Apologetics, Integrity, and Credibility

[My reply to this video is, here, written from the narrative perspective of:
Me responding directly to Randal.

However, it is primarily written for the benefit of myself as a mental exercise.

This is secondarily for the benefit to anyone willing to consider my perspective on these issues.

As always, 
I welcome divergent constructive points of view] 

Again, Randal, like always, I agree with much of what you say. However, again, you're missing the elephant in the room; the obvious thing that's bigger than the game you're focused on. Think about this. Cameron only has YOU (and maybe some few other easily-ignored human voices) offering to help Cameron SIMULATE the effect of spending time at a God-Beach, catching God-Rays. You've noticed. Cameron claims to have spent every day at the God-beach. But he never comes home with a God-tan. And yet, you keep misunderstanding the fact that you aren't in the same religion. And you do NOT have the same "God". Christianity is not "a" thing. It's not even "a religion". It's a public domain label, for a nebulous religious theme. It's different things to different people. Granted, many religious humans do share some common religious ground. It's fair for anyone to acknowledge this. However, that common ground is being exaggerated.

People who share a common religious theme may present themselves as if they're all talking about same "God". But they very clearly aren't.

You're in rival factions. You're not disagreeing about the details of the same "God". You each found very different gods. Meanwhile, many other people get "answers" such as: * spiritual non-religion [actual non-religion. I don't mean that actually-is-religion that fundies call "totally not a religion" for PSYOP marketing purposes], or * a impersonal deism, or * no woo-answer at all. And yet, HOW do religion-minded sheeple EXPLAIN how that "promise" has not been KEPT? They blame it on the failed moral character of everyone who got a different answer. Granted, differences of moral character have a lot to do with SOME (but not all) people's differing conclusions about "Who" (or "what") "God" is. The more child-minded the person, the more 'parental God' the search. The more barbaric the mind, the more barbaric the "God" they seek. The more barbaric the "God" they seek, the more barbaric the "God" they find. As a mind matures, "God" matures. If a mind outpaces their inner "God", that "God" gets left behind. The DESIGN of Bible-God was meant to dampen and hard-cap the growth which any host-mind can experience. The architects wanted to maintain a crash-crop culture of rampant exploitation. "God", for the Abrahamic religions, has always been a trojan horse; in which they smuggle mechanisms of control. However, minds born in captivity

do sometimes free themselves. Meanwhile, minds born free do sometimes seek to trade a careful portion of their freedoms; in trade for a sense of community, purpose, and structure. Some also seek a durable replacement for the parent/child relationship they lost. Many such persons seek for those things in "religion"; because they don't know where else to look. Such people define "God" within the context of the cultural-religious narratives they've been exposed to. And yet, the "answers" they get are greatly varied and mutually incompatible with the "answers" other people are finding. Again, we can blame or credit difference of moral character for SOME of that divergence. However, the PROMISE made by some of the Christian text-writers was: A person's moral character won't affect anything. Everyone who seeks ... is supposed to find the same "God". But that's simply not what happens in reality. That PROMISE has been DEBUNKED; not by atheists, but rather by the mutually-disagreeing testimonies of the faithful.

This is how I know you'll keep on failing with Cameron, and Gavin, and other rival apologists.

You can keep trying to reason Cameron into the BENEFITS of DECIDING to be an ethically responsible person, ABOUT some specific issues. But human psychology doesn't work that way; especially not when someone's God spends every day "personally vouching" for their moral character and cognition; as superior to everyone who disagrees with them. You won't succeed; unless you can get Cameron's mommy to say something like "why can't you be more like that nice Randal fellow?". It might also help if you can get her to make you a fresh batch of Cameron's favorite cookies, and then say "Don't touch these. These are for Randal". Alternatively, you could reach out to really anyone who has a parental-vibe relationship with Cameron. Otherwise, I wouldn't bet on it. And that's partly because your special books' promises are false. There is no God-magic available with which to override the physics. Worse yet, bibles foster and enable the very same dysfunctions you're fighting against. All human ethical and rational progress require humans to rely entirely upon each other. That's because either: a.) there is no sufficiently-powerful-Being hiding somewhere or b.) there is BUT they don't care.

