Patriotism in Unites States is wrong. It is blind devotion to the state. If the government is worshiped and its actions go unquestioned then the patriotic become puppets of the government. This blind devotion to the state occurred during the National Socialist movement in Germany.

What one should love is "freedom" or "liberty" and not a government. The United States government was created in order to provide liberty to its inhabitants. It is just a tool and a means to have and maintain liberty. If it does not fulfill these ends then it does not deserve our love. This is of course stated in "The Declaration of Independence" when it says that Governments are created by us in order to maintain the God-given rights of Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. And if any Government does not provide these things for all its citizens, it is the Right of the citizens to remove it and install a new government.

Excerpt from The Declaration of Independence:
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

The rich just kept on getting richer. The poor were getting poorer. With poverty, comes crime. In order to counter-act increased crime, our liberties were taken away. When it came that poverty reached even me, I had no means to combat the tyranny that was keeping me in such low means. I was desperate to feed my family and to feed myself. I would have done anything. But with the constant eye of the cameras and with no weapons to speak of, my fate was sealed. Everything was regulated. Everything was owned by the wealthy. We could not even sell ourselves into servitude. With the efficiency and machinery of today, human power is not needed to the extent that it was in our ancestor's days. We were obsolete.

It is not possible to set out to make a positive difference in this world. This is for the simple fact: you have no idea what effect your actions will have.

You have no idea whether your action will result in something that ultimately ends up being positive or negative. You also have no idea what making a positive difference really means. You may think you know, but "a positive difference" is a very relative term.

Plus, you can guarantee yourself being completely wrong by having a strong conviction in your belief that what you are doing is making a positive difference. It is irrational to unwaveringly believe in something that you cannot possibly know the outcome of. Humans are fallable, and any idea or interpretation that they think of has a chance of being completely wrong. You have to accept that fact and thus you cannot have an unwavering conviction that what you are doing will make a possitive difference.

Thus, in summation, it is not possible to set out to make a positive difference in this world.

This is the seed of an idea. It is very rough at this point but it is a good thought. It needs to be explored.
-----
You get robbed. What are you supposed to do?
You are supposed to call the police.
A financial deal goes sour. What are you supposed to do?
Get a lawyer and sue.
You are hungry. What are you supposed to do?
Go to the store and buy something that a farmer grew and a manufacturer assembled and cooked.
You are young and ignorant. What are you supposed to do?
Go to school and get lectured to about material that was decided upon for you.
You have no food or shelter. What are you supposed to do?
Get a job to earn money to hire other workers to produce food and build a shelter.

We are living by proxy. We are living indirectly. What happened to just plain straight-forward living? What happened to defending ourselves? What happened to standing up for our own rights? What happened to going out and seeking knowledge first-hand? What happened to doing something, anything, directly?

We have become weak and ineffective. We don't do anything anymore. If you die actually doing something, so what? At least you actually "lived". A tiger wants food. It goes and kills and rips the flesh off of the bone with its teeth. It wants to sleep, it finds a covering and sleeps under it.

-----
Do not be fooled by the rich elite who tell you that we live better than anyone else on earth. You are their penned up herd of cattle which they feed upon when hungry.

Why are humans so physically lacking in strength and deficient in natural "tools"? Other animals have sharp claws, sharp teeth, powerful limbs, specialized tools such as trunks, etc. Why does man lack all of this? Man is pretty feeble. It is difficult for a man to kill another man without using specialized tools. It can be done, but it is difficult.

When primitive man got into a fight with another primitive man, they tried to beat each other to death. This made each tired. And without any natural weapons or natural armor, both got superficially bruised and fell down and eventually got up and walked away. If they had razor sharp claws, they would have killed each other. We are no doubt an aggressive species and we will fight one another. If not for our feebleness, perhaps we would have killed each other off early on in the history of our species.

Microsoft is an "unstoppable" mega-corporation. Any legitimate competition is crushed by the might of Microsoft. Try to develop a for-profit operating system to compete with Windows and you'll get crushed. Try and develop a for-profit word-processor to compete with Word and you'll get crushed. Microsoft has reached the top of the food chain.

