Sexuality And Conscience

I closely know a number of exceptionally attractive and kind-hearted women; and in many cases their personal lives have not been all that good. Everyone wants them. If they do not reciprocate the attentions they are seen as bitches; if they do reciprocate the attentions they are seen as sluts. In serious relationships such women evoke men's insecurities that motivate many men to become abusive. Their negative experiences lead many people to conclude that such women are doing the wrong thing by being attractive and friendly, and that the correct solution is to be unattractive and mean. And this – based on the experiences of many women in the baby boom generation - has been the main thrust of Third Wave feminism, particularly among American women in Generation X and in my generation. Of course the world has not benefited from that course of action one bit.

On a somewhat related subject, there are many people who think that sex offenders cannot be rehabilitated and should spend their whole lives behind bars. Their claim is that there is no cure for sexual perversions. Now there may not be a cure for sexual perversions, but there is certainly a cure for action on sexual perversions, and it is known as self-control. Just about anyone is capable of self-control; and that also includes people who have committed sex crimes. That you feel an urge does not mean that you have to act on it; and self-control is the correct solution to this problem. Similarly I have seen it said on the Internet that if a man has been beating a female partner then that is his nature and that that is what he is going to do. This is completely wrong. He is not an animal. He is a person. A person can control his actions whatever his nature happens to be.

Similarly we are seeing many people now claim that “narcissists” and “sociopaths” are evil and can only be evil whatever they do. That is completely wrong as well. Anything human is capable of choice. Anyone capable of choice is capable of rightful choice. If someone is being selfish or unethical the correct solution is to give the person a correct moral structure. It is not demonization, it is not psychological evisceration, it is not working on self-esteem, it is not trying to get them in touch with their true self. It is giving a better way to relate to the world and teaching the person to put that way into effect.

There are two major problems that stand in the way of that, and they have very little to do with one another. One is “research” that teaches people that some people never change and that a person who has acted at any given point in time in a manner that they regard to be sociopathic or narcisstic will do that for the rest of their lives. Once again, that is completely irrational. Anyone can choose to act rightfully. One outcome of this attitude is that people will defend their actions, however wrong they may be, to the point of death so as not to be seen as being narcissistic or sociopathic, as being portrayed that way is an equivalent of a death sentence. Another outcome of this attitude is that people who have done work on themselves will continue to be seen as evil, regardless of how much work they have done on themselves, how hard they have worked and how much good they have done. Neither of these outcomes is remotely desirable, and both are totally self-defeating. In the first case the people cling to their bad behavior. In the second case any effort to improve one's behavior is rejected, and potential for positive action is denied. Both motivate people to act in precisely the wrong way while preventing any effort to improve their conduct or their character.

A bigger problem still is the fact that, in an interconnected world, everyone influences everyone else all the time. This will result in people's attitudes constantly being challenged. There are any number of problems with that, but there is one that is quite large that I have not seen adequately addressed. If someone's values have been deconstructed, then he is left without values; and a person without values is a monster, whether or not he has anything wrong with his brain. So that when someone comes to America from the former Soviet Union and has a strongly constituted conscience whose basis is Communism, it will be deconstructed, and he will be left without a conscience. The solution is not to demonize such a person, but to create a better constituted conscience. And looking for a better constituted conscience has been a major project of my life – one that has taken me in a number of different directions, some of them quite unlikely.

I find it fascinating how the same people who started out as starry-eyed hippie idealists became raving fascists. They started out thinking that all people are good; then they decided that some people are evil and can only be evil whatever they do. Neither attitude is correct. Anything that is capable of choice can be good, bad, indifferent or a mix. It is just as wrong to demonize people as it is to idealize people. Anything capable of choice is capable of both right and wrong. The correct solution, once again, is to have a righfully constituted conscience. And if someone has done something bad when his conscience was deconstructed, that does not make him an inhuman monster. It means that he was wandering in the wilderness, as many people are prone to doing in a world where everyone is constantly influencing everyone else and very few people can get away with a wrongfully constituted conscience or bigoted convictions with which they were raised.

