History As Propaganda

This stimulated me to actually make a new post! I have been neglecting my blog so terribly because I spend so much time publishing on Facebook. And for personal reasons it has been challenging. It’s good to make another post.

A response to the YouTube presentation, Untold History: White Slaves in America

In reality there is nothing to do with political correctness when we do not refer to indentured white servants as slaves. It has to do with historical fact. Indentured servitude was exactly that. It was a form of bondage, but at that time apprentices were often treated very poorly as well. 

Still, both groups retained their basic human rights. They were not property. Their testimony in court was accepted.  Their children were not born into bondage. Their children could not be sold away from their parents. They could not be brutally beaten. They could not be raped. They could not be tortured.  They could not be murdered.

At least not legally.

All of those things could be legally done to black slaves who were considered to be chattel, that is, property. Or, as the Dred Scott decision pointed out, not human.

Now, I would agree that there was a form of white slavery in America.  These men (and it only applied to men) were treated very much as chattel property, although legally they were not. Again, technically they had rights. Said rights were almost never respected.  They could be beaten and brutalized, and if they were murdered it was unlikely to ever have been accurately reported.  That is, those whites who were swept up in the Jim Crow chain gang down South. Technically, they were convicted prisoners, but they were treated as slaves. 

Of course, they would be released after they served their sentences, which was not true of actual slaves.  Neither could they be sold to a new owner, although they were sometimes “rented“ or “loaned“ to local businessman to complete specific tasks before being returned to their cells at night.

So, for both the indentured sevants and the men in the chain gang, at the end of the term of servitude, they were released and were full, free human beings. This was never true of a black chattel slave.

On a rare occasion, such a slave might be allowed to buy his freedom from his master, and perhaps even be allowed to buy his family’s freedom, but it was very hard for a slave to earn any amount of money much less the cost of such high-quality “property”.  Finally, once free, a slave was always subject to being seized and resold.

Our history is very ugly. We humans are known for our cruelty and greed, but chattel slavery was the worst of the worst.

I must note that there were actual white slaves at the time of the founding of America, but not in America. The Barbary pirates and other Muslim groups had for centuries been perfectly content to enslave whites. It was one of the causes of the Barbary Wars (a series of two wars).  They are recalled in the Marines’ hymn as “the shores of Tripoli”.

Furthermore, the speaker does have a correct point in that slavery has existed for all of human history as far as we can tell. The Romans enslaved everybody, but actually their slaves were able to become freedman and, once free, were respected Roman citizens, something impossible to America’s black slaves. Some slaves, once freed, actually became wealthy in Rome.

The Greeks also enslaved anyone they could, except fellow Helenes.  Well, some Greek cities toward the end of the Greek era did enslave their fellow Greeks, and the rest of the Helenes were horrified at the practice.

It is worthy to note that many of the so-called Five Civilized Tribes became slaveowners.  Numerous slaves died on the Trail of Tears along with their Native American masters.

If the  author’s case is that we humans are really stinking and pretty rotten as a species,  I won’t argue with him.  But black slavery was a different thing in America from other forms of slavery at other times in history, except when it was much the same (it all depends on what nation and what era we are   referring to), but white slavery never existed in America. Forms of bondage, yes. But not slavery. And certainly not chattel slavery.

These facts are bitterly denied by many conservative websites, but they are conflating the very harsh and sometimes brutal treatment of indentured servants with chattel slavery. The conditions, as harsh as they were, were much better for the indentured servant, although they were still horrific by today’s standards.

It’s all a matter of historical fact.

If you’re interested in a fact check on the subject click on the following link:

https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-fact-check-irish-slaves-idUSKBN23O2BS

Additional notes:

It is interesting note that the author also wants to see the American public school system destroyed and to return to the appalling situation of 200 years ago with apprenticeships replacing education.  No more free education. You have to pay for it, and suffer for it, and be abused for it.  

Remember, he himself identified apprenticeship as often brutal and sometimes even a form of slavery. Yet he wants to return to it for our children. It’s better than a public education, isn’t it?

Throughout the presentation, horrific pictures are posted as if they are signs of the evils of white slavery. In fact most of these are pictures of atrocities committed against criminals, rebels, and other “ne'er-do-wells” which have nothing to do with the slavery. I’m pretty certain that some of those pictures were Russian serfs being abused. What does that have to do with slavery in America? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

Amazingly, the author compares illegal acts such as kidnapping and shanghaiing individuals to serve on ships as proof that slavery was an accepted practice. Such actions were illegal. While it was very difficult to get the captain convicted for such a crime, he was a criminal. Peddling in human flesh in America, as long as the flesh was black, was totally legal and even actively encouraged by our laws.

Better yet, we suddenly see a picture, for no discernible reason, promoting Michael Hoffmann‘s hate filled screed, Judaism Discovered. Hoffman is a notorious holocaust denier and antisemite.  At first it’s shocking to see this suddenly appear in the middle of the interview, but on second thought, of course this website is also promoting vile bigotry, anti-Semitism, and hatred. Are you really surprised? I am not.

