Judeo-Christian Mystery Religion

This has been making its rounds on the Internet for a sometime now, and I've been waiting until I got a free moment before I comment on it.

Texas has a new Republican platform. And it's everything we've come to know and love from these motherfucking shit-for-brain idiots on the right. If you thought the Iowa platform was bad, boy howdy, you ain't seen nothing yet...

With this, the Republicans have finally struck a blow at the reality and in the process, created a gaping singularity of stupid that is slowly draining the collective IQ nationwide.

I Hate Illinois Nazis. Everyone Hates Illinois Nazis

Or, in this case, Floridian Nazis.

This is actually really scary. This is actually what happens when you let individual like this run amok. By their own admission, they're down there to "prevent race riots," which I translate as "shoot Black people and race traitors". They're doing the Police's job; the same police department that so horribly botched the murder investigation of Trayvon Martin. A murder that lead to this whole situation, that would likely have never reached this point - where animalistic conservatives are frothing at the mouth at the thought of demonizing a young Black teenage male while accusing liberals of race bating and projecting their own racism - had Trayvon been White. One that most certainly wouldn't have happened had Zimmerman been Black and Trayvon been White.

This is really going to make the situation better. Hell, I can see all sorts of lollypops and rainbow-shitting unicorns out of this deal. I know that it says the police haven't received any reports, but hey, they didn't arrest anyone for what was obviously a murder, so why the fuck should I believe what they say?

What's more, these particular Nazis call themselves the "White's Civil Right movement."

Nazis. The White's Civil Rights movement. This isn't appropriation of the term "Civil Rights". See, appropriation is highly offensive. This is well beyond merely "highly offensive."

There's so much wrong there I can barely begin to fathom it. That's a Calabi-Yau Manifold of  Absolute Wrong. Just when you think you've unwrapped that singular point in space time, you realize there are about six or seven other dimensions of wrongness that you totally overlooked. Reality parsed at the quantum level makes more sense than that statement does. It's like a singularity of malevolent stupid. What reality looks like on the other side of that singularity I can't contemplate, but I can guarantee that natural laws do not apply as we know them.

The murder of Trayvon Martin is one of the most racially charged crimes to happen in years. And what it's dredging up is the ugly history of American racism, and the ugly present of American racism. And as always, instead of having a conversation, and listening to the other side, the Conservatives are screaming like they're getting their teeth pulled without anesthetic. They just do not want to listen. They refuse. But then, this is nothing new. And with them, the vast majority of White men and White people, including non-Conservatives, in the United States.

New rule: if you deny racism exists, you cannot call yourself a Liberal. If you deny the existence of racism, you cannot call yourself a rationalist, either.

Nazis are now the White's Civil Rights movement. Someone please stop this ride, I want off.

A Different Drug Problem

Sometimes, I see things posted on Facebook that seem like they're just there to poke at me. Today is one of those days. While looking through my FB news feed, I saw a picture that one of my family members posted. I clicked on it and read through it, and facepalmed. The wonderful thing about social media is that information can spread quickly through it, and you can learn a lot. The downfall of social media is that misinformation can spread quickly through, and you get taught wrong.

This is a case of the later.

Conservative Love!

If you couldn't tell by the title, this has to do with love as only Conservatives are capable of showing it. So, heads up, because things can only go down hill from here.

A few Trigger Warnings - Animal Abuse for sure, with discussion of Slavery and racism in the Modern TEA Party - you know, the party that isn't racist - included.

Transhumanism and the Ethnic Identity

This is a tricky subject for me to write on, but I feel like I'm doing it a disservice if I don't. I've addressed the issue of race and privilege numerous times on this blog, and I've stated before that I'm a White, (outwardly) male. One of the benefits of this is the fact that I don't constantly have my identity shoved in my face, so I'm free to think of what it might be like as a different identity, and possibly even shed the notion of ethnicity and race all together.

Others don't have that freedom. So what happens, and what I've seen and read, is that they take the identity constantly shoved in their face and turn it into something they're proud of. This is why a "color-blind" society still does everyone a disservice: you're stripping them of their identity that they've worked hard to put so much pride into, while at the same time, continuing to shove it back in their face in a different way (a truly color-blind society still sees Blacks and Whites). The privileged, who are not constantly reminded of their identity because theirs is the "default" identity benefit from it, because they automatically become the "White."

