Close Encounters with the Westboro Baptist Church by mincingbeast

It's a pretty good bet that goyim killed some divine progeny before anyone even KNEW about them. >_> <_<

We're violent! :D

Also, your sacred beasts will be shot, barbequed, and mounted for trophies. Simply out of spite.

Baptists are extraterrestrials. This makes a great deal of sense. This means: 1) Scientology has it wrong, 2) Christianity is a slave religion that the aliens are giggling over how gullible we all are, and 3) Baptists and Mormons are rival alien races hellbent on each others' destruction. The Mormons just suck at it because the most they can manage is creepy stepford smiler passive-aggressiveness.

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Monday, May 3, 2010 6:10 AM

*laughs*
I've wondered sometimes myself, Byte.

As for WBC, Phelps, and the rest of them berks...

Price of freedom, such as it is - either a right is universal, or it's an act of oppression, simple as that, and just as they have the right to spout off, so too do we to mock and insult them.

It's issues like this that are the real litmus test for whether someone truly cares about human rights at all - because when the rubber meets the road, most folk show their true colors in that they want THEIR human rights respected, but fuck everyone elses.

But that ain't my way, and it ain't ever gonna be.

-Frem

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Monday, May 3, 2010 7:09 AM

Well, he does.

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Monday, May 3, 2010 7:54 AM

It was rather interesting look the first amendment in its face, and see the WBC. A loathsome nexus of free speech and exercise, to be sure, and at some point they must cross the veil twixt protected, if obnoxious speech, and unprotected speech. I wonder about the line--the FA isn't absolute.

Note that the goyim, though vicious, never got around to killing a god, for there is only one god, and he cries when babies are aborted. The score remains 1-0.also, you filthy goy only pick on those weaker than yourself.

Also, ascribing human qualities, like emotions, to great Cthulu, is blasphemous. Ia ia Cthulu, ftagn, and so forth.

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Monday, May 3, 2010 8:11 AM

Quote:
for there is only one god

This defies the historical record. As such, there could be many unknown gods we have killed. Most likely because encountering eye-crossing stupidity is a fatal infliction for deities.

Quote:
Also, ascribing human qualities, like emotions, to great Cthulu, is blasphemous. Ia ia Cthulu, ftagn, and so forth.

But would Cthulu care if we did?

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Monday, May 3, 2010 8:57 AM

Byte, you truly do inflict upon me the desire to toss you over my shoulder and make off with you in true villainous fashion sometimes...

Hee hee hee.

-F

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Monday, May 3, 2010 9:08 AM

There have been many errors, but only one god, you alien. The great thing about monotheism is that it sets a ceiling on deicide, which makes my peoples feat all the more remarkable. Stupidity is not a tool of deicide; god loves stupidity, otherwise he wouldn't have made a surplus of it.

Finally, Cthulu doesn't care, but those who spill blood in his inarticulable name might.

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Monday, May 3, 2010 9:53 AM

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Wow. I had to look them up.

The little I read was quite sufficient to turn my stomach, thank you! I realized I'd heard of them before...picketing the funerals of soldiers. Other than that, my life has been blessed with wonderful ignorance of these....uh....I can't come up with a word...

"I'm just right. Kinda like the sun rising in the east and the world being round...its not a need its just the way it is." The Delusional "Hero", 3/1/10

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Monday, May 3, 2010 10:25 AM

Christ-iacs? Christiax?

One derives from Christian maniac, one derives from Christian anthrax, both equally applicable.

Perhaps Christ-iacs for the plural, and Christiax for a single nutcase and for the disease in general.

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Tuesday, May 4, 2010 2:57 AM

Oh you'll LOVE this one, then.

Brain shuts off in response to prayer
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20627574.200-brain-shuts-off-in-
response-to-healers-prayer.html
Parts of the prefrontal and anterior cingulate cortices, which play key roles in vigilance and scepticism when judging the truth and importance of what people say, were deactivated when the subjects listened to a supposed healer.

Yanno, I never thought anyone would put the effort into it to do an actual study, but this is how my "voice of saruman" trick WORKS.

See, folks are conditioned from birth by this society and various elements therein, a setup DESIGNED to cause their critical thinking processes to shut off or stumble when the right buttons are pushed - which explains why Authoritarianism works even when logically it shouldn't, because of that conditioning.

