Tuesday, April 29, 2008

Never stop dancing

Never stop dancing
Dance is sacred
it is life itself
it's liberating and healing
Dance is medicine
Dance takes away suffering and illness
Dance brings bliss to all the spirits
Dance is prayer

Friday, April 25, 2008

One can measure the greatness of a nation and its moral progress by the way in which it treats its animals. - Mahatma Gandhi

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

HAPPY EARTH DAY

Eve, Mother of Life

The next time someone in the Abrahamic traditions tries to tell one of you, dear readers, that homosexuality is wrong because God created Adam and Eve, tell them: "Please, you HAVE GOT to get your mythology RIGHT!". It's high time we right the wrongs of the Abrahamic religions, the blatant appropriations of Pagan myths, the lies and the misconceptions.

Originally, Eve was not created by Jehovah. Jehovah was birthed by Hebat, the Mother of the Gods! In the Hurrian tradition, Hebat was the Mother of Life, the Creatrix and the wife of Teshub the storm God who was a kind of Baal. Her mount was a lion and She had the qualities of a warrior.

The Hurrians were a Hittite people, but were disseminated throughout the Middle East, and had been the neighbors of the Jews and their ancestors for many generations so that the Jews and their ancestors had been exposed to the tales of Hebat for centuries, and eventually re-imagined Her in Genesis and blamed Her, their Creatrix, for all the evils and sin in the world.

Evidence for Eve, the Goddess, reached its apex with the Amarna Tablets, also known as the Letters of Amarna. This archeological find, consisting of royal tablets, makes mention of a king of Salem (pre-Jewish name for Jerusalem meaning Peace) whose name was Abdi-Khebat. His name meant 'servant of Eve', which indicates that just as today we have Abdullahs or servants of Allah in the Middle East, there was once an age where kings were named after Eve and she was the official Goddess of the ruling dynasty in Jerusalem.

In addition to this, the myth of Noah was derived directly from the Sumerian account having to do with Shurupak - ancient tablets have been found with the original tale. The original, historical Noah was a merchant ... and a heathen, of course. Furthermore, in the Sumerian myths (Abraham came from Ur, which is in Sumeria), the Goddess Astarte was the Civilizer of humanity and it was She who gave humans the Code of Laws known as the Mes, the civilizing gifts ... She gave humanity its Laws in a holy mount. Sound familiar?

In addition to this, the myth of God creating the world in six days and resting on the seventh (shabat) is derived directly from the Sumerian tale of how the Gods labored for six generations and rested on the seventh generation (shapatu) by going on a strike. In Sumerian myth, the Gods had originally created humans from dust and breathed the breath of life unto them. Sound familiar?

In conclusion, it is now clear that the Bible, and in particular the tales from Genesis, is recycled mythology.

Monday, April 21, 2008

Attack on science and reason

A Skeptic Bible

King James had his version, Spanish Queen Valera had hers, and now even the agnostics have theirs! Check out the Skeptics' Annotated Bible.

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

The Wizard of Oz, alternative ending

Torch Song Trilogy



Torch Song Trilogy is one of my favorite movies ever. It is of huge importance: a piece of gay history. Back in the eighties it was one of the first movies to show gay life in the big screen, and to show the horrible effects of religion on the families, relationships and lives of gay human beings. It broke many taboos and opened the way for a gay presence in the film industry.

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Is what is moral commanded by God because it is moral, or is it moral because it is commanded by God? - Plato

Thursday, April 10, 2008

The Biblical tradition of polygamy

The recent events at the polygamist compound make me think of the profound dishonesty of Christians who spit out their family values at gay people, using the Bible.

I recently watched the movie Lifting the Veil on Poligamy, a piece of anti-Mormon Christian propaganda that does not even address, in fact it even denies, the presence of polygamy in the Bible. Not only does polygamy originate in the Bible, but the rape of women is ordered there in verses such as the ones in Deuteronomy 21, where there are instructions to massacre entire tribes and take their women, if found to be attractive.