I dislike the term "race," if only because it's such a political football. What is "race?" It depends on what country you're from. In the United States, we have "White" and "not-White", which is basically what it boils down to. When you look at selection under "race" on the census form not all of them are "races." Some - White and Black - are "races." Others, like "Asian", are geographic identifiers; Asia as a continent. I'm Asian even if I'm from the Caucasus Mountains - the root for the term "Caucasian". If I'm from the other side of the Ural Mountains in Russian, I'm Asian (this is especially painful when you see "Middle Eastern" on the same census form. The Middle East is in Asia, damn it); and even then, that's arbitrary. That's why you'll see "Eurasia" as a continent name, but never "Eurasian" as a race. Others, such as "Polynesian/Pacific Islander" are geoethnic designations. Some, such as "Latino", run the risk of being offensive. What is a "Latino?" Someone from Mexico? From Honduras? I'm sure an individual proud of their Mexican heritage loves being confused with a Nicaraguan - I have an uncle who's Columbian, and he does not like being called Mexican, and for Chrissakes don't say he's Cuban. Is it someone who's a mix Indigenous populations and Spanish? What degree of mix? Only Indigenous populations from Latin America? Someone who speaks a Latin language (Spanish or Portuguese)? And don't get me started on "Native American," lumping a diverse population of people together like they were one large identity.

Now, note: remember what I said above about people who take identities shoved in their face and try to turn them into something they're proud of? My dissection above is actually an example of privilege at work; there are people who are proud of those "racial" identifiers and will take strong offense to my dissecting them. This is one of the reason why, as a White man, I can never attempt to speak for an underprivileged population, and why trying to dissect any issue surrounding race can be a minefield if you're not sensitive in acknowledging that there are those who disagree with you, and their disagreements are every bit as valid as your points, if not more so because they have to live it every day when you don't have to. There are others - like my Columbian uncle - who will agree with me, and claim that you should never confuse a Cuban with a Columbian, because they're different. However, the above still serves my purpose, because it highlights the divisions between two totally different concepts - "race" and "ethnicity."

A Look At Modern Libertarianism

I've mentioned before Libertarianism is racist. I wasn't kidding, and that wasn't snark. American libertarianism is all about White Male privilege expressing itself and justifying itself through the presence of the Free Market. If there's nothing to make sure that the corporations are playing fair, and regulate them, then who gets trampled on? The poor. And no, you can't just sue them - you can't see someone if you're fucking dead. And your family can't sue them if they're poor and can't afford multimillion dollar hot-shot lawyer to take on a corporation run justice system - what did you expect, a public justice system? That's a vehicle for the government.

Like most other Right-wingers, Libertarians are all over the "I got mine, fuck you" mentality. In addition, they're all over the whole "government for me but not for thee" business; after all, they have to get to work somehow, and they certainly aren't using private roads to do it.

Society is geared towards a certain group of people. That's what privilege is, and that's how it works. Now, privilege is formed of interlocking gears and wheels; one person might have White male privilege without having Christian or wealth privileges, or cis-gendered straight privileges. It generally sets itself up as a tiered system; at the very top you have White straight cis-gendered wealthy Christian males, and it takes itself apart from there. Libertarianism is geared towards protecting this White, straight, cis-gendered wealthy Christian male privilege. After all, if there's no government to lift up people who are disadvantaged by the system, then these White, straight, cis-gendered wealthy Christian males (WSCWCM?) don't have to worry about sharing their social privilege - or, rather, the privilege that society awards them. If there's no entity to try to equalize the playing field and make sure that nobody is starting at a serious disadvantage, then the only people who benefit from it are WSCWCM.

And that's before we get into corporations and such, and how they exploit everyone. Modern libertarianism is just a tool expressed by those who want to exploit.

And if you need a look into that mindset, just take a stroll through the comment thread over on Ashley Miller's blog. She asks the question "Why does anyone like Ron Paul?"

I'll admit that Ron Paul is like the stopped clock of modern politics. He's done a handful of things that I agree with - not because he's Ron Paul, but because I'm a liberal social libertarian myself (in the class sense; I believe that the government should level the playing field for everyone so that nobody is starting this race blind with two broken legs, while things like the "War on Drugs" are a waste of money). However, like a stopped clock, he's wrong most of the time, but we're not talking the "five-o'-clock somewhere" wrong; we're talking incredibly, egregiously wrong.

Like his supporters, more than a fair share of whom are misogynistic gasbags, asshole racists, and generally blind to the faults of their "messiah." It's popular to mock libertarianism as a religion, but I think there may be more than just a fair share of truth to that. It's certainly one of the weirder economic cults.

