Terrorists, Nukes, the Flu, oh my!

Someone in the west wants us to be afraid. Not just afraid, mind-numbingly terrorized. So they have hijacked the media to spread fear of the modern versions of the boogey man. But these things are real, you say. And you are right – to an extent. I’m not denying that these three problems are real, but in reality they are just recycled fears from the past. In generaly, the average person has almost nothing to fear from any of them. Let me break it down like this:

Terrorists have existed for decades (some may argue millenia) in some form or another. The boogey men that most of us will remember most strongly are the communists of cold-war Russia. However, other groups obviously had more “true” terrorists. The most well known were/are the palestinian terrorists: PLO, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, etc; or those of Nothern Ireland, the IRA. So, how have things changed? They haven’t. The only reason the west has grown this new boogey man is because the US itself was finally attacked and the average American could be awoken to global politics. Of course terrorists should be combatted, but rationally. They will always have the advantage against free, democratic states. The only way to completely prevent their attacks is to live in a police state – and do we really want that? Anyway, it helps to remember that, each year, we kill ourselves far more often than any terrorists do (especially in the US – annually there are around 10,000 gun-related deaths, versus the one-time killing of 3000 people in the 11/9/01 attack).

There are some 27,000 nukes in the world (still. Despite the NPT). Who do you think controls most of them? That’s right – the west, and the US in particular. Iran has a nuclear program that has enriched uranium about 3.5%, barely enough for a small nuclear reactor. They require 90% enrichment to make a bomb. Even if they succeed in making 1 or even 10 bombs does anyone truly believe they would use them on the west, who has at least a 1000 times more (and is geographically much larger so that any devastation would be more dispersed!). It would be the surest form of suicide. Sure a good Muslim is willing to sacrifice themselves for Allah, but I can’t see their president sacrificing the entire country! It is clear to me that if Iran pursues nukes it is for the same reason the west claims to harbour them – as a deterrent. The US in particular doesn’t want Iran to have nukes because it suddenly makes an invasion impossible. Precisely the reason Iran would develop them. All countries want to maintain their sovereignty. I, personally believe that the Arabic worlds are getting the double standard treatment by the ruling west. It’s a matter of US vs. THEM and we are in control of the global governments. Of course, that’s not to say that I would like to live in an orthodox Islamic state. Of course not. But all three of the Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity and Islam) can be mobilized to war and violence very easily and all have their own share of fanatics. Only their methods differ (and, with the exception of suicide bombers, very slightly). The first two have become more moderate due to the development and incorporation of scientific knowledge but this can easily be a tenuous truce between reason and religion -- as the rise of the Christian conservatives in the US has shown. In general, we have more to fear from ourselves than any terrorists.

Fear of the great bird influenza epidemic has been circulating for several years now. It may or (more likely) may not come. But is the panic really necessary? Flu epidemics, of course, can be very real. There have been several periods of global epidemics in the past and that fact, combined with modern technology and the ease of travel, are undoubtedly what stimulates the fears this time. However, in the world so far there have probably been a dozen human cases and no evidence of transmission from birds to humans. Yes it is important to study it, to understand it, and to develop preventative measures and treatments. Does this really warrant the paranoia circulating in the media. I think not, but only time will tell.

Modern life is already busy and complicated enough without the powers-that-be terrorizing us with their boogey men (why they do it should be obvious). I say: enough is enough.

Void Surfer

Anachronistic West Challenges Chinese Organ Donors

Here's an interesting story I saw today on the BBC news site and I welcome any and all comments. It seems the West has pretty good evidence that the Chinese are using the organs of executed criminals for transplants -- without the prior consent of the criminal.

My take on this is as follows:

Hurrah China! At least the deaths will mean something. Of course, one has to separate the issues of 1) removing the organs without consent, 2) is executing criminals just, and 3) are the executed criminals simply enemies of the state. In fact, here we are only dealing with #1, since 2 and 3 will not change simply by stopping the use of the organs.

I believe that the negative reaction by many in the West (although, interestingly, not those who need a new organ) is anachronistic with its origins in religion. Without a religious basis for the discussion there can be really no argument that China is fully justified to do whatever it wants with the criminals bodies, even by Western standards. In addition, I argue that it is hypocritical for the West to treat dangerous criminals like animals and then argue that they still have human rights (this is especially true in the US where there is still capital punishment).

When we die, we die. When we are dead, we have no need of our bodies or anything else, for that matter. We live on, not in the rotting flesh of our decomposing corpses, nor as some disembodied spirit floating in a happy hunting grounds. We live on only in the memories of our friends and families and anyone else whose life we have touched. For that our bodies are not necessary. It is only the anachronistic concepts of religion that argue differently. Since China is officially an atheistic country, they have no reason to bow to such archaic religous ideas. There is, in fact, no reason to preserve the bodies other than to recycle the parts to help others live happier lives.

There are many, if not most, in the West that believe that the criminals, especially those on death row, do not deserve the same rights as the rest of us. I have heard it said many times that these people have forfeited their rights when they committed the crimes. This belief is quite obvious from the way said criminals are incarcerated. Very little attempts are made at reform them or to give them a useful role in society under more structured guidelines. The little attempts that come to mind (largely from US movies of southern 'chain gangs') suggest that the attempts were not to allow them to play a valuable role in society and to try to reform them, but rather simply to use their muscle power for manual labour in a menial, degrading manner. Thus, it seems that in the West we are caught in the midst of an hypocrisy. The criminals, we claim, should have human rights at certain times, but not at others. In fact, most of the time we simply lock them up and forget about them.

