Jo S. Wun's Blog, page 6
December 20, 2011
Circumcision Decisions
I've been trying to catch up on my reading and came upon a post by Ophelia Benson at Butterflies & Wheels. It's titled Mutilate the baby tastefully, and was posted a couple of days ago. It was Ophelia's response to an article on the Atlantic website, and has generated 178 responses so far. One of them was by a commenter identified as Stewart, who pointed Ophelia to a graphic at the Gnu Atheism page on Facebook. It's a flowchart, but it's very rough and ready.
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Absolutely nothing wrong with that, in terms of the flow, but I thought it would be nice to tidy it up a bit. Feel free to use it:
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December 19, 2011
The Conundrum Of Clichés
There have been a lot of eulogies as a result of the death of Christopher Hitchens (there's a bunch of highlights here), and some responses, like this one, which demonstrate how some people manage to define, or rather re-define, the meaning of words to suit their own purpsoes. Let's just say that Bryan Fischer's idea of love does not coincide with mine.
Death also has a knack of prompting people to trot out all that 'comforting' nonsense, about the deceased person being in a better place or [insert supernatural cliché of your choice here]. They do it even when the deceased was known to be an atheist, and, worse still, when the deceased's loved ones, who are grieving, are known to be atheist. I say "worse still" because grieving is difficult enough as it is, without having to remind people, in a way that doesn't hurt their feelings, that what they've just said is completely inappropriate.
The thing is that those clichés do trip of the tongue very easily, not necessarily because the person quoting them believes the words, but because it's what you say at times like these (which, of course, is how it's become a cliché).
Clichés are actually quite powerful. If you can get people saying something without giving it any thought, you can consider it a win. If you can hijack a single word, and manage to alter its perceived meaning to coincide with your own, you've hit the jackpot.
Take the word 'god', for example. It's been hijacked. Worshipers of Yahweh have hijacked it, changing it, via the capitalisation of the 'g', from a generic term to a specific reference to Yahwey. Now that's a jackpot of enormous proportions.
But getting back to stuff which easily rolls off people's tongues (an almost involuntary process which I can understand), I struggle to understand it when I see such stuff in print, when it's written by someone who should know better. I felt compelled to comment on JT Eberhard's eulogy to Hitchens, on his What Would JT Do? blog. entitled RIP Hitch. Rest In Peace? I know it's one of those things that people say, but coming from an atheist, in respect of another atheist, I really don't understand the thinking, or perhaps lack of it, which resulted in its use for the title.
Beware the irrational, however seductive. Shun the 'transcendent' and all who invite you to subordinate or annihilate yourself. Distrust compassion; prefer dignity for yourself and others. Don't be afraid to be thought arrogant or selfish. Picture all experts as if they were mammals. Never be a spectator of unfairness or stupidity. Seek out argument and disputation for their own sake; the grave will supply plenty of time for silence.
I'm sure I don't have to tell you whose words those are.
December 18, 2011
Praying For A Feast
I know you are waiting in the wings
diligently reciting your lines
until you know them so well
you can ad-lib your every performance
I can feel you edging ever nearer
your desire growing every day
for another chance to feed
on the fruits of a feast of fear
Will you find me in my final hours
and prey upon me with your prayers
your parasitic smiles
masquerading as compassion
Will you try to lure me inside
your chapel in the hotel California
with promises of everlasting joy
as you sharpen your steely knives
And when I decline your humble offer
is it sadness I will see in your eyes
or the perverted joy of the beast within
preparing for the coming feast
Lo, it will be your terror which is unveiled
as you warn me of consequences dire.
It will be your demons searching for comrades
to justify your position as their keeper
But you will not let your demons off the leash
and set them upon me in glorious freedom
lest I slaughter them with laughter.
No, you will keep them chained to your fears
And when my heart and lungs are still
you will drag your demons home again.
Petting them, you will say, "we did our best"
and make promises to exercise them more.
Then, clinging to your augmented reality
you will say prayers to your superhero
unconcerned that it is only you who listens
while your demons.contort your inner self
Do you think you are deserving of my pity?
No! You think it is me who should be pitied
while you strive ever harder to spread your fear.
That I cannot forgive, and is the reason I despise you.
~:~
On a lighter note, 'tis Sunday, and the first song out of my phone's music player this morning was:
Jackson_Browne_-_Take_It_Easy.mp3
Listen on Posterous
Take It Easy is from the album For Everyman, available here.
December 17, 2011
A Post I Didn't Want To Write
I read the news today, but it wasn't about holes anywhere in Lancashire. No, it was about Christopher Hitchens. He's dead.
