The Rise of the Anti Hero and the Triumph of Solipsim in a Godless World

This beyond dark imagery is becoming more and more prevalent. Just the imagery associated with some of the movies and television shows--for example, the imagery from American Horror Story--today repulses me. However, the imagery isn't always so repugnant.  From Dexter to Walter White to Tony Soprano to Frank Underwood to Jack Bauer the world is awash in antiheroes who sell sex, death, destruction and moral corruption as easily as...well, as easily as the devil sold the fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. The antihero rapes, tortures, kills, corrupts, etc. in service of his or her sense of what constitutes “the greater good.,” and not only do we root for them, we love them--some, of course, more than others. With the exception of Dexter because I can't stomach the idea of a "heroic" torturous serial killer-- I've watched them all and as much as I hate to admit it, to this day, I miss Tony Soprano and Walter White.  What that says about me speaks volumes. So I'm preaching to myself (and hopefully to my children if they ever read my blog...I'm certainly not holding my breath) because I'm as easily seduced, if not more so, by  the anti-hero.  As the saying goes: People teach what they need to learn.

In order to define antihero, you must first define hero because anti simply means “against,” or “opposite of.” So, what is a hero? He or she is one whose virtues and good works greatly outdistance those of ordinary good people. To take it a step further, heroes are "souls already purified from all attachment to things worldly, and solidly anchored in the love of God."  To put it very simply, an antihero is a central character or protagonist in a novel, play, movie, TV show, video game, etc, who lacks heroic virtues: temperance, fortitude, prudence, and whose virtues and good works greatly outdistance those of ordinary good people.

“Virtue consists in the following, or imitation, of God [Jesus Christ]. Every virtue, like every other thing, has its type [exemplar] in God. Thus the Divine mind itself is the type of prudence; God using all things to minister to His glory is the type of temperance, by which man subjects his lower appetites to reason; justice is typified by God's application of the eternal law to all His works; Divine immutability is the type of fortitude. And, since it is man's nature to live in society, the four cardinal virtues are social [politicae] virtues, inasmuch as by them man rightly ordains his conduct in daily life. Man, however, must raise himself beyond his natural life unto a life Divine: 'Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect' (Matthew 5:48). It is, therefore, necessary to posit certain virtues midway between the social virtues, which are human, and the exemplary virtues, which are Divine. These intermediate virtues are of two degrees of perfection: the lesser in the soul still struggling upwards from a life of sin to a likeness with God — these are called purifying virtues [virtutes purgatoriae]; the greater in the souls which have already attained to the Divine likeness — these are called virtues of the purified soul [virtutes jam purgati animi]. In the lesser degree, prudence, moved by the contemplation of things Divine, despises all things earthly and directs all the soul's thought unto God alone; temperance relinquishes, as far as nature allows, the things required for bodily wants; fortitude removes the fear of departing this life and facing the life beyond; justice approves of the aforesaid dispositions. In the higher perfection of souls already purified and firmly united with God, prudence knows nothing but what it beholds in God; temperance ignores earthly desires; fortitude knows nothing of passions; justice is bound to the Divine mind by a perpetual compact to do as it does. This degree of perfection belongs to the blessed in heaven or to a few of the most perfect in this life. -- St. Thomas (I-II:61:4)

The rise of the antihero is establishing a new social order completely independent of nature and totally at the service of human will.  Whereas, literary heroes used to be good people who did good things for good reasons, in contemporary literature, antiheroes have begun to outnumber heroes.  However, the anti-hero is getting harder and harder to discern as all moral boundaries are consistently and seductively blurred.  In other words, anti-heroism is a response to modern man's uncertainties about moral code and value judgements as modern anti-heroism captures the sensibility associated with modernism. The reader, spectator empathizes with characters who are immoral.

“The moral inversion of suspense is when the spectator empathizes with characters who are immoral, who are not necessarily presented as morally preferable in the narrative and may thus otherwise have been perceived as unsympathetic, and feels suspense in relation to a situation where it seems unlikely that this character will succeed. Empathizing with the character makes the spectator root for this character wanting him or her to succeed--more traditionally seen -- (The Antihero in American Television by Margrethe Bruun Vaage)

The devil, it turns out, with his disarming mix of charm and wit on the one hand and darkness and terror on the other, rules the day ...All you want to do is join the party, be his friend, sit next to him, make him smile. 

