…Cont

Islam is more cult ideology than religion. And, they have no sense of guilt. And what ‘s exactly wrong with guilt - right and wrong? They have a different mentality to the West with its Christian roots.

Remember, there is always more than one version of history and there are plenty of accepted myths out that are continually perpetuated. People in general are lazy or too over-worked and have no time to check the facts. The point Tom Hodgkinson makes in his books – be idle, instead of the busy busy. And reflect, dream, be creative. He has an online magazine called “The Idler”.

We are the slaves in this over corporatized world and any dignity is minimised. Rerum Novaram, Pope Leo XIII’s encyclical supported workers and espoused dignity. Consequently, his model was used in several countries.

There is a great article which Michael Thompson, a Labor Elder wrote during the Guillard years. I’ll try and find it. He was criticising the Labor Party which has lost its soul.

As Peter Vexatious says, Christ was the greatest social engineer ever and it was his teachings which initiated the Western concepts of law.

Pope Francis visit: Turkey's Christians face tense times

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-30214805

“Honesty is the most offensive thing in the world since the dawn of mankind” (John Lydon).

I’m going to be offline for over a week after today.

I think Constance has demonstrated that his or her[1] avalanche of words is true to the throwback tradition of not even following the practices of normal people in pursuing a thread of rational argument. For example I had transcribed word for word what Constance suggested through a quotation of the throwback historian Keith Thomas [2], summed up the Enlightenment - and added my presumption (stated as such) that she did not share these values.

Her response has hardened my presumption into certainty. Having asked about my pen-name, she then proceeded to doctor her original quotation of Thomas, to wonder why I missed “Creativity” and “real freedom” (I didn’t, Thomas did) and claim without any substantiation what she “thought” I really meant was “an odd mix of Protestant corporate enslavement and pompous lefty shite.”

Yes, Julian was a Roman emperor, described by Gore Vidal as counter-attacking the religious cult cobbled together in a deal between the crafty authoritarian tyrant Constantine and some rogue sects of the early Christians to bury Christianity beneath imperial power (and go to war against Christians who sought to stay with Christianity). The result, masquerading as “Christian”, persists to this day having (in league with hereditary tyrants) murdered its betters by the thousand over the intervening centuries. I chose Julian’s name as a pen-name, first as simple “Julian”, and then, cornered by the fact that “Julian” was already taken, added “Emperor”.

As for “real freedom”, without disclosing what she meant that term could only be likened to the Communist Yarra Bank spruiker who declared: “Look at those capitalists driving their posh cars home to dine on strawberries and cream. When the freedom comes you’ll all be doing that.” A voice called out “But I don’t like strawberries and cream”. “Comrade”, the spruiker growled, “when the freedom comes you’ll do as you’re bloody told”

[1] Constance being a traditional female name I’ll use “her”.
[2] “[The Enlightenment] stands for freedom of thought, rational inquiry, critical thinking, religious tolerance, political liberty, scientific achievement, the pursuit of happiness, and hope for the future".

...Cont

Julian (I'm not going to call you Emperor this time),

http://www.webpages.uidaho.edu/engl_258/Lecture%20notes/reformation.htm

Why is the Reformation Considered "Conservative"?

The Reformation was:

"a) Anti Neo-Classical/Scholastic: Opposed to Scholastic application and study of Greco-Roman texts. For example: Anti-Copernicus: should read the bible, not the stars and Aristotle (a Greek), to understand the nature of the universe (Note that Catholic church was teaching Copernicus' (1473-1573) mathematical methods, despite their geocentric implications, but by the time of Galileo (1564-1642) the Church responds to conservative criticism of Scholastic principles); should find all Truth thru Faith, not Reason.

b) Anti-Neo-Classical/Humanist or Anti “Neo-Paganism”: Opposed the re-emerging Greek belief the actions of the body naturally and properly expressed the humanity of the soul (see Michelangelo for example; anti humanist original goodness of man (vs. original sin).

c) Anti-Franciscan poverty: Opposed to the emerging Franciscan-Catholic belief that adherents should imitate Christ and avoid worldly possessions. Instead see wealth as evidence of God's favor. (note that the Vatican was also of course opposed to this radical idea; all of Francis' original followers were burned alive; yet the idea could not be so easily squelched)

d) Pro-Aristocracy and Anti-Egalitarian/Democratic: While Protestants challenged traditional Catholic power structures, the movement normally also maintained close allegiances to relevant national powers; power is not taken from the Papal Church-State to be given to "the people" but rather it is given to emerging Protestant Church-States. Luther will align himself with the German aristocracy, and Calvin will establish an actual Puritan theocracy, serving as the model for soon to emerge Puritan/pilgrim colonies)."

