To Carry Fire

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Life is Not Suffering

I spent my childhood learning about God. What he wanted from us humans, and how we could give it to him. What we were saddled with from birth: sin. Like with other religious sects, I grew up believing in my inherent imperfection. I grew up with the belief that life was suffering, and we had to make meaning from it. We would fail, constantly, and never live up to the standards God set for us, so we had to hope for the future. Through God's power alone could the world be set aright. Only through God's grace could we ever be forgiven. Jesus is the epitome of this viewpoint: His one time death was the only thing needed to release all men from sin and death. (Now, being Protestant, my birth religion did also focus on "works" not just "faith", but that's a separate concern.) Jesus needed to suffer for the world to be saved. And we, his spiritual descendants, had to suffer for the world to be saved. My belief growing up, then, was that suffer

A Brief Case for Self-Respect

Of the many concepts that are ethically important, one is incredibly valuable in this age of inflated self-importance and unhealthy narcissism: genuine self-respect. What is "genuine" self-respect? It is, more correctly, just "self-respect", but needs to have the qualifier to distinguish it from fraudulent self-respect: that which is proposed by the self-help circles and certain religious traditions. These forms of fraudulent self-respect are called "self-respect", "self-esteem" "unconditional positive self-regard", etc, but amount to an unhealthy psychological concept called narcissism. Narcissism vs. self-respect is a debate which seems too muddy to consider, but can be distilled into key similarities and differences. Similarities include the focus of both concepts on what the self is, what the self does, and why the self does what it does. Differences arise from the different answers to these questions. So, while a narcis

Defining Prosperity

I could take this time to write a brief post on the "Green New Deal", of recent acclaim and criticism... But I want to devote the time instead to examining what seems to be the goal of the GND: prosperity. I mean this in the sense that the proponents of the deal mean it: economic prosperity, as measured by equality between citizens and the abolition of classes. Now, we can quibble (correctly) that prosperity is not, in this sense, the real word for it. A better word may be "degradation" or "impoverishment". That is the actual aim, not the named goal. The only way to make everyone equal is not to provide maximum opportunity, but instead, maximum control. Take away the rights of an individual to make their own way in life and they will only be of value to a grand scheme - and to the schemer. Ultimately, this is why socialism is immoral: it shows a shocking, horrifying lack of regard for the individual. The goal of socialism (and specifically,

The Victory at The March

This past weekend, Twitter, in Twitterial fashion, erupted. The topic of the discontent? A group of high school students from Covington Catholic High School in Kentucky. Video clips made the viral rounds over the weekend, purporting to show the students harassing an elderly Native American man (Marine veteran Nathan Phillips). This event occurred at the Indigenous Peoples' March in Washington, D.C. In particular, one video clip showed this. Twitter's "liberal" sector noticed the students wearing the popular 2016 campaign slogan: "Make America Great Again". For the political Left, which has no interest in making America great again, this was a problem. The narrative shifted. It was not just a generational tormenting going on; it was a racialized event. Commentators and Twitter's #VerifiedBullies castigated the students and connected the branding of their clothes to the President's (often misinterpreted) racism. This castig

The Value of Star Wars

Spoilers for Star Wars, mostly Episode VIII: The Last Jedi. I promised Star Wars. Here's some Star Wars. While my fiancée was sick recently, we re-watched Rogue One: A Star Wars Story . It's the first of the new Star Wars spinoffs that takes place between Episodes IV and V. It made us both cry, multiple times. Other than the tears, it got me to thinking: why are some movies and books and TV shows so popular? There's many answers to that question; more than one answer comes down to timing and coincidence. Technical skill is also relvant. (A well-written book, all else being equal, is better than a less-well written book.) The answer that most interests me is how something reveals and encourages specific concepts- the way the world is supposed to be. Ayn Rand is good at this, which is I reference her so often and why so many people like her work. So, to Star Wars: why is it so special? Well, it had a theme- the most classic theme, of pure heroism versus pure evil

4 Reasons I'm Writing This Blog

Well. Here we are, another year. Here in Ohio, we're experiencing our first significant snowfall of 2019. I have to admit that it looks beautiful. Something about white snow covering everything the eye can see is refreshing. It's the frame of mind of renewal that brings me to my purpose for writing this blog. Most mornings, I wake up and lay in bed. My fiancée needs to get to work, so she's up soon. I dawdle on my phone, checking Facebook, not for anything, but just to pass the time. We eat breakfast and she goes off to work. She's new at her job, but she's getting the hang of it. I move from laying in bed to sitting on the couch, not for anything, but just to pass the time . Star Trek: The Original Series is the show I'm watching right now, but it's not just Star Trek I watch. I watch YouTube videos about video games I'll never play, Vines I'll forget in seconds, and motivational hacks I'll never use. I'm not spending my