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telamations-blog · 4 years

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Is Dogma Anti Church?

here's something I did after learning about the backlash of Dogma

The Plot

Is Dogma (1999) Anti-Church?

The story follows Bethany Sloane who is told by the Metatron (Alan Rickman) who explains they are the middle man as “the voice of god” as they explained (they because angels have no genitals of any sort) “Metatron acts as the voice of God. Any documented occasion when some yahoo claims that God has spoken to them, they're speaking to me. Or they're talking to themselves.” with the reasoning being “human beings have neither the aural nor the psychological capacity to withstand the awesome power of God's true voice. Were you to hear it, your mind would cave in and your heart would explode within your chest. We went through five Adams before we figured that one out.” they explain to Bethany that she is the last Scion and they must stop two angels who wish to return to heaven with a loophole in gods word through the Catholic Dogma (a truth revealed by God) but due to existence being on the basis of the infallibility of God. existence would fall apart. She is joined by the two leads of the View-Askewniverse Jay and Silent Bob who are said to be “prophets”.

The Church Controversy

Much of the controversy came from the films controversy came from some small and big points that the film got most of its story momentum from such as, Jesus having siblings, Mary wasn't a virgin, a thirteenth apostle that was left out of every translation of the bible, and that there are loopholes in God's word. Now since this is a hollywood relating to the bible, it won't be biblically accurate, which is another thing which tends to really upset religious groups. The film also shines a bit of a light of mistakes of the catholic church, such as when in a scene with the pastor/priest of the church the plot revolves around says what caused the plot to happen and that the church as a whole doesn't make mistakes, in which the characters list parts of history where the church was hypocritical. Such as “the silent consent to the slave trade” or “its platform of non-involvement during the holocaust.”

Most of the movie is filled with themes many churches or church goers frown upon such as cursing, gore, doubt in the existence of God, and also that God is a woman that looks like Alanis Morrisette. When a film called Dogma is being advertised (Dogma as in Catholic Dogma) is having trailers showing that there is a loophole in God’s word and that a way to return to heaven is a church in Redbank New Jersey, run by George Carlin.

The Deeper meaning.

Much of the deeper meaning or deeper questions are asked through Chris Rock's character Rufus, like when he talks about God’s opinion on humanity. “He still digs humanity, but it bothers Him to see the shit that gets carried out in His name - wars, bigotry, televangelism. But especially the factioning of all the religions. He said humanity took a good idea and, like always, built a belief structure on it.” which is something many people talk about how depressing it must be to see your children take something you gave so they can all be better people together and they take it and make hierarchies. Rufus also has a great line about the difference between an idea and a belief and they weight that difference carries “ I just think it’s better to have ideas. I mean, you can change an idea, changing a belief is trickier. People die for it, people kill for it. The whole of existence is in jeopardy right now, because of the Catholic belief structure regarding this plenary indulgence bullshit. Bartleby and Loki, whether they know it or not, are exploiting that belief. And if they’re successful, you, me… ALL of this ends in a heartbeat, all over a belief.” The two characters that ask the most hard hitting questions are Rufus and Bartleby. With a hard hitting monologue near the climax “My eyes are open. For the first time, I get it. When that little innocent girl let her mission slip, I had an epiphany. See in the beginning, it was just us and Him, angels and God...and then he created humans. Ours was designed to be a life of servitude and worship, and bowing and scraping and adoration. He gave them more than He ever gave us — He gave them a choice. They choose to acknowledge God, or choose to ignore Him. All this time we've been down here, I've felt the absence of the divine presence, and it's pained me, as I'm sure it must have pained you. And why? Because of the way He made us! Had we been given free will, we could choose to ignore the pain, like they do. But no — We're servants!...Wake up! These Humans have besmirched everything He's bestowed upon them. They were given paradise — they threw it away. They were given this planet — they destroyed it. They were favored best among all His endeavors, and some of them don't even believe He exists! And in spite of it all, He has shown them infinite fucking patience at every turn. What about us? I asked you once to lay down the sword because I felt sorry for them. What was the result? Our expulsion from paradise! Where was His infinite fucking patience then? It's not right! It's not fair! We've paid our debt. Don't you think it's time, don't you think it's time we went home? And to do that, I think we may have to dispatch our would-be dispatchers. Something many people will argue about Dogma and that it's not right for “Good Christians” is that the movie, both its characters and the movie itself is sexist. A character in the movie that doesn't necessarily point a finger the other way but more or less gestures back to the pointer is when the character of Serendipity (a muse for ideas and creativity) states “the whole book is gender biased. A woman is responsible for original sin. A woman cuts samson's coif of power. A woman asks for the head of john the baptist. Read the book again sometime, women are painted as bigger antagonists than the Egyptians and Romans combined…”