The history of polygamist abuse of children and women starts with Abraham himself, the inventor of the Abrahamic religious tradition, who had a wife Sarah, as well as had children with one of his slaves, Hagar. In the story, under the whispers of Sarah, he ends up exiling his slave and his firstborn son, Ishmael, to the desert with no more than a bottle of water and piece of bread, because Sarah did not want her son to share his inheritance with the slave woman's son.

and she said to Abraham, "Get rid of that slave woman and her son, for that slave woman's son will never share in the inheritance with my son Isaac." - Genesis 21:10

The Bible relates that it is a miracle that Hagar and Ishmael even survived.

When the water in the skin was gone, she put the boy under one of the bushes. Then she went off and sat down nearby, about a bowshot away, for she thought, "I cannot watch the boy die." And as she sat there nearby, she began to sob. - Genesis 21:15-6

After that, we see in Genesis 30 his grandson, Jacob, having sex with two of his wives (Rachel and Leah, who were sisters) and two of his slaves. Out of these four women, the twelve tribes of Israel arise. The Bible does not utter absolutely any form of value judgement against polygamy or sex with slaves (which, presumably, did not require their consent and served as moral justification for this practice in the New World for almost 400 years). This was family values in the Bible.

Not only does the Bible indicate that Abraham sent his own son off into the wilderness with his helpless mother, but the authors of the Bible believed that the God of Abraham had allowed him to do so. Only in the Bible, with its twisted presentation of family values, does abandoning one's own child become a sacred duty, and a polygamist father was stripped of all responsibility by virtue of these verses.

And so, it's only thanks to the legends of Abraham, Jacob and the like that false prophets such as Muhammad and Joseph Smith were able to get away with so much iniquity and abuse, and were able to confuse the common sense and good judgement of ignorant persons who followed them, carrying forward this institution of polygamy and presenting it as a moral, correct, God-given law that they had to submit to. It originates in the Bible, and it finds legitimacy there.

If DCFS had existed four thousand years ago in the Middle East, and if Abraham and Jacob had been caught raping their slaves and practicing polygamy, they would have probably been convicted like normal criminals ... and after the fact, Abraham would have been also forced to pay child support to Hagar, since he abandoned Ishmael. By today's standards, the most important of all Biblical patriarchs was a deadbeat dad.

The Bible is also the first one to illustrate the animosity and jealousy that existed within these polygamist families. Not only do we know of Hagar and Ishmael, but we also know that Jacob's children sold their own half brother Joseph as a slave. The dynamics that existed in these families were absolutely dysfunctional.

Perhaps the culture of pervasive psychological, physical and sexual abuse that is found in modern Mormon polygamist nests should tell us something about the origins of the Biblical tradition itself, what the lives of the women who were abused and mistreated in the Bible were like, and it may even help to explain the episodes of anger, violence, and jealousy that the God of Abraham exhibited: the authors of the Bible were projecting their own dysfunctional models of relating to authority figures, which they learned as children.

Da Vinci, the elephant!?

Wednesday, April 9, 2008

Milkmen

It turns out, male lactation is a phenomenon known to occur due to various reasons, including hormone intake, drug intake (which makes sense), but also evolutionary pressure may lead to it, and this is so interesting I had to share it. Men have all the same equipment needed for breastfeeding, and if stimulated, the nipple may produce milk.

The Lactating Widower:

A Sri Lankan widower has attracted the attention of doctors for his ability to breastfeed his young daughter.
Mr B Wijeratne, from Walapanee, near Colombo, took to breastfeeding her soon after his wife died three months ago while giving birth to their second child.
His elder daughter, 18-month-old Nisansala Madhushani, was so used to her mother's milk that she would not take formula milk.
Mr Wijeratne told Sinhalese language newspaper Lankadeepa: "My child would reject the powdered milk I tried feeding through a bottle.
"Unable to see her cry I offered my breast. That's when I discovered that I could breastfeed her."
The 38-year-old's ability to produce milk was noticed by doctors at the government hospital in the town of Kurunegala.
Dr Kamal Jayasinghe, a spokesman for the hospital, said: "Men with a hyperactive prolactine hormone can produce breast milk."
His younger daughter, who has still to be named, has taken to powdered milk.


