Post by khyron1144 on Jan 16, 2004 23:55:13 GMT -5
The Vision
By
JustiN Orion Neal Taylor
Being the polemic and manifesto of a pacifist, anarchist heretic
Let me tell you all about my dream;
It’s a place,
Where strip-malls abound
And diversion’s mere moments away.
Where culture’s defined
By the ones least refined,
And you’ll be left behind
If you don’t fit in.
It’s all distorted in Americana my way.
…My nightmare has come true.
My vision has come true.
Yeah, it’s all coming true.
-The Offspring, “Americana”
Crazy, but that’s how it goes.
Millions of people living as foes.
Maybe it’s not too late.
For us to learn how to love and forget how to hate.
-Ozzy Osbourne, “Crazy Train”
Introduction
This book is based on a few simple premises (besides the premise that I the, author, am smarter or righter, than you the reader, which is a basic premise of all books of advice or moral guidance).
The first is that the world is a pretty sucky place as it is right now. I think few will be in disagreement with me here. We know things are bad.
The second premise is that the problems which make the world a sucky place are caused by us, good ol’ Homo sapiens sapiens. I think it would be hard to find a problem that we can really blame on outside forces. War, poverty, hunger, all these and more are our fault.
The third premise is that we can fix these problems. This is going to be the hardest to swallow for many. After all, we can accept that it is the fault of our species in general and me just the tiniest little bit myself that little kids are starving in Africa. It’s tougher to say this is very much my fault because I can do something about it, and I haven’t.
This book is divided into three parts. The first is a look at what makes the world a sucky place. The second is a look at the world’s redeeming features. The third is my recommendations on how things can be fixed.
Part 1 What’s Wrong With the World
Something’s wrong with the world today.
I don’t know what it is.
Something’s wrong with our eyes.
We’re seeing things in a different way,
And God knows it ain’t his.
Comes as no surprise,
We’re living on the edge.
-Aerosmith, “Living on the Edge”
What’s wrong with the world mama?
People living like they ain’t got no mamas.
I think the whole world’s addicted to the drama.
Only attracted to the things that’ll bring the trauma.
-Black Eyed Peas, “Where Is The Love?”
Chapter 1 Violence
Overseas, yeah we trying to fight terrorism,
But we still got terrorists living here in the U. S. A.
The big CIA
The Bloods and the Cryps
And the KKK
Black Eyed Peas, “Where Is The Love?”
It is the early twenty first century and we are still killing, fighting, and raping each other. The problem is not the amount of violence. It is the fact that violence exists at all. We should be beyond such primitive behavior.
I consider all forms of violence equally reprehensible. It is as wrong for the government to execute a murderer as it was for him to commit the murder that put him on death row. I consider war, whatever the justification behind it, to be the biggest crime on the planet.
MADness
Must the world live in the shadow of atomic fear?
Or will they win the fight for peace?
Or will we disappear?
Black Sabbath, “Children of the Grave”
Back during the Cold War, a term popped up, Mutually Assured Destruction or MAD for short. This meant that the Russians and the U. S. A. both had enough nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction to assure that both sides are completely oblitereated, and probably the rest of the world too.
While it is sad enough that such a situation could have been allowed to occur in the first place, it is sadder still that nothing has been done about this since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Shortly after he became the first non-Communist president of Russia, Boris Yeltsin offered President George H. W. Bush a unique opportunity. If America would dismantle its nuclear stock piles, so would Russia. Bush the first, didn’t accept. What is worse, his successor, Clinton, was offered the same chance and didn’t accept either.
So we are still in a world that can be blown up with the greatest of ease. If that isn’t a problem that needs fixing, I don’t know what is.
Blood on the Streets
Drive by shootings. Muggings. Robberies.
We live in a scary world. It’s a fact. Crime exists.
I’m not going to weigh you down with lots of facts and figures and statistics. I don’t think it would mean anything to you. It would just seem cold and distant.
Government Sanctioned Murder
Hangman, hangman, slack you rope a while
I think I see my Father coming
Riding many a mile
Did you bring me any silver?
Did you bring me any gold?
Or did you come to see me swinging form a gallows pole?
-Traditional, "Gallows Pole"
In this, the early twenty-first century, the most culturally, morally, and technologically advanced country on the planet uses the same sort of punishment that was dictated by the code of Hamurabi in ancient Babylon. That’s progress for you!
The death penalty is supposed to deter people from committing crimes. Obviously it didn’t happen (see the section above).
So what do we have? A system of petty revenge that does nothing to fix anything.
Chapter 2 Reverence For Authority
Bow Down before the one you serve.
You’re going to get what you deserve.
-Nine Inch Nails, “Head Like a Hole”
You may not see reverence for authority as a problem. I do.
If you are an adult member of our society, you never do what you want. You are always doing someone else’s bidding. At work, you have to do what your boss says. At home you have to do what your significant other says. And all the time you have to do what the law says, and if you’re religious what the morality handed down by your religion says.
I will admit that reverence for authority is not the whole problem. Authority itself is the rest. If there is no one with boots to lick, you can’t lick boots.
Authority is what causes wars to be fought. Authority is what makes the food distribution system unjust to the point that it allows people starve while others grow fat. Authority is what makes people fight each other at all. Authority is what makes greed and ambition to exist.