In fairness to the interviewee, I do not know if he was aware that this book was being pushed during his presentation. Nevertheless, the fact that it was promoted tells you what kind of website promotes his book.

And now, I will confess. Halfway through the video I simply couldn’t stand any more of this nonsense. I did not watch the second half of the video. My patience was exhausted.  To put it another way, “When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies.” Revelation 21:8

Missing History Month

 Facebook again.

https://classicalwisdom.com/culture/sculpture/the-sudanese-pyramids-wonders-of-ancient-africa/

An interesting article,although not one that surprised me. The knowledge of the Nubian pyramids and Nubian civilization is out there; it’s just not that easy to find. I have an interest in this sort of thing, so I knew about them.

It does, however, make for an interesting question. If you ask people to name societies closely associated with pyramid building, everyone would say Egypt. I think many, but a smaller number, would say the Mayans and Aztecs.  I would expect quite a small number to say Nubia.

As a retired educator, I found this especially interesting because of how completely Nubia was ignored in discussions during Black History Month. The Nubians were very important to ancient Egypt. Quite often they were rivals, at other times Egypt dominated Nubia politically, and for a time Nubia ruled Egypt. Yet you almost never hear about Nubia.

Why? I think the answer is contained in one sentence from the article. >These structures stand testament to the wealth and power of ancient Nubia.<

A Black nation that was wealthy, powerful, and influential just isn’t very popular.  

(Nubia is not alone in this matter. There are a number of African cultures that should be in every history book, but somehow aren’t.)

The Alamo A La Mode

 

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/04/27/the-185-year-old-battle-that-still-dominates-texas-politics-484710?cid=apn

 

More lies my teacher told me.

>And the story of the Alamo—how an outmatched band of white heroes fought to the last against an implacable and vicious foreign enemy—has become so enmeshed in the culture that any attempt to tinker with it is met with outrage.<

The Tejanos (Mexicans who were rebelling against the Mexican government) have somehow disappeared from the Alamo story; even though they were there in the Alamo, fighting against Santa Ana and dying just as dead as the Texicans (the White folks fighting to defend their freedom to peddle in human flesh).

> “Texas,” wrote Stephen F. Austin, the father of Texas, “shall be a slave nation!”

Yet slavery was illegal in Mexico. The American immigrants rebelled...<

So the Tejano’s were fighting for freedom from the dictatorial government, while the Texicans were fighting to create a  dictatorial government in which they could enslave their fellow human beings.

Still, they had a common enemy so they fought together and they died together.

It should also be noted that few people seem to realize that the defenders of the Alamo had been ordered to abandon it because it was indefensible and defending it served no purpose in the greater strategy and tactics of the war.  They disobeyed their orders.

So how did the story change? The same way the story of the confederacy changed.  > In time, as Texas continued its fight for independence, the men became more than insurrectionists who had defied orders to retreat. They became martyrs whose sacrifice was deemed essential to the ultimately successful breakaway.

That interpretation—Anglo heroism in the face of Mexican oppression—got a major boost in the early 20th century when what was left of the Alamo site came under the management of the Daughters of the Republic of Texas. Akin to the Daughters of the Confederacy and the Daughters of the American Revolution, the group drew from San Antonio society.<

In other words, racism changed the story. White supremacy changed the story. Imaginary history replaced real history.

The glorious monument to those who died at the Alamo includes only the White people who died at the Alamo > ...the Cenotaph features a romantic carving of the Anglo heroes—and only the Anglo heroes—perched atop its pedestal.<

But the whole story has been greatly distorted, not merely the racial elements. 

> “There’s a significant distance between mythology and reality,” Harrigan, the historian, told me Santa Anna was not a drooling murderer. His professional officers were divided over executing rebels. And Travis never drew his famous line in the sand, asking willing defenders to cross over.<

This lengthy excerpt clears things up, but it will arouse bitterness and hatred in those who are allergic to reality.

> Chris Tomlinson, co-author of a forthcoming book on the subject. Entitled Forget the Alamo, it will be the 600th book on the subject, according to the Library of Congress. He is withering in his recasting of the narrative. “Everything about the Alamo is a lie.”

Among Tomlinson’s rebuttals: Slavery fueled not a revolution but a land grab. The Alamo was a blunder; it was supposed to be destroyed and abandoned. Travis was an amateur. Davy Crockett’s legendary toughness crumbled like a facade; he begged for his life when he was captured. The battle didn’t slow the Mexican march east. And ultimately, it was U.S. Army artillery, secretly deployed from Louisiana, that finally won Texas its independence at the battle of San Jacinto.

“We call it a revolt, not a revolution,” said Tomlinson, a former U.S. Army officer-turned-journalist. “They weren’t defenders or heroes.”<

How bad was the whitewash? Here’s one example: > ...the roster of the rebels at the Alamo is incomplete; there’s no mention of the Hispanic fighters; some names are misspelled; and the structure is probably 125 feet away from where Mexican troops allegedly burned the rebels’ bodies.<

And yet  to the jingoists, this is a holy cause, a crusade for the very soul of Texas.  > “Texas history is the Alamo,” proclaimed Bush’s Land Office predecessor, Republican Jerry Patterson..<. Or, more accurately, Texas history as reported in history books and as taught in Texas schools is a lie.  Racists find it a very pretty lie; even a beautiful lie.  Still, it remains a lie.