I was reminded of the myth of how Zeus gave birth to Dionysus, after the original mother Semele died. Zeus carried Dionysus inside his own thigh. The myth does not mention breastfeeding, but based on what I now know the myth was probably incomplete. More on male breastfeeding:

http://www.switch.tv/videos/39 - Milkmen, a short film on male breastfeeding



http://www.unassistedchildbirth.com/miscarticles/milkmen.html - interesting article, included the following account:

I knew these two wonderful guys, very dear friends of mine for years. A mutual acquaintance of ours was pregnant, unplanned, and did not want to do the whole "adoption thing" so when the guys approached her about taking the baby, they just proceeded as if it had been a planned surrogate pregnancy. The guys were adamant that the baby should get breastmilk. So when she was in her 7th month we bought a really good quality breastpump and Ian started pumping, every 2 hours during the day and once during the night. He was wonderful about it! He used an SNS (supplimental nursing system) after she was born, with donated milk from several friends who were nursing. He was making milk but not a full supply. By the time the baby was 12 weeks old he was making a full milk supply! He stayed at home with the baby (he was a massage therapist) and nursed her exclusively until she was 8 months old!! I don't think many people outside their intimate circle knew about it, I'm sure folks would have had a fit if they'd known...but I thought it was wonderful!


And, finally, the article entitled Are the men of the African Aka tribe the best fathers in the world? describes the interchangeability of gender roles between the men and women of the Aka tribe, as well as the frequency of male lactation among them.

This one article in specific got me thinking of the possibility that, with overpopulation and climate change on the horizon, and the very real chance of food shortage that we will face, it is entirely possible that some human populations will face the kind of evolutionary pressure that may require many or most of the men the lactate and breastfeed within several generations, so that this may eventually become the norm in some cultures and men's bodies will begin to reflect that change.

There is a huge body of historical evidence that shows that one of the elements that influences the evolutionary development of men and women within the diverse cultures of Earth is culture. The book 'When God Was a Woman' mentions that in many cultures in the Middle East, such as Libya and Egypt, it was women who went to war and worked, and men stayed at home. The same was the case among Celts, and chronicles mention that several thousand years back, Celtic women were much larger physically, and much more muscular. Later, as a result of patriarchal programming, women became smaller.

It seems, therefore, fair to propose that culture does affect evolution, and that it does affect the physical appearance of men and women after many generations of social programming, and that if we convince women of their physical superiority, and even encourage and pressure them to be stronger and more physically active, that they will begin to act on that programming and begin to change and grow physically, just as by convincing them of their physical inferiority we have in fact made them smaller over the last several millenia.

Perhaps as the attitudes towards male parenting and gender roles change in some cultures, eventually men's bodies will also change just as the bodies of women have changed throughout history as a result of social and cultural programming ...
"You can worship stones, so long as you don't throw them at me."

- Wafa Sultan, Arab woman, atheist, activist for secularism

Three Kings

three kings our ancestors gave us
three kings was our epiphany
our clan's totem
three loco kings
the mark of our identities

los pobres viejos y las viejas
worried sick
prayed their rosarios
fulfilling their vows
to gain merit for us
and they clad their three kings in their hopes
and they painted their skins in their image
one black for those who mourn
one white for those who seek clarity
one red for those who live
and crowned them with their pride
and with each divine child that was born
our holy kings had their hands full

latin kings our ancestors gave us
hardworking kings rich in gold
rich in the fruits of their labor
kings rich in incense and myrrh
spirit and devotion
kings rich in hope
who revered the child of hope

