It’s important, if life is “war” (I believe this is a male paradigm, but I might be wrong), it’s important to pick one’s battles wisely. For example, Pacific Justice Institute, making a name for itself in my area like lots of others, hasn’t said a thing [on the alerts I get] about the people dying in the streets, women’s issues, or the a bysmal failure of justice within church communities. They have taken on defending rights of parents versus schools, cities trying to invoke the name of Jesus in public prayers (defending), and now some artwork making fun of religious people in the Sacramento Law Library.

For Immediate Release: Thursday, July 15, 2010
Contact: President Brad Dacus (916) 857-6900

Law Library Promotes Artist Who Calls Religious People “Stupid”

Sacramento, CA – The Pacific Justice Institute is calling for the removal of a painting from the Sacramento Public Law Library that defaces a Bible and is accompanied by a statement saying that religious faith makes people stupid.

PJI is sending a demand letter to the Board of the Sacramento County Law Library, a majority of whose members are local judges, demanding that the painting Moral Values be immediately removed. The painting, by San Francisco attorney-artist Jeri Wyrick, depicts a large Bible with a label on it that states “WARNING: MAY IMPAIR JUDGMENT.” PJI was alerted about the painting by a local attorney, James Temple. In response to a public records request from PJI, the Library Director disclosed a statement from the artist calling people of faith “stupid.” The statement reads, “Moral Values is based upon exit polls taken at the time of the 2004 Presidential Election, where people who voted for George W. Bush said their main concern about America’s future was not terrorism, the war in Iraq or the economy, but moral values – i.e., gay people being allowed to marry. I came to the conclusion that there must be something about religious faith which renders people stupid.” Moral Values does not stand alone in the exhibit as a work that mocks religion.

PJI is a nonprofit, as follows:

Pacific Justice Institute is a non-profit 501(c)(3) legal defense organization specializing in the defense of religious freedom, parental rights, and other civil liberties. Pacific Justice Institute works diligently, without charge, to provide their clients with all the legal support they need. Pacific Justice Institute’s strategy is to coordinate and oversee large numbers of concurrent court actions through a network of over 1,000 affiliate attorneys nationwide. And, according to former US Attorney General Edwin Meese, “The Institute fills a critical need for those whose civil liberties are threatened.” “Through our dedicated attorneys and supporters, we defend the rights of countless individuals, families and churches… without charge.”

=======================

Last year, they announced opening an office in the SF Bay Area, probably as a conservative incision into an area perceived to be very hostile to civil liberties. I have a feeling this doesn’t include such civil liberties issues as it relates to discrimination on basis of color, GENDER, or sexual orientation, particularly the last one… I think public schools is one area of interest:

Pacific Justice Institute Launches Office in San Francisco Bay Area

City:

Oakland, CA

Date:

08/17/2009

Pacific Justice Institute announced today that it has opened an office to serve the greater San Francisco Bay Area. The office is located in downtown Oakland, 10 minutes from San Francisco and Berkeley.

With increased litigation and other needs for representation in the region, PJI attorneys have been traveling to the Bay Area on a weekly basis for some time. “The San Francisco region is without a doubt one of the most hostile places in the country toward religious liberties and values,” noted Brad Dacus, president of the Pacific Justice Institute. “But with growing challenges come greater opportunities. We are thrilled to have a new way to serve the courageous faith community in the Bay Area, and also to provide resources for our many affiliate attorneys in San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose, and nearby cities.” In addition to the new office, PJI continues to maintain offices staffed by full-time attorneys in Sacramento and Southern California.

The Bay Area office, on the edge of Oakland’s Chinatown, will be headed by PJI Chief Counsel Kevin Snider. With this opening, PJI will become the only public interest legal organization in the Bay Area specializing in meeting the needs of churches, parents and people of faith. “The hostility and intimidation towards this protected class has created a general environment of fear and intimidation,” said Snider, referring to the longtime legal designation of religion as a fundamental, legally protected class. “We want people of faith in the Bay Area to know that they are not alone,” he continued.

(small font unintentional, below)…

I think they have been fairly silent during the Oscar Grant issue, when a young black man was shot, to death, in the back, while lying on the ground and surrounded by BART officers. I guess that area was covered by someone else.

