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As has been previously noted, with respect to Western History, the existence of ideas involving multiple gods came to be supplanted by the (Jewish) claim that there was only One god named Jehovah, and that this one god stated that the Jewish community was THE chosen people. It was a belief in a central authority that exposed the projected ego-centricism of people who followed the precepts of a singular leader onto a singular god. In as much as Judaism has been cited as a religious belief because of its attachment to an idea called "God", if you remove the words "God" and "morality" from the vernacular of the religion, we find we have a belief similar to many political protests. When we exchange the words god and morality with another central leadership and law or rights, we can flip this around and view political protests as being a religious belief, or a faction of a given belief.
While it is true that the idea of a central authority generally known as "God" is a dominant theme in contemporary religious belief... having arisen in the presence of concepts involving multiple gods, there has been no wide-spread social thrust to produce a single religion... though some have adopted the practice of having "worshiping god" services involving all denominations of religions belief. Nonetheless, even in singularly named religions such as Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, etc., we find multiple interpretations of the same religious text... a text which may have multiple translations from older texts... not to mention being compilations of beliefs of those who claimed some authority to transcribe a presumed idea or context, when the originators of a religion (such as Jesus and Mohammed), did not themselves write their own thoughts down. Beliefs and belief systems of ceremonial practice often reveal adaptations of ideas applied to a given context and individual or group of people.
In the face of so many different beliefs, be they defined as religious or political, a person may ask which idea is the best one? Which one represents the best perception of reality... and thus truth? To such a circumstance, a person may indulge in the creation of their own belief if all those that they have been encountering seem to be lacking in one respect or another. And example of this is the Story of Joseph Smith of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Even if one has a bare minimum of exposure to it and are familiar with other religious beliefs, it is clear that the documentation that Joseph Smith was exposed to included some knowledge of Ancient Egyptian and Islamic beliefs. For example, the wearing of special garments, ritualized secrecy, an after-life, the word "Mormonism" being related to "Mohammedism", polygamy related to having a harem... In addition, let us offer the following excerpt:
The Islamic tradition (Koran 74.8) relates that God created a special angel Israfil whose task it is to hold the trumpet to his mouth without sleeping, century after century, until God gives him the sign to blow. The first blast will destroy all buildings on Earth and all people will die. The mountains will collapse, the seas will dry up, the stars will fall down. The second blast, forty years later, will raise the prophet Muhammad. On the third blast all people will rise, having received new bodies. (You would think that God would know way ahead of time when Israfil would need to blow the horn, thereby not requiring the angel to keep pace with time as if they were a statue.) It must be noted that the image shown to the right could very well be used as an illustration of the angel Israfil, the Norse god Heimdall, or the Pied Piper, but in actuality, it is an image of Moroni, who stands atop the Mormon temple. The similarity of the image to the above idea concerning Israfil (and others), leads some readers to consider the possibility that the idea for the character Moroni is an impression culled from the Islamic texts, Norse (Yggdrasil) mythology, or a Fairytale such as the Pied Piper, just as some consider many of the rituals in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints to be reconstructed variations of ideas from a variety of ancient texts (and other sources such as word-of-mouth stories told around a campfire) that Joseph Smith had access to (or encountered serendipitously) and had inter-mixed with his own imagination. --- Image Source: http://www.dcn.davis.ca.us/~vctinney/LDS.htmMoroni --- |
 --- LDS --- |
(The story is that Mormon founder Joseph Smith translated the lost book of Abraham from an ancient Egyptian papyrus scroll he purchased from an antiquities dealer in 1835.) If we were to use our own imagination a bit, we could see a similarity between the 3 blasts of the horn and the 3 notes played by the Pied Piper, and in some (musical) measure is also related to the 3-lettered auditory meditation chant known as AUM {Om}, and is thought to be linked to the recurrence of word-sounds heard at the end of prayers: "Amen" (au-men without the hyphen is clearly similar to AUM (OM); both of which may be linked to the ancient Egyptian Sun god Amen-Ra). Ever noticed how many three-patterned ideas exist in the LDS religion? This distinction is valuable for those that are interested in analyzing the development of basic cognitive constructs with respect to era, place, race, etc...) | |
Source: Religion: In The Beginning page 6
While some have referred to the word "Moroni" as a projected reflection of Joseph Smith's own image of himself (Moron- I = I Moron... I am a Moron), and that the words (language) used in describing the fairy tale that he devised because all the other religious fairy tales did not suit his self-entertainment interests, were made-up reconstructions of older ideas convoluted to assist in the delusion to be used during an era when there were few sources of information, illiteracy was wide-spread, and people (like today) were hungering for a "message" to provide them with a meaning of personal, self-centering importance. His story provided a measure of relevance to the lives of those who otherwise felt ostracized by prevailing religions in which established social structures existed with pecking order hierarchies. The development of a New Religion provided for the establishment of a New Social Pecking order which enabled otherwise minor individuals succeed in establishing notability in their own religious club. The ideas of Joseph Smith was a new set of social rules that provided for the establishment of a different leadership roster, like the different positions of individual players on a sports team and the development of a New Team to compete amongst already established (religious) teams. Members of the New Religion being claimed as The True Religion did not defer to the presumed greatness being exhibited by the egotisms of others from other religious teams.
