Documentary Watch List

Zeitgeist
The Ring of Power
The Naked Truth
Religulous by Bill Maher
History of the English Language
Life & Debt
Money As Debt
BBC - The Money Trap
The Ascent of Money
Secret Mysteries of America's Beginnings I - The New Atlantis
The Truth about the Federal Reserve
The Obama Deception
THE DECLINE AND FALL OF AMERICA
The Pirates Of Silicon Valley (The story of the unethical business practices of Microsoft and Apple Computer)
The Century of Self
Home
Earthlings
We: The Documentary of the Human Race Today
The Orion Conspiracy
The Chariot of the Gods
The Esoteric Agenda
Kymatica
Bowling for Columbine
Flow: For the Love of Water
Blue Gold: World Water Wars
Consuming Kids
Deconstructing the Myth of Aids
The Origin of AIDS,Polio Vaccine: The Smoking Gun
HIV- AIDS:Fact Or Fraud
The Land of Look Behind
End Game
If Drugs Were Legal - BBC Documentary(2005)
The History of Marijuana
Aphrodisiac: The Sexual Secret of Marijuana
Union: The Business of Getting High
Marijuana Inc. Inside America's Pot Industry
Prince of Pot
Cannabis: The Evil Weed -BBC.Horizon.2009
National Geographic Explorer - Marijuana Nation
Occupation 101
Ross Kemp On Gangs: Jamaica

If we must die

Jamaican poet Claude Mackay wrote a poem in 1919 called, 'If we must die' in response to race riots across American cities.

It was a poem of such quality that it became an anthem of resistance everywhere.

Twenty years later British Prime Minister Winston Churchill used it as a rallying call to encourage troops in the second world war and to persuade the US to join the war.

But Prime Minister and his speech writers never attributed the words to Mackay.

BBC's Mark Coles recently discussed the poem with Jamaican poet Lorna Goodison.

LISTEN HERE

Of Pearls & Swine in the Summer of Swine Flu

Why am I cursed so so...
So all the time,
So so so confined,
Condemned to cast cast...
Cast pearls at swine,
In a capitalist muddle,
To mingle, mix and meddle,
Damned, damned...
Damned to peddle,
My wares and what's mind,
My wares and all that's mine,
In a world of material commodity,
An intellect has and is no property,
Only to be mangled by an ancient monopoly(theist).

Now I am no sissy,
And I don't like to make a fuss,
But goddamit I feel like Sisyphus,
Up the hill with all I can muster,
Lacking shine... lacking... luster...rrrgh

Rasta at the Poet Tree... or is it Poet's Tree

Haiku series:

Deja's View

Madness spreads fever
Men come for the tight love grind
Nude pleasure sputters

 

Days of the Old Skool Yaad

Children at the skool
Shelter behind old stone walls
People everywhere

La Luna and the Lunar-cy

Some sweet god shimmers
Luminous nitefall spreads
This dream burning with lite


Homicidal Secrecy

Blind cries for deaf tears
I don't want to, but know things
So pain pours from me...


The Fear of Solitude

I sparked this madness
alone again, as always
All I know is pain.


The Sardonic Nature of God

God would laugh at me
I'm crying for no reason.
I was happy... once!


Soul-ar Eclipse

Contemplating suicide
I'm filled with disillusion
Today, my heart blackened

________________________________________

Permission to Speak Freely

If I might speak freely Ma'am,
I've been thinking on God,
And I've been keeping my guard,
I've been consuming ancient texts and toiling hard.

I don't want to talk,
But we need to speak,
And speak freely I must,
Even though I know my dry honesty causes disgust,
But I would tell thee of love and lust,
Sinking ships and broken trust,
A thought in me throbbing and growing robust,
I must place the scion of Kush in you with a thrust.


Lucea Harbour

Out on the docks,
Facing the sea,
Just behind the Public Lie Bury,

It was out on the docks
Just before dawn,
As lanterns dot the whispering, mumbling, Sssssshhhhhing secret sea...
Like peenie wallie against some big black blue damp dewed lawn,

As I hear the hushing sighs of weary waves that at long last reach shore,
As I hear the lapping of paddles and oars parting waters,
As I hear my own fingers swishing and squishing like feet playing in puddles & pools,
As I hear her parting labia label me Lord and Conqueror...
My mind is gone...
Lost in the cool morn twilight calm.