And just like how we turn the surveillence states own cameras against them, someone who KNOWS WHERE AND WHAT THE BUTTONS ARE, can use that programming and conditioning for their own end, or even subvert and sabotage it.

Again, I am *not* kidding when I say that in the end, the powers that be are going to hand us everything we need to destroy them on a plate, without a clue that they're doing so.

-F

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Tuesday, May 4, 2010 4:57 AM

...So THAT'S why Mormon church leaders all talk with the same lofty tone and cadence.

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Tuesday, May 4, 2010 7:33 AM

KWICKO

I wonder what our brains would do in that situation, Frem - yours, mine, and some others here. My natural inclination when I hear some dope start proselytizing is to raise hackles and bring up some of the more sublimely ridiculous points of their "faith".

Does that mean rather than shut down, those skeptical parts of our brains shift into overdrive and start working HARDER?

Maybe we're just not wired for that brand of faith.

Mike

"I supported Bush in 2000 and 2004 and intellegence [sic] had very little to do with that decision." - Hero, Real World Event Discussions

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Tuesday, May 4, 2010 11:13 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Kwicko:
Does that mean rather than shut down, those skeptical parts of our brains shift into overdrive and start working HARDER?

Yes, thus is the nature of a reflexive backlasher/snarker or a Dark Spark.

Their immediate reflex-reaction is "Bullshit!" - even when they have no evidence one way or the other, start beating on their door, they glance over the back fence FIRST, it's the nature of us folk, and why Religion itself, at least in contemporary form, is anethma to us.

So when you tell the programmed "Healthy Forests Initiative" - they go into dummy mode, nod and smile, OUR reaction is "so, what, gonna burn em all down then ?" out of pure reflex.

It's part and parcel of who and what we are.

-Frem

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Tuesday, May 4, 2010 11:28 AM

Aw gee guys, you're making this devout atheist feel sympathy for retarded theists. Beware of believing...in anything. And who in the devils name believes in doubt?

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Tuesday, May 4, 2010 11:47 AM

I'm not an Atheist, actually, I am a Maltheist with eastern leanings best described as related closely to Vajrayana Sorcery and Tricksterism.

-F

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Tuesday, May 4, 2010 12:05 PM

Egads Frem, sounds like religion to me. Or at least belief.

Occurs to me that it isn't religion I object to, so much as belief. In anything. I'm a nihilist, which was fine and dandy when I was 13, but is getting a little creepy now.

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Tuesday, May 4, 2010 12:47 PM

First time I've ever heard you describe 'em outright, Frem.

About all I know about Vajrayana is that it's the sect that has the Kama Sutra. I also know that I'm not really surprised, considering the polyamory.

Interesting, though, I knew another guy once who was really into the tantric occult. He had these skulls and stuff, also mentioned a few rituals and some meditation.

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Tuesday, May 4, 2010 3:01 PM

Well, that particular set of beliefs is hard to pin down, some of the roots spread across a couple of belief systems.

See, when most folk think of Kali, for example, most westerners in particular, they see death, destruction, the phansigar and thugee...

(FAIR WARNING: somehow when I wrote this the switch kicked over from description, to actual proselytizing, and this wasn't my intent, but thinkin long and hard on the difficulty of explaining otherwise, imma just leave it stand cause you might understand a bit better that way than if I *DID* try explaining it, if you'll understand it at all)

===========
But those where not the only branches of those beliefs, yin to the yang, shadow to the light, and while violent, even grisly by western standards, the mother goddess figure, representing or even less often depicted as, Gaia, isn't as comforting as conventional religion - because she is a figure of creation, nurturing, AND destruction, maiden, mother, crone, as it were, like the three fates, and everyone in fear of the scissors.

But to acknowledge that destruction, to revel in and even deliver it, and thus pacify the inner demons by sating them into helplessness upon the wicked, (or modernly, the fictional - i.e. games) and binding them to YOUR will, allows one to purge even the deepest of base urges and truly, fully REASON.

But to face ones own mortality offends, and frightens, and so folks turn to pie in the sky and promises, unaware of how such ignorance clouds their reason, dulls their senses, makes places in their own head, in their own world, where they dare not look, dare not see, the places where we hide, from which the wicked never see or hear the reapers blade.

