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Live and let live

Ed!

Kava Enthusiast
Prerequisite met, I am krunked.
Anyway, I was surprised a while back in a thread where a few folks mentioned that they were Libertarian. From the general populace that would be one in a bajillion, so I thought there might be something to it. Others here are also very "live and let live" even if they wouldn't ascribe to a Libertarian political leaning.
I'm personally a centrist on moral issues and right leaning on economic issues, but I think I was that before kava. Kava may have magnified those traits though, but isn't a cause for sure. I also didn't turn to kava because of it's ability to make me more "live and let live" so I find it odd that it would be a trend here.
Anyone want to throw in with their beliefs of "you don't infringe on me and I'm cool with you"? Any guesses why that might be common here (assuming it actually is)?
 

krunkedout

Kava Lover
I think it's because people who fall Into these categories are more open minded than most. We were open to receive the root. Most people aren't open to trying water that tastes like mud over and over until they break the RT. that's probably why the people here are so chill. I'll admit that when I first started using kava I was doing so for the soul purpose of getting intoxicated because I had heard it was a "legal high" but then, the root spread throughout me and changed me in such a profound way, I actually think I look at life differently now. And now I am 100% against kava being labeled as a legal high because I see that it is so much more than that and has so much more to offer. It's a root that can actually change a persons life. I too fall into the politically central spot and am more conservative when it comes to fiscal matters but I choose the libertarian party because I agree with just about everything in the libertarian party. They also seem to be the most honest, which is why they always come last.
 

Vekta

Notorious Lightweight
Review Maestro
Hmm...


Well I see two sides to this question, politics and just beliefs in general.


To be honest with you I don't really put much stock in politics of any sort. To me they are a necessary evil. Whenever politics come up it always seems to be "Republicans this...Democrats that" Religion inevitably gets thrown in with it and makes everything 10 times more convoluted. I force myself to watch, read and search for news about the state of politics in my country since it ultimately will affect me, but I got to tell you...it's tiring. The most noticeable thing about politics and politicians I see and read about is that they really don't care about the people they are suppose to be serving. They are just taking big money and pushing an agenda.


I support the 2nd amendment and exercise that right within the confines of the law.

I support the woman's right to choose

I support gay marriage/ union, whatever one is comfortable calling it. (Seriously, the church wasn't even involved in marriage as we know it until around 1100 and research as found nothing suggesting it's damaging anything)


I hate talking about these things because it seems to bring out the worst in people and some of the arguments I've heard just flat make no sense. I'll just go cast my vote at the ballot box and let other people go yell at each other on TV. *FLOP*


Beliefs in general? Well...that's a little easier...depending on the specific question being asked.
 

Ed!

Kava Enthusiast
I'm of the feeling that the political system today is basically a sport. We have red team and blue team, people get really excited about it, the presidential election is basically our uber-superbowl. Then when it comes to doing anything it's all posturing to get themselves re-elected.
 

Vekta

Notorious Lightweight
Review Maestro
Yeah, that's pretty much it Ed. Read it word for word in today's paper.


Party X is cautious about voting on Bill Y because next year is a reelection year. But if it wasn't...stuff that legislation in there and beat it in with a shovel.
 

Ed!

Kava Enthusiast
On that note, this video reaffirmed a lot for me, and added some wrinkles I hadn't assumed:
 

kavadude

❦ॐ tanuki tamer
Well, you have to be pretty open to new ideas in general to drink a bunch of gross oils from a gross tasting root. I can definitely say I haven't changed my political or religious beliefs because of kava, but on the other hand I was probably open to kava because I am already pretty liberal in my beliefs in terms of civil liberties. So I think if you have a venn diagram of "people who like kava" and people who are into "live and let live" they're probably almost entirely overlapping.
 

Prince Philip

Duke of Edinborogu
I can't speak for everyone, but I can speak for myself.


First, I don't want to be a buzz kill. If someone is happy or excited about something I think isn't all that great, I'll just keep quiet, or perhaps encourage their enthusiasm just to be a buzz buddy.


Second, on this forum, we have people with various degrees of anxiety disorder, depression, physical aches and pains, job stress, etc. We may also over-represent individuals on the autistic spectrum or who exhibit a broader autistic phenotype. I just don't want to add any additional grief to people who are already experiencing enough life-pain.


Third, I don't want to kill my own buzz. When I'm krunk, instead of telling the fat dog to go away, I'll feed him a fig and give him a hug. Kava flattens the sense of irony, sarcasm, and postmodernism and elevates the sense of sincerity and open-heartedness.

Specifically, kava increases my sense of laughter, honesty, loyalty, generosity, kindness, and magic.
 

HerbalDude420

Mr True Colors
Cannot say it any better than Prince Philip. Hi to all who don't know me. As for politics i believe there is no such thing as a good politician they all say nothing but hoopla. Humans as a whole really suck at being ruled over. The elections are nothing but a mere choosing between the lesser of two evils. Take away the paychecks and benefits no one will want to be a politic.


