Jihad and the Meeting of Cultures

Jihad for me is walking into the Mesjid. As an American, it is a good exercise for me to see the things which are deeply wrong with my culture. They aren't easy to miss. However, walking into the Moscow Islamic Center, I can't help but remember the deeper problems which the many cultures which have embraced Islam have. This is despite the vast strength and profound benefits which I believe Islam has to offer the world. (I must believe this, or I wouldn't have decided to become a Muslim.)

Islamic-culture problems like inferior treatment of women, sexual violence, a kind of "culture nazi" view of shariah, hiding in the closet in Western cultures, conflating religion and politics (sometimes to the point of violence), are easy to spot for an American observer. Part of this is because these problems are emphasized by the media. Part of this, though, is that these problems quite obviously exist. And I can't deny that. And that is why walking into the Mesjid is jihad for me.

As I journey through the world of being a Muslim, I see a great deal of hope and offering in the religion of Islam. I believe it is the best religion in the world. But it's always difficult for me to walk into the Mesjid, knowing my staunch unwillingness to discard my Stetson cowboy hat as a North Idaho Libertarian, nor to set aside my uniquely American beliefs about the world. I am an American. And I hold a far less cynical view of American culture than many of my Muslim sisters and brothers.

This makes the Eid al-Fitr gatherings and the public worship very difficult for me. Sometimes, I decide just to pray at home. It's too frightening to go to the Mosque. I willingly adopt the ideology which France would jam down my throat — I keep my religion private. I realize it is difficult particularly for my Muslim brothers, too. At first, I was hurt by the marked lack of "Aslaam-o-alikum" greetings at the local Eid al-Fitr feast. But then, upon reflection, I realized that a lot of the people there probably didn't know I was a Muslim. And, quite reasonably, they were afraid of me; a North-Idahoan wearing a Stetson cowboy hat is not someone an Arab Muslim immigrant wants to piss off. I don't want to make things this difficult for these Muslims, but I have to.

Why do I have to? Because of the ease at which the 12-year-old Pakistani Muslim came up behind me, said "Aslaam-o-alikum," and shook my hand. He treated me as a true brother: with a child's courage, undaunted by the baggage of Islamic-American relations. He will return to Pakistan with a positive view of North-Idahoans wearing cowboy hats, which insha'Allah has tremendous impact on the world's path towards peace.

Muhammad (sallallahu aleyhi wa salaam) said that the second best deed for a Muslim to do, just below belief in Allah (subhana wa t'alla) and His prophets. So I suppose I still, with the help of the more courageous of my Muslim brothers, will visit the Mesjid. Sometimes, with my punk-Libertarian upbringing, my Islamic-Buddhist beliefs, and my Stetson cowboy hat, I feel like my very existence is an act of jihad. But I have to do it. Because I feel I have a positive contribution to make. I hope, earnestly, that all these things help.

Eid Mubarrak.

**Note: Saying Islam is the best religion in the world in no way invalidates my Buddhist perspective. Buddhism has religious aspects, which I believe are Islam — or, at the very least, if you want to get technical, they are proto-Islamic. But primarily, Buddhism isn't a religion, but rather a system of mind-yoga which leads to truth, including religious truth, which was formulated as a radical contre-puntal to Hindu yoga. Buddhism is a philosophical mind-training technique and world-outlook, not so much a religion.

A Case for Islamic Buddhism

In Buddhism, it is said that only the Buddha's (PBUH) teaching can remove suffering and bring about joy for yourself permanently. It is said that Buddha (PBUH) was a perfect teacher, a teacher for the whole world, and that his teachings were flawless, having the quality of being something you could rely on absolutely. It is even said that Buddha was a perfect teacher.

In Islam, it is said that those who reject the faith of Islam will go to hell. Now, the wisdom prevalent in both communities is that it's better to just choose one, or just choose the other, and not choose both. I would like to contend with this notion.

While it is said that teachers like Muhammad and Buddha (PBUT) share a perfect message for the whole world, yet it can be said that in some subtle way, they have a flaw. How can they have a flaw? Not in the sense you might think. They do not have a flaw which in any way diminishes their statuses as perfect teachers. No flaws there. They do not have a flaw in that there are areas upon which they cannot be relied. No flaws there. Where, then, is the flaw?

The flaw is this: when you apply Buddha's sutras and tantras to a situation where, perhaps, another dharma may be appropriate, then YOU have a flaw. The application of one teacher's teaching to one situation where it is not appropriate is a flaw.

Now, both religions make the claim that they are given for the whole world. How then can one apply to one situation and not to another, where the other applies more readily? The answer is really, actually, quite simple. Buddha's (PBUH) teachings are vertical, Muhammad's (PBUH) teachings are horizontal. They both apply to the whole world, but they apply in different ways.

When you get right down to it, each of these teachers was just one man. Any teacher, no matter who they are, no matter how great they are, will have to tailor their teachings to their students. They will do so with the expectation that there are other buddhas in the world who will step in when necessary. Every teacher is like this, without exception. I contend that Muhammad and Buddha (PBUT) complement each other perfectly, and together, they form a religion for the whole world, just as each of them claims, but in different ways.

When a Muslim prays, he or she prays five times a day, in a specific yogic format, every day. Each prayer has a set structure and guidelines for completion. Ramadan fast is conducted similarly. And zakat, the giving of one's wealth to charity, follows a specific guideline (2.5% of savings per year). The Hajj pilgrimage has guidelines, too. These all fill out a mystical system of practice which can be followed.

Nevertheless, this system does not apply completely. Why? Because it is a specific yoga, and not a mystical enterprise. In other words, it extends horizontally, to encompass the whole world, externally, but not internally. This is where Buddha (PBUH) steps in. His enterprise was almost entirely internal. Everything was secondary to internal meditation, and almost nothing had to do with external yogic practices. Out of necessity, of course, yogic practices were maintained and developed over time by various Buddhist gurus with their disciples. Make no mistake, all these practices will eventually lead to enlightenment. However, it is my contention that both of them, when combined, form a perfect alchemical conceptual geometry which will lead to enlightenment more quickly and more assuredly than either one alone.

Now, of course, people may be attached to their own spiritual traditions and say, "I can do it all from within my own tradition." This is true. But in so doing, you will be throwing away certain specific methods of doing things which bring about greater benefit. Suppose you're a Buddhist and you want to learn both sutra and tantra in accordance with the Lam Rim all-encompassing path. You find a teacher who spend his entire life studying sutra, and only a little bit studying tantra. Now, you could, technically, make great achievements studying from this teacher alone. But yet, if you study under this teacher and excel in sutra, then learn of a teacher who has spent their entire life studying tantra and only a little sutra, why not study under both teachers and get a more complete view? This is what all the great practitioners in the past have done, and by promoting Islamic Buddhism, I am merely attempting to promote the same practice. Buddha (PBUH) excelled in internal looking. Muhammad (PBUH) excelled in external looking. They both excelled in the same act of looking, but in different ways.