Legitimate for-profit companies cannot compete against Microsoft. Due to this fact, "free" software, such as Linux and Open-Office, has bubbled to the surface as the only possible contender in the evolutionary struggle against Microsoft. Providing "free" software is the only way to possibly compete against Microsoft. There would not have been a need for "free" software if Microsoft had not crushed all possible means of fair competition.

This lack of competition also hurts Microsoft because: a competitor, in general, only needs to be better than his next closest rival. If there are no close competitors then Microsoft does not need to improve. If it does not improve it will stagnate, whither, and die. It will be overrun by the weeds of small "free" software projects just waiting to get out from underneath the shadow of the mighty giant Microsoft.

Perform actions without desiring the fruit of their outcome (their perceived beneficial results). This is how you get into "the zone". You are in the moment; you are in the act itself. You don't think of the outcome, you think of only what you are doing. The outside world and anything else that is not exactly what you are doing is cast out from your thoughts. It provides you with the patience to correctly perform and complete your task.

If interested in improving your life, I recommend attaining knowledge in the practical advice of Buddhism and Hinduism.

One needs to develop a large base of general knowledge in order to know what's what in the world. Then what? Through the teachings of Buddhism and Hinduism you can then direct your life towards the attainment of "Enlightenment" and the release from suffering.

As someone that "suffered" a lot early on, I can attest to the benefit of a large base of general knowledge along with what I have learned from Buddhism and Hinduism to steer me away from sorrow and despair to a better place.

General knowledge alone will not do it all since you will learn about all the suffering that the world has to offer. You need the mental guidance that is provided through the practical teachings Buddhism and Hinduism.

Throughout history, there have been the warrior class rulers that lorded over their peasant farmers that tended their land. Kept in ignorance through lack of education and kept in servitude to serve their lord, peasants were basically slaves. Today, we are under the illusion that things have evolved beyond this scenario. But don't most people toil their lives away so that some wealthy land owner can enjoy the millions of dollars produced on the backs of his workers? The wealthy lord is seen as the conqueror that deserves his position in life. The wealthy boss is respected by his workers just as the feudal lord is respected and admired by the peasants he rules.

Today there is an illusion that you too can achieve a level of greatness but how much does that actually happen? How many people really advance to a higher station in life beyond the one in which they were born? Most people are born into the working class and that is where they stay. The quality of life has increased for the working class but the quality of life has also increased for the wealthy. The level of the working class is as far away from the wealthy as it has ever been, the scale has just been shifted and everyone has it better than it was.

Larger and larger political states are required to support the creation of larger and more advanced war machines. When spears ruled the battlefield, a relatively small infrastructure was needed to mass produce the weapons of war. More advanced weapons such as crossbows, chariots, catapults, and armor require a more advanced infrastructure to develop and mass produce.

Borders of nations expand until there is no more room for expansion either due to a natural boundary or another nation's boundary. If the other nation is drastically weaker as well as filled with valuable resources, it will be consumed by its neighbor. When nations achieve an extremely large size, it is not worth trying to conquer one another. In the animal world, intimidating threats serve as a deterrent for combat because even if you are clearly bigger and stronger the little guy still has sharp teeth and claws and might get lucky enough to severely wound you. With substantially sized and well resourced nations, it is to the point where even if you conquer them, you will be severely hurt by it and so it is not worth it.

Surviving through each and every day of your life used to be something that you had to worry about as a human. Some humans still have this worry today, but for those of us with computers and other modern luxuries, we pretty much take surviving into old age for granted.

Even today we can not survive without a group of other humans helping us out. A naked infant left in the wild won't survive. Some species on earth are born and never see their mothers again but we as humans survive by being in a group. Maintaining that group is critical to the survival of each member. Without elderly members to pass on a lifetimes worth of life-saving information, the young would die. For example, during a famine an elderly member can remember back to when they were just a child and point out a root that is not eaten by current members but is abundant and was what his/her tribe ate when they went through a similar famine. Without young members to hunt and gather food, the old would die.

