Gil I am so torn between understanding the role Khameini’s regime and the IRGC, directly and via the proxy armies they fund, train, and direct, have played in not just oppressing and killing their own citizens but in repeatedly threatening my life, my wife’s life, my daughters’ lives, the lives of my friends and neighbors, Israeli … Read more
So in other news this weekend, I read some convincing critiques of the theory of the development of complex structures and speciation via blind selection of (even path-limited) randomly-generated possibilities. 🤷 I still think Dawkins is a great zoology writer but I’m no longer convinced the Modern Synthesis is a reasonable explanation of the biosphere. … Read more
There is so much hate in the world. Yoda taught us about the roots of hate – and where it leads. I try to hold empathy for those who hate – to recognize the emotional hell they inherited, refurbished, and unwittingly choose to remain trapped in. The part of us that is a supermonkey is … Read more
May the righteous Lord of warProtect the innocentPunish the wickedRescue the strandedHeal the woundedAvenge Your imageProfaned for so long May our Father in the heavensGuide the hearts and mindsOf Your children taking aimWhisper quietly into their earsThe demand of their own soulsThe call of a higher orderThe wisdom of a wild peace May the Creator … Read more
When I think of where You placed meA garden, watered by mist and riverA stretch of sand and sky between salty depthsA small rock spinning around a small starSwirling through eons of nothingnessIn flowing rhythm with a stream of myriad starsSpread out across a forgotten galactic horizonJust one, of uncountable legions –When I think of … Read more
Oh child of the moonYour tides are gently risingWith the shadow across your faceYour eyes glow with reflected lightLuminous pools, overflowing, thenNarrowing into shining slivers of nothingOnly for your rebirthIn a new circle of your quiet loveDistant whirlingFrom the center of your danceNever touchingYour belovedUpon(From)Whom you shine Oh child of the moonYou are empty nowBut … Read more
Fun fact: I am allergic to bullies and I detest religious bullies. I also have limited patience for those who evade accountability, especially in the name of winning the American culture war, and so an abusive, religious bully who evades accountability in the name of pwning the libs is basically gonna get the stick and … Read more
I grew up in an extremely right-wing, hyper-capitalist environment. (Oh, the stories I could tell from my misspent conservative youth.) Now I’m approaching 40 and just spent five minutes on a soapbox arguing that billionaires shouldn’t exist. 🤷 (That’s what happens when you make me defend Gender Studies as not a contributing factor to societal … Read more
It’s all one struggle. For Jewish rights. For Palestinian rights. For Black rights. For immigrants’ rights. For women’s rights. For the rights of every oppressed, disenfranchised, and/or persecuted group of human beings. Not because those people are all the same or their exact challenges are identical. But because the social system of wicked injustice that … Read more
We know the names of Rambam’s father, brother, son, nephew, father-in-law, and brother-in-law (twice over). We have a letter congratulating Rambam on his marriage. We do not know the name of Rambam’s wife. (Or sister. Or mother.) Not because there was anything wrong with her or because she had no impact on Rambam or their … Read more