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25. januar 2003
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Sex and guilt: The fuel that runs Christianity
What makes some religions thrive and others die? What social mechanisms caused a religion like Christianity, which is built on an ahistorical claim about an impossibility and founded on false prophecy, to be catapulted to boast almost 1.5 billion adherents almost 2000 years after its founder allegedly promised to come back "soon"?
One factor I have noticed that is scarily consistent among major religions is an extremely negative view of human sexuality. And Christianity is an anti-sex religion par excellence. Since almost everybody actually likes sex, how come this have been such a prominent driving force in the world's largest religions?
I think the answer is guilt. And guilt is, whatever people may say about love, fear and hatred, the major driving force in religious fervour.
Observe: humans have strong sex drives. Most people have, at least sometimes in their lives, sexual relationships that violates religious rules. Everybody has at least sexual fantasies that violates religious rules. And even in situations where people are actually allowed to have and enjoy sex, like in a marriage, the association with shame and guilt remains so strong that it causes serious sexual dysfunctions.
 How is this guilt a driving force? Religions not only tell people that they should feel guilty over sexual desires, they also proscribe ways to "deaden" those bad feelings. Religions prescribe methods to alleviate guilt and to get rid of the "bad" sexual desires: prayer, religious work, in short becoming more strongly religious. Instead of alienating the "sinners", succesful religions actually manage to draw them closer, using their feelings of guilt as energy to fuel its own activity. The priests, the nuns, the preachers, the active church goers are fueled by guilt and a need to show repentence.
A nasty side effect of this is that sometimes, the more a person feel they have to be guilty about, the more likely he or she is to become a religious zealot to compensate for sin. It is not at all hard to imagine a religious man driven mad by guilt over his sexual attraction to children. What will this person do? He will work harder in the church. He will believe that if he works hard, prays hard, studies the holy scriptures, then God will help him get rid of the horrible desires. He may become a priest in the Roman Catholic Church. There he will probably, because they are all driven by guilt, find many like him, and since the "cure" prescribed against their paedophilia is a sham, they become a pack of predators in an institution that will protect them and its own image, and that will keep fueling its fervour by the guilt of millions.
11:59:11 PM 
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Uh-oh. Here comes trouble
A new blog on Salon, provocatively titled Ex-Gay Agenda. With a prominent quotation from arch-fanatic Jerry Falwell my first impression was that this is major flame-baiting, but I think that was false. The links list is pretty "neutral", representing both those who think that good Christians should not have same-sex relationships and that gays can be "converted", and those who fight for acceptance.
Where my sympathies are should be pretty obvious, but I still wonder why gays are attracted to Christianity in the first place.
11:33:48 PM
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Iraqi scientists refuse private interviews
Two Iraqi scientists have refused to be interviewed privately by UN arms inspectors, insisting they have witnesses present.
Understandable they don't want to give Saddam Hussein any reason to believe they have given away any secrets. This proves, of course, that there are things those scientists could tell the inspectors that the Iraqi government doesn't want them to know. It also proves that Saddam Hussein is a murdering bastard, but that is nothing new.
11:15:07 PM
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It's not just you: The Net is slow today
A malicious computer worm, a virus-like program, has been targeting internet servers today across the world, starting in the Far East which has experienced the most serious problems. The worm exploits a weakness in Microsoft SQL Server, and instructs it to go into an endless loop sending data to other computers, looking for other servers to infect. This results in an enormous increase in overall traffic, succeeding among other things to effectively shut down Internet traffic in South Korea for hours. A fix for the vulnerability has been available for a long time, but web admins have been slow in implementing it.
8:44:01 PM
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Nuclear inspectors gives Iraq good grades
"The United Nations' nuclear inspectors will deliver a serious blow on Monday to Washington's case for going to war with Iraq, telling the world they have found nothing and giving Saddam Hussein good grades for cooperation." (Guardian)
Frankly, I don't see this as such a huge blow to the US. The IAEA only handles the nuclear side, and almost everybody agrees that Iraq does not have nuclear capability, yet. Thus, the Iraqis does not have that much to hide from IAEA inspectors. The arms inspectors responsible for the other WMDs, under Hans Blix, are more important for the evaluation of the Iraqi cooperation or lack thereof.
5:23:31 AM
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Palestinian cease-fire talks
Egyptian intelligence has managed to get representatives of around a dozen different fractions of Palestinian militants to meet at an undisclosed location in Egypt. The hope is to make the groups agree to a limited ceasefire: stop targetting civilian Israelis. Hardly anyone expects these talks to succeed, and it is getting more and more obvious that Arafat and the Palestinian Authority has lost control over a significant portion of the militants.
Officially, Israel says that Arafat is in control and thus responsible for all terror attacks on Israel. Off the record, Israeli sources say it is obvious he is less and less in control. However, the Israeli argument is increasingly that either way, Arafat should go. Either because he is behind the terror attacks, and thus untrustworthy, or he is unable to control the militants, and thus irrelevant. So who will Israel talk to instead? Hamas? That is one of the three fractions that staunchly opposes any end in suicide bomb attacks on Israeli civilians. Ironically, it is in the interest of Israeli hard-liners like Sharon that these militants do not come to any agreement.
1:38:19 AM
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© Copyright 2003 Jan Haugland.
Last update: 01.02.03; 00:37:22.
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