Fuelling the Clash of the Civilizations Meme!

Despite the fact that few persons on either side of the so-called Clash of the Civilizations divide actually want a "clash", there are those zealots who feel that wholesale planetary warfare is a positive course of action for the species. 

I've already discussed the rationals, why Bin Laden and his Islamist cohorts felt compelled to engage in their terrorist actions in previous posts (here and here).  The nature of the Islamist mind frame, generally speaking, is that of a victim seeking vengeance to mollify either actual or perceived attacks upon him and his metaphysical being.  To further the socio-political aims of its leaders, it requires a population, or at least a subset, to use the process of psychological transference, where their existing angst, anger, and inadequacies can be directly attributed to an externality that can be understood as the "other." In this case, the other is America or more generally Western civilization. For example, in an attempt to create a focus point in which they can blame the nation's inherent failings upon, the Mullahs inveigh against the "Great Satan". By transferring their own failures to America, they draw distinctions for their loyal followers of the high mindedness and virtue of their cause.  As the Green Revolution of 2009 has shown however, the majority of educated Iranians and youth, which form the majority of the population, find this decades old form of propaganda tiresome and repressive.

One has to remember, that across most of the Islamic world, their rulers are little more than quisling satraps whose existence is dictated by their utility to American hegemony. With the end of the cold war and advent of a more multipolar world, these nations offer America either oil reserves or strategic geopolitical use.  Equally, the governments of these nations are intimately aware of their own dependency on America's military, financial, and technical resources to exist. Weak failed states like Iraq -which has now been occupied by American forces for 19-years- and Afghanistan -occupied by NATO and Western forces for nine years- would most certainly degenerate into further civil war or complete disintegration without a firm military presence in the region; American or otherwise. Thus, while the specter of American hegemony may rankle the masses in many Islamic countries, those in control understand that if left to the demented illogic of absolute religious divinity over regional politics as espoused by factional leaders, these nations would combust into fratricidal violence and destabilize whole swaths of world.  For a thousand years, these people have been ruled and governed by others, and for good reason.

On the other hand, America's religious buffoons are hopped up on pushing humanity towards Armageddon and driving a war with the Kings of the East to validate Biblical prophecies.  For example, Pastor Terry Jones of Gainesville, Florida has proposed that on the 9th anniversary of the 9-11 terrorist assault on America, that his flock will burn Qu'rans (aka. the Koran).  The moral equivalence argument has been made that Muslims are attacking American Christianity through the construction of the Cordoba Cultural Center in New York.  The response by this lot, to this perceived slight, is to engage in a classic book burning exercise.  America's Republican party through their coy electoral race-baiting strategies have unleashed the most bigoted and unstable element of its confederacy of dunces.  General Petraeus, the Pentagon, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, President Obama, and numerous religious and national leaders across the world, including even PM Stephen Harper of Canada, have denounced the racism and brutal stupidity of this action, which they insist will further marginalize those who support American objectives in the Middle East and across the world. 

While the military-industrial complex and the mandarins of war need and demand that this segment of idiots ferment a rational for the Pentagon's exorbitant budgets, the rest of the world needs to contain, quarantine, and sterilize these maladroits before we are further dragged into their dystopian and self-destructive fantasies.

German Evangelical Christians find Asylum in USA

American conservatism, as espoused by so-called "social-conservatives" has long been described as being ideologically affiliated with right-wing authoritarianism.  Modalities of thought include the following attitudinal and behavioral motifs:  a high degree of submissiveness to establishmentarian authorities; a hyper-aggressiveness "against deviants, outgroups, and other people that are perceived to be targets according to established authorities"; and a high-level of adherence to" traditions and social norms that are perceived to be endorsed by society and its established authorities."  Coupled with these authoritarian themes is a theological framework that claims that its adherents are oppressed and victimized by elite powers that emanate from Western secularism and liberalism.

In 2008, a German family with Evangelical Christian roots, abandoned the Fatherland to seek political asylum in America.  According to Der Spiegal online, the Romeikes sought refuge in the United States, because the German state prevented them from withdrawing their five elementary aged children from school altogether and "home-schooling" them.

