House of Eratosthenes

Blogger friend Rick has a fascination with “the religious left” and it’s easy to see why. Yesterday, he linked to the following at Ravine of Light. It’s yet another wish that any & all violence in the world can be “unliked,” if you will, out of existence once and for all:

I’m Sick of War

And mostly I’m sick of guns!!

I have a 12 yo son. Lately (as in for the past year) it seems as though the only game he and his friends can play is war of some form or another. They play it on video games. They play it with nerf guns. They play it with air soft guns. He plays it in his head all by himself. He and his dad watch WWII movies or Vietnam movies. They talk battle tactics.

I’m sick of living in a culture that is permeated with war and news of war. Of living in a society where bomb blasts and mourning top the daily headlines. And soldiering (killing) is glorified.

Literally … it’s making me sick.

I understand why it’s happening … I’m just sick of it.

Nobody asked, but you know what I’m sick of? I’m sick of the Jean-Luc Picard train o’ thought…that when a peace-loving side meets up with a war-making side, the peace-loving side can simply communicate its thoughts and preferences that war not happen — and unilaterally decide that it is not to take place here.

That’s caused quite a few wars in the past, you know. That’s the biggest out of many reasons why I’m sick of it. FU, Capt. JLP.

Fellow parent Rick linked to his own spot to give her an idea of some other things of which she could be sick — namely, kids using up the valuable resources that are meant to give them an education, on a bunch of bullshit. Yeah, that makes me a little queasy too.

Me, although she said she “knows why it’s happening” I figured this wasn’t a sincere expression…see the Jean-Luc Picard theme above. You can’t wish war away, and if you think you can, then you don’t know why it happens. So I contributed a little bit of effort to help educate her:

I can think of another alternative. We could put a world dictator in power, and see to it that all who would oppose him are crushed overwhelmingly and without remorse, any time any one among them has the temerity to speak out. Sort of a Roman Emperor type guy.

Of course, Rome eventually decayed and fell…into a post-Rome world of…well, lots of war. Come to think of it, people who want to get rid of war forever don’t seem to use the “F” word very much. You know. “Freedom.”

I thought nothing further of it, until reading Rick’s main page this morning, and what to my wandering eyes should appear, but this…

Sonja is even more miffed now… you might remember Sonja from Monday’s post where she let the world know that she’s so sick of war.

Morgan and I had left her comments at her place… and she followed up with this missive:

Uh oh…uh oh…UH OH.

Alright … I’ve had enough.

I’ve tried over and over and over again to be polite. I’ve tried ignoring the snark. But I’ve discovered that what I’m doing is censoring myself in order to avoid it. I’m not going to do that anymore. So I’m leaving comments 3 and 4 in place at this time. But they are the last comments of that type which will appear on this blog.

From now on, all comments will be moderated.

I will delete out of hand any comments which do not make logical sense to me.

For instance, both 3 and 4 would be deleted. #3 would be deleted because being sick of war does not equal tolerating trans-gender homecoming queens (although I do), but the two things do not have anything to do with one another. #4 would be deleted because Morgan either can’t read or chooses not to and he missed the line: “I understand why it’s happening … I’m just sick of it.” Morgan, if you want to rant about world dictators and the like, you may do your fear-mongering in your own space. My blog is a fear free zone and I will not condone that behavior in my presence.

So, I’m done. I’m going to write and post as I see fit. If you want to comment, you’re going to have to abide by some rules. The first one is that there is no fear allowed … Jesus rules here.

I can’t resist (who knows how long that link will be good) a challenge.

Let’s see if I can walk this narrow, narrow line:

God bless you, your son who is exactly the same age as mine, and all the men in your life you love. May you all live long, happy, healthy lives and may none of you ever have to make some of the terrible, awful choices some other folks have had to make while they were armed.

But if it DOES come to pass, I hope your son is ready, willing and able to bring down a terrible destructive force to protect you, or anybody else who is important to you. In short, if it ever comes down to a choice between you and some scumbag who wants do (or is indifferent to doing) your family harm, I hope the scumbag loses and you win.

Because watching good people like you lose, and bad guys win, makes people a little sick after awhile too.

Hope that makes the cut, Sonja.

On a related note, my DVR happened to catch one of the best Twilight Zone episodes ever made, about the little boy wishing people out to the cornfield.

It fascinates me endlessly that people who’ve made that childhood life-choice about feeling their way through life, rather than thinking, all end up like this. They become agents of destruction. All of their fondest wishes become rooted to this singular keystone wish, that they can use their minds to stop things from existing. Get rid of war, get rid of guns, get rid of Morgan and Rick. Get. Rid. Of. In the blink of an eye, they become different people who have no other desires in life; they just want to wish things out to the cornfield. Creating things? Preserving things? The hostility they show toward those who preserve…by means of a legally acquired, responsibly wielded sidearm…takes second place to none other. In their hearts, they become destroyers.

It’s so sad. It’s exactly the opposite of what they wanted to be. The polar opposite.

Moral of the story is: Your cerebral cortex is the compass of your life. This is why her blog is all about flowers and lights and pretty wallpaper, and mine is about a guy who lived 2,200 years ago and noticed things around him to figure out how big the earth is. It’s got to do with priorities. To walk a straight path, you have to use yer noggin. There is no substitute.

