The Origins of Democracy

Many believe Democracy to be one of the greatest forms of government ever created. Psychological study supports Democracy as the most efficient and healthiest style of government in existence, encouraging social interaction, granting purpose to each citizen, and building faith in social institutions encouraging the flowering of community. Every citizen has a vested interest in their government, something to gain and much to lose should it fall, thus each contributes to their utmost to support the state because without them it would surely collapse. We come to identify ourselves with the state and thus protect it. It is an amazing form of governance, creating altruism, innovation, and inexhaustible possibility. But this grand political design did not spring from ideal thoughts, nor did it arise out of the vague belief in the equality of men. Democracy was birthed from fear, not hope. Doubt, not faith, was the ironic seed that birthed Democracy.

Democracy is in and of itself a check on power. It divides authority serving to keep any one person or group from unlimited reign. Each of us is given a piece, so each of us is a member at the table of power. This serves to draw the whole community to government, hundreds, thousands, millions of minds working to solve problems. When the power is wielded by one or a few, the threat to the whole of society increases. The centralizing of power serves to alienate individuals from the state. If one has no say, then one has no part. If one has no part, then why sacrifice? The state and the community separate, eventually destined to become enemies. The process is inevitable. From democracy to republic to tyranny to anarchy. Sometimes society rises from the ashes. Sometimes it does not.

The catalyst of centralized power differs. Sometimes it is a military threat from without forcing a state to streamline government for more immediate responses and defense. Other times it is a gradual process, good intentions such as socialism or communism which gradually take on more and more responsibility. Many times, it is that one or few who suffer from an insatiable drive to seize the reigns of power. It is this figure(s) who serves as the harbinger of tyranny’s reign.

Those of unlimited power find themselves quickly corrupted by it. This is because power can shape reality but also distort it. The tyrant must surround themselves with an inner circle who will carry out their wishes. This inner circle gradually becomes a rampart against the real as they, not the leader(s) exercise authority. They are the tyrant’s tools. This system insulates the leader(s) from society. They lose touch with the real, surrounded by those who rely on the leader(s) for power; leeches parasitically clasped to the breast of government. These sycophants serve as both a crutch and a handicap. Knowing their importance as the gatekeepers to power, this court of bootlickers can distort the truth to the tyrant in order to achieve their own gains or to escape punishment for their ills. They tell the leader(s) what they want to hear. Act as the leader(s) orders. They reinforce the tyrant’s belief in himself until he comes to the view of infallibility. There is no right or wrong. There is only the leader(s) will. This leads to an erosion of moral thought and eventually higher reasoning. Value for critical thinking is lost. Long term planning trails off. The importance of the state falls away. All that matters is the immediate wants of the leader(s). Power exists to support them and them alone. Power begins to be abused further. It becomes baser, more primitive. Society is no longer geared toward community but towards the leader(s) will. Basic service are completely forgotten leading to a decline of the state. As society crumbles, the leader(s) cannibalizes it. He becomes an all consuming monster. This is largely due to an evolution of the pact between the leader(s) and his sycophantic inner circle.

These sycophants become a threat. As the leader(s) powers wane, he comes to rely on his inner circle and their supporters to carry out his will more and more. These sycophants begin to accumulate power from the source until they became the leader(s) sole source of power forcing the leader(s) to make concessions of a damnable sort. Without these sycophants, the leader is vulnerable and defenseless. So he releases the leashes and lets his hounds loose to do as they will as long as they remain loyal.

One has only to look at Mugabe of Zimbabwe for a modern example. He came to power at the behest of the black majority of Zimbabwe in a revolution that saw the toppling of an oppressive white minority government. Great power was vested in him to change the nation for the better. Mugabe surrounded himself with allies as he sought to improve the plight of blacks in his country, home to numerous educated citizens and the breadbasket for southern Africa. He sought to raise the standard of living, spread education, and integrate his nation following the racist practices before his ascension. But greed tainted his rule. Mugabe began to act on his own behalf, enriching himself at the expense of the whites in his country. When the public became wary of his actions, Mugabe used his security forces, rather than the will of the people, to solidify his grip on power by destroying the political opposition, tightening his grip on all parts of the economy, and enforcing order as he saw fit. He sowed xenophobic fear throughout the state of Western attempts to re-impose colonial rule upon them. He galvanized the majority against the minority (blacks against whites). He did all this to divert the citizens’ eyes from his snatch at power. No one balked until the famine came coupled with unemployment and widespread corruption. Then the violence began to affect the majority as it had the minority. The state had come to threaten the community. The split was unmendable. As Zimbabwe increasingly turned against him, Mugabe knew only his security forces could keep him in power. They knew this too. They have made demands of their own, confiscating farms, terrorizing the populace, and worse with impunity because of the power they now held. Mugabe, more and more, has become a figurehead. Even now, Mugabe is largely in power against his will. Security forces are pushing to keep him where he is for fear of the power they will lose. Anyone else in office would surely curb their actions. This is the fate of all leaders: to be devoured by the power they once held.

Tyrants have existed for millennia. As to whether Locke was correct and government arose from a social contract or Hobbes had it right when he stated the strongest forces forged states is irrelevant to this argument. Tyrants arose from the mists of time and forged kingdoms and empires across the face of the world. With absolute power, only their will could check them. The human mind does not work well without boundaries. Every soul, given free reign, is destined to become lost in the limitless expanse of possibilities. Unlimited power is sure madness for the wielder. Every tyrant has proven so. Men such as Ivan III, Stalin, Caligula, and even Alexander have shown the decline humanity encounters once one passes through the portal into limitless authority. There is no structure, only void. Laws do not exist. Punishments do not exist. One keeps going forward into the darkness because there is nothing to hold them back. That is what absolute power is.

Tyrants become so far removed from their subjects that they fail to see them as people anymore. Humanity becomes a faceless mass used to build a tyrant’s feverish dreams into a reality. Bones and blood become resources. Given enough time, every tyrant comes to see them self as a god. Reality is no more. All that is can only be at the will of the leader(s) and woe be unto them who challenge this will.

