Additional commentary on violent extremism
Hundreds of
imams, scholars, intellectuals, and other Muslim leaders have met and issued the Marrakech Declaration, which
reaffirms the principles of good neighbourliness of the 1400-year old Charter of Medina for Muslims in
the modern world. This document, and the fatwa issued against terrorism are important,
as Islam, along with the other Abrahamic religions, has, unlike,
say, Paganism or the New Age
movement (which contrary
to the cited article, does date before the 1970s), has a dogma – a centrally
mandated declaration of who is or is not Muslim. Thus, terrorists who declare
themselves to be Islamic, despite not adhering to this declaration and the
aforementioned fatwas (not to mention all
the other breaches of Muslim practice hostages have reported), are NOT –
despite the moronic writings of the media and such terrorist’s self-declaration.
It would be like agreeing with someone who declared themselves Christian but
who worshipped the Flying Spaghetti Monster - in other
words, ludicrous.
Additional commentary on human rights and discrimination
An
excellent review
of some human rights changes in Victoria 15 years ago, changes which I was pleased
to be a part of.
Additional commentary on overcrowding and “modern”
lifestyle issues
Recently two young people in my home city died while drag racing. The
police response to that has included charging
the other driver, and a crackdown
on hooning. I have no problems with that
(especially given the profound risks to other people that such stupidity
creates), but there is a broader issue here, and that is that young people
– and older people – may need to feel that they are being daring or taking a
risk for the sake of their wellbeing. For that matter, risk taking is a key
part of humanity’s make up, and enables the creation of opportunities for
development and evolution. It also involves the risk of failure, and possibly
injury or even death – and there can be too much mollycoddling of people in an
attempt to prevent all such risk. That is harmful to individuals and the species. What we, as a
species, need to do is: (a) accept the merit in risk; (b) discuss the vexed
issue of who pays for the downside (if I
was to do something like sail singlehanded around the world, I would give
instructions that no-one was to go out of their way to try to rescue me. That
is because (i) people have too much of an unwarranted expectation of being got
out of trouble by others when they got themselves into said trouble, (ii)
planning for such events may become shoddy if the expectation of rescue is in
the back of their minds, and (iii) after the Tampa incident, I do not consider any Australian mariner has the right to be rescued
by any other nation), along with who shares in the benefits; and (c) in the
case of people who or less than mid 20s in age, who have not fully developed
their forebrain and thus are physically incapable of making a properly balanced
assessment, society as a whole has to come up with something that FEELS risky to those young people (NOT
something that feels risky to [possibly helicopter] parents – or to those who
love them), while maintaining a level of safety commensurate with their incomplete brain development.
The sooner we, as a society, face up to this, the sooner we will start to get a
grip on problems such as youth alcohol and drug abuse, some youth violence
problems (something like a “fight club”, PROPERLY conducted, could possibly have a place ... ),
youth traffic accident rates, etc. We would also be setting the scene for a
more balanced appraisal of the cost of helping adults who get themselves into
trouble – whether on the sea, or in the bush, or doing other things.
Incidentally, this does also mean, as far as I am concerned, that people who
are anti-any risk do not deserve to share in the glory of challenging
accomplishments. For more on this, see here, here, here,
here, here, here,
here,
here,
and here.
Now, one other aspect I wish to cover on
this is that the discussions need to be properly informed. When bicycle helmets
were made compulsory here, there was a lot of shooting off of people’s mouths,
but little properly informed debate. As I said to someone at the time, I didn’t
think I should be commenting unless I at least knew something about acquiredbrain injury (ABI). As it happens, I did, as someone I knew at the time worked at a
respite home for people with ABI, but I also said I had no right to expect
surgeons to work on preventable injuries without at least listening to what
they wanted for doing that:
- if they wanted, say, more money, then, taking into account also dislike of a proportion (NOT all) of bike riders / discomfort (new helmets reduced that valid objection) / reduced visibility (another valid concern, dealt with, again, by improved helmets), the debate became one of negative impact of helmets on bike riding (including participation) plus the costs of paying medical staff extra for having to deal with preventable deaths and injuries minus the costs of the reduced death and injury rate vs. the status quo;
- if they wanted the right to decline treating such patients if they’re not wearing helmets (pretty much unthinkable, given the doctors and nurses I know, but conceivable, given how tired most of them get dealing with stupid stuff that should not have happened), then the debate becomes the reduced numbers of cyclists (as a result of preventable deaths, ABIs and other injuries) and a less caring society plus the happiness of that proportion of cyclists who opposed helmets vs. more cyclists, a more caring society and more unhappy but still mobile cyclists.
(Incidentally, there has been some good evidence of the appalling attacks some motorists commit on cyclists in the news of late.)
Those examples are clumsily worded, but hopefully it is enough for you to get the idea: there are multiple sides to debates, and often many of the sides have valid points, but also, many of the sides do not really comprehend the others’ experiences.