I Don’t Give A Tinker’s Dam About Trump

 

Copying a Facebook post from the article linked below.

https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2021/03/trump-friend-family-relationships/618457/

An interesting article, but one that somehow  misses the very basic point of the entire situation. Some excerpts plus comments:

>During the Trump presidency, “she had crossed over to a side I had never known or seen before,” Luna told me. “I will miss the old person, not the new one.” Over the past five years, many other Americans have found themselves in a similar position, measuring the gap between what a relationship was like before Trump entered politics and what it was like after.

... Instead, many of those who dislike Trump talked about having seen for the first time a troubling side of their friend or family member—one they could never un-see.<

Unfortunately so much of this article is summed up in the following sentence with which I profoundly disagree:

>... “If you have a long history with people who have treated you well and loved you, is it really all ruined by who they voted for?”<

It isn’t about the fact that they voted for Trump. It’s about the fact that they revealed themselves to be virulent bigots. It’s about the fact that they revealed themselves to be white supremacists. It’s about the fact that they support the mass murder of political enemies. It’s about the fact that they deny science.  It’s about the fact that they deny that reality is a real thing.  It’s about the fact that they wish to destroy democracy. How can the author of this article not realize that?

I repeat, people I have known for over half my life have revealed themselves to be racist and profoundly prejudiced; full of bigotry and virulent spiritual poison. Trump? I don’t give a damn about Trump. I care about basic decency.

In theory, naïveté is quite charming. It’s even adorable. In a world of bigotry and hatred, it is pitiful.

Note:  Tinkers were travelers who went about the Irish countryside repairing things. Travelers still exist in Britain today, but they don’t go about patching pots, sharpening knives, etc. They now travel in modern trailers, not horse drawn wagons. The term tinker’s dam refers to a small ridge of dirt they might push up in order to hold in water or whatever material they were using to make a repair. In other words, its about as worthless as an item can be after its single (and very short term) application.

American Horror Story

I was planning a rather lengthy post for this particular topic but I’m unable to actually create it. The reason is explained at the very end of this truncated version. It all started with a Facebook conversation.

A friend who has fallen down the rabbit hole into the very deep depths of Trumpsterism posted an advertisement for actors to aid in a disaster simulation. This is a perfectly normal event which happens in various places around the country on a regular basis. Later on in the conversation, I pointed this out to someone who was refusing to believe that the advertisement was anything but a recruitment for people to fake a mass shooting at the Virginia gun rally so that the government could once again blame poor, pitiful and totally nice gun owners who were actually innocent.  The specific point I made was that we had drills of this type once a year at my school. It was to train first responders, our staff, yes and even the children, to be ready in case a disaster actually did occur.  It also tested our response systems and allowed for us to improve them.

Another poster commented with a montage composed of actual mass shootings with Sandy Hook right in the center. The point was that these were all faked by some evil cabal of who knows what?

I responded by declaring that those who attacked murdered children and their grieving parents, that is, people like her, were so morally disgusting,so repugnant, that she literally made me sick to my stomach.

Several hours later I decided that I would make this into a post in the manner in which I usually do. That is, I would simply copy everyone’s comments and post them with my own additional commentary. As always, I would protect both the innocent and the guilty by using only a single initial to identify them.

However, when I tried to look at the post, I could see only the beginning of her comment, “And you can crawl…”

This was followed by the declaration:

The comment may have expired or it may only be visible to an audience you’re not in. 

I would like to have seen what comment she made. I’m curious as ro exactly where she wants me to crawl. Unfortunately I have no access to the post, not even other parts of it.  In fact, I did crawl into bed shortly after I made my post. That’s because I wasn’t joking. She literally made me sick. I’m so upset at these moral degenerates who insist that mass shootings are all somehow staged events, including the horrors at Sandy Hook, that my blood pressure shot up high enough to trigger a vertigo attack. Thankfully, I was able to sleep for three hours and feel a bit better now. Naturally, that’s not the end of it. Once I have an actual serious vertigo attack,  I remain extra sensitive to them for a week thereafter. So I need to be careful and not deal with the most despicable of the conspiracy theorists for that time period. I suppose that means it’s a good thing I got blocked.

I also suppose it would give her a lot of satisfaction to know that her hateful attack on murdered children and their grieving parents actually succeeded in making me sick. Then again, the fact that it was my moral revulsion at her which sent my blood pressure soaring might have given her pause. No. I seriously doubt that she would stop her self degradation at any level.

