Life is Great and Other Lies

I wrote this yesterday:

Life is GREAT and it's Fun to Live… And other lies we believe when we're young and naive:

(The phrase "youth is wasted on the young" means that children and young adults have the best physical energy and time, but they do not realize or appreciate it because they lack life experience.)

Although there are several people who are credited with the original saying, none have documented proof they coined this classic.

(Origins of the Quote

The Attribution: The phrase has been linked to George Bernard Shaw since at least 1931, when it appeared in a syndicated newspaper column by Ted Cook, who credited Shaw.

Alternative Claims: The saying is also occasionally attributed to fellow Irish wit Oscar Wilde, though no primary source ties it to him either.

Similar Sentiments: Shaw did write a related thought in his play Man and Superman (1903), noting that "youth is a wonderful thing. What a crime to waste it on children," which likely helped popularize or inspire the modern phrasing.)

Tragically, we were ALL lied to by parents, teachers and religious leaders during our formative years.  There's another old adage which says:  (“Give me a child until he is seven, and I will show you the man.” It is most often attributed to St. Ignatius of Loyola)

Tragically, that one turns out to be more accurate and prophetic than others!  The religious indoctrination of children is the most dangerous and difficult to overcome of any other “control mechanism" injected into the minds of the young!

As a devout atheist, I pray that education and life experience washes away (like a kind of FACTUAL baptism) that false indoctrination as a child matures into adulthood.

Unfortunately, we're now being threatened by the 30% who still claim to be "Christians” who are victims of the orange Faux King conman and his billionaire sycophants.

They say:  “There are no atheists in foxholes!" Bullsh1t!  Vietnam was where I was finally able to break away from the indoctrination of my youth.  Watching what war does to a human being made me realize that we're ALL just people.  Black, white or brown ALL bleed red.  I saw Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, atheists and every kind of person at their most vulnerable.  

A Marine whose legs were blown off by a mine doesn't give a fvck about philosophy!  A young Vietnamese girl raped by an American soldier who was giving birth to a blue, dead baby in front of my 20 year old eyes didn't pray. She cried!

The bodies I carried from the choppers during the TET Offensive in 1968 were placed in body bags, not heavenly vehicles to be transported to a place with “Streets of Gold!"

I've lived almost 80 years.  I've seen FIRE and I've seen RAIN. If you're one of the 30% who are still supporting t-Rump and you happen to read my humble words, PLEASE look at reality just this once! You're following a pedophile, convicted felon and despicable disgrace to mankind.  If there's ANY truth to religion, he's going to spend eternity in HELL for ALL he's done here on earth.  Think.  Study.  Learn history.  Join those of us who have done those things and join us in November to put the brakes on this "out of control clown car” of sycophancy and cowardice.

I once had a friend in Georgia who asked me this:  "How can you be such a decent, honest person without religion?!”  My answer:  "I'd rather be those things because they're the decent, right thing, not because I fear going to HELL.”

That's my sermon for this Sunday.  It won't reach many who need to hear it.  I just wanted to let you ALL know why I do this work EVERY day.  I hope there's some truth to the dialogue from one of my favorite books, "The Grapes of Wrath" by John Steinbeck:

("I figgered, 'maybe it’s all men an’ all women we love; maybe that’s the Holy Sperit—the human sperit—the whole shebang. Maybe all men got one big soul ever’body’s a part of.' Now I sat there thinkin’ it, an’ all of a suddent—I knew it.")

That's the dream of this old, disabled Vietnam veteran: that we're ALL part of one universal soul.  Not individual races, creeds, religions, beliefs but all tied together in a tapestry of humanity with an obligation to be decent and honest and help each other.

These, in the words of that great philosopher, Thomas Paine: are indeed the times that try a man's soul!

(“These are the times that try men's souls” was written by the political activist and author Thomas Paine in his 1776 pamphlet series, The American Crisis.)

t-Rump is a despicable criminal.  He's a convicted felon and pedophile who is doing everything, including starting a war, to hide the evidence in the Epstein Files.

Don't be fooled by the endless lies and deception of these sycophants of ignorance and racism!  It's time to unite to form a dam of humanity high enough, wide enough and strong enough to withstand this tsunami of absolute EVIL before it sweeps away 250 years of progress.

Let's continue to fight, protest, write, speak and stand up to them!  That's why I do this work EVERY day.

We MUST win this WAR or ALL is lost!