Get News & Views Updates
Most Popular This Week
Popular content
Today's Top News
Killing For Fun; Military Madness
Killing is the key to success in military actions. Killing enough insurgents by invading and occupying US forces enables the winners to subdue and subjugate the survivors. The real winners in the Middle East are the US based corporations who seek to exploit the resources of energy and mineral rich countries like Iraq, Afghanistan and Iran. Also the corporate war profiteers of the defense industry are making out like bandits. They furnish the killing tools, the hired mercenaries and other wasteful and expensive materials, equipment and supplies for our never-ending wars-on-terror.
Mattis has a strong resume in the military killing business. He was a lieutenant colonel in the US invasion of Iraq in 1991, directed the Marines in the 2003 invasion of Iraq, headed the US assault on the Iraqi city of Fallujah in 2004 and helped design the siege that destroyed the city and killed thousands of Iraqi civilians. Mattis also commanded the initial troops that went into Afghanistan in 2001.
Describing his feelings about the people in Afghanistan, General Mattis said, "... It's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them. Actually it's quite fun to fight them, you know. It's a hell of a hoot. It's fun to shoot some people. I'll be right up there with you. I like brawling."
Author Thomas Ricks wrote that Mattis told his troops to, "Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet."
During Operation Desert Storm in Iraq, Mattis reportedly told his troops, "It's the mission of every Marine in the battalion to send one dead Iraqi home to Mama."
Perhaps World War II Army General George S. Patton, Jr. is a role model for Mattis in his glorification of military madness and the joy of killing. Patton said "Magnificent! Compared to war all other forms of human endeavor shrink to insignificance. God help me, I do love it so!", and "No bastard ever won a war by dying for his country, He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country." Patton also said, "America loves a winner, and will not tolerate a loser, this is why America has never, and will never, lose a war." Of course that was before our ill-fated military ventures in Korea, Vietnam and Afghanistan.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates called Mattis "one of our military's outstanding combat leaders and strategic thinkers, bringing an essential mix of experience, judgment and perspective to this important post." Asked about Mattis's bloodthirsty rhetoric, Gates brushed off an official rebuke against Mattis saying it was five years ago.
In Afghanistan, US and NATO forces casualties continue to escalate. The number of Americans killed so far this month is at least 23 with 14 killed last week. In June, 102 occupation troops were killed including 60 Americans. 1,149 American soldiers have been killed in the war in Afghanistan, and countless numbers of Afghan civilians have died. We don't do body counts of "the enemy" because, as former Defense Secretary Rumsfeld said, "death has a tendency to encourage a depressing view of war."
Our economic crisis is directly tied to the cost of the war. It costs $1 million per year to maintain a single soldier in Afghanistan. The 2010 Pentagon budget is $693 billion, which surpasses all other discretionary spending programs combined--while our deficit soars. We desperately need money to create green jobs, rebuild our crumbling infrastructure and improve education.
President Obama replaced General McChrystal with General Petraeus as commanding general of US and NATO forces in Afghanistan. McChrystal had made derogatory remarks about Obama and his administration's conduct of the war. Petraeus was head of the Central Command and will be replaced by Mattis. Obama said, "War is bigger than any one man or woman, whether a private, a general or president."
The war in Afghanistan is a big loser. Rearranging deck chairs to include one more "fun to kill" military madman will not keep it from sinking like the Titanic. Only ending the war will save Obama.
A recent ABC/Washington Post poll found that people felt the war was not worth fighting by a 53 to 44 margin. An NBC/Wall Street Journal poll had 62% of the American people saying the country was going in the wrong direction and Obama's approval rating at 45% with 48% disapproval.
President Obama was the most successful politician in the US who seemed to enjoy being elected to the highest office in the land. Fulfilling his promise of peace, hope and change is a winner. However his failure to conclude killing for fun military madness will make him a loser in 2012 and doom his party in November.
- Posted in
Comments
Note: Disqus 2012 is best viewed on an up to date browser. Click here for information. Instructions for how to sign up to comment can be viewed here. Our Comment Policy can be viewed here. Please follow the guidelines. Note to Readers: Spam Filter May Capture Legitimate Comments...
183 Comments so far
Show AllANNABELLE: Many thanks. If there weren't a few forum members such as yourself who appreciated these more mystical interpretations, I would not spend time here. I have met a few very thoughtful and wonderful people from C.D.
Totally agree.... adelante por La Lucha !
tioche, Mexico
"Not too many in this forum see what I see in terms of the parallels between state-sponsored torture (with sexual & pornographic elements), the levels of rape/domestic abuse in the US, the ubiquitous "consumption" of an overtly misogynistic type of porn, the worship of weapons (NRA & gun-love), and the vastly perverted forms of calamitous ecocide turning countless priceless areas into growing dead zones, stains upon the body of the Earth Mother, Gaia. The common thread to all these acts is a twisted sense of power, one that exalts naked force at the expense of every decency. It is Mars, god of war, unleashed upon the world."
Sioux Rose, I see it that way too. You express these vile connections so vividly. I always look for your posts and feel supported by them.
OPAL: Many thanks. It's interesting that it's the FEMALES who see the connections. When I notice the way some otherwise intelligent men (not Martian Bachelor, he's a child who has no experience in the world, and thinks feminine = feminism) seek out ways (and arguments) to avoid the mention of the WOUND to society that's resulted from the marginalization of women (and their input) over the centuries, I get some inkling of what it feels like to be Black (or increasingly Hispanic) in America. The truth of inequality and the scars of its legacy are somehow supposed to remain invisible... like "get with the 21st century! We're ALL equal now." Sure.