I have no respect for most modern libertarians, or modern libertarianism. I view them with the same disdain I direct towards anti-vaxxers and creationists, or towards birfers, or 9/11 trufers.

Batman, Aliens, and Hollywood

There are two things that have entered my world lately that are worthy of note, because bizarre thinking and criticism of movies and literature is the norm for me. Neither technically exist yet, but apparently they're working on it.

The first thing that came to my attention is the most recent trailer for the last Dark Knight movie, The Dark Knight Rises. The other thing that came to my attention comes to my attention through PZ Myer's blog; the fact that Ridley Scott is going to do a prequel to the Aliens movie. Both of these come from Hollywood. Thus, you know the origin of the post's name.

Now please excuse me while I indulge in some deep, probably over-thinking it but well deserved criticism.

When Your Government Sells You Out...

What happens when the law becomes illegal? When the government, in an act that can only be described as a proto-fascist power-grab, way over steps it's bounds and, as an end result, threatens to imprison anyone, indefinitely?

The United States is the proto-typical police state. I know there's a lot of readers out there in the developing world who scoff at that, but the U.S. has always been this way, since it's very founding. Our police have been militarizing since the birth of the so-called "War on Drugs" - we have an almost military-like police, if not a military police system in place, accountable only to it's own and nobody else. The legal system is turning from a legal system against people because of their skin color to against people because of their economic class. On top of all this, theofascists have been trying since the beginning of the Civil War and even earlier to inject their pitiful little god into the government.

Well, today, the U.S. Senate sold us out.

An amendment that would limit military detentions to people captured overseas failed on Thursday afternoon. The Senate soundly defeated a measure to strip out all the detention provisions on Tuesday.

So despite the Sixth Amendment’s guarantee of a right to trial, the Senate bill would let the government lock up any citizen it swears is a terrorist, without the burden of proving its case to an independent judge, and for the lifespan of an amorphous war that conceivably will never end. And because the Senate is using the bill that authorizes funding for the military as its vehicle for this dramatic constitutional claim, it’s pretty likely to pass.
It would be one thing if the military was clamoring for the authority to become the nation’s jailer. But to the contrary: Defense Secretary Leon Panetta opposes the maneuver. So does CIA Director David Petraeus, who usually commands deference from senators in both parties. Pretty much every security official has lined up against the Senate detention provisions, from Director of National Intelligence James Clapper to FBI Director Robert Mueller, who worry that they’ll get in the way of FBI investigations of domestic terrorists.

Cultures and Costumes

As usually, I'm probably one of the last to pick this up, but that's alright. I'm not trying to win first place - I'm not trying to win much of anything here. This is just my personal little area to sound off on what I feel is wrong, right, or otherwise sideways with the world we live in.

Ever since I've become aware of it (a while back; becoming atheist first alerted me to Christian privilege, having a few gay friends and being genderqueer myself alerted me to cisgender, straight, and indirectly, male privilege, and having explored what other people feel based on skin color by reading their blogs and through my own character in a novel I'm working on has alerted me to White privilege. Being mentally ill and unashamed of it has alerted me to neurotypical privilege. If you name a way to segment a population, there's a privilege for that. The rest fell into place from there), nothing has been more irritating to me than watching someone with no clue about their privilege in society run off at the mouth about it.

I've often said it before. I love the privilege I get for being male, cisgendered (until I open my mouth), believer (until I open my mouth), straight, and White. I love it so much I want to share it with as many people as I can, because they deserve it too. That's what equality is about; it's me giving you what's awarded to me while I keep it, so we can be on an even keel. We're a long way from there, but inch by painful inch, we make progress.

So when I ran across this - "We're a culture, not a costume", I couldn't help but support it.

And then I read the comment thread. By this time, you'd think I would know better, but still...

Now Is a Bad Time

When you say "Christian," there are a few words that pop into my mind, as a knee-jerk reaction, before I can catch myself and remind myself that I'm stereotyping. I understand that there are Christians out there who aren't like that - there's more than a few, and they certainly don't qualify - but honestly, sometimes it seems like those of you who aren't are a minority. I see why, and understand why, the term "Christ-follower" is picking up popularity. I honestly feel sorry for those of you who have a shared group identity with these people. Damn near every time Hitchens opens his mouth on the Middle East or Islam, I feel the same way.

One of the most appalling things about religion and it's believers is the drive that some of them have to use tragedy and human despair and pain to further their own aims:

Person A: "My Mom died this Weekend."
Person B: "Oh, that's terrible. Did she accept Christ?"
Person A: "Pardon?"
Person B: "If she didn't, she's burning in Hell right now."

