God/light is evil

Right, I'm not necessarily saying skepticism is bad - it's an essential part of critical thought. It's hard to deny post modernism hasn't made a religion out of it though

> skepticism is due to postmodernism
The fuck? Also, these "certainties" are indeed certain in tradition, but there's many different traditions, and even ancient people were aware of societies which violated the ideas they held as self-evident or true. Even without postmodern thought or critical theory, we can talk about the differences between cultures (though we might not end up making statements about the "validity" of these ideas).

That said I sort of get your point - if you're going to think deeply about worldbuildng a culture where a trope in our culture is inverted, you definitely need to be a skeptic. Or at least that's the message i'm getting from your post.

In many ways that's a classic as old as mythology itself. The Gods have always been fickle in the best of times and cases, and numerous stories are of mortals or things they've hated or cursed finally giving them their comeuppance. Even when a pantheon gets rewritten into a single deity placed at the center of a monotheistic religion, and the religion spends all of history extolling how this deity is good and wonderful and righteous, the picture's nowhere as rosy; the unification of the stories result in a sadistically abusive, tantrum-throwing megalomaniac with the overall acceptance that he is *good and just* being pretty much entirely "OR ELSE".

Until someone decided Dante's work was far more deliciously punitive, hell was merely the place (physical, really, since these were people that thought the gods were actually somewhere nearby) where YHWH's light and voice didn't reach: only his believers would get to spend eternity *basking in his glory* and *listening to his voice*; (worth noting the light was *searing* and burns away anything the god doesn't like, and the voice was *deafening* and madness-inducing).
Everyone else would, quite simply, not, and unless you were truly devout, "that specific god not there" would be the less annoying afterlife.

While there's plenty of edgelords who don't look into things and just want to think they're being original, it's also quite possible to have this view in a much more natural fashion: god/light have always been bad news, and wanting to fight such oppressive and destructive authority? Basic survival instinct combined with a naive sense of fairness that hasn't been beaten out of the person like usual.

There's plenty of good entities for folks to worship in various mythologies out there - but it's rather rare for them to become worldwide political powers since they aren't going to play dirty.

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Yes mortal. Light is right.

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Light is good!

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Was posting Holo meant to be an example? Because the whole church thing, and her nature as a pagan predator spirit could be seen as another facet of this.

It always strikes me as weird how so many old school religious development basically was "Nothing is good, everything is miserable, even if you get into God's kingdom, you're still going to have to deal with that shit" Like that one preacher who said God hated humanity and kept us from falling into the fires of Hell on the merest whim.

Misunderstood good guys are so fucking gay

Life was pretty shit back in the day. Religion was either what helped you get by or what helped you understand why everything was so shit

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Life sucked in the old times, people sucked even more, when you're a shit person surrounded by a shit nation ruled by a shit king in a shit world, the "good guy" starts to look awfully cruel from a modern perspective.

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The objective best way is to have neither god nor demons be evil, but demons are more fun/willing to break the rules.

Not all religions see things this way, not even close. Even stuff like the Avesta, composed by horseniggers expelled from better lands, is confident and positive, to a ridiculous extent, about the underlying truth of reality being on the side of them.

nothing wrong with this as a concept
it might be a bit overdone some times
but refusing it out of principle is effectively saying that things should stay the same, light and dark are always in the same roles forever

i dont think it really matters in the end

t's majorly Catholicism that does the whole "God is awful, and Heaven sucks, but Hell is worse and the Devil is a cunt, so you better not enjoy anything in life, especially not sex, and don't covet better things, and devote everything to loving God, or else he'll throw your ass in Hell, but he won't do anything in return, so everything is awful forever, but get over it, cunt, now pay the church money and beat your kids"

Catholicism is odd though, because it has a positive relationship with suffering. It's basically "everything you suffer with brings you closer to God, so suffering is fantastic and you should fast and live the ascetic life."