In conclusion let me say, 🤮

Mirror, Mirror

https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2019/10/jojo-rabbit-mocks-maga-extremism

Worth reading, and don’t miss the embedded “public service announcement”. > “Trumpism has broken taboos of civility, of respect, and of decency, and therefore bigots feel they are empowered, legitimized,” he said. “The 200 neo-Nazis in Charlottesville were not created by Trump. They were there before. All he did was make it possible for them to have the arrogance or the chutzpah to surface. They feel this is a time when it’s okay...” <

During the days of the Bush administration (Junior, that is) we legitimized torture and other crimes against humanity. We made them quasi legal official actions taken by our government. No one seems to remember this these days, but at the time this was an extremely controversial issue. I was making the same point as this movie back then.
I referred to those Bush supporters as the good Germans of the US. Those decent ordinary folks who nevertheless supported Hitler and his atrocities. This despicable action by otherwise moral people has always been regarded as a great mysterious puzzle, but it really isn’t and never has been. It’s just people accepting that their government is their country and they must be loyal to it. Accepting that their society is their home and they must go along with its norms.

The question really isn’t why so many Germans passively went along, the question is why so many were able to resist the urge is to conform, to fit in, to meet the expectations of daily life.

Back in the Bush days I was saying if you ever ask yourself how good good Germans went along with Nazi horrors, then first ask yourself if you supported torture when Bush was legitimizing it. If the answer is yes then the answer to your question about how did good Germans go along with these monstrosities is: Look in the mirror. The face you see is the face of a good German.

This is so true today as well. The crimes and the betrayals of Trump and his administration have been open and clear. He really has made no attempt to hide them. All he does is say well yeah but what about those other guys? Yeah I am a crook but so are other people like (fill in the blank with whatever political personality you don’t like).

Do you believe Q anon? Do you think everyone’s picking on poor, pitiful, glorious, holy Trump? Do you justify his crimes and his betrayals? Do you think he’s the victim of a great conspiracy? Then look in the mirror. The face staring back at you is that of a good German.

I want to end by emphasizing once again that Trump is no Hitler. He’s not even a Mussolini. Instead, he is the bad apple in the barrel who is spreading his rot throughout our entire governmental and social system. He’s no Hitler, but he’s laying the groundwork for one.

The Religious FreedomTo Persecute

https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/world/mississippi-wedding-venue-refuses-to-rent-to-engaged-interracial-couple-because-the-owners-say-its-against-our-christian-beliefs-to-do-mixed-race-and-gay-weddings/ar-AAGEPUL

ME:  We knew this was coming. Conservative Christianity is an now an excuse to break the law and deny people their human rights. Thank you Republican Party.  Back when Ronald Reagan was president I referred to Republican Party as the New World Hezbollah, the American Party of God.

     I was predicting the future more than describing the current reality at that time. And I was right.

S:  Uh oh. Shades of Hitler.  Many of Germany’s 30,000 Roma (Gypsies) were eventually sterilized and prohibited, along with Blacks, from intermarrying with Germans. About 500 children of mixed African-German backgrounds were also sterilized. New laws combined traditional prejudices with the racism of the Nazis.

ME:  We must remember that from the very beginning many have pointed out it’s not make America great again, it’s make America white again.

S:  True, true, true.

S:  Another consequence of Hitler’s ruthless dictatorship in the 1930s was the arrest of political opponents and trade unionists and others whom the Nazis labeled “undesirables” and “enemies of the state.” The mere denunciation of a man as “homosexual” could result in arrest, trial, and conviction. Jehovah’s Witnesses, who numbered at least 25,000 in Germany, were banned as an organization as early as April 1933, because the beliefs of this religious group prohibited them from swearing any oath to the state or serving in the German military.

ME:  Auschwitz was started as a camp for political prisoners, including journalists, who, of course, were enemies of the people.

S:  Could it happen here?

ME:  Not by that incompetent dolt, Trump. 

     Just as back in the days of Ronald Reagan I was seeing where the Republican Party was headed and was deeply worried about it, I can see that as Reagan laid the groundwork for what’s happening today, what Trump is doing today is laying the groundwork for what could very well be the turning of the United States into a fascist-theocratic dictatorship.  Back then I was saying the danger was of these fundamentalists turning America into a Third World country, just as they did to China, just as they did to the great Islamic empire. These once technological and cultural leaders of the world degenerated once they turned inward and began believing in their own superiority and purity and the fundamentalist beliefs of their religions.  Science is not at war with religion, with the exception of a few fundamentalist evangelical atheists. Neither is religion at war with science, except for a few fundamentalist evangelical Christians.  

     In spite of the minority status,they are a very powerful group in the United States.  Courts are being packed all across the country up to the Supreme Court with ultra conservative judges who believe in their theology. Elections are being rigged in favor of the ultra conservative and religious fanatics. And behind it all, of course, are the ultra wealthy. Those who wish to turn us into Mexico — a tiny ruling class of the Dons  and all the rest of us their peons, barely more than an other herd of cattle or sheep for them to exploit.

     I knew then that I was regarded back then by many as being foolish and extreme in making this prediction, but time has borne me out.

     There are times you really don’t want to be right. Even when you are certain that you are.

Self-destruction: An Overview

From The Atlantic.  This article appears in the July 2019 print edition with the headline “George Orwell’s Unheeded Warning.”