Now what does this have to say about other teachers, such as Padmasambhava, Tsong Khapa, or Christ (PBUH)? Naturally, with regards to certain areas of expertise, you will need help from different teachers. All teachers know how to cooperate, and every teacher recognizes the pure benefit of other teachers who are also pure. I say, in accordance with the main teachings of Muhammad and Buddha (PBUT), follow them first as your main practice, but also study the other teachers as the need arises and as your curiosity and free time dictate. All the prophets are legitimate buddha teachers, and though not every buddha is a prophet, every buddha is a teacher, and a worthwhile

On Control

I want to share something about control. There's internal control, and there's external control. Control is binary. There is a one, and there is a zero. There's assent, and then there's no signal. The essence of control is to isolate information down to the point of it being binary. That is control, and there is an internal aspect and an external aspect. The internal aspect of control is called self-control. The external aspect goes by social control, propaganda, or perhaps occultism, psychiatry, science, and so forth. Then, there is the union of internal and external control. That is important.

Enlightenment is where external control meets internal control. It's like two electric circuits connected by a wire; really, when you connect them, they are one circuit. That's union. There is no enlightenment without control, both internal and external, because without control there would be no clarification of concepts, no transmission of purity, no essence of the divine. You need control to have enlightenment. With control, you are controlled by Buddhas, and you control yourself. Everywhere there is nothing but control. And with this control, both internal and external, comes the transmission of purity which purifies the mental continuum to the point where it can continue on its own without further guidance. That is the ultimate point: clarifying information, purifying data, ruling out the decay of existence that marks the ordinary, unenlightened state.

In the Internet, we have transmission of data, and we have streaming. Streaming is like transmission of data, except there's more control. The pathway of data becomes one circuit, to the point where the two computers are indistinguishable, and then you get music coming through the wire. You can't have live music over the Internet without streaming. Control is what makes it stream.

When we receive a teaching, it doesn't matter if the teaching is secular or religious or what-have-you, there is a great deal of control. Language itself is control. When someone says something, we can't help but experience that thing. In some ways, this can be traumatic; someone can say something which triggers something in us that makes us feel uncomfortable, and we don't like it because we feel we have no choice. But in other ways, it is quite useful. Mutual control through language is what makes us so powerful as human beings. It's what builds societies. The trick to avoiding the trauma is to be open-hearted. Sense the essence of the word entering your mind. Feel its emotion. Feel the totality of it, and all the energy and light and soul behind it. Feel what it means to be that word. It will still control you, but the control is open-sourced, and you get to contribute, too.

That's something that Westerners, traditionally, have had a hard time accepting. Control is always two-sided. If you seek to control, you will always be controlled. Control is control. Control of others is others' controlling you. Control begets control, from node to node, point to point, everywhere on the network. It is never one-sided, as much as we may want it to be.

Consider the United States of America. It is a very powerful country. What makes the United States so powerful? Because of all the control. But America is a democracy. The citizens of America control the government, and the government controls the citizens, who control the government, who control the citizens. All this control is what makes us so powerful.

Now you may be wondering if there is something beyond control. Of course there is. Once you've achieved control, you can simply allow the energy to radiate throughout the nodes of control, providing love, inspiration; inspiring dialectics of power; granting crowns and relieving others of the oppressive weight of the same crowns. Once union between the nodes of control, being two, (internal and external), has been achieved, you have a blossoming of creative energy which can spill into the universe and settle among the Earth. This is the meaning of control. It is its ultimate end. If you hang onto control, you get a headache. If you loosen up, once control has been achieved, you achieve grace.

A lot of people are against the concept of control. I am not. However, I do understand that an extreme of control causes headaches. Control is necessary and important, but best to let it arise naturally, as the product of open-hearted investigation, inner and outer, into the nature of the world. Perhaps it may even be better to let the whole world control you first, before seeking to control the world. But once the control has been achieved, being open-hearted and loose and letting go returns us to that state of nature from which the control arose in the first place.

Lady Hornet Learns to Cry

One day, while gathering food for her hive, Lady Vespa (i.e. "Lady Wasp") happened upon the house of a magician. The walls of the house were so thick and strong that they appeared impenetrable to other animals. But Lady Vespa was clever at infiltrating other animals' abodes, and because she was attracted to the intoxicating scents emanating from the house, it didn't take long for her to find a way inside.

Once inside, she found the house to be very warm and comforting. Longing to discover where the wondrous scents were coming from, she began to explore. "Gee, imagine how happy the Queen and all the hive would be if I brought back a little piece of food something smelling like THIS."

In her search, Lady Vespa discovered that the scents all seemed to be coming from one table, upon which were arrayed a collection of potions in glass bottles set in a neat little line. She approached the first, and sniffed it. It smelled intoxicating, like alcohol. "This smells wonderful, like nutritious food, but it's so strong it wouldn't be suitable for the hive all by itself."

So she went to the next. It smelled repugnant, like poison. "This is a hearty poison, and a good dose of this would make our hive nigh on invincible. But it's so strong, and we need nutrients too. It's not suitable by itself."

So she went to the next. It smelled like a spicy fire, overwhelming her senses. "Wow. This is very invigorating. And it would be sure to bring much life to the hive, since we hornets love to be active so much. But by itself it is useless. It's not suitable by itself."

Then she had the idea, "Why not take a little bit of all three, and mix it all up in my mouth?" And that's what she did.

Just then, the magician came home and saw Lady Vespa. Magicians, as a general rule, do not like hornets. So when he saw her, he became angry, muttered an angry word, and wished for her to leave. Lady Vespa heard this, but she was an aggressive hornet, and like most hornets, saw herself as superior to the other. So she was unperturbed.

This made the magician even more angry. So the magician swatted at Lady Vespa. Lady Vespa fell face-first to the floor, where she bit off a big chunk of dirt, which mixed with the other ingredients. She contemplated stinging the magician, but the accident of falling to the floor was a "happy accident," because a mouthful of dirt was a good addition to the concoction she was brewing in her mouth for the other hornets.

Nevertheless, she was angry at the magician. So she flew right up in the magician's face and did the angry dance. "I am angry at you," she sang. "I could sting you."

"I am angry at you, I could sting you."

"I am angry at you, I could sting you."

Again and again, she sang this. Flying in front, and to the right, and to the left, then back in front. The magician was frightened, of course, because all animals fear the hornet. But he was full of cunning and poison was in his heart. So, just under his breath, he uttered a curse: "Abmamg, quem paravi. I have prepared."

Lady Vespa, feeling she had gotten her point across, left the house to return to the hive. On her way back, she saw bear. The bear had arrows sticking out of his back. Lady Vespa felt she should be sad, but unbeknownst to her, the magician's curse had taken away her tears. So she could not cry. She became angry instead, and she knew this was wrong, but she couldn't help it.

So Lady Vespa flew to the bear and asked him, "Who did this horrible thing to you? Tell me, and I will sting him."

"It wasn't a him," the bear replied, "It was a HER! The daughter of the Tribe of Man caught me stealing picnic food from her tent. I wasn't trying to hurt anyone, I was only hungry! But she told me to stop and tried to take back her picnic food. Angry, I swatted at her. Then her mother showed up and shot me with arrows!"

Not thinking clearly, Lady Vespa was full of anger. "Tell me where to find this woman and I will sting her," she said.

So the bear told Lady Vespa where to find the woman, and Lady Vespa set out to sting her. First, though, she came across the daughter. Lady Vespa flew up to the daughter and did the angry dance.

"I am angry at you, I could sting you."

"I am angry at you, I could sting you."

"I am angry at you, I could sting you."

The daughter said, "Why would you sting me? What have I done?"

"Okay. I'm not angry at you, I'm angry at your mother. She shot a bear full of arrows just for trying to have a good lunch. So tell me where your mother is so I can sting her."

The daughter said, "That bear should not have tried to steal from me. Why should I tell you where my mother is?"

