A Brief History of America

My friend sent me this. I would like to share his profound knowledge of history with you:

Ahh, the Fourth of July. Who doesn’t like the Fourth of July? Evildoers don’t, that’s who. Because the Fourth of July represents the beginning of the country that God Himself ordained to bring the destruction of all Evildoers around the world. Let’s recount that glorious and holy history and all the things God had us do, since, after all, we are a Christian nation of only the highest moral caliber. I mean, the Puritans, come on, they are a shoo-in for ethical paradigm. As we all know, giving-up, throwing your hands in the air, and saying, “Well, I don’t like this situation here, so let’s all just move away across the Atlantic” is the courageous and the proper way to deal with trouble and disagreement. I mean, that’s what we teach our kids right? Run away and flee from problems, don’t try to deal with them. And when those purest of Puritans got here, they used the native peoples’ friendship to gain survival knowledge, and then kicked them out of their homes. I am sure the Puritans were only thinking of what a great, Godly nation this would be if they would just swindle the native people out of their land and territory with horribly unfair trades. And how about those witches! They sure got them! I mean, nothing says ‘Solid theology’ like irrationally accusing young women of worshiping the devil. Arbitrary, Draconian law systems are really the best representation of revealed truth. Let’s also not forget the smallpox-ridden blankets that the Puritans distributed about the native population. It’s really only the first step to a national, God approved, genocide that would continue for many decades to come. Because when you flee from persecution, the best way to respond is to persecute everyone else in a textbook bully mentality.
But all that was before we were The United States of America, so let’s just go to the beginning of the organized government. We start this great nation by killing the British in guerrilla warfare. But this was not good enough, so in 1812 we went back for some more and killed a few more British and attempted to steal some land from the British, Spanish, and a few Indian tribes while we were at it. Of course, between these two wars we were not just twiddling our thumbs, oh no, we were killing Indians to while away the time. Not only were we killing Indians in between, but we also decided to take a little vacation and sail up the Barbary Coast. You know, to do a little relaxing, a little fishing, and a little piracy. Nothing says ‘American’ quite like state sponsored piracy to teach those Muslim pirates not to be pirates or Muslim–by way of murder.
Then, after some bad politics and an underhanded populous take over of Mexican territory, the Americans living in Mexican land decided that they did not want to give up their human slaves. Apparently, killing Africans was not good enough, so we started killing Mexicans. Of course, the Mexicans wanted the land back, so we continued to kill them for a little bit more, you know to get those ideas out of their blood.
After killing some Mexicans, we acquired more land and started killing each other. All this while, I should mention, from the time of killing British to killing each other, we were also killing black people, and would continue to do so sporadically, slowly dying off up to the 1960’s. We never really got tired of killing each other either, continuing to do so today as part of petty crimes. I mean, why the hell not. When God made this country with his own hands, He also drafted an amendment to the constitution we still have around that says we all should get to have guns. You know, just incase I find an invading monarch in my backyard one morning and need to shoot him.
Well, things turned sour in Cuba for the Spanish, and we decided this would be a good time to say we want peace, but act to gain more territory. So naturally, we sent our military presence into the middle of somebody else’s’ fight. The double speak began, and so did our killing of the Spanish. In the end we got what we wanted, more land.
On that note, internally we were creating state sponsored genocide of the native American peoples with such acts viciously named and executed as the Indian Removal Act and organizing mass moves and takeovers in the idea of ‘more land’. There have been some great marches in world history, but one of the best has to be our own, American born, Trail of Tears. Over many years and leading into modern American history, we have never really been sure what to do with these people. Well, at least we got the complete disenfranchisement, denial of proper representation (one of the reasons we killed British people), displacement, and abuse down pat. Yes, America nearly killed off an entire people.
