I can't understand why everyone is so upset about the verdict of the recent Casey Anthony trial. How do all these people know what was really going on? Why are they so angry about it? Does it affect them personally?
It's horribly upsetting and a real tragedy in my mind that people are so cruel. Hasn't this woman been through enough? She doesn't need prison, not our kind of prison, anyway... SHE NEEDS HELP!!!
People only commit crimes for one reason; to get attention. People crave attention almost more than anything else and people who are forced into desperate situations, or at least desperate within their own minds, have the capacity to commit a crime in order to get attention, and boy does our "justice" system give it to them! Look at all the attention this case is getting, in fact, I'm giving it more attention as I'm writing this.
Why is our society so obsessed with this vague idea of justice... I don't think it's justice at all... it's COMMUNALLY VALIDATED REVENGE... that's not JUST at all... we're a bunch of monsters to condone this system. We have to fess up that our system for dealing with criminals IS NOT KIND OR JUST.
I love the system they have in the land of OZ... of course this only works in most of "our" cases b/c of course our laws aren't perfect, like the laws the wonderful Ozma sets down. However, the attitude is totally applicable.
Take the young boy named Ojo who illegally picked a 7-leafed clover. He did so in order to save his uncle/caretaker from being a stone statue forever. The reason this act was illegal in the first place was to prevent magic from being done by those who would use it for mischief, or in other words: in order to prevent just such accidents from occurring.
Once discovered, Ojo is taken to prison, where he is treated kindly, and with remorse for his desperate condition. Ozma herself offers to do all in her power to save Ojo's uncle. Ojo is stunned by the kindness showed to him, and of course he meant no harm. In his mind it was the right thing to try to save his loving uncle. Wouldn't we do the same?
What if we could be a little more kind in our system? Wouldn't we be a better nation, a better world, if we took a little more time to listen to others, and stop being so accusative?
I AM NOT SAYING that we should have anarchy. On the contrary, I am saying we need a system for helping people in desperate situations. But shamefully, throwing people in prison makes a lot of money. If only we could be less obsessive, we'd save the real things we do have, without needlessly destroying them in haste and anger. Money means nothing without the things it buys, and greed is a fool's route to destruction.
Now you might say, WELL OJO WASN'T A MURDERER... that's fair I suppose, but the principle is the same. Would a rational person commit murder? Would you murder someone? Would you kill someone unless you were in a desperate situation? What if you thought you were in a desperate situation?
Even people who on the surface seem totally horrifying in their actions have either rationalized those actions to themselves, and/or are in serious psychological distress.
There is a difference between putting someone in a corner and teaching them that they can't always get what they want, and that they need to consider the feelings of others, and building a culture based on later breaking the essential code of considering the feelings of others as soon as someone starts to act out.
We are constantly lead to believe our world is in horrible distress all the time, and almost all the news we see is about wars, or murders, or other acts of violence. The world is not as bleak a place as it may seem on the news. To paraphrase John Lennon, peace is here if you want it, and so is kindness.
Friday, July 8, 2011
Friday, July 1, 2011
Money is "Worthless"
Money is worthless. Well actually it's not worthless. However, its worth seems to be greatly misunderstood.
First of all; Money is DEBT. If you have a dollar in your pocket that means you also have a tiny bit of debt. Money is an IOU. It has NO inherent value except the value of the paper it was printed upon. The "value" of money depends ENTIRELY on the system surrounding it. That isn't to say we should all go out and buy a bunch of gold... that's also ridiculous. Furthermore, the SYSTEM in the U.S.A. is constructed so that the Government will ALWAYS be in DEBT. To whom do we owe this money? The Federal Bank that prints the money is the answer to that question. We PAY them to print money, and so WE WILL ALWAYS OWE THEM MONEY!!! It is not an equal exchange system. It COSTS MONEY to PRINT MONEY, and so each time we print money, money is LOST to the Federal Bank. For a long time in this country we did not have this system, and in fact most of our beloved "Founding Fathers" railed against it and decried that such a system would kill the nation.
