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What happens was we became the enemy in the eyes of the world and in the eyes of thinking rational Americans. We involved ourselves ourselves in Vietnam over a domino theory of fear and then lied about the corrupt South Vietnamese government. We engaged in clandestine illegal actions in too many nations where our sole interest was the status quo. We allowed and supported Israel as they created an apartheid nation and looked the other way as they took over lands that were not legally theirs. We invaded Iraq over fear and hubris, and created a media of lies. A genuine patriot today would weep over their nations actions in-spite of the good we too have accomplished. Power corrupts and power in the hands of small men corrupts completely. We place halos on our heads as all people do and we forget our treatment of the American Indian or the Blacks who we brought over and made slaves. He without sin......
Maybe what happened was we started to be honest, to see things as they are, and not how we dream or imagine them to be. Maybe we are on a path to reason, maybe....
Amazon.com: Citizens of the Empire: The Struggle to Claim Our Humanity: Robert Jensen: Books
Amazon.com: The Culture of Make Believe: Derrick Jensen: Books
Once Upon a Time...: Trapped in the Wrong Paradigm: Three Handy Rules
What happened is that we became the enemy in the eyes of a bunch of people who wanted to redefine good as evil and vice versa in order to justify and rationalize their own desire to do things they knew were wrong without feeling guilty. They took advantage of the fact that most people are generally decent and/or want to believe they are, and convinced them that drawing a bright line between right and wrong and standing for it was "mean". And because most people ARE decent and/or want to believe they are, we let them get away with it.
Because we don't live in a country where most of us are ever likely to see less-industrialized nations firsthand, or even other nations at all for many people, it was easy for them to convince us that we were horrible and that any flaws we had, real or imagined, were actually enormous evil, greater than anything anyone else was doing.
Power corrupts, all right, and the power of suggestion that they wielded not only corrupted them, but us as well. And now we lack the perspective to compare ourselves clearly and objectively to others, and the will to state the results of that comparison and withstand the objections to it even if we could.
Excellent thoughts. Now the question becomes what to do about it.
I guess so, but it still doesn't explain why "God" allows the suffering of innocent children. How does your friend explain that?
I'm not one who doesn't believe in a higher power; it's hard not to just when exploring how human beings are biologically formed with all those vessels and circuits racing around perfectly in sync and miraculously finding the right place within our physical bodies to perform every manuever, conscious or unconsious. But I do vacillate between thinking the higher power reigns from a Shangri-Law called "Heaven" or from a mother ship.
It was in the story, dingbat. Read for comprehension.
Where would you prefer to believe He reigns from?
Sorry, but I still don't understand how Satan and God temporarily turning his back in order to prove "integrity" has anything to do with small children being burned alive. I don't know where "God" reigns, but I sure don't rely on The Bible to tell me. After all, it's great literature, but unproven history written by monks who had nothing to do all day but write stories.