Then a young, vibrant, and modern America toasted the new century by killing more Spanish for the very humane purpose of freeing the Filipinos. Freeing them right into our own colonial control. Naturally, once the Philippines were ours, we could then kill the Filipino guerillas at whim; and what are a couple hundred thousand collateral damages on the side? At least we got the land.
I seem to remember that somewhere in there we stated killing Hungarians, Germans, Bulgarians, Russians, Italians, Austrians, and Ottomans in the name of stopping all wars or something like that. But I guess it didn’t really last because before long we got busy killing Germans again. Of course, to be fair, the Germans might have deserved that one, but was it really necessary for us to steal their engineers of death for ourselves, not allow them to be tried in Nuremberg for the atrocious wars crimes they actively participated in, and have them build bigger killing machines for us with a promise of having that Godly, American hand over them to protect them. Which of course resulted in us creating what, I think I can safely say, was one of the larger, tragic events in the Japanese people’s history. I mean after all they had it coming, right? Once again, the proper response to a surprise attack on a military base is to bomb the living shit out of two civilian cities. We aren’t just talking about big bangs; we are also talking about leukemia, crippling and fatal birth defects, and massive cellular mutations that linger for generations. And on top of that, we interned our own citizens here while all that was playing out there–by presidential order.
It turns out, Russia got some Nazi scientists too, and so we had to make sure that our Jew enslaving scientists beat the other guys’ in creating our apoctolyptic toys for us. I mean, God forbid, if America doesn’t fulfill its duty as God’s keeper of peace–specially ordained. Obviously, capitalism = God, communism = Devil. One of those great theological statements we have made in the past, like about witches, or the slavery of the African people, or the removal of Indians, or the suspicious Japanese people.
Well, as we were on another great “red” witch-hunt, falsely accusing our own kind, we were also busy killing in South and Central America, asserting that theology of capitalism vs. communism. You know, the old, “We’ll use the CIA to overturn governments in other sovereign countries to bend their economics our way–by way of assassinations and instigated uprisings” strategy. That’s Holy, and 100% American.
It wasn’t long, of course, before we started killing Koreans, Chinese, and some Russians over this issue of God’s economics. We would return to this area to once again kill Vietnamese, but not before we almost got ourselves a bit of leukemia all having to do with that Cuban thing again. Boy, ever since the killing of the Spanish, we have really wanted that area, but never really got a great hold on it.
After killing Vietnamese, we got tangled up in the Middle East a bit here and there because people were killing each other after we had a part in changing all the boundary lines. That whole, “we’re sovereign, but we can ignore other countries sovereignty”. The classic double speak we often have the privilege of using as God’s messenger and performer of all His deeds.
And the Middle East brings us up to the present. We shot some Arabs. Took only the shortest of breaks, and then shot some more. We are still shooting them today. We’ll probably be shooting them for a while more now, all, of course, done for official reasons that have unofficially vacillated throughout the course of our killing them. But, we weren’t giving all our attention to the Middle East in the last few decades, oh no. If American is not equal opportunist, then you can call me Santa. How could we forget when we shot Panamanians and took the canal for ourselves–all in the name of democratic freedom, and strangely enough, neutral control of the canal.
All this and realizing that this all took place in just a short 231 years. And these are only the major events, there have always been other foreign and domestic involvements, but who has the time? 231 years, wow. Apparently Americans have the time. We make time for a good killing. How have we become the most powerful nation on the earth? Economics and God. God gave us the calling and permission to use His name for the production and propagation of our greatest export, killing and war. And dammit, who would have it any other way. So as we light our bottle rockets, we salute it and all it stands for. At the sound of the report, let’s say the pledge of allegiance:
I pledge allegiance to the flag
of the United States of America.
And to the republic for which it stands,
one nation, under God, indivisible,
with liberty, and justice for all.

