Picture Day!

Hey, it's Friday, so I've got more pictures!

Daddy Cardinal

 Mt. St. Helens

 On the Mall

 Yes, he really was that small once!

 ...and cute!

 It's an Apple!

 Lady Hummingbird

 My famous chili and cornbread 

 Blowing out an Emu egg!

 Beer!

 'nuff said!

 Man, it's cold out here!

 The beginnings of a good chili!

Self explanatory.

Technology Day! Story time...

Well, it's Thursday, so it must be Technology Day.

Instead of some tech advice, I've got a story of woe.  It's about me and my day today.

Usually, I see Murphy (as in Murphy's Law) maybe once a week, sometimes less.  He does show up - I do work with high tech, after all (IF you call Micro$oft's stuff high tech!).  But because we've got a good support group, we are rather good at keeping him at bay.

Usually.

Today, he found a way in, and he stopped in MY shop.  Spent all dang day there, carrying this big, black nasty cudgel - you know, the ones they depict in the comix with the huge freaking nail stuck through the end?  Yeah, that one - and he used it to beat me silly every chance he got.  Sadistically.  Wearing a big, smirky smile.

It really started a few days ago, when Adobe Captivate suddenly decided to stop loading.  On any machine, for both versions 5.5 and 6.  No rhyme or reason to it, it just decided to start freezing at the splash screen.

Today, I did get one machine to take 5.5 and it worked!  Hallelujah!  Choirs of angels sang!  So, as we agreed in our trouble shooting conference yesterday, I then installed 6.  Carefully copied the installation files to the local hard disk and unpacked them.  Ran them under my Domain Superman account.  Everything possible.

Rebooted after the install was finished.  Ran Captivate 6 - it stalled.  Damn.  Rebooted, ran 5.5 and IT stalled.  Double Damn!  Back to the beginning, right where we started.  Gonna call Adobe support tomorrow.

Wham!  Murphy strikes again.

Second laptop.  Lady came to me, complained that all her shortcuts were launching Windows Picture Viewer.  ALL of them.  So, I checked, and sure enough, every dang one had that same icon picture on it, and every dang one opened that same app.  Had one of these last week, ended up re-imaging it, because Windows 7 doesn't allow deleting profiles like XP did - in part due to our restrictive GPOs.

So, I played it careful - I talked to our new Windows 7 expert and he eventually pointed me to a set of instructions.  Remove the profile folder from the Users folder, launch regedit, go to a certain key and kill the hive associated with that user's folder.

Simple, right?  I launch and use regedit a hundred times a week, right?  Not this time.  The OS primly informed me that I had no such access permissions.  Went to the Windows directory, ran it from there.  Same denial.  Put my already privileged account into the Admin group, even though Domain Admins were already there - same error.  Had to re-image this machine too.

Wham!  Murphy strikes again.

So, I trek upstairs to install a monitor driver for someone whose big 27" monitor was no longer showing her laptop screen, which was supposed to be shared to it.  Logged her off, logged into the Domain Superman account, downloaded the driver from Dell's site and ran the installer.

Rebooted.

Blue screen.

Wham!  Murphy strikes again.

Gotta take this one up to Gaithersburg tomorrow to let the encryption team pull the data off of this encrypted drive before I re-image it.

Tonight, I am going to treat myself.  I deserve it.

Picture Day!

It's Friday, so I've got more pictures!

 Lady spider...

 Day Lily...

 Chicks & Hens - blooming!

 The Moon

 Redbuds are Heart Trees!

 Post production black & white filter

Purple!

All of these photos were taken by me with my Nikon 5100 DSLR.  I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed taking them!

It's Technical Information Day - Again!

It's Thursday, so it must be Technical Information Day!

Today, I am going to talk about maintaining your computer.

Apple, Inc. is very fond of using the tagline "It Just Works" in talking about their products, but as a desktop technician for over 20 years, I can tell you that isn't quite true.  In fact, it is pure marketing!

That said, Apple computers have pulled in ratings over the years as some of the best computers to own as far as build quality, longevity, reliability as well as customer satisfaction.  But they do break, and as with any human built piece of machinery, regular maintenance can help minimize inconvenience in case of trouble, as well as often put that trouble off for a while.

Macs use the Operating System known now as OS X (the X being a Roman Numeral, thus pronounced as "ten", not "ecs" as in the letter.  It is the tenth major iteration of the Mac operating system.) with the current version being 10.8.4.  The current version is a very robust system, and is designed to be extremely user friendly.  It helps that it is designed on top of a Unix kernel, which was designed from the beginning as a server OS that was intended to run for months if not years between reboots.

To ensure this, Unix (and OS X) runs certain maintenance tasks on a daily, weekly and a monthly basis to reduce log file sizes, remove system files no longer needed and reduce or remove temp files.  These tasks run at certain times when your computer is less likely to be in use. The tasks are scheduled for 03:15 to 05:30 in your computer's local time zone, if your computer is running at that time and not in sleep mode.  If the tasks do not run, it is possible that certain log files (such as system.log) may become very large in Mac OS X v10.5 or earlier.

In Mac OS X v10.6 and later, background maintenance tasks that do not run when the computer is asleep are run after it wakes from sleep mode.  So, although many people want to save energy (and money) by turning their Macs off when not in use, it is good for it to let it run overnight at least twice a month, if not weekly.

[Note:  Windows does NOT perform these tasks, they are programmed into Unix (and thus OS X) only.]

As for you, the user, one of the easiest things you can do to maintain your Mac is to keep the OS updated and current.  You do this using either the Software Update command in the Apple Menu in the upper left corner, or running the App Store app from the Dock and clicking on the Update symbol at the top of the window.  Your Mac will look for updates to Apple software, the OS and any third party apps you may have installed using the App Store.

This includes any Security Updates Apple may issue for your OS or Apple applications you have installed.  Apple does not issue regularly timed or dated security updates like Microsoft does.  It only issues them as needed, so be sure to check at least weekly, if not monthly.  You can set your Mac to do this automatically in System Preferences in the Software Update preferences panel.

[A word about updates.  Updates are wonderful things, but they CAN create problems by introducing new features and sometimes killing off older features.  If your software is used at all for what you consider critical tasks, be sure and investigate new versions BEFORE you click "update"!  This will ensure you don't do something you may regret later.]

Now, the biggie:  Backups!

No matter how cavalier you may be about your computing habits, you've got data you'd rather not lose.  (Note:  data = your stuff, pictures, email, word processing documents, spreadsheets, everything)

Everybody does.

