Burdened with atrophied sensibilities….

Ffolkes,

Good morning, ffolkes….

Just a short note, to give fair warning…. Gird your grid for a big one…. and, keep your wits about you.

Shall we Pearl?

“Who sees all beings in his own Self,  and his own Self in all beings, loses all fear.” — Isa Upanishad

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Yesterday, ’twas the Beatles; it’s only right today we include their contemporaries, who, somehow, are still going strong…. The Stones will be going on tour again this year… I’ve seen them live on stage a number of times through the years, and can’t think of any concerts I enjoyed more….Think of it; a stage full of 70 year old rockers, still making kick-ass, down & dirty rock and roll…. still rocking the world, fifty years on…. Enjoy, ffolkes…. Nothing else is quite like time spent getting down with the Stones…. and, I managed to find more than two hours of their best early work, to start your day right….

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“What is it the Bible teaches us? – rapine, cruelty, and murder. What is it the Testament teaches us? – to believe that the Almighty committed debauchery with a woman engaged to be married, and the belief of this debauchery is called faith.” — Thomas Paine — The Age of Reason

Ffolkes, I don’t think there is anyone, of a ffolkes-y nature, or, just folks, who would be able to disagree when I say the world today has gone stark, raving mad…. All one needs to do is take a daily trip through the international news, whether of a liberal, conservative, radical, or silly bias (ALL of them are biased; it’s the nature of the beast), to see the evidence is clear…. In too many places  on the map to count, war is raging, killing both the guilty and the innocent, for the entertainment and profit of the arms dealers, none of whom ever participate in any of the conflagrations, being satisfied to watch it all safely from a distance, while they count their rubles, or marks, or pounds, or yuan, or dollars, pouring in from nations and organizations around the entire planet….

Afghanistan, Ukraine, Syria, Yemen, Iran, Africa, nearly every continent on Earth is witnessing daily wars, or violent acts of terror. The governments of every country are spying on their citizens, and each other, hiding their real intentions from all, moving us closer to another world war. This while constantly trumpeting every sort of danger they can think of to keep the public distracted, too busy to think about what is actually being done, to them, and to society at large.

Society itself displays all the symptoms of a dying organism. The members of our species prey upon the weak, and vulnerable among us without compunction, as the sex trafficking trade in women and children, used to satisfy the perverted urges of pedophiles, misogynists, and men of every walk of life, who have been encouraged all their life to treat women as property, or anything but a human being, worthy of respect, dignity, and love. Churches claim to help the poor, while all the while buying their gold-lined robes, standing up behind their gold plated icons, preaching earthly obedience, to church and state authority, so they can be rewarded when they die, for being such idiots…

I’m sick of it all; obviously, not ranting for a while has built up a bit of pressure, as I seem  to be attacking on all fronts at the moment…. I am so sick and tired of the STUPID ASSHOLES, the elite oligarchs who control the world’s resources for their own aggrandizement, manipulating everyone else in the world by whatever means are effective (disinformation, violence, betrayal, legal theft, all those ways governments and corporations have of colluding to cheat the public….), without ever considering what they are doing to the rest of us, or to the planet…. Fucking dicks….

Then. there are the so-called men of our species, who, mostly, are misogynist, bigoted racists, who take pride in being able to fart the national anthem, or prove their manhood by abusing anyone weaker than they; children, women, animals…. Bah, humbug!  I can’t do this any more…. I find myself falling into name calling, spewing bile over people who not only won’t ever see it, (their reading is generally confined to thin books with small amounts of small easy-to-read words, and many large. colorful pictures, often of a prurient nature… which they wouldn’t understand as a euphemism for vulgar….), but, really aren’t worth the effort of abusing…. What I would really like to do is take my knives, my crossbow, and my lariat, to go hunting at night, on the streets….

SIGH…. It’s certainly inconvenient, not to mention occasionally frustrating, being honorable….

Now, since I can’t go hunting just now, I’ll sublimate…. Normally when I say that, you would see an old school pearl. Today, here is a link, to a blog I’ve recently begun to follow. The author and I have struck a common chord; he feels much the same as I do regarding our society’s persistent denial of a problem that has been with us far to long….. By failing to acknowledge the existence of a problem, there is a consistent failure to act, thus giving tacit approval, to what I consider the most vile flaw in human nature, for a man, i.e., the ability to rationalize misogyny, and/or physical or emotional violence toward women.

