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Cerebus Archive Report #7 November 2005 Text taken from Yahoo!Group postings regarding Cerebus Policy / Archive matters and sent to Dave, whose responses are in bold. 11/02/05 Greetings Dave, Here's part one of this past month & 1/2's worth of Policy Talk. Part one is almost exclusively about your Last Will and Testament letter. Hope you had a safe an enlightening Ramadan. I will be writing soon, I promise. I've gotten into my "overly busy" ruts. -Jeff Tundis Here we go.... Greetings,
Jeff… Yes
a very safe, enlightening and edifying Ramadan.
“T’ank youse for
askeen’.” I’m
going to have to divide this up into sections and it will probably
take me several weeks to answer all of the charges against me, but this
is what
happens when you actually introduce ideas into Marxist-feminist society. “Here we
go” indeed: Jeff
T: I just received this from Dave via Gerhard. I ask that you
all please take this thread seriously, even though
I'm well aware of my exclusion from
described group (you'll see). The letter has also been uploaded to the
files section so you can see any
italics, etc. A new folder has been created called Policy (Documents
pertaining
to Cerebus Legacy Policy). [Dave's letter: "Last Will and Testament and Powers of Attorney for Property and Personal Care"] Jason:
I can assure you that it IS what he wants and believes. He
discussed this
with me on the way back up to Niagara Falls, and we hit on a lot of
points, and
basically, he doesn't care if it takes some time for a consensus to
emerge
among whatever number of people are discussing it - in a very
real sense, he will, at that point, be entering the
public domain. Actually - it is a very logical extension of many of the
themes
he has always emphasized. Jeff T: Dave:
That isn’t true. Jason
had
about the same amount of “access to Dave” as anyone
else has, which is the
Yahoo newsgroup. I
answer the five
questions a month for everyone who is interested in reading what I have
to say
on various subjects that the average Cerebus reader
is curious
about. The same
reason that I put
together Collected Letters and why I prefer to
correspond by mail rather
than talk on the phone or get e-mail capability.
Because Jason was putting together the
“Ye Bookes of Cerebus”
exhibit, we corresponded on that for most of the last year. But that was what we were
corresponding
about. We had some
conversations about
various other subjects when he was up here and when he picked me up in
Niagara
Falls and when he dropped me back there but most of those sorts of
conversations
are incidental to whatever the professional connection is. Ger and I, in the same
way, talk about
various personal things in passing but 99.9% of what we talk about is
Aardvark-Vanaheim. Jeff
T: It would be helpful for someone who had time to really
talk to Dave about
it to help put this all in focus. _________________________
<< Some off topic discussion ensued, mostly about how you a attribute the "let's keep them alive when they're in a persistent vegetative state" attitude to atheist/marxist/feminists, when in this country it is the exact opposite - the Right Wing Religious Right are the ones responsible for that behaviour.>> <<And of course, the expected "he's crazy" comments. Sorry.>> ______________________ Jason T: The conversation went in a number of directions. The last will and testament is, as far as I can tell, just the first "kick at the cat" in trying to define his wishes in legal terms. Dave:
It’s basically trying to
cover as many bases as possible. The
big danger for me having invested all
the time and energy that I have in finishing Cerebus
and then having the
obligation to preserve it is to keep any “Dave Sim is
crazy” person from taking
over—which, given that that is a prevailing viewpoint
everywhere that Dave Sim
is known of is, to me, a clear and present danger. Someone who thinks
I’m crazy and has no idea
what I’ve been doing for three decades takes over with the
blessing of the
feminist courts, ruins the whole project and then concludes
“See, I told you
Dave Sim was crazy” much to the relief of everyone besides
myself. Jason T: I would say that, in some ways, the idea of 'pulling the plug' in accordance with Dave's wishes, may be the easy part. The hard part is in moderating his treatment, if he is unable to do so himself. He is very much against being pumped full of medications that might hinder his cognitive abilities or make him perpetually dazed and confused. Sounds like that is about his worst nightmare. Dave:
It’s not my worst nightmare, personally. Being lobotomized
chemically in this society
would really only make me like most other people, passively staring at
the
television for umpty-ump hours a day.
If you want to define normal behaviour in
North American society, that
would be it. But
accepting that personally
as the greatest likelihood is very different from accepting it professionally—that
while I was tranked into oblivion someone would be turning Cerebus into
something else than what I intended for it to be with everyone who had
been
interested in the project standing around and “abiding by the
family’s
wishes”. “The
family’s wishes” is the
trump card in feminist society. You
don’t have to make sense, you just have to shed a few
crocodile tears, mouth a
few platitudes about how much you respect what Dave has done and then
jump in
there and start dismantling it.
Arguably they would really think they were
doing the right thing, but
then that’s what the delusional feminist state is all about,
to me. You not only
destroy things you convince
yourself that you’re building them up.
“We really thought it was time to
reinvent Cerebus for a new
generation and we think Dave would approve of what we’ve
done” (now that Dave
is safely tranked into oblivion).
“Deconstructionist” is a
feminist term.
You can call me paranoid if you want, but
I’m the only person who is
willing to publicly say that I’m not a feminist who the
feminists can’t force
to resign or crawl before them (i.e. Lawrence Summers at Harvard). I have to take that
responsibility
seriously, in my view, given that I don’t believe in
coincidences. I
don’t think I “just happened” to be the
guy picked for this job.
A bridge to
sanity in a post-feminist world like any other bridge in that it can be
built,
but you have to get that first strand across the chasm and as far as I
can see
it that’s what my job is.
To get that
first strand across the chasm between the insane world of feminism and
a future
world that can return to making sense.
With absolutely no assistance and complete
resistance every step of the
way and from all sides. Fortunately
my
only interest is in what I perceive to be God’s intention
with me. “No
assistance and complete resistance” has
been my job description since issue 186 came out.
So be it.
God’s will be
done. Jason T:
So, having future Yahoos! that are medical professionals offering
second,
third, or fourth opinons on things, and then putting them up as a poll
question
for everyone to vote on - well, that is about as public as treatment
could get.
And is, I think, what Dave is driving at. If there are two choices,
things are straightforward - yay or nay. It just
gets more complicated from there. I also am not sure that there is a contradiction between needing people who understand Dave's wishes, and those who have faith in God. I think Dave is well aware that there will be a lot of conflicting thoughts, opinions, or emotions, if/when this becomes a 'real time' discussion. I mean, as I said to him in conversation, the most immediate conflict is between realizing that Dave wants to be let go of, and that the people making that decision will probably not want to let go. Maybe that's just me. Dave:
Yes, that was part of our discussion but that’s further down
the
line stuff. I tend
to think of Cerebus
as really pretty straightforward but I can’t bypass the fact
that there are all
of these questions continually asked about it.
As I said to Jason, I don’t see
myself as having any value in the frames
of reference of a feminist society and I’m happy to check out
of this loony bin
at any time. However,
I think I have to
take it as a given that a lot of Cerebus readers are still going to
have
a lot of questions no matter how old and decrepit I get. Having sacrificed my life
to the book it
only seems sensible to factor that in.
If I’m only lucid and aware for
two hours a day I should spend those two
hours a day answering questions as best I can even though I would
probably
think the way I do now. I
just want to
check out. Jason
only half-jokingly
said that he could picture himself saying, “Dave, for the
last time—Sir Gerrik
what was the story behind him?”
