I’ve been so busy lately; don’t even know where to begin. Since my last post so much has happened. I’ve been watching the news carefully, and trying to see where the truth lies between all the reporting going on, reporting that I must say is more one sided than not. Many say we’re very close to World War III, so far all I’ve seen in bloodshed, one dominant country, Israel, completely destroying the weaker country Lebanon. I do not intend to minimize what a life is worth, because I understand that what apparently set this whole crisis off was the kidnapping of 2 Israeli soldiers by the Hezbollah organization, one that was born out of the resistance movement against Israeli occupation in Lebanon during 1982. What this tells me is that no matter how one might want to isolate the incident, it always stems from the past, as in any event, in order to completely understand it, you must dig for its history. So the problems in the Middle East can be traced back to the rebirth of the nation of Israel in the 1950’s. Many will tell you that there will never be peace in the Middle East, and from what you hear in the media, the blame always seems to be put on the Arab or Muslim people. Why do you think that is? Why do we always label anything that we don’t fully understand as radical? , Militant? Terrorist? Yet we choose the ignore the carnage around the situation, we chose to ignore who is applying pain and suffering here, we even chose to ignore what the rest of the world thinks about how much force is being exerted here. George Washington led the resistance in our journey towards being a sovereign and independent country. People cannot and will not be oppressed forever, that’s just part of the human condition. So as much as we like to call everybody a terrorist nowadays, let’s not sound foolish while doing it. I will not agree with every tactic employed by some of these organizations, but the one thing they have in common is that they’re all trying to change the social and political conditions they are living in now. So how does that relate to us? Some of the changes these organizations seek may not benefit us as a country, and I’m speaking economically, not security wise. See, I believe that if we really want to be diplomatic at all, or be of any help to the world, we should try to solve conflicts like this with the peoples best interest in mind, not the leaders, not any given country, the people, because they are the ones getting blown into pieces day in and day out. Over 400 Lebanese, most of them civilians have died; every single soul as precious as any Israeli civilian. Click here to see what our ambassador has to say about collateral damage. Same scenario with Palestine, everybody was happy about the country having elections until HAMAS won the elections, chosen by the people, which says a lot if you asked me. Now, that being said, I do understand that you cannot call for the destruction of a people as HAMAS has done as well as other Muslim leaders have done. So, as I mentioned earlier, somewhere in the middle of this whole fiasco lies the truth, buried beneath all the deaths, all the previous wars, and most certainly tied to the past and to religion, more on that further on down.
Now I’m not standing here defending terrorism, I’m standing up for humanity, in much the same way the world responded to the Holocaust when Hitler tried to eliminate the entire Jewish race. And I’ll take the opportunity to say that I don’t think any Arab or Muslim nation can actually accomplish the destruction of Israel, as much as some of them call for it. Israel is too powerful militarily to be taken out like that, not to mention they have the U.S. as their cheerleader and ally. This is why this whole crisis is so alarming to me; it’s not even a fair fight. Was there any other alternative for Israel other than to butcher its neighbor? Of course there was, they could’ve talked, no one group of people is better than any other, and so we should be willing to talk to any group, even if that group shares completely different views on whatever many issues. The word racism has come up in many of the articles I’ve read. Go to the link “ANSWER” I have on my page for more information on this alternative perspective, something you won’t see on CNN. Do I think it has to do with race? Absolutely it does, it has to do with being Arab, it has to do with being Jewish, it has to with weather you’re pro or anti-American; it has to do with religion as well. There’s no single answer to this, but these are the major factors surrounding this issue. Occupation is what I relate this the most with, it comes in different forms, and we just choose to only look at one side of the coin. Some may say that immigrants are taking over our country, right? And this is why we want to secure our borders, and toughen immigration laws, right? I mean, if we don’t stop all these Latino people, they’re going to change our land, they’re going to take over, never mind that we nearly enslave them for labor, they are threatening the status quo, right? I mean, we got some pretty animated people behind this issue, and mind you that we’re not really being threatened by anything eminent per sei, but the loss of political power scares the hell out of the elite. And this is how this all relates to us. Imagine having to deal with some other country trying to take over what we call home. Many speculate on how complicated things would get if Iran and Syria join the fight against Israel. But who fears for what is happening now? Who is speaking out for the hundreds of innocent people that have already died? Walter Mosley once said that we as a country must look at ourselves as among the enemy; that we most consider if we have done anything as a country to provoke all this violence. Are we occupying some of these Middle Eastern countries, and enforcing our will on them? Are we turning our backs to some of these countries? Are we exploiting any of these countries? Or are we guilty by association? Iraq comes to mind when I look at the entire situation, and I can’t help but to feel sad for the 2500+ soldiers we’ve lost in the war, and the tens of thousands of Iraqis that have died in this crazy, unjustified war, in the name of freedom and democracy, ha. Why are we even in this country? These are the kinds of situations that give the rest of Americans a very bad name, when we bully our way through the world, not valuing life, not even our own lives. Digging deeper into this whole scenario, including our involvement, is the core source of all of our differences, an institution that has claimed more lives than all the major catastrophes in history combined, that is the social institution of religion.
