Humanist Association of Orange County -
Newsletter for June 2005
Issue
#91 ( HTML format )
Editor: Benito Franqui
Associate Editor:
Dave Silva
Send submissions and membership renewals to:
HAOC
2609
Fernside St.
Orange, CA 92865
benfranq@earthlink.net
Articles submitted for publication
in the newsletter
must be received no
later than 10 days before the
next HAOC
meeting.
The Humanist Association of Orange County ( HAOC)
is a chapter of the American Humanist Association.
Please visit our
website at http://www.ochumanists.org/
HAOC Board
President: Pete
Anderson
Vice President: Dave Silva
Treasurer:.Harry Becker
Secretary:
Jerry Parks
Member at large: Carl Mariz
Member at large: Benito
Franqui
NEXT
HAOC MEETING
Sunday,
June
19,
1:30 P.M.
Corporate
Personhood
Activist
Mark Tabbert will present an illustrated lecture on what he calls "the mother of
all issues." It's a look at the systemic or root cause of much of what ails us
and our world. It goes by the esoteric-sounding name of Corporate
Personhood.
Corporate
Personhood, which only developed as a legal doctrine in the late l800's, was
highly contagious. It has spread across most of the world in just the last half
century. It has literally caused some sovereign nations to rewrite their
constitutions and led others to sign treaties overriding previous constitutional
protections for their citizens.
This historical development has been
little noted in the school and college history books, but is now emerging as an
issue. While this is a part of such worldwide issues as globalization,
supranational corporations, the World Bank and NAFTA, it is also being
questioned by local political and legal actions in a number of
communities.
A
Date to Save
Famed
attorney Clarence Darrow will repeat excerpts from many of his courtroom
defenses and other speeches at the Orange
Coast UUC
on Saturday,
August 6. at 2:00 and 7:30 p.m. Tickets
will be available from Gene
Barmore
at June
and July
HAOC
meetings.
More
thoughts regarding Sam Harris’ book The
End of Faith
By
Jerry Parks
In
my original review of this book, I selected a few quotes that I thought would
give a general impression of its contents. In doing so I obviously had to select
them “out of context”. I did so hoping that it might inspire (or shock) others
to actually read the book, but unfortunately that left the quotes open to
criticism since any qualifying or limiting statements that were intended to make
the meaning clearer were not readily available.
When Harris said that
“The ideal of religious tolerance . . is one of the principal forces driving us
to the abyss” and that “even religious moderation will do nothing to lead us out
of the wilderness”, he was clearly saying that in consideration of the extreme
fundamentalism that causes religious fanatics to commit acts that are clearly
anti-social, including mass murders and other unforgivable
atrocities.
There is no way that a civilized society could or should
extend the concept of religious tolerance to allow for such behavior simply
because it was inspired by religious belief. Anyone reading the book should
realize that Harris did not mean that there should never be any toleration of
other’s religious beliefs, as has been suggested, but simply that we should not
be expected to tolerate all religious beliefs, since some can result in serious
harm to others. Certainly that is just common sense. In a civilized world,
religions simply cannot have carte blanche to promote anything they
wish!
Corporations
and Governments
by
Tibor R. Machan
Many
critics of free market capitalism focus their energies on demonstrating that
with corporations as powerful as they can become in a free market, there is no
danger as great as making it possible for them to pursue profit freely,
unregulated by government. They are convinced that only a power that is even
greater than wealthy big corporations can contain the rapacious ambitions that
are evident throughout corporate commerce.
The idea that big corporations
are untamed beasts that wreak havoc upon civilized society is immensely popular
throughout the academy everywhere in the world, including the United States of
America. Most professors in the humanities and social sciences, a great many
writers, journalists, artists, and entertainers—centered mainly in New York City
and Hollywood—cling firmly to their view that corporations are a threat to the
well being of nearly everyone in society and that those who do not share this
belief are deluded, period. It is not only Ralph Nader who embraces this idea
and the only reason Nader hasn't reached national political office is that he is
viewed as a naïve idealist who wants to take on forces that must be appeased,
not fought.
It is pretty clear that in a society in which people may
solicit governments for favors, big corporations will have an advantage over
others, although universities and unions are not all that far behind in the
power they wield through lobbyists throughout the capitols of the various states
and the federal government. Champions of the free society hold, of course, that
the answer to this problem isn't to abolish or try to regulate big business but
to refashion the legal system so as to ban favors to any sector of society. They
believe that corporations should be independent of government as much as
churches are. And their idea is not implausible since by firmly separating
church and state, the American government has, in the main, remained independent
of religious control. If, for example, a massive Roman Catholic church, with
millions and millions of faithful, can be kept at bay, surely corporations could
be as well.