If you don't see anything wrong with the above, congratulations. You too may be an evangelical, spreading the "Good news" that someone's parent is rotting in Hell because they didn't believe in your petty and pathetically tiny God (left wing evangelicals excluded. I haven't had the pleasure of meeting one in person, though, so I'm still not sure they exist yet).

I'd love to say it's a subset that have poor tasting in selecting the proper time to witness people. I hate being witnessed anyway; it's a waste of my time and a waste of yours. Even worse than the guy who witnesses after a funeral or uses emotional blackmail to try and get converts, is the guy who uses human tragedy or death the further the aims of his religion, and then wonders why everyone calls him an asshole (It's his "lot" in life; it's just a further example of persecution. Never mind that at least sociopaths can feign interest and understand when to and when not to use certain types of manipulation).

Allow me to present to you one of these people, at Defending. Condescending.

How To Write About Africa

Sometimes, it takes a little satire to bring a point home.

The Inherent Racism in Antirationalism

This one sort of ties into my post below. As I was thinking about the role that race and ethnicity play in the history of science and the Enlightenment, a couple of tangential ideas struck me that won't really form into a solid post for me, so I'll just list them as they are.

The Enlightenment is Not Just DWM

I had a point made to me recently that I never stopped to think of before. The way the point was made to me was rather bluntly; those are usually the best ways that points are made. I've heard and addressed the concern that the Enlightenment, and science in general, are the focus of "Dead White Males," and as a result, something to be dismissed. I've dealt with that in passing, but the point that was made to me was sort of a reverse: the claim that the Enlightenment and science are exclusively White in their structure, and their philosophy, and that they're a White invention.

To sum that up in one phrase: that's pretty fucking absurd.

What Is It With These People...?

Anyone remember Pat Buchanan? No? Consider yourself fortunate, because here he comes again, dredging the most wretched part of humanity along on his tailcoats. This man is sick, he has to be. I know he's evil; of that there's no question.

You'll recall that not even a week ago (maybe a little longer, I have difficulty keeping track of time when I have weird work weeks), there was a mass murder in Oslo, Norway. This mass murder was carried out by a Christian Terrorist by the name of Breivek, a nationalist, open Christian, and general right wing nut who loved to read, among other things, World News Daily (an American right-wing cryptofascist/insult to cryptofascism "news" and "opinion" webpage devoted to being as flat-out stupid as possible the right-wing cause). Mr. Breviek (whose name I will not be arsed to spell correctly because he doesn't deserve it) callously slaughtered 80 innocent children and teens in the name of Christian terrorism, and published an absolutely insane, 1500 page diatribe that rivals the Necronomicon in terms of sanity damage if you read it, without all the cool abilities that come along with reading the Necronomicon (i.e., the ability to drop Yog-Sothoth on the next CPAC meeting). Well, the right-wing noise machine's been scrambling, trying to distance themselves from Mr. Briefek, with the end result being the so-called "anti-Jihadists" in this country claiming they're somehow different from Mr. Befrvek's anti-Jihadism and Christian Terrorism. Out of the echo chamber comes Pat Buchanan, who I considered a real piece of work before this, but after it... well. Here, I'll dissect his argument just I have others in the past. It's probably the safest way to get near this, but remember - don't forget your moral hazard gear.

The 10 + Some Commandments

I've kept my eyes sort of on the right for a while now, and by virtue of not hiding under a rock, I know about this crazy woman from ... somewhere, she isn't from Earth, who's running for president. In addition to leading this full blown retreat from sanity, she's a liar; a full-of-crap lying sack of stupid shit. If this woman said that you needed water to grow grass, I'd have to test it for myself. She's lied so much that she gets caught up in a whirlwind of lies; it's like watching a dog chase its tail.

Well, what's left me speechless about this crazy woman is this set of 14 "vows" that she signed, and that others are being urged to sign. I know, because the GOP is just clamoring to get the crazy vote November 2012, others will sign on too. The full list of insanity can be found here, but for your reading pleasure, I'm going to dissect each of these points. This here is a general warning - you'll want to get the safety gear out, tape up the cuffs of your pants and sleeves, and make sure your oxygen tank is filled up. This isn't a biohazard zone, but it sure as hell is a moral hazard one, and we need to take precautions around those lest they infect us. Also, you'll want to set aside your irony meters, as always. It's the proper precaution when dealing with any right-wing contamination site.

So... deep breath and here we go.

