The Nature of Evil

Americans are generally extremely stupid people. Appearances are all that matters. If people can laugh at you, you have “lost” the debate… it doesn’t matter that the joke is in reality on the joker, as it proves that the joker is just a clueless, ignorant idiot. You see, the audience doesn’t understand this. They see someone making a joke and laughing, and her friends laughing too, so they laugh too. It must be funny, why would people laugh otherwise? Extremely stupid. Ketutar, from In Reply

I commented on the post:

“Intelligence is the ability to combine and apply one’s knowledge to real life and practical situations.”

Unfortunately for most righteous and upstanding people, intelligence is a-moral and a-ethical.

It’s no comfort, Ket, but being a rocket scientist isn’t all that. Bullies are by definition evil (and I use the word evil in its most basic meaning here – ‘opposed to that which is good, moral and ethical’.) – it may be that they have become so as a result of having been bullied themselves at one time or another, and in the case of the rocket scientist I am sure that is the case – nevertheless, she’s evil simply be3cause she chooses to bully and think it’s a good thing.

“All that it takes for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.” ~ Edmund Burke ~

You were hurt because evil decided to attack you, and ‘good people’ did nothing. ‘Good people’ decided that they were either too cowardly or too busy to do anything.

You are absolutely right – bullies tend to have that effect on ‘good people’ – they give the bullies a wide berth out of fear of being bullied themselves. That is how a few malicious and evil people can take over and control an entire Online Community (or country) – through the ‘terror of what might happen to me if I say anything’ – the bullies don’t really have to do anything, all they have to do is ‘give a few examples’ and the ’suggestion’ of the ‘terror’.

That is the nature of bullying – the actual incidents aren’t the worst – they can often be just basic verbal fisticuffs, with very little substance – the worst is the ‘terror’ it invokes in the victims, the gnawing anticipation of another attack. That’s why it works.

You did well to leave Care2. I think all of us who left Care2 because of this bully, her cronies and their cronies, including all the sock puppets, which made them seem as if they were so many more than you, me and our friends (because we didn’t use sock puppets to harass people; did well.

Yes you are right, Americans as a people are extremely stupid. Not all Americans are stupid, but the American People is. They live in a country where ’shallow’, ignorant’ and ’selfish’ are considered virtues. Where ‘helping your neighbor by paying taxes’ is considered communism and ‘might is right’ is the personal and public creed and where the color of your skin, your yearly income and ‘fame’ either buys you the right to vote or excludes you from society all together. How can they be other than stupid, they are raised to think that being stupid is smart and evil is good, that if you convince enough people that you are right through threats, terror and name-calling, you must naturally be right.

~SillyOldBear~

Now EARN it, Mr President!

Mr President, Mr Obama,

You were awarded Nobel’s Peace Prize this year. Despite not having kept one single promise you made to the World during your election campaign. Shall I remind you?

1. Close Guantanamo Bay ‘Detention Center’ and other American ‘black ops’ prisons around the globe.

2. Withdraw all American troops from Iraq.

3. Withdraw all American troops from Afghanistan.

You promised these things, not just to those Americans who voted for you – the entire Democratic and Human’s Rights Oriented World rooted for you during the campaign and cheered for you when you won. On the night of your election to the Presidency of the United States of America an entire world went to bed happy and hopeful, trusting and believing that the very first Executive Orders you signed would be fulfillments, effective immediately, of the three promises listed above, promises you made to the American People and to the World, promises that were largely the reason you were actually elected.

Speaking with the various warring factions of the world, verbally encouraging your adversaries to ley down their weapons, speaking about the importance of International Organizations and Cooperations, shaking hands with other political leaders – that is all good an well, and you should do that – but the world is still waiting for the closure of American Torture Centers around the globe, the complete withdrawal of American troops from Iraq and Afghanistan. So what will it be, Mr President? Will you now step up and EARN that prestigious prize you won on the merit of your skin color and promises alone and actually BE the leader of the free world? Or shall you go down in history as just another power hungry, lying, cheating and full of himself American President?

On the Matter of Feminism and Domestic Violence

“- Please be aware that in the midst of a serious discussion on gender issues, posting cruel or mocking humor tends to escalate things and upset people.  What seems funny to you might seem very offensive to someone else, and in any case distracts from the seriousness of such a discussion.” (From a Group’s guidelines on how to conduct a discussion on the matter of f.i Feminism)

- The guide lines were updated after “The Sweet Pink Rules of Feminism” (posted below) was posted and resulted in one woman sarcastically attacking a man’s sources of statistics and generally belittling men who are abused by women and another man pointing out to her that sarcasm is a form of verbal abuse and that he would not feel safe with her given the level of prejudice she exhibits through that  use of sarcasm and belittling.

The addition to the guide lines of that Group was clearly made to make sure that status quo is maintained – i.e women remain innocent victims of male abuse, and men remain monstrous perpetrators of such abuse in the minds of people – women are not perpetrators, because she has never seen any men, in her practice as a doctor, that were abused by women. And if they exist, despite her professional experience that they don’t, (she used her professional experience as leverage – it’s a logical fallacy called “appeal to authority” in the discussion so people will be convinced as to why she is right and the men’s statistics is wrong…so it’s only fair that this is called into question – her professional opinion.) they (implied) do so in such a small number compared to the number of women abused by men as to be (implied) negligible.