The latter state of affairs, Scott Lasch stated as my generation being at sea. This is correct. Once again, in a world where everyone is influencing everyone else we will rarely find people who act like a rock. We will find less integrity, but we will find more knowledge of other ways of thinking. The biggest problem with that so far, once again, is that in such an arrangement many people do not have a stable conscience, and any number of them do not have a functional moral structure. That will motivate even the more naturally honest people to act like sociopaths; and that is not good either for them or for the world.

How to solve this problem? I would say that the Bible has the solution to issues of this nature, and that is the solution that I have chosen to take. Of course we are now seeing many people take the reverse route and leave their Christian upbringing to partake of things such as atheism or feminism. I will caution these people that there are dangers ahead, and I will say that Christ has been doing work on me that I have never seen a psychologist, a thinker or a guru begin to equal. We are dealing here with greater wisdom than anything else that is out there, and if you are looking for a functional moral structure then this is the correct direction to take.

Character And Conviction

Different people have different natures and temperaments; and that requires different approaches. A person with a good nature will not need to do that much work on themselves, whereas a person such as myself who does not have such a good nature will need to be tough with himself and demand of himself a lot of self-control. C.S. Lewis said something to the effect of that the better people are more likely to be inclined to work on themselves and the worse people are less inclined to work on themselves. One major problem is that many people do not know what it means to be a good person, and they are not likely to take the advice from people they see as hypocrites.

This brings me to a much more important subject. There are many people who do things that are wrong while thinking that they are right. These people would be likely to do things that are right when they figure out what the correct definition of right is. A person who has been a devout Communist would become a devout Christian if he realizes that Christianity is right.

Probably the best example toward that effect is Germany. There were many people who were Nazis who thought that they were doing the right thing. Then they figured out that Nazism was wrong, so they got to work building a great country. Many of these people have been equated with the crimes that they committed when they were Nazis and seen as evil for life. In fact many of them ended up working hard and peacefully to build a country that has done a lot for the world and that now is livable, peaceful and powerful in a right way rather than a wrong way.

With Communists, we see the same thing. There were any number of people who were attracted to Communism for right reasons. They did not like to see workers mistreated. They did not like to see women being treated like dirt. They did not like to see the planet ravaged and other races being colonized. Communism was a wrong solution. However many of these people are not bad people, and if they find out a correct solution then they will be just as dedicated to putting it into place as they did in putting into place Communism.

One thing that is said about people with Communist associations is that they are “pinkos.” Apparently the implication is that they are weak. The Russian people for one are not weak at all. Neither are many people in unionized labor or many people in inner city America. Some of these people come from wrongful reasons such as envy; others come from rightful reasons such as compassion. It is rightful to stand against envy; it is not rightful to stand against compassion. And people who do come from the place of compassion often make highly effective individuals. One such person is my boss, who is a successful businessman who in his retirement has created a political information website. He is not weak, and he is not envious. He has good values.

In my case, I spent the first 12 years of my life in the former Soviet Union. My grandmother was a Communist, and I bought into Communism. But then again I was a kid. When I came to America the Communist beliefs were deconstructed; at which point I went on a lifelong search for a workable concept of right and wrong. I did any number of things that were wrong that I thought at the time were right. Most concepts of right and wrong that were thrown at me - self-esteem psychology, personality psychology, Freud, Adler, political correctness – I ended up deconstructing. But one does not deconstruct God; and when I was faced with God I ended up finding a much more workable concept of right and wrong than either Communism or these others.

Someone on the Internet once said that the people from Eastern Europe have intelligent views on why it is necessary to be tough in international affairs. Many of these people make excellent Christians. They have a strength of conviction as well as lots of knowledge; and they can tell people quite well what they are dealing with. Once again, a person who is strong in conviction for things that are wrong is likely to become strong in conviction for things that are right when he figures out what is right. Both former Communists and former Nazis can in many cases become very strong forces for right when they figure out what right actually is.

The innate propensities do not change. Convictions do. Character does change if one works on it. Paul went from being a prosecutor of Christians to becoming one of the most effective moral teachers of all time. Christ took someone with valuable qualities and turned him from a force for evil to a force for good.

