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CH1 said:
While we're giving advice, I recommend you don't hire a lawyer who gets life advice from Joel Osteen.
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More advice - if you can’t afford to hire that lawyer in the first place, no need to file away that little nugget of wisdom.
 
You guys are legit nuts. There's a tv show where some guy talks about things that we all probably struggle with in life. And he tells stories about the subjects to illustrate his points. It's about being a better person, adopting certain mindsets to let you better manage common situations that being stress, sadness, anger, whatever. I don't think there's anything other than a positive impact from watching it.

But sure, it's like listening to what Hitler, a genocidal, war-mongering maniac, had to say. Because Joel Osteen is all about going to war with the world, eradicating races and religions, having fun with the whole killing thing - they're cut from the same cloth. He's just like Alex Jones, a liar, a propogandist who tries to come up with the most controversial shit he can just to get people at each other's throats. Same guy.

Osteen tells people that it will curry favor with the heavens above to give money to the church? That's his crime against humanity? The same thing that every church and every synagogue on the planet tells its members? I think it's a safe bet that his church spends a bunch of money on charitable endeavors, employs a lot of people, and so it doesn't all go straight to his pocket. But sure he's obviously gotten rich too, yet he's clearly providing value, or his members would go elsewhere. All religion is a business at the end of the day anyway. If you can't raise enough money from the congregation, you're not paying the rent. I don't see what he's doing that makes him any different than any other religious figure with an organization to keep afloat.

The rabbi in the top synagogue here in LA makes $800k a year. He gets up and gives the sermon every week just like Osteen. He asks members to donate to the synagogue every time he speaks. It's implicit that donating is a good thing, that God will love ya for it, that you're helping to keep the place going, to do your part for the religion's continued survival. If they televise his sermon every week, he's Hitler too?

I think most of you have some unresolved issues with religion that you're allowing to spill over into a simple comment that his show spends 20 minutes talking about how to better yourself and your life, and that it is substantively good. Content that Zeke compared to what you'd see in Hallmark cards. Make sure not to get a card for your pop on father's day, lest you be confused for striving to resuscitate the glory that was nazi Germany.
 
It's pretty simple man. You're taking self help advice on how to live a good life from someone who prays on the gullible and gets them to hand over their hard earned dollars on the premise it'll get them into heaven. He then takes those hard earned dollars for himself. Sound like a good guy? Why would you want to support a guy like that?

Here's his house... not exactly redistributing all those donations to the poor

0fgjhs73h2r90kjbd.jpg
 
LeafOfFaith said:
You guys are legit nuts. There's a tv show where some guy talks about things that we all probably struggle with in life. And he tells stories about the subjects to illustrate his points. It's about being a better person, adopting certain mindsets to let you better manage common situations that being stress, sadness, anger, whatever. I don't think there's anything other than a positive impact from watching it.

But sure, it's like listening to what Hitler, a genocidal, war-mongering maniac, had to say. Because Joel Osteen is all about going to war with the world, eradicating races and religions, having fun with the whole killing thing - they're cut from the same cloth. He's just like Alex Jones, a liar, a propogandist who tries to come up with the most controversial shit he can just to get people at each other's throats. Same guy.

Osteen tells people that it will curry favor with the heavens above to give money to the church? That's his crime against humanity? The same thing that every church and every synagogue on the planet tells its members? I think it's a safe bet that his church spends a bunch of money on charitable endeavors, employs a lot of people, and so it doesn't all go straight to his pocket. But sure he's obviously gotten rich too, yet he's clearly providing value, or his members would go elsewhere. All religion is a business at the end of the day anyway. If you can't raise enough money from the congregation, you're not paying the rent. I don't see what he's doing that makes him any different than any other religious figure with an organization to keep afloat.

The rabbi in the top synagogue here in LA makes $800k a year. He gets up and gives the sermon every week just like Osteen. He asks members to donate to the synagogue every time he speaks. It's implicit that donating is a good thing, that God will love ya for it, that you're helping to keep the place going, to do your part for the religion's continued survival. If they televise his sermon every week, he's Hitler too?