In either case, we are on our own. In either case, even just ATTEMPTING to reason with Cameron "as a Christian", automatically means you KNOW your GOD is either utterly impotent, utterly disinterested, or imaginary. Your "God" is one of your own inner voices; whom you do not recognize. You keep mistaking "Him" as "someone else"; - "someone" who needs you to do what "he" could not. And yet, you would still end up giving "Him" credit for whatever YOU accomplish; -so that the illusion of a God-person working with a human-person ... can be maintained. You're still making the same mistake that ALL religious apologist channels are premised upon: The belief in a "God" who has ALMOST enough power to convert minds into his one true belief system. Much the same as how "God needs money", "God" needs each apologist to help God compensate for his inadequate powers of messaging and influence.

So let's imagine a world where you succeed at helping Cameron adopt a much better way to market imaginary Super-Dads (plural; although, incorrectly marketed as-if it's the same Super-Dad). Now what? He would make better choices going forward. And he would have you to thank for "inspiring" him to make those better choices. And then you'd both start endorsing each other's religious posturing. You'd both feed your followers the STORY that "God" used you to spread God into the heart ... of a man who spent years talking down to everyone who isn't in his imaginary religion. [It's imaginary in many ways. But in this case, I mean he's pretending that there is just one "Christianity" which he shares with billions of other Christians. No such "Christianity" exists. So then, he imagines being authorized to speak for ... a religion that doesn't exist] On what pedestal did Cameron stand, that whole time? He stood and postured and condescended on the same premise that you do. Although, at least you're smart enough to NOT say the quiet parts out loud. -That WE, the unwashed masses, "suppress truth, in un-righteousness", while Magnificent-HE stands forever-after REBORN(!) into oneness with GOD(!). According to Cameron, and according to Cameron's "God", Cameron has already (since years ago) embraced truth in righteousness. Cameron's superior character is (according to Cameron) what led him to seek God. According to Cameron, people who use their libertarian "Free Will" to "freely choose to be" a good-enough person, ... will be automatically making themselves "able to hear" and also "compelled to seek" the voice of the One True God. According to Cameron, his own moral GREATNESS automatically renders him able to DIFFERENTIATE between all correct doctrines about "God" from false ideas about God. Countless many other humans will be tricked into false understandings about "God". But not Cameron. Why, then, are so many others tricked into wrong understandings? According to Cameron, it's "their own FAULT". Because people only get TRICKED into misunderstanding GOD ... as a CONSEQUENCE of using their libertarian Free Will to: "choose to be" a not-good-enough person whom (as a result) will only be drawn to not-true-enough understandings about "God". Thus, Cameron's superior moral character is what assured he would correctly find only CORRECT understandings about God; at least for every matter ABOUT God that truly matters; such as: identifying TRUMP as a proper and true surrogate for GOD on Earth. Granted, you are assuming Cameron secretly knows Trump is a fraud. He might. But I think you're probably wrong about WHY he's willing to lie for "God". I think Cameron lies for "God" for the same reason Mike Jones does.