Non-Sequitur

I've got a job,
But am feeling hollow,
This a bit odd,
It does not follow.

I've forsaken street and lane,
With no tomorrow and they blow men's marrow,
But I fear supervisors and cubicles just the same,
I cannot comprehend it does not follow.


Sleepy Mornings

She's velvet black,
No not my sunshine,
Just my late lazy misty morn,
Wrapped in my rumpled sheets,
She's wrapped in an epidermal abyss,
A skin clammy with the nippy 9 am air of bleak days.

She is slumber,
She is languid,
She is limp,
She is supple,
She is my smokey sleep morning...


Julius Caesar and his Sunny Son

I've given you my five loaves and two fishes
Don't grant me platitudes and beatitudes,
Just answer me this,
If I pray... will you give me three wishes.
_______________________________________________

Thoughts before the battle! (Mental dialogue with Sun Tzu)

I've surveyed the terrain,
And my conviction remains,
I don't need Roy Forester to know which way the wind blows,
Rastafari knows how the current flows,
I've foresighted my foes,
I've visioned tomorrow,
And forecasted the future,
I will version "HIS" story,
I know I have my mathematics right,
I've been endowed the magic the mind the mettle and the might...
Vested for an eternal fight,
I have the heart and aim by sight,
With the first shot...
ONE bullet...

My hopes... my dreams will take flight.


Poethreat

I walk with a pen, a gun and a knife,
So fear me most...
For I can... kill you twice.

I write eulogies often,
I can draw you a coffin,
And I have the mind to put you in it...

For ink can steal your fame and stain your name,
Draw your caricature,
Mocking you throughout your eternal voiceless future,
Or it may...
Jot the words for your epitaph,
Something dry and witty...
Dark humour... guaranteed to make someone laugh.

I've heard it said the pen is mightier than the sword,
And God created the world with but a word.

So watch your words and deeds indeed,
As a matter of fact... watch your words and mind mine,
For I am vile new breed.

I walk with a pen, a gun and a knife,
I can kill you twice, so protect your life!

My hands know blood and ink,
So dare me to draw... dare me, just dare me to even think...

Is the Public Capable of Recognizing Quality Music?

 

Can the average music listener recognize quality? Can they distinguish a virtuoso from a mediocre musician? Can they recognize a “hit” that will still be esteemed a masterpiece in a hundred years? Does “popular” mean the same as “quality”?

I’ve just starting watching that great Massachusetts law drama “The Practice” again. In a recent episode, a film critic defended his occupation: “The public don’t know whether they like a movie or not unless we tell them!” Is the same true for music?

A couple of years ago The Washington Post held an experiment to find out. They called their experiment “Pearls Before Breakfast”.

The Experiment

To find his own answer to our question, Gene Weingarten from The Washington Post approached violin virtuoso and one-time child prodigy, Joshua Bell, and asked him to don street clothes and play quality music on his 1713 Stradivarius as a busker at a Washington DC railway station during rush hour.

Here is a brief summary of the experiment. You can read the original Washington Post article here, and see Dear Teacher’s take on it (including footage of the event) in the Youtube video below.

On a cold January morning, Bell arrived at L’Enfant Plaza Station at 7:15 am, and positioned himself against a wall on a busy subway platform near a trash basket. He wore jeans, a long-sleeved t-shirt and a baseball cap. He threw a couple of dollars in his open violin case, pointed it towards the passersby, and played Bach for 43 minutes with the same 3.5 million dollar violin and passion he would play with in Symphony Hall.

Weingarten describes the thoughts and decisions that passersby would have to process:

Each passerby had a quick choice to make, one familiar to commuters in any urban area where the occasional street performer is part of the cityscape: Do you stop and listen? Do you hurry past with a blend of guilt and irritation, aware of your cupidity but annoyed by the unbidden demand on your time and your wallet? Do you throw in a buck, just to be polite? Does your decision change if he’s really bad? What if he’s really good? Do you have time for beauty? Shouldn’t you? What’s the moral mathematics of the moment?

In their planning, editors of the Post discussed the issue of crowd-control, but they needn’t have bothered. A crowd never formed. What response did Bell get?