Still, business corporations are probably always going to
have a hold on politicians in the legal system as currently composed. They
control huge sums of money that politicians want so as to run successful
campaigns, which isn't the case with churches and universities. So long as
election campaigns need to be conducted and so long as people, including their
organizations, are, as they should be, free to make contributions to these
campaigns, it is difficult, critics of free market capitalism say, to imagine a
largely capitalist society free of undue big business-corporate political
influence.
Yet it is possible, slowly and over much time, to wean
corporations from government largess and vice versa. But this requires extensive
education and vigilant proselytization. The probability of such reform is small,
admittedly, but then so was the probability of abolishing slavery at one time,
or, later, segregation or the military draft. All changes of this magnitude,
that require undoing centuries of bad habits, both personal and institutional,
have a slim chance of succeeding. After all, corporations are entrenched in the
system itself, one that gives them such a bad reputation, without many of them
making a determined effort to end their dependency.
The question then
becomes whether it is of any real use to seek remedy for corporate influence
from expanded government regulation, This is what the current movie Enron: The
Smartest Guys in the Room, along with most statist critiques of the Enron fiasco
suggest—namely, that the answer to corporate malfeasance is more and more state
intervention. But the logic of such a position is seriously flawed.
After
all, if corporations have powerful, albeit wrongheaded, influence on government
today, why would government have the ability to set them right? That is a
preposterous idea. Moreover, government intervention, even apart from clearly
often serving corporate interests, is so susceptible to corruption, to misuse,
that placing one's hope in more and more of it is flat out
incredible.
The only hope is the slow, vigilant, process of divorcing
corporate commerce—as well as all other institutions susceptible to
corruption—from government. However much existing corporations exhibit the
relentless tendency to link up with government and thus wield much more than
harmless—and perhaps well deserved—economic power, it is plainly unreasonable to
expect that the alternative of increasing government regulation is the right
solution.
Humanism
and ... Adyashanti???
by
Benito Franqui
Humanists
are concerned with helping to make this a better world without reliance on any
kind of supernatural beings or supernatural revelations.
One
way we can promote that goal is by becoming better persons ourselves. In this
area, the work of Adyashanti ( Steven Gray ) has been found to be of value by
many.
Who
the hell is Adyashanti?
According
to his website ( http://www.zen-satsang.org/ ):
After
a series of transformative spiritual awakenings, Adyashanti began teaching in
1996, at the request of his Zen teacher with whom he had been studying for 14
years. Adya's teachings have been compared to some of the early Chan (Zen)
masters of China as well
as
teachers of Advaita Vedanta in India.
However,
Adya says, "If you filter my words through any tradition or '-ism', you will
miss altogether what I am saying. The liberating truth is not static; it is
alive. It cannot be put into concepts and be understood by the mind. The truth
lies beyond all forms of conceptual fundamentalism. What you are is the beyond –
awake and present, here and now already. I am simply helping you to realize
that."
Meetings
with Adyashanti include teachings, meditation and satsang. Bring your innermost
questions or join in deep silence, as Adya leads a profound and intimate
investigation into the freedom of spiritual awakening.
A
native of Northern California, Adyashanti is a teacher of growing recognition
and popularity in the United States. He teaches extensively in the San Francisco
Bay Area, offering weekly satsangs, frequent intensives, and silent retreats. He
also travels to teach in other areas of the United States and Canada.
Stephan
Bodian, a former editor of Yoga Journal, says, "Adyashanti has a penetrating way
of engaging in dialogue with people, in which layers of false understanding drop
away in the radiance of awareness, leaving the freshness and clarity of the
living moment."
Links
to several transcripts of Adyashanti's talks and dialogs have been posted at the
"Other Articles" page ( http://www.ochumanists.org/articles.htm ) in the HAOC website.
Those who are interested but do not have access to the Internet will be able to
get hard copies of these transcripts at the June meeting.
An
Adyashanti
Intensive ( donation = $70 )
has
been scheduled to take place
on
Sunday,
June 26, 2005 from 1 PM to 6 PM
at
Unity
of Tustin
14402
S. Prospect Ave.,Tustin,
CA
92780
Tel.
714-730-3486
or 714-730-3444
A
partial transcript of one of
Adyashanti’s dialogs follows.
