Category: democracy

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Power – ‘Where From’ and Why? – Ways Out of the Vicious Cycle

beautiful-still-life-with-water

Politics make me extremely mad sometimes, and this is my way to express my thoughts:
Men are at the bottom of power being considered a desirable asset, so it seems, more precisely: Patriarchy is. The idea of man being the “crown of creation”, the reigning principle, as it were.

It’s rather painfully obvious that in turn at the bottom of that is the emotion of empowerment, which in turn can be set in relation to sexual experience directly, alas. People sometimes even admit to that in front of cameras: below you find a particularly unusual statement to that effect, ©rbb and arte.tv.

Why? Why would it be a bad thing – feeling powerful?

Because people confuse it with self-confidence!
Self-confidence in turn can have a number of reasons, shortly summarized: it comes from being confident that we exist and behave according to the standards we were taught as children and adolescents.
That’s why people in such societies feel self-confident, when they are powerful (men) or beautiful (women).
But it’s neither power nor beauty that makes us attractive and desirable – it’s self-confidence. First and last.

If we base our self-confidence on new and more stable values than power or beauty we may find this earth turning into a finer place – every day.

Because too many people, and the majority of them men, are led to believe that being ‘successful’ makes you attractive – and being attractive leads (at least in most male fantasies) to more sexual encounters with willing women.
At the bottom the idea of simpletons that a ‘real man’ is defined by his ability to entice women.

There are rather disgusting examples, which I wouldn’t want to mention if I hadn’t to to be quite clear, such as the late Italian politician Berlusconi, the hopefully soon to be sentenced Trump in the US or the dictator of Russia, Putin.

Even the Russian politician Alexei Navalny – may he rest in peace  and his possible if not for-sure murderers be brought to justice – or the Ukrainian president Zelenskyy are no exception alas, apparently if not obviously driven by their adoration for their wives, who both are counted by modern standards among the ‘attractive desirable ones’…

I beg the pardon of all who know them better than I could using official reliable sources, should this appear blunt and unkind, in view of their achievements, too… But I also think that their connections and some actions due to their drive for political success at least deserve looking into.

On the side: No, of course, not every man on this earth is like that, thank heaven – and their smart parents. But too many of those that are in power – or want it badly – are like that, more or less.

All this seems perhaps blunt, but to me it’s to the point at issue, namely war and destruction and suffering and hunger created too often for no real reason – and there’s a lot of evidence in the documentations, reliable newspapers and scientific research in anthropology as well as history and social sciences to make this a very likely point of view.

(The video-clip is a very short extract. Please be aware that I chose it carefully for the abovementioned statement that is contained here. Otherwise you would want to watch the full documentary here.)

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The Three Wise Monkeys Revisited – The Art of Focusing

Image licensed adobe.com

“See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil.” The three wise monkeys are a concept, an idea, that stems from the Japanese culture. They are a proverbial idea of how to deal with bad or evil matters in human life. When you are raised on the idea that one should be truthful, that denial can be bad for you, you may be apt to wonder.

How is such an idea a good thing?

To my mind it’s two very important points to be considered here:

    • Words are powerful, they create images in our minds.
    • It’s not about denial – it’s about focus.

Images in our minds are powerful, as has been since established in scientific research too: They help us keep focus, they can drive our actions that way – and make us feel weak and insecure – or confident and strong.

One technique that also has been advocated for business negotiations and even marketing – is to ‘visualize‘:

Start using what you have learned in terms of ideas and words to actively make up the image of what you are aiming at.

Your next project, a higher level of health  – or understanding, in short, some measure of self-awareness or efficacy different from before.

That’s why the idea of the three wise monkeys can help not only focus – they help us focus on all the things that make us strong, confident and positive about reaching the goal. Which does not necessarily mean wealth or power.

The community at large will benefit from such views:

    • From the idea that you will not listen to rumours which may be even false.
    • From the idea that you will not direct your gaze onto the bad or worse matters, not focus on the bad things.
    • From the idea that you yourself will not help either creating rumours or bad ideas – or spread those images.

Words are powerful, in all ways. That’s why focusing on the good is important.

Not because one would deny problems or difficulties or the downright evil – but because they can help to make it better, again.

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After a Pandemic a Plague? US-American Republicans and Their Embarrassing Leadership

Image of chess game with board and black and white pieces
Image courtesy pixabay.com – free license

To think that after all that has happened the US-American Republicans seriously consider nominating a person like the one before the current president of that country is practically embarrassing! One would laugh with wholehearted mirth if it wasn’t too serious. I am trying hard to avoid naming its name. Yes, “its”: This is a sorry excuse for a man. To make him the president the second time is like advocating Adolf Hitler as head of state. Period.

