An arc towards justice or is it an oscillating towards the right?

Donald Trump at his worst is cruder, truly less informed than the other Republican presidents that have been pushing this country to the right since Richard Nixon. Getting rid of him, though desirable, won't change directions, does not restore some nostalgic normality, except maybe with a friendlier face and more towards "civility" which will help corral the fence sitters and independents. But if a Democrat wins the White House in 2020 what would it mean to return to "normality"? A return to neoliberal politics? To cold war thinking? To the belief in American Exceptionalism? That we are good but must fight against all evil in the world? We've had all that since the end of WWII.

I question the quote by M.L. King Jr. -- “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”-- it's a quote that President Obama liked to remind us of. (But an arc rises and falls, it's a section of a circumference where the first and second points of the arc land at the same level). So as metaphor I find that maybe it's not that useful? Lincoln arguably was our greatest President but no President after Lincoln pushed for changes in the country until FDR did to help move the country during the depression and after towards social justice sadly not for all though for many. No other President sought to improve the lot of poor and middle class Americans until he did.

Yes there have been positive social changes though at a snail's pace and the "ancien regime" of racial and sexual abuse and violence continues in hopes that any positive changes can be rolled back to some idyllic age of white male dominance and the myth of self-reliance, guns included. So instead of an arc since FDR our country's changes have been oscillations at best, oscillating toward the right, towards corporate control, towards religious purity, and fulfilling the dreams of Empire.

The Beginning of Story telling

Consider prehistoric beings. Somewhere on the side of a plain the grasses tall, verdant, along where an untrammeled brook ran, these uncivilized but highly gentle creatures lying on their backs, some cavorting, others sniffing the air, others engaged in coitus swatting away their playful offspring, somewhere there in the well-spring of our current collective conscious, they exist. Suspend all disbelief and come with me then, your imagination and mine, and let us explore at least one of the possible kernels of our own age.

A prehistoric being rises then from his activity. It is a he. There are probably many things to do. Fire is in existence and able to be controlled, sometimes. An organization of these beginning human beings had already managed to plan the next hunt. They are gentle creatures, yes, but they have begun to enjoy the meat of other animals, though not yet on a grand scale. They know they are different. They've begun to anticipate certain realities. They know the pain in their stomachs, known to us as hunger, can be regulated.

Out on the hunt, all the beings carry stones, some carry heavy sticks. As they move through the heavy leafed forest, they spread to the right and to the left. Those on the flanks move silently and swiftly ahead of the central movement. In the center, one being threshes at the grasses and underbrush, small lizards and birds are flushed, sometimes a rodent. Suddenly a bird is hit by a stone from the left. It falls, a colorful screech into the underbrush. As the central figure continues threshing away, the bird is gathered and bound; its neck snapped.

Then the prize they've been after bolts, a warthog more than waist high attempts to attack the thresher. He fends him off with his stick, backing up as quickly as he can. Volleys of stones missle in from both sides. The warthog wheels toward his other attackers. This is what they want. It's a dangerous situation, but now the thresher is free. He is at his age, all of eighteen, their senior and the group's expert hunter. He has two large stones and takes up his position. He throws with his right hand. But before he throws, he plants his right foot, takes aim at the warthog's head as he anticipates its velocity and direction. His aim is exact to an imaginary point where he believes the warthog will be by the time the released stone arrives. He hauls back and he fires, a perfect strike which catches the animal in the back of its skull, causing its feet to give way. The animal is down and is struggling to its feet, as stones rain from all sides. The thresher plants his right foot again, aiming his second stone for the animal's head. The creature is confused, blood dripping from its snout, it turns and turns snuffling at the ground. It is trying to charge again, but though it is headed toward the thresher, clearly it is blinded by a warthog's inner rage, and is charging wildly. It aims itself toward a tree trunk, slamming into it, screeching like a scared pig. The thresher aims again and this time the stone crashes into the pained beast's eye. It collapses and shrieks unable to gain footing again. The job is completed by the rest of the group who beat it with their sticks and stones.