Some men argue for history as witness to all that MEN (his-story) can be. It has discounted women for generations; and although SOME rights have extended to women in SOME countries, the legacy of so much inverted power and passion remains a latent, often crippling fact of life for far too many women. (The post about Haiti and the rape of women in camps didn't even merit ONE post. There ARE a few very caring, highly evolved men who post on CD. Unfortunately they are a minority; and that's a shame since this may well be the best progressive site on the entire web. Imagine what that says about the entirety of society and it's grim level of spiritual/moral evolution?)
Some argue that these topics are separate categories which cripples sentience from noting how the dots connect. Are current capitalism-without-conscience policies NOT harming nature? Is the study of the natural world not related to an understanding of how today's capitalism on steroids is raping it, down to every possible sector?
It's a shame that a few resident ding-dongs show up whenever the topic exposes war for the boys-playing-with-dangerous toys ethos that it is. No expense has been spared in building elaborate ejaculatory systems. These unconsciously cover the massive wound that has resulted from denigrating the Feminine counterpart and losing access to the Divine partner for centuries. All this lashing about is the act of an angry animal that's at a loss he cannot understand. It takes courage to get in the ring here on CD with those wounded warriors who have NO concept of why they act the way they do; but think/have been conditioned to believe all this is part of being a male; and thus they argue for a continuation of deranged, massively- destructive behaviors. NO. It is NOT human nature...
> not Martian Bachelor, he's a child who has no experience in the world
Translation, if you don't see eye to eye is Rose's narrow world, you're a "child". For calling people "child" that you hate, you sound like one of those mothers who is too authoritative
>All this lashing about is the act of an angry animal
>that's at a loss he cannot understand.
You're getting to be just like him. Better watch yourself.
>It takes courage to get in the ring here on CD
>with those wounded warriors who have NO concept
>of why they act the way they do; but think/have
>been conditioned to believe all this is part of
>being a male; and thus they argue for a continuation
>of deranged, massively- destructive behaviors.
Translation, you need to be an SR robot to be her "male" to cherish. Any independently thinking male is somehow bad.
> There ARE a few very caring, highly evolved men who post on CD.
Translation, only those who fully agree with Sioux Rose are the "few very caring, highly evolved men".
Luckily, you're so stupid and your comments so vapid, I need not argue them.
And you think anyone but your tag team thinks your comments have merit?
> Luckily, you're so stupid and your comments so vapid, I need not argue them.
Translation, Rose cannot handle disagreements so she gets personal. Good work Rose. Glad I beat you at your own game.
> And you think anyone but your tag team thinks your comments have merit?
Tag team? My oh my are you getting over-paranoid?
Rather disgusting, this:
"Obama said, "War is bigger than any one man or woman, whether a private, a general or president.""
but not the least bit surprising.
As much as I disliked G. W. Bush, I don't recall hearing HIM saying something like that!
Perhaps World War II Army General George S. Patton, Jr. is a role model for Mattis in his glorification of military madness and the joy of killing.
More likely candidates are Generals Buck Turgidson or Jack D. Ripper from "Dr. Strangelove". As Turgidson said to President Merkin Muffley regarding all-out thermonuclear war with the Soviet Union, "Mr. President, I'm not saying we won't get our hair mussed, but we'll take 10 to 20 million dead, tops", as if he were talking about a case of athlete's foot.
Doncha think any young person so stupid, vicious, ignorant or poor (read mercenary) as to join the military to fight for Obama's re-election and the preservation of the "mayor of Kabul (or for Obama's and Bush's lies) will do quite well under Mattis. That is, the mercenary thugs we call "heroes."
"My point is that beyond wars outside the homeland insecurity state, numerous wars are brewing inside its borders because war is the ethos through which every other challenge (or topic) is viewed..."
–(Sioux Rose)
–I can only agree.
"The war machine is exterior to the State apparatus..."
( Gilles Deleuze/Felix Guattari, "Nomadology: The War Machine, Semiotext(e))
The war's of America are not only 'external' to itself, but have an interiority, that is even more malignant yet and is even more perversely systematic than the materiality of any Pentagon planning of the state apparatus. It is the very scaffolding on which the later builds on and is nurtured by.
Americans insist on seeing their wars as something objectively 'literal,' or 'out there' somewhere else –not emanating from within and swarming all around them as exteriorized psychic constructs, with metaphoric ramifications and with consequences for the individual spirit.
It enables them to elide any and all complicity and becoming completely disassociated and detached from the diabolism. War has become effectively 'derealized' or else compartmentalized– as in making a discrete example of particularly galling and vile specimins of the greater malasie, like General Mattis.
It is the unseen reality, the ambient psychology, essentially apolitical in nature, which creates, at least for us, the eerie sense of estrangement and unreality where things and people often appear as robotic reanimations of the trans-human or even, the 'inhuman.'
San Francisco, perhaps more than any city we have visited or lived in, is the most relevant example we can name of this disquieting reality. Perhaps it is because it is because the city is becoming an epicenter of advanced bio-genetic research.
By the way, your recent postings breathe fire! Keep up the fine fettle and good form.
I lost a long, intricately argued posting in response to one of yours, when our computer crashed.
It was a long meditation on the rule of force in history based on a reading of Arno J. Mayer's disturbing (to some!) and brilliant book: "The Furies–Violence And Terror in the French And Russian Revolutions, Princeton Press.)
"Not only is another world possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing."
–( Arundhati Roy)
"People do not judge in the same way as courts of law; they do not hand down sentences, they throw thunderbolts; they do not condemn kings, they drop them back into the void."
–(Maximilien Robespierre)
The existence of General James M. Mattis is an ever salient reason why Robespierre's thought is ever prescient. That truth may hold true for the ongoing diabolism, the cataclysm of America, and its mirrored twin, Israel both.