"Even though the bear was not right in stealing the picnic basket, that doesn't make it right to shoot him full of arrows. Two wrongs don't make a right."

"Okay, you may have a point. And I'll admit, I was frightened by your angry dance. So I'll tell you where my mother is. If you go to the South, you'll find her in a cave on the mountainside. Okay, I've told you. Now please leave. You might be able to sting me, but I could always swat you or spray you with a can of Raid!"

So Lady Vespa left to find the woman's mother. But she didn't find her. Even more angry, she returned to the daughter and asked again where her mother was.

"You must've just missed her. She's headed West. Go West, and you'll find her lighting a big bonfire."

So Lady Vespa went West. Following a trail of smoke, she found the remains of a bonfire, but the fuel was spent, and the daughter's mother was nowhere to be found. So again she became angry and returned to the daughter.

"You must've missed her again. After going West, she was going to head North. Go North, and you'll find her in a treehouse."

So Lady Vespa went North. She looked for a treehouse. At first she found nothing, but by accident, the wind lifted her high into the air, and she found a village of treehouses very high up. She flew very quickly into each one so that she could find the mother before sundown, but she found nothing. So she returned to the daughter.

"You unlucky creature! She was making business in the North all day. Now she must've gone East. Go East, and you'll find her under a rock."

So Lady Vespa went East. She thought it would be difficult to find the rock the daughter was talking about, because there are many rocks in the world, even more than there are treehouses. But in the East was nothing but sand dunes, and in the middle of the sand dunes was one gigantic rock—the only rock for miles.

Lady Vespa knew it would be difficult to find a way under this rock, but she was not worried, because hornets are very clever at finding ways into places of which other animals are locked out. So she searched around the rock, and sure enough, she found many tunnels made by ants which were just big enough for her to crawl into.

But she crawled through tunnel after tunnel and couldn't find the mother. Still angry, but now exhausted, she returned to the daughter. When she came back, the daughter's back was turned. Lady Vespa wanted to do the angry dance, but she was too tired. She barely had enough energy to fly all the way to the other side of the room just so she could look the daughter in the face. But she did.

And when Lady Vespa saw the face of the daughter, she realized, suddenly, that she was not speaking to the daughter at all, but to the mother! And she was radiating such brilliant light, and looked so peaceful and pleasant and happy, she couldn't bring herself to do the angry dance, let alone sting her.

Lady Vespa thought about things. She was angry all the time, she thought. And she had no right to judge the mother for shooting the bear with arrows, because she herself was prone to sting.

"What's wrong?" asked the mother. "Are you afraid to sting me?"

"I would like to sting you, but it doesn't seem right anymore."

"I like hornets," said the mother. "You are my friend."

"Is it okay for me to sting people who hurt others, and to sneak into their houses and steal their potions, and to do angry dances?"

The mother responded by touching the Earth and saying, "Om."

And lady wasp began to cry. Her tears became rivulets, feeding all the baby wasps and all the animals of the world. And, still having the potion in her mouth which she concocted from the magician's house, she fed all the baby hornets her delicious food, and they all were happy, especially the Queen.

Practical Religion: Pray Five Times a Day to Increase Efficiency

Everybody knows that prayer is what keeps us in touch with the Ultimate, with the Source of Life. Certainly this is true in Islam as well. But did you know that there are practical benefits to offering salat five times a day as well?

When we organize our lives, it's best to have some kind of routine. We have to know when we're going to get up in the morning, how we're going to plan our day, and when we're going to go to bed. We have to have this routine to get our lives in order so that we can most effectively use our time. Muslim salat is a great way to do this.

Muslims everywhere pray five times a day according to the prescribed times of the day. The five prayers are: Fajr, Dhuhr, Asr, Maghrib, and Isha. Fajr time is when light first glints over the horizon, and when the birds first start singing. Dhuhr is when the sun is highmost. Asr is in between Dhuhr and Maghrib, and Maghrib is when the sun has just finished setting. Isha is when all light from the sun is gone.

Since I've started praying five times a day, I've noticed a definite change in my ability to get things done. For one thing, I get up at the same time, regularly, at around 8am or 7am. After I get up, I have plenty of times to get my day in order and get some work done before Dhuhr. After Dhuhr, I usually find time to work on a primary project of mine, and then after Dhuhr usually I work on secondary projects. I can work a little bit after Isha as well.

It's nice to set your life rhythms in synchronization with the sun. This helps relieve exhaustion and gives you a broader view of your life's work. I find being in sync with the sun allows you to see life from the sun's perspective, that there's always another day, that you don't have to do things in fits and starts. You can become comfortable with the fact that the work is never really fully done. You just get up, get your work done, and move on to the next day.

One point to keep in mind is the nature of the prayer. If you are a Muslim, the best prayer of course is the salah according to Muhammad PBUH. But if you're not Muslim, you can still find benefits from praying five times a day at the prescribed times. Keep in mind, though, that prayer should be a break. You should take a break from the world and acknowledge that there are greater things than just keeping busy doing your life's work all the time. The nature of the break from the world should include some kind of contemplation—inner contemplation and spiritual contemplation. It should be maybe five to ten minutes of contemplation.

While I don't think it hurts to pray according to other traditions, I feel there is no need to resist learning to pray according to the Islamic fashion. The Islamic method of prayer is nice because it incorporates many different aspects of spirituality. You have a form of hatha yoga, where you place your body in a specific pose to reflect an inner state. You also have mantra—saying mind-protecting verses which help you contemplate. Also, you have specific, liturgic contemplations, and when your head and nose are on the ground, you get to improvise and come up with your own requests and speak from the heart.

In the Christian tradition, there's a lot of speaking from the heart, but the other aspects are lacking. There's no yoga, and no liturgy. Or maybe there's a whole lot of liturgy, but very little speaking from the heart. Or maybe it lasts too long to be practical five times per day. So it's not quite the same.

The Buddhist tradition is an interesting case to compare, and illustrates why I feel I am a Muslim-Buddhist rather than just a Muslim or just a Buddhist. I feel the Buddhist vipassana meditation technique is present during the whole salah, and indeed, according to the Islamic tradition, the instructions on how to keep your mind state focused during salat is pretty much the same as in Buddhism. In fact, vipassana is a meditation technique that can enrich any spiritual tradition or religion, and it will improve your Christian prayers as well, or even your occult practices if you get into that. Vipassana will improve pretty much everything except doing evil, because it will transform your evil acts into compassionate skillful means to combat demon-enemies. But the fact that vipassana is so generalized can be a bit of a weakness. In other words, it's nice to have ONE prayer that you do, all the time, which you know is being done by millions of other Muslims, at the same time. The spiritual connection, as well as the practical benefits, and sheer convenience, are some of the benefits of doing salat.

If you have trouble discovering what time salat is, there is a great website called IslamicFinder.org, which has prayer times on it. Additionally, it has apps which you can download to your mobile device which will keep track of prayer times in your area, and automatically adjust them as the Earth shifts on its axis. If you wish, you can even allow these apps to automatically play a call to prayer (called "athan") during prayer times.

On the Legitimacy of Israel as a State

I questioned, in a Facebook post, the legitimacy of Israel's self-proclaimed right to exist. It seems to me, anyway, that God did not give Israel to the Jews, but rather England did. And I think Palestine is the main test of Israel's right to exist.

