Religion and War

For the better part of my life, I thought that wars, the vast majority that is, were caused by religion. Much of this opinionated clap-trap was undoubtedly due to my then dislike of organised religion. I still to this day see little point in organised anything especially religion but no longer have any angst with religious people or those of faith.  I truly thought war was largely the fault of religion. How wrong was I?

Thanks to the informative book, “Encyclopedia of Wars” by authors Charles Phillips and Alan Axelrod, we now have presented to us all the wars in the last 2,000 years, 1,763 of them in total, with only 123 being caused by religion. This fact can also be found with a little research of history books or via the internet. 1,763 wars with only 123 attributable to religion.Still, the myth persists that religion causes conflict.

Many of these so-called religions aren't religions at all but due to the sudden desire of those seeking to apportion blame where little blame can be apportioned, it makes a better argument, bogus to the point of being absurd, to have as many philosophies lumped in with religions the better to make the point.

How many wars has Buddhism, a philosophy, a science and a psychiatry, actually waged? Although Buddhism is not, as many people think, wholly pacifist, there are few wars in which Buddhism has fought as a 'faith.' This does not mean there have been no acts of violence as there has but this is debatable as to whether the violent acts where the actions of true Buddhist's or those claiming to be Buddhist. And of course, there are the Shaolin Monks whose mastery of Kung Fu has been used in self-defence which may be said to be an act of violence. For myself, I would suggest that the act of self-defence is as natural as breathing and is, therefore, a part of our animal nature. To defend oneself or one's children or loved ones from an attack is legitimate. Suicide isn't. Causing self-harm, even in protest, is wrong. Buddhists, so called, have been involved in wars. I find this very sad, sad beyond belief.

Jainism is said to be the gentlest, most peaceful of 'religions, although it too could be argued as not being a religion at all. Jain Dharma is co-joined with Sanatana or Hindu Dharma and Buddism. Even though Jains, unlike Buddhist's, have not engaged in wars they do believe in self-defence.

I am unclear if Taoism has ever been involved in wars but strongly suggest they never have. It really goes against their collective grain. However, Lao Tzu, the father figure of Taoism repeatedly said not to create a religion from his teachings. "The Tao that can be expressed is not the eternal Tao; The name that can be defined is not the unchanging name." As a philosophy, it works well and is highly regarded by Libertarians. Not the American, neo-libertarians but the original anarchists. 

I could continue in a similar vein listing all religions and philosophies who have not been involved in wars but won't. For one reason it would only highlight those faiths who have been drawn into a war. I would humbly suggest that no true person or persons of faith have ever entered into war but rather have had their faiths name used as an excuse by the leaders of their respective churches. You do not need Priests, Popes, Bishops, Mullahs, Gurus or Llamas. By having leaders you run the risk of having another dictate matters. This is when crusades get started. 

Of the 123 wars caused by religion, that is 7% of the total figure, 4% of those wars can be blamed on Muslim's. This too is an uncomfortable truth. I find a lot of the blame game pointless. There are those who repeatedly point the finger of blame regarding violent acts on Islam. This is not the truth yet all the same that 4% when the total figure is 123 then the wars caused by Muslims is 188.

Personally, I think the Dalai Lama has it right when he stated that there is no Buddhist, Christian or Islamic terrorist. A terrorist is a merely that - a terrorist. The same can be said of anyone who claims to be of a certain faith yet wages war, not in defence of themselves nor the homeland they live in but for the exercise of power over those they see, not the god they claim to follow, as being wrong. There are many paths to God. All paths are right.

In his book, "The End of Faith," Sam Harris suggests that faith, all faiths need to go the way of the dinosaur. I have no faith. I am of no particular group. Yet, the very idea that religions are going to accede to this simplistic view is juvenile. It is not the religion, it is not the faith that is at fault. It is the few who pervert others faith the better to suit their own ends. Religion has throughout its existence been the tool of those whose sole purpose has been to corrupt then control the faithful.  The Roman Empire is a perfect example.

Even Christopher Hitchens, a man sadly missed and who I am enamoured with,  certainly his razor-sharp intellect, got it wrong when he published his book, "God Is Not Great." First, you'd need to define God. Not the word which is man-made, not the deity which is the personification of a thing man can not easily describe let alone understand. Surely, Thich Nhat Hanh's beautiful description best describes God. God is everything. God is all around us. God is within and without us. What Christopher Hitchens takes an axe to is merely the Abrahamic view of God, of a deity. 

