Wednesday, November 14, 2007

Psychology behind suicide bombings

Interview with Pierre Rehov, documentary filmmaker
By Andrew Cochran


On July 15, I appeared on MSNBC's "Connected" program to discuss the 7/7 London attacks (you can see video of the segment on the linked page). One of my fellow guests was Pierre Rehov, a French filmmaker who has filmed six documentaries on the intifada by going undercover in the Palestinian areas. Pierre's upcoming film, "Suicide Killers," is based on interviews that he conducted with the families of suicide bombers and would-be bombers in an attempt to find out why they do it. Pierre agreed to my request for a Q&A interview here about his work on the new film. Many thanks to Dean Draznin and Arlyn Riskind for helping to arrange this special interview.

What inspired you to produce Suicide Killers, your seventh film?

I started working with victims of suicide attacks to make a film on PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) when I became fascinated with the personalities of those who had committed those crimes, as they were described again and again by their victims. Especially the fact that suicide bombers are all smiling one second before they blow themselves up.

Why is this film especially important?

People don't understand the devastating culture behind this unbelievable phenomenon. My film is not politically correct because it addresses the real problemshowing the real face of Islam. It points the finger against a culture of hatred in which the uneducated are brainwashed to a level where their only solution in life becomes to kill themselves and kill others in the name of a God whose word, as transmitted by other men, has became their only certitude.

What insights did you gain from making this film? What do you know that other experts do not know?

I came to the conclusion that we are facing a neurosis at the level of an entire civilization. Most neuroses have in common a dramatic event, generally linked to an unacceptable sexual behavior. In this case, we are talking of kids living all their lives in pure frustration, with no opportunity to experience sex, love, tenderness or even understanding from the opposite sex. The separation between men and women in Islam is absolute. So is contempt toward women, who are totally dominated by men. This leads to a situation of pure anxiety, in which normal behavior is not possible. It is no coincidence that suicide killers are mostly young men dominated subconsciously by an overwhelming libido that they not only cannot satisfy but are afraid of, as if it is the work of the devil. Since Islam describes heaven as a place where everything on earth will finally be allowed, and promises 72 virgins to those frustrated kids, killing others and killing themselves to reach this redemption becomes their only solution.

What was it like to interview would-be suicide bombers, their families and survivors of suicide bombings?

It was a fascinating and a terrifying experience. You are dealing with seemingly normal people with very nice manners who have their own logic, which to a certain extent can make sense since they are so convinced that what they say is true. It is like dealing with pure craziness, like interviewing people in an asylum, since what they say, is for them, the absolute truth. I hear a mother saying "Thank God, my son is dead." Her son had became a shaheed, a martyr, which for her was a greater source of pride than if he had became an engineer, a doctor or a winner of the Nobel Prize. This system of values works completely backwards since their interpretation of Islam worships death much more than life. You are facing people whose only dream, only achievement is to fulfill what they believe to be their destiny, namely to be a shaheed or the family of a shaheed. They don't see the innocent being killed, they only see the impure that they have to destroy.

You say suicide bombers experience a moment of absolute power, beyond punishment. Is death the ultimate power?

Not death as an end, but death as a door open to the after life. They are seeking the reward that God has promised them. They work for God, the ultimate authority, above all human laws. They therefore experience this single delusional second of absolute power, where nothing bad can ever happen to them, since they become God's sword.

Is there a suicide bomber personality profile? Describe the psychopathology.

Generally kids between 15 and 25 bearing a lot of complexes, generally inferiority complexes. They must have been fed with religion. They usually have a lack of developed personality. Usually they are impressionable idealists. In the western world they would easily have become drug addicts, but not criminals. Interestingly, they are not criminals since they don't see good and evil the same way that we do. If they had been raised in an Occidental culture, they would have hated violence. But they constantly battle against their own death anxiety. The only solution to this deep-seated pathology is to be willing to die and be rewarded in the after life in Paradise.

Are suicide bombers principally motivated by religious conviction?

Yes, it is their only conviction. They don't act to gain a territory or to find freedom or even dignity. They only follow Allah, the supreme judge, and what He tells them to do.

Do all Muslims interpret jihad and martyrdom in the same way?