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>Suffering brings you closer to God
>Hell is endless suffering
>Hell is punishment, but by it's nature, being in Hell should be the fastest way to God
Did I discover how to minmax Catholicism?

>Life was bad back then
End this meme. It was better.
>spend 30 years living vicariously
>pay back with one eternity of torture
Good one mate good one

Because fuck the Sun, that's why.

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I don't know, maybe if you're playing a nocturnal race it could work.

>It was better.
For who?

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All of it was cherry-picked over centuries by councils of bitter greedy old bastards. So the "lessons" have to be looked at separately and with their historical context, but doing so annihilates any hopes at mysticism because you can practically picture (thanks to seeing them almost daily on things like CSPAN) the asshole who wrote it that way.

In this story, god massacres children who called a prophet baldy, and this is righteous and good.
>It should be okay for me to murder those little pieces of shit that called me bald.

Shellfish is an abomination
>I don't like thing

A slave and/or a wife both must work their hardest and respect their owner for not doing so is to disrespect God
>GODDAMNIT, LISTEN TO ME FOR ONCE WOMAN!

....if a man lies with another man as he would a woman...
>I DON'T LIKE IT UP THE ASS, I'M SPECIAL, THIS IS SPECIAL! GAYS SHOULD ALL BURN I'M DOING AN IMPORTANT RICH-MAN RITUAL! I'M NOT A FAGGOT!

> wormwood
How else do you flavour absinthe?

Alternatively, they just like the idea even if it's done before. KInd of like people who prefer the opposite, more traditional state of affairs, you know?

if not creative, then it can be pretty fun
people dont need to be locked into "light good, dark evil" all the time

>End this meme. It was better.
Go backpacking and never come back.

The true patrician way is realizing that both the demons and the angels are assholes and parasites leeching off humanity's spiritual energy. Eradicate both the gods and the devils, colonize Heaven and Hell imo.

randumb fun xD

>It was better.
Tell that to people with TB.

Why not? Also, what why? Do you need an in-game justification of this idea, the reason why people like it, the reason for them being this way?

Because they fell for the Lucifer meme from Paradise Lost.

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It's not any more random than the other option, though.

Hey now, we only decided that hell was eternal torture a little while ago. The honest answer is that the bible doesn't explicitly say what "hell" in our sense of the word is. Lots of christian groups had different ideas about "hell" and treated it as a meh thing.

Heaven offers an eternity of servitude, Hell offers an eternity of freedom.

Hail horrors, hail this unbroken world. When hath reason equaled but thunder made greater.

Lucifer loves freewill, god never wanted you to exercise it.

Tell me what sort of asshole gives you freewill and punishes you for using it?

god is a nazi

the devil is just a big boy

The thing is that you only change the names.
What you are left with is "multiple good supernatural enteties that align with darkness" and "single supernatural being that aligns with light and is evil"

It's an hat as old as hats get and playing it well requires quite some skill.

I believe think the easiest way would be to play it more straight.
People worship some evil good that demands human sacrifice or will turn their medicore lives into shitty lives.
Outsiders come with their weaker but personal good spirits and look at the PCs like the degenerates they are initially.

>The light of judgment has been cast agiasnt humanity, and we were found wanting.
>The Rapture is over, and murderous angles and demons stroll the streets, accompanied by mad zealots desperate for the salvation, or uplifting of their soul.
>But all is not lost for humanity, Erebus the last surviving Titan used his powers for centuries to hide himself, and those races on the brink of death in a dark domain.
>Now united with the old magics of the world that fled in ages past, the mortal races play a dangerous game. Balancing the forces of fire and light agianst eachother, as if one ever won, not even the darkness would be safe.

Fear not the dark my friend.
And let the feast, begin.

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Is this a for real question or is this one of those here's my troll answer sort of things?

>Ghost Stories

youtube.com/watch?v=SxJ4VWoeOzs

Have you accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior yet, Veeky Forums?

Real question, what sort of benevolent creature creates freewill and then punishes people that use it?