There is no light without the shadow, and so too, do the trappings of the mothers represent this, from the Valkryies bloody spear, to Morrigaines crows and even Kalis famed necklace, the trappings of death and destruction are always with us to remind us that the clock is ever ticking, that the future we wish to buy must be purchased now, if at all, and punishment delayed, is punishment denied, and yet the true sin is for men to cast upon the gods responsibility for their own failure to act, to neglect the world that is their own, eyes fixated on the heavens while they trod their own children in the dust unseeing and uncaring, their own wicknedness unknown to them in their ignorance because they will not see, and when shown, will not acknowledge and what then for them but the swing of the reapers blade and the world better by just that much - a gift to them to lessen their sin and prevent its spread to the innocent and unwitting, unwanted and yet cast down onto them all the same, to where they would blindly repeat it in spited fury at a world where no hope for them exists.

And is it not better, to stand in the blood and ashes and celebrate life, than stand in the midst of plenty and celebrate death ?

For those who can see into the empty places, to walk through and beyond the darkness, is given the power to forge destiny, to break it's chains and forge them anew, even as those chains wrap round them and drag them as well to their final doom, a sacrifice unto themselves for the power they seek, obtained not from the whim of the gods who write the world above and below, but from their own world where everything took, must be rendered forth in return, lest the balance upset and the world slide into the formless chaos from whence it was born.

For the gods are unlike man, and inimicable unto him in the error of his creation, and the mother indifferent to the individual, so that only the whole cry of all would ever reach her, and thus all actions in their name are but excuses, what we do in their name, in truth we do in our name without knowledge of our final fate, only that this cycle of our lives will at some place in time reach its ending and the hope, the dream, that the path we tread will somehow smooth the way for others by the acts we take, by word and deed, for good or ill, seeking not the way of death that is ones own elevation at the expense and misfortune of others, but the way of life, by elevation of others, and rendering misfortune on the wicked instead of ourselves, we endure all that comes, and yet who are the wicked but ourselves, in our arrogance to know best for any, and so misfortune comes to us, and we revel in it and hold it on high to show our faith as its blows rain down upon us, purging us of the wickeness me must commit in the name of removing it from us all, but one step of a cycle, one foot on the path, a single spoke in a wheel that encompasses all that is, was, and ever will be.
===========

-F

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Tuesday, May 4, 2010 4:40 PM

Frem said

Quote:

Oh you'll LOVE this one, then.

Brain shuts off in response to prayer
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20627574.200-brain-shuts-off-in-
response-to-healers-prayer.html
Parts of the prefrontal and anterior cingulate cortices, which play key roles in vigilance and scepticism when judging the truth and importance of what people say, were deactivated when the subjects listened to a supposed healer.

Fascinating stuff. That makes a lot of sense. I think that this can be directly applied to many other areas, like doctors, professors, and leaders of political the party you support. Also military commanders. Maybe why some people seem to give me more deference than I feel is due. Not Frem, he gets annoyed at me for reasons I'm am completely unaware of. Don't worry man, the feeling is mutual, you annoy me at times, (the long I'm-so-bad-ass rants,) but sometimes you really hit the nail on the head. This is definitely one of those.

So, yes, Mike, even if you me and Frem, and I'll throw Byte in here as an ultra-skeptic, are different from one another, we're also distinctly different from 'normal' which is more adherent to belief structures.

I follow the Tao because I think it's right, as in correct, like insightful and stuff, but I'm still skeptical. In fact, over time, I've found 老子 to be more right than perhaps I would have cared for.. but, this is beside the point.

Wondering what it is that makes us think differently. I'm going to hazard a first guess. Even though I'm usually more of a nature guy, I'm going to go with Frem's take, I think it's nurture, and here's why: The only thing that I can think of that sets me apart from others, psychologically, is that I have no education.

