A friend of mine posted this photo on their Facebook wall. Like most people when they first see it, I was overwhelmed with several emotions. First of all, I felt a swell of compassion for these two. I don’t even know them, but I was immediately concerned with their wellbeing. I wanted them to be warm and fed, and protected. Secondly, I was touched with the apparent love and friendship shared by the two, even though they are not even of the same species. I thought, “They may have nothing, but they have each other, so they have everything.” I don’t know by what circumstance this man and this dog came to be together, living on the streets, but I think it is a reflection of the callousness of our society. Whatever the reason they are homeless, they are an opportunity for us, those who have the necessities of life in abundance, to show kindness and compassion. Remember this the next time you drive by a similar scene in your warm car. Remember that if you were in their shoes, you would want, or even if you would be too ashamed to ‘want,’ you would ‘need’ someone to help you. Our apathy is what makes us truly destitute.
Archive for the 'Philosophy' Category
I get in these phases sometimes when I go looking for horrific things on the Internet. I’ll go on Youtube and look for videos of slaughter houses, self-immolation, torture, and all manner of violence. Most of the time I can’t finish watching what I went looking for. Like I’ve said before, I have a pretty high capacity for empathy, and strangely enough… an equally high capacity for violence. Seeing someone innocent hurt, or even an animal being abused, triggers a kind of rage inside me. I have watched videos about women being kidnapped and then pimped out as sex slaves, and I would fantasize, do fantasize, about hunting down their captors and slaughtering them. I am keenly aware that there are two distinct sides to my psyche. One is gentle and caring, another is brutal and cold. I am careful to never allow my dark side to influence my actions. If I were to unleash it, even to avenge the innocent, I do not believe that I could ever fully recall it. I would be changed, and I can never allow that. Revenge is not the answer, and contrary to popular belief… you cannot fight fire with fire. You can, however, extinguish fire with water.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. has a dream, well, I have a dream too. In my dream there are no races or nations, we are all just human beings. In my dream, we are one family, living on one planet. In my dream, the things that we all have in common are far more important that the things we don’t. Come, join me… we can make the dream real.
I was discussing the recent incident of the US Marines urinating on the dead Taliban fighters with Denice. The video was very shocking to her. The bad thing is that it should have been shocking to me, but it wasn’t. Unfortunately, my eyes have seen this and much, much worse. For the life of me, I don’t know why soldiers love to film their exploits. I’ve seen video of soldiers hurling puppies off of cliffs, shooting random pedestrians, sexually abusing prisoners of war, torturing, raping, and killing… all for simple amusement. The amazing thing is that most of these people started out as normal, well-adjusted individuals. It takes a lot of training to make a good soldier, but just one good taste of the horrors of war to turn that soldier into a sub-human killing machine. It is a hard thing indeed for a good person to hold on to their humanity when they are injected into a situation where they are forced to kill, and often kill on a regular basis.
At a point in the conversation we got to talking about the trouble that is brewing with Iran. I personally think it is only a matter of time before the U.S. ends up in a major conflict with Iran. A war with Iran would be bad, no so much because Iran is a capable military opponent, but more because it could end up dragging China, Russia, and Israel into the insanity. China and Russia are heavily dependent on Iran for oil, and Israel has been frothing at the mouth to get at Iran for a long time. The U.S., China, and Russia all have nuclear weapons technology. What I see forming is the perfect storm of human stupidity that could very well usher in a Mad Max, Hell on Earth apocalypse.
If the wort case scenarios come to fruition, it is a certainty that the U.S. government will re-institute the draft. Technically, I have exceeded draftable age, but I’m sure if things got bad enough that wouldn’t matter. If the proverbial ‘shit’ hits the proverbial ‘fan’ then I’m afraid anyone who can walk and pull a trigger would be fair game. I want to make my position known right now on this. I am not going to play this game, period. I am not going to go kill people to protect corporate interests, or to satisfy the egos of government and military douche bags. I am not a coward, and have no problem using deadly force to protect what I hold dear, but I do not believe that this is the case. When things are escalating out of control, someone has to draw a line in the sand. If enough of us refuse to become instruments of death… then the insanity will come to an end. Enough is enough. War ends with me!