Democracy arose from the lessons learned of tyrants. The Greeks, the Romans, and many others forged their democratic governments not out of love for, and respect of, the people but to prevent the rise of another evil force. Power was distributed to halt the resurrection of an Age of Tyrants; to keep the Beast in the Pit.

Yet here we are in modern America watching the state gradually centralize authority into fewer and fewer hands. Our leaders are becoming insulated and detached. We have become numbers via polls, Social Security, and census data. We rebel the only way we know how, embracing our individuality in a stranglehold to the point of choking the life out of society. We are embarking on an insane path of centralization via fragmentation. Yet no one notices. So many have withdrawn from our political system because they have lost hope. So few have a stake in what is thus no one cares what is to come. The void is starting to yawn wider and wider. The question is who will step through it.

My Reason Why

People always wonder where the magic went, waking up to face each day; life getting dimmer and grayer with every receding dream. The magic never went away. You’ve simply become blind to it.

A large number of people believe maturity is the end all, be all to human development. We have to progress to that logical plane where everything had a reason and everyone a purpose. There is no room to be wild and spontaneous. One must have responsibilities and keep obligations. Well I say otherwise. Responsibilities are the chains that bind us and obligations the bars of our own make. Why does everything have to make sense? Why must we all have a purpose?

Now I’m not an immature man. Far from. I understand the need for certain responsibilities and the reason for certain obligations. After all, in this world, trust is an important thing. But I call shenanigans on forced responsibility and unnecessary obligation. Why should I take a job I don’t like? Why do I need that expensive car, those trendy clothes, or social status? And should others look to me, why is it my obligation to lead them? Why should I have to watch what I say or how I act to serve as a role model? Why can’t I simply be me, others be damned? There is a thing in life called choice and should others ignorantly follow in my footsteps then let the lemmings spill over the cliff. At least I have enough forethought to step aside at the last moment because I see the cliff rather than the guy’s back in front of me, placing my trust and safety in a guy whose face I’ve never seen.

This is the world we live in. We’re expected to “grow up”, set aside our wonder and instead question question question and prod prod prod to find out why, yet when the answer is right there before us we refuse to see it. Growing up is all about denying your true self. We build this armor around us of past memories and fashion glasses of former experiences not realizing that all we’re really doing is cutting ourselves off from the world and distorting the reality around us. Reality is only what we make of it. Our minds and perceptions filter what really surrounds us and sadly maturity means narrowing that broad horizon to a slit which allows only the slimmest of wonders to slip through.

Children are wonderful and I’ll tell you why. They don’t have past experiences to cloud their view of the magnificent world around them. Everything is new and special and welcome. Children aren’t afraid. They see no reason to lie to themselves. They don’t worry about what their place is in the world. They only worry that they don’t have enough time to experience everything there is to offer.

That is what life is. It is experience. Maturity, true maturity, shouldn’t be a limiting thing. You shouldn’t sell a part of your soul because you have something to prove. You should confine yourself to an existence that smothers your lusts to be.

The magic children see and we are too blind to notice is simply the wonder of life. There are still so many experiences out there no matter how old you are. So much to learn and discover. If we’d just let go of what has been, let the scales fall from our eyes, the blazing light of existence would reignite that smothered flame of our souls. Take every moment for what it is. Not what you think it represents. Find that magic.

People call me immature. But you know what? I don’t live for them. I live to be. That may make me giddy and to some apparently careless, but it’s my life and I don’t want to regret one single part of it. Life is experience people. Stop taking the safe road. Set off for that horizon. Follow your dreams. Create your destiny. Never settle for less than what you’re worth because you are worth far more than any material object you could ever own.

Humanity is Screwed

I have come to one very depressing conclusion: humanity is screwed. The environment is collapsing, the water is polluted, political systems are failing, society is crumbling, and civilization is on the verge of a mediocre smothering. I know, it’s been said thousands of times before, but come on people. The writing is on the wall. The worst part is most of you are too illiterate to read it.

Now notice I don’t claim the world is going to end, nor that life will cease to be. Trust me, we are way too full of ourselves if we think we’re capable of obliterating this rock we exist on. And life will continue to thrive long after we become extinct. That is what evolution is all about. Sure there will be tons of cockroaches and rats, but they have the tools to survive. Hell, we’ve thrown everything at those creatures short of an atomic bomb and even if we did that, those twin species would continue to scramble to all four corners of the globe.

So why is humanity doomed? Well, it’s quite simple. It’s our mindset. We all know the all important question posed to humanity: Why am I? Now we’ve come up with some interesting answers as well as some very skewed ones (scientologists, I’m looking at you). The problem is the question shouldn’t be “Why am I?” The question is “Why should I be?”

First, why the initial question is not only worthless but a threat to the human mindset. To think we are so unique that we warrant an investigation into our origins smacks of narcissism. Do you want the literal reason for why you are here? Sex, my friend. Do you want to understand how life came to be? Chemicals, energy, and chance. Do you want to realize your purpose? It’s balance. Always has been, always will be. The universe is a complex equation of check and countercheck, everything balancing everything else out because too much of anything is detrimental to the whole. So to believe that humanity ranks above the ecosystem, the plants that make it up, or the animals who thrive in it is to remove ourselves from our natural environment and place us in a land of confusion. Just because we have a gift called reason doesn’t mean we should do the equivalent of masturbating with it by dreaming up tons of questions that will never lead anywhere. Reality is a subjective thing. What you think makes sense I know I sure the hell don’t agree with. So seeking out some universal answer to some philosophical enigma is nothing more than a waste of time. You have reason for a reason: to figure out real world problems and create solutions. We are a part of the grand equation, each of us serving as a cog in the machine. The only question we should be asking is what cog are we meant to represent. Believing ourselves special because we are human and sentient is ridiculous. Sure, I know I’m an entity. What is so special about that? If we were to make man vanish, the world could easily get on without us. That is because we’ve so removed ourselves from the life cycle that we’ve become more of an irritant retarding life’s growth. We don’t balance things. We tip the scales in our favor. We play the role of the measurer rather than of weight on the scale. We are so distant from the world, sealed in our tombs called the modern home, seeing the world through television instead of through windows, we really have no clue what is going on around us. We’re oblivious to the fact we are destroying the world. Luckily, tipping the scale too far will only lead to us sliding down and out of the picture allowing it to bounce back. We, sadly, won’t be there to see it.