For the author, obviously, this was a very personal story to write; he wanted me to know, a comment of mine from a day or two ago, on another story of his in the same vein, along with another comment from another like-minded reader, had prompted him to write this story, with the added honor of including both of us as a character…. He gave me the name, Bob, which, though he didn’t know it, is my father’s name; most appropriate, since my attitudes on this come directly from him.

Ffolkes, this is a difficult story to read, but, the message it delivers is important, not to mention powerful…. If you are a male human being, with any sense of honor, and/or justice, you MUST read this…. You may as well do it now… Tissues will be issued, if needed, and they will be… Even you guys will need them… The story is called,

After reading that, I find myself with little to say; it’s pretty clear, as well as powerfully written…. Since I’ve already used up quite a bit of space, without even counting the reading involved in following the link, we’ll bring this to a close for now. It’s a subject you’ll see, here on ECR, (Exploring Consensual Reality), again, again, and again, until it stops, or, I’ve reached the limit of my tolerance for inaction by the rest of society, & gone hunting….

What the hell? I’m getting old, & I’ve got nothing better to do with the time I have left to me….

So be it.

gigoid has spoken….

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Written 2/4/2013.

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    Today’s final pearl comes with a chance to accumulate some bonus points. If you know the identity of the person quoted in the fifth pearl in the group, we will award one thousand points. The points are good for the final Quiz; you can trade them in for answers. (It’s an American Quiz, corruption is part of it…. Only five hundred thirty-tree thousand points per short answer, limit of one for the entire twelve thousand question test….)

But, don’t worry…. just memorize the quote, and think about it; not only will you know the answer, thus saving the points, but, you won’t much care who the author(ess) was…. All of these, you may rest assured, will be on that Final Quiz….

“All is mystery; but he is a slave who will not struggle to penetrate the dark veil.” — Benjamin Disraeli

“Desires and longings are the root cause of all suffering.” — Meher Baba

“All anger arises from obstructed desire.” — Krishna to Arjuna, Bhagavad Gita

“Three things in human life are important: The first is to be kind. The second is to be kind. And the third is to be kind.” — Henry James

“The one unforgivable sin, the offense against one’s own integrity, is to accept anything at all simply on authority.” — Maureen Johnson Long

“Clay is moulded to make a vessel, but the utility of the vessel lies in the space where there is nothing. … Thus, taking advantage of what is, we recognize the utility of what is not.” — Lao Tzu

“If it isn’t Scottish…it’s CRRRRRAP!” — Smart Bee

Oops! How’d that slip by me? Forget that one; Smart Bee was trying to be funny…. Though, really, if you look at it, it fits…. Oh, well, here is the correct finishing pearl for this group….

“Blah, blah, blah….” — Smart Bee

Now, STOP THAT!…. Sheesh…. Gerroudofit!…. Here, let’s try again…. The CORRECT finishing pearl….

“When subtlety fails us we must make do with cream pies.” — David Brin

“Hand me a pair of leather pants and a CASIO keyboard — I’m living for today!” — Zippy the Pinhead

SIGH….. Ffolkes, I apologize…. Smart Bee has gone over the edge, not to mention way over the top…. I’ll have to usurp his connectors for a while, and finish this up with a choice of my own…. Here, then, is an appropriate finishing pearl for such a formerly dignified, relevant, wise group of comments on living with honor and dignity…. Don’t worry, I put SB to bed; try to recapture the train of thought here, okay?….

“Do not confuse “duty” with what other people expect of you; they are utterly different. Duty is a debt you owe to yourself to fulfill obligations you have assumed voluntarily. Paying that debt can entail anything from years of patient work to instant willingness to die. Difficult it may be, but the reward is self-respect.” — Lazarus Long, Time Enough For Love by Robert A. Heinlein

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I’m not going to say this Pearl is special; I won’t even say it’s good. It is, however, to the best of my perceptions, done. For me, here and now, that’s good enough… After all, that IS the very essence of Axiom # 1 of my very own philosophy, right?…. “I think I am. That’s good enough.”  Yep, that’s what it says, and I’m going to take it as a given…. Besides, I’m hungry…. See y’all tomorrow, ffolkes, should the authorities fail to find and capture me….

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À bientôt, mon cherí….

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