Wednesday, December 20, 2017

"We Shall Not All Die" , But So Far We All Have and Most Likely Will.

It's very difficult for humans to say the words "He/she/they died." What a marvelous number of euphemisms for death we have. We pass on, croak, kick the bucket, go home, expire, succumb, leave, meet our maker, go to our reward, get wasted, check out, eternally rest, are a goner, end, bite the dust, get liquidated, terminated and annihilated. We give up the ghost, make the change, transition, get mertilized, go to to the other side, fall asleep, get taken, rubbed and snuffed out. We depart, transcend and buy the farm. We are feeling no pain, lose the race, cash in, cross Jordan and go with the angels. We get done in, translate into glory, return to the dust, wither away, give up, take the long sleep and a dirt bath. It can be curtains, a dropped body, six feet under and out of our misery. We find everlasting peace, new lives the great beyond, ride into the sunset and that's all we wrote. But in plain fact, we are dead.

I was told when I got glasses "you are deteriorating at the appropriate rate Dennis."  Great....

All of religion is predicated on the fact that we have to go somewhere after death. "We" being everything from our spirit and energy to our mind and ethereal body. We like it better if there is a good place for the nice ones of us and a bad one for the jerks. Although the idea of reincarnation lends itself to allowing everyone their spot after having learned lessons along the way many times over.

Western Churches spend your lifetime convincing you that their understanding is THE only understanding of what happens when we die and usually provide you with a program whereby you can leave your worldly goods, you know the ones they told you in sermons not to store up on, to them. I have seen many a family outside the particular denomination of the one who "went home" have to face the fact that all the goodies went to their church and not their family.

Let's make a rule that if a person gives a church their stuff after they die, and sons or daughters protest, the Church has to give it back to the family. This will help the church to practice what they preach and give that which actually belongs to a family to the family it actually belongs to. Beware of Churches who have a program for you to "honor God with your death," or "Your will, a way for you to continue giving after you die," program. The money given to the Church will be mis-spent and it would be more satisfying to have your kids mis-spend it than your church. Amen

It's funny how if you ask someone about quantum physics or how life works, it's such an unknowable mystery in the final analysis, at least for now. But ask a religious person about what happens after death, and pfffft...that's easy. We go to heaven, they go to hell, we get reincarnated often, we are deader than dead, we wait in the grave until Jesus returns, we rise in a physical body, we rise in a spiritual "body", we this and that as if they knew and the truth is that they don't. Westerners would never question the Bible as knowing what happens after death even though one can find all of the above mentioned in one form or another in the pages of the Bible.

Quantum physics now speculates we all simply live in a simulation for only supreme programmer knows why.

Like Humans, the Biblical understanding of death evolved into what we see in the Evangelical Christian Church today.

The Catholic Church has gotten good at adding new places the dead go, such as unsaved babies, or the unborn or the not quite saved types, but it's all a crap shoot. Because we can come up with questions like "well what kind of God would throw an innocent child in hell for not knowing.....", we have to figure out new holding pens for such categories of people. They are not real mind you, but they help us cope.

Missionaries rush to save the lost before they die while admitting, in some circles that if they left them ignorant, a loving God would automatically translate them into heaven upon death. I mean, they can't help it they were born in New Guinea or the Great Plains.

 Geronimo was asked by the General who hunted him down and imprisoned him in Florida if he wanted to go to heaven when he died? Geronimo asked if the General was also going to be there? "Why of course," came the response met by as simple "Then no" by Geronimo. Hell would indeed be for many having to spend eternity with those that drove them nuts in this life!

I mean, do you really want to spend eternity closer than ever to all the people in your church, including the same pastor day and night forever! I think not! Heaven just might seem like one big endless potluck of boring people who are still pretending to be what they never were back on earth. It would be an eternal obligatory Thanksgiving or Christmas with the relatives that most never wanted to attend anyway!