As for religion i hate religion because it seems like no body can handle it, its always im right and your wrong well I've got news for ya YOUR ALL WRONG imho. I believe one should look at every religion and pick a choose what they believe in because lets face it humans are what made religion in the first place so choosing one path you block your-self from all of what we have to offer as humans.


Kava may have brought us together but open-mindedness and acceptance of others is what keeps us here.
 

Prince Philip

Duke of Edinborogu
Religion is a tricky topic, I won't say a "sticky" topic, because then every religion post would always be on the top of the topic lists.


I'm going to quote Douglas Adams here.

Now, the invention of the scientific method and science is, I'm sure we'll all agree, the most powerful intellectual idea, the most powerful framework for thinking and investigating and understanding and challenging the world around us that there is, and that it rests on the premise that any idea is there to be attacked and if it withstands the attack then it lives to fight another day and if it doesn't withstand the attack then down it goes. Religion doesn't seem to work like that; it has certain ideas at the heart of it which we call sacred or holy or whatever. That's an idea we're so familiar with, whether we subscribe to it or not, that it's kind of odd to think what it actually means, because really what it means is 'Here is an idea or a notion that you're not allowed to say anything bad about; you're just not. Why not? — because you're not!' If somebody votes for a party that you don't agree with, you're free to argue about it as much as you like; everybody will have an argument but nobody feels aggrieved by it. If somebody thinks taxes should go up or down you are free to have an argument about it, but on the other hand if somebody says 'I mustn't move a light switch on a Saturday', you say, 'Fine, I respect that'.


The odd thing is, even as I am saying that I am thinking 'Is there an Orthodox Jew here who is going to be offended by the fact that I just said that?' but I wouldn't have thought 'Maybe there's somebody from the left wing or somebody from the right wing or somebody who subscribes to this view or the other in economics' when I was making the other points. I just think 'Fine, we have different opinions'. But, the moment I say something that has something to do with somebody's (I'm going to stick my neck out here and say irrational) beliefs, then we all become terribly protective and terribly defensive and say 'No, we don't attack that; that's an irrational belief but no, we respect it'.


It's rather like, if you think back in terms of animal evolution, an animal that's grown an incredible carapace around it, such as a tortoise—that's a great survival strategy because nothing can get through it; or maybe like a poisonous fish that nothing will come close to, which therefore thrives by keeping away any challenges to what it is it is. In the case of an idea, if we think 'Here is an idea that is protected by holiness or sanctity', what does it mean? Why should it be that it's perfectly legitimate to support the Labour party or the Conservative party, Republicans or Democrats, this model of economics versus that, Macintosh instead of Windows, but to have an opinion about how the Universe began, about who created the Universe, no, that's holy? What does that mean? Why do we ring-fence that for any other reason other than that we've just got used to doing so? There's no other reason at all, it's just one of those things that crept into being and once that loop gets going it's very, very powerful. So, we are used to not challenging religious ideas but it's very interesting how much of a furore Richard [Dawkins] creates when he does it! Everybody gets absolutely frantic about it because you're not allowed to say these things. Yet when you look at it rationally there is no reason why those ideas shouldn't be as open to debate as any other, except that we have agreed somehow between us that they shouldn't be.


That being said, the one religious belief that is 100% off limits is the Fey. The reason is that everytime someone says "I don't believe in faries," one of them dies. See? I just killed one by typing that statement. In fact, I gave the poor creature a slower, lingering death by putting it in quotes.


I, personally, am fair game. Many people doubt my existence entirely. Some say that I do exist, but am just another human being. Some even think that I don't come from Tanna at all, but am in fact from Corfu (which, while being an island, is nowhere near Vanuatu). I used to be an agnostic, until Descartes showed that because I think, I actually do exist.


You guys, though... I'm not too sure about.


Oh, and every time you say, "I'm not too sure about faeries," one of the Fey falls into a coma. However, because I used quotes, it'll only last a few minutes. Should be safe, so long as the Fey in question wasn't driving at the time.
 

Ed!

Kava Enthusiast
I'm not sure where you were going with the Douglas Adams quote, maybe I'm not getting it, but I don't feel like the basic assumption there is true, that you aren't supposed to question religious points. I think the "you can't question that" is more about ignorance than any particular subject. If I strongly believe that I'm the best fingerpainter in the world, but I have no art training, and you try to tell me that my fingerpainting lacks balance and proportion... if that's something I really believe in and have no defense for then I'm going to plug my ears and "LALALLALLLAAALLAALA."


It happens with theists and atheists, it happens with all forms of politics, it happens in the workplace, it happens in games. Anywhere that you can create two positions there will be passionate and ignorant people who will take up their spears and put in their earplugs. I used to play in a freeform story-writing game online. The governing body really had no purpose, no influence, yet we still had two major group fractures because of that effect.


I'm very religious by the way, if that isn't clear yet. I was raised to question my beliefs. I had a youth pastor who taught us that that when I was young, and I had another pastor in college who strongly emphasized the same. I'm listening to a church service today where the pastor is encouraging the questioning of beliefs on homosexuality and focusing on the basic tenet of "love your neighbor."


I think that there are lots of ignorant people out there who passionately believe things that they shouldn't. I don't know how many people think that this president is the devil or that the last president was an nazi ape without having any idea why.