But the party and its leaders seem not to think so themselves: A person who lacks any kind of scruples, is devoid of feeling any responsibility except towards the ‘Golden Calf’ of the bible, namely worshipping money – who is responsible during his term of government for cancelling the contracts for disarmament with Russia – and that way may be indirectly responsible for the current situation in Ukraine, a person who threatened North Korea into near war, until it became clear that money rather would do the trick with a nation that already has ‘the bomb’.
A person, particularly, who actually threatens the democracy of that nation itself they are so proud of stating to be the first real one…??!!! He was close and will get closer to instate another dictatorship in the US – and he will closely collaborate with Putin in Russia – they are the best of friends as anybody knows who follows the news.

And the news are only publicly acknowledged information, there is probably more, if we look into similar situations in history.

It’s a pity to think what the Republicans in America actually stand for: But the constitution or its principles are certainly not part of it, when all is said and done. Whatever they will tell you during election campaign(s).

Let’s hope that Italy’s sad example is not one they will follow.
…But then: Such leaders are really only about being ‘the man’, right? Silly women all around, as long as they are nice to look at, lots of booze and a large enough stretch limousine ready to take those said silly ‘chicks’ in – and with… and that in front of cameras too, is really all they care about.

And such people ‘we’ should vote for? Seriously?

I hope and actually pray that murder, money and power is not the only thing Republicans go for over there. Although: Looking at history that too may be too much to hope. Because: Murdering others in the name of the power and so-called US-American overseas ‘interests’ usually doesn’t make them turn a hair.
Or will it this time?

I can only hope that some kind of reason and responsibility will prevail over there and a Democrat such as Joe Biden be president – a second running in this case.

Whatever else happens: I will ‘bother’ all of those that are in power – and in stretch limousines – using my kind of weapon: the writing quill!

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War is Not an Option: War is Death

Buddhist monk walking rose petals barefoot
We can go there – if we really want it… Peace.

War is  wholesale murder.  Charlie Chaplin was not the first to point it out. He was not the last one either.
War is not a solution: War is the sign of failure to really try and find a solution.
War ist not heroism either: War is the ultimate cowardice in the face of – thoughts, life and difficulties.

Because: Anyone faced with the question at one time or another in the course of their lives if they were prepared to lose their own life for the sake of a cause – as long as they consider the cause to be ‘good’ – will come to the conclusion that as a fine human being you would have to.

But the point is: War is no ’cause’! War has a cause, not to say multiple causes. But they are never heroic, wonderful or sublime – whatever anyone tells you.

They are driven by interests, of lobbies, of industries, of companies, all those that will make money by selling things for those wars:
The weapons
The ‘units and kits’
The cars and vehicles
The ships
The phones and radio transmission devices
The food and shelter

All this makes a lot of selling to do. A lot of money, for those who provide the goods. The jobs…

Anything you want to sell needs marketing. That’s equally true of war: They will sell it by making it the only possible way out of a ‘fix’…presenting no alternatives anymore.
But that’s propaganda.

War is not a heavenly or sublime cause! Never was, never will be. War is about money. First and last.

 

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USA, Politics and Clearing up a Mess: The Trump Legacy

chessboard with pieces and hands moving one
In a democracy that is working – even if more or less – clearing up the mess of predecessors is a central part of the work.

The longer predecessors had time to mess it up, the longer the clearing can take. World politics these days are fraught with pain and fear, not altogether new, but at the time being, very central and basic again: Nuclear war?

Whom to blame?

The facts:

    • The two existing ‘superpowers’ – the Soviet Union/Russia and the US – have been constantly balancing their power and fighting all across the globe, including in diplomatic talks, since WWII.
    • The so-called ‘proxy wars’ in many countries in the past and present are signs of that.
    • Afghanistan is one of the most afflicted countries around the world, and has been for centuries:
        • In 18th and 19th century world politics, the wars between Britain and France and Russia partly were fought there; Afghanistan as ‘gate to India’ – a tool.
        • In the course of the 20th century numerous times, the Soviet Union and then Russia with the US fought there in proxy uprisings. Afghanistan a central region in several directions and seen as a gate yet again.
        • The civil war there raged for more than 30 years, leaving the country almost without any kind of infrastructure or healthy professions people could use to earn a living.
        • To leave it to self-destruct or leave it to those who would destroy it, would be bordering not only on the insane, but be basically a crime committed against its population whose majority is innocently suffering.
      • The USA under the Trump government terminated the INF-contracts that had been signed after, altogether, decades of negotiations in 1987 to finally end the Cold War after 40 years.
      • Trump had instated several supreme court justices of his own political believes.
        Let’s remember: In order to change the US-constitution the supreme court is crucial.
      • Trump had initiated the attack on the Capitol.
      • Putin and Trump were the best of political friends. The massive manipulation of elections from inside Russia in favour of Trump are proven without doubt.