So, back it up!  Keep copies of everything.  Keep copies on an external hard drive, or a flash drive or in the dropbox app online.  Google Drive is also ok.  Or, if you prefer to not have to think about it, Apple has Time Machine that will take care of the daily scut work for you.

Just back your stuff up!  You won't regret it.

Additionally, you can do the hard work of cleaning up your files, deleting old stuff, archiving things you'd like to keep but hate to delete and keep your stuff organized.

Occasionally, break open a can of canned air and blow out the air holes on your computer to remove the dust and crud that accumulates over time.  This allows a better airflow to keep your Mac cool.

Apple doesn't actively recommend it, but some Mac Techs do - run Disk Utility occasionally to check your disk for needed repairs.  All hard drives accumulate errors over time, as sectors go bad.   Disk Utility, run occasionally, will block these off and prevent your computer from attempting to read or write to or from these sectors, saving your data and keeping your blood pressure down.

Some folks will recommend repairing permissions also, but in my experience, it rarely makes a difference, unless you are having some issues with files not being read correctly or apps not running properly.  If it ain't broke, in this case, better off not fixing it.

Oh, and you don’t need to defragment or optimize your disk when you use Mac OS X. When writing files, Mac OS X optimizes your disk space and avoids fragmenting large files into smaller segments.  This is automatic, unlike Windows.

Ok, for this week, that's it!

Happy Computing!

An Atheist Thinks About Death.

I believe that one of the biggest draws religion has is the idea that after you die, you nevertheless live on.  That somewhere, somehow, in some unexplainable place, everybody you ever loved, or knew or even wanted to meet is there, alive and waiting just for you.

Assuming, of course, they pass the entry exam.

Humans are eternally optimists about themselves, they always like to assume they will still be around at any later point you want to talk about.  One of the most difficult thinking processes one can go through is to think about the world you know WITHOUT YOU.

Come one, give it a try.  At some point in there, doesn't your mind just want to slide off into another train of thought?  Doesn't that make you uncomfortable?

So it's no wonder that a belief system that says you won't be separated from the lover that got lost in a car accident forever holds some true attraction.

On the other hand, aren't there some folks you've known that spending an eternity around them just might get a little tiresome after a while?  To some folks, spending eternity around those abusive parents may not be a comforting idea.

Be that as it may, as an atheist, I don't have those problems.  To me, the idea that there is this unseen, undetectable soul thing which somehow survives your bodily death is one that makes no sense.  That an eternal deity would divide humans according to their credulity while on earth and would torture those who chose wrong for an ETERNITY sounds way beyond cruelty, it sounds positively medieval - which, of course, is when this particular belief was developed.  Interesting coincidence, isn't it?

So, Christians ask, how do you console yourself after a loved one dies?  How do you deal with difficulties in this life?  What comfort do you derive from not having heaven to look forward to?

To know, not to suspect, but to know that when a loved one dies you will never see them again, will never hold them again and will never hear their voice again is never an easy thing.  Heck, for many Americans who DO believe in heaven, it is a hard thing!  For a people who are supposedly informed about a future paradise after death, Americans sure do deal badly with it.  Our funerals are often dark, sorrowful things, which have always seemed to me to invoke a lack of real belief in an after life.  Even with the rituals that invoke the Christian beliefs, people don't ACT that way.

But as hard as it is, death is a fact of life, it is a part of life.  The life cycle includes it and one needs to learn to deal with it.  You move on, pick yourself up and learn to get along.  You speak with friends and family, you reflect on and remember the lost friend or family member and how much you enjoyed each others company. You try to keep the best of those memories for future remembrances and then you move on.  There isn't much else you can do!  How can treating it like a temporary absence help?  It just prevents you from being able to get over it.  Puts it in suspended animation so you don't have to deal with it.

It's the lazy way of dealing with death.

To me, the knowledge that the end of my life is THE END just makes what is left of my life more precious.  It makes ALL life precious, irreplaceable.  You realize that every time someone dies, their life, their talents, their point of view is lost - forever.  A point lost to the Christian view is that even if heaven IS real, that persons life, talents and everything are lost to this world anyway.  Never to be seen again.

This pragmatic point of view is actually pretty simple.  Life is what it is.  No mysteries, no hidden agendas, no invisible eye looking over your shoulder.  That puts the onus on being good on YOU.  You have no excuses that you didn't read something right, or that a lack of consequences for bad behavior is somehow proof that your sky daddy might approve of your actions, no matter how reprehensible.  What you do is on you.  Period, end of story.

Integrity was once described to me as being. Something you've got that makes you stop at a stop light or sign, even if the cross roads is in the middle of a desert and you can see for miles that there's nobody around.  Integrity makes you stop anyway, because you agree with the social contract that says you should.

That's how I think of being an atheist and believing that there's no god.  Morality is something I believe in FOR ITS OWN SAKE, and not because I might get punished or rewarded according to my behavior here on earth.

Not believing in heaven and hell is actually EASIER, because there is less stress.  It is also HARDER, because there's nobody to take the hard part off of your back.  YOU have to do the hard work of developing your morals and deciding what is right or wrong - because YOU have to live with the consequences of being wrong, and those consequences are often immediate and sometimes severe.  You don't have to wait for death to find out you were wrong.

Death is actually a release.  End of the run, nothing else to worry about.  I don't have to worry about some future judgement day, or something.

I find that to be a tremendously freeing thought.  It puts ME in charge.

And I like it that way.

Official Cybernetic Atheist Holiday - 37th Wedding Anniversary!

Thirty-seven years ago today, the cyber-girlfriend and I became husband and wife!  So, today, this post is going to be short, sweet and to the point.

Happy Anniversary to the Cyber-wife, I love you and hope that we can do this for another 37 years...

See ya'll tomorrow!

Technical Information Day!

As a long standing IT technician, I have been advising family and friends for years about cleaning up their computers before selling them or giving them away.  I am very happy to see Apple, Inc. has finally taken the bull by the horns and posted a Support Page document explaining how to do this for a modern Mac, including how to do it without accidentally deleting your data in iCloud at the same time!

Simply follow these steps:

Important: Do not manually delete contacts, calendars, reminders, documents, photo streams, or any other iCloud data while signed in to your iCloud account. Doing so will not only delete that information from your Mac, but will also delete it from the iCloud servers and any other devices you also sync with iCloud. Instead, follow the steps below to remove your iCloud account from your Mac and leave your iCloud data intact on your other devices.

1.  Deauthorize your computer from iTunes (if applicable).
2.  Back up your data.
3.  If enabled, turn off Find My Mac and sign out of iCloud. To turn off the iCloud service on your Mac:

• Choose System Preferences > iCloud.
• Deselect Find My Mac to disconnect your devices from iCloud.
• Click the Sign Out button on the left side.
• The system automatically removes iCloud data from your Mac. 

