The Anti-Christ May Come As a Social Justice Warrior

Drawing by vladischern

I’ve reached a crossroads where I realise that I need to take a stand and make my position clear.

I was telling a Christian friend yesterday that I’ve come to the conclusion that predictions of the rise of an “Anti-Christ” in the Bible refer to the domination of the world by a particular dogmatic cluster which has been described by various people as “critical theory”, “identity politics”, “postmodern Marxism” or “cultural Marxism”. The latter two terms may not be completely accurate, but what matters is what is being pointed to by them, not how accurate the name is.

There are other people who are much better than me at dissecting and critiquing these ideas. I recommend Jordan Peterson or Bret Weinstein.

The reason I have come to identify these belief systems with the figure of the Anti-Christ is that they promise what Jesus promised - an end to the injustices of the world - but it is not what they deliver.

For me, as an unbeliever, Jesus represents a principle of truth, love, non-judgement, forgiveness and generosity. Love - open, honest, spontaneous and generous communication - is the answer. But I believe that the dogma of identity politics, which has spread through our culture, brings lies, hatred, judgement, vindictiveness and selfishness, all the time claiming to fight those things.

When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand:)

Then let them which be in Judaea flee into the mountains:

Let him which is on the housetop not come down to take any thing out of his house:

Neither let him which is in the field return back to take his clothes.

And woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days!

But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the sabbath day:

For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.

And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened.

Matthew 15-22

The “abomination of desolation” refers to offerings give to a false God. To me the significance of this expression is that we are coming to a time when “social justice” replaces love as our highest good. Justice is important, but, by its very nature, it can only be achieved by force and control. Love, the attitude which allows us to treat all our fellows as equal embodiments of the divine, leads us toward healing and a better world for all naturally.

The rise of the “Black Lives Matter” movement has made it all so clear. The cat is out of the bag. We have a movement which claims to be about saving black lives, but it calls for the defunding of the police. Since far more black lives are lost to violent crime than to police brutality, this means it is promising one thing and delivering the opposite. If you point this out you may be labelled a racist. This thought virus is powerful and deadly. The sensible approach to reducing police brutality would be to spend far more money on the police so that they can spend more time training and so that enough police can be employed that it is very easy to fire any police officer the first time they show signs of racism or a propensity to use excessive force. No matter how dissatisfied anyone is with the police, they should be able to realise that any power vacuum created by a reduction in the effectiveness of the police will be filled by violent criminals.

When I went onto Twitter today I found someone who appreciates my writing saying : “If you've ever heard me say that heteronormativity is a product of patriarchy, this is where I got the information from. The book is called "How to Be Free" by Joe Blow.” The following pages of my book were attached to illustrate this.

So here is my crisis. What do I do when I find my writing being associated with that which I identify as the Anti-Christ?

I don’t blame anyone for making this connection. I talk about some of the same things that are talked about in critical theory. I talk about the psychological basis for patriarchy and fear of homosexual desire. But I don’t support calls to “smash the patriarchy” as those in the grip of identity politics sometimes do. I talk of patriarchy mainly in the past tense, because our society no longer excludes women from positions of power.

What about “heteronormativity”? It is defined as “the belief that heterosexuality, predicated on the gender binary, is the norm or default sexual orientation. It assumes that sexual and marital relations are most fitting between people of opposite sex.”

I don’t really disagree with that. Gender is binary. Biologically there is male and female. There are psychological characteristics which we identify as masculine or feminine. There isn’t some third gender with which we identify characteristics. Of course there are men who exhibit more feminine characteristics and women who exhibit more masculine characteristics, and there some people who have about an even mix. It is like colour. There are only three primary colours. All the other colours are mixtures of those. All gender identities are mixtures of the masculine and the feminine. And heterosexuality is the statistical norm, and heterosexual families are the organisation best suited to producing healthy children - all other things being equal.

None of that is to say that we should idealistically insist on that which may be the statistical norm. There are many ways of doing things effectively in the world.

In my book I posit that bisexuality is the underlying form of sexuality. I arrived at this conclusion as a result of what I learned about our close primate relatives - the bonobos - who engage in erotic exchanges irrespective of gender. Also because we have the biological capacity to share erotic physical pleasure with others irrespective of gender. And because many heterosexuals are uncomfortable with homosexuality, which implies, to me, that there is a contrary desire for it buried beneath the public face. All of this is just speculation on my part.

Another incident which has focused this problem in my mind has been the treatment of J. K. Rowling over her discussion of transsexuality. I read her blog post on the topic, which I found to be remarkably sensible, well-informed, open-minded and compassionate. Yet, she has been roundly attacked. This tells me that we are at a very dark time. To speak the truth in a way which challenges this pervasive dogma is dangerous, but necessary.

Some may think me paranoid to use concepts like thought virus or even demonic possession to depict what is happening, but I think it helps to visualise how it works - the way that it has a life of its own, which operates through people without them being aware of what is happening to them.

