Re: virus: Why religious?

ken sartor (sartor@visidyne.com)
Tue, 22 Oct 1996 09:49:49 -0500


At 07:35 PM 10/17/96 EDT, KMO prime wrote:
>
>On Thu, 17 Oct 1996 13:45:27 +0000 Martin Traynor <m.traynor@ic.ac.uk>
>writes:
>>-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>
>>If, as you suggest, a percentage of the human population cannot
>>sustain itself without the crutch of a religious meme to lean on then
>>do you think for one second that we'll actually be able to shake
>>those beliefs? I think no matter what we do those people (if they
>>exist) will stick to their faith or find another, equally comforting
>>one. If these people exist in sufficient numbers that they affect the
>>spread of the CoV meme noticably then we must either make it
>>comfortable for them or work on eliminating their need for comfort.
>>The former would, I think, compromise the whole point of CoV and the
>>latter is a very long term goal (probably spanning generations).
>
>If we want the Church of the Virus to assuage people's anxieties and fill
>the same needs that religion fills, then we'll need to build some church
>buildings and provide people with a social setting in which to interact
>with other people who are on the same developmental path. Sure, the
>virus list does that to some extent, but you must admit that reading an
>e-mail message doesn't pack the same punch as getting dressed up, going
>to an ornate structure with a few hundred like-minded people, singing
>songs, and listening to a charismatic and articulate speaker eloquently
>extol your virtues and condemn those of the conspiring shadow armies of
>heathens, liberals, secular humanists, and media elites who threaten to
>lure your children into lives of perversion.

Perhaps we could graft ourselves onto an existing church? Seems
like Unitarian Churches may be receptive to these ideas... This
could be seen as a baby step toward a full fledged denomination.

ken