What is Christmas?

I’ve been away from this blog for awhile.  It is not because I have nothing to say, it is because most times I have too much to say.  We are living in troubling times where we seem to see a continuous assault on personal liberties to - most would say - protect society from itself.  And, some might argue that society needs protecting from itself.  But, that is probably fodder better left for another essay.

But for this entry the question is, “What is Christmas?”

For the Christian believer, it is a celebration of the birth of Jesus…

For the Jewish believer, it is called Hanukkah, or the Festival of Light, and commemorates the rededication of the Holy Temple (the Second Temple) in Jerusalem.

To the Pagan believer, it is a festival of darkness, though not a darkness of evil, but rather the darkness of winter, and prayers for the return of light of spring…

To the Capitalist believer, it is a celebration of unbridled consumerism and demonstration of wealth.  Or to some, the lack there of…

To the child, it is a miraculous season where a jolly fat man in a red suit brings gifts to all the children of the world…

Whether your particular belief is here, or you believe something else, Christmas is a mythical celebration of human traditionalism and dogma.

Now, I have never made any secret of my beliefs…  I neither believe, nor disbelieve in God.  God is not provable point, and I don’t wish to waste time contemplating such a point.  But, I do not believe in the dogma that has collected for 1000’s of years for all current religious belief.  This dogma is the result of our ancestors answering the unanswerable questions of their time with what seemed like logical, though improbable, explanations.  These explanations now etched in the psyche of human race in defiance of the advancement of time.  This dogma for (your religion here) has unfortunately led to the vast majority of violence that we have perpetrated on each other for centuries…  more accurately, since the dawn of man.  That unquenchable thirst to control others which exists in too many individuals.

So, what do I think of Christmas?  Aside from the rampant consumerism, the aggrandizement of (your deity here), the parties and overindulgences…  Christmas, for me, is yet one more opportunity to celebrate the human existence, as imperfect as it is…  and to reflect upon the past to hopefully understand it, and help me travel the path to the future.

As Christmas rapidly approaches, and we begin to bid adieu to 2011, my wishes for all of us:

May we all find peace and happiness in our lives, and may we find it in our hearts to let each person live his or her life in peace and happiness, regardless of whether we agree with their choices.

Finally, Welcome Home!!! To all our service men and women coming home for Christmas, and my hope to all those still deployed that you are home soon.

May you all have a Joyful Holiday, regardless of which you may celebrate.

Your comments or questions are always welcome.

Another Visionary Leaves Us Too Soon

As news struck my brain that Steve Job had passed, the following thought rang out in my brain… “To see the world in a grain of sand.”  Yes, I know it is a line from Lara Croft – Tomb Raider, but it is so much more…

I knew it was coming; all signs were there for everyone to see. Even so, I did not think it would hit me quite this hard, but I sit here with tears in my eyes, mourning a loss in my life. As I sit here, wondering why I feel such a great loss for a man I never met, I am flushed with memories of the profoundly personal effect Steven Paul Jobs has on my life.

My first major research project in college?  A 25 page report on a blossoming young company and its two unknown founders, “Apple Computer and the Two Steves.”  Ask most people today who brought the micro computer to the business market, and you’ll probably get an answer of IBM or TI or HP, but they would be wrong…  It was Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and the Apple II.  All others were following on Apple’s success.  Ask those same people who brought the personal computer to the rest of us, and you’ll most likely be given a similar answer, but again they’d be wrong…  It was Steve Jobs, Apple, and the Macintosh.  The Mac was, and still is today, a computer that anyone can easily understand and use today.  Yes, today, I use a Dell PC and Windows, but, only because the business environment dictates it.  Windows and Microsoft would not be what it is today, if it had not been driven by Apple and the Mac OS.

My first major research project in business?  Armed with a brand new Macintosh Plus, and the newly release Microsoft Excel 1 for Mac, I embark on a mission to track and account for 5000 pieces of newly acquired module furniture spread over 3 buildings and two counties.  The successes of that project lead to being made responsible of $30 million in corporate assets.  And has led me through a career with jobs including, Accountant… Business Analyst… Technical Support Specialist… IT Consultant… Database Programmer, Developer and Admin… Sysadmin… IT Group Manager… Business Intelligence Analyst… and currently as a Business Operations Consultant. I even spent 2 years working at Apple Computer just before Steve returned.  I quite literally owe my career and success to Steve Jobs and an easy to learn and understand Macintosh Computer.  I don’t know if I’d have pursued the directions I have had I not been introduced to little electronic device that allowed me to learn computers and the processes they expedite, so easily.  Even my pursuit of writing might not have come about had it not been for Steve and Mac, as I am more attuned to the keyboard and word processor app than pen and paper.

I should also note that being only 6 months old; Steve Jobs is actually a contemporary of mine.  It is these time that often evoke thoughts of my own mortality, and contemplation of just how truly fragile is the human existence.  In looking at Steve’s life, we find a man who lived it on his terms, and never accepted what was, instead looking to what could be…  He never needed to be believed in, he believed in himself.  He believed in his visions and ideas so strongly as to appear to exclude all others, and usually turned out to be right.  He created products because they were thing that he wanted to use, and felt others would want as well.  Sounds a lot like another man I respect tremendously.  A couple of amazing and extraordinary human beings and our lives are better for their presence in the world.

