160209 What Do People Read?

Current Location:

United States, Texas, Boerne

Current Mood:

Inquisitive

Current Music:

birds

This is just curiosity. What do you read for free, and what would you pay to read? We all read, and most of us do some kind of writing, because what good is a blog if you don't put your fingers to the keyboard once in awhile?

For instance, I read a lot of non-fiction. I have found that my taste for fiction waned after I started having children almost twenty-five years ago. I watch videos of movies and old TV shows to get fiction, then read magazine articles, blog posts, and non-fiction books. Currently, most of my non-fiction is science, politics, or political science. My fiction is mostly science fiction or suspense. (Fantasy usually gets lumped with science fiction, but I prefer the sciency stuff.)

I pay for books (non-fiction).
I pay for magazines (non-fiction)
I pay for videos (fiction).

I do not pay for blog posts.
I do not pay for YouTube, nor any other online service. I simply view their free stuff.

Please leave an answer in the comments.
Thanks.

160127 Pro-Choice and Pro-Life

I taught my children the Word of God, and that they should think for themselves. Although it was a surprise, it was perfectly in character for my daughter to slap a Gary Johnson sticker on the back of her car in 2012. Since Gary announced his candidacy recently, I expect to see another one on her second car. If my younger daughter had a car, she'd probably put something like, "When you speak, I always here 'Punch me in the face,' but it's usually subtext." She's wordy like that, and hates politics.

Why do some people assume that because Person A supports Option A, that it automatically puts Person A into Catagory C? All my life, this kind of muddled thinking has frustrated me. Since the 1980s, which was the last time any idiot shot an abortionist, someone has tried to tell me how stupid I was to support the Pro-Life cause. The person(s) telling me this just assumed that I was going to go out and shoot an abortion doctor because I happen to confess Jesus as Lord in my life.

• First of all, labels are lazy shortcuts that let people get angry without thinking.
• Second, every person has to determine in his or her own heart and mind whether to believe anything. Smart people avoid blanket statements.
• Third, very few people, even among Christians, actually know what the Bible says about most subjects. Even if they can quote something, most forsake context and the most basic principles of research.
• Fourth, it behooves the Christian to study and to follow those who have worked even more diligently to unlock what God said. God did not give His Word in English, so we each need to learn Aramaic and study Classical Greek to find out what God really said.

Abortion is a complicated subject, but the loudest people reduce it to slogans and support politicians who agree with the slogans. Slogans circumvent thinking. That's why I hate labels. Forget labels and think about the words themselves. Everyone should be pro-life, because we all have a right to live. We should all be pro-choice, even if the choices of others disagree with the choices we ourselves would make. (For instance, while I agree with many Libertarian ideals, I will not be voting for Gary Johnson.)

Just because I am pro-life does not mean that I disagree with the death penalty, as more than one commenter has touted. Some people have proven their inability to judge between right and wrong. The Bible trumpets forgiveness, but also supports the death penalty in certain cases. Just because I am pro-choice doesn't mean that I agree with getting an abortion. Abortion is heart-breaking, and the costs verses the benefits should be weighed very carefully. This is an individual decision, not a legislative one.

Do you know what a "spontanious abortion" is? It is, or it used to be, a medical term for a miscarriage. A spontanious abortion occurs when a woman's own body detects that a fetus is not viable. This happened to me four times. I wanted those children, but my body refused. The Bible says that children are blessings. Some people just don't want to be blessed. Those are their choices. They don't have to be blessed. We'll all be much happier if we just let people make their own choices and deal with their own consequences instead of trying to make 'moral' laws. Legislatively forcing morality may in itself be immoral. That also goes for the environmental issues that some view as moral, but that's another story.

160108 Having Individual Thoughts

ThoughtPolice

It doesn't matter if I agree with Ayn Rand, the new Star Wars franchise, or an actor whose face I don't know. What's disturbing is that these social media affectionados believe that opinions need to line up with theirs or else be censored. Also disturbing is how many young people express that the Bill of Rights should be altered to exclude certain of those rights. Statistics and documentation may be available to some, but right now, I simply want to express opinions that have been formed over decades of observation, contemplation and meditation.

Our country was founded on laws and the belief that individuals have the right to think and do as they see fit. It was also based on a strong moral code that directs actions, but allows people to make their own mistakes. In general, the government did not punish moral mistakes. Even in Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, it seemed that the punishments were not legal as much as societal and/or religious.

Reader's Digest used to have a feature known as "There Outta Be a Law". It listed moral infractions by entities with power. Guess what? Forty or fifty years later, we now have a law for everything and no one is happy about it! Laws to restrain immorality seldom work. Instead of stopping the offending behavior, the offenders simply try new tactics. These "moral" laws have unintended consequences, and otherwise innocent people have become oppressed. For instance, a 1970 law meant to punish drug lords now takes money and property from families. Just do an Internet search on "asset forfeiture" and see what you find. There are far more stories than Google lists, because they filter the returns. (Ignorance is bliss, and keeps the masses quiet.) While I committed no crime, I lost property to the government. An attorney told me that it would cost close to a thousand dollars to sue to get it back, and that there were no guarantees that I would. In my distressed and destitute condition, I let it slide and thanked God that I wasn't charged with a crime for being a simple bystander.