However, unlike sports contests which are an established means of "proving" who has the better team, religions end up competing in ways that very often lead to destruction and death. Religions are not satisfied with having a friendly tug-of-war contest. They often want to instigate circumstances that lead to providing an excuse to be used as a reason to get rid of a competitor altogether. And neither do religions resort to the business tactic of trying to buy out their competition, though they do try to give the greater impression of charitable contribution, larger and more religious edifices (such as churches and temples), and various other social activities meant to give the impression of otherwise importance, greatness, dedication, charm, righteousness, etc... The same goes for different "teams" of protestors. Most of whom are not interested in promoting a new type of game (government). They simply want their views to have enough meaning whereby advocates (team members, cheer-leaders or sideline fans) can boast of a distinction they can egotistically swagger about with.
An attempt to combine all protest ideologies into a single reference has not actually been a topic of wide-spread interest. While there are those who have made lists of different protest groups:
Wikipedia: Protest
...And made reference to protest as a type of (cognitive) strategy:
Protest Movements as Political Strategy, by Ben West
...Different protest groups are largely left to being individualized expressions, like the acceptance of different fads... even if one would not be caught dead wearing such ideological garments in their day -to- day wardrobe of speech, even on those occasions in which their friends might describe them as "slumming" it in their (philosophical) attire. All in all, most protest expressions generally give the impression of being a Don Quixote fighting a windmill... or in other words, an impractical idealist. Although their idea(s) may be quite logical and offer a great deal of practicality, they nonetheless are impractical and illogical when attempting to confront one or more other impractical and illogical situations... such as the formula of governance which is a mixture of ambiguity and contradiction because of all the competing interests being directed towards using a government for their own ends. While one might hope for some happy medium to prevail, it is often the case that some ideas come to dominate others... even though the others may have greater value if the government was designed to accommodate them.
Don Quixote Image Source: Reader's Quest
Lots of people make such an assessment and decide to stay on the sidelines and make the most of whatever situation presents itself... though they may quickly assert themselves if conditions present themselves an opportunity to advance a like-mindedness of a given philosophy... however its integrated elements may be mixed. It is like a small-bodied person watching big-bodied players play various contests within a given (social) arena because they are incapable of asserting themselves in such physical contests, but will quickly do so if the members of the contests are particularly matched in physical and economic form. But protests as a political strategy often do not work, and quite often are used by status quo politicians as potential vehicles to be used to carry them into acquiring a position in which they can carry out a status quo routine, though they exhibit the verbal garments displayed by protestors. If protesting the government is the standard of perspective a politician needs to get elected into a position which demands that they conform to a status quo level of activity which does not jeopardize the prevailing structure of government, all politicians may play this same song and dance routine as a method of manipulating a given public with a given political philosophy to vote them into an office which is not designed to produce the results asked for by a protesting group.
Many protest themes are not based on a large philosophical disposition. While some are derived from former political themes that may or may not be heavily mixed with religion and business considerations, most do not involved expansive contemplations which consider the extenuating circumstances of related causes and effects. Like a child that falls down and cries because the episode is an experience they may not have been familiarized with on a personal level and not because of any actual damage having occurred; protestors can be very impulsive and emotional. Such impulsivity and emotionalism are sometimes used as complementary attributes of the protest-as-a-political-strategy tactic. Many protestors are not actually pushing for a change in the direction of an actual Communism, Democracy nor Socialism. While they want others to believe that this is their intent, or for others to believe that a proposed idea is a better formula of Communism, Democracy or Socialism, they actually don't care what system is in place so long as they can reap more socially viable rewards than most people acquire.
Because there are so few attempts to construct the idea for a different type of government functionality for the purpose of improving the present one(s), we must wonder why this is the case... and more so, why is it that an attempt to get more people interested in such a topic is met with disinterest... perhaps because it requires them to think in terms of being presented with an equation presented in the form of words. Like many a math (or other types of) test, the education system has predisposed the public to a ritual of test taking preparation... though some incur test anxiety because they have not been properly trained nor learn to train themselves. But this discussion is in no way trying to say that smartness necessarily becomes displayed by those who have an effective test-taking behavioral repertoire. Tests may not bother a particular person at all yet they do poorly on them, even though they are like-able people and can perform numerous other viable functions because they have developed good skills for a given occupation, which gives the impression of requiring great or multiple intellectual feats. In fact, a person may be a very good electrician, but fail miserably on a series of tests which would enable them to get a qualified Electrician's certification in order to legally have their own business... because those involved in developing licensing qualifications think such tests are an acceptable standard by which a person's ability is best to be judged... though in practical terms such a rationale is not applicable to everyone.