4.  Reformat your hard drive with Disk Utility to erase all stored data and then reinstall OS X on your computer. For instructions specific to your operating system, select the appropriate article below:

• OS X Mountain Lion
• OS X Lion

Optional: If you want to return your Mac to its original "out-of-the-box" state, so the new owner can set up the computer with the Mac OS X Setup Assistant, follow these steps:

1.  After you reformat your hard drive and reinstall OS X, the Setup Assistant automatically starts and displays the Welcome screen that prompts you to choose your country or region. Do not continue with the setup of your system.

2.  Press Command-Q to shut down your Mac.

Your Mac is now ready for its new owner. When the Mac is turned on for the first time, the Setup Assistant will guide the new owner through the setup process. 

Simple! In fact, so simple a cave man could do it!

(Sorry, guys)

Back on a serious note, you really, really need to do something like this, so your data isn't left on your machine for anybody to steal after you no longer have it.  Once it is out of your hands, you can no longer control it, so be sure it is gone!

Windows users, I can't give you specific instructions like this, but the same principle applies, save your data, reformat the old hard drive and reinstall the Operating System from the original media.  That way, your data is gone, not simply deleted.

Happy Computing!!

Another Guest Post!

Hey, folks, have I got a treat for you!

Cyberdaughter the Youngest has written another guest post.  Not a story like the last time, but a short piece on her love of books and how it affects her.  It is a wonderful little snippet, but well worth the time to read - more than once!

Books

Sometimes when I am reading just the right passage in a book, I feel as though I can reach out and touch the words. I can peel them off of the page like a sticker and adhere them on to the world around me and see, for a time, their meaning in everything that touches me. The words blend seamlessly in to my perceptions and for just a little while I am changed. Everything around me is suddenly awash with sensation, beauty, meaning... 

I feel more alive at these moments. I feel full and heavy and secret. I feel special and alone. For a few minutes, days, or even weeks, I am looking out at everything in a new and wonderful way. I move slower, I see more clearly the things that I often take for granted. Even the simple act of making myself a cup of coffee is full of moments that I never noticed before. I am more open to the people around me - the ones that I know and love and also the strangers that pass by normally unnoticed. It's as though they are wearing their stories like a cape or a blanket and in order to look them in the eye I have to read them all. Thoughts and meanings and words and strands of time weave around them and I almost feel as though I can run my fingers through them the same way I would run my fingers through my own hair; soft, silky, and intensely personal. Familiar. They are stories that I already know but had forgotten, the memory of them teasing at me as I take them in. They linger. A car drives past and the driver's stories reach out to me and settle gently around me as though the car drove through a patch of dust and left me covered in it, breathing in the cloud. It's a peaceful feeling, like having a silken sheet drift down to cover my naked body over and over again; it's always there, but I hardly notice it unless it moves. 

It fades after a while. The passage lingers until I once again forget in the face of every day motion. The sticker of words fades and peels, the edges are rough and the letters are barely legible after a while, but it never entirely leaves me. Some small piece, a tiny bit of paper, a letter, a feeling - it stays with me and becomes a part of my world. I cherish these pieces; they are my foundation. Hundreds upon thousands of these minuscule moments are embedded in my thoughts and perceptions. If I concentrate, I can pull one up and unfold it and cradle it and cherish it and be awash with the meaning of it for a while, but most often they are an accident. A moment, a thought, a bit of sun that looks just like it did that afternoon so many years ago. A shout in the distance, the splash of water, a scent, or a flavor of the past will catapult my senses back to those tiny, faded letters and for just a little while I am caught in its web once more. It is like my mind is pulling at the threads that make up my self and showing me for just a moment that I have not forgotten, that it is still there, that it is a part of who I am and always will be. That feeling is like the sun on a lazy afternoon. I bask in it, I close my eyes and smile to the sky until the clouds eclipse the rays of warmth and I return to my normal, whole self again, made up of all the faded words and feelings and stories so deeply woven with each other that they are scarcely separate letters anymore.

 Sometimes, being a parent is so worth it!

What do I mean by "Religious Harm"?

I have written a lot about how harmful I feel religions can be.  I have published examples of what forms that can take here, about any number of religions, including Christianity, Islam and Buddhism.  I intend to do a bit of reading up on other religions, too, as time permits.

But I figured I'd lay a bit of groundwork so you know what I am doing here, and what my goal is.

Above all, my goal on this blog is to illustrate my viewpoints on religion and things that are impacted by it.  I am NOT here specifically to convert anyone, as I know that the chances that anyone would read one of my posts, see that proverbial lightbulb turn on over their head and suddenly understand it all and just drop their faith like a worn pair of socks is slim to none.   That's not how people lose their faith.

People lose their faith over a million things, and usually it isn't a single thing that is the cause.  They usually go through a process of education which sometimes culminates in a realization of faith being lost.  That realization may be a long time coming and a gradual thing, or it may be a sudden "ding!" of eye-opening comprehension.  Some people may undergo a traumatic incident which causes them to leave their church, which then opens the way to a period of education and study which then, in the end, validates that decision after the fact.

Either way, it is a process, not a sudden event.

My purpose is to be part of that process, part of that education.

A part of my technique is publishing the harm that religion can do, both to individuals and society.  This isn't easy.  Oh, finding incidents that illustrate my points is easy, yes.  But then tying those incidents to an underlying reason for why religion is the harmful cause of that incident is what is hard.  Not because it's a stretch, or because the tie isn't there, but using the right words to show you, my readers, WHY the religious attitudes or rules or traditions are harmful, and in ways that outweigh any possible good.

That last is important.  Religion is, on the surface, all about "love", or at least that's what we are told today.  Modern Christianity, Buddhism and liberal parts of Islam emphasize the getting along with people parts of their rules and gloss over the less salubrious parts of either doctrine or traditional practice.

But all of them have the dark side.  With some, the dark side is part of the doctrine, some, like Buddhism, have developed harmful traditions and cultural practices that (like India's caste system, some Muslims countries' female genital mutilation practice and Christianity's patriarchalism) are very harmful, both at the individual level and at the cultural level.

It is very difficult to point these things out to people invested in those religions, because those things are excused by traditions that they "protect" sacred things, like the family or one's practice of morality.

These dark practices and traditions ARE harmful.  Yes, they are often said to protect good things, like morality.  But when examined closely, one can see that the things they protect are often carefully crafted facades hiding often harmful control measures.

Often, the harm is direct and openly on display, but the adherents often ignore the implications, because they are so indoctrinated in the excuses, they never see the real harm.  Of course, they do when it's ANOTHER religion on display...