I went to 1st, 2nd, 4th and 5th grades, but they were sketchy at best. I'd say this was public school at its laziest in the far reaches of nowhere. At first, I was sucked in by the flattery of doing well in class. I remember the early victories of math and english being meaningless when I realized that we wouldn't really be tested on this stuff for years, and science being even more meaningless when first I was given 145/100 (extra credit) and then my science teacher started telling us things like "The Earth has four poles, North, South, East and West." He was not joking. "If you go East long enough, you will find that you are going west." I remember speaking up and saying "Yes, because you got bored and decided to go home again" ;)

It's hard to take stock in a system like that. Still, even if it is nurture, there has to be a natural capacity which is being manipulated, but must have an evolutionary purpose to being there. Off the top of my head, maybe something that makes us behave in a superstitious way creates behaviors like avoidance of dangers and adherence to groups that has survival benefits and takes more quickly and effectively than if we had to logic it out, hence is an evolutionary selector.

Quote:

Again, I am *not* kidding when I say that in the end, the powers that be are going to hand us everything we need to destroy them on a plate, without a clue that they're doing so.

No argument there.

ETA: (;,;)

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Tuesday, May 4, 2010 5:02 PM

Frem: Kali is a neat concept. I've borrowed her name for more than one female protagonist of mine. :D

I imagine even mincingbeast would approve.

Also, no wonder why y'all make the Judeo-Muslim-Christians and Buddhists uneasy. Pointing the blame finger dead at them pining their hopes for a better world on an afterlife is hitting that nail so hard it's going straight through the board.

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Tuesday, May 4, 2010 5:23 PM

The Mincingbeast only approves of referring to itself in the third person, and as a proper noun. Still, read to us please from the Kali Yuga---the part where she cuts off the heads.

I encourage you all to abandon your beliefs, however alternative they may be, and not merely because apostasy is rad (though it is). There is nothing under the sun that merits meaning. Negation, spite and emptiness will always trump belief. While others build and affirm, you must destroy and deny. Thus, you may be a spiritual wolf, as opposed to lamb. This is figurative language, not furrydom.

Actually, I do believe that life is an unfunny cosmic joke, and I am the butt. The Westboro Baptist Church is part of the punchline, I suspect.

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Wednesday, May 5, 2010 10:06 AM

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Byte, how about Christiophiles? Tho’ Christiacs makes me giggle, being bipolar, it fits SO well! I’m not sure I can compare them to anthrax, tho’...that’s a bit much for me.

Frem: Interesting, fits all too well from my point of view. Can be turned to politics, too, of course, and politics and religion being the two hottest topics of discussion in the world, it sure explains a lot. And how sad...

Hee, hee, hee, Mike, BUT, does it mean our brains, when triggered, shut down too, that we go immediately to the “points” denigrating their prosletyzing? I know my prejudice against organized religion is a trigger point, but at the same time, people who are “real” in their faith get my absolute respect. Hmmmm...maybe some of those who prosletyze actually abide by the tenants of their religion and I’m only seeing one side of them because of my own prejudice, eh?

Mincing, it’s not “religion” I’M against either, nor is it “believing” or “faith”. It’s ORGANIZED religion, which puts the ability to misinterpret and have power over others in the hands of PEOPLE! Any BLIND “faith” gets my goat, if it’s used improperly. Religion can be a wonderful thing for many, it’s the abuses of same that piss me off.

Ah, I see, DT picked up on the other applications too, and I didn’t think of those other ones. But I ask the same question of you, DT, out of curiosity—does our brain react unreasonably to things we have prejudices about? Would be an interesting study, that. While we don’t go the “normal” route, is our “abnormal” route just as susceptible to brain farts?

Mincing, hee, hee, hee, I love it. You’re probably right about the Westboro, tho’ there are more, worse jokes I could think of. I tend to think in terms of “sometimes you’re the bug, sometimes you’re the windshield”, myself.

"I'm just right. Kinda like the sun rising in the east and the world being round...its not a need its just the way it is." The Delusional "Hero", 3/1/10

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Wednesday, May 5, 2010 10:09 AM

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

By the way, Byte, I've known numerous bipolars who, when manic, think they are gods, jesuses, prophets, angels, etc. It comes from the sense of knowing and being "all", of having all the answers, the experts say.

I tend to add in that maybe it's the LOGICAL part of the brain (deeply subsumed at that point) trying to make sense of all the grandiosity and giving it a "reason".

So Christiacs fits in more ways than you thought!