I also have been through repeated personal hell, during marriage, and during divorce proceedings, along several civil liberties issues. I noticed plenty of “church” women in the domestic violence support groups. They got to the support groups after failing to find help, or protection, in the churches. In at least one case, the batterer was a deacon or a pastor.

My civil rights were repeatedly violated, and around school issues, in the family law venue. PJI doesn’t take this on, naturally. I note that the words “individuals” and “parents” is definitely gender neutral, but I have a feeling which way the cookie might crumble when it came to representing a woman against a man as to system violation of civil rights in court, police, and parenting matters. I think you get my point.

I do take issue with taking public funds to do so. . . .

BUT, the mocking of religion in a law library, while I can’t say I disagree with the issues they take with it, well, MOCKING RELIGION IS AN HONORABLE TRADITION, PRACTICED (according to the Christian sacred text, a.k.a., the Bible) REPEATEDLY BY GOD (sic), PROPHETS, and JESUS ….

HERE are a few samples:

(of course, told from point of view of the faithful):

I Kings 18 . . . Elijah (major prophet) mocks the prophets of Baal because their prayers weren’t being answered. This has been commemorated in an oratorio by Mendelssohn, called (surprisingly) “Elijah.” Governments have been equating themselves with “God” forever, and it takes repeated sarcasm, criticism, and sometimes civil protests by prophets and others to keep them in line. Most governments do not take kindly to being mocked, nor do most religions.

And Elijah said unto the prophets of Baal, Choose you one bullock for yourselves, and dress it first; for ye are many; and call on the name of your gods, but put no fire under. 26And they took the bullock which was given them, and they dressed it, and called on the name of Baal from morning even until noon, saying, O Baal, hear us. But there was no voice, nor any that answered. And they leaped upon the altar which was made. 27And it came to pass at noon, that Elijah mocked them, and said, Cry aloud: for he is a god; either he is talking, or he is pursuing, or he is in a journey, or peradventure he sleepeth, and must be awaked. 28And they cried aloud, and cut themselves after their manner with knives and lancets, till the blood gushed out upon them. 29And it came to pass, when midday was past, and they prophesied until the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice, that there was neither voice, nor any to answer, nor any that regarded.

A minor point or two — in context, the prophets he mocked “ate at Jezebels’ (queen’s) table.”

Well, nowadays, there are plenty of people eating at the Federal Table, and I’m not referring primarily to the TANF sector, but those whose livelihood is prophesying about, well things like “female-headed households” and “fatherless children.” Yeah, we have to be able to mock.

As this account goes, after they were done cutting themselves, they got cut, too — by Elijah (i.e, beheaded). Being a prophet was dangerous in those times. In these times, I think the main “danger” of the fed-at-the-government table prophets is either job loss, or mass indignation, when/if the general public wakes up and finds out WHAT the smart people were researching with their money.

The real smart factor was compiling and automating collection of million$$ and billions$$ centrally to be dispensed without adequate oversight, and rearrange how government works, and WHO it Is; figuring out a way to get paid to study other people, and this is called, primarily, the income tax. Entire professions spring up from manufactured dysfunction.

(I’ll leave it to you to figure out whether I’m referring to “public education” systems, court systems, or the social sciences in that last sentence….)

Here’s Jesus calling some leaders “dumb,” in so many words. (Matthew 16: ERV)

And the Pharisees and Sadducees came, and tempting him asked him to shew them a sign from heaven. 2 But he answered and said unto them, When it is evening, ye say, It will be fair weather: for the heaven is red. 3 And in the morning, It will be foul weather today: for the heaven is red and lowring. Ye know how to discern the face of the heaven; but ye cannot discern the signs of the times. 4 An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given unto it, but the sign of Jonah. And he left them, and departed.

i.e., they weren’t real perceptive. Other places, he called them ‘blind leaders of the blind,” and a lot of other insulting names. Caveat emptor — eventually, this habit of refusing to join, endorse, and in general, refusal to blend in, shut up, and in general persisting in self-confidence, speaking, teaching, atttracting followers (probably the real “crime”) and breaking traditions, (though not law), and failure to mainstream himself, led to crucifixion.