>When something is within the light we can perceive it, understand it, catalogue it.
Alternatively, if there is too much light you'll be blinded.

>Real question, what sort of benevolent creature creates freewill and then punishes people that use it?

From my perspective I think you answered your own question. A benevolent creature does that. I mean, I'm not perfect but if my kid is beating on my other kid I'd want to intervene and punish the instigator. Maybe I'd try to get them to understand why what they're doing is wrong and why.

Why do you think that its a mark of moral evil to punish a person for using free will, if you where the one who gave them their free will?

Because subverting is a thing and out of all god Gods, good ol' Yahweh sure has a penchant for mass murder and pointlessly torturing his followers.

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Because you are also the sole creator of what makes good and evil.

If god is all knowing, all good and all powerful then the problem of evil still exists even if you try to make freewill.

Is it possible for god to still have freewill but no evil?

If you say no you have to violate at least one of the core principles governing the authority of god.

it's times like this that I'm reminded that america still thinks the rest of the world must somehow be kidding

Are you mashing together good and evil as subjective and objective? Because if God has created the objective reality of good and evil then the point still stands. A benevolent asshole is the type of asshole who would punish people for doing evil with free will, because they'd still in point of fact, be doing evil.

>moral compromise/grey is evil
>Good and bad/light and dark are good

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>demons/dark
>hell is brightly lit because of all the flames
>god/light
>heaven is made of clouds that block out the sun

Oh shit your right.
>Heaven is eternal dawn or dusk
>Hell is bright enough that you can see your sin.

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There is no free will, you're either controlled by God, or you're controlled by your vices

>Light represents certainty and orderliness.

Because it allows us to see. In reality, light is neutral, it is simply a physical force.

>It is inherently lawful.

It is inherently light, and nothing else.

If you're going to attach this stuff to light, remember also that light can blind and burn. It constantly burns us, in fact - the primary cause for skin cancer is UV overexposure, as is the primary cause for visible aging upon the skin.

The shellfish ban was because it went off quickly in the desert heat and could easily lead to food poisoning.

>Gnosticism
lmao

Or they're just jamming cliches they like into the things they're making.

iirc, Gehenna, an early form of what would be translated into "Hell", was a pit outside of Jerusalem, where bodies were burned.

>god/light is self serving
>demons/dark are self serving
>Mortals are caught in the middle, and survive by aligning themselves with whichever force they tell themselves is 'good'

Ys, but so did Boko Harem and ISIS when they first appeared.

Satan invented RPGs, rock music, and video games so he can't be all that bad.

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>His setting doesn't have light representing the concept of law and darkness heralding the subversion of law

Go play Fallen London desu

Chick Tracts objectively best setting

>god is evil
>lucifer is evil
>humanity is evil
God I love SMT.

Subversion is easy and reality has a bad habit of proving most or all of the authority figures in power wind up corrupt, selfish and disinterested in the common good, while those who affect change for the sake of the everyman wind up being, at the very best, described as being rebellious or outsiders in personality, or at worst being seen as outright criminals.

This causes culture to reflect "don't trust the big powerful guy who says he's in charge and wants what's best for you", because in reality he very, very rarely is.

Because you're racist?

If we are looking subjectively it’s the same problem because god is the ultimate authority of good and evil and can determine that we are all permissible by that authority anyway, which he should if he created us unless he’s just arbitrarily being a dickhead (ie not benevolent).

>gods are manipulative towards their personal interests
>Demons are open about how they use you for their interests
>Ultimately both sides drag you towards their needs.
>Humanity pursues forever their archetypal ideals beyond the grasp of gods and demons

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Ok! we're in agreement! the argument that God is an asshole because he punishes us for using the freewill he gave us is illogical and invalid.

/thread?

Also if there is an objective quality to good independent of god than god doesn’t have the authority to judge us based on those criteria anyway unless he wants us to conform to his ideal of good rather than the actual good (which means he’s a flawed dickhead).