By
JustiN Orion Neal Taylor
Being the polemic and manifesto of a pacifist, anarchist heretic
Let me tell you all about my dream;
It’s a place,
Where strip-malls abound
And diversion’s mere moments away.
Where culture’s defined
By the ones least refined,
And you’ll be left behind
If you don’t fit in.
It’s all distorted in Americana my way.
…My nightmare has come true.
My vision has come true.
Yeah, it’s all coming true.
-The Offspring, “Americana”
Crazy, but that’s how it goes.
Millions of people living as foes.
Maybe it’s not too late.
For us to learn how to love and forget how to hate.
-Ozzy Osbourne, “Crazy Train”
Introduction
This book is based on a few simple premises (besides the premise that I the, author, am smarter or righter, than you the reader, which is a basic premise of all books of advice or moral guidance).
The first is that the world is a pretty sucky place as it is right now. I think few will be in disagreement with me here. We know things are bad.
The second premise is that the problems which make the world a sucky place are caused by us, good ol’ Homo sapiens sapiens. I think it would be hard to find a problem that we can really blame on outside forces. War, poverty, hunger, all these and more are our fault.
The third premise is that we can fix these problems. This is going to be the hardest to swallow for many. After all, we can accept that it is the fault of our species in general and me just the tiniest little bit myself that little kids are starving in Africa. It’s tougher to say this is very much my fault because I can do something about it, and I haven’t.
This book is divided into three parts. The first is a look at what makes the world a sucky place. The second is a look at the world’s redeeming features. The third is my recommendations on how things can be fixed.
Part 1 What’s Wrong With the World
Something’s wrong with the world today.
I don’t know what it is.
Something’s wrong with our eyes.
We’re seeing things in a different way,
And God knows it ain’t his.
Comes as no surprise,
We’re living on the edge.
-Aerosmith, “Living on the Edge”
What’s wrong with the world mama?
People living like they ain’t got no mamas.
I think the whole world’s addicted to the drama.
Only attracted to the things that’ll bring the trauma.
-Black Eyed Peas, “Where Is The Love?”
Chapter 1 Violence
Overseas, yeah we trying to fight terrorism,
But we still got terrorists living here in the U. S. A.
The big CIA
The Bloods and the Cryps
And the KKK
Black Eyed Peas, “Where Is The Love?”
It is the early twenty first century and we are still killing, fighting, and raping each other. The problem is not the amount of violence. It is the fact that violence exists at all. We should be beyond such primitive behavior.
I consider all forms of violence equally reprehensible. It is as wrong for the government to execute a murderer as it was for him to commit the murder that put him on death row. I consider war, whatever the justification behind it, to be the biggest crime on the planet.
MADness
Must the world live in the shadow of atomic fear?
Or will they win the fight for peace?
Or will we disappear?
Black Sabbath, “Children of the Grave”
Back during the Cold War, a term popped up, Mutually Assured Destruction or MAD for short. This meant that the Russians and the U. S. A. both had enough nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction to assure that both sides are completely oblitereated, and probably the rest of the world too.
While it is sad enough that such a situation could have been allowed to occur in the first place, it is sadder still that nothing has been done about this since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Shortly after he became the first non-Communist president of Russia, Boris Yeltsin offered President George H. W. Bush a unique opportunity. If America would dismantle its nuclear stock piles, so would Russia. Bush the first, didn’t accept. What is worse, his successor, Clinton, was offered the same chance and didn’t accept either.
So we are still in a world that can be blown up with the greatest of ease. If that isn’t a problem that needs fixing, I don’t know what is.
Blood on the Streets
Drive by shootings. Muggings. Robberies.
We live in a scary world. It’s a fact. Crime exists.
I’m not going to weigh you down with lots of facts and figures and statistics. I don’t think it would mean anything to you. It would just seem cold and distant.
Government Sanctioned Murder
Hangman, hangman, slack you rope a while
I think I see my Father coming
Riding many a mile
Did you bring me any silver?
Did you bring me any gold?
Or did you come to see me swinging form a gallows pole?
-Traditional, "Gallows Pole"
In this, the early twenty-first century, the most culturally, morally, and technologically advanced country on the planet uses the same sort of punishment that was dictated by the code of Hamurabi in ancient Babylon. That’s progress for you!
The death penalty is supposed to deter people from committing crimes. Obviously it didn’t happen (see the section above).
So what do we have? A system of petty revenge that does nothing to fix anything.
Chapter 2 Reverence For Authority
Bow Down before the one you serve.
You’re going to get what you deserve.
-Nine Inch Nails, “Head Like a Hole”
You may not see reverence for authority as a problem. I do.
If you are an adult member of our society, you never do what you want. You are always doing someone else’s bidding. At work, you have to do what your boss says. At home you have to do what your significant other says. And all the time you have to do what the law says, and if you’re religious what the morality handed down by your religion says.
I will admit that reverence for authority is not the whole problem. Authority itself is the rest. If there is no one with boots to lick, you can’t lick boots.
Authority is what causes wars to be fought. Authority is what makes the food distribution system unjust to the point that it allows people starve while others grow fat. Authority is what makes people fight each other at all. Authority is what makes greed and ambition to exist.