For me, as a very strongly religious person, I question the origin of man. In fact, I really don't have an opinion on how it was these days. I don't feel like any of the current theories are perfect, so I'm pretty agnostic about it. People for sure passionately believe both ways without understanding why, but I don't know, and it doesn't really matter to me. That's not what what I'm about, and not what my belief set is about no matter what people make it into.
 

Prince Philip

Duke of Edinborogu
Ed, I'm too krunk to know where I'm going.


I think what I'm trying to say is that religious debates are OK, as long as they don't turn nasty, and that's only because nasty is bad. I don't want to read any nasty stuff... it kills the krunk.
 

Ed!

Kava Enthusiast
No worries, Philip. I've learned to take a very laid back approach to religious discussion. There is a lot of prejudice and ignorance out there on both sides, too easy to get swept up into it.
 

kl.Lente

Kava Curious
Prince Philip said:
Third, I don't want to kill my own buzz. When I'm krunk, instead of telling the fat dog to go away, I'll feed him a fig and give him a hug. Kava flattens the sense of irony, sarcasm, and postmodernism and elevates the sense of sincerity and open-heartedness.


Specifically, kava increases my sense of laughter, honesty, loyalty, generosity, kindness, and magic.

 
I would spell magic Magick.


And add that I have been a die hard Communist for the last ten years of my life. (Or Libertarian Socialist, if you want to split hairs. I know those terms seem mutually exclusive, but look it up if you feel the need.)


But over all, what Philip said.
 

krunkedout

Kava Lover
Ahh finally good and krunk! As far as what our supreme over-lord, Doug has said: I do. Find that it is a bit... What's the word... Biased? The idea that noone confronts religion is complete bull. Yes you don't have people storming against the Vatican, but you have people everywhere who will say the pope is a fool in the blink of an eye. However, I respect the view point, as it gives me a new lense to look at things through. I personally am a Christian, but when I was just a lad I started having some serious doubts, and I began to wonder if god was real at all; this began my journey. During that time I had an open mind to other religions because I thought that I should look at other religions to see if they make more sense. I found usefull things in the bhagavad Gita, the Koran was just plain boring, atheism required to much faith... Eventually I began to look at the historical side of it, and began to see that we are finding more and more evidence for different biblical sites and whatnot; and then I noticed that it SEEMED as though other religions had taken parts of Judaism and Christianity and sort of stitched it into their own. In the end I was a Christian again. However, I'm not your normal Christian, I actually know some people that would probably argue that I was never "really" saved in the first place. I consider myself a scientific lad, and new scientific discoveries excite me. Some folks take these discoveries and say "see! The earth really is old!" and my honest response is "so what if it is? God is all powerful, he could have made the earth whenever he wanted." and other folks like to say "see the big bang really did happen! Look at all the evidence!" and this poses no problem to me because I think "hey, god can make the world however he wants to! If he wanted to make it by using the big bang, I think he could have." to me, it makes sense that god works in a scientific way, since we live in a scientific universe. I mean, god would have created science, right? It makes no difference to me how old the earth is (although I lean towards the old earth idea) and it makes no difference weather the big bang happened or not. I also don't believe certain things are sinful that most Christians believe. For example, I think it's perfectly fine to catch a buzz as long as your not so drunk that you do things you wouldn't normally do. I mean hey, the bible says that god made wine to make the hearts of men merry! I think that "buzz" concept applies not only to alcohol, but to things like cannabis, kava, and whatever else. I also don't like to judge others because I believe someday I will be judged. I think we are all in the same boat, just a bunch of sinners that are all equal. To me it's like, oh you're gay? Great for you! Oh you want to be able to get married? Hey it's your life do what you want! Even if I don't agree with something, it's not my place to judge or tell someone how to live. But how this all relates to kava is the part I like. I feel like I get a special satisfaction from kava because I can honestly thank the lord for putting it in my life and for putting it on earth in general! And the thought of kava being a special gift, makes it all that much more enjoyable! I feel that it helps me to enjoy life more :) I believe tht someday (maybe even after the earth has ended) we will see the science behind god. There are so many things that we don't understand; I mean, what IS energy? What is in between the two positive charges that cause the two ends of a molecule repel each other? We're just scratching the surface in the quantum world as well as the astronomical physics and theoretical physics world. So many people chuckle when someone talks about their "god" or their "soul" and things like that; but to me, it makes sense that god and the soul and very thing else that is "paranormal" isn't hocus pocus or some kind of magic, it's a valid scientific 'thing' or event that we can't fully understand now. I think that heaven is most likely another realm with different physical laws then our own. I think that the soul is most likely some type of energy that makes up our "mind". I firmly believe in astral projection and dream telepathy because I mean, if we can make a computer with wifi that can connect to the web with millions of other people, couldn't our brains, the most advanced computer, do something similar? Just like how our computers can store Info in the cloud, and that info still exists after the computer is destroyed, couldn't the info for our "soul" be stored somewhere and still exist after our bodies die? Just the thoughts of a rambling krunk man lol
 
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