I opened with the thought, “To see the world in a grain of sand.”  But, did you know there is more?

To see the world in a grain of sand,

and to see heaven in a wild flower,

hold infinity in the palm of your hands,

and eternity in an hour.
William Blake

I can find no better definition for the existence of Steve Jobs, or Walt Disney, or so many others like them.  Our lives have been infinitely enriched by theirs’.  As we mourn our losses, we must also remember to celebrate the gifts.

I’m going to leave you with a quote that can be found on my personal email signature:

Our hopes are so far ahead of our abilities.

When we are satisfied, perhaps we haven't

aimed high enough.

                                                          Rex Brandt

I found this quote 16 years ago hanging on the wall of my Grandfather-in-laws art studio.  It was been with me ever since and ever so more fitting now.

Aim High My Friend, AIM HIGH!!!

Your comments or questions are always welcome.

Cross posted on my Disney History blog

9/11 Remembered

I haven’t been writing much of late.  Some might claim writer’s block, others just being uninspired.  I write here on personal revelations and in another Disney related blog about a passion, and I’ve been trying to figure out for the last couple of weeks why I have not been able type more than a couple of lines text before the synaptic link between fingers and brain melts into nothingness.  In the last couple of days it has been so bad, that the mere contemplation of transferring thought to text eliminates those synaptic links before they are even established.  For me, troubling times drive toward a self-analysis where my mind refuses to rest even when the body must.  The disconcerting idea that I could not and might never again put pen to paper, or more accurately put fingers to keyboard cogently to articulate my thought, has led more than a few sleepless nights over the last week, as writing is the first thing I think about every morning, and normally my last thoughts before sleep over takes me at night, a very frightening time for me, contemplating this challenge.

After many sleepless hours of reflection, I have realized; my blockage is not one of lack of inspiration, but rather one of conflicting stimulations.  Like many others, I live my life trying to balance between two worlds.  One of reality and one of fantasy, trying to make sense of the current unpleasantness in reality, while still dreaming of what could be, if only…  This blog is a reflective indulgence of how I arrived at my current level of enlightenment, or lack thereof, depending on your perspective, and how that relates to my reality.  My Disney blog is an indulgence of a passion, and a part of my fantasy life.

As we approach the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on this country, reality has clashed on fantasy, as it was actually the events of 9/11/2001 that really crystallized the direction of my fantasy.  Those who know me or have read my Disney blog, knows that prior to 9/11 I was planning a fishing retreat to decompress after a particularly stressful work period.  After those horrific events, I was left with a feeling of dismay at the thought of leaving my family for any extended period of time, so my wife and I planned a trip which included the whole family.  Since the girls had enjoyed their first trip to Disneyland a few years earlier, we decided a second trip was in order, and the event that began to focus a realization of my intense interest in the man that created this unique piece of fantasy called Disneyland.  With other recent challenges presented in my reality, 9/11/2011 rapidly approaching, and how little it appears that we have learned from those horrid attacks, my brain apparently decided it was easier to shut out both, rather than give either precedence.  But, in my ultimate refusal to succumb to challenges presented me, I will find a way.

I mentioned how little we’ve learned from the attacks on the United State on 9/11.  What was there to learn?

Nothing seems to change.  60 some years ago, we imprisoned American citizens simply because of the color of their skin or the sound of their surnames associated them with a then known enemy nation.  There was no investigation, or due process – a fundamental right of every U.S. citizen.  No, they were expeditiously rounded up sent off to internment camps.    Many losing everything they had worked for all their lives, never to see any compensation.

Over the last 30 years there have been dozens of terrorist acts (murders, attempted and successful, arson, bombing, etc.) conducted in fight against abortion.  In Oklahoma City several hundred people were killed or injured, because Timothy McVeigh retaliated for government intervention in the fundamental Christian backed militia movement in the early 90’s, most specifically the siege in Waco, TX.  We have some Christian leaders applauding these acts while other giving tacit approval in their silence.  Very few actually condemn the actions.  These and so many other acts of domestic terrorism can be traced back to one of many of the fundamentalist Christian sects, and there has yet to be a national condemnation of all of Christendom for these acts of terrorism.  It is merely chalked up to a few whack-a-doodles nut cases with a deluded understanding of Christianity. 

Yet today, well ten years ago but in more recent history, when a few dozen fundamentalist Muslim whack-a-doodles commit a horrendous act of terrorism on this country for their deluded understanding of Islam, and some Muslim leaders supporting them, we seem to have no problem condemning all of Islam on an almost national level.  Ten years later, our Muslim communities are still being harassed, threatened, and condemned because of the actions of a few whack-a-doodles professing to be Muslim.  I guess we should, or better yet, they (the Muslim community) should be thankful that we are not sending them off to internment camps.

The events of September 11^th 2001, were without any doubt some of the most vile and horrendous acts in our history. The financiers, perpetrators, and supporters of these acts should, and will ultimately, pay the price for their crimes against humanity.  But, we would be far better served to understand why these events have taken place.  Understanding will hopefully help to lead to prevention in the future.  The first thing to understand is that poverty and despair are fertile soil for hatred, and there are far too many fields around the world to sow those seed.  Don’t believe me???  Just look in your own backyard.  As our own economic woe mount and more and more people are driven into the ranks of poverty and despair here in the great country in the world, we see a growing group of citizens becoming angry, destructive and anti-government.  AND!!! We have a small group of political, religious, and social leader whipping these angry citizens into to an even greater frenzy by blaming these woes on our government.  Nothing really different than want a few fringe leaders in the Muslim communities around the world are doing.  At stake, our freedom and liberty.