These are some of the most important facts in regard to the situation we are facing now. Ukraine is, alas, one more country used as a proxy and recently put on the map again, because of that.

It pains me to write it – yet the only chance at peace we have – and ultimately survival, prevent a nuclear war, that is – is the reinstatement of contracts or agreements that make both of these ‘superpowers’ and their allies feel safe enough again.

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Work, Life and Chance – Backgammon: The Game of Princes

Iran, Esfahan (Isfahan) – Ali Qapu Palace

“Your life’s whatever you make of it.” That’s a popular phrase meant to bolster confidence – or even motivate employees… Well, there’s more to life than meets the eye at a glance. Anyone who’s gone through life longer than just a couple of decades has come to realize what Baz Luhrman so aptly said:
“Your choices are half chance. So are everybody else’s.”

Many smart comedians, philosophers and coaches will tell you that. It is actually a wise person who realizes it – it has been known for centuries if not thousands of years among people, mankind even.

There was a ‘modern’ urge when the civil society began to form that found one outlet in the possibility to emigrate to the USA, then dominions still. With a huge country apparently all there just to find your luck without any shackles or strings attached, the credo was: “Your life’s whatever you make of it.”

Was it, really?

Even the first settlers faced grave challenges, partly from indigenous peoples who wouldn’t all easily accept that land-taking by strangers. Bluntly put.

Additionally, so few conditions known, many pioneers just died from starvation due to completely different climate and soil conditions.

Yet, marketing and people who wanted to sell this idea and self-promoting methods as new ways to happiness and self-made wealth just persisted publishing self-help guides.

The idea of course is appealing. But in the long run it will lead to anger and frustration, because it leaves out all those chances life presents us all with: Recently we were all witnesses to it again on a huge scale, a pandemic, with millions of deaths.

We were lucky too, in many ways, in many parts of the world. But the long and the short of it is this:

Life is full of chances and conditions and surroundings that will make it easy or difficult to reach goals you wished to attain.

Sometimes, just knowing there is a philosophy behind it, summarized like this, can help:

“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
courage to change the things I can,
and wisdom to know the difference.”

Here is a fine short documentary on the game of Backgammon and its vital difference to chess: Chess is like war. But Backgammon is like life: And it is thousands of years old. It was even used to teach princes at the ancient courts of Persian kings to be sophisticated and wise leaders of their governments.

We cannot control everything in life. A lot depends on luck and surroundings. But we can always try to do our best in any given situation.

It’s a German language version with English subtitles:

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Talks and Decisions – Let Them Hear Our Voices

image showing swarm of birds at sea shore
Seagulls’ calls are impressive – Image courtesy unsplash.com – free license

Politics are no games; they are power plays and diplomatic arenas as well as sometimes ‘hunting’ grounds. If as voting individuals in a democracy we want to stay that, namely have a choice to say ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to some party’s politics – we need to stay put:

Bother the wrong choices – each and every day. Raise our voices additionally to voting, to stop them, whoever they are: In Brazil (Bolsonaro, recently lost 🙂 ) the US (the last but one president till 2021 and his followers) or Italy (sadly extreme right won this time; but Italy may change their government again soon) in China, Russia or the Ukraine, or any other place:
There are always those that hunger for more, more wealth, more power, more attention. And never have enough. And those that don’t.

Let reason and free thinking prevail – by keeping to be bothersome.

The voice of reason is the voice that can be heard in the United Nations’ Human Rights Declaration – and all who make it their task to remind those other ‘hungry’ ones of those rights.

Each day and any day: Let’s keep bothersome! Push them into the right direction by letting them hear our voices.

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Iran 2022 – The Protests for Civil Freedom and Equality

Image of Iran windcatchers in Yazd province
Windcatchers in Iran, Yazd province, an age-old system of cooling houses using wind (free license online via Ecosia.org)

Iran: A wonderful country of thousands of years of culture, tradition and cuisine, as well as a highly developed sense of community; a unique, Indo-European language; some of the most wonderful poems by world-famous poets come from there. Almost all of them were largely apprehended and adopted in new forms by European poets, such as Goethe and his “The West-Eastern Divan”.
Hafez who inspired it, also is widely known all over the country of Iran. People put the book of his poems in a central place on the highest festival of the year, ‘Nowrooz‘ – the spring festival dating back over 3,000 years. Or the epicurean poems by Khayyam, to name only two larger-than-life figures.

The main language ‘Farsi’ (Persian) has been preserved over centuries of being conquered and occupied.

Architecture, crafts, painting, music, hand-knotting of rugs – the finest worldwide – there’s almost no field you could mention in arts and crafts that hasn’t great works to offer.

