Dude, where have I been? I only now somehow stumbled upon this whole ‘everybody draw Muhammad thing.’ I mean, of course I’m aware of the situation. Newspapers drawing the prophet, then fundamentalists demanding an apology; Southpark’s spoofs (is this ok? Putting him inside a van, etc.)

But I just found the blog “Everyone Draw Mohammed” and the Facebook pages, both for and against the movement. I wish I’d thought of it first – although that sort of blatant, militant ambition is not my style (atheism or forms of anti-religion can be every bit as rigid and dogmatic as fundamentalist believers… although I agree with them, I’d still prefer a calm reasonable conversation to a bunch of angry hate-mongering.)

At the same time, this whole issue is just freaking retarded. Sure – they aren’t supposed to draw their prophet. That’s fine. Nobody’s making them. Telling everybody else, however, that they also can’t draw him or say bad things about him – that’s unfair, unjust, and undemocratic. How on earth did Muhammad get so special – more special than me, God or Jesus, not to mention Buddha, etc.

Why can’t we draw Muhammad? Obviously because Islam is a violent religion. Now everytime I say something like this, everybody gets all pissed off, and say I’m unfairly stereotyping Islam and Muslims as terrorists and how that’s not true. Seriously? Go fuck yourself. I’m tired of stepping on glass and avoiding the issue and being all politically correct about this. SURE not all Muslims are violent! Of course! And sure Christians or any other religious nut can be every bit as stupid, angry and violent as muslim fundamentalists!

But even so – nothing like this issue, or anything remotely like it, exists in the modern world for any other religion except for Islam. Everybody makes fun of Jesus – he’s so easy to make fun of. And Christians sob and pout and pray, but they don’t blow things up! Islam is the only organized religion who are organized and determined and righteous enough to defend their prophet’s honor through violence. That’s a fact. And giving up our own freedom of speech, because of fear of that violence, is an unreasonable imposition – an imposition which should be rigorously fought against.

Hence, I’m in full support of the movement. That said, there are much better sites where you can actually see the hundreds of cartoons that have been drawn as a statement against this absurd controversy. Also visit the wikipedia page to understand the full history of the movement. Here are a few of my favorites:

Kind of. In fact, they found a large wooden structure at about 13,000 feet, mostly buried under ice. It MUST be the ark, rather than anything else, they reason, because no human settlement has ever been found that high. They conclude that they are 99.9% sure that this is the boat God commanded Noah to build, which saved all of the animals from God’s wrath. (By the way – WTF? God wants to destroy humanity, so he floods the earth, but he doesn’t have a failsafe plan to protect all his other creatures, so he decides to spare one family so they can save his own creation from his own destruction? That’s some messed up planning.)

At any rate – besides the fact that the group is named after the ark, are Evangelicals, are specifically trying to find the ark (if they’d have found anything else up there, that might have been the ark, too) there seems to be a horrendous gap in adequate research standards on this expedition.

Moreover, proving that this thing is the ark should be all-too-easy. They say they carbon tested it to about 4800 years (although, some scientists have challenged that dating, and other tests put it at only 1,400 years ago – click here for that story).

They’ve also found small, wooden compartments (pictured below) which “could have been used to harbor animals”. There’s a great video of the team exploring – click here to watch it – and it really is a neat site, with lots of wood.

For it to be the ark, however, I’d like them to go into these little wooden compartments and scrape the floorboards for the impressive amount of hair and shit that you’d expect to find after keeping animals locked up for a long sea voyage. This biological matter could be DNA tested and wala – we’d know the species of animal (and the sex – to see if there really were a pair of each). This kind of test should be obvious, and easy to do.

Hell – if you looked long enough, you could find some human debris in there as well (next to the as yet undiscovered steering wheel?). We could bring back Noah through cloning. Now that would be a newsworthy feat.

They should also check the surrounding area to find the site where, after Noah reaches land again, he burns some of the animals that God commanded him to save in a ’sweet-smelling burnt offering’ that God enjoyed.

This is certainly an interesting and magnificent discovery – however claiming that it is a magical boat, which rose to impossible levels because God flooded the earth (despite all evidence to the contrary) a long time ago, and not a fortified city, town or military complex (what better place than high in the mountains?) is nothing short of quackery.

