>>27289
inb4 you're just too closed-minded to get it/you haven't read enough/you're egotistical

>>27289
I want more pads in my anime.

>>27289
It's fake but it's still interesting and can be beneficial to those that believe in it.

I think religions role on Geopolitics is often overplayed, most of the time it was just an excuse at best.

>>27292
>can be beneficial to those that believe in it.
oh absolutely, just look at the Amish or the Hasidic Jews, the sense of community those people have is incredible.

>I think religions role on Geopolitics is often overplayed
Whether you mean the influence of politics on religion or the influence of religion on politics, you're wrong on both accounts.

>>27297
I don't think I am wrong really, even something like the crusades was actually driven by temporal factors not religious ones, religion was just a tool used to encourage it.

This thread is pretty sad. Is this what I have to look forward to as I get older? It'll probably be far worse by then.
I guess I'd better enjoy things while I still can.

>>27289
>Religion is all fake
What I'm really curious about is how it started. I find it hard to believe that a bunch of people came together and decided to spin a tale, so there must be some kernel of truth that got blown up by a game of telephone through the generations. Also this is less true for Christianity where there's not much in the way of directed "practice", but for many of the eastern "religions" that are often intertwined with philosophy and medicine, there are interesting nuggets in there relating to the workings of the mind/psychology that deserve to be studied in their own right.

But either way, most people seem to be primed to subscribe to some religious system as a form of anchoring to maintain their stability, and so whether or not there's any truth by virtue of their believing in it the followers end up getting a sense of belonging. It's the same psychological mechanism that cults end up exploiting. And even those who claim to denounce Religion (with a capital "R") still end up succumbing to "religion" (lowercase r) in other forms (e.g. "scientism", political ideology, etc.).

Another element that's often lumped into religion is extra-material phenomenon, e.g. that there's some "higher force" or "higher energy" that we're a part of. Many of the eastern practices are more explicit about this, e.g. you'll see things like "kundalini" or "qi", and there are enough similarities between the various branches that they either all originated from the same practice or there's something worth taking seriously there, at least in terms of the purported effects (disregarding the explanation of the mechanism behind it).

That said, after investigation of the above (through personal experience via Hatha yoga as well as just reading up on the notable people in the traditions), while I do believe that the _effects_ are real, I'm very skeptical as to the validitiy of the explanatory framework used. (That is, the fact that you feel a tingling in your brow when you do some breathing + visualization is true, but that doesn't necessarily mean that the cause is due to some non-material energy.) And the fact that the people who claim to have undergone "kundalini awakening" or those who claim to be "experienced Yogis" haven't really amounted to anything substantial bolsters that claim.

E.g. take the example of "Gopi Krisha" who is supposedly one of the people who had a spontaneous "Kundalini Awakening." Sure he wrote all about it, but if you look at it overall, aside from a bunch of written books nothing else seems really notable. Surely a far cry from some sort of pinnacle of genius and creativity that he claims were the effects of this awkening. But fine, maybe he was a layperson who was unable to really put that to good use. Surely if you look at some famous Yogis you should see some wisdom shine through? Alas, if you dive deep what you'll often find are petty quarrels over things like "true lineage," supposedly renounced Yogis involved in land disputes, and nothing substantive to distinguish the "enlightened" person from a charlatan.

Nice gif by the way.

>>27301
Not necessarily. After all, the power of drills shouldn't be underestimated.

>>27305
The concept of "enlightenment" exists because an "enlightened" person is considered infallible. That's my understanding of it.

>>27306
I try my best to stay optimistic. I don't really mind being a loser, have been for a long time now. I'm sure all these kids will grow out of their bastardized form of otaku culture and go back to wherever normals go on the internet. Someday imageboards will be forgotten and they won't have the reputation that attracts edgy kids. It's all just a fad for them.
...right?

>>27305
>I find it hard to believe that a bunch of people came together and decided to spin a tale

I don't think it's that unlikely. Most likely a long, long time ago a few old men sat by a fire and talked about life, why are we here? Who made us? Why does Lighting happen? Etc. And they came up with theories and possible explanations and they kept talking about this with other interested people passing it down the line, they added to it and modified it and made it more interesting they created stories about these events.

There might be some truth mixed in but it would be lost to time, some of these tales might have grown from real life actions of certain people that were turned into legend over time and then turned into myth. For example, maybe Thor was a real man, maybe a chief who did some manly things and got bards to sing about him, people created entertaining tales about him and over time they morphed into the supernatural or they might have fused with tales about another great man or other gods to create what we now know as Thor. But this all happened so long before recorded history that it's impossible to know and might have been forgotten to time thousands of years ago.