Even Richard Dawkins book, "The God Delusion," in its attack on the Old Testament, only succeeds in destroying the myths and fables found with a book riddled with symbolism. It does not, cannot even scratch the surface of what man has selected to designate as God for the actuality is beyond attack.  

All these estimable gentlemen can do is disprove the magical, supernatural nature of the faiths and religions that worship a deity. They can show how many of these faiths practises are questionable in light of a world, its people, whose morals are far older than those religions and who see religious morals, as presented in Holy Books, as immoral. There is nothing supernatural about God. God is us and we are God.

Religious wars have become an excuse for latecomers, born-again Humanists, who have turned against a thing they want to see as bad because some of its texts are vaguely silly. They need to rationalise their own brand of anti-religion, which in itself is a religion, the better to berate a thing they dislike. Therefore they blame ALL wars, or at least the great many of them, on religion. This is false. This enables those in power, the George W Bush's, the Donald Trump's, the Tony Blair's, to take up arms, to wage war against those they fear for political ends.  Religion is not the cause of all wars. Man is.

Happy Basant Panchami

"Vasant Panchami, also spelt Basant Panchami, is a spring festival celebrated in India by Dharmaists. It is observed on the fifth day of the Indian traditional calendar month of Magha, which typically falls in the Gregorian months of January or February.

The festival is celebrated in various ways depending on the region. Many revere goddess Saraswati, the deity of learning, arts and music. She is celebrated with visits to her temples, by playing music, as well as the day when parents sit down with their children, initiate them into writing letters of alphabet or study together.

Others mark it as the festival of god Kama, the deity of love, by remembering the loved one particularly one's spouse or special friend, celebrating it with spring flowers. Its link with the god of love and its traditions have led some scholars to call it "a Hindu form of Valentine's Day". Others wear yellow clothes and eat yellow rice to emulate the yellow mustard (sarson) flower fields, or play by flying kites."

The Cheese Grates It: An Angry Cog

Source: Anonymous Art of Revolution

I was in the public school system from 1970 until I graduated in 1983. I became well aware by the time I was in junior high that they were trying to churn out cogs for the machine. I didn't want to become one of those cogs.
Although my life did not work out at all like I planned and I now work in a low-paying contract labor job and have to be careful not to earn too much so I don't lose Medicaid (I have several serious health concerns), I still refuse to bow down and be a happy little cog dependent on my Soma. I'd rather be an angry cog criticizing the individuals and problems spoken of in this post and trying in whatever small way I can to work for change. I may go to my grave a pauper, but at least I never became one of their kind.

~The Cheese Hath Grated It~

Spoken by a patriot who is extremely distressed at the destruction of my country by demagogues and theocrats.

This is not my America.

Copyright juliahenze@123rf

Also visit me at Sly Fawkes and Sly's Free Speech Space

The Cheese Grates It: Dark Night of the Long Grass

Night of the Long Grass by The Troggs Released 1967

The Cheese Grates It:

Dark Night of the Long Grass

The above has been one of my favorite songs since I first discovered it in my pre-teen years. I was somewhere between ten and twelve, I honestly don't remember exactly. As I will be 53 years old in approximately three weeks, I hope I can be forgiven for the fact that most of my childhood memories are fairly misty. I tend to remember emotions rather than exact events. The most prevalent emotion that has permeated my life is sorrow.

I seem to be constantly losing things. All of my life I have misplaced things. At this point I speak of losing people and beliefs. I will say right now that anyone reading this can check their "seek counseling and meds" trope at the door. I've tried both at various times in my life and neither works. So, let us allow ourselves to speak in terms of emotion rather than things strictly physical. I've found that approaching matters from a strictly physical viewpoint has never worked for me in any case.

One of the prompts I'm working with asks me to state one of my strongest beliefs and then disprove it. I'm not going to do that. That strategy is for those who delight in playing devil's advocate. I've never been that sort of person. In any case, believe it or not, I have no strong beliefs. I don't believe in much of anything anymore. The world has torn away all of my beliefs from me. Some will say this is a good thing. To them I will say "fuck you," as I am tired of hurting.

I don't follow any sort of religion. I don't need dogma or the promise of an eternal heaven, which, from what I can gather, is rather like an eternity on a constant winning streak in Vegas, to convince me to try and be a good person. I've never been to Vegas during my lifetime, and I can do without going there in the Afterlife. I also don't need the threat of an overbearing deity sending me to hell to convince me not to do awful things to others. I don't do awful things because it's wrong to cause harm, not because I fear the wrath of a celestial patriarch who will cause me to suffer for eternity. 