Works Cited

https://christiananswers.net/spotlight/movies/pre2000/dogma.html

https://www.theholocaustexplained.org/responses-1933-1945/what-did-individuals-do/how-did-the-catholic-church-respond/

https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Dogma_(film)

https://www.theguardian.com/film/1999/nov/13/world.news

#dogma #jayandsilentbob #jay #and #silent #bob #strike #back #reboot #god #church #jakepaul #Kevin smith

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luciola-reviews-anime · 6 years

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Let’s Talk About Conspiracy Theories

So with this post I want to talk about conspiracy theories, or at least, what one needs to have for it to be viable. There are a lot of them out there, and I'm sure there will be more to come in the future. We have the earth being flat, 9/11 was an inside job, the moon landing was fake, and vaccines cause autism. Just to name a few. No matter what side you're on, usually your views are very strong, but no matter what you bring to the table. It's in my opinion that if the conspiracy cannot meet these three targets, it simply can't even be taken seriously.

The first is very simple. Who benefits? Remember, what we're looking at is a fact that has either been falsified, or a truth that has been hidden from the world for a specific purpose. Let's look at flat earth theory. Whenever I check out something about this one. They claim that NASA is the group to benefit from a round earth. They're given billions of dollars in funds to run experiments and studies, and even to send people into space. From what I've studied, most people that believe in the flat earth say that space itself is a lie, gravity is a lie, and the mathematics to support them is fake. Any images of space is just CGI.

Here's the problem. NASA did not come up with the idea of gravity, nor did they originate the claim that the earth was round. The discovery of gravity was made in 1687, and since that point the scientific community has used the math and theories of gravity in a number of different ways. For over three hundred years, gravity has been subjected to the scientific method. Many a flat earther will remind people common believes have been disproved before, but they forget that they were disproved thanks to the scientific method and community.

Then we have the discovery of the earth being round. Again, this was not a NASA development, but proven when Magellan circumvented the globe. He did this in 1519 with a fleet of five ships to discover a western sea route to the spice islands. Though he did not survive, the trip was a success. We're close to five hundred years of knowing for a fact that the earth is round. The only counter acting of this argument is that what we know of history, is a complete falsification, for five hundred years, for no plausible benefit to anyone.

But this brings us to the second target of a conspiracy theory. How many people are in on it? Remember it just takes one person in the know to mess things up. You can argue that it's easy to silence one person, but why don't you tell that to the NSA and Edward Snowden? Or even the number of leaks that are in the current Trump administration? The fact is that the more people you need to have to be in on the theory, the less plausible it becomes. I picked on the flat earthers before, and I can just mention that it would take… Literally millions of people to be in on the conspiracy though history, science, sailing, flight, construction, and astronomy to name a few to have to be in on this.

So let's take the anti vaccinations. They say that Big Pharma benefits from hiding the truth that vaccines are dangerous. Because obviously when a product doesn't work properly, instead of fixing it, it's easier to just lie to the population of the world. Look, in the end it's still a business. If there's a hint that something is wrong with a product there will be studies and tests to determine if that's the case or not. These are independent studies done by people who want to make money off the failure of said product. Have you ever seen an advert about filing a mass law suit because a certain drug or procedure was found to be unsafe? In other words, you need the medical community of the entire world in agreement to hide this one little detail. Because if it got out? Let's face it, we still need vaccines to live. I don't want polio. I don't my kids to get polio.