• A $1 tip from a lady who didn’t stop to listen.
• A middle aged man slowed his pace to listen for a few seconds before hurrying again.
• One man leaned up against a wall to listen, but hurried off after looking at his watch.
• A three-year-old boy tried to stop to listen, only to be pushed along by his mother.
• A total of six people stopped briefly to listen.
• 27 people gave him money, but didn’t stop to listen.
• A worker at the station had no memory of a musician being at the station when he was asked later. He had been listening to his iPod.
• Another woman did remember the violinist, but “but nothing about him struck me as much of anything.”
• One person who stopped for a shoe shine complained that the music was too loud.
• 1,070 people passed by oblivious.
• There was no applause after any of the six pieces he played.
• He made a total of $32 plus change.

But there were a few people who appreciated the performance:

• One classical music fan and former student of the violin stopped dead in his tracks when he heard the music. He didn’t recognize Bell, but commented, “This was a superb violinist. I’ve never heard anyone of that caliber. He was technically proficient, with very good phrasing. He had a good fiddle, too, with a big, lush sound. I walked a distance away, to hear him. I didn’t want to be intrusive on his space.” He added, “Yeah, other people just were not getting it. It just wasn’t registering. That was baffling to me.” He contributed $5.
• Another woman who learned violin as a child appreciated Bell’s gifted playing, and listened during her coffee break. “I really don’t want to leave,” she commented.
• Right at the end, a woman who had seen Bell in concert three weeks earlier recognized him and positioned her just ten feet from him, where she remained planted until the end of the performance. “It was the most astonishing thing I’ve ever seen in Washington,” she said. “Joshua Bell was standing there playing at rush hour, and people were not stopping, and not even looking, and some were flipping quarters at him! Quarters!” She contributed $20.

Would you like to see Bell in action? Here is some footage, along with Dear Teacher’s take on the event.

Was the experiment fair? Let us know what you think. I don’t know if it proves anything, but I think there are some lessons in this story for we musicians and music producers.

Context

If I was rushing to work one morning, I don’t know if I would have stopped to listen to Joshua Bell. I can be pretty focused when rushing for a train. Once I was running to catch one, tripped, slid along the platform on my stomach until my face was up against the train’s window, and still managed to jump on.

It’s hard to learn anything from this experiment without taking context into consideration. If you want to run a successful concert with people stopping to listen, don’t hold it on a train platform during peak hour. In this context, the people’s lack of ability to recognize quality music isn’t the only issue. It’s unlikely they would risk their jobs to listen even if they did recognize the quality.

What we can learn from this experiment is that context is always an issue in how music is accepted. Whether we’re creating music for a concert, and advertisement, a soundtrack, or a computer game, that context will dictate the type of music that will be acceptable as much as any other factor. We need to answer the question, “Where will people hear this music?” and write accordingly.

Genre

Quality alone will not guarantee that music will be enjoyed. As with the fashion industry, taste plays a hugely important part – we all enjoy different styles and genres of music. Would the response have been different if the Post went with rock or pop music instead of classical music?

I’m sure that most musicians reading this article understand genre, and have strong opinions about what genres you enjoy. There are no right and wrong answers here: different people have different tastes. Understanding that, and creating music within a predicable set of genres – will increase your chances of success. Listeners who enjoy one of your tracks expect to enjoy others.

Even within a genre, fashions will change. The expected sound of a snare or bass line for a genre will vary over time. One thing I love about the tutorials here on Audiotuts is that many of them will help you tweak your music to achieve that sound.

Branding

People didn’t stop because they didn’t recognize Joshua Bell as a world-class musician. If signs were put up or announcements made on radio, I have no doubt there would have been a traffic-destroying crowd. If people were told he was famous, they would have been interested.

Branding – making a product, musician or band instantly recognizable – is a key element in marketing today. It also raises the question of this article: Are normal people able to recognize quality music without branding? Or, as the film critic on The Practice claimed, do people need someone to tell them what they like?

For producers of music, it is enough to recognize that branding and marketing are essential elements in becoming successful. We need to assume that quality is not enough, and make ourselves recognizable. What do you do to brand and market yourself or your music?

Popularity

Even more than needing an “expert” to tell us what we like, we need our friends to. Social proof is a powerful thing. Knackered Hack asks the question in his article The Lie Becomes the Truth: “Since I heard about social proof, and more specifically Joshua Bell’s famous busking experiment, I’ve wondered what in fact determines my own musical taste: how independent is it of others? Like anyone, I want to think I’m a free spirit.”

