Category Archives: Culture

The Great Debate.

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On Tuesday, Bill Nye “The Science Guy” debated Ken Ham, founder of the Creation Museum…you know, the place featuring dioramas of Adam and Eve sharing the Earth with dinosaurs.

I give credit to Ham. Not only did he pay Nye’s substantial speaking fee for the event. He risked exposing his supporters to a dose of reality. Nevertheless, I doubt Nye changed any minds. That’s the problem with trying to debate the faithful…they accept things based on faith and ignore anything that would contradict their beliefs, including actual scientific evidence based on centuries of observations and objective data.

For example, Ham and his followers believe the Earth is 6,000 years old based on the book of Genesis in the Bible. Ham says that the Bible trumps scientific research. “I find there’s only one infallible dating method,” said Ham. “It’s a witness who was there, who knows everything and told us, and that’s from the word of God.”

Ham fails to consider that the Bible is a written account of Judeo-Christian traditions and that it’s not necessarily any more accurate than the creationist accounts of other tribes – accounts such as the Chinese belief that humans came from a cosmic egg; the Tibetan belief that humans are the offspring of a monkey and a great demoness; the Egyptian belief that all creatures were created on a potter’s wheel; the Mayan belief that humans were created from wood; the ancient Greek belief that humans are the progeny of the Earth and the sky; the Hopi belief that man emerged from a hole in the Earth; and the Navajo belief that the first woman was created by blue and yellow clouds and the first man was created by black and white clouds.

All of these deserve as much credibility as the Judeo-Christian account. Moreover, unlike Ham, many civilizations believe the Earth is far older than 6,000 years. Indeed, Hindus believe that the Universe is 4,320,000,000 years old, a figure that more closely aligns with the dating of modern science.

But other traditions and science don’t matter to people like Ham. Ham believes the Judeo-Christian creation story is the only one that matters. He believes that the Bible was not written by man. He believes it is the actual word of God and anyone who contradicts anything in the Bible is simply wrong. It’s a matter of faith. The only one who could possibly convince him to accept the evidence supplied by historians, geologists, anthropologists, astrophysicists and archeaologists is God.

And the Judeo-Christian God hasn’t yet authored a sequel to the Bible.

Guns In The Neighborhood.

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I live in a small development near several tourist destinations in Arizona. There’s absolutely nothing remarkable about the neighborhood other than it is primarily populated by retirees from California and snowbirds from New England and the Midwest. The neighborhood has virtually no crime and has never experienced a home invasion. Despite this, I have to assume the majority of my neighbors are gun owners. Arizona, after all, is a gun-friendly state. Many people come here to get their cowboy on. And it seems that our legislature values guns more than people.

If that sounds crazy, I assure you that it’s not as crazy as some of our laws.

In Arizona, you can carry a gun virtually anywhere…in your car, to the shopping mall, to your church, even to the bar. The state has even made it illegal for cities to destroy guns that have been confiscated from felons or used in crimes. The cities are mandated to sell them.

As a result of our gun-crazy culture, Arizona has more than its share of gun hoarders…those who have convinced themselves that the government and/or the UN is coming to take their guns. There is also a large number of so-called “sovereign citizens”…those who refuse to accept the rule of government.

I have no idea how many of my neighbors fit into these categories, but I do know of two. One is a retired electrical engineer who owned a large collection of handguns, shotguns and assault rifles until he got drunk one afternoon and threatened to kill his wife and himself. The sheriff;s deputies confiscated the weapons and the neighbor is now serving time in prison for that and a variety of senseless crimes associated with his drinking. Another arsenal of handguns and assault weapons belongs to a neighbor whose love of high-powered weaponry is exceeded only by his love of alcohol.

How comforting!

Knowing that a few yards away there is a large arsenal in the possession of such an individual does not make me feel more secure. Neither does knowing that there are dozens more who have guns at the ready. These people are exemplified by a neighbor who was convinced to purchase a handgun by one of his gun-loving paranoid friends. He told me the first time he fired it, the slide nearly amputated his thumb. He’s still uncomfortable with it, but that doesn’t prevent him from keeping the loaded weapon on the nightstand next to his bed. Even more disturbing is the fact that he keeps a round in the chamber, which means he is more likely to accidentally shoot himself or a friend than any potential intruder.

