The Ardent Axiom
Illuminating the Facts About Behavioral Health and Rising Above the Stigma
Muslim Refugees, Christianity and the Future of Freedom
Muslim Refugees, Christianity, and the Future of Freedom
Vetting, the process of reviewing refugee candidates before they come into the U.S., should be a concern for all of us. In this essay I will discuss why, but above all else I want you to understand this simple truth: For anyone who studies history, you know that we relive it when humanity fails to learn a lesson. It would seem to me that it would do us all a great justice to learn about our past, so that we may better prepare for the future.
To begin, it’s perfectly reasonable to allow Christians, Jews and other Middle Eastern minorities into the U.S., as we can be generally assured they won’t commit mass murder and mayhem when they get here.
These people, who are so heavily persecuted in Syria, Iraq and so many other countries controlled by either theocratic governments or simply egotistical dictators, are undoubtedly grateful to get out of those hell holes.
A problem arises when refugees lie about who they are or what religion they belong to or to whom they are loyal. Interestingly, some countries require a person’s religion to be printed on their government issued identity card, but this is not in every Middle Eastern or North African country, where the majority of refugees are coming from.
Here’s the real heart of the matter. While liberal Muslims do exist, that is to say those who do not adhere to any literal interpretation of the Qur’an or the teachings in the Hadith, it is extremely difficult to know which Muslim is or is not sympathetic to the plight of ISIS – Muslims who abide by a literal and fundamentalist interpretation.
A major issue in America are Islamic apologists, these are people who will condemn you for speaking openly about your concerns with Islam. Though we know it completely rational to draw into question a Muslim’s loyalty; these regressive liberals as I would call them, see it as bigotry or racism. They are blinded by their political correctness and it prevents America from asking the questions that need to be asked.
I’m not sure if the biggest concern is currently that foreign born Muslims are coming into the U.S., who’s intentions we do not know; or that in 40 years from now as new generations are born and the influence of Islam spreads to greater percentages of our population they will gain significant political power.
As someone who has spent years studying world religions and once upon a time being an adherent, I know that it can be argued that all religions have some variance of usefulness or artistic appeal, but among the world’s largest religions, particularly the Abrahamic religions and Hindu religion, I could (and have in some cases) gather masses of material from the holy texts of these global belief systems that if taken literally (as they all were at some point in history) it would spell out the end of humanistic civilization as we know it.
Unlike Christianity, which has greatly stepped away from literal translations and adherence to fundamentalist interpretations, Islam has not reached this point of maturity. Of course, it has not been an easy or pleasant aging process for Christianity.
During the Middle Ages, historical accounts suggest as many as 3,000 Jews in Europe were murdered by Christians after mass hysteria in response to a single allegation that a sacramental host (the Eucharist – an unleavened cracker received by Catholics during Mass that once consecrated is believed to be the body of Jesus Christ) was desecrated by a Jew.
Beginning in 1184 by Catholic Pope Lucius III, the helm of the Holy Inquisition was then passed on by the hands of other popes, and carried out by bishops, priests, friars and monks, and would eventually lead to the deaths of 40,000 – 50,000 European Jews, Christian Cathars, pagans, alleged witches, other heretics, apostates and scientific scholars.
Though the Inquisition was not officially proclaimed until 1231, it lasted some 700 years and the act of execution by the Catholic Church lasted until 1850 in Mexico.
Justified by the Bible in such verses as, Deuteronomy: 17, 12-13 / 13, 12-16 / 13, 7-11 / John: 15, 6 and in many other books of the Bible to include Genesis, Exodus, 2 Timothy, Leviticus, Jeremiah and so many more. Murder and mayhem was brought about by such highly revered individuals as St. Dominic and St. Augustine, who in time would be heralded to sainthood for their encouragement of human atrocities during the so called Holy Inquisition.
It was a capital offense to be in possession of a Bible if you were a common citizen in Medieval Europe up until the 16th Century. In other words, you would be put to death if you were not a clergyman or if you were a woman and were caught with a Bible in your possession. The Bible was considered such a sacred text, that no common man and definitely no woman, was allowed to touch it.
Though the Roman Catholic Church’s days of brutality and intolerance have mostly come to pass in first world nations, in Africa people are still being executed in the name of the Christian God and Jesus Christ in countries like South Sudan and Nigeria for such nonsensical crimes as speaking openly about their skepticism of religion or for merely being lesbian, gay or transgender.
In these countries and others like them, government officials will publish papers distributed to the public, naming these poor souls – knowing full well that it will lead to their arrest and/or murder.
In our world today, most Muslims fall under the description of moderate. The difference between a moderate Christian and a moderate Muslim in first world nations is huge. Islam is a religion, under Shia or Sunni sects, that in its literal interpretation seeks to take control of communities, to enforce Sharia Law on all, whether all are Muslim or not.
ISIS, for example, has stated that Western non-believers can either convert or become slaves and pay a tax, up until the time you either convert or be executed. Like many religions, when taken literally, Islam is not peaceful towards or tolerant of anyone who does not adhere. Even moderate Muslims believe that certain Islamic laws should be obeyed by non-Muslims.
In polls taken across Europe after the murders of journalists for depicting Muhammad as a caricature, one in every four Muslims who replied said they sympathized with the murderers. That poll reached at least 1,000 Muslims in the United Kingdom.
If that’s not startling enough, 47% of them said they support clerics or Imams in mosques who preached hatred towards Westerners (non-Muslims). Further, 11% said they supported the Jihadist ideology.
Now, you must realize that the U.K. is a mostly liberal group of countries for those numbers to really hit home. If free Muslims living there harbor these types of sentiments, imagine how other Muslims might feel who live in other countries that are far less liberal or open minded such as Syria, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Iraq, Afghanistan, just to name a few in the Middle East, and countries in Africa like Algeria, Chad, Somalia, Guinea, Egypt, Morocco, Libya and Tunisia where 50-100% of those populations are now Muslim.
There is a tiny blip of hope. There are Muslims who are trying to change this. These liberal Muslims are speaking out against the type of fundamentalist ideals that lead to the massacres we have all come too readily familiar with. Unfortunately their voices are tiny and they too are targeted by extremists and cannot live in their homelands and inevitably flee to Western countries.
Foreign born Christians, Jews, Baha’i’s, other religious minorities and liberal Muslims who are fleeing their homelands as refugees and who speak out against ISIS and lone wolves, should be welcomed into the U.S. because we need their voices against those who seek to end our way of life.
This essay is available as an audio track on SoundCloud:
In Search of Self
In Search of Self
Over the years I’ve learned that the most potent of personal feelings can be the most consoling and relatable to other people who are going through their own hardships.
So without even knowing it, you can touch the lives of complete strangers in such a way that few other people could do. And you can do it by just being open and honest about how you feel. Sometimes our pain can be someone else’s healing.
This is why I used to write a lot about the emotions and thoughts I had during my worst experiences with depression. Optimistic and positive people never understood why I would write and share such sad, depressing, dark material, but they were never meant to be the recipients. My words were meant for those who understood me.
When I was 19 years old, I admitted myself into a hospital to be put under suicide watch. And I ended up being locked away in that hospital’s psych ward for three days.
There were many different kinds of people there. I was the youngest in the whole ward. All these old and middle-aged adults, many with spouses and children. Some of them were so far gone they never got out of bed or showered, or wouldn’t wear more than a robe all day.
Some were chronically depressed, some had bi-polar disorder, others were just facing more life hardships than they could handle.
I looked at some of them and thought to myself, “I don’t ever want to be like that.”
I’ve read many self-help books over the last decade or better, trying to find the answers that I needed in order to live my life differently.
I’ve taken more kinds of pills than I can remember, sought therapists, counselors and social workers whose faces I can no longer remember.
I’ve gone from being a Catholic, to an ordained Inter Faith minister, to a Buddhist student, to an outspoken atheist, to what should probably be called an agnostic.
