Category Archives: Religion

Why war happens in this day and age, a primer on making change

Economics, Politics, Religion, , , , , , , , , , ,

There’s been a lot of talk about war lately. It seems that whenever international diplomacy starts to fall apart, or easy answers to complex questions don’t seem all that available, talk of war starts up, and people begin to think that this is the solution to everything. It rarely is, and on an unconscious level, I think most people realize that. But in the end, it tends to be the final vestige of common sense, and then we find ourselves engaging in war talk which leads, not surprisingly, to war.

But few people seem to think about why we find ourselves talking about war, except in simplistic terms, like “they started it” or “they gave us no other choice.” Unpacking such comments can often lead one to realize that such proclamations are the same kinds of claims we made when we were children, when that one kid threw a rock at us and “forced us” to engage in a fight. We all know that walking away was an option. We also know ten or twenty other alternatives that didn’t lead to “knocking his block off”, but for some reason the escalation of hostilities seemed to be the only one we chose.

But is it as simple as that? I don’t think so. I think there’s a part of that, but it still doesn’t explain why a nation would want to go to war. People don’t think collectively like that unless something happens that puts them into a disturbed state of mind (like being bombed unprovoked by another country, invaded in the middle of the night, or where hatreds between two peoples has gone on so long that no one is capable of thinking any other way). So, if we put this sort of thing on the shoulders of the leaders, the ones who make these sorts of decisions for nations, then perhaps we might figure out why we see so much war today.

One of the problems historians have with modernists is that people who think in terms of “today” often think that we’re in some kind of enlightened age where things today are so much different than they were in earlier eras. We see that we have so much more technology, so we sort of assume that our thinking has progressed just as well. Well, it hasn’t. If you examine most wars happening today, you’ll see the same sorts of horrific actions occurring today as existing back in the days of barbarism. Soldiers still pillage. Soldiers still rape. Soldiers still run off with the spoils of war. And no, there isn’t a nation around that is so enlightened that it hasn’t done these things. Wars in Africa have been decimating the infrastructure of those countries. The UN has been accused of, and has definitely stood on the sidelines of, numerous rapes that have happened as a consequence of war. The United States had a run of American soldiers removing the relics of Iraq during its most recent war, and in some cases soldiers had to be forced to give back these items as we had to keep reminding ourselves that “civilized soldiers don’t do that sort of thing”. Only very recently did we return some of the spoils of war from Iraq’s palaces, as some military units in the United States had them on display as “trophies” of the war.

So, our thinking isn’t any more enlightened than its ever been. In some cases we act better, but when it comes down to the nitty gritty actions of war, we look the other way when things start to fall apart. That’s a natural consequence; no one wants to think they are part of the problem but somehow always part of the solution.

Which brings me back to leaders. When leaders don’t get along with other leaders and can’t seem to find easy solutions to complex problems, they do what they’ve always done: They declare war. Or they just attack. You’d think that centuries having done this over and over that we’d figure out how to stop this, but we’ve never been all that good at learning from history. Or even our own pasts.

But what’s significant about this is that we’re still following a model that is no longer relevant for today’s time. In the old days, just a few hundred years ago, leaders of nations used to duke it out on the battlefield over all sorts of stupid reasons. (“You stole my girlfriend, so we’re going to wage an epic war.”) But for so many centuries, wars were fought between the nobles of their subsequent empires. A king would declare war, and then all of his nobles would rally behind him and fight. Sure, lots of soldiers would fight as well, but the important fighting was the accumulation of nobles. If a king wanted to go to war, he had to convince all of the people who would actually be going to war that they needed to go to war. So those people would take to the field and fight. That was war.

Today, we don’t have that model. None of the leaders who declare war, or who help that leader decide on war, actually fight any more. The nobles are now very rich men (some women, although not that many) who are part of an aristocratic infrastructure that has no connection to the military. Instead, our military consists of a lot of people who are not part of the economic elite. When we go to war today, we send a lot of very poor people out with the skills to decimate the very poor people in the militaries of other nations. No more do we send out nobles on horses, leading the charge.

