__________________________________________________ / / / The Eternity Articles / / / / Act I, Scene ii -- April 1995 / /_________________________________________________/ \ \ \ Guy in charge: Sanjay Singh \ \ eternity@cyberspace.org \ \_________________________________________________\ "I thought I could capture the stories of the city on paper. I thought I could write about the horrors of the city. Horror stories you see. I tell you I didn't have to look far for material. Everywhere I looked, there were stories hidden there in the dark corners... I wrote and still there were more... No one would publish them. 'Too horrible,' they said. 'Sick mind,' they said. I thought I could write about the horrors of the city but the horror is too big and it goes on forever." [Grant Morrison] Here we go... onto the second issue of this ghastly beast. As promised this month we will be discussing freedom. There's really not much to say here, except to say that if you want any info on this, then check the first issue (WhyMe1-1.txt). That has lots of goodies, including how to get this, and how to get my quote list, and whatever else I thought was important last month... Now without any further delay... we're off! By the way, I've changed the monthly naming thing. Now it should make more sense. You can read April's issue in April. This is still the second one though... Don't worry, you haven't missed a thing. Introduction ============ Freedom? What exactly is it? Is it something that we are willing to die for, like others have done? Is slavery really a bad thing? Why didn't Picard just say "there are five lights" and be done with it and enjoy the rest of his life? What is so special about freedom? Ask anyone and they'll probably tell you that it's great because that's what America is all about, or they'll say something like "it means that I can be or do whatever I want to." Personally, I'm not sure what it is. I know that almost everyone thinks that it is a good thing, and that you can't have enough, but I can't really accept that. Is it a good thing? I'm not saying that it's a bad thing. I love the fact that I live in Canada, and we have our little democracy which gives us some freedom to be, do or choose whatever we want to, so what's wrong with that? In 1984 (by George Orwell), Winston Smith said that "Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four," but if you've read the book, you know that this philosophy doesn't hold up for too long. So does that make freedom optional, does it mean that you can change your mind about what it is, depending on what's happening around you? Too much freedom is definitely a bad thing. After all, rules limit freedom, and without rules our society would be in anarchy. This is a bad thing. But then again, too many rules can just be overwhelmingly constricting. Too little freedom is slavery. After all, if you can't control much of your own life, then somebody will be controlling it for you. And without any control of your life, or your future, you don't really exist at all. So now the problem is deciding how much freedom we should have, or how much we need. I can't answer that. I'm not qualified to, and why should I be telling you what to think? I am just a voice... a scream in the dark... nothing more, but certainly nothing less. But if any single voice is echoed enough, then eventually, maybe, enough people will hear it. Back To Basics ============== "How can you censor my thoughts? / What is right, what is not? / How is it you decide, / What I should feel inside?" [Frozen Ghost] I think that I can safely say that the three basic freedoms that we have are freedom of thought, freedom of speech, and freedom of expression. The freedom of thought is the most fundamental freedom that we will ever have. It is the least tangible of your freedoms, that means that no one can control it, or take it away from you. Without this one, no other freedom could possibly exist. "It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them." [Mark Twain] Freedom of speech, is also an important freedom. It gives us the right to say what we choose. This one can and is limited by censorship. Which is not all that bad. I'm sure all of us realize it's importance with prisoners of conscience. People who spoke their mind, and because it went against what the state said, were either killed or imprisoned. But it also has a bad side. Without censoring what people say, then hate groups, such as the neo-nazis, Black Panthers and KKK would spread like wildfire, because no one would be able to stop them from speaking their minds. Freedom of expression, is perhaps the most dangerous freedom that is out there. After all this is what people act on. Thinking about killing someone is different from saying that you're going to kill someone. And both of those are completely different from actually going out and killing someone. I'm sure we've all thought the first, and blindly threatened the second, but not many people have acted out the third. There's a great difference, and you can't just ignore it. Religion ======== "The first revolt is against the supreme tyranny of theology, of the phantom of God. As long as we have a master in heaven, we will be slaves on earth." [Mikhail Bakunin] "Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people." [Karl Marx] How