Shirley MacLaine asks: Were Holocaust victims paying for sins in past lives?

[Nuclear Unicorn]

Outrage as Shirley MacLaine asks: Were Holocaust victims paying for sins in past lives? (and did 'her friend' Stephen Hawking bring his devastating disease on himself?)

Her bizarre New Age views on topics such as reincarnation and UFOs have often left the public baffled.

Now Shirley MacLaine has provoked widespread fury by claiming the victims of the Holocaust may have brought their fate upon themselves.

The veteran Hollywood actress suggests the six million Jews and millions of others systematically murdered in Hitler’s death camps in the 1940s were ‘balancing their karma’ for crimes committed in past lives.

She also suggests that cosmologist Professor Stephen Hawking may have subconsciously given himself his debilitating motor neurone disease.


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2951513/Outcry-Shirley-MacLaine-asks-Holocaust-victims-paying-sins-past-lives-Comments-attacked-offensive-wrong-Jewish-campaigners.html#ixzz3Rff4ScVw

[Warren DeMontague]

1. Woo Train Comin'

get on board

[zappaman]

2. I prefer the slow train myself.

[Archae]

26. More like Crazy Train.

[Rex]

102. She has gone off the rails with this one...I didn't think she could outdo herself

but boy was I wrong!

[TeeYiYi]

3. Jayzuss...

Even if a person believed that, who the fuck would say it out loud?
Horrifying uber FAIL for Shirley MacLaine.

TYY

[Tree-Hugger]

4. I wonder

Who the hell she pissed off in her own past lives in order to be reincarnated as some halfwit, offensive, brainless asshole.

[leftyladyfrommo]

5. Lots of people who believe in reincarnation think like that.

Those ideas are not new.

For instance, the people in N. Korea were guilty of some awful crimes in past lives. They are paying for it in this life.

Or the people who carried out the Holocaust will all be stuck in awful situations in a later life.

People who live with horrible illness are paying for sins of another lifetime. Or they may simply be living that life time so that other people who have been reborn with them will learn lessons that they need to learn.

One incarnation lasts only a second in time. You come, you face tests, you die and then are reincarnated again to learn other lessons.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

9. So, where would that leave the tormentors? Do they now carry a karmic debt?

It'd be one big tragic cosmic merry go round.

[leftyladyfrommo]

40. I guess.

If you do something terrible you pay for it in spades in future lives. Being reincarnated onto this human plane is an incredible blessing because it is the only plane where we have the ability to improve ourselves. Compassion and goodness lead to better future incarnations.

You have to remember that we reincarnate over and over again for eons and eons back to forever because there is no beginning. There will not be an end until all sentient beings have achieved Buddhahood. There is no creator god. There is only karma. And yet it is all guided by something but I don't have a clear picture of what that something is.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

41. That doesn't really answer my question.

To say the victims of the Holocaust are paying a debt for past misdeeds is one thing but what about the camp guards?

Have the personnel running the concentration camps now incurred a karmic debt?

[sibelian]

43. It's a bit of a fuck up isn't it?

Cos, you know if the camp guards have to suffer in this world in some future incarnation for their awful acts, presumably someone has to inflict that suffering and then THEY have to pay, and someone has to extract that payment .... on and on and on...

It's actually a pretty horrible idea.

[leftyladyfrommo]

49. That's the reason it is so important to live a good life.

Living a good life wipes out a lot of bad karma. And it insures a better life in future reincarnations

But you have to remember that the essence of each person can also be reincarnated on other planes. There are hells out there. And planes where the saints live in divine heavens. It is not all happening on this earthly plane.

[leftyladyfrommo]

46. Yes. A huge one. Probably lasting for eons of reincarnations.

It's a huge vicious cycle that never ceases. And it would include anyone that participated in such atrocities.

The whole idea of Buddhism is to practice meditation and follow all the moral laws and doing that will eventually - after eons - set you free from this ever turning wheel.