Unfortunately – the team probably knows exactly what it is doing. There are many quacks among us. The Turkish government is eager to support the claim (they too believe it is Noah’s ark) because it will bring in millions of religion-tourists annually, significantly bumping up tourism and the economy. They’re also trying to get it made into a UNESCO World Heritage site. Not a bad idea – and definitely possible. But somebody besides the nuts is going to have to take a good look around and find out what it really is.

This unnerving assumption may sound like I’m just being wicked and picking fights. Not true! The problem of Jesus’ historicity excluding certain races and areas of the world through accidental historical developments is the main reason I gave up being Christian. It is an unresolvable dilemma. I spent years seeking the answer, in an attempt to save my faith. In the end, I chose a personal belief in a god that wouldn’t punish certain races to hell over a God who would – the Christian God.

Celsus said it first, and best. To paraphrase, ‘why send the son of god, salvation, to the Jews at one point in history, instead of making him easily accessible to all?’ Christianity started in Jerusalem and Alexandria before spreading to Rome. As it was incapable of coexisting with other religions, it soon wiped out all others. It came to the Americas via the European expansion. Specifically – the Christian idea that the world was made for Christians and that the Indians were wicked savages who would have to die before the ‘chosen race’ could inherit. (Just as the Jews first practices mass-extermination and genocide of the people that they found living in the land God promised them.) Millions of native Americans were also killed by the European viruses; the rest were easily slaved or converted to Christianity. Although much of America is now Christian, including S. America, that legacy is based on insidious, inglorious historical developments that are very ungodly.

Meanwhile, much of the world has never and continues not to be included in God’s plan of saving grace: does God hate the Chinese? They have absolutely never had the same opportunity to know and accept Jesus Christ. Access to him even today is through Westernized Chinese or Westerners, who have Western ideas and lifestyles. Jesus is a white male; a symbol of white culture. The Chinese who turn to him do so to the exclusion of their own culture and history – and it is a tiny fraction of the general population.

In other countries such as S. Korea, the introduction of Christianity has been successful. In the last 50 years, S. Korea has gone from having virtually no Christians to almost 50% or more. Is this country suddenly more deserving of heaven – unlike its ancestors? This increase is do to 20th century political maneuvering and warfare, which aligned S. Korea and the USA. Is this God’s plan? Does God love S. Korea more than Taiwan – which is also closely tied to the USA but in which Christianity has not taken as firm a root?

If Jesus is historical ‘and’ the true son of god – the fullest/best revelation of god and best/only path to Him, then it is problematic that through historical developments Christianity has taken hold in specific cultures. If Jesus is God’s plan to save – why did he only appear at that fixed geographic location – and why has God not seen fit to push the spread of Christianity? Is salvation just ‘luck’ ? Does God not care about Asia?

These are serious questions, which much be explained theologically before Christianity can be accepted.

Interestingly, the main story was actually taken from Christian mythology, rather than Greek: Zeus “loves” human kind, so would not punish them even in their defiance. But something has to be done. So – paraphrasing from the book of Job – Hades (Lucifer) asks Zeus if he can punish the humans; giving Zeus, the all powerful mighty God the loophole to duck out of. So Hades ‘torments’ human kind – although he really does no such thing. He just says you will all die, or you will give up your princess Andromeda. Quite rightly, the villagers don’t give a hoot about the princess and are ready to feed her to the beast.

How the indiscretions of a bunch of blasphemers can be compensated by the blood sacrifice on an innocent, faithful girl, is unclear. Perseus, rather than having any interest in Andromeda, just wants to kill the Kracken to get at Hades, whom he plans to kill (of course, it’s impossible to kill a god and in the end he just banishes him).

OK – the story does sound good. Monsters, princesses, greek gods – but somehow they screw it all up, and the story is peppered by ridiculous, laugh out loud bit of horseshit, inconsequential, underdeveloped characters that come and go, cheap sets and costumes (let’s just rub dirt on everybody – heck they never bathed back then did they?).

It played out like a bad, 30 year old TV B movie (actually the acting was probably better in the old versions, even with the crappy effects). Not that the bad acting was completely the actor’s faults. The lines were god-awful. There was no cohesive plot, no twists, no surprises, nothing interesting at all. Noone said anything funny or clever (the one attempt at humor wasn’t funny and the audience watched sadly as the actors all had to laugh as if it had been). I felt like the actors knew they were making a flop and just wanted to get out as soon as possible so they could put it all behind them.