Okay, so it wasn't unexpected, but that doesn't lessen my sadness. I didn't agree with many of his political views, and I found it difficult to fathom his reasons for holding them, but nevertheless, his wit and incisive comments, often made in debates, are something I will sorely miss.
There is one thing he said which I will always remember, because it sums up a lot of what his opponents brought up to support their arguments, and is a great one-liner of wisdom.
"That which can be asserted without evidence,
can be dismissed without evidence."
I watched this video of Graham Chapman's funeral to cheer myself up. How I wish there could be such unashamed laughter at every funeral.
December 16, 2011
Some Conspiracies Are Not Just Theories
I've had a busy day in the off-line world, so here's a documentary I've been saving for just such a day. It's just short of an hour long, so get yourself comfortable.
December 15, 2011
Absent Fathers
The statement immediately below this one is true
The statement immediately above this one is false
Yes, I know it's old (and used to consist of one statement written on one side of a card and one on the reverse), but we all love a paradox, right? Well, perhaps not 'love'. More that we are fascinated by them, drawn into their apparent depth, hypnotised by their contradictions. It's similar to how we can spend long moments looking at their visual equivalents.
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This impossible pentagram is based on the more famous impossible triangle. Adding extra sides into the shape reduces the visual effect, making it less striking, while still maintaining the impossibility, albeit a little more sneakily.
These phenomena seem remarkably similar, in the way they 'bewitch' us, to things that many belief systems use to ensnare their victims. Oh! Slip of the fingers - I meant 'enlighten their members', of course. Take, as a very simple example, the use of the word 'father' as a title for a priest, a man who has never been a father to a child, and has promised never to become one.
But surely there are much bigger, more real paradoxes in religions that that? Well yes, there are. There's the notion of life after death (by definition the cessation of life), the notion of burning for eternity (another impossible triangle?), the notion of a soul (undetectable but the very thing which is supposed to be what makes us human), and, of course, the good old 3-in-1 Christian god (the equivalent of the impossible pentagram).
Here's something else to think about. The idea of the Earth Mother pre-dates the patriarchal religions. It's easy to see how the idea, and worship, of an Earth Mother arose, because of the obvious life-giving and nurturing aspects of nature. You could physically touch her bounty. So how on earth did we go from there to the notion of an invisible father who is absent from our world apart from when he hurls lightning bolts, whistles up hurricanes and stirs up tsunamis?
It probably doesn't fit the definition of a paradox in itself, but I suspect there was a paradox, or two, involved in enticing the Earth Mother's children from her breast.
December 14, 2011
In The Year 2 B.I. (Before Internet)
The year 2 B.I. was a very significant one for me. It was the first time I experienced death in any meaningful way.
I'd experienced the death of people who were technically closer to me before, people like my grandfather, for example. He was a fairly remote figure, though, whose demeanour I found a little scary. He died before I reached puberty, and consequently before I'd begun to properly understand death. I just knew it was sad because I could read it in other family members, and, as you might expect, knew how to mimic their behaviour.
There had been more famous deaths, too. I sometimes hear, or read, that everyone remembers where they were, and what they were doing, when President Kennedy was shot. I think I was at school, but I can't remember much more than that, except I couldn't get my head round what would possess anyone to kill a person, let alone Kennedy.
Incidentally, because you might be wondering, Kennedy was killed in the year 6 B.I.
Otis Redding died in the year 2 B.I., and that event is what made it a significant year for me. It wasn't so much that I was an enormous fan of his; I liked the way he sang, and was into soul music (among other genres). However, I did feel I knew him, or perhaps it would be truer to say, I felt I had a bond with him, through his music. It was the unfairness of his death which hit me. Unlike Kennedy, a powerful politician who was bound to have powerful enemies, I couldn't find any reason which explained why Otis died.
It was that which made me begin to realise that shit happens. There was no big answer which would explain it. In fact, it wasn't even a big question. Shit happens, and sometimes it's personally painful. No amount of wishful thinking can erase the painful events which have happened, nor prevent future painful events. Better to invest one's energies in learning how to deal with them.
That's not to say I didn't find it bitter-sweet when Dock Of The Bay came out the following year. There were times, when it came on the radio, that I had to pretend I'd got a bit of dust in my eye.
(Sittin' On) The Dock Of The Bay by Otis Redding
Listen on Posterous
Just under two years after Otis Redding died, the internet was turned on. I didn't know it at the time, and I didn't know the exact date until I read this article, by Venkatesh Rao, just the other day. The date was October 29, 1969, which could become a momentous date for future historians, not to mention calendar makers (click the link to read the article!), and for everyone.