The problem with these excuses is that they are tacked on, added onto the fabric of the religious doctrine, because the naked purpose of the harmful act used to be pure protection of the religion and its power, and nobody needed to clean it up for public consumption.  In the remote past when the religions were young and in total power, everything was out in the open.  No excuses were offered, unless the one being "punished" was wealthy or influential, when they then needed some thin veneer of civility.  If the victim was poor, nobody cared.

Take "honor killings", for instance.  Supposedly, this was because the women violated the "honor" of the family or more correctly, the man of the house.  In truth, she was his property, and had, by having illicit sex, made him look a fool for not being able to control her.  The fix was for her to die, as an example to others of what would happen if THEY did the same thing.

"Honor" was the thin veneer, and it is even thinner today.

On a less remote issue, Christianity can have harmful consequences too.  Many people believe the bible, if not literally, then fairly well as a guide to god's word.  An obvious example is regarding homosexuality.  Two passages in the Old Testament denigrate it, and one calls for death to practitioners of it.

Now, many students of theology have spent probably millions of words debating this and its significance and its meaning.  There are many nuances of homosexuality, including the fact that females can be homosexual too, but the bible doesn't mention that.  It's only about men.  Cultural norms over the centuries have changed how people see it and how it is defined.  In biblical times, for men to have love affairs in the pastoral sense (without sex) was often the norm, and Greeks even took it to a sexual level, even while they were married and had sex with their wives too.

But today, we see homosexuality as a sexual orientation.  A lifestyle.  And those two verses have been generalized to mean that any man on man or woman on woman attraction is homosexual, thus wrong and in the eyes of some extremists, worth killing over, even if they can't prove sexual union has occurred.

I can't pretend to understand what the original cultural reasons were for the writers of the old testament to put those verses into the law they were writing, but the implications today are sometimes deadly.  And what purpose do those passages serve today?  Mankind is rapidly moving back to a time when homosexuality is no longer seen as a bad thing.  Unusual in the US, perhaps, but less and less a bad thing.  To cling to this "traditional" reading and meaning (when numerous passages in the same books of the Old Testament outline laws we studiously ignore) is harmful to the extreme.

The tendency of the extremist Christian fundamentalists to cling to this is harming even them selves, as it illustrates an attitude about others many Americans see as not just harmful, but distasteful as well.  This is resulting in many christians leaving their churches.  Many of them join the masses of unchurched apathetics, some actively become atheist.

My purpose is to show you what harm it does.  to lay it bare and illustrate that harm, and where it comes from.

A lot of you dismiss these illustrations with expressions of horror, but giving the excuse that, well, MY church doesn't believe that way, so it's not so bad.

Perhaps.

But you believe in and support the same scriptures.  You believe in and deify the same god, the same son of that god.  Your bible has the same verses in it theirs does, its just that you ignore the parts he doesn't.  Your belief that the book you both worship is sacred supports his belief that the parts HE uses to excuse his harmful acts are as sacred as the ones YOU follow.  Even as you deny that HIS acts can possibly be Christian HE is telling the world that YOU aren't Christian enough, because you don't believe the way he does.

And so it goes, round and round, in the meantime, he can still excuse his acts, and because it is HIS version of YOUR religion, somehow, nobody ever gets around to doing anything to stop it.  Nobody questions it, because it is a RELIGIOUS belief, thus unquestionable.

Somehow, I hope that sooner or later, some of this will seep into the brains of my readers, and perhaps you will see that it is the very unquestionable status of religion that makes it more harmful than other ideologies.  Because it has no reality check, it cannot be compared to reality, so it is not verifiable.  One has to take it on "faith".

No matter how much good it may do otherwise, the very fact that it cannot be held to a standard of verifiable truth makes it so harmful that it not worth keeping around.  It just hurts too many people and often does it by hurting entire cultures at a time.

Like Smokey the Bear says about forest fires, "Only You" can prevent religions from harming mankind!  One person at a time.

Are God's rules really eternal?

One of the most interesting things claimed by many theists these days isn't new.  I was watching Turner Classic Movies the other day, and they aired an old short film I can't remember the name of, in which the narrator used the constant phrase, "sin in the heart of man".  The theme was the same you hear today, that America's morals are off track, and sin is why.

Well, at least once, he noted that, "God's rules are eternal", as he denigrated the thought that modern morals have changed.

Oh, really?

So, if that is true, can I still go to New Orleans and buy a slave off of the old slave block right there on the docks, fresh from Africa?  Or, if I prefer, can I sneak off I to Canada and enslave one of our northern neighbors?  They are, after all, not American, and the bible says we can enslave our neighbors.  Of course, according to the bible, I can't hold a Hebrew for longer than seven years.  Then again, I can argue that since I am not Hebrew, that restriction doesn't apply to me, right?

Or, if I prefer, I can sell one of my daughters (I do still have one unmarried daughter) into sexual slavery.  She's a redhead, so she may be able to pay off all my debts at once, wouldn't you think?  I mean, it says so, right there in Deuteronomy, so it must true if God's rules are eternal, and redheads are still considered exotic!

Also, that same book tells us that shellfish are forbidden, eating animals with cloven hooves is also forbidden, and our modern practice of wearing mixed fabrics is too.

I could go on, but the point is made.  Today, in modern First World countries, none of these restrictions are followed, nor do we think about them at all.  Even First World churches pay no mind to these rules, even though Jesus himself told slaves to obey their masters, as did Paul.  No preacher today anywhere in the industrialized west would stand up in front of a modern congregation and advocate enslaving citizens of a neighboring country, nor selling young women off to pay their fathers' debts.

Yes, these "rules" are still written in the scriptures.  No, churches today do not put those verses on their reading lists for weekly bible studies, and the reason is obvious - religions must adhere to the current moral standards of the society in which it exists, or (lacking the force of government persuasion) people will stop going.

So the bottom line here is, no, the rules of God are NOT eternal, but are as subject to change as are the standards of any society which will naturally change with time and circumstances.  They must or the religion will die.

There is, of course, one exception to this, and I referred to it above.  If the religion is a State sponsored religion and the force and power of the State are behind rules which require attendance and adherence to the rules, then, obviously, whatever rules the leaders of that religion wish can then be enforced, and this will have the effect of artificially enforcing standards the population may not otherwise have wished to obey.  It may or may not have the effect of causing people to actually believe in those standards.  If they are far enough divorced from the general moral standards seen in use by the secular society prior to the beginning of that enforcement, they will breed resentment and resistance.  Eventually, even if not so far removed, if they seem to enforce rules that most of the population come to see as overly restrictive and protecting an upper privileged class, they can go so far as breed revolution.