Well,
there you go. I
don’t think of that as
being of any great importance, but if that’s what the Cerebus
readers think is
important and they’ve kept me alive all this time and
I’m only lucid for two
hours a day, well, put the spectacles on, re-read all of the Sir Gerrik
stuff
again and see if I can’t dredge something up from deep in
what’s left of my
memory.
Matt D: Okay, Jeff is out. Definitely. I've called Dave. We (those of us who aren't Jeff,) don't have to read the Bible and the Koran. We should, but we don't have to. All anybody (except Jeff (and kudos and applause to Jeff for being honest and open on this (from me and Dave))) has to do is "declare themselves, publicly, here on the Internet to believe in the One God of Judaism, Christianity and Islam and to declare themselves not to be feminists" And mean it. Do that (and send a copy to Wilf, his address should be in issue 300, if not send to Wilf care of A/V,) and you get what Dave says you get. Me, I'm gonna read the Bible and Koran and if I agree with it, then I'm making my Declaration. (I'm already not a feminist. Men is men, and women are women. Both have their pluses, but they are NOT equal.) Dave is serious about this. I talked with him for over an hour. He supports anybody who wants to look further into the Bible or the Koran, but isn't saying you have to. Well, I've had my say, and am looking forward to seeing if I believe that the three faiths have one God. And to re-reading the "begats". Dave:
I thought it was very honest of Matt to concede that all of his
previous attempts foundered on the begats of the first major chronology
in
Genesis that starts with Adam and goes through to Noah and that he
sheepishly
realized this time out that it’s really barely a page. As he remembered it it
went on for fifteen
pages. That to me is The Adversary in action.
“You don’t want to read
all this crap—look it goes on for fifteen pages. Go play some video games
and do some bong
hits. Much more
worthwhile.” And they
go for it. Dave also doesn't want to linger if he's supposed to go. So, the conclusion he reached was to find people that he "doesn't trust the least." (my phrase not his.) In other words, people he trusts to a point. Dave:
No, again—it’s
hard to communicate this to atheists.
I have to give God a fighting chance if it
isn’t my time to go and that requires people who believe in
Him and will go
where He steers them to go and say what He steers them to say. An atheist at a critical
juncture is just
going to find themselves making chit-chat in the cardiac unit when
I’m actually
in the next building in intensive care.
How did that happen?
That sort of stuff is
child’s play for the Adversary in a completely atheistic
environment. How
did that happen. Matt: Look at it this way, Dave (if this all works, and it IS an if,) will be the first person to have all records of his treatment available in "real time" to anyone who is interested. So if he is getting incorrect treatment, we (the people who have agreed to accept his power of attorney) will get as many opinions as we can get. It may not work, but if it was you, and you didn't trust anybody you know to make the right choices, what would you do? Dave doesn't really know Ger (and legally Ger couldn't take the job even if he really wanted it (which I don't think he would.)). And there isn't anybody else. So, Dave decided to trust that God would provide. I look at it this way. Dave has given me Cerebus. I've laughed, I've been entertained, and I've thought. The least I can do is read the rulebooks (Bible and Koran) and see if I think it's cricket. If I do, then what does it hurt to help a guy out? If I don't, I let Dave know where he and I part ways, wish him the best of luck, and hope and pray that everything works out all right. In the end I'm out the price of the Bible and the Koran, big woop. And if I agree, then I make my declaration and end my days knowing that I did my best for a guy who made me laugh, made me entertained, and made me think. And it'd be the one thing I could do to pay Dave back where he can't come back and "one up" me. ___________________ Dom: Well, I think Dave has the right to set whatever conditions he wants for those to whom he gives Power of Attorney, but this document continues many trends in Dave's thinking that I find irritating and disturbing. Dave:
Core signs of demonic possession as far as I can see.
Sorry to interrupt.
Why is it that you never think that your
being irritated and disturbed doesn’t go
deeper—like to a soul-deep level—and
that what you are responding to is your own soul’s responses
to what I’m
writing: “He’s
right. If you
don’t do something to save your soul
you’re going straight into the Pit.” That the
irritation and disturbance you’re
experiencing is all the layers of atheism you’ve piled onto
your soul since you
were six so that it’s almost completely stifled. Why won’t you
consider that the irritation and disturbance issues
from the sound of your soul screaming its lungs out from under eight
tons of
accumulated Adversarial evasiveness and substitution.
“What’s that faint
irritating and disturbing sound I hear?”
“It’s nothing. Just ignore it.” “Oh,
okay.” Dom: Despite his repeated assertions to be a rational, non-feeling person, I find it impossible to read this document without seeing all kinds of aggrievedness rear its head. Merely the first example: "If I'm hit by that bus that everyone keeps cheering for." ? Who keeps cheering for it? The Comics Journal? The intended audience of this document? Why does Dave feel such a compulsion, over and over again, to impute such motives--and so universally--to his audience? Dave: Because that’s what I see. No one ever said, “What happens if Gerhard gets hit by a bus?” In purely psychological terms when the only conscious thought about the end of a 26-year project for the last 10 years of that project is “What happens if the guy gets hit by a bus,” I assume there’s a certain amount of wish-fulfillment involved however much the wishers don’t like to see themselves that way and even though they might not be the actual source of the sentiment: rather, they’re just demonically possessed and are unconsciously looking for something to stifle Dave permanently the way they’ve stifled their own souls. And for exactly that reason. “I find this irritating and disturbing.” Well, it’s only in a feminist society that “irritating and disturbing” are seen as core elements of inherent wrongness. I see no evidence of people seeing the fact that I am almost always “irritating and disturbing” to originate with themselves. Maybe you need to be irritated and disturbed in exactly the areas where I’m irritating and disturbing you. Dom: And I am pretty sure that even in atheist Marxist-Feminist Canada, one can still construct a legal document or legal statement that you are NOT to be resuscitated or artificially kept alive in the event of incapacity or persistent vegetative state. Whether it would be honoured in any circumstances may be more of an open question, but a challenge would not be likely unless family member made it. Well,
again, this is the snake eating its tail.
Yes.
I consider my family to be the diametric
opposite of everything that I
believe in BUT in Marxist-feminist society they will likely still be
given the
last decision no matter what kind of a document that I ask Wilf to put
together. That’s
a good example of
demonic possession right there. As
a
society we slavishly believe that family is the panacea for everything
which
means it’s only a matter of time before Marxist-feminism
devours everything in
its path. That’s my best guess.
You
can’t frame a document in a Marxist-feminist society that
doesn’t conform to
the totalitarian dictates of the Marxist-feminist courts. Dom: Even mercy killing is largely tolerated or blinked at in Canada. Hell, Marxist-Feminist Canada has given no more than token punishments to suicide assisters, and in at least one case a pretty light sentence to a guy who "mercy" killed his daughter. Dave:
Yes, exactly.
But I think that
reinforces my argument rather than refuting it.
When my grandfather was dying, my mother
said to the nurses that
they should just increase his morphine drip so that he can die
peacefully. I tried
to explain to her that she was “counseling
to commit homicide” which is an indictable offense just short
of homicide
itself and certainly higher than manslaughter. It involves
premeditation and
conspiracy. Everyone in the vicinity was pretty philosophical about it
as I
recall. “Oh,
don’t worry we get
counseled to commit homicide all the time.”