The warthog is a heavy creature, heavier than even the largest human being. It is bound with thick grasses to six of the hunting party. These are very young boys who struggle violently to drag the dead creature to their current home. Many a being has been lost as result of this activity since dead animals raise a smell that a larger creature may come and spirit all the boys and their kill away. The thresher meanwhile walks ahead listening carefully and sniffing the air while looking around and hushing the others as they struggle with their burden. He carries his stick and another well-rounded stone for protection. After a time they stop to rest by the brook that runs near their encampment but is still some miles off. As they rest, they chew on berries and nuts and drink from the running brook. Leaning up against their load, they begin to make up stories about the thresher and how he will be hunting in the greatest hunting place someday. They sing how easy it will be for him and how he will have the greatest catch of all, a warthog the size of a mountain. He will have endless stones to cast, and will be remembered as the greatest teacher of all the stone throwers and threshers. The thresher is pleased and smiles at the others, but reminds them of their work ahead and how low the sun falls.

Three

I had a dream of three flames. They were like candles. My first thought was a religious one. Candles seem to bring about religion in my mind as I was raised a Catholic. This dream of three flames that become candles could be representative of three persons in one God. Typically Catholic. But I put this religious thought out of mind and thought deeper. It seemed significant in that it was three. Only three, not two, not one, not four but three. To be one seemed alone, near death. Two had an element of comfort but in the end brought on discomfort as two people together over time will bring on discomfort. Four would seem like a box and something inescapable. But three is an equilateral triangle It is better than two because each one has two others. It is an odd number and odd numbers always overrule even numbers. Why? I couldn’t say because I am not a mathematician.

But three can also mean triangulation which is considered bad in the world of psychology. But that was not the dream. The dream meant balance. And it was an ineluctable give and take balance. Three would find this balance inescapable with no reason to avoid the balance. Two does imply dialectic. Dialectic has been the premise of modern philosophies since the 18^th century. The dialectic provides us with thesis and antithesis. Marxism believes this is the only way toward resolution of all things, the synthesis of reality. However, it can be envisioned as like the arms of a hurricane, like the drawing of ancient Greek Hero’s engine. Or if the image suffices the whirl of a galaxy like the Andromeda galaxy. Ultimately it is on it’s way to calamity.

Three forms a tension. It’s not going anywhere. It does resolve though synthesizes nothing. It remains in balance. Three is the right number for interaction because intimacy can not be private. Three is the right number for any agreement to be made. Three is also the past present and future. It is our continual existence.

Society is weary of itself

Every age/society grows tired and weary of itself. The great changes brought about by individuals that are credited with providing change really occur because society has become sick of itself. Mostly it doesn’t know that it is sick of itself but someone always feels the temperature, the pain in the gut, the inability to get up and walk, the dread in the night. Or maybe the agent of change could have innocently arrived at his or her mode of changing through invention or done unintentionally because the intention was of another matter. But change never arrives out of the blue, so to speak. Not even by those who do not suffer in the sick society and will the idea of change for change sake because they have learned their history. Their conscious belief dictates to them and their ego delivers. But this is pure selfishnness.

Societies throughout all the ages of human history are like living organisms and have a lifespan. Ultimately as the life is coming to an end they reflect back on themselves and destroy from within. The joy is gone. The belief in self is gone. The growth has ended. The offspring have left home and are on their own. There is nothing more to want or to get or to have. It is now sick and dying.

Notes on religious indoctrination and the clinging to childhood beliefs

The Question of the existence of God and our immature beliefs that persist

These notes refer to my own upbringing as a Catholic. My experience is all I can write about and no one else’s.

As I matured my understanding of all things changed and still continues to change with education both formal and self actuated, with development of relationships and with experience in the world.

Can I safely say that most of what I learned as a child got proven wrong or turned topsy-turvy? I’m not sure. I know that many things have changed as a result of my maturation. Sometimes beliefs have grown even deeper and fuller with maturation. Other times fully rejected and replaced by other understanding. In the complete life of a human being, one who is thoughtful, who has imagination to absorb and process information and compare and contrast it to whatever was there before is able to synthesize it into a world view (weltanschauung). Pieces of previous views may fall away while others deepen as I’ve just said. However, the brain can’t maintain thoughts in the manner of say computerized transactional processing, where one can look at one transaction and see it replaced by another transaction and so on. If transaction records are kept properly then you can see transaction A, transaction B etc. And even if combined A & B will = C, you can still examine the first two and see the difference. Given this example the brain doesn’t do that. The brain can only comprehend and process Transaction C. It no longer cares about the two that preceded it.