“Through Wisdom is a house built; and by Understanding it is established: [But] by Knowledge shall all the chambers be filled." (Proverbs 24:3-4)

Instilling fear--because when fear dominates our thinking, love is absent--and the transvaluation (reversing the meaning of traditional and accepted values) and inversion of the predominant moral system of the Christian world are the operating principles of modernity and the postmodern ethos, which has successfully seized the moral high ground...not all that hard, considering the levers of power are in their hands to not only  'do what thy wilt,' but to convince us that 'to do what thy wilt is the whole of the law,' that is, unless you step out of line.

Links:

The Rise of the Antihero

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Demographic Warfare: Weaponizing Immigration

At the end of 2014, the number of people, worldwide, forced to flee their homes rose to a staggering 59.5 million compared to 51.2 million a year earlier and 37.5 million a decade ago. displaced from their homes.

“The increase represents the biggest leap ever seen in a single year. Moreover, the report said the situation was likely to worsen still further.

Globally, one in every 122 humans is now either a refugee, internally displaced, or seeking asylum. If this were the population of a country, it would be the world's 24th biggest.

Refugees boat sinking at Christmas Island

Most of us believe that immigration occurs naturally, that the hordes of immigrants we see today, fleeing unbearable circumstances is the direct result of unfortunate circumstances that haphazardly plague nations around the world.  We conveniently forget the centuries of ravishing and plundering of  these unfortunate nations--rich in natural resources and brimming with economic potential--by colonizing and neo-colonizing powers. 

Australian treatment of refugees

No, not too many of us consider the possibility that the natural flow of immigration has been co-opted by global elites who deliberately create the abominable conditions that force desperate millions (pawns) to cut and run.  Yet despite our nation's wealth created through the plundering of these war-torn nations,  we allow the corporate owned mass media foster and fan the flames of racism and anti-immigrant sentiment without question. 

Refugees on journey to Australia

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Does Thanksgiving Celebrate the American Holocaust?

At one time, approximately four centuries ago, prior to the Europeans arriving, there were anywhere from 19 to 100 million indigenous peoples populating the western hemisphere. By 1970, there were only 250,000. What happened to those people? They were systematically eliminated over hundreds of years.

Yet, we continue to celebrate Thanksgiving, based on the mythological fantasy--created by American expansionists--of America, the "shining city upon a hill," who because of its special virtues, was destined to redeem and remake the west, and now, apparently, the world. According to former the Chairman of the  Anthropology department at University of Connecticut, William B. Newell, Thanksgiving Day is historically based on gratitude for genocide.

“William B. Newell, a Penobscot Indian and former chairman of the Anthropology department at the University of Connecticut, says that the first official Thanksgiving Day celebrated the massacre of 700 Indian men, women and children during one of their religious ceremonies. "Thanksgiving Day" was first proclaimed by the Governor of the then Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1637 to commemorate the massacre of 700 men, women and children who were celebrating their annual Green Corn Dance...Thanksgiving Day to the, "in their own house", Newell stated.

"Gathered in this place of meeting, they were attacked by mercenaries and English and Dutch. The Indians were ordered from the building and as they came forth were shot down, The rest were burned alive in the building-----The very next day the governor declared a Thanksgiving Day.....For the next 100 years, every Thanksgiving Day ordained by a Governor was in honor of the bloody victory, thinking God that the battle had been won."

In June 1637 John Underhill slaughtered a pequot village in just the manner described above. Narranganset Indians were used as the mercenaries. Governor John Endicott of the Massachusetts Bay Colony proclaimed the pequot war. A pequot chief of sachem named sassacus warred against the Dutch in 1633 over the death of his father. The pequot made no distinction between the Dutch and the English. The Underhill massacre was witnessed and documented by William Branford and an engraving was made illustration the massacre.

The Jamestown Colony may be the source for the tradition of Indians under the leadership of Powhaton joining with early settlers for a dinner and helping those settlers through the winter. There were no pilgrims of puritans at Jamestown, however. The present Thanksgiving may therefore be a mixture of the tradition of the Jamestown dinner and the commemoration of the Pequot massacre.

The celebration of Thanksgiving as an official holiday possibly roots in the Pequot massacre, while the imagery is of Jamestown with pilgrims, images misused. ”

Even before the concept of Manifest Destiny was put into words, it provided the justification for the largest genocide in history, which raises the question of why we focus so much on the holocaust that took place in Germany during WWII, and not at all on the holocaust that occurred right here, and continues on to the present. Could one of the reasons be that the remaining Native Americans aren't as well funded as the Jewish population? Maybe it's because Hitler applied much of what he learned about the way we dealt with the indigenous people in order to create Nazi Germany, as he did when he studied the plans of Bosque Redondo to design the concentration camps for Jews.

