Extremism

Another tragic crime of hate in Parramatta, the horror of which further amplified by the fact that the perpetrator was only 15 years old.
Unfortunately, as is usual in recent times the murmurs (or shouts) of bigotry ensue. Whilst the perpetrator's beliefs were Islamic and the apparent motive behind his actions stem from his beliefs, it still remains the action of a misguided child that was brainwashed by a group of religious extremists. Now calls as to why the muslim community is not being vocal about distancing themselves from this person's actions are being tossed around.

Extremists have existed in our societies for as long as history has been recorded, and most likely even beyond that. The Spanish Inquisition, the attempt to assassinate King James in 1605 was Guy Fawkes and a group of Catholics, post civil war in the 1800's saw the Protestant based Klu Klux Klan emerge, more recently the National Liberation Front of Tripura in East India, the IRA and the anti-abortion violence in America to name a few.

As history has shown, extremists are born of many different belief structures and motives but they remain just that - extremists. The call for the muslim community to make a statement only serves to perpetuate the bigotted attitude that muslims are violent hateful people and provide a forum for those that believe this to further voice their narrow-minded baseless opinions. Quite simply stating that if the muslim community don't officially say anything, then that must mean they support them. Those in the media and influential positions (especially those in the religious circles, the old "people in glass houses" adage comes to mind) making commentary need to be more mindful of what they say and how it may incite and/or influence the minority in the community that are open to or already have bigoted opinions.

The question shouldn't be "Why haven't they made a statement?", it should be "Why do they need to?".

My thoughts and condolences go out to the Cheng family.

Friends

It seems almost a throw-away term nowadays.

Since the advent of myspace and the like, especially Facebook, it's constant (incorrect) use has all but eliminated meaning from the word. The apparent competition or need to have hundreds upon hundreds of "friends" that people barely know. A friend used to be someone you got to know, someone that you could talk to, even perhaps someone you could count on.

It's sad the number of people that place the importance on the number of friends, not the quality, amassing one after the other with gestures and promises only to fall short when the need arises.

Now I don't begrudge those that choose to have a large number of "friends" on facebook. Each to their own. Just think for a moment about the people in your life, both on and offline.

How many make claims?

How many follow through?

How many can you honestly say will be there for you in your time of need, if one was to arise?

You may be thinking that this is just a cynical view of society. Who knows, cynicism is really just born of experience. I guess if you had "acquaintances" instead on Facebook, it may not be the ingrained societal medium that it has become.

Societal Availability

An interesting term that came to me one day when talking with friends. We were speaking of various subjects that included dating, internet dating, infidelity, relationships and their 'lifespan'.

It seems that as society has progressed, a number of things have occurred in relation to relations. Not so often are childhood sweethearts growing together, marrying and raising a family and living their whole lives as one. Increased pressures exist to pursue a career from social, parental and societal influences as well as the social and societal message, if not pressure, to 'play the field', as a result many more young couples aren't lasting the distance as their priorities generally lay elsewhere; which is where the title comes in.

There seems to 4 camps;

1. The minority - meet young, stay together and live a long happy life with each other
2. The couples that meet young, rush into things, get married and unfortunately divorce.
3. The people that bide their time, waiting for that "perfect" partner to come along.
4. The people that all this just doesn't apply to.

Our world has, over the years, been quite rapidly becoming a smaller place to live in. People travel internationally and back for business within the duration of a week, whereas there was a time that would have had that same distance requiring a journey on a ship that took months to complete just one way. Telephones and the internet make the world that much smaller by enabling people to converse and interact as if they were in the same room. 

This ease at which we as a society are able to meet, connect with, grow with and virtually 'fuck' others seems to be at the heart of many problems to do with relationships around the world. We live in a world of an estimated 6.92 billion people. It would undoubtedly be quite narrow minded to say there is only 1 person out there for each individual, you would have to expect that theoretically if you were to meet every single person on the planet, there would be at least several people that given sufficient time to be with, one could make a life with them. Keeping that in mind, it actually seems inevitable that when people are surfing the web and meeting people on IRC, chat sites, dating sites etc. that they are going to bump into someone that they get along with as well as (if not better than) they do with their current partner.

The other side of this dirty old coin is though that the hopeful/determined/picky people of camp 3 spend their time connecting with many, many people and moving on in search of the "perfect" partner to replace the "great, with a few flaws" partner that they recently decided wasn't good enough for them to settle down with, subsequently leaving many battered, bruised and broken hearts in their wake.

Therein lies the apparent relationship between the advance in technology with the increase of failed relationships, failed marriages, broken hearts and emotional dysfunction and disability.

Of course there are the people who have other reasons for their relationships ending that include various forms of abuse and no doubt other circumstances that I've not been able to think of right at this moment.

Given time I could probably carry on all day, but right now it's time to go and get ready for bowling. :) 

So I hope that my little rant has stimulated your brain, given you a little chuckle or at least filled in a few minutes while you wait for the steak to cook through.

Until next time,

Moonlight.