Nope, if I get to go to heaven, please God, let there be quiet places where no one can find me and those I want to be around. You know, kinda like we can do down here if we choose.

I saw a lot of death as a minister. Sometimes it was after the fact long enough to just bury somone in a nice funeral service in a nice setting. Sometimes I found myself standing at the edge of a river while they searched for a lost one or taken to a morgue to roll the dead body of a child or friend out of a drawer for a private family look. I Even dug a grave once on a farm while we waited for family to arrive for a quick same day funeral and burial. I've picked up the cemains, ugh what a word, of people I had just talked to a few days earlier, now reduced to about 10 lbs. of gray sand. I have transported the neatly wrapped body of a newborn to another city in the backseat of my car, as the couple could not afford for the funeral home to do it.

Once I had visited a mother, just socially, who spent much of the visit recounting the talents, skills, and beauty of daughter, which is normal when a parent is well pleased. I specifically remember thinking on the way home "how would she cope if she lost that daughter, who was the center of all the mom lived for? When I got home, the phone was ringing and I was returning to the hospital where this young woman had just been brought fatally run down at 18 miscrossing a street. Tough stuff. I lost a nephew to a train that could not get his attention while he was wearing his walkman. I lost my two brother in laws suddenly in life.

The point seems to live in the moment, staying both out of the past of our lives, where we tend to store our anger and hurt, and also the future, where we store our anxiety and all that is unknowable. No one knows what happens at death. Just to say that is to stir the pot of religious surety. I know, no one but YOU knows  because you read it somewhere.

There are some great stories of past lives recalled by some with uncanny detail. Hmmm, could be.

Even the Bible gives the account of the blind man who caused the disciples to ask if the man's blindness was the fault of his parents or HIS own sin, "that he was BORN blind." We at least have to admit there is room there to question that if one is born blind due to sin, the sin must have taken place in a previous life. No other explanation is possible. Some in the early church believed in reincarnation. General George Patton was famous for his knowing where he had fought as a Roman Soldier in a previous life, while fighting again during WWII in Europe. He wasn't kidding and no one made fun of him either.

There are stories of those who have left their bodies in near death experiences only to return and recount the experience in detail that only a, well "Ghost" could give. They got recalled to finish their lives evidently and everyone who experiences such a thing never again fears death. Well worth the experience if only for that little peace of mind, I'd say.

Stories abound of those who were given organ transplants donated by those who have died, only to mysteriously acquire the deceased's taste in foods, books or familiarity with topics never studied in their own lives. This would give credence to the idea tha cellular memory can be passed on. Whoa..pretty inspiring stuff and not just a little bit spooky.

Crass religions make big bucks off the masses who need to purchase their places in the Kingdom of God. I remember once shoveling a drive buried in feet of snow for a woman who then paid me in Catholic indulgences. They gave me a full 90 days less in Purgatory. I told her I was Presbyterian. She smiled and closed the door. I almost shoved the snow back into the drive.

I'm glad that so many can be so sure they know what happens at death. Some just know because they read it in the Bible never thinking that even that book is just another attempt by humans to figure this out. Some just know it's true because it's "true for me." Some feel that it just has to be true or what's the point. One cannot just die for nothing after learning all this stuff in life and having all these experiences.

When one of "our own" i.e. Church related person, dies, devil or demon, we hardly know what to say. We tend to say nice things about those we somewhat agree with or at least did not hurt us or others along the way, such as Mr. Ian Boyne recently. We always know what to say when those we revile for their narcissism and pain inflicted pass.  Mostly we say nothing and let others handle that publically. But quietly, we mostly just wonder what will it be like when we get to that time or how that person might have felt in their final realizations that it was over.

It is the search that is interesting in life, not the finding.  Those who think they have found it all , neatly packaged and easy to understand if they are "called" or "chosen" are cruising on pious convictions with marginal information at best.  Nothing is as easy as or clear as Church of God types make it seem....






35 comments:

Byker Bob said...