After all, Joanelle Romero, who began putting this film (below), narrated by Ed Asner, together in 1995, originally intended it to be 90 minutes, but due to a lack of funding, this 29 minute version, released in 2001, is all that's been completed, and is quite possibly the only film of its kind.

“ Hitler's concept of concentration camps as well as the practicality of genocide owed much, so he claimed, to his studies of English and United States history. He admired the camps for Boer prisoners in South Africa and for the Indians in the wild west; and often praised to his inner circle the efficiency of America's extermination—by starvation and uneven combat—of the red savages who could not be tamed by captivity.

He was very interested in the way the Indian population had rapidly declined due to epidemics and starvation when the United States government forced them to live on the reservations. He thought the American government's forced migrations of the Indians over great distances to barren reservation land was a deliberate policy of extermination. Just how much Hitler took from the American example of the destruction of the Indian nations is hard to say; however, frightening parallels can be drawn. For some time Hitler considered deporting the Jews to a large 'reservation' in the Lubin area where their numbers would be reduced through starvation and disease." -- John Toland, Adolf Hitler: The Definitive Biography p. 202

“All the societies in the Americas, with very few exceptions, were built on genocide, on the blood of the indigenous people. People were wiped out… We live under a state of systemic racism. In the United States and Canada you can’t have open discrimination against us anymore such as they had 30-40 years ago but we are still not viewed as equals in these societies and we are not treated as equals, and we are still seen by the vast majority of the people here, because of lack the lack of education, as people that came from barbarous tribes, savage tribes and not as people who came from civilized a community.” -- Dr. Daniel N. Paul, a Mi’kmaq Elder and an Indian Historian

Links:

THE SUPPRESSED SPEECH OF WAMSUTTA (FRANK B.) JAMES, WAMPANOAG: To have been delivered at Plymouth, Massachusetts, 1970

United Native America

American Indian Library Association

Gathering of Nations

The American Indian Heritage Foundation

Navajo Code Talkers: World War II Fact Sheet

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9/11 Synchronicities in Pop Culture and Mass Media.

Obviously, some of the images/videos--only the tip of a very large iceberg-- below are just a coincidence, or possibly result from bad timing, but it's hard to believe that all of them are just a coincidence? Some might call some of these images prophetic, foreshadowing or even a form of predictive programming.

To start with, a newspaper advertisement placed by the Committee for a Reasonable World Trade Center that appeared on page 38 of the May 2, 1968 edition of the New York Times

1979 Pakistani Airlines ad:

Chilling Twin Towers image painted by amateur artist Willie Gardner was hanging in an office at an obscure Scottish community center since 1988:

"Renovations & Interior Decorating" magazine on the week of 3-9 September, 2001.

"The City of New York vs. Homer Simpson" (originally aired 9/27/1997):

The Coup - Party Music album cover art that was prepared, June 2001 to be released in November 2001:

Supertramp's Breakfast in America album cover:

German music album cover:

From 'Adventures of Superman" #596, scheduled for release on Sept. 12th, 2001:

By Mike Wieringo, who died in August 2007 at the age of 44

The March 12, 2001 cover of issue "New York"Magazine:

The July 1975 Cracked Magazine cover:

From the 1991 movie, Terminator 2: Judgment Day":

 From the 1999 movie "The Matrix":

From the 1983 movie, Trading Places:

From the 1990 movie,  "Pretty Woman":

From the 1996 movie, "Independence Day"

From the Disney cartoon "Gargoyles", which premiered on September 11, 1995, a stargate opens at the top of the twin towers:

A pre-9/11 General Electric advertisement from an Italian magazine. 

 From Novermber 1993 Hustler Magazine (p. 24):

From a pre-9/11 magazine advertisement for Maker’s Mark Bourbon:

From Marvel Two in One #100 June 1983:

From a NYC 1982 hotel guidebook:

From a FEMA Emergency Response to Terrorism Booklet: 1997:

1988 Microsoft cover:

Israel's Elite Candy ad:

From 1976 Sesame Street, "Monsters on the Loose!"

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Has Christianity Gone Satanic?

Secular Christianity may sound like an oxymoron, more than likely, because it is, as it implies serving two masters: the state and Jesus Christ.  Nevertheless, despite the inherent paradox, if you examine the beliefs and actions of most American Christians, and then reflect on what Jesus actually taught, you will see there is very little, if any similarity between the two.  Many Christian churches have adopted a worldly spirit, and have united with the state.   Incorporated 501(c)(3) religious organizations comes to mind.  In fact, considering the evangelical Christian embracing of Twilight as a pro-abstinence narrative, satanic Christianity may be more accurate. A little more on that, later.

