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PaperclipPerfector  2d ago (text post)   1660 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for May 18, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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I finished The Man in the High Castle last week. Pretty good, although I still preferred A Scanner Darkly. It made me want to play Wolfenstein The New Order again.

A few months ago I was asking for recommendations for books about Catharism. A few weeks ago it came up in conversation with my aunt, who recommended The Perfect Heresy, which I'm now about 30 pages into. It's a fascinating reminder that there's nothing new under the sun. If I told you I was reading a book about a faction of elites who:

  • believe that there's no distinction between men and women, and the thing that defines us is an ineffable immaterial essence
  • don't have children, a decision they justify on utilitarian grounds
  • practise a plant-based diet

am I talking about French heretics in the 12th century, or woke Western PMCs today?

The topic of this past Sunday’s homily at my parish touched on how Gnosticism is the great heresy from which many smaller heresies sprang.

Is that the one where it started out as some kind of heresy and then it kind of solidified into almost an ethnic group long after no one could even remember what the original heresy was? Or am I thinking of something else?

You’re thinking of the Cagots, who were treated like pariahs for hundreds of years. No one really knows why, as they seemed similar in every way to the surrounding population, except for pariah status, which besides the strict social segregation restricted their trade to carpentry.

This has led one writer to speculate they were the descendants of a fallen medieval guild of carpenters (?). There’s the national myth theory that makes them the descendents of the muslim warriors who lost to Charles Martel when he stopped the islamic expansion in 732. There’s one etymological-based theory where they were the slaves of the ancient visigoths (“cani gothi”, dogs of the goths). There’s the reverse uno card theory that says they were the first to convert to christianity and the surrounding pagans kept resenting them for their virtue signaling long after they themselves converted.

But one of the top theories is that they were descendents of cathars. And the imo most likely, is that they were descendents of lepers, because a lot of the prohibitions involve touching.

I'm not sure, you may be thinking of something else.

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