it's a savage, cruel world

there's a large daddy long legs spider residing in my cooking range hood. has a web, a piss poor one, covering a relatively large area, but very poor, seemingly haphazard construction. no discernable pattern to it, and not enough, not by a long shot, silk lines. i was just watching a couple of flies, one a common modestly sized housefly, the other tiny in comparison, has the size and look of a mosquito, but not the distinctive whine/buzz of it's wings (btw, mosquito means small fly in espanol/spanish. check it out on wikipedia. according to their article, by transmitting disease, mosquitos could have effectively killed 1/2 of the people who have ever lived!)

i digress. back to my spider pal. as i was saying before getting sidetracked, i just watched a fly and something that looked but didn't sound like a biting mosquito fly about it's raggedy and quite useless web. the fly flew in and out with impunity, sometimes flying right smack into a strand of web, appearing to burst threw it or slide easily by it, i'm not sure which, as i noticed no broken strands when i looked closely. the strands are just too far apart to snare prey. the poor spider (which appears healthy with a large abdomen, alert and vigorous and purposeful in movement) obviously perceived the fly as it sometimes buzzed about just above the spider, which agitatedly moved as if to perhaps shake and push it's sad little web toward the fly in an attempt to ensnare it. it didn't work. but it was very evident that the fly's close proximity had alerted the spider and brought out it's predator. it wanted to catch that fly! kill it, and eat it, eventually if not immediately.

i removed some cobwebs from it's/my home range a couple/few weeks ago, but i didn't remove all, or nearly all of it. it had become so spread out i was sometimes brushing against it. i removed the offending parts and a bit more, but mindful of my roommate, i hoped to leave enough web for it not to go hungry. the stuff i removed appeared much like i left alone. no pattern, and not dense enough to be very effective.

i guess that's how that species of spider does webs. i think i have several, if not many, residing with me. their webs have no obvious pattern. perhaps i disturb them too often, but i doubt it, as i tend to be tolerant of these harmless (to me!) arachnids, more tolerant than most. as long as their silk is spun in out of the way corners and ceilings, i tend to leave them alone.

i even feel a little bad for that spider now. i don't see how it can catch anything in that sorry excuse of a web, but i guess they do, or they wouldn't survive.

anyway, my point is we live in a world of predation. i watched some of a nature tv program the other day. it was about a wildlife reserve in africa, replete with lions, gazelles, elephants, the whole 9 yards, or what remains of such rare bits and pieces of remaining habitat. much of it was swamp land, mostly inundated during the wet season, which no doubt explains the relative absence of humans, allowing these increasingly rare and threatened with extinction species to cling to wild living in today's human dominated world. civilization/agriculture has spread to virtually every inhabitable (by humans) part of earth. with modern technology and infrastructure, we've even taken over large swaths of desert.

back to the point. the narrator of this show described this natural environment of large prey and predatory animals as one of tension or stress or something similar. many scenes were shown of predators stalking, chasing, attacking, and killing prey, making the point.

i think relatively large complex animals are a lot more like us than most of us imagine them to be. they're generally more intelligent and sentient than we give them credit for. like us, they have emotions and vulnerability to pain and suffering. they want to live. they want freedom, need habitat.

it seems civilized humans, or sheeple as i like to refer to my kind, have culturally evolved to have little if any regard for nonhuman life. we've lost touch with the natural world. it has traditionally been something to 'conquer'. In order to turn wild land into economically productive real estate, a whole lot of ecological destruction must occur. forests cut down or burned. prairies put under the plow. swamps drained, deserts made to artificially bloom, all at the cost of millions of wild species.

i saw a news report of baby wild elephants being kidnapped, taken from their mothers to be sold. it showed footage of one such incident, with much apparent cruelty on the part of the humans to the elephant, i guess to subdue and control it. i find such footage sickening, makes me hate my own kind, but then i think of what a privileged life i have. i live off the fat of industrial civilization, and although i generally conscientiously try to live very frugally by my society/culture's standards, i know i'm still a consumer, still part of the problem. perhaps if i'd been raised in extreme poverty and/or deprivation in a place like africa, and i was ambitious, i too could be involved in such activity. as it is, i'm still a very small part of a much more cruel and destructive thing: modern industrial civilization.