Of course, true Christians - those who really try to understand and live up to the teachings of Jesus - exist. However, you will never find them in places of power or celebrity. Why? Because the ruling elite truly hate everything for which Jesus stands. And, unfortunately, they are the ones who ultimately determine what society values. How? Well, by co-opting Christianity, of course. After all, the platform and tools necessary to promote any type of belief system requires massive resources. And, rather than crush the masses under their boot, our rulers have put forth "false apostles and deceitful workers, who transform themselves into the apostles of Christ" in order to promote their occultist belief system in such a way that the masses accept their version of Christianity - satanic Christianity - with a smile. 

Take the hottest pop culture phenomenon since Harry Potter: Twilight, not to mention, Buffy, True Blood, Vampire Diaries, etc, which has created an occult addiction amongst teens to such an extent that they think sinking their teeth into one another is the ultimate sign of intimacy and love. The juxstaposition of sex and violence portrayed is truely disturbing.
Uhm...hello?  Isn't vampirism the antithesis of Christianity?   The vampire is obviously the inversion of Jesus Christ. Both Christ and vampires deal with blood and eternal life.  But, whereas Christ shed his blood so that his followers could have eternal life, the vampire sheds his follower's blood so that he can have eternal life. You see, the vampire achieves immortality through immorality. Yet, Christian evangelicals hold Twilight up as somehow virtuous?

Sociopolitical Parasitism

Evil is parasitic. The whole idea of a beast subsisting on the essence of life sums up evil in a nutshell. Isn't it bad enough that we live at the mercy of a small powerful group of vampires people, who derive their wealth off the backs of the tax-paying working class? Why is it necessary to emulate them, too?

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Warning or Indictment?

Upon first viewing of this pithy little video below, I thought it was wonderful. It's brief, forceful, and gets right to the point. But, therein lies the question: what is the point? Does it leave you with a feeling of disgust for the parasitic, plundering ruling class who are destroying our nation? Or does it leave you repulsed by the "barbaric" low-class, mindless, "too-stupid-to-live" animals consumers from Hell? What are the chances that any of these "barbaric" shoppers will even see this video in order to mend their ways?

Just listen to the dehumanizing, condemning rhetoric...and to whom it is aimed. It sure ain't the pompous-assed prima donnas.

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Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely

As much as "We, the People", have been led to believe in our superiority - "Manifest Destiny" - the truth is that "We, the People" are human beings, just like everyone else on earth. Having said that, most will find the following story either totally unbelievable or horrifying shocking. However, when you consider the nature of power, especially absolute power, something the United States has enjoyed for the better part of a century, it should come as no surprise.

Below, Kay Griggs, former wife of U.S. Marine Corps Col. George Raymond Griggs (Chief of Staff Marine Atlantic/ Head of Psychological Operations, NATO), in an interview that took place in 1998 (before George W. Bush...before 9/11...before the Internet infiltrated our daily lives), gives details about what she was told during her eleven-year marriage to Col. Griggs.

Usually, after having too much to drink, Col. Griggs told his wife, stories about how he and others in this elite military group killed people ...stories about sexual perversion ...stories about murder, military hit squads, brainwashing and mind control. The most disturbing part is that all of this was not only sanctioned, but, participated in, and condoned by a group of military and political elite.

Mrs. Griggs calls the people, her former husband is/was involved with, the members of "The Firm" or "The Brotherhood". She said, if you are in this small click, you are above the law and literally can get away with murder. Famous White House correspondent, Sarah McClendon, told Kay Griggs to go public to save her life.

"He told me what they did. They nurture--they cultivate--the sons of prominent families. They're called "rising stars." They rope them in. Then they "turn" them."

"What my husband does for a living is train mercenaries -- young boys from countries like Romania, Dominican Republic, Haiti. They're training them to be murderers, and the taxpayers' dollars are paying for this. They psychologically profile them. The profile is similar to my husband's and Lee Harvey Oswald's and [Timothy] McVeigh's, and others who were all part of this program."

"St. Elizabeth's Hospital, like the Eastern State Hospital in Williamsburg, has Army intelligence people in there. They're targets -- people who have decided to tell the truth. People who believe in the American dream, who are Christians, who are trying to get things straightened out. If they transgress that line where they upset somebody in high command -- just like in Germany -- they all of a sudden move from being a person to being a target. Therefore, the enemy. Why are good people silenced, why are their papers gone through?"