[…] Read it. Nobody asked, but you know what I’m sick of? I’m sick of the Jean-Luc Picard train o’ thought…that when a peace-loving side meets up with a war-making side, the peace-loving side can simply communicate its thoughts and preferences that war not happen — and unilaterally decide that it is not to take place here. […]
- DYSPEPSIA GENERATION » Blog Archive » Freedom and Peace; Thinking and Feeling; Me, Rick and Sonja | 10/28/2009 @ 06:54
On a related note, my DVR happened to catch one of the best Twilight Zone episodes ever made, about the little boy wishing people out to the cornfield.

It’s a great short story, BTW, just in case you’ve never gotten around to reading it. Same title as the TZ episode.
- Physics Geek | 10/28/2009 @ 07:19
“Get rid of war, get rid of guns, get rid of Morgan and Rick. Get. Rid. Of. In the blink of an eye, they become different people who have no other desires in life; they just want to wish things out to the cornfield.”

So, where does that leave the “Let’s Get Rid Of” segments from my blog? I could, I dunno, get rid of them. 🙂
- Andy | 10/28/2009 @ 07:39
Thanks, I’ll look it up.

I’ve commented once, then again, on the connection between Anthony and the current occupant of the White House. When you think about it, this makes a lot of sense. If in your childhood you are never, ever corrected about anything — you’d grow up to become a hardcore liberal. You’d have to start living in a world in which things do not happen because of other things…there are only things that happen, and the ideas you get about them. You’d become enamored of this power you have, or wish you would have, to wish things out to the cornfield. All of your perceptions of the world around you would start to be filtered through that lens.

“If…then” would necessarily lose all meaning. Remember the last scene of the episode? Billy makes it snow, and his father, a farmer, starts to try to explain that IF it snows, THEN the crops will die, and IF the crops die THEN they’ll have nothing to eat. Then he’s reminded he isn’t going to get away with it, and so he relapses into “That’s a good thing you done…REAL good!”

That’s exactly what our liberals are doing to us, and we’re doing to them.
- mkfreeberg | 10/28/2009 @ 07:43
Well, if using the term “scumbag” gets you banned because we are all children of God, then I think it is a place I would stay away from. The political correctness is too oppressive in that area.

Yup. We’re all children of God. Some, though, are Children of God who have chosen through the Free Will that God gave them … to be scumbags.

We call ’em as we see ’em.
- philmon | 10/28/2009 @ 07:46
Nobody likes war. Well … that’s not entirely true. It’s true for the most part.

The few people who do love war are scumbags.

People who are prepared for it and have no illusions about certain elements in the nature of mankind … are smart. The often are mistaken by pacifists as one and the same. They are not.

So bring on the video games.

Better yet, let’s head down to the range with a few boxes of ammo and blow the hell out of some targets so we’re not skiddish next time the scumbags come around.
- philmon | 10/28/2009 @ 07:52
Illusion at last takes the form of broken heads, and the most obstinate credulity is not proof against that form of argument–Froude
- xlibrl | 10/28/2009 @ 08:37
I couldn’t resist – I had to give her some guff, too. She’s playing a sad little game over there.
- Andy | 10/28/2009 @ 11:23
‘You know, Sonja, deleting all those “knee-jerk” and “unwarranted assumptions” without making an effort to bring about a little understanding is basically just going to war on your commenters. Playing war with your blog. You can run around with Nerf guns and war movies, or you can run around with a thin skin and a delete key. I’ll leave it to you to work out which is nobler.”

Oh great stuff Andy, really good.

War, in its most simplistic form, is nothing more than stopping someone or a bunch of someone’s from continuing to do something you don’t like. Not unlike Sonja deleting, or threatening to at least, comments on her blog (the audacity of people!!!), hence your “war on your commenters” is dead on.

Not to go all psychobabble but I’ve often felt this is what is behind most Lib’s anti-war positions. They know war as inevitable (subconsciously or not) but won’t or can’t admit it, at the same time they hate the very real fact of it. Their left conflicted bordering on self hatred and may explain their seething anger (see any anti-war protest and/or Pres. Bush sign). Just some thoughts.
- tim | 10/28/2009 @ 13:16
I thought it was pretty good, too, tim – even though I used the word “basically” in there. I totally have to apologize for that.
- Andy | 10/28/2009 @ 14:30
Well you certainly ruffled her tailfeathers. I guess she has yet to learn the Charles Johnson Lesson: “How do you make your traffic smaller? Go to war with your commenters.”
- vanderleun | 10/28/2009 @ 14:49
Sympathies go out to her for the tragedy involving her dog.

Of course that doesn’t make her comments any more sensible, coherent, or (with regard to restating my own, so she can whip out the straw-man tactic) accurate…
- mkfreeberg | 10/28/2009 @ 15:38
[…] Cantor Nails It Zombie Bikini Babes Are Attacking Theory vs Fact Freedom and Peace; Thinking and Feeling; Me, Rick and Sonja His Blank Slate VII “If You Don’t Like It, Leave” How Important is Charisma? […]
- House of Eratosthenes | 10/29/2009 @ 05:45
BTW, here’s a link to the text of the Jerome Bixby short story.
- Physics Geek | 10/29/2009 @ 06:43
[…] Hiding Huge Things on Sarah Palin Cantor Nails It Zombie Bikini Babes Are Attacking Theory vs Fact Freedom and Peace; Thinking and Feeling; Me, Rick and Sonja His Blank Slate VII “If You Don’t Like It, Leave” How Important is Charisma? […]
- House of Eratosthenes | 10/30/2009 @ 07:24

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