The music industry is driven by popularity, not quality. The popularity of an album defines the number of sales. The two concepts are not necessarily mutually exclusive, but musical quality is not the only thing that makes a song popular.

The likability or infamy of the artist, the humor or currency of the lyrics, image and advertising, and the amount of radio time a song gets can all contribute to its popularity. The traditional line of the record companies is that they deserve the lion’s share of the profit because achieving popularity without them is impossible.

What are your thoughts about popularity? Is it important? How is it achieved? And is it possible to achieve it by promoting and distributing your own music?

Famous Composers

Joshua Bell was not recognized as being a virtuoso by most people in the crowd rushing to work that morning. We have to wonder whether things would have been different if they weren’t in such a hurry.

But quite a few now-famous composers didn’t achieve the recognition they deserved in their own generations. They produced beautiful music for decades, but the music listeners of the time were oblivious to its quality. Their musical genius was ahead of their time.

If entire generations missed the quality of a musical composition even after hearing it for decades, what hope did Joshua Bell have that morning?

Musicians Appreciate Music Differently

It is telling that two of the three people who stopped to listen were musicians. In fact, they had spent years studying the violin—the same instrument being played by Bell—and were able to recognize his greatness by their own familiarity with the instrument and the music.

Musicians listen to music differently to others. For a start, we’re really interested in music—though that can be said of many non-musicians as well. We can appreciate when a singer or musician does something special, because we understand what is involved in accomplishing it. We have a greater awareness of the sounds of an instrument, the structure of a song, the subtle things that make a performance outstanding, the beauty of a melody, and the extra flavor added to a chord.

The music you create will be listened to by non-musicians. They probably won’t hear the same things in your music as you do. They won’t understand the skill and effort you have used to create it. They’ll just be aware of whether they like it or not. How should that affect our music making?

Conclusion

I’m not sure whether the “Pearls Before Breakfast” experiment was a fair test. But it’s an interesting story which we can learn from.

Is the public capable of recognizing quality music? Let’s hold our own informal poll:

• Do you believe you recognize quality when you hear it? Do you believe the rest of the world does?
• If Joshua Bell was playing at your train station, would you have stopped? Even if you couldn’t stop, would you have recognized his talent and the quality of Bach’s music?
• If you make a mistake at a gig, how big does it have to be before someone in the audience notices?
• How important is quality in order for music to become popular?
• Besides quality, what other aspects are important for someone wanting to become a successful music producer?
• What did you learn from the experiment?

Is the Public Capable of Recognizing Quality Music?
Adrian Try
Thu, 24 Sep 2009 12:43:13 GMT

God Will Kill Ethiopia

"You Ethiopians will also be slaughtered by my sword," says the LORD. And the LORD will strike the lands of the north with his fist. He will destroy Assyria and make its great capital, Nineveh, a desolate wasteland, parched like a desert. The city that once was so proud will become a pasture for sheep and cattle. All sorts of wild animals will settle there. Owls of many kinds will live among the ruins of its palaces, hooting from the gaping windows. Rubble will block all the doorways, and the cedar paneling will lie open to the wind and weather. This is the fate of that boisterous city, once so secure. "In all the world there is no city as great as I," it boasted. But now, look how it has become an utter ruin, a place where animals live! Everyone passing that way will laugh in derision or shake a defiant fist.

(Zephaniah 2:12-15 NLT)

Top Ten Signs You're a Fundamentalist Christian

10 - You vigorously deny the existence of thousands of gods claimed by other religions, but feel outraged when someone denies the existence of yours.

9 - You feel insulted and "dehumanized" when scientists say that people evolved from other life forms, but you have no problem with the Biblical claim that we were created from dirt.

8 - You laugh at polytheists, but you have no problem believing in a Triune God.

7 - Your face turns purple when you hear of the "atrocities" attributed to Allah, but you don't even flinch when hearing about how God/Jehovah slaughtered all the babies of Egypt in "Exodus" and ordered the elimination of entire ethnic groups in "Joshua" including women, children, and trees!

