Rediscover Communication

I believe that satire is a catalyst for truth.

I thought this was amusing...:)

Heroes in the fight against bad music:
www.youhavebadtasteinmusic.com

john kerry on the daily show tomorrow

there's a bubble i've created
a world that conforms to my personality
a forcefeild
protecting me from situations in which my trust would be distributed
the outside world i don't connect with, and don't truely understand
so my opinions on the world should be passed off as nothing

Some things with the "shut it down" campaign just seem wrong... I am not saying that people can't or shouldn't be able to "exercise their civil rights", though I question whether this rises to the level of exercising ones rights. It immediately appears that it is punishing the wrong people. By doing this, these people are initially only punishing their employers. My guess is that employers in these industries are as broad a mix of political ideals as is possible. It seems wrong to bite the hand that feeds you in response to the actions of a third party. Like cutting off your nose to spite your face. Additionally, it seems like an ineffective waste of time. It seems like just random actions with an attached significance.
"Paint yourself neon pink and prance about naked to show your disdain for Bush!"
Again, I fail to understand the anger. You agree or disagree. That is fine. We have forums and ways of speaking our minds that are constructive and fruitful. Use them. Don't make arbitrary enemies by shutting down a politically neutral and possibly helpful industry. If you hate Bush, don't vote for him. If you think our electoral system is wrong, change it. Don't just criticize and be angry and call yourself a "dissenter". If something is wrong, get out there and make it right.

Don't like Bush/republicans/conservatives/whatever? Run for a local government seat and make things right. You may not be president first time out, but you have to start somewhere. I think it is more difficult than we think.

Think we are trashing the environment? Go get an engineering degree and figure out how to fix it.

Think we are mistreating the poor? Go help out at a shelter. Every weekend for a month. See what happens.

Think that the rich are corrupt and evil? Compared to many other nations we are each fabulously wealthy. How does it feel to be corrupt and evil? If it bothers you, give all your stuff away until you feel ok again.

My point is: it is very easy to complain. It is easy to say how stupid this particular person (Bush for instance, but others, indeed everyone else, could be in this blank) must be who is dealing with situations we have never dealt with and is working with information we have never seen. It is a very different thing to try to help or try to fix it. All I am saying is go out there and try, and in the meantime, entertain the remote possibility that we all may not have everything figured out.

poop

exercise your civil rights.

shut it down

and there are trees in the city,
standing out from the background,
saying things could be worse.

~Clearlake

when first i met my freind Jason Magnuson he exclaimed, "You are from Brainerd, home of Brainerdarian diahhrea?!"
till this day i had not looked into it.
here is the evidence of the words that Jason spoke to me that day.

i apologize for my laziness in composing a response.
i would just like to clear up that my post was not a personal attack on anyone's god.
it was not intended to call anyone to the defense.
i feel as though i was misunderstood.

allow me to diagram:

how arrogant it is to assume that god would be a man (probably the most common challenge to preconceptions about what god might be, and not one that i care to argue)

more arrogant still to assume that god would be a human at all (a statement that occurred to me as superseding the general challenge of god being male)

so you see i merely used the first statement as a springboard for the second.
so that rather than argue about which gender of our species must certainly be the form of god, realize that we are merely one animal on one planet in one galaxy in the entire universe, and it is as irellevant to envision god a mongoose or an amoeba as it is a human.
the reason for my statement is that it seems incredibly arrogant to me how man has created gods in his own image, and if he truly understood his utter smallness then he would stop trying to wittle god down to whatever he wants it to be and just admit that it is an unfathomable idea that we may never know.

Over two years ago Applekid left brainerd. I have finally edited the footage. 02.07.20

Ok... I will do my best to address the nature of the last post, though I am a bit confused because there are very many ways that the two statements could be taken.
First, I am making the assumption that the first line could also be written something to the effect of "It is arrogant to assume that God is male." The other main way to take the statement would be to say that "It is arrogant to assume that God is human", but this is the same as the second statement, so I will go with the first. Please correct me if I am wrong...
OK. This problem arises from two places. First, from the English language, and second from our biology. From the language standpoint, we have an old colloquialism that is becoming less commonly used but is still technically correct. From a precise grammatical point of view, the word "he" can refer to someone of the male gender or to a non-specified gender.

