And Then? Part Two

On December 7, 1941 the Imperial Japanese Navy launched a sneak attack on a deep water U.S. Naval base located in the island of O'ahu, west of Honolulu. The attack on Pearl Harbor woke the sleeping giant and plunged the United States into World War 2. This was our wake up call. The world was at war and it was taking us with it. At least to the general public, this attack was a complete surprise. It was a slap in the face, and we were both scared and pissed off.

In olden times it was a common practice to drive a goat off into the wilderness to die. The thinking behind this was that the goat would carry their sins and thus their guilt away with it. This is where we get our modern word scapegoat. And that is what we needed. Humanity has an inborn need to blame. We are problem-solvers. It is why we are currently the dominant species on the planet. We need to be able to point to something and say: "That's it, that's what caused this. Now lets deal with it." This is usually a good thing. But in the absence of something to blame, we will reassign the blame to something we can deal with.

Japan, for all intents and purposes was on another planet. It was so far away as to be, to most Americans at the time, an abstract concept. No good as a focus. It was too far away to relieve the helplessness that we felt. But there were Japanese people living here, right?

With Franklin D. Roosevelt's signing off on Executive Order 9066, the internment camps were born. This resulted in the forced removal of roughly 120,000 Japanese and people of Japanese ancestry from their homes on the west coast. At least 62 percent of these people were American citizens. To be fair the camps themselves were not bad places. The occupants received free food, lodging, medical and dental care, clothing allowance, education, hospital care and all basic necessities. But a gilded cage is still a cage.

the

In 1943, this poem began circulating at the Poston War Relocation Camp. The writer is anonymous.

THAT DAMNED FENCE

They've sunk the posts deep into the ground

They've strung out wires all the way around

With machine gun nests just over there,

And sentries and soldiers everywhere.

Imprisioned in here for a long, long time

We know we're punished -- though we've commited no crime.

Our thoughts are gloomy and enthusiasm damp

To be locked up in a consentration camp.

Loyalty we know and patriotism we feel,

To sacrifice our upmost was our ideal,

To fight for our country and die perhapse;

But we'er here because we happen to be Japs.

We all love life and our country the best,

Our misfortune to be here in the west.

To keep us penned behind that damned fence

Is someone's notion of national defence.

And Then? Part One

And Then? (part 1)

Let's try something different today, shall we? This will be a blog in three parts. In the first two parts, I will share two important pieces of literature. The third part, will be from me. I don't care if you like me or not. I don't care if you think I am a raging idiot or the most brilliant thing on two legs. These works are very important to us, as a people, and I implore you to read them with an open and honest mind. Read them and consider. I do not ask that you like them or agree with them or me, merely consider.

The first of these two works is the most famous. It was written by am man named Martin Niemöller. Mr Niemöller was a German-born Lutheran pastor born on January 14, 1892. He passed away on March 6, 1984. Mr Niemöller was, at first, a sympathized to Adolf Hitler. On July 1, 1937 he was arrested and brought to "Special Court" and tried for activities against the state. He was fined 2,000 reichsmarks and sentenced to seven months in prison. His detention period had exceeded the sentince and as a result, he was released after the trial. After leaving the court he was arrested by the gestapo and interned first in Sachsenhausen and then in Dachau concentration camps. He escaped execution due Germany's defeat. He was liberated by Allied forces in 1945. He was not a great man. He was a man like any other. He held ideas both noble and base and had is own prejudices and ideals. He was just a man, for better or worse.

This is his work:

First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out—
because I was not a communist;

Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—
because I was not a socialist;

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—
because I was not a trade unionist;

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
because I was not a Jew;

Then they came for me—
and there was no one left to speak out for me.




End Part One...

It's About Bloody Time!

Now there are 39. Until today the Department of Veterans Affairs had a list of 38 religious symbols that it allows to be engraved on the tombstones of out fallen military. Today we add the pentacle to that list. Normally it takes only a few months for a faith group to petition and win approval from the DVA. This time it took ten years and a lawsuit. Can anyone tell me why that is? I mean a legitimate reason, not one based on ignorance and bigotry.

My question is this: Why is there even a list at all? Ignoring the fact that through-out history all attempts to regulate faith has resulted in chaos and blood, we are talking about folks who died in service of their country. No matter what we think of the current cluster-fuck in Iraq, these people died, at least ostensibly, to protect and enrich our lives and freedom. Why are they limited at all. If someone wanted that girl from the back of mud flaps on their grave who are you or I to deny them that. I think they have earned the right.

The fact that this particular symbol took ten years and a lawsuit to approve should have we as a people asking some very serious questions of ourselves and our government. Are some of us so insecure about our own belief system that allowing others to express their own that we try to legally stop them? Does freedom of religion only apply to some of us? What happens when someone decides that it doesn't apply to you?