An eon is the time it would take for a bird carrying a silk scarf in its beak to fly over a mountain peak and wipe the scarf against the stone as it went by once a year. When the mountain is worn down that is the end of an eon. In other words, an unimaginable length of time.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

48. If someone executes a punishment imposed by an outside party (in this case, karma)

then they aren't committing a sin or a crime, they're fulfilling a duty.

If someone seeks to murder a person without justification we would call that a sin/crime but if an officer of the law killed the would-be murderer the officer would be fulfilling a duty and would be blameless. Indeed, the idea of then holding the officer to be as guilty as the murderer seems shocking.

Why would karma employ others as the agents of its effects then punish those agents?

The alternative is to suggest the Nazis will NOT be held to account and are actually a force for Good (which is still an implication of karma).

[leftyladyfrommo]

50. I think they would actually do both.

You can't murder someone. Killing anything racks up karma. As does lying. Or engaging in unnatural sex (however that is defined). You have to really live a moral life. Having compassion for all sentient beings is a huge part of this.

But you could be an agent and rack up negative karma at the same time.

I've got to go do some work. I'll think about that one. The whole concept of karma gets very complicated. And it is even more confusing when you realize that all of this is just a huge illusion anyway. Freedom lies in breaking through the illusion. It literally takes forever.

[sibelian]

53. Unnatural sex?

What's that?

[leftyladyfrommo]

58. Buddhists are pretty conservative about sex.

Monks are celibate. Sex is too powerful a distraction and can pull you right off the path.

For regular people they would say normal sex is OK. But not the kinky stuff. Fill in the blanks however you want. I don't know that it is specifically defined.

[sibelian]

60. Afraid of the dark, are they?

I'm not.

[leftyladyfrommo]

65. They are very moral people.

I would imagine that becoming engulfed in sex would also carry a pretty heavy karmic load.

Sex is tricky. It is such a powerful force. And it is perfectly possible to waste your whole life that way. A lot of people do waste their incarnations. Not just with sex but by doing other immoral stuff. Like working on Wall Street? Infinite number of ways to completely waste your life.

I think what really counts is not what awful things you may have done in the past but what you are like when you die. If at the end of your life you have become a compassionate soul then you wipe out a whole lot of bad stuff from the past.

[sibelian]

66. Wellllll....

Never would I deny that sex has power, particularly not in the arena of BDSM.

To place oneself in helplessness and humiliation in another's hands is a powerful thing, oh yes, it certainly is. Ancient wounds can be healed, or made worse.

You have to know what you're doing.

Yes, it's possible to forget the purpose behind it and simply revel in the ceremonialisation of suffering. That cannot be denied.

I am sad, sometimes, at the state of BDSM these days. Consent is only the beginning. In BDSM there must also be love, the deepest love, the strongest, that love which transcends pain, fear, judgement and contempt. The love must be true. These days, it is not always there.

It's like working in a nuclear reactor. One must know the rules and obey them.

And, yes. It is perfectly possible to waste your whole life on sex.

[leftyladyfrommo]

67. Here's the deal.

You only have this one incarnation on the human plane and your time is very limited. And there is a huge amount that needs to get done. You simply don't have time to waste on things that are counterproductive. And there is no telling how many eons it will be before you get back here so that you can continue your work.

There is no time to lose. But a huge amount can be accomplished if you really work at it. It takes a long time to develop a truly compassionate heart.

Preoccupation with sexual stuff is just one of many dead end paths.

[sibelian]

74. If they ARE counterproductive, yes.

But the separation of the body and mind is not a facet of a compassionate heart. The body is no more than an extension of the soul itself.

Of all the people I have met, those who take the symbols and processes of dominance and submission, hate and fear, which are the weapons of indifference and destruction, and ruin them in the furnace of love, such that only the heart is revealed, are the most compassionate.

It is unwise to treat it as a short-cut and to reveal your humbled self to anyone can be painful. But to have your humbled self accepted is love. Love is love. It is always known. It is not a "dead" end but THE end, the end of fear, the end of reflexive self-loathing, from which the loathing of all other things proceeds.