It becomes easier to slowly and quietly surrender our personal freedoms under the guise of greater security, and we do so with great fervor not understanding what is at stake.  It will continue until we yield everything, for that really is the ultimate clandestine goal.  While I don’t put much stock in conspiracy theory, there are those who believe the unwashed masses, here in America or around the world, are undeserving of the liberties guaranteed by our Constitution.  There has been a continuous assault, both domestically and from abroad, on this document since its very creations.  Unless we are willing to really live our lives free, regardless of the dangers inherent in such an endeavor, we will lose those Constitutional guarantees of liberty and freedom.  If you want the right to practice your religious belief, then you must allow others the right to practice their religions!!!  And, this must happen with the understanding and acceptance of the disagreements this will create.

Benjamin Franklin has been quoted as saying, “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.”

So on this 10^th anniversary of the atrocious attacks on the United States of America, I will remember and continue to mourn the tragic loss of live that resulted, with a specific remembrance of those heroic members of the New York Fire Department, who rushed in with complete disregard for their own lives, while others rushed out.  It is the finest act of humanity that one is willing to sacrifice his or her life for another.  In the thought, I will also remember on this day all those soldiers who have given their lives, since 9/11, protecting this country.  Regardless of your views on the wars they have been tasked to, their sacrifice and that of their families, cannot and should not be ignored nor dismissed.

I have taken this thought with me since 9/11, and will continue with it until my ultimate departure; I would rather die a FREE man, than live as mere drone to tyrants, no matter how benign their intentions may seem.

One last Ben Franklin quote to close.  “How few there are who have courage enough to own their faults, or resolution enough to mend them.”  I, like every single person on this planet, am a flawed individual, and I spend every day trying to discover and correct those flaws, knowing and accepting that I will never get them all.

May you today be better than yesterday and your tomorrow better than today. 

Your comments or questions are always welcome.

A Short Memorial Day Message

I’ve been away for while.  The need to making some money and provide for my family outweighs the need to express my creative muse, so I’ve been spending more time in that realm of late.  But today, a day of remembrance, a day that we memorialize our fallen service-people, so I provide my tribute with the written word.

There is no doubt and can be no argument that war is the most ugly, treacherous, and deadly serious event in human existence, and human live will be lost.  It should never be taken frivolously, and the thoughts of war should receive critical consideration.   But war should neither be sensationalized, romanticized, nor glorified; it should be recognized for exactly what it is:  an unfortunate and sometimes necessary evil with which we must all live.

I will not discuss the merits of one view over another with regards to sending our troops into battle, that is NOT what today is about.  But, regardless of your particular view, it is the men and women of our Armed Services, who have and continue to provide you with your right to voice your opinions publicly.

The men and women of our Military deserve nothing less than our respect and admiration for their willingness to sacrifice their safety and wellbeing to protect and secure ours’.  And, while it is nice to have one day set aside to remember those who have made the ultimate sacrifice, this is something that should be done daily by every citizen, not just who have lost, family, friends, or comrades.

Maybe if we thought of these selfless individuals daily, we might pay more attention to understanding and learning the history that caused us their loss.  Maybe then at some point we’ll arrive a point in human development, where losses caused by war will no longer exist.

I will leave you with a comment I made on a private board, which my friend Helen (Thanks) reminded me would make a good signature line:

“We honor our fallen warriors by not repeating mistakes that put them in harm's way in the first place, not by erecting monuments to them.”

Your comments or questions are always welcome.

Religion and the Constitution

As with the last piece, this one is an intermingling of religion and politics.  But hell, we are in a period in our history where the fundamental Christian communities are desperately trying to mix politics and religion, so this is probably somewhat appropriate.  And this one kind of feeds off of the last.

A current topic of discussion among many tea party proponents is the idea that the United State of America is in fact a Christian nation, and this was actually the intention of our Founding Fathers when they were developing the principles which govern this country to this day.  While Christianity was the majority interest religion of the period, our Founding Fathers were not interested in creating a theocracy in the United States.  The only mention of God in The Declaration of Independence is qualified as “Nature’s God”, even man’s inalienable rights are granted by his Creator.  Even when it was requested that Jesus Christ be identified as “Nature’s God” and the Creator, that request was rejected.  And, after we won our independence from England, these men did not adopt the Bible as foundation for their new nation, they wrote an independent document, The United States Constitution, describing how this government was going to work.  Again, not even a mention of God or religion in the original un-amended Constitution.

Even when one of the first items of business after adopting the Constitution was to create the first 10 amendments, also called the Bill of Rights, there is only one reference to religion:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;

These first 10 amendments were proposed as a package on September 25, 1789, and ratified all at once with Virginia’s acceptance on December 15, 1791

The very first amendment of this Bill of Rights clearly defines the intention of the writers that The United State of America was not only, not intended to be a theocratic country, but also that it would not become one at some later date.  Unless, of course, someone can now convince 38 States that it would be a good idea to rescind or modify the First Amendment.  Interestingly, that very same 1^st Amendment gives you the right to pretty much say anything you want on the subject recognizes no responsibility in the exercise thereof, but, it also provides me the right to point out the truth, no matter how simple and obvious it may be…  So…  To all the people of America, who believe the United States is a Christian nation, and the politicians who pander and lie to them for their votes, guess again, you’re wrong, you’ve always been wrong.