Anyone can become a force for good, even a “sociopath” or a “narcissist.” Anything capable of choice is capable of rightful choice. The correct solution is not psychological evisceration but giving the person a functional moral structure. At which point even the person with the worst natural inclinations can become a force for good.

Snobbery And Reverse Snobbery

A claim frequently made about people with strong backgrounds in literature and arts is that they are snobs. When I was in school, two English teachers got together and started acting in a very snobbish and nasty manner. I think that I understand the reason for this.

Literature and art convey many kinds of realizations. A person who has been exposed to these realizations may then see people who have not been exposed to such realizations as being inferior.

Now here is the big problem. The realizations are not theirs. They are those of the writer or the artist. For them to take credit for these realizations is completely inappropriate. They did not come up with the realizations. They were simply exposed to them. That they read a book and somebody else didn't does not mean that they are better than them.

A related situation concerns any number of people – especially young people – who have talents. They may decide – as did I at one point – that having these talents makes them better than others. Here is the problem. They did not create these talents. They were simply born with them. The credit for these talents do not belong with them and is not theirs to take.

The Bible does claim to have the truth; but it also teaches humility. Some followers of the Bible are vicious or arrogant to people who do not follow the Bible, but they are less known as being snobs. The same attitude should be imparted to people who have knowledge of literature and the arts.

One problem that I have seen is reverse snobbery. Some people are really under the impression that there is something wrong with people who are into such things as literature and the arts. This is wrong as well. Literature and arts are legitimate pursuits and deserve to be respected and cultivated. Civilizations are known largely by their written and artistic output; and people who produce good art and literature are making significant contributions to their civilization. They are not “bums” and many of them are not “snobs.” However it may be understandable to see some such people develop a negative attitude toward people who have such convictions when they are getting in some cases viciously attacked for their interests and their contributions.

So we see some people seeing others as being inferior, and we see other people seeing these people as having nothing worthwhile to contribute or as being wrongly made. This is not a rightful state of affairs. Both sides are in the wrong, and both are doing the wrong thing. The correct solution is for people to see value for things such as arts and literature, and it is for people who have interest or capacity in such things to have a better attitude toward other people. At which point there will be a greater demand for literature and the arts, resulting in more artists and writers being able to make ends meet but, much more importantly, in the civilization cultivating and benefiting from excellent literature and arts.

"Psychotics," "Neurotics," Cats And Dogs

According to some attitudes in psychology, a neurotic thinks that the problem is with himself and a psychotic thinks that the problem is with everyone else. Usually both have a point. There is something right - and wrong - with just about everyone.

The hard task is finding out what exactly is right – and wrong – with everyone. There are many qualities that work for some things and not for others. A pragmatic approach works in engineering, and inspiration-seeking approach works in arts, but neither works in the other. A person with the propensities of the engineer may think that there is something wrong with the person who thinks like an artist. In fact we are seeing a different mindset that does not work in his own pursuit but works in the other.

So that when we see someone with the propensities of an artist being raised by engineers, he will be seen as being wrongly made. In response to this he may decide that there is something wrong with himself, or he may decide that there is something wrong with people around him. What we are seeing instead is simply difference. A difference that can, if nurtured properly, produce beautiful results; or, if not, lead to a lifelong conflict.

Differences can be dealt with in any number of possible ways. It takes tolerance, maturity and often great skill to get people with different propensities to live in peace. Unfortunately such are not always found. A cat that is raised by dogs will be seen as abnormal, and a dog raised by cats will be seen as a barbarian. But there will not be any way for a cat to be a normal dog or for a dog to be a normal cat.

One thing that does happen in such situations is that a cat would pretend to be a dog. The cat would expend exceptional effort to learn how to bark like a dog, bite like a dog and wag its tail like a dog. This kind of cat would be known as a sociopath. It would be a pretender, putting on a front to act like a normal dog, in many cases succeeding, and sometimes developing extraordinary insight into how dogs think and using that insight for usually wrongful ends. There will be two major problems with this situation. One is that the cat will not develop its feline qualities and fail to use them for the benefit of the civilization. The other is that its personal relationships will stink, as in genuinely close relationships the front slips and, as the dog kisses it, it finds – to its horror – cat whiskers.

