156 - Text

[impure_tale]

Fellow denizens of the barge, I pose to you a question: 

What is your definition of blasphemy? 

I have a book here which defines it, rather simply, as irreverence toward the deities, artifacts, customs and tenets of a given religion. Which I suppose is a perfectly fair and universal explanation. But "irreverent" behavior -- don't you have to belong to that particular religion, or at least to the society that sanctions it, for it to count as blasphemy? 

For instance, most religions that use the Bible or some form of it hold to the notion that "taking God's name in vain" is a sin. Does this not apply merely to followers of that faith? If, say, I were to not be a member of the church (can you imagine?), I would therefore have no reason to hold the teachings of the Bible as sacred. Oui? By that logic, then, if someone were to, say, drop something particularly heavy on my foot, enough to induce extreme pain, then for me to exclaim "Jesus Christ!" should be perfectly acceptable. In turn -- because it's not just about teasing the Christians -- the same would be assumed if I were to say "Sweet fucking Tak!" instead, no? 

Is there a difference, aside from the fact that the religious whining is for once issuing the most loudly from a non-Christian?

This is not about respecting the differences of others -- I'm well aware that I could have made my point without such coarse language. I'm also well aware that if it were simply about respecting differing cultures, a Warden would not have been physically attacked today for "blaspheming" -- over Audio, where anyone could hear it, no less.

Has anything been done about this, by the way? Or were the lot of you simply having a laugh over it? 

Comments

[timesbureaucrat]

But words aren't harmless and therefore aren't blameless. It's also easy for a speaker or a writer to claim that he didn't mean to provoke the action that resulted from his words, and deny all responsibility for what his words evoked.

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

Speakers and writers are NOT responsible for the actions and decisions of others.

[timesbureaucrat]

So if a man uses his rhetorical skill to intentionally rouse a mob to murderous violence but doesn't participate in the murder himself he is in no way ethically responsible for the deaths?

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

You are implying that Monsieur Graves intended to be attacked.

[timesbureaucrat]

He intended to provoke.

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

And you would permit his actions to be rewarded with the attention he was after, rather than have him be ignored and put out the fire at its source.

[timesbureaucrat]

The source is Mr. Graves. I tried to stop his harassment of my inmate. Perhaps this will do the trick where my warning failed. Perhaps he's learned his lesson. In any case, I will not punish Ardent for a reaction he was provoked to over months of verbal abuse.

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

And what has your Inmate learned in the meantime?

[timesbureaucrat]

He's learned that he can trust me to side with him against an aggressor and that I keep to my word. And that being a warden doesn't make one free from reprisal and that being an inmate doesn't make one automatically oppressed by an unjust system. Did you know that Mr. Graves once boasted that he could get away with the abuse simply because he was a warden and Ardent was an inmate?

[impure-tale.livejournal.com]

He did not during that exchange.

Regardless of what he boasts he tends to make allusions toward being taken more seriously than he truly is.

[timesbureaucrat]

Not during that exchange, no, but he has in the past. Specifically, he strongly implied that he felt free to brain my inmate because the first-offence punishment for wardens was minimal. And although I should hope that the wardens would take a matter like that, if it ever actually came up, more seriously than Mr. Graves implied, the very fact that he said it to an inmate, who doesn't know what goes on amongst wardens and how punishment is decided, is damaging to my inmate's trust in this community.