My point here is that we know from history that the moral standards of societies do change.  Old practices such as slavery, dietary rules and other more mundane things such as fabric uses will be forced to change as the circumstances of the society change.  Economics, standards of education, and technical advancements can profoundly affect how societies manage themselves and how people's relationships in families, business and government work.

Religions that try to hold on to old, outmoded rules in ways that no longer make sense will, unless people are forced to stay, lose members.  Even if forced to stay, eventually, social pressures will eventually either force changes or those changes will be forced through violent means.  (Pay attention, this happened, in THIS country.  We forced a violent change to the rules, by forcing the state to divest itself of its religious connections.  We did this by violently divorcing ourselves from that old State and developing a new State!)

In the end, the lesson we learn is that nothing is eternal.  If there were a god which created us, loved us and wanted the best for us, he/she would use his/her superior knowledge to shepherd us into a better understanding of how to manage ourselves and better our lives.  This would not happen by enforcing rules that no longer meet the needs and requirements of a society which has outgrown the faults of a past age where violence was the norm.

Instead, we find churches that seek to use those old, outmoded rules to continue to force us to adhere to old social rules which make no sense and prevent us from growing and expanding human knowledge.  Rules which force us into past patterns of behavior which do not fit a modern, digital age in which knowledge and information is at one's fingertips.  Rules which seek to denigrate women, control our lives and support old established organizations which cannot change without being afraid of losing control.

Control which brings them YOUR money, YOUR support, thus supporting their secular, worldly power which in turn supports the lifestyles of the leaders.  The WEALTHY lifestyles. As we've seen over and over.

Thus, we see movements like Dominionism, which again seek to bring the old theocratic ways of the past to the present.  The rules which forced people to obey the old ways, the old patterns which bring power and wealth to those who control those rules.

Don't fall for it.  America is under attack from several directions, but the commonality is one of bringing control of this society to those who control the wealth.  Religion has ALWAYS been the means of control for those in power, and democracy put a rapid stop to much of that control.

You, the people, have the power to maintain your own control, the means to stop the power grab under way by the wealthy, by the cynical, godless men who would use your superstition to control you, like they did your grandfathers and great-grandfathers before you.

Only YOU can decide not to go along.  But you must see through their attempts to cloud your mind with superstition, with the old enticing rules which can seem so comforting, because they allow you to just drift through life without having to decide anything.  

But that is the way to slavery.  That is the way to letting someone else do your thinking for you.

Yes, cutting lose is hard.  It means you have to think, to actually take your life into your own hands and decide FOR YOURSELF who you want to be and what is important to YOU.  

The first step is letting go of the old comfortable rules and realizing that they no longer have any relevance to the modern world.  That they are the means to controlling you, not freeing you.

Remember, when they tell you to surrender to Christ, they are really telling you to surrender to the earthly leaders of the Christian religion.  Do you REALLY think those wealthy men have YOUR best interests at heart?

Really?

To All My Christian Friends and Family.

Yesterday, there just wasn't anything that leapt out and grabbed me, so I posted a bunch of cool pictures.  It was a nice break.  I hope you enjoyed it!

Today, however, I am angry.  It isn't often I get this angry, so if I get a bit testy and even offensive, please understand my emotional state.

First, understand something.  I was born and educated in Texas.  In spite of its proud tradition of individualism, it is one of the more patriotic States in the union.  Yes, in spite of our obnoxious boasts about having been the only State in the union which was its own independent country (which, damn it, IS true...), we are also very proud of having willingly given up that independence in order to join the US.  Yes, and we also obnoxiously believe you guys got the better end of the deal, having obtained our beautiful State and our unswerving loyalty!  Ahem, sorry, got the better of me...

Part of that was a firm education in what this country was founded to mean:  religious freedom.

Read that again.  RELIGIOUS FREEDOM.

That was NOT a lesson in Christian majority privilege, it was taught to every school child that the US was founded for the purpose of allowing Americans the right to their own brand of religion.  This crap about the US being a "christian nation" is a modern FICTION, and numerous quotes from the Founding Fathers proves that they also meant people of other religions besides Christianity, as well as Atheists too.

It is, in short, a tactic of modern fundamentalists to twist the conversation to assume something that isn't true.

What set me off?

This story, in Addicting Info, which talks about a story out of Tennessee.  It is a perfect illustration of what Christians, and not just fundies, will do once they get the political power to shut down the opposition, even if they have to do it illegally and ignore the basic rules of the game.

It is, in fact, an illustration of HOW they will ignore the basic rules and run roughshod over anybody who gets in their way.

"“This is people standing up for what they believe in,” said Steve McDonald, pastor of the Calvary Baptist Church. “We have a right to the democratic process and majority rule.”"

Yeah, and his message is that majority rule means that they can then manipulate the democratic process to ignore fairness and the basic Constitutional rules that are supposed to govern this country.

And this isn't even about anything really IMPORTANT.  This is just symbolism.  Just how bad would it get when they really get serious about something?

Really?  Since when is forcing your beliefs down everybody else's throat ok?

Why am I this angry?

Because these idiots have been spouting this shit for years now, and NONE of the people in this country who count themselves as Christian have yet to stand up and shout the bastards down.

I mean that.  When was the last time a man such as that Baptist minister, after having stood up and spouted such obviously unAmerican bullshit, got his ass handed to him by his congregation?

When was the last time someone like Pat Robertson, who spews such bullshit on a regular basis, lost viewers?

When was the last time that a man like that was admonished by the OTHER ministers in his town and told he was wrong?

Never, that's when.  Not only never, but the other good Christians in that town stood by and actually cheered and supported them as they willingly spent PUBLIC MONEY to violate the Constitution.

So, I will say this again:  What is wrong with you people?  Don't you know a violation of the Constitution when you see one?  Don't you see a violation of the very democratic process itself occurring, or is it ok because the guys doing it believe the same stuff you do?

THAT'S whey I am angry, because so many of you stand up on Facebook and tell me that these people are not being Christian and are acting unAmerican, but you never DO anything about it.  I don't see many stories about this being posted by the Christians I know.  They get posted either by me or other atheistic pages or groups, with little comment or support, mostly.

It is time, indeed, PAST time, for the moderate Christians in the US to stand up and put these fundamentalist bullies back in their place.  Take your conservative party back, throw the bums out and stop swallowing their bullshit.

Because, if you don't, once they take power, they will lump YOU in with ME.  Because you won't be conservative enough, you will end up being given the same choice I will.  Either worship in a fundie church or take the consequences.

Then you can see how it feels to be religiously oppressed.  Like atheists really are, not the fake oppression they like to whine about.