Those examples are clumsily worded, but hopefully it is enough for you to get the idea: there are multiple sides to debates, and often many of the sides have valid points, but also, many of the sides do not really comprehend the others’ experiences.
There is a balance in such situations, but
we are struggling to comprehend that there are competing needs to be balanced.
Another example of that is drink driving:
apart from such being clearly idiotic, in my view (there is plenty of evidence of impaired driving as a result of
alcohol), too few of those who are against restricting drink driving do not
know the impact of such behaviour, whereas I do, as a friend’s son was killed
by a drinker driving moron – and the emergency service workers were nearly all
killed by another such moron. On the other hand, drink drivers are often
drinking either to cope with a ****** life situation, or because they are
desperate to have social interaction and have been so impaired by the
upbringing/experiences that they know no other way to interact, or for some
other reason. Deal with those other reasons effectively, and drink driving may
be easier to reduce. Of course, that is a little like dealing with an
uncooperative: the time taken to deal with the broader issues are so large, so
endemic, that it would take an incredible amount of time and effort (and money) to deal with, and millions
of innocents would be killed, injured, or affected by the death of injury of
loved ones, so the ONLY
responsible action to take is to ban drink driving.
As a final point, one the unacknowledged
problems of legislation is that it creates an army of petty tyrants and
bullies. Such people are one of the reasons I will not get back into sailing.
Additional commentary on education
I mentioned, in the news post, that some
people were pushing for a restoration of democracy, and commented that it was
the desire to be ruled by a king that led to the current situation in Thailand.
There are people who genuinely fear and feel threatened by the chaos of discussion
and contesting views and collaborative decision making of democracy. They are
either overloaded by life and craving some peace, or do not understand how
people having opposing views can lead to a better outcome (which is through aforementioned debate), or fear that verbal
robustness will lead to physical violence
(which it can do), or just want everyone to do what the person concerned
thinks is best (ah, the lure of being a
dictator … wipes up drool [joke, Joyce]),
or some other reason.
This affliction also underlies much of the
ongoing violence in some nations: people are unwilling or fear living in a
society with a variety of people, lifestyles, views, etc.
The real dividing line is not
between Christianity and Islam, Sunni and Shia, East and West. It is between
people who believe in coexistence, and those who don’t.
As with any problem, cure is better than
trying to fix the problem after it has occurred, and this is where education
comes in – good, child-focused education, addressing not only the mundane
basics of knowledge, but also BPM character
development of the child, in this specific instance, how to feel comfortable
with variety, diversity and a modicum of what could be interpreted by some as
“chaos”.
I don’t consider our current teachers know
how to do this – certainly those teachers and education specialists / advisors
I’ve spoken to since I’ve left school have failed to impress me on this - and
other – topics. Nevertheless, ultimately, maybe in a century of three, it is
something will be brought in –and perhaps at the insistence of those parents
who genuinely love their child, and want the best development possible of the
child, rather than viewing the child as a “mini
me”.
[1] BPM =
Balanced Positive (spiritually) Mature. See here and here for more on this.[2] Please see here, here, here and my post "The Death of Wikipedia" for the reasons I now recommend caution when using Wikipedia. I'm also exploring use of h2g2, although that doesn't appear to be as extensive (h2g2 is intended - rather engagingly - to be the Earth edition of "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy").
[3] I apologise for the formatting: it seems Blogger is
no longer as WYSIWYG as it used to be, and there are a lot of unwanted
changes to layout made upon publishing, so I often have to edit it immediately
after publishing to get the format as close to what I want as possible.
Love, light, hugs and blessings
(pronounced "new-MYTH-ear"; ... aka Bellatrix
Lux … aka Morinehtar … would-be drýicgan or maga
... )
My "blogiography" (list of all posts and guide as to how to best use this
site) is here, and my glossary/index is here.
I started this blog to cover karmic regression-rescue
(see here and here), and it grew ... See here for my group mind project, here and here for my "Pagans for Peace" project (and join me
for a few minutes at some time between 8 and 11 PM on Sunday, wherever you are,
to meditate-clear for peace), and here
for my bindrune kit-bag. I also strongly recommend
learning how to flame, ground
and shield, do alternate
nostril breathing, work
with colour, and see also here and be
flexible.
The real dividing line is not between
Christianity and Islam, Sunni and Shia, East and West. It is between people who
believe in coexistence, and those who don’t.
- If your “gut” (your instinct/intuition) is telling you something is wrong, but logic and the available evidence is saying otherwise, the proper conclusion to draw is that you need better, more personally credible evidence. Your “gut” could be wrong, right, or missing the nuances / “shades of grey” . So could the available evidence.
- All of the above - and this blog - could be wrong, or subject to context, perspective, or state of spiritual evolution ...
Tags: activism, discrimination, energy work, magick, meditation,
nonviolence, peace, society, violence, war,
First published: Laugardagr, 6th February, 2016
Last edited (excluding fixing typo's
and other minor matters): Saturday, 6th February, 2016