can you discuss freedom without mentioning religion? I knew that I couldn't really ignore this issue, so I'll settle for trying to keep it balanced. What does religion have to do with freedom? Well if you ask a humanist you'll hear that religion is 'them' telling you how to live your life, and you're being oppressed. If you ask a Catholic they'll say that it's the freedom of knowing that if you live a good life you will be rewarded. If you ask me you'll get some creative little dodge of the entire question, but I'm off topic again. If you're into comics and you read "Mr. Punch" (by Neil Gaiman) and "Mystery Play" by Grant Morrison you'll notice that when Mr. Punch kills the Devil he says "Hooray! We're free to do whatever we want!" When God dies in "Mystery Play" someone says "I guess that means we are free to do whatever we want." [thanks to Tony Buchanan for pointing that out] So who's right? From one side of the picture we can say that God (religion) is controlling us, and we need to let go to be free. But who said that there was anything wrong with that? If you ask someone who is religious they'll dismiss the fact that they are following someone else (priest, rabbi, guru, pandit, whatever) as just part of their faith. They trust God, and supposedly God trusts the people that deliver his word, so why shouldn't they? You trust your friends, why shouldn't they trust what is supposed to be one of the most benevolent forces/beings in the universe? From the other side, the Devil is dead. Gone. No more Lucifer. No more Beelzebub. No more Mephistopheles. Great, I guess that means that evil is gone too. We can feel safe in our cities and homes. We are no longer a slave to the evils of the outside world. It's a time to raise up our arms in victory and party the night away, right? Maybe not. Being unreligious and somewhere between atheist and agnostic with a bit of humanism tossed in for good measure I don't believe in the Devil. But, I do believe in evil. Personally, I just think that the Devil (being the guy in the red jump suit with the pitchfork and pointy tail) is a nice little caricature of evil, so parents with nowhere left to turn to can use his image to frighten their children into being well behaved little soldiers. But I can't just dismiss this point because of that so, I'll back off from my personal ideals for a bit... So Satan is dead. I think that's where I left off... Does that really mean that we are free from evil? I don't think so. There's a lot more evil in the world right now than the Devil can account for. It's like how there's something in space called dark matter which is there and accounts for something like 90% of the mass in the universe, and no one has actually seen any of it yet. That's how I view evil. We see a small fraction of the evil out there. People are full of good and evil, and are constantly fighting to keep one side in control and the other side passive. Whether you are consciously aware of this struggle or not, it's still going on. No one is entirely good, and no one is entirely bad. Darth Vader always had some good left in him (who am I to question Luke?) and God took the seventh day off and rested. Laziness! Isn't that one of the seven deadly sins? From The Devil to Priests and beyond... ======================================= "The Devil begat darkness; darkness begat ignorance; ignorance begat error and his brethren; error begat free-will and presumption; free-will begat works; works begat forgetfulness of God; forgetfulness begat transgression; transgression begat superstition; superstition begat satisfaction; satisfaction begat the mass-offering; the mass-offering begat the priest; the priest begat unbelief; unbelief begat hypocrisy; hypocrisy begat traffic in offerings for gain; traffic in offerings for gain begat Purgatory; Purgatory begat the annual solemn vigils; the annual vigils begat church-livings; church-livings begat avarice; avarice begat swelling superfluity; swelling superfluity begat fulness; fulness begat rage; rage begat license; license begat empire and domination; domination begat pomp; pomp begat ambition; ambition begat simony; simony begat the pope and his brethren, about the time of the Babylonish captivity." [Martin Luther] Wow, I just found that quote and had to add it, it doesn't have too much (if anything) to do with freedom, but it follows that last bit nicely. Mom Was Right ============= "If they don't like you for who you are, then they're not your real friends." [everybody's mother] Where to go from here... that's the question that I have. I yapped on and on about everything that I think I wanted to. I've rambled ad nauseam about this freedom and that freedom, and something was still "missing." I just realized what it was. Freedom to be yourself. At a time when everyone is labelled, and everyone is a conformist (hell, even the non-conformists are conformists now) where does individuality fit in? Why are people so afraid of just being themselves? When talking to friends I've noticed that whenever we hit some grey area, or something controversial, either someone starts to apologize for everything that they've said or about to say, or they just deny everything that they just said. Why? Are we so terrified of offending someone, or sounding stupid that we need to hide behind a