VASHKAR: I was away for 2 weeks, and am unsure of the thread that you're relating? In any case, I appreciate the lively discourse now! And your intuition is working as indeed there is FIRE in me today, with Mercury (the messenger) crossing over the point of my chart's Mars (the principle of action, assertion, and self-interest).
In yesterday's Tom Dispatch thread, several males spoke of U.S. foreign policy through the metaphor of the penis. If that wasn't the ultimate invitation for me to segue in with the apt and related discussion of Mars and the nation's psychopathic worship of this principle, I can think of no other.
War on drugs
War on poverty
War on cancer
War on terrorism
Class war...
How 'bout a war on war... something cerebral to negate the premise in the first place?
I wish I could convey the power and wisdom of the lectures conducted by Dr. Alberto Villoldo. His understanding of the shaman-path and culture, and what it offers the world in terms of a peaceful means of living WITH nature (and other tribes) goes beyond what I may be able to relate to this forum. So many want "the answers" to conform to their pre-existing Western-flavored intellectual ideas about life and how this universe operates. Einstein made it clear that the problems now faced cannot be solved at the level of cognition that brought those into existence. Still, most argue that we must remain "safe" within the confines of existing paradigms. And therein lies the metaphysical rub!
Your comment fuels my fire further! How's that for alliteration!
I was young when L.B.J. implemented the "War on Poverty." As a kid, I just did NOT understand, and I asked my grandmother, "Does this mean they are going to start killing poor people?"
Of course, through the years, the poverty rate has grown, and poverty, we know, does kill -- through lack of health care, through the MIC, etc.
War metaphors confirm our glorification of war. The media sells violence and killing. If it bleeds it leads. How about Star Wars? I'm a loner in my own family on this issue. My children have taught our grandchildren to be enthralled by Star Wars and I occasionally voice my objection to such war metaphors. Why don't the Hollywood purveyors of violence do a Star Peace movie?
You put forth a great question! And, I agree that "war metaphors confirm our glorification of war." Like you, I often voice my objections to using war metaphors.
Thanks for taking the time to read our comments and to respond.
What can we expect when we allow our selves still to be called "Baby Boomers".
It is probably too late now but words more than matter.
Will history record that the Baby Boomers saved the world?
We are not so much insane as we are acting how we are expected to act from our title.
A king, subconsciously acts like a king while a Baby Boomer waits to be pacified.
What kind of country puts a sociopathic loser like this in charge of its army, not inside a mental hospital? Wait - the same country where individuals regard their right to own lethal weapons as core to their identities?
Thinking like mattis is the basis of what is wrong with this world, producing a cancerous growth of serial killers. His line of thinking is what must be eradicated from humans minds. Attack thinking is wrong thinking.
The Deatheaters have been running the country for quite some time now.
As long as war is so profitable, we will see endless war.
As long as we allow our hard earned tax money to be spent on killing people who pose no threat to our sovereignty or safety, we share in the joy of killing.
After all isn't the person who pays for a hit as legally culpable as the hit man himself?
We could use our hard fought "freedom" to put an end to this insanity.
War criminals and war crimes have become an accepted part of the American way of life.
Mattis is nothing more than a typical American. A uniformed assassin paid for and praised by our society.
Washington, mainstream media, Hollywood and nearly all of our religious leaders support corporate imperial killing.
Yet, anyone who supports the troops in Iraq or Afghanistan is complicit and supporting crimes against humanity.
I am not sure how the present situation came about, but this national psychosis will not be easy to cure.
http://www.lexrex.com/informed/otherdocuments/warprayer.htm
excerpt:
"O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle – be Thou near them! With them – in spirit – we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with hurricanes of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it – for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen."
[After a pause.] "Ye have prayed it; if ye still desire it, speak! The messenger of the Most High waits."
It was believed afterward that the man was a lunatic, because there was no sense in what he said."
And of course there is also Smedley Butler and "War Is A Racket".
http://www.lexrex.com/enlightened/articles/warisaracket.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smedley_Butler
"Mattis is nothing more than a typical American. A uniformed assassin paid for and praised by our society. " –(gonzonews)
While this is true, the larger reality indicates that Mattis, not only typifies an all too particular and 'individual' American, he is constitutive of America itself, on the meta or symbolic level.
Mattis exists as a totalizing summation for the larger essence of American reality. This is why it is not in any way incongruous that he has been 'honored' with his new position, despite the unconscionable nature of his comments.
What is unconscionable here is in no way merely General Mattis. He is a referent, a signifier, not the thing signified, but 'stands in' for the signified.
The very worst is actually the very best, and is feted as such, by a nation that can only do the very worst as a matter of course– as a thematic continuity, emanating from its very existence.
To continue to see him as an 'individual' is to miss the 'forest for the trees' by making an anomaly of him as a particularly virulent type, who is merely 'different' by degree.
The truth is far darker yet, and more all encompassing.
War economy is what we are. We ALL are at fault.
When 2/3 of the congressional districts in the USofA depend on war-related corporations for jobs (as in largest or next largest # of employees) you will not see representatives vote against any war funding.
The Rich ologarchy controlling the economy do not want to give up the war racketeering profits that allow them to ever increase their control, whether it be over the Congress or over the labor force.
One last thought - no oligarch wants to bring the troops back to US soil where they won't have jobs and could be disgruntled enough to actually act on their impulses for violence against those repressing them. Of course the oligarchs may also feel that they need to have a large number of combat hardened veterans on tap to deploy against the inevitable violence by the truly hopeless who have run out of peaceful means trying to better their lot.
Think about it!!!!!!
Mattis is not the last of the blood-thirsty ones to be called upon.