I hope people will find the bits I have quoted from this article sufficiently intriguing and provoking to go to the source and read it in its entirety.   It is well worth the time for both right and left wingers.   

Unlike the author of this article, I loved 1984 much more than Brave New World from the beginning.  I have always realized that the answer to the question, “How did he know?” lies in an error in the question itself. It’s not how did he know what would happen in politics, it’s how did he know the nature of human beings.   There is so much that is so very obvious if you step outside of your culture and your society for even a moment or two. But doing so is profoundly difficult for the vast majority of people.  >“To see what is in front of one’s nose needs a constant struggle,” Orwell wrote.<

Today it doesn’t take much to make either the right or the left surrender their freedom and even their intelligence.  Rationality is not a valued commodity under any circumstances and in today’s fetid atmosphere of passions it has almost entirely vanished from public discourse. >Unfreedom today is voluntary. It comes from the bottom up.<

>Orwell didn’t foresee “that the common man and woman would embrace doublethink as enthusiastically as the intellectuals and, without the need for terror or torture, would choose to believe that two plus two was whatever they wanted it to be.”<

While the right wing’s abandonment of sanity is based almost entirely on fear and the resultant rage and so is easy to understand, the left wing’s movement in this direction is rooted in the desire for a perfect utopian justice. >Progressive doublethink—which has grown worse in reaction to the right-wing kind—creates a more insidious unreality because it operates in the name of all that is good. Its key word is justice—a word no one should want to live without. But today the demand for justice forces you to accept contradictions that are the essence of doublethink.

For example, many on the left now share an unacknowledged but common assumption that a good work of art is made of good politics and that good politics is a matter of identity. The progressive view of a book or play depends on its political stance, and its stance—even its subject matter—is scrutinized in light of the group affiliation of the artist: Personal identity plus political position equals aesthetic value.<

The articles author points out that today >...intelligent people do the work of eliminating their own unorthodoxy without the Thought Police<

Finally,  I must agree with his conclusion that >Good art doesn’t come from wokeness, and social problems starved of debate can’t find real solutions. ...Orwell wrote in 1946. “What is needed is the right to print what one believes to be true, without having to fear bullying or blackmail from any side.” Not much has changed since the 1940s. The will to power still passes through hatred on the right and virtue on the left.

Again, I suggest you read the original article, Conservative or Liberal, it is well worth your time.  As for me, to quote an old and rather silly parody song about the days of the Troubles in Ireland, “Me, being strictly neutral, I bashed everyone in sight.”

Note: my apologies for the poor proofreading. My health is really not good at the moment and I’m just not up to the effort.

Notes: Extremism And the Left

Quillette Is doing well this week! Here's another article I found compelling and interesting. The first point of the article makes it I found most in need of sharing Is that the extreme left is growing and, unless it is reigned in, will become as extreme and anti-intellectual as the extreme right.

>Those on the right once were the main enemies of evolutionary theory, but today, as Colin Wright argues, those on the extreme left are the “new evolution deniers.”<

And in answer to all those extremist you choose to throw science into the garbage can:

 > But science should be in the business of advancing knowledge of the world and its inhabitants rather than advancing certain groups or sides over others. Like any discipline of science, evolutionary psychology has not been untouched by prejudice and ridiculous theories. But most of them were either unfalsifiable and thus unscientific or were falsifiable and subsequently refuted by experimental tests. <

Notes: The Rise And Fall Of Mary Magdalen

An interesting article covering the Journey of Mary Magdalene from eminent  apostle to repentant whore.  >But what most drove the anti-sexual sexualizing of Mary Magdalene was the male need to dominate women. <
Read more: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/who-was-mary-magdalene-119565482/#f70ziI9q5odmLQQ7.99
Give the gift of Smithsonian magazine for only $12! http://bit.ly/1cGUiGv
Follow us: @SmithsonianMag on Twitter

Not Guilty! OK, Maybe Partly Guilty

https://quillette.com/2019/04/01/prescriptive-racialism-and-racial-exclusion

While this article makes an interesting point, It also makes a grievous intellectual error. I'm reposting this article because of the following comment:

> The Islamic philosopher Al Ghazali did the same when he railed against the Greek pagan influence during the Islamic Golden Age, and in doing so he extinguished the brilliant flame of scientific thought of his era. The Middle East has been dark ever since. <

In fairness to the author of this article, it has been a common belief, almost a universal belief, among philosophic scholars that her statement is accurate. But a look at Al Ghazal's actual philosophy and his statements indicate  a somewhat contrary reality.

While his positions are very complex, on the issue of scripture verses objective reality he clearly stated that there can be no such contradiction. Reality is reality whether observed through a religious or an empirical lens.  When a contradiction does appear, he insists that objective reality must be accepted as real and that religious scholars must then acknowledge that the Koran cannot be taken literally on that particular issue, but must instead be interpreted as symbolically true, not literally accurate.

This is the declaration of an individual who strongly supports science and its empirical, objective base. A  fair-minded person must acknowledge that Al Ghazali is not only innocent of the supposed offense but in fact is an exemplar of  the opposite position.  But equally in fairness, we can not ignore the fact that Al Ghazali was a religious extremist who also caused a great deal of harm to his culture and society.