I have thought that I loved and thought that I was loved. I have used and I have been used.
Through all the things that I have read, studied or lived through in an attempt to find the answer or answers that I needed in order to let go of the past and get out of the darkness, I have merely found that no one has the answer and that the past is a part of you and the darkness is everywhere.
And yet I wander on, most of the time aimlessly, stumbling as I go, still in search, not of answers, or healing, or faith, or love, or light, but in search of myself.
This essay is available as an audio track on SoundCloud:
It’s Been A While
It’s Been A While
August 19, 2016
I haven’t posted anything on here in quite some time. Furthermore, I haven’t typed anything extensive that would garner being posted. The year 2016 has been a harsh one, not just for me, but also for other people whom I know.
As is standard practice, I suppose I should start at the beginning of the year. The last week of December my mom was hospitalized for a myriad of reasons, she had been ill for years and fighting a combination of heart, lung and arterial diseases. During her stay we were informed that she was dying and had a few months to live. She was released in January.
Like any family we grappled with this reality and even though we knew she had been in poor and deteriorating condition, hearing those words come from her physician’s mouth, had forced it in front of us in a way that we had not dealt with before. Even before that hospital stay I had told myself to be aware that her time was limited and that there would come a day when I would have to say goodbye.
My mom turned 71 years old this year, she and my father celebrated their 55th wedding anniversary. By early March, my mom found a strength and resilience, her condition seemed to improve and she spent most of her time crocheting and coloring in her art book. Earlier when she had been released from the hospital, we were advised to put a bed in the living room as her ability to move around would decline.
As time continued to pass and the weeks went by her condition took a turn for the worse and she spent most of her time in bed asleep, only getting out of it to use the bathroom. My mom smoked for 50 years before she finally quit. Having smoked for so long, she faced many health issues. She had a lung disease that caused a hardening of the tiny air sacks in her lungs, making it difficult to breathe, because of which she had to be permanently on oxygen. She had a heart attack some time around 2009, which resulted in congestive heart failure on the right side of her heart.
The heart attack was a result of plaque in her arteries. From 2009 through about 2013, she had numerous stents and a filter put in to prevent further blockages from either reaching her heart or being created in her heart and lungs.
In 2013, during one of her numerous hospital stays, she had a port device implanted in her chest that pumped medication directly to her heart 24 hours a day. This device helped relieve the strain on her heart, which was working double time because only half of it was functional. The strain of only being half-functional caused pulmonary hypertension and thus an enlarged heart.
So as you can see, she faced daunting conditions for years, but seldom did she ever convey how badly she felt. My mother was the type to hide those sorts of things, not wanting anyone to see her suffering. It would be true to say that I didn’t know how strong and brave my mom was, until I watched her face such devastating effects for so long.
By May, she was at her lowest point. She was supposed to go to a doctor appointment on the 16th, but she decided she should go to the hospital instead. Four days later she passed away.
Months before her January hospital visit, my mom and I had already had conversations about her condition, about how she would never get better. We never discussed the actual event of her dying, she was tough and persistent in continuing her life even though it became increasingly hard to do the most simplest of things.
I remember when her physician told her that she was indeed dying and had only months to live. She wasn’t ready to hear that from him, like all of us, she wanted to hear that there was another new treatment we could try to prolong her life further. I distinctly remember her saying, “I’m not ready yet.”
The night before she passed away, she asked to speak to all of her children as she was going to be given sedation and pain medications that would make her less coherent and thus may not be able to speak to us again. Some of her last words to me were, “You’re special to me.” Those words still echoe in my head as I think about all the moments we shared over the years of my life.
Prior to that awful experience and about the same time that she took a turn for the worse, one of my friends disappeared in a foreign country under mysterious circumstances, but his body was discovered over a week later and the case remains an open unsolved murder investigation.
I remember the day I told my mom that my friend’s body had been found. As the words came out of my mouth, I could see her reaction only in her eyes. I do not know if her reaction was because I had been telling her about the search for nearly a week and she felt the same sense of defeat and theft of hope that I had felt, or if her reaction was a reckoning to her own impending death.
Before my friend was found deceased, my nephew lost his father-in-law. After my mom died, a dear and close friend of mine lost her husband. After that, a co-worker lost his father. Death has been active in my life for several months now, too many wakes and funerals.
These events have been a catalyst for me, dragging me down quite far. I have perhaps not been this mentally and emotionally challenged for six to eights years. If you’ve read any of my previous writings on mental illness and depression, you know that I have grappled with these kinds of issues for many years in the past.
I have become quite lethargic, withdrawn, uninterested and fatigued. All signs and symptoms of depression I have dealt with in the past. I think that I would be a fool to assert that my emotional condition is directly connected to the death of my mom. Instead, I think that her death more so triggered something inside of me that had been growing and brewing over a lengthy amount of time. It brought to surface things that I’ve been pushing down and trying to ignore for a long time.
It will be three months tomorrow since she passed from this life. I have photos of her from throughout her life hung up in my apartment. I haven’t figured out if this is a good thing or a bad thing. On one hand, it keeps her spirit alive within and around me. On the other hand, it’s a constant reminder of loss, of what used to be and is no more. I’ve struggled with the decision to leave all the photos up or to take them down.
I’ve lost two friends over the years, both of which I at one point dated, but this is the first loss I’ve experienced with someone I’ve known my entire life and I think that only someone who has lost a spouse, parent, sibling or child can understand the strange emptiness and vacancy that follows such a loss. Because these people are so integrated into your life and then suddenly are gone, coming to terms with that is so difficult. Oddly I sometimes forget that she is dead and then it hits me… she’s dead. Practically three months later and those words still sound wrong on my tongue, bizarre and unbelievable… my mom is dead.
No more phone calls from her, no more visits to her house and seeing her sitting at the kitchen table. I remember after her death, the day I realized that I would never again hear her voice. I felt a sense of panic at that thought and I quickly reached for my phone, hoping that I still had an old voicemail message from her that I could listen to. But I didn’t, thanks to my OCD nature, I always delete all my voicemail messages and emails.
Panic is something I’ve been experiencing a lot lately. Every night to be more accurate. I have not been able to sleep much, I typically get about four hours a night during the week. My mind and body fight against me and refuse to let me go to bed. I literally tell myself to get up off the couch and go to bed, but my body doesn’t respond, it’s like my subconscious mind is telling me to fuck off. When I do finally get into bed, I have panic attacks while laying there, they typically happen right as I fall asleep and I abruptly awaken gasping for air and my heart racing or beating erratically and irregularly. Sometimes it seems as though I stop breathing just as I fall asleep… sleep apnea. If I lay on my side, it doesn’t seem to happen though.
On the weekends or days during the week that I take off work and I don’t have to set my alarm, I tend to sleep longer and when I do wake up, I’m unable to get out of bed. It’s common for me to lay awake in bed for hours and hours. Sometimes just laying there, sometimes passing in and out of wakefulness with no desire to get up and start my day. This has become a problem as I’ve been late to work and social events for this very reason.
I have no desire to talk to other people, friends or family. I do not want to socialize or go places, even messaging or texting people requires extra effort to accomplish. All I want to do is lay in bed or on my couch and watch a show called Naruto, of which I am in love with.
It’s been a very long time since my mind has wandered so deeply into the darkness that I have suicidal thoughts and feelings, but I’m there now. As I said earlier, it’s not just about my mom dying, her death was a trigger for other things I’ve been trying to blissfully ignore about myself and my life. I think it’s accurate to say that her death caused me to take a good long, hard look at my own life, evaluating what I’ve done over the years, what I’ve accomplished and where I want my life to go. The results of that self-assessment were anything but positive and hopeful.
From my personal life to my professional life, I’m a walking failed attempt at an adult. I’m a college dropout, working a low paying, dead end job that brings me no joy or sense of fulfillment at all whatsoever. I’m constantly worried about money and being able to pay bills.
