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The Eternity Articles Act 1 Scene 02
__________________________________________________
/ /
/ The Eternity Articles /
/ /
/ Act I, Scene ii -- April 1995 /
/_________________________________________________/
\ \
\ Guy in charge: Sanjay Singh \
\ eternity@cyberspace.org \
\_________________________________________________\
"I thought I could capture the stories of the city on paper. I
thought I could write about the horrors of the city. Horror
stories you see. I tell you I didn't have to look far for
material. Everywhere I looked, there were stories hidden there in
the dark corners... I wrote and still there were more... No one
would publish them. 'Too horrible,' they said. 'Sick mind,' they
said. I thought I could write about the horrors of the city but
the horror is too big and it goes on forever." [Grant Morrison]
Here we go... onto the second issue of this ghastly beast. As
promised this month we will be discussing freedom. There's really
not much to say here, except to say that if you want any info on
this, then check the first issue (WhyMe1-1.txt). That has lots of
goodies, including how to get this, and how to get my quote list,
and whatever else I thought was important last month... Now
without any further delay... we're off!
By the way, I've changed the monthly naming thing. Now it
should make more sense. You can read April's issue in April. This
is still the second one though... Don't worry, you haven't missed
a thing.
Introduction
============
Freedom? What exactly is it? Is it something that we are
willing to die for, like others have done? Is slavery really a bad
thing? Why didn't Picard just say "there are five lights" and be
done with it and enjoy the rest of his life?
What is so special about freedom? Ask anyone and they'll
probably tell you that it's great because that's what America is
all about, or they'll say something like "it means that I can be or
do whatever I want to." Personally, I'm not sure what it is. I
know that almost everyone thinks that it is a good thing, and that
you can't have enough, but I can't really accept that. Is it a
good thing? I'm not saying that it's a bad thing. I love the fact
that I live in Canada, and we have our little democracy which gives
us some freedom to be, do or choose whatever we want to, so what's
wrong with that?
In 1984 (by George Orwell), Winston Smith said that "Freedom
is the freedom to say that two plus two make four," but if you've
read the book, you know that this philosophy doesn't hold up for
too long. So does that make freedom optional, does it mean that
you can change your mind about what it is, depending on what's
happening around you?
Too much freedom is definitely a bad thing. After all, rules
limit freedom, and without rules our society would be in anarchy.
This is a bad thing. But then again, too many rules can just be
overwhelmingly constricting.
Too little freedom is slavery. After all, if you can't
control much of your own life, then somebody will be controlling it
for you. And without any control of your life, or your future, you
don't really exist at all.
So now the problem is deciding how much freedom we should
have, or how much we need. I can't answer that. I'm not
qualified to, and why should I be telling you what to think? I am
just a voice... a scream in the dark... nothing more, but certainly
nothing less. But if any single voice is echoed enough, then
eventually, maybe, enough people will hear it.
Back To Basics
==============
"How can you censor my thoughts? / What is right, what is
not? / How is it you decide, / What I should feel
inside?" [Frozen Ghost]
I think that I can safely say that the three basic freedoms
that we have are freedom of thought, freedom of speech, and freedom
of expression. The freedom of thought is the most fundamental
freedom that we will ever have. It is the least tangible of your
freedoms, that means that no one can control it, or take it away
from you. Without this one, no other freedom could possibly exist.
"It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have
those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of
speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to
practice either of them." [Mark Twain]
Freedom of speech, is also an important freedom. It gives us
the right to say what we choose. This one can and is limited by
censorship. Which is not all that bad. I'm sure all of us realize
it's importance with prisoners of conscience. People who spoke
their mind, and because it went against what the state said, were
either killed or imprisoned. But it also has a bad side. Without
censoring what people say, then hate groups, such as the neo-nazis,
Black Panthers and KKK would spread like wildfire, because no one
would be able to stop them from speaking their minds.
Freedom of expression, is perhaps the most dangerous freedom
that is out there. After all this is what people act on. Thinking
about killing someone is different from saying that you're going to
kill someone. And both of those are completely different from
actually going out and killing someone. I'm sure we've all thought
the first, and blindly threatened the second, but not many people
have acted out the third. There's a great difference, and you
can't just ignore it.
Religion
========
"The first revolt is against the supreme tyranny of
theology, of the phantom of God. As long as we have a
master in heaven, we will be slaves on earth." [Mikhail
Bakunin]
"Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the
heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless
conditions. It is the opium of the people." [Karl Marx]
How can you discuss freedom without mentioning religion? I
knew that I couldn't really ignore this issue, so I'll settle for
trying to keep it balanced.