In other words, he's not single-handedly guilty of destroying Islamic science but he did support and increase religious extremism. Which is to say he was a very mixed bag, like so many other human beings who tend to be regarded as exemplars of one particular trait but who are actually complex characters displaying both good and bad sides.

So who can be accused of single-handedly bringing down his own civilization? While it is very popular in the Middle East to blame the Crusades, there's no question it was an internal rot, a form of intellectual and spiritual cancer, which caused the destruction of the most highly advanced technological civilization on the planet, leaving it a desperately poor Third World entity to this day.

No one person was actually guilty of this offense, but one of the greatest contributors was Nizam al-Mulk. As visier, He established a highly influential set of madrasahs which firmly established the Islamic position of higher education as one of extreme religious fundamentalism.

These two highly influential men, living at the same time, did cause a great deal of harm and damage to their own society and civilization.  Still, I feel compelled to point out that Al Ghazali did not rail against science. Although he did contribute to the dominance of religious extremism and fundamentalism which led to the fall of the Islamic empire, he most certainly did not do it single-handedly nor did he do so by attacking science or objective reality. 

 Let me now note that I have previously stated over a period of decades that the anti-science movement founded in American religious fundamentalism constitutes an existential danger to our society. China was destroyed by turning inward into religious fundamentalism and away from science and objectivity, as was the great Islamic empire, as we will be if we do not reign in it's extremist excesses.

True Believers

Re: https://quillette.com/2018/12/27/from-astrology-to-cult-politics-the-many-ways-we-try-and-fail-to-replace-religion/

Humans have certainly used religion as a reason for hatred and extremism, but without religion, Communism turned to fanatic dedication to ideology, as have so many other “isms“. Atheists who like to blame religion for humanity’s problems, somehow seem to forget that the real cause of all of humanity’s suffering very often stems from the simple fact of being human.

> When people turn away from one source of meaning, such as religion, they don’t abandon the search for meaning altogether. They simply look for it in different forms. < > And if you imagine that secular ideologies and political movements now seem to exhibit faux-religious characteristics, you aren’t alone. “We have the cult of Trump on the right, a demigod who, among his worshippers, can do no wrong,” wrote Andrew Sullivan recently in New York magazine. “And we have the cult of social justice on the left, a religion whose followers show the same zeal as any born-again Evangelical. They are filling the void that Christianity once owned, without any of the wisdom and culture and restraint that Christianity once provided.”<

Well, the wisdom and culture and restraint that Christianity provided on occasion. I didn’t notice any of those three elements as a significant part of either the Protestant Discipline or the Spanish Inquisition.

Hitler Is Hitler!

In response to a post criticizing Trump's desire to publish a weekly report on crimes by illegals, which pointed out that the Nazis did this with a special publication called "the criminal jew" I responded:

The point is valid, this is a disgusting act. However, we should always remember that comparing Trump to Hitler is a big mistake. Remember those old SAT questions? "Hitler is to Trump as Himmler is to __________."

The answer is Chief Wiggum. Himmler was the nerdy looking, but extremely effective , commander of the SS and the Gestapo, two of the most feared organizations in the history of the world.
Chief Wiggum is… Chief Wiggum.

Point to Hitler for hate, but laugh at the Trumpsters.

The Really, Really, Big Lie

What we're missing is that the big lie, maybe the biggest of all the lies, is that the mainstream media are on Hillary's side. The reality is that they are so desperate to prove that they are fair and balanced and so afraid of the conservatives attacking them that they present lies that they know are lies as if they were possibly true.

As I've said before, if Germany had our news media back in the days when Hitler was trying to get into power, they would have reported endlessly on the evil of Jews and the need to exterminate them. They wouldn't have said they were evil and should be exterminated, but they wouldn't have said that it was nonsense either.

They would have just spread the lies and then presented both sides in a debate -- in a balanced manner. "Our first guest is Julius Streicher, followed by Rabbi Hertzmann."

When one side is willing to sell any bizarre lie no matter how foolish and finds that it's believed while the other side tries to least stick generally to the truth and the news media can't tell the difference between the two (or more accurately won't tell the difference between the two), abandon all hope you who enter here.

Note: As you know Fox admitted it lied about Hillary being indicted. It didn't take but A few minutes before conservatives began accusing FOXNews of having been bought off by the Clintons. Yes, that's right. They actually accused FOXNews of being on the Clinton's side. We have entered a world of utter madness, at least, on the conservative side.

News today is about making money. The non right wing news is like the Democrats have been for so long, afraid of offending the right wing wing lying news.

My prediction is that if this election is close it will make the Republican Party more extreme than ever. They will tell themselves' "if only we been a little bit crazier we would have won."

If it's a big loss for Trump, there is a chance that they might begin to mend their ways. But remember, many of them, like the whole Breitbart hate monger machine, are true believers and won't change no matter what.

