You have a faith in Tao. Tao exists within every human being. Not to have faith in our fellow brothers and sisters, in ourselves is to deny the very existence of that which you have ‘faith’ in, to deny the very existence of Tao. Have a little faith brother, it can move mountains.
A
Mastriani,
I’d have to agree. The dilemma is that I would have to play the “I remember when” game, and I refuse to be that old in the head to go there. If anything concerns me, it isn’t the differences in the superficial looks, and games being played in our society. It is in the lack of teaching critical thinking at a time when we need it most desperately. Still, I rely on my observations that there are never more than 10-15% of any generation capable of serious paying attention. You speak of the nobility of your elders. Think carefully. All of the older generation? Or perhaps just that 10 % that inspired you?
Consider: not everyone is ‘out to lunch’. Look at ILP and have some confidence. We have everything from genius to idiocy here, but in the main, we have people thinking, asking questions and testing answers. Many here are or will be the opinion leaders in the various groups they will inhabit throughout their lives. I take both hope and confidence in that. No, it isn’t like the ‘old days’ (thankfully) and I don’t have the vision to say with any confidence what the future holds, but I have faith in our humaness and I truly believe we will meet the test.
Jerry,
If you can stand it, turn on the TV and watch a solid hour of MTV. If that is more than you can take, a half hour of Entertainment Tonight. Actually, about 1 minute of either should do it. 
JT
dear angel,
What you say is true, I cannot refute … except on one pivotal point:
Tao is all, all is the Way, but there are too many who have forgotten why it is they are to play game. I think you remember the song lyrics I gave in one of your threads, for the “Headless Children”.
brother tenative, all I can say to you is that you are far more sagacious a spirit than I. I am truly humbled.
(stole that word from the braingel … thanks lady, you just made me look smartified)
Yes, I remember quite clearly. But if I were to give up because others have given up, that would be fatal, that would be to allow myself to be overcome by the very same forces that have imprisoned them and to not allow the Master within me to align with Tao. That would be a grave mistake, that would be a waste of my life.
A
Things are different for each of us angel.
I am very human, especially in error, and sometimes life hands out brutalities that change a perspective, whether the spirit takes heed or not, the mind remembers.
I am not a causeless misanthrope, errant or not, my reasons are relevant in this respect.
Brutalities although seemingly harsh are nothing more than our own creations. We create our reality, it is only the timeframe that we struggle with. Everything under the sun has a reason. Important for us to understand the structure in order for us to make changes.
A
Well, as arrogant as this will sound, I will say it anyways.
I am certain that I understand the structure and order, thus my stance doesn’t change. I require positive proof from other humans before my perspective will begin to accept change. Other humans, thus far, have failed to proffer anything to alter that perception.
Ah Mast, I can see that your cynicism arises from a real sense of suffering. But to wait for that which is external to make the first move is to not understand who and what you are.
A
Mastriani,
Perhaps a perspective to consider? The world and all the humans residing are simply being who they are. Some are saintly, some are the epitomy of evil. 99% haven’t the courage to be either. Most of them (us?) bumble through as best they can. Whether that is a source of inspiration or disallusionment is what we choose to focus upon. Is the cup of humanity half full or half empty? Many have suffered at the hands of their fellows and still find that which is good in man. It is a choice that we make. But whatever our view of our fellows, we make it what it is.
I am the least perfect of creatures. I ought to know, afterall, I’m talking about me. Still, for all that I am not, there is a few small things that I am. I grant that to every other human as well. We’re a mixed bag, we are. I prefer to see us with all the potential of good.
JT
I wonder if angel and tenative are familiar with Juvenal?
Master cynic was Juvenal. Learned much from him I have.
Perhaps a quote: “Honesty is praised and thus starves.”
Yes, I am most definitely a cynic, a large part of my affection for the works of the cantankerous old Quangzi.
Learn from the teachers and move on. Keep on moving.
A
<note to self: apparently no one takes you seriously when you say “no really, I’m an idiot”>
LMAO.
Ha ha Mast, you should take a page out of tentative’s book. He knows when to give up don’t you JT?
A
Juvenal… Takes me waaaay back, but yes. Somehow I managed to get past him. He definitely managed to find the dark side. Quangzi on the other hand, while certainly serving up examples of human failure, also was the pointing finger… His stories make the Tao Te Ching come alive in many respects.
Again, if you need confirmation of human failings you will find them aplenty. But if you seek the good in humanity you will find that as well.The manifest is neutral. All that is good and all that is evil is contained there. Choose one or the other, or find understanding and see both.
JT
Well brother tenative, as I have said, and more precisely displayed, duality still exists for me.
I challenge you though that it is not a desire to find the less than wholesome, it is far too often freely given without request. Therein lies the source of my misanthropic “pathology”.
<quietly sneaks into tenatives room, and steals playbook - ah hell, this is the nice guys playbook … pffffftttt … heads for the pub, disgruntled>
Well this thread has resembled anything I anticipated. I am not sure if the Tao can explain my rant as jerry would like, so I will go with this.
Firstly, to say that I believe Americans are despicable is a mis-characterization of my view. Frankly, all human beings are despicable. While this may sound misanthropic, it is not, for several reasons. To begin with, unlike most Misanthropes, I include my very own self within the ranks of Humanity, i.e., I despise that which I am.
I could argue that self loathing is simply the result of unhappiness. Say, if I believe curing cancer is a wonderful thing and a worthy goal but I spend all my time reading Philosophy as opposed to reading medical texts, if i study philosophy in college instead of medicine, I am failing to do what I can to bring something, I myself feel is worthy, into the world.
But being that I live in the world now, I do not judge my lack of dedication, nor my disparate interests, as being themselves despicable. These are goals I set. Priorities that exist in a hierarchy I myself build.
