The Pig Sends Greetings and a Heads-Up.
Greetings from the Santa Cruz Mountains of California and thanks everybody for the amazing, powerful comment stream on the Pornography post. Don't stop, please! I'm going to take Kirstie's advice and read each of you slowly with a notebook in hand - as soon as I have a reliable internet connection again. You guys rock!
This is an important stream of thought, and I'll tell you why I think so. The path we're discussing (I particularly want to thank Mr. Wiener/Old Broken Fence/Steaming Crab/etc etc for holding up his end so well - I'm serious) leads, in my opinion, directly from "everyday" pornography into a whole lot of Evil.
I'm talking about the thousands of children and young teens kidnapped and sold into brothels each year to languish, get AIDS and die. This is no weird fantasy, folks - the State Department tracks it and issues a report on human trafficking every year. And, in my mind, the pornography we have been discussing is most visible piece of the same continuum - sex for profit, big time profit, billion dollar profits. Enough profit, for instance, to support the governments of nations like Thailand, Cambodia, and a big swath of countries all the way across Asia and Africa.
I guess I AM attacking the profit motive again, holy grail of mankind that it is. I want to get the relationship out into the open, and, frankly, I REALLY want those kids safe from harm. I have a vivid imagination, and thinking about their plight makes me really, really mad.
There HAS to be a way for ordinary North Americans and ordinary Europeans to have an effect on such evil. There HAS to be! My plan, until one of you comes up with a better one, is to get up on the roof and start shouting.
But first I need a roof!
This is an important stream of thought, and I'll tell you why I think so. The path we're discussing (I particularly want to thank Mr. Wiener/Old Broken Fence/Steaming Crab/etc etc for holding up his end so well - I'm serious) leads, in my opinion, directly from "everyday" pornography into a whole lot of Evil.
I'm talking about the thousands of children and young teens kidnapped and sold into brothels each year to languish, get AIDS and die. This is no weird fantasy, folks - the State Department tracks it and issues a report on human trafficking every year. And, in my mind, the pornography we have been discussing is most visible piece of the same continuum - sex for profit, big time profit, billion dollar profits. Enough profit, for instance, to support the governments of nations like Thailand, Cambodia, and a big swath of countries all the way across Asia and Africa.
I guess I AM attacking the profit motive again, holy grail of mankind that it is. I want to get the relationship out into the open, and, frankly, I REALLY want those kids safe from harm. I have a vivid imagination, and thinking about their plight makes me really, really mad.
There HAS to be a way for ordinary North Americans and ordinary Europeans to have an effect on such evil. There HAS to be! My plan, until one of you comes up with a better one, is to get up on the roof and start shouting.
But first I need a roof!
Labels: Pornography
posted by Christopher Newton at 10:57 AM
11 Comments:
BRAVO
check my blog name...
I stand firmly on the belief that we as humans have a sick need to be the best, or at least better than our neibours, whether we know them or not. Here in this farming community for instance, a 3 year old truck is seen as flippin' old. Can't have that, time to upgrade...what would people think?
Same theory goes for sick bastards selling children. That can't be that cheap a commodity ( no disrespect). As for the devils buying, its not about sex, its about a sick need for power and control.Thats my best guess anyway.
Money never brings total satisfaction. Look at sports superstars wining about annual wages. What, does it become about who has the bigger pile? Beckham earns tens of millions each year. How much more does he really "need"?
As long as humans care about what others think of them as far as "success" goes, evil will continue. I wish, like you Mr. Pig, that I could gather all the children and wipe away their tears and protect them. I pray for the villians in the mix too. God loves them also but hates what they do. All will be held accountable at the end of the day.
As for me? I say donate time and money to save children instead of whales or bears.
Pray continually, beleive it or not, God is in control. Things seem bleak, broken and that the battles lost. This too is a lie.
Spoke is the man. Save the children. They deserve, many of them, much better than they get from us. As parents, some of us expect far too much from them, or else, we do things to them, emotionally, that are more than they can handle.
Face it, we all have suffered something as children. Some of us lose parents or siblings to death or other things. Some of us were aboused or hurt in any number of physical, sexual, emotional ways. Some of us had basically normal lives and suffered from complacency, not knowing how to address the sadness and sickness around us, all rendering us pretty neutral.
