Rintin35

Be a friend to the environment (read all 14 entries…)
Tolerating my intolerance 2 years ago

I’ve just read two posts (this one and the one she wrote 5 minutes earlier) that really exasperate me!

What I really want to do is reach out, appeal to her desire to make the best environmental choice she can, and not judge. But I can’t help myself – I also wanna spit nails at the whole “well, it’s God’s will that I do whatever the f*ck I want, despite how ignorant and selfish it is, because I wouldn’t be doing it if it weren’t his plan!” Granted, I’m not a religious person, particularly because of the whole trend toward “religion as excuse for being an asshole”, but I do have my own relationship with God, and I feel more spiritually connected when I’m appreciating and respecting the gifts that are this life and this planet.

Please, help me tolerate such lazy, self-serving behaviour; and help me remember that I too can be exasperating, lazy, self-serving and ignorant at times, so I am in no position to judge. Especially this person, who has at least added to her 43T list to “reduce, reuse, recycle more”, which is a lot more than most people.

Jun 12, 2007, 07:32AM PDT | 3 cheers


Comments:

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Jun 12, 2007, 06:47PM PDT

Rintin35

Nice to know..

that I’m not alone in my beliefs, my exasperation, nor in my desire to be a friend to the environment. Thanks for the support & wise words Perc!

Jun 13, 2007, 05:18AM PDT | Respond to this

evenstar42 Merry Christmas all :o)

Seeing both sides

I kind of understand where she’s coming from. My mom, who’s a Jehovah’s Witness, once made a similar comment when I ranted at her for a little too long about eco issues – along the lines of “God is going to restore the planet to a paradise anyway, so while it’s good to take care of it, we don’t have to worry too much about it.” I suppose if you really believe then a viewpoint like that makes sense. I’ve found that there is no real way to discuss an issue like that with a committed believer, because they’re coming at it from an irreconcilably different point of view. Of course, it is exasperating that it leads to someone not doing as much for the environment as they could; that’s part of a bigger issue, though, and one of the things I dislike most about religion in general – people often use it to absolve themselves of responsibility for their own lives and actions.

Jun 13, 2007, 03:28AM PDT | Thread | Respond to this 4 cheers

Rintin35

Voice of reason...

as always, you wisely state the simple truth – while Percivas & I are (I suppose) entitled to our outrage, there really isn’t any easy way to address these kinds of issues with people whose perspective is so different from our own.

In situations such as this, mutual respect can go a long way to bridging a divide; for example, in the case of you & your Mom – obviously loved ones will go a lot further to accept, respect, and/or even try to understand and/or support our points of view, even when they differ from the loved ones’ own. Not so often the case, I find, between strangers.
That was why I mentioned at the beginning of my post that I wanted to reach out to the woman who wrote those posts – to see if there was any way I could encourage &/or support her in ANY efforts she could make (because it sounded as though she was a bit frustrated with not being able to do enough, and was reaching the ‘why try?’ attitude point), rather than just confronting her [IMO misguided] belief that she didn’t have to make any effort because “God’s got our backs”.

Thanks, Evenstar, for your ever-level-headed perspective. Have you ever considered a career in mediation?? :+)

Jun 13, 2007, 05:01AM PDT | Thread | Respond to this 2 cheers

evenstar42 Merry Christmas all :o)

Actually I have :o)

I’m good at seeing both sides of a story. It’s great for resolving disputes, but really lousy for decision-making :-p

Totally agree about the mutual respect. Unfortunately, in the case of many devout believers respect and acceptance isn’t an option, because it’s a condition of their faith that they never give up trying to ‘open the eyes’ of non-believers. (I’m not saying all believers are like that, of course. I personally know several very religious people who combine a profound faith with a wide acceptance of others, and I think that kind of faith is a beautiful thing, even though it’s not for me.)

As for the “God’s got our backs” mentality – doesn’t it say somewhere that God helps those who help themselves? Even if he was going to save us from ourselves, surely he’d prefer if we did everything in our power to limit the damage? And who says he does have our backs? He gave us free will, so they say, and that means freedom to make bad decisions as well as good ones. Any parent would tell you that there comes a time when you have to let your children take the consequences of their actions, and if we keep on going the way we’re going, I think it’d be perfectly understandable for God to sit back and look on sadly as we destroy ourselves.

Jun 13, 2007, 06:30AM PDT | Respond to this 1 cheer

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Jun 13, 2007, 05:04AM PDT


Rintin35 has gotten 3 cheers on this entry.

 

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