Smedley Butler is rolling over in his grave at the thought of Mattis wearing a Marine uniform and acting as the attack dog of the corporacrcy.
I'm in general agreement with Tirebiter's observation:
"You are assuming rational choices from people who are mentally ill - the American public - which is my point. I suggest that we as a culture are mentally ill. We display all the signs. To expect rational decisions from irrational beings is irrational itself. Why is it a surprise that many of us behave irrationally?"
One can argue about the history of how we got this way until hell freezes over, but if we reflect on what influences are imposed on our everyday lives in the HERE and NOW, we live in a constantly reinforced psychosis.
Start with what we call The News. The MSM are truly an "echo chamber" reiterating the patently absurd, whether it be from NPR, PBS, BBC, DW, ABC, NBC, CBS, etc., etc. etc. It is as though, on a daily basis, ALL are receiving their marching orders from a single source. But what is that source?
The whole idea is to keep you in the dark. All the "authoritative" sources repeat the same lies. Is it a conspiracy or a consensus, or something else? ("Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.")
My opinion is that it is "something else."
From the article:
Mattis has a strong resume in the military killing business. He was a lieutenant colonel in the US invasion of Iraq in 1991, directed the Marines in the 2003 invasion of Iraq, headed the US assault on the Iraqi city of Fallujah in 2004 and helped design the siege that destroyed the city and killed thousands of Iraqi civilians. Mattis also commanded the initial troops that went into Afghanistan in 2001.
Describing his feelings about the people in Afghanistan, General Mattis said, "... It's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them. Actually it's quite fun to fight them, you know. It's a hell of a hoot. It's fun to shoot some people. I'll be right up there with you. I like brawling."
Author Thomas Ricks wrote that Mattis told his troops to, "Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet."
During Operation Desert Storm in Iraq, Mattis reportedly told his troops, "It's the mission of every Marine in the battalion to send one dead Iraqi home to Mama."
(end quote)
Sioux Rose is right in her constant invocation of "Mars rules." What is IMPLIED but never stated in the Mattis quotes is that he ALWAYS was in a position to kill rather than be killed because he had the POWER while the "enemy" did not. The not-so-subliminal message here is you're either with us or against us and you better not be against us, regardless of any other value than that of Power.
This psychosis comes in a context that Sioux also recognizes, namely the environmental catastrophe that such militarism generates and that is to an enormous extent virtually irreversible. The world's greatest polluter is the American military, at all levels.
If Americans continue to need a War Metaphor to guide their daily lives, they are certainly fighting the wrong war. As many others have observed (Shakespeare among them), the quest for Power is generally suicidal. The real problem at this level, however, is that people like General Mattis would take down so many others in their self-destructive quest. Certainty is delusion.
"No time to say Hello Goodbye, I'm late..." Make sure you kill all the white rabbits, General Mattis!
-30-
'Sioux Rose is right in her constant invocation of "Mars rules."'
No she isn't. Martian's posts here are much closer to a functional use of the Mars word symbolism. I contend Sioux Rose manifests the same malady that dis-eases most of humanity. To me the situation we face isn't Mars ruling, it's more like osteoarthritis where calcium is out of solution, thus Mars is out of solution having lost the embrace with Venus: S. Rose depicts this with her statement about Mothers in her posting here. I work directly with Mothers and their children(special needs) every day, and the number one aspect for the Mother to nurture and care optimally for her child is to care for herself, and ,yes, that means herself first -- the case is closed: this method of approach/recognition leaves all others in the dust as far as experiencing continued human development in all spheres(feeling, acting, sensing, thinking...) of human endeavor, regardless of the label one places on the special needs challenge.
Mars/masculine, Venus/feminine: Rose depicts the Mars out of solution phenomenon with her statement about humanity wallowing at the alter of Mars/war...but I heard only one person mention having a party to recognize the time frame when Mars was as close to Earth as it would be for the 13k or 26k years. Kneeling at the alter of war and calling that paying homage to Mars is such a slight to Mars(what did Mars do to earn such disrespect?), and it flows from a strict mental abstraction removed from the organic reality of where Mars is and what energetic flow forms it is availing.
Masculine and feminine: in each, the Weavers of each, human body regardless of gender. Masculine, in part, focusing mental energies; feminine, in part, expansive embracing energies. Rose does something "right" in these postings here: using a mental thought form to call out a war on something "cerebral". And that's what humanity will do: just like in the work I do with Mothers and their Children, more and more of humanity will recognize their brain/mind goes way way beyond the cerebral cortex. The number one act I'm doing now with the families is apprenticing the Mother's skin to receive information and apprenticing the Child's skin to receive information. This is similar to what's happening as a result of, the out of solution Mars mentality that punctured a hole in Mother Earth's skin, the goings on from the Gulf of Mexico. All , or at least a much larger extent, of humanity is being coerced into recognizing their organic skin reality with Earth. In these ways humanity has the opportunity for optimality of the "fucked" up situation of humanity's use of Mars and Venus essences and transmute them back to love making.
And that brings me to end with something I love about S. Rose. While she may not be optimally "right" in how she uses the symbol Mars, she forces into the conversation the fact that humans function with the use of symbols; hopefully for her own enjoyment, many pleasing moments, and pleasure, as well as all of ours, she will come to the organic realization that symbols become meaningless fantastical abstracts (masculine missiles firing aimlessly in every which way) without the information and embrace(feminine holding, embracing and recognizing what can be) that can come from the skin and other human organic receptors. And as Mars starts to recede from it's close approximation with Earth, I suppose(?) a Venus or other feminine aspect will come into predominate play or availing. Let's hope humanity drops the fucking and gets to some love making, because if the Great Mother energy approaches and she isn't in her right mind...well, the final smothering of a Mother's well intention will be the final demise of humanity...and there's still so much to be learned and enjoyed from humanity's communion in Earth.
