Photo by Barack Obama

We're just registering voters to benefit democracy--no bias whatsoever.

The front page of USA Today reported today on a record-breaking season for voter registration as we approach the 2008 Presidential Election. Democrats gained 800,000 voters, but the Republicans lost 300,000 voters. Some would call it a victory for Democracy.

The leagues of folks with their clipboards and their registration forms stand just outside the door to your favorite bakery. They stand proud and upright as if they are doing a service for Democracy. But this is no philanthropist’s mission. These people are strategically targeting you. They pose behind kindly smiles, but they aren’t just aiming to get you registered, they’re not pining for true democracy, they’re aiming to sell their party.

Why is it that USA Today chose not to report the number of independent voters registered? Who the bleep cares about the independents, that disloyal backstabbing bunch, right? The ones who actually think for themselves and don’t subscribe to any political dogma. The ones who would not sell their soul and would not sell their vote.

The racket of the two dominate political parties invaded the mainstream long ago. They’ve long succeeded in delegitimizing independent voices. Let’s be honest with ourselves and recognize that this isn’t a democracy, this is a mob war. Let’s not be foolish, these men and women with their clipboards want their candidate to win. They campaign in areas where they think they’ll find a few undecided souls to reap. They’re not interested in encouraging a more educated vote. A majority of them just want you to declare your party affiliation. The Democrats set up base camp on liberal college campuses, and the Republicans conduct voter registration in their church parking lots.

Here’s what I think: If a person doesn’t have the time or motivation to register to vote, they most definitely don’t have time to know what’s going on in politics. Isn’t that logical? God knows, some of us have wonderful lives outside of the political mob scene. Fortunately, there are folks out there who don’t feel the need to impose their reckless opinions upon others. This is truly noble.

So here’s to all of you unregistered folks out there. Thank You for standing strong. Stay true. There’s no shame in abstaining from business that you don’t have an interest in. It would certainly, be a shame if you were just filling in the ovals because someone told you to. Thank you for fending off the mob and their incessant racket. We’d have a far more democratic country if everyone else was like you.

What is truly shameful, is the man or woman who has never given careful thought to life or liberty and out of weakness has submitted his or her independent mind to the will of one mob or another. These people, in compromising themselves, have effectively disrespected and spit in the face of every individual: man, woman and child. What is more contemptible is the arrogant man or woman who wants to impose his or her superior opinion upon everyone else. This man is the enemy.

I snapped a photo of this sticker on the back of a pickup truck at a stop light. I often wonder if this sort of person realizes what this quaint little sticker really implies.

Regardless of the 26th annual United Nation’s International Peace Day, a suicide bomber detonated a truckload of explosives at the Kirkuk police academy this afternoon in Northern Iraq killing three recruits. You wonder if the bomber was pissed that the police recruits had disrespected Peace Day by not laying down their fire arms. I doubt the bomber had any such intentions, but what exactly is “peace” when police officers and military men must enforce it?

The word “peace” is so overused and abused it has become cliché. The word has lost all potency. We, the privileged of powerful nations, toss it around invoking warm tingly sensations justifying everything we do, as if we were its vanguard. The way we spout the word it seems it should be easy to accomplish if it just wasn’t for all those big bad people out in the world who screw it up, right? But what is peace? Or, at least, what meaning is really intended when we use the word?

Peace is a still pool of water. Peace is a wave at equilibrium. It is an element at rest. It is an element that has been left alone, seeing that when a stimulus is introduced unrest is created. It is therefore hypothesized that peace can also be made to exist by removing the stimuli which brings about unrest. If wind ripples the pool, remove the wind. But when the concept is abstracted to the social level, the meaning becomes difficult to ascertain.

Life itself is a rift in the peace of the universe. The human body is never literally at peace. We hunger and we thirst. We want and we need. Perhaps in death we are brought nearer peace, but our bodies do not rest in peace–they decompose. When the word peace is applied in social terms, it is obviously not to be interpreted literally. So, what is really meant?

In general, it is understood to mean social congruity, whereas social incongruity brings about conflict. But as life has proven to most of us, the desires of one person quite naturally conflict with the desires of others. And naturally, the desires of one nation will also conflict with the desires of another nation. This is inherent. How then is social congruity achieved?

