Imagine

What an awesome song.
Here is Neil Young singing it, for the 9/11 tribute:


I'm so happy he kept the "And no religion too". It's a bit odd though, seeing how this was probably the height of american nationalism and religiosity in the past 40 years. Three thousand people die, and Neil Young is asking them to imagine there is no heaven, no religion. But the wonderful thing is that if there is no religion, and no belief in heaven, and nothing to kill or die for, well. . .none of this would have happened. It's amazing how many people love this song without knowing what it even means, or outright ignoring what it means. 3000 people die, and people start playing an anti-religion song on the radio...pretty cool.

Maybe rock and roll will survive Jesus.

Folk Musics

It's 10:30ish AM time on the East Coast, and I haven't written here, so I should probably do that. I don't especially know what to write about, but I should keep in the habit.
I spent all yesterday on IRC, and me and a few people watched Cloverfield together, which was fun. And. . .that was all I did yesterday/today. Really.

I listened to some musics too. I have been advertizing this like crazy as of late, but if you want to listen to music for free (and also legally!) you should try Grooveshark. It goes by Youtube rules: don't post anything copyrighted, but if you do, we won't do anything unless someone complains ;). It has a lot of what I like, including 22 different options for the Season of the Witch (Donovan).
Also, it has tinysong, which is cool.

I've been listening to Nick Drake all night. Here is Pink Moon, one of his most famous: EZE.

And Parasite
Kinda sad stuff. Nick Drake was a very depressed, introverted soul.

I've been liking folk a lot. Here is Lelena.

That's all. :)

Real Life Firefox Logo

Everybody (except anyone over the age of thirty, because they're still on AOL, haha) recognizes the logo for (what should be) the most popular web browser ever, Mozilla Firefox.

The official mascot of the corporation is the Firefox, more commonly known as a red panda. However, that critter in the logo is a fox, because it looks better. Anyway, I saw an image of a red panda hugging a . . .red thing, and thought it would be funny if someone photoshopped an earth in there, so they did.

So cute! Hopefully this will replace the other, decidedly more NSFW "real life Firefox logo" that is circulating the Internets.

Why Call Jesus Racist?

"I don't believe in Jesus, and besides, I don't like him either. He's a racist."

I don't believe in the dude. . .he might exist, I don't know. . .but for some reason people seem really convinced that The Parable of The Good Samaritan betrays Jesus as racist.


Context:

On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to say to Jesus. "Teacher," he asked, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?". "What is written in the Law?" he replied. "How do you read it?" asked Jesus. The man answered: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind' and, 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'" "You have answered correctly," Jesus replied. "Do this and you will live." But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, "and who is my neighbor teacher?
In reply Jesus said:

"A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he fell into the hands of robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead with no clothes. A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, and he passed by on the other side. So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, he too passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, took him to an inn and looked after him. The next day he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper. 'Look after him,' he said, 'and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.' "Which of these three do you think was a neighbour to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?" The expert in the law replied, "The one who had mercy on him." Jesus told him, "Go and do likewise." New International Version

Well, it's pretty much about another race, a Samaritan, doing something nice, which is unexpected. And somehow telling this story makes you racist.
I had this pleasant discussion argument on IRC twice now. The opposing side says that Jesus is implying that Samaritans are inherently bad, a racist sentiment. They paraphrase him as saying "Even those filthy worthless Samaritans can do awesome deeds!". If Jesus did put it this way, then I would certainly agree that it is unequivocally a racist sentiment. But Ole Jeezy here didn't say "even", and in my opinion imply it at all. In fact, the story is interpreted by many Christians to be anti-racist.

Imagine if an anti-semite claims all Jews are selfish pigs, and I say, calmy "well, my friend is a Jew, and he gives 10% of his earnings to charity". Was that a racist sentiment? Of course not; I was giving a counter-example to his stereotype! And while it be more effective to give data showing that most Jews aren't greedy, saying that one isn't greedy shouldn't count against me as a racist statement!
"Well," they hypothetically argue "things were different back then. The Jews were racist! They all viewed the Samaritans as immoral people!"
Which is the crux of their argument. But what we are attempting to do is find out if Jesus is racist, not the writer of the book! But. . .Jesus didn't exist. Or, if he did exist, we have no reliable way of knowing if this story happened, seeing how much of his life was fabricated. So what are we doing here?
One of the following could be the case:

1. Fictitious event, the son of God did not say this, and the writer of the parable was being racist


2. Fictitious event, and the writer was not being racist


3. Jesus the son of God did say this, and was being racist


4. Jesus said it, but he was not being racist

Now, we can't get into the head of the writer (whether it be the non-omniscient Jesus or Matthew or some other dude), so that could be either 1 or 2. We have no way of really knowing, so what's the point? I can accept that he was being racist, like all in that time, or, since he was helping create a new morality, he was quite an enlightened individual.

Or, Jesus, the Son of God was real, and did speak this parable. Either He could have meant it racially or not. But think about it. If we are right about race, and there are no inherent differences based off genes, then certainly Jesus wouldn't be racist! He has the knowledge of God! So 4 wouldn't be the case, leaving 3, from a Christian standpoint.
No, you know I'm an atheist, so why would I care about 3 or 4 anyway? Well, what's the point of not liking Jesus because he's racist then? Are you trying to convert the Christians? They are working off the hypothesis that God is good, your contradicting that using a verse that can easily be interpreted both ways isn't going to change their mind! It's pointless! Say the writer was racist, sure. But it is pointless to call Jesus racist.

Also, the Kinks are a p good band.

Jejune Jubilance--what does it mean?

"Jejune jesuit" was a term used by Buck Mulligan to mock his friend Stephen Dedalus in the novel Ulysses by James Joyce. Steve, still in mourning from his mother's death about a year ago, only wears black, and makes a point of washing once a month, the blimy bohemian bastard. But Buck is still a real prick for picking on poor Stevey boy.

Stephen is an atheist and so am I. He is also an arrogant sonofagun, refusing to kneel down for his own mother on her deathbed. It takes a lot to stand up for your own lack-of-belief (har har). It's a p good book, though, about stuff that most people will find boring.

Jejune jesuit tickled my friend Evan once, even though I didn't really get it. But it's nice alliteration, and an artitistic guy like me can absolutely appreciate that, even if it does mess with his meter a bit =/

Jejune means insipid, ignorant, deficient, uninformed and childish. Jesuits are catholics, which I was baptised as but am not.

Jubilance means joyfulness, happiness! Dancing on the cieling! Something that I am not.

I kinda like the two put together. Childish, uninformed joy.

That, or "Mellifluous melancholist" was a bit of a mouthful.