Currently, there are no established standards by which a person's protest interests are validated, except by ad hoc measures of popularity and notability. But just because millions of lives may be affected by a given type of protest, this does not necessarily validate the good or bad value of a protest perspective. For example, though the protest beliefs of a terrorist has caused destruction and death, this doesn't necessarily mean the beliefs are correct, though the incorrectness may be judged according to its association with undesirable activity. Nonetheless, the good or bad of a belief, regardless of how many hundreds, thousands, millions or billions of lives are affected, may have little value when placed into a larger context of overall life. For example, if the survival of DNA, RNA, and Proteins is of paramount importance, the survival of such basic biopolymers supersedes the importance we humans may place on any particular form of life, including ourselves. Beliefs which help to sustain the viability of one or another human which ensures the viability of the basic biopolymers in a human form, is thus more important than any belief that only marginally helps the human species survive, or not at all. Likewise, whether humanity uses Communism, Democracy, Socialism, Theology or some bits and pieces type of philosophy as a social governing ideology is of less importance than the ability by which humans can otherwise adapt to different environmental conditions. If Communism, Democracy, Socialism, Theocracy or some other cognitive is assistively more valuable under a given set of environmental conditions, then so be it. This is what is best. However, if conditions change which create the need for a different philosophical standard... than this is what the human species must use... as is the case being presented to us with an increasing urgency, though many do not see the need for an alternative governing practice.
The human herd has shown itself to be capable of running off the edge of cliffs sometimes called war, though the idea can be analogously aligned with the idea being used as a tactic to herd one or more animals into a position where they are forced to surrender a belief, goods, services, property or their life... such as in the accompanying image in which bison are "captured" during a Native American hunt for food and other resources (hide, bone, fat). It is a scene also sometimes described as a possible tactic used by Paleo-lithic hunters working in concert with one another against a formidable (size/deadly) obstacle to getting desired resources for nourishment. Much in the manner that protestors are up against when confronting a government... but the protestors have not as yet learned to work together to accomplish a similar interest... though they have not acknowledged the similarity because of petty ideological rivalries which infrequently spill over into inter-protest confrontations. Instead of viewing one another as off-shoots of a similar clan that could gain more through cooperation, they act like different tribes engaged in theft and mock war battles should their paths happen to inadvertently cross on the (blacktop/asphalt) jungle.
Bison Image Source: Charles Marion Russell paintings
Even though some protestors have voiced the opinion of wanting to kill this or that politician, and perhaps some cultures has voiced the opinion of wanting to destroy another nation's government interpreted to be the originator of social problems (a view often perpetrated by a government in order to create a scapegoat to conceal its own social governing ineptness and dysfunctionality); many protestors do not advance an opinion of wanting to redesign the government they are protesting about. Again and again (hence the repetition of this acknowledgment), we find a lack of those protestors engaged in an active practice of thinking outside their conventional social box by trying to construct the schematic of a New Government (a Cenocracy) in order not only to correct perceived governing problems, but to ensure that such problems (due to design flaws) do not arise again simply because one or more politicians prefer to reinstitute some former governing practice as a strategy for confronting issues that they believe are caused by subsequent "fixes" to primary ideas laid out in a government's initial design... whereby problems have a cyclical recurrence because the type of government being practiced permit such a repetition to occur.
In General, protestors are not working together. Nor does a level of "protest professionalism" develop whereby different ideas are merited with full participation by all involved, and subjected to measures which can effectively and honestly test the validity of a given perspective... without automatically tossing it away simply because it didn't work in a given instance under given conditions, by given people. Even makeshift tools may need to be kept in a toolbox for possible future usage. Specific goals need to be outlined and communicated to all participants, including the public. Goals must stipulate if attempts to make changes are going to be directed along the course of internal governing processes such as legislation, and also outline what course(s) should be taken if such a course is fruitless. In terms of stating a specific interest in a singularly given issue, one must organize the ideology with a goal, and how the goal may be achieved... and what obstacles will and might be encountered. Is the protest to be a full-time venture, or will people have to participate part time due to having school, work and or family concerns to take care of? What resources are needed, and how does one go about getting those resource requirements filled?