What does religion have to do with freedom? Well if you ask
a humanist you'll hear that religion is 'them' telling you how to
live your life, and you're being oppressed. If you ask a Catholic
they'll say that it's the freedom of knowing that if you live a
good life you will be rewarded. If you ask me you'll get some
creative little dodge of the entire question, but I'm off topic
again.
If you're into comics and you read "Mr. Punch" (by Neil
Gaiman) and "Mystery Play" by Grant Morrison you'll notice that
when Mr. Punch kills the Devil he says "Hooray! We're free to do
whatever we want!" When God dies in "Mystery Play" someone says "I
guess that means we are free to do whatever we want." [thanks to
Tony Buchanan for pointing that out] So who's right?
From one side of the picture we can say that God (religion) is
controlling us, and we need to let go to be free. But who said
that there was anything wrong with that? If you ask someone who is
religious they'll dismiss the fact that they are following someone
else (priest, rabbi, guru, pandit, whatever) as just part of their
faith. They trust God, and supposedly God trusts the people that
deliver his word, so why shouldn't they? You trust your friends,
why shouldn't they trust what is supposed to be one of the most
benevolent forces/beings in the universe?
From the other side, the Devil is dead. Gone. No more
Lucifer. No more Beelzebub. No more Mephistopheles. Great, I
guess that means that evil is gone too. We can feel safe in our
cities and homes. We are no longer a slave to the evils of the
outside world. It's a time to raise up our arms in victory and
party the night away, right? Maybe not. Being unreligious and
somewhere between atheist and agnostic with a bit of humanism
tossed in for good measure I don't believe in the Devil. But, I do
believe in evil. Personally, I just think that the Devil (being
the guy in the red jump suit with the pitchfork and pointy tail) is
a nice little caricature of evil, so parents with nowhere left to
turn to can use his image to frighten their children into being
well behaved little soldiers. But I can't just dismiss this point
because of that so, I'll back off from my personal ideals for a
bit...
So Satan is dead. I think that's where I left off... Does
that really mean that we are free from evil? I don't think so.
There's a lot more evil in the world right now than the Devil can
account for. It's like how there's something in space called dark
matter which is there and accounts for something like 90% of the
mass in the universe, and no one has actually seen any of it yet.
That's how I view evil. We see a small fraction of the evil out
there. People are full of good and evil, and are constantly
fighting to keep one side in control and the other side passive.
Whether you are consciously aware of this struggle or not, it's
still going on. No one is entirely good, and no one is entirely
bad. Darth Vader always had some good left in him (who am I to
question Luke?) and God took the seventh day off and rested.
Laziness! Isn't that one of the seven deadly sins?
From The Devil to Priests and beyond...
=======================================
"The Devil begat darkness; darkness begat ignorance;
ignorance begat error and his brethren; error begat
free-will and presumption; free-will begat works; works
begat forgetfulness of God; forgetfulness begat
transgression; transgression begat superstition;
superstition begat satisfaction; satisfaction begat the
mass-offering; the mass-offering begat the priest; the
priest begat unbelief; unbelief begat hypocrisy;
hypocrisy begat traffic in offerings for gain; traffic in
offerings for gain begat Purgatory; Purgatory begat the
annual solemn vigils; the annual vigils begat
church-livings; church-livings begat avarice; avarice
begat swelling superfluity; swelling superfluity begat
fulness; fulness begat rage; rage begat license; license
begat empire and domination; domination begat pomp; pomp
begat ambition; ambition begat simony; simony begat the
pope and his brethren, about the time of the Babylonish
captivity." [Martin Luther]
Wow, I just found that quote and had to add it, it doesn't
have too much (if anything) to do with freedom, but it follows that
last bit nicely.
Mom Was Right
=============
"If they don't like you for who you are, then they're not
your real friends." [everybody's mother]
Where to go from here... that's the question that I have. I
yapped on and on about everything that I think I wanted to. I've
rambled ad nauseam about this freedom and that freedom, and
something was still "missing." I just realized what it was.
Freedom to be yourself. At a time when everyone is labelled, and
everyone is a conformist (hell, even the non-conformists are
conformists now) where does individuality fit in? Why are people
so afraid of just being themselves?