[Dont call me Shirley]

75. Rape

[Lordquinton]

82. So... Rape is unatural sex

but being raped is kharmic punishment?

[Dont call me Shirley]

84. Rape is unnatural sex...

To the one being raped, rape feels unnatural and wrong, as it is unnatural. To the one doing the raping, it may feel "natural" to them as they are in a state of addiction to violence.

Relate this to a cigarette smoker, the smoker addicted to tobacco has created the act of inhaling a puff as "natural". But smoking is addiction and therefore unnatural, conning the addicted into believing smoking is a natural feeling. Really the natural state of a human being is that of a non-smoker.

Violence is an addiction, not a natural human state.

[Lordquinton]

85. What did you just say?

Cause it sounded to me like you just doubled down on victim blaming.

Is the person being raped participating in unnatural sex? Does being raped fall under unatural sex, or is it deserved punishment for a karmic misdeed in a past life? Or both? Or neither?

[Dont call me Shirley]

86. Rape is unnatural sex, period.

I wasn't relating "Rape is unnatural sex" to victim blaming or karmic repayment.

The person being raped is being forced against their will into participating in an act of unnatural sexual violent aggression.

Rape is the blame/fault of the rapist/aggressor.

But putting rape into a karmic repayment situation, the person being raped has then repaid a bad karmic debt they owed by creating bad karma for themselves earlier in their existence, whether in present life or past life. The person doing the raping is creating a bad karmic debt for themselves, which the will have to repay sometime in the future.

[Lordquinton]

87. What a horrific philospohy

Truly appalling what people rationalize.

[Dont call me Shirley]

89. Are you talking about the "rape is unnatural sex" philosophy or the "karmic" philosophy?

The bible explains karmic philosophy as an eye for an eye. Universal vengeance, if you will. Neither one of those beliefs teach people how to stop harming and begin living in harmony with all.

The real shocker is that any one human can accept that rape is a natural human behavior.

[Lordquinton]

90. The Kharmic philosophy

Any human can accept that rape is natural, this is true, but you just said that Kharmic philosophy states that the rape victim deserved it, and that's the horrific part.

[Dont call me Shirley]

106. Yes it is horrific.

As a victim/survivor of repeated rape I can tell you that I did not deserve that, nor did I deserve the way my parents and community treated me me after the rapes.

We must create an working belief system which uplifts people, allows for gentle correction of behavioral errors and which the ultimate goal is honoring the goodness within each one of us.

[alphafemale]

51. Reincarnation theory is just another horrid rationalization of atrocity.

OK you were three.

You were beaten, raped, had your head shaved and were died gasping for breath, and trampled under naked panicked people with no one to comfort you because you were separated from your parents back at that train.

You must have been a beast in your last life. Along with every other of the 8 million people slaughtered in those few years.

Reincarnation is such total horseshit.

[leftyladyfrommo]

61. It's an explanation for atrocities. It's not an excuse.

Those behaviors are never excusable. And, like I said, the karmic debt of having committed such atrocities would be huge.

[KittyWampus]

68. "you only live once" is a rationalization of making victimhood a cult. According to materialists

we are all unwilling victims of circumstances.

[AtheistCrusader]

81. What a convenient way to blame the victim.

[mainer]

6. So rich, beautiful people deserve to be that way?

Because they were so good in a past life?

Donald Trump must love her.

[Dont call me Shirley]

14. These are creating very bad karma for themselves. They may look beautiful on the outside

but on the inside they are ogres of the worst kind.

[pipi_k]

33. I'm not so sure

that being rich and beautiful is a guarantee of spiritual happiness.

People can be rich and miserable. Or beautiful and miserable.


I mean, just look at, for instance, Whitney Houston. Beauty. Fame. Money. An awesome gift for singing.

Miserable. Tortured inside. Died way too young.

Anyone who thinks someone like Donald Trump is truly happy hasn't really paid attention...

