I finally figured out the reason

that I keep putting off grad school applications. I'm terrified.

racism violence fear and shame

Wikipedia define racism thusly:

Racism is a belief or ideology that all members of each race possess
characteristics or abilities specific to that race, especially to distinguish it
either superior or inferior to another race or races. It is also the prejudice
directed against someone of a differet race based on such a belief.

So in the huge media frenzy over the violent deaths of 33 people in Virginia on Monday, I just have one question: Does it not prove we are racist?

What do I mean? Well, Tuesday, another 58 people were killed or found dead in Iraq, in violence which sans doute is related to the ongoing U.S. occupation and U.S. instigated four year old war.

So does the average American consider the violent deaths of Iraqi people less important, less cause for, as the Seattle Post Intelligencer put it today "Rage and Grief" than the violent deaths of American people? It seems fairly obvious to me that they do. Based on proportion of national population, Iraq's loss on Tuesday is 1700% bigger than America's loss on Monday.

In fact, I bet the average American is more disturbed emotionally, yesterday and today, about the violent death of 33 VT students than they are or ever have been about the deaths of 800,000 people in Iraq under U.S. invasion and occupation.

So does that make us racist?

Roy Barnsness pointed out the other night that we all, each and every one of us, have fear and shame, and that we must, in one way or another, live with the horror of the fact that we are constantly in both roles: victim, and perpetrator. How can we end the passive and active violence which we experience and perpetrate, perpetrate and experience? Can we choose to examine our fear and shame and ... de escalate the level this violence?

Doomsday Clock

In recent news, the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists advanced their doomsday clock two minutes closer to midnight, so that it now stands at 11:55 PM. This is intriguing to me. It seems to me that ... more people in the west, and perhaps in the world, had a stronger sense of impending disaster from nuclear warfare back in the 60's, 70's, and 80's than do now in the 00's.

What do you think? Do you have a sense of impending danger/doom from either nuclear profileration/warfare, or from global warming/climate change?

My own sense is that though I do have a lot of fear, my fear is generally unjustifiable/irrational--it's not based on things which are actually dangerous or deadly, at least not at the same levels as the fear seems to indicate. This irrational fear tends to drown out the sense of reality based fears which I otherwise might have.

Quote of the week

This from Byron's post Fearless Service III. For me, it captured perfectly and instantly what it feels like to be human

We are all dying, giving birth astride a grave.

your most terrifying moment...

Saint Louis, Missouri

So I have been having a lengthy conversation with Luke (from St. Louis) over here. We started out in some sort of debate about theology (at least that is how it seemed to me) which occurred because I rather don't like Dietrich Bonhoffer, and Luke rather does. I started to feel my attention drifting (as is bound to happen with me when theology becomes too much the subject of a conversation). Wanting to refocus, I thought "I know, I'll ask a question the answer to which is sure to interest me." So off the top of my head I asked "What is the most terrifying moment you ever experienced?" I was hoping to be spellbound--enchanted--something which Christine Wicker says we all have a huge desire for in her newish book "Not in Kansas Anymore". And then I thought--hmmm--what's my answer?

The most terrrified I can ever remember being was a 2 day period a little before Megan and I were wed on Nov 25, 2000. I awoke one morning--awoke quite suddenly--with the feeling of a ton of bricks piled directly atop my chest and the voice of god in my head. He was saying "Benjamin--guess what? I am going to require you to tell megan all your scariest darkest most horrible secrets before you get married." this is the only time in my life when god has ever spoken to me in such a commanding way--it wasn't as if he were giving me any choice--it was just that I had to do it, period. And I knew exactly what horrible secrets he was talking about. And I knew that telling them to Megan would hurt her mega enormously. I was completely terrified more than I ever had been. It wasn't that I was afraid she would hate me or not want to to marry me or stuff like that (although that came into it). It was just the horrifying fact that I would be hurting her so. In fact, I was so terrified that I made an appointment with a cousellor to talk with them before I talked to Megan. As it turned out, my fear was well founded. And yet, I am gigaprofoundly grateful that god made me do that, because it somehow helped create the space for our marriage to be and become the astonishingly beautiful/delightful thing that it is. god is very good to me (sometimes...)

So what is your most terrifying moment?

Darkness Overcomes you

Darkness overcomes you is the title of this painting by shaun tan, from his book "The Red Tree", which is the most brilliant picture book I've ever seen. You can see lots of Shaun's artwork in the picture books section of his web site The Red Tree