When talking to friends I've noticed that whenever we hit some
grey area, or something controversial, either someone starts to
apologize for everything that they've said or about to say, or they
just deny everything that they just said. Why? Are we so
terrified of offending someone, or sounding stupid that we need to
hide behind a shroud of apologies and denial? Granted that no one
wants to hurt one of their friend's feelings, or step on their
toes, but you have to be able to hold onto your own ideals, and
thoughts. Those are yours. No one can take them away from you.
All they can do is judge you by them. And not every judgement
needs to be guilty.
My sister asked me if something was politically correct over
the Christmas break. I actually was annoyed that she asked me
that. I'm no fan of being PC, and I try not to live my life in
constant fear that the PC police are going to beat down my door and
take me away. (hrm... then I'd be a prisoner of conscience. I
wonder how Amnesty International would handle that?) But why was
I so bothered by that? I can say that I don't like being told what
to do, or say, or think. I don't like the need to constantly watch
over what I am saying just to make sure that I'm not offending
someone. I don't want to hurt someone again, but I'm not going to
change who I am just to suit the needs of society.
"Most of all we hate collective identity: every day of
your pathetic life you are being put into a little box by
society by the way you look or the bands you listen to.
Collective identity sucks. Be an individual, don't make
it easy to be dismissed in a sentence." [Matt Spinks]
And before I go, I wouldn't be an X-er if I didn't start
screaming about how much I hate the Generation X label. But, if
you think about it, we are exactly what 'they' say we are. We just
don't care anymore. That's what our generation is all about. I'm
not saying that that applies to everyone. I have friends that are
actually trying to make a difference. They do care, and they do
want to do something about it. Maybe we should just be identified
as the generation that want's to be adults when they're 13 and want
to be kids when they're 25. It might not actually solve any
problems, but it would at least let me know that there's someone
out there that I can relate to.
Slave To Society
================
"Going round and round / because you can't get on your
feet / Going round and round / still taking all the heat
/ Going round and round / never touching ground." [The
Cars]
This is quickly becoming more of a rant than what I intended,
but I like the direction this is going in, so I'll just 'go with
the flow.' Here I am at university and I'm noticing a scary little
trend going on. Why am I here? To learn, to learn all I can about
whatever I want to. That's the beauty of education, there aren't
any real 'boundaries' out there except for what you place on
yourself. I want to study philosophy, theology, music, science,
the arts, everything. I want to know everything that's available
to me. But, (and there's always a but) I can't. I'm allowed to
take maybe what 10, 15 electives over my 4 or 5 year stint here.
Of course, I made a trade off when I decided to come to this
school, sacrifice learning how to think for learning how to do.
Being a computer science major we do learn how to think on a very
narrow level, we learn how to analyze and logically deduce the
solution to certain problems, but how does that help me in the real
world?
Anyways, getting back on track... that was a good answer in
itself, but it was a lie. Why am I really here? Because I need
this little piece of paper with some fancy lettering and some
signatures of people that I've never met and a bunch of cryptic
little letters after my name to get a job. But why get a job? I'd
be more than happy sitting here writing this sort of thing for the
rest of my life (or at least until I run out of topics) but then
I'd probably starve, or end up living with my parents for the rest
of my life. Not some great options. So I have to work. Work gets
you money. And although I hate the thought of worshipping the
almighty dollar, I don't have a choice. Money may not be able to
buy happiness, but it can sure make the search for it much more
comfortable. So let's see how much money we can build up. To make
lots and lots of money, we need either lots and lots of education
or lots and lots of luck. I know I don't have much of the latter,
so that leaves me with the education problem. (is this making any
sense to anyone?)
"Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The
world owes you nothing. It was here first." [Mark Twain]
So what do I do, I sacrifice again. Self awareness (or a
sense of 'I') for society. And what do I get for it? No the world
does not owe me anything, but if I'm giving up so much of myself,
at least I'd like to know what I'm giving it up for. It may be
better to give than to receive, but if you keep on giving away
parts of yourself without receiving something to replace them,
eventually, you run out of yourself, you become just a shell of
what you should be. You're not you anymore, you're just a machine
that looks a lot like you. This isn't an episode of "The Twilight
Zone", this is real life.
The Sense Of 'I'
================
[by Jason Hamilton, prophet@ksu.ksu.edu]
If you have an intelligent machine that has no "awareness"
(sense of "I"), than you can make it do anything you want. If it
has most of the capabilities of humans, or even more, it is a very
useful machine.
If, however, it does have awareness, it is no longer a very
useful machine, but a very useful slave.
In other words, machines and insects have no moral standing.
