Timeout

I have been wondering a lot about my life. I have been wondering about what I have been doing. I have been wondering about what I am doing now. I have been wondering about what I am going to do. I am surprised that these things don't go together in a package. Maybe they do but for me they have not. I like to think that they are not meant to go together as some would have me believe. I think that for many people they would not have been able to get away from the role that birth had given them if they believed that they were really meant to.

I think I want to be a teacher. I think that by being a teacher I am in a place where I can do the most learning. Teachers in my opinion have the best jobs for seeing the things that I want to see. They have a front row seat to the evolution of thought. I wonder though if I can do it without influencing the thoughts myself. I wonder if I am supposed to. I flip flop a lot on the role of a teacher in a school setting.

I imagine that a core problem of the world is that we ask questions faster then we can answer them. Then we get frustrated when we realize that our time is running out and there are more answers we still have not found. In all actuality all we did was ask more questions, and work up some very in depth theories to the other questions. There is a lot of emotional investment in our opinions and theories. We come to believe them as truth because we know we can not get all the facts.

I have met teachers in the past that have pushed more of a moral lesson than the one in their assigned text. I liked those teachers at the time because it meant less studying. I even learned to look for them later in my scholastic career. However I also knew that the SAT’s were going to be from the book information. Some people can not make that difference and get out of school with head full of opinions and a job at the post office. We all know what a bad combination that can be.

I think I want to be a teacher somewhere else. By somewhere else I mean not in America. I think English is something that I would like to teach. (Note to self: go back to school moron) I think trying to teach understanding in America is impossible when no one understands American people beyond what they see on a screen. Most of our own people don't understand Americans other than what they see on a screen.
I have discovered in myself a pity for America that I did not know was there. I knew about the love. I knew about the anger. I knew about the concern. Pity is something altogether different.

I guess the good news could be said to be that we have not really gotten any worse but only that more information has been made available. The bad news could then be said that we have always been this bad.
I think that by teaching somewhere else I have a better chance of changing the world than I do if I were to teach here. I think that if more were to go to other countries with the idea of embracing their culture instead of having the goal to make them more like us we would have a bit more tolerance from them. Maybe then we can help them to understand how important it is to understand a nation’s people. That is a lesson I would like to teach to America but I am afraid that the competitive view is much better funded than me in this debate.

I wish America could sit alone in a quiet room for a little while and try to get its thoughts in order. Just stare at the wall and try to make a plan based on what it feels is the “right thing to do” without all the people yelling about what “the right thing for you to do.” I wish we had the time. It’s a shame that we can not bring the cultures of our own country together but we can not stop trying to mess with the cultures of others.

Puff Puff Give

So some more people have died in some more countries about these cartoons. I have learned more since my last post on this subject. Not about the cartoons or about the situation, but more about us as a people.

I believe more and more that we are simply aching for a fight. There was a part of me that used to think that maybe we were just getting too crowded and nature was attempting to thin the herd. Yesterday I heard that someone had discovered a place in Indonesia that had never been discovered before. It is said to have 100’s of new species and breeds of flora and fauna. That kind of gave my “too crowded” theory a reality check.

It’s ironic how my personal (romantic) life seems to be doing so good just as I seem to notice how bad things really are. I guess I should go on the belief that as long as “my life” is good then “life” is good. I thought I had learned a long time ago to not to care for my so-called “fellow man”. I guess not. I catch myself raising my voice at times when I am concerned about a subject. I know there have been times in the past where I yell more out of concern than out of anger. I feel sorry but I sound mad. I am sure that this has led to some confusion in me dealing with some personal and family problems. Even now with my significant other I catch myself. In all the habits that I want to break I think this is one of the biggest. I wonder at times though if I am the only one who has this problem.

So often our family dynamic works on the “the loudest is right” principal. How is it that we can realize how wrong this is on a global scale but we can not see it when it is down at eye level. I guess it’s that “forest for the trees” saying.

You’ll notice that all of these riots take place where there are other Islamic / Muslim problems already present. I think this simple cartoon is bringing focus of these people to a “common problem” they can deal with rather than the problems in their life that they can not deal with. This is similar to the way some Dads might carry over anger from “wife problems” to the failure their child to do their homework. They yell loudly and act aggressively as a way to relieve the tension from other problems.

The leaders of these other areas of the rioter’s lives will gladly avert that tension to somewhere anywhere else. I have seen a few wives who would go to the child after dad did his yelling and say something along the lines of “see what you did?” knowing the whole time they are the real reason for the anger.

I believe that societies and cultures think and act much the ways as individuals. I think that we can learn much of how our cultures act together by viewing how individuals interact. Of course it’s bigger so it’s slower but the actions seem very similar to me. It’s almost as though we as individuals are the individual thoughts going through a larger being’s brain. Some work from the conscious (government) and some from the subconscious (people). It’s hard to tell which ones will carry the weight in the decision making process. I don't know which is more important over all but I will say that a lot of people believe that “enlightenment” is when both are brought together.