The God that I learned of in my youth, when I was, by the way, a very devout Catholic who truly believed in Him, came to seem to me to be an abusive megalomaniac of a parent. For those with different perceptions, it is not my intent to attack your devotion or convince you to stop believing. This is my perception. 

I initially lost my religion in my late teens and could never go back to it. It does not ring true for me anymore.

I discovered Wicca and New Age ideals when I was in my late teens. I lost my religion again in my late forties, having discovered time and again that much of the New Age thinking is rife with victim-blaming and My Way or the Highway thinking, just like the religion I left behind in my late teens. Although some of the mystical practices that I did as a solitary practitioner brought me a degree of solace, I was too hurt by those I had interacted with in an attempt to find camaraderie to continue them.

I am not an atheist, if for no other reason than the fact that the idea of the here and now being the be all and end all is simply too fucking depressing for me to abide it. I continue to at least believe in the possibility of spirits, angels, other dimensions, an afterlife, because it brings me a grain of solace to do so, and I'm not going to try and disprove it, simply because it can be neither proven nor disproven given modern scientific methods and tools. If you wish to read theories disproving the existence of these things, there are a plethora of atheist writings devoted to doing just that. No, I am not going to point you in the direction of such works. Google is your friend. I am merely a remote person ranting in the dungeon of my own sorrowful hell and finding no solace. 

I lost a lot last year, including my occupational identity. I had been a nurse for close to two years and had been a caregiver for close to twenty-five. My own health was deteriorating, and I was fired because I fell into a deep sleep while working a night shift. I had seen the warning signs. I was dozing off more often during the night. I knew that my diabetes was getting worse, but I was trying to pull together the time and money to go to the doctor. I worked myself into the ground because people needed me. 

The other nurse on the case was sick. I was sick too, but I had contracted the illness from the patient I worked with three days a week, so the case coordinator felt that I could keep working with him because I couldn't re-infect him. 

I fell into an extremely deep sleep which I don't remember falling into. I woke up to see the patient's father sitting on the side of the bed, glowering at me. I collected my belongings, apologized profusely, and left. The family embellished the tale, stating that I was ordered to leave. I was not. In fact, the father told me I could finish the shift. I told him that I felt it would be better if I left, and that I would remove myself from the case. 

When I was called into the office, my coordinator said that I had always done good work for the company and that he would give me a positive recommendation to any potential employers who called, but would have to tell them that I wasn't eligible for rehire. I was polite and brief, thanked him, and left without making a scene.

I worked with another patient through another company until that patient became severely ill and had to be hospitalized. The company didn't get me another case. I ended up delivering food via Uber Eats. I tried driving passengers through Lyft and Uber. Some dumb stoner kid backed into the rental car I was driving, and that was that. The company I'd rented the car through didn't credit me for the unused days. I was out a thousand dollars.

I tried going back into working in a long term care setting, and ended up nearly passing out. I tried working for yet another homecare agency, but found that I could no longer do the extremely physical portion of the work. I left nursing entirely.

For a time, I worked for a grocery delivery service. However, the service was poorly run. Often I would be sent out with a bag full of ten deliveries, and I would come to find out that I was making the delivery several hours after it had been placed. The company never called the customer to advise them that the delivery would be so late. Often there would be one manager on while the other managers acted as drivers. I ended up with severe nerve impingement in my left arm and a badly inflamed lateral epicondyle, which left me unable to sit up for long periods of time because the pain was so intense. At this point the pain is gone, but the numbness and tingling in my left hand remains. It may never resolve.

While I was working for this company, I would wake up screaming every day due to horrific cramps in my calves. My tendency to sleep paralysis also worsened exponentially during this time.

I parted ways with this company after a person who had meant a lot to me from the time of my very troubled youth died far too young from early onset dementia. The man wasn't young when he died--he was sixty-four years old--but he was too young for such an awful fate. Dementia seems to me to be the Universe taking a huge shit on a person, and this man didn't deserve that. He tried to be kind. He was flawed, but he tried to be good in spite of his own predisposition to addiction and depression, and the fact that he had a bit of a temper. He didn't deserve the way he went out. His mind was his defining feature, and he was robbed of it. He didn't consider himself physically attractive or particularly charming or especially talented, but he did seem to pride himself on his innovation and determination. That he couldn't have been allowed to find comfort in those things during his last days seems like nothing but a huge slap in the face, and I hate it.

