BS: maybe I expect too much

Subject: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: Donuel
Date: 17 May 07 - 01:10 PM

Maybe I expect too much.
Maybe you do too.
I think expecting too much
may just be a crutch,
But still its a good thing to do.

DH 2007

My mother's life span began with the Scopes trial and a time when aircraft was becoming commericial. Several decades later we were on the moon. DNA was discovered and the hunt for the human genome began. She lived in the time of the newly invented telephone all the way to the internet. With blitzkrieg speed the worst war and holocaust was followed by exploding over 200 immensely powerful nuclear weapons from the watery deep to the fringes of space. She lived in interesting times.

In my life since we went to the moon we seem to have retreated in light of a religious resurgence. I asked myself why and realized that today we are only: 137 years removed from the Catholic Inquisition, 142 years removed from the American Civil War (I was a kid when the last civil war veteran died) and only 60 years away from WWII.
While I see we are now on the cusp of holding our destiny of good health and longevity in our hands with the aid of stem cell breakthroughs and understanding the universe at large with the promise of super stings, I also see a pull back from the science that once earned America prestige.

I expected by now that evolution would be a non issue. I expected that the Inquisition against Jews would have ended. I expected that "fitting in" would no longer be measured by religion and race but rather by the reach of compassion and knowledge.

Maybe I expect too much.
Maybe you do too.
I think expecting too much
may just be a crutch,
But still its a good thing to do.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 17 May 07 - 01:46 PM

Progress finds its own pace....guess we just have to go along with it.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: Amos
Date: 17 May 07 - 01:50 PM

A common vision would help -- the notion that mankind
Is here to work out its own destiny
As a brotherhood forging a better future for all things,
All forms of life, all worlds,
All children, and all dreams.


A

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: gnu
Date: 17 May 07 - 01:53 PM

Common vision... yes, something different than looking through rifle sights might be a start.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: Bill D
Date: 17 May 07 - 02:40 PM

There should be a required class in school from about the 4th grade on thru high school...called 'Perspective & Critical Thinking'...and then in college, prospective teachers should be taught HOW to teach Perspective to younger kids.
   Maybe someday enough people would understand history, progress, relationships, and how to look at them in order to evalute what is happening today. 'Today' meaning ALL todays.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: katlaughing
Date: 17 May 07 - 02:42 PM

That's one of the best pieces you have ever written and shared here, Donuel.

It gives pause for thought,
A "common vision," he says.
Yes, and then some
As differences colour the glass.
May all look within their hearts
And find the UNcommon vision of Unity.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: gnu
Date: 17 May 07 - 02:43 PM

History is bound to repeat itself, if not taught properly.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: Bert
Date: 17 May 07 - 06:38 PM

We have progressed technologically, but as people, we have not changed much for over two thousand years.

If you read the histories of Herodotus ,you will read about the same people who are around today. Many of the characters you will instantly recognise. "Oh yes! that guy is just like old Joe at work"

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: Amos
Date: 17 May 07 - 08:58 PM

I think I wrote in haste. I do not want the whole species to have one vision -- just a common bond of goodwill, with an eye toward making a better future come about. That is a sort of premise for a wide variety of possible visions.


A

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: mack/misophist
Date: 18 May 07 - 07:10 AM

Scale is part of the problem. I was 30 before I began to understand just how short a century really is.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: kendall
Date: 18 May 07 - 07:21 AM

Perspective is always with us. One example; "Everything is relative; to a germ, good health is a type of disease."

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: skipy
Date: 18 May 07 - 07:33 AM

AS long as there is religion there will be war!
Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: kendall
Date: 18 May 07 - 09:02 AM

The most troublsome word in our language is "Expectations"

When you ecpect someone to do or not do something, you set yourself up for disappointment.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: 3refs
Date: 18 May 07 - 09:51 AM

"AS long as there is religion there will be war!
Skipy"
Although there are countless religions, each different from the other, they all serve the same purpose. Each tries to answer questions which all humans seem to be programmed to ask: Why are we here? What happens when I die? How shall I live my life? Now that, at a glance, seems like a good idea to me!
With the click of a button, we have the ability to travel the globe. We can see how other people answer the Why's, What's and How's. The problem is if the answers don't coincide with each other, and I believe that mine are right, then your's must be wrong!

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: Donuel
Date: 18 May 07 - 10:46 AM

Billy d

Teaching history as a perspective on how it is shaping behavior right up to this minute, is a valuable idea.

The usual way it is taught is a highly politicized (propoganda) for the current regieme or ideology. In school we did not have a chapter on the Civil War, we had the war between the states. Frewsweixk Douglas was not mentioned nor was the ramifications on civil rights today.

Perspective is not the best word to describe the echo of the past that reverberates in our lives but it will do until we thingk of a better word.

Sometimes I muse that Islam is undergoing their version of the Catholic Inqusition. It is horrid to remember that the Christian Inquisition lasted about 400 years. It is even more revolting to realize that an Islamic Inquisition now includes nuclear weapons.


I do not intend that the Catholic Inquistiion tortured and killed only Jews. The Inquisition morphed to include the murder of Lutherans and the growing protestants that railed against the Holy Roman Christian Church. The Holy Inquision did their wrok hand in hand with the authoirty of the State. It was a religious state with royal kings and queens who did whatever evil the church decreed but on paper the ruling family was a secular power.

Every religion creates an offshoot with a new twist that grows out of an existing religion. Usually the mother religion is villified by the new offshoot. Today the Protestants are beng absorbed by the evangelicals...just as christians grew out of Judaism.