Is someone going to be designated a leader, or will there be multiple leaders for different tasks that are either assigned or assumed because of interest? What response(s) is/are expected, and if met... or not, what will be (if any), the follow-up response? Will no one in particular be designated a leader, whereby leadership comes by way of a consensus that never actually develops into a clarity to be comprehensively described to the media and the public? Will there be a definitive Manifesto written, or a document promoted as a tentative Manifesto along the lines of a "patent-pending" approach which permits occasional upgrades and revisions? Will the Manifesto contain an accumulation of ideas which are supported by criteria that can be designated as precedents, and thus used as an injected declaration of a presumed Right? How serious a protest is one to undertake? Is the protest to be embraced as a life or death, do or die condition that one is willing to sacrifice themselves to, and if necessary, go out in a blaze, explosion, or gunfire of supposed glory?
Does one undertake the development of a large philosophical expose', or are they content with a superficial contemplation that is defined as being a deep consideration? And given that terrorist activities, or typical protest antics do not regularly bring about the guarantee of desired change, will one seek out the development of a new strategy or be content with actions which are interpreted as being viable simply because one is making an effort beyond mere complaints shared amongst friends, family, relatives, neighbors or co-workers... thus fighting against the notion that most protest efforts are expressions of futility... unless one's participation in a social protest activity is esteemed with great personal value? And let us also ask, when does the initial analysis stop and action take place... if it is being monitored by members who want "to do something", which at least gives them the illusion of making a difference by making an attempt, because such a personal philosophy is derived from activities which involve a trial and error effort, such as cooking, gardening, automotive repair, making a quilt or one's own clothes, learning how to swim, etc...?
Is it actually helpful to review past protest efforts, such as rebellions and revolutions set in a different time, place and set of contributing conditions... if there is no systematic collation of ideas undertaken from the perspective of a stated hypothesis, or that an hypothesis is not generated afterwards? And seeing as how most rebellions and revolutions occur by way of the actions of multiple people, do your ideas generate the necessary level of interest for acquiring a following? Is your present following more on the nature of a social gathering episode with no actual applicable vision external to the group? Are present group members those who can best assist in acquiring desired goals, or must one look elsewhere... even in unlikely places? Are members in the association due to a shared philosophy, due to a sense of inter-personal belonging, or because it gives them something to do in an otherwise uneventful life?
Are laws which are generated by legislative impulse and emotion best addressed by a confrontation of contrasting impulsiveness and emotion? In other words, are some situations best dealt with by using a similar type of developed structure, or will otherwise be ineffective because some circumstances are designed for the usage of brawn over brain or vice versa? Whereas in most instances all protest activity takes place with a potential flight, freeze or fight option because opposition may take a counter-position... thus effecting a rock, paper, scissors scenario; how does one alter the overall game plan so that a different set of rules favor those interested in making what are believed to be progressive change; as opposed to those that may claim the same in word, but not so in any realistic deed of actuality... and want to instigate a different set of rules favoring their view? How does one out-strategize a strategist, if one has more resources with which to alter the conditions and descriptions of the contest?
For example, a protest group that is gaining ground may be effectively confronted by a government that will resort to changing the type of game being played out by introducing an unexpected element (game piece or player) in the form of introducing a biological or "weapons of mass destruction" idea with fabricated intel developed by a supportive government agency... or external collaborator being presented as an unbiased "expert" or witness who is described as having nothing to gain? Another example might be the introduction of an attempt to consolidate public attention towards support for confronting an external foe, and thus becomes a needed public distraction away from the topic of the protest? How does a protest effort confront the potential of having to confront multiple government-supporting groups within and outside the internal structure of government? How does one exhibit a strategy to attract the attention of serious protestors and yet display negligible face cards to strategist working with the intent to preserve the status quo... not because it is the best form of government to be practiced, but because they and their ilk are comfortable with its usage?
As in the game of poker many people exhibit a "tell"-tale sign of a given strategy being employed, and some use such a knowledge to fool another's strategy of interpretation in order to employ their own gaming technique... such a view is only valuable if one can actually see their opponent. In many cases, protestors do not see their actual opponents. There is no face -to- face competition. They are simply confronted by rather superficial game pieces called law enforcement who frequently do not provide an effective "tell" of those behind a given political strategy being employed. Protestors do not often seek out to identify a single or multiple opponents in order to effect a promising strategy. Often-times, an employed strategy of governance occurs as the handiwork of multiple legislators, lobbyists and unseen others. When protests very often ineffectively address the target(s) of a given strategy, being able to hit the side of a large barn is impossible if one can not see the barn... no matter how big it is.
Slowly but surely our New Government profile is being exchanged amongst different social reform thinkers who, are their own terms, will judge the merits of an intended Cenocracy.
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Page First posted: Tuesday, 30-Aug-2016... 07:54 AM
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