have a considerably high IQ, an insatiable lust for moss and a hilarious, but unnecessary, tendency to lick the ears of passersby.

Chechnya: The small, ewok-like creatures of this unrecognised state are locked in an ongoing war with the Imperial Stormtroopers to the north, comprising multiple skirmishes in the Chechnyan heartlands. Have been noted by numerous sources to live in cities built entirely in the treetops, and to be wary, but approachable, people.

In retrospect, this list looks more like a bestiary than a list of tongue-in-cheek pseudo-stereotypes. Well what the hell, I’ve vented and I feel a lot better for it anyway.

It’s worth noting that whereas racism is the malformed baby born from the womb of malevolence – the lovechild of Mr. Illogical Fear and his mistress Domina Contempt – stereotypes are not a direct manifestation of racism. Ignorance maybe, but just because you’re making a joke about something or someone doesn’t mean you hate it. I love foreign people, some people would say too much, but I don’t allow my little xenophilic fetish to get in the way of what really matters – making fun of other people to make yourself feel bigger. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a find a nerd to pick on.

Holy shit, one more post about race and I get my BNP membership card!