Rant Over... For Now

Westboro Baptist at it Again

Westboro Baptist Church (the "god hates fags" people) has made an announcement that they will be protesting the funeral of Ryan Clark on April 21. Mr. Clark was one of the victims of the Virginia Tech shootings. They seem to believe that the VT shootings and other tragedies are the result of god punishing America for it's tolerance of homosexuals. If this sounds familiar, it should. These are the same people who have been protesting the funerals of our military personnel killed in Iraq and before that the funerals of AIDS victims and homosexuals thanking god for both 9/11 and HIV. Unfortunately the response to their activities has been terribly lopsided with the whole country getting in an uproar when the protested the military funerals and not giving a damn when the protested the HIV victims and homosexual's funerals. Now, to the best of my knowledge, Mr Clark was neither military nor a homosexual so it will be interesting to see the country's response to this. Some have proposed banning WBC from protesting funerals. This is a slippery slope. While they are vile, horrible people, they are still American citizens and should have the right to peaceful protest guaranteed to all of us in the Bill of Rights. If we take their rights away, who is next. As long as they remain peaceful, they should be allowed to protest and hold up their little signs. In this country we do not have the right not to be offended. That having been said, I also support the rights of another group of protesters to stand directly in front of the WBC protesters holding up giant blank signs obscuring the ones of the WBC. As long as the "anti-protesters" do not com into any physical contact with the WBC members, I don't believe any laws would be broken. After all, you are not guaranteed the right not to be ignored either. Just a Thought

Wanted for Questioning: Pac-Man

Well, ladies and gentlemen, it is another school shooting and another round of folks pulling nonsensical reasons out of their asses. As usual lawyer Jack Thomson popped up again barking about the horrors of video games and how they cause ordinary people to become slobbering nutters, as he wipes the drool from his own lips.

The man may be a blow-hard with no imagination and even less of a sense of humor but at least he is dependable. And that's what we like in this country, things that can be counted on to distract us and keep us from focusing on the actual problems and, god forbid, do something about them. I have a sneaking suspicion that the situation is much the same in other countries but, as I have yet to have the opportunity to travel anywhere outside the US other than Mexico, I can only speak for what I have observed here.

Now, we have the same conclusion coming from another source. Dr Phil "look-what-I-just-pulled-out-of-my-butt" McGraw decided to pop up on an episode of Larry King Live and spout the same distracting sewage. Now, I am sure that the comments made caused the entire Oprah-worshiping population to immediately rush en mass to his way of thinking, as they seem to have no discernible thought process of their own, but it still doesn't change the fact that this argument has no actual basis in reality.

On the show, Dr. Phil makes this statement:

DR. PHIL: "...common sense tells you that if these kids are playing video games, where they're on a mass killing spree in a video game, it's glamorized on the big screen, it's become part of the fiber of our society. You take that and mix it with a psychopath, a sociopath or someone suffering from mental illness and add in a dose of rage, the suggestibility is too high."

There are may flaws with the good doctor's conclusions. Let's start simple, shall we? First, he seems to suggest that the video games are the instigating factor in these and other killings. This conclusion is completely ridiculous. Humanity has been killing each other since the beginning. We are very good at it, it is what we do. Doubt that? Can anyone tell me the name of that video game, you know, the really violent one that Hitler played to set him off?

The good doctor suggests that when you mix a psychotic or sociopathic personality with a violent video game you can create in them the urge to kill. This is both ridiculous and true. While the urge to kill can be sparked by a video game it can also be sparked by something as as benign as a dog as was the case with the "Son of Sam" killings. David Berkowitz received the impetus to kill from his neighbor's dog who, according to Berkowitz was a "demon dog". While I freely admit that Harvey, the name of the dog, is a fine name for a demon, I sincerely doubt that Harvey actually was the cause of Mr. Berkowitz' homicidal actions. The truth is, anything can cause a psychotic to snap, that's why we call them psychotic, because they are fundamentally damaged individuals, the trigger can be different for each one and can, indeed, change over time.

As much as the doctor would like for it not to be the case, people are not numbers. Numbers do not change, they do not have quirks, people do. In the human equation A + B does not alway equal C. This is what happens when people of limited imagination and reasoning capability go questing for the "magic bullet" of human behavior, if you'll pardon the phrase.

I ask you this: Does anyone really believe that the "Son of Sam" murders would not have been commit if there were no dogs? Should dogs be banned because one was there? Will ever psychotic be set of by a dog? These people are sick and need help but they are no less human no matter how hard we try to convince ourselves that they are not. And people kill. We kill for all kinds of reasons both noble and ridiculous.

For some, video games offer a cathartic release. It is a safe place to take out the rage that dealing with other humans invariably creates. Millions of people across the world enjoy violent, graphic, bloody games. Why haven't they killed? Why is it that according to the US Bureau of Justice Statistics the rate of violent crime has actually been decreasing since 1994. I'll say that again: Violent crime has decreased. Have the games become less violent? Less graphic? I would suggest that the opposite is true. Assuming that I am correct in my assertions, what happens to the "magic bullet" then?

But hey, who am I? Video games are an easy answer, and we like easy answers. It is certainly easier than actually thinking about all the causes that can contribute to homicidal behavior. It is easier to have a bad guy you can point to and say "that's it! They are at fault." The fact however is that video games to not kill people nor do the cause them to be killed, neither does music, nor television nor do movies. Remove those factors, and the killing will still continue. It is what we do. It is a primal instinct that must be fought against. Hiding our heads in the sand may make us feel better, all smug and cozy, but it doesn't actually fix the problem. In the long run, it makes it worse.

Rant Over... For Now