We learn about the world through an amalgam of objective awareness and conditioned response. This state of struggle, within the sense of unity defines what we call consciousness. Listening to those who speak as if consciousness were unipolar, who use the blank, flat, language of their own pseudo-mechanization, I fall into a state of agitation for which the only release involves taking a baseball bat to everything in sight. Oddly, moments of true joy bring out a similar response. Violence is a function of my greatest frustration and greatest happiness.

addendum: What disgusts me is faith, not as exhibited by people with little else, but as by those with the will and power to act on it in ways that affect the lives of others. Not even faith alone, which is inevitable in most, but faith without doubt. And it doesn't matter that someone is unaware of his doubts, they show up on their own. But to have none, not even in secret from oneself, and to have power:
I cannot begin to describe the hatred I have for such creatures.
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"Beheadings would be ridiculous, but all options would be on the table."
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This, linked to on Mon. has gone beyond silly.
Slaves to an idea. Relativism as an absolute good rather than a prod to curiosity and the ability to learn.