Freethinker's corner

    Is this America or is this China?

    Here in America, we have a Constitution that guarantees free speech, yet on popular media censorship is rampant. I suppose we can be thankful that the penalties for saying something forbidden are not as harsh as in China, but they are nevertheless frustrating.

    On Facebook I have noticed that certain pages can get away with posting material that if the regular user posts it… even shares it… he/she runs into conflict with “community standards”.

    As it is we have to deal with ads popping up all the time. These ads provide income to Facebook. So, a user comes on and uses the utility and runs foul of “community standards” after having provided income to Facebook by looking at their crummy ads. Humor is a difficult concept it has been said, but if you say the wrong thing, even in an attempt at humor, you are penalized as if you committed a crime.

    I swear this site will be deleted if I receive a penalty equal to the time that it takes to delete a site. I believe that is 30 days. After coming off a seven day restriction and the frustrations involved in watching things happen upon which you cannot insert your two cents… I simply will leave the site go and maybe come back and establish anew at a future time.

    No, I realize no one including Facebook will care. What else can you do?

    Despite denials humanist and atheist groups hold ideologies. These are adopted credos, or beliefs, decided upon without any research, or sometimes even in contradiction to research. You find quite quickly when you attempt to join such groups that ideologies exist. If you are in disagreement with those beliefs, you are hounded until you either blithely accept them or leave the group. I have personally experienced these pressures, so I know they exist.

    For whatever reason these groups adopt a perspective about certain issues, and that perspective is based on nothing more than preference. While spouting loudly about the merits of science, they nevertheless adopt perspectives that have no science backing them. When you ask for the science backing their viewpoint, they most often become angry and label you a bigot or worse.

    Acceptance of a group is not based on science. Sometimes it is more based on compassion, sympathy, or empathy. Such acceptance does not need science. The error, the illogic, is claiming that there is science backing your preference… when there is none. More than one issue is held by otherwise reason-based groups in this way.

    What irks me is the claim of backing by science, not that they hold these ideals. I share the perspectives of some issues, knowing it is only through compassion that I hold them. I do not claim science where there is none. It is the “human” thing to do.

An incident occurs, but at the time its gravity of meaning is not realized. Many incidents occur over time that are of that nature. They remain in your mind, your memory of them occurring time and time again. It may take years for the gravity of those incidents to gel and develop into hatred.

You may struggle to relieve the thoughts, might even make a valiant effort to make them fade into obscurity. A mind does not work that way. Though time may lessen the hurt the thoughts recur again and again. Some thoughts flare into the mind with an intensity equal or surpassing the levels experienced when they occurred.

Finally, you realize the depths to which the incidents affect you. You are able to point at the specific moment when an incident became overwhelmingly disturbing, affecting your relationship with the author of the words or actions remembered. You begin to realize the emotion the memory produces is hate. From that moment on the relationship is changed. You may have been close, but now the distance between becomes insurmountable. You just don’t know them anymore. They become like a stranger. A stranger that you feel animosity towards. You desire they just stay away. In some cases, you’d rather never see them again. Yet the memories remain. Then you are eternally faced with the desire to make the memories go away.

Fret, worry, anger, anxiety, your emotions are on automatic. Your memory, mostly images, or thoughts without form, seem to initiate emotional reactions in the same degree as actual reality. Naturally, memories are desirable in order to learn, and to not make the same mistakes over and over.

    The flaw, I think, is that the memories cannot just be perceived dispassionately, instead they reignite the feelings felt at the time. If it were possible to look at them as pictures, as simple information, then the additional stress associated with the original real encounter would not be relived. Though such an ability may not be included with our software, the ability to learn exists. Perhaps with repetition and exercising will this software can be altered.

    The wear and tear on an organism from the initial emotional encounters should not have to be compounded by reliving them every time you view your archives. All of this could be rendered moot if our minds possessed a delete function. However, try as one might, neither our minds have it, nor do humans possess the technology to erase memories. Besides, how can a lesson be learned if you forget it?

