If I had absolute power in my country for one hour, and I take this to mean that whatever I accomplished in that hour could not be undone as soon as I was no longer in power, I’d overhaul our education system, work on social and health care reforms, create stricter guidelines to protect our environment, and ensure that future presidents really were elected by the people and upheld their campaign promises or faced hefty fines at the end of their terms.

Grade school teachers would get raises. Children would be taught according to learning styles, not by rote memorization, and classes would have no more than ten students per teacher. College and University professors would receive raises from a board which took into account student opinion and general class grades. Any college/university student that maintained a 3.5 GPA or higher would have a full scholarship provided they were a citizen of the United States. Any college/university student that maintained a 3.0 GPA while working a fulltime job in order to make ends-meet would also receive a full scholarship. There would be no more sports scholarships. They make enough money when they go pro that they don’t need scholarships that cater to a meathead mentality.

Anyone who worked in a service industry would receive significant raises. The more a person’s job brings them into direct contact with an often rude and ignorant public, the better the raise for that group… think restaurant wait-staff and retail salespeople. People who put their lives in danger as part of their job – firefighters, police officers, etc would also receive raises. Necessary health care would be covered up to at least half of the bill, though I wouldn’t touch elective surgeries. People would still have to pay for their liposuction unless their health was endangered by their weight. Retired citizens and children would receive free medical coverage for doctor and hospital visits and medicine. I would also create a fund to inspire civic pride and increase knowledge and respect for the various cultures and religions in the US.

Car and factory emissions would be subject to fines if they contained too many harmful pollutants. I’d push to reward any car companies that went completely green, with zero emissions. The greener a company, the better the bonus at the end of the year, with Grammy-Oscar like awards for the most environmentally/worker friendly companies in the USA and outside it. We can’t control pollution elsewhere even though it impacts people everywhere, so maybe a system of rewards/awards might inspire them to curb their actions. I would legalize hemp because it’s better than cutting down trees for paper. It just looks like marijuana; it doesn’t contain any THC, and it does nothing if smoked. It grows faster than trees and has a wide variety of uses.

And finally, I would do away with our electoral college. Presidents would henceforth be elected by popular vote only, tabulated by computers and not subject to a turn around from representatives. We would become a true democracy, not a republic. All government decisions with far-reaching ramifications would be subject to a public opinion poll prior to action. Our technological capabilities have evolved to the point where it is entirely possible to not only have a paperless election process for every level of the government, but also to have every elected official actually be elected by the people, not another elected official. Every presidential candidate would receive equal funding from the government, no matter what their party, and I would create a free wiki-like community board wherein the presidential candidates would be compared and criticized. Any citizen could go to get the complete story on any candidate and add their opinions as well. Any president, once elected, would have till the end of his or her term to fulfill their campaign promises. If they failed to do so, they would be fined the earnings of one year. As it stands, presidents receive $200,000 a year.

I would have a VERY busy hour. Can you tell that I wanted to be president once upon a time?

I just answered this Featured Question, you can answer it too!

I look up to a lot of people. They are all nonconformists. They do or did what they had to do, not what people told them. I look up to Vlad Tepes, Dracula. I think his life was so sad. Half of what they said about him was pure propaganda, and the rest, well, he was protecting his country. He didn’t have any allies. He didn’t have the support of his Church or his sovereign. He wasn’t the first to use psychological warfare in combat, and if he was such a horrible person, why is he still a hero in his own country? I look up to him because he made the best of a bad situation. He protected his country and people without the assistance of outsiders. He may have been harsh, but according to written record, his reign was virtually crime free. So I look up to him. He did what he had to do.

I look up to Gandhi. An odd man to be sure. Did you know he drank his own urine? Bleh. But I still respect him. He stood up for his principles. Like Vlad Tepes, he did what he had to do, to improve the lot of his people. He willingly took on the suffering of his people in his hunger strike and became a target upon which the enemies of his people could focus their malice. He changed the world for the better, and didn’t even have to kill anyone to do it. He did what needed to be done, even if it wasn’t the easiest thing to do. He didn’t do what was expedient. He didn’t roll over and let what was wrong around him continue. He spoke up for his beliefs and the cause of equality. No one should have the right to treat another person badly… not for race, religion, or social standing.