"I'm just right. Kinda like the sun rising in the east and the world being round...its not a need its just the way it is." The Delusional "Hero", 3/1/10

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Wednesday, May 5, 2010 11:04 AM

Quote:
Byte, how about Christiophiles? Tho’ Christiacs makes me giggle, being bipolar, it fits SO well! I’m not sure I can compare them to anthrax, tho’...that’s a bit much for me.

I have a feeling the WBC is associated with the same people who want to rewrite the bible more "conservative" so saying they love Christ (Christo - Christ Phile-love) might be a stretch. Also, there's homosexual overtones.

...Hmm, actually, your term has grown on me.

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Wednesday, May 5, 2010 11:10 AM

DT: I also note that the anterior cingulate cortex is a major center that processes human empathy, reactions to other people, and emotional response. It's disturbing that charismatic speakers can shut this off, but it explains quite a lot. This is why war happens and is possible.

There's definitely people who are born without the shut-off, though. I'm one of them. I've fought and argued and debated with my parents endlessly since I was old enough to remember. We generally can only get along if we don't talk to each other.

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Wednesday, May 5, 2010 11:18 AM

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Your remark about homosexuality made me giggle. Thank you.

"I'm just right. Kinda like the sun rising in the east and the world being round...its not a need its just the way it is." The Delusional "Hero", 3/1/10

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Wednesday, May 5, 2010 11:20 AM

It's funny because it would piss them off.

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Wednesday, May 5, 2010 11:33 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Bytemite:
It's funny because it would piss them off.

Wow, you get it. Anger amuses. Too bad you're Mormon, and Furryflyfan.

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Wednesday, May 5, 2010 11:38 AM

No to either. I'm offended! Watch me shout my outrage in an inefficient manner, which will quickly devolve into angrish.

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Wednesday, May 5, 2010 12:58 PM

Byte,

Lol@angrish

I'm still tempted to agree with Frem on this one, it's not inborn, it's taught. If it were inborn, it would require massive brain damage not to have it. Since I find that unlikely in your case, and due to being instituionalized three times I know my brain has been scanned more ways than there are to scan a brain, and then never found anything more than a couple benign tumors, I can be certain that I don't have it. Hence I conclude that it is because I didn't go to school that I do not have this programming.

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Wednesday, May 5, 2010 1:01 PM

wow, indepdent research confirms that angrish is awesome. it is the moment where speech fails, and all that is left is funny.

edit: i have resolved to coax the inarticulate beauty of Angrish from the next person i speak to in real life. it will not be my fault.

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Wednesday, May 5, 2010 1:04 PM

I did go to school, and my parents were very insistent that I conform to their worldview. I rejected my parent's attempts to teach me, fiercely and consistently, and often considered myself better informed than my teachers.

I should have become a bitchy poor-people hating racist under a fine veneer of "lady-like" behaviour.

My case may be unusual, as disagreement with parents the likes I was having aren't conducive to the long-term survival of a child.

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Wednesday, May 5, 2010 2:05 PM

No, but maybe their parenting skills were unusual...

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Wednesday, May 5, 2010 3:20 PM

Well, they did give up, kind of, eventually. Off and on they would try again, but I never had any of it. Mostly I raised myself on books, taught myself values out of them.

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Wednesday, May 5, 2010 5:12 PM

Byte

You're getting closer.

I can't say with how much certainty I can peg that there's no disable lobe in your brain unless you have some major medical condition that you haven't mentioned.

It's amazing, also, how influential the little mindless automaton factory is.. I know some truly brilliant people that believe some fairly ridiculous things because they are accepted by the establishment and taught at an early age, but moreover, I know some also very independent minded people who are still subject.. Very independent minded people who went to school still seem to be overwhelmingly influenced by the rhetorical power of Obama. I watch and see what he says, or doesn't, but I'm not wowed. I think he has a lot of personal charm, but I'll notice right away if he's alluding to escalating a conflict, and I know a lot of people who won't, they'll say "oh, he doesn't mean that," or "oh he had to say that" or the scariest of all "oh, did he say that?" Yes, and you heard him do it. An impressive power. But a power that only works on the preprogrammed mind.

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Wednesday, May 5, 2010 9:00 PM

I am still rather firmly of the opinion that Byte is a Dark Spark "prime" - one of the ones born with the trigger on the genetic preload pulled, instead of having it happen later by environment.

