Three Dog Night "Easy to be Hard" OnTV

Being - Eckhart Tolle

Although the following passage is from Eckhart Tolle's excellent book "The Power of Now" it is nothing less than the essence of Buddhism. Buddhism is not so much a religion as a philosophy. It deals with the mind, the ego and of course awareness. As I have said before, I am not Buddhist even though my eldest daughter when angry with me some months ago said, "You and your Zen Buddhist bullshit."  There is no bullshit with Buddhism only common sense and a great deal of uncommon decency. Equally, there is no bullshit in what Eckhart Tolle says below. 

I, much like Jiddu Krishnamurti, see no need to belong to any faith or philosophical group. You simply cannot find the truth or God by a single path or through group mentality. One thing is for certain though, the key to awareness, to finding 'God'  is through the mind and on that I, along with Buddhism, Jiddu Krishnamurti and Eckhart Tolle agree.

"The word Being explains nothing, nor does God. Being, however, has the advantage that it is an open concept. It does not reduce the infinite invisible to a finite entity. It is impossible to form a mental image of it. Nobody can claim exclusive possession of Being. It is your very essence, and it is immediately accessible to you as the feeling of your own presence, the realization I am that is prior to I am this or I am that. So it is only a small step from the word Being to the experience of Being.

The compulsive thinker, which means almost everyone, lives in a state of apparent separateness, in an insanely complex world of continuous problems and conflict, a world that reflects the ever-increasing fragmentation of the mind.

Enlightenment is not only the end of suffering and of continuous conflict within and without, but also the end of the dreadful enslavement to incessant thinking. What an incredible liberation this is.

The mind is a superb instrument if used rightly. Used wrongly, however, it becomes very destructive.  To put it more accurately, it is not so much that you use your mind wrongly you usually don't use it at all. It uses you. This is the disease. You believe that you are your mind. This is the delusion. The instrument has taken you over."

The Cheese Grates It: Click-Bait Articles and Bile-Yellow Journalism

I really hate clickbait "articles" with titles like "Ten Beautiful Celebrities Who Aged Horribly."

Shockingly, people age. Oh, the humanity! How dare they!

A few years back, I ripped the Daily Fail a new one (I know, not that they care) for publishing pictures of Malcolm Young, a person who could not possibly have consented to said pictures being taken of him because he has advanced dementia. Not only that, but of course they berated his appearance, including his attire (a sweatshirt and jeans), his graying hair (imagine, a person in their 60's having graying hair--what is this world coming to?) and his frailty.

They're right, of course. I mean, the crust of this rogue, having the temerity to appear frail when he's, you know, terminally ill and his brain is literally shrinking. How dare he not look like a hot, youthful stud muffin?

The caregiver who was with him was referred to as a middle-aged man, which is surprisingly generic coming from the Daily Fail. I guess since he isn't a celebrity, it wasn't worth their while to berate his appearance, although to rags such as the Daily Fail, being middle-aged is considered a terrible thing.

The photo I'm showing is one that Malcolm consented to while he was still well enough to have some autonomy. He obviously isn't well, whereas his brother looks like a reasonably healthy middle-aged fellow. When I first saw this picture, I thought that Malcolm might be developing Parkinson's disease, given his facial expression and stance.

At this point in his life, he was often accompanied by his children, his brother, or his nurse, all of whom the Daily Fail probably has something nasty to say about as well.

It's a horrible thing to go through life looking for ways to attack other people. If you don't like what you see, move the fuck on. It's simple. Other people really don't exist to be your eye candy.

The Cheese Hath Grated It

Being Poor Is More Expensive Than You'd Think @alternet

Being Poor Is More Expensive Than You'd Think @alternet: For giant corporations, there's big money to be made on the backs of those who have no money. Poor people are cash cows. It makes no sense, really. One would think that poor people, by virtue of being poor, would not be profitable customers. However, for many large corporations that target the poor and working poor, there's big money to be made on the backs of those who have no money.