Now I’m going to shock you. All that crap you’ve been told since birth about being special: you’re not. Yeah, mommy and daddy wanted to build up your ego, aid in the building of some self-esteem. Well, face it. You’re not special. In a world of over 6 billion (6,000,000,000) humans, what exactly sets you apart? You have the same organs, the same senses, and likely the same skin and hair of some fraction of the rest of humanity. So are you a stand-out? Are you some demi-god or messiah, some superhuman? No, you’re not.

Let me shock you some more. We are not all equal. Yeah, the introduction on the United States’ charter would have you believe otherwise: We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal. First off, if that were true then why were only the educated upper classes representing the rest of the colonies? Why was there an aristocratic elite even in a backwater like America in the eighteenth century? It was a nice little idealistic spiel but not an honest one. If ol’ Tom Jefferson wasn’t winking when he wrote that then the man was obviously broken in the brain. No my friends, we are not all equal. There are those who are smarter, stronger, more aggressive, more creative, more innovative, etc. We are a multifaceted species and that is a good thing. It allows us to look at problems from different angles, to each play some role. If we were all exactly alike, all “equal”, then why should one guy get the chance to hold a position over another? Why are there hierarchies? We all have gifts, usually not the same as others. The pathetic part is television, the media, and our very culture rams down our throats that we are all capable of the amazing and nothing is beyond our grasp. People, stop driving yourselves insane. Not everyone is capable of being the greatest. The slots are limited, the competition intense, and you very likely do not possess the tools to accomplish victory. Sad but true, yet it doesn’t make you pathetic. You play a part, you’re just not meant for greater things. There is no shame in realizing your limitations. But to believe yourself capable of far more than you really are; that is hubris and that is the direction humanity is going. If we continue to believe we can do the impossible, the frustration is going to kill us.

Another problem with civilization is our glorification of those who feed our hunger for illusions. We deify athletes, movie stars, and musicians yet forget soldiers, teachers, and others who contribute far more to our society. Sure, that boxer overcame the odds and knocked out the champ in the last round in a Cinderella comeback, but what about the soldier who took a bullet in a unknown battle in a forgotten part of the world? Wow, that actor was really good in that movie. Real blockbuster stuff. Did you see all the explosions? What about the teacher who taught the actor to read the script, the writer to write, etc. We glorify our dreams and forget the reality. There is a reason why past societies considered entertainers lower than prostitutes: because they take you out of the world. Sure, they can make you forget the problems in your life for a few hours because of them, but when it’s over you sure the hell still have the same problems. Why not glorify people who actually strive to change the world, not make you forget about it?

So, I ask you, why should you be? What do you have to offer humanity? What do you have to offer the world? If you’d just drop the damn narcissism and realize you’re part of a larger whole, that you’re not special or unique but belong to a larger whole that can’t function without you, then maybe we could stop the fragmenting of civilization and actually turn the world around. You exist so that there is a tomorrow. That is why you are. Try to find a way to make it happen. A life well lived is one where you left the world better off because of you’re life. It’s not material possessions or fame, historical precedent or a even a large family. It’s having done what you could that things improved.

Come on guys. You all have reason for a reason. Stop wasting it, shutting it off, squandering that potential. Stop letting other people tell you what to think, how to act, what should be. Make a mark. Let those sparks of thought fly, burn bright with your inquisitive nature, illuminate a path to a greater tomorrow. Make me eat my words. I’m challenging you. Now do it!

Me

I am not expecting anyone to understand the complexity that is me. Neither I, nor my ex-wife, ever understood what I am. I am a miasma of so many emotions; a conflicting series of wants, needs, and desires. Sometimes I wish I were in a different time. A simpler time. I feel so out of place.

I know you don't know what I mean. Maybe you do. I pressed myself so hard in my youth. I had to achieve the impossible as soon as possible. There was not ime to waste. I had to be the prodigy. I had to change the world. When I failed, I faced depression beyond belief. I wanted to be so much more than I am. Then reality finally came and I began to see I am only human. That is an amazing thing.

I loathe those who strive for perfection. Man was never meant to be perfect. We all have flaws. No one will ever be perfect. No one can ever achieve the impossible. I believe that is part of my hatred for Christianity. That faith lashes one for their inablity to live up to a standard; a standard of a man who liekly never existed, and if he did, he did not exist in the form that he did.

The human condition is one of learning. It is a lifetime of stumbling, of discovery, of self-assertion. There are those who do not understand this or who refuse to. I do not hate any race, any sexuality, any view. I realize we are all diffrent. We are all unique. For anyone to hate a person becuase of who they are is short sighted, shallow, and ill-informed. We are all special in our own way.

I know I may be rambling. I am quite intoxicated as it is, but I felt it important to share my views. So many people fail to understand those strangers just a few feet away; fail to hear what it is they wish to express. We are all human beings who speak a shared language, yet are incapable of understanding what we mean.

I'm a solitary man; a lonely man. I wish there were those who understood me. But I have come to realize mine is a lonely path of discovery. I envy you, those who have those to join them on their path of discovery. Learn from these precious moments given to you as I struggle forward hoping to understand why I am and what I was meant to be.

Know and Love Your Asshole

In any group there are three kinds of people: The leader, the follower and the asshole. It never fails and try as you might, no group will be successful without all three elements present.