As an aside, the reason elderly are no longer respected could be due to the ability of recording history in books. We no longer have to rely on the elderly to tell us what to do in a situation that we are unfamiliar with and which they already lived through. Elderly are no longer valuable resources since the information they contain is available in books. This is not entirely correct though, due to their longer existence the elderly have the potential to have learnt more and processed more data. This could give them a broader outlook and provide them with more informed opinions. It does not always turn out that way but the potential is there.

Without cooperation, the group would die. Due to the critical nature of maintaining the group, those humans that did not exhibit cohesive group dynamics ceased to exist. Natural selection produced humans that were successful in groups. Our behaviors and decisions reflect this group living. In teenagers for example, being part of a group is what drives their behavior. They base their self-worth on how they are valued by their group. They act in accordance with their group whether rational or not since it is about trying to conform as much as possible so that they are considered a successful member of the group.

In a pair-bond comprised of humans, decisions should be made by either a benevolent dictator or by consensus. If the pair is comprised of rational decision makers, then consensus should be utilized. If instead one's decisions are based on irrational "feelings" then a benevolent dictator should have the final word.

If logical, rational, and structured thought form the basis of both parties decision-making process than they should always strive to reach a unanimous decision. Problems can be hammered-out with a logical discussion and the most logical course of action to solve the problem will bubble to the surface. If emotional issues surface and cause a lack of objectivity in one or both of the parties then this will be recognized and weighed into the discussion. Once everything is weighed in, a best course of action will be undeniable and agreed upon. If it does not work out that one of the party concedes to the correct course of action, then chances are that they are acting irrationally and not following a logical argument. Remember, even though it might turn out that it is wrong in the future, there is still a "best course of action" that can be decided upon given the current data.

If two people cannot base their decision making process on sound logic, then it is better to designate one as the benevolent dictator. This should be the person that is shown to make better decisions more often. If you are wrong more often then not, what makes you think you are correct about this one particular issue? You are better off letting someone that is correct more of the time make the decisions. When two people argue without sound logic, then the outcome is hopeless. Both parties are providing unsubstantiated arguments which neither has any reason to believe over their own unsubstantiated and illogical reasoning. Both think they are correct and since their arguments are not based on logic, they cannot be disproved by logical means. Nothing will be resolved and only hate and anger will come from such a futile activity. Because of this, only a dictator that has the interests of both parties in mind, should be allowed to make the final decisions. It has to be trusted that the chosen dictator has the couple's best interest in mind.

If neither of these conditions can be met i.e. a logical partner or a benevolent dictator, then joint decision making should not be undertaken. The people should remain as individuals and not pair up.

The purpose of a government that was created by the people, for the people, is to provide for its people the basics of life. To achieve this goal, it should provide a means for the acquisition of food and shelter as well a safe environment from dangers both foreign and domestic.

Due to limited resources, it must develop a structured method to fairly distribute the resources that provide the basics of life. The current system in place is not fairly distributing resources. Certain segments of the population are provided for more so than others.

For example, certain segments of the population are safer than others. Should greater wealth provide for greater levels of safety? Do the wealthy have more of a right to life? Do they deserve better and healthier food choices that also assure their longevity. Do they deserve safer working conditions? Is it then fair to not provide top of the line health care to the ones working in hazardous professions? Why do the ones that require the least health care get the best health care?

Certain segments of the population are better educated than others. Again, should greater wealth provide for greater education? What possible benefit is it to maintain large segments of the population ignorant and ill-educated? Is it a form of slavery in order to keep them working in menial jobs? Why isn't every person that is a part of the "people" educated to the fullest extent of possibilities? Why is it fair for those that already have all that they need to have even more while keeping those that have little in the dark about how to achieve more?

The system in place is unfairly distributing resources amongst its citizens. The basic rights of life are stolen from most and given to the few. Those not receiving their share cannot just join the ranks of those elite few. It is an exclusive club with high barriers to entry. With history as a guide, it will either be a noble elite that recognizes this unbalanced scale and strives to balance it or it will be a revolution by the people, for the people, bloody or otherwise that will bring about its balance.

You people suffer from having an incorrect perspective on life as well as from having unrealistic expectations. For one, you have no bearing on human history compared with your current position and lifestyle. A hundred years ago or even a thousand years ago you would have been born into service at a wealthy estate. The majority of people on earth have always been laborers and not rulers or wealthy elite. Your days would have consisted of labor-intensive tasks repeated every day of your life.