Death Denial

Why is it that when the topic of death arises in conversations people tend to dismiss it as an inappropriate subject for discussion? Many times the topic of death is viewed as "morbid." Goths are stereotyped as "weird," "dark," or "messed up" because they commonly talk about death. Why do we call those who enjoy discussing death "weird?"

Maybe it's because we only think about death when American society has deemed it appropriate to - e.g. Funerals, Legal Wills, or War. See, there's a big difference between saying, "Yeah, I will die some day" and embracing death. Embracing death would mean something completely different from merely giving the topic attention at funerals, for legal wills, or during war (for example). How often do we RSVP to a party invitation with this response: "I plan to attend your party for certain, with the exception that I am run over by a car while crossing the street to your house; then in that case I will not be attending."

If death is certain and for the most part seems spontaneous, then what good is it to think about it day to day? First, I think its likely someone who doesn't think about death a great deal of time has not really accepted it. If we truly accepted death, how could we not factor it into the reality of our everyday life? Isn't it true that at any point we could die? Everyday, there is a chance that we could keep living or die. To not accept this as a reality is death denial.

Death denial is facetious because it does little to alter the reality of our situation. It is merely a way to "cope" with what is real, and to substitute a false approach to the world in which we live for a real one in order to "cope" with our fears is probably harmful to our individual self-fulfillment. I think this is true for two reasons: 1) When we see others die, especially those that we love, our death denial collides with reality. This leads to serious emotional and psychological problems, and as we grasp to fill the void death denial once did, we reach for other even more absurd things (the examples I will leave to you). 2) Individually, to live as if we might die abruptly brings a whole new perspective to human existence - one that motivates us to ambitiously explore and embrace life for everything that pleases us.

I think it's obvious that many people, especially in modern, industrial and advanced societies, have death denial. If Johnny, a computer tech service guy from some complicated company name who is indifferent towards his job, thought he was going to die in 8 hours, would he go into work to embrace his life one last time or would he spend that last 8 hours enjoying life in whatever ways please him?! Of course, we can't know exactly when we are going to die like Johnny did, but that's the point: we don't know if we are going to stay living either. And that makes all the difference! Think about it. If we truly embraced our imminent and spontaneous deaths, what would we spend our time and effort on?

Bass Pro Shop

I just got back from Springfield MO. I had a blast. The people I stayed with were fantastic, and the atmosphere was pleasant. I hope to go back sometime. It was only about a 3 1/2 hour drive from St. Louis.

One of my friends said, "Springfield is known for three things": 1) Pro-bass shop (a typical outsider attempt at describing their projected destination, which is Bass Pro Shop, to a gas station clerk at Kum & Go [yes, that's a real gas station name]) 2) Chinese restaurants, and 3) Churches. Before I went to Springfield, the only thing of these three that I hadn't heard about was the Chinese restaurants. I knew that Bass Pro Shop in Springfield was the third largest tourist attraction in Missouri - it being the home base and all. I also knew that Springfield is the "Bible belt" portion of Missouri, and it so happens, the most politically conservative region in Missouri. In fact, Republican candidates will announce their intention to run for the Republican Party in Springfield instead of St. Louis or Kansas City or anywhere else.

Even though I knew these things, my eyes widened as my friend drove me around mid-downtown and downtown Springfield; I watched church after church after church after church on both sides of the road zoom past my window. There was Baptist, First Baptist, Second Baptist, Baptist Church of America, Church of Christ, Methodist, First Methodist, New Methodist, Free Methodist, United Methodist, Dayspring, Christ Episcopal Church, PCA-Evangelical, PCA, PC-USA, Church of the Latterday Saints, Church of Jehovah's Witnesses, Church of the Seventh Day Adventists, Church of Christian Science, Church of God, Church of Jesus, Church of the Bible, Church of the Spirit, Doves, Figtrees, Living Waters, Life, Heavens, Vision, Harmony, etc....There was 1 mega-church for every 10 houses! When I say mega, I mean mega. These buildings were by far the largest in the whole city. Every single one covered at least a square block, with a parking lot able to accomodate several thousands of cars. They had shuttles and busses parked in their lots. They had playgrounds, basketball courts, soccer fields, etc. Some had little mini-malls in their buildings, with a starbucks, a play center, a library, a book store, chat rooms, class rooms, computer labs, etc. It's not that I haven't seen mega structures like this in St. Charles - I certainly have (e.g. Grace Church, Calvary, Church on the Rock, Harvester, etc.). But the mere size and quantity of these churches was overwhelming.

I think for sure these churches have it all good. They have so much money that they do not have to worry about what they need anymore; they get to progress to a luxurious life - one where they can support their wants. This is the simple dream of American life.

I get a bad feeling in my stomach when people choose to chase this dream for a life of luxury in exchange for their time and effort, which might be used otherwise. I get a bad feeling when I do it myself. I get the same bad feeling when I see churches doing it.

It's how institutions become "American." If you've ever wondered what it means to be an American, look at the churches and other institutions, then look at secular culture - they both have luxurious consumerism in common.

I'm not saying that consumerism is all bad; I'm not even saying that luxurious consumerism is all bad. I suppose the bad feeling in my stomach arises when I see it in play where I wish it wasn't the most. In this case, it is mega-churches that make me nauseous because they seem to convey a message of love over competition, eternity over self-worth, and sacrifice over consummation through their words, but when I take in the whole picture - one that reveals the actual amount of money a mega-church spends on increasing its self-worth and feeding its luxurious appetite - it seems they convey a message that is particularly American, a message that is particularly opposed to their words. I can't help but wonder: if actions are manifestations of beliefs, then what do Christians in not only Springfield MO but the rest of the US believe?

Words are never enough.