I know that there are those who have lost everything and yet manage to maintain their beliefs and avoid bitterness. I suppose I'm not as good as such people. Honestly, I've never seen much good in me. I don't like myself very much, if one is to be entirely honest, and I doubt I ever will. Still, I used to have my imagination and my wonderful world where fantastic dreams could come true. At this point I seem to be losing even that, so you'll pardon the fuck out of me if I don't feel like disproving whatever fragile bits of belief may remain.

Perhaps this is more a confession than an actual rant. In some ways, once a Catholic always a Catholic. I haven't forgotten how to confess.

If I am ever diagnosed with dementia, I will commit suicide. Anything else, I will put up a fight and let it takes me when it takes me. Dementia does not get that much respect. Fuck dementia. It destroys everything that a person is. My aunt has dementia, and she no longer communicates with words. If one speaks to her, she giggles. She wanders and is forever searching for something that she cannot put a name to. At least she is not combative and she doesn't seem particularly distressed. However, she is not herself and hasn't been for a long time. I will not become that way.

Forgive me for at least hoping that there is something better on the other side for those who have suffered. Forgive me for at least believing in the possibility of magic and an afterlife even though I quite question the interpretation of the Higher Power in which many people believe. Forgive me for being neither here nor there, for being neither a believer nor a non-believer. Or don't. What I believe or don't believe really matters to no-one but me.

~The Cheese Hath Grated It~

 Prompts Used:

The Daily Post: Strategy

ISFP Prompts

Mindlovemisery's Menagerie

Thich Nhat Hanh

The Cheese Grates It: My Resolution to Minimize Body-Shaming Psychic Attacks

Per my resolution to minimize the amount of toxic, ignorant, psychic attacks negatively impacting my life, I kicked the radio station which had been my primary choice to the curb following an onslaught of weight loss surgery ads and the afternoon DJ making the inane remark that "exercising makes you feel thinner. This is especially true for women." 

I now have the radio in the Forester permanently tuned to the publicly funded jazz station. I have satellite radio in the Fusion, which tends to be on one of the 70's or 80's stations or the Underground Garage. They don't blather on and on about bullshit calculated to offend and shame people with non-optimal appearances: bigger people, older people, women who aren't conventionally attractive.

 It's a huge relief to be able to do my job and have some music to keep me from dying of boredom without some stupid advertisement or idiot remark from one of the DJ's raising my blood pressure multiple times during my shift. I've thought about writing a letter to the radio station, but I doubt it would do any good.  

I hope one day we will have a world where a radio station playing such toxic advertising would be flooded by emails rebuking them. 

People deserve to live their lives without being constantly reminded that they are seen as undesirable thanks to the constant brainwashing by mega-corporations hell-bent on taking their money.

Advertising is usually a form of attack rather than an informative medium.

It's time to stop kowtowing to the Frankenstein monster which was in no small part created by behaviorist John B. Watson. Watson was a bit of a shit in any case. He was unscrupulous in his experimentation on vulnerable subjects. 

We need to learn to think for ourselves rather than allowing advertisers to mold our beliefs.

~The Cheese Hath Grated It~

Happy Makar Sankrant

"Makar Sankrant is a Hindu festival that celebrates the sun's journey into the northern hemisphere, a period which is considered to be highly auspicious. There is a wide variation in the celebration of Makar Sankranti thoughout India, in particular the name. Celebrations in different Indian regions In Gujarat and Maharashtra, Makar Sankranti is a festival of the young and the old. Colourful kites are flown all around. In Punjab, Makar Sankranti is called Lohri. December and January are the coldest months of the year in Punjab and huge bonfires are lit on the eve of Sankranti. Sweets, sugarcane and rice are thrown on the bonfires and friends and relatives gather together. In Uttar Pradesh, this period is celebrated as Kicheri. It is considered important to have a bath on this day and masses of people can be seen bathing in the Sangam at Prayagraj where the rivers Ganga, Jamuna and Saraswathi flow together. In Southern India it's the harvest festival Pongal and lasts for 3 days. On the first day, rice boiled with milk is offered to the Rain God. On the second day, it is offered to the the Sun God and on the third day, the family cattle are given a bath and dressed with flowers, bells and colours, to honour them for their hard work in the fields."

Text courtesy of the BBC's religions page. 