Sometimes the cat decides that the problem is with the dogs. Such a cat becomes a rebel. It meows very loudly and obnoxiously and frequently scratches everyone in sight. Some cats like this wind up criminals; others become feminists or suchlike; some join Hollywood or academia; and occasionally they rise to leadership of countries and sometimes have oral sex with interns while in office. Whenever anything of that sort happens, the dogs bark very loudly indeed, and often they get together to not only chase the cats out of the leadership positions but put into place orders to criminalize and pathologize cats, in some cases waging extermination campaigns against them.

In some places there is the attempt to medicate the cats. Usually this results in cats who sleep 12 hours a day and do not have the energy even to chase after mice to feed themselves. This leads dogs to think that such cats are parasites and should be shot.

Of course we also see attempts to claim that the cats are evil. The problem with this stance is that both according to the Bible – and according to the evolutionary theory - the cats and the dogs are equal – either in mutual virtue or in mutual sin. Either the nature of both cats and dogs is equally corrupt, or it is equally there for a reason. From Biblical considerations, cats are no more naturally sinful than dogs. Both have sin in their nature, and both have the capacity of choice to act rightfully in spite of that nature. And from evolutionary considerations, both are there for a reason that it facilitates the survival of the species or the success of the society. We need both original thinkers and people who are willing to follow canons, and we need people who are inventive or innovative and people who are willing to do daily tasks.

To a dog, a cat will always be a freak or worse. And when confronted with such an environment, a cat is not likely to be healthy. So there will be some who think that the problem is with themselves and there will be some who think that the problem is with others. And then there will be some wise cats who realize that what we are seeing is simply difference, and that difference between species does not mean that either is good or bad.

A cat who thinks that the dogs are right fails to see the good in itself, and the cat who thinks that the dogs are evil fails to see the wrong in itself. The first results in ruined lives and waste of potential, and the second results in wrongful action on the part of the cat itself. What often is necessary for the cat is finding out what it means to do right and what it means to do wrong. This is not always an easy task. If you are living in a place that tells you that your species is bad period - as is the case if you are Jewish and living in Iran or if you are labeled a sociopath or a narcissist - you are not told a workable way to be good. You are told that you are bad, period. If you go for values to other cats - especially rebel cats - you risk developing values that are spawned in hatred of dogs and that are therefore just as bigoted and oppressive as those of the dogs. At which point you may require going for a workable concept of right and wrong to the wisdom that is not owned by dogs or by cats but that transcends all species.

Should a cat be either a neurotic or a psychotic? A cat should be the best cat it can be and get along with dogs. Any cat can be good or bad, as can any dog. But a cat will never be a dog, and a dog will never be a cat. Let cats be the best cats they can be, and let dogs be the best dogs they can be, and let the two figure out how to work constructively with one another. And then we will have a civilization in which we have the best outcome of both economics and culture – of establishment and innovation - of the dog and the cat.

Fear Of God And Love Of God

Many people have a problem with the idea of the fear of God. They think that you should love God. It appears that we are called upon to do both.

What does it mean to fear God? It means that you don't want to make God angry at you. You do not want God's anger. For an omnipotent being to be angry at you can be quite a problem. So it is important not to provoke God's wrath.

That, is the meaning of the fear of God.

Is it compatible with loving God? Absolutely it is. There is no reason at all why one should not love and revere at the same time. The love part in this means, among other things, that you do not want God to be unhappy with you. You love God and you want to make Him happy. It breaks your heart when God is unhappy with you. So you do what you need to do to make God happy.

Together, fearing God and loving God stand to lead toward righteous conduct. Fear means that you don't want God to be angry at you, and love means that you don't want God to be unhappy with you. Different people are motivated by different things and at different times in their lives. The people who are motivated by self-interest are most lead to righteous conduct through fear of God, and the people who are motivated by love are lead most to righteous conduct through love of God. There is a large place for both fear of God and love of God. So it is rightful that people both fear God and love God.