Just another example of why I think medical
facilities are, as Merlin
put it, “A kind of seventh day when reason rests”
and consequently I have to
install my own checks and balances where they—not only no
longer
exist but where I suspect they never have
existed. The doctor and the family know best. Dom: "[T]he groundwork has already been—and is being—laid by Marxist-feminists to seize control of my intellectual property." Hunh? Is Dave serious here? He really thinks that there is a plot afoot to seize control of his personal intellectual property? Even if he's referring more generally to some sort of legislation, I have no idea what that would be, but on the face of it this sounds like sheer paranoia. If Dave did get his by a bus and get taken dazed and confused to a hospital, the odds that anyone working on him would have even the first idea who he is or would want to manipulate his treatment to seize control of his intellectual property is, frankly, pretty out there. Since in other contexts Dave ALSO complains about how universally ignored he is and how nobody is interested in what he's accomplished, this is just a fundamentally illogical, of not irrational position. In effect, Dave wants to get two grievances for the price of one: on the one hand everyone ignores me and nobody cares about my accomplishments as artist, evolutionary theorist, religious exegete, scientist, etc; but on the other hand nodoby can wait to wrest my intellectual property from me, thereby silencing me. W? T? F? Dave:
It depends on which is the actual
reality and which is the
ostensible reality. You think that beneficent or neutral feminism is
the actual
reality and malignant feminism is the ostensible reality (that I have
manufactured
in my own mind). Again, I’m the only
person who is willing to speak out against feminism who the feminists
can’t
force to resign so I think it’s important for me to keep
pointing that out. Forcing people to resign for disagreeing
with you, to me, takes your argument out of the realm of beneficent or
neutral
feminism and into the category of malignant feminism. Again,
I think the evidence supports my point of view and not
yours. What I’m pointing out is that if
you repeat a thing often enough it becomes the reality for most
people. Virtually everyone in the comic-book field
agrees that I’m crazy even though probably only 2% of the
field has read my
work. To me, that’s laying the
groundwork for psychiatric incarceration which is a venerable tradition
for
Marxists. The challenge is to get me to sue someone for defamation or
libel so
that I can be tried and found insane in the feminist courts or to
gradually
allow the viewpoint to become universal by not addressing my arguments
but just
vilifying me personally (looking on the bright side, Margaret Thatcher
used to
say that she welcomed it when her opponents were reduced to maligning
her
personally because it made it obvious that they had no contrary
viewpoints to
offer with any basis in reality). I mean,
that’s an inescapable fact. Cerebus is
a 6,000 page story which, I submit, is an interesting fact in and of
itself
and, presumably, would be documented or reviewed intelligently in any
environment where stories and ideas were weighed on their own merit
rather than
on the totalitarian dictatorship of what is the right way to
think. I was only reviewed intelligently when I
appeared to be a secular Marxist-feminist.
As soon as I made it clear that I wasn’t a secular
Marxist-feminist, I
was universally declared crazy and my work was
ignored. The end of the book passed without
comment. To me it’s only rational to
ask questions about those things particularly in a world where any
deviation
from the feminist party line is grounds for dismissal in any
professional
environment. So the guy isn’t a
feminist. Why does he have to resign?
It seems to me a very basic question centering on a core human right of
freedom
of belief and freedom of expression. Net result of question: No
answer—just
that malign silence that says, “Keep it up and
you’ll find out why he had to
resign.” Duly noted. The threat is always
there with Marxists. If
you can’t support your own arguments threaten your
opponent. I keep a checklist of their venerable
techniques and try to minimize their chances to put them into
effect. I would rather work towards a viable form of
self-preservation than just sit here going, “I better not do
anything or say
anything or they’ll call me paranoid.”
They’re Marxist-feminists.
They’re going to call me paranoid no matter what I say unless
I agree to
capitulate and become a Marxist-feminist and abandon common sense and
the
weight of evidence which, viewed objectively, weighs heavily against
any
favourable opinion of Marxist-feminism not in the least because it is
so
heavy-handed in suppressing even trace elements of dissent. Dom: "I would rather roll around in broken glass and iodine than to have my father within a country mile of either me or the Cerebus intellectual property." So, did Dave ever get around to reconciling his current view of his father with Cerebus's great sin of not getting home in time for his father's death? Dave: Yes. The ultimate question, for
me, is, was and will be does “Honor
thy father and thy mother” extend to atheists?
My ultimate conclusion (that, so far as I
know, I am staking my soul on)
is that it doesn’t extend to atheists. Honoring atheists who are
undeserving of being honored, to me, is
the greater sin. Particularly
in the
universal combat zone that is North American society where family and
forced
capitulation to Marxist-feminism is being used as a cudgel to make men
toe the
feminist party line. As the only person willing to buck that
totalitarian
reality making my parents as human beings more important than their
avowed
atheism is just another form of capitulation.
Marxist-feminism or God?
I pick
God. My family or
God? I pick God.
Does picking God over my family make me
inhuman? The only
opinion on that that I care about is
God’s and I’ll find that out on Judgment Day.
God’s will be done. Dom: "So, the best that I have been able to come up with is that anyone of the Yahoos who is willing—in the event of my incapacity—to declare themselves, publicly, here on the Internet to believe in the One God of Judaism, Christianity and Islam and to declare themselves not to be feminists (that is, to declare publicly that they don't believe men and women are equal and that—having followed my argument as thoroughly as you all have—they agree and agree to agree publicly that yes, the evidence supports Dave Sim, it doesn't support Oprah Winfrey, that the Fourteen Impossible Things to Believe Before Breakfast are indeed Impossible, not difficult or unlikely or improbable: Impossible) will be given co-jurisdiction of What's Left of Dave Sim and will be given one vote each in deciding what is to be done with him and with his intellectual property in the event that he has officially been declared to be Not All There but has not officially been declared legally dead." Again, Dave has the absolute right to set whatever criteria he wishes. Dave: We
don’t know if that’s true and I think the weight of
evidence
will prove to run contrary to that. I
know that hurts your feelings to think that society may have already
run past
the point where you are allowed any criteria besides Marxist-feminism
but I think it far more likely that as Wilf
researches the issue we will find that the only accepted criteria in
our society
is “family uber alles”. That is, family
is the cudgel which is used to keep everyone in the feminist camp or to
give
the feminist camp control of anyone who refuses to toe the line. Dom: I do think it's unfortunate that he is willing to have faith only in someone who affirms that he (or she) thinks EXACTLY what Dave thinks. It sounds like he wants a disciple, not someone who will act in his best interests and in acordance with his wishes. Or, to put it another way, it's not enough to act in accordance with Dave's wishes, one must also actually share his beliefs. Dave: Mm.
That’s not true. I
could cite any number of significant differences between Jeff Seiler
and
myself, Sandeep Atwal and myself, Billy Beach and myself both
theological
differences and notions of free will expression.
I’m not like any of
them and they’re not like me. But they do believe
in God and they are
willing to admit that feminism is a detriment to society. To
me, that
gives them a fighting chance
against the Adversary and his adherents (however inadvertent their
adherence)
if it comes down to crunch time. Dom: "Let me say here that I think it will probably be a period of years before anyone who agrees with me will actually work up the gumption to declare so publicly" Now, that's just insulting. So, if you don't declare that you share Dave's views exactly, you are either a Marxist-Feminist athiest, or you're a coward? Insulting AND illogical. Dave: No,
I think feminism is insulting and illogical and yes, I think
men who already know that and have allowed themselves to be intimidated
into
toeing the feminist party line are cowards.
