I have been having fun surfing various forums on LUSENET and observing the "character" of the posts, if you will. Just in contast, the American perspective seems rather humorous and all over the place...to wit, Doreen's Freedom Forum, currently posting paranoia, to Unk's Wild Wild West, currently (and continuously) bashing people for their paranoia! Read back and forth, one gets a fine sense of how free Americans are indeed. They can have any number of perspectives and express them, no matter how wacko.

I'm getting a real laugh out of a lot of posts...not at anyone's expense. Just noting the black and white of it all...

-- Anonymous, October 10, 2001

Answers

Yes sheepish, you certainly do get the feel of how free we really are!!! I have no need of entertainment beyond my computer these days. ;>)

-- Anonymous, October 10, 2001

I really have to check out some of these other forums (you mean there are others besides BTS and CS??). I've looked at the list of Lusenet forums, but get totally overwhelmed trying to decide!! I think I have looked at Sojouner's forum (name?). I don't watch much T.V. so probably this IS the best place for entertainment, Diane :-)!

-- Anonymous, October 10, 2001

This morning I made a long post over on Country Families about the origins of Halloween, and so far I haven't been attacked or had anyone try to save me. There may be hope for some of the other forums after all!

-- Anonymous, October 10, 2001

Well, I scampered over to read it, of course, Sherri. VERY well done! I have Isaac Bonewits' "The Real Origins of Halloween" bookmarked, but it's VERY long (pages and pages). Would you mind if I made a copy of your post and shared it with some other folks?

-- Anonymous, October 10, 2001

Excellent reading, Sherri. Sure made me understand where Halloween really originated! My son is all grown up now, but I'll be sure that my granddaughter knows the truth. Thanks!!

By the way, too bad about the location of the forum "country families'...right below "corporate suckup forum"!! Wow!

-- Anonymous, October 10, 2001

Okay, I'm curious, how do I get to the place you wrote this?

-- Anonymous, October 10, 2001

Dee, my notes on how to make a direct link are at work and I'm afraid that I'll mess it up if I try to do it from memory. Here's the roundabout way to get there. Go to the top of this page and click on LUSENET. This will take you to a list of all the forums. Scroll down until you see Country Families (it's right above Countryside). Click on Country Families to get into the forum, and look for the post called "Holloween celebrations???"

Joy, feel free to pass it on.I wrote it off the top of my head while I was at work today so it's not the greatest, but I'm glad that it was helpful.

-- Anonymous, October 10, 2001

I also enjoyed your post Sherri. I must plead ignorance prior to now as to the origin of Halloween. I have always thought it was a fun holiday and sew for my grandchildren's costumes most years.

-- Anonymous, October 11, 2001

Great job, Sherri! I Too will print this and share it. Isnt it fascinating how the church has throughout the ages twisted things around to make other religions' rituals/beliefs look evil? How unsure of the attraction of their own they must have been.

-- Anonymous, October 11, 2001

EM: Adopting customs and symbols from the indigenous cultures was a common practice to spread the word and Christianity wasn't the only one that did it. I read once that some of what is Tibetan Buddhism today was "borrowed" from the indigenous Bonn religion but using Buddhist iconography instead.

Same thing with Mexican Catholicism---the Lady of Guadalupe was a pre Christian, "pagan" icon that was adopted by Catholicism. I've got a hunch they do it so the "new" religion doesn't seem so foreign and alien.

-- Anonymous, October 13, 2001

John, you're absolutely right. Many pagan symbols have been borrowed by other religions. Trouble is, within the historical christian church, and on to today, that symbolism's origins are often denied or obscured. Not knowing much about the history of Tibetan Buddhism, I cannot say (although you have herewith inspired me to do some research!) if this is the case, but I would venture to wonder if in the course of their adoption of local pagan ritual/symbols they coincidentally attempted to devalue "competing" religions. Somehow I doubt it.

-- Anonymous, October 14, 2001

I like to check out the other forums too. Check out "Ask a Drunk" for some British humor. The Current Events-Homestead Preparations is intense information re: security et al.

-- Anonymous, October 14, 2001

Ah! So that's where Old Git got up to! I see a lot of old Y2k and TB2000 folks on a lot of different forums these days. Interesting!

-- Anonymous, October 15, 2001

Anne, when the news is really stressing me I go to the Current Events site and somehow it gives me some comic relief. Am I sick or what??

-- Anonymous, October 15, 2001

May be Diane! But 'Current Events' tells me about all kinds of things that never even occurred to me....so I rest assured that there are others doing the worrying for me and I can go to bed!

-- Anonymous, October 15, 2001

Sheesh! There's about 10 bazillion Country-flavored forums on LUSENET now. I just noticed that Little Bit has her own forum, too. I just found it. My goodness! I think I'll start one! How about "Reliance Beyond the Country Family's Sidewalks?" We can discuss things like homesteading, philosophy, religion, families, our aspirations, stuff like that! How novel! Nobody does that! ;-)

-- Anonymous, October 18, 2001