All Muslim believers believe that, ultimately, Islam will prevail on earth. They believe this is the only true religion and their is no room, in their mind, for interpretation. The main difference between moderate Muslims and extremists is that moderate Muslims don't think they will see the absolute victory of Islam during their life time, therefore they respect other beliefs. The extremists believe that the fulfillment of the Prophecy of Islam and ruling the entire world as described in the Koran, is for today. Each victory of Bin Laden convinces 20 million moderate Muslims to become extremists.

Describe the culture that manufactures suicide bombers.

Oppression, lack of freedom, brain washing, organized poverty, placing God in charge of daily life, total separation between men and women, forbidding sex, giving women no power whatsoever, and placing men in charge of family honor, which is mainly connected to their women's behavior.

What socio-economic forces support the perpetuation of suicide bombings?

Muslim charity is usually a cover for supporting terrorist organizations. But one has also to look at countries like Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Iran, which are also supporting the same organizations through different networks. The ironic thing in the case of Palestinian suicide bombers is that most of the money comes through financial support from the Occidental world, donated to a culture that utterly hates and rejects the West (mainly symbolized by Israel).

Is there a financial support network for the families of the suicide bombers? If so, who is paying them and how does that affect the decision?

There used to be a financial incentive in the days of Saddam Hussein ($25,000 per family) and Yasser Arafat (smaller amounts), but these days are gone. It is a mistake to believe that these families would sacrifice their children for money. Although, the children themselves who are very attached to their families, might find in this financial support another reason to become suicide bombers. It is like buying a life insurance policy and then committing suicide.

Why are so many suicide bombers young men?

As discussed above, libido is paramount. Also ego, because this is a sure way to become a hero. The shaheeds are the cowboys or the firemen of Islam. Shaheed is a positively reinforced value in this culture. And what kid has never dreamed of becoming a cowboy or a fireman?

What role does the U.N. play in the terrorist equation?

The UN is in the hands of Arab countries and third world or ex-communists countries. Their hands are tied. The UN has condemned Israel more than any other country in the world, including the regime of Castro, Idi Amin or Kaddahfi. By behaving this way, the UN leaves a door open by not openly condemning terrorist organizations. In addition, through UNRWA, the UN is directly tied to terror organizations such as Hamas, representing 65 percent of their apparatus in the so-called Palestinian refugee camps. As a support to Arab countries, the UN has maintained Palestinians in camps with the hope to "return" into Israel for more than 50 years, therefore making it impossible to settle those populations, which still live in deplorable conditions. Four-hundred million dollars are spent every year, mainly financed by U.S. taxes, to support 23,000 employees of UNRWA, many of whom belong to terrorist organizations (see Congressman Eric Cantor on this subject, and in my film "Hostages of Hatred").

You say that a suicide bomber is a stupid bomb and a smart bomb simultaneously. Explain what you mean.

Unlike an electronic device, a suicide killer has until the last second the capacity to change his mind. In reality, he is nothing but a platform representing interests which are not his, but he doesn't know it.

How can we put an end to the madness of suicide bombings and terrorism in general?

Stop being politically correct and stop believe that this culture is a victim of ours. Radical Islamism today is nothing but a new form of Nazism. Nobody was trying to justify or excuse Hitler in the 1930s. We had to defeat him in order to make peace one day with the German people.
Are these men traveling outside their native areas in large numbers? Based on your research, would you predict that we are beginning to see a new wave of suicide bombings outside the Middle East?

Every successful terror attack is considered a victory by the radical Islamists. Everywhere Islam is expands there is regional conflict. Right now, their are thousands of candidates for martyrdom lining up in training camps in Bosnia, Afghanistan, Pakistan. Inside Europe, hundreds of illegal mosques are preparing the next step of brain washing to lost young men who cannot find a satisfying identity in the Occidental world. Israel is much more prepared for this than the rest of the world will ever be. Yes, there will be more suicide killings in Europe and the U.S. Sadly, this is only the beginning.

This Interview was published in another blog.

Source:http://counterterrorismblog.org/2005/07/interview_with_pierre_rehov_do.php

Friday, November 9, 2007

“Bowling for Finland” and the Power of Ideas


The original Video was taken out.

