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social, health, political imagery through the lens of G J Huba PhD © 2012-2021

Posts tagged Religion

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Back in 2012, I published a mind map on this blog suggesting that giving people one chance to learn (as in, you only get one taxpayer-subsidized educational opportunity) or to receive free treatment for drug abuse (as in, if you can’t quit the first time you are morally undeserving because you do not have the moral strength) or to receive specialized behaviorally-related healthcare (as in, you let yourself get fat or nicotine-dependent or out-of-shape so you pay the consequences) is an obscene abuse of other individuals,

It’s just as true now as it was then. I know more about mind mapping now and am even more irritated by those who want to balance the budget by not helping others enough, or even at all. So I thought I would revise my mind map and make this a post a lot more angry that we do not give people second (or even eighteenth chances).

Show me a drug abuse treatment  provider who says you can go through treatment one time and it will “stick” and I’ll show you a snake oil salesperson who is trying to sell services to 18 year old entertainment industry billionaires surrounded by a media feeding frenzy. Do you really want to deny additional free education to someone who realizes in their 30s or after going to prison or after achieving a stabilized life without drugs or while serving our country in the Armed Services that they need more education to get good jobs and be successful and much better citizens? Mental health services should not be denied or limited to tossing people pills because someone lost the genetic lottery and has a life-time disease or experienced trauma (like a rape victim or maybe somebody unlucky enough to have lived in an earthquake or hurricane zone or in a dangerous neighborhood or in an Armed Services encampment in Afghanistan, Iraq, or Vietmam).

Enough said. The picture will tell more than 100,000 words ever could. And if one fails after 18 chances?

Well, there’s always a 19th chance or a 36th chance waiting. [And a special ring in hell waiting for those who would only offer people one chance at happiness or productivity or health. Or the politicians who supported this position to get (re)elected.] Oh, and if you were one who denied others a second chance, you have a second chance to act in a more moral and supportive way and give others that second or 18th chance.

Click on the image to expand. Then think about whether we should invest in people and families or in creating the wealthiest uber-class in the history of the United States?

18th Chance 2014

 

 

There are more than 7,000 rare diseases in the world, almost all of which lack any type of medical treatment. Were every religious congregation in the world to “adopt” a disease and do what it can to help find and provide a cure for that one disease, it is quite possible that the hundreds of millions of people (in aggregate across all rare diseases) could be helped in small and large ways.

I think that it is very possible that organized religions can put away their ideological differences and work cooperatively through information sharing, advocating, raising monies, and demanding progress from governments and corporations to fight rare diseases. After all, most of these diseases are genetic in origin and more than 50% of those who suffer from rare diseases are children. And, central values in the organized religions are showing compassion, helping, and supporting those in need.

I am not naive enough to believe that religions, religious leaders, and religious congregations working together in small ways is enough to solve religious bigotry, the hot points in Jerusalem, or prevent future ethnic-religious cleansing by horrible people deceiving their own citizens. But let’s at least try to start in the small ways of learning about one or two rare diseases and pooling creativity, resources, and prayers for the energy and stamina to find cures. Religious congregations and their energy directed by the desire to help are almost unstoppable forces.

February 28 is Rare Disease Day.

It is also a day when the religious peoples of the world can unite to plan to make small and large steps to acknowledge and cure at least some of the rare diseases.

I pray that it will happen.

And should you not believe in organized religions, I hope you will nonetheless join in an organized search for effective treatments.

Click on the image below to expand it.

RELIGIONS RARE DISEASE DAY FEB 28 2014

Sadly, today starts the first day of super-aggressive end-of-year (online) shopping sales in the USA. I salute the countries where the capitalists are “controlled” by the social norm that you don’t practice aggressive capitalism on a religious holiday (of any religion). The opposite is true in the USA.

I have very aggressive spam detection on my computer and iDevices. Nonetheless my inbox is flooded with X% off, an extra Y% off, Z% off the list price that the retailer does not charge on any of the 365.25 days of the year.

I defy anyone to find a retailer who “honestly” states the “percentage off” on their sale merchandise. Even on a day when the world’s largest religion (Christianity, about one-third of the population, and concentrated in the USA, Brazil, Mexico, the Philippines, Europe, and China) is celebrating one of its holy days, folks of all backgrounds are out to swindle the adherents for the next two weeks.

Show some respect to both religion and mathematics.

And, I do not recognize “unbridled capitalism” as a religion although I recognize that some might believe their practice of it is a form of “Satanism.”