What does the number have to do with anything? Men are abused by women – they just don’t tell her about it, probably because they instinctively know that she’s not safe, despite her profession.

The fact is that women abuse men just as much as men abuse women, the methods of abuse just look different, and in the case of physical abuse the severity of the damage will differ between the genders, generally due to difference in physical strength  – if a 200lb male boxer beats his 100lb photo model wife, she is likely to be both bruised and broken, but if a 100lb photo model beats her 200lb boxer husband, she isn’t likely to cause more than bruises, unless she uses an implement (skillet, lamp, baseball bat etc), which means that she (if he beats her) needs to visit a hospital, but he (if she beats him) probably won’t have to do more than put on a band-aid and take a couple of painkillers. This doesn’t mean that some men aren’t seriously injured by women in domestic violence situations – a baseball bat will kill also in the hands of a woman. Add to this that men rarely hit back if they are hit by a woman, because despite what feminism claims men are still raised with the value that one does not hit a smaller or weaker person.

The amount of physical damage doesn’t determine whether abuse has taken place or not – whether the victim had to seek out the emergency room or not is irrelevant to the question of if abuse has taken place. If I steal a $100 from someone I am just as guilty of theft as if I had stolen $100.000 from some one.

Domestic violence is not a gender issue – it’s a serious issue, and it needs to be dealt with, but it’s not a gender issue, it never was and it never will be. The victim’s gender is and should be irrelevant – however, in the mind of the general public this is not acceptable reasoning, all because of what Feminism have taught about men and about women throughout history.

The Sweet Pink Rules of Feminism

1. Feminism requires you to talk about “equality” for both sexes but some sexes are more equal than others.
2. God could be a womyn, but the devil is most certainly a man.
3. We’re equal to men, and this makes us morally superior to them.
4. We are equally capable of doing anything a man can do and men can’t do anything right.
5. We must scorn behavior which is associated with stereotypical masculinity while whooping with praise when the same behavior is exhibited by womyn.
6. We must demand that womyn be allowed into military combat because we’re equally capable of smashing-in the faces of vicious terrorists. But we also laugh at the idea that a husband could be the victim of a wife’s physical abuse because everyone knows that women are never violent.
7. We seek to stop “violence against womyn” but girl-on-girl violence and lesbians who batter their partners don’t bother us quite as much.
8. We attack the gender-stereotypes that portray womyn negatively as we gleefully embrace the ones that portray womyn positively. It’s customary to invert this rule for “you-know-who”.
9. Helping womyn succeed is not nearly as satisfying as seeing men fail.
10. “Power” in the hands of men is always destructive, selfish, tyrannical and harmful. This same “Power” in the hands of womyn is always democratic, nurturing, honest, good for the environment and good for humanity.
11. Men of quality support womyn’s equality but womyn never have to do anything to prove that they are “of quality”.
12. Finally, us feminists are absolutely not anti-male and that’s why we rarely have any positive things to say about those penis-having bastards.
13. Women are just as good at everything as men are, except for things at which women are better.
14. We feminists are equal to men, and that gives us the elevated authority to pass judgment upon them.
15. If you’re not female then your opinion doesn’t count, you sexist bastard.
16. Any criticism of feminism is a form of Hate-Speech. A feminist’s own speech is allowed to be as hateful as she wants it to be.
17. If somebody has the temerity to criticize the behavior of feminists, you should dismissively sneer that they’re attacking “strawfeminists”– absurdist caricatures who don’t exist. Feel free to resume your usual attacks on strawpatriarchs every day of the week.
18. The only feminist you are officially allowed to criticize is Valerie Solanas. That’s because a feminist has to literally advocate the extermination of half the planet before the rest of us start to wonder if she’s got a screw loose.
19. You have 10,000 years of grudges to seek vengeance for in your single lifetime.
20. Collective guilt and collective punishment are anathema to a society which fulfills the feminist goal of treating people as individuals, which is why us feminists must constantly intimate the collective guilt of men and suggest that they need collective punishment.
21. You must demand that a father shoulder half of any effort to raise “his” children as you simultaneously demand that a mother be granted automatic sole custody of “her” children after divorce.
22. Whether or not you feel “offended” is the central principle to how the world should be re-organized.
23. A feminist must say “Patriarchy” at least ninety-seven times per hour. The ten millionth time you say “Patriarchy” you will trigger a shower of confetti and receive a fabulous prize.
24. As a feminist, you are opposed to the spread of stereotypes. But don’t let that stop you from constantly stereotyping men as being an over-privileged class of dimwitted exploiters who always get everything they want.
25. Ovaries good, testicles bad.
26. We believe every woman should have unrestricted access to any kind of abortion, no questions asked. We also believe that abortion should be tightly restricted in China to prevent millions of potential girls from being robbed of their lives.
27. We feminists must demand aristocratic levels of deference while never behaving with aristocratic levels of gentility.
28. We must grouse continuously about traditionalist expectations of women while we conveniently forget to pay half the check on our dinner-dates.
29. Men avoid us because we’re too gosh-darned smart.
30. If a man works 60 hours a week to support a wife who cooks and cleans, the man is a lazy shit who exploits his wife.
31. If a woman works 60 hours a week to support a husband who cooks and cleans, the man is a lazy shit who exploits his wife.
32. If the majority of women do not call themselves feminists, the root problem lies with the majority of women and not with feminism.
33. We demand respect for all women and their diversity. That is why we dismiss, infantilize, mock or denigrate stay-at-home moms, traditionalist women, pro-life women, Republican women, Catholic women, Protestant women, Mormon women, Orthodox Jewish women, Muslim women who don’t object to hijab standards, Hindu women who don’t object to dowries, women who care about their weight, women who wear cosmetics, female researchers who study innate behavioral sex-differences, women who look forward to marriage, women who warn about giving birth after the age of 40, sorority sisters, cheerleaders, girls who like playing with dolls and any other woman who doesn’t slavishly dance to our tune. Except for them, we demand respect for ALL women and their diversity!4. Falsely accusing a man of rape is a great way of raising his consciousness.
35. If a teacher were to beat black boys more than white boys, we’d excoriate him for hateful discrimination. If the same teacher beat only boys, that’d be fine.
—
The above list may seem to be tongue-in-cheek – but it really is not. It very accurately depict the ATTITUDE towards men (and women) fostered by Feminism.