One of the oldest religions, root for all theologies that are monotheistic, Judaism, Christianity and Islam, comes from there: Zoroastrianism

Compared to the long history of all of it the Islamic Republic is comparatively young: A little over 40 years ago now, the clerical part of the society took over power. Clerics had always been one part of the power factions throughout Persia’s – or by its younger name ‘Iran’ – long history, especially since the 16th century AC by Western reckoning.

The people now protesting in the streets of Iran and risking their freedom and even their lives have been raised to another movement of protest by the death of a young woman; a student, who was detained by the police for not wearing the ‘hijab’, the headscarf mandatory to wear for women in public places or in the company of men other than close family.

The civil rights in Iran have been a sad story to say the least ever since the revolution of 1979. Things hadn’t been easy before. The Savak, the Shah’s secret service was present everywhere.

But things became worse, in many respects, after 1979.

This is a reminder to all who care: Iran is worth it, every day. More civil rights and the basic human rights would be a start.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N97ZLq1Y-dE

The song above states the reasons for the ongoing protests. Hashtags as sources the singer assembled the Twitter-posts of protesters and made this song called ‘baraye’ = ‘for’…

It was published originally on Twitter or Instagram. It has been retweeted 153 million times, so the information on another retweet I have a URL to. Since I am not a Twitter member myself, I use this post that adequately translates the Persian words with English subtitles on youtube. The singer has been arrested.

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Cruel Attack on Salman Rushdie – Award-winning Writer

Image showing Salman Rushdie discussing with mic in hand
Image courtesy Ecosia Search Engine – Free license

After all this time someone managed to hit, cruelly: Salman Rushdie, wonderful poet and writer of award-winning books was attacked on Friday with a knife and hit 10 times. At the moment of this writing he seems to  be out of danger. I hope he will recover and heal mind and body to come out even stronger than before.

The darker side of any religion sometimes is revealed in such acts: Manipulated simple-minded people who actually believe that freedom of press, opinion and religious following could be considered a sin, exist. They existed in ancient history when Muslims and Christians killed each other in the ‘Holy Land’ apparently over who would own it.
When it really was about power in that region and trade ways as well as roads.

In ancient times and these days: Any religion can be abused to manipulate people into cruel deeds, into following someone for the sake of simple solutions in words, in order to feel special, in a dangerous, deceptive safety of woolly-headed idolatry.

The only way out of what Plato described in the cave allegory: People sitting in a cave, with the entrance behind them, a slight elevation and a light on it between, watching the cave walls. Life and its figures passing by the entrance outside, to such humans appear like flickering shadows on that back wall.

To leave that cave of misinterpretation and age-old manipulation means: Train your mind.

Learn about thoughts and ideas. Understand that humans need to respect each other in order to be able to live in a world of peace and joy. To be able to even let their dreams come true which might be just – to live and let live in peace of mind.

To watch over human rights as declared in the Human Rights Declaration of the United Nations – is without alternative!

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War, Power, Power Plays – Power Balance – The Cruelty of Politics

game of chess with fire in background
Image courtesy pixabay.com – Free license

Politics is about tactics too, the official definition in the Oxford dictionary states, as one meaning:
The activities of governments concerning the political relations between states.
Politics can be wise and be based on sound values – or they are cruel and serve a few with no values at all, except their bank account(s).

Others use politics as a means to heal wounds of vanity, retrieved some time during their lifetime. Like, dreadful example, though one of many, really, Adolf Hitler, ‘Reichskanzler’ (Chancellor of the 3rd Reich) during the Nazi dictatorship in Germany.

Famously applied at the Vienna Academy of Arts and rejected he spent the rest of his life redeeming a fragile self-confidence or rather image.

To this day dictators often are about this more than anything else: Many take the wealth in the wake of power as a means to an end – and bathe in any kind of public recognition and the approval of one part (usually the rich and extremely rich) of the respective society.

These patterns are recurring, and usually do so cruelly – as per latest example, in regard to Putin in his way to power – and the Ukraine.

The Ukraine is part of the power plays between nations and actually the former Soviet Union and its remnants – as well as a personality the likes of Putin who took over this vast country of Russia bit by bit in more than two decades.

His own motives may be hidden in biographical privacy yet – but they seem rather apparent when watching recordings of his public and private appearances: Extreme understatement standing out as the apparently simple guy, the almost nice, familiar neighbour who wears his business suit anywhere, even in parades among numerous highly decorated militia…

Yet, when seen driving big motor-cars and enjoying the fact that he is a ‘force to be reckoned with’, the purported modesty and neighbourly demeanour are revealed as so much window dressing.

In the long run educating people to the values that have proven to be vital to any civil, democratic society, namely the Human Rights Declaration, are the only real weapon we have against such populism and cruel repression.

In the short run, being aware of the balance of power and respect it early on might be the safe route around war.

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