Hooray for Brother Pig, tilting with the profit motive. It ain't a windmill, but probably as close as we'll get in our lifetimes. But it's gotta be done. Not because making a profit is bad or that success is bad. Rather, at what and whose expense do you make profit? Who gets hurt? Do people have to get hurt?
As Lance says, all will be held accountable at the end of the day.
You know, the older I get, the more I realize that humanity cannot fix/save itself. The "problems" are far greater than puny humans can fix.
Well, I feel
Like I have to feel
Something good all of the time
With most of life I cannot deal
But a good feeling I can feel
Even though it may not be real
And if a person, place or thing can deliver
I will quiver with delight
But will it last me for all my life
Or just one more lonely night
The lust, the flesh
The eyes
And the pride of life
Drain the life
Right out of me
Well, I see something and I want it
Bam! Right now!
No questions asked
Don't worry how much it costs me now or later
I want it and I want it fast
I'll go to any length
Sacrifice all that I already have
And all that I might get
Just to get
Something more that I don't need
And Lord, please don't ask me what for
The lust, the flesh
The eyes
And the pride of life
Drain the life
Right out of me
And I love when folks
Look right at me
And what I'm doing
Or have done
And lay it on about
How groovy I am
And that I'm looking grand
And every single word
Makes me think I'll live forever
Never knowing that they probably
Won't remember what they said tomorrow
Tomorrow I could be dead
The lust, the flesh
The eyes
And the pride of life
Drain the life
Right out of me
The 77's
". . .Secret naked doodling do show / secret scatological thought, / that’s why everybody wants to see it. . . "
I'm not moving in, Mr. Pig, but found this Jack video from 1959 with a young Corso and Alan and Peter. thought maybe it'd be liked.
Pull My Daisy
off-topic but not really.
I've distanced myself for a couple days from the brawl brewing in the pigsty. Nothing to say, believe it or not.
I do have to say that the "Pull My Daisy" video was a hit here. Shoulda seen that about a week ago. Maybe Mr. Tuna and Sammy could have stemmed some of the battle with that. It's a good one, for sure. A beautiful gift at the end of a stressfull week turning into a new one.
That's probably why I come by the "Pig's Pad". In the end, there's always some G-string to get pulled or some renewal of silliness even in the face of the sadness and frustrastions of the last post and comments.
I think the submitter, Senor Crackhead, Fence, Weiner, whatever, deserves some kudos for that link. Many thanks from the desert.
Hello Dear Ponderer =) Here is the link to the US 2005 Report on Human Trafficking http://www.state.gov/g/tip/rls/tiprpt/2005/ ...just my humble opinion, but I firmly believe that to help the victims (and the children especially) we need to get off our butts and get involved, no need to talk about it, just do it...the exploitation of innocent children is sickening and the people behind it need to be caught, locked up, and the keys thrown away! How do we get involved? Become a foster parent, sponsor a street child overseas, heck - why stop there? Why not adopt one? I'm serious - if every financially able family in the US did that think of how many lives could be touched and made better; a pipe dream bordering on the naive? Perhaps, but I'm sure you get my drift. If everyone did their part to help just one child I do believe a difference would be made.....
Peg is correct. We're back to "Think globally, act locally".
I don't talk about what we do here. It's important to share it sometimes, but then there's the idea of just doing things without telling anyone. You know, don't let your left hand know what your right hand is doing? But, yet...
How can change occur without someone seeing that there are those in the world that do what has to happen? Who is to be an example? But then they/we don't comment about it either? I'm getting tired of nebulous comments and theories and no constructive answers.
Ok. Here's a stretch. Maybe we, with the Pig's assent, can share some good works on this blog, for the edification of each other and, hopefully, start some good works somewhere else? Am I pushing it?
Pig and Patrushka's cover has already been blown. Can I, Senor Pig, invite people to blow their cover, in terms of personally answering the evil and ugly that they see and cry over?
Maybe we can get back on the track and leave the commentary on the roadside. I believe Hannah got this started and we, the conmmentators have to, for lack of a better analolgy, shit or get off the pot.