but our youth grew angry
when they were shamed
and denied their pride
when they were shamed
and denied their culture
and they became latin kings a la kkk
an urban tribe of murderers and gangbangers
seeking father figures
seeking to belong
in a culture uprooted from their culture
seeking to belong
with their laughable accents
who initiate their own by beatings
because they were powerless at home
into a tribe of stupid bastards with their cocks cut off
murdering their neighbors who talk and walk like them
instead of building kingdoms for their queens and princes

three kings my mother gave me
kingly because of their dignity
three kings my grandfather gave me
before them my ancestors prayed for us
generation after generation
and their love protects us
and they keep us through the window of our totem

three kings is the ark of our covenant
that places my tribe under the wings of God
may the mothers of my mothers
may the forefathers of my forefathers be in peace
may they live forever and ever
ashe
I saw a well-equipped invading army indiscriminately killing millions of civilians and raping 200,000 women. Eight million uprooted people walked barefoot to take refuge in a neighbouring country. The institution of Islamic leadership supported the invading army actively, in capturing and killing freedom fighters and non-Muslims, and raping women on a massive scale. Each of 4,000 mosques became the ideological powerhouses of the mass killers and mass rapists, and these killers and rapists – these Islamists – were the same people of the same land as the freedom fighters and raped women. That was the civilians of Bangladesh and the killer army of Pakistan in 1971. All the Muslim countries and communities of the world either stood idle, or actively sided with the killers and rapists in the name of Islam.

The message was clear: something was very wrong – either with all the Islamic leaders, or with Islam itself.


- From the book 'Leaving Islam', by Ibn Warraq, the author of the book 'Why I am not a Muslim'
Too often our churches are guilty of sanitizing and domesticating King's radical message. We embrace the King of Montgomery, Selma, and Birmingham, while ignoring the King who boldly and courageously opposed the Vietnam War, arguing that "America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube." We lose sight of the man who was assassinated while supporting sanitation workers in Memphis. We forget that prior to his death, King was in the midst of organizing a Poor Peoples campaign to unite white, black, and brown around a shared economic justice agenda. Dr. King understood that the next phase of civil rights had to realize economic justice for the disinherited of America. At worst, some will proof text and manipulate King's words – such as "we should be judged not by the color of our skin but by the content of our character" in order to justify their own ideological arguments to reverse many of the gains of the civil rights movement, including in affirmative action programs.

Adam Taylor, Baptist minister
I have never seen the slightest proof of the religious theories of heaven and hell, of future life for individuals, or of a personal god.

- Thomas Edison

Jesus creates an alternative family

... with only a few words

Jesus saw his mother there. He also saw the disciple whom he loved standing nearby. Jesus said to his mother, "Dear woman, here is your son." He said to the disciple, "Here is your mother." From that time on, the disciple took her into his home. - John 19:26-7

New Queer Christian blog

http://www.jesusinlove.blogspot.com/

Earthlings, the movie

The following is a documentary which unveils the horrors of the meat and other industries which are founded on exploitation, abuse and cruelty to animals by the members of our species. It has shocking visuals, but it's only depicting the reality of the meat industry, and I believe that it's important for all the members of our species to watch this and to understand the huge amount of unnecessary suffering that they generate by choosing to consume certain products. As consumers, we have a direct impact every day on this, we either sponsor it or boicot it with every decision that we make when we purchase things.

The movie is entitled Earthlings, and it can be seen in its entirety here:

http://veg-tv.info/Earthlings

I am hoping to awaken others to the cruel realities of animal exploitation and cruelty and I invite you to take in this message of non violence and ponder it, and then make informed decisions as an ethical person and as a consumer, and hopefully stop financing this madness.