When it comes to my personal life, well it’s pretty pathetic. I really think that I must be the shittiest friend anyone could ever have. It’s no lie, I’m heavily concerned with myself and my own problems, resulting in me being mostly vacant from other people’s lives. It doesn’t help that I feel little to no common connection with other people anymore, especially right now that I’m so withdrawn and uninterested in nearly everything that I used to be interested in. I truly have no ambition or goals and when I encounter individuals who are ambitious and want to talk about their goals, I just get disgusted by them and have no desire to communicate further. I suppose it’s because it reminds me of everything that I am not.
And then there’s romance. Or to be more accurate, what the fuck is romance? Cause I’m definitely not familiar with it. The last time I was dating someone it was still 2013, and the last time I had sex was 2014 and it ended horribly. Honestly, I couldn’t care less about the sex part. The part I miss is feeling emotionlly connected to someone. I no longer know what it’s like to be in a relationship of any kind with anyone. The last few people I involved myself with wanted only friendship and nothing more, or they just used me to get attention, money, food and when I told them what I wanted – I was thrown away as inconvenient and no longer useful.
I’ve really just become a bitter, broken, failure who cannot see the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel or even a reason to look for it. If I were a weaker man, I think I would have turned to substance abuse by now or some other self-harming avenue to avoid my feelings and problems.
There are times I’m very self-aware of my thoughts and actions and I shake my head at myself in disgust and anger. I say things to myself such as, “You pathetic fucking loser,” “Look at you in your petty worries,” “What a piece of shit you are,” “Why are you so fucking lazy,” “Get the fuck over it,” “Why don’t you do something useful for once,” “Look how other people are out living their life while you sit here depressed, lazy and getting old and fat,” “Get up and work out you piece of shit,” “You’re nothing but a fuck up, you ruin everything,” “You’ll never go anywhere in life, just give up like you always do, failure,” “Nobody likes you, nobody cares about you, you wouldn’t be missed.”
The Four Cornerstones
“To be loved is to be acknowledged as existing.”
– Thich Nhat Hanh
The Four Cornerstones
The older I get the more I realize the difficulty of long-term social attachment. By that I mean relationships. The way we see things changes as we grow older, and in terms of human interaction, we experience a lot of heartbreak, betrayal, loss, and other things that make us distrust other people. Ironically, the older we become the more desperately we yearn for things like trust and commitment and ultimately companionship.
I have found it so very true that we as human beings, whether you are male or female, desire to be noticed, to be heard, to be appreciated and to be remembered. At the core of every human relationship are those four tenants. Without those four cornerstones, relationships fail.
We often think of relationships as something romantic or even perhaps sexual, but really every relationship we have, whether mere friendship or all the way to marriage, truly begin the same way. And because of that, we can learn a great deal from all of those collected experiences. Even the bad ones.
I remember my first sexual experience, and for a long time I always saw that as a pivotal moment in my life, one that made me realize at 12 years old that I was attracted to guys, much to my disappointment. But really the complexities of human attraction are far more intricate than simple sexual curiosity or release.
If I go back even further to childhood, the friendships I had back then taught me the first cornerstone: to be noticed.
As kids, we all want friends, people to play with. Fun is the fundamental part of every childhood friendship. But to make friends you have to be noticed. Through those years I made friends who were guys and girls alike. I had guy friends I played video games with and had sleepovers with, girl friends that I kissed on the school bus and who offered to do my homework because they thought I was cute. Normal kid stuff.
From the time I was 6 years old and onward, there was one particular person who’s friendship I wanted most of all. I wanted him to notice me, I wanted us to hang out at recess, to share secrets, to stay over at each other’s houses, to be best friends. Inseparable.
As hard as I tried to make those things happen, it never seemed like it was enough to sate the feeling I had. We even dated the same girl once during elementary school. Despite knowing each other so well, I always had this feeling, even as a young kid, that I wanted more from my friendship with him, but I didn’t understand it and I didn’t know what was missing. All I knew is that I saw him or felt differently about him than he did me. Why didn’t he notice?
Back then, I couldn’t know and nor could he, because we were just too young to understand. You can’t understand those things until your teenage years, when your mind and body change, you go through such a change that you learn the second cornerstone: to be heard.
So many things are going on inside of you, especially your mind, during the transition of kid to teen. You feel awkward, misunderstood, among many other things. You just want someone to listen to you, to understand you as you are. You want to be heard.
Unfortunately for me, I didn’t get to attain this cornerstone until my early twenties, because I had to accept myself before I could open up to someone else. And that process took me nine years.
When I had gained an interest in enlisting in the military I met another young guy who shared the same interest. Immediately, through this common goal, we connected. Even though he and I were also very different.
He was the son of a minister, he was very devout, perhaps the most religiously conservative guy I’ve ever met. An Evangelical Christian who considered himself a Calvinist, the most fundamentally conservative denomination of Christianity.
At the time I was still a practicing Catholic, but our views were different and I still had not yet come out of the closet. Despite these things, he and I would stay up for hours upon hours late into the night just talking about life, our fears, ambitions and our beliefs and thoughts.
For a few years we’d communicate with each other, even after I admitted to him that I was romantically interested in guys. It was awkward for him at first, but by that time he already knew so much about me that we moved passed it.
One night during our intellectual and sometimes playful banter, we had a moment where we brought up feelings and how we perceived each other. It’s important to know that he was strictly straight, had made it clear he was only romantically into females.
We agreed that we enjoyed our long and deep conversations, our willingness to be open and honest, even to the point of being painfully honest when we didn’t see eye to eye. And that’s when it happened, he told me he loved me.
For the first time in my life someone told me they loved me. I couldn’t believe it and I said, “What?” And he said, “Man, I love you.” His words cut into me and they hurt, not because I didn’t like it, but because no one had said it to me before, I had never felt that word before. Love.
My face flushed, my throat tightened, my eyes began to gather tears. In that one moment I understood not only the second, but also the third cornerstone: to be appreciated.
We didn’t just hear each other through those late night heart-to-hearts, but we appreciated them and each other to the point that he grew to love me. And for the first time in my life, I said that four letter word too, right back at him.
Though I wished that moment could have been more, it was never meant to be more. He was straight and therefore he would never be willing to go beyond that boundary all truly straight men set. So it was bittersweet. And even worse, in time we stopped being friends and lost contact.
The last I heard, he was commissioned into the Marine Corps and got married.
The fourth cornerstone is one you can only learn when you have attained an unconditional and unending loving bond. This can only be done when someone retains their connection with you, the type that comes from a life-long friendship or relationship.
One that withstands fights, where even in anger and ill-judgment, you still can’t help thinking about the other person’s feelings. You concern yourself with their well-being and they feel the same way about you. They remember you because they value your existence, cherish the moments and memories that you created together.
So how did I learn the fourth cornerstone? Through pain and suffering, and not just through my own. You see, to be remembered is not just an acknowledgement of other people, but also to remember ourselves and the things that have shaped us into the human beings we are.
Through sharing experiences we become emotionally invested in others, we attach a part of ourselves to them and see their lives as they do, this is called empathy. And through this attachment we bond deeply.
I came to understand the fourth cornerstone through the darkest hours of my life, when I wanted to die. Because I remembered the bonds I shared with other people and how my absence from their lives would leave a void dark and deep, a pain that even in my suffering, I could not inflict upon them. And nor could I abandon the life I had been given to live, for I remembered all of those that I had lost, who no longer could stand in the sun and smile in its warmth.
Through life you learn these cornerstones and they enable you to form loyal, honest and rewarding relationships with the people you meet, whether it be friends or a romantic life-long partner. Stay true to these tenants, not only as a recipient, but also a giver and you will find emotional fulfillment.
Do not just be noticed, but also notice. Do not just be heard, but also listen. Do not just be appreciated, but also appreciate. Do not just be remembered, but also remember.