>>27309
I was referring to Jesus in particular, since all the events told in the Gospels are quite specific and centered around a single person. And by all accounts (e.g. letters between Roman governors) the person was indeed real, so then the question becomes what exactly did Jesus do to get so many followers.

>>27308
I don't see things getting better anytime soon, but there's also no point in being bitter about it: there's nothing you can do about it but enjoy your interests and hobbies. Plus, we always have TC and some other small imageboards as bastions.

>>27311
Yeah, it's not all bad. TC is actually pretty good. I've visited a few times briefly, but never stuck around long. I'll probably stick around now. I don't feel like such a loser here, and there's probably good information around here somewhere.
At the very least it's good to have someplace other than Kakashi Nenpo.

>>27301
What itt exactly made you feel sad?

>>27313
It's not so much anything in the thread itself, but rather the thoughts they invoke.
Were things really much better before? Did I really miss out on a greater sense of community than a few slow imageboards?
Then I have to wonder, where are things going to go from here? The imageboard format seems to be dying. Especially the sites where I don't feel completely out of place. Will there be places like TC by the time I'm 30 years old? I've never felt "at home" on any of the boards I frequented up until recently.
Maybe sad isn't the correct feeling. It certainly isn't pleasant.
What do I know, I'm just a dumb kid.

>>27314
I'm 20, and I can relate to this sentiment. I hope there's enough people in our boat to coalescence some day.

I also think people view imageboards of the past with rose tinted glasses. If you look at archives yourself, you can tell there was always massive amounts of dumb, inane shit. So they weren't really bastions of serious discussion.

Post edited on 19th Apr 2022, 6:22am

>>27315
>If you look at archives yourself, you can tell there was always massive amounts of dumb, inane shit.
Yes there was lots of dumb stuff, but the variance was a lot higher. You could find pockets of creative, original humor and interesting, serious discussion more easily. Now everything is homogenized and anodyne.

>>27314
>Were things really much better before?
Yes, they were.
That doesn't mean there wasn't trolls, cancer, dumb shit. But there was a mindset and a sense of community which was authentic. This idea of being "ironic" about things didn't exist. Normalfag behaviour was shamed. There was a particular self-depreciating pride in being an outcast, weirdness was celebrated, degeneracy was a bonus point. Mainstream politics were rejected. It felt more juvenile, in both bad and good ways. We laughed at everything.
It was a very different place from the real world, with it's own rules. Now all the internet feels like a mere extension of the real world.

>>27315
>If you look at archives yourself, you can tell there was always massive amounts of dumb, inane shit. So they weren't really bastions of serious discussion.
I've noticed that. It's hard to compare the archive to how a board was however, as nonsense threads usually die and are created pretty fast and good threads tend to stick around a while. That's my assumption anyhow.
Oh, and people didn't always post the same shit everywhere. I don't know why people assume every board is the same or want them to be as such.
Either way, I have a lot of fun picking through archives.
>>27320
That sounds really nice. Some people still have that pride. At the very least, I do.

>>27315
>If you look at archives yourself, you can tell there was always massive amounts of dumb, inane shit. So they weren't really bastions of serious discussion.
Maybe it's hard to explain my feelings about it. At that time I felt at home, I felt that I had the freedom to discuss seriously when I wanted to and the dumb inane shit was something I was fine with and enjoyed because it wasn't going against anything I was trying to do. Maybe it's just a symptom of growing older on the internet, but it really does feel like even behind all the dumb inane shit back then, there was a different intent in the posters. People actually valued it a little bit, even if they were behaving like idiots for fun. It looks like people who post on imageboards now don't really give a shit and just see the whole internet as their dumping grounds, with no respect for any user-moderated culture they happen to run into. I don't mind stupid shit, but people who grew up on phones and twitter really don't value anything at all, even something as simple as an imageboards community.

>>27299
>I don't think I am wrong
That's because you don't know enough about the relevant religions, or about politics in general.

>>27337
No I think it's because you don't.

You're all wrong!
Now prostrate yourself in the presence of our God, Her Moe-ness, Yurie-sama!

>>27311
Do you mind sharing those sites?
I am always interested in checking out new places. So far TC is the only place I know worth investing time in and I really would appreciate some variety.