Christ's Teachings And Correction Of Left And Right

It appears that Christ teaches us whatever we need to be in order to be pleasing to God. He would provide whatever is in your character, or at least I believe He has been doing that with me. In my case it has been quite a lot. I did not realize how bad I was, or am. Being in contact with a perfect being shows the extent of one's flaws; and even the better people – which I am not – will feel completely inferior to Christ.

Christ has been teaching me many things – honesty, humility, principle, responsibility, self-control. Any number of these things – especially humility – I did not see for a long time as a virtue; but having a being such as Christ come into your life without being supercilious makes a very strong case for humility. If the most powerful being in the known Universe can be humble in his relations to you, then that means that you too should be humble. The others are virtues inequivocally. Many people speak in favor of things such as responsibility, but they do not practice it. There is nothing responsible about poisoning the planet. Whereas the kind of responsibility that God appears to demand from us – making sure that our actions have the right consequences – is most certainly a virtue.

One thing that I have learned is that, if someone bends the rules, then others will bend them as well, and in many cases they will be doing it for very wrong things. If conscience is gone, then people will do unethical things to the planet. People will do what is in their short-sighted self-interest but that impacts badly on other sentient beings. People will be rapacious and short-sighted. Whereas with Christ there are certain rules, but they work for the better.

So Christ has also been telling me to waste nothing. That is rightful as well. This is something that unfortunately the Western civilization has for a long time not done, and it is something that people such as the Native Americans understand a lot better. When they killed a buffalo, every part of the buffalo was used for something. The Incas worked out agricultural practices that fed everyone without being destructive to nature. This is a matter that other civilizations understand much better than do us. And I do believe that this understanding is consistent with the will of God. I do not believe that the creator would be happy with people plundering the creation with no eye toward posterity, or with people destroying what they cannot at this time re-create.

On many matters the “greenies” and the “pinkos” have a point, and it is a point that I consider to be consistent with Christ. You do not destroy what you cannot re-create. You do not treat workers like rubbish. Now any number of people in these mentalities have a negative view of Christianity; but that is a folly. In fact within Christianity there are many reasons to espouse at least parts of the agenda of both. Once again, I do not believe that God would be happy about people destroying what they cannot re-create. Nor do I believe that God would happy about people treating others badly.

Now I have known any number of people on the Left. There are many people who think badly of them, but even among the Commies there were many who came from rightful considerations. There are many people on the Left who do not like to see the nature plundered or workers treated badly. These are completely legitimate considerations. A true Christian would take heed of these things.

Of course when they decide that the Western civilization is the root of all evil or that the “propertied class” should be slaughtered they are doing a massive wrong. It should however be possible to address their legitimate concerns without partaking of these and other grievous errors. These, once again, can be very well addressed through the Bible. God would not be happy about people destroying what He has created and what they cannot re-create. Nor would Jesus be happy about people treating their neighbor badly.

Now I used to have a very low view of conservatives; but I do not any more. I have a newly found respect for Christian conservatives. That is because I have myself experienced Christ – or so I think – and it is rightful that people would invite Him into their lives. However these people are not all doing the right thing either. There are many of them who live wasteful lifestyles, and there are many of them who have no compassion. Neither of these attitudes are likely to be pleasing in the eyes of Christ. I want these people to change these attitudes while retaining the real Christian virtues of character, ethics and hard work.

So Christ stands to correct both those who strayed from the straight and narrow to the Left and those who strayed from the straight and narrow to the Right. He would correct those who believe in wrong things and act unrighteously and those who poison the planet. And then He stands to put into place a much wiser order than any that man has devised.

Analysis And Growth

With psychoanalysis, you are analyzing yourself but you are not improving yourself. Improving is done through much different means.

The project of psychoanalysis is to look back in the past prior to getting any kind of trauma. The problem is that what is re-created that way is the state of mind of a child, which one becomes then quite permanently as a result of following this approach. In many cases the correct thing to do is not psychoanalyzing oneself or re-creating a previous state but rather growth. That is not achieved through self-analysis but through self-improvement.