People do, and maybe dogs and dolphins, too. If a machine were
self aware, it would have moral standing as well, and therefore
deserving of "human rights". That's one reason why it is
important to figure out what has a "sense of I".
I Can See The Music
===================
"DJs communicate to the masses / Sex and violent classes/
Now our children grow up prisoners / All their lives
radio listeners" [REM]
"Got to give us what we want / Got to give us what we
need / Our freedom of speech is freedom or death / We got
to fight the powers that be" [Public Enemy]
Like I said before, one person can't make a difference.
Neither can one song, one movie, one book, or one speech. All they
can do is maybe increase awareness. Maybe, just maybe, if enough
people realize what's going on, they might rally together and do
something about it. There is power in numbers, if you don't like
something, just sitting on your ass and complaining about it won't
make a bit of difference to anyone. No one really cares what you
think in the world, after all, you're just one person in 5 billion,
and this world would go on just fine without you. The trick to
making a difference is to let people know what you think, how you
feel, what's going on inside your head. Maybe then someone will
find out what you're thinking and say "Hey, they're right!" And
that's where power begins, that 2 will become 4 and then 8 and 16.
This is not just your ordinary, run of the mill, pyramid scheme...
this is legit. Chances are that you have at least one friend that
thinks and feels the same way that you do, and they probably have
a friend that feels the same way. Simple multiplication, word of
mouth travels fast. Hell, start up your own zine, you already have
a voice, give yourself an amplifier.
"Life is like a mop... and sometimes life gets full of
dirt and crud and bugs and hairballs and stuff and you,
you, you got to clean it out. You got to put it in here
and rinse it off and start over again, and sometimes you
know, a mop... a mop is not good enough you, you got to
get down there like with a toothbrush, you know, and you
get to really scrub to get it clean... you got to get it
off, you got to really try to get it off... and if that
doesn't work, if that doesn't work you can't give up.
You got to stand right up you got to run to a window and
say 'Hey these floors are dirty as hell and I'm not going
to take it any more!'" [from UHF]
Tell me if I start to make sense.
Uncle Tom, More Than One Of The Smother's Brothers
==================================================
"I know the argument friend. It's the great theory of
history. I've heard it before. It says when things
ain't good, instead of getting down and doing something
about it, instead of changing your life, it's a hell of
a lot easier to blame somebody else. And it just don't
wash in my book." [Talk Radio]
Sometime this week, there was a newspaper article in regards
to one of my favourite people, none other than Ben Johnson (prefix
'The Disgraced' or suffix 'The Athlete', your choice). Anyways,
cheap shots aside, he was 'informing' us about the white conspiracy
to keep black athletes at bay. In his words "Every time a black
man tries to succeed in life they try to put him down. Black guys
are making some good money and the white people don't want to see
them succeed, Mike Tyson is another good example." Now maybe my
memory is a little selective, but come on. I think banning Benny-
boy might have had a little tiny bit to do with him openly
admitting to taking steroids during the Olympics and before. And
I think Tyson being in jail has something to do with him
'allegedly' raping that woman, not because he was becoming to
powerful.
I have no problem with anyone making their living in any way
that does not hurt anyone else, whatever their race, religion, or
whatever is. If you think that there is a conspiracy in
professional sports then think about this... who is the highest
paid baseball player? Barry Bonds. Michael Jordan makes just
under $4 million and Shaq makes just over $4, with endorsements
they make $34 and $16 million dollars, respectively, a year. Tell
me that there's a conspriacy to keep blacks from gaining power and
stature in the world. To Gatorade, Nike, Wheaties and whoever else
he's the spokesman for, he is God... That's an acomplishment
regardless of colour. I'm not saying that there's no race problem
in professional sports, but we have come a long way from Al
Campanis' little blunder on Nightline.
Now we've "evolved" to the point where everyone has to have a
scapegoat. If you pour boiling coffee on your hand, just sue
McDonalds for making it too hot. It's happened, and that lady made
a couple of million pretty quickly. We don't need to find a get
rich quick scheme, we've got one. Whites blame orientals,
orientals blame indians, indians blame blacks, blacks blame whites,
and everyone blames the jewish. That's the problem today, no one
wants to take any responsibility for themselves. If you beat your
wife, you're a victim because you were bullied in school. If you
join the clan, then we should feel sympathy for you because you
were only defending your own race. If you kill people and then eat
them, you must be insane, and therefore you deserve special
treatment, and shouldn't go to jail. If this is the ride that
we're stuck on, I want off.