It’s already famous in the Internet the video of Pekka-Eric, the new suicide-killer from first world schools. In his video, published in You Tube he says: “I am a cynic existentialist, anti-human-humanist, anti-social-Darwinist and a type of atheist god”; “hate, I am full of hate and I worship it”; “I am the law, the judge and the executor, there is no major authority than me”.

In times like this, passes through my head that atheist arguments against the Medieval Christianity and it’s anti-Christian madness. But I am not going to deal with this issue, cause I don’t think it’s fair to bring any concept upon atheism based on the particular acts of an atheist, like concept the Christianity based on the act of an particular Christianism.

But what I would like to analyze here is the content of the T-shirt of Pekka-Eric. “Humanity is Overrated”, is written in the T-shirt. Something that he is trying to fight when he take away 8 lives including he’s own. We all were affected by he’s acts. Not just the wounds, and killed, and friends of them. But the intire world looks astonished for something, that is becoming even more common. Cause, never is natural or healthy to receive this kind of information no matter where you live.

“Humanity is Overrated” is an example of what ideas are able to. One idea (in fact two, cause there is nothing new or original in shoot inside a school) killed 8 persons and call all that attention. The idea was clear and was taken to the last consequences.

A lot of people question the media influence above people, but is also very evident that the ideas carried through it can destroy or construct. Media is means, it just carries a message. Who should be the responsible for that message? Who watch or who transmit? Looks like to me that the basic logic of “the greater, take care of the less”, found in life and transit laws should be repeated here. The media is every more specialized while the audience do not evolve in the same educational speed. In another words, to put into the audience the responsibility of the message is the same as give to Pekka-Eric that T-Shirt.

Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Dexter – Symptoms of Sickness

Little more than one year ago, started on the American's TV, in the Showtime channel, the Dexter’s series. The idea is, at least, creative and this calls the attention and curiosity of a lot of people, mostly the ones who were influenced by the new wave of series that surprised the public by it’s originality like, Lost, 24 Hours and Desperate Housewives.

Dexter, is a series for people who have no stomach. In fact, you need to don’t have another stuff too, like for example, critical sense, common sense, and other abilities common in the mind and social faculties. I know that some fans will want to rip me apart, but that’s just because they are fans. They already bought the craziness of this entertainment. However, you just need to analyze shortly some arguments and you won’t gonna be able to avoid the sensation of puke (sorry for the lack of euphemism). Dexter is one irresponsible entertainment.

Dexter works in the Police Department, doing the blood analyses in crime scenes. But he is a killer that should be arrested or even executed, depending on some American laws. He follow his victims, always with the Maquiavel argument of have a reason to do it, cause he just kill criminals. He prepare his crime scene, tie people naked using some kind of tape, makes he’s own show, given arguments to the victim and the expectator, choose the knife or any perforation object and initiate what he calls “ritual”. Executing with sadism the victim. That always leave the scene inside of black bags. That said, consider, he is the hero of the plot.

Some of the terrible details that I would like to share: He’s first victim, is the nurse that was treating his father in the hospital. His father told him that she was drugging he and others, and people were getting worst and passing out. He gives to his psycho son the mission to get rid of her. Good excuse, right? Wrong! Well, he get’s the old woman, put her naked into his ritual table, make her beg for her life, then stab her until the blood spills all over him. Another interesting scene is when he almost kills a boy that wasn’t a Serial Killer but a boy, who was violated. If the boy hadn’t talked about this, the “Justice” of Dexter would be a great mistake. The last scene that I want to comment is the “coyotes” couple. They killed the Cubans that didn’t pay the fee to be released into US soil. Dexter, kill them both one in front of the other, with screams of “I love you” one to another, without any ceremony. He passes all night killing the man, with the wife watching everything. Just to remember, this guy is the Hero!