Compassion is Not Weakness

The Cheese Grates It Poetically: The Vile Truth

Abandoned House

Image obtained from wallpaperfo.com

Content warnings for profanity and gloomy, pissed-off poetry
If you have a problem with either of those, don't read this and then bitch about it
Anyway, I didn't write it for you

The Vile Truth

It's time to write a poem all about me

To tell a truth which will set no-one free

I won't deny, it will be bleak 

If sweetness you want, somewhere else you should seek

For I speak only the vile truth

***

I graduated high school back in 1983

Into a world which despises people like me

I was never spry or slick 

Nobody wanted to be my sidekick

I was one of the forgotten people

***

Let's get the eating disorder aside first

For although it's bad, it isn't the worst

In a world which treats thinner people like they walk on water 

My sin was being the chunky-thighed, chipmunk-faced daughter

A plump, unloved candle with two charred ends

***

Starve until you get thin then binge when you can no longer stand it

Same sorry story, I'm so done with this shit

To spy on celebrities and watch their weight with disdain

This society has a lot of reasons to be ashamed

A dose of fetish in a shallow, judgmental world

***

Why don't you sprinkle on a little more self-righteous hate

When I look at you, what I see isn't that great
You tap-dance a sleazy staccato while you whistle a disdainful tune
Sing "I'm prettier than my brother" as you sashay across the room
Attractive on the outside, but filled with a soul-scathing darkness 

***

Perhaps you should pay more attention to the shadows in the cellar
Of your own soul, and not that of the other fellow
Watch your back is something I learned long ago
Men who tell me I'm pretty have a hand they won't show
Predators have left me with a heart made of frozen filaments

***

 I funnel my sorrowfulness into my writing though I don't believe
That anything of worth in this life I will achieve
She ran away from everything that hurt her, even herself
I have nothing to brag on, not fame, wealth, or health
My struggles inescapable: a mind without doors

***

 If the deities think there are different things I should do
I want to hear it from them, not you
I don't know if I believe in magic any more
But perhaps one day the fairies will settle the score
I can't help but hope for the wrath of the dryads

***

On this shallow world
Which destroys those
Who are not deemed beautiful
In a very narrow way
Which judges people on looks rather than 
On the way they treat others

~Cie~

Notes:

Yes, I'm angry.

No, I don't want your suggestions on how I can finally become thin, beautiful, and find Prince Charming.

I want a world where we don't judge people on their physique or their perceived beauty, and Prince Charming would be just one more pain in the ass whose needs I had to attend to.

I don't pull punches with my poetry. 

I don't write about sweetness and light.

To me, poetry is hyperbolic.

It isn't a process of trying to make myself into one of the shiny happy people instead of an icky, dark, depressive thing.

It is simply me expressing thoughts that are not appropriate dinner conversation.

I am nearly 53 years old and I have a lot of health problems plus I live with a brain that has been trying to kill me for my entire life. 

To break that down into a diagnosis that people who need an explanation for everything can understand, I have three major mental illnesses and I do not respond well to medication. I live with this shit. I accept this shit. But that doesn't mean I necessarily like it. Whatever potential I had was stolen from me by mental illness and more so by a society which has disdain for people like me, make no mistake.

As to my body, I discovered health at every size and size acceptance when I was 45. If I had discovered these critical concepts years ago, I might not have tried to starve myself into an arbitrary "acceptable" size. I might not have wasted hours a day at the gym instead of spending time with my son in his early years, all in the quest of achieving a "perfect" body so someone might "love" me. My overexercising (orthorexia) contributed to a lot of the musculoskeletal problems I now have. I couldn't exercise like that anymore even if I wanted to. 

Further, these behaviors never made me thin. I do not have the kind of body that will be thin regardless of how much I starve or overexercise it. Unless I become terminally ill as my great-grandmother did (acute myelogenous leukemia took her from 300 pounds to 95 pounds in the space of a year and then she died--but, hey, she cut a svelte figure in her casket!) I will never be thin. Fuck it. If this is a problem for you, than you're the one with the problem. You shouldn't be judging people based on their body type.

I'm diabetic, so I have to be careful about what I eat. My go-to snack is seasoned Kale. My treat is five of those little "fun size" candy bars: two sugar-free and three regular. I drink unsweetened nut milk, which is 45 calories per cup. Do I think this makes me some kind of saint? Fuck no! It actually pisses me the hell off to have to mind what I eat to this degree, and, in fact, I find discussions of diet and exercise boring as fuck. Who the fuck cares what you eat or how much you exercise? I certainly don't, it's none of my damn business. I only mention it because my point is I eat a very restrictive diet and I'm still fat. A person's body type is much more complex than "calories in, calories out."