"Now these generals in the Marine Corps and Army, according to my husband, they are ordered. My husband, being Chief of Staff, told his men it was like this: It's the Marine Corps first -- the Brotherhood, the Cherry Marines, the bonding that goes on. The Marine Corps comes before God, before Jesus Christ, before the country. My husband is not a Christian, he's an existentialist, and most of these guys are. [Their god is] the Brotherhood. It's very German, it has Masonic leanings. They're all Masons. This Brotherhood -- Opus Dei -- they're the Mob. The Marine Corps are the hit men. They're mercenaries. They'll work for anybody. They'll switch hats. My husband said it's no big deal. I'll go work for the State Department."

"The Marine Corps is just a smoke-and-mirrors thing. On [my husband's] level, he said we've never been an enemy to the Soviet Union. They work with these Communists. The man who started this whole intelligence operation -- OSS [Office of Strategic Services] -- he was recruiting known Communists who were involved in subverting Spain. They're not Americans. They're not Christians. They're German existentialists. Now what are they doing running our nation? They have more affinity for the State of Israel than they do our nation. They don't care about American citizens. The judges now in the courts are all military officers following chain-of-command orders. They're not independent judges."

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Liberating The Savage Mind

Claude Levi-Strauss  is the father of modern anthropology because of his revolutionary conclusion that so-called primitive societies did not differ from modern ones. He banished the whole idea of primitive man as separate from civilized man, and he also concluded that the “savage mind” is necessary to the creative process and is something we all have access.

According to Strauss, the "savage mind" is in a conversation with itself throwing up new ideas in wild abundance but within those ideas there is order and pattern. It is in the imagination of people that we can see new things, new developments, new creativity.

“Intellectual thought is something like a wild flower that develops in certain conditions of life away from civilization or that which we deem to be. “ -- Claude Levi Strauss

Even in what we consider the most primitive states of being, or ways of life, as we see it, the people are still using imagination in the most elaborate manner. Rather than create an advanced industrial civilization, they create a wonderfully rich world of familial structure, art, ritual and pattern.

“In all matters touching on the organization of the family, and the achievement of harmonious relations between the family group and the social group, the Australian Aborigines, though backwards in the economic sphere are so far ahead of the rest of mankind that to understand the careful and deliberate system of rules they have elaborated, we have to use all the refinements of modern mathematics. It was they who discovered the ties of marriage represent the very warp and woof of society, while other social institutions are simply embroideries on that background; for, even in modern societies, where the importance of the family tends to be limited, family ties still count for much: their ramifications are less extensive but, at the point where one tie ceases to hold, others, involving other families, immediately come into play”. -- Claude Levi-Strauss

“International institutions must be aware...that progress is not a comfortable "bettering of what we have", in which we might look for an indolent repose, but is a succession of adventures, partings of the way, and constant shocks. Humanity is forever involved in two conflicting currents, the one tending towards unification, and the other towards the maintenance or restoration of diversity. ..The need to preserve the diversity of cultures in a world threatened by monotony and uniformity has surely not escaped our international institutions…We must hearken for the stirrings of new life, foster latent potentialities, encourage every natural inclination for collaboration which the future history of the world may hold. We must also be prepared to view without surprise, repugnance or revolt whatever may strike us as strange in the new forms of social expression. Tolerance is not a contemplative attitude, dispensing indulgence to what has been or what is still in being. It is a dynamic attitude, consisting in the anticipation, understanding and promotion of what is struggling into being. We can see the diversity of human cultures behind us, around us, and before us. The only demand that we can justly make (entailing corresponding duties for every individual) is that all the forms this diversity may take may be so many contributions to the fullness of all the others. -- Claude Levi-Strauss

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The Irish: An Elusive, Unmistakable Character

"The Great Gaels of Ireland are the men that God made mad, for all their wars are merry, and all their songs are sad." -- G.K. Chesterton

Beneath the surface charm of quaint thatched cottages, beautiful rolling green countryside, and the lilt of Irish voices, lays an anguished and tragic history.

Like Ireland's weather, with its constant changes in light, color and atmosphere, the Irish are a people of baffling inconsistencies. Wit, whimsy, charisma and the easygoing charm of the Irish people often richly blend with an unpredictable, feisty, stubborn independence and deeply felt melancholy, grappling with the paradoxes woven so intrinsically into the fabric of its land and people. It could be that these contradictions of character may be one of the reasons Ireland has produced many of the world's finest writers.