Understandable cowards, for all of that. As we’ve
seen, the Marxist feminists aren’t playing games
here. They are actively ruining
people’s lives to maintain their core delusion using every
form of legal and
public coercion to destroy anyone in their way. If you so
much as raise as a remote possibility that women don’t
have the same aptitudes men you do have
the world crash in on your head as Lawrence Summers found out and as I
found
out. As I’ve told any number of guys
who are sheepish about their capitulation, I can understand
it. It’s the whole point of the “forced
resignation/public capitulation and crawling before
feminists” construct. If you’re off the
reservation they will do
everything they can to ruin your life, professionally and
personally. That’s a good way—in fact the
only way—that
you can maintain a universal societal construct with no basis in
reality. If the consequences experienced by the lone
dissenter are severe enough, dissent ceases to exist.
That’s how they do it in North Korea. That’s how
they did it in
Tianemen Square. That’s how they do it
wherever Marxism holds sway. Dom: "This then intrudes on other areas which include the fact that medical care in Canada—as would come as no surprise to anyone with a brain in his head (i.e. non-Canadians)—is not-so-gradually slipping to Third Word levels because Canada is the only completely Marxist medical system remaining on the planet and certainly the onlyone in a G-8 country." So presumably all Canadians except Dave are brainless. And all non-Canadians DO have brains in their heads (the logical corollary of his statement here). Dave: When
it comes to Marxist medicine, unfortunately, yes. Canadians
universally adhere to the view
that single payer government controlled medicine is the promised land
and any
deviation from that viewpoint is grounds for dismissal from the public
debate. Even though the Prime Minister
himself goes to a for-profit clinic (which is only allowed in Quebec
because of
Quebec’s Marxist-feminist stranglehold on the politics in
this country) he will
run in the next election on his vow to keep the public system entirely
public
and out of the hands of profiteers and no one in this
country—certainly not the
Conservative party—will even suggest that anything other than
exclusively
public medicine can be allowed in Canada. Even though it already exists
and the
Prime Minister is making use of it.
Yes, I would say that that means that Canadians don’t have a
brain in
their head. Where do you see “brain” in holding
self-contradicting and
illogical viewpoints? Dom: "owing
to the
inherent secretiveness and ass-covering of those practicing
Marxist medicine, I am just as likely to be commended to the
not-so-tender mercies of Abdul the Butcher as I Dave: Again,
they don’t proliferate in Canada but because they are only
allowed to exist in Quebec you are not allowed to say that they exist
in this
country. The
consequence game comes
into effect. Look
what happens to
anyone who suggests that a combination public/private system should be
adopted. You
don’t want that to happen
to you? Then stop
making waves. And
everyone in this country besides me
stops making waves. Dom: "If I
can't get any volunteers in either category (and it wouldn't
surprise me that I can't) then at least I don't think I can be accused
of
indirectly committing suicide by my lack of
Dave: Sorry,
I was referring to God and to the God-fearing. I care about
the actuality of how my behaviour looks in the eyes of God. I do believe that suicide
is a sin. With the
different permutations being
developed by medical science—i.e. if I don’t want
to be kept alive as an
artificially maintained piece of meat, am I indirectly committing
suicide?—suicide is becoming a very nuanced noun. Just by saying I
don’t want to be kept alive artificially by a
machine, technically I may be committing suicide.
Relative to Judgment Day it isn’t
a matter of whether someone
would want to make such an accusation as I believe it will be that the
accusation will be irrefutably, inescapably there if, as the Koran puts
it, the
book of my life is put into my left hand instead of my right hand. There will be no place for
hair-splitting
nuance on Judgment Day I don’t think.
Paradise or the Fire.
Nor will
there be clever lawyers who can tie the rules up in knots and get me
off on a
technicality. If
the rule is “no
suicide” and I say I don’t want to be plugged into
a machine, it’s quite
possible that that will be it for me. You
either did right or you did wrong. It’s
very possible that it’s a core point in the argument with the
Adversary. No
matter how many ghoulish devices the
Adversary compels atheists to invent to keep deceased cadavers alive,
as a God-fearing
individual you are expected to stay at your post and remain alive for
decades
if necessary. I
think that’s the
underlying point of a lot of these things.
Let’s make things really
complicated for those who believe in God.
That’s the reality, to me. The ostensible reality is
“Let’s keep
everyone alive as long as we can and never stop to consider if
we’re supposed
to be doing that”. It’s
just part of
being born in this time period and trying to be a proper monotheist. Medicine is going to make
it progressively
more complicated. To
me, you make your
own call, realize that your soul is at stake and that something that is
completely out of your control—prolongation of human
existence by any means
necessary—is turning the fate of your soul into a coin toss. Dom: "If you don't believe in God, the odds are that you believe very strongly in drugs." Others have already commented in the inherent logical flaw in this position, so I won't bother. Aaaaah. Fuck it. I keep hearing about how gracious and friendly Dave is in person, but he's one truculent, snarky curmudgeon in his prose. Dave: I
don’t think that’s the case. I think
you’re projecting your own
nature onto me because of the soul-deep discomfort you experience when
you read
what I have to say. You want to bury me
as you’ve buried your own soul under metric tons of
Adversary. It’s a
natural response. I used to be the same way.
I’m opening a can of
worms with my “power of
attorney” choices that everyone prefers would remain
closed. If you
don’t want to be reminded that your
soul is very likely in extreme peril, then don’t read what I
have to
say. Distract yourself with music or videos or
games or chit-chat or whatever else you want to distract yourself
with. Your life—like everyone’s
life—is going by
very quickly and will be over before you know it. In the same
sense
that you can recall vividly your earliest
years, you are already on your deathbed.
You’re really going to have to cram a lot of distractions
into the
short
time you have left. Dom: In case you're wondering, no I won't be declaring myself a Dave acolyte who believes the 14 Impossible Things are Impossible etc. in order to get the privilege of participating in his medical care. Frankly, even if I believed all Dave believes, including the 14 Impossible Things, I would not do so, especially in response to a call such as this. A failure of gumption, no doubt. Dave: You
said it. I didn’t. Hey,
I was only going to answer about half of this but then I found
out that there is no committee meetings scheduled at City Hall today. Which is a good thing
because I have to be
here for when some artwork has to be returned from the Harbourfront
Graphic
Novel exhibit (not announced as an appearance because it was during
Ramadan so
I wasn’t going to be there), I have to pick up my
dry-cleaning and I have to
get some printing done in advance of the Big Apple Con this weekend. Printing what? You’ll have to
be there Thursday night to find out.
Steve: Every Christian and every Jew believes in the God of Islam. They
just
disagree on the status of Mohammad as a Prophet and whether or not SOME
of the
things Muslims believe about God are true. But with few exceptions on
the
fringes of all three religions, most people recognize that they all
believe in
the same God. Dave: I’m
not sure if that’s true except in the most
“politically correct”
sense of the debate. I
hope it
ultimately proves to be true and is the meaning behind the Koran
exhorting
Muslims to continue to fight “on path of God until all the
religion be
God’s”—we all hook up somewhere up ahead
if we sincerely submit to God’s
will. Most
Christians and Jews—at least
until recently—believed that Muslims believed in a god called
Allah. Or that
Muslims were Mohammedans in the
Christian sense, worshippers of Muhammad.
I think there’s a certain amount
of lip service paid by ecumenical
Christians and Jews to the validity of Islam but it seems to me that
truly
ecumenical Christians and Jews—Mother Theresa as a good
example judging by her
funeral service—tend to be of the “more babies,
more bathwater” school of
theological debate. Let’s
include
Islam, and while we’re at it, let’s include
Hinduism and Native Indian beliefs
and goddess worship and Wicca. The
Lunatic All-Inclusive, in my view.