One of the hardest things to swallow for me personally when I was led back to faith about 11 years ago was the idea that I would be required to live forever. One of the aspects that I had found so comforting about atheism was that you lived life the best you could, and then you were simply gone. Life was the journey, its own objective, a phenomenon totally unto itself.

As a technical person, who serves people by making their various technologies work, one of the aspects I found most troubling was that in the Kingdom, I would be forced to rule people. I found this problematic not only because I don't like to interfere with other peoples' trips or free will, but because we were taught that we were "qualifying" (actually being controlled) by learning Armstrongism, and would be applying that Armstrongism to our subjects for all eternity. I could not fathom being forced to be an anal retentive asshole for all eternity, and reporting to the same idiots who ran the WCG. But, apparently there are certain personality types (think Dave Pack, Gerald Flurry, Rod Meredith, James Malm, or Bob Thiel) who would relish this and consider it to be the ultimate reward and opportunity.

Fortunately, I believe there is something better in store for us. I believe that God has given us our unique personalities, aptitudes, and intellect to be used as a form of individual expression in accomplishing good. I no longer believe that we will be forced into being Armstrong #111 Yellow Pencils or automatons. So, death, rather than conforming to all the above euphemisms and humorous expressions, is simply the closing of one door, as the next one opens for us. And, while I hope to be around for a while to accomplish more good, death is not something I fear. I would not go so far as to get a custom "Death is a Gas!" black T-shirt, but let's face it, unless a seed dies, there can be no new plant.

BB

James said...

Death isn't all that bad if it frees someone from armstrongism. Life is hard enough without some asshat minister telling you what to think, where to go, and how to behave.

Being free of all those constraints allows a person to make decisions based on free will. It is free will that makes a individual who they are, not some "church' who bleeds you dry as it controls your every breath.

Thiel, Flurry, Asshat Pack, etc, all have the makings of a third world dictator. Give them enough power and they would start executing those thought not worthy of life.

Gerald Bronkar said...


Well thought out post on death Dennis! I hope that when I "pass away" I will simply leave my dead body and open my eyes to a wonderful surprise. It is not a belief based on faith, but merely a hope for the possibility of a genuine purpose. Atheism requires almost as much faith as Christianity, and offers no real answers for matter, life and consciousness.

The future that Christianity offers is indeed bleak, unless you happen to be in the 0.99% of those who say they have accepted Jesus Christ as their Savior. It is not an inclusive belief system, and places non-Christians in eternal torture. What kind of god would put his children in forever misery, even if they were rebellious? Humanity would be much better off with nothingness.

The concept of reincarnation is an interesting possibility. It seems to offer purpose, growth and a place for everyone.

Surprise me! Or not. What I think or believe is not significant to the real outcome.

Dennis said...

BB
Yep..The idea of ruling over cities and nations was the last thing I would need or want to feel complete. The antithesis of peace.That idea must only appeal to the insecure psychopaths/sociopaths/narcissists types. Give me a wind in the pines with a small log home . keep the mansions..

Anonymous said...

BB
Americas founding fathers got it right with the role of government being that of 'securing peoples right to life liberty and the pursuit of happiness.' Herbs ministers are off on a tangent with their 'ruling' of members, or 'ruling' people in next life.
Observing the world, the commie Russians promised economic prosperity in exchange of people giving up their freedom. The prosperity never materialized. The same with the watered down version of the 'social contract' in the western democratic countries after WW2. Economic growth typically dropped from 8% to 2% when these policies were implemented. As for the higher 'spiritual' values, by definition of being higher, they can only be the product of personal choice. They cannot be achieved by government tyranny.
Meaning, there is no evidence that church tyranny is justified. It is not to be found in the bible (but rather condemned) and it's application worldwide always results in harm.
The logical conclusion is that the splinter leaders 'ruling' is pure power lust, combined with envy and murder toward their betters in the church.

Dennis said...