I’ve said that idealism is the root of all evil and is a thought virus. Identity politics (lets stick with that term) is the most dangerous form of idealism which has ever existed, because it has spread most broadly to the global community. Religious groups have often done terrible things because of an idealistic insistence on imposing their dogma on others. And communists and fascists have slaughtered millions as a result of their idealistic dogma. If the current lie can be exposed in time, it may not come to that. But I have no doubt that, if not exposed as the lie that it is, this current dogma will lead to even worse horrors and, in fact, the end the human race.

So, there, I’ve explained where I stand. If anyone wants to quote my writings as a way of supporting this dogma, they are welcome to. That is their business, not mine. From the very beginning I’ve renounced what I call “the control strategy”. I take no ownership of my ideas. They are offered to be used as the person receiving them sees fit. To my mind this is how I differentiate myself from what I call “the Anti-Christ”. You will see those who are in “his” thrall trying to control others expression through intimidation or censorship.

I am, and have always been, on the side of freedom and love.

"Ye shall know them by their fruits." Matthew 7:16

Has the World Gone Mad? : A Comparison With My Own Experience of Insanity

Photo by grechka

How often do we ask ourselves : “Has the world gone mad?”

I wonder if there is something to be learned about some forms of social behaviour that we see in the world around us from my personal experience of mental breakdown.

First an irreconcilable conflict became apparent within the conceptual framework through which I was living my life. Order broke down.

Much that had been repressed by that, now shattered, conceptual framework, came to the surface.

Desperate for escape, my mind built utopian dreams out of the wreckage. They had to be true, because the alternative was unthinkable. But they never could persist, because they were mad fantasies that had no basis in the ground of real life.

As the fantasies evaporated I was left in the barren desert of despair. No wonder I had clung so desperately to the illusions. Here I was confronted with personal responsibility in its most extreme form. What if all the problems of the world were somehow my fault? This was a contrary form of madness, but perhaps a doorway to sanity.

Perhaps this terrible doorway is there within all of us. The most terrible place we never want to go.

Human society is a system playing itself out - action and reaction, in an intricately woven web. Information, knowledge, wisdom.. can bring some order to the system by bringing commonalities to the thought processes of individuals or communities and integrating them with practical realities they face, allowing their problem-solving actions to bear fruit. Lies, on the other hand, whether we tell them to ourselves or to each other, sow disorder in the system, leading to conflict and, very often, violence.

Chaos theory tells us that the most infinitesimal changes in a system will, over a long enough time period, change the entire system. So change in any of us, could be the change which determines the difference between triumph and disaster for the human race as a whole. That terrible doorway is that realisation.

That doesn’t mean we know what to do. And self-consciousness about our own actions tends to impede our effectiveness at even helping ourselves. Ultimately, we have to somehow open up and surrender to some kind of intuitive process. That is what lies on the other side of the terrible doorway - the awareness that we can’t force improvement in the social system, but that we can be a conduit for something helpful to flow into that system and help to manifest the orderliness which will benefit all.

When we see our fellows caught up in mad frantic utopian dreams or mob behaviour or judgement of others, perhaps we can see behind their behaviour a fear of that desert of despair and that terrible doorway that lies there. But that realm is only terrible if we go there alone, unguided and without hope.

Ask And Ye Shall Receive?

Photo by Pop Nukoonrat

"Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.” Matthew 7:7

I often find passages from the gospels a great stimulus to exploratory thinking. I’m not a believer. It seems to me that, to be a believer, is to think that we know what something means. The fact that I may look for meaning in a passage of text, first of all requires a degree of mystery. It is also an experiment. I don’t intend to try, as one might by researching context and language, to make a case for some kind of objective interpretation. I’m treating the passage as if it were a seed that I’m planting in my imagination to see what will grow there. I can’t make any claim for the healthiness of any plant that this experiment produces. I may be gardening in contaminated soil.

The above passage is a mysterious one. No doubt many who thought their faith was strong have asked for things they didn’t receive.

The passage guarantees that the asker will receive and the seeker will find. This sounds a bit like the theme of a Disney cartoon feature - “Don’t let go of your dreams and eventually they will come true.” It may be true that those who give up their dream are unlikely to achieve it, but there are plenty of people who hung onto a dream and came to a sticky end or found themselves mired in debt.

For the time being anyway lets ignore the guarantee. Maybe the guarantee comes back in if we understand the meaning of the passage. Maybe if we do it right, it’s bound to work, but I feel more comfortable being skeptical about that at this stage.

There are three things that it is suggested that we do : ask, seek and knock.

Ask

When we ask for something we describe what it is that we want or at least give it a name.

Unless we are asking for something trivial, we are most likely also admitting an insufficiency in our own ability to supply it.

What do we want? We might make like a beauty pageant contestant and say “World Peace.” But what exactly do we mean by “world peace”? What would it look like? How would a peaceful world need to function in order to maintain that state. What are the barriers which stand between us and it which we need to ask to be removed? The more specifically we can describe what we want, the better chance we have of that description acting as a blueprint that could draw us and others toward it as a reality.

So whether we get what we want can depend on the quality of our asking. If we ask for something which others want as well and in a way which inspires them to action then  our wish may be granted.

