Sentient Filth

To the guy who makes 700k/year, "homeless" is a theoretical concept. The guy who makes 36K/year knows what bums are actually like.

There's something important about sales and marketing that a lot of Christian evangelists don't understand very well. People buy your product when, and only when, it solves a problem that they, themselves, have already decided they have. So the trick is to create a story, or get them to create a story, which links in your product as a solution to a problem that's already bothering them. This is why a major portion of those who convert to Christianity in adulthood are whores, junkies, and jailbirds. These are the three main groups are actually prone to think of "sin" as a personal problem they have. And it's also why evangelism is considerable less successful with other, ordinary adults. Most of them don't sit around thinking "what am I going to do about all this sin I have?" Instead, what they experience is someone coming along, telling them they are bad, and that they can be saved from punishment if they do what they're told. Which feels a little bit like a weird variety of mob shakedown. "Like, we wouldn't want something bad should happen to you or nuthin', right, Vito?" "Hur, hur, yeah, boss, das right." But there is one more group of people who quite voluntarily construct a story that connects Christianity to a problem they have... a slightly different problem. These are people who have behaved badly, and want other people to forgive them. That's other people. Not god. And they're hoping you will confuse the two. See, if I understand my Christian theology, Christ promises forgiveness of whatever to anyone who sincerely repents. So by making a public show of contrition, and talking about Jesus a lot, a certain kind of person hopes you will confuse Christ having promised to forgive her — which might or might not be happening — with you having promised to forgive her — which you definitely didn't. The fundamental flaw in this line of thinking is twofold. First of all, there is nothing in the idea of god's forgiveness that requires us to forgive also. If there was, then god would be withholding justice from victims. Whether restitution is owed to god or not, it is definitely owed to the people they have harmed. And if it has not been made, or cannot be made, it is up to those harmed to decide whether or not to forgive the debt. Secondly, when someone does something wrong, harm is not the only issue. In fact, often it isn't even the major issue, because only certain people are harmed. But everyone finds out what kind of person she is. Isa Casa-whatever-the-fuck-her-StarWars-name-is didn't harm me by gloating over Charlie Kirk's death. My feelings are not that easily hurt, and I don't care what bloodthirsty communists think. I don't need to examine her feelings before starting up the helicopter. And I'm sure many of you feel the same. What matters, in our case, is that we found out she is the sort of person who will gloat and jeer over the death of one of the most peaceful, patient, and forgiving men I know of, merely for disagreeing with her retarded teenage political opinions. What we found out about her doesn't go away because she said sorry. The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior, which means what she is most likely to do is spit more malice, then ask forgiveness again when faced with the prospect of consequences. I don't want people like that in my country.