The
fact that Muslims believe that Jesus was not—as the Koran
explicitly states in
numerous suras—the son of God puts them beyond the pale of
most Christian
debate in the same way that Christian definitive belief that Jesus was
the
Meschiach puts them beyond the pale of most Jewish debate. There may be some
Christians who don’t
believe that Jesus was the son of God and there may be some Jews who
believe
that Jesus was the Meschiach. However, pretty much by definition,
Christians
believe that Jesus was the son of God and the Meschiach and Jews
believe that
Jesus wasn’t the son of God and the Meschiach is yet to
arrive.
Chris:
I have to disagree with you there. The theologians certainly do, but
the
layperson generally does not, in my experience. And even where there is
acknowledgement that they are all worshipping the same god, there is
almost
universally the belief that those other faiths are "doing it wrong". As
an example, Billy Beach is a devout Jehovah’s Witness. In his prayers he mentions
Jehovah by
name. I had no
problem participating in
those prayers at meal-time when I was visiting because I know that he
means
God. Again, if I
said to him, “After
you’re done praising Jehovah make sure that you curse the
name of God as the
false God and usurper of YHWH’s glory” I know he
would be appalled and refuse
to do so. Ergo, to
me, he’s a
monotheist.
Dan
P: If you do not trust the health care system (and Dave sure isn't the
only
one) then the idea of being subjected to it with anything less than
100% of
your facilities is not a pleasant one. Dave:
It’s probably not particularly efficacious,
either—it’s more that, in
order to cross all the t’s and dot all the i’s of
my “end of life” legalisms
(which is what I set out to do) I had to come up with something that I
thought
would cover all eventualities to the extent that all eventualities
could be
covered. If God
wants me ravaged with
an incurable disease or my brain destroyed by misdiagnosed medicine
then that’s
what’s going to happen.
If, however,
it’s just the Adversary causing trouble, then there are a
certain number of
steps to assist in your own defense (which is what I’m trying
to do here) that
I think you’re kind of obligated to take rather than just
saying “Well, I’ll
just leave ‘power-of-attorney’ blank and count on
God to bail me out.” That’s
backing God into a corner, in my
view. Sorry, God,
too busy to cover my
own bases here—please toss me a miracle at the appropriate
moment, Sincerely,
Dave. The
sort of things you document I think are pretty well universal in
hospitals and doctor’s offices.
These
guys get a lot of kickback money from the major drug companies to
prescribe
high-priced medication. And,
to be fair
to them, there’s no way that I can see for them know if
there’s any value to
the medication given the universal reality of the placebo effect. You give the medication to
a hypochondriac
who just wanted to have someone “feel their pain”
for thirty minutes and it’ll
clear right up. If
you give it to
someone who actually has a medical problem it could make things worse
or do
nothing. You might
as well just flip a
coin at that point or say “Take some of these and if they
don’t help, come back
and I’ll prescribe something else.”
Even in that case it might be a
hypochondriac whose self-pity has hit an
all-time high and you’ll have to prescribe three different
medications—three
different thirty-minute “I feel your pain”
sessions—before their mind will stop
making the pain up. Or
they might get
laid or win the lottery and suddenly they feel better.
Steroids have become very popular with the
medical profession for the exact reason that they make people feel
better in
the short term. Make
them feel like
Superman, in fact. The
same reason that
they used to give housewives speed: “mother’s
little helper”. Steroids
and speed are obviously (to me,
anyway, obviously) bad long-term solutions to anything and are very
difficult
to wean people off of. Doctors
don’t
seem to be unduly troubled by that when it comes to prescribing
steroids and
speed. Rick
S: You know, this sounds a lot like me. I
mean, I think I've been pretty public about all of the above for years.
Scary, hunh?
Larry
H: And I thought you were excluded on a technicality for not giving
Islam equal
weight with Christianity, but upon re-reading Dave's request, I see
that's not
a condition. He doesn't say you can't be a husband or father either. I
say go for it. Billy
Beach is also a husband and a father.
Feminism makes it supremely difficult to be
a God-fearing husband
and father but nothing is impossible with God, including keeping
feminism at
bay either in a wife or a daughter as long as you realize that your
relationship with God dwarfs your relationship with your wife or
daughter in
importance. Dave: Yes,
exactly. The Koran
assures us that our disagreements will be cleared up for us on Judgment
Day. Given the
limited range of
perception and understanding that we have in our
“meat-encased” existences (not
knowing when a soul enters a fetus as a good example of our intrinsic
ignorance
of core realities) it seems more sensible to work on developing faith
and what
we consider good orthopraxy than to expend a lot of time on subjects
the
accuracy of which are beyond our ability to determine.
Life’s tough enough and anything I
can put
off to Judgment Day because a human being is incapable of coming to a
conclusion
about it based on evidence, I’m more than glad to put off to
Judgment Day. Dave: Yes,
allowances have to be made although making allowances means that
as a society we are digging ourselves deeper into the feminist pit on a
daily
basis. At some
point either men have to
start drawing a line in the sand or we are apt to get beyond the point
of no
return where we can’t climb out of the feminist pit. It’s one of the
reasons I’m so vocally opposed to feminism because
happenstance has— thank God and God willing—put me
beyond reach of their
talons. That’s
where it has to start
and then move on to the fellows who will be putting their livelihoods
at risk
by openly dissenting from the feminist dictatorship.
Everyone has to decide for himself when the
time is right, as I
did in 1994. Dave: It’s
a tough call because I’m not exactly a theological guide and
I’m
unwilling to be cast in that role.
I
can tell you the areas of disagreement between Judaism, Christianity
and Islam
but I can’t tell you which number to put your money on. If Jesus was
God’s son and there was only
one Jesus and he was the Meshiach, it seems to me that Judaism and
Islam are
going to be of very little use to you and would, in that case, be
blasphemous
heresies. There
might be something in
the Book of Isaiah that would hit Matt like a ton of bricks and make
him See
The Light, so I’d be doing him a disservice by saying just
read the
Pentateuch. Matt’s
girlfriend, Paula
(hi, Paula!) is a borderline lapsed Catholic who is going to Mass only
because
Matt will go with her. If
Matt doesn’t
go, she’s going to stop going.
Something of a theological nut-cracker for
young Matthew. That
may be how God is setting about the
task or it could be the Adversary as well (“If attending
Catholic Mass for six
months doesn’t scare him away from God, I don’t
know what will”). Those
are Matt’s choices to make.
Submission to the will of God is all that I
counsel. After
that, God’s will be
done. Dave: Yes,
I would agree that the inclination and intent count for a
lot. At the same
time, Billy Beach is
definitely not a feminist and from what I saw from the week I was there
he’s a
very good husband and father. There
might be a world of difference between being “unshackled from
a woman” and
“unshackled from women”.
I tend to see
them as tending to go bad out of perverse resistance.
She can seem like a good wife and mother,
but if she’s watching Desperate
Housewives she could be ready to bolt at any point. A
woman’s right to
choose. I’m not sure how much egg that leaves on the
husband’s face in God’s
eyes but I tend to suspect “Quite a bit”.
If the vast majority of women ever start
behaving like “wives and
mothers” and potential “wives and
mothers” and stop using the escape hatch,
then it might be safe to go back in the pool but I don’t see
that happening
anytime soon. My
best guess in terms of
percentages is that maybe 5% of women are potentially wives and mothers
and 95%
are capable of changing their minds at any point without notice and
bolting. Those are
lousy odds when it comes to getting
“shackled” and I assume that God, at this point in
human history, is more in
the market for men who are willing to be vocally unshackled and
identify
feminism as a societal malaise (where its failings outweigh its
benefits in the
long term) than men who are willing to give their marriages 110% and
end up
standing there with egg on their faces.