The way Israel is treating the Palestinians is not justifiable. Israel isolates them from the outside world. It would be better if the Palestinians could leave, or become a part of Israel. But this is impossible. Why? Because Israel sees it in their best interests to isolate them. The problem, of course, is that the Palestinians probably have a more legitimate claim to that land than Israel.

Israel is forced to battle Palestine. Peace is impossible for them. Why? Because if they make peace, the Arab states will take advantage of a weak stance and attack Israel one way or another. I believe this is the case. Also, I believe that there are Arab states who might ultimately win in the conflict (if peace were made) which are worse states than Israel. States like Syria.

But really, all this is a battle more for the State of Israel than for anyone else. Israel was founded on questionable principles. The right of an ethnic-based State to be formed by an external oppressor because it's in the Bible is questionable. The right of any ethnic-based state to be formed is questionable. If Israel has any shred of legitimacy to its existence, I think the true test will be Palestine. Also, I think Israel fully realizes this, which is why they are in so much trouble about it.

Israel has very few options. They can't exterminate the Palestinians. They can't let them emigrate to Israel or elsewhere. They can't make peace with them. They can't fight them too hard. They can't fight them too soft. There are no choices for them. And the way they behave in Palestine is very similar to the way a failing regime behaves when its legitimacy comes into question. They imprison people without cause, place them in concentration camps, incite violence to legitimize violence, spend more money on security than research, and so forth. I've never been to Palestine, but from what I've read of the situation there, it's like a concentration camp. It's very similar to psychiatry. A failing regime grasping at straws to ward off its inevitable defeat.

I've had experience living in a concentration camp kind of existence. And when you're inside the concentration camp, sometimes it's a difficult decision you have to make whether to threaten or use violence or not. Because sometimes an oppressor will only respond to violence. This is a fact. I had to threaten to stab hospital wards with a pen in order to force them to bring food to my seclusion room. The decision was part of a long series of pressures I put on them (this one being the only truly violent one), which probably resulted in enough food to survive. Barely.

But oppressors all ultimately act the same. They inevitably spend all their energy on bolstering security rather than gaining knowledge or helping people. This is why fewer and fewer people choose to be psychiatrists: the pay really isn't very good, the training is exhausting, and the fact that they will be pigeonholed into an existence where they must oppress people every day really makes it hard. Why is the pay not so good? Probably because psychiatry prisons are locked down tighter than military compounds. They spend all their money on more and more traumatic seclusion rooms, rather than actually helping people, or gaining knowledge. Why don't they spend money on knowledge? Because as research comes out about psychiatry, it shows them that they're all doing it wrong; that psychiatry is an illegitimate institution.

And the fact that these oppressors act the same, when they're not bolstered by an external oppressive force, indicates that they all eventually cannibalize themselves in the end. So the smartest strategy for someone who is NOT living in a concentration camp system is non-violence. It is to put political pressure on the oppressors, forcing them to cannibalize themselves, without resorting to violence, and thereby legitimizing their oppression. The problem comes when your motivation is bad. People with bad motivation will collect up these victims of oppression and pray on their sufferings to the point of inciting them to violence. It will legitimize both oppressors, until they go to war and one oppressor is defeated. All oppressors act the same.

In a lot of ways, America is behaving the same way. But I'm not sure that the outcome for any of these oppressors is set in stone. I feel America will survive. America is a legitimate state with a troubled history of oppression. That's how I feel. But in order to survive, America has to do soul searching. This is what is happening with the Occupy / Tea Party movements. This is happening internally within the Republican Party, I'm aware, and may also be happening in the Democratic Party. Obama has made surprising decisions, such as the decision following the will of the people not to go to war with Syria. Even this decision may have been a mistake, but it's an example of soul searching.

The problem for Israel is that I'm not sure they have the luxury to be able to do soul searching, surrounded as they are by all these Arab states who do not believe in their right to exist. America is a world superpower, very rich, and having the most powerful military in the world. We can do soul searching. Allowing Israel to do soul searching for the benefit of Palestinians, unfortunately, is not very much on the to-do list for these Arab states. A lot of them are very authoritarian, and rely on strong security forces. And the problem is, these security states require some kind of propaganda to keep their publics supportive of the current regimes. Palestine is a good propaganda point for any dictator in a Muslim majority state.

So really, the right for Israel to exist is less of a test for Israel as it is a test for Arab Muslims. Are these Muslims going to point to the passages in the Qur'an which say that Jews will be hiding behind rocks and the rocks will tell them to kill them? While conveniently ignoring the passages enjoining us not to dispute with the People of the Book except by means better than mere disputation? Or are these Muslims going to work to promote more and more functional democracies at home, so they can deal with Israel intelligently? This is the test. Arabs as a nation have a right to exist on their own land, of course, but many of their states, I feel, are as illegitimate as Israel's or more so. The fate of Israel rests on the fate of Palestine. And the fate of Palestine, and Palestinians, I feel, rests on the ability for Arab Muslims to combat oppression in their own states so they can restrain their own militants from attacking Israel, and allow Israel to sort out its right to existence on its own. If Israel is purely an oppressor, the more it becomes isolated from support from the outside, the more they will cannibalize themselves. If not, they will survive, and peace will prevail.

Degenerate Times

I think it is important to note a couple of things about Buddhist prophesies. First and foremost, a prophesy is not a death sentence. We in the West are so particular about details that we often think of prophesy in the strictest possible terms. Thus, we see it as equally prophetic if Buddha prophesizes that we will live to be 10, as if I or someone prophesizes that my dog will eat a bagel at 2pm Eastern Standard Time next Monday before taking a walk. But Allah is greater than that. We can't simply confine prophesy to strictly worldly terms without any room for freedom of choice.

The two prophesies I would like to mention are Buddhist prophesies: the prophesy of degenerate times, which I believe dates back to the Buddha himself, and the Kalachakra prophesy.

In the prophesy of degenerate times, it is prophesied that our life-span will degenerate gradually over the next thousand or so years until we live to be only 10 years old. Then, there will be a 7 Days War, which of course will last seven days. It is said that the slaughter will be so great that afterwards humans will be so rare that when they encounter one another, they will kiss each other on the mouth. And after this 7 Days War, people will be so profoundly affected by the killing that they will vow never to kill again, at which point the life-span will increase to 14 years.

Gradually, over the period of a couple thousand years, people will renounce evil after evil, and the life-span will increase until it reaches 80,000 again, which is what it was before people began to degenerate. To this, I will add a couple of senses of my own: people I think will be drinking Boyds Coffee, and some will be doing Yamantaka practice. Those were what have been revealed to me through valid cognition and observation.

Now, there are a couple things to note here. As I said: a prophesy is not a death sentence. If someone were to ask me to sum up my philosophy while standing on one foot, I would tell them: it is possible to use the energy of degeneration to one's advantage. That is the prime focus of everything I've been seeking to expound upon for my entire life, and I suspect insh'Allah it will be until I die. I can't imagine me trying to teach anything else, what with my peculiar experiences. And it is an important fact.

All prophesies, including the most damning, are empty of inherent existence. So on some level, we don't know fully what they are talking about. Will the Earth be a desolate wasteland, devoid of life, after the 7 Days War? Will it be like the movie Mad Max taken to an absolute extreme? I contend no. The prophesy, I think, applies mainly to humans qua humans. It does not apply to humans qua yakshas, humans qua nagas, humans qua devas, and humans qua Buddhas. In addition to this, the prophesy applies only generally. People will probably live to be as old as maybe 30, or even older, during these times. And while human-to-human contact may be rare, a survivor human may well encounter many nagas, devas, and Buddhas in his or her quest to find other humans. The Earth will not be a desolate wasteland, but will remain rich with life. This is my opinion.