At least somebody understands and can think independently without being a feminist robot. Rose may be factually correct but her use of astrology to play the female as always the victim is disturbing. I couldn't care less if a man or woman rules so long as they're gender neutral and doing what's fair and right.
When a flailing and irritable male-bashing is the only tool one has to explain their dissatisfaction with life, it is inevitably applied to every problem whether appropriate or not or efficacious or not.
OLE MAN: Nice job. I agree with your post, which means I now recognize that the madness context (via media) that dominates our society as Tirebiter described it IS valid. What I was responding to (in his posts) was the assertion that violence is inherent to human nature. I thought I made a good case for the long-term social conditioning tools and machinations that have led to that appearance. Appearances do not speak to cause and often are deceiving.
Thank you for an intelligent, diplomatic post.
If it weren't for the fact that people die and get killed, wars could be categorized as just another business venture - in grand style. Just like any other business venture, the purpose of going to war is to increase wealth and gain capital stock. Just like any other business venture, the act of war entails the manufacturing and use of goods and services in demand. And, just like any other business venture, war generates waste. Although rational, civilized individuals will abhor this concept, from a strict economic perspective it can be argued that manpower, whether military or civilian, is but another usable resource in the basket of commodities the consumption of which can be accounted for as well. So much for the dead ...
The great George Carlin on war:
http://space4peace.blogspot.com/2009/08/we-love-war.html
Killing is a business not just limited to wars. Insurance companies kill people when they deny coverage. People die of automobile accidents every year with some tracing to faulty manufacturing. Junk food companies kill people with obesity.
"This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation's homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into veins of people normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice and love. A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death." -- Martin Luther King, Jr.
Some people are arguing that war and aggression are human nature -- I don't believe that it is human nature to kill.
"The military, particularly the marines (as I subsequently learned from several men I've dated), works very hard to break down that taboo... because KILLING is not natural." -- Sioux Rose
From Howard Zinn on aggression and human nature:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=subwDAZtEN0
For me, all issues we face are related, from big oil and the energy industries, to the MIC and the war culture that permeates this country, to the deregulation of media and the buildup of the M$M, to the health insurance and other health industries that are allowed suck the life out of people -- with the audacity to call it health care, to the dismantling of public education and the current intent of the Obama administration to privatize schools across the country, to massive unemployment and the deflation of wages, to the disintegration of the U.S. infrastructure, to the loss of our natural resources -- the poisoning of our land, air and water, and the collapse of our environment, to the place where we should all plan to meet in protest -- Wall Street, with its complete and utter disregard for all humanity -- profits over people at any cost.
This culture of masculinity doesn't just live and breathe within the MIC, and the war machine, but also on Wall Street. Read Liar's Poker, Michael Lewis' book about his experiences working in a London office of Salomon Brothers. In the book, Michael Lewis describes the men who are the biggest money-makers, who belong to a club called The Big Swinging Dicks of Wall Street, often making reference to their own "iron balls." You can find these same references in several books about Wall Street, including the recent book by Scott Patterson, The Quants.
As Sioux Rose has stated, time and again, our culture is completely out of balance, and until the feminine is considered in the equation, as an equal, there is little hope for progress and/or change.
"In a technological civilization geared up for its own heady destruction, we are destined to become the victims of an outworn patriarchal consciousness so long as we collude in equating femininity with biological identity. That kind of consciousness is propelling not only individuals but the whole planet into an addiction to power and perfection which, viewed from the perspective of nature, can lead only to suicide. Feminine consciousness dare not be limited to unredeemed matter or unconscious mother. The realization that a neurosis has a creative purpose applies globally as well as personally, and surely, in an age addicted to power and the acquisition of material possessions, the creative purpose must have something to do with the one thing that can save us -- love for the earth, love for each other -- the wisdom of the Goddess. Responsibility belongs in the individual home, in the individual heart, in the energy that holds atoms together rather than blows them apart." -- From The Pregnant Virgin, Marion Woodman, 1985
> This culture of masculinity doesn't just live and
> breathe within the MIC, and the war machine, but also on Wall Street.
Blame masculinity for the MIC, war machine, and Wall Street. Please send more children to die for wasteful feminine plastics.
>until the feminine is considered in the equation, as an equal,
>there is little hope for progress and/or change.
No, feminism is already here. More women are using femininity to show their militarist strength and push men into war. Feminism peaked in the 60s and then turned militarist for out of fear.
>Feminine consciousness dare not be limited to unredeemed
>matter or unconscious mother.
How come feminists care about rich women but turn the other way when a poor man is homeless on the street? You women fought for your rights to have careers and were heard. Men who wanted their rights to be housewives were ignored and laughed at. How come women have more rights than men but the feminists still say it's not enough. Be grateful.
Martian Bachelor,
You poor dear.
Have you had some very bad experiences with strong or overly dominant woman?
Are you a hurt and wounded little boy on the inside?
Feminine energetic influence and feminism are not the same, and shouldn't be confused.
How are woman "pushing men into war", exactly?
What strong, smart, compassionate woman would look past suffering of any kind? I believe that the balance of energetic influence is necessary for balance on Earth, and I believe that woman and men should be allowed to live as they please, without being subjected to oppression, and as long as they cause no harm, woman and men should be allowed to contribute in the way that is best for them...without having their contributions condemned because they are potent. Does that make me a feminist?
How do woman have "MORE RIGHTS" than men?
Men can be homemakers, as long as the family is able to survive with only one spouse working...why not?? Nobody is laughing about that in the present day, are they?