    A fervent believer considers his/her god the one and only. As a result, all other gods of other belief systems are looked upon as abominations. A religion expects a believer to support and spread its particular dogma. It usually condemns the followers of any other belief system as being lost souls headed toward a nasty fate. A truly fervent believer is therefore highly motivated to convert everyone… in order to “save” them. B

    In order to enforce the particular dogma of his/her belief system it most certainly would make things go easier if the government adopted the belief system and made life difficult for anyone not a member of the faith. If the government continually issued support to one particular belief system and the religion chosen displayed prominently in every locale, as constant reinforcement of the dogma, people would be less likely to oppose it.

    This is why Christians have since day one of the United States claim it was founded on their religion. This is why they fought so hard to keep the Republican Party in office. This is why a near insurrection occurred this month.

    In the end it was clear… the Evangelicals were hoping to force the entire nation to bed knee to their particular concept of a god… at the point of a gun.

    The Islamic religion is feared for this reason. This insurrection is a reminder to all that Christian fundamentalism is every bit as dangerous and to be feared just as much.

    Remember, a religion is not a race, it is not racist to oppose religions. It is not bigotry to possess a fear of what religion is capable of.

    Beware of incrementalism, when a law is adopted now, or later, and little by little you soon find yourself a living in a country ruled by a specific belief system. Even now the right is pushing change in order to strengthen religion’s strangle hold upon the nation.

The world is celebrating. A crazy man has been thwarted from creating another Reich. Trump will not get a second term.

Now, just what could cause a man to behave so childishly, so foolishly? What do his creditors hold over him? Who are his puppet masters?

Notably, Russia is not happy. Is it their bidding that Trump has been carrying out? Will Trump now make haste to finish whatever goal they have assigned him? Is there any way to stop him?

Good grief, he exposed a lot of bigots, racists, and otherwise hate-filled people to a public airing. It is very disappointing to realize so many degenerates live next door, or in the state, or country. Trump received nearly 71,000,000 votes, meaning in effect, there were 71,000,000 people willing to surrender to a dictator, lose all freedoms, serve a madman. And for what?

Seems it was all for the purposes of returning to the days of yore when racism was rampant. Or was its thrust aimed at establishing a white supremacist nation? Was it an attempt to force religion upon all Americans? Some foolishly claim that it was for “draining the swamp”. How; By complete destruction of government and country. All in all, it was in reality an attempt to return to the Dark Ages.

Is the United States going down? Despite the efforts of the GOP that has not been decided yet. Trump has used the GOP and religion in what has been a very successful effort to divide the nation. In the United States the glue that holds us together has never been very strong.

So many factions, so many different beliefs, it is surprising that the country has lasted this long. Will it become just another experiment that has failed? Are we now destined to become an authoritarian dictatorship led by a madman?

If he continues on his present path there will be much misery in the country’s future. He will remove Social Security and Medicare as he has promised. This will leave millions of Senior Americans with nothing and no where to go but the streets. He wants to eliminate unemployment and anything that they believe is the least bit socialist. In just a few years the United States will achieve third world status.

The total elimination of anything remotely considered socialist will eliminate fire departments, police departments, and public roads works. He means to develop a utopia … but only for the rich. Only the rich will be able to retire, travel, or even own property. He will take the vote away from all except the rich. A dictator dictates.

The country will become like it was during the Great Depression, only this time, Trump will ensure that there are no soup lines. He will make sure there is adequate prison space for the resisting population. Slavery will be the lot of those lacking wealth.

I am sure this is not what Right wants. They can’t seem to understand that they are being used as one might use stepping stones. They have become a means to the country’s end. Freedom and Liberty will become dirty words no one dare utter. Never have sheep acted so blindly against their own interests.

The best thing for America right now would be if Trump ceased to be. Yes, succumb to the virus “hoax”. Let it be so.

    The stage is set, the players are poised, the script has been forced upon us all.
The audience is the world.

    All that is left is for the puppet masters to begin the show.