Small religious rant…

Not that I’m religious, which I think was made quite clear earlier, I realised that when believers talk about their religion they talk about the people within it. Muhammad, Jesus, God.

The beautiful messages that someone, whether it be an anonymous author, sons of God or random prophets, expressed was – and still is – completely ignored by their followers. The first request is don’t kill people. We can all agree that this have been ignored for a while. When the Christian church was established in Rome, the Romans were still killing. The Orthodox department were still killing – and unfortunately, my favourite, the protestant church were still killing when it was established in Germany not so long ago. All the Christian soldiers in Iraq and Afganistan, all the Christian soldiers in the World War series, all the Christian militias since the dawn of Christianity. This doesn’t only count for soldiers, we still have politicians, police officers, home-moms and other random believers that thought killing in the name of God was a good idea. A second request is don’t lie. Everybody lies! I lie, you lie, he, she, it lie, we lie, you lie, they lie. I could continue but my message couldn’t be any clearer.

As much as I want worshippers that wasn’t my intention – my intention is to express a message: Believe in kindness, don’t harm people. Jesus didn’t seek fame or worshippers, he sought believers to believe in kindness and goodness. Beautiful quest, but failed miserably resulting in genocide, homocide, suicide and many other -cides.

Equality may not be such a good idea anyway…

Out of the countless of policies and law enforcements I dislike, detest and wish to abolish, the 2nd Amendment of the United States of Americas Constitution. So many times have I argued that it should be removed, and gun regulations should be enforced in the US, and I have often discussed this with Americans. They all disagree with me, because they have the legal right to bear arms. And I keep telling them that guns do nothing but kill and hurt other people. As counterargument, they say – “what if somebody breaks into my house in the middle of the night with a gun and I won’t be able to protect myself?”

This is where no one can argue. I had my house broken into on several occasions, one time I was home. The thief didn’t carry weapons, and when I noticed her I told her to leave. She did. But I wasn’t comfortable either. And when I heard that Switzerland allowed guns, my argument was completely gone. How could I keep the Americans from killing each other?

Then I noticed something embarissingly obvious. Mentality. Americans have a higher tendency to murder each other brutally than the Swiss. With the ability to kill comes responsability – now put down the guns, and stop killing each other – the whole religion thing, you know ‘thou shall not kill’ and ‘thou shall turn thy cheek to the other side,’ is a better idea. Just don’t go to the extremes.

Extremes … that’s another rant.

Where to look?

Sometimes I am left without alternative transportation, and my only possibility is to use my feet. In these dire situations, I tend to look at the ground when walking. I do this to loose sense of time. If I look straight a head, I look into the infinity, the future as an estimation of my path to my goal. If I look toward the skies, I loose myself in my mind of swirling thoughts, a song on repeat. My thoughts are my questions on a eternal search for answers, but I rarely grant time for questions that I have already answered. I become aware of myself, the pain or joy I feel, that I am actually living.

The problem with religion

For many years I have questioned why more half the population of Earth believe in a god, especially in the western world. In interest of being disgusted, I sat down this afternoon and watched Jesus Camp. Only sixteen minutes into the film, it was completely obvious to me. That’s when I paused it, and went to write this.

The opening speech in the film is more than reassuring. It’s good. Becky Fischer is a minister of Christianity, and teaches children. She says that we should fix the world. Just get up and fix it with our tools. So, Becky says to the children, “Get up everybody” and they do it. Then it all turns to chaos, as she says “Open your mouths and speak what the Holy Spirit whispers into your ears.” Now the children are either shouting indistinguisable words, shaking, moving forward and backwards, falling to the ground. It’s everybody, children in the age between five and thirteen, in the midst of chaos. It made me remember how Muslims and Buddhists pray.

The movies goes on. Now we see how these children are being taught – educated. “Levi, how would you like to go to a school were they said “Creationism is stupid, you are stupid if you believe it in.” Levi don’t like that. Nobody likes their beliefs to be ridiculed. But how did Levi obtain this opinion at the age of 12?

