Vandaag een gastoptreden van het Roodgebaarde Orakel uit China, Theophontes. In het Engels, weliswaar, maar gesneden koek voor de meesten onder ons, wat? Enjoy!
My criticism of some humanists with the debate on Libya:
We blithely trot out the claim of being (secular) humanists as long as the weather is fair. But what happens when a group of people – just like us! – are shelled for claiming, in small measure, the freedoms that allow us to communicate so freely with each other?
One often finds a quotation of Epicurus*** in the atheist blogosphere. The lines in which he attacks the believers’ idea of god, showing how inefficacious it is. Yet we are in danger of falling into the same predicament when we do not turn our ideas of humanism into something effective and meaningful. Something that upholds the ideals we like to claim as we sit on our asses and type our comments. Allow me to paraphrase the relevant part of his argument:
Are we able [to prevent evil], but not willing? Then we are malevolent. (… and might as well fuck off right now!)
There are two points of view that have been made (amongst others) that stand out as particularly unsupportable:
Thinking that it is all about the USA and that the “other”, “out there” (the uppity Libyans in this case) are somehow less important than the petty political rivalries that so animate the US natives. The Libyans are still human beings, people! Like you and I.…
” But, but, … it is going to cost us money! We fucked the economy with our greed, so now we gotta skimp on our principles…” Before you go and swoon over the bill, Merkins, let me point out that you have already spent the money on those overpriced and depreciating assets. Stop whining and do some maths: A paid-for (think of the “opportunity cost”!) war ship sits in the Med and draws down slightly on the enormous stockpile of missiles. (If you never replace them it would be fine by me too.) You gotta pay the salaries of all the personnel anyway. The entire financial equation occurs (bar a little shrapnel here and there in Tripoli) hermetically within the US bubble. Ease up and regard the whole experience as just another “live fire” training exercise.… You might even save the lives of some of your fellow human beings!
*** Hobbes attributed to Epicurus:
Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God? (Epicurus)
And an idea for “bombing” the “shit” out of the people of Tripoli:
From the BBC Live feed:
0653: Libyan Freedom tweets: “No internet access in Libya&Tripoli for 1 month, the media never mentions it. All they scream about is who r the rebels? #Libya #Feb17”
Mmmmh.… No internet access in Libya? That gives me an idea. What about “information bombs”: ie: drop (electronic) pamphlets onto Tripoli (I know, Hitler did this in WW2… these could be more newsy and less propagandy though). Cover all the recent news on Libya , history , perspectives etc. You could do a really good job putting quality html site onto USB’s and dropping them with the paper items (break the fall). USB’s have value, so people will pick them up when not being observed. Clear, neutral presentation will deconvert the less obtuse away from Mad-daffy and his ilk. (All the brighter sparks should have laptops/pc’s.) A “message in a bottle” – a sign of concern from outside the reach of his mad rantings – could have an incredibly powerful affect in bumping peoples’ consciousnesses out of their depressive little bubble.
/ [flight of fancy]