This means that the people who decide to go to war are most likely not the people fighting it. Think about that for a moment. If you didn’t have to fight a war, what would stop you from deciding to go to war? Sure, some might have kids fighting in those wars, but look at our legislature when Iraq and Afghanistan wars started. Very, very few sent their own kids. Instead, they sent the kids of other parents. There was absolutely no risk to them. Only benefits. And the economic elites didn’t send their kids either. They received only benefits.

But that’s just the western nations. What about all of those other third world nations? Same thing. Their leaders are rarely fighting the wars. Instead, a lot of brainwashed, or patriotic (call them whatever they are), young people fight those wars for them. When you have this model in place, there’s absolutely no reason to avoid war. As long as the enemy doesn’t destroy your infrastructure and your continuation of being able to rule and enrich yourself, there’s nothing to lose. Even the economic elites of Iran and Afghanistan have suffered minimally, having stopped being rewarded by their former leaders and now enriching themselves through the corruption of having themselves selectively placed in positions that allow them to do so.

With this in place, why wouldn’t a leader want to go to war? That’s the question that no one seems to ask. Instead, they allow themselves to be rallied towards more wars. As long as you have standing armies that need to be used in order to be seen as useful, you are always going to see petty wars being fought for the purpose of justifying existence.

Until people stop accepting this as the way things are, the model has no reason to change itself.

Is Craigslist Really the Enemy They Claim It Is?

Politics, Religion, Social Networking, , , , , , ,

Craigslist recently announced that it is going to be suppressing its listings for sex ads. Instead of the adult listing, it now shows up as “censored” on their site. Public interest groups are now high-fiving themselves because they seem to have won some sort of Quixotic victory that they believe has somehow made things better. Others, of course, still say that it’s not enough and want pretty much the universe when it comes to compliance. I thought it would be interesting to examine this and see what’s really going on.

First off, let’s look at the original problem. Craig Newmark started Craigslist back in 1995 in San Francisco. The idea was to give people a one stop marketplace where they could take care of their every need. You could find an apartment, get a job, sell that old TV you could never get rid of, and yes, even hook up with a potential partner, if that should be your current desire. Not surprisingly, that latter option has opened up all sorts of controversial issues with the online distributor of trade.

In 2002, according to Wikipedia, because of complaints, Craigslist started adding warnings to some of their personal ad areas, such as “men seeking men”, “casual encounters”, “rants and raves”, and “erotic services”. Already, these areas were causing problems with the mainstream segments of the population.

From this point forward, Craigslist has been on the attentions of quite a few public interst groups, and not surprisingly, law enforcement officials.

Up until this time, erotic services were pretty much an entity you had to search through some pretty creative methods, often involving a lot of bait and switch circumstances that one had to navigate solely on the hope that the next time would be better than the last time. Massage parlours were often a place men would go to seek prostitution, and after a lot of false leads and deception, it was not unusual for a man to pay hundreds of dollars to receive absolutely no desired experiences. Some got lucky, but most didn’t, and it was quite often a very discouraging experience.

The Internet was supposed to change all of that. At one’s fingertips was now immediate access to all sorts of information. Craigslist jumped into the game, and people were now following want ads for what they were seeking, and in conjunction with a lot of other erotic services on the Internet, people were actually finding what they were seeking. It was not unusual to see someone’s want ad on Craigslist, then check out the profile on one of the other erotic feedback sites, and then decide whether or not to book a session with that person. Very hard to find erotic services were now being much easier to find because they could now be found on Craigslist. Many people may not realize it, but there are a lot of people out there looking for some very specific types of encounters, and having everything in one place made it much easier for these people to connect.

Well, this didn’t bode well for the industy when there were people who would do everything possible to make sure that such people could never make any such connection. But this probably wouldn’t have been that much of a problem if another entity did not show up, which made things even worse. I’m talking about the scammer.

People may not realize it, but the entity of the scammer has pretty much destroyed every good thing that has ever come across on the Internet. Porn didn’t hurt the Internet, as the fuddy duddies would like you think it did (it actually served to fuel the Internet in its infancy, which is somewhat ironic if you think about it). Scammers did. Most of your email is now pretty much worthless because scammers found out they could profit off of naive people. You are required to buy special software to protect your computer because scammers discovered they could infect your computer just by hosting evil programs on sites where you wouldn’t expect them to be. Ebay used to be a great place to buy things; scammers and thieves put a wrench in the trust factor of that entity. So it is not that much of a surprise that scammers showed up and pretty much destroyed Craigslist.