Ironically, the 3 most influential religions in the world, Christianity, the Muslim faith, and Judaism are all fundamentally Abrahamic; they share some of the same books, and in theory, they all believe in the same God whether they call HIM Jehovah or Ala. In the name of God, ushered by religious practice, man has committed the biggest crimes in history. Where should I begin? Well, if you look in the Bible itself you will find evidence of brutal wars going on in the name of God, the war between the chosen people of God and the unclean heathens, you’ll find blood all over the Old Testament. The Spanish were at war for 700 hundred years in the name of religion, trying to claim their land back and rid it of Moors and Jews. If you didn’t convert to Christianity you could be expelled from the land or maybe even killed. Then we can go back to the late 14th century and early 15th century where in the name of God, the Christians of the world, began to enslave Africans to bring to the Americas, so they could work them to death. The Spanish for instance argued that they were indeed doing the world a favor by Christianizing the Africans and Natives, that they were nothing but savages, and would not be able to see the face of God if it weren’t for them. In the name of God David Koresh burned with 80+ of his followers. More recently, my hometown of NY was attacked on 9/11/01, in the name of Ala, which is what got us where we are today, fighting the war against terror. So whose God is right? For which of these Gods is it ok to kill for? What happened to the all loving God? This is what I’m getting to, religion is supposed to be a unifying force, a practice that accentuates the good of all humanity, yet none of the religious leaders has been able to stop the bloodshed, always one claiming to be the one true faith and announcing damnation to the rest of the world. Religion is one of the strongest social institutions worldwide; it has so much to do with how we behave everyday, and how we look at the world, our socialization begins at a very early age. As a child, I myself was raised in the Roman Catholic faith, so very early I was taught that I was only supposed to get married once, that murder was a cardinal sin, not forgivable by God, that fornication was bad, that eating meat on good Friday was being irreverent to God, and I got very good at memorizing entire verses of the Bible or the rosary book, let’s not even talk about the Virgin Mary. Later as a young adult, I tried out the protestant approach, now this was even harder in the sense that nearly everything you could possibly think of was a sin. I mean, I went to churches where listening to secular music was ungodly, women couldn’t wear makeup or pants, so many doctrinal procedures, it was hard to keep up with it, it really did feel like a camel would have a better chance of squeezing through a needles’ eye before I could get into heaven. I lived my life in fear of eternal damnation. I used to wake up in the middle of the night sweating, thinking I had missed the rapture. So what am I saying here? All I’m saying is that as human beings we must never lose our ability to think for ourselves, to process the information passed on to us, and actually see if it makes sense. Religion nowadays has nothing to do with spirituality or even salvation for that matter, and I wonder if it ever did. Look, I’m not here to renounce God himself, but none of this that I see today comes from God, and if it does, than that’s not my God. It’s a giant socialization machine, that how I see it, it creates the biggest fears on people, and this is how you get them to follow your every absurd idea. Fear mongering is what it is, this is how George Bush got re-elected, and it’s exactly what goes on with some of these other militia leaders. The right wing extremist of our nation have dictated a lot what we can and cannot do in our country recently, and it all comes from these misplaced values of cleanliness, morality, and righteousness. If we could only practice what we so adamantly preach, we might have a half ass chance into heaven. George Bush just vetoed a bill that would’ve help fund embryonic stem-cell research, click here, on the premise that it was morally wrong, and I quote "Human beings are not a raw material to be exploited or a commodity to be bought or sold and this bill will help ensure that we respect the fundamental ethical line,". The problem I see with this veto is that it is morally hypocritical, the same man that is making a statement about how precious every single life is, is the same man who has created chaos in Iraq, causing death by the thousands, and he hasn’t even skipped a beat. So far he’s done nothing to influence Israel to stop killing people, yet stem cell research is morally wrong, there’s a thin line between precious life and collateral damage I guess. But this veto was done exclusively to satisfy the religious right, let’s not forget we have elections coming up in November, and he needs to make sure that his fan base shows up at the polls. Do you see how powerful the social