The Cheese Grates It: Fat Shaming, Thin Praising, ED and Me

The look when a bunch of fat shaming "jokes" show up in your FB feed from people who should know better

The Cheese Grates It:

Fat Shaming, Thin Praising, ED and me

Trigger Warning:

Eating disorders

Diet Talk

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I'm a proponent of the Underpants Rule created by Ragen Chastain:

You are the boss of your own underpants. You are free to do with your body as you see fit.

You are not free to tell other people what to do with their bodies.

If you belittle other people's bodies, you are not some sort of champion of "health." You're a dick.

Also, while I believe in the Underpants Rule, I am under no obligation to be anyone's dieting cheerleader. I'll support people in other ways, but I'm not going to engage in Thin Praising any more than I will engage in fat shaming. I find both to be toxic.

I don't unfollow people for posting about dieting, but I do hide dieting posts. My eating disorder and I don't need to see that.

If anyone's curious about what exact eating disorder I have, the specific diagnosis is "Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified." It primarily resembles bulimia in the way it manifests.

I tend to binge and then starve myself rather than bingeing and purging.

However, sometimes I binge without starving afterward (not as often since I was diagnosed with diabetes), and sometimes I starve without bingeing first.

Starvation bouts (I'm going through one right now) can also be triggered when I skip meals because I simply don't have enough money to eat. Then when it comes time that I could eat, I don't eat because now I'm in the old Pro-Ana mode, which has mantras like "hunger hurts but starvation works."

Funnily enough, even though I often end up eating 1000 calories a day or less, I'm still fat. This isn't a lament, it's a simple observation of the fact that "calories in calories out" is an oversimplification of what really happens. There are many components to a person's body type. Energy intake and output is only a small part of the equation, or there wouldn't be any fat people. Seriously, would anyone choose to be fat in a society that treats us like shit on a daily basis simply for existing? If "eat less and exercise more" worked, pretty much everyone would already be thin. Also, you think we haven't already tried that MANY times, Asshole? Duh!

Another factor in my size is doubtless due to the fact that from the time I was twelve until I was 45, I went on numerous weight reduction diets. The end result each time was gaining back the weight I'd lost plus about 20 pounds more. I literally had to stop dieting to keep myself from gaining more weight. Once I stopped dieting, my weight stabilized. Once my diabetes was recognized and I started treating it, I lost approximately 50 pounds within two years without trying. Again, this is not an attempt to praise myself for weight loss, it's a simple statement of fact and also proof for the argument that "calories in calories out" is an oversimplification.

By the way, I'm not obsessive about carb counting or avoiding dessert. I don't have the money to be particularly choosy about what I eat these days. I eat what I can afford. When I do have the money to be more selective, I try to choose food items that have a lower glycemic impact (i.e. high fiber foods) as opposed to a low carb count per se, but I'm not obsessed with it. If I want something that has more than the recommended allotment of carbs, I'll eat it with middle finger on high to the Diet Police. Life is too damn long to choose only what makes you miserable.

Right now I'm trying to fight the old "hunger hurts but starvation works" mantra with "hunger hurts and starvation doesn't work. I'm allowed to feed my needs."

Maybe this will help somebody. I don't know.

All I know is that none of us deserve to be hated on or berated for our bodies, people who fat shame are ignorant and/or assholes, and thin praising is insidious. Thin praising is the flip side of the fat shaming coin. Both are telling us that large bodies are bad. Both are wrong.

Also, I'm trying to divorce ED. He's a shitty life partner.

~The Cheese Hath Grated It~

Om Shanti Shanti Shanti Om

Extremists

Extremists of any stripe are wrong. They defecate on the floor of the domicile we live in while we tolerate their unpleasantness before cleaning up after them. Yet we should ask what is extremism,  what is terror? Is not war terror given legitimacy by nations seeking to justify murder under the fraudulent flag of democracy? A nation who wages war on another country, their bombs tearing apart men, women and children are committing an act of terror no less evil than that of those we call terrorists or extremists. There can be no justification for slaughtering innocents.

The flaw with all Extremists is that their thinking is fundamentally flawed. In reality, they manifest their gross, often violent attributes, onto their God of choice then cherry pick sections from their holy books to support the things they do. They all seem hell bent on extracting the very worst, typically human and very ungodlike parts the better to support the heinous things they do. Their major hang-up is sex. Well, okay one of their major hang ups. What is ironic is that the word 'fornication' is not a Hebrew word. It owes its roots to the Indo-European word gwher. It has little do with sex though as its literal translation means...