Dave: That’s
a bit of a distortion since it would suggest that I know what
“sure” is and that I could assure Matt that I know
what “sure” is which I
don’t. Again,
I can tell you what I see
as the major disagreements but I’m no more
“sure” than I would be saying that
you will always win at roulette if you bet “Red 17”
first. You may well
win every time you bet “Red 17”
first but that’s more likely to be an accident than anything
to do with my
being “sure”.
Dave: Yes,
that’s one of those things.
The Adversary can certainly see it as a
signal triumph that out of
however many thousand Cerebus readers only two or three are willing to
openly
declare on the two subjects. At
the
same time, I think that can have a negative effect from the
Adversary’s
viewpoint because it might wake some people up to what the percentages
are in
both categories. I
don’t think God
finds it unduly troubling. He’s
got
three guys to work with if the Adversary tries to take me out by
conventional
Marxist means. That’s
all I was trying
to do—was to make sure He would “have a dog in that
fight” without leaving it
entirely up to Him. If
there are six
guys by the year 2010, well so much the better. All along with the Cerebus
experiment I’ve been the pathfinder and it’s a
responsibility I take
seriously. If
there’s a Dave Sim up
ahead who isn’t an innovator but who is necessary to God (and
dramatically more
necessary than Dave Sim was) then I see it as my job to plot a complete
life
trajectory, identify the pitfalls and if necessary end up dying because
I made
a wrong choice so that whoever he is knows not to make that choice when
he gets
to that juncture. I
learned a lot from
Elvis and John Lennon up to a point and then they both went off the
rails in my
view and let love supersede their obligation to the musicians that
would come
after them. If you
follow Elvis’
trajectory you end up face down in front of the toilet with your pants
around
your ankles and a pagan paperback open on the floor at 42. If you follow John
Lennon’s trajectory you
end up shot to death in front of your apartment building at 40. If
you talk about these things while you’re still alive you
really
irritate people and you make them hate you and want to destroy you. To me, it’s more
important to serve as a
template for future people who want to attempt your course of action
than it is
to be vaguely admired by the general populace. _______________________________________________________ Matt D: Reading the Bible and the Koran is just sorta hedge-betting to me. I'm pretty sure I'll agree and we'll be off to the races, but I really wanna be sure. Thank God I'm not the only one willing to do this (accept Dave's offer,) it'd scare the pants off me if I was the only one. (Gee me and Jeff S. and (maybe) Rick, against the world!) Dave: There
was a great cartoon by Vip (I think it was) in Playboy years
ago—massed legions of mounted heavily armed pike vanishing
out onto the
horizon. In the
bottom left corner, a
guy in a bearskin with a club standing next to two cripples with
pointed
sticks. Up above
them is the director
with the film crew behind him shouting through his megaphone
“Okay, Kirk,
sweetie—Let’s take it from your line
‘Come on! They can’t stop men who want to
free!’” I’ve
thought about that cartoon
a LOT since 1994.
________________________________________________ (on Terry Schiavo) Jeff S: Due to what he sees as the atheistic "fear of death" (which I disagree with) and the marxist/feminist notion of undermining a man's wishes, or the will of God for that matter... It makes sense in that regard. It seems contrary to what we saw with the whole terry Schaivo drama, but what was motivating the politicians who supported keeping her alive? Who were they trying to satisfy? Dave: Their
respective constituencies.
Politicians are usually trying to just get
in on the most popular
viewpoint and avoid the most unpopular viewpoint.
In the blue state/red state checkerboard
pattern of the modern
United States it would depend on the jurisdiction.
In San Francisco or Portland, pulling the
plug would be a
political no-brainer (er—in a manner of speaking) and a good
way to score
brownie points in the ranks of the electorate.
In Alabama or Mississippi, I would think
that supporting “life at all
costs” would be a way of picking up brownie points from the
electorate. Most
other places were probably just as
happy to see it disappear from the headlines before their politicians
were
forced to piss off half of their constituency by making a choice. ________________________________________________ (response to Rick Sharer) Steve
B: Again, if I remembered your stance wrongly, I apologize. But I
thought
you were weighing in on the side of the parents in the Schiavo case.
And the
public perception, certainly the perception of most of those on the
"just
let her die" side of the fence, was that everyone siding with the
parents
was "keep her alive in perpetuity, no matter what, Dave: Obviously,
I tend to think in terms of the intellectual viewpoints
involved rather than, say, “the parents”.
If you ask me what I think is right, that
would be one answer, if you
ask me what the law says, that would be another answer.
In terms of “power of attorney for
personal
care” if the individual hasn’t got a notarized
written preference then the
decision falls to the “next of kin” and as far as I
know “spouse trumps family”
in that particular paper/rock/scissors game although in anything having
to do
with the courts the wanton and indiscriminate application of money is
ultimately going to be the deciding factor.
If the spouse wants to pull the plug because
that’s what the patient
would’ve wanted, but the parents are willing to mortgage
their house and cash
in all their securities to pay a high-priced legal firm to fight it,
the odds
are the parents are going to win whether they’re right in a
general sense or
right about the patient specifically.
___________________________________________________ Stanley L: Dave's explication, and to a lesser extent his solution, are so specific as to make a higher percentage of agreements statistically unlikely -- I don't think it is any surprise to him if people continue to collectively roll their eyes. Dave: No,
I’ve pretty much accepted at this point that people
collectively
roll their eyes about me as a matter of course.
With all due respect, I think it’s
much easier to roll your eyes
than to have a coherent worldview that you’re capable of
defending. Dave: Well,
no. Actually that’s eminently reasonable.
I certainly haven’t heard back
from Wilf,
nor do I particularly expect to. It’s
just as likely he’s joined in the collective eye-rolling. Even if he’s
able to frame my “power of
attorney for personal care” as I’ve outlined it,
there’s no guarantee that the
courts would allow it or uphold it.
My
best guess is that they would take it out of my hands and put it in my
family’s
hands which is why I have to be so vehement in wanting my family
excluded. Any chink
in the armour and they’re going to
be in there like a dirty shirt. And,
in
the immediate crisis we’re speculating about, I agree. Doctors is doctors. They think
they’re God because most people
treat them that way, so I would assume in the lunatic asylum they work
in the
odds are they would just bypass Sandeep and demand a contact name for a
family
member. The
Doctor/Family Axis is
pretty much unassailable. I
don’t think
that’s right, but I certainly acknowledge that it’s
realistic. Wilf’s
a pretty imaginative guy. If
anyone is able to frame a supportable
document I would imagine he is. Dave: All
part of the job description—and just think: I don’t
charge you a
penny for the services provided! All
this ethical societal aggravation is FREE FREE FREE!! Actually
I’m not sure of
myself. I make my
choices on a “going
forward” basis and I accept that I have to live with the
consequences if those
choices are wrong. That’s
why I
strongly recommend that no one take my word for anything. My soul is at stake on the
basis of my
choices. Your soul
is at stake on the
basis of your choices.