Sure – great special effects. But we’re used to special effects. I could have been home playing God of War Three – which is visually more appealing and has a much stronger story… If I were editing this movie as a novel (which is what I do) I would have torn it apart. Why did this character do/say/think this? What was the motivation? How did they get from here to there so fast? Why is he angry/sad/happy? What’s the reason? Why would Zeus have given Perseus divine presents when Perseus mission was to defy and defeat the gods? etc.

The movie stuck pretty close to the original myth of Perseus and Andromeda, which was interesting to watch – until they absolutely screwed it up in the end by having Perseus ditch Andromeda, and letting Zeus restore the already dead Gemma so that the two demigods could get it on (why Zeus didn’t restore Perseus dead family instead is one of many unanswered questions.)

If you want to see a good movie, go see Percy Jackson’s the Lightning thief: more stars, and better acting. Clash of Titans, it’s true, probably had better effects; but I’ve come to realize effects mean very little when you’re painfully sitting through a movie with gaps in logic, reason, motivation, and consequence.

Hi – Satan here. It’s been a while. I was kind of busy with little trivial stuff, work etc. Christmas came and went. I’ll bet a lot of you think I hate Christmas. Jesus Christ is born, he will later conquer me and restore righteousness, blah blah blah. No, Christmas to me is just another day – although the way you people celebrate confuses the hell out of me.

First off – God and I had our disagreement before the creation of the world (at least in some versions, and according to your definition of world). That was like, millions of years ago. And FYI, humans were celebrating the birth of a savior, a bringer of light, on December 25th LONG before Jesus showed up.

Christmas has NOTHING to do with Jesus Christ. The candles, the fir tree, the gift giving – are you serious!? The Attics used to cut down a fir tree, place a little suffering Attis doll on top, and bring it into the temple of the goddess every year. It symbolized, incidentally, a phallus (penis) impregnating the goddess and regenerating life on earth. And you still do it today!! What does Jesus have to do with a Christmas tree? Nothing. But it was a common pagan practice.

Oh sure, you go to church on Christmas Eve, but you sing about a child being born in a manger, who will someday defeat darkness and was visited by shepherds – these things were all said about other saviors – especially Horus, the Egyptian sun god. The birth of the sun on Dec. 25th, a huge pagan festival called Saturnalia, the mourning of the passing year (retired sun) and celebration of new life and a new year – these are sensible, meaningful rites. Thank you god for the seasons, for the sun, for food and crops. Nowadays you’ grown lazy; life is too easy for you, you take your food for granted. You don’t need to pray for the sun’s return, for a good harvest. You’re fat and lazy – this life isn’t that scary. Now you’re worried about the next life of all things. You want assurance that the next life, and even eternity will turn out alright. You’re not happy with just another year of existence, you want Heaven and Eternal Bliss. Spoiled pansies, all of you. So you celebrate, instead of the sun, a savior who will give you exactly what you want – but with absolutely no sacrifice on your part. And you use the same words, customs, practices and even the same DAY that the pagans already used for their own life celebrations.

And Jesus Christ, Santa Claus!? Father time (Saturn) combined with Apollo, the sun god riding his chariot through the sky each day, combined with the patriarchal God the Father – the old bearded man in heaven who is keeping tabs on whether you’ve been naughty or nice… Santa (an anagram for Satan by the way) is more real than you think. Oh, sure, you know he’s a myth now; but you’ll teach him to your children until their old enough that you can tell them the truth without breaking their hearts and replace him with virtually the same myth in grown up terms.

Anyway, whatever. It’s a time of fun, usually involving holiday and a lot of alcohol, so I’m totally down. I just think some of you have got your head in the sand about what you’re doing and why.

This would be more than enough for archaeologists; just today in the news it was announced that China had found the tomb of a famous historical/mythical character, Cao Cao – a third century ruler. The identification was made, not by the name, but because certain tablets had his posthumous title on them: “The stone tablets bearing inscriptions of Cao’s posthumous reference are the strongest evidence,” archaeologist Liu Qingzhu, of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, was quoted as saying. “No one would or could have so many relics inscribed with Cao’s posthumous reference in the tomb unless it was Cao’s.” (yahoo news).

That bit of logic aside, curiously these tablets were not found in the tomb at all! They were seized from people who had apparently stolen them from the tomb; a statement which strikes me as suspicious in the extreme. All things may well be in order, but it reminds me of the early British Egyptologists who (badly) painted a pharaoh’s name on the wall of the great period as proof of their theory that it was a tomb of said pharaoh – no doubt in the process bolstering their reputation and funding.

