Good Reason

It's okay to be wrong. It's not okay to stay wrong.

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More on the Maharishi’s empire

24 February 2008 / / Comments Off on More on the Maharishi’s empire

The New York Times reports that the Transcendental Meditation folks are trying to expand into suburban neighborhoods. There’s some nice snark in the ‘background doctrines’ part of the article.

Though the movement is admired for its finances, many independent critics question its belief that large groups of people meditating or practicing yogic flying — where people meditate and hop while sitting cross-legged in the lotus position — can spread peace.

The organization cites studies that it says found that large groups of yogic fliers helped temporarily lower crime in Washington, D.C., end the cold war and briefly reduce hostilities in the Middle East.

It has also been shown that insane people who make bizarre claims has caused a temporary rise in me wanting to jack them in the gut.

Is it possible to construct any idea or belief so horrendously stupid that no one will believe it? I would try, but despair at the human condition overtakes me before I get very far.

Celebrity deconversion story

24 February 2008 / / 21 Comments

I enjoyed reading this “My Defining Moment” piece from actor and writer Ricky Gervais.

He became an atheist at age eight, over one afternoon. How smart must he be? It took me years! Sometimes I get envious of other people’s intellect.

Friday Random Five was sleeping on your shoulder

22 February 2008 / / Comments Off on Friday Random Five was sleeping on your shoulder

Before I hit the Random button and talk about the first five songs that come up (no cheating), a word on recent explorations into ambient IDM/downtempo/glitch.

Carbon Based Lifeforms (no ‘the’, please) are a duo from Sweden that makes music like glaciers — cool and verrry slow-moving. I’ve been checking out two of their albums: Hydroponic Garden and (the slightly better) World of Sleepers. Both guaranteed to transport you to BubbleWorld, and not to antagonise you or raise your blood pressure more than a few ticks. I’ve found that there’s a place for the Carbs, and if you try listening in the wrong place, it’s desperately boring. Get it right, and there’s nothing else quite like it. Hint: driving, bad; working or sleeping, good.

If you like CBL, there are lots of other things you might get excited about. You might try Pushing Air by Deru, still ambient but with beats and more of an edge. Somehow it feels more substantive and engaging. Nice to see that the Boards of Canada tradition of putting weird little experimental numbers between the songs is holding up.

And in other news, did you know Devo had a new song? We didn’t get the Dell ad over here, so you Americans please excuse us while we watch them work it.

Good to know they’re still out there.

And now on to the Random.

The Robots (Cha-Cha-Cha) by Señor Coconut
Album: El Baile Alemán
I’ve blogged about Señor Coconut’s work before. This track comes from his first album — Latin reworkings of Kraftwerk songs. It’s more than just concept; the songs really stand up to repeated listenings. Even newcomers to Kraftwerk would probably enjoy these. My only qualm is that El Señor doesn’t follow the chord progressions for the song exactly. I’m a purist that way. His second attempt, Yellow Fever (consisting of YMO covers), is even better. Part homage, part humour, and all Latin.

Love Street by The Doors
Album: The Best of the Doors
The Doors remind me of being a kid in Jeffrey’s house. Maybe his older brothers listened to them. For some reason, the music of the Doors is in a different place in my mind from other 60’s music, but I can’t say why. It seemed deeper somehow.

I never got the chance to hear this song until I saw the movie, which is why I associate it with Val Kilmer as Jim, slinking up to Meg Ryan’s house. Run, Meg!

Love is a Stranger (Stranger Days Mix) by Eurythmics
Album: Art of Compilation CD7
More Eurythmics this week. This time, a dance mix of this classic track.
Liberation by Pet Shop Boys
Album: Very
‘Liberation’ is a powerful choice of word — it’s tied up with struggle and emancipation. As a straight guy, our society constantly affirms my sexuality, including when my beloved and I are in public. It’s difficult for me to imagine what that situation would be like for two men in love. I’m guessing that this is the situation described in the song, which uses the word to describe the feeling of freedom and self-acceptance from being with a lover. I’ve always thought this a lovely song.

Dark Star (David Andrew Sitek Remix) by Beck
Album: The Information
I have a confession to make. I’m a bit obsessive about documenting my music-listening habits. It’s pretty easy, because iTunes keeps track of playcounts etc. for you. But if I hear a song on the radio and I have it on the computer, I have been known to notch up the playcount for it. Because it should count, dammit. So it means something if I say that the album version of “Dark Star” is currently number 15 on my list of most listened-to songs (out of 13,000).