Furthermore, we have to understand an important point regarding degeneration. It is not our fault that we will live to be only 10 years old. And, we will still have brain technology as is being developed even today to make our lives more meaningful. A wandering 10-year-old after the 7 Days War may well make contact with another human over Facebook telepathically using brain technology.

The other point regarding degeneration leads into my discussion of the Kalachakra prophesy. According to this prophesy, in India, a Muslim will rise to power and claim to be the heir of an Islamic prophesy. A vast force, led by Buddha Manjushri, will then descend from the heavens, engage in holy warfare with this Muslim and his followers, and defeat them. After this, all non-Indic invaders will be routed from India, and humanity will begin to recover from the degenerate times.

As you can see, the two prophesies are related. They both refer to the point at which society ceases to degenerate. The relation is important, because it points to the very heart of the nature of degeneration. I recently became a Muslim, in addition to being a Buddhist, and my intent is to learn the very heart of this religion, as it is important to me. (I have had more intimate connection with many more Buddhas through Islam than through all my 15 years as a Buddhist.) Obviously, then, I am against the view that the Kalachakra prophesy prophesizes the downfall and defeat of Islam. But I don't think the prophesy is inauthentic.

From what I've observed of Muslims today, the ongoing trend seems to be that while they are practicing their religion, they are subtlely involved in what I would call "the cult of the white water." Ordinary water, as a metaphysical substance, is a metaphor for emptiness. In other words, emptiness is like water. It dissolves all things. It is clear. Many creatures live in it. It is vast as the sea. It forms rain. It carves mountains. And so forth. But what color is water? Well, ultimately, water is clear. However, it is also very highly correct to say that water is white. When it freezes, it is white. As it moves about, it froths at the tips of waves, and reflects lights, and ends up becoming white.

Muslims want to be like white water. They want to purify themselves to the utmost extent, become fully distilled of every little stain, and rub themselves clean all the time. They want to be at the tips of the waves, reaching into the void. But one thing they may perhaps overlook is that water is also black. It is equally correct to say water is black as it is to say it is white. Why? When water is gathered together densely in one place, if you peer into its depths, it is black. In a way, water is as black as it is white, but no less pure.

The West, for myriad historical reasons, seems to be deeply involved in "the cult of the black water." The West likes to examine physical things to their depths and uncover their deepest secrets. It also is far less concerned with purity, and riding the tips of waves, seeking to deeply immerse itself into physical phenomena.

What happens when "the cult of the white water" meets "the cult of the black water?" The result is the 7 Days War, which will culminate in at least some small realization that really, water is clear. It may manifest as white, or as black. But ultimately, it is clear. Following this, I suspect life will be much like the famous Andy Warhol movie Chelsea Girls: one side black, one side white. And the result will be purity. Clarity.

I suspect that with regards to the Kalachakra prophesy, Western countries, particularly the United States of America, will play a very important role with regards to the cult of the black water, in answer to India's cult of the white water. Manjushri, in my opinion, will probably come from America.

It is not good to become overly involved in either the cult of the white water or the cult of the black water, because water is clear. However, recognizing and honoring water manifesting as black or white, or as rainbows, and so forth, is important. Light refracted in water, or reflected, or absorbed, still remains light. And ultimately, we are beings of light. My ideas, as they stand now, have to do with blackness. I feel this is important, because too many people are overly concerned with white, while we have a natural tendency to avoid blackness. This is a mistake.

It is a human mistake, but a mistake nonetheless, and as equally dangerous as any mistake, potentially costing real people their lives. I suspect that today many people in Pakistan are dying unnecessarily because overly religious Islamic zealots want their society to be pristinely pure and white in color. The Taliban won't let people listen to music, or make art, or do pretty much anything, because they want to wear robes of white. It is so dangerous to be a Muslim today, I feel, because of the resistance to experiencing Western society, which is the dominant and globalized form of society in the world today. I'm worried that concern with issues such as playing music, or drawing representative art, will condemn foreign muslims to poverty and powerlessness. Why? Because it is impossible to move the hearts and minds of the people without making movies, and you can't make movies without drawing pictures and writing music. Period.

Purity is important, but it is not that important. We have to remember that good Muslims are like doctors, and that they do not come to the healthy, but to the sick. And anyway, it is impossible to be one hundred percent pure. Frankly, the fact that the religious people most concerned with purity are the ones who do the most damage convinces me that purity is sometimes a worse evil than sin. If this isn't true, then why are so many terrorists going around calling themselves Boko Haram? The lesson from this is what I consider to be my most important and, hopefully, enduring contribution to moral knowledge everywhere. This is why, I'm certain, I have lived my life. And there is far greater to share and more contributions as well. I'm not always the best at keeping the faith, but I hope my message has reached at least some people in the right way. That is my wish.

The Super-Rich Are More Rich than They Need to Be

Society is degenerating, partly because people who could be accumulating wealth if given the opportunity do not have the opportunity. This is because money is being syphoned to the super-rich, instead of growing among the poor and middle-class. The very wealthy accumulate wealth without regard for the greater good of the economy, which is becoming more and more suitable for small businesspeople.

However, part of the problem is the attitude of the poor and middle-class. Throughout my life, I've observed the attitude of others with regards to changing the world. With rare exception, everyone I've come across simply has no wish to change the world. I don't know if this is because public school beats it out of them, or if it is because of a hereditary attitude that has been promulgating itself since the time when people would be hanged, crucified, or burned for trying to change the world, or perhaps if it is just a personal lack of conviction in their own ideas. Whatever it is, I think it is a problem. Part of the reason the rich can get away with accumulating wealth that should've been ours is because 99% of people are at a loss for what to do with extra wealth when they get it. Maybe a new home theater system. A Winnebago. A trip to the Bahamas. Start a business? Make a film? No, no. That is for people who want to change the world.

The super-rich are going to become more meaningless over time, because our cultural consciousness and economy are becoming decentralized, making centralized wealth less important. But what will replace our major corporations if nobody wants to change the world? They will be replaced with a bunch of mindless sheep begging to be invaded by people with the chutzpah to actually do things. I hear complaints about how Americans aren't accumulating wealth like they used to. I complain about that, because I tend to get stuck in the economic doldrums spending all the money I get on rent and utilities. But I complain about it because I actually have ambitions to change the world, which cannot be realized without extra wealth. Unfortunately, I'm a minority. Most people could care less about accumulating extra wealth, because they are more concerned with living comfortably and quietly smothering themselves with their own down pillows.

I don't care if you want to be a follower rather than a leader. We need followers just as much as we need leaders. All I ask is that if you are going to be a follower, at least try to follow people who are changing the world, rather than just paying a salary. Follow people who challenge you. Follow people who reward enterprise and good decisions. Follow people with a conscience, and with vision. To survive, society needs to constantly change. And it won't change unless we change it. People who refuse to change the world, even if they're not natural leaders, aren't doing anyone any favors.

The Super-Rich Aren't as Rich as They Used to Be

I realize that is a contentious claim, and many would argue it runs directly contrary to the facts. After all, according to The New York Times, the top tenth of one percent income bracket in the United States saw their wealth increase by 21.5 percent, while the bottom 99 percent saw their incomes rise by just $80. However, just because you have a lot of money doesn't mean you're very rich.