So which is it? Are they to be treated without rights - in which case there is no moral dilema with taking their organs without consent, or are they to be treated with only the very few human rights as can be entrusted to them? In this case, far greater efforts at reform and some form of social usefulness should be found. After all, you don't think that being incarcerated and separated from most of humanity for decades is a significant punishment by itself?

Void Surfer

Senseless Death Arrives!

For those of you too numerous to count (I'm sure), who have been eagerly awaiting the adventures of the psychotic skeleton Senseless Death, the first chapter has arrived. Follow his journey through the Rogue Isles and his quest to regain power. And what of his pitiful minions: G.What.Bulsh** and t.B.liar ? Only time will tell.

Catch the on-going saga now, only at /http://senselessdeath.blogspot.com

Where have all the heroes gone?

Perhaps its just my reaction to a difficult period in world history and my personal, emotive response to all the craziness in the world these days, but recently I’ve started wondering - where are all the heroes? Where are all the average people doing feats of great prowess and greater altruism?

Now, I was born in 1970, so I grew up through the cold war nuke fears (which I always believed were a load of garbage) and the energy crisis, and then, what seemed the golden years of the ‘90s and now …for want of better term…the new dark ages.

*[aside] Interesting how dark ages always rear their ugly head when religion makes a comeback*

But, despite the problems of the 80’s, in Canada anyway, there arose two heroes from the ranks of the everyday people. Well, everyday handicapped people, in fact. I remember watching the news stories of Terry Fox in his attempt to run across Canada to raise money and awareness of cancer – on one leg. He gave his life in this pursuit, running his final miles near ThunderBay, Ontario (the nearest city to my home town). Now, in many countries his name is remembered through an annual charity run for cancer. Another great person who arose in Canada in the mid-80s was Rick Hansen. He was a man who suffered a spinal cord injury when he was 15. Twelve years later he decided to ride his wheel chair around the world to raise money and awareness of spinal cord injuries and the plight of disabled people. It took two and a half years until he finally arrived home to Vancouver and a heroes welcome. Of course there were other heroes of the world and not all of them had to do great feats of athletics. One of the few religious figures I truly respected, Mother Teresa, is one, of course. These are people that have given their lives, or large parts of them to make the lives of others better.

So where are the heroes now? It seems something happened in those golden years of the 90’s and now no one is willing to be a hero without getting paid. Okay, that’s not really fair, especially to all the people around the world who really are trying to help; fighting poverty or famine or other worthy causes, despite the apathy of the rich western governments. So, clearly there are a lot of little heroes around the world. Still, these are definitely times when we could use the uplifting feeling a larger-than-life hero gives.

Oh well, they would probably be bought, sold, and disposed of by Big Money before they could get around the block.

Void Surfer

The Orthodox Religious

At the risk of being offensive, I believe that people of orthodox religious views have very little imagination. Why do I think that, you might ask - and rightfully so. No, its not just to be offensive. But consider the following comical definition of a person of orthodox religious views:

They have a deep and unwavering belief that the supreme being, the omnipotent and omniscient creator of the entire universe and everything in it has a very personal interest in their sex lives.

Now this sounds funny when you read it, but when you really think about it, it is true. The orthodox religious truly believe that the creator of everything cares about their sex lives, whether they have sex before marriage, whether they have abortions, whether they use contraception. Come on people! It must strike some of you that this is completely absurd.

So, how do I connect this with a small imagination. Well, it strikes me that such people cannot truly fathom the scope of the universe. It is my opinion that this is a general feature of religion and began …from the beginning. Consider that when the story of genesis was written it was likely believed that the Earth was the center of a very small universe. The heavens, including the stars, existed more or less on the surface of a sphere surrounding the Earth. In effect, sort of a small galactic onion with the Earth at the center. In this case, a God would only have a single planet to think about, a very small ‘universe’ with a very small population.

In fact, this view persisted through until the middle the last millennium and the scientific renaissance began by Copernicus and others. Even now, although we know the universe is infinitely larger, unless one really spends time thinking on it, it is difficult to truly get any feel for what that means. I’m sure that the average, non-science fiction reader/watcher, non-astronomer, really has never thought about it and has very little feel for what an infinite universe means. To consider that our solar system is probably already larger than what the ancients believed the entire universe to be. Then consider that that solar system is completely unnoticeable compared to our galaxy, which is some 80,000 light years in diameter (or more than 469,967,132,160,000,000 miles across – for comparison, the distance from the Earth to the Sun is 93,000,000 miles). Then consider that our galaxy is one of billions of other galaxies of similar size. Then, to make things even larger, consider that the spaces between the galaxies are larger than the galaxies themselves. If you can fit even a fraction of that in your head you quickly realize that any creator of the universe is not going to care about your sex life any more than it cares about the sex life of a creature on some distant planet of the 85,694,234th galaxy. Consider that, if there is only ONE intelligent species per galaxy (a very real possibility at any particular period of time), then there are still BILLIONS of intelligent species in the universe. And this god that many humans worship is supposed to take a deep personal interest in each and every member of each and every species!?!? Well, either the orthodox religious have a much smaller imagination than I do, or they have an infinitely larger one!

Void Surfer