Hi Constance,

What was the comparative state of Islamist thought and notions of human rights back in the sixteenth century, and how much has it developed up to the present ? At all ? Not necessarily in a progressive direction, anyway, although Julian, I'm sure, could find something 'progressive' in the development of ideas over those five hundred years.

I remember glancing at a book, thirty -odd years ago, (by Sternberg ? Steinberg ?) which suggested that the original peoples of the area around Palestine were all pretty much the same people, 'Abiru/Abr', some with towns and villages, and some still out in the desert. Some of the desert people envied their cousins in the towns and eventually, around 1000 BC, invaded 'Palestine' and either absorbed or exterminated (more likely the latter, in all traditional societies) the townspeople. Later, of course, they devised their own foundation myths, perhaps around 500 BC. I think that was Sternberg/Steinberg's thesis. Sounds plausible.

Meanwhile, the desert people continued as before, picking up garbled bits and pieces of outside ideas and stories, Jewish, Greek and eventually Christian, in Hebrew, Syriac and Aramaic, on top of their own traditions and languages. Along came Mohammad and his successors and, to justify their aggressive burst out of the desert, laying waste wherever they needed to, they cobbled together all those bits and pieces, regardless of time or sequence or rhyme or reason, into a book called the Koran, eventually written in Arabic. Of course, its underlying thrust relied on its solid traditional origins - in old-fashioned Leftist terms, the most reactionary and backward foundation possible.

Traditional people everywhere go on about the 'magic' of secret words, which are never to be changed, not one iota. So it is with the rational for the Koran. So how - since the sixteenth century (or even a thousand years before that) - could a single ignorant word, or idea, or precept, or belief, or assumption about the cosmos, be changed ?

[TBC]

[continued]

That may be the dilemma of this century - how can a reactionary set of beliefs undergo change, even just to acknowledge the modern world on which the 'people of the Book' depend just like everybody else ? How long can people live one life and prattle about another ?

My hopes are with the women, and with education. With no working class worthy of the name in any Muslim country (except maybe Turkey), any dream of some sort of Left revolution is just a fantasy: if it won't happen here now, so it's not likely to ever happen in any Muslim country.

So perhaps, brave women like Malala Yusufzai and Malalai Joya and Shirin Ebadi and so many other women who put our 'feminists' so much to shame, will have to bear the brunt of the inevitable reactionary and violent counter-action.

Whose side will people like Julian and John Bilger be on, I wonder ?

Joe Lane

Loudmouth I don’t have any problems with whose side I’m on. The side of the three people you listed, together with others who represent a possibly more hard-nosed though no more courageous conservatism, such as Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Ibn Warraq and Raymond Ibrahim and Geert Wilders.

Conservatism? Yes, a much abused term employed to take advantage of the fact that it has two meanings in existential conflict: Conservation of self-serving authority vs. conservation of gains for individual liberty already upheld in the Enlightenment and the wars against fascism. The human rights which the above heroes uphold are nothing new or progressive but are already in place all around the world – and in conflict with throwbacks. Islam, through its Taliban mouthpiece, has described Malala Yusufzai as “a soldier against Islamic society”. Too bloody right she is whether she sees herself that way or not. The world needs millions of soldiers against the vile religion that underpins Islamic society. In the civilised parts of the world that means against the uncritical bridgehead that Islam has planted.

A spearhead of religious or racial supremacism is its radical wing – al Qa’eda warriors or lunatics like Netanyahu. But the underlying enemy of the Age of Reason is the supremacism itself, not just the spearhead. It includes the religious (faith-based) roots. The world can’t afford to wait until the supremacists change their minds, the best that can be struggled for is to make them keep out of the way while people exercise and defend and consolidate the liberties which have been bequeathed to us.