The Romeikes also wanted to spare their children from the "un-Christian goings-on" at German schools. They said that their children were being "educated according to an anti-Christian worldview" in public schools, and that textbooks are filled with obscene language, swear words and blasphemy. "They're more about vampires and witches than about God," says Uwe Romeike.

Despite their desires, courts in Germany have confirmed that it is the "government's responsibility to provide education in a pluralistic society" and therefore the "public has a rightful interest in preventing the formation of  'parallel societies' based on religion or worldview" through home-schooling.  Furthermore, "the European Court of Human Rights ruled that Germany's mandatory school attendance policy, along with the corresponding ban on homeschooling, is compatible with both European law and the European Convention on Human Rights."

For the flat-earth believers and self-appointed moral-police of America, it wasn't enough to pollute America with indolent and regressive half-wits intent on converting all of America to their bigoted quackery.  The Romeike family was resettled in Tennessee with the assistance of an evangelical Christian lobbying group called the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA).  On the claim that they believed that there was "a well-founded fear of persecution" based on their religious convictions, they were awarded political asylum.

HSLDA attorney Mike Donnelly claimed, "This is simply about the German state trying to coerce ideological uniformity in a way that is frighteningly reminiscent of past history."  Judge Lawrence Burman, who adjudicated the case, stated that, "We can't expect every country to follow our constitution," and opined that it was his belief that the family's basic human rights were being violated.  

It is always nice to hear from conservatives, who claim to strongly believe in the rule of law and constitutional prerogatives, that the US constitution has applicability to non-citizens.  Oddly enough these laws don't apply to citizens of their own country who see their homes being searched by government officials, their phone calls llegally listened to, or holding them indefinitely without charge, when issues of the global war on terrorism arise.  Nor does it seem that the US constitution is applicable to non-citizens held in concentration camps where they are subject to torture.  The level of hypocrisy of America's social-conservatives is always admirable.

Save Me… from organized Charlatans!

This week’s examination of faith-based lunacy comes in a family-friendly ‘value’ package of three.

A) National Baptist Convention USA, the oldest and largest African American religious convention in America, with an estimated membership of 7.5 million, is holding its convention in Detroit this weekend. What is unique about this particular gathering is that the former leader of this group, Rev. Henry Lyons, who was convicted of, “Racketeering and grand theft and sentenced to prison for bilking nearly $4 million from corporations seeking business with the convention and stealing nearly $250,000 donated by the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith for burned Black churches in the South” has returned and is once again seeking the organization’s leadership.

Maybe its just Detroit, which persistently fields politicians like former Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, who was found guilty of obstruction of justice, or Councilwoman Monica Conyers, wife of Congressmen John Conyers Jr. (D-MI), who recently pled guilty to bribery and conspiracy charges. Regardless, what I find so luminating is how so many conservative black Americans are willing to endorse and accommodate the rise of these predators in both their spiritual and political lives. Apparently God does work in mysterious ways…

B) Turning from crooked black theologians to crazy-train riding black parishioners is the following case of a Gay-Exorcism in Connecticut. Having enjoyed the cinematic release of ”A Haunting in Connecticut” the locals went looking for and found some juicy gay-demon ass to kick (albeit in the form of a sixteen year old boy). The accompaning youtube video shows the child to be writhing in pain on the floor and vomiting. A church elder shouts, “Right now in the name of Jesus, I call the homosexuality, right now in the name of Jesus.”

C) The final story shows that religious quackery knows no racial barrier is of a Louisville, Kentucky pastor who is encouraging his flock to come lock n’ loaded to his holy house of worship. Obviously, he has been in touch with the folks in Connecticut, who know them Damn’ Gay Demons could be lurking everywhere, even under a church pew. Chris W. Cox, legislative director of the NRA proudly states, “We have right-to-carry laws in over 40 states; 20 years ago, it was in just six.”

These right-wing half-wits, have been responsible over the years for fire-bombing black attended churches, shooting “liberal” congregationists, and most recently murdering an abortion doctor, while he was in his own church. So it makes complete sense, why these people need guns at their churches. Obviously they have to defend themselves against the black-helicopter owning liberal swine that are relentlessly hunting them down to eliminate their cherished gun-totting liberties. What else could it be?

God bless America.