Along with Ron Dart, I believe "he that is greatest among you, let him be your servant" seemed the best and safest form of "ruling"

Allen C. Dexter said...

There's a lot I wonder about. I know there is no YHVH in control of the whole damn world and my destiny. I know Jesus is a fictitious construct dreamed up by the Romans to bring order. I know the Bible is mostly ludicrous fiction. I see no absolute evidence that anything survives death, but it's an intriguing possibility that I'm not groveling in fear about. Maybe reincarnation of something immaterial is possible. Maybe there is something unseen and spiritual we can't detect, on the order of "dark matter" and "dark energy. There are a lot of possibles. But, in the meantime, I'll go with what science proves to be absolute. I'm not going to give my personal freedom to anyone's narcissistic dominion anymore. I'll live my life by the principles of humanism which far outdo any list of commandments any god supposedly gave. I'll go on being as loving and caring as I possibly can, being painfully aware of my own faults and inadequacies and the inevitable mistakes I make, but not groveling in fear of damnation from some all-powerful source that never seems to show up when it is needed most.

Byker Bob said...

What's source for your economic growth figures? Preliminary fact checking indicates that those are impossible.

BB

Anonymous said...

From people I have known, I have to conclude that religious people are much more afraid to die than those who are agnostic or atheist. One would think the opposite would be true. I can only conclude that these religious people were either unsure of their beliefs and felt doubt, or perhaps thought they were going to suffer from the hell/punishment their religion promised for the sinners and unbelievers.

Anonymous said...

my cousin died earlier this year, and her mother died just recently: both times i felt obligated to pony up money in contribution towards their funerals...

i told my mother and my sister that if i died before them i do not want them to spend any of the insurance money on a funeral; if they want to honor me they should spend the money on the living: spending money on my carcass is a waste, and could be better spent on clothes, school supplies, transportation, etc., that would benefit my neices and nephews (i have no children of my own, and my ex wives can go eff themselves)...

True Bread said...

well written Dennis....

If I ever get into a position again of being in a "group" I would like to be led by Dennis....but I will never be a part of another "group".

But it's simple....I know what happens when we die. We go back to where we came from. We are not from this earth, nor this dimension....get your mind around that.

We will all have our shot at immortality....if you don't want it, you don't have to have it.

Anonymous said...

i am assuming that ur heading is quoting 1 Corinthians 15:51: "Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,"

i dont think it unreasonable that if Christ were to Return, say, today that there will certainly be those of the elect that would be presently alive and changed into incorruptable beings...

its either that or kill them and resurrect them simultaneously, right?

Anonymous said...

Those who think they have found it all , neatly packaged and easy to understand if they are "called" or "chosen" are cruising on pious convictions with marginal information at best.

Which is why exposing global Zionism is a honorable endeavor. Too bad Herbie did the opposite.

Retired Prof said...

I don't just believe in reincarnation, I have seen it in action.

In our family we bury our garbage, consisting of dead plant and animal parts, in the garden. The garbage turns to compost, and that compost fertilizes the roots of plants. In other words parts of the plants and animals we threw away are reincarnated, a word that etymologically means "made into flesh again" and can be paraphrased as "becomes new living things."

As a matter of fact, I have also seen the compost that surrounds skeletons in the bottoms of graves, with tree roots threading through that compost and coiling around the bones, sucking up the substance that once constituted a human being. To turn into compost, that person had first been reincarnated as billions, maybe trillions of microbes, and in turn they contributed substance to the tree. The tree transferred some of that substance to birds in the form of berries, dropped dead leaves to the soil for compost, and gave up parts of its bark and wood to beetle larvae, some of which got recycled into woodpeckers.

No doubt people who recognized (if only vaguely) this process leaped from purely material reincarnation across a vast abstract chasm and landed on the regeneration of consciousness. Me, I stop at the concrete barrier of the purely material. There may be some way that consciousness could persist after the brain rots and its atoms get redistributed and rearranged into new and different molecules constituting parts of many different plants and animals, sure. Have it that way if it feels good to you. It's just that to me it seems about as likely as unscrambling an egg.