Marxisocialcommienaziism

The last post got me thinking about class antagonism. I didn't touch too long on it because I wanted to get into taking apart the word "militant" and the projection associated with it, but now that I've got some more time, I'm going to look into this class antagonism more.

The funny thing about living in America today is how many people are willing to open their mouth and spout off about stuff that they don't have the first clue about, like their opinion is somehow made fact because they wrote it (in crayon, misspelled) on a sign. Or if you clap your hands, you too can indeed make the red ones go faster. I call this Grot Physics. They live, eat, and breath thought-terminating cliches with such elegance, and practice blackwhite like all doubleplusgood proles, Big Brother would be proud of them. And, of course, there's the weapon's grade projection that goes along with that, which probably makes it easier for them.

But, upon reflecting, one thing becomes clear. Not only are these people not the sharpest tool in the shed, but they're also poor. When they open their mouth screaming about socialism, using it like a child does a "naughty word", screaming about unions, screaming about public education, and screaming about X, Y, and Z (the letters as variables, not the French agents), what they're really doing is hurting themselves. As a liberal, this has given me pause many of times. You want to reach out and get through to them - preferably with a heavy iron object. "I'm trying to help you, stupid!" is the common thought that goes through my mind. And it's not like they don't want to be helped; oh goodness no. The problem is that they're already think they're being helped. And that's a big problem.

Let's turn back the clock for a minute. During the days leading up to the American War of Secession (it's not a civil war, so let's stop referring to it as one, shall we?), escaped slaves finding their way on the underground railroad was a common thing. They would escape from their rich owner's plantations and either find freedom up in Canada or stay in the North. Naturally, this hurt the plantation owners, who were loosing their "property". Which, in most cases, meant they wanted it back. So who did they send to get it back?

They gathered together gangs of poor, White southerners and told them "go get these slaves back." And those poor, White southerners did.

Let's take a look at this dynamic for a minute. You have, on one end, the rich southern plantation owner. He's rich, and he has land, and he's living the high life with all his slaves. On the other end, you have the slaves themselves, who occupy a low status in society, and you have the poor Whites, who are arguably just a touch more free than the slaves are. Now, obviously those poor Whites resented being poor. I know I resent being poor. They wanted a piece of the pie. Modern Conservatives call this "the politics of envy," with the notion that you're just better off being poor or being a slave. And those rich White plantation owners probably weren't keen on giving them that slice of pie. So what's the logical thing here to do? There's a lot more of us, if you count those Black slaves, than there are of those rich White plantation owners. Solidarity, brother! You may be Black and I may think you're the cursed Child of Ham, but you know what? It only makes sense here for me to ally with you to get things done.

And the plantation owners realized that. So they when the slaves started escaping (they'd been escaping from the beginning), those wealthy plantation owners went to those poor Whites and told those poor Whites,"go get my slaves back." There's a power dynamic at work there: those poor Whites are suddenly given more power than the Black slaves had. If they started working with those Black slaves, that power dynamic would go away. Thus, any solidarity that might have existed (providing one was able to ignore all of the other factors at play) was completely shot. And the rich heaved a sigh of relief.

Hit the fast froward button to the present: This same dynamic is at work today. Remember how I said that the teabaggers and the conservatives already think they're being helped, when it's clear to anyone they're not? That's because the rich in this nation - the corporations, the millionaire bankers, the political leaders - have convinced them that they don't need that help, in much the same way that the wealthy plantation owners convinced the poor Whites that they had power: focus on an imaginary enemy. Usually, this enemy is what's best for you in the long run, because what's good for you as a poor person in the long run is bad for me as a rich person in the short run. Thus, things like socialism, unions, and public services become the villains, even though they're designed to help people like the very same individuals who are protesting it. It's the poor being used by the rich to keep the poor poor. If you look hard enough, you'll find this same sort of thing repeated throughout history time and again: the elites, whether they be priests, kings, barons, dukes, financiers, industrial barons or billionaires, have always managed to take a segment of the poor - usually the lower middle class, but also the functional middle class if times are tough enough - and convince them that anything designed to help them (like nationalized healthcare) will somehow hurt them in the long run.

Do you agree with me on this? If you do, congratulations, you're a proponent of Marxist theory. And now you, unlike those poor-to-middle class Whites who are being rallied by the wealthy, actually know what the term means. Of course, education is the first key to combating this; if people knew, if they were learned in these subject matters, they would see. But they're not. And the elites with the power know that, and as long as they can keep these people uneducated and poor, they can keep these people on their side, acting against their own best interests.