The leader leads, the follower follows, and the asshole questions the leader and antagonizes the follower. All three factions are crucial to the dynamics of any group. Without the asshole, the leader wouldn't conquer the little challenges such as keeping a group together, while the follower wouldn't learn to stand up and solve an issue on their own. Assholes truly are a needed commodity in the world. Unfortunately for the group, the job of an asshole is to be an asshole. Trust me; it's not as easy as people may think. We've got a tough job despite it being only a single track agenda. I was told as a child that I could be anything I wanted to be when I grew up, so I became an asshole. It's a thankless job, and it's not easy to fill the shoes of a good asshole. We're often ostracized from "normal" social groups for being too ‘verb adjective', but – that's what we do. We are also painfully undervalued. Be that as it may, I feel it is my duty to try and shed light on the two distinct breeds of assholes.

Think of this as my way of saying that your today sucks, but that doesn't mean my tomorrow has to.

A good asshole will always have:

A sense of humor.

A good asshole can make almost anything funny, even jokes about themselves. However, making anything funny isn't enough; they've got to know when it's appropriate to make something funny and when to plain shut up. If someone asks "Do these pants make me look fat?", the good asshole will respond with a light hearted "No.", give a pregnant pause and follow up with "The fat makes you look fat." The bad asshole will simply reply with a "yes." It would have been better to say nothing because "yes" isn't funny.

Someone to kick when they are down.

Often times we come across someone who is having a bad day. The good asshole will remind their victim that certain aspects of their life sucks or that, despite various other achievements, there is one irritating challenge not yet met.

This can be best seen in the "Do these pants make me look fat?" question where their victim obviously has concern about their weight and it is likely that this is the unmet challenge.

A bad asshole will devalue the achievements already attained by their victim or make a general statement about the status of various elements in their victim's life to a degree of being downright ugly (which, from a 3rd person perspective, is funny to a good asshole).

Someone to remind them that they are an asshole.

All assholes know they are an asshole. They're told this religiously, but a good asshole needs to be encouraged to continue to be a good asshole, or they go bad very quickly. Good assholes love to make someone laugh (though often it is themselves who laugh). As such, assholes are in their own rights attention whores – narcissistic attention whores, but attention whores nonetheless. It is important to note that the reminders given to assholes must be gentle.

Assholes can take being treated accordingly, but nagging an asshole about being an asshole does one of two things: Makes them a bad asshole or makes them a follower. On the same token, forgetting to remind the asshole that they are about to miss a perfect moment to be an asshole will confuse and dilute the asshole into becoming a mindless drone.

Trust me when I say this – the only thing worse than a bad asshole is an ex-asshole. They're unfunny with horrible timing and really bad taste. They strive for a level of excellence that they'll never achieve – like the 70-year old grandma who still lives in her whoring glory days by wearing a Limited Too ensemble to the grocery store. You know the deal - sports bra that supports... nothing, "hooker red" lipstick that serves to only accentuate the unique hue of antique yellow her teeth have become, 6 months overdue for a re-dye red hair in an 80's coiffe/bouffant thing, a tattoo of what I'm guessing was a baby that now looks like a tattoo of Edvard Munch's "The Scream," spray tanned leather covering she calls "skin," and booty shorts that say "juicy" which are loosely draped over the ass yet is somehow shoved up it as if to indicate that her ass was eating the shorts.

Intelligence and Self Control.

A good asshole has some degree of intelligence. People love to hate the smart asses, but their points are generally well founded. It happens to be that their means of delivery can seem sophomoric and infantile with respect to the topic. People will laugh with the good asshole or smart ass, whereas they'll laugh at the dumbass bad asshole or not at all. Thus, the dumbass counters the point of pimping themselves out for the laugh of the crowd.

I have never heard anyone say, "What's this guy doing here, he's such a smartass."

I have heard people say, "What's this guy doing here, he's such a dumbass."

Furthermore, a good asshole won't be too much of an asshole with the wrong issues or will refrain from being an asshole altogether. Good assholes know when it's time to be an asshole. Bad assholes do not.

A sense of self worth.

This can be best summed up as "Poor planning on your part doesn't constitute an emergency on mine." One might also infer that when comparing the good and bad asshole, it is akin to the comparison of a geisha and a butterfly girl; the geisha gets respect although she in essence is a whore, while the other gets no respect and is also a whore.

A good asshole will know when it is inappropriate to whore themselves out for the laugh. An ugly baby is funny, while a dead baby isn't.

The bad asshole will try to make them both funny at exactly the wrong time, while the good asshole will make only the former funny at the right time.

Effective time management

Assholes, good and bad alike, know the value of their time and in general are great people to go to when you have time management issues. This isn't to say that the price of consultation isn't light, or that you'll like their solution, but it is to say that the good asshole will manage your time effectively to get the most from and for you. While the bad asshole also manages time effectively, they'll simply tell you to go away as a form of better managing their own time by not wasting it on you. In short, at least the good asshole will help you.

So, next time you run into a good asshole, be sure to let them know that they're doing a good job of being an asshole by calling them an asshole. They'll be an asshole to you for it, but you deserve it.

Pondering Reality...

I know this site is notorious for its comedic/satirical, rather than overtly intellectual, content. Over the past month I've been mulling around numerous thoughts which have sprung up from my Psychology and Philosophy classes.

First and foremost, the human body is an amazing creation. How it came to be has been endlessly debated for well over a century and a half. Was it evolution? Was it the hand of God? Well, I'm not here to enter the fray of life's origin. I'm just here to posit some of my thoughts for you to chew on. Whether you swallow or spit is really your choice.

My studies have revealed how the human body is constantly evolving. I do not mean over periods of centuries or millennia, I mean during one's lifetime. The human brain is an excellent example with how it rewires and alters its shape and functionality based on stimuli. In effect, our thoughts control and affect us. We are the products of reason, thinking, and reaction.

Now I've believed as far back as I can remember that we create our own realities. There is no real right or wrong. It is what we instill faith in which makes something real. Examples are God creating the universe versus the entire process coming about from a raw, untamed force of energy exploding outward in a "Big Bang". For some the former is real. For others it is the latter. We build our lives around beliefs, create realities from thought.