If that wasn’t enough, Dexter’s father teaches him to develop his furtiveness with the excuse of teach him to survive the electric chair. In summary, the father’s value code say that if he’s son is a monster, even killing a lot of people should survive. He irresponsibly creates a monster and release it in society. Dexter excuse him self saying that can’t help him self from the kill urgency. He also thanks a shrink that treated him, for help him to accept who he really are, ripping he apart next. Do you think a sociopath should accept his situation? Dexter also obstructs justice, making serious crimes inside the police corporation, like planting evidences. And he awaits sincerely that one other Serial Killer continue free killing more people, so he can continue with he’s fetish for morbid competition. The glamorization is so high that in the last death there I watched, was listening to a music in off. Then happens the banalization of death. The American philosopher Sissela Bok, from Harvard, names this circumstance “compassion’s fatigue”, “an state of spirit that makes possible witness the brutality with distance, without involvement” (Translated from a Brazilian Magazine. Super Interessante, June of 1999, p.p. 21).

In the end, I ask my self, why the American society allow this kind of entertainment? Why in a place where people get guns and start a shooting hell, entertainment like this are produced? Why in the land of Serial Killers, this kind o entertainment is promoted? What will guarantee that repressed psychopaths won’t come out of the closet with good excuses to canalize theirs impulses? With such a glamorization of the sociopaths what gonna stop them? Maybe the one who didn’t knew his problem could recognize it in the screen, and instead of search for help, try to solve it like Dexter does. Without professional help and perpetrating revolting crimes. In the same way that normal people is influenced by media’s glamour, maybe, I’m almost sure, sleeping psychopaths would press a button that will destiny then to live the “adventures” of Dexter. Cause also, the character is evidently ruled by challenges. It’s easy to ask: “Who will be the best Serial Killer?” You can see in this series that they love competition. In a competition of Serial Killers, who do you think is going to loose? Funny, if not tragically sick. I already watched more then I should, for me it’s enough!

Friday, October 26, 2007

Richard Dawkins Stumped by Question

This is one of the most viewed Richard Dawkins video on You Tube. However, there is no comment for it, you'll understand why as soon as you watch...

Sunday, October 21, 2007

Modern Science, Old Faith

I’ve been present in the I International Seminar of the Historical Jesus in the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro in the last 3 days. The main character present was nobody less then John Dominic Crossan, founder of the Jesus Seminar and a famous scholar in the Historical Jesus studies. He is criticized by many other scholars that argue against he’s method, what is the Achilles Tendon of his conclusions.

The seminar was enricher and frightening. Frightening because I discovered something that I didn’t imagined that had came to that point. The science is losing it’s criteria. In the search of a less dogmatic discourse two devastate implications are rising against the scientific method. 3 were the cases analyzed.

1 – Some researchers choose to quote Jesus texts like historical and other texts of the same Jesus were throwing off based in the actual common sense. What makes no sense cause the gospel text was written for the audience of the I and II century a.D. In another words, what Christ said that affirm the main ideas of the researcher sustains itself through the Historic-Critical Method, but the irrelevant texts for the main ideas of the researcher, or even the texts that oppose his ideas, are thrown out without any criteria.

2 – Other researchers based their allegations and “scientific discoveries” in completely hypothetic factors. And at least, responsibly, admitted such dependency of hypothesis build upon not enough evidences. So, they establish a whole research in a unstable basis (by the inexistence of the basic hypothesis validation) to conclude, in the end, what just could be proven if the basis hypothesis of the research were proven. That’s scarily speculative.

3 – The last, worst and more frightening argument in the scientific method that I saw in the event was: More than one of the scholars who showed their researches, made allusions to the pluralism of ideas, the inexistence of absolute truths, but subjective ones. The maximum materialization of the anti-dogmatic discourse. “The science can’t be dogmatic”, they say. However this is a great postmodern illusion. Cause in the end, when is Said that science can’t be dogmatic, or there are no absolute truths, or that all truths are subjective, then, we are dogmatizing and establishing the plurality of ideas as an absolute truth (what is extremely contradicting to the pluralist proposal). In another words, there is no anti-dogmatisms, but the opposition to the disagreeable dogmas. The pluralist argument don’t sustain itself. A river must always have banks never more.

What bring us to the last implications of this discourse, the science is loosing it’s criteria by the denial of absolute truth. Although this discourse is based on the constant evolution of knowledge and the scientific truths in the elapse of time (something true 50 years ago, today can be a reason of jokes). That’s also a fallacy, cause we can’t deny lies if they don’t position itself as truths. The pluralism doctrine condemns good ideas to mix if bad ideas that will never be unmasked cause don’t figure as absolute truths. It’s part of the process of discovering and scientific evolution that one truth rises as absolute to be putted under prove and, if possible, proven or replaced.