It's only a theory, but it fits too close to dismiss.

-F

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Thursday, May 6, 2010 3:37 AM

Mystically, it may sound nice, but it seems unlikely to me from a neurological pov. Sure, it happens, but usually through some sort of brain damage. There are some subtle cases of fairly pronounced mental changes without any physical changes, like Mike Burry. I don't know specifically what cause Daniel Tammet, but it's more common that you get a case like Kim Peek, where there's a fairly obvious physical side effect of any abnormal neural formation.

The other thing that I think you can be inborn with is a chemical dependency. My mother smoked too much, and I was born with a gaba down-regulation as a result. Maybe this effected my outlook on life, but it probably didn't make it alone.

Here's a less romantic but more probable answer: Somewhere early on people can flip as the result of a loss of adult credibility. Kids rebel against parent/guardian or school because teachers lose credibility, which happens not only from being wrong, but also getting in the way. Sometimes it's as simple as adults give children advice that they know won't help because they don't want the child to pursue something.

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Thursday, May 6, 2010 4:38 AM

Actually it's a bizarre, and very rare, combination of factors, not all of which even I understand - but I do have the empirical evidence of a couple decades and seen it borne out well enough to make a call like that with some accuracy.

I think there *IS* some mental kickswitch that is spun kinda sideways at birth in the "primes", and it seems to be linked in many cases to Gerstmann syndrome.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerstmann_syndrome

Problem is, even Gerstmanns is just a catchall "diagnosis" for anything screwy in a specific region of the brain which they don't really fully comprehend how it works, that whole area is very much a black box to anyone but maybe Doc Perry, and I wouldn't give HIM even odds.

But whatever it is, there's a switch kicked over in there, resulting in a sidewinder "wiki walk" thought process, and a few other minor 'tells' which are mostly behavioral in nature - if the poor kid survives our society long enough to determine them, which they mostly don't.

Seems to have some effect on the native biochemistry as well, particularly the HPA axis.

But in truth, I know very little, most Dark Sparks get ground up or destroy themselves, and they're damn rare to begin with.

-F

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Thursday, May 6, 2010 4:42 AM

I dunno, I have a bunch of other psychological problems too. I just happen to manage them without drugs is all.

Whatever this is would have to go back to before I was two. I suppose it could still be environmental, and the other psychological issues stem from the same trigger, but whatever it was would have to have been very early on.

I also suspect I have a genetic predisposition, because my grandfather and my uncle have had similar problems.

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Thursday, May 6, 2010 4:54 AM

Hmm... I can't say anything jumps out at me about Gerstmann's Syndrome. Except maybe for the left-right thing. I still get confused and have to use that old hand trick (Left hand makes a capital 'L'). I thankfully don't have dyslexia, and I learned to read and write early on. Really early on.

I'd have to ask if I had delayed motor development during infancy. I do know I was an unusually quiet child who slept an unusual amount, maybe I did that because I couldn't do much else.

Then again, that could also have been environmental, as my mother was taking care of my brother back then, who might have been the worst two year old in existence. It's possible I was unintentionally neglected, and my behaviour then was a reaction as opposed to an inborn personality feature.

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Thursday, May 6, 2010 5:07 AM

Frem

Yes, your Dark Angel take makes for a much better pick up line than "maybe you have transmissible spongiform encephalopathy." (something I need to learn, cause I tend to just say what's on my mind, which trust me, is not really a good idea, socially.)

But seriously, I just don't think it's so. I've talked to byte a lot and if there was an irregularity in her brain I think that I would pick up on it, and she would also, in a physical way, and finally, it is, as you say, very rare.

In medicine they say it you hear hoofbeats, it's probably horses. Sure, it could be a giraffe, but if you're not in africa or at the zoo, it's probably not.

It's more likely that Byte is affected by something more common. A few points

Byte

1. It's very common for all of us to associate all of our psychological an physical issues as stemming from somethign early when it's more likely that those psychological traits which developed early persist through our lives, and so we associate them with things that happen later. For instance, I have memories from having OCD as a three year old, but then I associated that with my nervous breakdown, as did the medical establishment, but now i'm fairly convinced that they're unconnected. It's just that my OCD became more pronounced and Monk-like because of my nervous breakdown, but it wasn't caused by it, and it didn't cause the breakdown, which was the erroneous conclusion we all came to. My OCD is probably directly related to something chemical, that my mother smoke three packs a day while she was pregnant, something I didn't accept until I found the underlying chemical link, the downregulation of gaba receptors, which I found because I had a physical problem which was then diagnose as a downregulation of gaba receptors, i was prescribed ghb, which was then banned, so instead i opted for seizures (fun?)