So, in the final analysis, what I mean to say is this.  If you don't have the will to stand up and MAKE THIS STOP, then you agree with it.

Really, that IS what it means.

Photography Friday!

I figured that enough depressing stuff is happening, and I didn't want to talk about anything serious or depressing, so today is Picture Day!  Photography Friday!

 I like to take pictures of nature, like flowers...

 budding flowers...

 flowers in the sun...

 The Moon!

 Bugs...

 Food at restaurants....

 BIG flowers!

 Orion, my dog...

 Redbud flowers!

 Pan, caged...

 More Redbud flowers...

 Food from home!

Something I copied from Facebook...

Work doesn't have to be work.

Cyberdaughter from Tampa posted an interesting article on Facebook, entitled, "10 Little Habits that Steal Your Happiness".

It is a nifty little article, which doesn't go into a lot of boring details, but keeps it sweet and simple.  I'd tell you that everything talked about there is good to know.

I'd say a bit more about Number 3, "Working for nothing more than a paycheck".  In over 40 years of working at several different jobs at several different employers, some private, some government, just about the worst thing I've seen people do is to stick with a job they hate.  I had one for a while, and I got away as quickly as I could find a way.  My current job is one that I love to do and frankly, were I retired, I could do it for free!  (Just don't tell my boss!)

Forget the article's advice about, "When you design a lifestyle in which your work is something you suffer through daily strictly to pay your bills, you end up spending your entire life wishing you had someone else’s."  That's wishy washy.  Weak sauce, limp dishwater.

Instead, look at it this way, the fastest way to ruin your entire life, every relationship you've got and poison your professional reputation forever is to take a job, find out you hate it, and stay.  I've seen people who have stayed in such jobs for a decade or more, and they often see their marriages ruined, families alienated, friends run off, and to make things worse, their job performance is often so bad and their professional relationships so tainted that they couldn't move to another employer if their lives depended on it.  They remain only because they keep their performance just good enough to not get fired.  They end up hating their jobs, their boss, their coworkers, the people they ride the bus with and often the folks they see in the same restaurant every day at lunch!

To talk with such folks is poison to the rest of us.  They are cynical, unpleasant, and often have little good to say about anyone, and you end up walking away wondering what they will say about you to the next unfortunate soul who stops by and gets caught by that same rant.

My advice to you is that if you find out that you've taken a job you hate, GET OUT IMMEDIATELY.  Don't wait until your budget is so dependent on the salary that you can't afford to move.  That is suicide, and will doom you to a life of despair and unhappiness.  Go back to the last few companies that  you applied to and try again.  If you have to spend a few weeks out of a job, unless you are about to get thrown out of your living space, go ahead and quit.

Believe me, finding a job you either like a lot or just simply love is worth real, cold hard cash.  You will be happier, healthier and your professional reputation will reflect the improvement in your circumstances.  Your family will appreciate it, your marriage will not suffer (unless you turn out to be a workaholic, but that's a whole 'nuther conversation) and your health will be better and stay that way far longer.  You'll probably live longer, too, since stress is a proven killer.

But again, a word of warning, do pay attention to the folks who say not to allow your job to define who you are.  Even if you love it, IT IS JUST A JOB.  It is a means to an end, to get the money that allows you to live decently, provide for a family and have at least a reasonably pleasant lifestyle.  Letting it define you is a recipe for disaster, mentally, if your company has to downsize and you end up getting laid off.  Don't let your job get intwined with your ego!

But, if you happen to find one you love, that's a bonus worth holding on to, and something to work hard to find.  Believe me, you won't regret the extra time and trouble you had to go to in order to find it.

Dominionism - a list of quotes.

Today, for those who have a problem with understanding which public figures are into the Dominionist movement, I've got  a site for you.

It's called Quotes from the The American Taliban, and the quotes you will find there are not only eye-opening, but go back over 50 years!

A sampling:

David Barton (Wallbuilders)
	"There should be absolutely no 'Separation of Church and State' in America."

David Trosch
"Sodomy is a graver sin than murder. – Unless there is life there can be no murder."

Fob James (Governor of Alabama)
	"Behind this judicial wall of separation there is a tyranny of lies that will fall... I say to you, my friends, let it fall!"

If these kinds of attitudes don't make you sit back and wonder about where the speakers are coming from, you've got a problem.  These people are not patriotic Americans, they are enemies of democracy, enemies of the Constitution, and proponents of throwing society back hundreds of years.

They should be thrown out of public life and shamed into obscurity.

Something else that never stops.

A lot of my writing here has been to show how crazy the right wing can get.  Most of that has been about politicians, but the occasional right wing fundie preacher shows up, too.

Today, a special one, because this one is about the large undercurrent of religious hubris that finds its way into the mailboxes - both real and virtual - of those the right wing decides to hate.

First, I take you to Kingston, Canada.  Some enterprising right wingers have decided that targeting the gay ladies there is the way to go!

Addressed to "Lesbian bitches," the letter demands that the recipients leave the city as soon as possible or face all manner of harassment (read the full letter here).

It is signed, "In the name of our Lord, Jesus Christ, our savior"

Second, is an email sent to Mikey Weinstein, of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF), as posted to his website, along with responses by some of Mikey's followers.

Dear Military Religious Freedom Foundation, 

Mikey Wienstien is an enemy to American people. I will die for Jesus Christ and fight for Jesus Christ. I fought for this country for freedom. Not for people like Mikey to steal it. Mikey will fall like the coward him and his family is. If he thinks he’s gonna win then he will soon be crushed like the Nazi regime he supports. He is the same as a child rapist or adolf Hitler. You will never take god from us. This country was founded on it. Watch as you fail. 

(name withheld)

 Don't you just love those lovin' Christians?  The MRFF gets lots of these, every day.  Many prominent atheists do, too.  In fact, anybody these clowns don't like are liable to get targeted like this.

I classify this under both Religious Harm and Just Plain Crazy.

More Religious Harm - Buddhism, It's Your Turn!

More than once, I've been told, after making the point that religion is harmful regardless of what it teaches, that Buddhism is a religion of peace, and its teachings do not lead to violence.  Well, I beg to differ, at least as to the violence that is possible - regardless of what it teaches.

Oh, you want links?  Why didn't you say so?

This story comes from a web site called Colombo Telegraph, and the story is entitled, "Full Text Of The Banned Time Story – “The Face Of Buddhist Terror” ".  The story is in part about this man:

His name is simply Wirathu, and he is an influential Buddhist monk in Mandalay, the second largest city in Burma.  Apparently, the government of Burma has banned the printing of this story in Time magazine, probably to avoid the bad press.