Where does thought come from? Perception. But what we perceive is governed by the flesh we find ourselves in. What we see, hear, taste, smell, and feel is radically different from other species and thus not real to them. Our reality is not their reality. It is solely ours. Does that make it more important? Does that humble us in knowing there are shared realities? In fact, how would our realities look should our eyes be capable of seeing beyond the limited spectral plain we now perceive or if we were unable to taste.

Philosophy and science can be difficult subjects to bring together. Science requires true quantifiable evidence leading to a single answer for phenomena whereas philosophy is open to interpretation. What philosophy has shown me is how we structure our conscious realities around us, try to explain the reasons we act. Yet science would say we do not act but simply react. We have been reacting since the "Big Bang", or God's shove (whichever you prefer). Every action has been the result of a prior action, known in philosophy as Determinism. Without a prior act a future act cannot be. If one were to follow this theory to its end, then all action began from one single action yet if action cannot happen without prior action then how can action be at all? Surely everything has a beginning and end. But what if that is merely our view of reality corrupting what it truth? We measure time, action, and event based on temporal structure: past, present, future. Does time really function that way or is it merely a construct of our reality based on limited perception? What if life is truly a circle, constant renewal, growth, collapse, etc. What if there is no beginning, no end, but a constant. Science says energy can neither be created nor destroyed. How did this all arise? Is growth impossible? Collapse as well?

In fact, what if our lifetime is the equivalent of a small town nestled in a valley upon the whole of the Earth. All we see and know is what happens in and around us yet we are part of something larger despite not perceiving it. We cannot see what we believe to be tomorrow over the ridge nor yesterday because of a shroud of mist. Yet it is there just as we are. What if every point functions at the same time yet we cannot perceive it. What if time really is more frequency than passing, layers rather a one way road. What if all were now and as easy to touch as the screen you read this upon.

What interests me most about the human form is its ability to manipulate energy, mostly at the subconscious or unconscious level. Thoughts, sensations, sight, etc. are all nothing more than the body converting energy into electrical, chemical, or some other form which is then deciphered and translated by the brain. Our bodies are repositories of energy. Our souls, that initial spark struck by the union of sperm and egg, flares in our flesh. Thus our soul is really manipulated energy. That force out there in space which governs gravity, light, and so much more at the macro level is within us at a sort of micro level. Yet our manipulation of energy is more than the simple process of chemical reaction, kinetic power, or electrical discharge. We manipulate energy into sentience; consciousness. What does that truly mean? In manipulating energy into creating our personalities what does that say about our flesh? What does that say about death? If energy cannot be destroyed do we dissipate into all things? Do we rejoin some lost galactic whole? Or does our energy signature somehow hold? Do we become a packet of energy, like a transmission, which holds together and continues to survive beyond the flesh? If we were to continue beyond physical death what would that type of existence be like?

Science has shown energy is useless without the physical. The physical manipulates energy, turning into a thing of creation. Could life be the evolution of energy? Could we be giving thought to that once raw, unbridled force? From destruction comes construction.

And what does this say concerning the prior subject of Determinism? If everything can only happen due to a prior act, then do we really have choice? Are we bound by some fate instigated eons ago which continues to play on through us? And if we have no choice then are our thoughts really illusions? If we cannot change things, if we have no control over events, then our thoughts can't truly be unique but the combination of prior events, actions, and material. Thus we serve no purpose for ourselves but only for whatever began the process yet if the process began blindly then we are all struggling forward blindly. Is the individual really real or does it exist simply because that is how we perceive the process of existence?

Energy has evolved and continues to do so through the physical world, but if we truly do have some control over it through our bodies then imagine when we are able to consciously manipulate it. I do not mean through machines but by thought. If all began because of some prior event, mindlessly started perhaps, what if our will became powerful enough to break the onward cycle and we became strong enough to alter our reality beyond perception.

So many large ideas. So much muddling and meandering. What do I truly believe? All I can say is I believe in the right to discover. That is the only way to learn.

Reality

What is real save what I believe,
An illusion all mistakely weave
Around themselves like a collar,
A shroud through which to see.
My whims, my words, my wishes
All carve the 'real' from the darkness.

My world is structured
By the power of will,
With a foundation of experience
Upon which stands a thrusting tower,
Piercing Heaven,
Housing pulsing emotion.

Overtime, my heart reveals
Its traitorous designs.
Each beat steals faith,
Instills doubt,
Wakens me from dreams;
This tower my prison.

Each quake of my heart threatens me,
The beating uncertain.
It rules me.
Tyrant, sadistic despot
Who pains me
Refusing serenity.

But his grasp slackens
And my flesh surrenders.
My tongue dries
As ragged rasps
Pass my cracked lips
Like smoke from a dying fire.

My soul ascends from the vast desert.
Life, once grand, becomes a ruin
As the real collapses beneath me
Crushing life,
Ceasing thought,
And the abyss does swallow my tower.

What It's Like to be an Atheist

A few folks wanna know why I'm an atheist. I'm not planning on sugar coating this with any platitudes about how religion helps some folks cope with the brutal facts of life they never asked for and don't deserve; it does do that and it does lots of useful things. But that's not what this is about.

If you don't want to know, stop reading ... now. I mean it, stop reading this right now. If you've recently lost someone or are about to lose someone and religion is the one thread you're hanging onto to keep from going bonkers, don't read this; If you need to feel that humans have some kind of special place in the universe and without that special dispensation, it's all 'for nothing', don't read this; If you're easily offended and/or intolerant, don't read this. Normally I'd be happy to indulge all that, but in this one singular case I'm not going to be terribly empathetic about people complaining.

And, I'm gonna do this thing in two parts; one today and one tomorrow. The first trying to explain what it feels like to be an atheist, the latter part on why I'm an atheist. There will be some overlap.

What it feels like to be an Atheist

I've always been an atheist, I know nothing else. From my earliest memory of considering the question, I'm talking maybe age three or four, I was skeptical as hell. The God stories just didn't add up. I'm amazed everyday of my life that everyone isn't an atheist like me. But they're not, I have no idea why that is, but it is reality. And based on many questions over the years it sounds possibly hard for someone who is not one to understand it. So follow me for a bit if you can. And I'll try to describe the world as seen through atheist eyes.