There are two methods by which to attempt social congruity. The first can be achieved through social intimacy, where a tribe of humans are bound to each other emotionally because their fate is shared. This was the way of the Native Americans and primeval people. In this way natural social congruity is achieved. The second method is accomplished by means of power, where a ruling group first subverts the tribe and second imposes order upon the tribeless men. This is the method implemented by the organization we call the nation-state. This is imposed social congruity.

As Peace Day is an initiative of the United Nations, and the United Nations is an organization of nation-states, we can infer that Peace Day refers to the social congruity that is imposed and achieved through power. Despite best intentions, the U.N. is not concerning itself with peace among men. It concerns itself with peace between nations.

A nation itself, however, fails it’s purpose of social congruity outright. The people automotically react against the imposed order of a state. There is nothing that binds the people intimately to the state, therefore, the people do not serve willingly. Some people follow the imposed order only by fear of law and by the threat of law enforcement. Some people become cunning, and find ways to circumvent laws for their own benefit. Some develop a faith in the state and strive to change it though they disagree it. But in all cases the state is socially disintegrated. In all actuality, the state is just a precarious arrangement, that if not carefully put into order and maintained, tends to divide itself back into smaller intimate social units. But as long as the power’s that be exercise their power, the citizens of a state are obliged to act in accordance.

When you think about it, conflict of nations, be it a civil conflict within a nation or a conflict between borders, is likely one of the greatest causes of violence. Frankly, the world would be a lot more peaceful without them. Nonetheless, the U.N. hopes to bring peace by literally uniting nations under international law. And if you know anything about international law, you’re aware that there is really no effective way of enforcing it, unless a powerful nation decides to exercise influence and take measures to see it enforced.

While the U.N. aims at facilitating international cooperation, it still falls prey to inherent problems that arise from a world of independent nations. The U.N. only has the power that its member states grant it. It cannot demand nations to disarm their police force or military. It cannot stop a nation from exercising its power. The U.N.’s political influence is about as effective as the faint words of a mother to a schoolyard of bullies, outcasts and runts. With this dismal picture, what strategy does the U.N. have imposing world peace?

Obviously, “imposed peace” must be imposed by means of power, and if we’re talking world peace, it would have to be one world power. The U.N. itself could never serve as the hegemonic power that would be required to impose peace around the world, but it could potentially facilitate one powerful nation or a group of powerful nations into a position of hegemonic power.

Such a world order would act similar to the federal government of a nation, but it would have no other nations to war against, because it would be the only entity to influence war. It is obvious that a certain level of order may be accomplished by a world power, but do we really want this peace if it requires hegemony?

Even though the U.N. hasn’t thought this far ahead, ultimately, this is how world peace is to be won. One should be reminded, that this type of peace, just as with the nation-state, is imposed, and therefore always tends to disruption. Similar to the nation-state, this world order would have to take police action against it’s own people who break it’s laws and challenge it’s dominance. And we’re back where we started. What is peace where it must be enforced by police officers or military men?

After this analysis, it becomes difficult to use the word ‘peace’ at all to describe what is intended by Peace Day. The word becomes completely inappropriate. In essence, the “peace” which the U.N. intends to promote is the same peace that is won when a hostage submits because he has a gun held to his head. The more fitting term is “order.” Thus, Sept. 21 should be more appropriately called Order Day.

The way I see it, the concept of peace is not at all applicable to humanity. Social interaction inherently involves conflict. The characteristic that marks a good social group is the way in which these conflicts are handled. When these conflicts are handled well, I would call this social harmony, not peace. Peace is lifeless and still. Harmony is a progression of diverse and changing tones, which work themselves together in a complimentary fashion.

So then, if the question is how to accomplish social congruity, we must take a step back to the two methods by which it can be achieved. Since we have found that social congruity imposed by power is detestable, we must choose the route of social intimacy. Only in this way may social harmony be restored.

Today was Patriot Day. It was the seventh memorial of September 11th when thousands of Americans perished in the World Trade Center attacks. It is a day when teacher’s tell their children to where red white and blue. It is a day when the pledge of allegiance is made a specifically important part of the daily events and is, perhaps, followed by a moment of silence.

