When will America stop worshipping the Christian god in favor of legit worshipping companies?
When will America stop worshipping the Christian god in favor of legit worshipping companies?
This question is a joke. Also, the mods should add a joke tag to allow dumb answers.
Americans worship Supply Side Jesus
but then there’s also plenty of arguments that most Christians worldwide worship the Church not Jesus
Indeed. Wasn't one of the commandments to avoid false idols and stuff? And wasn't one of Jesus' things about you being able to directly pray to god or something? Just saying, the church is and always has been a scam, a political institution used to better control the masses, especially applicable in large population nations and empires (like the Roman Empire), loosely based on ideas of some guys' teachings. And that's the case for all organised religion.
Tags don't exist in Lemmy, so it's not something we can add to the community. How about adding [joke] or [non-serious answers only]?
tags don't exist in Lemmy
But Lemmy is open source. The framework could be added so everyone could have tags.
That's indeed a wonderful thing about open source software. It doesn't necessarily solve this person's question, though.
You can even file an issue (or upvote similar ones) here: https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy-ui
Or ask in c/wrongAnswersOnly?
thatd be good, kinda like askreddit [serious]
We don't worship the Christian god. If you look at a US dollar bill, this is explained quite clearly.
In God We Trust.
This is printed right there, on our real god: money.Blasphemer! "Money" is always spelled with a capital letter! or are you not a capitalist?
Oh!! So that’s the “capital” in capitalism!
God money will do anything for you.
Our Money, which art in our wallet.
Hallowed be thy buying power.
Thy interest come, thy inflation be done.
In our bank accounts as it is in the Fed.
Buy us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our impulse buys
as we forgive those who advertise against us.
And lead us not into poverty
but deliver us from want.
For thine is the Kingdom, the power, and the wealth
for ever and ever.
Cha-ching!
They prefer to be called the primal forces of nature.
Sadly, I'm old enough to remember when that movie was a blistering satire and not nostalgia for a simpler time.
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I'd argue that the American civil religion already involves worshipping money, rich people and corporations
As an atheist, I had to ask myself how I know people are worshiping a god. In the US, it seems to boil down to a few things:
- Giving money to an organization in order to participate with the community
- Showing obedience to authority by allowing them to dictate some (but not all) of one's behavior
- Being hyper-focused on how the organization got to where it is today and whether what they do today aligns with its initial values and goals
- Performing rituals in hopes of causing specific outcomes
Based on this, I am already worshiping Apple.
I disagree woth the third one, as it implies using critical thinking to evaluate the success of an organisation, be it in a positive or negative light. I haven't heard a single strongly religious individual immediately agree that Joseph and Mohammed were p*dos, and using that as evidence to make a sound reasoning and evaluation on their religion's moral principles.
I would argue that nobody gives money to their church as a form of community participation. Rather, they give money in the hope that they can buy their way to salvation or as payment to ease their guilty conscience. Probably both.
I live in Utah. Mormons are absolutely required to tithe in order to participate in temple ceremonies. I've never been LDS, but my understanding is that the accounting for how much you tithe is carefully monitored. It's also my understanding that you must participate in temple ceremonies to achieve admittance into heaven.
As someone raised in an authoritarian Calvinist belief system (albeit not in the US) it’s simpler than you think in my opinion. People in general believe whatever fits the random things they absorb into their psyches growing up as kids because being kids they have no yardstick to differentiate between fantasy and reality other than what the authority figures in their life tell them and the evidence of their own eyes. This is true whether you’re raising someone on a diet of intellectual curiosity, a diet of pernicious cult-adjacent nonsense, or anything in between. There’s a reason so many people who’ve left similar authoritarian beliefs love “The Truman Show” in my experience but it’s true for everyone.
Part of being human is that our perceptions unconsciously bend around our beliefs and that the stronger the belief the stronger the amount of bending. We all have this built-in bias towards existing beliefs to a greater level than we instinctively assume, although it’s usually a lot more obvious among authoritarian religious groups because their beliefs are so markedly different from consensus reality.
They've already found that new Apple releases activates the part of the brain activated during religious experiences.
They already did
Was going to say... ask any Christian what their favorite parts of America are and they'll prattle off exactly what corporations want them to say.
I'm pretty sure most Trump supporters already worship him more than God so it seems to be on its way 😅
If you were going to choose s corporation to worship, which would it be?
I really like Costco. They have almost everything i 'need' and you can get a hot dog and a soda for $1.50.
Costco: Pray for a fish. You won't receive a snake, you'll receive 129,342 fishes.
i mean… at least companies exist
Excellent video about Japanese culture that I think is extremely relevant here:
We do that too. That's what our nationall holidays are about - greeting cards, candy, tires, and tvs.
They seriously watch Christmas specials all about anti-consumerism and finding the real meaning, then immediately go out and buy buy buy. Legit riots on black friday just to save a bit. It's so disconnected that it's just baffling to me. Our family has strict spending limits on gifts - if we even give them at all. We have enough stuff, keep your money
I’m going to go pray to my wallet now for your heathen soul. May the Almighty Dollar bless you and not send you to Debt.
not send you to Debt.
What would be the Christian version of filing for bankruptcy? Are we getting rid of dischargeable debt?
My instinct says purgatory
We have slowly been in the process of this for a long time. People are becoming less religious but more consumerist. Traditional religion is being replaced by influencers, celebrities, brand names, etc.
We're never going to outright call it religion but it is functioning in a similar role for our society.
Instagram is a force that gives us meaning! A sad, thin and nutrient-poor sort of meaning but it does seem to calm the shakes for some people.
Article from more than 20 years ago:
The Market as God. It might interest you.
Time to attack and dethrone our corporate overlords.
Some would say it's already happened, just not completely. Corpo worship really is a thing. It's just not yet larger than Christianity, though it does affect policies much more than religious institutions.
"Will"?
The "God" actually is a worldwide mega-corporation, or few business in a particular market
You need to delve deeper; from what I can see, there are people worshipping not only Google and Microsoft but even Meta!
When the American republic becomes the American Empire and companies become divinely chosen aristocrats. Not an impossible outcome.
The moment "kill the other guy" becomes a legit option the whole logic changes, though, and you don't have a corporation. Businessperson to warlord is a transition you can make, as the Russians can attest to, but it's a transition.