Two fingers to the monarchy!

Sometimes, when I'm sitting through a seemingly endless parade of patriotic people and banners and flags, I think about nationalism and chauvinism, and all the suffering and woe that such thinking has wrought, and I despair.

When I'm tempted to let pessimism and cynicism get the best of me, though, I just think to myself, WWJD?

"What was Jefferson doing" when he penned the Declaration of Independence, and "Who was Jefferson dissing" when he did so? Looking back on it now, most of the grievances seem rather antiquated and a few actually sound a bit petty. If you stand back, and take in the entire document, you see that almost all the particulars are really just a way of demonstrating the absurdity of monarchy without democratic accountability. Life, liberty, and prosperity are our axiomatic values, shoving off the yoke of autocracy is only the first step in making those abstractions into practical realities for all Americans, and eventually, everyone else.

Granted, revolutionary war should be a painful last resort, but some things really are worth fighting and killing for:

War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.

On that note, here's wishing you all a happy 4^th -- now let's go blow some stuff up!

Reading this month

I've decided to spend my copious spare time in July reading the memoirs, ideas, and hopes of our next president, or rather, listening to the author reading it to me while I try to keep my car riding along an appropriate path.

Believe you me, there is a little extra 'oomph' in hearing the Senator from Illinois read these passages aloud for himself, especially in Dreams from My Father, where the author/narrator's emotive inflection really helps you get a richer sense of the original intent behind the text.

I'll post up favorite quotes and puzzling snippets in the comments throughout the next few weeks.

Pusillanimous parishioners perpetuate preachers' primitive propriety

Here we go again with the new Pew Forum study data. (No, I’m not trying to get a job at Pew.)

[Click on image for full-sized graph]

Here are the propositional claims tested in this particular part of the study:

• Abortion should be illegal in all or most cases
  
• Homosexuality is a way of life that should be discouraged by society

Note that the scatter-plot is very nearly linear, as one might not necessarily expect given the relative dearth of homosexuals hanging about the abortion clinic. Perhaps these answers are highly correlated because these seemingly distinct issues address essentially the same fundamental moral question in two different contexts:

Should adults be allowed self-determination over their own bodies when it comes to matters of sexuality and reproduction?

It is becoming alarming clear that certain faith-based groups are far more interested in following ancient dogmas instead of following our national ideals of personal liberty and autonomy.

Here is the money-quote from the report synopsis:

The connection between religious affiliation and politics appears to be especially strong when it comes to certain issues, particularly those that have been at the forefront of the “culture war” controversies of recent years. Some religious traditions, for instance, are overwhelmingly opposed to abortion; seven-in-ten Mormons and six-in-ten members of evangelical churches (61%) say abortion should be illegal in most or all circumstances. On the other side of the issue, six-in-ten members of mainline churches (62%) and seven-in-ten of the unaffiliated say abortion should be legal in most or all instances. A similar divide exists on the question of whether homosexuality is a way of life that should be discouraged or accepted by society.

This accurate assessment should scare the living shit out of you all. Rather than listen to their own consciences and reason out the ethics of victimless crime for themselves, religious believers in our free and secular society most often rent out their moral faculties from a handful of poorly-educated public speakers who fill their heads with Bronze-Age ethics. This would be downright pathetic if it weren't so effing infuriating.

Now, I don't have a womb and I'm not into men, and hence my own personal liberties are not directly tied in with the political fate of those who find seminal fluid less revolting than I do. That said, these are not matters of personal taste but public policy issues, and it should be blindingly clear that the tyranny of the majority can turn its spiteful venom upon anyone, at anytime, for any reason or none. Accordingly, we freethinkers must make our stand against those who stand against personal liberties in any form. Now, thanks to the Pew Forum, we have now a clearer idea of those against whom we struggle. Onward, non-Christian soldiers, to the culture war!

Founders, Framers, Freethinkers

Which of America’s foundational figures are those most worthy of close examination? Joseph J. Ellis has expounded upon the emergence of those heroic figures who originally “deserved to be inducted into…the American pantheon.” (Passionate Sage, p. 212) starting of course with the apotheosis of George Washington followed by John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. Later, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, Benjamin Franklin were joined to the constellation of great American luminaries, even as the first generation of founders passed from life into living memory. These six figures, commonly considered the most influential and defining figures of the founding/framing generation, are the primary subjects of a book by Brooke Allen titled Moral Minority – America’s Skeptical Founding Fathers, which I heartily recommend to anyone interested in the emergent mythology of Christian Nationalism. Contra Novak, these six men were those most prominent in the American pantheon (among scholars and laypersons alike) for generations before Allen was born, rather than hand-picked by her on account of confirmation bias. These six men are those whose lives and characters are most apposite to the question of whether this nation was founded on secular or sectarian principles, regardless of how Allen or Novak happen to feel about them.

If one takes the time to “go back to primary sources,” as State Rep. Sally Kern has so often recommended, one will find that not one of these men was a professing Christian during the time of the national founding and constitutional framing. Indeed, only one of them turned back to Christianity in the twilight of his life, that is, Alexander Hamilton. This is unsurprising to those who study American history, since of all the great luminaries of his generation Hamilton was the most comfortable with the idea of a strong authority concentrating power at the centre of things and having dominion over all aspects of life. To a Jeffersonian, these are fighting words, but Hamilton was not among those devotees of liberty who considered John Locke a far greater man than Julius Cæsar.

That Infamous Engine of Grief (Part II)

Here stands another great homage to an ancient engine of grief, keeping watch over the east side of town some 8¼ miles across town (as the crow flies) from our other great cross.

As it turns out, the background story behind this particular cross is rather more Machiavellian than one might have reasonably supposed. City council intrigue and church electioneering, and other such antics at the crossroads between church and state, that is, Interstate-35 and Old Route 66.

p.s. A shiny new John Adams dollar to whomever digs up the "engine of grief" quote in its original manuscript form. Thanks!

Podcasting the Anglosphere

One of the absolute greatest things about the synergy of fairly new digital technologies (WWW sites, RSS feeds, mp3 podcasts, & etc.) is that the new media are truly trans-global for the first time ever, one's ability to imbibe global media is limited only by one's spare time and the number of languages which one comprehends. Like far too many of my countrymen I am more-or-less limited to my native tongue, but then again, the anglosphere is a pretty big place.

I know this very point has been made over and over again by the tech-heads over at 2600, Wired, and Boing-Boing for years, but I've yet to see many people really take advantage of the potential of these new developments. Most folks are still listening to (relatively) local programming on AM/FM/XM.

In an effort to spread the digital gospel, let me share with you just a few of my favorite weekly radio shows on the subjects of religion, politics, and ethics:

Religious Talk (USA)
Everyday Ethics (UK)
Sunday Night Safran (AU)

Let it not be said that the evitable 1½-hour daily commute is entirely accursed, for now (by the Grace of Man) we have the blessing of digital radio. Yea, verily.

Of course, every blessing comes with a corresponding curse (thus saith the Lord) and the flip-side of our wonderful worldwide web of new media is the creation and propogation of pan-Islamic jihadist media. Allahu akbar!