If Trump wins, this nation may be in the biggest trouble it's ever been in. The Brits were never willing to put out the massive levels of force, blood, and treasure that was necessary to subdue us, as long as we held out they would eventually give up. Hitler and Tojo really didn't have a chance against us. Eventually we would have used the atomic bomb on Berlin, if that's what it had taken. The danger of the Cold War was more nuclear war than anything else. And OK, that would've been a disaster for the whole human race, but we weren't in any serious danger of being conquered, just our entire species becoming extinct.

I'm not the first to point out that the real danger to America is an internal, voter supported coup. I'm also not the first to point out that would be largely religious coup. (And with the military becoming more and more fundamentalist evangelical it's possible that we might not even need voter support.)

Bill Marr recently described the Republican Party's efforts in recent decades as a slow moving coup. I prefer "slow-motion coup" but he makes an excellent point.

America's place as the most democratic nation in the world has long been degrading. We're about number 21 on at least one respected list. Democracy is dying in America. I've said it before, we're turning into a kleptocracy. That is the fault of the Democrats as much as the Republicans.

Republicans are refusing to fill any Supreme Court justices unless their candidate wins the election, an absolute repudiation of the rule of law, of democracy, and of the Constitution. So even if Hillary wins, our nation could be crumbling before our very eyes.

The only reason I have hope is the millennial generation. They are not perfect, but they sure have a lot of very sound basic ideas and they can tell the difference between Internet lies and reality. After all, they grew up with the Internet. I trust our grandchildren. Whatever happens I believe they will save the world and the United States.

The Truth, However Ugly, Is The Cure

http://www.vox.com/identities/2016/10/24/13385942/emmett-till-memorial-sign-vandalized-racism-racist-resentment-politics-trump

In response to this article I posted:

Fear and resentment are the main forces at work.

>Interpreting a focus on civil rights as a threat to white Americans is, of course, not new. Just think of the pushback against Black Lives Matter’s expressions of despair over police killings of unarmed African Americans, or the outsize hostility toward San Francisco 49ers player Colin Kaepernick’s peaceful protests during the national anthem before games.<

And, sorry Trump apologists, economic issues are NOT an important driver of Trump support.

Even in the general election, while support for Trump is correlated most strongly with party ID, the second biggest factor, per the analysis of Hamilton College political scientist Philip Klinkner, was racial resentment. Economic pessimism and income level were statistically insignificant.<

The truth hurts, but only the truth can heal.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2016/10/24/as-trump-stares-a-loss-in-the-face-even-his-favorite-lies-are-failing-him/?utm_term=.0cc5d0ffff56

 And in response to the above article I posted:

>But if Trump’s strategy is all about dragging Clinton down into the pig slop with him — and about generally spraying a fine mist of pig slop over the whole process, to make (some) voters turn away in disgust — it looks as if this all may end with Trump floundering around in the pig slop all alone. <

This has been the losing strategy for the Republicans for years now. Every time it fails they tell themselves,"We just need to be even more extreme and more hateful". And then it fails again.  They just can't learn.

The Republican Party, in collaboration with its extremist right wing media machine, has created all the problems that they are facing now. Trump is not the disease. Trump is only a symptom.

If the party is not to continue in its steady decline, currently slowed only by carefully rigged elections thanks to the most effective gerrymandering in history, it must cease to base all of its hopes in fear mongering, race baiting, and rage enhancement.

But it's spiral of addiction and self-destructive behavior  seems unbreakable.

Whiter Than White

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/cover_story/2016/10/trump_and_the_gop_are_alienating_latinos_the_way_they_once_alienated_black.html

Excerpts plus very brief comments.

>Baseball pioneer Jackie Robinson, who’d endorsed Richard Nixon in 1960 and attended the 1964 Republican National Convention as a “special delegate” for New York Gov. Nelson Rockefeller, “asserted that any black leader who demonstrated support for [Goldwater] would lose power and influence since ‘the Negro is not going to tolerate any Uncle Toms in 1964.’ ” <

How times change.

>Attempts to bring nonwhites into the fold inevitably run up against a key reality: that movement conservatism is a white ideology.<

How times stay the same.

>Goldwater wasn’t just offensive; he articulated a vision of national life that would inevitably leave black Americans on the margins as second-class citizens, subject to the whims of segregationists and their allies. And if Goldwater didn’t see it, his explicitly anti-black allies did.<

Exactly the same.

>Romney explained during a Republican presidential debate, “We’d have a card that indicates who’s here illegally. … And if people are not able to have a card, and have through an E-Verify system determine that they are here illegally, then they’re going to find they can’t get work here. And if people don’t get work here, they’re going to self-deport to a place where they can get work.” Romney took the right-most position on immigration, and used it to sink his strongest rivals, like then–Texas Gov. Rick Perry.<

So....16And the second beast required all people small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their forehead, 17so that no one could buy or sell unless he had the mark—the name of the beast or the number of its name.  Revelations.  👍🏻

Mad Men 2016 Version

From a  Boston Globe report on a Trump rally.

A Trump supporter, "There’s going to be a lot of bloodshed. But that’s what it’s going to take. . . . I would do whatever I can for my country.”