As I pointed out earlier, if you believe you can get an amendment out of Congress and ratified by 38 states that changes the 1^st Amendment, you should go for it.  But be warned, the last amendment to be ratified, took over to 200 years to achieve ratifications, and the amendment before that was proposed and ratified 40 years ago, with several hundred proposals never making it out of committee.  A change as radical as establishing the USA as a Christian nation is going to be very difficult to pass, if not impossible.  This is now, and always has been a secular nation, with many belief systems, and has led to a world were theocratic nations are becoming more and more scarce.

Your comments or questions are always welcome. 

My First Real Conservative Challenge

We are entering an area in my life where I began to truly understand how intermingled my political and religious view had become, and how one clouded the view of the other.  In the early 90’s I had begun to explore topics I had been avoiding.  One of the vehicles of that exploration was a local news talk radio station which provided a great breath of various topics, and current news and commentary on those topics.  I did really understand it at the time, but this station also had a truly balanced cast of commentators across the spectrum of political and religious views.  While individual commentators presented their segments quite pointedly from their perspective, there was a balance of views presented throughout the day’s programming.  As I was working a second job at the time, which had me behind the wheel of a delivery van every Friday evening and most of every Saturday, and a commute to and from my regular job of a couple hours a day, I was afforded the opportunity to listen to a variety of this radio station’s programming.

One of the frequent topics of the time was homosexuality, a subject that I had strong opinions against, and could often be heard deriding the practice, with burgeoning HIV/AID crisis the really hot subject.  In the late 80’s into the early 90’s, AIDS was touted by the media and most of the fundamentalist Christian community, as the gay disease, and I went along blithely agreeing.  I was, of course, still a devout conservative, a struggling to find God.  These people were going against God’s will with their homosexual lifestyle and HIV/AIDS was their punishment, right?  Well, long about the early 90’s, reports started appearing in the mainstream media that a genetic link had been found to a predisposition to homosexually.  Religious communities had been claiming for years that homosexually was a choice and a sin, and here was proof on a biological link.

Being still challenged in my views of what God is, and steeped in the religious dogmatic training of my youth, here presents my first real challenge to my conservative views.  If you believe that God created everything in the universe, then God created homosexuals, and how could God create something that he viewed was a sin.  Of course, there is the classic argument that it is a homosexual’s individual choice, by free will, to be homosexual.  First it occurred to me to question, after witnessing how homosexual are treat in our society, why someone would freely chose to live a life which draws such serious ridicule, contempt, and disrespect, not to mention potential physical harm if discovered?  Along comes this information that the choice may well have been made for them biologically, not of their own free will.  I finally had to acquiesce that to call this a choice, one would then have to agree that one could chose to being one race over another, to have blue eyes instead of brown, be a blond over a redhead, to be 6’2” versus 5’9”.  Most importantly, my young daughter born with the genetic abnormalities could or did somehow choose her fate.  RIDICULOUS!!! As far as I have been able learn, these are not choices we can make for ourselves, they are part of our genetic makeup.  With the exception of choosing a racial ethnicity, or a genetic anomaly, yes most of these things can be changed to a degree; colored contact lenses, hair coloring, or lifts would counter some issues.  But, without constant attention and maintenance, we will revert back to our genetic programming.  So why then assume that a homosexual person could change what is at his or her core?  I had to accept that this too was ridiculous!

Some of the religious communities claim that mankind is the only species on the planet the practices homosexuality, that the laws of nature prohibit this practice for survival of the species.  No true.  There is a great deal of information available, more today than when I was first struggling with my views, that there are quite a few other species here on earth where homosexuality is practiced, around 1500 species by some accounts.  A simple Google search will reveal almost 3 million hits on the topic of animal homosexuality.  I will probably discuss genetics again in other pieces, but for now, the basic conflict for me at the time was; if you believe in God, and that he created the universe and all things in it – he created homosexuality.  I was left with the conclusion that, like many things I had been taught, the negative views of homosexuality were a man-made creation, not that of some omnipresent divinity.  More on this later as well.

As my research and self-assessment progressed, I found my views on this topic softening.  The really turning point came in the mid 90’s.  I was working at a company in the valley that had, for some time, been what was viewed as “gay friendly.”  One of the gentlemen I worked with would often take smoke breaks together, and a work friendship began to develop.  About two month into this friendship he told me one day, I am to this day not sure why, that he was gay.  I hate to think what my response might have been a few years earlier, but, on this day I responded with, “That’s nice, I’m not.  But, that doesn’t mean we can’t be friends.” Needless to say, I was rather surprised at my answer, and consider this, as I look back, probably the turning point for my transformation into the person I’ve becoming today.