However, at the root of all that characterize the Irish is their strong sense of loyalty and clannish spirit. After all, emerging distinctly Irish, following over 700-years of resisting assimilation by the British, their cohesive tendencies must have served them well in preserving their unequivocal singularity .

Oh, Paddy dear, and did ye hear the news
that's goin' round?
The shamrock is by law forbid to grow
on Irish ground.
No more Saint Patrick's Day we'll keep,
his color can't be seen,
For there's a cruel law ag'in in the Wearin'
o' the Green...

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Pulling Yourselves Up by Your Bootstraps When You Don't Have Any Boots.

Individualism - where everyone is expected to look after him or herself and his or her immediate family, and where it is believed that anyone, regardless of their status can pull themselves up by their bootstraps and raise themselves from poverty - is quintessentially American. It is what defines our culture, above all else, yet more than ever, Americans are falling victim to this "everyone for himself" belief system, generated by those (power elite), who most benefit from we the people's ignorance of this ideology's mythological proportions.

We rank highest in the world, on the individualism (IDV) index, which is part of the five dimensions of culture, created by Geert Hofstede, who conducted the most comprehensive study of how values in the workplace are influenced by culture, and after analyzing a large data base of employee values scores collected by IBM between 1967 and 1973 that covered more than 70 countries.

Placing so much significance on this one aforementioned dimension can be very destructive when government policy, not only fails to provide the level playing field required to make it work, but, in addition, sets up barriers that make it impossible, for all, but those with the luck of a jackpot lottery winner, to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, despite the lack of boots. Of course, then, those lucky individuals will serve as the token success stories that sustain the "bootstrap" mentality.

As more and more of our professional class find themselves facing situations - lack of health insurance, unemployment, foreclosure etc. - previously thought as something that only happens to slackers, the better the chances are that this "bootstrap" myth will be put to rest.

Fortunately, culture is not a fixed entity, rather, it is, or should be, dynamic and fluid, however this requires that we the people take off our blinders and refuse to live in denial or remain in a state of complacency, and instead develop a culture of cooperation, fairness and respect for the individual, regardless of that person's social status.

Hofstede's five dimensions of culture:

Power Distance Index (PDI) is how individuals interact with people with authority or status over them. It focuses on the degree of equality, or inequality, between people in the country's society. A High Power Distance ranking indicates that inequalities of power and wealth have been allowed to grow within the society. These societies are more likely to follow a caste system that does not allow significant upward mobility of its citizens. A Low Power Distance ranking indicates the society de-emphasizes the differences between citizen's power and wealth. In these societies equality and opportunity for everyone is stressed.

Individualism (IDV) focuses on the degree that society reinforces individual or collective, achievement and interpersonal relationships. A High Individualism ranking indicates that individuality and individual rights are paramount within the society. Individuals in these societies may tend to form a larger number of looser relationships. A Low Individualism ranking typifies societies of a more collectivist nature with close ties between individuals. These cultures reinforce extended families and collectives where everyone takes responsibility for fellow members of their group.

There are only seven (7) countries in the Geert Hofstede research that have Individualism (IDV) as their highest Dimension: USA (91), Australia (90), United Kingdom (89), Netherlands and Canada (80), and Italy (76).

Masculinity (MAS) focuses on the degree the society reinforces, or does not reinforce, the traditional masculine work role model of male achievement, control, and power. Do values of assertiveness and competition dominate? A High Masculinity ranking indicates the country experiences a high degree of gender differentiation. In these cultures, males dominate a significant portion of the society and power structure, with females being controlled by male domination. A Low Masculinity ranking indicates the country has a low level of differentiation and discrimination between genders. In these cultures, females are treated equally to males in all aspects of the society.

Uncertainty Avoidance Index (UAI) focuses on the level of tolerance for uncertainty and ambiguity within the society - i.e. unstructured situations. A High Uncertainty Avoidance ranking indicates the country has a low tolerance for uncertainty and ambiguity. This creates a rule-oriented society that institutes laws, rules, regulations, and controls in order to reduce the amount of uncertainty. A Low Uncertainty Avoidance ranking indicates the country has less concern about ambiguity and uncertainty and has more tolerance for a variety of opinions. This is reflected in a society that is less rule-oriented, more readily accepts change, and takes more and greater risks. Are unknown situations threatening or acceptable?