i've referred before to civilization, likened it to ecological cancer. humanity progressively appropriating earth, destroying wilderness and wildlife without compunction. we've come to view ourselves as special, unique, precious, sacred, and other  beings, other species as not any of those things. we've even created creation myths and gods who have anointed us with this exalted status. we have 'souls', they don't! we're intelligent, sentient beings, they're dumb, instinctive beasts.

but surreally, we're not that different, just another branch on the biological tree of life, related to all the rest, if my understanding is correct. all come from a common ancestor, a simple single cell. whatever mysterious miracles were contained in that humble beginning have been manifested in the amazing and surreal variety of species that have evolved over eons of time. we're not the only species with impressive abilities and characteristics. we're not the only species whose lives matter or have value. we seem to have forgotten this.

i think our primitive 'savage' ancestors hadn't forgotten it. but they hadn't yet adopted a way of life that requires such a worldview. they were foragers, not farmers. they belonged to the land, not vice versa.

i digress further. back on point: civilization is the greatest and by far the most deadly and destructive predator earth has ever known. it's brought about the deaths of more beings, the extinction of more species. sheeple generally don't kill their prey, they pay somebody else to do it, and then to process it into tidy clean little packages for our purchase and consumption. removed from the killing, the suffering of factory farmed animals, the suffering of fellow humans, impoverished and exploited, who fill jobs in the industry, for privileged sheeple like me and perhaps u, dear reader.

even if u're vegan, unless u're living primitively, unlike a vast majority of sheeple, u're part of the cancer that is civilization, as am i. sheeple are responsible for the recently recognized and currently ongoing 6th great mass extinction in earth's history. responsible for disappearing forests, vanishing wilderness, desecrating and trashing the planet, and now initiating a climate disruption which might easily bring about our own near term extinction.

what kind of compassionate loving god would create life that feeds off itself? a world of eat or be eaten. a world of suffering and pain, horror and ugliness, as well as pleasure, beauty, and awe? an awesome awful world. what kind of god???!!!

if there is no god, if this is all a bizarre cosmic accident, how can life have ultimate meaning or value? if there is no god, how is that better than having a weird inscrutable god who doesn't love us, that has no problem with pain, suffering, horror? either way, we're screwed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosquito

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pholcidae

bullshit and 'russian propaganda'

lee camp is an american dissident comic who does a show on the russian financed RT. in the clip below, he explains why. in america, if one wishes to try to divulge news stories, events, facts, or opinions that are openly opposed to oligarchical rule, the military industrial complex, foreign wars and sanctions based on lies, the utterly corrupt and rotten 'war on drugs', cia involvement in drug trafficking, police brutality, prosecutorial misconduct, mass incarceration, how both big corporate financed and friendly american political parties are full of shit, and so on... this can't be done on corporate mass media. it's not allowed. the only platforms are alternative ones, with alternative funding, including sometimes from foreign governments. establishment sources do their best to discredit such reporting with smears such as it's 'russian propaganda', but bullshit is bullshit, and truth is truth, regardless of who's paying the bills. for all i know, russian citizens also have to rely on news funded and brought to them from outside the russian establishment for their truth. perhaps it's the same, more or less, everywhere. anyway, listen to mr. camp, and judge for yourself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IG3mTTI_RY

debussy and de pianist

when jim valvano was dying of cancer he famously said there's 3 things one should do every day: laugh, cry, and think. an episode of FAMILY GUY a day will certainly take care of that first requirement. in this little clip they manage to pack more double entendres in 30 seconds than one would think possible:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y906Bfl1Kk4

handing horrible hillary her head

much as i hate 'conservatives', 'centrist' democrats are a very deplorable alternative. in this clip, comic political pundit jimmy dore and a few friends share a few choice words re. hillary clinton and the 'fake news' corporate media. (i know, this almost makes me sound like a trump supporter, or a 'russian asset', which i'm definitely NOT. the truth is american corporate news is full of shit propaganda, regardless of whether it's liberal like cnn or conservative like fox ['faux'] news. it's all agenda driven, promoting status quo oligarchic capitalism, ceaseless wars and war and fear mongering in the name of 'democracy', 'freedom', 'human rights', and 'national security'. the deceit and hypocrisy is thicker than january molasses. it's sickening!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6juT2B5xtc