While there was a time when Feminism was needed to get rid of some very basic injustices and inequality between the genders, it has now come to a point where it is damaging both men and women, and have in fact created injustices and inequalities, and we now need to get rid of Feminism.

Feminism has created some rather weird concepts, that have snuck into how various societal institutions operate in regards to men:

When a woman is taken to hospital due to physical injuries that are clearly not accidental and domestic violence is suspected (which is the rule) it is assumed by the medical staff that the perpetrator is male – despite the fact that the perpetrator could just as well be another female or the result of a mutual/reciprocal violent situation where the assumed victim was the instigator or a voluntary fight with another female.

Evidence it taken of all the injuries automatically, to secure DNA and photographic evidence, and most often a rape kit is used to determine if a sexual assault occurred.

When a man is taken to the hospital due to physical injuries that are clearly not accidental, it is assumed that he was in a voluntary fight with another male, domestic violence is rarely suspected, and no evidence is secured unless the man requests this, no DNA or photographic evidence is secured, and there is no assumption of sexual assault – there are no rape kits made that works sufficiently for male victims of rape/sexual assault.

When the police is called out to a domestic violence situation they automatically assume that it is a male who has beaten a female – in fact the expression “domestic violence as ” is so strongly wired into the very fabric of society that when one thinks “domestic violence” the images that it conjures up are of a man beating his wife. There are no neutral words for domestic violence in Swedish – it’s called ‘wife-beating.’ The term “domestic violence” was coined by Erin Pizzey in her 1974 book “Scream quietly or the neighbours will hear”. While she never intended it to connote or denote ‘male-on-female’ domestic violence exclusively – which is evidenced by the fact that she is the patron of of the charity Mankind Initiative‎ and “has expressed her dismay at how she believes the issue [domestic violence] has become a gender-political football, and expressed an unpopular view in her book Prone to Violence that some women in the refuge system had a predisposition to seek abusive relationships. She also expressed the view that domestic violence can occur against any vulnerable intimates, regardless of their gender” – the term has nevertheless become synonymous with male-on-female domestic violence.

If one uses the term ‘domestic violence’ and is talking about a woman beating her husband, one has to qualify this or one’s audience will automatically think “husband beats wife”.

Police, social workers and medical professionals are trained to assume that all domestic violence is ‘male-on-female’ – they have no training in how to get a male to speak the truth about his injuries or even open up enough for the authorities to be able to establish what happened, so that he can be treated adequately. This of course leads to charges never being brought against his abuser, who can keep on with her (or his) abusive ways.

Medical professionals are trained to assume that if a woman seeks out psychological counseling for depression, anxiety, panic disorders etc., the reason is her husband, and that is basically the first question they will ask – they will also assume that she is lying about being abused to protect her husband, they are also trained to encourage the woman to leave her husband, and will pressure her, coerce and manipulate her (if she stays in ‘therapy’) in such a manner that they eventually get what they have been trained to do, or she ends the counseling.

This is all because of the skewed view of men (and women) that feminism has imprinted on Western Society in the last 30-40 years.

Half of you who found this blog entry using the criteria ‘domestic violence’ did so because you were looking for information on ‘husband beats wife’, and I think that perhaps half of those are rather pissed at me right now for daring to rock the pink boat of feminism.

Here are some numbers for you:

In Finland, in a 2007 survey among men and women, the researchers found that 60 % of the victims of domestic violence are women, 40% are men and in half of the cases where the man was the perpetrator, the victim was equally violent. 60 % of the safe houses’ visitors/clients are violent in situ or have been violent in their relationships.

