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By Tom Pain
Jun. 28, 2007 Will you admit to envy? Have you ever wanted what others had, or their talents? Most will admit to many such feelings in their life. In the world today, there are hundreds of millions of people who envy you for being able to view this web site. They envy your temperature controlled environment that’s free of most insects. Many in this world envy your front door, that its lock need only repel a boot or jimmy, and not an AK-47 or armored vehicle. You sleep soundly, comfortably. You travel confidently at ease. You expect to be alive for decades, with dreams of “retirement” dancing in your head. Is envy always bad? Can it motivate in positive as well as negative ways? Is some envy too petty? I think envy is not necessarily bad, but that it can become dangerous. I equate envy as the first true evidence of the innate existence of evil in men. Killing over food, shelter, or reproductive partner may have occurred first in man, but I do not equate survival with evil. Envy is evil. Again, not all envy, but many people, including many of those with low self esteem, allow their envy to morph into animosity. They would like to have the possessions or talent of another, but since they do not, they become resentful. If only it stopped with animosity, envy might not let the Evil cow out of the barn. Sadly, no – the enviers are rarely capable of suffering in silence. Instead, animosity consumes them, and turns to hatred. The barn doors fling wide open and Evil explodes into the barnyard as a heaving, snorting bull ridden by our innocent envier wearing the ugliest scowl. How does he hang on to that wild bull? With an incredibly strong bridle named “Rationalization.” Our site is the scene of frequent rationalizations. Not all are motivated by envy; some are simply the result of laziness, deceit, lack of intelligence, or carelessness. While spewers of envy-based rationalizations may also suffer those deficiencies, one clue signals that envy is their primary motivation – repetition. Seeming obsession with the subject of their repeated rationalized attacks is a sign of envy. Envy out of control. Alas, that seems to be the case with one of our frequent contributors, a seemingly brilliant man. If one were to divide mankind, throughout history, by various demographics seeking to associate the prevalence of any particular quality found in man to a demographic, some truisms could be identified. For instance, a talent for building igloos would be found more prevalent in Eskimos, Siberians, Laplanders, etc. If you were to look for such general, but empirically determinable, associations to qualities including intelligence, creativity, scientific reasoning, writing, and artistry, understanding the extent that subjective valuations would impact your conclusions, would certain demographics rise to the top more often? For instance, 300-year old Englanders living in Stratford-on-Avon named Shakespeare might rise to the top of the Writing talent list. Obviously, few Englanders would be in that group. No, I’m thinking on a larger scale – races, nationalities, gender, religions, left-handed, blue-eyed, etc. – groups with millions of members. One group in particular rises to the top of your search for those admirable qualities again and again. Intelligent, creative, and logical deep thinkers, this group includes famous scientists, artists, writers, politicians, academics, and bankers, lawyers, inventors, and billionaires. I can think of no other demographic whose contributions are greater, per capita, over the history of mankind, than this group’s are. Did you guess that I refer to gays? You are probably right; however, their hidden nature through history does not allow that to be completely known, and, as tremendous as their contributions undoubtedly are, I don’t think they overshadow the group to which I refer. No, I refer to another demographic - equally persecuted as gays, but tremendously more successful. I refer to Jews. Throughout history, how many wars have Jews started? Certainly there were tribal battles, the Old Testament describes many. How about in the last thousand years? I don’t recall any, but I’m not a historian, there may have been one. If so, it would still not compare to the numbers of wars during those years initiated by Christians and Muslims, or by Germans, Japanese, the British, Americans, Spain, France, and many others. By any unbiased assessment, Jews would be considered among the peaceful. What countries have Jews conquered? I don’t consider the wars of self defense by Israel as such, even if their lands grew slightly. However, if you do, surely you admit that on the scale of great land empires built, tiny Israel lags behind, say, Alexander the Great. That Israel recently offered to return that seized land makes any world domination theory moot. I’ve never been discriminated against by a Jew – to my knowledge – but I have been by blacks and Hispanics, and Christians and Muslims. I know of no one that has been discriminated against by a Jew although I’m sure there are some. A truthful assessment would find Jews certainly no more discriminatory than other demographics. So, why are Jews persecuted? Why do people, such as our resident Jew-hater here at U-K, attribute everything evil in the world to Jews? Why do they expect anyone to believe their fantastical conspiracy theories against Jews that have no damning evidence, only innuendo, vague suppositions, and disconnected coincidences as their basis? In truth, I doubt they really expect anyone to. Being only a result of their resentful envy, those delusions serve only to mollify their fragile egos that can’t stand seeing brilliant Jews succeed. In his most recent delusion, our resident Jew-hater rationalizes for a thousand words or so that Jews should be banished from Israel because, essentially, it’s been a few thousand years since Jews governed those lands originally. His attempts to dismantle an imaginary argument that Israel’s creation and only justification for existence relies on that nebulous past connection are inane rationalizations of his hatred for his superiors. Whether Jews lived in Israel thousands of years ago, or just last week, has no bearing on their right to live on those lands. Similarly, whoever lived on those lands in the year, months, weeks, days, or minutes before the creation of Israel have no better claim to the land. Governments are the only entities that create and enforce property rights. Countless examples exist in history of one government usurping another and taking property from citizens without compensation. If the shoe was on the other foot, and Israel’s enemies overran the country and abolished their government, there would be no talk of compensating Jews. Jews right to govern Israel has but one justification – the UN proclamation that created the country, and the fact that almost every country of the world agreed to that proclamation. Those that did not agree had still agreed to abide by the proclamations of the UN in return for the benefits accruing from membership in that organization. If our resident Jew-Hater wants to make an argument that Jews should be banished from Israel, he should provide evidence that a majority of the world’s countries did not vote in favor of establishing Israel, or that they have passed a second proclamation rescinding the creation of Israel. Unfortunately, even if he were able to do that, which he can’t, it would not serve to paint the Jews as Evil Incarnate as he desires, and does not, therefore, elevate his intellect in comparison. He just needs to accept the fact that Jews are everything he’s not – talented, brilliant, hard-working, successful, and rich – and resent his parents instead. ------------ About the author Tom Pain: Just an American boy with so much common sense, it hurts. Email: thomas.pain@hughes.net Comment on this article here! ------------ All articles are EXCLUSIVE to Useless-Knowledge.com. Please link to this article rather than copying and pasting it onto your site (which would be unauthorized and illegal). |
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