Clearly there are times when traumatic events would stunt or misdirect growth. However getting past the trauma is only part of the solution. Real effort is made in actually pursuing real growth; and that is a part of the situation that many involved in psychoanalysis fail to see.

A person who comes from the position of psychoanalysis will therefore be expected to remain childish. He would be re-creating what he had been as a child without growing past it. And that does not affectuate in people a real betterment.

Is psychoanalysis worthless? In some cases it is necessary. Once again, there are all sorts of things that happen to people that stunt or misdirect their growth. However it is only the first part in such situations. The second part is actually growing as a person.

Now there are claims that some traumatic events create things such as the antisocial and the narcissistic personality disorders. The people who believe in this frequently claim that such people are bad and can only be bad whatever they do, particularly that they are likely to be cruel. This attitude is of course very cruel in itself. To demonize someone because they have had something bad happen to them is beyond injust. Anyone can choose to act rightfully; and anyone can choose to act in an ethical way, whatever traumatic events they have had in their lives.

So that while it is valid to be conscious of what happened to you as a child, it is not valid to remain a child. Rather real growth and real improvement must be pursued. Analyzing the problem is the first part of the situation. The next part is moving past the problem. And it is in this that true improvement is actually achieved for the person.

The War Of Two Worlds

For a long time I was getting attacked by feminists, who wrongfully saw me as a misogynist. Then I left that world to join a very different world, at which point I suddenly became a pussywhipped idiot and a male feminist.

According to the beliefs of many in that world, a man should control the woman and do everything in his power to beat her down and intimidate her lest she should attempt to leave him, and that he was justified in doing everything in his power to destroy her if she does. I showed the people in that world that this was not the case. When my wife left me to be with another man, I maintained a positive relationship with her. We still have a positive relationship. If a man who has been maligned as much as I have been maligned can do this with a woman who has been maligned as much as my former wife has been maligned, then any man can do this with any woman.

Right now we are seeing the two worlds clash, and I am not taking either side. On both sides we have seen exceptionally vicious behavior. When Hitler and Stalin are fighting each other, the solution is not to take the side either of Hitler or of Stalin. It is to protect the innocent and let Stalin and Hitler keep beating each other.

We have of course seen viciousness all around. We have seen viciousness from the feminists. We have seen viciousness from the Fathers' Rights people. We have seen viciousness from the skeptics. We have seen viciousness from the people involved in personality psychology movement. Among the followers of Christ, we have seen some who favor righteousness without love and some who favor love without righteousness. It appears however that Christ wants us to have both; and this is the course that I am choosing to take.

Do feminists have a point? Yes. Do the Father's Rights people have a point? Yes. When men are being jerks to women, the women have the right to be angry. The same is the case on the other side. What they do not have the right to do is take out on the innocent their anger at someone guilty. If a man raped you, you do not have the right to attack all men. If a woman screwed you over, you do not have the right to attack all women. The people who get attacked in such situations are the least guilty ones of all parties. The women who get mistreated are usually women who have good will toward men and are willing to treat men right; and the men who get mistreated are usually men who have good will toward women and are willing to treat women right. Which means that the better get punished for the sins of the worse. And that is not a rightful state of affairs.

In the recent election I did not vote. I did not know which candidate was better. Trump is a throw-back to 1980s, and Hillary Clinton is a throw-back to 1990s. Both decades were good economically but awful socially. In one the men were jerks, and in the other the women were jerks. I did however write statements defending Donald Trump against his attackers at Psychology Today, who diagnosed him as a narcissist. I take issue with this concept. According to the definition of narcissistic personality disorder, the world owes vastly to its narcissists. If it is narcissistic to seek great success or to have original ideas, then most people who've had great success or original ideas were narcissists. The upshot of this is that the world owes vastly to people with this disorder.

So now we are seeing two worlds clash: The world that labeled me a misogynist and the world that labeled me a pussywhipped idiot. Christ does demand that we forgive our transgressors, but He does not demand that we side with them against their enemies who were likewise transgressors against us. So I am going to sit this one out. Let Stalin and Hitler keep beating each other to pulp. And let's also make sure that as few people as possible wind up as casualties in their foolish conflict.