In a report to the Irish Department of Health and Children (March 2002) Kieran MacKeown and Phillippa Kidd found – going back as far as 1975 in Canada, UK and the US – that the number of female-on-male perpetrators of domestic violence was higher or significantly higher than the number of male-on-female perpetrators of domestic violence.

The Blog “Dads and Things” which is citing this report, with a link to the report in its entirety, then goes on to say:

“The report is based on an examination of a good number of DV studies from all over the world.  It confirms what those with open and objective minds have known for decades: inter spousal violence is not a male monopoly.  It is at least as often committed by women as it is committed by men.

That the myth of men having a monopoly on that aspect of interpersonal violence persisted for so long in the face of so much evidence from reputable and even government sources is nothing less than evidence of the power of feminist propaganda promoted by people in thrall to an oppressive totalitarian ideology.”

In a Finnish online discussion about domestic violence the topic of female on male DV was discussed and the Feminist view was declared:

Discussion about domestic violence: “when the wife beats”

“It’s just a question of that in the marriage where it’s the woman who beats, the woman has taken on the male role between the partners. It’s a question of men’s power in society and the oppression of women which has forced itself in to the family in a way that differs from the usual.
It’s the same phenomenon in lesbian marriages. In those too there is domestic violence, it’s the perpetrator has taken on the male role in the society. This can occasionally happen also in heterosexual relationships”

“So the woman must first take on the male role before she hits? weirdly one managed to turn this thing too into men’s and male society’s fault..:”

“And I thought domestic violence was because the perpetrator was a little sick case, nervous, stressed, can’t deal with things, has few tools, so one tries to solve problems with violence. But it’s a male model? A real man model? Wow.”

“One must deny the explanations where the domestic violence is due to the perp’s psychiatric disorders. It’s a question of how, in society as a whole, men oppress women  as a group and the tool of that oppression is family and domestic violence. That’s why in Sweden it is forbidden to treat domestic violence with the help of therapy. The societal culture and societal structures are seen as the cause and as that which oppresses women.”

The last quote there, I can, as living Sweden vouch for – some 10 years back the then Minister of Equality, Margareta Winberg suggested, in all ernesty, that men should be obligated by law to pay a gender tax. That’s right, Swedish Feminists have so thoroughly indoctrinated Swedish Society that it is seen as an axiom that ALL men oppress ALL women, and therefore should be collectively penalized on the grounds of their gender. Fortunately the Proposition was voted down in Parliament, but it made it there and it was a serious Governmental Proposition. Which says a lot about just how Feminism have hi-jacked not only the gender debate, but Society in general.

Just a week ago the Hot line and Shelter Center for Men – the only one in all of Sweden – was closed down because of a lack of government grants – no Hot lines or Shelters for Women have ben closed. Interestingly enough the Shelter Center for Men didn’t just help some 50.000 men during its 3 years in existence, it also worked tirelessly among young men at risk and convicted perpetrators to prevent violence, domestic and otherwise from occurring or reoccurring in their lives.

Acknowledging that men are abused too and that women abuse too isn’t enough, especially not if we doctor the statistics in such a manner that they show that female-on-male violence is the exception to the rule of male-on-female violence or create legislation that discriminates one gender.

We have to move beyond the false premises of Feminism and realize, deep down, that  domestic violence is not a gender issue, that women and men are equally perpetrators and victims and that moving towards a thinking where victims of domestic violence are qualified not by their gender, but by the fact that they are victims, is a necessary measure if we are to land in an equal society. I believe that without a mutual acknowledgment of suffering (without dragging along the measure tape to see who has suffered the most) we cannot find reconciliation between the genders, and thus no true equality.

Somehow we have to move from ‘feminism’ (and its implied gender discrimination) to ‘equalism’ – where it doesn’t matter what gender a victim of sexism, violence and discrimination is, and where its our humanity that empowers us, not a perceived gender.

Another Chauvinistic American Project

The Crane Project; What is It?

This project uses the symbol of peace and of long life to tell the story of loss in Iraq. The soldiers who lost their life in Iraq, the citizens of Iraq who died as a result of the conflict, the journalist covering the war who were killed doing their jobs. Different parties, with different interests. But all human beings, with lives ended too soon for those who love them and knew them.

Polymer clay cranes are being folded, with information about each individual, for the soldiers. They will be hung in strands to represent each week in the war, in order to present the passage of time, as well as a visual representation of their numbers.

Waxed paper cranes are being folded by volunteers across the country. These cranes will represent the Iraqis who have lost their lives. A count by the Iraq Body Count project is shown below. This is considered to be a conservative estimate.

Cranes will also be folded from newspaper stories about the war to represent journalists who lost their lives in Iraq. Without journalists telling the story, we would know even less about the cost of war.