Some of the biggest crimes that have rallied people against Craigslist have been people who have been cheating other people on the Internet. Call them scammers. Call them thieves. Call them the mob. Or whatever, but it’s this group of people who have caused all of the problems that have made Craigslist the cesspool that it can often be.

Because face it. Women being prostitutes has never caused all that much of a problem, unless you’re Tiger Woods. But people forcing women into prostitution has. Child predators looking for children for sex causes problems. Again, those same people are the ones that make this sort of thing available. These people are criminals who care little for the activity but everything for exploitation and making a quick buck. Unfortunately, they serve to diminish an activity that others might be providing in a more positive way, and unfortunately, there’s often very little way to separate the two.

There are a lot of honest people who are into the sex business who aren’t trying to steal from other people or to hurt other people. They easily get pushed aside whenever the bad class of people show up, and unfortunately that bad class shows up way too quickly and way too often.

All of the issues that have caused public interest against Craigslist have come from these bad elements of our societies. No one rallies around a leader seeking to stop prostitution. But everyone rallies around anyone seeking to stop child exploitation and people who wish to develop nonconsensual slavery circumstances.

This is the problem that Craigslist has fallen into because the owners of that site really didn’t care who was posting on the site. They were more interested in developing a site that brought in money. I can’t see that I blame them, but because of this, they have become the victim of their own success. With great success comes great responsibility, to steal and destroy a great line from Spiderman, and unfortunately Craigslist hasn’t really come up to the plate for the responsibility thing. It played a lot of shell games in hopes of getting people to think it was on the right side of morality, but when it came down to it, it was really only thinking of itself. When the public finally started to become a hammer to be used against them, they censored themselves and then tried to act all First Amendmentish and posted “censored” where they censored themselves.

The fact is: They could have dealt with this a lot easier by actually policing their ads in the beginning to see how much exploitation was going on. Instead, they dropped the ball and lost the whole game. But for lack of stupid analogies, I’ll take this one step further and say that they haven’t lost the whole season yet. They can still do something about cleaning up their site without destroying what they set out to do in the first place.

There are a lot of sex workers who do rely on Craigslist, and unfortunately because of this action, they are forced to start using more exploitive sites out there that are much worse, and that’s sad. Craigslist could step back up to the plate and decide where it wants to be in this debate. It can kowtow to the Bible thumpers and give in completely, like it’s doing right now, or it can bite back and work hand in hand with the communities that have grown up with them, making sure that the evil ones are ostracized, but the ones who are there for the right reasons still have a forum in which to do what they do best.

Unfortunately, it looks like Craigslist may take the easier road because it is filled with fewer obstacles. In the end, it may be a road that leads nowhere.

I’m so glad I don’t work for Vasily Boiko

Religion, , , , , , ,

If you live in Russia and work for Russkoye Moloko, which means “Russian Milk”, it’s not just good enough that your job is done well. You also have to kowtow to everything that falls under the rules of the Orthodox Church. It seems that “Boiko the Great”, as he likes to call himself, has determined that having an abortion is a firing offense. He says it is murder and will not employ anyone like that. One woman is currently on the chopping block as a result. But that’s not all. He also thinks that if you’re “living in sin”, you’re wrong and should be fired. He has given an ultimatum that will be carried out on October 14 (a holy Russian, Orthodox day). If you are living in sin after that, you’re fired.

What’s interesting is that even if you’re not of the Orthodox religion, he doesn’t care. You’re still going to be fired. What’s even more interesting is that this is not a man without sin either. This guy just served time in prison for fraud allegations in 2007, which really isn’t that long ago. So because HE found religion in prison, suddenly everyone else has to suffer as a result.