(I guess they've never heard of the Streisand Affect.  But, I digress.)

Anyway, this guy, in spite of being a Buddhist monk, is responsible for inciting the local Buddhist population into a frenzy of violence against Muslims.

“Now is not the time for calm,” the monk intones, as he spends 90 minutes describing the many ways in which he detests the minority Muslims in this Buddhist-majority land. “Now is the time to rise up, to make your blood boil.”

Ok, I do get it, that his sermons and incitements to violence are not exactly in sync with the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha, who supposedly lived and taught some 2500 years ago. For that matter, the actions of the Roman Catholic Church don't exactly mesh with the teachings of Jesus, either, but for well over 1600 years the RCC has justified torture, arrest, burnings and various other methods of death for a huge variety of offenses against their religion, based on what many Christians today would term twisted translations and interpretations of Old Testament verses.  There are even those who will claim that the violent verses of the Koran were superseded by more peaceful teachings later and thus should not be used to incite violence.

Which illustrates my points (made numerous times in this blog) that ANY religion can be subverted to the nefarious needs of intolerance, bigotry and sectarian chauvinism in the service of pure, unadulterated politics.  Of course, there is no doubt that virtually any ideology or creed can be so subverted for a time.  Mankind is particularly adept at twisting just about anything to serve in the name of its pet hatreds and it is not a surprise that religion can also be so twisted and melded to a cause too.

But, again, religion has a particularly nasty characteristic that simple political ideologies do not.  Religion, being the study and worship of the supernatural, has no reality check.  Since the rewards and punishments of either passing or failing a religious test are gained or suffered AFTER death, there is no way to tell if the claims it makes are true or false.

For political ideologies, there is a simple test - at some point, people will expect it to work.  Its claims of prosperity and well being must at some point be shown to actually come to pass as advertised.  If they do not, people will eventually turn to another ideology or method of governing.  If nothing else, they will compromise and add solutions seen to work elsewhere.

But for the religiously faithful how can one compromise with the devil?  If one's religious truth is revealed to you by a deity, to compromise those truths is to disobey your god.  Thus, political compromise is impossible.  Reality is ignored in favor of scripture, dogma and theology.  There is no test of whether the teachings and dogma of the religion  agree with reality.  Indeed, since the claims of most religions are about life AFTER death, a reality check is impossible.  The claims religions can make are limited solely by man's imagination.

Thus, we get, eventually, the kind of violence this story reports on.  Sectarian violence, killings and discrimination based solely on what supernatural myth you happen to think is true or on your rejection of someone else's superstition.

I guess my whole reason for tilting at this nefarious windmill is that the human race has so many different things we need to fix, and so many other ways to hate one another, why in hell do we need to make up more?

Aren't the ones we already have bad enough?

Hooray for Ireland!

There is a Constitutional Convention in Ireland this year, and they are considering the removal of a clause from the Irish Constitution allowing blasphemy laws.

Dated July 13, 2013, the advocacy group Atheist Ireland has submitted their reasons for removing Irish blasphemy laws from the Atheist constitution.

This is good news, for more reasons than just helping to make Ireland a more tolerant and friendly society.  You see, one of the things that make blasphemy laws in Western countries a bad thing isn't just the Bad Things that can happen because of those laws, it is also because Islamic countries are using the existence of such laws as political fodder to push for International laws against blasphemy.

Religion is always trying its best to use the power of government to protect itself.  This is an international extension of that effort, because it is obvious that even globally, Atheists are the fastest growing demographic in the world, even outstripping the growth of Islam.

Just as obviously, this worries the Imams who have the most to lose in that race.  This is why this news is the best news on the legal front I think we'll hear this year!  Certainly on the international scene.

I commend our Irish brothers and sisters for their wisdom in pushing this agenda.  Our best wishes for a successful conclusion to the effort.

At First, It Looked Good. Now? Not So Much.

A while back, the word went out that the Pope had made some changes in Vatican law that criminalized child abuse.  Yay!!

In the Vatican.  Not everywhere, just the Vatican.  So, not so yay.

Now, the word is out (now that the verbiage of the new laws are now public) that it isn't such good news after all - it seems that simply reporting any sex crimes is now illegal!

According to the new laws, revealing or receiving confidential Vatican information is now punishable by up to two years in prison, while newly defined sex crimes against children carry a sentence of up to twelve years. Because all sex crimes are kept confidential, there is no longer a legal way for Vatican officials to report sex crimes.

Whoa!  All of a sudden, it isn't "yay" at all.  It is rather more in the character of "Boo"!

Of course, there is an explanation of sorts:

“We didn’t mean for this to happen, obviously,” lamented Vatican foreign minister Monsignor Dominique Mamberti. “It’s quite the papal pickle that His Holiness has placed upon our heads. Sex crimes are more illegal than ever, but technically it’s illegal to report them.” Mamberti said that the simultaneous passing of each law is merely a coincidence and insisted that the Church is not trying to protect itself against further embarrassment, but critics outside the Vatican are skeptical.

Skeptical?  Why would we be skeptical?  Could it have anything to do with the fact that almost every case of child abuse we know about was reported OUTSIDE of the Vatican, and thus the new laws won't have any more affect than trying to use a popgun to sink a battleship?  Or that the Church has done everything but commit murder to prevent word of sex crimes of any kind to get out to the public - much less reported to authorities?

Nah.  Couldn't be.  Right?  Right?

As the Holy See moves to clarify the law, Mamberti has warned would-be offenders within Vatican walls that they “are still subject to the most watchful eye of all: the eye of God..."

 Ok, now I know we're in trouble.

Speaking of Racism, Its version will kill the Republican Party

Yesterday, I wrote about racism.  Much of it was pointing at the institutional racism that has resulted from the last forty years of efforts to stifle the most blatant expressions of it.

Today, I turn my attention to another aspect of it and a practical application of how that modern version of institutional racism will probably kill the Republican Party.

The article I will point you to tonight is from The Texas Monthly.  The article was written by Robert Draper, and is entitled, "The Life and Death (and Life?) of the Party".  It is an excellent examination of the prospects of the Democratic Party to change Texas from Red to Blue, or perhaps just Purple.  Personally, I see it as a bit pessimistic, but then, I am not a politician, I'm a blogger.  (sort of)

Dallas County, now mainly composed of minorities, went from red to blue in 2006 and has remained a Democratic stronghold ever since. Nearly 15 percent of the state’s general-election voters reside in Harris County, and a majority of them supported Obama in both 2008 and 2012. And the trend is spreading. 

Now, some stats to back it up.