I look up to the Dalai Lama. He never did anything wrong to anyone. In fact as a Bodhisattva, he was reincarnated specifically to help people. The Chinese exiled him from his homeland, practically calling him a dictator and despot. I imagine it hurts him, and maybe even makes him angry sometimes, but since he’s the Dalai Lama, he has to swallow it and find peace within himself even though he knows his people are suffering and that there are people in the world who would try to get his homeland back for him if he asked it of them. He doesn’t want to be a source of strife or suffering. He’s an international celebrity, welcome virtually anywhere he goes, but he can’t go home. He’s said that he probably won’t come back for another incarnation, and I don’t blame him. I think maybe this exile is his higher spirit’s attempt at releasing him from his final attachment… to his culture and home. I think, provided the pain of his exile doesn’t poison him and doom him to another incarnation here, that he really couldn’t be reincarnated in this plane again. He’s too good for this world any more. I don’t think I even want to come back myself sometimes, but I probably will. Hard to get rid of me… I’ve been murdered in quite a few of my past lives for speaking my mind.  

All the people I admire are extremists of one kind or another. They are non-comformists and do not shirk the burden of thought for the easy way of society. So easy to be sheep in this world, to do as you’re told and not what you know you must do. The easy way is seldom the right way. I spit on expedience. I’ll do what I need to do too. I always have in this life and others, and I always will.
   

I just answered this Featured Question, you can answer it too!

Oh I can think of lots of things that I would die without… air, water, food. But barring the essentials, the thing I really couldn’t live without is words. I love words. Sung, spoken, or written, a world without communication would not be worth the effort. I might go on living, but my heart wouldn’t be in it.    

I just answered this Featured Question, you can answer it too!

My greatest fear is for my nephew. I worry about what the world will be like when he’s grown. I wonder if it will continue to go down hill, and if it does, will he have the self-control and self-awareness Not to go with the flow… to be his own man and make his own decisions even if they are contrary to what his peers and his mother want for him? I hope that he’s smart enough not to give into peer pressure and conscientious enough to do what is right even if it is not easy or sanctioned by the greater population. I hope that he is a non-conformist in the same sense that I consider myself a non-conformist. I hope that he can learn to think for himself and not let others do it for him. I hope that he is strong enough to find his sense of self and give honor to others without losing his self-respect. I hope that my sister’s heavy handed idea of childrearing does not discourage him from being an individual… that he does not turn into her shadow or allow her to turn him into the image of what she thinks he should be. He does not need to be rich, he does not need to be powerful, and I just hope that whoever he becomes as he grows from a toddler, to adolescent, to adult, he can like himself and live in the world without trying to own it like everyone else does.

I just answered this Featured Question, you can answer it too!

Remakes seem to be the current Hollywood trend……and I hate it.

The more remakes I see, the less I want to see. You may have already seen previews for I am Legend, which is the third time Hollywood is interpreting Matheison’s story of the same name. The first one was The Last Man on Earth with Vincent Price. The second was Omega Man with Charleton Heston. Beyond the story itself which no movie has yet successfully translated fully to film, Last Man on Earth is my favorite version. I think Vincent Price was one of the best and least appreciated actors of his era. I collect Vincent Price movies. He was such a talented actor. Charleton Heston’s acting style always reminded me a bit of William Shatner, all dramatic pause with little substance, though he does have a bit more emotional range than Shatner. I feel that Last Man on Earth was a much better film than Omega Man, though each took elements of the original story and ran with them. Omega Man is a good movie, but not great. Whereas Last Man on Earth, aside from being a black and white movie with styles of dress, architecture, and automobiles indicative of the 50s, could have occurred at any time, Omega Man was filled with dialogue and issues of race that tie it directly and forever more to the 60s. As a cultural commentary, Omega Man is an excellent film, but as a faithful adaptation of Matheison’s story or a remake of Last Man on Earth, it falls woefully flat. Omega Man is not Charleton Heston’s best work… that would have to be Soylent Green and Planet of the Apes. And there’s another remake that annoys me…. Planet of the Apes…. it didn’t need to be done. The effects and makeup were head and shoulders above the original, BUT comparing the acting of Charleton Heston to Mark Wahlberg is like comparing carrots to peas. The remake (or reimaging as Burton calls it) is entertaining (Get your hands off me you damn stinking human!), but it doesn’t have the emotional impact of the original. And besides, Roddy McDowell was the best thing about Planet of the Apes.