So what does this have to do with freedom? Not really sure,
I could probably think of a great many ways to link this to
freedom, and you could probably think of just as many as to why it
shouldn't. I think it has a lot to do with freedom, if only as an
example of why if we aren't going to censor ourselves then maybe we
should let the CRTC and FCC do it for us. Hell, freedom of speech
is a privilege not a right. It may be a tired cliche, but that
doesn't make it any less true. If we're not capable of policing
ourselves then maybe we do need to go under military rule. We're
just spoiled children, and as soon as someone says no to us, we
can't accept that because we've never heard it before. We have too
many privileges just handed to us, maybe we do need to actually go
out and earn some of this freedom that we have. At least then we
might actually notice it in everyday life, instead of just pulling
it out and using it as a shield whenever it's convenient.
Last Stop: Final Exit
======================
"If I cannot give consent to my own death, then whose
body is this? Who owns my life?" [Sue Rodiguez]
I'll make this last bit brief. The thought of covering
euthenasia didn't even really cross my mind until I read our
student newspaper today, and they had an article in it regarding
the topic, and so I'll just condense what they (Heather Calder of
the Imprint) said... This is one of the few really controversial
issues that I really have a strong leaning towards one side, so
don't expect this to be even close to balanced. I tried that
everywhere else in here, but I honestly can't think of any reasons
to be against this one.
Imagine being told that you would be dead within two years.
Imagine that you were dying of ALS (Lou Gehrig's Disease), a
brutally slow disease that attacks and destroys the body, while
leaving your mind untouched so you can relish in every agonizing
moment. You can actually feel your life slipping away, you know
exactly what's happening, but you can't do anything about it. This
is exactly what happened to Sue Rodriguez in 1991.
Euthenasia is illegal, basically it's murder, but you have to
look beyond that. It should fall under the same category as
suicide. And it does, except for when it is assisted, either by a
doctor, such as the infamous Dr. Kevorkian, or activist like Svend
Robinson. Rodriguez took the matter to the supreme court, which
ruled against her with a 5 - 4 vote. Regardless, Rodriguez took
her own life. The doctor who assisted in the suicide is subject to
life imprisonment under Canadian law, and the fate of Robinson (who
was present at the time of death) is to be determined by a
specially apointed prosecutor. All I want to know is why?
I want to personally commend Sue Rodriguez for having the
courage to take her own life regardless of what her options were,
and also to Svend Robinson, who has constantly fought the
government over this issue. The wheels may be turning slowly, but
at least he's got them turning.
The Road To Nowhere
===================
"Well we know where we're going / but we don't know where
we've been. / And we know what we're knowing, / but we
can't say what we've seen. / And we're not little
children, / and we know what we want / And the future is
certain / Give us time to work it out." [Talking Heads]
Well, I personally think this went much better than last time.
And it's still just the beginning of March. Pretty soon, there
might even be more than the 7 pages that we're at right now. Next
month, we will return to the more personal side of life with a look
at duality and multiplicity. How many people only have one side to
them? I don't, and I don't think I know anyone that does... so
let's try digging a little deeper and see what we pull out.
Thanks for listening.
Details, Details and More Details
=================================
Well if you have this then you probably know how you got it,
but in case this was passed on to you, then I'll just let you know
where you can find it.
ftp: ftp.etext.org /pub/Zines/WhyMe/
gopher: gopher.etext.org follow the prompts
mail: if you want a copy sent by mail then just send a request
to me at the eternity address. I'm not sure if I'm going
to set up an automatic mailing list... depends on demand
I suppose. But if you ask for a copy then I will send
one to you.
And the quote list that started it all can be found at the ftp
site... I think you can gopher it, but it's pretty big, so ftping
it would probably be the easiest thing to do. Or I could just mail
it to you.
Disclaimer
==========
I take full responsibility of the overall content here. There
might be other contributors (and what they say is their own
intellectual property), but what goes into this is my choice.
Truth is subjective (if you believe something then to you it is
fact, and if you don't then it is fiction, simple enough?) so I
won't make any claims about honesty... believe what you want. I
have no problem with people taking bits and pieces from here to pad
essays, or even their own stuff. Just make sure that you cite
whoever wrote the article. If it doesn't say who wrote it, then
it's probably mine.
If you know anything about ISSN numbers, like where I can get
one, or what I need them for, or even if I need one, could you
please let me know... Everyone else has one, and I want one too.
Thanks.
Sanjay Singh (3/26/95)