AFK

In my life away from these keys over the past few days I have had some “real life’ problems.

1. A good friend of mine has lost his son to a drug overdose.


2. My kitchen sink is stopped up and it’s annoying to do dishes in the bathtub while we wait on the maintenance man.


3. I am at a current wall in the search for my oldest daughter, so I am rethinking that for the best angles.


4. I am having delays with my government help concerning my health issues.


5. I stretch daily which means I am in pain nightly.

It’s the waiting that is the biggest burden. I know and completely understand that I can not solve my problems in a day. I know and I understand that I can not solve the world’s problems at all. Still I look at these things and study and try to understand.
Watching or reading only gives me two options. I either learn about the problems, and face them or I avoid the problems and learn nothing. I have taken what actions I can to work on my problems and at this moment I am forced to watch for openings where I can act again. While I wait I feel that my time is best served to look at the world around me. My only other option is to hide within either fantasy or comedy. I have learned how to moderate my addictions to alcohol. I have learned to shut-down my smoking. I can not however seem to shake my addiction to information. I used to spend an easy 12 hours in front of this computer playing games, but now I spend almost my entire time searching down information. I used to spend my entire day watching “Comedy Central” or the “Sci-Fi Network”, but now I wake up early so that I can check the headlines to see what I missed over night.

Flowers in Chernobyl

Currently there is a deal of controversy concerning the portrayal of the Prophet Muhammad in a few European newspapers. As I understand it there was only one paper that printed the article but the controversy that followed has caused it to be put out again and again. People have died over these expressions of freedom.

The papers claim loudly that they have the right to express themselves however they want. The Muslims and Islamic people from all over the word feel that the image portrayed is insulting. I don't know is whose rights should carry more weight. Where does the right to free speech outweigh freedom of religion? Is this a religious matter?

I know that when I don't like something on TV I am told to turn the channel. It does not matter how insulting it is. I am my own censor. Here in America we have been trained to have an overall understanding that you vote with your pocket book. If you agree with something buy it. If you don't, then don't. <I know that it is not allowed in Muslim or Islam faiths to have any representation of the Prophet. This is to stop Idolatry.

i·dol·a·try
n. pl. i·dol·a·tries

1. Worship of idols.
2. Blind or excessive devotion to something.

I am guessing that we are talking about the number 1 definition here. I am not Christian but as I understand it some sects of the Christian belief have a law around this policy as well.

Number 3 In King James Ten Commandments
Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them.

Many Christians believe this line is to also include pictures or statues of Jesus (graven image) or anything, such as a cross (Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them) that symbolizes God.

Although I am not a Christian I still believe that everyone has a different view about God and what he looks like just seems like one more thing to argue about. In all the things that people argue about, God’s appearance seems pretty stupid to me. But that is my opinion and really does not have a lot to do with the rest of this post.

I am proud to say that here in America we have not had the problems that they have had in Europe. So far “we the people” have done a remarkable job of handling this one. Unlike their non-American brethren, the American Muslims have taken this conflict with their core beliefs in a remarkably calm fashion. There was a press conference where our news papers were NOT told what they could NOT print, but instead ASKED for respect.

So as in all things I havr to ask why? I don't “know” the answer here. I ask myself how in the whole world “we the people” are the ones that handled this with some civility. Not once have I seen this picture on American Television. When curious I had to go look on the Web and then could not find it in American “main stream” media sources.

Why?

I can not know of course from the view of an American Muslim, but as a “New Age Pragmatic” who was raised by Christians I can and will say this. DO NOT ‘TELL” the American Media what they can and can not say about your religion. It is a challenge that they are more than willing to accept if you give them a reason. American Media is the one superpower that you will never have the right to question, and if they are on your side just go with it and hope it stays that way.

Right now in a dark room somewhere on a shelf are books and books of stereotypes and phraseology just waiting to be loaded into the “Weapon of Mass Persuasion.” There is nothing sharper than a point of view.

Just feel free to ask the “tree-hugging granola eating hippie freaks” or maybe the “bible thumping fundamentalists”, about what American media will do to your beliefs in the name of free speech. I am sure you wont have to look to far to get an example or opinion from someone. Even the effects nuclear weaponry dissipates faster that the hatred and ignorance that can be caused by the “weapon of mass persuasion”.

I wonder what would happen if the Christians would hold that press conference, or if a Wiccan, or Pagan or any (insert religion here). I am truly happy for the American followers of Muhammed. I think they handled this well. In the matter of who’s right and who is wrong concerning the idolatry of God I don't really have an opinion. What small opinion I have on that matter is stated above in red. If you feel you need to have one then I recommend you think about it on your own.

I am merely pointing out that not only have governments bowed down to our media in all its glory, but here is an example where the Gods themselves request some respect and hope the media is in a giving mood.