Consider the phenomenon of people winning the lottery and ending up poorer than they were before they won. These people have a lot of money, but they don't have a lot of capital. Capital is defined as holdings which produce income. But when you win the lottery, you don't have any holdings which produce any income, despite a sudden spike in income. The income, then, becomes quite worthless. I would argue something similar is happening to the super-rich.

The economy has been growing at an average of about five percent since 1984. But the structure of the U.S. economy is vastly different than in the latter half of the 20th century. The United States between 1945 and 1991 was a country defined by its mass-mobilization against an easily defined external enemy: the Soviet Union. The consciousness of the people of the United States was unified by the threat of nuclear war, and there were ways to speak to that consciousness. People wanted to define themselves with the "us" rather than with the "them," so they did particularly American things. But people aren't doing these things anymore. That is what, I believe, is suggested by the fact of the decentralization of our economy, a fact which is supported by evidence.

It has been becoming increasingly easy to buy small, local products rather than large, mass-marketed products in our economy. And according to marketers, it is no longer relevant to try to mass-market products. What this points to is a decentralization of the economy, and we do not know whether it is reversible. It certainly doesn't feel reversible. Unfortunately for the super-rich, the most obvious effect of a decentralized economy is that massive centralization of wealth becomes less financially relevant, and suddenly, the super-rich feel more like the person who suddenly won the lottery rather than leaders of the economy.

Think about it. Our economy could grow at 20 percent a year, but if the super-rich can't find places to invest their money, it won't benefit them. And as markets become increasingly segmented rather than unified, it becomes harder and harder for a guy sitting in a penthouse in New York City to find the real money-makers in the economy. Granted, our economy is hardly so massively decentralized now that it is impossible to make money simply by having money. But in the future, it may be more and more difficult to do so. That, certainly, is the trend. And when you look at it this way, the tax cuts for the super-rich and economic policies favoring greater income inequality suddenly make a lot of sense. Certain members of the super-rich, I think, are probably sensing that they are becoming a dying breed, because their massive financial holdings are going to quickly lose relevance as the 21st century progresses and the economy further destabilizes.

The solution, I think, is for the super-rich to stop frantically grasping at more and more money, and rather, embrace their roles as leaders of the economy. They should restructure their holdings to favor local enterprises in localities they care about. This would help them maintain financial relevance in our economy. The fact of the matter is, the mere fact of being super-rich is becoming less and less a guarantee of income. This is because major corporations are becoming less and less relevant as economies become more and more localized. Americans no longer crave the unity they used to feel in the fifties knowing they were all watching the same television screen, so that feeling no longer is going to capitalize your assets.

Practical Religion: Use the Teachings of Christ to Increase Food Supply

In the West, we're all familiar with Christ's miracles — feeding thousands of people with just five loaves of bread and two fish, and so forth. Now we may not be able to perform miracles like that, but using the teachings of Christ and the early Christians, we can increase our food supply and decrease costs if we live in groups. Here's how it works.

Normally, when we live in groups, we use Sharpies to mark up which food is ours, and everybody gets to eat their own food only. However, this is an inefficient way of managing food supply. Instead, use this rule: all the food in the house is community food, provided everyone contributes. This is pretty much the only way to ensure that everyone eats properly. Why? Because when everyone contributes food, people will naturally specialize in what kinds of food they buy. Joe might buy all the vegetables, while Karen buys the grains, and Jeffery may specialize in microwavable instant foods. Because everyone is contributing something, we can rely on other people in the household having the other food we need when we buy only our specialized food. And because we're buying specialized food, we can take advantage of deals and decrease prices by buying in bulk.

Note that people naturally specialize. It isn't necessary to plan out who will buy what food. The system actually works better when people organically decide what food to buy based on a number of factors, including need, price, knowledge, taste, and so forth. But people will end up specializing, and part of the point is to welcome this.

One reason why this works out better for everyone is because the food we buy will be less likely to go bad. Often, we're forced to buy more portions than we need if we are buying just for ourselves. This is especially true with fresh produce. But yet, we must buy the food or we will go hungry. This is less of a problem when we are buying for more than one person.

One subsequent effect of this is that we can take advantage of foods we don't need too often, and increase the richness of the diversity of our food. For instance, we may have a craving for radishes one day. But we know that we won't really want to eat radishes every day. So we buy enough radishes for one person one or two days, which is possible in most supermarkets, while buying the staple foods we need for the rest of our diet. That way, we satisfy our cravings and no food goes to waste.

We can also take advantage of cropping of foods. For instance, if we buy local, there may be an influx of a great deal of specialized food, like say, fresh Kokanee Salmon. Since we know we will all be eating it, we can buy more than we normally would. There will be leftovers, and none will go to waste.

We may balk at this idea because we won't necessarily be catering to our own particular tastes in food. Since we will be forced to eat the food of others, we won't necessarily have any guarantee that we will get our own favorite foods. But if we take a larger view, and look past merely our own tastes, forgiving the trespasses of others onto our food diets, we will begin to understand that our diets will be diversified, which is healthy for us, and that we won't go hungry on a low budget. Because of this, we can free up our money for more interesting activities than just eating every day. We can be more generous and liberal with our overall budgets, because the food budget will be less. All in all, following this system will work out better for everyone.

Practical Religion: Binary Buddhism

I'm sure you've heard of applying Buddhism to improve your spiritual quality. But there are very practical applications as well. For instance, the practice of breathing meditation, in combination with binary counting, can be used to tell time. This can be useful for telling time at a bus stop when there isn't a clock, or for timing sesshins or meditation sessions without a clock or phone or timer.

Here's how it works. First, time how long it takes to breathe in and out twenty-one times. This means one in-breath, one out-breath, times twenty-one. For me, it takes about two minutes. Then, make a strong habit of counting up to twenty-one breaths then returning back to one while doing breathing meditation. Do it like this: "In-breath, out-breath, 1. In-breath, out-breath, 2. ... In-breath, out-breath, 21. In-breath, out-breath, 1."

It will take some attention at first to get used to counting up to twenty-one when you breathe. Here I find the motivation to religiously follow the practice comes in handy. If you are able to count up to twenty-one without skipping numbers and without losing count, it means you're paying attention. If the religious goal of your practice is to know how to pay attention, this can be a strong motivation for keeping track of numbers. Pretty soon, you'll be doing it automatically.

Next comes counting in binary using the fingers. You can count up to 2047 in binary using your fingers. To do this, you must understand the math. In binary, there are only two digits: zero and one. In base-ten, the system we're used to, there are ten digits, and when you get to the last digit (9), you reset back to one in the second column and zero in the first, and so forth. In binary, it's similar, except you reset once you get to one. So, for example, the first four integers in sequence from one to four in binary are, 1, 10, 11, 100.

When counting in binary using the fingers, for the right hand, use the thumb as the first digit, the pointer finger as the second, and so forth. Treat the thumb of the left hand as the sixth digit, and the pointer finger of the left hand as the seventh, and so forth. When the finger is held up, that indicates a one. When it is closed, it indicates a zero. Thus, for the number 1010, which is ten, in your right hand, your pinky will be closed, your ring finger will be open, your middle finger closed, your pointer finger open, and your thumb closed.

You'll want to practice counting with your fingers until you're very proficient at it. The whole idea for the purposes of telling time using the breath is that you are going to count in binary the number of times you reach 21 breaths. Remember, each cycle of 21 breaths (for me, anyway) is 2 minutes. So ten cycles of 21, or 1010 in binary, is equal to 20 minutes. Fifteen cycles, or 1111 in binary, will be 30 minutes. An hour will be 30 cycles, or 11110 in binary (pinky, ring, middle, and pointer fingers up, thumb down).