We now have an incredible fight between legal gun owners and those who think that getting rid of guns gets rid of crime. Hmm. There certainly was no crime before guns were invented! There was no sin, no war, no evil at all! If only gunpowder had been confined to fireworks! Then all would have been sunshine and roses!

Guns, however, were invented, and Cain shot Abel. Wait! You mean that guns were not invented right out of the Garden of Eden? Well, certainly Brutus shot Caesar! No? Didn't Mongol hordes sweep across Asia with repeating rifles, or Vikings terrorize Europe with sub-machine guns?

Guns are not the problem, people. The hearts and minds of humans are. We have to guard our thoughts. We have to guard our own thoughts, because no one can do it for us. We have to be able to think for ourselves. We have to be taught right from wrong and make our individual decisions based a proven moral code. Old knowledge is not lame knowledge. We have not evolved into creatures that don't need a moral compass. Everything said has been said before. Everything done has been done before. Humans are no different today than they were thousands of years ago. Only the names have been changed to perpetuate the myth of progress.

Is there no hope? No trend is irreversible. In fact, all life runs in cycles, (or circles). Humanity is approaching winter, when everything looks dead and dying. Spring follows winter. People try to say that if we never had this or that event, that we would be enjoying a Star Trek like paradise. This is foolishness. The world never settles for peace. Remember the 'peace dividend' that we were supposed to have after the Berlin Wall fell? It turned into the first Gulf War. Material prosperity leads to discontent. It will get better, and it will get worse, and then better and worse again and again until time stops.

This is why we need the free exchange of differing ideas. And guns. Guns provide the tool that allows the weak to be able to defend against the strong. Instead of worrying and/or yelling, enjoy whatever true, honest, just, pure, lovely, good, or virtuous things you find. Keep them in your mind, and let others think their own thoughts. That's true freedom.

151210 Writer's Block

Mending Fences

If you could restore one broken relationship from your past, which would it be? Why would you pick that one, and what happened that caused the relationship to deteriorate originally? What's been the best relationship you've ever had, and why was it so special?

REPLY14

Why does one need to go back? Frankly, we can't go back. What was done is done. We can attempt to repair, but we can't change the past. The only person you can control is yourself, and this includes controlling your own emotions. You can't make another person love you, or agree with you, or believe like you. If the other person wants to carry a grudge for something real or imagined, that is his or her burden. You can try to heal the relationship, but the only person you can really control is yourself. Be free, and quit bossing the other person around. 

My children and I have a great relationship, because I don't try to control them. Instead, I taught them right from wrong, and instructed them to make their own decisions based on the results they wanted. My adult child does things I don't like, but that simply means that she is her own person. She never intentionally hurts people, and I know that she loves me. The same goes for the teen. The main difference between them is that the teen is still under my supervision and my responsibility. I look forward to the day that she becomes an adult as well. She is almost prepared to take charge of herself. Perhaps parents and children fight because the parents forget that their job is to train a child how to function in life, and a typical lifetime has more adult years than childhood years.

150805 The Un-People Person

Proverbs 14:4
"Where no oxen are, the crib is clean: but much increase is by the strength of the ox."

This verse helps me. My personality is ISTJ and Shy-Introvert. This means that if stranded on a deserted island with plenty of food and adequate shelter, I might miss other people in the third or fourth month, but even that's doubtful.

In Proverbs 14:4 God reminds me that, yes, interpersonal relationships are messy, but we are better together than apart. My elder child moves out today.

150301 Politically Correct Lies

People use euphemisms to soften a hard truth, but that is not what political correctness does. Political correctness disguises the truth. Leonard Nimoy, a respected entertainer, passed and was laid to rest. That says it much more nicely than, "The old coot freakin' died!" (Strangely, I was more saddened when another Russian Jew left the land of the living. I still mourn the death of Isaac Asimov.) Euphemisms help us to cope with harsh truths. This explains why we have such a hilarious number of them for the end of life.

This morning, I read some trollings concerning opposing political opinions. The PC crowd cannot handle facts. They have to explain them with corrections. They have to massage the numbers into a lie. One of my favorite lies says that when 17% of the population commits 39% of all non-drug related crime, it has to be the fault of the other 83% of the population. Part of that lie says that education has to be acquired without discipline, because discipline means oppression. Tell that to an Olympic gold-metalist. Another lie says that culture doesn't matter. It doesn't matter unless that culture is Christian, because Christians are oppressive, divisive, and destructive, (unlike Muslims,who are simply misunderstood).

Where do I get these ideas? Mainstream American news outlets and the trolls who follow them beat these messages on the relentless drums of propaganda. In 2012, I made the dark prediction that we Americans have had our last free election. Now more and more people are starting to agree. Few adults know history without the filter of the progressive agenda. Fewer children have any idea what brought about our Declaration of Independence, nor what true freedom entails.