And this takes us to the third target. Can you prove it one way or another? Let's face it. The reason that something is placed in the category of a conspiracy, is because we're being fed a false truth to cover up the real one. The problem is that you shouldn't be able to prove a false truth. You shouldn't be able to circumvent the globe if the earth is flat, and there should be no way to see or prove the curvature of the earth. Doing either of these things instantly busts the argument. (sorry flat earthers) Studies by independent parties shouldn't be able to say things like "There is no evidence that vaccines cause autism."

Now you might say. But Lucio, those are the false facts being fed to you! The problem you're running into in these goes in three fold, first we have the second point, how many people are in on it? And we can add in, how credible are the people we're trying to discredit? Remember in the anti vaccine argument, we're not trying to discredit one group of people making one specific product that cannot be recreated. We're trying to discredit the entire medical community, and people who make and study diseases and medicine. If there was a problem with vaccines, there would be another group that would be working night and day to make a safe working version of them instead of just giving out a faulty product. Finally we would have to ask. Where does the truth end, and the lies begin?

Let's look at it this way. Say I offer the theory that the anti smoking campaign is actually a false organization. They've spread out fake medical reports about cigarettes to get people to quit. They actually make nicotine patches, they're behind vapping, and they also collect funds from organizations like Truth. I can support this much like a flat earther. I mean, I've seen people in their eighties that claim to smoke every day and they're fine. I can support this like an anti vaccine supporter and say that the medical facts and studies that we have been given are just lies, or even state that these are the same people who are telling me that vaccines are safe. So when should I believe them, and when shouldn't I?

This is why you must look into how credible the other source is, and how able the world is to be able to prove something. With a flat earth, we have so much mathematical and scientific evidence that you must say is simply a lie in order for you to have any ground to stand on. There have been countless studies on vaccines and if they cause autism, but far too often there simply isn't any proof. Most commonly what I hear from these theorists is that they just have a feeling. They have a feeling that they're right, despite the evidence. Another excuse is something along the lines of "You shouldn't just take everything people tell you as a fact." Yes it is good to ask questions, this is how we learn. But there's asking questions, and there's ignoring the facts. Most people within the conspiracy theory are not actually open to the truth, kinda ironic, right?

I can give a quick glance at the other two theories I mentioned, so they don't feel left out. The moon landing was staged. We have a clear benefiter. The USA and Russia were in the cold war, and anything one could do better than the other would be a clear win. The space race was, in a way, a proxy war. The people that needed to keep the conspiracy secret would not be too unreasonable either. It would have to be all of NASA at the time, a select number of US governmental and militaristic figures, and the people who staged the show. The great thing about this as well is that the people in the know, can grow smaller and smaller in numbers as the years pass. And finally. I mean, how can you prove it one way or another? Go to the moon? And why haven't we been there since then?

Sounds like something we can, oh wait a minute… So question? What about Russia? I mean. There's no way they would just give us the win if they knew it was false. And you have to believe they wanted that win. So we'll have to add in an enemy nation into the people that need to keep it secret, at no benefit to themselves. This can also actually answer why we haven't been back to the moon. Do you know what's on the moon? Nothing. I've read some articles on how the next great business idea is to send a rocket out to mine a comet for minerals. This could be a trillion dollar idea. And there's the moon. Right there. Where we can see it, we've been on it. And that's how we know there's nothing good on it. We beat the Russians there, mission accomplished. Going back is just a dangerous waste of time and resources until we can colonize the bastard. Or attach lasers…

Well at least 9/11 was an inside job right? I mean again we have a clear benefactor in the US. Stage a terrorist attack, get the perfect excuse to go to war, get that delicious delicious oil. You don't really need a lot of people to be in on it either. Just the military personnel who planned it. Hell, let's even go with this. The US knew it was going to happen, and they let it happen. They didn't think it would be such a disaster, but when planes crash into buildings, things happen. And it's not like we can prove one way or another that the US didn't know about it and just let it happen. I mean, look at Pearl Harbor. Shit, I might have to look into this one more sometime!