Anonymous said...

Like BB, I have no desire to be in charge of the Decapolis. Like Diehl, I think after this world, I will need some alone time - at least 5,000 years to begin with - maybe not so much alone as to be with all new faces - people I did not have to deal with here at this time. I want to enter into rest.

This is why to me that little black book written by HWA called Tomorrow's World or something like that - where he assigned himself, as if he were in the role of god, a very high rank in the Kingdom - was like a tour through Dante's Inferno of an Armstrongist type.

It is odd that biological life fades out. Rocks don't die. You would think evolution would have selected for longevity long ago and by this time all biological life would be of great duration. And life would be edging toward immortality. But instead we are all sailing toward entropy.

Gordon Feil said...

Dennis, you've clearly had a more interesting life than mine. I don't say that grudgingly. I like that you think. I don't always agree with your conclusions, nor often with the ones you reveal in this blog, but I have often said I don't care what a man believes as much as how he came to believe it, and i respect the process through which you have arrived at your conclusions. I just think something is missing. Even though it may be small, it can be crucial in the same way that a small signpost may be crucial to a traveller.

As to ruling, I too have no desire for that power. Power? Who needs it? But that is with my current motivations. Once i am translated from this simulation where I have human tendencies, and my consciousness is placed into a real body in the real world (the one inhabited by God, a real person), I expect I will see things differently and acquire a taste for ruling.

Yet I expect that the ruling will be in much the same way as i tried to rule my kids when they were small ---- allowing them as much freedom as they could handle so that they would mature and learn wisdom; allowing them to get hurt but not destroyed, so they could grow from it; and letting them know i was always there for them for advice, comfort, whatever.

And eventually those being ruled will grow into the same place where I then am and ultimately there will be no need for rulership because all will merge in intent and connection in a collective self-rule only feasible because of absolute Love and Wisdom had by all. Even in typing that, i recoil a bit because it isn't me....i'm like you in that i want my own corner...but i expect my nature to change so that i will be quite comfortable AND comforted by how things are then. Truly, we see through a glass darkly....maybe we are simply each noticing different things when we look through it.

Michael said...

Byker Bob wrote:
"One of the aspects that I had found so comforting about atheism was that you lived life the best you could, and then you were simply gone."

I don't see what you found comforting about it. I certainly don't.
But if it's the hard cold fact of existence there's nothing to be done about and as an atheist you just have to accept it - that when you die, everything you did, loved accomplished reverts back to zero.

I think anyone who rejoices in that fact (as an atheist) is just bluffing. Everything you ever do amounting to naught isn't a cause for rejoicing.

But the fact that it's not pleasant doesn't make it not true.

Michael said...

Dennis posted:
"Missionaries rush to save the lost before they die while admitting, in some circles that if they left them ignorant, a loving God would automatically translate them into heaven upon death. I mean, they can't help it they were born in New Guinea or the Great Plains."

The inherent cognitive dissonance of the Great Commission isn't it.
We gotta save everyone, it's of paramount importance to God's Great Plan! (or, for the WCG flavor, "We gotta *warn* (not save) everyone").

But only the smallest fraction of persons in New Guinea (or____ fill in the blank) ever get reached, this has to be reconciled with a supposed loving God, so there you go.
They will reach heaven some other way, or nature teaches them about God, or HWA had a meeting with some leader in their part of the world so by extension they have been warned... or whatever other rationalization is used.

Believers need to feel like they're busy actively and vigorously doing something important for "God's work", whatever that is, but since it's obviously not being effective, hence the workaround explanations.

Anonymous said...

BB
Those economic growth figures are presented on the YouTube video 'The myth of Scandinavian socialism' by Stefan Molyneux.

Anonymous said...

hard to cite a source when ur merely parroting fox news...