The media and politicaly driven evangelicals as created by Jerry Falwell, and even earlier Billy Graham, differ with fundamentalists who want to recede from the corrupt media worldliness.

I am seeing how certain evangelicals are just a cunt hair away from becoming an organized violent army ready to kill for their gospel of hate. Instead of Jews it will be homosexuals, but when Jews object they too will become evangelical targets. They will not call their acts terrorism a holy war like Muslims use the word jihad, but rather a new rightiously clean term will be invented. Right now they are using "God's Soldiers" for the kids who go to Jesus Camp.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: Donuel
Date: 18 May 07 - 11:06 AM

typos...

the dog bumped my arm

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: Ebbie
Date: 18 May 07 - 03:10 PM

"I am seeing how certain evangelicals are just a cunt hair away from becoming an organized violent army ready to kill for their gospel of hate."

Was this too a typo? To me, it is misogynist and nastily offensive.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: M.Ted
Date: 18 May 07 - 04:42 PM

I'm with you, Ebbie--and misogyny is on the list with homophobia, Anti-Semitism, racism, all the flavors of religious and anti-religious bigotry, and all that other crap.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: katlaughing
Date: 18 May 07 - 04:51 PM

Amos, I didn't mean it personally, it just was convenient to use that reference in what came from the *muse*.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: Donuel
Date: 18 May 07 - 11:44 PM

Ebbie
you owe me an apology.

You may be on auto pilot outrage or pride yourself as a militant feminist but calling me a mysoginist now for a second time is both undeserved and slanderous.

There are many machinists who use a lathe to a tolerence of not merely one thousandsth of an inch but 1/10,000, and they will know the term cunt hair. It is not a condemnation of women, their intellect or their hair.

"For me there are no bad words but only bad people who use words for bad things." George Carlin


There was a man in my town who lost his job for using the word niggardly. They said he should have known that people don't know the word's actual meaning.


Maybe I expect too much but I deserve an apology, and I am cock sure of that.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: Donuel
Date: 19 May 07 - 12:09 AM

As for Mr. Ted, you are most slanderous of all to call me (by attribution) homophobic, anti-Semetic, racist and an anti-religious bigot.

I think of all those people who no longer even lurk here because of such loose ad homonim attacks and I realize it is due to people like you.

To denigrate everything I stand for by claiming the reverse of everything I stand for is not just missing the big picture, not just missing the forest for the trees but was meant to cause intentional personal harm.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: katlaughing
Date: 19 May 07 - 12:23 AM

There are some very interesting things in this "Answers.com" entry for cunt. Not that inflammatory of a word in other parts of the world, it seems. Still, if it offends, the polite thing to do would be to not use it.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: Ebbie
Date: 19 May 07 - 03:37 AM

"To me, it is misogynist and nastily offensive."

Methinks thou dost protest too much. I did NOT say that YOU are mysogynist; I said that statement is misogynist and nastily offensive. And to me, it was, it is.

It makes no sense, in my opinion, to use that term to denote ultra fineness. Cunt hair, as you so endearingly put it, is coarser than head hair. Therefore, although I have never heard the term before, I assert that I doubt its validity.

But far be it from me to insult or denigrate you. Even though you yourself have precious few qualms about slandering many, many people.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 19 May 07 - 04:00 AM

Here we go again...

I bought the wrong bananas when I went down to the shop
I bought the wrong bananas but the man told me they're not...

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: kendall
Date: 19 May 07 - 07:20 AM

That word in any context is offensive to me.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: M.Ted
Date: 19 May 07 - 01:25 PM

Donuel,

I never accused you of any of those things-- I agreed, and agree with Ebbie--you used a phrase that was inappropriate in the extreme--and its use is misogynistic.

Do you want me to take back what I said and say that misogyny isn't a hateful prejudice? That's not going to happen. When you use the language of hate, you stand with the hateful.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: Becca72
Date: 19 May 07 - 01:32 PM

I'll bet you that there are many machinists who wouldn't dare use that phrase at home, pal.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 19 May 07 - 04:06 PM

Do Muslim mechanics call those springy little fasteners "Jesus Clips"? I know that many Jewish mechanics do. The phrase in question above isn't on that I use myself, but I fail to see why it's misogynistic. Vulgar, sure.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: katlaughing
Date: 19 May 07 - 04:12 PM

I kind of agree, Dick. I don't like the word, but how is it worse than prick, cock, etc.?

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: Bill D
Date: 19 May 07 - 04:25 PM

35 years ago, I heard a guy who was adjusting a machine mumble that it was "...just off an 'RCH'.." ...the R stood for Red, and was just his censored vulgar way of saying 'a teeny little bit', as 'Red' was supposed to be finer than 'black'. (I guess blond is finer yet)
   I suppose he thought it was cuter to say RCH than 'teeny bit'...*shrug*

In here, Don, you are saying it to the world, not another guy at work. You gotta expect reactions, no matter how you meant it....and you see it DID distract from your message.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 19 May 07 - 09:02 PM

I'm with you Bill...

... bought the wrong bananas...

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: Donuel
Date: 19 May 07 - 11:31 PM

Thats the way I heard it too
Actually some blonde hair is finest of all. Nature makes more blonde hairs per sq. inch while the thickest hairs are mauch fewer per sq in.

Maybe I expect too much.
Maybe you do too.
I think expecting too much
may just be a crutch,
But still its a good thing to do.

Subject: RE: BS: maybe I expect too much
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 20 May 07 - 01:57 AM

You just can't stay away from the crutch, can you?