Question for the sane..

[missweirdness.livejournal.com]

I know that the festival of the supreme being hastened Maxime's fall but certaintly he must of known this, right? Why didn't anyone stop him? I mean why did the CPS and convention or any of his allies ever stopped him? And how in the hell, did they let him stage IT?!! Did they not have any sense either? I'm seriously wondering that xD I mean..that's bugged me when i read all sorts of things on it but they never explained why. Unless..everyone was on crack..then i can totally understand.


>.> and expect some fanart from me in a few days time. Hahah, i have some other twisting ideas that should be fun to draw xD *cracks up*

and on a total unrelated note: The CPS's table. Their table. I swear to the supreme being that i keep thinking it's circle or oval rather than a rectangle or SQUARE; =/ (which still pisses me off that we were lied that a square and rectangle were DIFFERENT shapes, not a special type of rectangle or special type of square. whatever =/ IGNORE ME xD Ranting a lot xD)

Comments

[sibylla-oo.livejournal.com]

Just a detail: La Fête de l'Être Suprême was actually a big popular success, unlike it's shown in RF.Les années terribles. It was many members of the Convention, especially the atheists, who were appalled by the Fête. But on the popular level, it was well-received and interpreted as a reconciliation of the regime with the religious people.

[missweirdness.livejournal.com]

doesn't seem like it would; but i'm just wondering why the other members of the convention were so offended by. They must of thought something about it xD But i still can't believe they let him do that. =( I'm quite jealous about that.

[sibylla-oo.livejournal.com]

They were offended, because they were convinced (rightfully, imo) that the institutions of the government should not promote any religious belief. Some of them were more extreme thinking that the government should promote the godlessness instead.

[missweirdness.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure, because since i live in America and i see everyday on my currency and any state documents, "In god we trust"(and believe me since I work at a fast food joint, it's a lot); it kind of feels that my government is promoting a religious belief on us, the citizens; Though it shouldn't be done, yet no one really objected too much except for the people..well you know those people and atheists.

I'm starting to think i've been brainwashed by my government =O

So, for me, I don't see a problem in what Maxime was doing; so i can't really understand how they really thought and felt about this. Maybe it was rightly thought it shouldn't be, but how can i possibly understand, if i'm a product of said thing? It makes one wonder on these things, you know?

It just feels odd. I wonder if we're the only country that does this..maybe there is more..?

[sibylla-oo.livejournal.com]

Well, for your first point:
I'd say, yes, you might be right :D Sorry, bad joke. I mean, it's really against the principle of secularism (laïcité) or religious neutrality. What about the atheists and the polytheists?
Well, yes, they are other countries that do the same: Iran and Saudi Arabia, for example XDDDDD Sorry, I do feel like making bad jokes today (it's true, nevertheless)

[missweirdness.livejournal.com]

Yeah tis ok. If you live in america you have to deal with all that. You are good. jokes are great. Thats why i never really was like Maxime did a bad thing. It blows my mind that he can actually do that. Still reading an entire essay on his religious beliefs doesnt strike me as weird. but why do historians then consider a blemish on him cuz of that festival if it succeeded at the lower levels? that should matter right? i would think so. you know? but government is kind of funny like that.

[victoriavandal.livejournal.com]

I think the religious aspect of the French Revolution is really underestimated/underplayed by historians. It's actually something that historians tend to ignore generally - it's hard for well-educated Westerners to think themselves into a mindset that genuinely believed in hell fire and eternal damnation. For example, look how Thomas More is portrayed in Robert Bolt's play - as a 20thc liberal dying for a principle, rather than what was more likely to be the case, that he was someone who believed being beheaded was better than having his soul damned for eternity (!).

The atheist campaign in France allowed Royalists to incite rural peasants - more religious than urban people - into what was in effect a 'jihad', a 'holy war' against atheist infidels, i.e., the Jacobins and others of urban Paris. The atheists were attempting a reformation that went even further, and at very high speed, than the other religious reformations elsewhere in Europe, which had taken centuries - and a lot of bloodshed - to achieve. The 'Supreme Being' was an attempt to calm things down and seek a middle course with a state religion. It may look bonkers and very very kitsch from this distance but I think it was an attempt to pour oil on troubled waters.

[sibylla-oo.livejournal.com]

Yes, the religious question is downplayed not only in the movies and fiction books on the Revolution, but also, and even more ahistorically, when other, earlier periods are dealt with. Your example of More is very pertinent.

[victoriavandal.livejournal.com]

We have Charles Darwin on the £10 note! (England/Wales/Northern Ireland - Scotland prints its own notes).

[lucilla-1789.livejournal.com]

I've wondered about that, as a foreigner in UK. There's like a cult of Darwin. He's everywhere.

[victoriavandal.livejournal.com]

He's been on the money for years, but this year was the 200th anniversary of his birth, so there are a lot of exhibitions, tv programmes etc. on him. I heard that the new feature film with Paul Bettany can't get a distributor in the USA! That's extraordinary - the religious lobby is so powerful there.

[sibylla-oo.livejournal.com]

Talking about good films about scientists and the religious lobbies: GO TO SEE AGORA, it's a great, great film.

[estellacat.livejournal.com]

As sibylla_oo rightly points out, the FdlES was a popular success, but it's also important to remember that Robespierre was not the only Conventionnel who supported it. Too often it's been presented as Robespierre's pet project that he imposed on a kind of modern, secularist Convention. There were certainly atheist Conventionnels (and, less, openly, those who remained Catholic as well) who thought the idea was harmful and/or ridiculous, but a great many of them were deists like Robespierre, albeit with varying degrees of conviction. They placed the Constitution of 1793 under the auspices of the Supreme Being without Robespierre's instigation, and though he was a strong supporter of the FdlES and played an important role in the ceremony as president of the Convention - his religious convictions were assuredly not foreign to his election to this position at that particular moment - it was not originally his idea.

Whatever *we* might think of the idea of the FdlES, we need to keep that separate from how it was perceived at the time. If the question is, why didn't Robespierre's friends and allies stop him from supporting and then presiding the FdlES, then the answer is likely,
a) many of them thought it was a good idea too,
b) they didn't necessarily recognize, lacking the hindsight of historians, that this would contribute to his downfall (remember, they don't know about Thermidor at that point), and
c) even if they did feel that the FdlES would be impolitic, people tend to forget just how idealistic the Robespierristes were; not everything was raw political maneuvering with them: sometimes they just did things because they accorded with their principles. (On the political side of it, however, there's also the issue that Robespierre throughout his career always thought it more important to be popular with the people than with his colleagues in whatever assembly he belonged to, and by that criterion, the FdlES was a success, as mentioned above.)

[missweirdness.livejournal.com]

See you saying that, makes me more sense than what i read. They really just make it seem like HE was behind everything and no one really supported by him. That clears a lot about that..=) thankies.

[estellacat.livejournal.com]

You're welcome. I recommend reading Mathiez's article on the subject, if you haven't already. I posted a translation a while back.

[missweirdness.livejournal.com]

Though i do remember reading an essay about his religious views in my new book xD The 50 dollar Robespierre book. It was good none to say the least. But it didn't stick with me. I think i'll read it. Thanks for that also. It's just so hard sometimes to figure these things out when it's passed over so vaguely.