The movie is impossible to find at Blockbuster. This may be because many movies are promoted jointly with products sold by powerful corporations (McDonalds, etc.), and Blockbuster apparently does not want to risk the sponsorship of these corporations. I asked a customer service rep at Blockbuster if they would make this movie available, but was told that the movie is no longer being produced, which is doubtful. Never has this issue been more relevant and pressing as it is today.

The movie can only be found through networking with animal rights activists, as it lacks significant financial backing and many of the organizations that deal with animal rights are either non-profits or religious organizations (I heard of this movie from the Hare Krishnas here in Chicago). For this reason it was made available online for free, and I'd like to ask my readers, if you are moved to compassion after watching it, to please share this movie with as many people as you can. Little by little, the non-violence movement will gain momentum, but for the time being we who care would like to influence the media and the minds of people on the side of compassion and non-violence.

One who kills a cow is as one who kills a man. - Isaiah 66:3

Please visit goveg.com for more information on animal cruelty and to learn little things that everyone can do every day to change this shameful paradigm.
"Dumbledore is gay"

- JK Rowling, author of Harry Potter

Homosexuality among animals

I never meant to say that the Conservatives are generally stupid. I meant to say that stupid people are generally Conservative. I believe that is so obviously and universally admitted a principle that I hardly think any gentleman will deny it.
-John Stuart Mill

Fafafines

HIV and karma

Aware of the deficiency of my intelligence, I focus my attention on Pavana Kumar (Hanuman) and humbly ask for the strenth, intelligence and true knowledge to relieve me from all of my sins which generate suffering. - from the Hanuman Chalisa, a prayer to Lord Hanuman

Earlier last month, I was watching a program about the chimpanzees that are being raised by humans in the Gombe natural reserve in Africa, under the tutelage of the heroine of the movement for the preservation of that fascinating species, Jane Goodall. It was Jane Goodall who first observed apes making tools, and it was she who first observed them in awe before a waterfall, as if experiencing a religious kind of awe. Jane Goodall described this behavior as a rudimentary form of spirituality.

I was very saddened by the program. It shows the effects of the illegal bush meat industry is having on the great apes. There are hundreds of orphaned apes that are being raised by humans. They are often found clinging either to body parts of their dead mothers, or alone, famished, confused and fearful. Their rescue stories often sound miraculous. They then have to be forcibly removed from their dead mother's arms, and taken to the reserve to be taken care of by human mothers, some of whom are nursing more than one chimp or gorilla at a time.

The nightmare does not end there: these human mothers have to give up everything and dedicate many years of their lives to raising chimps, which is a job that takes most of one's day and night. Baby chimps, like humans, need a lot of love and patience, constant affection and care. The first two years of their lives they do not let go of their mothers. There is constant physical contact. Many of them do not abandon their mothers' constant physical proximity until they're six, or sometimes until many years after reaching adulthood, and after she's raised several other siblings. Their bond lasts until death.

Depriving a baby chimp of his mother causes irreparable psychological and spiritual damage. We can only begin to imagine what it must be like to deprive an entire generation of apes of their mothers. The psychological problems of adolescent chimps are quite in evidence in the reserve: there are problems of violence, and many of the younger ones transfer their motherly/filial affection toward each other, and establish strong bonds with others of the same age, which roughly makes up for the mother-hunger.

Apes are one of the only other species, besides humans, that have a culture, that is, behaviors that are learned and passed on from generation to generation, like staying in the branches in certain locations in order to avoid predators, tool making, how to crack open nuts, etc. All of this folklore, which includes skills that are crucial to survival in the wild, is lost when apes are raised in captivity. This directly impacts the evolutionary momentum of the entire species.

Chimpanzee population consisted of around a million living entities back when Jane Goodall started doing her work several decades ago, but now there are only more or less 150,000 chimpanzees, many of them in captivity or natural reserves. Within one generation, it is likely that due to deforestation, loss of habitat, and the bush meat industry, there will be no more chimps in the wild. Another species, the humans, will become the sole custodians of their fate.