You are under the assumption that life has all these great and wonderful fruits that are just there for the plucking. But as a quick study of human or non-human lifestyles will show, life is mundane and ordinary. The sun comes up, you gather food, eat, defecate, gather food, procreate, eat, defecate, and then the sun goes down and you sleep.

Too many stories have told you otherwise. Stories that were written by the most mundane of people that sat alone for hours on end doing absolutely nothing of interest except in their minds as they sat and wrote what they thought. Most of them did not live the lives they wrote about.

There is nothing wrong with the mundane and the ordinary. It is how animals have lived for the past millions of years i.e. "same crap, different day". It is how humans have lived for the past 100,000 years of their existence as well. You will most certainly cause yourself grief by trying to obtain something outside of the natural order of things. It is unrealistic and the wrong perspective. You have to learn to love the small things like sunshine on your face, the taste of fresh ripened fruit, a smile, a laugh, a cute cat, etc.

The best thing for you to do is to find a comfortable spot with some good and decent people and relax and enjoy the simplicity of life. Most people think that fulfillment and happiness are god-given rights and something that they should have naturally. But fulfillment and happiness will never be a constant thing, all you can do is appreciate them while they are there for the moment.

the thought of tearing the flesh off of the bone of an animal repulses most people except when it is cooked and served for dinner. they eat it just fine because of an altered perspective. most women would say they would never kill another person but then ask what if someone were harming your child and a lot would find killing acceptable. to some, insects are nasty, dirty little pests that should be exterminated and to others insects are a vital part of the environment. to some, the idea of a lion killing a gazelle is awful but to others it is a natural part of life which without the gazelle population would increase to the point that they would run out of food and starve to death. it is all perspective. change it, and your life can be as good or bad as you perceive.

modern slavery is just an extension of every civilization of the past

Every ancient civilization was based on slavery. There had to be someone to do the manual labor that built the empire. Monuments had to be built and granaries had to be filled. The royals, clergy, and bureaucrats were the educated elite that prospered from the toils of slavery.

Slavery has served as the foundations of civilizations even into modern times. The U.S. was based on slavery, which without, would not be the wealthy nation it turned into. Slavery is free money to get you started in your empire. It gets you over that initial hurdle of starting an empire with little money. If you need money to start an empire but you need an empire in order to make that large a sum of money then your answer is to use slaves.

Has slavery really ended though?

Slavery most likely began from the enslavement of defeated foes in war. You took the families and brought them back to your home and made them your slaves.

Modern corporations vanquished small companies and left the employees out in the cold to rot. They now have to come groveling to the corporations for employment on the terms that the corporation sets.

If you are working for the benefit of others instead of you and your family then are you not a slave? If you are not sure if you are working more for someone else's benefit than your own then ask yourself this: Who gets richer from your labor? Do you or does your boss who is already rich? Is it the usual case of the rich getting richer? Someone is benefiting a lot more from your labor than you or your family. Has slavery really ended?

A long time ago in human history there were little tribes of people all around. One day a baby was born. This baby grew up to be hell bent on world domination. From some fluke of nature, this baby had an inkling to enjoy the idea of world domination. That's all it took. This baby then went on to rally his tribe to conquer a neighboring tribe. He then went on to conquer all the tribes in his known world. His genes that contained his love of world domination spread to his descendants. Like a tree branching out, his descendants branched out and conquered more and more all while spreading their genes.

Those tribes that lived in peace and harmony and thought that the world was a big enough place for all tribes were consumed by the tribes that contained leadership bent on world domination. When a dominating tribe met another dominating tribe, war also ensued. When both tribes were equally matched, boundaries were created. The dominating tribes would expand and consume until powerful opposition forced it to stop.

This consuming and expanding is what created the political boundary lines on maps in our atlases. Many countries would have gladly expanded into all of europe until it was one solid country. Opposing forces stopped this from occurring.

Our ancestry is full of conquerors. It is in our blood. Unless resistance is offered, conquerors will rise from our populations and try and follow through with their quest for domination. If you offer no resistance, you will be taken advantage of and consumed in an ever-expanding empire sought by a conqueror.

need to go on hiatus again. need to catch up on reading. infrequent updates. read extensive archives if looking for something to read.