Of course, Jesus’ tomb should be easy to identify: it will be empty. There will be no body or bones. Jesus was probably buried with no treasure – we are not told of any decoration or furnishings. We are looking for a hole, maybe with a big rock by the door. (Although, if the tomb was donated by a rich convert as tradition tells us, it may actually have been quite nice.)

My faith that the tomb of Jesus will be found is much less due to my faith in the historical Jesus, as it is due to my lack of faith in archaeologists, who are desperate to link a site with a noteworthy historical personage and read into history only what we already know of history. (If this is too strong, I’ll admit that many are probably excellent, and morally and intellectually superior, to this generalization.)

Already Switzerland is facing criticism and condemnation; such a strong backlash that the Supreme Court may overturn the decision. If that happens, the future of Switzerland as a politically forward, independent, intellectual, enlightened country dedicated to progress, tolerance and freedom will be jeopardized.

It’s a Catch-22 that when a fundamentalist, dogmatic religion is introduced into a religiously tolerant, free country, that religion will spread until it takes over completely. Its embers will burn slowly at first, feeling its way around, establishing itself in the root system until it has a significant hold on the country. When a country (like Switzerland) realizes that it has allowed the fire to spread unchecked, and tries to douse it with water, the fire will leap up, rage, protest, and fight with unexpected power.

Islam, as it is practiced in most forms and in most countries, continues to stress Faith over Reason; Submission to holy authorities, subordination and abuse of women, and active (sometimes violent) missionary tactics. Of course there are many good ideas in Islam, and in the Koran. Of course many find in Islam comfort and meaning in life. However, it is a Truth that Islam “is not just a religion”. It comes with certain ideologies, and a pattern of self-replication. Islam grows, it recruits, it expands, it converts.

6% of Switzerland is now Muslim, what will happen when it reaches 50%? Will Switzerland, like the USA, begin having arguments about whether to teach evolution in school (or allow women to go to school?) Will Switzerland make political ties with other Islamic countries, negating it’s neutral status?

I see the same process happening in Taiwan with Christianity. In the last 5 years, hundreds of new churches have popped up; Christians have begun having big public ceremonies and gatherings – the English songs and white linen robes look a little ridiculous here. In another 5 years, Taiwan could well be another South Korea, which is nearly 50% conservative, fundamentalist Christian.

Religious Tolerance is not a virtue!

A virtue is a country finding the best ideals that work for the majority of its people to safeguard their freedom and happiness, and continue supporting the countries values. Switzerland has, for a long time, been a beacon of tolerance and neutrality; should it take no action when – as a result of this tolerance – its core social structure is being changed?

But I just found a website explaining the history behind our beliefs in monogamy, which actually argues for Polygamy, and more interestingly, for Christian Polygamy. I found the following website fascinating: http://www.truthbearer.org/

It argues that Christianity was originally polygamous, and that Monogamy, like most other things, were copied directly from the ethical vacuous Romans and Greeks. While it can be easily dismissed as crap, the website offers an extremely lengthy and well researched treatise on the historical developments of both polygamy and monogamy, which for historical interest, is quite brilliant and interesting.

My own convictions are that:

A) love in all forms is good, and an intimate relationship with others should never be unnecessarily thwarted

B) honesty is paramount: “do no harm” is a good starting point

C) For practical reasons, when intending to raise a family or live with someone, monogamy is probably going to be a necessary evil, and can be quite fulfilling if you work at it.

What do you think?

As I’ve mentioned in other posts, this website is intended mainly as a forum to post my research into the historical Jesus (or lack thereof) not as an explicit condemnation of Christianity or modern faithful.

However: Obviously, simply by virtue of questioning those sacred beliefs passionately held by a grand majority of the human race, it is inevitable that I will confront opposition from time to time. I was recently asked (on my Facebook page, in response to one of my paintings) “When did you become so angry?” I hadn’t thought I was particularly angry, but I won’t deny it completely. I would argue FRUSTRATED. Frustrated that I cannot speak my truth quietly and simply without being satanized and damned to Hell.  The following is a recent comment I received on this website:

“Your HB website has to be one of the biggest insults ever …. there has to be some curb of speech! It’s not even clever. You’re not even having rational ‘debates’ about the existence of Jesus. Well, as a good Christian who’s supposed to pray for you .. I most certainly will pray that you rot in hell!!!”