Rather than make our neighborhood more secure, all of these guns make it more dangerous; more likely that there will be an accidental shooting; more likely that the guns will be used in a shootout between neighbors than to shoot an intruder. But most suggested changes for gun control would fail to weed out these people. They all passed background checks. They all supposedly took at least one firearm safety class. Yet they are all armed and dangerous to themselves, their families and their neighbors.

These people clearly demonstrate that the only thing that can reduce the number of nincompoops who own guns is to reduce the number of guns. Period.

Worse Than Iraq.

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This past Saturday, the United Nations reported that at least 733 Iraqis had been killed and at least 1,229 wounded in January as the result of violence. Worse, the UN said that the numbers did not include Anbar province due to problems verifying the numbers killed. Those numbers are startling and they justifiably made headlines in newspapers throughout the US.

But there was one nation that experienced even more violence last month – the United States of America.

As I noted in a recent post, there are more than 11,000 gun homicides in the US each year. That means that, on average, there are more than 916 gun homicides in the US each month…nearly 200 more than the deaths that occurred last month in Iraq! And, if you include those killed by other means, the US likely experienced more than 1,330 homicides last month…nearly double the number killed by violence in Iraq!

Looking at it another way, the US experiences nearly one-third the number of violent deaths each month as Syria, which is immersed in a cruel civil war. Yet I don’t recall seeing any headlines decrying the violence in the US. I don’t see humanitarian groups running to the aid of those in our most violent neighborhoods. I don’t hear conservative politicians calling for military intervention to help curb our violence.

Are conservative politicians so afraid of the National Rifle Association, that they have become willing to ignore our own violence? Have ordinary citizens become so accustomed to mass murders, gang violence, revenge killings, road rage and domestic violence that we no longer notice it? Or worse, yet, no longer care?

A Memorial To Gun Victims?

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A new study by Dr. John Leventhal, professor of pediatrics at the Yale School of Medicine, found that firearms kill more than 3,000 children each year in the US.  Another 7,000 are wounded badly enough to be hospitalized, most from assaults. And those are just the statistics for children! Overall, there are more than 11,000 homicides per year in the US involving a firearm and more than 19,000 suicides involving a gun according to statistics from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.

No other advanced nation comes close.

To put these statistics into perspective, the number of children killed by guns in the US in a single year exceeds the 2,977 people who died in the attacks on 9/11. The 4,486 US soldiers killed during the 6 years of the Iraq War is less than half the number of gun homicides that occur in the US in a single year. And the 2,287 US soldiers who have been killed during the 10 years we have been engaged in the Afghan War is roughly equivalent to two and a half months of gun homicides in the US!

Put another way, as of May 2011, there were 58,272 names on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, DC, representing the number of US soldiers killed during our 14 years of military involvement in Vietnam. The number of gun homocides in the US would exceed that number in approximately 5 years. And, if you included gun suicides, the number would be exceeded in just 3 years!

Do you still think we don’t have a gun problem in this country?

Yet despite the overwhelming reality of these statistics, American politicians refuse to act. The shooting of a US Congresswoman and the mass murder in Tucson, Arizona wasn’t enough to force common sense gun control. The mass murder in an Aurora, Colorado movie theater wasn’t enough. Even the slaughter of 26 children in Newtown, Connecticut wasn’t enough to prompt Congress to act. They couldn’t even pass a measure calling for universal background checks of gun purchasers when polls showed that a vast majority of Americans supported it.

It makes one wonder what it will take to bring Americans to our senses.

I would suggest that we create a memorial to gun victims listing all of their names. Make the memorial as visible and as powerful as possible, something similar to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. Add the names of gun victims week by week; month by month; year by year. It may take a while, but eventually most sane people will realize exactly what our lax gun laws are costing us.

At least I would certainly hope so.

Another Perspective On The Racist Frat Party At ASU.

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The weekend before Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, the clueless frat rats at the Tau Kappa Epsilon fraternity at Arizona State University decided the best way to celebrate was with a “blackoutformlk” party. Those who attended the all white party wore basketball jerseys, hip hop clothing, some reportedly even wore black face make-up. They also drank alcoholic drinks out of hollowed-out watermelons and flashed gang signs while posing for the camera.

Understandably, local civil rights leaders were outraged and threaten to boycott all ASU athletic events. They want those involved expelled from the university and the fraternity banned from operating on campus. (The fraternity had already lost its house on campus after a fight in 2012 when up to 20 white frat boys brutally beat an African-American member of a rival fraternity.) ASU officials say the matter is “under investigation.”