It's pretty obvious that the internet has brought great changes to our world, and continues to do so, with the potential for even greater change. But I am reminded, especially in view of the roll it has played in recent events ('Arab Spring', The Occupy Movement, and most recently, the Burzynski affair) of Karl Marx and the ownership of the means of production.
The owners of the internet are businesses, some of them very big businesses. If they feel too threatened, if they feel it necessary, they can simply turn it off. I feel like a part of me is missing when I experience an internet outage (not so very uncommon in my part of the world), but how much worse it would be in a crisis situation if I had to rely, once again, on media controlled information.
I remember watching TV shows (in black and white) about world war two, and how the resistance used encrypted short wave radio transmissions to communicate. Maybe we need a modern equivalent. An internet that doesn't rely on big business. Then all we have to do is figure out a way of independently generating enough power to run it! Just in case some more shit happens.
"People say that I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one"
December 13, 2011
Code Complete
Site is down.
Inner self could not be reached.
Unable to connect.
Internal failure, security is breached.
Cache is empty.
No residual emotions.
A lack of perception,
Tried, but failed, to catch my mind's implosions.
A buffer overrun
Overwrites embedded thought
In recursive iteration
Adjusting everything which I'd been taught
Finally
I can register defeat.
Escape this endless loop
Of sucking on perfection's empty teat
Upgraded!
Creeping excellence
Excluded from my core.
The finishing line now fills me with a sense
Of awe.
December 12, 2011
A Multimedia Marvel
December 11, 2011
Special Requirements, Eh?
I'm not a regular reader of any newspaper or magazine, either on or off line, and I rarely watch television. Yep. That's right. I'm a fully paid up member of the get-my-news-via-the-internet club, and that's how I got to hear about Cristina Odone writing in her blog, at The Telegraph, about the Clive Bone/NSS court action against Bideford council (for starting council sessions with prayers, which they claim is illegal). I won't recommend clicking the link to her blog, but that's probably because I am biased. Having read some of her output previously, I think of her as Cringe-ina Odious.
Be that as it may, although it's not clear if she is partly quoting Aidan O’Neill QC, who is, I think, representing Bideford council, or whether all the words are her own, the following sentences appear in her piece.
Christians have special requirements, just like the disabled, women, the elderly or ethnic minorities. Courts must accommodate their beliefs, not ignore them. I hope that this will prove a winning argument.
The emphasis is mine. Why? Because it's a line of reasoning I've come across several times, in various forms, but always equating religious belief with other 'states of being'. In case it hasn't already struck you, people who adhere to Christianity (or any religion for that matter) are not just like the disabled, women, the elderly or ethnic minorities. There is a crucial difference.
A disabled person cannot simply decide to cease being a disabled person.
A woman cannot simply decide to cease being a woman.
An elderly person cannot simply decide to cease being an elderly person.
A member of an ethnic minority cannot simply decide to cease being a member of an ethnic minority.
Christians have a choice about being a Christian. They can decide to stop being one at any time.
The thing is that I am not the first person to point this out. People much more prominent than I have pointed this out many times. And, after all, it's not really that difficult to see it for yourself.
All things considered, perhaps there is a similarity between Christians, or to be fair, Cristina Odone, and disabled people. The disabled people I'm thinking of, though, are not those who are permanently disabled (who, I imagine, would dearly love to be in the position of Christians who can exit that 'state of being', any old time they choose). I'm thinking of the temporarily disabled. People who have, say, broken a leg. The difference is, of course, that it's likely that people with broken legs will be restored to normal in about six weeks
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Yes...it's Sunday, again.
For those of you who read my previous two Sunday posts, who are also curious to know what my phone's music player randomly selected for me, while I sat in the church car park this morning, there was not a hint of Joan or Bette. However, is there some irony in the fact that the first song was Save Me?
Probably not, if you listen to Aimee Mann's lyrics, which begin thus:
You look like
a perfect fit
For a girl in need
of a tourniquet
Then again, I've no doubt Cristina Odone would be able to equate Christians with girls in need of a tourniquet and ... no ... I can't bring myself to finish it off. I'll leave it to your imagination who the perfect fit would be while I indulge in a bit of face-palming.
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Save Me by Aimee Mann
Listen on Posterous
Save Me was written for the film Magnolia. More about Aimee Mann at her website
The leg in a splint image is from HealthArticle24 (no copyright info given) and the original injured eye image is by Tim Morris from Leicester, UK (Shit Pirate) CC-BY-2.0, via Wikimedia Commons. The baby face palming image is from MoneySavingExpert.com (no copyright info found).