The Darklord
I feel it now, in the distance, that slow advance of the cold, pressing forwards and retreating as if to test the walls of my castle. It comes at dawn and dusk, settles upon me in an eerie breath of darkness the way the cold air of fog settles upon the warm ground, seeping in ever so deeper. My breath escapes me and I am faint, too weak to flee my abode. I am alone. Waiting for the darkness to be made visible.
Cracks split across that sealed away grim, the demon’s ice-covered tomb buried deep within. In darkness, a darkness I dare not tread, his eyes have opened. The Darklord rises from the slumber I had once cast him into. Time is ticking in his favor, he calls out my name from the shadows, growing stronger as I grow weaker, he awakens to yet again claim the empire of my mind, yearning to sit once more upon my throne of sanity and steal away my crown, to take away my power.
Tap, tap, tap… he beckons a forewarning of my defeat, peering through my stained glass window, the time has come again to fight or fall…
Crash
September 11, 2013
I crashed my car in July. About two hours/100 miles from home, on my way to my vacation destination. Physically there was no way I would have really been killed, it just wasn’t that type of collision. There has been a lasting financial outcome to the accident. I have been thinking about other outcomes, not just the death of the other people involved, that would have been the end of me had someone been killed.
I’ve been thinking more about if I had not survived. I feel like there’s so much I have not done. I would have died without honest fulfillment. I have not been living the life I want to lead. It takes money to do a lot of things in life, money I simply don’t have and seem unable to earn.
I really don’t seek fame or fortune. I just want to be happy with my life. Our lives are so short, our experiences too few. We live and die, that’s all we get, we should do all that we can to make that lifetime worth remembering. Let’s face the truth, most of us will be forgotten eventually. Not very many of us are ground breaking thinkers and inventors or social revolutionaries. We’re just ordinary people, going about our ordinary lives.
Even for us ordinary people, happiness shouldn’t be unattainable. I should wake up every morning anticipating my day, but I don’t. I dread the sound of that alarm. I should enjoy what I do for a living, I should feel like I’m accomplishing something, but I don’t. I don’t look forward to work and I feel like I’m wasting the precious few years of my life. Especially as I grow closer to thirty. I truly feel as though I have wasted nearly ten years of my life accomplishing nothing and enjoying so very little.
Why does money determine the value of our lives? Why does money determine our happiness? Civilization has granted us many good things, monetary value is not one of them.
Dinosaurs, as we traditionally know them, existed for some 100 million years. All that remains of them are fossilized bones. Humans, in any sense of the word, have existed less than 3 million. Maybe we make it on this planet that long or maybe we don’t, will money still rule our lives? Will we still be asking the same kinds of questions that I ask? 97 million years is a long time, I cannot fathom what life will be like.
My lifetime is so very short compared to that. All our lives are. Any of us would be lucky to reach just 100 years. Do you think we will say to ourselves, “I wish I had made more money?” Not very likely.
I will be saying what I’m saying right now, that I wish I had done this or that, experienced this or that, traveled here or traveled there. Living is what I will regret, not money. If I’m lucky, I won’t regret anything.
It takes willpower to live. All the money in the world cannot fill the void of unhappiness. It can buy you things that make you momentarily happy, but that’s a cycle that doesn’t end. Eventually you’ll want to buy something else, something newer. And it just keeps going. Look how unhappy many of the rich and famous people are, they could buy nearly anything they want, go anywhere they want and yet they are not happy. Happiness comes from within, it is not a material thing or a physical place.
Experiences, memories, dreams, these things bring us joy or happiness. Sadly in today’s world, money can now buy these things, or you cannot experience them without money. There is a price on everything now days. Even our thoughts and ideas can be bought and sold as intellectual property.
You have to settle for the small things if you ever want to feel happy. Everything else seems fake, unattainable or not worthwhile because they will mean nothing in the end.
I appreciate experiences that force me to reflect on things. If only I could say that I appreciate the outcomes of those reflections.
Update:
Seven days after writing this piece, I crashed again in a different car only 2 miles from home. In the accident from July I had been hit by another vehicle on the back passenger side. The crash from August was caused by loose gravel from road work, my front tire lost traction and slid as though I was on ice and crossed the center line onto the other lane which consisted of loose gravel and fresh oil.
Essentially, I spun 180 degrees and slid off the side of the highway down an embankment where my car flipped upside down. Hung up in my seatbelt, I was able to get myself free. The doors were all locked (never crossed my mind to unlock them, though the roof of the car was mashed in from impact and the doors pressed into the dirt may not have opened anyway). With the windows mostly intacked, I looked towards the back of the car and saw that the back glass had completely busted out, through which I was able to escape.
Between the two, this was the most violent accident I’ve experienced. Thankfully, I walked away with only scratches from the broken glass and a knot on my head where I hit the roof of the car. An accident similar to that is how I lost a close childhood friend ten years ago in August. She was not wearing a seatbelt and was thrown from the car which landed on her. A reason I have always worn mine and do not allow people riding with me to not wear theirs.
Anger, Violence, Death, and Regret
“No man is angry that feels not himself hurt.” – Sir Francis Bacon
Anger, Violence, Death, and Regret
I can remember when I had just begun my teenage years. Back in those days, and earlier, I had an affinity for animals. I revered them with marvel and wonder, amazed at how different they seemed from humans and yet inspired by the similarities between us all.
One day, one of my brothers came into the house and announced that he had shot a bird. I was sitting on the couch, watching cartoons most likely, and initially I didn’t think much of it. I had killed things before too and it wasn’t that big of a deal, but for some reason the machine that is my brain began to turn its wheels. I started thinking about what might be the consequences of that bird’s death. I began to analyze the situation, the effects of my brother’s choice to kill the bird.
“Was this bird part of a breeding pair?” I asked myself. “Was its mate out there alone now, having to struggle to raise the next generation?” I continued to ponder. “What if they don’t survive without one of their parents?” With those thoughts, I concluded that my brother didn’t just kill one bird, but may very well have killed several. And I asked myself for what reason? Fun, entertainment, amusement, out of sheer boredom?
At any rate, I became upset, got mad and emotional, threw a fit and shouted out in anger at what I deemed a meaningless loss of life.
I was still young and innocent, naive and perhaps better off because I was unaware of the cruelty of the human heart. A naivety and innocence that in the near future I would lose.
As I became a teenager, I became increasingly angry, short fused and bitter. Unwilling to participate in things, unwilling to communicate more than what needed to be done. There was a battle beginning inside of me that would eventually become a full-blown war. Like any conflict there would be innocent victims, bystanders to my emotional torment. I would commit acts that earlier in my childhood I would have never anticipated.
There is one act in particular that I can remember as though it happened yesterday. So cruel and sickening that it has been etched into my memory permanently. I was somewhere around thirteen or fourteen years old. I was out on one of my many walks in the woods and across our family farmland. I used to take these walks to escape my life and in many ways in an attempt to escape myself. It was in vain of course, but I needed to get away and be alone with my thoughts and walking for me was the best way to clear my head.
Sometimes I would take these walks when I was angry and sometimes I would take them because I felt adventurous. I’m not really sure which of the two sparked this voyage into nature, but all the same I was taking it. I would often walk for hours at a time, just walking, looking around, picking up things I thought were interesting to inspect, watching wildlife as it passed before me, touch the trunks of trees as I passed; it all made me feel alive, connected and somehow safe, it became my sanctuary.
However, where man travels, so too does anger and violence follow. And in our youth these things can all be one in the same, unwise in our dealings with life and its obstacles, inexperienced in dealing with our problems. We often take these frustrations out on the things and the people closest to us. The flames of our anger lash out against that which we hold close.
I had come across a small pond on our property, like an ant hill filled with water, one had to walk up the banks to get to the water which was cupped by red clay. As I approached the pond, my eye caught something moving in the grass. Not but a few yards to my right was a turtle making its way through the green blades, tall enough to nearly hide his dark round shell. Out of curiosity I approached him and as I got closer I heard a hiss and he retreated into his shell, offended by my interest in him.
