Summary
LGBTQ Americans are deeply concerned about Donald Trump’s second term, citing his anti-LGBTQ rhetoric, policies, and ties to conservative groups like the Heritage Foundation.
His past actions and campaign ads targeting trans individuals have raised fears of eroding healthcare access, legal protections, and rights, especially for transgender people.
Trump’s alignment with the Project 2025 agenda, which promotes rolling back LGBTQ rights, heightens anxiety, despite his appointment of an openly gay treasury secretary.
Advocates warn of significant societal and legal repercussions.
I’ve always heard Buddhism referred to more as a spiritual practice than a religious one. Buddhism has no “deity,” the Buddha would not have condoned the worship of himself as a God. Buddhism’s whole thing deals with karma and the path the self enlightenment, which is the key difference between Buddhism (and other spiritual “religions”): spirituality is self contained, religion isn’t.
Per most actual religions, you need to worship in certain places, listening to certain people, and many religions encourage the conversion of those outside of the religion (sometimes by force). The community aspect is a requirement of the religion, it’s not considered “kosher” to just do it all by yourself in your house.
And thus, these religions tend to be organized: they have a hierarchy, a power structure, hell, some ever have their own governments/countries. They protect their own, shielding them from the law despite their pedophilic transgressions (cough cough Catholicism), they require tithes or their patrons but rarely offer financial assistance to their own parishes.
Buddhism can be practiced in groups (monks and monasteries), but those groups are not forcefully trying to convert outsiders (though they may welcome them), and they aren’t necessary. You can practice Buddhism entirely on your own and still be faithfully practicing all of the tenets of the “religion,” despite never interacting with any type of significant religious figures.
I’ve never met a Buddhist who sat down next to me at dinner and started asking when I’m going to accept Buddha and start going to meditation and find my inner chakra and give up all of my possessions for the pursuit of pure enlightenment, or tell me I’m going to reincarnate as a disfigured creature because I’m trans.
I have been told by various folks of various Abrahamic-Religion flavors that I’m going to hell for being trans, need to repent/kill myself, been asked when I’m going back to church, how I can turn my back on my creator, told religion will fix my depression/mental issues, and so on.
And the fact that the majority of religions rely on the indoctrination of children for their member base to remain consistent/strong enough, rather than allowing people to find their teachings and accept/deny them for themselves when they can consent as adults, should tell you most religions are more akin to cults than anything actually beneficial to society.
So… You’re saying buddhism isn’t a religion because it isn’t bad?
That seems like circular reasoning if you’re using it to arrive at an anti religious point of view.
I’m claiming Buddhism isn’t a religion at all, it’s a spiritual practice.
It’s a spiritual practice, an ideology or philosophy, there’s no centralized Buddhist religion with an unelected figurehead dictating your “religion.” You can buy a pillow and watch some YouTube videos on Buddhist practices, and you’re a Buddhist so long as you follow the ideology and practices. There’s no weekly check-ins at the church, no needing to pass certain coming-of-age rights, no baptisms or indoctrination ceremonies, no pressure to convert those around you.
But I wouldn’t call you religious, I’d call you spiritual. You’re attempting to gain an enlightened and spiritual connection with the world/universe around you. You’re not trying to appease a God in the hopes you’ll be granted an eternal afterlife, and following every single religious rule/practice is the only way to ensure that.
So… You’re saying buddhism isn’t a religion because it isn’t bad?
That seems like circular reasoning if you’re using it to arrive at an anti religious point of view.
Y know what, fuck it, I’m so sick of this. I’m actually attempting to defend you and Buddhism here, and I’m getting this nonsense pedantic questioning.
You’re right, Buddhism is a religion, and it’s a shit poison just like every other religion, and you’ve proved that. Hurray for Drag, once again proving drag’s superior intellect over everyone on Lemmy.
Edit: Absolutely insufferable, and to think I was defending your pronouns in another thread too, despite you being an insufferable tool.
Edit 2: I’d link the whole write up, but you’d probably start pedantically arguing against my point because you’re just the smartest fucking person in the world.
Please don’t he/him drag. Drag doesn’t use he/him pronouns. Please edit your comment to remove the he/him.
I already did.
I’m still waiting for you to apologize for calling me a fascist Nazi Trump supporter who wants you and all of your friends dead, but I guess that would involve you admitting you were wrong about anything, and I know that’s impossible for someone like drag.
Edit: I’m waiting…
Why would drag call you a Trump supporter? Did you abstain in the election, or spend the entire campaign season telling people that Harris presidency would be no good for them, or something?
Anyway, since you’ve done Buddhism the kindness of insisting it isn’t a religion, drag thought drag would be equally nice to you by returning the favour: You’re not an atheist. Atheists are all abrasive nerds who insist that all religions are trash and misgender trans people who disagree with them. You’re a good person, so there’s no way you can be an atheist. You’re just a non-believing-in-gods-theist. And this proves exactly why atheists are all bad people; it’s because no good person like you could be an atheist.
Drag wouldn’t normally say this kind of thing, but you were so nice in insisting that Buddhism can’t be a religion because it’s good, that drag simply had to return the favour and defend you from any accusation that you’re an atheist.
Oh, I’m sorry, drag is right, drag didn’t call me a Trump supporter, drag only called me a Nazi. Though, I distinctly remember you telling me I wanted you and all of your friends dead, but you aren’t worth any more time looking because you’ll use whatever mental gymnastics you need to to continue to feel that you’re right about everything.
The rest of your comment is meaningless, drag, I didn’t purposefully misgender you, and I thought I corrected it before you saw via an edit. It wasn’t malicious, and if it was, why would I be referring to you as drag in every other instance I refer to you?
Utterly meaningless, much like what you provide to literally every discussion you’ve been involved in. I clearly laid out my reasoning behind why Buddhism is a spiritual practice as opposed to a religion, including the fact that, by definition, religion requires the worship of a superhuman ability, primarily through a God or God’s, which Buddhism does not have, as I pointed out in my first comment.
I like how you are throwing a temper tantrum because I accidentally misgendered you in one comment out of the dozens you and I have exchanged, yet I already know you’re not going to apologize for unjustly calling me a Nazi because that’s somehow justified in your empty head.
You are a child, drag, and you need to get over yourself. I wasn’t insulting Buddhism, I was trying to show you how it doesn’t meet the definition of a religion. And in turn, you’re now defending atheism, or attacking atheism, (you’re writing makes zero sense), and I never claimed that Buddhism is perfect. It’s not an organized religion, it’s just not, idk why you’re doubling down on this when you are just wrong.
And for the record, I am an atheist, you insufferable bag of hot air, and your comment doesn’t lend you the credibility you think it does. Nor did I ever claim to be a good person.
I’m done, drag, any time I see you from now on will only be to demand my apology, with a link to the screenshot for all of Lemmy to see what an insufferable, miserable child Drag really is.
For the insufferable child who can’t admit they’re wrong:
https://lemmy.world/comment/13732345
Did you seriously have to link drag a thread where you’re lying about drag’s pronouns to other people? Why? What purpose does it serve? Is it just to upset drag?
Called it.