I think most of you have some unresolved issues with religion that you're allowing to spill over into a simple comment that his show spends 20 minutes talking about how to better yourself and your life, and that it is substantively good. Content that Zeke compared to what you'd see in Hallmark cards. Make sure not to get a card for your pop on father's day, lest you be confused for striving to resuscitate the glory that was nazi Germany.
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800 years posting together and you still don't realize that I take things to their ridiculous but logical endpoint to show how nuts a viewpoint is at it
s core? Of course I don't think Osteen is literally Hitler (or even Goebbels for that matter) but he is a prosperity gospel grifter/dbag with a whole heap of regressive views (not uncommon among evangelicals of course). So I mean, if some of the noises that come out of his hole sounds decent enough, hooray...I guess. But there are far better sources for good life philosophy than a prosperity gospel preacher/grifter/dbag. If Hitler had written the best text on the planet on how to raise Pomeranians, I would probably buy the 2nd best instead. I don't expect my philosophical teachers to be above human error (MLK himself was a serial philanderer if we're digging for flaws), but surely reasonable standards should apply, no?

So there, that's the fucking joke explained in full, which as I understand it, makes every joke funnier.
 
WellPlayed said:
It's pretty simple man. You're taking self help advice on how to live a good life from someone who prays on the gullible and gets them to hand over their hard earned dollars on the premise it'll get them into heaven. He then takes those hard earned dollars for himself. Sound like a good guy? Why would you want to support a guy like that?

Here's his house... not exactly redistributing all those donations to the poor

0fgjhs73h2r90kjbd.jpg
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Good for him. I’m not supporting him. I’m saying there’s value in his tv sermons that can be useful for anyone and are objectively good.
 
MindzEye said:
800 years posting together and you still don't realize that I take things to their ridiculous but logical endpoint to show how nuts a viewpoint is at it
s core? Of course I don't think Osteen is literally Hitler (or even Goebbels for that matter) but he is a prosperity gospel grifter/dbag with a whole heap of regressive views (not uncommon among evangelicals of course). So I mean, if some of the noises that come out of his hole sounds decent enough, hooray...I guess. But there are far better sources for good life philosophy than a prosperity gospel preacher/grifter/dbag. If Hitler had written the best text on the planet on how to raise Pomeranians, I would probably buy the 2nd best instead. I don't expect my philosophical teachers to be above human error (MLK himself was a serial philanderer if we're digging for flaws), but surely reasonable standards should apply, no?

So there, that's the fucking joke explained in full, which as I understand it, makes every joke funnier.
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I think you're taking this to a ridiculous endpoint. I know you don't think he's Hitler, but you're trying to say that the substance of a 20 minute cable tv sermon which talks about objectively good ideals is somehow HORRIBLE because it's being delivered by a guy who does what every other pastor or rabbi of a congregation does, all day every day, since the beginning of time, by telling his audience to donate money.

I guess all of you are super caught up on all of his views outside of his show. I don't know anything about him outside of those 20 minutes I've watched maybe 10 episodes of, and the content of those lectures is fucking great. Only a sociopath would find fault in them. So, for me, all of the noises that come out of his hole come out on that tv show, and there's been nothing but positive stuff. I don't hear anything about him anywhere else (didn't even know he existed until I came across his show while flipping maybe 6 months ago), and I don't know where you're all purporting (or pretending) to hear all this allegedly awful stuff he says and does. I mean, what, literally because the guy has a televised show, and is super successful, he's worse than your local pastor, who pleads with his congregation to donate every Sunday, even sends around a fucking basket for you to put your money in? What's the reasonable standard Osteen is violating, that he's doing exactly what all the local guys do on a large scale and got rich doing it?

And you're making it sound like this is my one stop shop for philosophy or daily life musings. He's one guy who I've heard in very limited spurts here and there, and like what he says, probably heard less than 3 hours of his stuff total. He's not exactly my one and only philosophy teacher such that I gotta get rid of him and go with the next guy because a ton of people like him and donate to his organization.

It was just a dumb fucking joke. The explanation didn't make it any less funny, don't worry.
 
WellPlayed said:
You don't support him. You just watch his sermons and tell people you love him.
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Yeah, I've watched a handful of sermons and mentioned that I like them. Yip de fucking doo. I didn't realize that meant I sent him my life savings and am going door to door to get converts.
 
MindzEye said:
Also....I thought you were Jewish??

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Yeah, which is exactly my point - it isn't a religious thing. He throws in some Peter Paul crap that I don't know anything about, as well as some Old Testament stuff which I do know some stuff about, but the figures/characters are irrelevant - the stories are illustrative of the point, and he tells them well and draws good lessons out of them.

This shouldn't be so tough for you guys.

Anyway, enough of this bullshit.
 
LeafOfFaith said:
What's the reasonable standard Osteen is violating, that he's doing exactly what all the local guys do on a large scale and got rich doing it?
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This isn't the counter argument you think it is, but whatever man. If you want to get snippets of life philosophy from an evangelical grifter, fill your boots.
 
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