Like any child, he believed in what his mother or minister taught him. So the mother or minister told Levi, “evolutionism is false, creationism to right,” and Levi believed it. Levi didn’t go to school. As an atheist, I want a little ‘evidence’ or at least some sort of second-hand confirmation of this postulate. My mother never spoke of gods, because she doesn’t really believe in it, but I prayed when I was a child. I prayed to God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit that the good cartoons would be on. Half the time, God payed attention and forfilled my wish, half the time he didn’t. I thought God was a bit naïve, because I kept telling him “I’ll never do a bad thing in my life if you do this little thing for me,” but when the cartoons came on, I forgot all about it. Nobody that I intended to believe told me that God actually existed. I was free to believe what I wanted without anyone telling me what to believe in. I learned about religion as the years came on, and I thought “That sounds like a nice thing.” All the happy people, the healing, the ten commandments and so on. At the age of 12 I believed that kindness was the path to a peaceful world. Be good to others, don’t lie, don’t steal, simply don’t go bad things. Unlike half the population of the world, I didn’t need any god to tell me that.

So I finally came to the conclusion. Don’t believe in what other people tell you, find out for yourself.

But entertainment is worth more

How long...

I stumbled upon this image, and an interesting thought struck me. The Olympic Games this year had opened for debate. Many was considering boycotting the Summer Olympics, because not only does China have poor human rights, but also the campaign and violence in Tibet. Another major factor was the Chinese support for the regime in Sudan, which is accused of committing genocide in the Darfur region. Yet no one did boycott the Games. US official sponser Nike said, “Nike management deeply respects human rights, but the contract is so big that USA team will go to Olympic Games regardless.” No country, team, or sportsperson pulled out. So, does Nike actually respect human rights? Apparently the contract was too big. It means there’s a lot of money involved. Money comes before humans – and their rights. It’s a simple equation.

The area the Olympic Games were taking place was surrounded by a wooden wall. Behind it, the games of poor human treatment, poverty, homeless and suffering were taking place. Not only could the money spent on the Olympic Games, Beijings new airport terminal and the general suppression of the Chinese people, remove poverty and save the lowest in , but generally increase the standard of living in China.

But entertainment is worth more.

Smiles

I don’t know why I smiled, but all of sudden I was happy. It was the third time, and I guess it just didn’t affect me anymore. Yesterday I was looking forward to it, just a little bit. After eating supper, I quickly vanished to my room. Eating supper was ridiculously boring. Unless I had friends visiting, or we had guests, I was the only one initiating a conversation, and usually the respond wasn’t great. Later a few of my friends were coming to watch some movies, so napped a quick shower before they came. I was clean and pure, I had no worries on my mind, and it was one of the better days. Then my dad called me. “Get in here,” he yelled.

I could hear his voice that something was up, but I didn’t realise. Only wearing a towel, he told me “We’re getting divorced.” And with a stone-face I didn’t know I could make, I said “Okay.” He assured me that I could choose where I wanted to live, that I was welcome anywhere and no one would be hurt. I didn’t say anything as he repeated it several times, and when he finally finished, I said “Perfect.” I knew it, I had known for a long time, and even prepared for it. I had told my friends, laughed about it. Then I smiled, and said that I had one demand. Back in July I had held a party, and my mother had forbidden me any more parties. Now that they were getting divorced, I promised my friends that I’d have one more party when they had moved some of the furniture out. I told my parents that I wanted that last party, and then I left the dining table. I didn’t feel joy, but I was happy. I was smiling. I cried the first time. I had no emotions the second time. Now I was smiling. I wonder if they ever get back together, and divorce for a fourth time, I’d laugh into their faces. I dispise the idea, but one can’t help thinking the thought.

Perhaps I’m smiling on their behalf. I’m not afraid to say that my father is an alcoholic. It would be much easier to just hate him, but unfortunately I can’t. And my mother had to deal with him. My father was an honest man. He was hardworking, and did everything to feed his family. Especially me. He always gave me a little extra love. Love my mother should have gotten.

When my friends came, I didn’t say anything. I had completely forgotten about the incident. I guess I had jinxed myself when I said, “the only thing you have to do … is smile.”

ENTAKT

Youngsters like myself enjoys the occasional holiday at least once every season. It enables us to stay up as long as we want to, and harm our bodies in other illicit ways. I enjoy staying up until morning, and as of now, I forgot when I last slept. I think I’m close to 30 hours, but I can’t say for sure. Except staying awake like I do includes sleep. Simply because you wake up at some point. I woke up a few hours ago.

I was surfing the Internet, explicitly bored, when I came across a music site. Formerly named Mymusic.dk, but changed its name into something forgettable. I pity you who don’t understand the Danish language. Even though I critised it for many years – and sometimes still do when I forget how beautiful it is. English is an easy language, easy to write, speak and use, which I will show you in a moment. Danish is recognised as one of the hardest languages on Earth, and it wasn’t an easy trip for me either.