Jeff T: Or that it seems like a good idea to have
people that actually
share my beliefs make decisions for me when I can't? Decisions that I
may
actually agree with? But whether or not the Doctor is influenced by Dave's comics or essays is irrelevant. Will the doctor, without outside influence, act in a way other than the Marxist Medical Association expects him/her to act? Will Dave's wishes be fulfilled in a way that Dave would agree with? Dave's looking for insurance against the Way Things Are, and he's not not going to get that from people that don't share his views. So yeah, the second half of your last paragraph is an unreasonable statement. Let's
not turn this into an attack on Dave, OK? The guy asked
for help and/or input on a sensitive issue, not to be skewered *yet
again*. If
you're so set on proving him wrong, stop proving him right. Dave:
It’s all right, Jeff. I
don’t
want to be like the Marxist-feminists and close off debate because
people
disagreeing with me is somehow “wounding”.
If I’m
“wounded” by honest reactions—which
I’m sincerely not—that says
far more about my own position than it does about people disagreeing
with
me. I
knew exactly the can of worms
that I was opening by bringing the “power of attorney for
personal care” to the
Yahoos on the basis that I did and I had a pretty good idea what the
reaction
was going to be. In
my experience doing
what you think is right can never factor in possible or likely
reactions as a
basis for decision-making (What will people think of me?). There’s right
and there’s wrong and most of
the time in our world doing what’s right entails severe
consequences and doing
what’s wrong is pretty much clear sailing.
I’ve done both and
that’s been my experience, anyway. Dave:
Or disrespect it and speak up—of course I’d prefer
that people
speaking up limit themselves to contributions that are useful to the
project at
hand: i.e. how to supersede the Way Society Does Things with what I
want
society to do in my own case. But
there’s no reason that someone couldn’t rationally
dispute the whole idea,
suspect my own motives and attempt to undermine my argument as being
inherently
detrimental to society in all sincerity—just as I do with
Marxist-feminism. If
you don’t want
your own viewpoints suppressed you can’t advocate the
suppression of other
viewpoints.
(more Terry Schiavo) Jeff:
For the most part, yes, but even that was a dog and pony show
meant to distract from the political agenda of restructuring
congressional and
judicial powers. Reigning in renegade lower courts (in Florida no less!) Dave:
I think at the very least you should be aware if you are in the
catbird seat when it comes to “power of attorney for personal
care” and who is
in the catbird seat when it comes to your own “power of
attorney for personal
care”. Here’s
a good example: husband
says to his wife, “I don’t want to be kept alive
artificially. If
there’s any brain damage, I want you to
authorize pulling the plug.”
Wife: “I
don’t think I could do that.”
You’re
better off knowing. That
way you take
the decision out of your wife’s hands and put it in your
family’s hands or in
the hands of someone who is going to do what you want them to do by
putting it
down on paper legally and having it notorized.
If you’re a spouse or the next of
kin for anyone you should ask them
what they want to have done and make sure that they get it legally put
down on
paper if its at variance with the opinion of anyone else who might be a
party
to the decision-making. It’s
not
particularly relevant what you
come up with so long as you come
up with something and get it
framed in legal terms. Terry
Schiavo and her husband evidently had
the conversation but they didn’t get it put in writing and
notarized. It
would’ve saved them and America a lot of
aggravation if they had. << More in-fighting. "This group existed long before Dave" "Don't talk about him behind his back" "He's crazy" "No he's not">> <<Etc, Etc>> Dave:
Policy is a little different since I
get these print-outs. You’re
not talking behind my back except in
a time-delayed sense. I
accept that the
vast majority of people think I’m crazy.
That’s what I’m trying
to work around because it does potentially have
long-term repercussions in my life particularly as pertains to
“power of
attorney for personal care”.
I don’t
think saying I’m crazy is particularly helpful in any
discussion. I like
to think that if you think I’m crazy
that you would steer clear of my work and people who admire/enjoy my
work. I
don’t see what’s served in just endlessly
repeating that Dave Sim is crazy or collectively rolling your eyes no
matter
what Dave Sim says. On
the other hand,
it may provide a useful catharsis for its participants and
it’s pretty easy to
avoid when it comes to my own decision-making.
Am I crazy?
I decided some time
back that, no. I’m not crazy so I don’t see any
pressing need to revisit the
question as often as many others seem to see just such a pressing need. Jeff:
All valid points, and food for thought. Thanks. Dave:
I’m pretty much able to hone in
on the core points of an argument and
determine for myself what I think is right and what I think is wrong. I’m pretty sure
that you can’t do that if
you’re *very* emotional/sensitive since those time periods in
my life when I
was the most emotional/sensitive were the ones where I made the worst
decisions. Jeff: and has adopted an unemotional stance for self preservation. Dave:
I can assure that un-emotionalism is
no more a “stance” with me than
emotionalism is a “stance” with you. In
both cases it’s a choice.
You think
(or, more likely, feel) that emotions need to be
factored into
decision-making and my own conclusion based on long, hard experience is
that
emotions are detrimental to decision-making.
I reserve my emotions for things like 9/11,
the earthquake in Kashmir,
the drowning of New Orleans where my own decision-making
doesn’t apply but
where I see the Hand of God Writ Large.
My Eid Mubarak card from Reflections on
Islam this year shows a ticking
clock and quotes Sura Jonah 10:49 “For every nation there is
an appointed
term. When their
term comes, they
cannot delay it for an hour or advance it.”
You know: Happy Eid-al-fitr everyone!
But it’s a very
Islamic approach
to address it directly. Kashmir
got hit
by this massive earthquake that killed tens of thousands in the first
few days
of Ramadan. What
else would you have to
say when Ramadan is over? This
is what
God wants us to be thinking about, obviously.
The big debate now is whether the earthquake
was a judgment on
Musharraf’s government in Pakistan for siding with the
Americans in the War on
Terror or on Kashmir as an al-Qaeda hotbed.
To me it seems kind of obvious.
The earthquake didn’t hit
Pakistan, it hit Kashmir. But,
again,
these are large issues which genuinely touch
my emotions. Having
the flu for three months didn’t touch
my emotions. Where
my own
decision-making applies or is central (as with “power of
attorney for personal
care”) I just keep the emotions at a remove from it because I
want to make the
right choice. Jeff: Whatever the case may be, I don't want to belabor this *particular* subject with this kind of thing. If he's trying to trust a group of people more than usual, I don't want to slap his hand away. Dave:
No, there again it appears to me that
you’re trying to make it into an
emotion-based construct—that I’m
“reaching out” to people and “trying to
trust
a group of people”. I’m
trying to make
the best possible decision that I can that will create the greatest
likelihood
of a positive outcome in the eyes of God.
Whether my society will allow me to do that
or not is the issue. Belief
in God and Disbelief in Feminism to
me are two cornerstones of sanity in our society and I would rather
that anyone
making decisions on my behalf be as demonstrably sane as possible
before I
create a situation where they are allowed to do so.
That’s not the same thing, in my
view, as reaching out to people
or trying to find people I can trust. Jeff: There are better
subjects for
such Sim deconstruction, IMO. Certainly there's no defending "Men grow
from sperm, Women grow from eggs" unless it's some kind of clever
analogy
lost on the masses! Dave:
On the contrary, I think if you analyze sperm nature and egg nature
you’ll find that a lot of masculine attributes can be linked
to the former and
feminine attributes to the latter.
