Consider how such diabolical humanism informs law, the so called rule of law, government mission and the culture of death.
Let us repent, together.
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U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee’s Report on CIA practices for Detention and Interrogation
The official title of the unclassified #TortureReport is a long one: Senate Select Committee on Intelligence: Committee Study of the Central Intelligence Agency’s Detention and Interrogation Program. It is the 528 page executive summary that has been released for public review. The full Study exceeds 6,700 pages and it documents the countless, inhumane, and diabolical abuses and mistakes made between 2001 and 2009. Those abuses and mistakes represent a grotesque monument of horror, immorality and human rights violations.
Here’s a few links for you to begin a journey into an Inferno which makes Dante’s hell seem polite and tolerable:
It is no coincidence that we have been woken from our sleep at this time. We cannot ignore the overwhelming and horrific evidence that our society and culture has been compromised, corrupted, and turned over to an enemy – unprosecuted police abuses, the murder of 12 year old Tamir Rice, and, now, the #TortureReport.
Any attempt to defend, ignore and obscure these horrors is reducible to deception, false accusations and diabolical suspicion regarding the dignity of the human person, human purpose and the destiny of the human species.
The Culture War is not an academic debate. It is not a moveable feast for the parlor of intellectuals. It is not a clever forum to debate the diversity and consequence of opinions, values and ambitions. It is about casualties. It is painful, horrible and juggernaut. And wars, they are fought in the streets.
Snooze Button
Who can you trust? Neither Republicans nor Democrats to be sure. Nor libertarians, I regret. For they all serve the same masters – pride, greed, gluttony, lust, etc. Parties are called parties for good reason. No? But if you can’t trust anyone, why not hit the snooze and wake up when the dust has settled? Some suggest that this is what a democracy looks like.
What should a great democracy look like? Where is the dream, the vision, and the want for a promised land?
Where is the hunger and the thirst for good things? Where is the want for greatness, goodness and prosperity?
Where is the love!
Love, it is said, comes like a river when we have repented of our evil and forgiven others for the evil they have done to us.
Dear Phil Robertson and everyone else interested in this public scandal,
There will be disagreements, contentions and frequent temptation to act and speak in an unbecoming manner – especially in a multicultural society and that includes online communities. In this context, idle talk and memes can be a divisive device which begs caution, scrutiny and wisdom.
How shall we live, work and relate with each other in our diversity? How shall we enthusiastically collaborate toward the common good and our own separate, individual, nobel ambitions?
However our opinions may differ, each of us will find it challenging (more or less) to live in a world that includes those whose actions, opinion and political will contradict our identity and, perhaps, even challenge the living out of our intimate hopes and aspirations.
That is a challenge we must accept with several virtues. I speak of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
If each of us do not accept to meet this challenge with these several virtues, then we are not worthy of democracy, freedom, peace and/or happiness.
If we cannot agree these virtues are necessary or exercise these virtues with an enduring devotion, then communities and nations are doomed. For we will walk in darkness.
That is a bleak future that reminds me of the Prince’s warning and lament in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.
Sooner or later, Techcrunch’s Alexia Tsotsis will master the graceful art of the kowtow. Or join the ranks of freelance writers who struggle to pay the rent, story to story. OR not. Perhaps, Alexia will become a freedom fighter celebrated for her snarky courage and determination. Certainly, Alexia imagines that all her klout gives her the right to criticize her employer’s evil ways. Yeah, we’re talking about AOL.
You can read how Princess Alexia spanks Darth Aol here.
As a fellow Trojan (we are both alumni of the University of Southern California), I should be sympathetic just because! Fight on, Alexia! “Fight On!” was our motto at USC.
On the other hand, she’s fighting a bigger fight – the kind of fight that I can get excited about. Alexia is fighting corruption. She may not even know it. But Alexia is fighting the corruption of the press – an institution whose relevance to Freedom and Democracy was once considered so vital that it necessitated unambiguous protection by a Constitutional Amendment. Read the rest of this entry »
The debate over the usefulness of Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube (and many other internet services) is being argued in regard to steering and consummating political and social change at ground zero. The sweeping change in hearts and minds across the Arab world have fueled these debates – especially the resignation of President Hosni Mubarak, but also the events in Bahrain, Iran, Jordan, Libya, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, UAE, Yemen, and beyond.