All I can say is that I’m fortunate that I don’t work in that environment. While there are times when my own geographical area scares me religious-wise, as the locals can be somewhat dogmatic about religions that aren’t mine, and there have even been times where I’ve seen that filter over into the work environment, at least my job hasn’t been at jeopardy because one lunatic decided that his way is the only way. It’s one of those things that has scared me for quite some time because as an amateur philosopher-scientist and writer, I find myself often at odds with practically everything and everyone around me. I’ve always been open to everyone else, even to the point where I don’t care what religion other people are, and I’m not going to be expending any energy trying to convert other people to my own religion. Let people worship what they want to worship, even if they’re all wrong and going to Gre’thor when they die (Klingon Hell for those not versed in Star Trek mythology). Everyone has his or her own religious beliefs, and I think that’s wonderful. What is not wonderful is when some moron thinks that his or her own religious beliefs should be worshipped by everyone, including those who aren’t of that particular faith.

I’m fortunate that I live in a society where I don’t have to worry about such things. But that may not always be the case. It doesn’t take much for a lot of stupid people to start forcing their values and norms on everyone else. It also doesn’t take a lot of time either. Mobs of stupid people have been known to destroy the very foundations of enlightened societies, but unfortunately people don’t take lessons from history or psychology. They take lessons from their own hearts, and as comforting as it may be to them, it’s not all that comforting to people who are not them. Just imagine being told that your very livelihood (and sometimes even your life) depends upon bowing down to a religious entity you don’t believe in. And then imagine forcing someone else into that same paradigm. That’s why I don’t push my own religious values on others. Unfortunately, there are way too many people who don’t feel the same way.

Vasily Boiko is one of them, and things in Russia just got really crappy for a lot of people who were probably minding their own business until this ultimatum came upon them. It’s amazing how one powerful, shitty person can ruin the days of so many.

(image: from Startrek.com)

Reflections on Life in General

Politics, Religion, , ,

I spent a few hours this weekend paying bills. You know, the usual, where you sit down with your check book and write out checks for all of the bills that have been building up over the last few weeks. The kind that build up not because you can’t afford to pay them, but just because you don’t want to take the time to pay them. I find myself doing that a lot, and have even paid some bills really late because I just didn’t feel like filling out the paper work that is required to fill out in order to pay a simple gas bill. I really hate  paying bills, and no matter how many times I pay it, that feeling just doesn’t change.

For me, it feels like my life has very little meaning when it comes down to it, because when I’m sitting there with a handful of utility and credit card bills, one starts to feel that there’s really little purpose in life other than paying bills to people who don’t provide anything for me other than little nuances that one needs to endure in order to live somewhat comfortably. I pay a gas bill because I don’t want to freeze, and sometimes I like to cook food without having to rub two sticks together and hope that millions of years of evolution don’t put me back a couple of thousands years to where I’m still required to provide my own fire. I pay an electricity bill so that I can watch TV, turn on the lights, run the microwave (avoiding that rubbing sticks together thing), fire up my computer to write this blog, and other things that come from Ben Franklin’s kite discovery a couple of centuries ago. I pay my rent bill so I don’t get kicked out on my behind and actually have a stuff to put my, to put what George Carlin eloquently referred to as, “stuff”. I pay my car payment so I can avoid having to take the bus to work, and then I get to pay my insurance bill so that I’m legally allowed to drive my car on the road. Add in credit card bills and other little nuanced payments here and there, and honestly, I’m paying a lot of money to maintain a very low level of existence.

But what’s the meaning of it all? I mean, why continue to pay all of this money to entities that don’t care one iota about me in any way just so one can continue to survive? Throughout history, reflective souls have constantly asked the inward-looking questions of “why am I here?” and each generation seems to have one or two philosophers that think they have it all figured out, yet why is it that we still keep having to ask this question? I mean, we can read all sorts of philosophers and think we have it all figured out, but I get the impression that no one has ever really figured it out, because we still have to keep asking the questions. But we don’t seem to come up with any real answers.

I remember a colleague and I once joked in political science that we were challenging the paradigm Americanist belief that all representatives do what they do in order to be re-elected. We posited that perhaps the rationale behind congressional representatives was a little simpler, that maybe they did what they did in office, and to achieve office, because they were interested in dating. In other words: Attracting a potential mate. Sure, those of us in the discipline laughed at us, and we chalked it up as a joke, but if you think about it, there’s probably something there. If you look at it from a basic biological necessity, most people tend to do the things they do in order to perpetuate the species. Men fluff their feathers in hopes of attracting a mate, so why couldn’t it be seen that in the end congressional representatives do everything they do in hopes of perpetuating their species as a biological necessity? Sure, getting elected, or re-elected, may appear to be the end goal, but what if it’s really just a step in a biological direction? I honestly think that scientists aren’t all that interested in examining such issues with sincerity because then it would present all sorts of dilemmas that they don’t want to deal with, especially if the base values of a politician are narrowed down to simple reproductive functions.

