"This isn't reality. This is fantasy."

I am getting incressingly annoyed with the whole "this is reality" trope that shows up in fiction. It pulls me out of the story, degrades it, and degrades the characters who usually make points that are actually helpful in context if not in general. So allow me a moment to shit all over it.

I could make the argument that, objectively, you really can't tell one one way or another what is real or what is not, but that is more or less bullshit. You CAN tell. Maybe not 100%, but reality is simply best recognized as consistency. Facts add up. Things fit together. If you try and change facts, try to wedge it in to a person's idea of reality, it stands out like a sore thumb in relation to the facts around it. The only reasons we don't know things is we don't have all the pieces yet, but the ones that do more or less fit. Not so in a dream or a fantasy where implications and imperfections cause "plot holes". The more things don't fit the more potholes there will be. This is why we need Willing Suspension Of Disbelief.

However, even IF we recognize the unreality of something doesn't mean that fiction is useless or without merit. A lot of it is researched in it's own way, partly based on things that are real, or what if situations where various elements are toyed with in as realistic a manner possible given the knowledge of the author. Reality's basic forms and ideas trickle downward into fictional works, either in recognized forms as equivalents to day-to-day life, or as exotic forms and ideas we may not recognize but are in fact more or less the same as real life. Granted, one should be able to recognize the difference between reality and fantasy, but one should also recognize that sometimes, fantasy IS more then mindless entertainment.

At the very least it would teach me how not to be an idiot in relationships by avoiding the what should be obvious by now pitfalls sitcom characters find themselves in again and again.

(Also I realized half way through this rant, that this could apply to religion too, but I already beat that horse enough. Also also "real"ized. I think my concept of reality sort of fits in with that word.)

[insert bad pun here]

[insert overblown statement here]

[insert inane gripes and complaints here]

[insert ridiculous vague metaphysical argument here]

[insert random non-secular closing statement here]

It's been a Blasphemy

Everyonce and a while I will find myself reading though a furry comic for reasons I cannot begin to fathom. Because aside from pornographic images and a few people I sorta know (such as Nova), I tend to stay away from the whole furry thing. Never the less, I found myself reading a particular comic. What troubled me about it more then anything is how it degenerated into what frankly seems little more then Christian moral propaganda.

It is not the first one to do so for me, nor will it be the last. A lot of works of fiction have characters that act in ways that may seem natural and right to the author and horribly wrong and idiotic to others, which just goes to show how utterly subjective morals can be really. I for one am offended by the vary idea of some Christian values and philosophies. The whole idea of "sin" for example is something I reject utterly, along with the idea of an absolute authority on right and wrong.

To be honest, I often am sympathetic to the hardline atheist views that not only is god not real, the idea is actively harmful to humanity as a whole. However at the same time, I can't reject Christianity completely, because while I don't believe in their god, or perhaps any god, I do believe in something else. I believe in humanity.

It's not that I think faith is bad though. Christians and some other religious people, as well as many who utterly reject religion, seem to think there are only two possible outcomes: Faith in a higher power such as God derived from written word, or no faith in anything. Christian philosophy, as well as that of related religions such as perhaps Islam and Judaism, is about subservience, while a lot of atheists are little more then nihilists. The thing they miss is the possibility to put faith in yourself or in humanity. Two thinkers once thought a good deal about this problem, one who felt god shows himself in humanity, and one who rejects god completely. Both blame the same thing for most of the world's problems.

I used to be a Christian, long long ago. My mother still is, and is not a raving begot nor one who preaches overly about one moral right. I turned away from Christianity for one simple reason. Hell. Suffering on earth I can understand. It's temporary right? It helps us grow right? But hell? To have a god judge us forever for being the way HE made us? No. That's not right. Of course looking back, seeing all I learned, all the other religions of the world I heard about, even some of the alternate ideas that were floating around when the bible was formed concerning Jesus's teachings, I realize the problem is not as simple as that. The problem is, essentially more the church then the scriptures, and more the culture and the people then the word they follow. The comic I was reading it's self touched on some of the issues in the church but fails to follow it to it's logical conclusion.

It's organized religion that is the problem. It's people sitting in church being lectured and blasted with questionable interpretations or outright lies. It's people being raised and pressed into their parents religion and culture and cut off from all material that may change their interpretation of it. It's the cult-like nature of control that surrounds organizations and churches with their own laws and rules.

Of course this has all been said a million times before, so bah.