Including destroying it?

Another Trumpster, "“Trump said to watch your precincts. I’m going to go, for sure,” said Steve Webb, a 61-year-old carpenter from Fairfield, Ohio.
“I’ll look for . . . well, it’s called racial profiling. Mexicans. Syrians. People who can’t speak American,” he said. “I’m going to go right up behind them. I’ll do everything legally. I want to see if they are accountable. I’m not going to do anything illegal. I’m going to make them a little bit nervous.”

Thus genuinely rigging the election.

Joe Cecil, a 39-year-old restaurant manager, said he has never voted before but is newly inspired by Trump.
“If people are offended by the sexual stuff, what do they think is going to happen when Muslims come here, implement Sharia law, and start raping our women?” he asks.

What can you say about simple insanity?

Rights And Wrongs

In response to a post which reported that high school students were expelled in punishment for their Facebook posts supporting neo-Nazis and the murdering of Jews I posted:

Talk about a mixed bag!

1.  The postings were disgusting. There is no excuse for them. It's clear that at least some if not all of the parents were shocked by their children's behavior. I repeat, there is no excuse for this. I make none.
2. Once informed of this, Facebook correctly took down the posts.
3. This is exactly the kind of hate speech the Donald Trump calls politically incorrect. It is exactly what he has authorized and made acceptable again.
4. The school was completely and totally wrong and punishing the students for these actions.

How can I say on the one hand of the actions deserved punishment and then immediately add that the school should not have administered punishment? The answer is very simple. This was none of the school's business.

Once we begin to allow schools to punish students for actions taken off-campus and after school hours, we have given schools an unbelievable excess of authority over parents and children and at the same time we have put upon schools a terrible and impossible burden.

Should schools also punish children for talking back? Not eating their dinner? Not cleaning their rooms? Parents are in charge of the children when their children are not in school. It is been traditional, and  may still be a cultural fact, that Japanese teachers are superior to parents. Parents  traditionally bowed more deeply to teachers than teachers bowed to parents. Teachers were considered to be failing in the duties if they did not spend at least some nights checking to make sure the lights in students' bedrooms were on well after normal bedtime. This was accepted as evidence that the child was studying hard. If a teacher felt parents were not doing their duty, the teacher was expected to give the parents a stern lecture. Parents were expected to listen and comply.

I do not think this would be appropriate in America.

This  also places  a ridiculous burden upon the schools. Every teacher in the high school is to be held accountable for disciplining their students for their behavior of those children after school hours?  Only the principal? So he's now responsible for all the students in the school?

Discipline and lessons are clearly in order for these children, but since these activities took place off-campus and after school hours, the school should not be involved in individual responses unless the parents ask for assistance. The school is responsible for being aware of this conduct and making it a part of lesson plans to prevent such actions as a part of educating our future adult citizens.  This, however is a general action not specifically aimed at individual pupils.

As a parent I did not want the government, not even in the form of the school system, taking responsibility for the actions of my family outside of school hours and activities. As a parent, I will deal with my children.

As an retired educator I would have objected to being required to deal with private disciplinary problems which should be in the hands of the parents.

There is one possible excuse for the school's actions. While the article strongly implies the students were expelled for being a part of the group and for the posts, it also mentioned that at least some students reported being threatened and harassed by members of the group. Such behavior, if it took place on school grounds, would be a valid reason for the expulsion of the students who actually threatened or harassed other students.

Notes:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/oct/14/nazi-facebook-group-alt-right-execution-jews-black-people-colorado-students-expelled?CMP=oth_b-aplnews_d-1

The report about parent teacher relationships in Japan is from Samurai's Ghost, a book written by an American who taught in Japan for a number of years.

Donald Trump, Flea Magnet

In response to an article showing in grim detail just how much virilent racists love Donald Trump and how they expect him to bring back the days of white supremacy, I responded:

Trump supporters should remember the old saying, "If you lie down and sleep with stray dogs, you will get up with fleas." Trump is deeply beloved by neo Nazis, white supremacists, the Ku Klux Klan, and other murderous hate groups. Why do they love him so much? Why don't they feel repelled by a man who is so beloved by such monsters?

From the article, “The success of the Trump campaign just proves that our views resonate with millions,” said Rachel Pendergraft, a national organizer for the Knights Party, which succeeded David Duke’s Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. “They may not be ready for the Ku Klux Klan yet, but as anti-white hatred escalates, they will.”

Economics

In response to a post from my friend, Charles which asked who agreed that the media was responsible for promoting racial division, I responded:

Well, yes. In the same sense for that the drug dealer is responsible for spreading drugs around. If nobody came to buy the product, they would sell a different product.

Remember that even supporters of the right wing media lie machine state freely that the "Conservative" venues were created in order to give conservatives the news they wanted to hear as opposed to all the news they didn't want to hear. They don't understand that the news they wanted to hear wasn't being promulgated because it was lies and deceit. The bottom line is millions of Americans are saying, "I will make you rich, famous, and powerful if you tell me the lies I want to hear."

Is it so surprising that there are people out there willing to sell that product?