—

I realize this isn’t the full historical or cultural context, or certainly political, but my point is to draw parallels with today. When you can’t change things, you CAN mock them.

When that mocking, however, goes nationwide, is officially endorsed, and profiles people according to some superficial characteristic, for example, where they worship or WHAT they worship, it is tending towards genocide. Study Rwanda, Study Hitler, Study any genocide or prejudice. First, the target has to be dehumanized, because in all of us (let’s hope most, at least) there is still a vestige of recognition of conscience that that “target” person is at least PART-human, which part has to be silenced.

PJI is right — that artwork in the public law library IS inappropriate. A point could be made that there is a quality of “stupidity” in religious people, and there is a character involved in believing the impossible or improbable to be true. HOWEVER, religious people in no way have cornered the market on gullibility or stupidity.

TAKE FOR EXAMPLE, STUDYING

“TRANSITION TO FATHERHOOD at CORNELL”

=================

I fail to see where this falls into the role of government, but it’s a large enough grant:

TAGGS Abstract Details

Title	Transition to Fatherhood
Award Number	P01HD045610
Project Start/End	10-MAR-2005 / 28-FEB-2010
Abstract	DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Policy makers and others are concerned that many young men today are only loosely attached to their children and their children’s mothers. This concern has been fueled by rising rates of non-marital childbearing, delays in the age of marriage, increases in the share of children being raised in female-headed families, and the failure of some biological fathers to provide economic support to their children. The aim of this proposal is to form a multi-disciplinary team of research collaborators who will meet on a regular basis to plan and conduct coordinated analyses on topics relating to the transition to fatherhood using multiple data sets. The four projects included in this proposal address the following related issues: 1. What are the economic, policy, psychological, and sociological factors that influence the timing of biological fatherhood and the circumstances under which fatherhood occurs? What is the role of men in the timing and circumstances of sexual initiation, contraceptive use, pregnancy, and childbearing? 2. What is the relationship between the transition to biological fatherhood and other transitions to adulthood, such as marriage, educational completion, and entry into the workforce? 3. What are the determinants of responsible fathering, and, in particular, what is the role of family process within and across generations? 4. What are the social, economic, policy, relationship and individual factors associated with men having additional births after they have already become fathers, and what factors lead men to have additional births, with more than one partner? Each project will conduct parallel analyses across multiple data sets, and similar data sets will be used across many of the projects. The data sets used in the four projects include National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 and 1979; Add Health; National Survey of Adolescent Males; National Survey of Family Growth; Fragile Families; Early Head Start; Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Birth Cohort; National Survey of Families and Households; Panel Study of Income Dynamics-CDS. Our strategy will enable us to obtain a much fuller understanding of the factors that influence the transition to fatherhood. We also propose two infrastructure cores: (A) Administration and Dissemination and (B) Data Management and Methodology.
Thesaurus
PI Name/Title	H E PETERS
PI eMail
Institution	CORNELL UNIVERSITY ITHACA 120 Day Hall ITHACA, NY 14853
Department
Fiscal Year	2009
ICD	NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF CHILD HEALTH AND HUMAN DEVELOPMENT
IRG	ZHD1

Award Funding Details

FY	Recipient	Budget Year of Support	Award Code	Agency	Action Issue Date	Amount This Action
2005	CORNELL UNIVERSITY	1	000	NIH	03-08-2005	$ 992,602
Fiscal Year 2005 Total:						$ 992,602

FY	Recipient	Budget Year of Support	Award Code	Agency	Action Issue Date	Amount This Action
2006	CORNELL UNIVERSITY	2	000	NIH	07-01-2006	$ 917,129
2006	CORNELL UNIVERSITY	2	001	NIH	09-28-2006	$ 64,887
Fiscal Year 2006 Total:						$ 982,016

FY	Recipient	Budget Year of Support	Award Code	Agency	Action Issue Date	Amount This Action
2007	CORNELL UNIVERSITY	3	000	NIH	03-13-2007	$ 967,400
2007	CORNELL UNIVERSITY	3	001	NIH	05-21-2007	$ 85,631
Fiscal Year 2007 Total:						$ 1,053,031