Which brings me back to my original question of “why are we here?”. I mean, is that all there is? Are we here specifically just for reproducing, and thus, all of our mannerisms and manifestations mean nothing but achieving survival through offspring? I’d really hate to think that life is as simple as that, and the bigger picture is really nothing more than just the continuation of the species.  Wouldn’t that be truly sad to discover that after all of this evolution we’re no different, or better, than a snail slug? What a joke that would be if our achievement of sentience means absolutely nothing but an ability to acknowledge that we really don’t have a purpose in the first place.

All of this discussion makes it really difficult to conclude without at least mentioning the concept of religion because when it comes to this type of conversation, there’s always this tendency to try to find answers through a “higher” meaning. Having been brought up in the methodist sense of spirituality, I often find it interesting that there are people who can so easily surrender to the idea that it’s all just a part of a religious purpose, that there’s no need to think any deeper than that. In a Penrose sort of way, it’s hard not to be able to acknowledge the possibility of something deeper than basic humanity, but at the same time it’s so difficult to accept that we have managed to figure it all out because someone in an earlier age, with less ability to understand the bigger picture, had it all figured out and wrote it down in a book for the rest of us to follow, especially when the book is so damn confusing, is interpreted so many different ways (often leading to war, subjugation and hatred), and no two copies of “the book” are believed to be any more valid than any other. And then the followers of those books do such horrific deeds and offer up such hatred towards other people, all in the name of doing the right thing.

Anyway, I’m starting to ramble now, so I’ll leave it at that for now.

Women Are Causing Problems Again!

Bizarre, Religion, , ,

(FYI: This article is satire, so if you read it, please understand that it’s not meant to be taken seriously. For some reason WAY too many people have responded to this article as if it’s actually a criticism against women. Most people get the point of this post as a post-modernist criticism against Iranian patriarchal policies, but unfortunately not everyone else does)

This just in! Women cause earthquakes. I mean, we all suspected this. Women are known for doing some pretty evil things, but it wasn’t until we checked with Iranian cleric, Hojatoleslam Kazem Sedighi, who stated eruditely, “Many women who do not dress modestly … lead young men astray, corrupt their chastity and spread adultery in society, which (consequently) increases earthquakes.” I mean, what more evidence do we need than that.

Come to think of it, this type of cause and effect analysis reminds me of the gnome underwear thieves in South Park, who argue profit strategy, summed up as:

1. Steal the world’s underwear

2. ???

3. Profit!

Now, it wouldn’t be a funny story if just some obscure cleric made such a ridiculous comment, but soon after, it was backed by none other than Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who then argued that as a result of this horrible situation brought on by promiscuous and sexy-dressing women that an imminent earthquake is going to hit Tehran, advocating that its 12 million residents must relocate IMMEDIATELY.

Now, I don’t want to point fingers, but I’ve always suspected that women wearing sexy clothing cause horrible calamities in the world. I mean, think about it. In 1909, there was an earthquake in San Francisco. Sexy women were dancing in brothels in San Francisco at the time. Need more evidence? Before the huge earthquake in Haiti, I heard that some guys were in downtown Los Angeles having a lap dance from a stripper named Roxy. Although I was not there to report it, due to a stupid jury duty appointment I had to keep, I can bet Roxy was wearing some pretty revealing clothing. As a matter of fact, I’ve been thinking of nothing BUT what she might have been wearing since I was unable to make that appointment.

We really need to do something to stop women from causing these horrible disasters. Obviously, we can’t ask them to patrol themselves because they’d just go back to their lascivious ways because they’re women, and we know you can’t trust them and their lustful manners. Therefore, I’m proposing a task force, led by me because I care so much, to go into places where we know evil, morally-bankrupt women to congregate and educate them on how they are derailing our attempts to circumvent earthquakes and wonton destruction. I could start on the west coast and work my way east.

I mean, someone has to think about the children.

By the way, the article can be found here. I’d blame Fox News, but it originates from the Associated Press.