But back to my beef with Last Man on Earth/Omega Man/I am Legend… Can you believe Will Smith is going to be the lead in this third remake? What’s worse, I’ll have to buy it. I mean, I have Last Man on Earth and Omega Man. I’ll have to have the third one too, just for the sake of having a complete collection. I honestly can’t envision Will Smith in the role. The only thing I’ve ever liked him in was Independence Day. He’s a comedian. I am Legend is horror; it’s always been horror. I like funny horror like Evil Dead, but that’s supposed to be funny. Bruce Campbell is The Man. A funny I am Legend would ruin the whole thing for me!

And bringing up Evil Dead, there’ve been rumors floating around for years, that it would be remade yet again, and this time without Bruce Campbell. Why is it that they keep remaking  cult classics? So most cult classics are “campy” rather than cinematic genius. That’s what I like about them! Modern Hollywood seems to think that effects are more important than almost any other aspect of film-making. The old movies with their superior acting and art deco scenery are head and shoulders above just about anything Hollywood has put out in decades. Current Hollywood trends stress emotional and sexual tensions over good acting and plot.

So I am Legend isn’t even what riled me up enough to post this rant. I’ve had months to come to terms with the idea of another remake. What really annoyed me is that I just read they’re going to remake Logan’s Run. Yeah… another cult classic if there ever was one. I even watched the series that it spawned, in reruns of course… I’m not old enough to have seen them when they first premiered. If anything, they should just start showing the old films on tv, not remake them. I love movies from the days when acting and plot, not special effects, made a movie good. All these remakes are driving me nuts. I want to see the originals. Maybe they should just start rereleasing the originals for movie theaters like they rerelease them for DVD, but I doubt that would fly for Hollywood… if they’re not spending a couple million dollars in order to make it back over the course of its debut, they just aren’t happy. It would even be cool if someone opened a theater for the sole purpose of showing the original and remake of any movie together. Let the public decide which is better.

Still I wish they would start making good new movies, and stop remaking great, old ones. The remakes aren’t all bad, but most of them aren’t that good either.

Internet Island Topic Post #28: Premonitions

28.1.2: Do you believe in the supernatural, and if so, what do you think causes things like premonitions, deja vu, telekinesis, and the reading of others minds?  If not, why do you think these strange things happen? Is there a natural explanation?

I may not like Shakespear, but he got it right when he wrote, “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” I respect atheists and other people who don’t believe in the supernatural or divine, it takes a lot of guts dismiss the unknown as insignificant or incidental to their lives, but I must disagree. The supernatural is alive and well, though it keeps to the shadows outside your bedroom window when you here that tap-tap-tapping but cannot find the source, it hides in the shadows of your closet when you casually reach through the hanging clothes without looking, it hides under the bed and tickles your feet when you let them dangle in the dark. The supernatural is the unknown and unknowable. It is everything about reality that we do not understand, but still experience.

Still we try to come up with reasons for our experiences. Asking why the supernatural exists is almost as silly as asking why we exist, why the universe exists, what came before the “big bang”…. The supernatural exists because we can’t explain it. Because we cannot explain it, it becomes something other than natural, super-natural, or abnormal. Just because we do not understand what causes the phenomena, that hasn’t stopped us from trying to explain it. Some say that the phenomena is natural, that it is simply something which our minds do which we do not fully understand. Scientific examination would seem to bear this out… some Christian saints and many Buddhist holy men have developed strange abilities in their quest for the divine. However, many people have abilities without the benefit of years of prayer and meditation. Others have assumed that many psionic abilities come from a group subconscious, that what we call premonition or synchronicity comes from a mental connection at a metaphysical level… it is sometimes referred to as the Akashic record.