While we are on the topic of homosexuality, I think this is an appropriate time to touch on a current issue that bears discussion.  Gay Marriage…

I’ll go along with the idea that marriage is a religious concept.  However, it is my opinion that “the church” gave up claims to the religious sanctity of marriage when it allowed secular societies, like our own, to legalize these unions thru licensing, and to perform civil unions as marriages not sanctified under one religion or another.  It is my contention that, much like Coke is view as the generic term of most soda pop, marriage too has become the generic term for a religious or civil union.  I feel that unless and until the churches get a secular society to agree that any civil union performed outside of a church is not a marriage, they have not claim to the sanctity issue.  Add to this, the issue that some churches, in states where it is currently legal, willingly perform gay marriages.  So, if we cannot discriminate against anyone because of their race (genetics), sex (genetics), or religion (free will), why then is it okay to discriminate again homosexuals (genetic or choice)?

Simply put, let the Gay community have the same rights and legal protections as anyone else in this country.

Your comments or questions are always welcome.  Though I may ignore them.

Osama Bin Laden, A Chapter Closes

This day after the announced that Bin Laden has been killed, I felt it appropriate to reflect on this historic event.

First let me say, I will not mourn the dead of this man, but, I will never celebrate the taking of a human life, no matter how evil the soul attached to that life.  Celebrating the taking of human life is the purview of; the ignorant, unaware of the profound effect that event can have on a moral soul…  the morally or spiritually numb, locked into the narrowly defined moralities of religion…  or the immoral, who relish in such detestable activity.  Unless you have experience directly the taking of another human life, and I hope you never have to experience such an atrocity, you cannot and will not understand the toll extracted from the just soul for such actions.  I have such experiences, and even I did not understand, at the time, the intense effect they would ultimately have on my life.  Given similar circumstances, I would do it again without hesitation.  However, I will never again rejoice in the taking of a human life, no matter how deserving the individual.

I remember vividly the events of September 11, 2001.  I awoke at my normal 6:30 AM, padded out to the kitchen for my morning coffee, and turned on the TV to get my morning news update.  As I stood there looking at the burning WTC Tower on the screen, desperately grasping to understand the picture was viewing, I almost dropped my cup of coffee as I moved to set it on a nearby table.  Just as stock was beginning to wear off, and my mind was beginning to grasp the meaning of what it was witnessing, my horror re-emerged as I watched a second plane slammed into the second tower.  As much as my mind wanted my body to freeze on that couch in utter terror, I rose to get dress for work knowing that we had personnel all around the country who were going to need assistance from the home office to weather this event.  At work, we set up a TV in main conference room to get updates throughout the day.  It was there that I witnessed the event that I had suspected would be coming as I watched the earlier coverage from home.  First one, then the second tower of the World Trade Center came crashing to earth.  It was at work that I learned that all air traffic into and out of the United States was being grounded, and U.S. airspace close to all traffic.  GREAT, one more worry to add to a growing list.  My wife’s parents were flying back from a trip to Europe, and we had no way to check in with them.  Yeah, GREAT!!  It was three days before we learned that their flight had been diverted to Gander, Newfoundland, and they were safe, if not somewhat scared and confused.

Well, as days progressed, things began to normalize, as much as can be expected considering the environment at the time.  We checked in with all our employees and made arrangements for their safety and upkeep.  For, you see, on any given day of the week, we could have dozens of people flying around the country and staying on hotel away from home, with air traffic shut down, many of these people were stranded in places far from home.  Thankful, that the needs of my people were addressed, I turned my attention to those who were not so fortunate.  While it took time to get the an accurate count, there is one thing I am grateful for, given the large numbers of individuals working in and close to the WTC, the loss of life, while still unacceptable, was rather small given the potential.  I will always remain sorrowful for the lives lost on that day, let us not forgot all the lives wantonly ended in the name of God, and religious zealously.  And, let us not forget the thousands of U.S. Troops who have given their lives in the last 9 years, in the defense of and search for justice the American people and victims of the 9/11 atrocities.

But, we also should not forget that the events of this weekend change nothing.  Yes, we got one important figurehead, financier, and organizer of terror, but, as long as there are zealots, religious or otherwise, willing to carry out the terrorist acts of these people, these events will not stop.  And remember, there are zealots and fanatics in all religious beliefs.  Whether they perpetrate acts of violence and terror, or merely insight it among their flock, with their rhetoric and vitriolic bile, they are a danger to society at large, and should not be taken lightly.  Those on the radical fringes of your belief systems are just as dangerous, as those on the fringes of belief system with which you disagree.  All must be condemned and diligently discouraged, if are ever to evolve beyond our current selves.

So, while I am thankful that one less fanatic exists today to insight others to violence, I will not celebrate his passing, as there too many others waiting to take his place.  I’ll will try to remain diligent in my choice to speak out these individuals wherever I encounter them.

Your comments or questions are always welcome.

Religion – Creationism and my doubts

I realize that discussing or writing about religion is like dancing on the edge of a razor, as many take their religions very seriously, and do not like having those religious view challenged in any way.  But, while I respect your right to hold those beliefs, I feel in no way obligate to be silent on mine.  That said, let’s proceed.

How many religions are there in our world today?  Well there Hinduism, Judaism, Christianity (in the broad sense), and Islam to name the big ones.  There is even still paganism today, and yes paganism is a religious theology, not the Satan worshipping occult that many would have you believe.  I will be concentrating my writing on the big three, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, as that is where I have spent the most of my time researching, with the major focus on Christianity.

