Morning, apologies for missing the last couple of days, Hugh and I did a very early Horizon Scan episode on Thursday and then I was up moving house stuff yesterday.
Really simple, what does this have to do with the Olympics? Secondly, who actually wants this? The first answer is absolutely nothing, the second answer is a vanishingly small group of people. I’d put money on the vast majority of the LGB community looking at this and thinking ‘fucks sake’ and being embarrassed. The only people who support this are people who support the breaking down of traditional societal standards in behaviour, the blurring of lines between biological reality and the destroying of long standing practices that brought Western civilisation to it’s peak. In this case this is open mocking of Christian symbolism, you cannot deny that. Very obvious point, but I’ll make it anyway because it’s completely relevant and accurate considering the issues France has had in recent times, would this be done to Islam? Of course it wouldn’t, I’m not convinced it’d be done to any other religion. I studied Theology at University, I’m not a Christian, I’ve been Zen Buddhist for about 25 years - it perhaps won’t surprise you that I considered becoming a priest - but I see this and my immediate reaction is…
The fuckers are radicalising me 😂 - More than anything else I just think it’s disrespectful, tasteless and rude. Go 100 years back in a specific European country and you’ll see where this can lead.
As you can see I’m actually really angry about this 😂, I’d like to write more, but I’ll force myself to keep scrolling.
Timeline is completely dead, so I’m just going to rant more, a bit more, but not too much, it’s Saturday after all.
The battlefield of ideas is a real thing. The older I get and the more experience of life and human nature I gain, the more that holds true to me. If you believe something to be true and you believe it to be beneficial to you, you should uphold it through your daily actions and example. You must do what you believe to be right. It’s not necessary to try to convince others, to engage in endless debate and arguments that rarely come to anything and just end up wasting your life - especially if you do it online. Just do the thing, everyday, and you become the result of those practices. You will become the proof, the winning argument. Now in the modern day we have the internet, we can leverage that to broadcast that example. That’s not to say preach, it’s just more reach, you’re extending the ability for people to see you, the product of your practice. Whereas previously you may only be seen by those in your town, today you can be seen and see others, internationally.
This approach is open to everyone, including those who planned and took part in the Olympic ceremony that I posted above. That is the battlefield and you, the product of your actions, are the idea. Each person will either develop their own individual practice or they will see the results and example of others and choose to follow that way, this is how groups and movements are formed. Whichever idea wins, takes responsibility for shaping the future, until another idea has more adoptees and the process continues.
What we have currently though, certainly in the West, is a fake version of this. The group and movement currently in power are able to give the impression using the tools available to them due their position, that they are the winning idea. That they are majority, their example is followed by the most people. There may have been a point in the late 90’s/early 2000’s when this was true, today it is a lie and you are being gaslit through their use of the mass communication apparatus available to Governments, to believe it. It’s very likely this makes you feel demoralised, you feel at odds with the world around you, you feel like you’re the only one who sees the world as you do anymore. This isn’t and is never the case. You are never the only one feeling something. This applies to us all but it effects people differently.
Women are hardwired to be part of a group and their social interactions are different to men. Women know more than anybody how psychologically heartless they can be when it comes to dealing with differing opinion and rejecting outsiders. They have a sixth sense for this that was evolutionarily useful for protecting the group. This is why many of the most ardent enforcers of the current fake prevailing idea are women (and feminine men), those doing so care less about the downstream effects of the practices they propagate and enforce, and more about that they are in the ‘in group’ and therefore safe from being outcast
Men need to feel agency and purpose, they search for meaning in their lives. We react very badly when those things are discouraged. When rules are applied to us that we feel repress our true nature, which is to protect those dear to us and to adventure and gain for our group, we can become dysfunctional. For the group currently in power the feminised version of society we’re living through where dissenting opinion and action is ‘cancelled’ and offenders outcast is useful, particularly when it comes to those who are most of threat to them, men. Make no mistake, the deriding of anything seen as ‘traditionally masculine’, the push to pathologise normal male behaviour as ‘toxic masculinity’ and the replacing of male role models and heroes with women and feminine men is completely deliberate and it damages both sexes.
So for the men and women who find themselves outside of the group currently in power, who have differing ideas about what is right, useful and good for them, it can be incredibility difficult and it is no surprise that you may feel lost and at odds with the world. But I’ll reiterate what I said above, it’s fake, you are not the minority and those of you who have the strength of character to say so and show a different example will find that you will be followed by those who feel the same, but are too weak at the moment to lead without your example.
You can start this today and I’ll leave this here along with a link to something else relevant I wrote about Integrity.
Be without fear in the face of your enemies. Be brave and upright that God may love thee. Speak the truth always, even if it leads to your death. Safeguard the helpless and do no wrong. That is your oath.
Gaz, really enjoyed your post, really resonated thanks for taking the time to write. These days when I get angry if I see something, like the 'Olympic last supper' I try and pause and ask myself why I'm feeling that way, and who wins if I let it annoy me? That usually does the trick. I am however reassured that there is an entire community of us that feel the same when we see stuff like that. Following your post I also asked chatgtp to 'explain Zen Buddhism to me like I am 10 years old'. A lot of parallels with Stoicism. Jim
The last supper one’s a bit crass but headless woman and Papa Smurf have got nothing to do with Christianity tbf. First was Marie Antoinette and blue boy is apparently some 90s French pop star dressed up as Bacchus.
French media is just stupidly horny and very camp. They used to have hardcore porn on public TV after 9pm 20 years ago and they’ve had pop songs with sex sounds top the charts. Cross dressing’s been a thing in Parisian burlesque clubs for best part of two hundred years and their TV & entertainment industry is ridiculously camp (Eurotrash was heavily based on actual French TV shows). None of this vibe is particularly new, it’s just sent Twitter into a tailspin because the most interaction 90% of conservative yanks have ever had with the French was changing the name of their chips 20 years ago to Freedom Fries.
On plus side at least it’s a change from that lot accusing France of being an Islamic caliphate for a few days.