There are another problematic factor in the question of putting speculations in position of scientific truths to be proved. Cause of the inconsistent basis, even resisting for years, will be product of studies that we don’t know, maybe never, the relevancy of the time dispend in this research. So, a great, and irrational, loss of time.

In the end, this is one problem find in the human’s ego that don’t like to be find oppositions, and prefer to admit other’s people truths as validate since won’t invalidate his own. But leaving a side this philosophic deepness, see how science is becoming exactly what it most hated since his born. The blind faith. Blind faith in science. The same blind faith that disconnected it definitely from religion. Scientific declarations are made based in weak speculations, with no prove, and so relative that makes me ask what is the relevancy of it? What’s the relevancy of scientific researches if the absolute truth don’t exist? If what is going to be the conclusion is just the product of the subjective mind of the researcher? What’s the science objective? When science sees the hole that is digging down will start to make this same questions, who knows if won’t gonna live a discredit crises like religion lives today?

Who knows it self-destructs? I hope not. But I don’t see any relevancy in the subjective and speculative arguments, do you see?

Saturday, October 6, 2007

Richard Dawkins is SO right!

Analyzing Dawkin’s most famous work, The Selfish Gene, we can see the systematization of a reality known a thousand hundred years ago, the human being is selfish by nature. The irony of that rests in the fact that the result of Dawkin’s research completely agree with the book that he most condemns. The Bible.

Yeah, Dawkin’s conclusion is no news to the Bible’s scripture, in fact is one of the main thoughts in a lot of the teachings in this book. And we must praise the zoology teacher for his effort, that in the end, was capable to prove a biblical truth that says that human nature is essentially evil (Jeremy 17:9; Romans 3:10).

In another words, the science in favor of faith. Dawkins in favor of Bible. Very Ironic. It’s a shame that for sustains his intransigent point of view, that God don’t exist, he had to pass trough situations like this. I don’t see any problem with his denial of God, the problem in my opinion is that old cliché: “The worst kind of blind is the one that don’t want to see” (proverb commonly used in Brazil, I don’t know the English version of it). Don’t change his opinion it’s not an indication of intransigency, but don’t judge all information available (what science demands) is cover the eyes to see, that’s intransigency. I don’t want to prove anything, or convert Dawkins, or he’s followers with this text, but lead to a simple observation that things aren’t so simple.

To tell the truth, there is the complication, ‘cause makes no sense at all for a selfish organism to perpetrate acts of altruism. And that’s the great problem in the moment for the evolution theory, that can’t explain the presence of altruism. That little act of self donation without wait for anything in exchange. Or even the simple honesty ethics, that make you alone in a dark room don’t dare to cheat in your income declaration. Or maybe you do, than that annoying feeling of guilty appears, from where, if the gene is selfish and just cares with his own success? As they keep trying with no success, to solve this problem, the most obvious is silenced by will reasons and not rational ones. The same will that he condemns in religion, the auto-blind(if I can say this) one. What’s so obvious? Oh, I don’t even need to say, you know it, even if you deny.

Friday, September 28, 2007

People worth more than things.

I'm very diffident about my English in this one...

Do you know when you find a true statement that you immediately incorporate it to your cosmovision? Is that magical moment when you see a perfect delimitation of an idea that, although never had been in touch with you in that way, is so familiar? That happened to me last year, when my Applied Communication teacher, designed the phrase more simple of the world, but containing the most pragmatic truth that my social intelligence will never forget. “People worth more than things”.

If you allow me to advance in this thought, I would like to amplify that concept to: “Life is more important than things”. We define, therefore, “things” as everything that don’t live at all. I know, for half dozen persons reading this may look obvious what I am saying till here, but I say to this minority, believe me, there are a majority that don’t understand so easily this simple truth.