It is a day designed to unite American citizens, despite our diversity, in a blind celebration of nationalism. Together we celebrate the terrorist acts that the American government has committed with impunity. We celebrate our privilege as a powerful nation and our ability to force our will upon other sovereign nations. We celebrate our ability to force a corrupt paradigm of government upon other nations so we may have power over them. We celebrate our power to force “liberty” and “freedom” along with our valueless culture and our ailing society upon other nations. We celebrate as we dismantle vibrant and independent societies so they are open to be exploited by the global economy.

And all the while we wonder how anyone in the world could hate us. How could anyone hate us? We are the United States of America! Every other nation envies us. Every other nations just wishes to live up to our greatness!

There was a girl I once new in high school. She was a beautiful spirit. The kind of person who would cheer you up, when you were down. Her name was Lisa.

That was four years ago. Upon a visit to my old hometown, I just happened to run into her. She was working for my father as a secretary. But when I first saw her, I did not recognize her. Her smile was gone, her face had rounded out, her hair, which had once fell long and full, was tied back carelessly and she was wearing a black and unwashed over-sized t-shirt. Her spirit was all dried up.

I sat down and spoke with her briefly. “So how’ve you been?” I asked.

There's that smile.

“Oh, ya know, just working.”

“So, your with…uh… Kribbs, right?”

“Yea.”

“Great,” I said having nothing better to say.

“Not that great,” she blurted.

I stumble, I nod my head like an idiot. I don’t know how to respond, I want to console her, but instead I change the subject: “Well, what else have you been up to?”

“We moved out to Denver for a while, cuz Luke wanted to try college. But he hated it, so we moved back.”

I’m afraid to ask another question. I feel like this casual meeting has become an interrogation, a rude exposé. But she continues anyway without my prompt, as if to confirm her utter sorrow.

“Married. … Two kids. … yea.”

And there it was everything bared, in sincere dejection, yet without shame and without embarrassment.

God. What frustration. What sadness. What’s a man to do? I feel just as helpless as her, and I want to help, but there’s nothing I can do. God. I wish I could ride in on a white stallion, rescue her in my arms, and gallop of into the sunset to some place where people would treat her the way she deserves to be treated. But there is no such place. And alas, I’m a homosexual. And while I’d still be there for her, I cannot give her myself and I cannot give her the love she deserves.

As I ride home across the Colorado passes on two wheels, wind in my ears, my mind replays the scene. I’m angry at the world for stripping away her spirit. No, I’m not angry at the world. I’m angry at the failure of my community. High school taught us nothing of how to deal with this. I’m angry at my father for paying her something just above minimum wage to work for him. I’m angry at him for not caring about her, beyond the fact that she shows up on time. I’m angry at her husband for consuming her beauty. I’m angry at all those around her who could allow this to happen. And I’m angry at myself for being able to do nothing.

I came home and found her picture in the yearbook. There’s that genuine smile. There’s the sparkle in her eyes. There’s the lively girl I once knew. And as I flipped to the end of the book I see a note written in silver marker. It read: “You are the funniest smart kid I know. Remember life is short so smile. You are just sooo cute. -Lisa.”

Author’s Note: It may seem insensitive that I’ve used the actual names of the people mentioned in the above article, but I think we waste each other’s time trying to protect and maintain some false image of our lives and the lives of others. In this way, everyday social crimes are concealed from the awareness of others. Thus, social problems are exacerbated. And it should be known that I mean everything I write with great compassion. I never write with the intent to cause harm or find fault. I hope, however, what I write will draw out conflict where conflict is needed in order to inspire positive change.

Lemonade Stand by adwriter

There’s something I find particularly disquieting about the early capitalistic endeavors of children. A sign drawn in multicolor marker in hand at the street corner: a desperate shake or wave of the sign not just informing you, not just asking you, but begging you to buy their exorbitantly priced lemonade.

It’s not as if you can pretend to have overlooked their place of business in the favor of another: you would feel quite immoral. How could one ignore that youthful exuberance, those seeking eyes, and the angelic halos cast by the summer sun?

Coming across the typical lemonade stand, at first, you are likely to feel a call to flight. Oh, if one were to stop at every lemonade stand! You try to look away so as not to be entrapped by the guilt-inspiring tractor beam of puppy-dog faces.

