Sweden: Dont refer to God as a 'he'

[Mr Walker]

I was reading the local paper today and there was a push from a woman  for gender neutral characters in modern children's books so that children were not socially conditioned into genders or gender specific roles and behaviours.

   In part it was part of a larger move to stop boys being presented as more physical, more assertive, more in charge or dominant  etc than girls and to stop them being presented as natural leaders   I can understand where this view comes form but it accepts the idea that gender is a social rather than a biological construct, which is a bit non scientific   it was a rewrite of this article. 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5117745/Call-ditch-fairytales-favour-gender-neutral-books.html

Th same paper however offered an alternative pov  a bit earlier in the year

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/rendezview/stop-the-sexual-politicisation-of-childhood-we-have-gone-too-far/news-story/2025d0b4b57d76a145798fc2fbe2ce49

Edited November 27, 2017 by Mr Walker

[Area201]

On 11/26/2017 at 4:32 AM, DieChecker said:

But, isn't the use of the male pronoun in all these cases to refer to everyone generally not point back at society and culture being patriarchal? 

Woman are expected to be one of the "guys", but Men would never put up with being one of the "gals". ????

It may seem a step forward toward unisex language, but really it is just lumping the females into the same group as the men, and calling them all men (basically).

 

tbh I think the main problem here is not the patriarchal culture but verbal language itself that is clumsy. Society is not developed enough spiritually for advanced telepathy which is said to be prominent in higher ages of our planet. For now, I communicate instantly via internet connection with you however using text and emojis  

Edited November 27, 2017 by Area201

[Dark_Grey]

15 hours ago, Mr Walker said:

I was reading the local paper today and there was a push from a woman for gender neutral characters in modern children's books so that children were not socially conditioned into genders or gender specific roles and behaviours.

I wonder if this woman has children of her own? Most of the time, the ones suggesting we neutralize male/female roles do not.

Quote

  In part it was part of a larger move to stop boys being presented as more physical, more assertive, more in charge or dominant  etc than girls and to stop them being presented as natural leaders. I can understand where this view comes form but it accepts the idea that gender is a social rather than a biological construct, which is a bit non scientific

In order to fully accept this idealistic view of gender/sexuality, one really does have to push Biology aside. To imply that all male and all female traits are simply "social constructs" denies hundreds of thousands of years of evolution shaping our genetics to produce "natural born leaders" on one side and "natural born caregivers" on the other. There is a reason each sex gravitates towards those respective roles, whether the individual knows it or not.

Besides, this has been studied over and over and the results are virtually the same: there is an innate, biological reason boys gravitate towards toys like cars and girls gravitate towards dolls.

ScienceDaily

Quote

"Biological differences give boys an aptitude for mental rotation and more interest and ability in spatial processing, while girls are more interested in looking at faces and better at fine motor skills and manipulating objects. When we studied toy preference in a familiar nursery setting with parents absent, the differences we saw were consistent with these aptitudes. Although there was variability between individual children, we found that, in general, boys played with male-typed toys more than female-typed toys and girls played with female-typed toys more than male-typed toys.

I don't know why Sweden continues to pursue this faulty line of gender-neutrality. No matter how many times they removed all notions of gender and "social constructs" from pre-schools, the boys are still acting like boys and girls like girls. Proving, for the millionth time, gender is still biologically based. On that note, you have to love how men identifying as women are dominating every women's sport they enter. Soon, there won't be a point to having a women's league in any capacity. Another fine social adjustment brought to you by feelings, not facts.

Edited November 27, 2017 by Dark_Grey

[Only_]

On 2017-11-26 at 4:26 AM, and then said:

 If his second coming is an "internal spiritual renewal",  why does the bible take so much time explaining his actions UPON HIS RETURN?  Are you aware of any of them?

You are deep within the swamp land of litteralism. None of this was meant to be taken literally. The second coming, Jesus' resurection ect. are truths embedded in myth. It's what you have the potential to become. It's what you can achieve now on this earth and carry into the beyond. It doesn't take reading misquoting Jesus to know this and deep in their hearts christian fundamentalists know this. But end up performing so many mental and emotional circus du Soleil exercices retreating deep into tranches of denial and fumbling forward too far into the misty coastlines of faith that the endgame results in the form of psychosis or abuse of trauma. And then we wonder why protestant christianity has become so thin and brittle, why it suffers from dual personality disorder, why it's often a violent paradox and a cause of so much friction with western society.

It basically has become those ''dry canals'' that Jesus speaks about in the Nag Hammadi Library's Aprocalypse of Peter.