Depending on the setting, you may not be able to use your hands to count the number of times you reach 21 breaths. For example, if you're leading a meditation session, you won't be able to use your hands. In this case, it's best to visualize counting in binary by holding up imaginary fingers in front of you. One thing which will help you remember which fingers to hold up is to remember that each zero digit represents a dedication to the buddhas, while each one digit represents the body of a new buddha to be dedicated. That way, when the digits switch, the meaning is significant and more easy to remember.

This method is accurate to the minute. If it is less accurate for you, you may breathe more slowly or more quickly. Instead of trying to change the rate of breathing, change the number of breaths in a cycle or the number of minutes each cycle is worth, or both. Work out a system that works for you.

In addition to being useful for telling time, this method also helps improve concentration in general. Concentration has a number of practical benefits, helping you to better do a variety of tasks including studying, listening to lectures, conversation, cooking, etc.

Belief in Karma Is Crippling for Modern Buddhists

As a muslim-buddhist, I must confess I'm a little tired of the rhetoric of oppression that's so commonplace in the buddhist community. Many prominent lamas often advise their students that others cannot make you suffer, that you must forgive your oppressors, that you shouldn't blame others for your problems. While I don't necessarily disagree, I think there is a story on the side of the oppressed, and also the oppressed who are fighting back, which is not being told.

I don't like how the emphasis tends to imply inaction in the face of adversity, and seems to subtly imply that we should always blame the victim for their own oppression, and never encourage or help them to fight back. On top of that, there's the added indignity of saying that it's the oppressor's good karma that allows them to be so negative. The indication seems to be that the universe rewards bad behavior and punishes good behavior.

Additionally, the oppressed is in a double-bind: if you do something bad, it's your fault and you get bad karma. If your oppressors do something bad, it's your fault, and you get bad karma. If you do something bad, it's your bad karma, if something bad happens to you it's karma for you to do bad things (because abuse is cyclical). According to this world-view, everything is always bad and it's your fault. I'm surprised more Buddhists don't commit suicide!

The biggest problem with this point of view is that it eternally binds people to suffering, with no hope for salvation. This directly contradicts the buddhist dharma which states that Nirvana is true, attainable peace. It also leads to an isolationist worldview that separates buddhists from those who could benefit from buddhism among the poor and dispossessed. In other words, it enables middle-, upper-middle, and upper-class Buddhists to say to the dispossessed, "I've got mine, screw you." And quite often, this is exactly what they say.

The Dalai Lama himself says that we Buddhists could learn a lesson from Christians in the area of charity. But the root of the problem is karma: the en-vogue definition of karma is one that Christians don't share, and is specifically refuted in many ways in the Bible, which is why they do more charity. What I would like to see more of is an emphasis on the correct way of viewing karma and its relationship to the external world, which is explained in H.H. The Dalai Lama's The Four Noble Truths, published in 1997 by Thorsons. In this book, karma is confined solely to mental activity by a moral agent which leads to emotional experience by the same moral agent. And the external world, by contrast, should not be viewed as "karma," but rather as the sport of Buddhas, which is an idea from a different scripture. Karma means that if you lash out in anger, you will be unhappy. Not, as in all the Internet memes, that something similar happens to someone who does something. Karma, in other words, is pretty much a mental phenomenon, and the physical aspects of it, though not entirely wrong, are vastly overplayed by the Buddhist community at large.

It's really sad that buddhists leave this sort of critical view to outsiders, and don't adopt it for themselves. Perhaps they view their constituency as primarily focused on internal mental development rather than external works of charity. Frankly, though, I see it as a problem which encourages a large and growing section of middle-class Americans and Westerners to view adversity and problems, where real people, perhaps even themselves, suffer, and do nothing. I guess as a muslim / Tibetan buddhist I'm not really an outsider, but I'm also not ordained as a teacher formally in any sect of buddhism. No buddhists have shared my point of view on karma, even though two specific emanations of Tara have come to me and told me flat-out, "I don't believe in karma." One of these women squashed a bug for emphasis, and that bug is now probably in a pure land. I think there is an important lesson in that for both Buddhists and New-Agers. The lesson is that our ideas about karma are totally wrong, and they hurt real people. And the karma for spreading these ideas is that we will end up feeling hurt and oppressed.

Our Culture: Investing in Money

I believe there is such a thing as a perfect economy. This would be an economy running smoothly enough to be incapable of further growth, and not inclined to diminish.

A perfect economy implies that there be full market share of all businesses, especially banks. Banks are particularly important, because they fund new ideas (represented by entrepreneurs), and a full market share in this area implies no new ideas are currently available.

Full market share for businesses also means that business operations are sustainable. This means, among other things, that profits come from robust, sustainable growth. By robust, here, I mean that profits come from genuine market share, and not from, for instance, slashing costs and burning through third-world labor. Such cost-cutting techniques do not produce robust nor sustainable profits. Robust growth comes from opening new markets and increasing shares in old markets.

Now what I'm saying basically rests on what I consider to be a robust assumption: that it is possible to gain a maximum market share. I think not only that this is possible, but also that a lot of companies have already achieved this given today's economy.

Another implication has to do with the value of money. Money, itself being a commodity, also has a maximum share of market. It also must be managed in sustainable ways promoting robust growth. This sustainable growth responsibility lies with all of us, from ordinary consumers to Exxon-Mobil.But this is not to say that we need to be overly concerned with income inequality. Barking about income inequality is largely barking up the wrong tree, because the nature of new ideas is that they tend to concentrate wealth for their creators. However, if income inequality is produced by burning through labor resources by exploiting the poor, your wealth is not robust. I can handle inequality, provided the poor are not exploited. Inequality must be based on the production of new, valuable ideas.

Now all this is not to say that infinite growth is impossible, or that society must be stratified between rich and poor. On the contrary, infinite growth is definitely possible, but it must be robust, and rooted in such things as the continued evolution of the human mind and body, not in exciting, new opportunities, of which there are probably a finite number at any given moment. As for stratification, there will always be motion in markets, which implies liquidity in assets, including human ones. And anyway, I think we owe it to ourselves as human beings to offer the opportunity to all of us to live either simply or complexly, as we choose.

The Value of Bitcoin

I've seen it said one or two places that the value of bitcoin is in its anonymity, or its lack of corruption due to the lack of centralized banking. I don't believe this to be the case. Dollar transactions can be anonymous, too, and gold has no central bank, but the value of bitcoin is different than the value of gold or dollars. I think the value of bitcoin has to do with the nature of the tangible thing which is coined.

Dollars are pieces of paper with art printed on it. The art is printed in such a way that it is difficult to forge. The value of the dollar is enforced by the United States government, and the open market. It can go up or down, depending on the quality of things bought with it. When a thing is put into circulation in the open market, the value of the dollar is affected by the amount people are willing to pay for the thing. If the thing contributes to the value of the economy, then the value of the dollar goes up.

The value of the dollar bill itself that you carry in your pocket depends on its availability for use in transactions. This depends on the armored vehicles, bank vaults, printing centers, and so forth which manage and create dollar bills. As a physical thing, it is very difficult to create and very difficult to transport when compared to bitcoins. Bitcoins are easy to create and to transport. But they are comparatively more difficult to transfer. It is more difficult to pull a bitcoin out of your wallet and hand it to someone else than it is to pull a dollar out of your pocket and hand it to someone else.