Another year. Time gently flows from the decay of all things. I’ve been attently observing the decay of all form, when distractions suddenly reveal themselves empty, which happens more and more now. You don’t observe the gentle flow of time like a person standing on the firm margins, away from the raging sea, but yourself as the very waves breaking at rocks and becoming foam; if you put attention to the tip of your fingers, you’ll see the flow of time as your skin turns to dust, a light breeze carrying your hand away like sand from a pavement.

What now, friends? Since my last post ( >>27124 ), I’ve continued on the path towards enlightenment, almost like there’s nothing left to be done about it. I don’t go around thinking “I need to take this step”, but “This is the only step that exists to be taken.” It’s not yet a completely stable progression, there are times I let myself be eaten by distractions, then suddenly I’m able to take a good look at our situation, like a flash of lightning making a night bright for an instant and I’m back on track. But enough of these silly allegories.

Six months ago, while I was looking at the trees being violently basted by the wind, a stray cat showed up asking for help. So I went inside and fetched a bowl with some cold cuts. Two days later it came again. A week went by and now two cats showed up, so I had two bowls. Would you believe it, now there are 3 cats showing up. They talk to each other. “Aren’t you fat? Where are you getting all this food?” “In such and such place, I’ll show you.” At one point I tried to convince them to be vegetarians “Here friends, try some boiled rice as well.” They had the meat and left all the rice, so now I’m purchasing cat food.

A middle aged housewife came to me one day as I was looking at the trees again. I could sense from afar she was rehearsing her posture to lecture me with chastising words. She told me “Your cats are making a mess of my azaleas, they’re pooping in my yard!” so I apologized profusely, and told the cats when I met them the next day “Friends, for your own benefit as well as mine, refrain from pooping at the azaleas.” The woman didn’t show up to complain anymore and I’m not sure how the solution came about, but it worked. It’s important to keep the noble eightfold path in your every view, every speech, every action, every livelihood, every effort, every mindfulness,every concentration, so at every passing moment you’ll grow closer to enlightenment. When dealing with humans, have a tight grasp on your thoughts, remember right thought, and what is right thought? Thoughts of renunciation, non-ill-will, and harmlessness.

Months later, as I was outside looking at clouds and enjoying the breeze, one of the neighbors came by while walking his dog “Hello there bud, I see you’re feeding those stray cats. I have some cat food I have no use for, you can have it if you want.” How I rejoiced at those words! I thanked him profusely. Isn't it nice when you’re given a point of fleeting brightness in a regularly dark world?

The third cat, he’s completely black and very suspicious. He never accepted to be petted under any circumstance. One day he stood by watching as I petted the first cat and the second cat as well. Then he allowed to be petted, but only after watching my behavior for a long time. I said to him “It’s very good, friend, to be suspicious around other sentient beings, for most are blind and some are worse than that.” I have three little bowls in front of the house and one large water bowl with water. I change the water everyday.

Sometimes one of the cats, I’m not sure which, shows up at 3 AM and starts meowing close to my window and I wake up annoyed. With my first thought I quickly grasp the annoyance, thinking “Why are you annoyed? Towards what end but your own detriment?” It’s important to keep the noble eightfold path in your every view, every speech, every action, every livelihood, every effort, every mindfulness, every concentration, so at every passing moment you’ll grow closer to enlightenment. In times like this, it’s important to remember right effort, and what is is right effort? Strive so unwholesome mental states don’t arise, strive so wholesome mental states arise.

Striving so wholesome mental states arise is not an easy task, but everything offers you help, if you know where to look. This cat has been showing up to warn me, at this late hour, saying “Time is short, it gently flows from the decay of all things, so hear, friend, how long have you left to strive towards liberation? Should you be sleeping so close to the end? Don’t you remember the words of the Enlightened One, on the day of his death? ‘All conditioned things are of a nature to decay. Strive on untiringly.’” And I realize he’s right. So now I wake up at 2:55AM and meditate until 5AM. When the cat shows up, I check the time. “Look at the clock, friend, it’s 3:08, you’re the one who’s late. Thank you.”

My dad had a rake I would regularly use to rescue insects from drowning at the pond nearby. He hired a bumbling gardener to help with a tree that may have ended up falling on the roof. After the job was done, this gardener used the rake completely heavy-handed and broke its braces. I didn’t see this happening, I just noticed the rake gone and asked my dad about it “The idiot so and so broke it, so I tossed it, I’ll get a new one”. What a tragedy, I thought. That rake had the kamma of a holy monk, having constantly saved sentient beings from certain death for the past 6 or 7 years, and above all, that rake was completely absent of self, unmoved even by scripture, like Bodhidharma would say. Now it was lying in a pile of rubbish somewhere, all broken and useless. One doesn’t need a charnel-ground nearby, filled with corpses, one, two days old, swollen, blue and festering, corpses eaten by crows, hawks, vultures, corpses reduced to a skeleton with some flesh and blood attached to it, corpses blood-besmeared and without flesh, corpses reduced to disconnected bones, scattered in all directions, corpses reduced to dust, to be reminded of the fate of all things subject to existence. A rake, a cat, a shat on azalea will do.