institution of religion is now? The same could be said about leaders such as Osama Bin Laden and Hassan Nasrallah, they too have a following, and I’m not drawing a direct comparison here, but my point is that all three of these leaders claim to have faith in God, they all appeal to the masses by using religion as the basis for their moral stance or course of action. Who is right? I ask again. What lives are worth saving? Armageddon is coming says the preacher man now, they end of the world is near, the return of Jesus is sure to be soon, let us repent and ask for forgiveness and salvation. Not that these preachers haven’t been saying this for years now, but it certainly is a way to keep the following faithful. The signs are all there, right? But let’s keep in mind that they were probably saying this during WWI, WWII, Vietnam, Desert Storm the year 2000, 9/11, and of course again now. I’m not saying there aren’t any good lessons to be learned from religion, but these are not the lessons we hear of today. Live in fear is what I hear, who knows; maybe the people in power will be able to scare us into another term in office ya know. See, when we don’t know the answer to something, when we don’t know what lies ahead of us, when we are cluttered with unpredictability, that’s when we are most vulnerable, that’s when we turn to God, to faith, to a higher power. Instead we are misguided by those who seek their personal interests and hide behind the holy cloth. Let’s not just take everything at face value people, use your head as much as it may hurt to do so. And that my friend, is real.
Now I’m not standing here defending terrorism, I’m standing up for humanity, in much the same way the world responded to the Holocaust when Hitler tried to eliminate the entire Jewish race. And I’ll take the opportunity to say that I don’t think any Arab or Muslim nation can actually accomplish the destruction of Israel, as much as some of them call for it. Israel is too powerful militarily to be taken out like that, not to mention they have the U.S. as their cheerleader and ally. This is why this whole crisis is so alarming to me; it’s not even a fair fight. Was there any other alternative for Israel other than to butcher its neighbor? Of course there was, they could’ve talked, no one group of people is better than any other, and so we should be willing to talk to any group, even if that group shares completely different views on whatever many issues. The word racism has come up in many of the articles I’ve read. Go to the link “ANSWER” I have on my page for more information on this alternative perspective, something you won’t see on CNN. Do I think it has to do with race? Absolutely it does, it has to do with being Arab, it has to do with being Jewish, it has to with weather you’re pro or anti-American; it has to do with religion as well. There’s no single answer to this, but these are the major factors surrounding this issue. Occupation is what I relate this the most with, it comes in different forms, and we just choose to only look at one side of the coin. Some may say that immigrants are taking over our country, right? And this is why we want to secure our borders, and toughen immigration laws, right? I mean, if we don’t stop all these Latino people, they’re going to change our land, they’re going to take over, never mind that we nearly enslave them for labor, they are threatening the status quo, right? I mean, we got some pretty animated people behind this issue, and mind you that we’re not really being threatened by anything eminent per sei, but the loss of political power scares the hell out of the elite. And this is how this all relates to us. Imagine having to deal with some other country trying to take over what we call home. Many speculate on how complicated things would get if Iran and Syria join the fight against Israel. But who fears for what is happening now? Who is speaking out for the hundreds of innocent people that have already died? Walter Mosley once said that we as a country must look at ourselves as among the enemy; that we most consider if we have done anything as a country to provoke all this violence. Are we occupying some of these Middle Eastern countries, and enforcing our will on them? Are we turning our backs to some of these countries? Are we exploiting any of these countries? Or are we guilty by association? Iraq comes to mind when I look at the entire situation, and I can’t help but to feel sad for the 2500+ soldiers we’ve lost in the war, and the tens of thousands of Iraqis that have died in this crazy, unjustified war, in the name of freedom and democracy, ha. Why are we even in this country? These are the kinds of situations that give the rest of Americans a very bad name, when we bully our way through the world, not valuing life, not even our own lives. Digging deeper into this whole scenario, including our involvement, is the core source of all of our differences, an institution that has claimed more lives than all the major catastrophes in history combined, that is the social institution of religion.