So, sure, there's possibly something in the brain, but it's most likely chemical, but trust me, you want it to be, you don't want something to be wrong with your brain. Sure, it would make you unique, but it would also come bite you in the ass. But I think it's just unlikely. You can, however, be born with a chemical imbalance, particularly if your parents took something. My mom smokes because her mother drank, and she has an anxiety problem probably related to that. You see how it can be a long term inherited trait without being genetic. Not to say that it can't be genetic. It's much more likely to be genetic and chemical than to be something physical about the brain.

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Thursday, May 6, 2010 5:22 AM

My mom doesn't drink or smoke. But she had a brain tumor the size of a small orange when she was carrying me, and her mother both drank AND smoked. They didn't remove the tumor or medicate it until after she had me, so, you're probably right, it's not something in the brain. It's also probably not a substance related chemical imbalance. Could it be a genetic chemical imbalance?

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Thursday, May 6, 2010 7:24 AM

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

I'll vote for chemical imbalance too. That is part of our problem, the mentally ill. But remember genetics can play a part too--it may skip one or more generations, but if the gene is carried for "difference", it can show up.

Either of you got any insurgents in your family history?

Also, bear in mind that bipoars and unipolars are usually found to have a higher IQ than average; why, if not some genetic or chemical imbalance? And if not just us, why not others with mental disorders--remember that a mental disorder is only classified as one if it severely impacts our functioning (especially within society), so why not the concept of people with minimal mental disorders not serious enough to require treatment also being higher IQ which may cause them to think more for themselves than follow the "norm" of society?

We tend to be more unusual and perhaps "anti-normal" in our thinking, some more radical, so maybe in some, higher IQ goes along with questioning things? And again, if us, why not others not officially "mentally ill"? Frem, at one point you were considered to have some kind of mental illness which caused you to be the way you were, didn't you? I'm sure they questioned your anti-establishment views and relegated them to some kind of brain disorder SOMEWHERE down the line, didn't they? Just an idea...

Added to that, chemical imbalances can be caused by genetics as well, one doesn't have to have parents or even grandparents to ingested chemicals; it can occur naturally.

"I'm just right. Kinda like the sun rising in the east and the world being round...its not a need its just the way it is." The Delusional "Hero", 3/1/10

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Thursday, May 6, 2010 10:31 AM

Pffth, a better question would be is there anyone in either family line who *isn't* an insurgent !

And remember, we live in a society that seems bent on considering the questioning and defiance of authority, no matter how illegitimate, a "mental illness" (borrowing a page from one of the nastiest regimes in history, no less!) so it's not like I would give them or conventional psychiatry/psychology any more credence than some witch doctor in south africa - if anything, I'd think the witch doctor more trustworthy cause of the actual accountability (i.e. possibility of gettin lynched) that comes with his profession, as opposed to the mindbenders, who often enough (see also MK Ultra, et. al.) have been complicit in the very worst of social and legal abuses.

Reason I ever tried to figure it out in the first place was the sorrow of watching these kids self-destruct, and my take on "mental illness" is that if you have found a way to cope, and you're content or even happy, then you're OK, problem is most people ain't...

But a lot of that isn't mental illness so much as we live in a crappy country with a twisted society run by sociopaths - calling things for what they ARE isn't mental illness IMHO, swallowing the "everything is so wonderful" bullshit story is.

-Frem

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Thursday, May 6, 2010 10:37 AM

WULFENSTAR

http://youtu.be/VUnGTXRxGHg

"But a lot of that isn't mental illness so much as we live in a crappy country with a twisted society run by sociopaths - calling things for what they ARE isn't mental illness IMHO, swallowing the "everything is so wonderful" bullshit story is."

Go get them Frem.

You and I may disagre, and get heated ect... but in this?

OORAH!

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Thursday, May 6, 2010 12:29 PM