[leftyladyfrommo]

69. Buddhist monks don't own anything.

They have two sets of robes and a begging bowl. One of the real dead ends is owning stuff. Besides you don't really own anything anyway. That is just another huge illusion.

I would think that rich, beautiful people need to find their way clear of that lifestyle.

[Xipe Totec]

7. Pathetic attempt to remain in the public eye. nt

[world wide wally]

8. So then, what were Republicans in their past life?

Village idiots?

[Dont call me Shirley]

13. Witch burners.

[LiberalElite]

18. They probably were but

why would they then be village idiots now?

[3catwoman3]

34. They are village idiots...

...in their present lives as well.

[eShirl]

10. What is, "No," Alex.

[BeyondGeography]

11. What a fucking idiot

[DisgustipatedinCA]

57. By the way, I'm the one addressing you as Fuckstain in the alert you'll see soon.

Have a great day.

[Ilsa]

78. Man, I wish I had been here earlier to read

that one. I don't think I've seen one nasty enough on DU for "fuckstain."

[DisgustipatedinCA]

79. called the other person the "C" word, right out of the gate.

Also accused the other poster of having shit for brains (or similar wording, I don't remember). I think this one lasted a total of 3 posts.

[BeyondGeography]

80. Lol...Missed the whole thing

I too wondered wth? That guy had joined in 2003 and then, at long last, his great moment came, falling on his sword for Shirleykins.

Glad we could flush him out.

[Hekate]

99. 2003? Makes you wonder how many other accounts he had/has. Yeesh. nt

[Dont call me Shirley]

12. Reincarnation and Karma are beliefs held by over 25% of the worlds population, including

Buddhism, Hinduism, Zen, and more.

http://berkleycenter.georgetown.edu/essays/karma-hinduism

http://www.zen-georgia.org/ZenFaq.html

[melman]

15. That doesn't mean it's not bullshit

[bigwillq]

17. FTW!

[Dont call me Shirley]

21. We truly DO NOT KNOW

[sibelian]

55. Sure love to behave as if we know, though, don't we?

Wonder why that is...

[Dont call me Shirley]

77. To what "we" are you referring? You and I? Society at large?

People frequently mistake belief for Truth. People fear stepping out of the group beliefs for fear of ostracization by the group. It is difficult living the life of an outcast. Therefore it is more achingly comfortable to remain in the realm of the group-think than to step into the realm of Truth.

[wheniwasincongress]

62. Which is why

one should not believe anything when there isn't proof for it - reincarnation, for example.

[TM99]

24. True, and these religions

do not teach those who follow these beliefs that the bullshit that Shirley MacLaine is spewing is loving, compassionate, or even likely.

I can't see H.H. the Dalai Lama coming out with a quote like that.

[Dont call me Shirley]

30. Her quotes were over the top agreed.

[Codeine]

59. So? Republican beliefs are held by an

even larger percentage of people in this country and those ideas are still utterly idiotic.

[sakabatou]

16. Where's my clue-by-four?!

[LittleBlue]

19. What the... Holocaust karma? Giving yourself ALS?

Kids, don't do drugs. Or any New Age shit.

[ScreamingMeemie]

20. Is Shirley MacLaine trying to find a way to stay relevant?

That is the truly the question.

[Smarmie Doofus]

31. If so, she's going about it the hard way.

This stuff ( western style "reincarnation&quot was faddishly popular in the 80's-90s.

But it ran its course a long time ago.

Common sense, newer spiritual fads and a gradual accretion of experience and wisdom overtook the masses. Crowding out the "multiple lives" thing.

I'm surprised she's still hawking it. She used to be pretty smart at least.

USED to be.

[Agnosticsherbet]

22. 11 million people were killed during the Holocaust: Jews, Jeohvah's Witnesses, homosexuals, disabled

people, and Gypsies. And I am supposed to believe that they did something so heinous in a past life that they deserved to be murdered.

Bullshit.