It’s easy, in the world today, that people follow in love for things. And for that they cross values out, passing through what really mattes in life. People. In fact, there is a super-valorization of the person when this happens, but the wrong person. This person put it’s own desires above external values. When someone steals, kills, commit adultery (in all senses, sexual, social and economic), cheat, betray, pass through other interests, hurt, brake laws, ill-treat animals and etc… What is really happening is the super-valorization of it self. What, for consequence put things, the desired objects of an individual, above people. Above true values of life. We become what we most want, therefore even more humans will look like things, and not living beings. Things don’t relate, they make use, take advantage or serve each other. They are impersonal and inflexible in the fulfillment of their functions.

Impact of this modern thought, people die for profit

Someone can be asking, “but why relate is more important?” Last week I watched a philosopher in TV say one of the most few phrases in television that marked my life: “The family is the only institution capable to generate life”. It’s clear now? Just relationships generate life. What’s the meaning and relevancy of Pluto to the rest of Universe? None. But if there was life there? Then, it would be one of the most important planets in Via Lactea as the Earth. The life, for more miscomprehended that have been is what we know of most valuable. Even those who already gaved up of life and don’t give to it the proper value anymore, do this for the love of it.

Backing to the subject, we understand that, the world is more materialist today for lack of altruism. In another words, the excess of selfishness consumes us, cause human’s relationships are substituted by relations between people and things. Objects and living beings. Desires and realizations of a single individual. The man relates more with him self and less with the rest of the world. The Ipods are one pragmatic prove of that. The more time is passed with a thing the less time is passed with a living being and more time is passed alone.

That’s not so far guarantying the survival of mankind, but of the individual species. The human’s relations shall always exist, but they have even less meaning, they are helping the individual in his personal agenda to achieve his desires. The more this phenomenon happens and expands, more things get highly valuable over life. Less peace we’ll have, more divisions, more economic dysfunctions, less happiness, more stress, more rush, more capitalism, less solidarity e etc…

I was talking to a friend about CO2 guns, he told me that he loved to kill birds from far. So I said that I don’t shoot birds, but I like to shoot in glass and objects that react beautifully to my shots. He immediately understood my veiled critic and said: “So, you don’t shoot birds, but you shoot in someone’s else goods?” I understood that he had interpreted the word “glass” as a reference to my neighbor’s “window” (this is very common into Brazilian Portuguese semantic) or car’s windows targeted. Automatically, I fixed his mistake and explained that I was referring to glasses that I owned and stored for this activity…Wait a second!!! Let’s rewind a little...

Have you noticed that my friend putted someone’s goods above the life of a bird? Maybe if you had not realized it, don’t you think is time to reconsider? So glasses from windows and goods have more value than an animal that “is”, live and feel individually? This animal have social responsibilities with the lives it generated and relates with others members of it’s own species. That’s the reason why it worth less then a piece of glass that costs 2USD? Makes no sense.

Lotuho's village, also known as Latuka people.

“For traditional Africans, keep the balance and harmony in relationships inside his own family and tribe is extremely important. The possession of material goods is much less important than keep the appropriate interaction with other people. To the occidental man, in another hand, the value of people tend to be measured by the quantity of it’s possessions – land, money and goods. One result is the seek for success that means long hours in work, and disposal to annihilate other workers, friends and even family to be able to achieve great profit.

The Lotuho people, from south Suddan, for some time rejected the use of cattle to pull the plow, even knowing that the use of this animals would raise their production of food. With the cattle, the great feasts that happened during the field preparation for the sowing, would not be necessary, and that feasts were crucial to keep the relations in society. Better have less food, they say, than risc the harmony inside the village” (Applied Comunication class notes 2006, teacher Valdecir Lima).

If it’s not clear yet:
In life what really matters are not things, but relationships.

Without this comprehension and the legitimacy of our relations, we’ll be mere individuals alone in a multitude of abandoned. In the day that career, job, opportunities for your personal life, profit, desired objects and things in general become more important in your life than people, then it’s time to revaluate your values. For whom had we lived for? To fulfill the sheet in the duty of living? To realize ourselves at the cost of everything and all? This behavior in practice is what defines who you are. Are you a person or a thing? People relate.

Monday, September 17, 2007

The Death of Hope II – Man is not the solution?