shroud of apologies and denial? Granted that no one wants to hurt one of their friend's feelings, or step on their toes, but you have to be able to hold onto your own ideals, and thoughts. Those are yours. No one can take them away from you. All they can do is judge you by them. And not every judgement needs to be guilty. My sister asked me if something was politically correct over the Christmas break. I actually was annoyed that she asked me that. I'm no fan of being PC, and I try not to live my life in constant fear that the PC police are going to beat down my door and take me away. (hrm... then I'd be a prisoner of conscience. I wonder how Amnesty International would handle that?) But why was I so bothered by that? I can say that I don't like being told what to do, or say, or think. I don't like the need to constantly watch over what I am saying just to make sure that I'm not offending someone. I don't want to hurt someone again, but I'm not going to change who I am just to suit the needs of society. "Most of all we hate collective identity: every day of your pathetic life you are being put into a little box by society by the way you look or the bands you listen to. Collective identity sucks. Be an individual, don't make it easy to be dismissed in a sentence." [Matt Spinks] And before I go, I wouldn't be an X-er if I didn't start screaming about how much I hate the Generation X label. But, if you think about it, we are exactly what 'they' say we are. We just don't care anymore. That's what our generation is all about. I'm not saying that that applies to everyone. I have friends that are actually trying to make a difference. They do care, and they do want to do something about it. Maybe we should just be identified as the generation that want's to be adults when they're 13 and want to be kids when they're 25. It might not actually solve any problems, but it would at least let me know that there's someone out there that I can relate to. Slave To Society ================ "Going round and round / because you can't get on your feet / Going round and round / still taking all the heat / Going round and round / never touching ground." [The Cars] This is quickly becoming more of a rant than what I intended, but I like the direction this is going in, so I'll just 'go with the flow.' Here I am at university and I'm noticing a scary little trend going on. Why am I here? To learn, to learn all I can about whatever I want to. That's the beauty of education, there aren't any real 'boundaries' out there except for what you place on yourself. I want to study philosophy, theology, music, science, the arts, everything. I want to know everything that's available to me. But, (and there's always a but) I can't. I'm allowed to take maybe what 10, 15 electives over my 4 or 5 year stint here. Of course, I made a trade off when I decided to come to this school, sacrifice learning how to think for learning how to do. Being a computer science major we do learn how to think on a very narrow level, we learn how to analyze and logically deduce the solution to certain problems, but how does that help me in the real world? Anyways, getting back on track... that was a good answer in itself, but it was a lie. Why am I really here? Because I need this little piece of paper with some fancy lettering and some signatures of people that I've never met and a bunch of cryptic little letters after my name to get a job. But why get a job? I'd be more than happy sitting here writing this sort of thing for the rest of my life (or at least until I run out of topics) but then I'd probably starve, or end up living with my parents for the rest of my life. Not some great options. So I have to work. Work gets you money. And although I hate the thought of worshipping the almighty dollar, I don't have a choice. Money may not be able to buy happiness, but it can sure make the search for it much more comfortable. So let's see how much money we can build up. To make lots and lots of money, we need either lots and lots of education or lots and lots of luck. I know I don't have much of the latter, so that leaves me with the education problem. (is this making any sense to anyone?) "Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first." [Mark Twain] So what do I do, I sacrifice again. Self awareness (or a sense of 'I') for society. And what do I get for it? No the world does not owe me anything, but if I'm giving up so much of myself, at least I'd like to know what I'm giving it up for. It may be better to give than to receive, but if you keep on giving away parts of yourself without receiving something to replace them, eventually, you run out of yourself, you become just a shell of what you should be. You're not you anymore, you're just a machine that looks a lot like you. This isn't an episode of "The Twilight Zone", this is real life. The Sense Of 'I' ================ [by Jason Hamilton, prophet@ksu.ksu.edu] If you have an intelligent machine that has no "awareness" (sense of "I"), than you can make it do anything you want. If it has most of the capabilities of humans, or even more, it is a very useful machine. If, however, it does have awareness, it is no longer a very useful machine, but a very useful slave. In other words, machines and insects have no moral standing. People do, and maybe dogs