English also has no third person pronouns, so we have no way to refer to a personal being (we can't call Him "It", for instance) without specifying a gender, however incomplete a description of Him that may be.

That said, God is referred to in some generally masculine ways as our heavenly Father, king, judge, shepherd, etc. , but is also referred to in feminine ways:

"For example, God is portrayed as a mother who nurses and comforts us (Isaiah 66: 12-13). God is likened to a midwife (Psalm 22:9), and as a seamstress (Luke 12: 27-28). God's wisdom is characterised as a woman (Proverbs 8). The imagery of a female eagle is employed to show God's tender support for us (Deut. 32: 11), and similar bird-like imagery is employed in Psalm 91 with us sheltering under God's wings. In the New Testament Jesus likens his concern to that of a mother hen gathering in her chicks (Matthew 23: 37)." - jesus.com.au

God is also referred to in other, gender-neutral ways, as a fire, a door, fortress, rock, bread, etc.
The Feminist argument (please don't read disrespect for Feminism into this - this is defined as a Feminist view) is that referring to God as male is idolatrous and would seem to exclude women or to look down on them in some way. On the surface, this would seem true, but there are some problems with it. First, to refer to God as "she" comes across as being just as matriarchal as referring to Him as "he" would seem patriarchal, and further lacks the grammatical point that "he" can be gender-neutral. Also, referring to God as "she" implies a complicit agreement with the neo-pagan (Wiccan) concept of goddess worship, which is certainly NOT endorsed by the Bible.

From a biological standpoint, God, being a spirit, has no biology, and in that sense can be neither male nor female. To consider God as being dominantly male or not is to confuse Him with created things. The best way to describe this is that God is the Originator of gender, and as such transcends gender.
This brings up the argument of Jesus being male (which ties in with the second statement as we shall see). There were a couple of reasons for this. First, in order to be God Incarnate, God had to pick a gender to become. There are only two to choose from. God could have just as easily chosen to be female, but this would have presented two main problems. First, throughout Scripture, God generally prescribes leadership roles to be filled by men. This is not a hard and fast rule, but is generally so, and is the topic for a whole other discussion. A good reference is "Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood" by John Piper and Wayne Grudem. I haven't finished reading it, but it is very good, if dense, reading. Also, at the time of Jesus, He simply wouldn't have been able to fill the roles he filled by being a woman. Something I want to stress is Jesus' affirmation and respect of women, as evidenced in John 4 and John 12 (and many other places). PLEASE READ THESE CHAPTERS. Read the whole thing for that matter... It is very good. :)

OK, so that deals with the first line.
The second line is more confusing, but I think can be dealt with much more simply. To think that it is arrogant to assume that God became a human at all completely misses the point for why He did so in the form of Jesus Christ. Far from being arrogance, it is absolutely humbling. Condescension has a negative implication among people in that it places one person above another, but in the relationship between God and man, God is obviously above the other, and condescension takes on a truly good meaning. God becoming man is the ultimate form of condescension, so much so that it will absolutely blow your mind if you think about it for a few minutes. Go ahead... try it.
Ok, now that your minds have been sufficiently blown, I will continue. :) God set aside the free exercise of many attributes so that He could "fit" into human form and participate in our human-ness with us, and thus provide a means of redemption. This is something that we could not have even come close to doing on our own. The Bible says that our own efforts at righteousness are "as filthy rags". This becomes even more striking when you realize that the term translated into "filthy rags" refers to essentially a used tampon. And righteousness is something that we desperately need, to "pay off" a backlog of sin. This necessary righteousness was "condensed" by God in the form of Jesus to provide just that payment. It is really amazing when you think of it. There is so, so much more to it, too. Really amazing when you start to look at these things. Please think these things out... I am interested in discussion on or off blog, so let me know if anyone has anything else....

So I will leave you with that. Just think about what I have written. Many of you may disagree with all or part of it, but think about it nonetheless.