Anonymous said...

hard to cite a source when ur merely parroting fox news...

Anonymous said...

"Quantum physics now speculates we all simply live in a simulation for only supreme programmer knows why."

actually (in my opinion), i think there is some fundamental truth in that statement: i have long believed that we in the flesh are merely artificial life, certainly in comparison to the spirits that God Created...

it is most evident in the ease with which we become nonexistent: any one of us can simply become non existent in an instance, even in the midst of our pontificating we....oh, uh, errr, ahhhhhh....

Byker Bob said...

Those figures simply don't jibe, 11:45. From 1929 to late in the 1940s, the USA and much of the world was enmired in the winter season of the Kondratiev long wave economic cycles which have been inherent in all capitalist economies, a depression during which there is contraction, negative growth while debt is purged from the system, and the economy readies itself for renewal, the spring season of the next cycle. This also coincides with the evolution and embracing of new technologies. The Jubillee year of the Old Testament basically dealt with this winter economic season and quickly corrected it.

Over the past decades, even as some of the European nations have embraced the Scandanavian model, The US has largely resisted socialism. This is why Hillarycare was rejected, and why there is so much resistance to Obamacare, and why there was reform to welfare.

Keynsian economics created the huge middle class in the USA, by providing wages to factory workers that would allow them to purchase the products they made in the factories in which they work. The resulting US consumer base is what has driven the world economy in the decades following World War II, during which time the US first emerged as a world super power. The GI Bill, and higher wages are what enabled poorly educated factory workers to send their children to college and university.

Comparing Scandanavia's runaway socialist economies to that of the US is useful as a cautionary message, but it ends up being an apples to oranges comparison. The US has always been the land of checks and balances. We do have some socialist aspects to our capitalist economy. But, the two party system has acted as guy wires, so that any time the pole begins to list to one side or the other, there is a mighty tug from the opposite side to stabilize it. We've never even become as socialist as Canada, our neighbor to the north which has had socialized medicine for decades.

BB

Miller Jones/Lonnie C Hendrix said...

Dennis,
This was a great post, and I very much enjoyed the discussion which followed it. You are, of course, absolutely correct about none of us knowing with any degree of certainty what comes next. Even for those who rely exclusively on Scripture, there is more than enough ambiguity contained in its references on the subject to make certainty seem ridiculous.
I liked Retired Professor's take on what happens to our physical remains after we die, and how all of that gets recycled. I understand where Michael is coming from, but I found his assessment a little bleak and unfair to atheists.
For me, the world around us suggests something better. ALL of the life on this planet is preoccupied with the business of perpetuating itself (in other words, achieving immortality). We pass on some of our life, essence and experiences to future generations - pieces of us survive (and I loved Dennis' allusion to the possibility of cellular memory). After all, evolution is entirely about the perpetuation of life. In the end, even the branches of the tree which don't get to continue have contributed to the survival of the whole tree of life.
Hence, I find that the speculation of the human authors of the Bible on this subject eminently reasonable and warranted by our experiences and observations in this life. In the end, I agree with Byker Bob - I believe there is something better in store for us than just nothingness. I also agree with the general consensus expressed here that, whatever that turns out to be, it won't be limited to a select few.

Anonymous said...

1.55 AM
Fox news? Stefan is a independent who is financially supported by his blog viewers.

nck said...

BB and Anonymous,

Perhaps you are mistaken "socialist types programs", with "socialist economies.

To understand for instance a country like Norway.
One should understand that this little country small in population has invested its oil proceeds in such manner that it (sovereign wealth fund controlled by the Norwegian government) currently owns 1-5 percent of some 9000 companies. In just a number of years they could increase that to 7% of the best companies in the world.

This is paying for "socialist programs" yes, but socialist economy?

Most European nations are currently re discovering the merits of the "Rheinmodel", where the workers are considered as important an asset or stakeholder as the stockholder. More of a long term model than the Anglo Saxon 3 month reporting to the stockholder.