https://wikispooks.com/wiki/Corporate_media

the authoritarians

bob altemayer wrote a great book summarizing his work as an academic researcher studying authoritarianism, specifically the personality of authoritarian followers, those who are most happy to fall in line behind a 'strong' leader who will tell them what to believe and how to act, and persecute dissidents. if one wishes to understand our modern world, this subject is of primary importance. the writing is informal, engaging, and charming. the introduction and closing chapters are particularly strong.

https://theauthoritarians.org/Downloads/TheAuthoritarians.pdf

youth indoctrination centers

i love to learn, and after only a few years of it i learned to hate having to go to school!

granted, early on they do a good job of teaching kids to learn to read and write, along with basic math skills. but after that, forget about it!

'public schools' are elitist controlled institutions. the curriculum taught is determined by deep state controlled institutions and sheeple. 'teachers' have little to no say in the matter. venture too far afield from what the curriculum says, and they can be disciplined or lose their jobs. they don't get to teach what they consider to be most important, if it clashes with the hidden agenda or purpose of schooling, which will be discussed much further in links provided below.

unless one is home schooled, an option few parents choose, from 5 years old until at least the age of 16, youth are required to get up far too early in many cases in order to attend mind numbing classes for about 1/2 of their waking hours, then saddled with further mind numbing homework later. like their teachers, they have little to no choice regarding what they get to learn about. this effectively discourages and prevents independent inquiry and learning, which is a big part of that hidden agenda.

i read part of a biography of albert einstein some years ago. couldn't finish it, as it was too dry and boring to me (like the vast majority of what i 'learned' in school!). but a book by another great scientist, carl sagan, BROCA'S BRAIN, contains a chapter that's a very concise and engaging mini bio of einstein that i think captured the essence of his mind and worldview, which captured my rapt attention.

perhaps u recall as i do being taught in school that einstein was a poor student who dropped out of school. of course what they didn't teach was why. they didn't teach that einstein hated schooling for the same reason so many do: because of it's authoritarian nature, designed to fit the needs of the state, not the student. in sagan's book, this is spelled out in exquisite detail. below are a few quotes attributed to einstein taken from it:


it is little short of a miracle that modern schooling hasn't already completely strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry -from page 25

through the reading of popular science books i soon reached the conviction that much of the bible was false. the consequence was a positively fanatical free thinking coupled with the impression that youth is intentionally being deceived by the state: it was a crushing impression. suspicion of every kind of authority grew out of this experience. -p.29

my passionate interest in social justice and responsibility has always been in curious contrast to a marked lack of desire for direct association with men and women... i have never belonged wholeheartedly to a nation or state or to my circle of friends or family. these ties have always been accompanied by a vague aloofness, and the wish to withdraw into myself increases with age. such isolation is sometimes bitter, but i do not regret being cut off from the understanding and sympathy of others. i lose something by it, to be sure, but i am compensated by being rendered independent of their customs, opinions, and prejudices. i am not tempted to rest my peace of mind on such shifting foundations. -p.34

nationalism is an infantile disease. it is the measles of mankind... our schoolbooks glorify war and hide it's horrors. they inculcate hatred in the veins of children. i would teach peace rather than war. i would inculcate love rather than hate. -p.37


i feel in great company knowing einstein felt the same way about school and 'authority' in general.

another brilliant thinker, george carlin, who chose an entirely different field of occupation, comedy, also had some biting things to say about schooling, in a couple of links below.

finally, perhaps the best concise source on this topic comes from wikispooks. i highly recommend u check it out, especially the video link contained towards the end of it under the heading 'alternatives', which is a great discussion featuring a woman who has chosen to home school her children named laurette lynn. the work of john taylor gatto also is mentioned in this article. he's a former ny state teacher of the year who quit his job in disgust and proceeded to write a couple of books explaining why he did so, one of which is mentioned in this article. the one not mentioned is shorter and i actually liked it better. it's titled DUMBING US DOWN.