The second instinct, however, is one of pity. While these young boys and girls are not likely to be risking any great financial investment, there is some great hazard at hand to their naive egos. And for a horrifying instant, one worries that there is no one but oneself to save their enterprise and their innocent faith in capitalism.

On approach to the rickety stand, young eyes reeling you in like a floundering fish, you can’t help but feel awkward. For an instant, you wonder if you had any choice, in the first place, as to the, now, inevitable purchase.

You’ve entered the radius of proximity of prospective customer. But at a lemonade stand, a prospective customer is a guaranteed customer, and you know you’ve been involuntarily committed. The little capitalists know likewise. You pretend you still have options, and maybe you stall as if stumped between a choice of Country Time instant lemonade, or Country Time instant lemonade.

You look quickly for pricing information, none to be found, so you ask with a smile and sparkle in your eye: “How much is this, here, lemonade by the glass?” The terse response “two-fifty” rings so loud in your ears with the tone of impatience and unfriendliness, that you forget to be outraged by the price.

Your grudgingly keep a smile on your face and pull for your wallet in sheer embarrassment. You’ve been conned, and you know it. Couldn’t they at least hide the lemonade powder, so you didn’t know you were being ripped off? But you realize that that is a more advanced capitalistic lesson that they have yet to learn–a lesson they don’t need to learn as long as they have baby faces.

And when you receive your half-full Dixie cup of instant lemonade, you think you’ve reached maximum exasperation. That is, until you’re handed your 50 cents change and notice the youthful eyes intentionally avoiding the giant fish-bowl labeled “Tips” in hand-written three-inch bubble letters. And you falter, you almost choke on your first and last sip of lemonade, and you deposit one quarter after another with protracted, yet concealed, bitterness.

The quarters still ringing in your ears, you walk away, hurt, wounded and extorted. Such are the lessons that dispel the myth of childish innocence and stand as testament to their ability to effectively exploit the capitalist system.

Originally composed June 24, 2008

Hannah Montanna is just so hip and sexy. Why wouldn't you want to buy her jeans?

I was resentfully assaulted by this whole Hannah Montana sensation upon a rare visit to my local Wal-Mart. Images of her plastic face decked with copious amounts of foundation, heavily liner-laden porn star eyes, lips sparkling with her own brand of lip gloss were enlarged and plastered on display bins and posters at every turn in the store.

Her face was branded on bicycle helmets, movies, compact discs, backpacks, alarm clocks, swimming suits, clothes, lunch boxes, jewelry, stickers, games, scooters, play phones, bath beach towels, notebooks, planners, key chains, iPod docks, dolls, books, folding chairs, blankets…I’m frankly too fed up to go on.

Now I have nothing against Miley Cyrus personally, but don’t you think she’s a little young at the age of 15 to be in bed with fat dandies like Wal-Mart and Disney? Wait, there’s no age of consent law when it comes to selling your body to a corporation. But this is really undignified. One could say she entered into these agreements on her own free will. But these corporations own her. They made her who she is. They put her up in front of the lights, up in hot new clothes, in layers of makeup, and they purchased the rights to her body for just a couple million dollars a year. Despite all the money they’ve paid for her services, they know they’re getting the better deal. They are ravishing this young woman, and they’ll gang bang all the money they can out of her hot little bod until she’s dried up on drugs.

What’s even more disturbing is how parents aren’t disturbed that their little girls are eating it all right up. And that their pubescent boys are salivating at the mouth. Sure it’s effective marketing, but what does it reveal about the idiocy of our culture? Are we not concerned about the dignity of our girls who are parading around as little Hannah Montana wannabes? Are we not concerned that this underage sex-icon is setting the standard for young women? Is this perfectly-primped Barbie-doll-superstar millionaire-teenager, really the role model we want our girls to aspire to and compare themselves against?

Of course not. But is Wal-Mart going to pull Hannah Montana items from their shelves in moral indignation? No. Are Wal-Mart customers going to boycott in outrage, until they do? No. Hannah Montana is the product of Disney, a great and paternal corporation. When a great and paternal corporation endorses something, the customer is obliged to endorse it as well. Who is a single man to disrespect a great and paternal corporation?