FY	Recipient	Budget Year of Support	Award Code	Agency	Action Issue Date	Amount This Action
2008	CORNELL UNIVERSITY	4	000	NIH	02-26-2008	$ 936,396
Fiscal Year 2008 Total:						$ 936,396

FY	Recipient	Budget Year of Support	Award Code	Agency	Action Issue Date	Amount This Action
2009	CORNELL UNIVERSITY	4	000	NIH	12-04-2008	$ 0
2009	CORNELL UNIVERSITY	5	001	NIH	02-02-2009	$ 824,700
2009	CORNELL UNIVERSITY	5	002	NIH	06-18-2009	$ 91,633
Fiscal Year 2009 Total:						$ 916,333

FY	Recipient	Budget Year of Support	Award Code	Agency	Action Issue Date	Amount This Action
2010	CORNELL UNIVERSITY	5	000	NIH	11-09-2009	$ 0
Fiscal Year 2010 Total:						$ 0

Total of all awards:

$ 4,880,378

What concerns me about this (just a drop in the bucket of this fascination of studying the life span, sexual habits, and emotional makeup of the human male) is that when HUMAN BEINGS become SUBJECT MATTER and the SUBJECT OF STUDIES THE REST OF US FUND, THROUGH TAXES, WE ARE PAYING “OURSELVES” TO TEACH SUPPOSED EXPERTS AND ‘MASTERS” HOW TO MANAGE US.

This is why it’s important — really important — to continue mocking some of the language found in these studies on “fatherhood” and transitioning to it. It’s NOT a laughing matter, not at that price tag, and this price tag includes throwaway children.

I mean, GOOD GRIEF — do we NEED to know all this?

If so, WHY?

Experiments are always being done on people in institutional settings without their informed consent. Like it or not, there are people whose lives are NOT “live and let live” but “how to rule the world,” and it’s no laughin matter. The assumption being that ONE set of wisdom is important, and ANOTHER is devalued. One sector of society is important and another is devalued — or the value can be exploited by studying their motivations, psyches, sexual habits, household income, and more.

There is a conflict of interest with the U.S. Constitution as it stands (and the Bill of Rights, etc.) and the global monetary system, the INTRINSIC compounding debt system of the U.S. $$ once it went off the gold standard, and so forth.

These are called ‘silent wars.” The war between men and women (and it IS an ideological war, there are casualties, there is propaganda, there is hostage-taking, there is economic supply “war” and there is most definitely an ongoing “spin.”) sometimes pales by comparison when costs are evaluated.

As I looked (with dismay) at the people submitting justification for “MORE FATHERHOOD FUNDING” and Obama’s INNOVATION (on the same old story), I wondered where intelligence went, and common sense.

We are no longer in an age where people can afford to learn only what goes in their niche. The key to understanding HOW LIFE WORKS is intelligent understanding of symbols, operating paradigms, and telling a fool from a wise person, and: more important: An Honest one from a deceitful one.

I hoped that the “Rosenhan Experiment” link (recent post) would be read and would show the relatively intelligent how stupid we all really are, and how gullible, in our own times.

The U.S. government is indeed trafficking in human beings, whatever they may say about wanting to stop it. The HHS department ONLY came into being in 1991 — that tells us something.

I’ve blogged about “The Greatest Experiment Ever Performed” (on women: re: HRT) and about the poor black woman whose stem cells were harvested for research, but (after she died) her relatives were not told, nor were they offered a share in the profits.

A recent passing acquaintance told me enthusiastically about a new area of experimentation, in the sky, called “chemtrails.”

(The photo is of a CON(densation) trail, not a “CHEM” trail.