This mix is faithful to the original, with slightly more tambourine. I thought the instrumental interlude a bit unnecessary.

Bonus sixth.

Circus Ring by Vitamin Z
Album: Rites of Passage
I always thought this album was a cut above the usual late-eighties good-looking synthpop. Probably Anne Dudley’s influence. Searching for copies of this album was always futile, and I came to hate the sight of Sharp Stone Rain in the bins under ‘V’. It never did see a US release; even Discogs.com fails to list the CD. Nowhere else but Japan, from which this recording comes.

This track has a majestic quality, but its intensity stays in control. One of their best songs.

He doesn’t believe it — he just sells it.

20 February 2008 / / 7 Comments

A story in the NYT about a church in New Mexico. There’s a hole in the floor, and the dirt therefrom is claimed to have healing properties.

[T]ens of thousands of pilgrims walk eight miles or more to the shrine on Good Friday, some bearing heavy crosses and others approaching on their knees. Scores of people visit every day the rest of the year, many hoping to cure diseases or disabilities with prayer, holy water and, most famously, the healing dirt, which visitors collect from a hole in the floor inside the church.
…
Visitors bring their own baggies or containers or can buy little plastic containers marked “blessed dirt” at the church’s gift shop.

Few leave without some of the reddish soil, scooped from the 18-inch-wide “posito,” or well, that is continually replenished — by a caretaker, Father Roca is quick to explain, despite rumors over the years that the pit was refilled by divine intervention.

He pointed to the small building nearby where trucked-in dirt is stored. “I even have to buy clean dirt!” he complained.

Some people take dirt away for divine luck, while those with ailments may eat it, brew it in tea or rub it on the afflicted body area.
…
Father Roca believes in miracles, too, but, he said, “They are the work of the Good Lord.”

“I always tell people that I have no faith in the dirt, I have faith in the Lord,” he said. “But people can believe what they want.”

You know, for someone who doesn’t really believe in the dirt, he sure shovels a lot of it. But hey, why not? It brings in the customers, and the rubes can believe whatever they want. Including, apparently, that eating dirt will heal you.

If Father Roca seems like a good guy in this story, it may be because he’s not trying to fleece people with a phony dirt-replenishment miracle — he’s honest about where the dirt comes from. But if Father Roca’s up-front about the little things, he’s dead wrong about the big things. Not only is the dirt of no effect, neither is the faith. But the believing gather up the dirt anyway, despite the feeble protests of the smarter believers.

This symbolises something that’s been bugging me about liberal believers. Lots of smart people claim to believe the Bible (or choose your favourite holy book), but they argue that some of it is intended to be understood metaphorically. (Which parts? The parts that have already been falsified.) They may not even believe much of it at all. Sort of like our dirt-shoveling man — it’s not the details, it’s the big picture.

Some of these Liberal Metaphoricists choose to paper over their disbelief and participate in church anyway. Maybe they like the ‘community’ of it all, or maybe it’s habit — could be the music, who knows. In doing so, they not only dodge the difficulty of dealing with their cognitive dissonance, but they also support organisations that teach ideas they suspect to be false, to the detriment of the most faithful among their congregation. People can believe what they want, right? Everybody’s got to believe in something.

That’s the way it goes. You’re either shoveling out the dirt to the faithful, or else you’re eating it. But it’s dirt all the same. Best to sort it out and get clean.

Let the bodies hit the floor

19 February 2008 / / 2 Comments

Christian showman Benny Hinn seems to be famous mainly for making people fall over. Put it to a Drowning Pool song, and you get a quite good video, actually.

The boys asked why people were falling over, and I had to remember back to my psychology training. It’s good old participant bias: When there’s an authority figure, people tend to act in ways they think the authority figure will like. And don’t forget communal reinforcement: if the values of the group are confirmed when you roll around on the floor… well, why wouldn’t you roll around on the floor?

Or it could be Gawd.

Deconversion stories: the 2004 election

17 February 2008 / / 7 Comments

We’re knee-deep in election results these days, so I thought I’d tell about an eye-opening election result that assisted in my deconversion.

During my Utah days, I was a member of that rare but illustrious species: the Mormon Democrat. I didn’t mind being a minority; I rather liked it. Contrarian streak. Most members agreed (in theory) that liberals could be good members of the Church, but every once in a while someone would question whether liberal points of view were in fact compatible with Church teachings! It didn’t bother me too much. I figured those things weren’t the Church, just the people. One day, things might even out. They were good people.