Wonderful! Fold a crane to represent a dead victim of the war in Iraq… Excellent idea! My wife found the site, and at first she thought it was great…

But the entire idea fell flat, because the American chauvinism and arrogance poisoned the idea – polymer clay is almost indestructible, while news paper and waxed paper are perishable materials, so the cranes made for American soldiers are to last forever, but the cranes folded for Iraqis and journalists are to perish with time – moral: Only Americans are to be remembered…

And Americans wonder why the rest of the world think they are Arrogant, Loudmouthed, Bigoted and Chauvinist Idiots? Well we do, thanks to ideas like this…

Arguing with G-d – Moshe

The background to this is Bamidbar/Numbers 14.

Bamidbar/Num 14:1-2 “And all the congregation lifted up their voice, and cried; and the people wept that night. And all the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron; and the whole congregation said unto them: ‘Would that we had died in the land of Egypt! or would we had died in this wilderness!”

The Children of Israel are in an uproar, they are dissatisfied with the way Moshe and Aharon and ultimately G-d is running things as they near the Land of Canaan and are told that they will soon have to face the inhabitants of that land, fearing that they will be killed there.

They start to pick up stones to stone Moshe and Aharon. That’s when G-d enters the scene:

Bamidbar/Num 14:11-12 “And the LORD said unto Moses: ‘How long will this people despise Me? and how long will they not believe in Me, for all the signs which I have wrought among them? I will smite them with the pestilence, and destroy them, and will make of thee a nation greater and mightier than they.’”

G-d is coming out all riled up (verse 10), threatening the Israelites with all sorts of horrible things, including disinheriting them and make another People for Moshe and Himself. On the surface He is in His right. He has over and over shown them what a wonderful G-d He is, He has clothed them and fed them and defended them against  hoards of enemies, and all they do in return is yell and scream, groan, moan and whine, object to his commands and generally be extremely obnoxious. Anyone would lose their temper in the face of such obstinacy and adversity! So G-d loses it. He loses His temper and is about to go berserk on the Israelites when Moshe confronts G-d:

Bamidbar/Num 14:13-16 “And Moses said unto the LORD: ‘When the Egyptians shall hear – for Thou broughtest up this people in Thy might from among them – they will say to the inhabitants of this land, who have heard that Thou LORD art in the midst of this people; inasmuch as Thou LORD art seen face to face, and Thy cloud standeth over them, and Thou goest before them, in a pillar of cloud by day, and in a pillar of fire by night; now if Thou shalt kill this people as one man, then the nations which have heard the fame of Thee will speak, saying: Because the LORD was not able to bring this people into the land which He swore unto them, therefore He hath slain them in the wilderness.”

This is absolutely wonderful! Moshe throws G-d’s own vanity in His face! “Hey here’s what your enemies are going to say about this if you kill this people. You went about getting this people for yourself by virtually stealing it from the Egyptians. You made a big show of things, in fire, smoke and all sorts of fireworks and now, because they grumble a little, you give up!?” Then Moshe throws G-d’s own words in His face: Bamidbar/Num 14:17-19 “And now, I pray Thee, let the power of the Lord be great, according as Thou hast spoken, saying: The LORD is slow to anger, and plenteous in lovingkindness, forgiving iniquity and transgression, and that will by no means clear the guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation. Pardon, I pray Thee, the iniquity of this people according unto the greatness of Thy lovingkindness, and according as Thou hast forgiven this people, from Egypt even until now.’”

See what Moshe is doing? He is using the same tactics that Avraham used in Bereshit/Gen 18 – he points out to G-d that what He is planning is not in accordance with Who He Is. Again G-d is confronted with the other side of the Justice coin, this time through His own word -  Shemot/Exo 34:6-7. He might, on the surface, be in His right to obliterate the entire people, He is G-d after all, but not when the matter is looked at on a deeper level. On a deeper level G-d must act with Mercy and in accordance with His own word. Oh, by all means, punish those who are actually guilty, but Justice without Mercy is no Justice! Moshe knows it, and he points this out to G-d. And then he asks G-d to forgive the people. Which G-d does, immediately.

So what’s in this for us?

First the understanding that true Justice is spelled Justice/Mercy. One cannot exist without the other. Even when we violate G-d’s Law and mess up to a point where we can imagine G-d tearing His hair in frustration can we hold up G-d’s own Torah to Him and claim G-d’s justice for our crimes and know that the moment we ask Him to fogive us, we are forgiven. We still have to live with the consequences (such as having to apologize to other people and accept that they are angry at us, change how we deal with similar situations, pay the fine for speeding or attend AA meetings for drunk driving, etc) of the mess-up, but we are no longer “at odds with G-d” over it. This is grace in its truest meaning.

See also 2 Shmuel/Sam 12:13

Secondly we are taught that we are to treat others with the same Justice/Mercy as G-d is treating us with. Moshe and Aharon were about to be stoned by the angry people – still Moshe interceded and asked G-d to forgive. I.e Moshe forgave the people that they attempted to kill him. Why? Because, I think, he remembered what is said in Vayikra/Lev 19:2 “Ye shall be holy; for I the LORD your God am holy” and in Vayikra/Lev 19:18 “Thou shalt not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.”