Your comments are inflammatory, and I found them to come from a place of misunderstanding. Perhaps you should study feminism, and find out why ladies were so fed up with being treated like property and being told by men that they had no mind of their own, and what their lives should entail, and being told by men that they don't amount to much more than a baby-making work horse with soft warm breasts and thighs and an impossibly long-lasting temper.
That is the reason that feminine energy and masculine energy must be allowed to come into balance, because suffering on Earth will not end without energetic balance. And it won't happen through fighting, war, oppression, greed, or any of those other tactics. It will happen with mutual, conscious, gentle, enlightened power and wisdom.
It will happen, no matter how painful and disdainful the present day seems. Be kind, and don't polarize or be prejudiced, Martian. Please.
KAY: Splendid job. Thank you for sharing important, relevant quotes. One wonders what might be the motive of those that argue that violence is inevitable, part of human "nature." Just as some "experts" sought to use Darwin as their excuse for justifying a dog-eat-dog society (without any mention of its economic underpinnings), to claim that violence is natural gives war a free pass. Recently Darwin's writings have been exposed in a new light, one that espouses cooperation over competition. Of course in our Mars-Mammon society that info must be kept under lock and key. Imagine if people were given a more enlightened concept of so-called human nature!
Few in this forum recognize the relationship between the LIE of "Original Sin" and why so many walk around emotionally wounded, thereby too often ready, willing, and eager to wound others reflexively. To authoritarians, that's "off topic."
Thanks for that beautiful post, Kay. Your posts are always thoughtful, and decidedly share the sentiment that many people hold, but bypass when posting, due to our fear and frustration coming to the surface...or our inability to articulate our deepest desires for the materialization of Goddess wisdom on Earth. Gaia is alive and well, teaching us all, although many of us don't realize her influence. Thanks for holding it together and posting with a loving Goddess heart.
Namaste
We all need to ban together and converge on D.C. and put a stop to this folks. This is OUR country, not theirs. So set down the remote and the bud light, and lets show our kids what we're REALLY made of!!!!! We owe it to them for our slothfulness in protecting what they will inherit from us. Let's not let them down....
I agree with you Organic Farmer.
Raising Hell among ourselves allows us to vent our anger but we all need to go to DC to protest on the mall and march to the White House like we did before and after the Bush Administration launched the criminal invasion of Iraq. Maybe we should all camp out on the mall like the Bonus Army did in 1932. It might be time for a bunch of us to get arrested for peace like Thoreau when he did not pay his taxes in protest of our invasion of Mexico. The Bonus Army veterans were encouraged in their demand for immediate cash-payment redemption of their service certificates from World War I (the war to end all wars) by retired U.S.M.C. Maj. Gen. Smedley Butler, one of the most popular military figures of the time who became passionately anti-war.
People came from all over the country to protest the Iraq War including many of us from our extremely militaristic state of South Carolina. We must have had at least 300,000 to 400,000 people a couple of times but the war loving media low-balled the crowd size saying only "tens of thousands" were there.
Obama co-opted the peace movement with his slick peace, hope and change rhetoric. I voted for the warmongering son-of-a gun.
Whenever Eistein is mentioned, I post the following :
"With the growing arsenals of the superpowers, Einstein feared global destruction. "The only salvation for civilization," he told the reporter in 1945, "...lies in the creation of WORLD GOVERNMENT, with security of nations founded upon LAW (my caps)...As long as sovereign states continue to have separate armaments and armaments secrets, new world wars will be inevitable."
(Eistein -'Decoding the Universe')
In Obama's speech in Berlin, before he was elected President of the USA, he said the goal was to remove all borders between nations. Thought to be 'the salvation', and not only by Einstein, of course... W. Willkie and many others : "ONE WORLD - or - NONE"
However, when he became President of the USA, for home consumption, he ordered drones to 'patrol our border'...
White men speak with forked tongue... except for white men like Mattis.. he doesn't speak with forked tongue.. Ugly brute.
"Killing is the key to success in military actions."
No it isn't, and this false idea is the reason why the USA keeps losing its wars.
From my perspective, all wars are losers. The military thinks you "win" by killing, subduing, and subjugating the "enemy" to benefit their corporate masters. To me there are no real winners when you engage in the mass murder called war. Intentional killing is wrong. I believe in the inherent worth and dignity of all people, everywhere. Killing them against their will is always inexcusable.
Tom Turnipseed
Absolutely true..fascist amerika is way ahead in the suffering it has caused, and now the payback is happening !
This pee brain - Marine or not - can't be human.
We'll see how butch this sociopath is when he finally meets
the IED with his name on it. I can't wait. I'll but a round
for my buddies to celebrate.. Afghans have been fighting fools
like this for thousands of years. This guy is just a racing
stripe on the underwear of history.
We hate the military and yet depend on it to defend us for what???
> That its purpose is to create conflicts to justify and grow
> its continued flawed existence is renown.
Partially true but if we depend on the war machine to keep the quarrels going, how do we stop it if stopping it is a threat to some "businesses"? Every country has a military and those that don't have much of one rely on the US for cover. Getting rid of the military would be like Venus ditching Mars even when she relies on him for protection. Mars ruling used to be a great thing when his characteristic of defense stood out compared to war. I could be getting it wrong but the military is being used to start wars by spinning it as defense to kill defense. Men and women are in many different ways hooked to the war machine. Men sign up to feel strong. If they back out, they are ostracized by their own men and women treat them worse by refusing to go out with them for not being manly enough. Let's give an easy example. A woman has to choose between two men who are almost the same except for one difference. One of them is pro-war and the other wants peace. The odds of picking the war guy is 9 to 1 because she feels attracted to his perceived strength and trusts him to defend her. She will usually overlook any dark sides such as bullying and starting wars unless it affects her. That is the hardest lesson I was forced to learn before giving up getting married. I'm not sad about that and happy that I didn't have to be someone I didn't want to be. It must be working similarly on the war machine. Fears exist.