The
deeper reading I did on the initial stages of the development of the
blastocyst
(and even earlier in the process) which I didn’t have room to
incorporate into
289/290 only confirmed those viewpoints for me. Dave:
With all due respect, Jeff, I think your uneasiness is soul-deep. These discussions touch on
the secular
context that you inhabit as well as I do and that you need to make as
many hard
decisions as I do and get them put down in the form of a legal document
after
having a number of very uncomfortable discussions with the relevant
figures in
your own “power of attorney for personal care”
construct. The
construct exists even if you don’t take
an active role in shaping it. I
think
you have the disadvantage of not really having any belief system to
apply to
your decision-making. What
do you want
done if you’re incapacitated and why is that what you want to
have done? It’s
far easier discussing Terry S. as if
she’s some remote laboratory specimen and the only one who
will ever go through
it rather than considering that you could be the next Terry S. Jeff: He also attributed the "Give Elian Gonzoles political asylum in order to keep him from is father" attitude to atheist/marxist/feminists. If you believe that was the sole reason, then yes. Dave: I do think that the father should have control over a minor’s decision-making where that decision-making is at variance with the mother’s wishes which I think was the core issue in that story. As far as I know the father is a communist ideologue which I’m not. To me, the father controlling a minor’s decision-making supersedes all other considerations including what I or anyone else might think is in the minor’s best interests.Larry
H: Except that it was conservative Republicans (anti-Castro) who were
doing that,
not Democrats or lefties. And if conservative Republicans are
atheist/marxist/feminists too, then why does Dave consider them to be
"his
team"? Jeff:
No idea. Does Dave still believe that about the Gonzalez
episode? Could it be that "bad seeds" within the Republican party did
this for said reasons (and also to contradict Clinton in every way
possible -
making him appear to be a Castro/Communist supporter)? And in calling
them
"his team" is it just that they most closely match Dave: If by “the sort of people” you mean people who believe in God and who aren’t feminists, yes, that’s exactly “the sort of people” I was hoping would agree. That’s why I made those the criteria. Rick S: One thing Dave *is* sure of, is that he's screening out the people who *aren't* going to be saying "yes", and apparently that's much more important to him. Dave has been blasted for two things over the last decade: his stance on the Genders (to the point of being habitually labelled as a "misogynist"), and his newly found belief in God. Is it any wonder that he would require these two declarations from people he needs to trust? Billy B: I've just got back from a few days away on business in Belfast, so I woke up at 4 this morning in Belfast, have been on a plane for 3 hours to Rome from which I drove across to the other side of Italy taking a further 3 1/2 hours. I'm now back in the office at work and have seen some of the postings on this matter. I will now proceed to print out this text from Dave and read it closely over the weekend hopefully coming to some kind of decision on what position to take, or what steps I need to take so as to clarify what all this entails. From what I've read in the group's replies to this post (I haven't read any of Dave's text yet directly) I would agree with Dave's one God position though I obviously do not think that all 3 monotheistic religions or their respective multitude of offshoot religions are serving their one God in the way He suggests. I would also agree with his anti-feminist stance, I am quite open in conversation when the topic comes up that I am not a feminist explaining why not, but Dave does see me as a married man to have capitulated to the feminist stance (I may wait until Dave's reply to my latest letter arrives before taking a official position about this, as I brought the subject up in it). Dave:
As Billy would have discovered I
don’t see him as having capitulated
to feminism by marrying Francesca.
I
think it does put him in a potentially awkward context relative to his society
depending on how Francesca chooses to be.
At the same time, I’m reasonably
certain that Francesca is a devout
Jehovah’s Witness and that that serves to check her
conventionally rebellious
female nature which I think devout faith tends to do.
If, as a woman, you have eliminated God from
consideration or
reconfigured Him in your feminist image, then I think you will just go
through
life rebelling and, thus, making you a problem for any guy who makes
the
mistake of finding himself within your context.
I also don’t envy Billy when it
becomes apparent the level of
feminist indoctrination to which Emily and Kevin will be subject when
they get
into the later grades. That’s
my
biggest concern as an anti-feminist is that I would be legally kept
from
raising my children as anti-feminists because of the feminist
dictatorship (of
course my wife would have left long before that, but there’s
still the level of
responsibility—my son’s being turned into a little
girl and my daughter is
being trained to become a man and there’s nothing I can do
about it) Billy:: I also do not agree
with those
who think that medicine is the solution to all problems, the only
medication I
use regularly is Ventolin for my Asthma, I also use other medication Larry
H: Maybe it
bugs you just a *little* bit that no matter how close
you've gotten to Dave through recent correspondence, no matter
how
supportive you've demonstrated yourself to be, no matter how much hard
work you've done on his behalf here on the list...he still
equates
you with Hilary Clinton or Cindy Sheehan "in the final
analysis".I
certainly understand if that's the case. ;) Dave:
Larry I really wish that if you are going to take this direct attack
approach on my politics that you leave the little
“winky-smiley” face off of
the end. As a
general rule, I tend to
find it a lazy literary device which allows people to be a little more
direct
than they want to be and then to take the edge off by putting those
idiotic
symbols in there ;). See
what I
mean? Just for the
record, no one gets
close to Dave. It
is (inexplicably) a
thing devoutly to be wished in some quarters but as I just finished
explaining
in a letter to Dan Parker, what I’m interested in are ideas. I was interested in the
13-page David Brin
piece that you sent me if only because you thought that his view of the
Iraqi
occupation reflects your own viewpoint more eloquently than you could
manage. There have
been other things you’ve
sent that were just tedious or, to me, irrelevant. In neither case did
I
respond to the name on the envelope apart from recognizing who it was
from. I respond
when I open the
envelope and see what the person has to say and what question they want
me to
answer. I try to
answer all questions
but if the answer to the question is “I just don’t
think that evidence supports
feminism as a positive force in society” then I’m
not apt to have a positive
response to the person’s letter.
If the
next letter allows me to commit to paper something I’ve been
mulling over for
the previous four weeks then I’m apt to have a positive
response to that
letter. But in
neither case does the
response “carry over”.
Oh, yay—a letter
from Dan Parker. I’ve
had letters from
Dan that were in both categories.
I
take them as they come.
> Jeff
T: Not really, but only because I *expect* that. It just seems an odd
forum for such a request to me. But for someone with no family
connections, and
apparently very few friends, I suppose it makes sense. Of
course I'd be lying if I said I wasn't at least a *little* upset
about being "shut out" of this current policy-- but at the same time
I'm relieved that
this laid-back-and-jovial-on-the-outside-but-stressed-out-control-freak-on-the-inside
has one less thing to be responsible for because it's completely out of
my
control. It's Dave's choice, and that's fine with me! I will
continue to help where I can, to be a part of the community,
and be involved with Dave until he tells me to "Go On, Beat It, and
Scram" because I respect the man, his work... and of course -- I'm a
raving, drooling fanboy:) Unknown:
Did he think it said a good thing or a bad thing? Unknown: Larry, I would guess, from his tone of voice that it would indicate the overall decline of society as we know it; or, at least, as he knows it.That's what I figured, but I need to specify further. What seemed to be indicative of a bad thing to him? The fact that a few people responded so quickly (indicating we're all geeks with no life off-line)? The fact that ONLY a few people responded so quickly? Thefact that people responded so SLOWLY? Larry:
'Cause at the very least, he's mistaken about how quickly the responses
came.
It wasn't up for 48 hours before Matt made his pledge and you and Rick
chimed
in, was it? Less than a day, to my recollection. And if the post was up
for
longer than that before I actually read it, well, does Dave think all
of us are
here on line all the time? I'm asking a legitimate question here, not
presuming I know the answer. Just
what did Dave seem disappointed with? Dave: Obviously (?): that out of thousands of potential candidates only two or three were willing to state publicly that they believe in God and that they think feminism is misguided. I wasn’t disappointed. I was certainly curious as to how many—if any—would volunteer. Had I been heart-stoppingly inter |