Growth And Risk

In economics there is the concept of growth and the concept of risk. Growth is steady increase in the value of the stock; risk is its fluctuation. In investments, people like to maximize growth and minimize risk.

In life, sometimes people do something else. They increase risk in order to get higher. Of course risk will also take them very low. The people who take that route experience great highs and great lows, but over the long run they lose.

Using the concepts from economics, it makes sense to do the opposite. It is to do as much as you can to increase growth while minimizing risk. Some measure of risk is good. It prevents life from becoming boring. However over the long run it is growth that is desirable, and risk that is less so.

Risk is great when you are young. But as you get older what you want is steady growth. So it becomes advisable to encourage growth and, while not necessarily eliminating, at least reducing to manageable levels, the risks that one takes.

A positive feature of risk is that it exposes one to the unexpected. From the unexpected grows the understanding of the world and the wisdom. Wisdom can then be used by self or others to enhance growth. With wisdom the growth increases.

Take the risks to achieve wisdom; use wisdom to enhance growth.

Psychology And Free Will

For a long time the main idea in studying people has been that of free will. According to free will, people have the ability to choose their behavior, and people's behavior is a function of conscious, deliberate choice.

This idea has been challenged by some in psychology, who stated that people's behavior was instead a function of drives, feelings and instincts. Some people saw this idea as being liberating from the moral strictures that went along with the idea of free will; but in fact it is enslaving in the end. The logical outcome of this kind of thinking is the attitude that people are their nature and can only be their nature. So that, if someone is possessing of a bad nature in one or another form, then this attitude will damn such a person for life. According to this thinking, once a sociopath always a sociopath, once a narcissist always a narcissist, once a pedophile always a pedophile, and further along the same line. The outcome of this has not been liberation, it has been something very close to fascism. Some people are singled out for extermination or at least evisceration and dehumanization. And that has created one of the most vicious movements that the West has known in a long time.

In this scenario the liberation is achieved through re-introduction of free will. Liberation is achieved by regaining the concept of choice. Even if one has something wrong with his brain, he can still choose to act in a rightful manner. A pedophile can choose not to act on his pedophilic urges. A sociopath can learn ethics. And a narcissist can use his mind to figure out another person's perspective even if his heart fails to do the job.

A movement that once promised freedom from moral strictures of Victorianism ended up becoming a force for fascism. According to these trends in psychology, some people are evil and can only be evil whatever they do. The result has been vicious, relentless persecution of some people. This trend in psychology is not even rational. Once again, if people are responsible for their actions then anyone can choose to act rightfully; and if some people cannot choose to act rightfully whatever they do then people are not responsible for their actions.

I believe that people are in fact responsible for their actions. In fact I know they are. There have been all sorts of people who chose to act rightfully regardless of what was in their nature or in their psychology. In this situation the idea of free will indeed becomes a force for liberation. It allows people to choose rightful conduct and rightful thinking whatever exists in their natures. And that makes it a force for true liberty.

The problem with the Victorian model was that it ignored everything except free will. In such a situation it is in fact correct that people see other things that are there – things such as feelings or instincts or drives. But then psychology went to the other extreme and denied free will. It stated basically that we are animals. One obvious problem with this, once again, has been that it has lead to fascism. Psychology decided that some people are evil and can only be evil whatever they do. This is irrational; this is cruel; and this is wrong.

And by restoring free will without ignoring everything else that is there, is achieved true freedom and complete existence as human beings.

"Losers" And Christianity

I have had it with one or another person going on about how others are losers.

Most of these people owe the bulk of the money they have to scientists – whom they would regard to be losers. They owe their postitions as yuppies to their teachers and their professors – whom they would regard to be losers. They owe their property rights and their lives to the military and the police – whom they would regard to be losers. And they owe the money that they make to manual and brain laborers – whom they would regard to be losers as well.

I am tired of people claiming Christian values treating others like dirt. This is not what Christianity is meant to be about. If you claim your authority to come from Christ, then you better be treating other people well. And if you are not willing to do that, then you cannot claim to have Christian values.