How many Christian know that all three religions stem from the same tree?  Judaism sprang for Egyptian slaves about 1500 years before Jesus.  Christian from the dead of Jesus, and was codified about 300 years after his death.  And Islam actually came forth from Judaic and Christian theologies in about 800 AD.  Yes, the Muslims do believe in Jesus and the Virgin Mary, just not the same as Christians.  How many Christian know that the Old Testament of their Holy Scriptures or Bible is really little more than a collection of writing predating Jesus, and actually contain the holy book of Judaism?  Yes, the first 5 books of the Old Testament are actually The Five Books of Moses, or the Jewish Torah.  Even Muslims believe the Torah is a Divine Book, though they believe it was modified after Moses’ death, so all three of these religious philosophies sprang from the same soil, like it or not.

So let’s look at the very foundation of three of the largest religions in the world today, The Book of Genesis, and the story of Creation…

There are researchers around the world trying to valid The Book of Genesis as a factual record of the creation of our universe. I know that there is a search for evidence of the great flood, and some claim to have found evidence of the remains of Noah’s Ark on Mt Ararat.  There are those arguing Intelligent Design, claiming that the human race is so special and different from all the other species on this planet, that it would be statistically impossible for mankind to have developed here by accident or by some normal and natural process.  I could almost let this go were not for one simple problem, I’m a skeptic. I have yet to find any situation where there is something that exists for which no proof of its existence can be found, except for the idea of God.  So, I got to thinking, how would I go about finding evidence to support God?  Certainly if God was any more than a manmade phenomenon there would be proof somewhere, and if the Bible is God’s Holy Scripture, you’d think it would be in this book.  For me Genesis became the key.  First there is the question of the creation of the universe, excuse me, heaven and the earth.  Heaven and earth are supposed to have been created in 6 days, as he rested on the 7^th.  Some have told me that they believe or accept that days were not really days but geologic periods covering the millions of year that we now know the planet has existed.  Problematic for the logical thinker in me, but something I might be willing to accept, if not for the more a interestingly problem, in those 6 days he only created those things that were good and that he liked but nothing that displeased him which he destroyed and replaced.  This is problematic because, we do know today that dinosaurs roamed this planet some 65 million years ago and, other then in the fertile minds of some, there is no evidence that dinosaurs and mankind ever co-existed.

But what became the most important problem for me, when did Adam appear.  Even putting the dinosaur issue aside, the paleontological record would seem to indicate that the human race has been around for a couple of hundred thousand years.  BINGO, the lightbulb went off over my head…  The begats!  Surely if there was any credence to Genesis, Adam would have dated way back.  So I ran the begats, from Adam to the first individual who can be successfully dated in more modern history, Abram or Abraham as he was renamed in his 99^th year.  Every piece of information I can find puts Abraham on Earth sometime between 1400 and 1300 BCE.  So by starting there, and dating the begats backward, we place Adam’s arrival at somewhere around 5000 BCE.  So whether or not you can rationalize day 1 thru 5 as varying geological or paleontological era, we can place at least the end of day 6 to approximately 7000 years ago, long past the records of mankind’s exist.  There is today evidence of mankind in China 9 to 10 thousand years ago and some 400 thousand if you include the discovery carbon dating of the Peking Man.  There is evidence of mankind’s existences dating back at least 20 thousand years in South, Central and southern North America.   All of these defy the story as told by Genesis.  And yet, Genesis believed to be the true and accurate story of our creation by millions.  To make it even worse, I have asked some faithful Christians if they can explain these discrepancies, only to be told that “The Good Book” is the only true book of God and that he deliberating place these thing on Earth only to test our faith.  COME ON, REALLY???  So this God of benevolent love and peace, or anger and vengeance, depend on where you are reading, would also lie to us to test or loyalty.  Sorry, I don’t believe it.

With this very first book at the foundation of three religions so fatally flawed and inaccurate, I cannot place a great deal of value in anything that comes after it.  The Torah, and everything created or written after it, is a creation of man, and I believe God, as we know it, is also a creation of man in an effort to explain at the time that which was inexplicable.

I will close again with the idea that, I neither believe nor disbelieve in God.  Whatever created the universe as we know it today is completely beyond our mortal explanation or understanding?  That may change someday, but for now, my just as comfortable with the possibilities that the human race, no matter how great we think we are, could be nothing more than a cosmic accident.

I try to live a clean and honest live, do what is right because it is right, not out of fear of retribution or punishment in the afterlife, or fear of a vengeful God.   When my time comes to depart this plane, I am willing to accept whatever happens…

Your comments or questions are welcome, even though I may well ignore some of them.

Conservative Turning Point

So last we left the conservative in me, it was the very late 70’s to very early 80’s and my life was slowly beginning to come around and things were getting a little better economically.  Not great but better.  As I struggled, I just couldn’t understand why it looked like I was the only one struggling.  I was beleaguered trying to come to term with my religious views, and found that many of my conservative views were tied to fundamental Christian teachings.  I thought I hated homosexuals, though I’d never really known any gays, because I was supposed to, didn’t the Bible teach that homosexually was a sin and an abomination before God?  I was very much anti-abortion, buying many claims that it violated the 6^th commandment, at the time thought to be “Thou shall not Kill,” a notion still held by many today, even though it has been discovered and acknowledged that the old Hebrew was translated incorrectly, with the actual translation being “Thou shall not Murder.”  Anyway, at the time, I agreed that it was morally wrong.  And finally, I was very much against the welfare system, but that was more of an economic motivation.  Why the hell should I have to pay anything to support children and family that I didn’t create, and why didn’t these people keep having children they could support?  I found myself hating more people than I liked, but that is something to be discussing in my next religious confession.