Imagine that you live in a world where 90% of the people around you sincerely believe in something that appears to you to be downright whacky, if perhaps relatively pleasant on the surface in many respects. Say they believe in Santa Claus; beard, the big red suit, the flying reindeer, the sled loaded with a billion gifts, the North Pole Workshop, Mrs. Claus and the elves; all of it.

But in this fantasy world, they're not content merely to believe in Santa Claus, they want you to publicly agree all the time that you also believe in Santa, in their specific version of same, and they pressure everyone else in numerous ways to pretend that they're not strange or childish for believing in this. They don't just limit it at that even, they insist everyone kiss their ass about their Santa belief every damn day of their lives and if you don't humor them at the drop of hat under any circumstances, you're being disrespectful, you're out of line. No matter how much you humor them, they always demand more.

Imagine, seriously imagine for a moment now, that these people, the vast majority of the electorate, vote for politicians based in large part on what they think Santa wants, campaign speeches all end with "Be good or Santa won't come to visit". And most of these voters won't even consider voting for someone who doesn't believe in Santa Claus and his factory at the North Pole. Yet they routinely congratulate themselves as belonging to the most graciously tolerant and open minded people in all of history.

Imagine that large sections of the country, the majority in fact, reject modern geography and want to teach that Santa lives at the North Pole in a giant Dickensian factory manned by elves as part of that curriculum. They don't just want to teach it at home or in Santa Mass every Sunday, they wanna teach it as geographical fact and they're militant about it. They lobby the school board and stack them with Santa-ists who want to 'teach both sides of the geographic controversy' and let the kids decide if they wanna believe in Santa's Workshop at the North Pole, or not. They want to 'teach the evidence against naturalistic North Polism" and no amount of evidence, no sat photos, no onsite reports, no live North Pole Cams, will dissuade them from this effort.

Imagine that if you even voice the possibility that Santa might be a pleasant legend or some aspects of the story may be more allegorical in nature rather than literal, at the local school board meeting when this issue comes up, you're shouted down, called everything from a Nazi to a demon to a terrorist, exiled from the neighborhood and maybe isolated at work. Because while a bunch of nice things get done in the name of Santa, a lot of nonsense and out and out bullshit also is justified with the same. For example; your kids better not repeat any Santa skepticism, or they'll be teased horribly at the very least and might get the shit beat out of them by other kids from time to time.

Now further imagine; although the underlying story is sweet enough on its own, the actual uses it is put to by various self-serving factions are about as ugly as it can get: The ruling party is supported by a large block of truly radical Santa believers who want to run the entire country like they believe the North Pole facility operates, including sweatshops with kids all busy working away seven days a week 365 days a year in long assembly lines, with hand tools, in the freezing cold arctic winter, all for benefit of a few old men with long white beards who live in complete splendor on that labor. Because that's how Santa wants it, see?

And even though Santa loves children, it is wrong for government to do Santa's work, so really, it would be going against Santa's will to ever just give the millions of working kids a decent meal, but throw a couple of dozen of them a toy once a year you're A-OK with Santa. That's what they want and they're working hard to get it.

On top of that, based on their Santa beliefs, they also want to outlaw all cortical steroids and hormone treatments of any kind for any reason; cancer, growth defects, hormone deficiencies, replacement therapy, arthritis and other autoimmune disorders, muscular dystrophy, and on and on: Because they claim with utter certainty that Santa likes elves. Elves are Divine, and some hormones could be used to treat dwarfism. You might accidentally prevent the normal development of midgets and the bone pathologies associated with it, if hormones were legal and widely prescribed. So no hormonal or cortical drugs, no exceptions. Some of them want to reclassify all drugs as hormones ... just in case.

They try to stack the courts with Santists and they stacked the regulatory oversight boards with Santists at every chance and anytime someone rules against the interest of the sweatshop lobby they're labeled Activist St. Nicks. Anyone who presents evidence to the contrary to Santa or any of these government approved concentration/work camps or ideological Santist Policies is viciously smeared by a professional media, most of whom share the same set of Santa beliefs, and that's on the rare, once in a year occasion when someone who will argue against the literal existence of Santa is even allowed airtime. The nation slides slowly towards Santacracy year by year.

Their entire rationale for this belief system and all the ugliness and oppression associated with it, is based purely on one long Christmas Carol handed down through the ages and some self anointed speakers for Santa--who happen to be in the employ of the wealthy bearded caste--and one or two old children's books.

And BTW it's the same story with various minor differences all over the world; across the ocean are people who reject Santa by name, but who believe in Kris Kringle or Father Christmas or St. Nick with equal or greater intensity than these domestic Santa believers. And some of those pagans are ready and willing to kill each other, kill you and your entire family, in a split-second, up to and including strapping explosives to themselves and blowing up a kids daycare or turning a jet into a missile kamikaze style and plowing it into a factory; all because of that minor quibble over the name and/or suit style of Santa, just to make the point that they really believe their story more than our Santists believe theirs.

Picture your life unfolding in this world: As a child you also believe in Santa because your parents told you to, but as you grow up you become skeptical, some things just don't seem to add up. By the time you're six or seven years-old, you start asking legitimate questions like "How does Santa get down the little chimney, how does Santa get the time to visit each house, how does Santa know the kids who've been good from the ones who've been bad" and so forth. These questions elicit first strangely evasive answers devoid of content and a general sense of unease among the adults you're asking. Over the next few years that moves onto reactions of scorn, patronizing insults, and open hostility. But never, ever one single answer that holds up over time.

Finally you come to suspect there is a real possibility that there is no literal Santa Claus at the North Pole with a toy factory run by elves and flying reindeer. You began gently asking other folks about your concern. But, when you confide in a few of your most trusted friends and closest family members that the whole Santa idea is a nice sentiment to be sure, but it doesn't make much rational sense and there is no evidence for it, the reaction ranges from puzzlement, to pity, to shock, to anger, to open accusations and implications that you're some kind of mental defective for even wondering about it.