Chimps share between 98-99% of our genes, thus eating them can almost be considered an act of cannibalism. It is the only other species where laughter is part of normal, everyday social interaction ... as well as crying (although this one has also been observed in dogs and elephants). Their social, emotional and psycological lives are as complex as ours. Their babies look human ... and so do their elderly. The sounds we make when we make love are almost identical to theirs. At our wildest, at our most natural, we humans express our ape nature just as much as they do.

Even if we put aside the repulsive notion of someone eating an ape, I've always thought of the suffering that we are generating and the possible karmic repercussions of the unfair and unnecessary destruction of another species' habitat and families, especially now that we are the only species with the intelligence and the resources to save the chimp from extinction.

This article about the origin of VIH indicates:

Studies suggest the virus first entered the human population in about 1930 in central Africa, probably when people slaughtered infected chimpanzees for meat. AIDS has killed more than 25 million people and about 40 million others are infected with HIV.

It was apparently during the first few decades of the 20th century that the version of HIV virus that the chimps had muted, and being a very intelligent virus it transformed itself to became a human parasite. It seems to have entered the human body via consumption of ape meat.

Just as we are descended from apes, the human version of the HIV virus is descended from apes' version of HIV. In this sister species we've found clues to our origins ... and possibly our apocalypse.

In Africa, there are nations where between 33% and up to 40% of the population (Rwanda) is HIV+. The most productive generation (that between 20-40 years of age) has almost disappeared in Rwanda, leaving elderly ladies to take care of dozens of orphans alone in societies with hardly any middle aged people. Naturally, these old ladies have their hands full and cannot also be teachers, carpenters, etc. The working class has to come from somewhere else. Such a society cannot function normally, but becomes dysfunctional. It is an incomplete society.

The point that I'm making with this entry is: How ironic then, that due to our destruction of the continuity between the generations in ape societies, the members of our species in Africa find themselves in the very same paradigm that the apes are. This is karma! Perhaps it's time for us to wake up to the fact that, to Mother Earth, the lives of these living entities are no less valuable than ours. That we are part of the same cycle of life. That we interexist.

In Hinduism, God has names and aspects not only in human form, but also animal form, which makes perfect sense because Spirit dwells in them as well. Many of the same archetypal forces that shaped our species, shaped other species as well. In my own Vaishnav tradition, there is a God known as Hanuman, one of the heroes of the Ramayana, who personifies devotion, diligence, and service to God and all of creation.

Hanuman was the monkey and servant of the divine incarnation or avatar known as Rama. Lord Rama appeared six thousand years ago in the holy city of Ayodhya in order to show members of our race how to sanctify all of their relationships: he exemplified the ideals within all human relations: he was the ideal husband, the ideal king, the ideal master, the ideal brother, etc. His loving relationship with Hanuman shows us how to treat other species.

The psalm known as Hanuman Chalisa tells of an instance in the epic of Ramayana where Lord Rama embraces Hanuman, and tells him: "Friend, I love you just as much as I love (my brother) Lakshmana". Imagine if Jesus the Christ had said this to a highly intelligent, loyal ape sidekick and pet, with genuine love and thankfulness, and you may begin to understand the tenderness that this Christic incarnation had for Hanuman, and the tenderness that this episode evokes in the devotees. That is the example that was set by Lord Rama for us to follow in our relations with lesser animals. He did not treat Hanuman even as an inferior, or as a beast, but as the highly intelligent living entity that he was, fully capable of loving and worthy of being loved.

The stories from the holy epic of Ramayana are often used in India to teach human values to children. They are oftentimes no different from the tales of super heroes in the West, except that to his devotees, Lord Hanuman is a real person, a God that protects children and helps them get good grades in schools, a true living super Hero that they can literally count on and that exemplifies obeisance to parents and service to creation.