I pray you rot in Hell? Not to bring up the obvious contradiction in this statement with absolutely everything good, moral and Christian, I can’t help but wonder how many people out there believe there must be some curb of speech. I’m certainly not opposed to it. I certainly think that anything said in public as a factual claim should be supported by logically sound and empirically proven evidences; that children be thought to reason and think and not believe; that insults and angry outbursts should be silenced, in favor of calm, polite discussion.

I comment in order to diffuse tension and increase understanding. Obviously I must be doing something wrong. I’m really not such a bad guy. I try to do right by my friends and family, I give money to the poor, I always help out a stranger in need…WTF does Jesus want from me that I’m not giving him?

What did you learn about in school today, dearest? I learned about the revolt of the slaves. I learned how the Jewish, slave mentality, unique in history as the theology of a poor and downtrodden nation, re-invented morality and inserted their perverse sickness into every aspect of contemporary culture. In Nietzsche’s time, it was a BIG deal to criticize Christianity, but he did. How have things changed? What is the critique for my own society? How are things different from Nietzsche’s time? Well, I am allowed to criticize Christianity. In theory, at least. However, those Christian ideas, of pity and self-sacrifice, had already seeped so deeply into the spiritual thought of the last 2,000 years, the cultural conscousness, that they crept outside of religion and made roots in societal consciousness itself. Certain safeguards became in place. Nietzsche is out of vogue now because of political correctness and religious tolerance. It is amazing to me that, despite Nietzsche’s brilliant, methodical, impossible to confute theory on the social evolvement of human morality, Christianity still exists! And they believe the same thing! Why is this? Well, even Nietzsche recognizes that many people are cut out to be sheep. Out of every large group of people, many will be stupid. At least half, maybe more. And so, regardless of religion, there will probably always be some pervading, superstition which, however false and vile, will be believed by all the stupid people. I suppose, to spend a lot of time yelling at stupid people, trying to convince them that what they believe is stupid, is itself very…stupid. (Blake quote) If they were not stupid they would not believe it anyway, the real trick is how to avoid making stupid people in the first place…and this may be somewhat circular, for if the religious system has, from the very beginning, put pride in blind faith and stupidity and meekness and vileness and sickness, and suffering in general, so thick a film of stupidity surrounds them that it is amazing they can function at all. So….the crime of my society, if the stupid are to be left alone, is how the stupid have woven a web of social responsibility so overwhelming that the powerful, the strong and intelligent, must abide by it.

Religious tolerance is one: it is not a Christian value, it protects all religions equally. It protects religions from each other, and it protects religions from academic criticism. What a gift for the stupid! (I need a new word for stupid, too derogatory. Deceived? Blind? Arrogant and clueless?) They can continue with their system, (which is the absolute height of intolerance!) condemn and judge those who don’t agree with them to everlasting fires of hell, without being rebuked, countered or questioned. The wise philosopher who goes to the mountain and spends his life meditating on Truth and Justice and Goodness, returns to society. When it is found out that, in his meditating, he did not encounter the name “Christ, Jesus,” he is checked off the list of eternal reward and penned in for eternal punishment. Eternal punishment! Not for any sin of character, any stain of evil, but for a name untaught! And, as the societal law of Religious Tolerance decrees, he cannot defend himself. He cannot offer counterproof or argument, he cannot engage in a logical debate to save his mortal soul from the clutches of the masses, the millions of uneducated who, for all his constant seeking, and for all their ignorance, know exactly where he will be sent when he dies. What good is this religious tolerance? And to whom? To the religious, of course. And how is religion helpful to society? One religion ties a society together, teaches it to be good, and maintains its divine superiority over other societies. In the rise of nations, then, religion has been instrumental. As have wars, violence, cultural smugness and empirilism, and slavery. Religion has allowed and excused everything necessary for the past 2,000 years of development, everything we know label an error in judgment. “yes, that was wrong, that was bad, but we see that now, and have moved on.” And yet the instrument, the vehicle, which allows us to sin gravely, but sin communally, and be excused for it, has been maintained.

Religion is necessary perhaps, and useful, perhaps. But while earlier religions were honest with man, and god, and honest with life, life, good and bad, modern religion is a revolting life. A lie to truth, at complete odds with reason, an enemy to the body, a prison cell to god.