How do I know that I make my own priorities? Well it is easy, I live in a free country. I am not bound to one path in life… don’t you agree Jerry?
I mean, isn’t your story here, really, that fiscal success is not bad in itself? If I were to dedicate my life to the attainment of money, well that is just another priority. Nothing is inherently wrong in priorities… right?
But then in choosing and following the priorities I set for myself, don’t I then become responisble for my choices? If I say “I want to be a business man” and I fail in business, isn’t it most American to say that my failure is really my fault? That I live in a free country, I had every opportunity everyone else had, regardless of whether I grew up in a slum, and my competitor was Donald Trump’s son, my failure is my fault.
Or is it really more american to say that we are all equal, and thus similarly talented in some fashion, thus if I fail it must be because of something in the system itself, something that our government can only address?
What if both points of view seemed mutually viable, how would you answer this. You may say one is right, or one is wrong, but you won’t deny that either is American.
I reject both these ideas, human and their americanized versions, as a false dichotomy.
I submit that the priorities we set are expressions of our nature and that they are not valueless. If I make it a goal in my life to kill everyone who does not have blonde hair and blue eyes, I would wager that you would say such a goal is, in itself, wrong and that something is broken within me for choosing it.
If you were to say such things about my stated goal I would agree . But note that the rightness or wrongness of a thing does not rely on our affirmation. I can make a claim and you are free to affirm or deny for any reason… maybe I am paying you to agree, maybe you feel like fighting and so you deny just for the sake of denial itself, in the hopes it will lead to a physical altercation.
Being free, you cannot be compelled to agree or disagree either way. Compelled, no, never. However you can be coerced. Bought off, bribed. Prostituted.
If I brought before you a man, and laid him out at your feet and withdrew a gun and asked, “Let me kill this man”? Would you let me?
What if I said “This man has weapons, he means you harm” Would you let me kill him then?
What if I said, “if you let me kill him I will give you a tax cut” would you go for it?
here comes the philosophical part
Man is an animal, and yet, not an animal. What an animal wants he takes by force, or by stealth. What man wants he takes by force or by stealth.
In a Democracy I cannot compell you, ie, force you, to let me take what I want. So, as an animal, I must use stealth.
This is nothing new to human beings or Democracy, according to Plato, the Sophists are those that use the stealth of words to compell men to be animals.
The Republic is chock full of many ideas, one of if not the central idea is this, Man is Man when he employs his rational faculties. It is the mind that separates us from the herds that are ruled by the loudest or the strongest. It is the mind that built the civilazations that do not require us to crawl on our stomachs to find the next meal.
And it is the same mind which we use to determine which goals are truly valuable, and which are only the result of our animal appetites.
Think of the animal appetite as that which seeks immediate gratification. “I want food” “I want sex” “I want lots of dead arabs” “I want oil” “I want tax cuts”
Think of the mind as that part which rules over the appetite.
It is the rational faculty which must ultimately apprehend the ‘good’ or the ‘bad’ or the ‘indifferent’ in any task we choose. And we do choose them, Jerry… we could not call ourselves a free people without even the illusion of choice.
As for my rant about America… you could apply it to any nation in the world, though some are not “free” as we take “freedom” to mean, they tell themselves only slightly modified lies.
As a free people, Jerry
We choose mediocrity over substance
We choose quantity over quality
We choose waste over thrift
We choose war over peace
We choose comfort over character
We choose entertainment over education
We choose violence over dialogue
We choose ignorance over truth
We choose expediancy over struggle
We choose imitation over creativity
Notice this, I need not posit some vast right wing or left wing conspiracy Jerry… such fables obfuscate the truth. And neither am I writing about our forefathers of yore, racists, rapists, and murderers that some of them, no doubt, were.
No Jerry, this was the Human condition as it existed in Athens, this is the human condition as it is, so long as we are ruled by our less noble passions.
I hope I have made myself understood, and if so I conclude as I did in my rant
You can run anywhere, but you can never escape yourself.
GCT,
I had a long, eloquent reply about halfway written when I remembered that I have elsewhere declared my quality most appreciated in a poster is brevity. Plus which, I fear my reply would fall on deaf ears.
You, my friend, have dug a hole the bottom of which I have no rope long enough to reach.
I have also been accused earlier today under another thread of “preaching.†So I have no desire to do that either.
I’m not seeing a real difference between your view of humanity and Mastriani’s view of humanity. And so I will only repeat what I said to him: We each have to make this choice, whether or not to have faith or trust in other human beings. I have made a different choice.
I do appreciate you at least saying that your contempt for mankind stretches beyond the boundaries of the United States and could apply to any nation in the world.
I also appreciate this: “You can run anywhere, but you can never escape yourself.â€
I’m just wondering if you fully understand the truth of this.
For myself, I see neither GCT or Jerry “preaching”.
GCT and I, which I was previously unaware of, share some common themes of thought, in an almost a priori fashion.
Strangely, this is one of the few times I have seen ideological discussion as opposed to self-affirming, ego-touting, knowledge spewing.
I realize that Mr. Jerry “chooses” to view humanity with an outspoken optimism, which is valuable and honorable. I won’t speak for GCT, but for myself, I can’t view the humanity cup as half full, based upon exactly what GCT so eloquently stated:
My only place of difference with GCT, may be that I have travelled abroad, and in many non-westernized countries, there was a commonness of the people that did not affirm branded arrogance.
I still have friends in other countries, and they openly and derisively jab me about the influence of “American culture” on the ethics, morals and principles in their now westernizing nations - they are displeased for exactly the reasons that GCT enumerated in his list - avarice for the material is destroying the fabric of once great nations and cultures.
I think there is more to be said, but I’ll just stfu for now. Fool that I am, I always have something to say.