6 - You laugh at Hindu beliefs that deify humans, and Greek claims about gods sleeping with women, but you have no problem believing that the Holy Spirit impregnated Mary, who then gave birth to a man-god who got killed, came back to life and then ascended into the sky.

5 - You are willing to spend your life looking for little loopholes in the scientifically established age of Earth (few billion years), but you find nothing wrong with believing dates recorded by Bronze Age tribesmen sitting in their tents and guessing that Earth is a few generations old.

4 - You believe that the entire population of this planet with the exception of those who share your beliefs -- though excluding those in all rival sects - will spend Eternity in an infinite Hell of Suffering. And yet consider your religion the most "tolerant" and "loving."

3 - While modern science, history, geology, biology, and physics have failed to convince you otherwise, some idiot rolling around on the floor speaking in "tongues" may be all the evidence you need to "prove" Christianity.

2 - You define 0.01% as a "high success rate" when it comes to answered prayers. You consider that to be evidence that prayer works. And you think that the remaining 99.99% FAILURE was simply the will of God.

1 - You actually know a lot less than many atheists and agnostics do about the Bible, Christianity, and church history - but still call yourself a Christian.

10 Extremely Weird Religions

10

Scientology

Scientology has featured on a previous list, but if I didn’t include it here the comments would be inundated with “where’s scientology?” questions. The Church of Scientology is a cult created by L Ron Hubbard (Elron) in 1952 as an outgrowth of his earlier self-help system called Dianetics. The Church of Scientology holds that at the higher levels of initiation (OT levels) mystical teachings are imparted that may be harmful to unprepared readers. These teachings are kept secret from members who have not reached these levels. In the OT levels, Hubbard explains how to reverse the effects of past-life trauma patterns that supposedly extend millions of years into the past. Among these advanced teachings is the story of Xenu (sometimes Xemu), introduced as an alien ruler of the “Galactic Confederacy.” According to this story, 75 million years ago Xenu brought billions of people to Earth in spacecraft resembling Douglas DC-8 airliners, stacked them around volcanoes and detonated hydrogen bombs in the volcanoes. The thetans then clustered together, stuck to the bodies of the living, and continue to do this today. Scientologists at advanced levels place considerable emphasis on isolating body thetans and neutralizing their ill effects.

9

Creativity Movement

The Creativity Movement (formerly known as World Church Of The Creator), is a white separatist organization that advocates the whites-only religion, Creativity. It was also a descriptive phrase used by Ben Klassen, that included all adherents of the religion. The use of the term creator does not refer to a deity, but rather to themselves (white people). Despite the former use of the word Church in its name, the movement is atheistic. Creativity is a White Separatist religion that was founded by Ben Klassen in early 1973 under the name Church of the Creator. After Klassen’s death in 1993, Creativity almost died out as a religion until the New Church of the Creator was established three years later by Matthew F. Hale as its Pontifex Maximus (high priest), until his incarceration in January 2003 for plotting with the movement’s head of security, Anthony Evola (an FBI informant), to murder a federal judge.

8

Thee Temple ov Psychick Youth

Obviously spelling is not a fundamental part of this religion! Thee Temple ov Psychick Youth (TOPY) was founded in 1981 by members of Psychic TV, Coil, Current 93, and a number of other individuals. The ever-evolving network is a loosely federated group of people operating as a unique blend of artistic collective, and practitioners of magic. TOPY is dedicated to the manifestation of magical concepts lacking mysticism or the worship of gods. The group focuses on the psychic and magical aspects of the human brain linked with “guiltless sexuality”. Throughout its existence, TOPY has been an influential group in the underground Chaos magic scene and in the wider western occult tradition. TOPY’s research has covered both Left-hand path and Right-hand path magick, various elements of psychology, art, music, and a variety of other media. Some of the influences on the network have been Aleister Crowley, Austin Osman Spare, and Brion Gysin.

7

Nation of Yahweh

The Nation of Yahweh is a predominantly African-American religious group that is the most controversial offshoot of the Black Hebrew Israelites line of thought. They were founded in 1979 in Miami by Hulon Mitchell, Jr., who went by the name Yahweh ben Yahweh. Their goal is to return African Americans, whom they see as the original Israelites, to Israel. The group departs from mainstream Christianity and Judaism by accepting Yahweh ben Yahweh as the Son of God. In this way, their beliefs are unique and distinct from that of other known Black Hebrew Israelite groups. The group has engendered controversy due to legal issues of its founder and has also faced accusations of being a black supremacist cult by the Southern Poverty Law Center and The Miami Herald. The SPLC has criticized the beliefs of the Nation of Yahweh as racist, stating that the group believed blacks are “the true Jews” and that whites were “white devils.” They also claim the group believed Yahweh ben Yahweh had a Messianic mission to vanquish whites and that they held views similar to the Christian Identity movement.