Strong: South Korea, Japan, and Latin America
Weak: US, the Netherlands, Singapore, Hong Kong, Britain

Geert Hofstede added the following fifth (5th) dimension after conducting an additional international study using a survey instrument developed with Chinese employees and managers. That survey resulted in addition of the Confucian dynamism. Subsequently, Hofstede described that dimension as a culture's long-term Orientation.

Long Term Orientation Long-Term Orientation (LTO) focuses on the degree the society embraces, or does not embrace, long-term devotion to traditional, forward thinking values.

Long term cultures:
Supports a strong work ethic where long-term rewards are expected as a result of today's hard work.
High respect for tradition and family honor.
Avoiding shame and "Saving Face" is desirable.
Knowing true way of doing things important.

China; Hong Kong; Taiwan, Japan and India.

Short-term cultures:
Change can occur more rapidly as long-term traditions and commitments do not become impediments to change.
Focus on one's own reputation and security and pursuit of personal happiness.
Avoiding guilt is motivating.
Gaining status and wealth desirable.
Tolerance and diverse opinions are acceptable.

Britain, Canada, the Philippines; Germany, Australia.

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Browser Racism?

Blackbird is a web browser for the African American community, developed by a group of African American entrepreneurs, under the direction of Ed Young, CEO of Blackbird. At face value, it is a regular browser, however, intrinsic to its creation, just two or three clicks away, the user can access expanded content that is targeted toward the black community, not easily found elsewhere.

Rather than segregating black content, this browser pulls out black focused information, into the web, bringing it to the forefront. This information could be found in a GOOGLE search, however, it may show up as result number 17,100,000. In other words, this browser sorts the information differently than Internet Explorer, Firefox, or Safari.

White Bird was created in response to the Blackbird project. Of course, by default, all popular downloaded browsers are "whitebirds", making the creation of White Bird nothing more than a spoof.

White Bird was developed on the simple proposition that we, as the White American community, can make the Internet experience better for ourselves and, in doing so, make it better for everyone. Primarily we believe that the White Bird application can make it easier to find White American related content on the Internet and to interact with other members of the White American community online by sharing stories, news, comments and videos via White Bird.

So, is the Blackbird browser racist? Is the White Bird browser racist?

First, we should define racism. If we define racism as hatred or intolerance of another race or the prejudice that members of one race are intrinsically superior to members of other races...Blackbird does not qualify. Nor does it segregate, as it only rearranges information...it does not take away information. The user is also given the choice (radio button) to use it as a "regular" browser.

Second, Blackbird affords a certain part of our population the opportunity to obtain information the same way the majority does - leveling the playing field, in a sense - therefore, if anything, Blackbird counters an intrinsic "racism", that is almost impossible to eliminate because it is generated by demographics, and is not the result of malicious intent.

The White Bird browser, on the other hand, might be a tad "racist". That is, if it does not allow the user to include results other than "whitebird", especially considering "whitebird" browsers are a dime a dozen. Other than providing a little amusement, White Bird serves no purpose, as - like I said before - all browsers are "whitebird".

In conclusion, the Blackbird browser is not racist at all and despite what I said before, I believe White Bird is not racist either...just useless or funny, depending on your perspective.

Jay Smooth, host of NY's WBAI's Underground Railroad, and founder of one of the first hip-hop websites, hiphopmusic.com does a very good job clarifying racism, including how best to respond to it.

"I don't care what you are; I care what you did." - Jay Smooth

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Are Republicans Hijackers?

Embedded in the DNA of American culture is the notion that the activities of external life - doing, fixing, accumulating, competing, accomplishing etc. - trumps the activities of internal life - reflecting, thinking, becoming, evolving, etc. In addition, Americans tend to value obedience, conformity and simplistic thinking over depth of knowledge, dissent, and critical thinking. This type of atmosphere, where reflection, self-awareness, and intellectualism are disposable and, in some circles, seen as a sign of weakness, providing fertile ground for the agenda of despotism as it creates the perfect "hijackee" (emotional).

What is emotional hijack? Supposedly, in stressful or threatening circumstances, emotion "hijacks" our rational thought processes. The signals we receive in a "threatening" situation bypasses our "thinking brain" (cortex), and sends the signal straight to the amygdala, which is the most primitive part of our brain and functions primarily to react in a defensive and self-protective manner.

So, what does all of this have to do with politics or Republicans? Studies have shown that people retain information better when that information is accompanied by emotion; therefore, there is no better time to inform habits of thought than when the brain is seized by sorrow, fear, anger, or hate. This is the time to convince "Joe the Plumber" that his interests align perfectly with big moneyed interests.