It's really unfortunate, for many evangelicals truly wish what, we, truth seekers want. And that is a spiritual prison-break, astral fuel to kindle their godly substance and that witnessing of the event horizon known as the divine wholeness.

Edited November 28, 2017 by TruthSeeker_

[hetrodoxly]

I've not read the whole thread so this might have been mentioned, is 'it' just for Christians or all religions?

[Farmer77]

On ‎11‎/‎25‎/‎2017 at 10:35 PM, seeder said:

 

how so?

Christianity is a veiled death cult. They're literally cheering for millions to die in an apocalypse so they can be proven right. 

That's why they're so excited about Trump's Jerusalem pronouncement. That's one step closer to all the infidels dying a painful death for their lack of faith 

[FLOMBIE]

8 minutes ago, Farmer77 said:

Christianity is a veiled death cult. They're literally cheering for millions to die in an apocalypse so they can be proven right. 

That's why they're so excited about Trump's Jerusalem pronouncement. That's one step closer to all the infidels dying a painful death for their lack of faith 

It's not veiled in any way. The Christians believed that the end is nigh from the very beginning. It actually used to be the driving factor. 

[MrBene]

So, let's pretend for a second that actually God was real and he created men and women. How did he communicate with them? Languages didn't exist. So I guess, he's God, duh, he used some sort of telepathy, right? Well, languages were developed many years later and these "God created everything" was first written in...what...Sumerian? Well, I'm not very good at Sumerian but as far as I know Sumerian language divides nouns in animated and inanimated objects which excludes gender at all, I mean, they don't use gender in their nouns, so I believe in the first translations from these writings the word "god" didn't carry any gender explicitly which makes sense that "updating" certain translations you want to avoid the whole he/she thingy.

Edited December 12, 2017 by MrBene

[FLOMBIE]

31 minutes ago, MrBene said:

So, let's pretend for a second that actually God was real and he created men and women. How did he communicate with them? Languages didn't exist. So I guess, he's God, duh, he used some sort of telepathy, right? Well, languages were developed many years later and these "God created everything" was first written in...what...Sumerian? Well, I'm not very good at Sumerian but as far as I know Sumerian language divides nouns in animated and inanimated objects which excludes gender at all, I mean, they don't use gender in their nouns, so I believe in the first translations from these writings the word "god" didn't carry any gender explicitly which makes sense that "updating" certain translations you want to avoid the whole he/she thingy.

I think everybody was supposed to speak the same tongue at that point. Languages did not exist, but speech did. 

[Farmer77]

1 hour ago, hetrodoxly said:

I've not read the whole thread so this might have been mentioned, is 'it' just for Christians or all religions?

Its not even for all Christians. Its specifically speaking of one church's change in doctrine. The thread title is a tad bit misleading 

[FLOMBIE]

1 minute ago, Farmer77 said:

Its not even for all Christians. Its specifically speaking of one church's change in doctrine. The thread title is a tad bit misleading 

But saying that wouldn't add up to the narrative that Sweden is on the verge of destruction and, drum roll, APOSTASY! 

[MrBene]

33 minutes ago, FLOMBIE said:

I think everybody was supposed to speak the same tongue at that point. Languages did not exist, but speech did. 

Let's say speech is an arcaic version of an structured language, well, I hardly believe that they would use genre to refer to their god/gods. I believe that the he/she language confusion occurs when a church mostly dominated by male decided to give their own interpretation to the original scriptures. Again, if more "updated" churches want to go back to their original "non-gender" god I believe it's a step in the right direction technically speaking.

Edited December 12, 2017 by MrBene

[FLOMBIE]

1 minute ago, MrBene said:

Let's say speech is an arcaic version of an structured language, well, I hardly believe that they would use genre to refer to their god/gods. I believe that the he/she language confusion occurs when a church mostly dominated by male decided to give their own interpretation to the original scriptures.  

God has created man in his image, and the first one was male. Most religions have a patriarchal system. 

Speech is speech. It can be archaic or not. What I meant is that everyone spoke the same language, until god punished man by giving him different languages. The bible doesn't talk about speechless people. 

[MrBene]

1 minute ago, FLOMBIE said:

God has created man in his image, and the first one was male. Most religions have a patriarchal system. 

Speech is speech. It can be archaic or not. What I meant is that everyone spoke the same language, until god punished man by giving him different languages. The bible doesn't talk about speechless people. 