Besides Tolerance, another evil of modern society is Political Correctness, which disables us from judging any groups (society, bound together, living in community, used to glorify itself through religion. When introduced to other societies it could not vanquish, the exhaltation of the meek. But when living together with other societies, which it was not beneficial to call evil and to fume with hatred, it was settled on tolerance. Once societies blended together, and religion was no longer an umbrella holding together the like-minded, and thus religious tolerance no longer protected from criticism, we arrived at political correctness. Political correctness means we cannot criticize or find fault with any group, for anything. Not for their religious or spiritual beliefs, not for their sexual orientation or practice, especially not for their looks or skin color. This may be a positive step, I’m not sure. However, as an enforced, externally imposed moral, I can’t see how it’s better than any other externally enforced moral. Although its reasons might be sound, and its application practical, it is not beyond the critical examination of Nietzsche’s morality; is it “Good”, good in itself? It has convinced itself that it is; when breached, you will be chastized harshly by whomsoever you have deeply and personally offended. In fact culturally, we are in such a state of hypertension that we are sensitive and easily, so easily angered.

I am not black, and I am not Buddhist. But if someone makes a cutting joke about either blacks or buddhists, I am aware that this is not only poor taste but absolutely off-limits, against the rules. I am offended, but to what end? And for whom? Who am I stepping up for, all blacks and buddhists every where? What has made it my job to defend them? It may be noble, and an advancement of human society in general that we hesitate to say bad things about any group of people, except for two things: we are not able to observe something that may be true about a race. (Nietzsche’s views on Jews: The Jewish slave mentality caused the perversion of morals. The sickly triumph of the weak, continued today in Christianity, is the Jews fault.) But oh no! We can’t blame the Jews. We can’t blame them for anything. We can’t put a critical eye on them at all. Why? Because they have suffered as no people have suffered. Worse than the millions starving in Africa, even today? Is our casual indifference any less cruel than the Nazi’s plan for Jewish extermination? And interestingly, if Political Correctness is good ‘in itself’, we don’t hesitate to speak poorly of other people. I can hate whomever I please, I can hate their actions, their manner, their background, etc, as long as I single them out for something I hate in them alone, and not something they share with a large group. Yet in this case I malign a specific person…is it less hateful than a large group with countless, faceless members?

Enough. I will go no further, for I realize heavily another part of this argument, the final part: Nietzsche, and all philosophers in fact, miss one crucial point, and this is not their fault for it lies in a misconception about the nature of philosophy. Philosophy is the love of wisdom, and consequently the pursuit of wisdom. All too often this is confused with pursuit of truth. The truth, is unfortunately, not synanamous with wisdom for many reasons. The first is that, as many philosophers have shown, Truth is either too far up there to be reached by human intellect, or it is in fact created by human intellect and changes with the tide of human progression. Further more, the Truth as philosophers see it, tends to be at diametric opposition to the contemporary truths of culture. The philosopher, as a gadfly, is the one who has dared to step outside of assumed social truths to seek the Truth, the one with the big ‘T’, up in the sky. The philosopher is the one from Plato’s cave who steps outside into the light, comes back to share the message of the Truth with the big ‘T’, and is consequently torn apart by his contemporaries….in this the philosopher separates himself, although it may be more acurate to say, the philosopher is first the one separated, from society. Looking at the lives of philosophers, they are often full of tragedy. Nietzsche himself, while terribly sick, could not get along with many people, fell viciously in love with women who would not receive him, did not have his work accepted as he had hoped, went mad and died in relative darkness. And, subsequently, while he hoped his work would overthrow social constraints, cause a revolution in religious and philosophical assumptions, in fact, it did not. Those drawn to Nietzsche today are likewise those who consider themselves outsiders, prophets, wisemen, who intelligently and honestly describe the errors of contemporary society, artists and writers, philosophers, musicians. And here’s the secret, silly and humorous: society, at large, ignores them completely. The music is enjoyed, of course, the idealogies of the masses change a bit, but society and its progression, is unaffected.