In the end though, the thing that makes it a conspiracy theory, is that you can't prove it. It might be brought into light later. But you shouldn’t chose to distrust or hate the government or an organization because of a plausibility. There's already too many reasons for that as it is.

I hope this helps you in your future! Remember those three proofs when you hear about any crazy theories out there, and have fun. Please try not to take any of them too seriously though, because in the end a belief is a tricky thing to change, and often enough that's what they turn into. I'd rather take the advise from the Thirteenth apostle, Rufus, and instead just have a good idea.

#flat earth #anti vaxxers #flat earthers #moon landing #9/11 #bush did 9/11 #conspiracy #conspiracy theories #science #dogma #vaccination

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ramajmedia · 5 years

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You Can't Stream Kevin Smith's Dogma Because of the Weinsteins

Kevin Smith has stated that the reason his 1999 religious fantasy/comedy Dogma isn’t available anywhere to stream is because of Harvey and Bob Weinstein. Despite the rest of Kevin Smith’s filmography being available on a streaming services, Dogma remains a conspicuous blank spot, meaning anyone who wants to watch the film needs to search for alternative methods.

Dogma follows Bartleby and Loki, two fallen angels who enact a plan to return home after discovering a loophole in Catholicism that would allow them reenter heaven, but unbeknownst to them would result in all of existence being unmade via disproving God’s infallibility by defying the deity’s word. Bethany, an abortion clinic counselor who lost her faith years previously, is tasked by the archangel Metatron to stop them, along the way being aided by two prophets (recurring Smith characters Jay & Silent Bob), a muse named Serendipity, and Rufus, a black man and the unrecorded thirteenth apostle. Smith, who was raised as Catholic, used the film to explore problems he had with his own faith, asking questions but not presuming to offer any answers, instead intending audiences to make up their own minds about the issues he raised.

Related: Everything We Know About The Jay & Silent Bob Reboot

Kevin Smith posted the explanation for Dogma’s lack of availability a tweet after user Mark D Parker questioned it by stating the alternative to be to rip the DVD, and that “I want to give you money and you have T-Rex arms.” As he has done previously, Smith explained that Harvey and Bob Weinstein bought the film personally, outwith the control of any companies they operated, and then licensed it for theatrical and home release. The distribution deals predated the existence of streaming and have now lapsed so cannot be updated, and with it being doubtful that anyone in the film industry will now want to have anything to do with the brothers in the fallout of the scores of allegations against Harvey Weinstein, it will unfortunately most likely stay that way.

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As well as being absent from streaming platforms, Dogma has also been unavailable on home media for many years, with online retailers having long since sold out their stock without the film ever receiving a re-release. As a result, the only available copies are sold second hand on online marketplaces that often require import, and whose owners frequently demand extortionate prices, making watching the film an even more complicated and expensive undertaking.

It’s a shame the complexities of rights issues leave Smith with no control over Dogma’s distribution, as he would presumably make the film available in a heartbeat were he able to, and with streaming being how much of media consumption now takes place, the film’s unavailability it is a frustrating absence. November marks twenty years since the film’s debut in cinemas, which would have been perfect timing for an anniversary edition that looks back on the film’s production and the careers of its stars, in particular its central duo of Ben Affleck and Matt Damon, who although are now box office draws, at the time were merely “those two guys from Good Will Hunting.” Additionally, as the contemporary US is increasingly required to bend to the will of people’s religious beliefs, the film’s examination of the true purpose of faith could not feel more relevant.

Next: 10 Best Kevin Smith Movies, Ranked

Source: Kevin Smith

source https://screenrant.com/dogma-kevin-smith-streaming-rerelease-weinsteins/

#screenrant

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