and dolphins, too. If a machine were self aware, it would have moral standing as well, and therefore deserving of "human rights". That's one reason why it is important to figure out what has a "sense of I". I Can See The Music =================== "DJs communicate to the masses / Sex and violent classes/ Now our children grow up prisoners / All their lives radio listeners" [REM] "Got to give us what we want / Got to give us what we need / Our freedom of speech is freedom or death / We got to fight the powers that be" [Public Enemy] Like I said before, one person can't make a difference. Neither can one song, one movie, one book, or one speech. All they can do is maybe increase awareness. Maybe, just maybe, if enough people realize what's going on, they might rally together and do something about it. There is power in numbers, if you don't like something, just sitting on your ass and complaining about it won't make a bit of difference to anyone. No one really cares what you think in the world, after all, you're just one person in 5 billion, and this world would go on just fine without you. The trick to making a difference is to let people know what you think, how you feel, what's going on inside your head. Maybe then someone will find out what you're thinking and say "Hey, they're right!" And that's where power begins, that 2 will become 4 and then 8 and 16. This is not just your ordinary, run of the mill, pyramid scheme... this is legit. Chances are that you have at least one friend that thinks and feels the same way that you do, and they probably have a friend that feels the same way. Simple multiplication, word of mouth travels fast. Hell, start up your own zine, you already have a voice, give yourself an amplifier. "Life is like a mop... and sometimes life gets full of dirt and crud and bugs and hairballs and stuff and you, you, you got to clean it out. You got to put it in here and rinse it off and start over again, and sometimes you know, a mop... a mop is not good enough you, you got to get down there like with a toothbrush, you know, and you get to really scrub to get it clean... you got to get it off, you got to really try to get it off... and if that doesn't work, if that doesn't work you can't give up. You got to stand right up you got to run to a window and say 'Hey these floors are dirty as hell and I'm not going to take it any more!'" [from UHF] Tell me if I start to make sense. Uncle Tom, More Than One Of The Smother's Brothers ================================================== "I know the argument friend. It's the great theory of history. I've heard it before. It says when things ain't good, instead of getting down and doing something about it, instead of changing your life, it's a hell of a lot easier to blame somebody else. And it just don't wash in my book." [Talk Radio] Sometime this week, there was a newspaper article in regards to one of my favourite people, none other than Ben Johnson (prefix 'The Disgraced' or suffix 'The Athlete', your choice). Anyways, cheap shots aside, he was 'informing' us about the white conspiracy to keep black athletes at bay. In his words "Every time a black man tries to succeed in life they try to put him down. Black guys are making some good money and the white people don't want to see them succeed, Mike Tyson is another good example." Now maybe my memory is a little selective, but come on. I think banning Benny- boy might have had a little tiny bit to do with him openly admitting to taking steroids during the Olympics and before. And I think Tyson being in jail has something to do with him 'allegedly' raping that woman, not because he was becoming to powerful. I have no problem with anyone making their living in any way that does not hurt anyone else, whatever their race, religion, or whatever is. If you think that there is a conspiracy in professional sports then think about this... who is the highest paid baseball player? Barry Bonds. Michael Jordan makes just under $4 million and Shaq makes just over $4, with endorsements they make $34 and $16 million dollars, respectively, a year. Tell me that there's a conspriacy to keep blacks from gaining power and stature in the world. To Gatorade, Nike, Wheaties and whoever else he's the spokesman for, he is God... That's an acomplishment regardless of colour. I'm not saying that there's no race problem in professional sports, but we have come a long way from Al Campanis' little blunder on Nightline. Now we've "evolved" to the point where everyone has to have a scapegoat. If you pour boiling coffee on your hand, just sue McDonalds for making it too hot. It's happened, and that lady made a couple of million pretty quickly. We don't need to find a get rich quick scheme, we've got one. Whites blame orientals, orientals blame indians, indians blame blacks, blacks blame whites, and everyone blames the jewish. That's the problem today, no one wants to take any responsibility for themselves. If you beat your wife, you're a victim because you were bullied in school. If you join the clan, then we should feel sympathy for you because you were only defending your own race. If you kill people and then eat them, you must be insane, and therefore you deserve special treatment, and shouldn't go to jail. If this is the ride that we're stuck on, I want off. So what does