Economic freedom is indeed a great driver to prosperity. Although full capitalism and 100% freedom breeds inequality, the destruction of the middle class and inevitable revolution.
Therefore the rainmakers need to be restrained by social politicians.

BTW great description of one of the aspects of "the unseen hand" from some place.

nck

nck said...

It just struck me that in socialist theory, capitalism is a necessary phase to enter into socialism. You cannot go from serfdom to socialism without the capitalist phase.
No wonder people have a hard time reconciling HWA rampant capitalist support of the American empire in all diplomatic support wcg provided all over the world especially the vunerable allies in the third world, while at the same time preaching that it would result in something that mirrored "a socialist utopia."

It is not internally inconsistent.
It is the pattern toward a global consciousness and one planet for all kind of thinking.
Globalism is just a phase toward that goal.

It will be ruthlessly implemented since it works. Never has the city of Milan attacked, Bologna or Florence again after they were united under one ideology.

nck

Anonymous said...

Every now and then I sort of go into a chasm, where I realize what a screw up I have been, and how sick I am of the struggle of life every single day. At times I have cried to God to let me go and be with Him. I would love to see my Dad, my brothers and other friends and family that preceded me in death. I crave the day that God will dry every eye, as written in Revelation. However, recently my narcissistic, physically abusive Mother died after being in the WCG/GCI for almost 60 years. It was a hard and spiritually draining relationship. I am now experiencing peace and relief from all things WCG. I find now I am willing to wait as long as possible as to not reunite with her. The pain all too fresh. So if this is all there is, ok by me.

Anonymous said...

which would explain why he couldnt cite any sources to support his contention...

Byker Bob said...

There's probably something better waiting for you, 1:33. Most Christians believe that in the Kingdom, or in Heaven, we'll be with our families. But in actual life, we're close to and nurtured by our families (unless they were Armstrongites) only for the first 18 or more years of life, and then we leave our families and build relationships with others, such as friends, in-laws, co-workers, and our various mentors. Who is to say which set, if either, we'd be closer to in the Kingdom? Some of us have nothing in common with our families, and much more in common with those with whom we share a common path. Sometimes, the people we're closest to actually hold us back, keep us from learning, and in general throttle us.

Plus, when Jesus gives us all perfect understanding, it's going to change many of our attitudes. You'd probably rather sit down and have a beer with Charlie Manson now, and I know we've got one poster here who just can't wait to meet Hitler, but your Mom may end up actually being a cool person in the Kingdom, someone who can finally express her own opinions rather than just spitting her programming in your face as she did throughout your physical life. You never know. Also, nothing wrong with hanging out here on planet Earth for a while longer, even if life after 30 does pretty much suck. Win, dude!

Cheers!
BB

Byker Bob said...

The mistake you pointed out in not making the distinction between socialist programs and socialist economies? That's not my mistake, nck. It is anonymous's mistake alone. Somehow, he is also not realizing the distinction between socialism and social justice. And, that has been the point I've been trying to make in my discussion with him all along. He is taking in data, like the information on some of the Scandanavian economies, somehow failing to analyze and interpret it in proper context, and then hypothecating the future for the USA based upon it, and not the checks and balances reality of the USA's past and present existence. His mentality is very similar to that of people who join or lead militias. And we must remember that like members of Armstrongism, militia types consider themselves to be the enlightened ones, and marvel that somehow the rest of us just can't see it.

It's a manifestation of the unseen ass from somewhere.

BB

Byker Bob said...

Nck, what's true is that parasites require a healthy host in order to survive. All parasites do sap the host's energy somewhat, but not all parasites kill their host (example: fetus in the womb).

