I’d name them ‘Jack’ and ‘Jill’.
You’re tinkering with the topic of subjectivity meets objectivity, again, and which I have to admit is always a very interesting one. You’ve explained your angle well (not wishing to sound condescending).
I am going to respond, and continue to keep on the side of being definite at all times in one’s understanding on matters. And I think that is the nuance (I like these): the difference between ‘opinion’ and ‘understanding’. You can reason something to be good or bad. Even seemingly neutral areas of existence, which can be told by their effects (again, for good or bad).
I would also exchange the word ‘open’ for ‘awareness’. You can be aware of a great many things without believing you have to be in even neutral agreement. Why is that a sensible idea? Because then, when some matter or other does surface, and maybe one not of a daily occurrence, then you are not starting from ground-zero in terms of getting up to speed.
Why replace the word ‘open’; why not keep open to all God can invite you into? Because not all avenues presented are from God. God is Love. While there do exist enemies of your soul.
On the subject of HipHop, back to this, I would say I am wary…in allowance of remaining a bit open to it. I heard a YouTube evangelist talk about how demons came out of rap music, when he was fairly well known as a performing rapper in some region of the US. I didn’t wholly believe that to be true because I have my own discernment and he was not speaking on behalf of the Vatican. So, I keep a bit of an ‘open mind’, while being wary of the potential dangers, yet not too scrupulous in terms of my listening habits. I would say being aware outweighs openness, if to be concise, as many of the outward effects of HipHop has led to bad attitudes on ‘the streets’ (from white people as much as black; it’s a racially diverse genre in that sense). But there is a lot of bad attitude which stems from it and it has to be said that at least to some degree the music can have an influence which manifests in the presence of social problems.
There is a lot of positive rap music by the top artists such as Wu Tang, as one example, circulating the various web platforms at present, all the same, who are clearly just rappers making music because it’s fun to make and not as a life lesson for murder (one member said in an interview that as a group they always tried to make their music have meaning to it). That said, even the harder tracks I can empathise with as anger is cross-boundaries (I don’t mind sitting here playing through a track by M.O.P).
Here’s the way it was put to me, you do what you want, Free Will is your birthright, but this is how I look at it.
Open minds are constantly seeking knowledge, and their thirst will never be quenched. They will constantly be feeding their mind and constantly be searching for the truth. There is no end to the knowledge they possess, because after all, we are not these bodies nor are we these minds. These are nothing but meat suits, they are vehicles we use in this Dimension to maneuver around and is a vessel for our spirit. We are eternal beings having a hueman experience. We are quite literally love incarnate.
And then you have people who are closed-minded. These are people who refuse to venture beyond the confines of their own worldview. These are people that while they can learn, eventually they will get full. They’re willing to learn but only to an extent. Once again, we live in a Free Will Universe, and in a Free Will Universe, nothing is ever completely off the table. There’s a saying that says “With God anything is possible.” To judge anything is to make up your mind about something, and once you make up your mind, anything else that could possibly be the actual truth is discarded. This is why you question everything and you don’t just go along with what everyone else is doing.
Having an open mind is being able to see the nuance in the nuanced.
But, that’s all I’m saying. You can have an open mind and still know your limits. You can disagree with something, but still learn something from something you disagree with. Why choose one belief system when there are so many schools of thought to choose from? Stop looking at life as a pizza and instead look at life as a buffet. God has given everything you need to innerstand the world around you. And if there’s any mystery in your life at all, it’s because you refuse to see the world through any lense but your own. For an open mind, there is no mystery, there’s only room to learn and grow. But for the closed-mind, there will always be something that won’t make sense, and the only person who’s limiting yourself is yourself.
Ok I’m done lol.
“Meat suits”. I might be sick.
Christ is “Love Incarnate”, to be exact. We can be vessels for love shown towards people, yes - that’s the idea.
“…nothing is ever completely off the table”. You have poison chalices.
There is a difference between “judging” something for good or bad and judging a person. The first is one of the first and sometimes automatic decisions we make whenever faced with a scenario. It is what causes us to make choices one way or the other. And this is also the case on the level of instinct. And which you go on to say: “This is why you question everything and you don’t just go along with what everyone else is doing.”
“Having an open mind is being able to see the nuance in the nuanced.”
This sentence belonging to an inter-dimensional human-being having lived twenty lifetimes in three parallel universes and explored much of what there is in the dictionary and encyclopedia for good or bad. And somehow survived.
“Learn something from something you disagree with” basically translates to, ‘I don’t make the same mistakes as everyone else, while to some extent excusing and even considering participation in what they do.’
“For an open mind, there is no mystery.” We’re not God, so…yes everything in Creation can be explored when as said not all things presented to us in life are good for us.
We’re repeating ourselves but in a variety of ways.
Maybe it is that I don’t treat the word ‘open’ in the same way. An example: I can remain open to a subject, while remaining on the sceptical side.
So, being ‘open’ to an idea can mean in instances where we haven’t made up our minds and yet this is still only enroute to eventually coming to a decision (whether we care less about coming to a decision over a particular thing, or not).
Reaching back to the 60s and 70s, when I was in high school, “rap” was slang for talking, particularly informal but meaningful conversation. I wonder whether rap music was applying this by adding music to the talk. This also seems related to a musical form called “talking blues,” with lyrics spoken rather than sung, in combination with music. I think that Arlo Guthrie’s “Alice’s Restaurant,” which came out in my high school years, was an example of talking blues.
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folk - Is there a connection between talking blues and hip hop/rap? - Music Fans Stack Exchange
These peeps suggest not but an interesting theory, nonetheless. Could have been an influence.