There is a natural reason why “supernatural” things occur. I don’t know what it is, but all things that exist are natural. There is nothing unnatural about supernatural phenomena; it is just that we haven’t discovered a plausible reason yet for why it occurs. There are certain words that I shun -normal and unnatural are at the top of that list. Normal is a statistical illusion and nothing that exists can be unnatural, because if it was antithetical to the natural world, it couldn’t and wouldn’t exist.

I don’t know why “supernatural” things happen, but I don’t worry about them either. I’ve experienced a lot of “weird” things over the course of my life, and while it seems to have had a warping effect upon my views of what is “normal” and “natural,” I have learned that acceptance of the unknown and unknowable is an easier undertaking than analysis.

28.1.3: A lot of bloggers “blog their dreams”. Do you have or have you ever had a dream which seems to relate to “real life”? Has a dream ever told you to do something, or stay away from doing something? What are dreams? How do they relate to life, or do they? Why do people seem to forget their dreams immediately after they wake up? Can someone die in their dreams like in the “Nightmare on Elm Street” movies? Use these questions, or formulate some of your own for an entry about dreams and nightmares.

I’ve had a few dreams that seem to relate to “real life,” but never anything that was specific. I rarely look to my dreams for answers, though I have a knack for analyzing and explaining other people’s dreams. I tend to accept my dreams as entertainment, my subconscious telling me a story, and for the most part, my dreams are better than television. Sometimes they can be comforting when I am distressed about something, and if prophetic, they must pertain to a very distant future.

Dreams are a way for us to work out things asleep that we are unable to tackle awake. Some people recall their dreams, and some never do, but just about everyone dreams. I don’t think it’s important to recall dreams, though I like to remember mine -I’m a storyteller. I pack away everything I dream for future use in a story. Even if someone does not remember their dreams, it’s pretty much been proven that the act of dreaming is as necessary to good mental health as regular excercise is good for the body.

It’s an old myth that you can die in a dream and therefore in the waking world. If someone died in a dream and in the waking world, how would anyone know that it was their dream that did them in? People can die in their sleep, my great grandmother did, but I doubt dreams are the culprit.

28.1.4: Here’s a more serious subtopic you might try your hand writing about. Is there a spiritual reason for paranormal phenomena?  Or is it a bunch of hooey?

Some people are sensitive to ghosts and sometimes ghosts will try to communicate with the living. Sometimes it’s for their own sake; they have unfinished business. But sometimes the ghosts are trying to help the living as well. If you’re asking is there a divine reason for paranormal phenomena, I’d say yes to that too. Every living thing contains a piece of the divine, and it is through this spark that the divine continues to communicate with us. Sometimes this manifests as paranormal activity, but mostly we just don’t notice and take occurrences, strange or otherwise, for granted. It’s not really a big deal if we don’t notice the messenger, so long as we get the message.

Hahaha…. I couldn’t do this. Some of these questions are good and make you think, this question however… well, I just couldn’t talk to the man. His stupidity makes me so angry. And one minute? That might be enough to knock him on his a$$, but not really enough time to set him straight. Yeesh, give me a couple months and I might be able get him to admit his ”war on terror” is a war for oil, but I doubt I’d get much more out of him. I’d probably have to break him just to get that. He’s an insignificant, self-serving child. Some people have said he is a figurehead…I believed that at first myself, but in reality I think he knows exactly what he’s doing, more’s the pity.

Don’t give me a minute with him. It’d take a couple decades to even turn him into a human being.   

I just answered this Featured Question, you can answer it too!

This is a question that reminds me of the three wishes you supposedly get when you release a Djinni from its lamp or ring. The only difference being, I’m solely responsible for making sure they come to pass. Guess I should get cracking.