But what happens if we don’t understand where Transaction C arises and evolves? This is where my critical notes regarding religion and belief of any kind actually comes about. As a child I was taught early about God. Religious training must begin early. I still recall being taught to bless myself by my Mother’s Mother who was Catholic. “In the name of the Father and of the Son (that’s me) and I’m afraid of the Holy Ghost.” I would say, kidding around with Grandmother who was always amused by my antics except when I pissed her off. She’d laugh and tell my Mother who did not think along the same lines.

What was happening to me at the age of three or four was an introduction to God as the Father (all seeing all powerful all knowing being as far as I was concerned in my dealings with my father who was male role model and final authority on everything). I was also being introduced to Jesus Christ, the son, who I identified with immediately because I was the son. And also I learned about the Holy Spirit or Ghost, that mysterious invisible force that I was frightened of especially when it was dark. I had an image of this white spooky presence that would intentionally scare me.

Of course what could be my understanding? Did I know what it meant? I don’t believe so. At the time I only thought I did. I can’t see transaction A. Because I was innocent of any kind of ideology it was clear to my innocent mind. Yet theologians can’t explain the three persons in God that Catholics believe in. They would fall upon the sword of mysticism if forced for an explanation. They would claim these are matters which can not be explained rationally only felt, only seen with the eye of religious fervor. And they would further claim God loves you. He would not trick you into some falsehood. Only Satan would trick you into believing something that wasn’t and manipulate you into a false thing to worship.

If one has a questioning mind, if one likes to take things apart to see how they work, if one only believes what one hears and sees this concept, three persons in God, creates a problem as the brain matures. Say we started out as fully formed adults with all concomitant experiences we would easily dismiss this doctrine as we do advertisement (in most cases). But they get us early. And they make it part of us. And we are frightened. The transactions which process into the final transactions can’t be seen. That early training worms its way in. We say our prayers as a child because we were told to. In that moment we discover comfort at first because God is listening to us (and 7 billion others in hundreds of languages I might add) We believe as children that all will be right. We are comfortable. We confess our sins with the same relief because we were told to. And these little bits like tiny atoms and molecules cling to other thoughts with maturation and we look for relief and comfort in what amounts to not prayer but a form of meditation. Yet this we don’t know unless of course we examine what we are doing. But minds that do not evolve with deeper thoughts still believe in those childhood prayers. It is a superior brainwashing system for children.

And once brainwashed we carry it into our adult way of thinking but that teaching when we were between ages of 3 and 8 doesn’t change. It can’t. It’s comfortable. It’s easy. It’s relief. That’s why we go there. But if we ever doubt we’ll still cling to it because it is part of our bodies . It’s a piece of our brain we can’t cut out because we don’t know where it is in the final transaction. It is an inherent part of our body, our existence our childhood, our love of the people who formed us. That is the life of a Catholic.

If I had been born a Jew this would all be different. Jews have a different kind of connection to religious belief. It is tied in with everything cultural and racial among Jews. It is the DNA of their being. There can be no such thing as a lapsed Jew only a secular Jew, but Jewish all the same. A Christian can lapse because it is not part of the DNA. But because it is not, it is a far more frightening a thing to lose. This sounds contradictory. But that is the crux. The belief in Catholic Orthodoxy is tenuous mainly because it is an intellectual pursuit, a psychological pursuit, a forced belief and if we lose it there is nothing. And “Nothing is greater than God.” (Read that any way you would like.)

Notes on abortion and the insanity of Religion

The religious man or woman, say of the Christian fundamentalist persuasion (Catholics too) is deathly opposed to abortion because he or she believes that permitting or sanctioning such a thing for any human female is detrimental to his or her eternal soul. The soul is eternal according to this Christian belief. It is eternal and can not be destroyed. It immutable, it is the constant in the life and afterlife of all humanity. Belief has nothing to do with its existence because whether there is belief or not the soul exists. Consider this constant the same as physicists since Max Planck have postulated that the speed of light is constant and can not be exceeded.