Arguing With G-d – Avraham

Background:
Bereshit/Gen 18:17 And the LORD said: ‘Shall I hide from Abraham that which I am doing; seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him?

G-d is debating with Himself whether to tell Avraham that He intend to destroy Sodom – enumerating the reasons for including Avraham in His counsel. He decides to tell Avraham (perhaps also because Lot is living there, which we are informed about in Gen 19).

Bereshit/Gen 18:20 And the LORD said: ‘Verily, the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and, verily, their sin is exceeding grievous. I will go down now, and see whether they have done altogether according to the cry of it, which is come unto Me; and if not, I will know.’

The Argument:
What ensues in the next batch of verses (23-32) is one of the best examples of how to argue with G-d, and actually win!

Bereshit/Gen 18:23-32 “And Abraham drew near, and said: ‘Wilt Thou indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked? Peradventure there are fifty righteous within the city; wilt Thou indeed sweep away and not forgive the place for the fifty righteous that are therein? That be far from Thee to do after this manner, to slay the righteous with the wicked, that so the righteous should be as the wicked; that be far from Thee; shall not the judge of all the earth do justly?’ And the LORD said: ‘If I find in Sodom fifty righteous within the city, then I will forgive all the place for their sake.’ And Abraham answered and said: ‘Behold now, I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord, who am but dust and ashes. Peradventure there shall lack five of the fifty righteous; wilt Thou destroy all the city for lack of five?’ And He said: ‘I will not destroy it, if I find there forty and five.’ And he spoke unto Him yet again, and said: ‘Peradventure there shall be forty found there.’ And He said: ‘I will not do it for the forty’s sake.’ And he said: ‘Oh, let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak. Peradventure there shall thirty be found there.’ And He said: ‘I will not do it, if I find thirty there.’ And he said: ‘Behold now, I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord. Peradventure there shall be twenty found there.’ And He said: ‘I will not destroy it for the twenty’s sake.’ And he said: ‘Oh, let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak yet but this once. Peradventure ten shall be found there.’ And He said: ‘I will not destroy it for the ten’s sake.’”

What I find absolutely wonderful in this passage is how Avraham not only argues with G-d about Sodom (well, he raises the question anyway), but how he makes it virtually impossible for G-d to deny him his request – he questions G-d’s sense of Justice! He points out to G-d that a truly Just G-d would consider sparing the people in Sodom on account of the righteous that might live in the city. By implcation he is telling G-d that if He destroys Sodom without taking into consideration even ten righteous people, He is a flawed G-d! There is no way Avraham can lose this. Now, Sodom was destroyed, but only because Lot’s family was short a few people.

How does this affect us? Well, first of all it teaches us that according to Torah, Justice without Compassion is no Justice, and that not even G-d may disregard this. Secondly it teaches us that questioning G-d is acceptable. It’s ok to reason with G-d and tell Him that whatever is going on is not ok by us. We might not be in a position to know first hand what G-d intends or to save ten people, but we certainly are in a position to tell G-d that we are questioning His actions, His sense of Justice and His  capacity for Compassion. Thirdly it teaches us that the Will of G-d is not cut in stone, that life is open-ended and it’s up to us to influence both G-d and events. G-d is actually interested in our points of view. We aren’t pre-destined by our genes or memes to be a certain way or live a certain life, what is in store for us around every new corner is ours to form. G-d will accept our decisions. He won’t do things “over our heads”.

On the Matter of Human Rights and the UDHR

As I have traveled the various on line discussion groups, forum sites and mailing lists in the last ten years, I have come across some interesting, to say the least, ideas about human rights, what they are, who has them, who has them not and most curious, how they are obtained and retained.

People from all walks of life have expressed their views on these ‘issues’, and it seems that a majority of people do not grasp even the basics of what exactly the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) means. It seems, people think that some people do not have any human rights, or are not entitled to some human rights and that some things are human rights that are not. All of it based on their own personal prejudices and preferences, often ruled by religious dogma or political agendas.

I have found people to be abhorrently uneducated, willfully ignorant and deliberately obtuse when faced with these thirty simple principles for human conduct, human society and human interaction.

It is all quite simple. Human rights are not earned, nor can they be forfeited or lost. They are not bestowed and they cannot be revoked. Every human being has them from the day they were born until the day they die, without exception.

“Article 1. All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood. Article 2. Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, color, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.”

This indisputable fact notwithstanding; people in civilized countries will not only claim that it is not true, they will actively work to violate the human rights of people they deem unworthy. People like prisoners, former criminals, children, women, GLBT people and foreigners. These people are thought to have some status ailment that disqualifies them in the eyes of the people who will abuse their human rights. Yet, article 2 of the UDHR clearly says that no single, real (or imagined), status may be used to deny anyone their entitlement to all the rights in the UDHR which are the birth-right of every human being.