"Old English beornan, byrnanbærnan (transitive), to burn; b. brimstone, from late Old English brynstn, “burning mineral,” sulfur (stn, stone; see stei-); c. brindled, from Old Norse brenna, to burn. a–c all from Germanic *brennan (intransitive) and brannjan (transitive), formed from *brenw."  The Latin, Fornix, which relates to prostitutes. It is again very possible that the word 'fornication' gets lost in translation.

If you seek justification for the violence within you then the Bible and Koran supply that. This needs addressing. The only people able to do this are Priests and Imams, by those who preach their faith in good faith, in the belief that their faiths are loving faiths, not factories where those seeking justification for their violent thoughts find vindication.

"Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor a person who commits extortion will inherit the kingdom of God." - 1 Corinthians 6:9-10

"Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body". - Corinthians 6:18 - King James Bible

"ONE SHOULD NOT PLACE CATTLE IN HEATHENS' INNS BECAUSE THEY ARE SUSPECTED OF IMMORAL PRACTICE WITH THEM. A WOMAN SHOULD NOT BE ALONE WITH THEM, BECAUSE THEY ARE SUSPECTED OF LEWDNESS, NOR SHOULD A MAN BE ALONE WITH THEM, BECAUSE THEY ARE SUSPECTED OF SHEDDING BLOOD."

Cattle? 

Really?

What is it with sex that causes them such consternation? The Old Testament clearly thinks sex is a pleasant enough distraction as shown by this beautiful poem


Song of Solomon

1:1 The song of songs, which is Solomon's.

1:2 Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth: for thy love is better than wine.

1:3 Because of the savour of thy good ointments thy name is as ointment poured forth, therefore, do the virgins love thee.

1:4 Draw me, we will run after thee: the king hath brought me into his chambers: we will be glad and rejoice in thee, we will remember thy love more than wine: the upright love thee.

1:5 I am black but comely, O ye daughters of Jerusalem, as the tents of Kedar, as the curtains of Solomon.

1:6 Look not upon me, because I am black because the sun hath looked upon me: my mother's children were angry with me; they made me the keeper of the vineyards, but mine own vineyard have I not kept.

1:7 Tell me, O thou whom my soul loveth, where thou feedest, where thou makest thy flock to rest at noon: for why should I be as one that turneth aside by the flocks of thy companions?

1:8 If thou know not, O thou fairest among women, go thy way forth by the footsteps of the flock and feed thy kids beside the shepherds' tents.

1:9 I have compared thee, O my love, to a company of horses in Pharaoh's chariots.

1:10 Thy cheeks are comely with rows of jewels, thy neck with chains of gold.

1:11 We will make thee borders of gold with studs of silver.

1:12 While the king sitteth at his table, my spikenard sendeth forth the smell thereof."

Extremists have a dislike of homosexuals that borders pathological hatred. So obsessed are they with its apparent sinfulness that some countries still stone gays. This makes me wonder what they are so scared of? Could it be some secret hidden truth? That homosexual love is as valid as heterosexual? One Evangelist, renown for his talks and debates, suggests that homosexuality is as unnatural for men to love each other, women too, as it is for fish to smoke cigars. They say the act goes against God's will. I disagree. Homosexuality exists within nature. Other animals also commit this sin. If it is a sin and since the natural world is the creation of God then why did He create it? Is He such an awful designer that his design is flawed or is the flaw the judgemental thought process of the bigot?

Could it be that when these books were either written or transcribed that birth control wasn't available? That sexually transmitted diseases were prevalent? This would have meant all manner of people having crippling, life-threatening diseases or alternatively plentiful offspring. Was this not the common sense of its time? The only exception to that would be the bias toward Homosexuals but even that might have been from health issues. 