You don't understand what's going on, none of this Santa stuff makes any sense and there's zero evidence for it, why can't everyone just admit that? What's the big conspiracy about? Why is everyone pretending there really is a Santa? Then it slowly dawns on you, around age ten or eleven ... the chilling, horrible truth:

They're Not Pretending. They REALLY Do Believe There Is a Santa Claus.

Egads! Holy Shit! You suddenly feel a little bit lonely at age sixteen as you come to realize that you may surrounded by fully grown adults who are delusional incompetents that cannot distinguish fiction from fact and are enthralled by some kind of massive group hysteria! They're most of them all like that! And they all think you're nuts for not buying into their delusion! What the hell is wrong with these fucking people, can't they see how crazy this shit is?

So, being an adolescent who wants to know things and unafraid, you confront people who are trying to convince you about the existence of Santa with what seems to you to be pretty obvious shortcomings in the story. The result is a torrent of stupidly phased questions, anger, at times hatred, usually disguised as pity or concern, but not always.

"Where do you think Christmas came from? How do you think the idea of giving gifts arose in the first place?" you're asked repeatedly.

Some of the questions you're being badgered with now are utterly exempt of any semblance of logic, "I've seen Santa so how do you explain that one?" or "How do you think the North Pole came to be Santa's Workshop if there is no Santa for crying out loud???? Huh? Huh? Answer THAT ONE Mr. Smarty-pants!!!"

And no matter how many times you explain it's more likely Santa was thought up and refined over time by earlier generations, that there is in fact a long historical trail of Santa like characters in the cultures of your ancestors seamlessly leading up to the present day version, you are ignored or laughed at. And over and over the same tired old questions incessantly get thrown in your face again and again as though there was never a response on your part and there is no possible explanation outside of Santa (Or St. Nick or Kris Kringle or Father Christmas, if you happen to be questioned by those respective adherents). It's baffling to you.

Come your college years, more serious folks around now, I'm talking otherwise fully functional adults who hold jobs, sport an array of impressive degrees in Law, Philosophy, Science, or Mathematics, and who make important decisions, bombard you constantly with "Without Santa there would be no reason for us to be good, where do you think morality and ethics come from?; What's your 'world-view' and what evidence do you have for it, if you have no origin for morality?; I mean what's to stop you from going on a killing and raping spree if you don't believe in Santa?"

And no matter how many times you freely state you have no 'world-view' outside of an intuitive 'reality' and that such ideas regarding morality and ethical behavior and what is or is not a crime, likely stem from the culture you are raised in where they're acquired as a child unconsciously and then refined over time as one matures, they ignore you and keep throwing back the same question. The same question over and over in a dazzling variety of slick, pseudo intellectual wrappers, while they practically dance in victory with glee every time they hurl the same dumbass question, as though they proved their Santa belief beyond any questionable doubt.

As you begin your adult life, marry or have a family of your own, the arguments don't get any better, they in fact get noticeably worse at times. Irate e-mailers demand, "How do you explain Rudolph's glowing red nose?"

And no matter how many times you patiently explain that Rudolph's existence and his nose is no more rational or supported than Santa's, that the question exhibits a fundamental logical fallacy by assuming the premise, you are ignored as if your response is invisible to your questioner and the same question is thrown endlessly back in your face as if it's a dead-cinch proof of Santa. You begin to understand that these folks aren't only whacked in the head, they're either liars or unable to think beyond the level of a toddler. Because it really is like arguing with a two-year old most of the time, only these aren't two-year olds, these are grown educated human beings. And you start to really worry now; what if most people are insane and you just happen by the luck of the draw to be one of the few sane ones? A lucid person in a world gone mad?

Hey, maybe you've not given this Santa thing a fair shot. Maybe if you talk to a pro, or meditate or think on it long and hard, something will click into place you're missing. So you embark on a multiyear voyage asking Santa ministers and reading the theology of Santa. You look at other beliefs like the ones who worship St. Nick or Father Christmas, you try, you really try to make it work. You play with altered states of consciousness and talk to people from other cultures about their version of the Santa belief.

And sure, you learn some useful tips, like how to distinguish fresh blotter acid from stuff that's been laying around turning into strychnine, and you might be able to lower or raise your heartbeat using biofeedback after a few sessions. But you find in the end none of the actual Santa like beliefs make any more sense than your own homegrown version. And you can no more force yourself to believe any of them, than you can flap your arms and fly away.

Still, incessantly they recruit you, incessantly they beat you down anytime you open your mouth and try to engage in a real, honest, thoughtful discussion, with the same damn cheesy worthless lines you've been hearing for years now. And from time to time, when you finally convince someone, say someone who is trying to recruit you to accept that Santa is a real entity and really does all those amazing things, that you're not buying it merely on their say-so, they stalk off screaming things like "OH I get it! You HATE Santa Claus and you HATE Christmas and you HATE getting presents, and you're trying to get even by pretending you don't believe in Him. Well, I'll be laughing this Christmas when I'm opening my presents and your only gift is a brand new brain tumor for being bad".

Imagine, as you puzzle your way through this temporal menagerie called life, full to the brim with more of the functionally insane humanoids that make the fabric of experience; bosses, girlfriends, pals, enemies, and role models, that Santa reminders are on every coin, every paper dollar, on every street corner, on every news show, on every cable network, that there are radio and TV stations that are dedicated 24 hours a day to extolling the virtues of Santa and the power of his mighty Sled. Every now and then you come across a fellow traveler who also marvels at the insane people, and you might become friends, compare notes, and laugh about the crazy mother fuckers, but it's a rare thing to meet them in person.

And in every one of those Santa reminders on every five cent piece and every dollar bill, lurks a tiny hint, a latent glimpse of those ugly components of Santa-ism and open wounds of rival Santa-like beliefs that are always at each other's throats; the wars justified and condoned, we're assured, by Santa; the sweatshops and pagan suicide bombers and the political opportunists who want to outlaw a huge class of life saving drugs based on Santa belief; the crazies who want to enact laws forcing everyone else to suffer horrible pain and disfiguring fatal diseases, all to humor their belief in mythological elves. Sometimes as you get older, all you can do is laugh so that you don't cry at the immense human tragedy of it all.