I bent down and picked him up for closer inspection. As I did so, he peed and I lurched my lower body back and extended my arm out so that he wouldn’t pee on me. Without thought, I let out a cuss word or two at his unfriendly act of disdain. I stood there a moment looking at just the turtle’s shell and its intricate pattern, as he was still hidden tightly within, unwilling to come out. I looked up at the pond and wondered to myself if box turtles could swim?
I made my way up the bank of the pond with turtle in hand, when I reached the top of the bank I gently tossed him into the water. He entered the water with a small splash and to my surprise he did not sink, he emerged from his shell and began swimming to shore. Amused by his efforts and swimming ability, I eagerly awaited his return to the bank.
When he made it to shore, I quickly scooped him up again and this time he didn’t retreat into his shell. Clearly he was aware I wasn’t interested in eating him, but certainly he was annoyed by me and desperately just wished to get away and about his daily business. But I had much harsher interests in mind. I was not done with him just yet.
Once again, I had the turtle in hand and this time I chucked him high into the air, straight up over the pond so that he would come flying down right into the middle. And so he did with a large crash, sending waves across the pond. With resilience, he swam back to the shore, away from me and to the other side. I ran around the bank to the other side and again anxiously awaited his coming ashore, I had more plans for this tough turtle.
Many times on my walks, I would take a pocket knife or a slingshot with me. The knife for practicality and the slingshot with the intention to kill something. Birds and squirrels were my usual targets.
This time I had my slingshot with me and with practice I had become a decent shot. Again, I picked up the turtle and he hissed at me and went inside his shell, clearly pissed off at me and my relentless torture. At this point I’m sure he was getting tired of swimming and probably dizzy from being thrown up in the air and into the water.
This time I decided to throw him into the water like a football, fully intent to get him to spin through the air. I placed my fingers in the right places so that I could get a decent grip so that when I launched my hand forwards my fingertips would make him spiral towards the water. As he hurdled through the air, I leaned down to pick up a few small pebbles from the bank at my feet. I was going to shoot at him as he desperately swam to shore.
As the turtle slowly swam to the shore, clearly exhausted and weakened, my slingshot let out a SNAP, then another SNAP, as the elastic band holding the pebble was released from my fingers, over and over. The rocks went striking through the air and breaking the water’s surface all around the turtle, like a ship under fire, he struggled to make it through my barrage of pebbles. One rock hit his shell and a piece of it flaked off. This hit encouraged me to continue, but eventually the turtle made it ashore.
I became infuriated that I had missed so many times. Hell bent on striking this turtle with my slingshot, I ran up to him on his way out of the water and up the bank and grabbed him tightly in my hand and with all my strength sent him crashing into the water with a huge splash. He returned to the surface and just sat their floating, likely in complete shock. He regained his bearing and began swimming to shore. Slow enough this time that I was confident he would never make it to shore.
I began pelting him with pebbles from my slingshot, aiming for his head. Finally, POP, one of the shots nailed him right in the head. I heard a sharp whistle and his head went down into the water, he was spinning in a circle and I could see tiny bubbles rise up from where his head was submerged. The bubbles continued and he sank beneath the surface.
I stood there in shock. Strangely, as if I didn’t expect that to happen. The turtle was dead. I had just killed him. The turtle that had fought so hard to survive my teenage antics, now drifted to the bottom of the pond, lifeless.
This feeling came over me, first from my stomach and then up into my throat. Guilt, shame and regret came over me like someone had just injected me with something. It spread over me and the horror of what I had just done, sank in. I let out a few cuss words and started to cry with remorse. What the hell did I just do and more importantly why?
I was different after that experience. Forever in the back of my mind, I became consciously aware of the danger of my anger and the consequences of losing control of myself. A voice remained there to remind me that for every action there would always be a reaction, an effect to every cause I created. That within me lay the power to alter the lives of everything around me. The realization that we are all connected and that we have the power to impact each other, regardless of species.
In the years to follow I would take life again. A much larger life. This time, I was deer hunting during rifle season. I had never killed a deer before, but I was motivated to do so. Hunting was a big part of my family’s tradition, passed down from my mother’s side and involved my extended family on my father’s side. I had witnessed many fallen deer over the years, but seeing something that is already dead and witnessing something die are very different things.
In my youth, I caused death in anger, a release of frustration. But deer hunting was a sport to me, a hobby, for food and trophy. Killing a deer was a big deal and earned you congratulations, something I wanted. I wanted someone to pat me on the back and say good job. I wanted to be a part of something larger than myself, be counted among others in a common interest. Spending time together, hunting together, talking shit and laughing, it was a good time. Getting your first deer was a big deal.
So there I was in my stand, waiting and trying to be as motionless and silent as possible. I had a 30/30 in my hands, waiting with not a whole lot of patience because I had been hunting for years and never seemed to have a decent shot or worthwhile target. Whether with a bow or rifle, I never had much luck. But this time was different, a buck came walking down the fence line, right towards me. Slow enough that I would be able to get off a shot if he would just stand still. He jumped the fence and looked away from me, so I pulled up my rifle. As though he sensed or heard my motion behind him, he stopped and turned his head to face me. I swear that in those dark eyes he was looking right at me, but couldn’t quite make out what he was looking at, so he didn’t run away. I lined up the sight tip to his heart, and fired. He dropped right on the spot, fell to his side and started kicking, he spun around in a circle and I stood there watching him die.
Despite being nervous, my knees shaking and my heart racing, I was fully aware of what was happening. I had told myself this was okay, that I wanted to be a part of this sport, I wanted to bag my first deer, but instead of joy and excitement, I couldn’t help, but think of that turtle. Who’s life I had taken so carelessly, several years before. Here again, I was watching something die, merely because I wanted it to. Perhaps not in anger, but equally thoughtless. I wasn’t starving, so I didn’t need food. He wasn’t threatening my life, so it wasn’t to defend myself.
I put the rifle back on safety, climbed down out of my stand, took it back off safety and approached the deer cautiously. I poked him with the rifle’s barrel tip to make sure he was dead. He didn’t flinch. I could smell urine and feces, and on the ground I noticed why, something that everything does when it dies. I stood there asking myself to give justification for what I had just done. I came to no acceptable conclusion.
In the hours to follow that evening, I was congratulated and the attention felt good and I tried to make myself feel proud, but inside I didn’t know what I was supposed to be proud of. It didn’t feel the way I had thought it would. I continued to hunt for a couple of years after that, thinking that those feelings and questions of morality would go away, but they never did. I never killed another deer or any other animal intentionally after that and soon quit hunting all together, unable to renew the interest. I swore to myself that I would never again take a life so thoughtlessly, that unless for survival or defense, I would never take a life that was not mine to take, for I was convinced that I had no right to do so.
This essay is available as an audio track on SoundCloud:
Of God
February 5, 2012
Updated and Expanded April 27, 2014
Of God
I’m going to take an agnostic point of view to muddle through the complex ideas and theories behind a creator god and the Universe and try to come to some conclusions with my own personal understandings and why I hold them as literal and practical approaches to questions that have long been unanswered and probably will remain officially unanswered for a long time to come. It’s at this great paradox that many people simply give up and accept one thing or another. I think that the insecurity of not knowing or not believing is too much of a weight to carry for most individuals and that letting go of the burden of the question (whether it is concluded as true or not) seems to be their only viable option to carry on in life feeling better about themselves and the world they are caught up in.
It would be incredibly difficult and time consuming to venture through every known theistic religion and discern between their varying beliefs, to decipher which is likely to comply with my perceived notions of what is logically possible or true and what is not. For this reason, I don’t want to touch any one specific religion and instead will throw all religiously labeled preconceptions aside and approach this with a raw perspective of the nature of a creator god and the Universe. Essentially, spell out how a creator god could or could not exist and what role the Universe holds.