https://wikispooks.com/wiki/School

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rsL6mKxtOlQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uo-QIY7ys-k

imagine

yesterday (beatles song) would have been john lennon's 79th birthday. imagine if he was still alive, all the great music he could have made since his assassination 39 years ago. for all u 'crazy conspiracy theorists', check out the wikispooks article on that. spooky, indeed. happy birthday, john. i miss u!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkgkThdzX-8

https://wikispooks.com/wiki/John_Lennon

the jimmy dore show

jimmy dore's an american comic who does a show with great alternative political analysis and discussion, with an occasional joke thrown in, mainly pointing out the corruption of both corporate political partys and the deep state controlled corporate mass media. the link below is of one of his lengthier recent clips, dealing with the current impeachment proceedings.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1BsWtp1d6w

civilization isn't all that it's cracked up to be

truth can be a very unwieldy, complex, multi faceted thing, not easily or quickly articulated or understood. yet it's what i hope to help my readers discover here with this blog. call it a lazy human's guide to enlightenment. well, lazy in the sense of how much time and effort i'm putting into it. the surreal time and effort involved is in the in depth independent reading and research behind it, that i ask my readers to partake for themselves.

regarding civilization, i'm going to try to make the case, backed only by a few excellent references, that it is in fact a very bad thing. bad for humanity. bad for life in general. civilization is ecological cancer. it keeps growing and growing, destroying ecosystems in the process. civilized sheeple are for the most part out of touch with nature, including our own human nature. civilized social structures, based on the imposition of hierarchical patriarchal repression, private property, and nuclear families, goes against the grain of human evolution. it's artificial, not natural, and not conducive to achieving contentment or fulfillment.

i may return to and expand upon these bare boned ideas and assertions in many later posts. for now i'll just mention a couple of books which will get u started down the path to this worldview.

first there's AGAINST THE GRAIN by richard manning. subtitled: HOW AGRICULTURE HAS HIJACKED CIVILIZATION (which is stupid considering agriculture forms the very basis of civilization, but let's not get hung up on that). this book's not very long, and except for one chapter, i think the 2nd one, not particularly noteworthy. don't get me wrong, the whole book is very well conceived and written, and worth reading imo, but it is that one chapter in particular that paints a very revelatory picture of civilization's ecocidal roots that makes me highly recommend it.

the 2nd book is SEX AT DAWN by christopher ryan and cacilda jetha. it is a somewhat lengthy scientific exploration of the evolution of human sexuality and family structures, making a strong case in favor of the idea that we are by nature non monagamous free lovers evolved to be egalitarian communitarians, with families that extend far beyond the suffocating limitations of the exclusive, isolated, 2 parent nuclear families we're all familiar with and raised to think of as not only 'normal', but morally superior to any other way of being. that in fact children are much better off being raised in communities in which parenting is a communal responsibility. this should be obvious to anyone who ponders it with an open mind. unfortunately, pondering (thinking) and being open minded in a rational way, isn't very common among sheeple raised to be dogmatic.

https://www.amazon.com/Against-Grain-Agriculture-Hijacked-Civilization/dp/0865477132/ref=sr_1_10?crid=2F9IJBX7WFR1W&keywords=against+the+grain&qid=1570170885&s=books&sprefix=against%2Cstripbooks%2C174&sr=1-10

https://www.amazon.com/Sex-Dawn-Stray-Modern-Relationships/dp/0061707813/ref=pd_sbs_14_1/147-0608104-9491051?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0061707813&pd_rd_r=92e47a59-1fee-43fb-8955-1f867a72b29b&pd_rd_w=FLP6z&pd_rd_wg=IJh0H&pf_rd_p=d66372fe-68a6-48a3-90ec-41d7f64212be&pf_rd_r=H1XTFFFA36E7EZHQMB4H&psc=1&refRID=H1XTFFFA36E7EZHQMB4H