2 Corinthians 3:17
"Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty."

Obviously, in order to bring about a totalitarian government, they have to get rid of God. Only God can bring us back to freedom.

150101 Happy New Year!

It is simply the change in the calender, but many people apply significance to it. I, however, prefer to start my new year in the fall. Today, I weighed in at 234, which is up from my previous weigh-in two weeks ago. I shall use this conveniently placed calendar change to add more exercise and better food choices to my routine.

Job 3:25
"For the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, and that which I was afraid of is come unto me."

Fear is believing. If you don't believe in it, how can you fear it? Actively disbelieve those bad things, at least as they apply to you, and be proactive in expecting good things. With God, all things are possible. His promises are in His Word.

 — celebrating New Year's Day.

Last night, I did something different. I went to what could be best described as a 'prayer meeting'. I have gone to a handful of those in my life, and they were all a little different. Last night, many people had some weakness they wanted addressed. I prayed for everyone.

I went home expecting to find Agent Em waiting eagerly with The Hobbit in hand, but no one was home. Moon got off work and took her to some debauchery involving her friends and another band. What a wonderful end to a nice, Christian evening. :O Therefore, I rang in the new year with Diet Coke, X-Files, and intermittent snoring.

Many proclaim great hopes for the new year, but didn't they do that last year? I believe that I will continue my journey with God and apply more of His promises to my life. I also expect this year to have its own Day of Infamy. Let's drink to me being wrong.

141023 Registering for NaNoWriMo

There is a story bubbling in my soul, and this is the right time to write. Now, the rules are that I have to wait until the 1st to start. I shall be hampered by the trip we have planned, so I'll need to fit that into the schedule. Some people write the novel in two weeks. I'll shoot for that.

I won't post anything here until it's done.

141014 SoA

I know and have known dozens of people who own motorcycles. Maybe a double handful of those Ride. Four Bikers have been close personal contacts. At least two of those associates are born again.

A month or so ago, two unrelated Facebook friends referenced a TV show known as The Sons of Anarchy. Good Internet had just been piped into my home, so I watched the first couple of seasons online.

Like a fifteen car pileup, it drew my attention. It took until the start of the third season for me to pull my eyes from it. Yes, there was a code of honor; there was the love of family; there was a kind of justice, but there was nothing inherently good about it. Hollywood keeps its characters in constant strife, and tweaks all story lines to conform to their own worldview. Truth doesn't matter.

Truth is, while isolated incidents and even some story lines were believable, the combination was not. There should have been more jail time, injury, and/or death for all. I know of only one old biker who still rides, and he does that only for show. Also, he has lost his hearing. Cops are not stupid, and in any department, more than one of them is going to be a 'straight arrow'. Based on these deviations from reality and the excessive emotional pain the characters constantly generate, I developed a great dislike for the show.

I realize that TV is not real, but Hollywood acts like they are showing the 'real deal' in their fiction. Actually, many writers such as myself do attempt to illustrate reality with our fiction. Aesop used stories to convey wisdom. Shakespeare and Steinbeck illustrated the human condition. Maybe that's why most of Hollywood disgusts me. It seems that they have completely abandoned this facet of fiction that reveals truth and replaced it with this facet of coercion. They seem obligated to drive home certain narratives without ever allowing certain alternate opinions or even facts that contradict.

My daughter told me that new experiences, even second-hand or fictional, cause the brain to produce dopamine. Even unpleasant experiences can cause the production of dopamine. That must be why SoA captured my attention. I am not, however, an addict (dependent personality disorder). Nope. Not me, but I was married to one.

In sixteen days, I may return to an old experience that causes a rush: NaNoWriMo. November is usually a tough month with many obligations, so maybe not. It is, however, my kind of fun! Certainly, I can do better than watching SoA!

140110 Not Writing.

It seems harder to write than it used to. I didn’t write in November. There is too much to do, but I don’t do it, or can’t do it all. I feel like a broken record, sometimes. Everything I say is either political or comes from the Word, or both. I guess I quit writing because of the name-calling. My political stance is based on the Word of God. Bashers like to make personal attacks rather than point by point comparisons. Facts generally initiate either a thoughtful change or an emotional response - normally the latter, because the former is just plain work. Yelling louder seems to mean that one has won the point. Facts lose value. Truth becomes pliable. Only feel-good rhetoric and high-minded lies matter.

Personally, I have made great strides in personal growth in the last five or six years. I gained a little knowledge and a great deal of wisdom, which somehow makes me want to speak and write less. Why throw pearls before swine? (Matthew 7:6). “Stupid is as stupid does,” (1 Corinthians 14:38) and as much as I want the entire world to understand wisdom and discretion, (Proverbs 3:21,22), the entire world has been given over to idolatry, (Romans 1:21-23).

This site was meant to start a business, but instead of selling oils, I seem to be stagnating. “People don’t care what you know until they know that you care.” I care, but I don’t convey that well. Sometimes, I care too much, so I have to stop caring in order to function. Disentangling is the only part that some people see. I cry that my books and my poetry protect me. I want, however, to see people healed.