Before I even begin, I’d simply like to say, with the utmost honesty and humility that I wish I was much more educated in the field of science, more specifically in microbiology, genetics, neuroscience, physics and astronomy. If you wanted to understand the relationship between human beings and the Universe and what the nature of that relationship is, I think these fields are invaluable. No one knows what the future holds, perhaps one day we will be able to prove or disprove the existence of a creator god and if we do, I’m convinced one or more of these fields will play a major role.
We first must figure out the enigma of a god. Immediately, we have to throw away every humanized theory of a god’s identity. An entity that has created the whole of the Universe, from quasars to the elementary particles within subatomic particles and everything in-between, would not be human-like. Humans are but one small grain of sand on a beach full of incalculable grains of sand. The probability that a god that created something so immeasurable, would look so specifically like one of its youngest of creations is unlikely. The tendency for human beings to believe that their creator looks like them is a psychological desire. To make us feel important and special. To make us stand out among so many other created things, to justify our perception of being more important or valuable. It’s simply human neediness and shameless arrogance.
In order for god to have created the Universe, it would have to predate the Universe. All the understandings we have for the Universe, all the known laws and theories would not necessarily have to apply to a creator god, for it would be above and beyond them. God’s appearance could be something we have never seen before, shapeless and formless to our knowledge. Simply put, human beings would not be able to comprehend or manifest an image of what a creator god would look like because all our preconceptions would be based on things we or our ancestors have only seen before. Also note that I have tried to refrain from referring to this creator god with a gender. Giving a supernatural being a gender would suggest that there are others like it. God would not need to be male, unless there are females.
To further explain, gender is directly connected to reproduction. If there is only one creator, it cannot be one gender and not another. Therefore, either god is ungendered and asexual or there is more than one creator god, each of which is creating and destroying the Universe simultaneously, in every solar system, every galaxy and possibly every Universe because as some astrophysicists believe, there is actually a multiverse – where our universe is merely one of an incalculable number.
So if god is not human-like and not gendered, then what is it? Sometimes in order to understand something we must first understand what it does. If something is being created and something is doing the creating, then the product of that creation must most certainly be made of that which is doing the creating. If this creator god is creating and destroying the Universe, the particles that make up the Universe must also make up the creator. For example, carbon is on the periodic table, when added to other chemical molecules it can create something new. Carbon is made of atoms and these atoms are made of subatomic particles, themselves discernible from one another by elementary particles which are currently the smallest known particles to exist, the most recent of which was the Higgs boson. And those particles may be made of even smaller particles not yet discovered. The point is that everything in the Universe is made of something else and when you break them down, you discover that everything is actually many things connected together, giving the illusion of being one solid thing.
Any creator god would definitely need to be made of the same particles that it is creating. And there in lies a great problem. Where did these particles come from? Where did the particles that the creator god is made from originate? Sadly, it’s an endless question because once you figure out where or when the particles were created, you must ask why or how they were created and so on and so forth.
At this point I can state, that if a creator god existed, it would either be nongendered or it would be one of many creator gods coexisting in the multiverse. I could say that the term god would be synonymous with particles because we know that everything is made of smaller things. So I should instead say that this creator particle(s) is creating and destroying the universe and possibly many other universes simultaneously.
I think that for a lot of theists (people who believe in god) they have trouble wrapping their minds around the notion that god is more element than human-like because it destroys that humanistic character that so many give it. Believers want their god to understand them, to love them, to care about their well-being, etc. Much like a parent or family member would do. Psychology has made attempts at explaining why human beings throughout history have created these enigmas and the bones for those theories support that human beings are trying to sate their primal desire for acceptance, security, guidance by manifesting a sort of uber-imaginary parent or friend, much like children sometimes do when they yearn for social interaction. Life is hard and it’s a great comfort for people to think that there is someone out there, who is all-powerful and all-knowing watching over them and who is doing what it believes is the best for them.
If the creator god(s) is, or is made of, something like elementary particles, then most of the omnipotent powers humans give to this creator would be nullified. It could not know everything, be everywhere at once, etc. Its very level of consciousness would be in question. It would not speak English, if it could verbally speak at all. A verbal language would require a voice box or larynx, which would then require a body and we already discerned that it is not human and nor do I see possible for it to be anything Earthly animalistic, because it would have to be capable of existing in zero gravity and in otherwise inhospitable locations throughout the universe, such as inside stars as they are born.
If god is the source of everything, then it must contain the information to create everything. Just as I said earlier, in order to understand what something is, you should first understand what it does. If the creator god is elementary particles that create and destroy, it should therefore somehow contain the information to do these things. I disavow the notion that a creator god “knows” all things, I think instead such a being would rather retain the information of all things in existence and hold the ability to create things not yet known. Think of it this way, a creator god would contain or be source code and when it creates something the code becomes binary. The creation is then capable of certain actions or knowledge based on that binary code and then performs or utilizes that knowledge by reading the binary code.
Or one could also say that the creator god or particles are like the DNA of the multiverse. Retaining all the knowledge required to create and destroy, but not an actual living entity itself. When that knowledge or energy is spent or as something is created, the creation inherits some of that knowledge, the capabilities of action and/or thought. As DNA is indeed code, organic code.
The trouble here is that now we have code as a creator, who must then also been created or have some sort of origins. It’s like that chicken or egg debate. Which came first, the chicken or the egg? An egg (which is a reproductive mass of cells) cannot exist without a living thing in which it is formed. Therefore, the chicken came before the egg, but then where did the chicken come from? According to evolution, we know that birds are genetically related to reptiles and that reptiles evolved from amphibian like creatures that came from the oceans. And we can continue to go back until we get to micro single-celled organisms. So the real question should be, where did the micro-organisms that first inhabited the Earth come from? A theory suggests that they traveled here on asteroids that impacted with the Earth during its initial formation and colonized, because we know that micro-organisms can exist on asteroids and other space material, but we do not know how they get there.
The next question would be where did these micro-organisms come from out in space? Is there some sort of wellspring of life somewhere in the center of the universe? Are there numerous wells, spewing out the particles needed to create life? Is the creator god a celestial wellspring of elementary particles?
After all this inquiry about creation and creators, what of destruction and destroyers? We know that according to the nature of the Universe, everything that is created is also ultimately destroyed and in that void of apparently nothing, there comes into existence new matter and new life. Where there is matter ceasing to be, there is anti-matter. And if that wasn’t enough there is also dark matter. People confuse the terms dark matter and anti-matter as one in the same. Actually, dark matter is not intended to be ominous, the term dark simply refers to its inability to be seen with modern telescopic instruments. Dark matter does not react to light or radiation, the only way we know that it exists is due to its interaction with gravity. Some scientists believe that this dark matter is what holds things together by gravitational pull, that dark matter is made of elementary or some unknown particles that have not yet been discovered because we are not yet technologically capable of isolating those particles.
And so what of anti-matter? What is it and what role does it play as the destructive force in the universe? Is it a part of the creator god, is it separate? It’s difficult to say how any of this could fit together, two apparently opposing sides. In that theoretical evaluation I am reminded that creation and destruction truly go hand-in-hand, they are two sides of the same whole. Anti-matter does exactly as its name would suggest, it eliminates matter. If you were to touch anti-matter particles, your hand would disintegrate. In the Universe, the most powerful examples of anti-matter are known as black holes. These form after the death of stars and absorb all matter within their gravitational pull, until eventually they explode. Some scientists believe that this is how the Universe perpetuates itself, that when black holes explode they cast out particles and energy (known and perhaps even unknown) that through gravity re-collect into new types of mass that eventually form stars, planets, etc. Some theorize that this is how the Universe began, what they call the Big Bang Theory. My unanswered question about that theory is how and why did the big bang occur, what set it off? New research into black holes suggest that most, if not all, actually evaporate rather than explode.