In the US, prisoners and former convicts do not have the “right to take part in the government of his country, directly or through freely chosen representatives” because they may not vote (article 21). Those same prisoners are also subjected “to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment” (article 5) when they are required by American law to inform potential employers of their crime and their conviction. This requirement frequently lead to them having their “right to social security and realization, through national effort and international co-operation and in accordance with the organization and resources of each State, of the economic, social and cultural rights indispensable for his dignity and the free development of personality” violated, because they are rejected by employers and cannot earn a decent living (article 22 and 23) due to their criminal past.

Many criminals and former criminals are “subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence”, and “attacks upon his honor and reputation” (article 12) when their names, location and crimes are made public in the press and on the Internet, either as part of news stories or as listings that take on the likeness of witch-hunts. These witch-hunts are clearly intended as an incitement to violation of these people’s human rights and often lead to former criminals being physically attacked, some times resulting in their death. Article 12 explicitly says that “everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks”, yet the lists on the Internet and news stories, which are known to incite people to perpetrate such attacks are legal in the US. All because in the US some people are not considered human beings.

Women and children do not seem to be considered human beings either. Women are consistently paid less than men, a violation of their right to equal pay for equal work (article 23). Women and children are routinely subjected to attacks upon their honour and reputation (article 12), when, in sexual abuse/rape cases, they are questioned about their sexual practices, morality and or drinking habits; it is implied that they invited sexual attention, all as a matter of routine in such cases. Lawyers are routinely allowed such degrading and cruel lines of questioning and argumentation by the court system and the judges. Such lines of questioning and argumentation are also violations of article 12 which stipulates that everyone has the right to protection by the law against such attacks.

GLBT people are also routinely subjected to violations of their human rights, not only when they are harassed and attacked by the general public (article 7), but also in the very legislation of the US, which refuse give them the right to marry (article 16). The UDHR doesn’t specify that men may only marry women or that women may only marry men. It specifies that men and women of full age may marry. Not a word about marriage being between a man and a women. The UDHR specifies the family as a fundamental group unit in Society that is entitled to protection by society and the State. The UDHR doesn’t define ‘family’. This means that siblings may not be separated and f.i placed in different foster homes – society and the State must protect the “family group unit” of those siblings and make sure that they are placed together, no matter how young or old they are. Not to do so is a violation of their human rights.

Millions of people in civilized countries have their human rights to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services (article 25), violated, even in national legislation when minimum wage is not  set sufficiently high to provide a safe and secure standard of living, health care and unemployment  payment are dependent on previous savings or insurance payments. This is especially grievous when it strikes children. Article 25 especially specifies that all children shall enjoy the same social protection, and still they don’t, not even in the richest countries of the world, such as the US. Not all children have a home, a family, and safe place they can call their own, nor do alll children have the same protection before the law. Children from wealthy families, educated families or politically powerful families are rarely tried as adults or have to serve time in detention centers, simply because of who their parents are, how much money or education their families have. In fact, children from wealthy families, educated families or politically powerful families rarely see their parents go to jail, not because their parents don’t commit crimes, but because their parents aren’t either found out or are aquitted in court due to what is considered their social standing. This is a violation of their human rights. Being held accountable, being considered responsible for one’s actions are actually human rights too, and every time people are not held accountable or seen as responsible for their actions in accordance with their mental, intellectual and spiritual faculties, their human rights are being violated.

The UDHR doesn’t only protect human rights, it also protects human responsibilities, (article 1). With each of the thirty principles of Rights of the UDHR comes an equal principle of Responsibility to make sure that the right stated is given to each one of the human race.

This is another indisputable fact, which to many is not self-evident. I have found that many people seem to be very adamant about their rights to all sorts of things, especially in the area of the right to freedom of expression (article 19), even to a point where they actually promote violation of this right when it comes to others. I.e they claim the right to say anything at any time in any place they like, but are at the same time claiming that others do not have this right. if what others say either does not agree with them or point out that what they say is hurtful, demeaning and  abusive. Apart from being highly hypocritical it is also wrong, according to the UDHR.

They have no problem incarcerating people  based on a mere suspicion that they might belong to groups of people they have dehumanized, but if people from that dehumanized group should treat them or their friends similarly, they start screaming about rights they denied their alleged adversaries five minutes earlier.

They don’t mind subjecting people they consider lesser than themselves to cruel and inhuman treatment, like water boarding, but if those “lesser” people decapitates some of their friends on national TV, they scream bloody murder.

The fine things about the UDHR is that it’s for all people, regardless of who happens to be popular any given week. The UDHR guarantee that any violations of human rights are the same regardless of who perpetrates them and regardless of who is the victim of such violations.

None of the rights enumerated in the UDHR may be used to violate any of the rights enumerated in the UDHR (article 30). This is the guarantee that we are all responsible as well as imbued with rights the same as everyone else’s.

My safeguarding another’s rights means that in the end I am safeguarding my own rights.

On the matter of Gender Politics

Even when the person asked about their “shadow perpetrator” is a woman, does the conversation focus on the ills of men. “Do all men have an inner rapist?” The possibility of asking such a question about women doesn’t even register. Ok, well it actually did – for one line and only through the use of “human” instead of “men”.