Clarity is what i have. i can see things that the regular person can not. i see myself from the outside. i can stop in mid-action and say "wait, control yourself". it is difficult for me to remain angry or sad as i will always see myself from the outside and tell myself to stop because it is doing me no good. if i were to follow through with any emotion, it would be just an act, as the moment and mood of it are spoiled by my watchful eye. when i see someone angry i can't help but to think "why are you acting it out like that, just stop it". where if someone said that to me, i would stop it, i have learned it does not always work in others. it has the potential to work, but they do not know that most of their life is just an act in a play.

"i am the type of person that does and says this". that is a role you assigned yourself to play. you could easily stray from it but you keep yourself focused on that role and play it out to the bitter end. most probably don't know they can stray from it. when you are offended by something, it is just an act you chose to play. "i will be offended by this". you don't really have to be offended but your role says that you must act out the part of the offended.

all these labels that we give ourselves helps us to define our roles. "i am an irish female and will thus act accordingly". if you live by these labels, then you are living as an actor in a play. you are forming yourself into a mold and acting accordingly to it.

how can you take someone seriously when their whole interaction with you is a semi-scripted play? once you know their labels you can pretty much tell what they think and what their responses will be. they make it easy by wanting to conform to their labels.

Many years ago, you never would have conceived that you lived on a hunk of rock that is hurtling through space around an enormous fire ball. Your knowledge would have been limited by the knowledge that your society provides. What we know is based upon a build-up of previous knowledge that we inherit from previous generations.

In pre-historic times, the knowledge of which berries to pick in the forest came from the previous generations who watched tribe members die from eating deadly berries. lack of abundant food supplies, made experimentation necessary. in time, the tribe knew which food sources were safe to eat and which were not. this knowledge was passed down to younger tribe members who then built upon it with new knowledge of newer food supplies.

once civilizations came into being, knowledge of food procurement and general history was not the only information passed on to the next generation. scientific and technological advancements were passed on and built upon by the next generation.

certainly throughout time, humans have had a skewed vision of the world around them due to the limited knowledge of their society. it's as if people see things through tinted glasses with blinders on the sides. They only see in the direction that their society provides by its particular buildup of knowledge and what they see is skewed by their society's limited knowledge. If one is part of a mystical society, one may view events as originating from magic.

some truths or at least half truths are revealed with this limited vision. These revelations are held up as proof to the veracity of the entire limited vision. If this is true then the rest of it must be true, is the common mantra. this of course is nonsense and leads to a skewed view of the world and its constituents. you think you are seeing things clearly, but with the tinted glasses of your limited knowledge, things may not be as clear as you think. and with untruths built upon more untruths, your entire view may become seriously skewed.

most of our time is spent escaping "reality" i.e. books, movies, tv, drugs and alcohol. even the ones who spend their time engaged in "serious" matters are really only playing a game of pretend. "I am a federal court judge and demand the respect and honor that my high position grants me". that person is just another hairless ape like the rest of us playing a part in some grand game of make-believe. reality is completing the digestive cycle while sitting on the toilet.

watch a lot of people play board games or athletic games and you can see them taking the games a little too seriously. in the same way, you are taking the games of pretend that you play in your life too seriously. sure you can play your games and have fun doing it but do not forget what is real. do not get so caught up in the games. all those special meanings that you attach to everything are just pretend. there is nothing more special to a wedding ring than there is to a clump of dirt. the meaning is pure imagination.

when you play games of pretend, people will tend to bend the rules to their favor. children do this all the time with their games. this is not a fair game and one that will not go as you originally intended. it will not go by a strict set of unchanging rules like many expect it to. those that cheat will exploit the ones that don't cheat.

you should find, once you step outside the sphere of pretend, that life becomes a simple process. there are no longer all these intermingling realms of pretend with differing rules. you see what is really going. all those things that used to not make sense are now cleared up. most of them were probably just pretend and no longer matter anyway. and those that weren't pretend, are no longer covered in its shroud and are plainly visible for what they are.