RE: Justice Arcs July 14th, 2010 8:18 pm
> The likelihood of real Agent Provocateurs here on CD,
> that have particularly targeted and attacked SIOUX,
> has been devastating to her. The validity of this
> evidence itself, may have been part of an additional
> provocation, although at this point it hardly matters.
I have seen her going into battle with some of the posters but there is no evidence of any devastating damage done to her. Forums are only places to post. The war between Shawn Berry and Sioux Rose is familiar but I read somewhere that it died down in June.
> Perhaps she would have been better off not accepting that > possibility as true, but since then it has colored her
> ability to be patient when under duress.
It can be very difficult for someone to maintain patience when he or she gets put through a lot of abuse, embarrassments, or any sour experience. If Sioux had any of it, I don't see the source coming from anyone in the forum.
> Nonetheless she perseveres. She continues to be tirelessly > selfless in her dedication to teaching and improving our
> collective sanity and understanding.
I disagree with you on that based on some of her posts. Doubledee and Stanley1979 tried to ask her to think positively and believe in team work but she attacked doubledee as working for the status quo and calling Stanley's idea of working as a team some sort of authoritarianism and insulted him when he tried to explain his level of independence. Nonetheless, both of them also respect Sioux Rose and might know her better than I do. I would like to agree with you but she has written too many insults to others who don't see eye to eye with her and told them that she doesn't have time to explain or go over. If she could spend more time insulting people who disagree with her, then she could spend the same time posting in a constructive tone. If you would like, I can bring up those posts from the archives and go over it with you so that you can help her tone down a bit and possibly restore her patience without changing her. I do not believe in vengeance and starting wars just to fulfill the desire for vengeance.
> She attempts to transcend the likely persecution, but it
> doesn't take much to trigger a reaction -- and that is the
> outcome that "they" were most likely hoping for.
I don't know if each of them really do that but I speak out my beliefs with knowledge and conviction. I am not afraid to voice my opinions even if they sound very controversial to some but I don't do it with ad hominem attacks either. I welcome debates but not her ad hominem attacks. I have seen her responding to ad hominem attacks in the past and that is fine and no arguments on that. I just think that she has copied the Bush doctrine of preemptive attacks and just like the insurgency in Iraq, we end up with wasteful flame wars.
> I mention this because she and I walk similar paths, and
> suffer similar doubts and fears, that rip into our very
> lives' fabric to wonder why to continue at all. The answer
> is for the community we do it -- for everyone and the
> future too, for life itself.
I don't know her personally but if you do, then please accept my apologies for any misunderstanding I have of her. Look, we all suffer a lot. You, me, and her would have to get together personally and compare our sufferings to verify who has suffered the most. But that's pointless if we can find ways to heal them without starting new wars out of urge of vengeance.
> That most care little about cutting another slack in
> today's dog eat dog mentality, itself frames this
> situation -- she deserves a lot more slack than most are
> willing or capable of giving. The value she provides is
> both immeasurable and tangible, and I feel no need to
> apologize for anything that she's said -- while I do hope
> this particular posting might serve to lighten her load
> somewhat.
I understand that you and her are great friends and I respect that. I have nothing personally against her but I after calling each of us names for disagreeing with some of her ideas and naming us tag teams or other screen names, I cannot cut her any slack for those mistakes she chose not to correct. When she can stop calling me other screen names that I am not and stop playing her profiling games, I will cut her some slack on that. I have seen people on this site who can be just as spiritual as her and yet fair minded. If something is preventing Sioux from trying, then good luck and by all means help her remove those obstacles. I will try to be a little less harsh on her but she must cooperate or I can't do it either.
> At any moment any of us could choose to never post here
> again, but being part of this community means a lot to
> each of us to enable our dreams in common. We are an
> extended virtual family, and if we fail to cherish each
> other ( even when in disagreement ), than we've dropped
> that common ball of connection, and our dreams do
> potentially shatter.
That we can agree on.
> It's time we gave this lady the benefit of the doubt,
> particularly for what she's already given to us.
Nobody is 100% correct. Again, you know her very well but I don't have all the details you have so I can only go by what she posts here. I can respectfully agree and disagree with what anyone posts but I don't intend to treat any one person with special royalty. I think we should all be treated as equals regardless of our disagreements and continue to discuss and debate.
> It's a big stretch, but do consider how you might react
> and feel if you were in her shoes.
Again, we would have to get together in person and stack it all up. I don't know if I suffered exactly the same as her. Maybe we're on the same boat and maybe we're not. It all depends and each of us has been through different circumstances. Even two people being on the same boat 100% of the time doesn't guarantee that both will react the same. I don't get emotional or reactive even if I were to suffer the worst. I may sound like a "misogynist" to some but I am none of that and will explain in later posts.
Words can matter and you got me for not being specific. I only meant evidence based on the posts on this forum. The only communications I have done with her were within this forum and nowhere else. I don't know what Sioux has gone through personally and maybe it is something I said that reminded her of something she experienced with someone, either here on this site or outside of CD. Another thing is if someone says they have evidence, it is their responsibility to show that evidence. Just saying that he or she has evidence but will not show it only makes the claim suspect at best. I would have to be informed all about that experience but I could have a different interpretation of it. I don't know. If there is one or more posts on this forum where the poster said something to actually devastate her feelings, I would like to see which one it is. I would have to read the whole conversation in the thread to see who was really at fault for her alleged devastation before taking that as valid proof. That doesn't mean I won't necessarily dismiss the evidence. Debating the evidence presented can't hurt so we can clear things up. Anyway, I appreciate your civility and thank you for sharing your thoughts on the matter. By discussing this, I think that we are better able to discuss the deeper meaning of military madness. I look forward to future discussions with you.