The
Illusion of Victimhood and the Futility of Blaming
A(Adyashanti):
In other words if you were thinking about thirty-one flavors of ice cream, you
probably wouldn't be talking to me about it. You would just be like, "my mind
can't get off of strawberry ice cream, that's strange. So we wouldn't be talking
about that. This really isn't much different until your mind says it is and
believes it is. So your unconscious just starts to unload itself. That's part of
silence, that's being on retreat. What's been buried unloads itself. Just let it
unload itself. There's not really something to do, to figure out, to get rid of.
Just realize that this is the projections of your own mind and its associated
emotions. It's just coming up because you're not keeping the top on. So they
just arise in consciousness. What to do when they arise in consciousness? Just
allow it to arise in consciousness. Make nothing of it.
Q(questioner): And
that's the same thing for getting out of the victim mode too then?
A: Sure.
There is no victim, you see what I mean?
Q: I know that intellectually and
I've heard you talk about it with many people who come up
A: But you have to
see it for yourself.
Q: There's a part of me that still believes it. I look
at it and ...
A:
Let's just take one then. Victimhood is based on what they should or should not
have done, correct? That's victimhood. They should or should not have done that.
Just pick one, any event what they should not have done. What is it that they
should not have done?
Q: Okay, George Bush starting the war in
Iraq.
A: Yes, okay, so George Bush should not have started the
war in Iraq. Oh, that's a good one (laughter)! I love George Bush if for no
other reason than he pushes egoic buttons very ... (laughter) Okay, so George
Bush shouldn't have started the war in Iraq (more laughter). Start with the easy
stuff (laughter). How do you know that that's true?
Q: Well, I
don't really. On the surface it seems like a bad way to try to settle things and
it's causing a lot of people suffering.
A: Yes, that's the story
part. So if God herself came up and sat right next to you, but this is a god
that is a little upset. So she has a big sword and says, "I have the power to
take away your eternal life with one swoop across your neck. Now do you actually
know that George Bush should not have gone to war. Do you know that?
Q: Of course not.
A: Good for you, you just saved your
neck (laughter). The question is not whether it's good or bad, that's not what
we're saying. What we're saying is, you don't know. You don't go to the volcano
that in the past killed thousands of people and stand at the foot and say, "you
should not have blown your top and killed five thousand people." Nobody is
listening. It happened. So when we tell ourselves that George Bush shouldn't
have gone to war, we're pretending that we actually know. It may be true that I
wish he hadn't gone to war, that may be true in a personal sense but this isn't
what causes suffering. It's what should or should not have happened. And you
don't even know. You CAN'T know what should have happened because the world
doesn't work according to shoulds, does it?
Q: No.
A: It works according to what is. And then everybody sits back with
their shoulds and shouldn'ts and thinks that that has an effect. And wonders why
it doesn't. Wonders why reality is not listening. And then you can take it one
step deeper into yourself. We project our own state onto others. George Bush
shouldn't have gone to war, but here you are, you're already at war. You are at
war with your idea of what should or shouldn't be. So as soon as you own it, now
you've got your truth. Not that George Bush shouldn't have gone to war, I
shouldn't have gone to war. Not for any moral should or shouldn't but because
it's not really true to yourself. Because have you noticed that we are always
asking the world to do what we're not doing? YOU stop going to war, you, you,
YOU stop going to war. Meanwhile, we're already at war. When we take it back, we
realize it's me. Then you can stop going to war.
Q: I guess
that's one of the hardest things to give up is blaming other people. You can't
do that anymore because that's not where the answer or the truth lies.
A: No, it's ludicrous actually when you really look at it. When you
actually see what's happening ah, I won't get into that (laughs).
Q: (makes a plea for support about an upcoming surgery)
A: We'll hold you in our hearts.
Q: Thank you very
much.
A:
This doesn't mean when you see it very deeply that you won't give a damn and you
won't go protest or whatever. If you're drawn to do so, you'll do so. But the
difference is YOU won't be at war. That's the difference and that's the
difference between heaven and hell. Inside and outside. That's the difference.
And then we don't appear as a victim to anything or anyone. Because we're not.
It's not what's true. Very revealing when we really look at what we want others
to do, our lovers, our friends, what our parents should have done, what our
government should do, etc. Just own it. Very revealing, very revealing. You'll
find it's your true nature talking to you. But it's talking to you, it's not
talking to them (laughs). Very revealing.