From: ibshambat@gmail.com   
      
   I have come to the conclusion that people’s actions are not as much a   
   function of their character or personality as it is a function of their   
   beliefs.   
      
   Under Nazism, even the better people behaved in horrible ways because they   
   were practicing a horrible ideology. When that ideology was dispensed with,   
   these same people created a beautiful, peaceful and prosperous country that   
   has exercised a positive    
   role in world affairs. It is unlikely that the whole population changed its   
   character in short time between one and the other. What changed was their   
   beliefs.   
      
   We see some interesting things with feminism. There was one form of feminism   
   in 1960s and 1970s, and completely another in 1990s. The first cultivated the   
   character of compassionate, generous and free-spirited hippie idealism. The   
   second cultivated the    
   character of the harpy. The same people were involved in both. Once again,   
   their innate character did not change; what changed was their beliefs.   
      
   I have watched the same people act in completely different ways depending on   
   what they believed. I have found that the people who were caught in the   
   ideology of survival and competition became mean and were always freaking out.   
   This is the case with even    
   the best people. When they no longer had those beliefs, the change in behavior   
   followed.    
      
   People’s actions are therefore a function of things that drive their   
   behavior. A vast amount of behavior is owed to beliefs. Which means that to   
   correctly impact upon people’s behavior it is necessary to work with their   
   beliefs.   
      
   How much of people’s actions is character and how much it is belief? And how   
   do the two relate to each other? What is the seed and what is the soil? What   
   is the relationship between nature and nurture?   
      
   These questions need to be asked across the board so that insight be achieved.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)