The Bus Seems to be Low on Fuel

There is a lot of good and bad crap being spewed into the universal compost heap. Some of the gasses that are being created by this deluge can be very useful in keeping the Bus motoring toward a vast vacation spot that is large enough to allow all of us to bask in the Sun of Enlightenment and swim in the Sea of Equality. But as is always the case, some of the gasses just stink like a dead skunk in the middle of the road.

The divisions in this world are not insurmountable by nature. They are merely bumps in the road. But too many riders want the journey to be accommodating to a view of comfort that is myopic and self-centered. Many of us have been bathed in this manner so many times and for so many generations that we can't see anything changing. But it must! The bus is running out of fuel quickly. The old fuel, while propelling the bus for millennium, has fouled the air, the water, the land, and our hearts and minds.

Somehow, if we are to survive ourselves, we need a new fuel for the Bus. Or maybe a truer statement would be an old fuel that has been ignored. EQUALITY ANYONE?

The ease with which oppression of someone else is justified in our minds will be the downfall of civilization. Doing what is right is not easy most of the time. The short term comforts of taking the easy way out benefit so few that they cannot last as we all want to bask in the Sun.

I know, I know. Some will say " It has been this way since the dawn of time!!". I agree. Things have gone so well, why change? Right? But, as I look out my window, watch the news, dream of smelling the Roses, I wonder when the Bus will run out of fuel and we will be forced to walk in the dead skunk gasses...or perish.

I WANT TO BASK AND SWIM...WITH OTHERS...DAMMIT!

The Stuck In Time Machine

When I was still in High School I saw what I was sure was the direction civilization was going. Equality, humanity, and generosity seemed to be the obvious path. Being one of those that always jumped at the chance to be in the future early, I got married at 17, and had 3 children by 25. I became enamored with learning how to manipulate the physical universe at will while I grew as an accomplished soul.

At 45 a divorce threw me back into the mix. Imagine my surprise to find that the world had not only failed too keep up with my journey in many areas, it had actually stagnated or regressed in most, especially woman's rights.

Sure, some things were different than in my mother's and grandmother's day, but those things seem to hide the truth. Much of the liberation of women was a mask that society used to obscure the flaws in status quo. The trickle-down theory of Reagonomics applied to social justice in a hideous way.

It has left me virtually alone because men don't seem to believe misogyny exists or is wrong, and women of semi-enlightenment see me as the enemy because of my genitalia. I seem to exist in a no-win environment as the Time Machine sputters and fails.

I stopped to Smell the Roses, But Blindly Drinking the Kool-Aid? I Don't Think So!

The information environment in the world today is choc-full of good and bad, true and untrue, humble and arrogant. Some of the would-be prophets in the Academy continue to speak in absolutist terms that really show that, no matter how smart or educated or well connected they are, they can't, or refuse to, speak words that do not put themselves ahead of all others. Even when they know they are only one drop of rain falling into an infinite sea.

The use of such rhetoric serves to alienate rather than foster. While it is true to say that some statements may make sense in one construct, it is dishonest to believe that there is only ONE way to view something (your way) and that it is fact rather than a matter of opinion. It is even more dishonest to state things as though they can be proven when, in fact, they can't. Facts not opinion are proof of something. And conclusions based on facts may still be wrong or incomplete. Only those that consider themselves omniscient and omnipotent make their opinions count as fact.

Saying that something does not evolve because it does not jive with a narrow, cherry picked, dismissive of all other permutations, meaning, is a crime against knowledge.

If one says the earth is not round and you can prove it, that statement is just wrong. To say the earth is not round because it has mountains, valleys, oceans, and flat lands, is an incredibly dishonest trick of logic.

So drink the Kool-Aid if you want to. As for me, I'll wait to see who dies before sipping. What grieves me most when people act like a god, is so many people say "I don't know if what they say is true but I will take it as fact because they are such a great speaker".

Drink up sheep!