@briankaranja said in Can anybody justify the 7 deadly sins? I'd like to see you try...:
At the beginning all I would like to say is, keep an open mind, and remember that the world is not all unicorns and rainbows.
Here it goes...
Lust
Lust is the desire to experience physical, sensual pleasures (not just those which are séxual). The desire for physical pleasures is considered sinful because it causes us to ignore more important spiritual needs or commandments.
Condemning lust and physical pleasure is part of religion's general effort to promote the afterlife over this life and what it has to offer. It helps lock people into the view that séx and séxuality exist only for procreation, not for love or even just the pleasure of the acts themselves.
Séx is an important aspects of any healthy relationship (excluding the aséxual people here). One of the major reason why most long distance relationships don't last is the lack of touch.
The popularity of lust as a sin can be attested by the fact that more gets written in condemnation of it than for almost any other sin. It's also one of the only Seven Deadly Sins that people continue to regard as sinful.
Lust also acts more deadly for women than men, Donald Trump can say "Grab them by the stuff" or Bill Clinton can have an affair whilst being The President, but nothing happens to them. The moment someone like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez even dances in college all the Alt Right comes out regarding family values and sins and stuff.
Demonizing séx and séxuality keeps people under control of the authorities and then keeps them tied to the religious institutions in their search for happiness.
Let lust take over you, enjoy your life, get a proper relationship, find your own happiness, don't wait for the 72 virgins you will be offered in the heavens!
Have Safe Séx!!!
Gluttony
Gluttony is normally associated with eating too much, but it has a broader connotation that includes trying to consume more of anything than you actually need, food included.
Although consuming less in theory might be appealing, in practice condemning gluttony is a sin has been a good way to encourage those with very little to not want more and to be content with how little they are able to consume, since more would be sinful.
At the same time, though, those who already over-consume have not been encouraged to do with less so that the poor and hungry could have enough.
Greed
Greed is the desire for material gain. It is similar to Gluttony and Envy, but refers to gain rather than consumption or possession.
Condemning greed as a sin keeps people from rebelling again the elite 1% who own 99% of the wealth and keep the rest lingering in poverty, barely surviving and scraping at the bottom of the pile.
No one tells the rich to stop being greedy, they tell the poor to stop wanting more to stop being greedy.
Greed pushes you to make your life better, greed makes you fight injustice. Greed helps you survive in an unjust world.
Sloth
Sloth is the most misunderstood of the Seven Deadly Sins. Often regarded as mere laziness, it is more accurately translated as apathy. When a person is apathetic, they no longer care about doing their duty to others or to God, causing them to ignore their spiritual well being.
Condemning sloth as a sin functions as a way to keep people active in the church in case they start to realize how useless religion and theism really are.
Religious organizations need people to keep active to support the cause, usually described as "God's plan," because such organizations don't produce anything of value which would otherwise invite any sort of income.
People must thus be encouraged to "volunteer" time and resources on pain of eternal punishment. The greatest threat to religion isn't anti-religious opposition because opposition implies that religion is still important or influential.
The greatest threat to religion is really apathy because people are apathetic about things which just don't matter anymore. When enough people are apathetic about a religion, then that religion has become irrelevant.
P.S: It also applies to sending kids to do unpaid internships instead of letting the kid take a semester off.
Wrath
Wrath is the sin of rejecting the Love and Patience we should feel for others and opting instead for violent or hateful interaction. Condemnation of anger as a sin is thus useful to suppress efforts to correct injustice, especially the injustices of political and religious authorities.
Anger is a pretty good motivator to act against apathy and injustice.
Anger fills you with the necessary to get shit done.
Here's a gif from American Gods where god Anansi tells slaves on a slave ship to get angry at their master and rebel.
Envy
Envy is a desire to possess what others have, whether material objects (like cars) or character traits, like a positive outlook or patience. Making envy a sin encourages one to be satisfied with what they have rather than object to others unjust power or seek to gain what others have.
Focusing on the feelings of envy and condemning them rather than the injustice causing those feelings allows injustice to continue unchallenged.
Why should we rejoice in someone obtaining power or possessions which they shouldn't have? Why shouldn't we grieve over someone benefiting from injustice?
For some reason, injustice itself is not considered a deadly sin.
So use the envy to fight the wrong, to motivate you to fight the injustice.
Let envy work for you to bring out a better version of yourself.
Pride
According to the Aristotle, a person is proud if he both is and thinks himself to be worthy of great things. If he both is and thinks himself to be worthy of small things, he is not proud but temperate.
On the other hand, if he thinks himself worthy of great things when he is unworthy of them, he is vain; and if he thinks himself worthy of less than he is worthy of, he is pusillanimous.
Vanity and pusillanimity are vices, whereas pride and temperance are virtues because (by definition) they reflect the truth about a person's state and potentials.
It's certainly true that people can be overconfident in their own abilities and that this can lead to tragedy, but it's also true that too little confidence can prevent a person from achieving their full potential. If people won't acknowledge that their achievements are their own, they won't recognize that it is up to them to keep persevering and achieving in the future.
Condemning pride as a sin keeps you exploring yourself, it keeps you bound the definitions society attaches to one and keeps you under control.
In short, be proud of your pride. Cultivate it. Give it a free rein. Let it work for you!
And now that we are done with the sins, come to think of it these so called "sins" were made sins way back in a time of anarchy where questioning the church and the king were heresy.
In today's world a democratic government survives on people questioning it.
Anything in excess can be a sin, while playing outdoor sports is considered good and not a sin, doing so at the cost of your grades, and family is a sin.
The sins defined above are nothing more than elements of control tied around you by the church and the ruling authority..
Break free from the control..
SIN!!