No well informed opinion can deny that humanity’s struggle for freedom and dignity has received more attention now than ever before. The unfolding drama and embrace of change have never captured the imagination and hearts of so many of the world’s population as the recent unprecedented changes in the Arab world.
Never before have so many experienced true revolution directly by picture, video, text message and blog post. Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube (among other social media) made this possible. And let us not forget that it was the English language which was instrumental to the sharing of information, inspiration, insight, sympathy, anguish, hope, and, yes, outrage. Read the rest of this entry »
You can read the previous post in this multi-post commentary here.
Fight On!
What we all want is a better world. A better life. Isn’t that what we really believe Democracy and Freedom is all about?!
Such democracy is not something we can purchase at a store – online or offline. It’s not a one time, one click purchase. No government can deliver on that. For each of us, it is a life-long commitment to demanding it from each other -demanding the things that matter most. And not just demanding those things – but also giving them. Read the rest of this entry »
Today, I had a chance to see Geert Wilders’ so-called movie, Fitna. Apparently, it came out during my Easter pilgrimage to Bucovina.
If you haven’t seen Fitna, play it below.
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Almost a month ago, I said this about Geert Wilders. That was before Fitna was released. Below is my reflection after the release of Fitna.
Although the short video clip (let’s not call this a movie, shall we!) does not seem as contentious as Wilders’ politically incorrect manner of speaking and writing, Fitna exaggerates problems, misunderstandings and concerns with an oily, underhanded, used-car salesman’s approach – and a very sophisticated mastery of subtle, misleading suggestions.
Background music for your reading pleasure: Radiohead, Creep. Play it below.
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What this video clip (Fitna) provides is a compelling opportunity for plain clothes Europeans (not academics of the ivory towers) to evaluate the tenets of political correctness, multiculturalism, and cultural relativity. Europeans must answer some big questions for themselves. For example, do these ideological constructions (political correctness and multiculturalism) adequately reflect the things needed to further pursue the course of human freedom within the context of European cultural identity and aspirations?
Unlike Americans, Europeans have never been ones to allow their freedom of speech to be regulated by the self-proclaimed, American-imported demagogues of political correctness.
Americans, however, remain bound by a Christian humility and humanism AND a Victorian sense of correctness and virtue. These things derive from our European protestant roots and the English-Victorian influences that came to define the aspirations of the American middle class. In other words, certain forms of social thinking and action are built-in in America and make it difficult for us to succeed in any kind of critical re-examination.
MLK, Jr., for example, would never have moved the European heart. Europeans, in general, would have never have accepted his accusations of complicity to the degree that they would feel personally compelled to overcome their own sense of bigotry and racism. This, however, does not mean that European civilization is somehow inferior to American civilization. What I hope to illustrate by this example is that MLK, Jr. represents a dogma which leads Americans to certain conclusions to which Europeans are not bound. Read the rest of this entry »
Reaffirming the Second Amendment does not mean we should not discuss the problems of violence in our culture or the tragedies and horrors that we have observed in our schools, streets and low income neighborhoods. As Americans, we are smart enough, creative enough and passionate enough to find compelling solutions that do not infringe upon our obligations and rights as Americans… and as prominent an important members of an international community.
Below, a trailer for a documentary on the Second Amendment:
The failure of a U.S. federal judge to stop wikileaks.org reminds us that the democratization of communication and information channels are powerful tools in the struggle for human freedom.
Information Democracy
The democratization of communication and information channels provides as much promise as threat to the way politics and business is done.
Romanian politicans beware! Shady managers and company owners too. There’s terrabytes and terrabytes of disk space waiting for leaking files and documents about you on wikileaks.org. And there’s no way to stop this juggernaut that exposes all the corruption and lies that come into its great path. Whatcha gonna do?
Posted by Stan Faryna 
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The unofficial blog of Stan Faryna 