Christianity teaches, and whether this was put forth by Jesus Christ himself I could not say, perhaps through the teachings of Saul/St. Paul, the Roman police agent who was actually a pharisee responsible for arresting people and placing them in a situation where they could get the death penalty for heresy or apostasy. The world according to Saul/Paul, police agent, is chaotic, mutable (unlike the soul) pitiless and painful but the after life is a place to be counted upon to be the opposite of the world. Death is the gatekeeper to that better world but to fuck up that afterlife by sinning mortally in the earthly world eliminating your chances for a wonderful afterlife you have forfeited for all eternity your soul’s opportunity to be with God.

Murder is such a sin that will send your soul for eternity to a place that is even worse than your life on earth. It has been described as hell. Many authors have described this place. This sin of murder is very simple. It is ending the life of another human prematurely through violence of some kind. Christians believe abortion is a violent ending of a life prematurely.

Thus, anyone sanctioning this violent end, even if not present but declaring that such an end is allowed through legal means is considered the same mortal sin. And anyone assisting in said abortion is considered to having commited this mortal sin. Just voicing ascension of abortion is a mortal sin. Even acquiesing is the same as being guilty. Think accessory to the crime.

This is the insanity of religion.

The democratic slide into Totalitarianism

Democracies are joining all other societies in their slide towards totalitarianism. There are only democratic, authoritarian and dictatorship societies. Monarchical society is a vestigial leftover from the past, bound in some cases by tradition, and can have some form of power within those who are ruled or have complete control. Saudi Arabia is good example of a monarchical society as is the UK. But they are very different. The UK has a parliament that makes laws. Saudi Arabia has an advisory council but is an absolute monarchy. Most of the other societies declare that they are in fact democracies and the people are taught that they are and support their leaders. The United States and North Korea are examples of “democracy” and “dictatorship.” Yet the difference between the two are some variable degree. North Korea calls itself “The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.” Russia today is a good example of an “authoritarian” society though it too calls itself democratic. It claims to be the Russian Federation. The people who are not engaged in the government believe they have “freedom.” Governmental operatives know differently. Freedom is a very difficult word to define in terms of governments.

But what is meant by democracy? Our democratic societies are not ancient Athenian style democracy from which the concept is derived. It is believed that democracies today operate by the rules of law whether those laws are made by decree within representative government or through precedent in courts. The U.S. has laws from both. And in addition it is through the will of the people who are governed that these laws are agreed upon through election of representatives who will make those laws. Democracies are self-supporting and self-governing. Democracies require co-operation of all citizens. So much for the ideal. The reality is something else and the deck is stacked.

The ideal can not face what is reality. We are slowly developing a closed society. A few years back it was discovered that all citizens in the U.S. were being spied upon by it’s own government 24/7 in our technological utopia which it has become. Some rules were instituted to ameliorate this problem but there is no knowing how much of that has changed. It would be best to call the United States a technological utopia instead of a democracy because technology is believed to be the panacea that will move the U.S. forward and make it thrive.

Technology itself is not destructive. But utilized to allow some to have power over the many it destroys. There is a belief that each day brings a new “us’ a new “we the people.” But instead through technology we have become passive, regressive and reactive not proactive. Instead of a community of citizens willing to work together and assist each other where each individual can contribute something, we are becoming fractured, existing in our small ever shrinking withdrawn worlds. We are small groups in this technological utopian world where we only look for like-minded beings. Where we want to be liked for whatever we do. Where we want only agreement. Conflict of any kind is dealt with hostility. Rumors drive our belief system. History ends each night we go to sleep.

Thus fractured we look for the individual who will lead us from this morass we have fallen into. And when found that individual is given the power to tell us what to do, what to believe, what to think, which group is important who is on the outs. Those who are not recognized and are on the outs become scapegoats and are demonized. When they resist they are ostracized, imprisoned or killed. Our weak resistances these days are inspired and run by celebrity. And when the heat comes who do you think will disappear?

