The context:
CorruptUser wrote:[EDITED BY OBSESSOMOM TO PARAPHRASE: Someone else had expressed doubts that many religions provide justifications for murdering children.]
Ba'al Hamon, God of Carthage, required child sacrifices. Interestingly, it was the nobles who had to offer a sacrifice, because it was their fault things got so bad. The gist of it was, whenever there was a crisis, i.e., food shortage, someone had to die. And it was better to kill someone you weren't yet attached to.
This was actually surprisingly normal for the world until very, very recently. Eskimo retirements weren't a thing, but they did murder newborns they couldn't take care of. The greeks would abandon newborns they couldn't feed, usually the girls, which is why they were so gay. Also why they were so murderous, seeing as the only way to get laid was to murder and rape in the next town over. The catholic church ran brothels, but would murder all the male children. The Aztecs... well you know. The Eastern Shoshone of North America (or one of the Shoshone tribes) killed ALL the female newborns, and got wives by either buying slaves or kidnapping them. The Canaanite cultures famously sacrificed to Moloch until 3200 years ago, around the same time that part of the world turned to constant warfare instead...
Be very, very VERY grateful you live in a world with condoms. Because without which, the only way to survive is some combination of murdering your children or murdering your neighbors.
CorruptUser wrote:Obsessomom wrote:CorruptUser wrote:The greeks would abandon newborns they couldn't feed, usually the girls, which is why they were so gay.
I understand that your entire post is on the hyperbolic, outrageous gadfly side, CorruptUser, but I find it very hard to see humor in statements like this. Just sayin'.
Not that much hyperbolism, actually. We can look down upon the "backwards" views on sexuality of our ancestors because we did not have to suffer through the living hell that was the world prior to birth control. And paternity tests. And food preservatives. And vaccines. And antibiotics. That's pretty much the definition of "privilege", as we never had to suffer from the horrors of not even that long ago.
And based on what part you quoted, I feel I should clarify that I don't view homosexuality as being "perverse" or anything like that, just that homosexuality was somewhat more tolerated in ancient Greece than in the past thousand or so years indirectly because of the female infanticide.
Ethics philosophy quarantineSpoiler:sardia wrote:It's still better than when he called every extremist a closeted homo.
Ok, that one was excessive hyperbole, but I still stand by my hypothesis that it's higher than the average.