6

Church of All Worlds

The Church of All Worlds is a neo-pagan religion founded in 1962 by Oberon Zell-Ravenheart and his wife Morning Glory Zell-Ravenheart. The religion evolved from a group of friends and lovers who were in part inspired by a fictional religion of the same name in the science fiction novel Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein; the church’s mythology includes science fiction to this day. They recognize “Gaea,” the Earth Mother Goddess and the Father God, as well as the realm of Faeries and the deities of many other pantheons. Many of their ritual celebrations are centered on the gods and goddesses of ancient Greece. Following the tradition of using fiction as a basis for his ideas, Zell-Ravenheart recently founded The Grey School of Wizardry inspired in part by Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, the school in the Harry Potter novels.

5

Universe People

Universe people or Cosmic people of light powers (Czech: Vesmírní lidé sil světla) is a Czech religious movement centered around Ivo A. Benda. Its belief system is based upon the existence of extraterrestrial civilizations communicating with Benda and other “contacters” since October 1997 telepathically and later even by direct personal contact. According to Benda those civilizations operate a fleet of spaceships, led by Ashtar Sheran, orbiting the Earth. They closely watch and help the good and are waiting to transport their followers into another dimension. The Universe People’s teachings incorporate various elements from ufology (some foreign “contacters” are credited, though often also renounced after a time as misguided or deceptive), Christianity (Jesus was a “fine-vibrations” being) and conspiracy theories (forces of evil are supposed to plan compulsory chipping of the population).

4

Church of the SubGenius

The Church of the SubGenius is a parody religion that promotes slack, while in a meta-commentarial way, satirizes religion, conspiracy theories, UFOs, and popular culture. The church claims to have been founded in the 1950s by the “world’s greatest salesman” J. R. “Bob” Dobbs. “Bob” Dobbs is depicted as a cartoon of a Ward Cleaver-like man smoking a pipe. The church really started with the publication of SubGenius Pamphlet #1 in 1979. It found acceptance in underground pop-culture circles and has been embraced on college campuses, in the underground music scene, and on the Internet. An important SubGenius event occurred on July 5, 1998: X-Day. The Church had been predicting that on this day the world would be destroyed by invading alien armies known as the X-ists (which is short for “Men from Planet X”). When the event didn’t come to pass, the church administrator who predicted it was tarred and feathered – but allowed to continue on as administrator. Paul Reubens (Pee-wee Herman) is a SubGenius minister. Patrick Volkerding, the founder and maintainer of Slackware Linux, is also a SubGenius affiliate, and he has confirmed the Church and “Bob” inspired the name for Slackware.

3

Prince Philip Movement

The Prince Philip Movement is a cargo cult of the Yaohnanen tribe on the southern island of Tanna in Vanuatu. The Yaohnanen believe that Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, the consort to Queen Elizabeth II, is a divine being, the pale-skinned son of a mountain spirit and brother of John Frum. According to ancient tales the son travelled over the seas to a distant land, married a powerful lady and would in time return. The villagers had observed the respect accorded to Queen Elizabeth II by colonial officials and came to the conclusion that her husband, Prince Philip, must be the son from their legends. When the cult formed is unclear, but it is likely that it was sometime in the 1950s or 1960s. Their beliefs were strengthened by the royal couple’s official visit to Vanuatu in 1974 when a few villagers had the opportunity to observe the prince from afar. Prince Philip was made aware of the religion and has exchanged gifts with its leaders and even visited them.