I keep coming back to this thread and I’m not sure why and if I should. But this time I have a good excuse (funny I would need something to excuse myself), this time I have something to offer. I edited a nice and clean version of one of the most important suttas out there, the Mahasatipatthana or The Great Discourse on the Establishing of Mindfulness. This sutta is like a hammer, it’s a tool to be put to practice. It’s short enough for you to memorize it. I also added in there a nice diagram of the 4 noble truths. I hope it’s useful. Hopefully you can appreciate it at any level, even if it’s just as a curious piece of literature. There are many beautiful passages in there. If nothing else, read The Nine Charnel-Ground Contemplations located on the Contemplation of the Body session. It takes like 4 minutes to go through it.

I've made 3 files. A PDF, here:
https://anonfiles.com/v0f7r4T6yf/Mah_satipa_h_na_Sutta_pdf
An epub you can download at:
https://anonfiles.com/x6u8hfTcy4/Mahasatipatthana_Sutta_-_The_Great_Discourse_on_the_Establishing_of_Mindfulness_-_Anonymous_epub
Finally, I've made an html file of it, it's hosted at: https://mahasatipatthana.neocities.org/
I’ll probably post these files and link in another ib or two, we’ll see.

And that’s that, friends. I guess I’ll see you next year, if we live. Or not. Be as it may, I hope you’re well and when/if you’re not, to put in the effort in the right places to be able to bear it.

>>27976
>At one point I tried to convince them to be vegetarians
Cats are obligate carnivores. You'd know that if you learned a bit about biology.

>>23464
Fortunately for me it's the opposite regarding social media: I finally gave up all kinds of social media, including the "alternatives" ones. I only keep twitter and only for following artists I like. As about communications with relatives, I only use viber.

>>28013
The irony of this post is palpable

>>28013
Should newfags message you on IRC?

>>27976
It's good that you're feeding the cats, but you have a right to be annoyed if the cat is waking you up. What purpose could he have for meowing at your window, other than to be let in?
He's being a bother.

>>28013
This better be an avant-garde jest.

>>28014
Oh, I'm sorry for not using chat apps nobody uses!

>>28017
Huh?

>>28019
IRC isn't an app...

Post edited on 7th Feb 2023, 8:14am

>>28021
Can't expect much from somebody who openly shares their social details when they haven't even been asked for them.

>>28013
>>28019
Well, you can't be an oldfag at all, can you?

>>28021
To be fair, there are apps that let you connect to IRC.

>>28019
You're asking oldfags to use something that is popular with newfags. I think that's what other anons are saying is ironic. Then you're saying no one uses it anyway as if that somehow makes it cool? That's a bit insulting.

>>28036
Though that anon is retarded, I think more oldfags use discord than you think. I think it's been mentioned before that a lot of oldfags move on to invite-only channels on whatever instant messaging service, like discord. Many a time I've been on an old forum from the late 90s - early 00s which for some reason now has a discord server. You can be an IRC elitist all you want, but you've gotta admit that discord is convenient.

>>28039
>you've gotta admit that discord is convenient
How? Because instead of posting links to images, you can post the images directly? Discord requires an email address, has global content rules, and you might get hassled about account security or whatever the fuck.

>>28039
I'm almost 35yo, I tried use Discord multiple time, stopped using that shit for good now because that "discord app" is just shameless spyware, and now, is explicit shameless spyware.
They change they privacy policies, now, they are 100% explicit about what they do with our data.

I will use IRC until the last day of my life.

>>26380
I'm 42, autistic. Remember watching Buffy the Vampire and wondering if that was normal life. Re watched it recently and enjoy it more and I'm more at peace with myself. I have a pet Kestrel which keeps me and is too long-lived for me to take myself out anytime soon. Blessed be honestly.