Basically, socialism is parasitic in nature. Socialism saps the energies of capitalism. Simultaneously, it also functions as a nurturer-pacifier for the at risk or marginalized peoples (miner's canary?) amongst us. But, socialism is another one of those percentage deals. So long as it is low percentage, and limited in its application, the host can remain healthy indefinitely. As in the case of the Roman Empire, if it ever becomes dominant as a practice and a mentality, the host can do nothing but succumb. You can also limit it, but in using a nation's pooled resources for the common good of the citizenry, it is totally impossible to completely eliminate it. Some practices are going to be parasitic, while others are going to put back into the system. The nature of the survival of any ecology system is such that more must be put back than is taken out.

BB

nck said...

"The nature of the survival of any ecology system is such that more must be put back than is taken out."

Yes yes I do agree!

I'm just arguing that full capitalism has a tendency to take more than put back in. Since it does tend not to pay the full prize. (global warming was not prized in, depletion of resources, slave labor in ANY chocolate bar you know the drill) Capitalism might be considered parasitic over the backs of the common worker/citizin at times.

I am all in favor of freedom. Then looking at photographs from the 1850's boroughs of New York or the destitute conditions in London during the "greatest empire of the world" or the serfs in Tsarist Russia I cannot bring myself to calling the marginalized parasites.
Those pictures beat any argument that socialism is born from "jealousy".

The first social programs in the world were executed in about the 1500's when the merchants of the cities noticed that their families were dying because of disease stemming from the poor circumstances of the other inhabitants. Societies should be a symbiosis between the talented and the less fortunate.
And yes we should rewarding parasite behavior, while at the same time believing we as individuals are all that great while enjoying a "non circular" economy.

I am glad the norwegian sovereign wealth has announced the end of the oil age.

Africa is the fastest developing region after 60 years of depletion now finally the Chinese have taken the lead. Western moralizing (both capitalist and soviet) had left them destitute. Chinese investment is bringing prosperity and growth. Our moralizing was just a veil to take and deplete without paying the full asset prize for commodities.

You know how we maintain our power. We sell them outdated or inferior f16 and keep the superior stuff for ourselves. It's ok. I love ourselves. But we should always maintain humble while adressing those less fortunate and never deem ourselves superior while we control the system and manipulate it deliberately to maintain the status quo.

nck

nck said...

Haha yes life sucks after 30.

It used to be 40.
But hey if you are a millenial BB is statistically accurate.

I have heard rumors that after 50 it start to get pretty cool again.

But hey as John says.

Time will tell.

Aspire to be more than a statistic and some pretty cool things will occur.

Nck

Byker Bob said...

Nck, I've only lived during the times after Keynsian economics created the vast American middle class, a model which later enriched much of the rest of the civilized world. But, you make a valid point in that the business moguls and industrialists prior to that time certainly were unconscionable parasites to the working class, who had so little to be "parasited" to begin with. Actually, It is quite fair to say that HWA modeled his church and the ensuing exploitation of the "proles" after what he witnessed following 19th century industrialization. Much of the moneyed class of today would like to take class conditions back to that time, but fortunately there are too many protections in place to allow that to happen. Reagan only got so far in his vigorous attempt to dismantle them, and Trump is most certainly doing his best, but again, they're bucking against the guy wires from the other side. This time around, I am a little apprehensive though, because Trump distracted people and caused outrage with his tweets each time he needed cover to appoint a new batch of ultra-conservative judges. I understand he's pretty much restacked the judiciary within the past months. It's now been a while since he has deliberately embarrassed himself with any new tweets, so the damage has probably already been largely done. The last liberal bastion is the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

E pluribus unim. That's always been our strength. Some would like to foment the Balkanization of it, but so doing would create anarchy. I believe that after the examples of Yugoslavia, and Iraq, we can all understand that no good comes from that sort of scenario, and there are no winners. War and strife tear down and destroy. World War II destroyed the dominance of the great empire-building nations of Europe, even the winners were spent forces. The sheer magnitude of problems planet Earth currently faces must be addressed globally, in a cooperative fashion. Nations which deny them and secede from the communal effort become part of the problem, and make it much more difficult for the nations making an honest effort in the repair.

BB