Demography is the driver of this runaway freight train. The 2010 census found that the state’s population had increased by 4.3 million over the previous decade and that more than 3.3 million of the new inhabitants were minorities. Of these, an astounding 2.8 million were Hispanic, historically a reliable constituency for Democrats. These numbers conveyed a new reality: the Texas political landscape was getting friendlier for Democrats and tougher for Republicans.  

The mentioned demographics don't stop there, many projections show clearly that the US as a whole is set to go majority minority by 2050.  Already, nationwide, the birth numbers are higher in raw numbers for minorities than for whites.

Again and again, the Republican Party has managed to alienate every voting block except white Southern males.  Immigration, abortion rights, contraceptives, food stamps, taxes, the debt "crisis" they manufactured for their own political gain which has hurt almost every low to middle income American, efforts to stifle voting rights through their voter ID laws, elimination of early voting laws creating Election Day lines of up to 8 hours in some States, batshit crazy statements about rape, pregnancy, science, education and religion have created a hostile atmosphere for just about anybody who isn't white, male and living in the old Confederacy.

Or rich, let's not forget the rich.  They're laughing all the way to the bank.  The ones they own, of course.

I've written before about how I see the modern Republican Party as headed towards the brink of destruction.  This article, no matter how pessimistic about the prospects of the Democrats, is just further proof that their train is still headed for the chasm without a bridge.  Geez, just two years ago, not a reporter in the country would have touched that story.  Now it's published by the Texas Monthly.

Let's get behind that train and help push it over the cliff!

Let's Talk Racism.

First, a caveat:  I am a white, Anglo-Saxon male, although I am not religious, so I guess the WASP thing is out.  But I say this to state unequivocally that I am well aware that I am not experienced in being on the receiving end of racial bigotry.  So, I am not trying to tell anyone that I know the true state of racism from the standpoint or perspective of a minority who does.

Ok?  Good.

I do think that I've got a pretty fair idea of how racism works, though, because I grew up in Texas in the 1950s and 60s, and am VERY familiar with how whites in the South view blacks and hispanics.  So, while I can't exactly talk about the receiving end, I CAN talk about the folks that dish it out.  Been there, actually did that at one time.

And am very ashamed of myself for it.

After having lived in Maryland for the last 26 years, my experience has been enough to turn my views on people of ethnic backgrounds other than whites completely around.  I have worked alongside them, lived next door to them, shopped among them, stood in line at the bank behind and in front of them, sat at the DMV next to them while we all waited the same exorbitantly long periods of time for our driver's licenses and paid the same high fees for the same pieces of plastic.  Long enough to be uncomfortable using the word "them" in the last sentence, wishing there was a better way to express it without using a word that sets us apart.

I've witnessed young people grow up alongside each other from a very young age who were surprised and shocked to learn that their friends were somehow different - in a way they'd never even imagined.  So I know that racism is taught, and somehow, growing up as human beings without the divisions of skin color is natural and can be perfectly normal.

So, what is all this about?

How I view modern racism as having changed, morphing into something that is very different - but no less nasty, perverted and bigoted, while being totally ignored.  In spite of being so in your face, you have to be blind not to see it.

You see, whites eventually noted that the blatant, ugly racism of the 50s was pretty bad.  Stressful, if you will.  It gave us a bad name, and for many, made us feel a bit dirty.  So, we went along with the program and did away with the personal racism, at least in person and face to face.  We passed laws that made the blatant personal racism much harder to pursue and in many cases, illegal.  In short, we made "some" progress.  Federal programs of one kind or another made things seem to be just humming along, equalizing the numbers a bit.

At least, that's what the media would have you believe.

But, if I am to believe the minorities I've known, under the surface, it is still there.  A thousand little ways, it is still there.

But, the really BIG ways are even worse.  I am talking about the institutional racism, the built-in racism that pervades the justice system even worse than it used to.  The institutional racism that pervades the media, the Corporate world and even worse, the voting system.

A very interesting article the other day noted that in the District of Columbia, they graduate over 2800 high school students a year.

They also arrest twice that number for minor drug possession!  Over 80% of that number are black.  It is well documented that drug use across racial lines is about equal, so there are a lot of whites not being arrested.  The incarceration levels between the races are equally (!!!) bad.

Note too, the efforts in State after State to limit the ability of minorities to vote.  While in the Corporate world, hiring practices have made the raw numbers of minorities look better, as one get higher in the pay grades, the numbers of minorities (including women) get lower and lower.

In education, schools in minority black areas still don't get the public funding that those in white areas do, although in some States, there have been efforts to level the playing field.

Look at the Trayvon Martin case.  A teenager gets killed, walking unarmed, by a man who is carrying a gun (against the rules of the Watch group he is "working for") and who gets blamed for his death?   He does, not the adult who pulled the trigger after ignoring the directions of 911 authorities to stay in his car.  In case after case, blacks get the shaft, in State after State, the percentages of blacks is higher in raw numbers of those incarcerated, of those serving longer sentences and of those on death row.

In at least one State, the Governor did recognize this as an issue and used it as an excuse to suspend the death penalty pending corrective measures.  We'll see how long it takes for those "corrective measures" to be made!  I suspect that the reasons for the suspension are less over racial disparity in sentencing than on simple opposition to the death penalty.  In the meantime, a higher number of blacks in that State now are in prison for life, lengthening the average length of sentences for blacks in that State.

My point is that in spite of our efforts to reduce racism and the apparent successes we have made in many areas, much of those efforts have done little but direct the expression of that bigotry into other areas, many of which are difficult to legislate away.

Take the justice system, for instance.  All along the chain of officials from the cop on the beat to the supervising officers and the Public Prosecutor's Office, we have people fulfilling functions that to most of us are esoteric, enforcing laws according to rules that have become so complicated that it is impossible to legislate any kind of equality between races.  Each position is responsible for making decisions about cases where they must take into account individual situations, circumstances and differing laws where they can, even must, use their individual discretion and experience in making those decisions.  Discretion which allows them to express their individual racism without blame, without oversight, allowing them to blame it on "the system".

This attitude is pervasive throughout American life, and all public institutions, whether private or governmental.

Unless you are white, you are behind the eight ball from the git-go, as we say down South.

Well, I've got news for all you folks out there who are instrumental in supporting these racist attitudes and institutions:

By the 2050's, you won't be part of the majority any longer.  Whites will be just one of many minority groups, and there just won't be a "majority" race.  Are you willing to bet on how long it will take a coalition of other ethnic groups to end your segregationist ways?  Or whether they will decide to treat you better or worse than you have treated them?

This country has a long way to go before we meet the Supreme Court's rather cavalier proclamation that racism is over.