>>26694
I mean you must have been exposed to it by your aprents or whatever, I hated showing anything to my parents and only when I realised i could use headphones did i try anything other than video games

>>28636
Nice necro. I had older college-aged relatives who were into anime when I was a kid and I was always curious about it. My mother sometimes made mocking comments about them (liking those 'Chinese cartoons' or whatever), which made me self-conscious about liking it at that age. I could say more things about both of my parents, but I'll just mention that I wouldn't mind them dying even if it means I'd have to stop being a hiki and get a shitty job.

The realization that I'm now in my late 30s is hitting me hard. The awareness that it's probably too little too late is starting to sink in. I've always felt that I've walked the best possible paths I could in my life despite how things have turned but for the first time in my life that feeling is slowly giving way to a longing sense of regret for what could've been. I'm at a complete loss as to where to go from here, the desire for an end remains but the same cannot be said of the willpower to go through with it. I've never seen myself living to my 40s or 50s but the prospect of it is becoming very real and I'm struggling to reconcile with that reality.

>where the fuck are all the 30+ weebs?
36 here. I'm not dead,just not on social media/message boards much these days. Everything seems so oversaturated anyhow,i just like to chill and listen to my music and watch anime and yt. Its kind of nice not having a rectangle in your face 24/7 .sometimes

>where the fuck are all the 30+ weebs?
IRC and those psuedo-chatrooms like meguca

Just read through most of this thread and wow. I actually did get into anime when I was like 12 and man was it really fun, discovering doujinshi on blog sites and fanboying was really something I guess. I may have been too "rawr XD" to realize how adults saw me (who didn't reveal my age at that time), but I do look back on it weirdly fondly. I have no idea why. I guess I was more passionate about animu? Almost like a pure worldview I guess, before it got ruined by puberty and family problems lol.
>>29462
I'm a like a decade younger than you and I've also stopped using social media and even coming to imageboards as often. A post-2016 internet is nothing worth logging on to anyway. It was kinda bad before that year but pretty much everything has gotten worse since then. I draw and listen to music, youtube is just the source of today's problems so I avoid it unless I truly need it.

>>29466
>>29462
I envy how separated you are from the zeitgeist. For me "keeping up with the times" is like an addiction. Not that I use tiktok, but I waste tons of time looking for bs happenings to occupy my attention.

I just turned 30 and haven't an hero'd yet. I do feel really isolated though. Anime becoming so mainstream really has made connecting with anyone through the communities I used to unbearable. It's only a matter of time til Tohno-chan gets a tiktok made about it and becomes trendy and zoomer infested like lainchan and uboachan.

>>29548
I'm actively opposing my desire to connect with anyone. I am failing hard at opposing other desires, but at least this one doesn't bother me too much. As long as I can dump my mental illness into some postform I'm fine. I don't care if I get responded to or if the response is mean. I just need an anonymous postform. Nothing more. People are unavailable this day. I hope you don't suffer your isolation.

I turned 41 this year and much like >>29462 I avoid most social parts of the internet now, preferring to just watch anime, read the occasional VN or manga, and listen to music. I go through a cycle of working for a few years & then NEETing for a while with my saved up funds which allows me to enjoy my hobbies more so than somebody who works every day would, though at the cost of my retirement; regardless, I digress.

I've known a lot of people over the years, ranging from an old anime MUCK to old IRC channels to several imageboards/forums, and the majority do just move on. They may not quit the internet entirely, but they usually dial back on their hobbies and begin to take a more passive role as life takes over. Additionally, the internet is far more walled now than it used to be despite the rampant centralization of it all; there's a good chunk of "old weebs" that went to platforms such as Twitter and Discord, but these by their very nature are not conductive to open discussion. The former is largely reliant on who-knows-who (much reminiscent of the more ugly parts of IRL) and the latter is quite literally a walled garden where you can't join unless you're granted the secret password. As a result, you'll most likely never encounter these people.

Another aspect I've thought a lot about which I equally assign this to is how a good chunk of people treat this general 'sphere' of hobbies. Anime, manga, VNs, etc. tend to attract a lot of people who use the hobby as a means to socialize rather than socializing because they enjoy the hobby. This results in many people significantly dialing back their interests over time & moving on to other stuff once they've established a group of friends. Whether one considers this bad, intentional, whatever, I don't really care, but it's certainly prevalent.

Cutting the rant short, I believe it a mixture of people moving on due to life; people moving onto walled gardens, which makes them practically nonexistent to anybody outside of said gardens; and people who were never actually that into the hobby in the first place, using it as a means to socialize instead. Those left are either the occasional rare older people who still have a heavy passion for the mediums and still contribute publicly & those like me who hardly ever post anything online. It's a boring answer, but it's that simple; people change and so has the internet.