The transcending thread in this writing is particles and energy of some sort or another and in some way or another. If there is a creator god or gods, they are made of these particles and energy and they are creating and destroying, using particles, all things within this Universe and in the greater multiverse. It is highly unlikely that this particle(s) and energy, if you will, is a conscious being, rather instead this source contains the information required to create, sustain and destroy all things that are known and things yet to be known and does not require consciousness. It must only retain the information to create and destroy and also not be anything tangibly discernible in its physical nature, only a source of power in its recycled energy.
If you are theistic, a believer in a creator god or if you are agnostic and unsure of what to believe or if you are an atheist such as myself, I am hoping that this writing can offer everyone something. Thoughts to chew around on within your own mind, digest and perhaps draw your own conclusions about a creator god and the Universe we call home. I’ve long taken the approach that in life we must question everything because learning is essential to our existence and the future. Knowledge is such a powerful tool, it is invaluable and when we learn and use that knowledge it becomes something that not only betters ourselves as individuals, but changes the world and leaves it better than when we first experienced it. Knowledge in use becomes wisdom.
This essay is available as an audio track on SoundCloud:
The Erosion of the Sagacious American Intellect
January 1, 2012
I once said that I would write an atheist manifesto, but this is not it. However, religion and atheism is the subject of this writing. If you don’t like the idea of subjugating American religion and ridding it from our government (ode to the complete and absolute separation of church and state) then you will not like this writing.
If you ask a religious person how long they have been practicing, you will more than likely hear that they’ve been immersed in it for as long as they can remember. Ask them if they could imagine a life and world without it and they would have trouble contemplating such a thing.
How does a person who once believed in metaphysical concepts and spiritual naivety suddenly find themselves in apparent opposition to those beliefs? They don’t. It doesn’t suddenly happen. Doubt is required, just a small glimmer of inquisitive thought about a religion’s structure, laws, beliefs, leaders, any foundational prerequisite and from that small question grows, what I call, the small hope of reason. And every human being is capable of finding reason and logic. The only difference between those who do and those who don’t is desire. What you yearn for, has the power to change everything you believe.
I was born and raised Catholic for some 15 or 16 years. When you are brought up and taught to believe that something is real, you have little ability to question or deny those beliefs of their supposed truth. Essentially, you are brain-washed into believing it. Fooled into believing it. You don’t have a choice, it is force-fed for years and years and the outside notion that it isn’t true is beyond your ability to comprehend. That is until you reach a certain age and have a substantial degree of external experience.
Going from being Christian to being atheist is a slow and gradual process. It has taken me about eight years to go from believing what the bible and religious leaders say to outright denying them any serious legitimacy. That journey has been peppered with experiences in other religions and spiritual belief systems, and even a rebirth into Christianity. All experiences that I believe were essential in my eventual embrace of atheism.
It’s similar to when people try to quit smoking. You gradually step down from that addiction and you realize that you don’t need it to survive. Religion is like an addiction. Though you deep down inside subconsciously don’t believe, you consciously fear not believing. Not believing is a state of mind you are unfamiliar with and it scares you to be without religious faith. Your mind conjures all these reasons and points as to why you should not stop, and where your mind doesn’t manifest excuses, the religious community you are a part of will joyfully convolute your thoughts and offer you repercussions for liberating yourself. Guilt, fear, punishment, this is a recipe for intellectual slavery.
Christians rally around the Bible as though it is a living part of their god. As is said, it is the “Word of God” though it’s really the greatest tool of mind control human beings have ever created and I’d throw the Qur’an right in there with it, along with every other religious “textbook” man has ever written. Again, that MAN has ever written because indeed they are written by human beings. Formed in the thoughts and desires of human beings for the sake of converting and controlling the minds of other human beings with fear and false hope. Organized religion is power, it is power over other human beings for political and monetary gain. The Bible is no more useful than your child’s Clifford: The Big Red Dog book.
The Bible is a collection of writings all believed by historians to have been written within several hundred years of each other by numerous individuals. None of them were written earlier than approximately 200 years after the death of Christ. In regards to the life and times of Christ, the Bible is literally all he-said-she-said material. Islam in this regard is no different. Most of the Qur’an originated from verbal teachings, collected into one volume after the death of Muhammad. The collection and publication of these writings in the centuries to follow their original versions was overseen by various other groups of individuals for both the Bible and the Qur’an, and most other religious texts. Why? It’s simple, to make sure it said exactly what those groups wanted them to say; those books are tools. Dare I say weapons.
If you discern a timeline according to the Bible, you will realize that the Earth was created some six-thousand or so years ago. That is obviously false. The process of carbon dating materials has already proven that untrue. We have the remains of people, civilizations, plants and animals that go far beyond the beginning of that timeline, some into the hundreds of millions of years ago.
The problem with putting all your trust into a collective book put together by groups of people more than a thousand years ago, and translated through many languages for centuries, you disregard every scientific discovery since and rely solely on what people knew (thought they knew) in a time where personal hygiene, reading and writing were either near to or were simply non-existent.
Nearly all the authors of the Old Testament were sexist and racist because in those days that was simply the environment those people lived in. Some of the content is so bad that the people in them would, today, be arrested or even thrown into mental health institutions. Skip several hundred years and you get to the New Testament which is really not a whole lot better. Most of the teachings of Jesus Christ, as they were recalled by authors hundreds of years after his death, were considered progressive, open minded and in many ways liberal for his time and he was looked upon negatively by many of the religious and political leaders of the Mediterranean regions in which he lived and traveled.
If I had the will to suffer through the agonizing burden of reading the Bible again and this time word for word, front to back, I could write a rather critical review. The few things I remember from it in my youth during class readings has typically been enough to sate any curiosity I’ve had. However, when I became a reborn Christian some six years ago, I did manage to make it one-third of the way through, which is also about as far as I made it through in the Qur’an. The Bible should be admired as a literary work of art, but holds no ground as a historical record or moral compass.
Religions are built upon fabrications of mystery and the reliance upon a lack of education and reason. Solve those mysteries and quench that lack of education and the fabric of faith unravels into the falsehood it has always been. For religion was born out of fearful ignorance and so it shall pass into history, a useless and primal concept.
Christianity teaches you not to question or doubt, that doing so is a sin in and of itself. To think for yourself is to realize the lie you are being fed. If ever there was a huge red flag, right there would be it. As to say, “Surrender your cognitive abilities to me or render yourself to a hellish damnation.” It’s almost worth laughing at if people didn’t actually take it literally and submit to it.
I’m ashamed that I ever believed. I am embarrassed that I once called myself Christian. I have remorse for those who still believe. However, I think that it’s a good thing I once lived in that state of mind because now I can look back and see how misguided and fool-hearted I was to think that what I was reading and believing was actually true. I couldn’t say that I understand what it’s like to be a believer, if I had never been one myself.
The reality is that atheists cannot abruptly convert an adult away from Christianity, or any other religion. What must exist before such a thing is a small seed of doubt. Without a reason to consider something else, you will never do so. So what was my reason? What allowed me to have doubt? My hunger for knowledge. For I believe that in time, all things are knowable through scientific inquiry. Perhaps not by those of us alive today, but by future generations of the human race. There in exists my faith, what gives me hope… the intellectual growth of humanity.
Just as other ancient belief systems and religions have been discarded, so too will those few religions that still exist today. No one, save a few nutcases, still believe in Poseidon, Greek god of the sea, and yet so many in that surrounding region once did along with a pantheon of other super beings. You ask Christians today, if they believe in the gods or goddesses of other religions current or past and they will unhesitatingly tell you that they don’t and that it’s absurd. The most evangelical of them will express disgust towards those false gods. How can they deny the existence of every other god and yet uphold the existence of their’s, when neither can be proven nor disproved?