Lotsa theories and no action makes for... nothing. Faith has to have legs or it doesn't walk.
The Pondering Pig of the West has been incommunicado the last few days because there is no internet up here in the hills of Mendocino. But, as the Beatles said long ago - I'll be back again. Please, Leo and Peggi - can you guys run the show for a few days? I know you'll do a great job. I think we all have the same perspective.
Brother Pig, It's my pleasure to try and handle a few things here, as I'm sure Peggi will assent to as well.
I got an e-mail from Foghorn, still in Florida I think, concerning any number of topics. I'm still ruminating all he had to say. I encouraged him to respond to these threads, but he is reticent, for some reason, to stick his neck out. This is hard, sad, passionate territory. It's not an easy subject. And yet...
And yet the rest of us have had so very much to say.
I don't quite know why the resultant commentary from Pig's initial comment has become so, well, funky over the past week. I take some blame as I do tend to sidetrack far too easily, that is, if I'm not sidetracked to begin with.
Obviously Mr. Pig has hit a nerve out there. I don't pretend to have any answers for any of this stuff. I know what I know, think, believe and that's alright with me.
Since Chris gave me and Peg the OK, I feel need to go after that illusive "What do you do to make a difference?" question.
From daughter Hannah, we have the word that Pig and Mrs. have been incensed and active over the issue of sexual exploitation for a while now. Peggi has provided some useful info, as has Chronicler.
As much as I know blowing your own horn is a rather questionable way to comment, I feel the need to do so now. There are plenty of things we can do, but here's what I do.
I learned about 3 years ago a whole lot about kids and death on the African continent. I met a bunch of kids from a group called "Watoto". What they all have in common is that they or their siblings or parents suffer from or have died from AIDS. No having to guess how they got it. Anyways, rather than sponsor a kid, we, my family and I, have chosen to sponsor a woman who acts as mother to a house full of suffering kids.
As a parent myself, I saw that as a good way to put some feet on my weak little bit of faith. Mine might not be a precise response that addresses the nut of the sexual exploitation issue, but it does respond to the actual need of actual people who suffer as a result of it. Can't just say "be warm and well fed" and go along my merry way.
Well, anyways, there's my little bit. Idealistically I say that we as a corporate society have a responsibility to get out there and fight the battles anywhere and everywhere. But, alas, dreaded realistic thinking shows me over and over again that as good as intentions and beliefs are, they don't do diddley-squat to face off the uglies that cross our paths. It's like saying "someone ought to do something" and then sit back and wait for someone else to act. Or, worse, offer a lot of advice with no action.
I close with a quote from a Johnny Cash song called "Death and Hell" some of which was alluded to in a Chronicler posted scripture of a few days ago...
"Death and hell are never full
and neither are the eyes of men.
Cats can fly from nine-stories high
and pigs can see the wind."
There you go.
I agree,words are almost always "fruitless". We feel good because we "get on side"verbally.Often, thats the only actions we step out in. We beleive we are part of the solutions thru good intentions. However, in the smaller (minded) parts of North America, where I live for instance, people just don't care, because they don't know.
Education is the first step towards action. Don't ask me HOW they are unaware, they simply are. My pockets are not as deep as I'd like, but my mouth is bigger than most, so I often make a point of pointing out Global issues they may not know. If nothing else, it sets them to pray for at least a time. Many purses, deeper than mine, are loosened towards good. Everything and anything we can do, helps.
I think any good efforts put forth are worthwhile - including prayer...if a person is not in a position to donate money, or their schedules don't permit them to volunteer their time, prayer is the perfect way to help others (of course, prayer is always a good thing =). It is a fact of life that the poor and suffering will always be with us - sometimes we ourselves may even be the ones going through the hard times, and then it's wise to gratefully accept help and go on from there...I think Leo & his family being involved in helping the kids in Africa is wonderful =) And I truly admire those who find a cause they believe in and do what they can to help...we're all on this planet together and at sometime or other we are all going to be the ones doing the suffering (yes, some more than others) but it can't be stressed enough that if we are in a position to help, or pray, or whatever - that we do it - it's definitely worth the time and effort....(my apologies if I sound like I'm preaching here..............)
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