Ironically, the 3 most influential religions in the world, Christianity, the Muslim faith, and Judaism are all fundamentally Abrahamic; they share some of the same books, and in theory, they all believe in the same God whether they call HIM Jehovah or Ala. In the name of God, ushered by religious practice, man has committed the biggest crimes in history. Where should I begin? Well, if you look in the Bible itself you will find evidence of brutal wars going on in the name of God, the war between the chosen people of God and the unclean heathens, you’ll find blood all over the Old Testament. The Spanish were at war for 700 hundred years in the name of religion, trying to claim their land back and rid it of Moors and Jews. If you didn’t convert to Christianity you could be expelled from the land or maybe even killed. Then we can go back to the late 14th century and early 15th century where in the name of God, the Christians of the world, began to enslave Africans to bring to the Americas, so they could work them to death. The Spanish for instance argued that they were indeed doing the world a favor by Christianizing the Africans and Natives, that they were nothing but savages, and would not be able to see the face of God if it weren’t for them. In the name of God David Koresh burned with 80+ of his followers. More recently, my hometown of NY was attacked on 9/11/01, in the name of Ala, which is what got us where we are today, fighting the war against terror. So whose God is right? For which of these Gods is it ok to kill for? What happened to the all loving God? This is what I’m getting to, religion is supposed to be a unifying force, a practice that accentuates the good of all humanity, yet none of the religious leaders has been able to stop the bloodshed, always one claiming to be the one true faith and announcing damnation to the rest of the world. Religion is one of the strongest social institutions worldwide; it has so much to do with how we behave everyday, and how we look at the world, our socialization begins at a very early age. As a child, I myself was raised in the Roman Catholic faith, so very early I was taught that I was only supposed to get married once, that murder was a cardinal sin, not forgivable by God, that fornication was bad, that eating meat on good Friday was being irreverent to God, and I got very good at memorizing entire verses of the Bible or the rosary book, let’s not even talk about the Virgin Mary. Later as a young adult, I tried out the protestant approach, now this was even harder in the sense that nearly everything you could possibly think of was a sin. I mean, I went to churches where listening to secular music was ungodly, women couldn’t wear makeup or pants, so many doctrinal procedures, it was hard to keep up with it, it really did feel like a camel would have a better chance of squeezing through a needles’ eye before I could get into heaven. I lived my life in fear of eternal damnation. I used to wake up in the middle of the night sweating, thinking I had missed the rapture. So what am I saying here? All I’m saying is that as human beings we must never lose our ability to think for ourselves, to process the information passed on to us, and actually see if it makes sense. Religion nowadays has nothing to do with spirituality or even salvation for that matter, and I wonder if it ever did. Look, I’m not here to renounce God himself, but none of this that I see today comes from God, and if it does, than that’s not my God. It’s a giant socialization machine, that how I see it, it creates the biggest fears on people, and this is how you get them to follow your every absurd idea. Fear mongering is what it is, this is how George Bush got re-elected, and it’s exactly what goes on with some of these other militia leaders. The right wing extremist of our nation have dictated a lot what we can and cannot do in our country recently, and it all comes from these misplaced values of cleanliness, morality, and righteousness. If we could only practice what we so adamantly preach, we might have a half ass chance into heaven. George Bush just vetoed a bill that would’ve help fund embryonic stem-cell research, click here, on the premise that it was morally wrong, and I quote "Human beings are not a raw material to be exploited or a commodity to be bought or sold and this bill will help ensure that we respect the fundamental ethical line,". The problem I see with this veto is that it is morally hypocritical, the same man that is making a statement about how precious every single life is, is the same man who has created chaos in Iraq, causing death by the thousands, and he hasn’t even skipped a beat. So far he’s done nothing to influence Israel to stop killing people, yet stem cell research is morally wrong, there’s a thin line between precious life and collateral damage I guess. But this veto was done exclusively to satisfy the religious right, let’s not forget we have elections coming up in November, and he needs to make sure that his fan base shows up at the polls. Do you see how powerful the social institution of religion is now? The same