To be fair, the gods are pretty easy to chill with and understand when you stop acting like there's one in charge of everything.

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>this is what the American jingoist believes

Only in the case god is the supreme authority.

You can rationalize some really shady shit if opinion = fact.

God could randomly kill us all and send us all to hell without distinction to suffer for eternity and it’s still good.

We are all plucked from the void to meaninglessly suffer and struggle until dead anyway, I don’t see why that bastard wouldn’t pull that shit.

You mean like every time they measure things in thumbs, legs and canine genitalia?

Yes! thats the point! But if we're talking specifically about the christian conception of God, then he turns around and pulls a Kamina, breaking reality, by sacrificing himself to provide atonement for our sins! So unless we're talking about some other type of fictional "god" then this whole thread is grade-school daft.

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>not having the embodiments of light and dark being neutral to lean into the true nature of these natural forces.
ISHYGDDT

Just because I allow you to walk in my forest, it didn't mean I let cut down my treesl

Grey "morals" are basically useless and stagnant society.

Well, while we're at it we might as well discuss ways to design these elements.

Personally, I'm kinda leaning towards . Light or Dark aren't inherently totatlly good/bad, but if devote yourself too much to either you cease to be human.

Light is authority, guidance and control, but loose control of it and you become nothing but a machine endlessly repeating it's given task. No joy, no pride, no desire for improvement.

Darkness is freedom and acceptance of your weakness, but it's also exploint anyone and anything for personal gain. If you don't control it it turns you into a mindless beast, who thinks of nothing but eating, fucking, sleeping and shitting.

Except god did allow cutting down the trees. If you are omniscient and omnipotent you implicitly allow everything that happens because you could always prevent it from happening or even retroactively undo it.

In Fantasy book i once read were two godlike entities, one light, one dark, based on Slavic mythology.

>Belbogh (basically "White God")
Motherfucker that was imprisoned in Slavic version of Asgard, where he was kept under massive mountains that were always covered by dark volcanic ash to prevent him gather energy from light. He was leeching this powers from higher standing sun god.

>Chernobogh (basically "Black God")
God of unnatural magic and night, Belboghs twin, while Belboghs goons used light magic to blind and set things on fire (Poludnitsa or Lady Midday was one of his demon spawns), the Chernobogh and his goons and demons, that kept Belbogh in prison used everything that scared slavs in moonless night (Wolves, demons, etc.)

It was pretty good played out in the books, such as the Dark powers are not always the inherently bad (bud you could say, that while Belbogh was your tyrannic overlord with amassed puppets and cultist, Chernobogh was opportunistic neutral (?) evil)

Societal allegory, with demons representing whoever they feel got an unfair shake? Or maybe they just really like Paradise Lost but didn't realize Lucifer wasn't the good guy there, either.

After everything that's happened? Everything I've seen? Why should something to whom even the stars are mere flecks of dust care about me? It's ludicrous. It's an idea that REEKS of hubris. We're just one tiny, pathetic gaggle of hairless apes on a tiny, laughable ball of dirt and water. Do people really think we're so special? Based on what? If there is a creator, and he does have a chosen people, that people is somewhere ELSE in that endless void.

God likes cats though.

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Name 10 good things that can happen in the dark

I can name plenty of good things that can happen in the dark. The issue is that I can also do those things and people in the light.

Because the monsters hunt by daylight, and night is our best chance to survive?

I can never agree on demons being good, though. That defeats the purpose of them being demons. Angels that are so extremist and alien they might as well be called evil, yeah, why not. Good demons just aren't demons.
God might be evil because It is a bored child playing with its toys and creating interesting stories, not really caring if they are sentient. They are about as sentient to It as rocks seem sentient to us.

Why would a monster hunt during the day? Humans are diurnal and have horrible night vision

It might have even worse night vision? Powered by light somehow?

Oh yeah, maybe it's actually monster plants. They need light to be active. At night, they tend to slumber.