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Badtux the Snarky PenguinIn a time of chimpanzees, I was a penguin. Religious fundamentalists are motivated by the sneaking suspicion that someone, somewhere, is having fun -- and that this must be stopped. |
Friday, February 16, 2007On the banality of Norman Vincent PealeNorman Vincent Peale's philosophy can be summed up by the last scene of "Monty Python's The Life of Brian", where Brian is hanging on the cross dying and the whole chorus of dying people is happily singing "Look on the bright side of life." In that respect, it is similar to many Oriental philosophies, which advocate looking beyond worldly things to the spiritual. It is, fundamentally, the philosophy of someone with no hope and no courage.It's a nice philosophy if you're living under a Confucian dictatorship with no hope of changing the conditions under which you live, or if you are a mouthpiece of men of wealth and power who want you to convince the rabble to not overthrow their oligarchy, or if you're hanging on a cross dying with no hope and no future. It is not, however, the philosophy of a free man who is both ready and willing to stand up for what is right and oppose that which is wrong. A free man must be willing to be outraged by injustice, applaud courage, worry about those in need, and otherwise experience the full gamut of human emotion. Otherwise he is but a tool. If you wonder why I am no big fan of "spritual" approaches to life, that is it. Life is a mean, nasty, dirty, ugly business for far too many people both in our nation and elsewhere. Until you acknowledge this, until you bother your beautiful mind with reality, there can be no hope for the better. - Badtux the Philosophy Penguin Labels: life Posted by: BadTux / 2/16/2007 05:51:00 PMComments:It doesn't matter who you are, or how you live. Sooner or later you seek your spirit. Or it seeks you.If you don't find it, well, you just don't I guess. But spirit makes a person better. I'm generalizing of course. Assholes are just assholes. # posted by BBC : 17/2/07 7:45 AM
In the end, we're dead. Religion and/or spirituality is just an attempt to paper over that nasty little fact. |
About Me
I am a black and white and yellow multicolored penguin making his way as best he can in a world of monochromic monkeys. ArchivesApril 2004 / December 2004 / January 2005 / February 2005 / March 2005 / April 2005 / May 2005 / June 2005 / July 2005 / August 2005 / September 2005 / October 2005 / November 2005 / December 2005 / January 2006 / February 2006 / March 2006 / April 2006 / May 2006 / June 2006 / July 2006 / August 2006 / September 2006 / October 2006 / November 2006 / December 2006 / January 2007 / February 2007 / March 2007 / April 2007 / May 2007 / June 2007 / July 2007 / August 2007 /
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"Keep fighting for freedom and justice, beloveds, but don't forget to have fun doin' it. Lord, let your laughter ring forth. Be outrageous, ridicule the fraidy-cats, rejoice in all the oddities that freedom can produce." -- Molly Ivins, 1944-2007
"The penalty good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men."
-- Plato
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