This last week You Tube published the World Premiere of “How Far We’ve Come” song, from Matchbox Twenty. It does not matter if you like the sound of it (I loved) but the lyrics are really deep. It talks about the same subject that we were talking before. The end of hope to makind. It does not matter either if we are talking about apocalypse, nuclear wars or the Global Warming issue, the same entropic behavior is well noticed for everybody.

Pay attention to the lyrics, they recognize the lonely situation of the postmodern and nihilist man (that may not have someone to say goodbye) and the images in the background. You’ll see great conquests of mankind and also an allusion to our failures. Then in the final chorus we see in the background the universal symbol of joy and commemoration: Fireworks. But they are in antagonism to the words in the mouth of the Group. In another words, we are “pretending” to be glorious, but “Let’s see how far we’ve come”…

Thursday, September 13, 2007

Hero’s decadence – The end of Hope

I’ve noticed and irritated alot with the way how the heroes have been pictured at present. The reborn of heroes in cinema and TV series is just an illusion. They are dying. In all the last movies launched about heroes, just one thing was common to all. The postmodern and hopeless thought. All heroes today are less heroes, more humans (even the ones from out of Earth), filled with faults and existential crisis.

I don’t know if you remember, but the hero objective always was inspire integrity, morality, values and hope that someone would save us from ourselves. Although, the heroes now are more like one of us. Not so full of rectitude anymore, see for example the new Superman movie. He uses his powers to spy and violate Louis Lane privacy, he’s ex-wife, now merried with another man. If wasn’t enough, he immorally seduce and put her in a betrayal situation against her present husband. Yet in this movie, the 5 (I think) years old son of Superman, kills a man. All right, you can say that he deserved that, but so what? Since when a 5 years old child has the power to judge who lives and who dies? And if he did it by accident, where is the responsibility of the ones who hold the power? Where is this safety filling that heroes gave to us, protecting us from the ones who irresponsibly uses power?

Think in any present movie, from X-Men to TMNT, from Rocky VI to Rambo 4, all heroes had some kind of existential crisis in witch their powers were a way too higher weight in their mission to save the world. Why our new histories are like this? Cause we want to turn this histories real or cause we are, each time, more hopeless about everything? Looks like the second law of thermodynamics is reaching our thought, ideas and creations. As we can see in the Nickelback song, called Hero, where the composer affirms don’t wait for a savior anymore:

“And they say that a hero can save us. Im not gonna stand here and wait… Someone told me love will ALL save us. But how can that be? Look what love gave us.
A world full of killing, and blood-spilling That world never came”.

As long as we continue to look to our bellybutton we’ll just find faults and disappointment. Super Heroes don’t exist, but I don’t know how good is this believe, in the absence of external hope, to us? Are we tired to wait, or are we looking to wrong place all this time? And if there is salvation outside our superficial reality? And If?... Science don’t have an answer to that, Religion claims to have it. How much of this issue have you researched? How good is to a convicted to know that there is no one out there for him? I know, this hopeless situation does not prove anything, but shows that we need hope. Not a fake one, we reject that, but a real one. Do you think this exist? I believe.

We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.

Martin Luther King Jr.

Wednesday, August 29, 2007

And if man could create life?

Great problem he would create. I was reading a blog topic (http://1001gatos.org/uma-definicao-definitiva-de-vida/) about the Science dream of create life in laboratory. In fact, the dream is much more incredible. We want to create life from inorganic matter. That’s something, but are we able? Looks like we found in the silicium the best substitute for carbon-based organic matter, the first step to the creation of life.

Ok, that’s cool, but what are the effects of this accomplishment? I don’t want to talk about clone process here, but was the first barrier that we tried to cross. Some scientists like the idea others hate. And that brings some very interesting point to the issue. Follow this. Francis S. Collins, Director of the Genome project said in a interview to a Brazilian Magazine, that make clones would make us hate ourselves more, would make us feel more dirty. And I agree with him. The ethics questions that this situation can raise are beyond our capacity to deal with them. All the world would be shaken by this issue. The very core of our existence would be put into a serious discussion.