I have to inject insulin because I have a zombie pancreas. I also have to take thyroid medication, because I have a zombie thyroid. My PCOS is pretty well resolved thanks to menopause. However, my pituitary is whack in some sort of unspecified way. I have a crappy, third-rate endocrine system. My crappy, third-rate endocrine system insures that in a world where thinness is next to godliness, I will always be fat. I honestly don't care about that. It just pisses me off that so many people do care about it, and, further, that they think it is their right to care about it.

Here is your TL:DR takeaway:

Quit judging other people for their looks or based on what you think they "should" have accomplished in their lives. You probably don't know what battles they're fighting or how much impact your words have. If blaming and shaming worked, we would have no addicts, no fat people, and no-one would be mentally ill or struggling for even the most meager of "success." Try a measure of kindness instead.

~The Cheese Hath Grated It~

 Prompt List

The Daily Post
Funnel

Daily Text Prompt:
I want to hear it from them, not you

Hourly Writing Prompts:
Sorrowfulness

Mindlovemisery's Menagerie 

Prompts Blog:
I'm prettier than my brother
 

 We Write At Dawn:
Watch your back

WNQ-Writers:
She ran away from everything that hurt her, even herself 

Word and Phrase List

binge

deny

sidekick

sin

slick 

sprinkle

spy

staccato

thinner

watch

water

whistle

funnel
sorrowfulness 
I'm prettier than my brother
I want to hear it from them, not you
Watch your back

The Vile Truth

Shadows in the Cellar

Frozen Filaments

Inescapable: A Mind without Doors

Soul Scathing Darkness

Wrath of the Dryads

A Dose of Fetish

The Forgotten People

Charred Ends

1983

The Cheese Grates It: I Just Can't Even With This Shit

Yep, this isn’t gross, disrespectful, or fetishizing at all.
Not like it totally ignores a person’s illness and suffering. Forget that. They looked sexy when they posed for a picture 50 years ago.
Yes, this shit actually is a problem. It isn’t cute or funny. It’s entitlement.
Let me break it down a little.

Here’s David Bowie. He was so very talented. He was kind and gentle. Yes, he was attractive. Shockingly, it is possible to find people attractive while still respecting them and not fetishizing them. This kind of becomes even more important when the person is no longer of this world.
David Bowie died of cancer early in 2016. But by all means, let’s fetishize and objectify him. Because that’s hawt.

Here’s a picture of a young David Cassidy with his brother, Shaun.
David Cassidy was very attractive.
He was also much more troubled than most people realized.
He developed dementia in his later years. This isn’t what killed him directly, although it eventually would have. He died from multiple organ failure. His last words to his daughter were “so much wasted time.”
That’s really fucking sad.
But, by all means, do continue to objectify him. Because your masturbation fantasy is far more important than showing respect for the dead, and it surely is not possible to find someone attractive without fetishizing them.

Malcolm Young wasn’t conventionally attractive, but there are certainly plenty of entitled individuals who see fit to fetishize him, even though his illness and decline were beyond tragic. For the past ten years, his brain was literally deteriorating, and, at the end, he didn’t even recognize the people who meant the most to him, such as his children and his siblings.
But, by all means, objectify the fuck out of him, because one time, nearly forty years ago, there was a picture of him that looked like this.

Don’t forget to fetishize his grieving brother too, even though he’s still alive. It isn’t like he’s a human being or anything. He’s there as fodder for your fantasy.

Since the grossness wouldn’t be complete if you weren’t fetishizing the entire family, here’s a picture of a youthful George Young back in the 1960′s. George died back in October. He was a really talented musician and producer. But who cares about that? He was sexy in his youth!

As an added bonus, you can fetishize Alex Young too. He died in 1998 from lung cancer. Suffering and death, that’s so hot. Particularly since it’s completely impossible to find people attractive without objectifying them.
The reason I find this sort of thinking atrocious is because it is rife with entitlement (my desires above everything else) while completely lacking empathy. It isn’t cute. It isn’t funny. It isn’t edgy. It’s perverse.
When I say “perverse,” I don’t mean sexually kinky. I mean it deviates from right thinking. By right thinking, I mean having an attitude of compassion towards others. Seeing others as objects to be ogled and utterly ignoring their struggles is sociopathic. It takes only your own desires into account. People become things. A world in which people are seen as things is an ugly world.
The Cheese Hath Grated It

Pax Vobiscum

Pax Vobiscum