Obviously, the party says volumes about the fraternity. But it says even more about the members’ families.

After all, people aren’t born racist. Racism is learned behavior. Most of these boys likely come from relatively well-to-do families in Arizona. You know, the only state that refused to celebrate MLK Day; the state that decided to honor King only after it had lost tens of millions of dollars from boycotts; the same state that passed the blatantly racist SB1070 anti-immigrant bill; the state with only one African-American legislator; one of the red states dominated by the Tea Party which has held numerous anti-Obama rallies complete with Confederate flags.

Yes, that state!

One has to wonder exactly what these frat boys learned at home and from watching the public debates over our nation’s first black president. One wonders how many of their parents watched Fox News Channel and listened to Rush Limbaugh with the kids. One wonders how many vicious letters to the editor they have read; how many racist comments they have heard at school and at sporting events; how many news reports and “reality” TV shows they’ve seen that focused on black crimes while ignoring white crimes; how many rap songs they’ve heard that glorify violence.

The leaders of ASU have their work cut out for them. Not only must they find an appropriate way to deal with the fraternity and educate their students. They need to find a way to turn this into a teachable moment for the rest of the state’s population.

UPDATE: The TKE fraternity has been expelled from campus. Futher actions against individuals are under consideration.

The Symbology Of Politics.

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You can tell a lot about people from the symbols they choose to attach to their bodies, their cars and their homes. In the Sixties, a generation wore long hair and tie-died clothing as the symbols of revolution. In the Eighties, Yuppies (Young Upwardly Mobile Professionals) turned to pricey brand labels and t-shirts from vacation spots intended to show their status and wealth. Today, those symbols have been replaced with symbols that establish our class status, religious beliefs and political leanings.

For example, anyone displaying the Gadsden (Don’t Tread On Me) flag is likely to belong to the Tea Party. A Stars and Stripes decal on a car almost always indicates a conservative. How angry the driver is may be indicated by an NRA insignia or a leftover “W” or Romney campaign sticker. A somewhat more subtle conservative indicator is the fish or cross symbolizing Christianity. An Obama, Hillary or Elizabeth Warren sticker indicates a Democrat. A rainbow or a = indicates a GLBT supporter. And a peace sign or “Coexist” almost always indicates a liberal.

“What do moderates display?” you may ask. The obvious answer is, “It really doesn’t matter, because they essentially no longer exist.”

So what brought us to the point where ordinary people feel it necessary to display their political or religious beliefs? After all, weren’t we all told by our parents that there are two things never to be discussed with strangers? Those are, of course, religion and politics. Obviously, we’ve transcended that advice out of, what I believe, is a sense of tribalism. The same sort of tribalism that causes someone to wear their school colors, the logo of their favorite NFL team, the branch of military in which they served, even the insignia of their military unity.

I would also suggest that the display of some symbols indicates a sense of superiority. What other purpose does it serve to display a bumper sticker warning others that the driver is subject to sudden rapture? Do you really believe that the rest of us are grateful for the warning? No, you want to tell us that you’re better than us. In other words, I contend that it’s a sign of self-righteousness. The kind of self-righteousness that Pope Francis addressed when stating that one doesn’t have to be Catholic or Christian to be redeemed; that one’s unselfish deeds is enough. If that’s true, and I believe it is, there should be no reason to show your religious beliefs.

And what is the purpose of displaying a decal of the flag of the United States? Are we to believe that its bearers are more patriotic than those who don’t? It certainly can’t be a mere label. We already know that there’s a good chance that they’re American because that’s where they live! I suspect that, like the religious symbols, the flag is displayed in order to assign a sense of self-importance. To me it attempts to say, “Because of my (conservative) political beliefs, I’m a true patriot and you’re not.”

In my opinion, we would all be better off if we threw away the partisan symbols and replaced them with a symbol of the Earth. That would indicate that we believe in true equality for all people; that we share a reverance for each other and the place where we live; that we have compassion for all sentient beings and we’re committed to protecting them.

Now that’s a sentiment I’d be happy to display!

The Slavery We Ignore.

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Despite the emancipation of African-American slaves, slavery in the US is not over. Not by a long shot.

Today’s slaves are African-Americans, Caucasions, Asians, Latinos…even children. And instead of working on plantations, they work in hotels, bedrooms and massage parlors. I’m referring, of course, to the sex trade in which thousands of people…mostly women…are held against their will for the financial benefit of their “owners.”