The overhead of transportation and creation of bitcoins is very low, while the overhead of transferrence is very high. This indicates a couple things for the value of bitcoins. For one, complex, long-distance infrastructure of transactions are easy to maintain, provided the "buy it now" attitude is not too highly stressed. I believe this means that bitcoins are good for small, independent businesses that deal primarily in quality of service and quality of product, while dollars are good for more simple, standardized businesses like franchises that deal in immediate products where the quality and service doesn't carry too high a premium. Dollars are good where things remain the same, as with MacDonalds. Bitcoins are good for where things are different, as with Main St. Pawn.

What is needed currently for the value of bitcoin to be optimized, I think, is a decentralized banking infrastructure. This banking infrastructure would provide backing for the businesses that choose to use the bitcoin, so that they are all benefitted by the growth of the bitcoin economy. What I'm talking about is a radically decentralized system of investment banking that anyone can use but that promotes wise investment. Something that connects investors in a way that does not require a "stock market" or any other kind of limiting institution which tries to rule out companies to invest in. This would have to simultaneously fulfill the needs of an investment community of small, diverse businesses, and also prevent "boom/bust" cycles in the bitcoin economy. If such a system were developed, bitcoin would be a great boon to the artisans and small business owners that make up the middle class.

Clarification of Psychiatry: What It Is and What to Do About It

Psychiatry is the following two-fold act:

Part 1: Inventing discrimination.
Step 1: The psychiatrist picks out people he doesn't like based on their behaviors.
Step 2: Everything the psychiatrist doesn't like is labelled part of an illness.
Step 3: Every side-effect caused by the medications prescribed is labelled part of the illness.
Step 4: Pretend, with no evidence, that all things labelled part of the illness are a chronic, incurable, biological, genetic disease, and that the only treatment is medications which, in fact, cause all the behaviors described as part of the illness.

Part 2: Brainwashing.
Step 1: Isolate someone from their friends and family. Give them no contact to the outside world. Take away their posessions. Treat them as inferiors.
Step 2: Reprogram them to convince them all pleasure is bad and all pain is good.
Step 3: Hurt them over and over again.
Step 4: Release them into the world, finally, when they have given up on life.

It is my belief that all psychiatrists must be professionally disabled, and disallowed from doing their profession. There are a list of concrete rules, directed at psychiatrists, which would prevent them from doing their discriminatory and harmful jobs and which are based on pure common sense. Here are some:

1. Everyone in a mental hospital must have the same rights as people in a physical hospital. E.g. cell phones, Bible study, hugging, computers, exchanging notes, publishing written material for distribution, etc. are to be allowed.
2. You are not allowed to punish anyone for legal activities. You are only allowed to punish people through recourse to the law, for illegal activities.
3. You are not allowed to claim something is "scientific" or "known" unless it has been shown to be experimentally valid through scientific experiments. Science is in the business of determining causation, not engaging in wild, baseless speculation. Consequently, none of the data in psychiatric journals as of this writing is to be drawn from, because they all postulate biological and genetic causation for behaviors when no causal link has been established.
4. You are not allowed to prescribe medication chronically as the sole treatment for mental behaviors which probably have psychological causes. You are not allowed to cause brain damage just because you don't like someone's behavior.

If we as a society followed even just one of these rules, psychiatry would be completely defanged and psychiatrists wouldn't be able to find a job, because their profession would be rendered obsolete.

Thoughts about Anonymous's Project V

This is a clarification of Anonymous's new project, "Project V." This came on the heels of their "Operation V," the goal of which was apparently to take over the United States government.

I've noticed, just looking around at society today, that there are thugs involved in my government and perhaps corporations and so forth, taking things over and not really doing positive actions or behaving in an awake manner. So I'm not at all surprised that there is a movement to try to take over the government, or to protest the government. I support a lot of what these people do.

The reason I support many of the people who fight government and corporations and so forth is because of the thuggishness I've seen. The thuggishness itself is the first part. The second part is the fact that thuggishness is not merely the natural, human sort — an understandable sort which you can expect to be some part of any society — but something which is slowly becoming law. We cannot have "thug law." Thug law, in this case, involves people in office, and running corporations, who don't care about listening to other people, especially the people they affect. Thug law involves things being created for their own purpose, to multiply like viruses, such as cash or even money, or such as government regulations, or psychiatric harm.

A commodity is produced in a factory not for its own sake, but in order to be sold to someone else. However, it seems an awful lot like many of the people running these corporations would be satisfied if the product is produced for its own sake. In other words, the attitude is that it's about the product itself, and promoting the product itself, rather than about listening to what the consumer wants.

This doesn't happen everywhere, but it does happen in the case of food, for instance. Food today is produced for the purpose of food being produced and sold, not for the purpose of feeding people. There is an important difference between the two, and we need to start rethinking the way we do things to promote feeding people instead of producing and selling food. Similarly, transportation seems to be about producing and selling gasoline, not about transporting people. Energy production seems to be about producing and selling raw materials, not making energy. Our corporations are sick.

Now that I've talked a bit about what I agree with about Anonymous, I'd like to share what I disagree with.

Consider the idea of a revolution. What is a revolution? The idea is that you're getting rid of a society, and replacing it with a new one. But if you examine it closely, the idea becomes less and less clear. What do you want to revolutionize? Just the executive government? We do that every eight or so years. What about the law? Are we trying to change the law? Well, perhaps we are, but we can change the law in a couple of ways: by changing the letter of the law, or changing how it's enforced. If we change the letter of the law, then we get into the problem of semantics, which means we may have changed nothing unless we change how it's enforced. If we change how it's enforced, though, we have a problem there, too. Who enforces? Who enforces law against the enforcers? In a sense, the people enforcing the law are embodiments of the law. But are we changing just the people themselves? How do we control against merely switching out one corrupt judge or peace officer for another? Either we have to use the law to control this, in which case we're going in circles again, or we have to change the underlying society which educates and produces the judges.

But how do we change society? Are we changing the actual minds of the people themselves? Are we giving them more education? Education of what? What do they already know? What don't they know? Is it really about what they think they know, or how they behave? How do we change the way people behave? And are we changing a group of people, or changing people one-on-one? And where do we stop? Should we just switch out everyone we don't like and throw the old people in jail? If so, what makes us any better than the oppressors? Or should we let everyone be as they are and work out their own problems? If it is this, how is our movement a revolution?

I don't think we need a revolution. I think we need loyal opposition parties, and we need perhaps a simplification of our culture. But you can't have a loyal opposition party and a revolution at the same time. And a simplification of something doesn't involve the introduction of new elements. That's what you do when you want to make things more complex. What we need is to go back to our roots, and instead of wildly thrashing about and making more new ideas and stuff, we need to be satisfied with a simple understanding of how things work. Instead of choosing more stuff, choose the right stuff. This sounds like an economic idea, but really it applies to government as well. We should be more conservative about how we run our government. We should be conservative about how we run our churches as well. The only thing we shouldn't be conservative about is helping other people. But remember: help doesn't come in the form of money. I am not a socialist. As soon as you start thinking that help comes in the form of money, you begin producing money for the sake of producing money, which is exactly the kind of problem which I see today that needs to change. We need to help people live. In every sector of our society. That's what we need to do. And a lot of what the resistance people in our society are doing is just that. But I don't think they see it that way, and they really should.