[Hekate]

92. In addition, many of them were children.

[Beringia]

23. She is going to be in hot water because of that one.

[Warren DeMontague]

25. Shirley MacLaine has no clue what she's talking about. Utahraptor, on the other hand, GETS IT.

[Archae]

27. The older cartoon "Tiny Toons" had a character "Shirley McLoon/The Loon"

Into all that new age crap.

(Although I do like the music!)

[cherokeeprogressive]

28. WE'RE paying.

For HER past sins.

[still_one]

29. Yup blame the victim Shirely, you have now joined the crazies

[jwirr]

32. You have it wrong Shirley. They were innocent victims of sin.

[Luminous Animal]

35. Shirley MacLaine is an asshole. She's been an asshole for a long time.

[ND-Dem]

36. She's a big democratic donor, or used to be. like her brother warren.

[Luminous Animal]

37. Well, then. She's an angel.

[randys1]

52. I dont believe in angels. I think she has the right position on most things, the mature adult

liberal position.

At the same time she has been engulfed by a form of religion that isnt any better than any other.

There is no such thing as reincarnation or karma etc.

There is life and death and a whole lotta craziness in the interim

She is one of the best along with Meryl actors, male or female, in history.

[AverageJoe90]

38. Oh dear, Shirley.....you've gone off the deep end for sure.

[RiffRandell]

39. I predict an apology coming.

I've been watching the Nazi rise on the History channel lately and the camp footage makes me sick to my stomach. It's still so unbelievable that it happened.

[MuttLikeMe]

42. Some (or most maybe) CHristians believe the same thing.

That the holocaust was karma for rejecting Christ.

[Hekate]

93. I don't think so. It's a medieval point of view no longer shared by the vast majority ofChristians.

[calimary]

103. Welcome to DU, MuttLikeMe!

Glad you're here! It's amazing what religion will convince people to think.

I found a FABULOUS quote about it - I think it's Deepak Chopra:

"I believe that God gave us truth and the devil said let’s organize it and call it religion."

[Marrah_G]

44. Dementia maybe?

[Hekate]

94. Probably not. But this addled view of "karma" really is the dark side of New Age woo.

[HappyMe]

45. She's an idiot.

What a horrible thing to say.

She's been a taco short of a combo plate for years.

[fadedrose]

47. Who was perfect in a previous life?

Clearly, it was the millionaires and billionaires who live in luxury with no sickness or heartache or any kind.

That explains everything.

[leftyladyfrommo]

70. They don't live a life of no sickness or heartache.

They have huge issues to work out. They are just different issues than poor people.

It's a really tough, hard slog for everybody.

[daredtowork]

105. I think that's the problem right there

The super-privileged keep trying to push belief systems that will make all problems equal, so they won't have a greater responsibilty or feel more "pressure" or "hassle" about doing things for the rest of the world when they realky just want to focus on "self-actualizing" themselves.

Hence, Madonna got into the Qaballah, with her little red thread bracelet talisman against the "evil eye of jealousy".

Hence, Tom Cruise and John Travolta and other Hollywood A-Listers got into Scientology, with its intense self-auditing, self-help theory of Dianetics, and sharp attention to personal goals.

Hence, a generation earlier many of the self-justifying rich got into EST, which turned any issue into attitude-adjustment and transformation of consciousness. While most distance themselves from EST today, it was a very widespread philosophy/stance/theory in the 70s, and you will still find the views of elites toward socual justice seriosly poisoned with it. This is because EST allows them to express harmony with ideas of social justice without taking responsibility for accomplishing anything in the material world through resource redistribution ir power reorganization. As long as consciousness is transformed, that's "meaningful"! (and as long as the status quo remains as-is, they can have their privilege guilt-free!!!)

Anyway, Shirley M is just using Buddhism to get what she wants, like the rest of the super-privileged.

[ck4829]

56. Just-world hypothesis is complete bull

This isn't about reincarnation, this is about the belief that there is some sort of externalizing justice or balance in the world and that victims of horrible events that most observers would say is out of there control did SOMETHING to deserve it.