I just got through watching this ten minute video of Peter Joseph being interviewed on Russia Today about the current social and economic problems that we are all facing. As always, Peter cuts straight through to the root of the problem – the inherent flaws in our social and economic systems. As I always say, when the rules of the game are screwed up, no one wins.
Peter Joseph is the creator of the Zeitgeist film series and the founder of the Zeitgeist Movement. The goal of the Zeitgeist Movement is to bring awareness to the fundamental flaws in our thinking that have brought us to the bleak place that we now find ourselves in. Most people just live in the paradigm that we are in and seldom think about the possibility of a better way. Like in the movie The Matrix: we get up, go to work, pay our taxes, buy lots of junk, and repeat the process tomorrow. The only problem is that this system has brought us to the point that we are about to run out of ‘tomorrows.’ The economic paradigm of infinite growth is on a collision course with reality and the very finite natural resources that make our existence possible.
Another interesting thing in the video is when Peter talks about the “1 percenters,” you know… those we call wealth – the ones who push the buttons. Peter says that it is a mistake to demonize them. They are basically just the best players in a twisted game that was already here. Everyone knows you don’t hate the player… you hate the game. I think that is important to understand. It doesn’t really matter how the game got here, it simply needs to be fixed. People can get along, and work together to solve our common problems. We must. Like it or not, we are at a crossroads. Change is coming regardless. We will evolve our culture or we will suffer the consequences.
Halloween was my favorite holiday as a kid. I think it was my favorite because it allowed me a chance to demonstrate my creativity and strategy, as we assaulted multiple neighborhoods in the search for candy. I remember designing intricate costumes – more than one. We needed more than one because we discovered that we could hit the same places multiple times if in a different costume, and thus rack up on the candy. We would gather intel for drawing up detailed maps of the neighborhoods, carefully marking which houses gave the best candy, greatest quantities, and when they retired for the night. We would walk for miles into distant neighborhoods, and would return dragging massive caches of treats.
Things have changed. Today we take are timid little kids to churches, where they meander from parked car to parked car. It sickens me to see this. It is such a departure from a time-honored tradition. Halloween used to be about risking the dangers of the night, with out your mom and dad holding your hand, and coming back victorious with hoards of candy to show for it. It was about staying up late into the early morning hours, devouring your spoils, and watching horror movies. Why have we become so paranoid? Things were just as dangerous then as they are now. What has changed?
I think a lot of it has to do with the way churches have decided to wage all-out war against this “dark” holiday. They device alternative activities like Trunk-or-Treats and Fall Festivals, and pass out pamphlets to conventional Trick-or-Treaters explaining how what they’re doing is de facto devil worship. I know this is true, because I passed out many such pamphlets myself. One of the churches I used to go to would distribute thousands of these little anti-halloween tracts. And yes, they literally used the words, ‘Devil Worship,’ to describe Trick-or-Treating. Today I know that Halloween, or Samhain (pronounced sah:win) as the Celts called it, originally had nothing to do with the Devil. The Devil is a character from Jewish and Christian mythology, and the early europians had never heard of him when the came up with the festival of Samhain.
So, call me a devil worshiper if you must, because I have my jack-o-lantern fired up and bucket full of treats ready to go. Bring on creatures of the night!
If you’re like most people, you probably think the world we be a much better place if everyone just did what you told them to do. I know I do. I think that all the time. Does that make me a bad person? Well, not really. It just makes me human.
I have found that just about everyone believes that their way is indeed the best way. It doesn’t matter who you ask; be they a religious person or an atheist, capitalist or communist, city or country, man or woman… everyone believes that they have the answer – that their way is the best for all.