2

The Church of Euthanasia

The Church of Euthanasia (CoE), is a political organization started by the Reverend Chris Korda (pictured above) in the Boston, Massachusetts area of the United States. According to the church’s website, it is “a non-profit educational foundation devoted to restoring balance between Humans and the remaining species on Earth.” The CoE uses sermons, music, culture jamming, publicity stunts and direct action combined with an underlying sense of satire and black humor to highlight Earth’s unsustainable population. The CoE is notorious for its conflicts with Pro-life Christian activists. According to the church’s website, the one commandment is “Thou shalt not procreate”. The CoE further asserts four principal pillars: suicide, abortion, cannibalism (”strictly limited to consumption of the already dead”), and sodomy (”any sexual act not intended for procreation”). Slogans employed by the group include “Save the Planet, Kill Yourself”, “Six Billion Humans Can’t Be Wrong”, and “Eat a Queer Fetus for Jesus”, all of which are intended to mix inflammatory issues to unnerve those who oppose abortion and homosexuality.

1

Nuwaubianism

Nuwaubianism is an umbrella term used to refer to the doctrines and teachings of the followers of Dwight York. The Nuwaubians originated as a Black Muslim group in New York in the 1970s, and have gone through many changes since. Eventually, the group established a headquarters in Putnam County, Georgia in 1993, which they have since abandoned. York is now in prison after having been convicted on money laundering and child molestation charges, but Nuwaubianism endures. York developed Nuwaubianism by drawing on a wide range of sources which include Theosophy-derived New Age movements such as Astara as well as the Rosicrucians, Freemasonry, the Shriners, the Moorish Science Temple of America, the revisionist Christianity & Islam and the Qadiani cult of Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, the numerology of Rashad Khalifa, and the ancient astronaut theories of Zecharia Sitchin. White people are said in one Nuwaubian myth to have been originally created as a race of killers to serve blacks as a slave army, but this plan went awry. Here is a list of some of the more unusual Nuwaubian beliefs:

1. It is important to bury the afterbirth so that Satan does not use it to make a duplicate of the recently-born child
2. Furthermore, some aborted fetuses survive their abortion to live in the sewers, where they are being gathered and organized to take over the world
3. People were once perfectly symmetrical and ambidextrous, but then a meteorite struck Earth and tilted its axis causing handedness and shifting the heart off-center in the chest
4. Each of us has seven clones living in different parts of the world
5. Women existed for many generations before they invented men through genetic manipulation
6. Homo sapiens is the result of cloning experiments that were done on Mars using Homo erectus
7. Nikola Tesla came from the planet Venus
8. The Illuminati have nurtured a child, Satan’s son, who was born on 6 June 1966 at the Dakota House on 72nd Street in New York to Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis of the Rothschild/Kennedy families. The Pope was present at the birth and performed necromantic ceremonies. The child was raised by former U.S. president Richard Nixon and now lives in Belgium, where it is hooked up bodily to a computer called “The Beast 3M” or “3666.”

The Nuwaubians built a city modelled on Ancient Egyptian buildings in Putnam County, Georgia (pictured above). It has now been demolished.

Boyne, atheists and the Bible

Published: Thursday | September 24, 2009

The Editor, Sir:

Ian Boyne's articles on militant atheism makes no case for Christianity's validity, vitality and value to humanity, if not of religion in general.

The recent Sunday articles are in the usual vein of

Boyne's cowardice and intellectual dishonesty.

He does an exposé of atheists, probably for the hype of the topic and the rise of atheists like Bill Maher and much of the literature he discussed, but, as a religious man, Boyne takes no stance and seemingly presented the atheist argument so well that there is no defence he can make. I am of the belief that he is incapable of giving a creditable answer for Christianity and all its faults.

I cannot see how well-thinking black people who have suffered at the hand of slavery backed by the Bible can still cling to it. Christianity is losing on two grounds, the logical invalidity and inconsistency in the Bible and throughout its arguments, as well as the history and authenticity of the Bible and its account of history and the world.

Will never subscribe

I, as a black man, will never subscribe to a religion that claims:

"When a man strikes his male or female slave with a rod so hard that the slave dies under his hand, he shall be punished. If, however, the slave survives for a day or two, he is not to be punished, since the slave is his own property." Exodus 21:20-21

"Slaves, obey your earthly masters with deep respect and fear. Serve them sincerely as you would serve Christ." Ephesians 6:5 NLT

I am, etc.,
YANNICK PESSOA
cyber_yan@yahoo.com
Montego Bay

http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20090924/letters/letters2.html

Today's Cartoons - JamaicaObserver.com

Today's Cartoons - JamaicaObserver.com