It goes without saying that I want to be a rich and famous author… Really, the rich part is what I would have to work at, since most authors are not rich and never become rich depsite their popularity. But honestly, if I hope to achieve either one of my other top goals, I’m going to have to get money somewhere, or at least be considered such a talented writer that people do what I say (for once). 

I want to be president…. that is my second goal. Not only would I like to be the first female president of the United States, I would like to be the first Pagan, socialist, female president of the United States. I don’t dream small, do I? I can’t technically run until I am thirty-five… which is age discrimination if you ask me. But without money, I wouldn’t be able to run for president anyway. So, first I must become a famous writer who makes lots of money, or a famous writer who people will want to give lots of money to. heh

And third, I want to inspire social reforms, sweeping changes in education, and greater respect and conservation of the environment. So you can see how the first two goals are really paramount in achieving the last. I want children to be taught based on Learning styles rather forcing them to conform to the norm of rote memorization. I think in order to get their highschool diploma, every student fresh out of highschool, irregardless of social standing, should be required to do at least six months of community service in a service industry or in a job where they must deal with the public, just so they know for future reference how the other half lives. Automobile companies should strive to create Only cars which do not rely on fossil fuels, and cars requiring gasoline should be phased out as soon as possible (at most, ten years after they are removed from the market). Factories which spew out toxic fumes into the atmosphere or in other ways abuse the environment should be fined, heavily, until they self-sanction their actions and reassess their goals. Companies which go above and beyond respect for the environment should receive awards and bonuses and be televised like the Grammys or Oscars.

So those are my top three goals. Really I think the last bit should be everyone’s goals… reform that is. We can all point to things in our countries and in the larger world which are just not right. So, we should try to change things, right? One should always strive to leave the world in better shape than one found it. It is pretty depressing, that at this point in time, there really is a lot to improve upon. But maybe there is always a lot to improve upon. We just have to be willing to devote the time to effect these changes.

I just answered this Featured Question, you can answer it too!

Belief = Energy

Energy +/- Willpower = Reality

Reality…. you’re soaking in it

All rituals boil down to a belief in a goal. If you cannot believe in the possibility of your goal, you will never reach it. Rituals serve to focus the will on the goal, get the thoughts in the proper order to harness the energy generated by belief. This is why spells work for some people and not others. This is both the power of positive thinking and psychosomatic phenomena. We are just as likely to believe ourselves into a bad situation as a good one.

Ritual is a mental tool used to focus the will on a desired reality, as opposed to accepting whatever comes your way.

spellwork

prayer

affirmation

meditation

ceremony

We use these tools of belief to create sufficient energy to achieve goals. Our belief in the possibility of our goals harnesses this energy and forces it into a channel. Doubt in oneself or one’s goals disrupts the flow of energy, almost guaranteeing failure. Belief creates energy, but without Will, it is just energy. It will follow the path of least resistance, consumed by channels already formed by past beliefs.

Belief and reality influence each other. What we believe to be real, is real. The more people believe in a thing, the more real it becomes. I am not a Christian, but the Christian god and angels exists because people believe in them. The same goes for the devil and demons of the Christian hell. All gods, in all the pantheons, exist and are dependent upon our belief, shaping themselves based upon our perceptions. We sustain them and lesser spirits with belief. Even to say you do not believe in something contributes energy to its existence.

Many lesser spirits were once gods in their own right until their worshipers were subjugated or destroyed. There are two theories regarding fairies in Ireland which indicate that some were once deities and others evolved from the deified dead. As belief in the fairies diminished, so too did their stature. This is where the belief in pixies and brownies and other small fair folk came from.

Reality influences belief and vice versa. If a belief is strong enough, it can alter reality, but for the most part, it is reality that is stronger. We exist in a base universe upon which we all subconsciously agree. In order for really big changes to occur in the base reality, many people must unite in their beliefs or one person must convince others of the validity of a belief. But small, individual changes are also possible, and the more probably they are, the more likely they will occur.