Cameron believes "God" WANTS Cameron to lie about it, because "the ends justify the means". Any lie which "brings" people to GOD, OR helps God accomplish any other great purpose ... must be what God wants Cameron to USE ... to HELP GOD. No doubt, Cameron reasons "Who are WE to question the will of God? God can use anyone for his purposes". Years ago, thanks to Cameron using his libertarian Free Will to make himself good-enough to correctly HEAR, SEEK, and UNDERSTAND GOD, ... That "free will'ed choice" made Cameron compatible with all truth. After finding and merging with "God", Cameron RECIEVED uncompromised access to all essential truths. That's when Cameron became "filled with" and "one with" the perfect character of "God"; imbuing him with wonderous new levels of moral clarity and decency. This is EXACTLY what Rebekah Davis ("Bread Of Life" channel) was talking about. The true Christian is made righteous like Jesus; because "righteousness" is an all-or-nothing proposition. They are a "new creation"; not a slightly improved old-creation. Thus, they become fully justified to pre-dismiss and fully-dismiss ALL challenges to their character; and also to their understandings about God's character, will, and actions. -- In contrast, here in the real world, ... On the larger cultural scale, the "God of the Bible", as a cultural memetic, is always trailing behind secular moral advancement. And yet, inside of Cameron, as a "person", "God" can only understand and value whatever Cameron understands and values. Why? Because that version of "God" exists nowhere else except in a hijacked and partitioned part of his own psyche. There, the idea of a moral-authoritarian "God" was seeded, cultivated, and grown; as defined by other humans, combined with Cameron's own formative life experiences. There, "God" "lives and breathes" as a part of Cameron's own mind. -The mind of a stunted man-child who projects "Mommy's little angel" vibes stronger than anyone else I can think of. "God" is Cameron's super-vulnerable, desperately self-protecting, Super-Ego; which Cameron imagines as "Someone else". Within you, "God" is a different person than the "God" inside Cameron. Your version of "God" is built from different people, and from other facets of your unique lived experience and character. [Note: I AM NOT saying there is-or-isn't a pre-existing, autonomously self-aware, universe-creating person (or persons). In fact, none of my writings or streams ever take a stand on that issue. My points, individually, stand-or-fall, in either case] As far as I can tell, you are a better person than Cameron. If you help Cameron improve either his: a.) actual character or at least b.) his socially, theatrically strategic character, ... the "God" within him (not the same "God" that you "know") will grow in synch with that development. Together, you could then join forces, to help rehabilitate and elevate the cultural memetic called "God". As a "before and after", I agree: That would be real progress for humanity. However, it's too little and too late. Humanity needs to make MORE progress in a shorter amount of time, or else we should expect to go extinct in the near future. The stakes are that high. The time is that short. And the larger religious domain of Abrahamic authoritarianism took the LEAD in driving us to this brink. For as long as you keep marketing "God" as "The God of The Bible", you'll be helping ancient and modern predators smuggle poison into humanity's collective consciousness. I understand that you have good intentions. I applaud your demonstrated ability to ADMIT when various evils in Bible are evil. However, that ability is not as complete as you think it is. Although, for the sake of simplicity, I can just say "it's great". It is. However, you've mistaken your mind's adapted ability to FILTER (most of) those toxins out .. as a thing that "everyone will just naturally do", if-only you can retrain apologists so that they teach everyone else how to do that. Your vision about this is halfway noble. "If successful" (which it won't be. But if it were), it would count as: contribution; for messy progress towards a common nobility for our species. But it's unrealistic and it's dangerous. Because you've underestimated the power of the poisons which constitute the bulk of biblical concepts. Those poisons will often "go to work" on each exposed mind ... before those minds have a chance to develop the filters your mind relies upon to keep it (partly; maybe even mostly) safe. Because, at the beginning and end of every day, those authors, writing in the name of "God", will always be sexists, pro-slavery, pro- child-trafficking, anti-consent, ethnically racist, nationally favoring, religiously biased, authoritarian MEN whose "God" needs a starship. In fact, this is why yours does too. Those MEN thought it was a good idea to build and maintain a PLATFORM from-which random fallible dudes can artificially INFLATE (render greater; an expressly non-equal social dynamic) the POWER of their own voice over everyone else's; by projecting their voice through a larger-than-life psychosocial CONSTRUCT they call "God". -all while GALSIGHTING that such grandiosely posturing inequality ... is the ultimate expression of "humility". They were MEN with Major Personality Disorders ... writing "How To" Guides for getting away with it. [a specific observation which both Dr Jennifer Bird and Dan McClellan have gone on record to correctly observe.] Cameron hasn't misunderstood the original character of the bible-writers' "God(s)". Jesus was nothing like Trump. However, Yahweh was EXACTLY like Trump. And THAT is the phenotype character Jesus was an enabler and a groomer on behalf of. Jesus (per the legends) promoted values which were progressive (compared to that culture's established norms). But he did so

as a lure. He was trying seduce people like moths to light. Unsuspecting vulnerable idiots would end up in a hyper-conservative dystopian religion. Jesus was the bait. Yahweh was the switch. And that's what Cameron Bertuzzi is trying to do; albeit with obviously-bad lures. Helping modern groomers perfect their lures is not how we solve the problem. We need, more quickly, to become a mutually respectful, functionally cooperative, singular collective people; without sacrificing healthy cultural and personal diversity. There is no place in that world for moral-authoritarianism, colonizing Master Race religions, romanticizing eschatology, nor for Kissing Hank's Ass.