Personally, I would love to see a world free of violence and poverty. Most would agree that would be a pretty nice world to live in. The thing is, I didn’t always think the way I do now. I used to worship violence. I learned it early on, and thought it was completely normal. I used to think that the smaller and weaker kids getting beat up at the hands of other kids who should have departed that particular grade years ago was a good thing. I thought that it would toughen them up and make them better people for it in the long run. I used to think that it was ok to inflict violence on people if their world view differed too greatly from my own. My point is that even though I have changed 180 degrees on most of my thinking, at the time I still believed I had the answers and that the world would be a better place if people would listen to me and do things my way. We always believe we are right, and it takes a hell of a lot of pressure to force someone out of that ‘I’m right’ mindset.
Now, some people take this latent ‘rightness’ to the next level by trying to force others to do things their way. We see it in all cultures at one time or another. One group will rise up and force their way on another. The National Socialist Party in Germany had a vision of what they believed would be a perfect world. The problem was that their perfect world did not have any Jews, Negroes, or Asians in it. Religions have this control thing down to a fine art. If you don’t believe my way, you’ve got to burn. If you don’t have sex my way, you’re an abomination. In the old days if people didn’t agree with the mainstream religious dogma, they were burned as heretics. Things have gotten a little more civilized since then I suppose.
One of my strongest philosophies is that every human being is an individual. Sure, we come together to build families and civilizations, but we are sill all individuals. My partner in life, Denice, knows that I don’t think our marriage license is worth the paper it’s printed on. If either one of us want out there is no legal document on the planet that can prevent it. Of course on the other hand, if we want to be together, there is no force that can tear us apart. I want her to be with me more that any thing in the world, but she will be with me of her own free will. I don’t want to control her mentally, emotionally, or economically. I don’t own her. Did you hear what I said? I don’t OWN my wife, and you don’t own yours. I don’t care what they taught you in Sunday School. She is a free agent. I don’t want her to be dependant on me. I want us to be interdependent on each other. The difference is huge. Dependent people don’t have a choice. They don’t have equal power. Interdependent people are really just independent people who realize that they can create far more awesome things if they work together, willingly, with other independent people.
Ultimately, trying to control other people with force is fruitless. They will probably break free eventually, but even if they don’t… do you really want to be in a relationship where you have to hold something over the other person to get them to do what you want? I want people to be around me because they like me, and I want them to take my advise because hopefully it makes sense. If it doesn’t, I want them to be able to set me straight. If we live like this, then we all win.
I haven’t done a DITL in a few days, and I’ve definitely been alive the whole time… so, here we go. By the way, if you’re wondering what the heck the title is all about, it’s a reference to a completely random piece of Internet humor called ‘Badger, Badger, Badger.’ Just click on the link and watch. It’s funny, but you have to make it to the very end to get it.
It’s been a pretty uneventful day. The weekend is over, and I miss it. Work was busy today. We have just a couple of weeks before we head out to Colorado for vacation, and we’ve been trying to get everything in order around the house before we leave. Basically, that means both Denice and myself are going to be busy at work and at home for the next two weeks. It’s going to be crazy, but I have no plans to slack on my blogging. I’m pretty dedicated to it now.
That’s pretty much the day today. I’m sitting on the couch with Denice and the critters, watching DVR’d episodes of Sister Wives again. It’s a fun show, but personally, I don’t find it controversial. Like I said before, there are a lot of different ways to make this love thing work, and what works for one may not work for everyone. To each their own. One thing I don’t like though is how people put so much enfasis on the legal side of it. I think it is foolish to seek the approval of the State in your interpersonal relationships. It gives them power that they shouldn’t have. I am married to Denice, but not because I have a legal contract (which we do), but because she has my heart, and I have hers. We didn’t need anyone’s permission to love one another, and I would stay with her regardless of whether or not the world liked it. If you love someone you will move heaven and earth to be with them. If you don’t love them, there is no legal contract or religious ceremony that can make you stay with them. Boy, that was deep.