*The Law of Worldviews*
The world we perceive is actually a mixture of the nominal world (the Tao, the objective reality that is unknowable but which underlies all that we think we know) and ourselves (the subjective). Changing your worldview does not change the eternal, real world, but it does change the world you perceive. That is, changing your worldview makes real changes in the world which is real to us. Because there are an infinite number of ways to perceive the world, there are also an infinite number of worlds we may assemble without awareness.

The true underlying reality is unknowable to us as long as we retain our worldview of separateness and self. You can become one with the universe but you cannot step back and observe it, because you are in it. You cannot observe a phenomenon without altering it by your mode of perception. There is no such thing as an independent observer. You participate in creating the world by perceiving it.

**The Law of Personal Universes** Every sentient being lives in and quite possibly creates a unique universe which can never be 100% identical to that lived in by another. So- called “reality” is a matter of consensus opinions.

**The Law of Infinite Universes** The total number of universes into which all possible combinations of existing phenomena could be organized is infinite. Anything is possible, though some things are more probable than others and so are easier to enact.

According to this law of magic, we live in a world of our own creation as well as an underlying or “real” world. Both worlds are real in as much as both affect us and our well-being, but the world you create through your perceptions is constantly changing based upon both the real world and your perception of it. Only your own personal world may be altered willfully. A good example of this is the use of positive affirmations. By convincing yourself of the possibility of change, you bring that change into being.

True immersion in the *real* world would remove any desire to change the world. You might ask why you cannot live in the *real* world, and I would have to say you can… but it is the world we go to when we die. So, you can visit for short periods, but not stay, unless you are ready to move from this plane to the next and leave your body behind. If you should manage to dissolve the illusion of separation from the nominal universe, you lose the ability to observe or alter because you have acknowledged your part in it. Since you cannot live in this *real* world all the time, affirmations, meditations, and spellwork are still valuable tools to reshape the subjective world you must live in. Attempting to alter reality immediately removes the observer to the mutable universe of perception and creation. It is only in the universes of our finite perception that changes may be put into effect because they are mutable, warped copies of the underlying universe which exists independent of our thoughts and perceptions.

Because the number of possibilities in any individual universe are infinite, so to are the types of phenomena you can cause through the application of will. However, since some phenomena are more probable than others, some will require less energy should you attempt to put them into effect. For instance, for argument’s sake, it would be easier to create a pig than a flying pig.

It is also difficult though not impossible for two (or more) people to agree upon the same phenomena. Creation of phenomena is easier with one observer (the self) and becomes successively more difficult the more (outside) observers are included. Should you manage to obtain the cooperation of other observers however, either in suspending their expectations or in focusing their wills on a joint project (through agreed upon symbolism), the bending of reality to the Will becomes easier than with only one observer/magi.

The Law of Worldviews is a valuable tool toward understanding the nominal universe and affecting the subjective universes of individuals. Application of this Law allows the creation or dispersal of energy in the form of phenomena through our selective perceptions and acceptance of possibility. If you believe you can see and communicate with fairies, angels, spirits, etc, then you will be able to by application of that worldview. If others share that worldview, they will be able to function partially within your world, and you within theirs. Shared perception creates a shared world through which you may affect each other. The shared world will become more real based upon the number of believers in that world. Thus if three out of four people believe enough in the presence of a spirit, they may be able to empower that entity to appear or cause phenomena the fourth non-believer may experience. It is not that we create a non-human entity (though it is possible to do so), but that we allow ourselves the option of perceiving it where others may prefer not to allow it into their personal worldview.

The application of this Law is limited only by your imagination.

*II Law of Attention*
The more one seeks to support a given law, conclusion, or worldview, the more evidence one will find. Worldviews have inertia. Since we create our world each moment, we are constantly maintaining our worldview. This is done by means of a recursive internal dialogue of words and symbols with which we constantly edit our perceptions. By rearranging our attention, we rearrange our worldview.

This law may be viewed as an extension of the Law of Worldviews, or something entirely separate. On the one hand, by seeking to validate your worldview, you may be creating the evidence you seek. Your subconscious provides the symbolism and signs to which your conscious mind responds. A kind of synchronicity occurs between you subconscious and conscious mind which results in coincidental observations. These observations make it seem that what you believe is true or increases your belief that something is true.

