"WARS NOT MAKE ONE GREAT"
It is April 8th, 2007, a day that we find the average Canadian celebrating the death-defying (re: zombie) exploits of a man who went on record rejecting not only emperor worship and idolatry but also participation in the military. Curiously, on this very day we find the same Canadians engaging in a vigorous round of collective self-worship over the 90th anniversary of the battle of Vimy Ridge, apparently the "defining moment" in Canadian history (according to every single blathering cultural commissar on every single CBC network for the past 2 weeks), where hundreds of thousands of lives were mowed down in a geopolitical blaze of horror and tears.
Nevermind that 3 weeks ago, 99% of Canadians could not have told you where the hell Vimy Ridge was, let alone what happened there. Nevermind that. It's not important. It tells us nothing about the world around us.
Let's just sit back and enjoy this day of unimaginably mixed signals and keep in mind that Ryan Smyth of the New York Islanders belongs to the same evangelical church that Prime Minister Stephen "Humans Rode Dinosaurs" Harper belongs too. It is only fitting that they lose to the New Jersey DEVILS today (thereby securing a playoff berth for the Leafs).
Canadians say they want to live in an open society, but their constant obedience to flags and fairy-tales renders it nothing more than an empty platitude. I can truly say that i've never felt more anxious about the prospects for an open society in my entire life.
I've become a broken record on the value of the ideas that (Christian war-correspondent) Chris Hedges outlined in his book War is a Force That Gives Us Meaning. He has since compiled two others that are equally important:
Losing Moses on the Freeway: The 10 Commandments in America American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America I feel that there are terrible times ahead for the non-believer. You may want to weigh the evidence yourself. In fact i beg you to do just that.