As for me, I must sleep now. g'night
jeff

how arrogant it is to assume that god would be a man
more arrogant still to assume that god would be a human at all.

made to survive in the wilderness,
my sight dulled from staring into monitors and televisions,
my hearing dim from electronically amplified music,
and my body slow and fatty from a life of sitting and being moved about by machines and the absence of any real and useful work needed for my survival;
i am a damaged specimen, an unhealthy beast that must soon fall to natural selection.
may the xylophone of love play loudly over our doom.
~adam

Well, as per the assault weapons ban, I would challenge that the issue is moot anyway because the ban did exactly nothing. Basically, all it did was require cosmetic alterations of semi-automatic rifles to make them look safer (mechanically, they function the same), and restricted the manufacture of large-capactiy clips (20 rounds is now the limit, I believe, though there are multiplied BILLIONS of larger capacity clips that were created before the ban and are "grandfathered" in - you just can't legally make new ones). Later modifications required waiting periods and background checks, neither of which really work. I can still steal a gun from someone, buy one that has been stolen, or buy one from a private individual, completely bypassing any regulations.
The cosmetic alterations boiled down to a choice between any one of three things; "assault" weapons are generally classified as having a flash suppressor (a device on the end of the barrel that directs the flash of a shot axially away from the barrel so that it can't be seen well in the dark) a pistol-style grip and having a bayonet and are specified to be semi-automatic (fully automatic weapons require an FFL to purchase, and this just about requires an act of congress to get). You can choose one of the three to have on a weapon. Everyone chooses the pistol grip because a flash suppressor is useless and needless, as is a bayonet, and they require the least modification of the rifle. Short of this degenerating into an argument over the second amendment and the necessity or not of weapons being available to the public, be assured the supporting the ban but not caring about passing it is the obvious political choice to make, because it completely doesn't matter.
Also, as one who has had some experience with these weapons, I can tell you that it further doesn't matter because the weapons themselves are useless. They generally can't hit the broad side of a barn, and are very prone to malfunction (misfire, jam, etc). And full-auto is even more useless. Fully automatic weapons are ideally suited for having 50,000 troops on one hill shooting at 50,000 troops on another. You seriously CANNOT hit anything accurately beyond a range of about 5 feet. I shot one one time, and let me tell you, it is absolutely nothing like the movies. I even have video of my grandma shooting one... that one is funny. :) Lots of fun, lots of noise, lots of ammo, but absolutely no utility.

By far and away, the most deadly weapon ever created is the average hunting rifle. Long distance accuracy, flawless functioning, high-power, etc. Labelling assault weapons as assault weapons only obscures the argument.
As for good things Bush has done or been for, I can name a few
1.The partial-birth abortion ban. This was his most shining moment as a president, I think. I still haven't forgotten my paper on abortion - actually I have written and revised several. I will explain more in coming days.
2.Backing out of the Kyoto Protocol This is a bit technical - I have looked at it because I was originally for the Kyoto Protocol, but when you really get down to it, it is ineffectual and prohibitively expensive. This can turn into a lengthy technical discussion, but my best opinion as a geophysicist at this time is that there is a better way to reduce emissions.)
3.Backing out of the ABM treaty. ABMT bit the dust with the Cold war and MAD. ABMT was prohibiting development of interceptor missiles that can defend (hopefully - they sometimes fail) against a strike by N. Korea (a far more imminent threat than Iraq ever hoped to be). Russia is no longer an enemy and we should quit treating them as such.

There are others... I would need to think for a bit. I guess that the differences that people have lie in the fundamental nature of their worldviews. You really can group people into two general groups (right and left - NOT republican/democrat, though one will generally prefer one over the other with a continuum of views on issues inbetween). For instance I support the heterosexual/traditional definition of marriage, and can support it within the construct of my worldview, but since most of you would pretty much reject my worldview, you can therefore reject my conclusion because you reject the fundamental assumptions in my arguments. This is just a for-instance... I could prop up any argument for anything and we would most likely be at loggerheads because of this fundamental difference in worldviews. In a way, it is like we are speaking different languages or something like that. I think that it is so fundamental that we miss it unless we really sit and think for awhile.
You can try to make the case without reference to a worldview (largely the realm of ethics), but that is in the end doomed to failure because it provides no frame of reference. It is as useless as me saying that I am moving 5 miles an hour. You can build a worldview, but since nobody can completely divorce themselves from their own worldview, your constructed world will be different from someone elses, and different from your own, and they will still reject your argument, and you on some level will reject your own argument. It won't completely square with your sensibilities because it is a distortion of your own worldview.
So in the end, we are all doomed to argue in circles.

Everybody who sees this should go to www.questfortherest.com and play the game there.
then go out and buy the new Polyphonic Spree album and experience something truly incredible.
more music needs to be like this.