Think of the U.S. today. The U.S. has the kind of society where you are not constantly questioned for every move that is made. There are many things wrong with the United States but you still can exist without having to “show your papers” all of the time. (Though that might be limited by the browness of your skin). But for the most part, theoretically, if you decide to get into your car and drive to the store to buy some milk no matter what the hour of the day it is and the store is open no one is interested in knowing why. But U.S. society is becoming more fractured. And a fractured society needs a strong leader to pull the fractures together.

Why is this? We have no unified principle anymore. We used to be defined by class, values, family, religion, skills and strength of character. Class divisions of course are not a great way to exist but class divides could be broached. Today though we are defined by race, gender, celebrity, popularity, technology and perverted interpretations of religious belief and still in many ways, class. And so many of these things could lead to hostile conflict. Shame doesn’t matter anymore. Anger takes precedence over all. Patience is not a virtue. It is thought of being taken advantage of. Every belief is challenged by some opposing belief. This is particularly destructive in the realm of politics where even proven scientific fact seems to have some “alternative fact” that can challenge a fact. And above all it’s wealth not class that defines us specifically. The wealthier we are the more important we are no matter what kind of boorish individual we are. Only the wealthy make the rules that turn into laws that govern us. They control the levers of politics in this country. And those laws get subsumed as the new values that we believe we should have.

Values are usually thought of as family, spiritual and secular beliefs, education, growth, recreation and friends. These are still talked of in today’s technological utopia. Except the definitions of those words have changed to have meanings that support the technological utopia and our drift towards totalitarianism. Is there no way out of the morass we call the United States of America? It remains to be seen.

God and Religion

I am an atheist or at least I believe myself to be. But for certain I ascribe to no religion. And I put no stock in a deity to have anything to do with me. I was baptized a Roman catholic, was an altar boy, thought about becoming a priest and then reached the age of puberty and as George Carlin was known to say, “I was a Catholic until I reached the age of reason.” So that's who I am. Still this short essay is about God, the supreme deity that people of all faiths believe and I suppose I can even as an atheist make a defense for God. John Lennon said, “God is concept by which we measure our pain.” Perhaps. I believe that God is a manifestation of the imagination. But is that wrong? Must we cut away our imagination? Remove God and you stunt a portion of human imagination throughout the world because many people certainly the great majority are believers. You remove God and a whole realm of ideas, beliefs, aspirations and inspirations disappear.

Yes there is the question of morality that is derived within the structures set up within the various forms of God worship. But that is a question to be taken up at another time. What this belief is has to do with self-consciousness, an arisen consciousness an awareness of the self in relation to the other as well as the positing of the human in the universe and the belief that something perfect can exist borne out of imagination, a collective imagination if you will. The rules within religion, starting with the dictates of morality have somehow perverted this perfect entity of our imagination. The perversion is when religious dictums turn God into a voice, a creator, a giver of laws, an eternal justice definer, a damner. After all these matters are from the “imagination” of those who choose to take the power from the imagination of those who are not so devious and only wish to believe in the perfection beyond reality. These are the people who create a religion who demand that we follow their rules, their beliefs and serve in fact their needs while claiming they receive their beliefs from a higher power, God.

Should perfection be worshipped? Perhaps this is where we can find the crux of the problem of religion. One religion can never say the name of God. It is written g-d. Another religion claims three persons (three entities) exist in one God. Another requires a medium not to be worshipped but this medium's visage can never be shown, creating a need for one's imagination like the God he demonstrates he knows though this medium existed as a person. And then there are the laws written down by scribes and interpreted by anyone who aspires to do so, cutting off the head so to speak of each individual's imagination.

Religions are political forces designed to cause fractures in society for the benefit of some as if to prove that humans on their own with no designs of wanting to rule others and wanting to live and survive as nature intended are incapable of anything but destruction, error, falseness and deceit and only by worshiping a certain formula for accessing this imaginitve perfect being can their perceived enemies be defeated while the sins of the worshipper acting to defeat can be forgiven. What the appeal is can only be guessed at. Perhaps it is when engaging in destructive acts against others. Because guilt can be an unbearable force and it can not be expiated by any means other than lying to oneself or the lie in and of itself.