Most of these people were captured from street corners and malls. They were enticed by on-line predators. They were lured into the “modeling” business with the promise of fame and money. They were neglected children who were sweet-talked then brutalized until they submitted to their pimps. They were hopeful immigrants who were promised transportation and green cards then held against their will until they pay off their captors’ investments. Of course, they never can. As soon as they come close, they are sold or traded to other pimps. They are held captive in cubicles in the basements of massage parlors and illegal brothels. Many are moved from city to city to prevent them from getting too close to their customers and establishing contacts that may help free them. Their services are advertised for sale in newspaper classifieds and on the Internet.

All of this is a crime…a despicable, horrible crime. Yet an even worse crime is that many people actually know about this slavery but, because it’s centered on prostitution, few people seem to care. They either condemn everyone involved…pimps, “johns” and victims alike…or they hold to the belief that all prostitution is a victimless crime. Public officials say that this form of slavery is difficult to prosecute. In reality, many in law enforcement and city governments actually participate in the crime, either as customers or as the recipients of bribes. Customers claim not to know about the circumstances of the women. They want to believe that all of the women serve willingly, and undoubtedly many do. But far too many are victimized over and over and over again.

Often the victims have been subjugated and victimized for so long they remember little else. They need help and support in order to survive even after they’re freed. And they’re often much too frightened to testify against their abusers.

But the situation is not hopeless. All that’s required for it to change is for the public to demand change and elect government officials who are determined to act. It would help if the more puritanical among us would recognize that prostitution has been around since the beginning of time and that it’s not going away. Indeed, there are women who see the sex trade as a way to improve their financial futures. And there are a seemingly endless number of customers. Legalizing prostitution would take the profit out of illegal prostitution. It would allow governments to regulate, license and control it in an open, transparent and safe manner. It would turn the women into business entrepreneurs instead of victims. More important, it would eliminate the pimps and “owners.”

Ask yourself which is preferrable? An open and controlled sex trade? Or the continuation of slavery and the victimization of women and children?

Why Teapublicans Are Wrong About Government.

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After all of the GOP talk of “freeing businesses from government regulation” and “shrinking government down to a size small enough to fit in a bathtub,” it’s time to force a dose of reality down their loudmouth throats. No matter how much they rant about the “evils” of government, we need government to do a variety of things the private sector can’t or won’t.

We need government funding and oversight to build and maintain infrastructure – roads, highways, airports, seaports, and more. We need government to protect our borders; to control our monetary system; to negotiate treaties. And, although we live in a nation built on capitalism, government has always been needed to prevent private businesses from taking advantage of our citizens. Whenever new industries are created by business, government eventually has to regulate them in order to keep them from running amok.

For example, before Ralph Nader and his book, Unsafe At Any Speed, American automakers paid little attention to safety. There were no seat belts, no air bags, no crumple zones, no crash tests…no safety standards at all.

Before the Food & Drug Administration, there was no labeling of ingredients for packaged foods ; no bans or warnings for ingredients known to cause harm. Before the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), large corporations felt free to dump toxic chemicals in our streams and in our drinking water. Before the EPA, large corporations spewed tons of toxins into the air we breathe. Before the Securities Exchange Commission, financial institutions could engage in insider trading and sell any junk securities people could be bamboozled into buying. Before the Mine Safety Act, most miners died from tunnel collapses and black lung disease. Before the US Department of Agriculture and the US Forest Service, lumber companies felt free to clear cut our forests destroying critical habitat for many species and mortgaging our future. Before the Department of Labor, businesses thrived on child and slave labor.

Do you really want to go back to the days of allowing corporations to regulate themselves?

Would you buy meat for your family that had not been inspected? Would you drink water that hadn’t been tested for bacteria and other contaminents? Would you give your child pharamceuticals that were untested? Would you strap your child into a car that had not passed basic safety tests? Would you place your life savings in a bank that did not insure your deposits?

We already know what happens when you replace government functions with private companies. We have abundant evidence that contracting with corporations to operate prisons costs more than publicly-operated prisons. Private prisons have also proven to be less secure. We also know that, on the whole, students in private schools perform no better, and often worse, than those in public schools.

Contrary to President Reagan, government isn’t the problem. Often it’s the solution. Instead of trying to reduce government to some arbitrary size, we should be trying to improve it. Apparently, Teapublicans have never considered that.

Beheading More Right Wing Lies.