Republicans excel at emotionally "hijacking" the American public, either as the catalyst for combustion or ready to jump in and exploit the "threatening" situation to their benefit. This is when the GOP intentionally diverts America's attention away from the actual source of the problem and targets a scapegoat - a group or program (gay, poor, African Americans, Welfare, New Deal etc.) - who, not only are innocent of wrongdoing, but are victims of the disruptive or upsetting conditions, as well. Republicans are notoriously good at paving the way to hell so that we, the people look forward to the trip, so much so, that we actively participate in our own undoing as the politically elite cash in.

So, are Republicans hijackers? It depends. Obviously, if the Republicans orchestrate an event for the sole purpose of exploiting its citizenry, the label hijacker applies. However, if Republicans did not plan the threatening event, which is more than likely the case, rather they readily pounced on the first calamity to exploit it to further their agenda, the label does not apply, because their ability to take advantage of a negative event requires our permission to do so.

Having said all that, emotional "hijacking" does not account for the complex, intricate relationship that exists between thinking and emotion in human beings. Thinking underlies our emotions and emotions propel our thinking and it is up to us to control both in such a way that we consider the good of the greatest number of people involved, otherwise, it is likely that political leaders will succeed when employing manipulative techniques to get us to act against self interest.

Ironically, if we indulge in intellectual laziness, and show no interest in evolving our thinking beyond that of a 2-year old, where everything is about me, me, me, our myopic, self-centered thought patterns will prevent us from seeing the whole picture, making us the perfect candidate for politicians who will do their very best to make us accomplices in efforts to disenfranchise ourselves.

We can prevent the greedy, power-hungry political elite from emotionally hijacking us by differentiating ourselves from them. We can do this by consciously transforming our egocentric, self-serving thinking, unconcerned with the rights of others, to a more self-aware, non-egocentric, comprehensive way of employing one's mind. Then, and only then, can we impose intelligence on our emotions and challenge the destructive dynamics that the politically elite create to remain in power and enables all 1% of them to earn more than the bottom 50% and own more than the bottom 90% of our population combined.

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Culture Influences Brain Function

MIT researchers report in the first brain imaging study of its kind that American culture, uses their brains differently than Asian culture to solve the same visual perceptual tasks.

Americans, which values the individual, emphasize the independence of objects from their contexts. In contrast, they found that East Asian societies, who values the collective, emphasizes the contextual interdependence of objects.

Americans, when making relative judgments that are typically harder for them, they activated brain regions involved in attention-demanding mental tasks. They showed much less activation of these regions when making the more culturally familiar absolute judgments. East Asians showed the opposite tendency, engaging the brain's attention system more for absolute judgments than for relative judgments.

Everyone uses the same attention machinery for more difficult cognitive tasks, but they are trained to use it in different ways, and it's the culture that does the training," Gabrieli says. "It's fascinating that the way in which the brain responds to these simple drawings reflects, in a predictable way, how the individual thinks about independent or interdependent social relationships."

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Will the Demise of the VHS Tape Curtail Creation of Culture?

BILL HAMMACK: Back in the 1980s, the Supreme Court ruled VCR makers couldn't be held liable for copyright infringement.

That gave consumers the right to make personal copies of TV shows and movies using a VCR.

The new digital media that are erasing the VHS format are also erasing our rights.

A few years ago, a Judge issued a catch-22 ruling: Yes, she said, we can copy commercial DVDs too. But no one can sell the software to do that.

In effect, that lets a content producer, the copyright owner, code their own intellectual property law into the DVD.

What's wrong with what? I mean surely only criminals would like to copy, right?

Well, wait a minute.

The U.S. has a long history of fair use: You have the right to cut out and frame a New Yorker cartoon. Or photocopy a newspaper article.

Fair use also catalyzes innovation and allows us to talk about ourselves, to create culture.

Take an artist of the future. He or she might want to make a statement using a bit of video or sound in a creative work.

But as all media — even books — become digital, every embodiment of thought or imagination becomes subject to commercial control.

DVDs use a technology called Digital Rights Management that allow producers to control when and where you watch.

They can specify whether you view a movie once or 100 times, and they can even restrict the devices you can play it on.

The slow demise of VHS tape risks the literary and intellectual canon of the coming century becoming locked into a digital vault accessible only to a few.

As our country moves forward to regulate digital copying, I urge us all to bear in mind T.S. Eliot's famous saying. "Good poets borrow; great poets steal."

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