Shame & Delusion

    I've long believed in the connection between shame and violence. Having just watched "Behind The Curve," I now see how shame is also connected to identity and delusional belief systems. It is obvious that the latching onto dogma is more about their connections with other humans than it is about the beliefs themselves. While I've long understood that the primary reason people latch onto identities is for "social" reasons...I don't think I've given enough weight to the drive that many people feel to pursue them over truth and progress.
    It's truly maddening, though, knowing that if we could shed this one thing...we could eliminate so many of our people problems...religion, anti-science conspiracies, anti-environmental sustainability ideologies, social darwinism, harmful economic dogmatic beliefs, harmful beliefs about "human nature," etc. We must all become truth-seekers and truth-teachers. I haven't given much thought into the best ways to implement that into the methodologies of society, but I should probably start.

Technology Abuse and Neo-McCarthyism

Since we're facing a new "Red Scare" with both the left and right afraid that Progressives will bring corporate rule to an end, or greatly diminish it... and the fact that fascism and hatred are seeing a resurgence; I figure it's only right to add some wisdom from Ed Murrow, who fought the previous generations battle against authoritarianism and abuse of public platforms.

"If we confuse dissent with disloyalty — if we deny the right of the individual to be wrong, unpopular, eccentric or unorthodox — if we deny the essence of racial equality then hundreds of millions in Asia and Africa who are shopping about for a new allegiance will conclude that we are concerned to defend a myth and our present privileged status. Every act that denies or limits the freedom of the individual in this country costs us the ... confidence of men and women who aspire to that freedom and independence of which we speak and for which our ancestors fought."

"This instrument can teach, it can illuminate; yes, and even it can inspire. But it can do so only to the extent that humans are determined to use it to those ends. Otherwise it's nothing but wires and lights in a box. There is a great and perhaps decisive battle to be fought against ignorance, intolerance and indifference. This weapon of television could be useful."

- Edward R. Murrow

The Gatekeepers Of Truth

I Googled for "historically accurate documentaries about McCarthyism"...and Google recommended "anti-communist movies." It SCARES the shit out of me that McCarthyism is simply reduced to "anti-communist"... McCarthyism was not just a "position" for or against communism, it was a period of MASSIVE rights violations, no matter what your opinion of communism is. I know people have been talking about Google bias for years now, but revisionist history and censorship is a FUNDAMENTAL flaw that MUST be remedied IMMEDIATELY. I know it sounds cliche, but seriously THINK OF THE CHILDREN. We are feeding them shit information, and not allowing them to see reality clearly and become moral, independent thinkers. Gas-lighting our children will only create a world where nothing is true, people can't distinguish between news and fake news, and people make emotional decisions based on tribe and self-interest... oh wait...

"War is Peace

Freedom is Slavery

Ignorance is Strength"

ALL HAIL BIG BROTHER!

If I only knew then, what... the fuck...

Everyone wishes they "had known earlier," or could do X over... well here we are in "do over" world. We have a chance to stop ANOTHER war for oil, masked as a humanitarian crisis and a "fight for democracy"... laughable. We have a Presidential election coming up with Trump, Corporate Democrats, and Bernie Sanders... let's see if Americans with EVERY FUCKING fact at hand, knowing intimately who and what they're dealing with, can make the right decision this time around. Seriously, if we can't do this basic thing, I'm becoming a geneticist so I can create a future generation that is radiation and toxin resistant, or a programmer/roboticist to create AI that can survive space travel... otherwise we have no future.

I thought Nuclear Apocalypse was too cliche

Trump is now talking about giving nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia...a country that floats on an ocean of oil, with endless, open, wind-swept spaces, bathed in sunlight...and they need NUCLEAR power to secure their energy future? On top of that, let's look at their ideology and determine if they have the maturity to handle nuclear technology...they are a THEOCRATIC MONARCHY...they have barbaric and draconian laws, they oppress women, people of -any- sexual orientation...they are, right now, involved in a genocide in Yemen...they take away documentation from immigrants so they can trap them in the country and use them as slaves, etc., etc., you get the point.

Okay, the answer is obvious... and yet, here we are... Trump is still President despite EVERY indication he is dangerously incompetent AT BEST, if not outright opposed to all reason... Okay, that too is obvious... and yet, here we are with CONGRESS able to remove the dangerous idiot... but they are too busy enriching the already absurdly wealthy, preaching endless war, sexually assaulting people, and generally also being dangerously incompetent... Okay, so that is AGAIN no secret... and yet, here we are with a PUBLIC able to put intelligent, capable, people in office... oh wait, they are too busy waging war on imaginary threats and demanding we build impossible solutions to those imaginary threats, reviving white nationalism, voting against basic necessities, endlessly consuming resources, and watching reboots that ruin everyone's childhoods... I've heard of "turtles all the way down," but how did we end up with "dangerous idiots all the way down"?