If they are intelligent enough to deny the existence of all other gods and religions, how can they be so resolved to not hold their own religion and god under the same judgmental magnifying glass? The answer is desire. Want. Fear. These things force them to hold tight to their faith because again, a world without those things is a scary thing. But I bid them consider the lesson I have learned, of how liberating it is to finally leave it all behind. There is freedom outside the box in which they insist upon existing.
So what of god? If religions are merely man-made and completely fabricated control systems, then what of god apart from religion? What of the elemental concept of god, the unknown source of all the energy in the universe? Who started it, where and why did life begin? If you are asking these questions then you are well on your way to becoming atheist or at least agnostic and I applaud you. The core of every non-believer is the question and absolute desire to know and the ability to doubt even when we are given conclusions. It is a part of being human and in my opinion the greatest part of all.
The truth is that a creator god has neither been proven nor disproved. Today, science does not yet have the capabilities to give substantial theories either way. However, it is generally accepted that the Universe was not “handcrafted” as many religions would like you to believe. I personally also do not accept the Big Bang Theory as a definitive explanation. So I simply accept that I do not yet know and that I might never know, though that is not to say I won’t continue to ponder our universal origins.
Scientist and author, Richard Dawkins believes that it will one day be within our power to prove that god, as humanity understands him today, does not exist and therefore did not create the universe. Should be interesting to see that day and the response by world religions, though I’m reserved to think that it will change nothing for the most devout.
The leaders of religions the world over are very rarely ever innocent people seeking global love, peace and unity. The vast majority are power hungry, egotistical, self-centered individuals who sometimes don’t even believe the garbage they spit out of their own mouths and yet marvel in how easy it is to convince so many people to follow them and worst of all give them money so willingly and so freely without reservation. It’s sad, disgusting and disheartening to witness and be unable to do anything about it, but hold to the hope that one day people will wake up from their intellectual slumber and let that spark of doubt and curiosity engulf them in the purifying flames of reason and logic.
And finally that hovering darkness of religious oppression can be cast away, that poison of free thought, that disease wintering our ability to progress and move forward, will be gone. For religion is the erosion of the sagacious American intellect.
The Ardent Axiom 
Lemmings and Other Things
Posted on October 8, 2011 by Kēphen
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October 8, 2011
I was talking to a friend of mine this past week about how fear and misunderstanding lead to a negative impact on minority groups. About how inequality and ignorance still run rampant in our society and about how those things are created and how they perpetuate through generations.
This friend of mine happens to be black. And he made the point that people often say things about people of his race based on what other people say and think. And it humors me and at the same time angers me, that people get so easily persuaded by their environments and their social circles.
There’s always been that ideal that the majority rules. That whatever the majority of society thinks or even believes, that it must be true or righteous. But the real truth is that it isn’t correct at all. Whether or not a majority is right is entirely circumstantial and is really based on the particular situation in which it’s being imposed.
For example, the majority of Americans still neglect a healthy eating habit and unfortunately restrain from adequate exercise. Does this mean that such a lifestyle is correct? No, of course not.
I used to have a history teacher who would often call his students lemmings. Lemmings are small rodents that are notorious for leading one another to their death because their desire to follow each other over powers their ability to think for themselves and perceive danger. As students will often partake in bad behavior when they see their fellow students performing such acts.
I don’t know if he knew it or not, but he was teaching us an immense lesson that we could carry with us for the rest of our lives. How often do we find ourselves persuaded by the majority, to make a decision that’s urged upon us by other large groups of people? Convinced that it’s the right thing to do, simply because a large number of people tell us so?
We cannot allow ourselves to be so easily swallowed by the majority. We have to stand on our own and think for ourselves. We cannot always rely on others to think for us, to answer the questions we have or tell us what we need to do. So many situations in life call for us to do these things on our own. Only then can we honestly say that we fully grasp whatever decision we are making.
To me, there’s no better way through life than to have reason to be accountable for your own actions and thoughts. How blinding and how foolish it is to be so easily led astray out of fear and ignorance. How easy it is to wallow in misunderstanding and be insensitive to diversity when all our decisions are being made for us by other people. It seems so sheepish to me, to be led around like a mindless fool. And yet, so many people do exactly that and are seemingly incapable of realizing it.
It’s such a shame, such an embarrassing road through life. I feel sorry for people like this and at the same time I ponder that perhaps this is best, that they are simply better off being led around, too stupid to think for themselves. They need someone to guide them, to tell them what to do because they are not intellectually capable of doing it for themselves. And then I realize that those who lead, do not always have the best of intentions and that indeed they could lead large numbers of people in very negative and harmful directions. And they do, every day.
The fallout of such perpetuating stupidity is racism, sexism, nationalism, etc. Fear and misunderstanding spread like fire through people who are too ignorant to think for themselves. Society, in whatever part of the world, seems to have a desire to be led, to be taken by the hand and walked through life. People want to be told what their problems are, what they need to do to fix them or even better what someone else is going to do to fix them. This is where things get dangerous.
Hitler rose to power because he gave Germans answers to their problems, he told them and showed them what was wrong with their lives and who was to blame. Racism in America is not entirely a different beast. Working class Americans want to blame someone or something for their problems and so when someone suggests a target, it spreads. We’ve all heard of such things like African Americans being too lazy to work and that they all live off welfare and that it’s hurting our country because they live off the rest of us, or how Mexicans are ruining our job market by illegally entering the country and taking all the jobs away and not paying taxes.
African Americans living in poor neighborhoods has a lot to do with family income, lack of family stability, lack of education and the lack of opportunity. However, we have to keep in mind that not all African Americans are subject to this. Many do very well and stereotyping an entire race is one of many ways Americans assert their stupidity. African Americans only make up about 14% of the U.S. population.
What really needs to be done is work in poor neighborhoods to give black youth a better chance at receiving an education, constructive and positive activities within the community and equal opportunity in employment. The environment in which at risk youth grow up in, greatly influences their adult life.
Mexicans flee their homeland because they stand a better chance at making a living here in the U.S. Between the threat of drug lord violence, crime in general, education concerns and unemployment, it’s easy to see why they escape to American soil. Getting a green card or visa is not an easy task and not to mention that it costs money. Many of the people crossing the border cannot afford to enter this country legally. The jobs they take, everything from hard labor to migrant farm work and factory work are jobs most Americans wouldn’t take anyway and their pay is cheaper than if those companies had hired Americans.
So is it a problem? Yes, of course it is. They should not be allowed to enter or stay in the country illegally, they need to be documented and given citizenship. The process is flawed and needs to be fixed. They should want to be legal citizens and not have to fear being deported. For some Mexican families, their primary source of income is from a family member living and working in the U.S.
Far too often we like to point the finger at people and tell them how they cause problems. How they make our lives worse. What we should do instead is spend our energy finding ways to fix these problems. And real answers, not extreme actions that cause more harm than good. The right path is never the easy one and it’s hardly ever attractive.
We must accept responsibility for ourselves and make choices using our own judgment and not someone else’s. It is so easy to destroy, but it takes dedication, hard work and time to create. Instant gratification or an instant fix is not logical. Problems rarely ever happen in a moment, they arise through various issues over time and they are never fixed instantly. Not months and likely not years. Something I see in our country right now is how people are expecting this nation’s problems to be fixed right away. These problems didn’t just happen out of nowhere, we’ve been wandering in this direction for decades and we need to wake up and accept that it’s going to take just as long to recover.
The most important thing is a plan. To have a logical answer to our problems and have the resolve to stick to that plan and see it through. After that, it’s simply going to take time and the will to do whatever we have to in order to make it through the hardships we all will surely have to face.
So as you carry on with your life, remember that no one is more responsible for your life than you. That the decisions you face and the questions you have should be addressed by you and what you have learned. Knowledge is a book and books are useless when not read. It’s when they are used that they become useful tools, the same way that knowledge becomes useful when it is applied to our lives. Knowledge in use is what I call wisdom.
This essay is available as an audio track on SoundCloud: