Watched 'Inner Worlds, Outer Worlds' the other day (got a link from PD). Not so much a documentary as an exposition. This was actually really good - it's sort of a modern (western/hippy) overview of Hindu philosophy/cosmology, but with various other traditions chucked in and quite a bit of science - and excellent 'trippy' visuals. I like a lot of the hindu tradition, except where it disagrees with science too much (or gets involved in social issues (castes etc)) - this doc didn't really give me any trouble on the science front (except maybe the stuff about chakras) - don't get me wrong: it isn't science, but if you want to entertain some spirituality without ditching your science this film's pretty good. Proto-dawkins-types should have to argue (in detail) against this stuff rather than going for the easy abrahamic targets.
Officially intrigued by that. P&S did a poll years back about one's "favourite religion". I objected on grounds of being a bleedin' moronic way to phrase the question and was the one and only vote for Hinduism. Is a fascinating thing is Hinduism. Not so much on the surface level - the bits and shits that we'd laugh at any "Western" religion for - but on the "deeper" truths. If there is any truth to any religion (in the actually religious sense) it's very clearly Hinduism that has it on the money. The One is all that exists - I am you as you are me as we are me and we are all together and all that: there is only One. But that is in imbalance cos if you slop one of anything on the scale it drops like a stone with nothing to counterbalance. Nothing of interest happens. So the One has to split into many cos that's when interesting things happen. All that bullshit about castes and stuff is the Hindu equivalent of beating yourselves with sticks and flails cos some 11th century monk missed a letter during scribing school one afternoon. It's utterly irrelevant to what is being said but is easy to pick up on to stratify society to the benefit of the few. That's not what it's all about in Hinduism as I perceive it.
Buddhism tried to vary this theme and did so successfully. It took away some of the more "base" 'gods' and 'godesses' stuff which was never a real part of the true religion - was for the uneducated. Such was life back then. Simplify and control. Has that changed? Don't think so. The base tenets of Hinduism are truly profound as far as religion goes. It's as close to a sense of "wider" reality as I can get in my own life. It works scientifically too (ayurveda and whatever aside). You have to drop prejudices and be prepared to hack away at the undergrowth to see wood amongst the trees though. As far as religions go though, it's as close as any of us will ever likely get to reality I suspect.
And in almost (but actually not at all) unrelated news...
After Porn Ends
Feature length doc on... well... what it says really. I've

'd porn since almost before I can remember knowing of such things. Partly for the obvious reasons, mostly for the (perhaps) less obvious ones. I

it for it's reality. It's truth. Almost no other media on Earth will bring you these things. Again, not on the surface level necessarily but scratch the surface by barely a fingernail's worth and all human life is there and there in ways not seen elsewhere.
Of almost surprising interest to me in this particular doc is those ex-pr0ns*s that "found god". I know I have a certain... history with that particular topic but man are they fukked up so much more than the others. It's plain for all to see. The film seems fairly (surprisingly given subject matter) balanced. There are many human stories to be had... but the only ones that reek of falsity, bullshit, hypocrisy and pain are those that claim to have found god. Unsurprisingly, it's always the Xtian god that fucks them over. What is it about the American interpretation of that particular Middle Eastern deity that goes so very, very wrong? Is bizarre. Also saddening cos they look... seem... so very lost. Compare and contrast with Nina Hartley or Seka and it kinda sums it up. You are in control and the very second to try to pass that off on to some ancient war god you are screwed. Which is utterly fukked cos that's the one considered most acceptable in the "West" as we see it