Why? For one, the heart of society is more Marxist than anyone acknowledges. Commerce and economy marches on, and humans race for the oars, for at the end of the day, we must find a place in this complex, economic organism to buy our daily bread. Even philosophers, pretending to be above such duty, cannot escape the fact. Life needs fuel, and we have lost our taste for nuts and berries, and lost our skill at hunting, skinning and flesh; and were we to regain it, we would have no time for such pursuits as philosophy. But I digress. Society continues. I may be Christian one day, Marxist, the Nietzschean, and final some conglomerate of New Age idealisms, but every day, I put on my tie and go to work. Idealogy has no effect on commerce and economy. My point? Nietzsche and philosophers, while fascinating, can be easily discarded as malcontents, criticizing only what they once desired but failed to attain. What if the first girl Nietzsche had proposed to had accepted? Most likely he would never have written another book. He may have had the same ideas, possibly, but might have been convinced by his better half not to stir the waters or offend the in-laws. Nietzsche’s writings were his own form of hatred and revenge; revenge on a society who ignored him and didn’t hold him in the esteem he held for himself. His Zarathustra was his own personal warrior, sent in to defeat his enemies: although he had no trouble naming and defiling his enemies (which were also once his best friends) on paper. And now? Today we have bred a society of philosophers. With the insurgence of new and contradictory ideals, the post-modern breakup of community and group, as well as any hope for meaning and truth (despite blind acceptance of some religion, which should have, on its on merits, died out in the face of rational criticism). We have a whole lot of malcontents, struggling to find a place in society, struggling to be counted, to be loved, eager to offer their criticisms on society or anything else they can think of; and yet, we also, as in any age, have everyone else, the masses, the sheep, who try to carve their name into the side of the wall nearest them and hope someone reads it. With the ease of being suddenly rich and famous, based on skill only, everybody wants to be rich and famous, and so we covet grandness, while sipping our coffee and enjoying every day as much as we can. My point: I’m trying to get something out of myself which is stubbornly staying inside, somewhere where I cannot coax it out, but will have to consciously force it out and commit it to paper; in the ensuing battle parts may be damaged or violated but here goes nothing: Maybe philosophers are not necessary anymore. Maybe they have never been necessary. Perhaps like all artists, entertainers, they offer a brief destraction, some great ideas, hell they may even describe life exactly as it is, perfectly, and have come to know the True nature of all things. So f*ing what? Tomorrow we will still need to work. We will still need to eat. We will still have the same animal instincts towards the opposite sex, towards fear and danger, we will still have jealousy and pride, we will still have to get along with and co-exist with people we may very well like to strangle. What good is Truth?! We cannot escape the symptoms of our existence, the state of our earthly mission. And so, rather than prophets of eternal reality, philosophers are really the people sitting on their ass, looking at the clouds go by, refusing to participate for fear of giving their efforts to a point they can’t conceptualize intelligently, while the rest of us are trying to make do. At least, that has been the philosopher of the last 2000 years. Much more useful, perhaps, no – definitely, are those persons who can acutely understand our actual existence, on its own terms, without criticizing its obvious pointlessness, and offer concrete ways to improve it! What does it matter WHY we are here. We ARE here. What does it matter, if what we see is ‘real’, if our actions are ‘good’ or ‘evil’ and if these terms hold eternal value or are social constructs. All of philosophy is immediately dismissed. All that matters. ALL that we can ever know for sure and nothing else, is this, one moment we find ourselves in, and every previous, and every subsequent, until death. And so, what I find of immense value, is anyone who knows how to increase the worth of this one moment.

How worth? I would like to propose the term “enjoyment” although many may disagree. If you prefer sorrow, suffering, meekness, then go martyr yourself and be done with you: you will still have chosen what you find preferable and it wouldn’t be hard to prove what you prefer, what you choose, is what you enjoy. Hence, enjoyment. How do we make THIS moment more enjoyable? How do we make every moment, as best as we are able, keeping in mind that we have real lives which we are always immersed in, and cannot, as Nietzsche says, simple get out of the current and stand on the shore and watch (It is all a current, even the shore, there is no escape from the river of life, short of death). We have returned, finally, to one of the original, and I argue, the only valuable aim of philosophy: the pursuit of happiness. Happiness~! Joy! Have you not noticed that it is from this emotion that Love flows effortlessly, Generosity too and self-lessness is second nature to Happiness. We WANT to help others. To be Happy, truly happy, makes morality trivial, inconsequential. You do not need to force someone to be good when they are happy (Yes, I realize I am probably wrong on this, but this is not the place to examine myself more closely) My point only is that Nietzsche, while giving us lots and lots of truth, could  not find for himself any happiness, and thus, has not really given any else happiness. Or was that my point? I seem to recall my point being that there is no point to criticize the herd, for they will never change, and that learning to live with them was more advantageous, at least for the individual soul. Man is, after all, a social creature.