On the other hand, by simply desiring a worldview to be true, your mind begins to discard any illusions between you and its validation. In other words, you see more evidence because you are no longer disregarding it. The evidence may have existed all along, but until you were ready to accept it, it remained hidden from you.

In the long run, this Law is primarily good for strengthening your worldview. By stringing along events and symbols in a “logical” fashion, you can prove a worldview exists, and in doing so, make changing a previous worldview easier. What I mean is, if you are attempting to alter your current worldview to a new one, attempting to change your reality for something else, then use of the second Law will facilitate that change.

This law deals specifically with divination and the interpretation of omens and portents as well as the use of sigils and symbolic systems.

When I was a kid, this question plagued me. I grew up during the Reagan/Bush era, so all I ever worried about was whether or not there was going to be a world to grow up in. I suppose kids probably feel the same way, what with the so-called War on Terror. I blame my fear of what the future held for my lack of motivation in school. Why bother with curriculum when by the time you’re an adult, the world might be in ruins? Instead I researched vitamins, herbs, and nutrition, ancient history, symbolism, and survival techniques. If anyone asked me about my weird (for that age) interests, I just said I planned to be a writer and a writer writes what she knows. It was at least a partially honest answer since I like to write and would be overjoyed to someday be a professional writer. The ancient history and symbolism might seem like odd studies coupled with the other more useful information, but I felt that not being a particularly athletic person, if the world ended but I survived, the survival information -herbal and nutritional- might inspire someone else to keep me alive, while knowledge of the past would allow me to keep human history alive for future generations.

I still think the world might end… maybe tomorrow. Who can say? I still don’t trust our government, or should I say, the Religious Right who control the government. The Nazi SS has been exchanged for the modern RR. The only thing that has changed since I was a child is that the RR is a lot more honest about their motivation. It’s no longer a cold war… it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy of the “end times.”

I just worry about the end of the world for different reasons now. Mostly I worry because I have a little nephew, and I wonder what kind of world will he grow up to? How big are the holes in the ozone going to get? By the time he’s grown, will we be taking conservation efforts in the oceans as seriously as those on land? There are already dead spots in the ocean from industrial and agricultural runoff. Did you know the ocean provides a hefty percentage of the world’s oxygen? Some say, more than the rainforests do. What would happen if we succeeded in killing the oceans and the rainforests? We’re well on our way… when my nephew is an old, old man, will people even be able to go outside or will we all live in enclosed bubbles which keep air in and UV rays out? I’ve read scifi novels and seen movies to that effect. At the rate we’re destroying and corrupting this world, I don’t think we even deserve this beautiful place. I just read an article about the murder of apes in Africa. Why do people do that? It’s not enough we kill each other for no good reason, we have to kill our closest cousins too? We’re scum… if we all died, in some ways it would be a good thing. Sometimes I think my nephew would be better off if he never got to grow up. Better he should die before these worries plague him too and he becomes as frustrated as I am with the world’s leaders.

Beyond these world encompassing worries, I think about my job sometimes and making ends meet, but compared to my primary worry, these almost seem petty. Why worry about them when we might not even be here tomorrow or in a month, a year, or a century…. wiped out by an ecological disaster that we caused or chemical or biological warfare or just a couple THOUSAND nuclear bombs?

And it’s all the fault of the Religious Right. Whether it’s the American fundies or the Islamic Jihadists…. the RR is everywhere. All they do is run around trying to tell others how to live. They are so insecure in their own faith, any other belief is a challenge to them. I am 100% certain that if people didn’t doubt their own beliefs, that they wouldn’t feel a need to persecute others for theirs. It all boils down to “if other people believe something different than me, then maybe I might be wrong, but in order to assure myself that I am right, I can’t bear for those other people to exist; if I’m wrong, then at least everyone else will be wrong too.” They need therapy for their self-esteem issues, but that’s something they’ll never admit, let alone seek.

And that’s why I worry.

I just answered this Featured Question, you can answer it too!