Yes, I was guilty of this wrongful behavior myself. I have learned from it. I did use to have some elitist attitudes; but life has cured me of that problem. Right now I have respect for all sorts of people for whom I did not have respect before. I want to see more people make the same choice.

If you really do believe in Christian values, then you are obligated to be good to other people, including people who are not part of any kind of “elites.” And if you are not willing to do such a thing, then you cannot claim legitimately to have Christian values. The people who claim to have Christian values when they are treating their workers like dirt are full of crap. You are a Christian, you are obligated to be good to others. And if you refuse to do so, then you cannot claim to be a Christian.

So it is about time that this hypocrisy be confronted. If you are a Christian, then you are obligated to treat others well. And if you fail to do so, then you cannot claim to be a Christian.

It is about time that more people recognize this and treat the situation accordingly.

Why Beauty Is Not Shallow

Some people appear to be of the opinion that beauty is shallow. They simply haven't seen enough good architecture and good art. There is nothing shallow about the Sistine Chapel or the Chrysler Building. Beauty takes talent and effort to produce and deserves respect.

Now it may very well be that spirituality does not discriminate for beauty; but it most certainly does not discriminate against it, and the people who think that there is something incompatible between being beautiful and being spiritual are obviously coming from a wrong place. In many cases they are not driven by spirituality at all. They are driven by hatred. It may very well be legitimate to be angry at not being treated well because of your appearance. However claiming that this anger is spiritual, and that the people who have not been treated that way are shallow, is very wrong. The unattractive women do not own suffering. People suffer for all sorts of reasons, and there are many beautiful women who suffer as well.

Is beauty shallow? Once again, there is nothing shallow about great architecture and art. Nor is there anything shallow about magnificent things in nature. As for people's physical beauty, it is part genetic and part what they are doing with it. Some people will be experienced as beautiful by everyone, and some will be experienced as beautiful by some and not others. We have toward that effect two studies. Judith Langlois found out that a face with particular proportions will be experienced as beautiful by everyone cross-culturally. Another study showed that someone will find any given face the most attractive. There is both absolute beauty and relative beauty.

The two studies validate the correct claims on both sides while invalidating the wrong ones. The Langlois study shows that beauty is not merely taste-dependent, and that there is such a thing as absolute beauty which is a function of mathematics. This validates the case for the artistic search for value in beauty and invalidates the abuse by feminists against attractive women. The other study shows that there is someone for everyone. This validates that a person deemed unattractive at home does not have to be relegated to a lonely existence and invalidates the abuse by bad parents and stupid teenagers against unattractive kids.

The latter situation has been used to claim that beauty is traumatizing and should not be pursued. The confusion is between a value and the misuses of the value. Anything that has any kind of appeal to people will see someone wanting to use it for wrong. That does not make it bad in itself. Money, intelligence, and moral values such as altruism and patriotism can also be used for wrong; but that does not make any of them bad. Michelangelo and John Keats are not responsible for the actions of bad parents, stupid teenagers and unscrupulous plastic surgeons. Beauty is not the reason for these wrongs. Misuses of a good thing to turn it into a bad thing are.

When someone on the Internet was writing that people were shallow, a man responded with “they have ways to go before they can be as shallow as you.” In many cases we see just that in the people who militate against beautiful women and men who love them. They are driven by hatred rather than spirituality; and they misuse and discredit spirituality by using it in this way.

Are there attractive women who are shallow? Of course there are. However there are plenty of people who are shallow who are unattractive, and much more importantly there are many attractive people who are quite deep. There was nothing at all shallow about Julia or her artwork. Nor was her life a bed of roses. She was very spiritually connected, very thoughtful and very strong. These things did not keep her from being exceptionally beautiful.

So it is time that these confusions be put to rest. Beauty is not the same thing as abuses of beauty, and it is itself innocent of such misdeeds. There are plenty of people who either possess or value beauty who are deep enough. There is amazing beauty in both nature and human architecture and art, and none of these things are shallow. And while it is certainly wrong to mistreat kids because the town does not find them attractive, nothing of any merit is gained from attacking women who are beautiful and men who love them.