This is a little bit false too, and it is because of "Might Makes Right." The ACTUAL value is the value of material objects, the value of the strength of human individuals, the value of physical objects like food, water, land, etc. And yet we often constantly obsess over possessing more money? Are we completely insane? We are destroying the material world around us in the name of clinging to an imaginary, and furthermore destructive thing. We ignore and abandon preserving what we NEED to survive; clean air, clean water, wholesome food, harmony with other beings, human and all other. Why do we do this? Our greed isn't even really greed. We are greedy for a fantasy? Do these multi-millionaires actually EAT MONEY? I don't think so...
Money is nothing more and nothing less than a system of organization that allows for distribution of limited resources. Other species seem to find equilibrium through different means, like the predator-prey cycle. We as human beings seem to have no natural predators, except ourselves perhaps, so WE ourselves are the predators. That said, we will, if we don't use moderation, eventually deplete our resources to a point that is no longer sustainable, and the Earth doesn't care how much money you have. WE ARE ONLY AS VALUABLE as the water, carbon, and other natural elements in our bodies, and ALL HUMANS have this in common. And that is why it doesn't matter if you have a million dollars, a billion dollars, or just one dollar.
So why should some people feel the need to accumulate SO MANY THINGS, so many unused, wasted things? Does anybody really need more than one house?
We're afraid. That's what I think. We are afraid that if we don't hoard for ourselves and insulate ourselves with money, and stuff, and weapons, etc. then everything we have will be taken from us. When we think that because we are full of greed, and hate, and misunderstanding that the world is out to get us, we're wrong. WE ARE OUT TO GET US, and no one else. We CAN change if that is what we really want. NO ONE IS STOPPING US EXCEPT OURSELVES.
So don't be afraid. Fear is what drives you crazy.
First of all; Money is DEBT. If you have a dollar in your pocket that means you also have a tiny bit of debt. Money is an IOU. It has NO inherent value except the value of the paper it was printed upon. The "value" of money depends ENTIRELY on the system surrounding it. That isn't to say we should all go out and buy a bunch of gold... that's also ridiculous. Furthermore, the SYSTEM in the U.S.A. is constructed so that the Government will ALWAYS be in DEBT. To whom do we owe this money? The Federal Bank that prints the money is the answer to that question. We PAY them to print money, and so WE WILL ALWAYS OWE THEM MONEY!!! It is not an equal exchange system. It COSTS MONEY to PRINT MONEY, and so each time we print money, money is LOST to the Federal Bank. For a long time in this country we did not have this system, and in fact most of our beloved "Founding Fathers" railed against it and decried that such a system would kill the nation.
This is a little bit false too, and it is because of "Might Makes Right." The ACTUAL value is the value of material objects, the value of the strength of human individuals, the value of physical objects like food, water, land, etc. And yet we often constantly obsess over possessing more money? Are we completely insane? We are destroying the material world around us in the name of clinging to an imaginary, and furthermore destructive thing. We ignore and abandon preserving what we NEED to survive; clean air, clean water, wholesome food, harmony with other beings, human and all other. Why do we do this? Our greed isn't even really greed. We are greedy for a fantasy? Do these multi-millionaires actually EAT MONEY? I don't think so...
Money is nothing more and nothing less than a system of organization that allows for distribution of limited resources. Other species seem to find equilibrium through different means, like the predator-prey cycle. We as human beings seem to have no natural predators, except ourselves perhaps, so WE ourselves are the predators. That said, we will, if we don't use moderation, eventually deplete our resources to a point that is no longer sustainable, and the Earth doesn't care how much money you have. WE ARE ONLY AS VALUABLE as the water, carbon, and other natural elements in our bodies, and ALL HUMANS have this in common. And that is why it doesn't matter if you have a million dollars, a billion dollars, or just one dollar.
So why should some people feel the need to accumulate SO MANY THINGS, so many unused, wasted things? Does anybody really need more than one house?
We're afraid. That's what I think. We are afraid that if we don't hoard for ourselves and insulate ourselves with money, and stuff, and weapons, etc. then everything we have will be taken from us. When we think that because we are full of greed, and hate, and misunderstanding that the world is out to get us, we're wrong. WE ARE OUT TO GET US, and no one else. We CAN change if that is what we really want. NO ONE IS STOPPING US EXCEPT OURSELVES.
So don't be afraid. Fear is what drives you crazy.
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