The creative principle which we see in operation around us - both in nature and in culture - works through the formation of new wholes. Ecosystems are wholes in which the individual organisms interrelate in a way which not only keeps each species alive, but has allowed for increasing complexity both in the system and its most advanced members. In society, individuals come together in families to produce and raise offspring and individuals come together also to form organisations which engage in creative endeavours, such as producing increasingly powerful forms of technology. Individuals create by bringing parts together to form new wholes, for example I’m creating this blog post by bringing together a new arrangement of words.

One need not have a supernatural concept of God to see that bringing some new thing or new arrangement of things into being means opening up to this creative principle - looking outside ourselves, as well as beneath the surface of our inner self, perhaps - seeking the connections which are the very essence of creation.

Our pride may stand as a barrier to receiving the blessing we seek from the creative principle. Maybe we think we already know. Maybe we think we can already do. But if we get down on our knees and admit that we don’t know and we can’t do, then maybe we will be prepared to see a realisable potential we had been missing.

Seek

Seeking is all about looking. It is about paying attention.

Seeking means first admitting that something might exist. We can’t afford to be too cynical.

Only if we pay attention to the people around us and to the systems - natural, social and  technological - of which we are a part, will we see the opportunities - the potential new connections - through which what we seek can come to pass.

If we get too caught up in our own personal schemes we lose sight of the power that we can have through our appreciation of the talents of others. Many a talent lies dormant because nobody has called upon it.

Knock

A knock is a determined action intended to call forth a response.

If we want something we need to take some kind of action. We need to initiate it, while at the same time remembering that there is much that we don’t know and much that we can’t do.

We might take action to share our vision. We might ask people what they need. It might involve literally knocking on doors.

***

If I can ask for anything, why not ask for the “Kingdom of Heaven”.

What does this phrase mean to me?

This is a potential which exists within us and within the world to manifest a community characterised by loving fellowship.

Thus, “…your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven…”, to me, means the realisation in the material world (“on earth”) of the matrix (“kingdom”) of love (“God”) which otherwise only exists in the world of positive potential (“heaven”).

Don’t we want to experience the ultimate pleasure and save ourselves from suffering?

The ultimate pleasure is that of loving connection with others or with the world around us in which we lose ourselves in the experience of being part of something larger. Maximising our ability to savour this pleasure requires a harmonious social environment and a harmonious relationship to the natural environment. Within the context of such a loving community, it would be much easier for us to work together to solve the practical problems which face us.

What stands between us and this potential loving community?

Egotism, greed, prejudice, aggression, despair, resentment… There are so many psychological barriers. There is so much in us which can make us enemies and thus lock us all out of “Heaven”.

Let’s imagine a tyrant who inflicts terrible suffering on his people. He is a fortress made of beliefs and behaviours which hold fear and guilt at bay. Can he acknowledge the common humanity of those he oppresses? No. Because to do so would be to confront his own guilt at having treated other humans so appallingly. Can he take his sword away from their throat? No. Because he fears they will rise up and exact their revenge. He really has no freedom of mind or freedom of behaviour. He is a reflexive pattern of oppression within which the loving being he was when he was born is imprisoned.

This is the extreme, but there is something of that tyrant in all of us. We have our rigid defensive beliefs and our fears which push people away.

The Kingdom is the state of freedom. Imprisonment is what keeps us from that kingdom. We are troubled by other’s selfishness, egotism, prejudice, violence. But these are their prisons. Each of us has our prison which is the source of our suffering and may contribute to the suffering of others. Our enemy is the jailer and not his victim.

So what do I ask for?

I ask not for justice, for justice is something which must be imposed. Instead I ask for the key which unlocks the prisons of the mind of which the injustices of the world are the outward expression.

How to Be Free - The Audiobook

How to Be Free has been available as an audiobook for several months now. It is available on the following platforms :

It is proving particularly popular on Apple iTunes and Google Play.

My original idea was to narrate an audiobook version myself. This proved difficult, partly because I'm very self-conscious as a reader and partly because I haven't the skill or equipment to produce a high class recording.

My self-consciousness on full display.

One day I was Googling myself - as one does - and found that an audiobook narrator used a quote from my book as one of his samples.

This got me thinking seriously about hiring professionals to create an audiobook for me.

First I had to find a company which would do the job for someone like myself who doesn't have a U.S. Tax File number. After a bit of a search, I settled on Findaway Voices. They provide a brilliant service and made it very easy for me. I was provided with some samples by different narrators and chose Derek Botten. He was easy to work with and I'm very happy with the way he read my book.

My initial assumption was that an audiobook version, like the print version, would be something I would have to charge for. Whether I would ever recoup the money I invested in having it created was another question. It surprised me to find that many platforms would allow me to set the price of the audiobook at $0.00. This allows me to continue the approach I've had with the ebook, even though the cost to myself has been much greater. What interests me is not making money but reaching a large audience.

Some services do insist on a charge, most notably Audible. (That's the link to the book on the Australian Audible site.) So if you want to help me to recoup some of my investment and you are an Audible user, you could buy the book from there.) As of today 7/06/2020, my total income from the audiobook has been $7 U.S. But, for me, the 5 star reviews which indicate that the book has been a help to people are the true treasure.