And sure, you're used to it, it doesn't really bother you most of the time because you just don't think about how totally fucking nuts the people around you are or what easy prey they are for the shameless predators of this loony jungle, as long as they're kept from hurting you or enacting their crazed legendary tenets into law and screwing up your life, but it's every damn place you go and it's getting worse and worse. The Santa Clausians are becoming more demanding, more powerful, more delusional and more arrogant every year. You grew up swearing your allegiance at the start of every school day that America was One Nation Under Santa from kindergarten on, and now some people are questioning the usefulness of that tradition, and pointing out it could be seen as blatant brainwashing, and they're being attacked day and night by Santa apologists and compared to pedophiles in the process. The entire Congress shuts down to pass a unanimous amendment supporting saying Santa in the Pledge in School and recites it on the steps of the capitol, shrieking the word Santa out, playing to the cameras and the demented Santa believers on the other side of the optical pipes they're attached to. Which is more comforting? That the leaders of the nation are lying and pandering to Santa believers? Or that they actually believe it also? Hell of a choice, eh?

It starts getting uglier: Imagine that one very loud group of Santa believers regularly demands that you move to another country and/or that you be prevented from giving or receiving gifts or having Christmas Day off because you don't believe in Santa, while members of the same group are attacking you in an even louder voice claiming you are trying to ruin or cancel Christmas, and they demand that you be forced to celebrate it and participate in each and every Santa Claus ritual they personally deem requisite. It's pretty clear to you now: These seemingly normal people are not just fucking insane when it comes to Santa, they're incoherent, dangerously unbalanced, demanding mutually exclusive sets of behavior from you that would be impossible to comply with.

Now imagine: Just two or three-hundred years ago it was totally SOP to take folks, men, women, children, who didn't believe in a specific version of Santa and stick red-hot steel objects into their rectums and vaginas, boil their limbs, beat them senseless with padded clubs, tear them apart with teams of horses, cut open their stomachs and rip out their intestines while they're still alive in front of their loved ones, or slowly burn them alive in public; all in the name of Santa's good will and often on the mere anonymous allegation from some two-bit ten-year old kid or a crazy deranged nutcase suffering from schizophrenia that you once said you don't believe Santa can really fly. Now imagine that that still goes on in some parts of the world AND there's a whole bunch of people in your country who are clamoring to bring that all back.

Imagine that when your mom or dad or heart surgeon or teacher or your best friend tells you they firmly, devoutly, believe in Santa replete with the flying reindeer and the ability to get down every chimney in the world in one evening, that you'd better believe also or you won't be getting a damn thing in the will or in life from them ever, or maybe they'll just treat you like shit in front of the rest of the family, AND THEY'RE NOT KIDDING IN THE SLIGHTEST ABOUT ANY OF IT.

You are under a barrage of Santa believers from the cradle to grave who act everything from shocked to disgusted that you don't believe in Santa, they're getting increasingly militant, yet not a one of them has the slightest bit of evidence that an entity called Santa really exists; not one of them is willing to explain why the North Pole is nothing but a barren, frozen wasteland, except maybe to vaguely explain that the "Workshop" is incorporeal or not meant to be taken "literally"; a claim which other Santa believers disagree with vigorously. Not one of them offers up the slightest tidbit of convincing scientific rationale for how reindeer fly and tow an arial sled, or how Santa reads the minds and keeps tabs on 2 billion kids, and visits them in a single 24 hour period once a year to deliver toys built at his workshop by magic miniature toymakers. Not one of them can offer any compelling real-world reasoning for why Santa would want to do this anyway, what he gets out of it, how he obtains supplies, feeds himself and his workers, treats disease, avoids old age and death, or how they all came to play this role in the first place. And yet you are portrayed as an imbecile and one chip short of Adolph Hitler for not believing it.

Pretty ridiculous, huh? A world gone bonkers, populated and completely run by a majority of people who are frankly clinically insane, dangerously immature, often violent, historically monstrous, completely irrational, closed to any internal questioning, convinced you're either stupid, evil, or dangerous, and hoping for all they're worth to infect you with the same mimetic virus. Can you even imagine how whacked it would be to have to deal with that kind of shit? To have to go through life walking on eggshells on the subject of Santa lest you offend a believer and they blow their stack at you, target you for persecution for political purposes, and/or question your worth, your job, your very life?

Well, if you can imagine all that, you know for just a few moments how it feels everyday to be a grown adult surrounded by wishful childish thinkers clinging to nonsensical myths as if they were real and insisting, in fact force feeding, that mythology to you; people who sometimes turn quite violent, get downright nasty if you express the slightest disagreement with their specific version of the Jolly Old Guy; people who happen to wield incredibly powerful arsenals of WMDs and massive traditional military might as well as running everything from the local police department to the IRS; people who are now are reopening torture chambers and gulags with armies of pundits cackling with delight at the very thought of returning to the good ole torture days.

It's not like we're living everyday in mortal fear, but it's nevertheless a little nerve racking that we find ourselves surrounded, defenseless, and at the mercy of hordes of people that for all the world appear to have lost their minds. And it's a bit depressing that this is the best the human species and/or our own nation can do or has done in millennia, especially now given our potential and the technology/knowledge now at our disposal.

And in the end, you can either pretend to be a Santa believer, basically live a lie 24/7 and try to avoid any showdowns over it that would expose you. Or you can be yourself, embrace reason, live truth, and take your chances, thanking your lucky stars the whole time you don't live in the past or somewhere else in the present; hoping to hell that the Santa believers don't completely dominate everything and go on some kind of anti-Santa purge.

That's kind of what it feels like to be an atheist. If you try and imagine further why you don't believe that Santa is real regardless of how nice a story it is or all the nice things about Christmas you enjoy, you'll be ahead of the game for tomorrow's post on why I don't believe in deities, including yours. More then.