Fast-forward to the 2004 election. Most Americans now disapprove of George W. Bush as president, but at the time, it was running half and half. That seemed strange. Having started the Iraq war, after the revelations of Abu Ghraib, the choice between Bush and NotBush seemed fairly clear and unambiguous. Not everyone would make the right choice, but didn’t the Book of Mormon say that most people would make the right choice most of the time?

Then came the results: Utah went for Bush county for county, one of only three states to do so.

Well, of course they did. Utah’s conservative, and is to this day more pro-Bush than any other state. But the election did disabuse me of one idea: that the conservatism of Utah was some kind of anomaly that would get sorted out eventually. The people of my church had gotten it wrong, and badly so. No dissenting counties? Not even Park City? A state full of people that claimed to have the Holy Spirit of God had voted for evil, and their vote was unanimous.

I can smile about it now — Utah didn’t vote the way I wanted them to, so they’re evil. But at the time, it was profoundly disappointing. They would never get it. And it changed the way I saw rank and file Mormons. They could get it wrong.

Australian flag debate

15 February 2008 / / 1 Comment

Of course there are more important questions than whether Australia should change its flag. But we at Good Reason firmly believe that if you wait until the big issues are solved, you’ll never deal with the little issues. So I want to put forward my pick for the new design, in case Australians ever decide to resolve the whole flag debate.

Here it is.

It’s tasteful and modern, it’s got the Aboriginal dots thing going on, and it combines sky, sea, beach, and bush, which just about covers the Australian Experience.

Seen anything better?

Religion and divorce

14 February 2008 / / 3 Comments

A sad story from the NYT: what happens in custody arrangements when parents get divorced, and then one parent turns into a religious froot-looper?

From the age of 1 month, Mrs. Snider’s daughter had lived with her, and later Mrs. Snider’s new husband, Brian Snider, with occasional visits to her biological father.

But in 2003, when Libby was 6, an Alabama court gave primary custody to her father, William Mashburn, after he and Mrs. Snider’s own family argued that the strict religious upbringing Libby received at her mother’s home, which involved modest dress, teachings about sin and salvation, and limited exposure to popular culture, was damaging her.

…

The Sniders are quietly, unapologetically fundamentalist. They believe that American culture, even conservative denominations like the Southern Baptist Convention, has drifted perilously far from biblical teachings. They attend a large Independent Baptist church in Madison, where the music, the sanctuary and the congregants are unadorned and old-fashioned.

Women wear skirts as a sign of modesty. They do not swim in mixed company. They eschew rock music and nearly all popular culture. They do not drink, smoke or swear.

The Sniders have raised Libby, now 11, in that tradition. But it has put them at odds with Mr. Mashburn and Mrs. Snider’s family. Mr. Mashburn and his lawyer declined to comment .

Mrs. Snider said she understood that Libby might wear pants at her father’s home or go to the movies. But she insisted that Mr. Mashburn not swear or drink in front of Libby or expose her to inappropriate movies and music, which, she said, he has repeatedly done.

I would say that this situation (like most post-divorce situations) can be worked around by not being a jerk, but this advice doesn’t help when one’s religion more or less requires one to be a jerk.

Even when both parents want what’s best for the child, religion throws everything into disarray because the religious froot-loop parent thinks the child will go to hell unless they obey the arcane rules of the religious system.

Just another way in which the non-negotiable absolutism of religious belief harms children. And how’s this for a heart-breaking conclusion:

At the last hearing, Libby, who spends about 40 percent of her time with the Sniders, testified against Mr. Mashburn.

“I’m more of my mom’s religion, and my dad sometimes talks bad about my mom,” she said. “He called it a cult, and it’s definitely not a cult. It kind of makes me mad sometimes. Maybe he thinks her religion may be bad for me, but I think mainly he doesn’t like my mom and is using that as an excuse.”

Will she ever escape fundamentalism and rebuild a good relationship with her father? Sounds like the spilt is only going to grow. But hey, what’s the problem. Didn’t Jesus say:

Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword.

For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law.

And a man’s foes shall be they of his own household.

It’s a feature, not a bug.

Why we do what we do

12 February 2008 / / 3 Comments

This is what we’re working toward.


(Does anyone know where this comes from? I lol’d.)

Wanker of the Week: Brendan Nelson

11 February 2008 / / Comments Off on Wanker of the Week: Brendan Nelson

People don’t like the realisation that they’re irrelevant, but it is a rare person who can realise it, and then try to ingratiate themselves and kvetch at the same time. Liberal Brendan Nelson is just such a person.