So I found myself buying into the idea that we shouldn’t be paying our hard earned income on taxes that on all these entitlement for citizens who didn’t caring enough to try their hardest to make it in a difficult world – like say me?

Until my first child was born, I was perfectly happy to be one of the conservative realm’s pawns.  It was easy, and it made sense.  I wanted more of my money to do with what I wanted, and I didn’t want to be told how to spend it.  I was working hard; everyone should work hard, right?  Then two things happened that started that process of introspection.  One, my first child was born, and two, she was born with a serious genetic problem.  If you have never experience the terror of having a pediatrician come and tell you that there is a problem with you newborn child and she may not make survive, I hope you never have to experience it, but I can tell for me, it was the beginning of a complete re-evaluation of my life, my views, and my values.  I have seen combat, been shot at, and been shot off and landed on an aircraft carrier, so very frightening events.  But, I have never been so terrified as I was during the first couple of weeks of my young daughter’s life.  She had undergone two surgical procedures before she was 24 hours old, and a total of five in that first week.  After 5 weeks in the NICU, she was finally well enough to come home, and the additional pressures of raising a child with special need began to exert themselves.  That was when the self assessment began to occur.

While we had an exception support network from our family and friends, the work environment was stressful.  I had been a hard worker for the previous seven years, with a work ethic that had me doing just about anything that was asked of me, and had been recognized with a few promotions in the company.  That work ethic came with a cost that I had not recognized until a few years after my daughters were born.  Yes, we did it again about two years later.  However, that cost I spoke of was an employer who now expected me to take on any activity they deem necessary, an expectation that quickly created normal work week in excess of 60 hours a week, for a salary barely adequate to a 40 hour work week.  That was sort of okay, I was working hard to support my young family, but two events (really more) began to create doubts in my mind.  The first occurred when my manager began to require me to take vacation or sick time for any of my daughter’s many appointments, even though I was covering much more than my 40 hours a week.  When I questioned this policy, I was told that the company does not offer comp time, and any activity that required my absence from the office between 8 to 5 required me to use my personal time off options, and that I was still expected to complete my weekly work load, that is what is expected of salaried personnel.  I accepted this for awhile; after all I had a family to support and a young daughter with expensive special needs, I felt trapped by my circumstances. 

The next event opened my eyes to exactly what my employer had in mind for me, and that they felt they had me trapped right where they wanted me.  As part of my take on any challenge mentality, I had begun to move into the information technology arena from my finance position.  I discovered that I really enjoyed the challenges of using and implementing technology to solve problems, and I decided I wanted to pursue the technology arena as a career path.  While this employer was more than happy to allow me the “honor” of taking on additional responsibilities and the associated additional unpaid hours in the IT group, they continually balked at and thwarted any attempt of a full scale move into that group.  Needless to say, as my hours increased and I saw no possibility of moving in the direction I really wanted to go…  My performance began to suffer, as I began to balk at taking on even more hours and even tried to reduce some of my workload.  Soon after my change in attitude, my performance evaluations began to suffer even thought my functional responsibilities include that of; accountant, data analyst, programmer, and desktop support tech and systems analyst, with an associated 70 plus hour work week.  Not to mention missing most milestone events in my young daughters’ lives.  The poor performance reviews began to take their toll, and a performance improvement plan was put in place, even after discussing the situation with the VP of Human Resources.  While acknowledging that my workload was a bit much, I was informed that there was really much call for what I did outside of the company, and that I should just be happy that I had a job.

Time for change and a personal assessment became the order of the hour.

The very first realization of this personal assessment was that I was being extremely undervalued.  The hard part of this realization was that it was not my employer perception of my value, as much as it was my own views of my worth.  I realized that my own views of my worth allowed others the opportunity to exploit my talents to my own detriment.  If I did not chance how I viewed myself, and become my own champion of my talents and worth, no one else was going to do it for me.  With this new understanding, I began to explore opportunities outside of this employer, and discover a wealth of positions paying far greater salaries for more reasonable weekly workloads.  When I informed the VP of HR that I would be leaving the company for another opportunity that paid almost twice what I was currently receiving, and was exactly within the direction I want my career to take, the shocked look on his face was almost worth the experience.  I have never regretted my decision to move on, and I have not had an employer since who has ever shown me the disrespect of undervaluing my worth to any organization.

The outcome of this initial introspection, and the success I have achieved with it, led me to an additional realization that it was time for me to start analyzing the rest of the views, opinion, and values that I had been holding onto for some many years.

I’ll start sharing those analyses in my future posts.  We’ll explore the first of my religious challenges in my next post.

I do hope you enjoy my writings, or at least find something interesting within, but consider this a warning…

Many will hate it, and I’m okay with that too.

Your comments or questions are welcome, even though I may well ignore some of them.

Developing the Conservative in Me

By the time I was old enough to begin developing any political interests, my parents had already divorced.  Since I was screwed up enough by that event in my life to be labeled a problem child, I served out the remaining couple of years of adolescences in the custody of a very domineering godmother and her family.  Don’t get me wrong, I do and always will appreciate what she did for me, she didn’t have too…  But, it was a very conservative environment, and one couldn’t help but be influenced by it.  My godmother and her husband were very supportive of Nixon administration, even though the wheels began to fall off of that bus shortly after I left to go into the Navy in 1973, and were even stronger supporters of the conservative movement started in the Goldwater years.  I guess it not hard to understand that some of that conservative element would rub off on me.  So, let’s just say that indoctrination is much easy with our youth than enlightenment, and that works as well for some of my liberal counterparts of the era.