So what about creating life? I think you already got the picture. The ethics issues concerning creation of life are way too higher and deeper then clone problem. Imagine the superficial questions raised within. What this being would be? What the meaning of his existence? What should we be for it, Masters, gods, fathers, brothers? If they are our creation, it’s our responsibility, should we guarantee his existence? Would it be free? And the list is endless.

If the last question gets a positive answer, then this apply that our creation could turn back against us! It means, that could have the right to fight against us, hate us, blame us, do exactly what we do to God. If you don’t believe in God, is exactly that free will that should be granted to the creation. I know, we are talking about an intelligent form of life, and I know will not start with that, but for sure is the desired end. Although could be just like an animal in the start, but no matter what form of life or evolution state still would raise ethics questions beyond our existence knowledge. At least the scientific knowledge available about our existence, origin and reason for living.

Don’t look obvious that with all this ethic questions, and need of knowledge, science and religion should let their prejudice behind and start to seek the needed answers? Religion is not trying to deny science anymore, that’s from the Dark age. In another hand, science is going too far ignoring the power who made our ethics cultural, religion. We can deny it legitimacy but not it existence and power. Science came that far ignoring religion, but is going to a point where gonna have to face it. Doesn’t matter how much advanced it would be. And if religion has the answer? I am not talking about the religion system, but the religion content? Bad christians are like bad scientists. Humans are imperfect every where. Even Richard Dawkins is antipathy and arrogant as also George W. Bush. But, wait, that's is not the topic .

Sunday, August 26, 2007

Who in history would You like to meet?

This is my first try to reach another kind of audience to my articles and thoughts. Some of my articles will be posted in English. This will help me to improve my English skills, and world wide the discussions on Theology, Philosophy, religion and politics from our Modern Context blog. Feel free to comment my grammar and vocabulary mistakes, as also the topic itself.

I believe that when a question like this cross our minds we obviously seek for a name in the modern history. People who made our world what it is today. But I would like to go a little further, in fact, back in remote history. I would like to know personally Moses. I know, it's a Bible person. Although I am not Jew, I like very much the history of this legend. Who is considered strongly until today in the Israeli's culture. The Christians has some guilty on his fame too, but It all started in the Egipt’s great period in history.
What calls my attention most, in the history of Moses is his commitment to help his people and obey his God. I feel that we have less committed persons in this world with the good direction of old values. We are more interested in live for profit, peace and happiness. And looks like Moses was not thinking in this at all. Yes, he was trying to take his people to a peaceful place, a profitable land and a happy living. But was much more than this. His history tells us that he died without receive his final reward. He did not give one single step into “promise land”. But history, and when I say "history", I mean tradition and Bible itself, says that he died with God. Wich means that he's values were even more strong and in a high priority place than his personal wishes. He was able to die without yell for his own life. He maybe yelled, but never argued, or turned against His God, Who was literally deciding his life to end.
That is not usual in our context anymore. People just care for it´s own belly Button. Where can we find committed persons worried with the meaning of life or his own relevance to this world and history? There are too few. We complete lost our hope, now we don´t want to “loose” our fading time dedicated to what don´t makes us feel “alive”! We must FEEL the life the more we can cause soon or later we won´t gonna feel anything anymore. That´s assuming death, while living. We are waiting for the worst and living like that was inevitable. In another words, we changed the view from the outside values to the inside values. We stopped to look for an answer out of us, and conformed to our own and single existence like if it was the end in itself. Then, of course, we´ll never more feel hope, cause humans aren´t the reason of life.
I have to confess now, I believe in Moses. And the Jewish tradition and also the Christian, says that Moses is alive. No, he is not Elvis. He is alive for real, in Heaven right now. But we are not talking in life after death here, Jude said in his canonical book, that God raised Moses from dead and taked him alive to Heaven. In another words, I believe for sure that one day I will meet Moses. You can call it bullshit or childish thought, I call it faith. Moses call it the same. And even been a beautiful legend that you might never believe, It still was the reason to a complete committed person with real values of life. It still inspire us. It still show us, that this life worth living and spending for greater good, and has no values on humanity itself. It´s beyond us.

If you understand Portuguese, go to our Portuguese version blog at http://contextomoderno.blogspot.com The content is not the same, although I’ll start to translate my previous posts in Portuguese to post here.