Yet some learned it. Very well actually. A Danish band ENTAKT. In capital letters, yes. Some might applause Scott Matthew, Teitur or … no, I don’t know any mainstream singers that write good lyrics. But ENTAKT writes impeccable, complete, everlasting, flawless, ne plus ultra lyrics.

When I stumbled across their newest album, “Bagsiden af Europa” (EN: The Back of Europe – this proves how Danish is beautiful. In English, it’s rather clusty, and not conceived as poetic, but in Danish it’s more than exquisite). I slammed the Play-button to listen to it, How I Started To Smoking, and little to do with the actual song or lyric, I was deeply inspired.

WHISPERS & ANSWERS

first I lick my upper lip
in compliance with the pleasure trip
then the music begins to thrill
no longer does silence my heart kill


back and forth with the melody
the strict rhythmical odyssey
like an aesthetic enchant
alas, merely a sugary deviant


acid conflagating attention-deficit
only five milligrams per reincit
otherwise la fille francais decay
when le beau monde ensures a continental crossway


it is in a free fall toward the skies
a plethora slowly whispering goodbyes
assuring an ethereal panacea
and existence is a preconceived idea

A silly tale of a man’s long lost dream.

Now that I was happy, I wanted to find peace. With my new goal, as quickly as you read these lines, I realised that I was not happy at all. A cup of noodles, an empty Coca Cola bottle, a reused flask of Cacao with milk in it and me amongst it in this untidy room. My DVDs were laid scattered; a lousy band is playing in the background and a ton of post-it notes are laying around me. One of them says “The BEST from all the WORLDS”, a second says “Peace, nature and technology combined” and a third says “The…” I had forgotten what the third one was supposed to express, I couldn’t find a pen to write down my thought before it vanished.

A minute before I wrote the third note, I was sitting in the garden with my eyelids shut. It was about 5:30am on a Saturday morning. My only company was the birds singing a morning tune. When I opened my eyes, I came to realise how beautiful this simple garden was. My parents had put a lot of work into it, yet I had never given it any thought until that lonesome Saturday morning.

Later that morning, I watched an episode of Cowboy Bebop. It was about how television is the new religion, the new god. While it was still playing, I drifted off to sleep. When I woke up, a friend of mine, who liked classical music had sent me a link to a video called “The Piano”. As I listened, I came to realise why I wasn’t happy. Not because my room is untidy, I’m not particularly happier when it’s cleaned. No, it was because I had many ideas, many dreams and many goals – none seized, none conquered and none reached. It brought me war, contradicting peace. My life was nothing but post-it notes and a lost hope to achieve anything in life. Despite my utter ennui, I didn’t do anything to counter this. I sat down and wrote on a fourth note “Realise your dreams rather than planning them”.

Yet I failed once again. I simply planned how to reach happiness and peace. In fact, I thought that if I find peace and enlightenment within myself, I would be happy. I didn’t trouble to answer the most obvious questions of all. How would I find peace within myself when my mind is a swirl of hopes, ideas and dreams? How would I become enlightened when I skipped out on meditating and practise? How would I become happy if I did nothing but sit around doing nothing.

In school, I did less than what was necessary. As my dreams never came true, I feared that I would never find talent in anything I did. Yet my papers were graded, and I was among those who worked hardest and received good marks. I never bothered to open my eyes or ears, much less my textbook, despite my love for education. Those classes I failed where those I loved the most.

My eyelids were shut, and my mind set on achieving my dreams. The dream of playing the piano, the dream of learning philosophy, history and psychology, the dream of teaching. The number of dreams were infinite, and dear reader, they were. I wanted to become a politician; I wanted to become a writer, a journalist, a historian and archaeologist. Perhaps when my days were over, I would like to teach. I wanted to change the educational system and even out the economy. I wanted to show the world that there were more than just murders, rapes and disasters killing more people. I wanted to learn the words of Hegel and Freud. I wanted to study the truth of the holy texts and I fear that none of this will happen. Most of all, I wanted to teach the world how it could improve and become a better place. I had most of it figured out on beforehand; all I had to do is seize the goal.

Now that I’m writing this, I have achieved one goal. To be a writer, you must write, which is what I am doing. Yet is writings supposed to be written or read, and who’ll read a silly tale of a man’s long lost dream of success?