Denice and I are watching Sister Wives right now. I find it funny that Christians of all denominations and even LDS Mormons have a problem with Kody Brown and his ‘sister wives.’ Am I the only person on the planet that happens to remember the tiny, insignificant detail that both the Bible and the Book of Mormons were written by polygamists? I mean, come on… just about every religion that is older than a hundred years has a strong tradition (if you want to call it that) of one man having multiple wives.
I personally think polygamy is a throwback to a time when men used their brute gorilla strength to dominate females. It only makes sense that the barbarian men of the past designed their religions (whether consciously or unconsciously) to make God in their image, and to make the female inferior by such a God’s decree. Because of these primitive beliefs, women have been denied an equal education to their male counterparts for generations, and we have all suffered as a result. You can’t not use over half the minds in your population and not suffer societal retardation as a result. I think it’s one of the big reasons why we haven’t advanced further than we have.
Anyway, I could personally care less whether Kody has one wife or one hundred, as long as it is a consensual realationship. It doesn’t bother me one bit. In fact, I think they have a cute and very well-adjusted family. However, I do have a problem with Kody’s catch phrase, “love should be multiplied, not divided.” I think that only applies if he’s the common denominator. It’s really kind of hypocritical because if one of his wives wanted to bring home a ‘brother husband’ for him, I doubt he would very enthusiastic about the proposal.
I finally made it to Wednesday. It’s been busy this week. I fell behind in my blogging a little bit. I actually have been working on three different drafts, but they all seem to be going in a direction that I’m not sure I want to go. For some reason, even though I don’t intend it to, my writing seems to be getting, well, nasty. I don’t mean filthy, I mean… mean.
For instants, one of the drafts I’m working on is about the book of Jonah from the Bible. We had a church service on it last Sunday, and Denice and I ended up discussing it over a delicious lunch at the Soccer Taco. She believes that story is literal, and I spent the entire time explaining all the reasons why there’s no way a guy could survive in a fish/whale/ocean dwelling creature’s stomach for three days and nights and live to tell about it. The discussion went nowhere as usual. She held firm in her belief in the story and I ended up feeling like a jerk for trying to sway her away from it. Anyway, I have been working on a post about the Jonah story for about three days now. I almost posted it a couple of times, but when I proofed it I felt ashamed at the meanness of my words. I’m not going to go into the details of what I was planning on saying, but let’s just say I was going to take some cheap-shots. I have decided that I am better than that, so I will be self-censoring my thoughts on the subject until I am believe I am capable of expressing them in a more constructive way.
I used to watch debates between theists and atheists on Youtube all the time. The arguments would go back and forth without either side budging an inch on their positions. It was entertaining at first, but after a while it became highly irritating. At some point I gave up on the whole concept of debate. I gave it up because it us ultimately fruitless. There is no scientific argument that can convince a theist to give up his or her deeply held beliefs. Their beliefs are a part of their culture… their very identity. And likewise, there is no supernatural experience that you can share or ancient story that you can tell that will convince an atheist to give up their linear reasoning. It is what makes them who they are. Debates are a waste of time, for they rarely bring change to either side.
I have looked back on my experience of departing from the Christian faith many times, trying to figure out just what it was that made a hard-core believer like me change. It’s a very hard thing in deed to put your finger on. I suppose at some point I accepted the possibility that I could be wrong. Once I admitted to that possibility, the self-policing part of my mind relaxed, and then it just all started to fall apart. I went from knowing everything to knowing nothing, to being sure about nothing. It was a scary time. Hell, it still is, but it’s exciting. The world is not nearly as well lit now, but it’s full of mystery again. It’s full of potential. Since I have stopped believing, I have learned about many other belief systems and ways of thinking, things that I used to insulate myself from. Basically I’ve learned that people will believe just about anything that their culture tells them is true. This is true for me and every other human being. It’s just how we’re wired. The thing that I am trying to learn now is to accept people the way they are, and not give in to the urge to make them like me. I am who I am, and I need to let them be who they are. What I do want to do though is seek out the things that we all have in common, and use those things to build meaningful relationships with my fellow human beings. I believe that this is my straight and narrow path, and I intend on walking it.