The United States Air Force has stated that the theory is a hoax which “has been investigated and refuted by many established and accredited universities, scientific organizations, and major media publications”.^[8] The British Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has stated that chemtrails “are not scientifically recognised phenomena”.^[6] The Canadian Leader of the Government in the House of Commons has stated that “The term ‘chemtrails’ is a popularized expression, and there is no scientific evidence to support their existence.”^[9]

The term chemtrail is derived from “chemical trail” in the similar fashion that contrail is an abbreviation for condensation trail. It does not refer to common forms of aerial spraying such as crop dusting, cloud seeding or aerial firefighting. The term specifically refers to aerial trails allegedly caused by the systematic high-altitude release of chemical substances not found in ordinary contrails, resulting in the appearance of supposedly uncharacteristic sky tracks. Believers of this theory speculate that the purpose of the chemical release may be for global dimming, population control, weather control, or biowarfare and claim that these trails are causing respiratory illnesses and other health problems.^{[2][3][10][11]}

=Here’s another site on it called RENSE.COM

Chemtrails DataPage

I’m not following up on that topic. It seems clear enough to me that the PROFIT motive often interferes with PROBLEMSOLVING.  I’ve had enough experience with children and schools over the years to know that kids don’t come out either violent, or stupid; these are conditions that are made, not typically inherited.

Moreover, human beings are one piece, and no matter how segmented a culture becomes, by whichever profile, one of the MOST dangerous practices, and I’m talking WHITE-collar crime, is when the “masters of society” have detached themselves from those they rule.  This is why superstructures have to continually be dismantled, mocked, and their basic operating systems understood.

Common sense says that if we believe that a “THINK TANK” is going to solve “OUR” issues, then we have just dumped our thinking into a container, and delegated it to someone else.

Thinking, reasoning, and deciding is a PRocess, and has to stay context sensitive.  IN a society, there has to be enough of a common social contract understood that there isn’t chaos.

But the empire of “health and human services” in particularly is just that — an “empire.”

It has no clothes on.  The arguments are facetious, and I believe that if enough people stopped actually debating the ridiculous, we might also just be able to stop sacrificing money, and pouring blood — and as sites like DASTARDLY DADs and the headlines show, blood does flow from the idolizing of a specific family arrangement, regardless of characters of who’s in it — we might be able to stop the process before DoomsDay.

Also be aware of people so intent on directing the conversation, and framing the debate.  When this is seen (and the “mainstreaming” and “collaboration” of domestic violence advocates and fatherhood practitioners is now old news.  It’s a done deal, and it’s obvious if you look at the conferences, the websites, and the common themes in the different groups), understand, like Jesus did, that while they may perceive certain details, they have missed “the sign of the times.”

And walk away.  Life is short.  Time is finite — use it well.

One of the signs of the times is argumentation over everything, and fogetting which arguments are most important.  Pick your Proverbs and live by them, adjust as necessary en route.

KNOW a fool when you run across one, and if possible, walk away.  That foolishness will tear your life up worse than a bear, says Proverbs.  In the realm of domestic violence, the bottom line is life itself (i.e., it can tturn lethal).  But also, the quality of life while alive — and whatever it takes to NOT live in fear is ESSENTIAL.  While religion talks about resurrection (or reincarnation) the point is, to make best use of the time — while still breathing.  In this way, it can be “redeemed.”  In the long run, none of us controls the world, nor should we try to.  We should control ourselves and our own responsibilities, part of which is not giving those who ARE trying to run it (into the ground, along with us and our kids or mates) too long a leash with which to do it.

And — case in point, the Cornell study is just one — part of that lease is your tax money.  No world rulers want to totally tear up the place — where would they live?  They would much prefer to set in systems to gradually but pervasively humble people til they can’t protest, and leave the goods intact.

PART of SMARTS is accepting that such people exist in this world, and get over the idea that everyone is as altruistic as you may be.

Gandhi’s model was to win over people without violence.  INTRINSIC in this model was self-reliance, including refusing to buy salt (the march to the ocean), and weavingone’s own  clothes, not adopting a lifestyle and clothing style that was foreign to him, imported from England.

We might want to consider this again (ladies . . . . Moms . . . . . ).  Can you manage WITHOUT that child support system?  If so, do – it’s a trap.

Expect a fight. Entrenched interests – religions, nationwide educational systems that dumb down a populace and set them at each other instead of whoever wishes the failures to continue — and tax systems, ALL have a history.

So does the concept of Money.  And the concept of “job” (Just Over Broke).  Some jobs pay well, but take a toll personally and as to family, which isn’t worth it.