The bible was written by people, not by god. The events described in Genesis occured how many years before the first version of the bible? Let's say a couple thousand years. So basically the whole "God created man in his image" could be just a misinterpretation or just an assumption of something that actually wasn't like that. Maybe the right interpretation was "human" and not "male human"? I don't know. No one knows.  

[FLOMBIE]

Just now, MrBene said:

The bible was written by people, not by god. The events described in Genesis occured how many years before the first version of the bible? Let's say a couple thousand years. So basically the whole "God created man in his image" could be just a misinterpretation or just an assumption of something that actually wasn't like that. Maybe the right interpretation was "human" and not "male human"? I don't know. No one knows.  

But it makes no sense speculating on that if we do not even have a single hint of what is going on. Christianity is just that, what you find in this book. Did it used to be the prime example for equality? well, maybe, but if you look at what similar teachings of this period said, I highly doubt it.

We know that the bible was altered and used as a method of control, see the First Council of Nicaea, for instance. But there is no indication for what you assume. 

[MrBene]

I'm just being technical that maybe the first translators or the first scriptures weren't good at all describing the whole thing.

[FLOMBIE]

Just now, MrBene said:

I'm just being technical that maybe the first translators or the first scriptures weren't good at all describing the whole thing.

The first bibles were written in Aramaic, think. I have no idea how genders work in this language. Maybe, yes. But only maybe. It's pure speculation. 

[odas]

What if God is both, male and female?

Why does God have to have a gender at all? I think "IT" is propper. If we can put a gender, prefference, immage to the likeness of God, then in my opinion, it minimizes the greatnesd of God. Given the vast space, the universe, our solar system....why just focus on our little planet?

[FLOMBIE]

29 minutes ago, odas said:

What if God is both, male and female?

Why does God have to have a gender at all? I think "IT" is propper. If we can put a gender, prefference, immage to the likeness of God, then in my opinion, it minimizes the greatnesd of God. Given the vast space, the universe, our solar system....why just focus on our little planet?

Perhaps the concept of a genderless being was too much for the people back then. 

[MrBene]

30 minutes ago, FLOMBIE said:

The first bibles were written in Aramaic, think. I have no idea how genders work in this language. Maybe, yes. But only maybe. It's pure speculation. 

You're true here. The language used in the first "written" versions is Aramaic, which uses gender just like old fashioned english or greek. I said Summarian because I believe that the genesis or the explanation of god/men/women were first written in Summarian (which doens't have gender) and was adapted to Aramaic. We have thousands of years between the two languages tho. 

[hetrodoxly]

1 hour ago, Farmer77 said:

Its not even for all Christians. Its specifically speaking of one church's change in doctrine. The thread title is a tad bit misleading 

I don't see a problem as long all religions are treated equally, no 'he' there shouldn't be a 'she' goddesses etc.

[Podo]

So the Christians of this one part of the world have decided to refer to their imaginary friend as an "it" instead of a "he." Cool. How does this affect anything at all, again?

[Michelle]

1 hour ago, hetrodoxly said:

I don't see a problem as long all religions are treated equally, no 'he' there shouldn't be a 'she' goddesses etc.

It would be impossible in Arabic. Nouns and adjectives are either masculine or feminine. There is no neuter. Yes, that's what they call it. Very difficult to leave gender out of a sentence structure. Classrooms demanding we not use the "he" or "she" pronouns are actually being very discriminatory to other cultures, including the French.

[SHaYap]

There are options though ...
 

Quote

 

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Genderless languages are listed at List of languages by type of grammatical genders. Genderless languages include the Indo-European languages Armenian, Bengali, Persian and Central Kurdish (Sorani Dialect), all the Uralic languages (such as Hungarian, Finnish and Estonian), all the modern Turkic languages (such as Turkish), Chinese, Japanese, Korean, all the Austronesian languages (such as the Polynesian languages), and Vietnamese.

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• wiki link

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A very old monk spreads it out to me in such a manner ...

" If god is male then there would need to be a female counterpart ... that would also mean there is a dad and mom god ... and that further means many baby boy and girl gods ... "

~

I went and got myself drunk after that ...

~

[Michelle]

9 minutes ago, third_eye said:

There are options though ...

A very old monk spreads it out to me in such a manner ...

" If god is male then there would need to be a female counterpart ... that would also mean there is a dad and mom god ... and that further means many baby boy and girl gods ... "

~

I went and got myself drunk after that ...

~

So the answer is to force them to speak a different language entirely? Won't happen. They don't even enforce the native languages in schools. They provide bilingual teachers.

Maybe I missed something...