Another big reason is reason number 4

4. Gives a sense of community and cultural connection that other things don't quite provide.

I've met a not so inconsequential amount of people in my life that when pressed admitted, they don't believe in god, don't believe in the moral teachings, but attend a place of worship because they think there is no replacement for the interwoven community and cultural connection their place of worship provides. Many people simply like the community connection of their root culture. This is especially true in minority groups (black church, synagogue).

When I was traveling in South Korea they had these at some counter service and fast food restaurants. Since often people didn't speak English and I don't speak Korean they were immensely helpful. They had several languages and settings that made ordering so much easier. From an accessibility standpoint they are awesome.

That's not my understanding about how modern arranged marriages most commonly happen in the Indian community. For the most part it isn't really that different from a blind date that your parents arranged and participate in overseeing. Many people go through several arrangements before they find someone suitable to marry. Also many people work within both the westernized system of dating and the arranged system until they find a partner. For the vast majority of modern arrangements both parties have broad latitude to back out.

Only in the most conservative and extreme households do people receive coercive pressure to marry against their will. You'll find that more in rural India than among expatriates.

Also many men and women still prefer the arranged system as they find dating cumbersome, awkward or time consuming.

The reason you should accept other cultures is partly because of how much ignorance and presumptive reasoning your carry into you decision making process...

Tupac was also political, he wasn't just some artist. He's like if Killer Mike was 50 times as famous. I think you're right about how death transforms someone's legend, but I think Tupac was set to be as famous as Snoop Dogg is now. Accept with the political drive to be a cultural revolutionary. I doubt he would have faded into history like he was ja rule or some shit.

The latter, it's the latter.

Dividing into camps along political lines and shouting at each other is what happens out in the world. It’s not supposed to happen at church.

Wait, I thought this was their main feature...

The comedian Emo Philips has a well-known joke about religion that may explain some of the decline in membership... "Once I saw this guy on a bridge about to jump. I said, "Don't do it!" He said, "Nobody loves me." I said, "God loves you. Do you believe in God?"

He said, "Yes." I said, "Are you a Christian or a Jew?" He said, "A Christian." I said, "Me, too! Protestant or Catholic?" He said, "Protestant." I said, "Me, too! What franchise?" He said, "Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Baptist or Southern Baptist?" He said, "Northern Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist or Northern Liberal Baptist?"

He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region, or Northern Conservative Baptist Eastern Region?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region." I said, "Me, too!"

Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1879, or Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912." I said, "Die, heretic!" And I pushed him over."

I imagine that was entirely their point.

I think this cultural blame on SUV/truck drivers is misguided, and I pedal a bike to work and share a car with my wife. While I try to make responsible decisions, the impact I can have on the environment is tiny in comparison to large corporations and billionaires. Largely my "sacrifice" is meaningless, past giving me exercise and making me feel good about my decisions. If every middle income or poor person in the world did their best within the system to make responsible environmental decisions we would still be headed to, and in, a climate catastrophe. Policy has to change and corporations have to be forced into making more responsible decisions. An electric car is still an incredibly inefficient use of energy. But I can't force my city to add public transit to make not owning a car viable. Large properties and spread out infrastructure is also killing the environment, but I can't personally force city councils across the country to scale back single family zoning in favor of multi use zoning.

The main place regular people are failing is not what they drive, but who they vote for, imo.

This is me right now, I spent ~$2k on a bike 11 months ago instead of getting a second car for our household and had no idea if it would work out. At 1500 miles, almost all commuting, definitely worth the money. I back of napkin calculated that it pays for itself somewhere between 2k-3k miles with saved gas, wear and tear, etc. Also my wife wanted to buy a Tesla as a second car, and me leaving her the car during the workday has essentially saved us ~$45k in that respect. In better shape, eating better, sleeping better, and bike commuting has a lot to do with it.