The Opposition has offered in-principle support to an apology but is waiting to be fully briefed by the Prime Minister about the precise wording of the speech.

You know, I don’t really care whether this batch of Liberal wankers support The Apology or not. They blocked it until it looked like it was going to happen without them, and now they’re jumping on. Where were they before?

Wait, it gets better. Notice how, having contributed nothing to the whole “sorry” mess, Nelson gets pissy about not having been included.

Leader of Government Business in the Lower House, Anthony Albanese, says the wording of the apology will be released for all to see tomorrow.

But Dr Nelson has told Fairfax Radio he has not been told what is going on.

“This is all appearing chaotic. To the great credit [of] a lot of my colleagues we have decided in principle we will support this,” he said.

“But if Mr Rudd wants it to unify Australia, to bring our nation together, the most important person he should be negotiating with is me.“

“It’s very important that we actually sit down, we’re two days away from this for goodness sake.”

Me! It’s all about me! Only Dr Nelson and his precious feelings can heal this nation!

No, it’s about the people who have been wronged by the policy. It’s a bus, Dr Nelson. You missed it.

UPDATE: It never stops for Nelson.

Opposition Leader Brendan Nelson has been forced to defend his response to today’s stolen generations apology, in which he spoke of indigenous Australians “living lives of existential aimlessness”.

The Liberal leader provoked outrage among the thousands who gathered across the nation to watch the televised broadcast when he spoke of ”the seemingly intractable and disgraceful circumstances in which many indigenous Australians find themselves today”.

Across the country, people booed, hissed and shouted during Dr Nelson’s speech – with some going so far as to pull the plug on the televised broadcast.

In Melbourne, the 8000-strong crowd at Federation Square turned its back on the screen during Dr Nelson’s speech, amid chants of “get him off”.

In Perth, noise from the angry crowd that had gathered on the city’s Esplanade drowned out Dr Nelson’s words. A protester then cut the Liberal leader’s speech short by pulling the plug and causing a power failure.

In Canberra, many of those gathered outside Parliament House had either walked away or turned their backs by the end of his speech.

Some grew increasingly angry as Dr Nelson told Parliament: “Our generation does not own these actions, nor should it feel guilt for what was done in many, but certainly not all cases, with the best intentions.“

Members of the crowd jeered and yelled at Dr Nelson to “get off”, “go and learn history” and “get your hand off it Brendan”.

It gets worse if you read the full text. At first, the speech seems appropriate enough, but it eventually turns into partisan rancor…

Alcohol, welfare without responsibilities, isolation from the economic mainstream, corrupt management of resources, nepotism, political buck-passing between governments with divided responsibilities, lack of home ownership, under-policing and tolerance by authorities of neglect and abuse of children that violates all we stand for, all combine to still see too many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people living lives of existential aimlessness.

defence of John Howard…

Sexual abuse of Aboriginal children was found in every one of the 45 Northern Territory communities surveyed for the Little Children are Sacred report. It was the straw breaking the camel’s back, driving the Howard government’s decision to intervene with a suite of dramatically radical welfare, health and policing initiatives.

cultural warfare…

Our generation has, over 35 years, overseen a system of welfare, alcohol delivery, administration of programs, episodic preoccupation with symbolism and excusing the inexcusable in the name of cultural sensitivity, to create what we now see in remote Aboriginal Australia.

… and, incredibly, defence of people that carried out the acts of kidnapping (with undertones of warning against giving the dole to those filthy undeserving poor).

Even when motivated by inherent humanity and decency to reach out to the dispossessed in extreme adversity, our actions can have unintended outcomes. As such, many decent Australians are hurt by accusations of theft in relation to their good intentions.

In future, when people tell us there’s really no difference between the two major political parties, let’s just remember this moment, shall we?

UPDATE 2: Unbelievable.

As Nelson rose to offer his apology to the Stolen Generations on behalf of his Opposition, the signs were already abroad that all was not roses. West Australian Liberal Wilson Tuckey had made great show of reciting louder than anyone the Lord’s Prayer at the beginning of the parliamentary session, and then had marched out of the chamber. He would have nothing to do with any apology. Nor would fellow West Australian Don Randall, who was absent, and Victorian Sophie Mirabella, also missing. Others shuffled paper and read throughout Rudd’s speech, and Peter Costello tapped on a laptop computer.

I

I got nothing.

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