What kind of a father figure deliberately sends his only son away to be tortured and murdered at the hands of barbaric strangers ?

Fact is the bible is chuck full of gratuitous violence, and sex. And sexual violence.
I have no doubt that if you sang it to a hip hop beat it would get a wrapper and an age restriction in every state in the Union.


Or maybe you'd just get a lot of rapper Baptists, i donno.

Actually the point of the article was not that it's wrong to read the bible. I've read a good bit of it, actually, and I'm glad that I did - mainly so I have a handle on the historical and religious context surrounding it. I don't agree with the theology but that's not a good reason to ban it.

The issue is that the state in Hong Kong deems it appropriate to censor, or at least limit accessibility of reading material that it has deemed "inappropriate." What these people are trying to show is that text contained in the bible meets or exceeds those same decency standards but is not censored and is freely available to anyone who wants it. It's a large inconsistency that highlights flaws inherent in the system. Either censor everything, including the bible, or don't censor anything. There's no reason it should get any sort of pass.

Becouse getting advice from 80's talent is SOOO much better thank you for showing me the error of my ways. The Christian faith has a good foundation just the zealots out there suck and ruin it for everyone. I got my basic faith from there as a child. As an adult I dont buy into everything the good book says and even less to what the preacher man says I do NOT beleive any devine being hates anyone and I will never let my set learn hate from anyone or anything its a bit outdated I agree but the idea is still sound.

so over 2000 complaints eh? there's what, like 1 1/2 billion people living there?
I'm sure that the outrage of a 2k really doesn't matter in the long run.

I wonder what would have happened if they had wanted to have quran banned, now there's a violent book.

A lot less then that actually, the population of Hong Kong is nearly 7 million.

Hey read away!

Please, no one knows right from wrong on their own. You have to be taught by society; and religion, no matter what type, is a large part of society. I think the bible, for the most part, is an excellent teaching tool. Unfortunately, it's a little out-dated and doesn't really fit with the times.

You know that Jesus Christ Superstar was probably a more accurate viewing of Jesus. At least in the sense of he's hip rad cool and the show to see. Sounds like what 80's talent was once.

I think what they ought to do is to break up the bible into two parts. Take the old testament and put it in the historical fiction section. Take the new testament and put it in the self-help section, next to the stuff by Deepak Chopra.

Okay, well, three sections - take all the shit by Paul and put it in the Misogynistic Homophobe section.

No I'll be the hated one here. The way I see the article, it was put here not because Hong Kong is censoring, but because there is a push by some (doesn't matter how many or what percentage) to have the Bible censored. Legionnaire points out some very "colorful" passages. They are there and a lot more. If you're looking for it, check out Judges. Not much time? Then the last 3 chapters. Judges 19:29 is particularly shocking.
As far as Hong Kong and censorship go, what could surprise us that they will? This is a place that you could get publicly caned for a minor indiscretion during the day but, does little about underage prostitution at night. (or so it has been reported.) And changes will continue as HK and traditional China hammer out there relationship.
What this has become in the comments is a debate on whether the Bible "gets a free pass" from being censored. The Bible has a rich history of being censored (and is outlawed now in some places.) The history of the Bible in the English language is a very colorful story (for adults) that I find
more interesting than the above Bible quotes.
I'm not debating if there should be cencorship or not, I just think censoring the Bible is a lot like censoring Huckleberry Finn or Chaucer or history books that include a number of seamier details. Most people just aren't familiar with the text.
The Bible needs no free pass. It has done fine without one.

OK. Lot's hot daughter three way is a given. I think you have the wrong take on Ruth. But what about Noah's Wang? Are you talking bout his nakedness being exposed? (as in older translations)

You can buy the old testament alone and the new testament alone and I imagine you can volumes on just the Pauline Episties. You want to give some quotes why in the Misogynistic Homoghobe section?

Oh Christ... Regarding the bible, I place no more credence in it then I do Gulliver's Travels (not to demean the value of Johnathan Swift's work). As far as I'm concerned it is like a condensed readers digest for thousands of years of mythology. Being agnostic, I find it pathetic for people to limit their capacity for thinking about spiritual matters from a single book. Even more, I loathe the thought of others using the bible to prescribe their narrow religious beliefs in order to control others through fear and dominion. God, if such a thing exists, is too vast for human understanding. Certainly the idea and interpretation God is bound to be wrong. Human perspective places too much bias on the matter, tainting and severely limiting the potential for what God (or Gods) may be. The Bible is wrong in this matter from the very beginning, it was not God who created man in his image, but man who created God in his...

As far as Hong Kong is concerned, who am I to judge their decision making. It is only relevant to them that such literature is obscene. We can be critical from afar, but it makes little or no difference unless we decide to invade and indoctrinate them with "our X-ian values" That being said, I don't believe that censorship is really the answer though either. If a society wishes to regress from having knowledge of other ideas, it's their prerogative. It's sad, but again, there is little that be done from without, it's simply their business. On a general level, I completely disagree with any and all forms of censorship. It simply limits out understanding and the enrichment of humanity, it is no different then the controlling and diminutive views of religious fundamentalists.

There are bibles with his drunken nakedness removed? Kinda works toward the point of Christians already censoring themselves, I guess.

As for your Ruth point, I'm just going by the numerous sources I've seen that say that "feet" in Hebrew is a euphemism for genitals. Me, I can't read Hebrew, so I have to take the people who can, word for it.

The overall sad part is, illiteracy used to be kept in place partially so that commoners couldn't read the bible and had to take the monks (or whoever's) word for it. Now we have a whole wide world of supposedly literate people, with all the world's information at their fingertips, who still have their head up their ass when it comes to actually knowing what the bible says.

culturally open-minded? since when is not allowing more than one child open-minded

In Britain it got an 18+ BBFC certificate, and there was a heavily censored version released which was still only given a 15 years and above certificate. So there are very few kids who were allowed to see that film in Britain.

I don't call censorship of the bible cultural open-mindedness on any level, and I don't see it as slipping religion a hospital pass. Some people seem to be of the opinion that it gives people a bad moral view which is why the book should be censored, but if that's the case, we should do it with all religious books and all other works of literature. Which is of course, a ridiculous idea. It's okay to censor the bible but anything else gets censored and its violating freedom of speech? I'm against censoring anything period, no religious book or any book should be censored. If all books started getting censored, Chuck Palahniuk's entire output would vanish in an instant, as would Bret Easton Ellis'. Books just shouldn't censored anywhere, I don't see why the bible should be censored too.

Admittedly we see watered down versions for the kids, but that's true of almost anything. Shakespeare is watered down for kids, somne of the greatest works of literature are 'kiddified' to make them more friendly. It's just a thing about growing up, as far as I'm concerned.

china and hong kong are not exactly the same place bubs. they are connected but they have their own systems in place. the one child policy is china, hong kong is not governed by that.