JA, you are making a mountain out of an ant hill let's make this simple. Could you find one posting from the archives from someone that actually devastated Sioux Rose and post it here? That's all I am asking for. If you or anyone else can't find even one post to back up that statement, then the allegation remains invalid until proven true. That's how the justice system works at least for now until the kangaroo courts finish taking over the justice system that's already broken.
> Her and my own feelings and our expression of them IS the relevant evidence,
> because what is in question is a state of mind that was created internally, via
> interchanges on CD and in email. The words on the pages are but a portion of the
> situation, and have little existential impact unless there are people reading them, > thinking, feeling, and responding about them.
Unless one writes down their feelings on the forum, how are we supposed to know? You admitted that even writing and what we see on television doesn't say everything and you're right. I don't even know if Sioux really means half of what she says when she writes emotionally angry remarks or if she's just trying to act like a grouchy clown for entertainment. Is she always going to be that way from now until the end of her life or will she change? I can only assume that she is human. I do my best to not allow my emotions into what I post. Whether I am successful or not is open to debate.
> I find this portion to indicate to me that you gauge another's experience AS IF
> you were the final arbitrator of absolute truth for all of us, and thereby you
> project your assessment as like it were a final one, ignoring that possibility of
> another's point of view ( billions of them ) and the profound slipperiness of
> truth.
Not at all. I take things on a case by case basis and don't use a fixed solution for every problem. I go mainly by concrete evidence and only if needed do I use abstract evidence as a backup. That's how most people do it. I think I understand what you mean when you say that truth is relative and I might agree on some of your explanation on it. I don't think abstractly like you and Sioux as you can tell. That isn't to say that all truth is necessarily true. I understand that frustrations of what isn't really true often poses as truth but we should not use that as a basis to mistrust everyone and everything we see because if we do, we'll never make it out of the dark like that.
I don't see the patterns because I wasn't always on these forums but I question your first two points.
> ( 1 ). It was the issue of several paid assailants attacking her,
> that created the situation over time, and there's plenty of evidence
> of that re-occurrence.
From her written conversations with those she disputed on this forum, there were no assailants unless I missed any written posts that can prove the pattern. There may have been people laughing at or disputing her belief system but no posting has indicated assailing her. She's too good to play the victim.
Now you say that they were paid and she has had the same thing but how do you really know that they were paid or are you just assuming that they were paid because the alleged assailants wrote things she couldn't tolerate? Did you or her see the alleged assailants' transactions and why would anyone pay to write in a forum?
You also say there is evidence but unless the evidence is shown, nothing has changed about the case. Anybody can allege and just say that they have evidence but without showing that evidence, they have no credible case to make. I'm not making this up. This is part of the system of justice and even spiritual justice do not tolerate heresy.
> ( 2 ). An exponentially escalating part is by knowing this attribution of them
> not being merely CD posters, but paid assailants.
Again, you are only assuming and alleging that they are paid assailants. How can you or I possibly know that they are paid assailants? You aren't buying into the myth that anyone who disputes Sioux Rose's beliefs is a paid assailant, are you? There have been disputes and flame wars going on but claiming that Rose is some victim of some kind of a conspiracy is as ludicrous as Bushites alleging that Bush is the victim of a vast leftwing conspiracy or Hillary Clinton making that foolish remark about Bill Clinton being the target of a vast rightwing conspiracy.
The third and fourth points I have no intention of touching since that is your personal experience which I respect regardless.
You speak well on forgiveness and maybe Sioux might be forgiven for being too harsh on some of us who don't see with her eye to eye. As for me, I don't beg forgiveness either. If I did something wrong, depending upon what I do following up on it, it is my belief that I will either receive karma or forgiveness.
I'm sorry that we have to disagree on the idea of proof. How do you expect people outside the narrow confines to believe an allegation without proof? I don't engage in being biased in any way but rely on independent thinking based on concrete evidence.
> As an engineer and a scientist, the closest proof that
> you're getting is my statement that I saw something very damning.
Again, anyone can say that they saw something very damning but until they can prove that it actually existed, saying what you saw is open to interpretation and debate.
> If I had access to IP logs and whois showed "the usual
> suspects," what difference would it make at all to this interchange ?
It would validate or invalidate allegations such as "Poster X is Poster Y". Then you could be sure that you were right or wrong about your suspicions.
> There is a surfeit of proof for similar attacks by Zionists paid by Israel
If by that you mean paid to cause physical harm, not virtual harm on the Internet, then fair enough.
> If you google Hasbara paid assailants, there's likely many job offers on the web.
I did the google search and only found opinions in forums but not a single poster throughout the entire blogosphere has come close to proving that virtually paid assailants in forums actually exist. If such job offers had existed, they would have been exposed even by the right wing.
> Our gov't likely spends billion$ on PSYOPS warfare on American
> citizens, evidence you can easily see on FAUX & CNN, and has
> been published in thousands of articles.
I have no doubt about that and I see it everywhere when people copy what CNN or FAUX spouted without thinking.
> Are you one who believes in "left leaning" and also
> "independent" $ewer Main $tream Media ( $M$M ) ?
Usually, they are wrong but occasionally they are right. I look for proof and other sources to see where they are lying and where they are honest.
> As I have stated several times, the devastation is not subject
> to critical review as it is subjective and systemic.
Provided that the alleged devastation actually happened. It may look like a devastation to you but I don't see how others will see it to that extreme.