could be said about leaders such as Osama Bin Laden and Hassan Nasrallah, they too have a following, and I’m not drawing a direct comparison here, but my point is that all three of these leaders claim to have faith in God, they all appeal to the masses by using religion as the basis for their moral stance or course of action. Who is right? I ask again. What lives are worth saving? Armageddon is coming says the preacher man now, they end of the world is near, the return of Jesus is sure to be soon, let us repent and ask for forgiveness and salvation. Not that these preachers haven’t been saying this for years now, but it certainly is a way to keep the following faithful. The signs are all there, right? But let’s keep in mind that they were probably saying this during WWI, WWII, Vietnam, Desert Storm the year 2000, 9/11, and of course again now. I’m not saying there aren’t any good lessons to be learned from religion, but these are not the lessons we hear of today. Live in fear is what I hear, who knows; maybe the people in power will be able to scare us into another term in office ya know. See, when we don’t know the answer to something, when we don’t know what lies ahead of us, when we are cluttered with unpredictability, that’s when we are most vulnerable, that’s when we turn to God, to faith, to a higher power. Instead we are misguided by those who seek their personal interests and hide behind the holy cloth. Let’s not just take everything at face value people, use your head as much as it may hurt to do so. And that my friend, is real.
3 comments:
As a believer, I have to admit that I have come to a personal crossroad with all of it. I have come to the conclusion that nobody can dictate another persons moral standard. I believe that an individual will ultimately live by their own covictions. However, I do believe that all human beings possess an innate sense of right and wrong. Unfortunately, greed and lust, both in the church and out, have corrupted those who sit in power and who are charged with leading the masses. To boot, one does not have to believe in God to be religious. Religion meaning routine. Everbody is religious about something but everyone does not heed spiritual conviction and good ol karma. Heck, I am dog on near convinced that even God doesn't want anything to do with religion, He just wants us to love Him and each other. If we focused on being instead of telling each other how to be, we might just get the damn thing done ya think? As for me, I'll be marching to the beat of my own drummer. Using my heart as well as my head. Living by faith but not faith blindly. I won't necessarily follow the crowd. I've learned, the crowd actually CAN be wrong.
I feel you on that sista. Thanks for stoping by. My posting might show a little bit of hostility towards religion, but I don't want to sound like I don't believe in God, or the spirit of love that we all possess. I do believe God is revealed to us through the kindness of man. I've been through so many changes myself, so many misconceptions on life itself. Today, I can tell you that I'm not big on church, but I do take the time to reflect, and even talk to "God". I no longer pray for a better life for myself, instead I do all that is my power to make it happen. When I pray, I pray for those who need it most, those who don't have anyone to turn to, I pray for world peace, to stoping hunger and racism, feel me? But I just hate religious propaganda, and as you noticed, too many of these leaders only have self interest in mind, but no concern for what is really happening in the world.
whew! a post like that deserves a comment that is worthy. don't get excited- this probably isn't it. :) i think that you hit many nails on the head. my own feeling is that the middle east is on one level and we are on another and it is a complex dance of manipulating religions for secular goals. it is unfortunate that the people in any situation are the ones to suffer- and this is true of the arabs and jews caught in the crossfire in lebanon and iraq. it is true here too. the sudden issue of illegal mexican hordes taking over america makes me so mad i don't dignify many posts made about it with comment because the people making the posts are so ignorant. i just came upon information today that the displaced african- americans in the gulf coast region- notably new orleans- living in fema trailers have been routinely denied freedom of speech by armed guards at the camp. yes, i said armed guards denying these people freedom of speech in camps. my point is- there is a severe lacking of leadership in america today and in many western countries in the world. the aim seems to be to amass as much power and control over people as possible- while gobbling up resources and money. there is no regard for human lives- trust me i read many 'conservative' blogs. i get so frustrated at willful ignorance and lack of compassion- i think i could really harm someone or something someday. not sure i covered everything. i won't touch the religion thing- i am a rabid anti-religion person.
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