After my service in the Navy, and participating in the real end to the Vietnam War, my political views were really pretty raw.  I say the real end to the Vietnam War because most history books will tell you that we end the war and left Vietnam in 1973.  NOT TRUE!!!  You’ve all been told that hostilities in Vietnam had ended in 1973 with the signing of a cease-fire, and that all U.S. Troops left the country.  Again I say, Not True.  Suffice to say, I know, I was there.  Those who know me know some of my stories, but, I’ve moved on and do not talk about my military experiences unless there is a damned good reason, so I not going to change that policy here.  The only thing you need to know is what effective it had on my political views.  I turned 18 and eligible to vote in 1973, so I missed the ’72 election.  Being exposed to mostly conservative views before I turned 18, I probably would have voted to reelect Nixon.  But, coming home from Vietnam with those experiences, and the recent debacles of the Nixon administration, I had a less than favorable opinion of the Republican Party.  When I did get my first chance to vote, being a disillusioned young conservative, I cast a protest vote for Jimmy Carter.  Beside, everyone knew that after Nixon, there was no way Gerald Ford and the Republicans weren’t going to get another term.

Well, for a young conservative, that couldn’t have been a worse choice.  At the time, young and inexperienced in the ways of politics and the economy, Jimmy Carter came off to me as one of the worst things that ever happened to The United State of America, and I have helped to elect him!  Argh!!!  So, I embraced my conservative Republican side, and jumped at the opportunity to elect Ronald Regan in 1980.  While I was still searching for my spiritual center, not religious and conflicted but still looking for God, I bought into the fundamentalist view that homosexually was an act of choice, and that abortion was a sin.  On the political side I bought into Reaganomic, after it appeared to be working, and neo-conservative viewpoints of the era.  I was a young man, struggling to make my way in the world.  After getting out of the service, I struggle to find and keep jobs, which I blamed on Carter and his lousy handling of the economy, and of course the “liberal” idea of affirmative action.  I bought the conservative view that affirmative action was nothing more than a liberal hand out to people who didn’t work to have to work to succeed.  After all, I was struggling and no one was there to help me out.  And what about all those mothers sucking the system dry with their welfare claims, why should I be made to pay, when I did have a job, for their mistakes.  I’d spent a several years growing up in a house with single mother struggling daily to make ends meet, and a dead beat Dad who did little to help.  Sorry Dad, but you know that’s the truth.  My Mom never went on welfare to make things easier.

Finally, it took me many years to come to the realization that I was a very bitter young man.  I’d never got any help to do anything in my life.  Mom could never help out, she was still struggling to take care of my sisters, 4 and 6 years younger than I, and Dad all but refused to help.  Actually he all but disappeared from my life at that point.  Two things that stand out in my youth at lead to this bitterness; first, at about age 11, while arguing about me, I learned that my Dad was not my Father.  I spent many years believe I was the sole reason that for my parents separation and divorce.  The second was a little activity that took place when I was about 13.  I was living in Connecticut with my Dad and the bitch my stepmother.  I was a better than average student, but didn’t really apply myself; I got decent grades, usually B’s, without really working that hard.  I was already pretty messed up mentally by then, so I didn’t see any real benefit in trying too hard.  Dad and the bitch my stepmother would ask me almost weekly what I wanted to do when I grew up?  I’d was really sure at the time, but, I’d come up with something or another, to which the return response would be, “Well you know you’re going to have to get better grades to get into a good college to do that…”  The message I got was, “you’re not good enough.”  Something I was already having re-enforced routinely, I wasn’t in Connecticut by choice, and I knew very well that neither my Dad nor stepmother wanted me there, interfering with their new life together.  So, after several months of this badgering about my future and never any reason for the comment, I finally responded one day, “Well then I just won’t go to college!”  The immediate answer from Dad?  “Great, then I don’t have to pay for it!”  It wasn’t until years later that I realized that this was probably his plan all along and the way he justified it.  I wasn’t his real son anyway, right?  Bitter?  Hell yes I was bitter!  While it still hurt to think about it, and writing it out here hasn’t been a pleasant experience, but, I’d like to think I’ve move past that bitterness.  Throughout the decades, he’s never really done anything to change my views of him, but, that fodder for a later post.  Maybe.

Anyway, never really getting a hand up, or hand out to help me, I brought into the conservative viewpoint hook, line, and sinker.  That, and in the early ’80, with Regan in charge of the country, my life was beginning to turn around.  Beginning to succeed by my own guile re-enforced the conservative notion that, if I could pull myself by my own boot-straps, everyone could do it, if they really wanted it enough, right?  I didn’t realize it until just recently, just how perfect a candidate I was for the conservative movement.

Next time for the conservative confessions, I’ll start discussing where things started to change, but the next post will be on my religious enlightenment.

I do hope you enjoy my writings, or at least find something interesting, but you’ve warned…

Many will hate it, and I’m okay with that too.

Your comments or questions are welcome, even though I may well ignore some of them.