I don't know how to end this on a positive note, so I'll just say if you're even mildly intelligent, run for office, build your wealth, influence the influential...whatever it takes to get this ship under the control of rational and benevolent forces.

How To Protest

Recently, people have been protesting based solely on passion...and I'm sorry to say that is the wrong way to do it. A protest is a focused pressure on the system, it must be succinct and unbreakable. Save the in-fighting for the discussion groups, save the preaching, etc., when you show up to a protest, you must all have the same voice, the same policy agenda...shoulder to shoulder and solid.

"Work Ethic" Neurosis

    While we all agree that a healthy work ethic is a great thing...I think the way it's being portrayed in society today is so distorted. First of all, a strong work ethic is only "good" if what you're working at is good... to correct the religious meme on this subject: idle hands don't do the devils work...busy hands doing the devils work, do the devils work. This problem is compounded by the fact that the values promoted today are self-interested and tribal. This is further compounded by the fact that only work that the wealthy and powerful demand is properly incentivized. In the US, there are virtually no sources of funding for the public good...public banks have been destroyed by money interests, and politicians will not tax the wealthy or push initiatives that help the average person, because they ARE, or are beholden to money interests.
    When I look at all the people who claim to have strong work ethic and demand it of others...they don't have strong work ethics at all...they are simply laser-focused on solely improving their own situation and they misinterpret that dedication to self-interest as work ethic. Meanwhile, they accuse everyone else of being lazy, only when someone else refuses to do something THEY want. We don't have a work ethic problem, we have a problem with aggressive, self-interested people trying to coerce self-determined people.
    Keep an eye out in your own life, see if this is true for you as well.

Disposable Culture

If a person threatens a hunger strike, really it is an appeal to their opponents sense of "value of life." They are assuming that people will see that life is more valuable than whatever practice they are continuing/protecting. Similarly, if a people pour wine out, burn books, or pour tea into a harbor...they are making a similar point; appealing to a persons sense of "waste" and/or that the people protesting are willing to invest even more into destroying a practice/product than the cost of having it.

This works, only when people VALUE things...when they have a deeper understanding of the relationship between things/ideas and the efficiencies won or lost in the exchange of said things/ideas. However, we live in a "disposable" age...an age of single-use plastic, of stagnating wages, of leaders who happily torture and kill publicly (or would like to if allowed)... an age where we value virtually nothing and cater only to self-interest.

The key to solving this is public UNDERSTANDING, if one understands more, they can value more/appropriately.

Example: Your determination of the value of life becomes more accurate when you understand how difficult it is to "live" in the universe, how precarious and tied to the environment it is, the difference between a life of misery and a life of flourishing...when you really understand life, you can value life appropriately.

Bottom line, protesting means nothing if society values nothing...
Nobody can vote on action unless we agree on reality and the value of things in that reality...
The beginning of every change and solution is building our UNDERSTANDING.

War

"War... War never changes.
Since the dawn of humankind, when our ancestors first discovered the killing power of rock and bone, blood has been spilled in the name of everything: from God, to justice, to simple, psychotic rage.
In the year 2077, after millennia of armed conflict, the destructive nature of man could sustain itself no longer. The world was plunged into an abyss of nuclear fire and radiation.
But it was not, as some had predicted, the end of the world. Instead, the apocalypse was simply the prologue to another bloody chapter of human history.
For man had succeeded in destroying the world... but war... war never changes." 

- Opening Cinematic from Fallout 3

There is no winner in war. Everyone believes they are the hero in their story and will backwards justify any outcome...but in reality, we always lose precious progress on the whole. We must eliminate war from existence.
Although Eisenhower was involved in creating the Military Industrial Complex, he recognized his folly and later said:

"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.
This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children."

Repeat The Mistakes Of The Past

In the 1800s inspectors noted: "A somber discontent runs through the ranks of this class. That they long for the return of the past, loath the present, despair of the future, give themselves up to the evil influence of agitators."

You might think that sounds like Trump supporters, but ironically these people wanted to immigrate to America. The philosophies of blame and escape beget the misery they try to evade. As Buckminster Fuller says: "We are called to be architects of the future, not its victims." We must see ourselves as part of society and the adopt a culture of problem solving.