Violence, domination , the need for and use of power is assumed when it comes to men, even by men themselves and any attempt to hold women accountable and responsible for violence committed against men and children by women is disregarded. Women and violence doesn’t even compute within the scope of a gender discussion.

What is this other than a willful invisbilization of men? What is this other than a willful denial of reality on the part of women? It is a crime against womanhood, committed by feminism and ultimately by women themselves, in that it denies women their full potential and paints an inaccurate and untrue picture of women and in the end keeps women from achieving any true equality. Feminism in that respect is just another “gender politics” that aims at maintaining status quo, while pretending to liberate women.

Without full accountability and responsibility there can be no true equality. Unless women step up and accept their full potential they will be forever locked in victim hood. Unless we demand of and allow the same for both genders, we cannot expect both genders to grow into Human, because maturity can only be had through accountability and responsibility.

In the 70’s a Finnish-Swedish author, Märta Tikkanen, wrote a book titled “Men cannot be raped”. The book tells a tale of a woman who avenges the rape she suffered at the hands of a man after a “night on the town”. The title of the book is the underlying thread that binds her actions together. She will get away with the atrocities she visits on her rapist, because it is assumed that rape entails two things women are assumed not to have: the physical strength to overpower a man and means by which to penetrate him. The book also assumes that men lack means by which to be raped. In the end the main character succeeds in her intentions to avenge herself and in raping her rapist. Without getting caught.

The book was received with loud cheers and a sense of triumph among Swedish and Finnish feminists as the ultimate revenge on patriarchy. It is still the staple diet of Scandinavian Feminists. While there is nothing wrong with wanting revenge on one’s rapist and it is quite understandable that one would want such a revenge, the general thesis of the book is symptomatic of what is inherently wrong with feminism; the assumption, which it shares with patriarchy, that men cannot, in any true sense, be violated and women cannot in any true sense violate.

A few years ago I hosted a men’s group on line. Women were welcome to participate in the discussions, which dealt with issues ranging from silly jokes to gender, equality and recognition of abuse, as long as they did so with the understanding that they were guests in the men’s home. A majority of the women held and expressed the opinion that men’s statements about being survivors/victims of abuse were offensive to women because such statements, by necessity, must be a negation of women’s reality as survivors/victims of abuse. Some even went as far as to demand that when men shared about their experiences of domestic violence and other abuse in the group, they must first qualify that women’s experiences of domestic violence and abuse are worse and more painful because 1. they are women and 2. there are more women that are abused by men than there are men that are abused by women.

What I am trying to say here is that it’s all good and well that men are being made to understand what kind of impact they have on women’s lives, but if we truly want gender equality and the eventual eradication of gender, we have to see both genders for what they are in terms of violations against humanity. This means that women too have to be made to understand what kind of impact they have on men’s lives and how feminism is screwing both genders to the bone and serving neither men nor women in the long run, but in fact cementing the skewed ideas we have about men and women.

On the Matter of Zionism

“Zionism is not merely a political movement, but in its essence represents a deeply disturbed view of the world, which is a reflection of a terrible disease of the mind.”

Since those Radical Far Leftists equates Zionist with Israel with Jewish as a matter of course, this pro-palestinian equates being Jewish with a disease of the mind. And then those Radical Far Leftists have the gall to claim that they are not antisemites…*lol*

On the Matter of defining “Jewish”

Silly Old Bear, may I ask what defines you as a Jew? I believe there is a certain amount of dissension as to whether your heritage is carried via the mother or the father or both. Can a proselyte become a Jew? I am in no way anti-semetic but isn’t the Jewish faith and/or race as exclusive as any religion – perhaps more so?

“I am in no way…anti-semitic….but…” That’s what they all say. When you read or hear “I am not….but” you know, it’s a dead give-away that there’s something treif (non-kosher) about that person’s thought process. Non-Jewish people who wish to define Jewishness wish to do so because they want to profile someone.

This guy is not interested in the answers to his question – if he really was, he could just as well Wikipedia the answer – Who is a Jew? – No, he just has to target the only openly Jewish guy in the discussion and demand answers to insensire question – question born out of his antisemitism

About two years ago I wrote this:

“The Jews control the media…”

“The Jews control the diamond trade…”

“The Jews created those Muhammad cartoons…”

“The Jews control the world’s banks…”

“The Jews controlled the Slave trade…”

“The Jews cause the Black Plague…”

“The Jews control the UN…”

“The Jews control the movie industry…”

“The Jews…”

Why is defining someone as “Jewish” important? What does someone being Jewish have to do with the media, the diamond trade, the Muhammad Cartoons, the Slave Trade, the Black Plague, the UN, the movie industry?

Why is that all other peoples in the world are defined as the country they live in, but a resident of Sweden or America or any other country, who also happens to be Jewish, is defined as “Jewish”?

One guy actually came in and responded to the question with “to show bias” – and probably thought that he was only saying that he wants to show the “Jewish bias” – well, it turns out that he also shows his own bias – against anything “Jewish” – and so does anyone insisting on defining things as Jewish, where “Jewish” is completely irrelevant.

SoB