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According to the right wing blog, Freedom Outpost, “more than 68,105 new medical codes are being added due to the Obamacare monstrosity.” The blog claims that the codes are intended to “link us to the international system created by the World Health Organization (WHO). It goes on to state, “One thing is for sure. This coding is directly related and tied to creating their ‘International One World Government.’ While the WHO pretends to be for helping people, they create codes for ‘Legal Execution’ by beheading.”

You read that right. The author is claiming that Obamacare will result in the legal beheadings of patients! Presumably the claim was spawned by Sarah Palin’s “Death Panels.”

Of course, once Freedom Outpost sent this claim into the blogosphere, it was picked up and repeated by most other right wing blogs. It was passed from one Tea Party Parasite …er, Patriot… to another until it became so prevalent that Politifact.com had to debunk it with a “Pants on Fire” rating.

Obviously, the only ones who have lost their heads are Teapublicans afflicted with what some have called Obama Derangement Disorder.

This lunacy is not new. There have been other wild accusations such as the claim that Obama created a program that allows school children to earn higher grades by studying Islam; that a hidden provision in the health care law taxes sporting goods as medical devices; that Obamacare will provide insurance to illegal immigrants; that Muslims are exempted from the health care mandate; that the Obama administration plans to take away our guns as part of a UN treaty; that the Obama campaign offered citizens cell phones in exchange for votes; that Obamacare includes a 3.8 percent sales tax on all real estate transactions; that President Obama doubled the national debt; that Michelle Obama said “all this for a damn flag” during a 9/11 memorial; that President Obama banned prayer in the military academies; that President Obama demanded all military headstones with crosses be replaced. There have been hundreds more.

All of these have been awarded the “Pants on Fire” rating by Politifact.com.

Although Politifact.com draws no conclusions as to why so many of these preposterous claims have dogged President Obama, I’ll state the obvious: racism. Why else would conservatives question the president’s birthplace? Why else would they claim he is a radical Muslim? Why else would there be a six-fold increase in racist hate groups during his presidency?

Yes, I know, right wingers are quick to deny prejudice (most claim to have black friends) and they try to turn the tables by accusing those who call attention to their lunacy of “playing the race card.” Still, the racism of these “patriots” is both obvious and undeniable. Virtually every Tea Party rally has included racist chants, blatantly racist depictions of President Obama, and an abundance of Confederate flags. And it’s not just the far right wing wackos who have displayed their racism. So-called “mainstream” Republicans have piled on.

I believe that no matter how much they deny it, conservatives – they of family “values” and supposedly strong religious beliefs – simply were not ready for a black president. Most can accept black athletes, black entertainers and black co-workers. But black neighbors? Or (gasp) a black president? A black man who has real power?

Of course, these conservatives continue to say they’re not racists. They’re just passionate about freedom and patriotism.

Riiiight!

What The Most Recent Shootings Tell Us About Access To Guns.

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The shooting in the Florida movie theater that left the father of two dead was not carried out by a reclusive young male who was mentally ill and felt spurned by society. It was carried out by what most people consider a highly qualified gun owner…a retired police officer who was merely upset by a young man texting his 3-year-old daughter. The shooting at the school in New Mexico was carried out by a 12-year-old boy who had access to a sawed-off shotgun.

Moreover, neither of these shooters was stopped by armed vigilantes. They were stopped by unarmed witnesses who had the courage to act.

These facts stand in stark contrast to the recommendations of the National Rifle Association (NRA) that reacted to the mass killing of 6-year-olds at Newtown by saying that the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.

The fact is that those who carry guns are tempted to use them. What might have turned into a fist fight in the movie theater instead turned into a murder because of the presence of a gun. What might have become a school yard fight between middle school students left one student critically injured and another in serious condition because of access to a gun.

There are only a few conditions that warrant the carrying of guns – when you are carrying large sums of money, when you have been threatened with violence, when you are working alone in a store overnight, when you must travel in a remote area known for violence, or when you are a paid security guard or on-duty police officer.

And there are no circumstances in which a minor should have access to guns without the presence of a parent.

However, the NRA would have you believe that you are always at risk unless you’re packing heat…ready to fire, round in the chamber, semi-automatic heat. And, unfortunately, too many Americans (especially right wing American politicians) have accepted the NRA paranoia. It’s the reason our gun laws have been changed to allow virtually anyone to own and carry a gun. And it’s the reason at least 10,000 fellow citizens lost their lives to gun violence in 2013.

When will it end?