With the world's population growing at an alarming rate, with a planet capable of supporting one billion people comfortably currently supporting seven billion and forecast to double by the middle of this century, a tragedy is waiting to happen. By the year 2050 food will be in short supply for all human life. It will no longer be a case of poor black people starving nor poor Indians but a global problem affecting Europe, America, Canada and the rest of the world. Could it then be that God in His ultimate wisdom has selected homosexuals as being a natural way of decreasing childbirth? Sure, gays can adopt, they can even have surrogate or self-inseminated births but still, Gays progeny is far less than that of heterosexuals.

Again we see where the unlearned and those unprepared or reluctant to see the history of the texts are able to pervert its historical integrity into something mean spirited and apparently contemporaneous.

They don't much like females either although I think perhaps they do but are incapable of managing their own sexual desires, unable to keep the cock in the coup preferring to let it wander in the hen house. 

“Enjoin believing women to turn their eyes away from temptation and to preserve their chastity; not to display their adornments (except such as are normally revealed); to draw their veils over their bosoms and not to display their finery except to their husbands, their fathers, their husbands’ fathers, their sons, their step-sons, their brothers, their brothers’ sons, their sisters’ sons, their women-servants, and their slave-girls; male attendants lacking in natural vigour, and children who have no carnal knowledge of women. And let them not stamp their feet when walking so as to reveal their hidden trinkets.” - Quran 24:31

The vagina is the altar of life. It is a thing to worship not deride. Men throughout history have used derogatory terms for the vagina. Gropecunt Lane was a famed London street where prostitutes plied their trade. There are many other pejorative words, an endless number, in fact, that suggest that man's love of that female body part is also his fear of the same. What he worships is what he fears - just like God.

Nor is the beauty of women a thing to be hidden away. If men cannot cope with bare flesh then perhaps they should wear blinkers. I think some already do for they only see in those trusted tramlines of a convention, of a male made convenience. It is all about power, though. Men being notoriously insecure they, when in the governance and regulations of Fundamentalists, are able to control their own dark urges by subjugating and oppressing females. This is not a characteristic showing strength but a fatal weakness. They also aren't that keen on others who don't follower their faith going so far as to committing murder and worse, genocide in what is effectively ethnic cleansing.

"We beg Thee, O Lord, indict Thy wrath on the nations not believing in Thee, and not calling on Thy name. Let down Thy wrath on them and inflict them with Thy wrath. Drive them away in Thy wrath and crush them into pieces. Take away, O Lord, all bone from them. In a moment indict all disbelievers. Destroy in a moment all foes of Thy nation. Draw out with the root, disperse and ruin unworthy nations. Destroy them! Destroy them immediately, in this very moment!"  

Prayer said on the eve of Passover  (Pranajtis: Christianus in Talmudae Judeorum, quotations from Synagoga Judaica)


Nature makes waves. Tsunami's that remove parked cars from corporate car parks like a Giant fist before tossing them into the swelling sea. This is not God and yet, if God is in everything, it is, even if only remotely. The extremist does not see God and nature as one but as two separate articles with one being the tool by which God metes out judgment. 

He sees only the 'word' of God and by that I mean the word as written in the text of his or her perceived Holy Book. What they read is what they want to believe. They do not want, either because they are too lazy or indifferent, to look beyond the words. They do not lack interest but they lack the motivation to see beyond the initial meaning, the symbolism inherent in the text put there originally by those who first wrote those texts centuries before. This means, by shallow disregard, they are then allowed by default and therefore by implied divine rectitude, to follow to the letter that which they have read which they then manifest in their minds to fulfil their needs and to serve their desire to kill. This means they can carry out the most brutal of deeds because God's word is being fulfilled.

This very act of carrying out 'Gods Will' diminishes God, it usurps His power implying He is powerless. A supreme being needs no others to act for Him as He, and He alone has ultimate power. The slaughter of one human being by execution is a crime beyond measure.  The genocidal leanings of those who use God to enable extreme prejudice, as a shield, sword and divine sanction for such evils are not themselves good they are in fact evil and are working for Lucifer, working on behalf of Iblis. They are servants of Satan not God.

"All ideologies are idiotic, whether religious or political, for it is conceptual thinking, the conceptual word, which has so unfortunately divided man." - Jiddu Krishnamurti