this have to do with freedom? Not really sure, I could probably think of a great many ways to link this to freedom, and you could probably think of just as many as to why it shouldn't. I think it has a lot to do with freedom, if only as an example of why if we aren't going to censor ourselves then maybe we should let the CRTC and FCC do it for us. Hell, freedom of speech is a privilege not a right. It may be a tired cliche, but that doesn't make it any less true. If we're not capable of policing ourselves then maybe we do need to go under military rule. We're just spoiled children, and as soon as someone says no to us, we can't accept that because we've never heard it before. We have too many privileges just handed to us, maybe we do need to actually go out and earn some of this freedom that we have. At least then we might actually notice it in everyday life, instead of just pulling it out and using it as a shield whenever it's convenient. Last Stop: Final Exit ====================== "If I cannot give consent to my own death, then whose body is this? Who owns my life?" [Sue Rodiguez] I'll make this last bit brief. The thought of covering euthenasia didn't even really cross my mind until I read our student newspaper today, and they had an article in it regarding the topic, and so I'll just condense what they (Heather Calder of the Imprint) said... This is one of the few really controversial issues that I really have a strong leaning towards one side, so don't expect this to be even close to balanced. I tried that everywhere else in here, but I honestly can't think of any reasons to be against this one. Imagine being told that you would be dead within two years. Imagine that you were dying of ALS (Lou Gehrig's Disease), a brutally slow disease that attacks and destroys the body, while leaving your mind untouched so you can relish in every agonizing moment. You can actually feel your life slipping away, you know exactly what's happening, but you can't do anything about it. This is exactly what happened to Sue Rodriguez in 1991. Euthenasia is illegal, basically it's murder, but you have to look beyond that. It should fall under the same category as suicide. And it does, except for when it is assisted, either by a doctor, such as the infamous Dr. Kevorkian, or activist like Svend Robinson. Rodriguez took the matter to the supreme court, which ruled against her with a 5 - 4 vote. Regardless, Rodriguez took her own life. The doctor who assisted in the suicide is subject to life imprisonment under Canadian law, and the fate of Robinson (who was present at the time of death) is to be determined by a specially apointed prosecutor. All I want to know is why? I want to personally commend Sue Rodriguez for having the courage to take her own life regardless of what her options were, and also to Svend Robinson, who has constantly fought the government over this issue. The wheels may be turning slowly, but at least he's got them turning. The Road To Nowhere =================== "Well we know where we're going / but we don't know where we've been. / And we know what we're knowing, / but we can't say what we've seen. / And we're not little children, / and we know what we want / And the future is certain / Give us time to work it out." [Talking Heads] Well, I personally think this went much better than last time. And it's still just the beginning of March. Pretty soon, there might even be more than the 7 pages that we're at right now. Next month, we will return to the more personal side of life with a look at duality and multiplicity. How many people only have one side to them? I don't, and I don't think I know anyone that does... so let's try digging a little deeper and see what we pull out. Thanks for listening. Details, Details and More Details ================================= Well if you have this then you probably know how you got it, but in case this was passed on to you, then I'll just let you know where you can find it. ftp: ftp.etext.org /pub/Zines/WhyMe/ gopher: gopher.etext.org follow the prompts mail: if you want a copy sent by mail then just send a request to me at the eternity address. I'm not sure if I'm going to set up an automatic mailing list... depends on demand I suppose. But if you ask for a copy then I will send one to you. And the quote list that started it all can be found at the ftp site... I think you can gopher it, but it's pretty big, so ftping it would probably be the easiest thing to do. Or I could just mail it to you. Disclaimer ========== I take full responsibility of the overall content here. There might be other contributors (and what they say is their own intellectual property), but what goes into this is my choice. Truth is subjective (if you believe something then to you it is fact, and if you don't then it is fiction, simple enough?) so I won't make any claims about honesty... believe what you want. I have no problem with people taking bits and pieces from here to pad essays, or even their own stuff. Just make sure that you cite whoever wrote the article. If it doesn't say who wrote it, then it's probably mine. If you know anything about ISSN numbers, like where I can get one, or what I need them for, or even if I need one, could you please let me know... Everyone else has one, and I want one too. Thanks. Sanjay Singh (3/26/95)