It is said that Hanuman cries tears of love everytime people chant the holy names of Lord Rama and that he is devotion personified. The merit and the sanctifying effects of the cult of Hanuman are endless: he is one of the main deities that helps develop Hindu children's characters from an early age, so that they will be diligent, responsible and devoted citizens as adults. With Hanuman, we learn about the true purpose of religion.

Even if our animal nature is over-developed, through Hanuman's grace we can still reach the feet of Lord Ram through devotion to creation, by following his example. If our minds are like monkeys, unstable and always running after the senses, and keep us from doing yoga and staying focused on one thing for more than three minutes, with Hanuman's grace we can learn discipline and diligence by channeling our energy into service like he did.

Hanuman also reinforces the idea, which is prevalent in Hinduism, that everyone worships according to their own nature: there is a dharma, a path of religion and righteousness, which is appropriate to each peculiar soul according to their peculiar karma and tendencies. True to one's nature, one can always turn to God, for as Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita 3:33: "what use is there in repression?"

Even dogs serve humanity and the rest of creation: they lead the blind, they work as shepherds and guardians, lead our sleds, and in doing so they channel their inherent tendencies into service to creation and incur karmic merit. Work is worship in Hinduism: it is noble, in fact it is one of the very definitions of the word dharma, some of the other definitions being religion, decency and righteousness.

I cannot discern a huge difference between a simian mother who, with infinite patience, raises her children, teaches them how to hunt termites, how to find food and shelter, gives them love and protection throughout the years, and a human mother who does the equivalent for her human children. The ideal of the loving ape mother was embodied in Hanuman's holy mother, Anjana.

In India, when apes and elephants die, funerals are held: they are cremated and prayed for just like a human. Even in the Ramayana, Lord Rama himself held a funeral for a vulture. Few other cultures take compassion for other living entities to this level: how relevant this is to us, in this age of Kali where we're pushing thousands of species to the verge of mass extinction. These are the values that we should be fostering and teaching our children, who usually limit their love of animals to familiar pets, like cats and dogs.

If even elephants have been seen solemnly observing silence before the bones of ancestors and holding funerals of a sort, why should humans, who ostentate complete and very elaborate religious systems, not also hold funerals for other species? When one ponders the possibility that animals have spirits, it becomes evident that Spirit transcends species and that we may transmigrate back and forth between species.

I would like to invite my readers to look at the members of other species, especially the most innocent, defenseless animals, with the eyes of Spirit. Do not limit your sense of social justice and compassion to the members of our own species. For as Lord Krishna said in the Bhagavad Gita 5:18:

The humble sage, by virtue of true knowledge, sees with equal vision a learned and gentle brahmana, a cow, an elephant, a dog and an outcaste.
The Arabs must replace the mentality that glorifies destruction with a mentality that glorifies construction.

- Former Kuwaiti Minister Ahmad Al-Ruba'i on Arab Conspiracy Theories
... the world is overpopulated with the wrong kind of people ...

- Ellen DeGeneres
I am not Catholic! I am Jewish! - Mother Mary, in Medjurgorje

Islamic Republic of Britistan?

Archbishop Rowan Williams is now denying that he called for Islamic shari'a in Britain. He was quoted earlier this week stating that the barbaric legal system of the Muslims should perhaps be introduced in order to solve minor family disputes, and that its role might be similar to the Jewish Beth Din.

I still remember it was thanks to the recent establishment of shari'a in northern states of Nigeria that Miss Universe was cancelled there several years back due to fear of violence and terrorist attacks after some contestants had stated they would boicot the country due to the (then) planned execution by stoning of Amina Nawal, a woman who was accused of adultery after her husband impregnated her and divorced her.

And it is thanks to shari'a that in Iran several gay men have been executed in public in recent years, a problem which has generated international outcry but little tangible response from the rest of the world.
I should like to know why nearly every man that approaches greatness tends to homosexuality, whether he admits it or not.

- D.H. Lawrence