[wheniwasincongress]

64. The Far Side

(I just found out she's Warren Beatty's older sister. huh.)

[Algernon Moncrieff]

71. Let it go

Shirley's old. She doesn't mean anything malicious by the remark. She's not suddenly anti-Semitic or pro-Nazi. She's just an older lady with a belief set that many of us consider odd.

The other day, Joni Mitchell was quoted as saying"[she'd] experienced being a black guy on several occasions."

http://www.bustle.com/articles/63775-joni-mitchell-claims-she-has-experienced-being-a-black-guy-on-several-occasions

Just think of it like a comment from a beloved, slightly demented elderly aunt or grandma. Let it go.

[Hekate]

95. "...a beloved, slightly demented elderly aunt or grandma..." That's a kind view. Thanks.

[Paladin]

72. Shirley MacLaine just made my permanent shit list.

I have no tolerance for anyone who claims that Holocaust victims brought their suffering upon themselves in any way, shape or form.

[6000eliot]

73. Remember when she wrote that crazy book about reincarnation

in order to justify her affair with a married man? Good times.

[Turbineguy]

76. The advantage of being on DU

is if and when somebody says something that stupid, there will be plenty of those who will point out that that somebody is well past it and should be taken into care before they injure themselves by forgetting to breathe.

[zappaman]

83. Shirley MacLaine asks: Just How Fucking Stupid Am I?

Answer: Very.

[Rex]

101. FTW!

gooooooooooooooaaaaaaaaaall!!!! gooooooooooooooaaaaaaaaaall!!!!

[mr blur]

88. What absolute bullshit this all is!

Past lives? Bullshit.
Karma? Victim-blaming bullshit. Avoidance of personal responsibility bullshit.

Come on people, let's stick to real life.

[Hekate]

91. 1) Karma doesn't work like that. 2) This shit is the dark side of New Age woo. 3) Not every thought

...needs to come out of someone's piehole.

[hifiguy]

96. WTF???

[Hekate]

97. Early American Protestants were of the opinion that God rewards the good and punishes the bad...

...and that therefore a person who accumulated wealth and other worldly things deserved those things because he had pleased God. People who were poor and unhealthy had displeased God.

Much of this filtered into the well-known Protestant Work Ethic, which was not an altogether bad ethic to have. (It does encourage people to work hard and save for the future, after all.) A lot of it just came right on through American history with a streak of self-righteousness about the poor being undeserving. A lot of it reappeared in the 20th century in those Christian mega-churches where people were encouraged to pat themselves on the back for not being among the undeserving poor.

Now we come to the New Age, which featured a lot of crystals and wind-chimes and happy talk. Take a little bit of Buddhism, add a dash of colorful Hinduism, a whole lot of misunderstanding of those ancient and sophisticated Asian philosophies/religions, some wishful thinking about reincarnation, and voila! A misunderstanding of karma that bears a strange resemblance to the early American Protestant preaching about God rewarding the deserving and punishing the bad right here on Earth.

No, Shirley, it doesn't work that way.

[Cha]

98. That's an awful thing to say.. mean spirited even if you think it.. it would be

the time to STFU.

[Rex]

100. Pure unadulterated gibberish. But okay what the hell you posted it so I will play along.

What are the odds that 10 million 'sinful' people would all be gathered together like that at any given moment in time? See...I can out crazy her illogic with a good question.

Let's see Stephen Hawking...believes he has an active state quantum computer, for a brain. So naturally he afflicted himself with his own thoughts...duh Shirley!

[Behind the Aegis]

104. Just another form of blaming the victims.

"The Zionists were responsible."

"The Jews brought it on themselves."

"The Nazi party was plagued with homosexuals."

"Hitler was really a Jew/homosexual."

The above are all examples of victim blaming that is much more mainstream, and, in some cases, cross political boundaries.

[Major Nikon]

107. Exactly, and no less batshit crazy than the shit mainstream religious people come up with

Like AIDS and hurricanes are god's vengeance.

[charles d]

108. I'm not Jewish, but

Oy!