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Wednesday, July 13, 2016

As Natives Declare Treaty Rights Police Admit Defeat — Cite Lack of ‘Manpower’ to Remove DAPL Protesters

(Via TheFreeThoughtProject) Authorities in North Dakota may be feeling the heat from the international attention the Dakota Access Pipeline is getting. They’re now saying they lack the manpower to remove the encampment of protesters located on federal land near the controversial pipeline. The announcement may signal a softening of the treatment the protesters, up until now, have been receiving.

For months now, The Free Thought Project’s spotlight has been shining on the, some might say, dark and dirty deeds of law enforcement and their treatment of largely Native American peaceful protesters. Attack dogs were unleashed on the protesters in September, injuring six, and an additional 30 protesters, including children, were sprayed with pepper spray. In all, more than 260 people have reportedly been arrested since the protests began in Morton County — over 100 this weekend alone.

The sheriff’s office’s announcement comes just two days after The Free Thought Project encouraged readers to contact Sheriff Kyle Kirchmeier’s office demanding him to allow for peaceful protest, even providing a link to a petition for his removal. Spokeswoman Donnell Preskey told The Associated Press the department doesn’t “have the manpower” to remove the more than 100 protesters from the property. “We can’t right now,” she said.

Preskey said the land belongs to a Texas-based firm, Energy Transfer Partners, and was purchased from a local rancher for an undisclosed price. According to the AP, the Native Americans claim the land is theirs by way of an, “1851 treaty and they won’t leave until the pipeline is stopped.” “We never ceded this land,” said protester Joye Braun.

“The $3.8 billion pipeline, most of which has been completed, crosses through North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa and Illinois. Opponents worry about potential effects on drinking water on the Standing Rock Sioux’s reservation and farther downstream on the Missouri River, as well as destruction of cultural artifacts,” writes the AP.

The disputed ranch is more than 100 years old and was the first one to be inducted into the North Dakota Cowboy Hall of Fame. According to the AP, “It is within a half-mile of a larger encampment on U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ land where the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and hundreds of others have gathered in protest. Protesters do not have a federal permit to be on the corps’ land, but the agency said it wouldn’t evict them due to free speech reasons. Authorities have criticized that decision, saying the site has been a launching point for protests at construction sites in the area.”

While the announcement by the Morton County Sheriff’s office may signal a change in tone and the potential for more relaxed police tactics, it remains to be seen. Late Monday, Standing Rock Sioux chairman Dave Archambault II issued the following statement, calling on the Obama Administration’s U.S. Department of Justice to investigate the militant treatment of its peaceful protesters, and asked for an injunction to the pipeline’s construction. Archambault wrote;

The militarization of local law enforcement and enlistment of multiple law enforcements agencies from neighboring states is needlessly escalating violence and unlawful arrests against peaceful protestors at Standing Rock. We do not condone reports of illegal actions, but believe the majority of peaceful protestors are reacting to strong-arm tactics and abuses by law enforcement.

Thousands of water protectors have joined the Tribe in solidarity against DAPL, without incident or serious injury. Yet, North Dakota law enforcement have proceeded with a disproportionate response to their nonviolent exercise of their First Amendment rights, even going as far as labeling them rioters and calling their every action illegal.

We are disappointed to see that our state and congressional delegations and Gov. Jack Dalrymple have failed to ensure the safety and rights of the citizens engaged in peaceful protests who were arrested on Saturday. Their lack of leadership and commitment to creating a dialogue towards a peaceful solution reflects not only the unjust historical narrative against Native Americans, but a dangerous trend in law enforcement tactics across America.

For these reasons, we believe the situation at Standing Rock deserves the immediate and full attention of the U.S. Department of Justice. Furthermore, the DOJ should impose an injunction to all developments at the pipeline site to keep ALL citizens – law enforcement and protestors – safe. The DOJ should be enlisted and expected to investigate the overwhelming reports and videos demonstrating clear strong-arm tactics, abuses and unlawful arrests by law enforcement.

The chairman’s request seems to validate many of the reports coming from the field, that peaceful protesters are being labeled as rioters and are not being treated with the dignity they feel they deserve. As The Free Thought Project reported two days ago, many of the protesters are being thrown to the ground, squashed underfoot, strip-searched, and forced to remove sacred hair braids — all considered “strong-arm tactics, abuses, and unlawful,” by Archambault.

Sunday, July 10, 2016

Carl Gustav Jung – The Three Births of the Human Spirit

C. G. Jung believes that we need to go through three births in our lifetime. The first is our physical birth, then the birth of our Ego, and spiritual birth of Consciousness. In accordance with that fact, we also undergo three phases of development in our life. In the first third of our lives, emphasis is on our bodily growth, in the middle phase of our lives our Ego grows, and the last third of our lives is the period of our internal development. While at the first two births the most important thing is the maximum exploitation of the opportunities offered by the external world. In the third phase, however, the emphasis shifts on our internal development potentials. Unfortunately, the majority of people will never experience the spiritual birth for various reasons. Let us examine the possible reasons for that, to find out what factors prevents spiritual birth in us.

The Programming of the Mind

Our spiritual birth is usually prevented by the conditioned deep programming of the mind. These programs place the development of the Ego in the foreground, and make efforts to sustain that development until the end of the life of the individual. The programmings support the progress of the Ego, they urge us to develop a powerful and efficient Ego for ourselves, and they make us believe that it is the ultimate goal in human life. These programmings regard any effort at suppressing the Ego as a sign of weakness that we should be ashamed of, and that we should avoid at any cost.

These conditioned mental patterns are realized as various systems of beliefs and patterns of thoughts in our lives. These patterns of thoughts and beliefs are not created by ourselves. They have been handed down to us by our parents, our community and the society in which we grow up, and we have also borrowed some from the media. We very often accept these ready-made mental patterns and beliefs uncritically, without any thinking; what is more, we identify with these patterns that will, in this way, be incorporated into our personalities.

That is how our different convictions have been created over the years, that is how we have created a system of values and beliefs for ourselves, and we now organize our entire life based upon those systems. Those conditioned mental patterns serve as a background to the events that are happening to us day by day. The majority of our worries, desires, pleasures and motivations are derived from those mental patterns and all these, in turn, further reinforce those patterns.

The Social Pattern

All what has been stated above will lead us to the conclusion that our programmed Mind is a social product. Reinforcing the Ego and the never reached spiritual birth, in fact, serve the interests of society. The most important system of social co-existence on Earth today is the consumer society. It means that the basis of social development is economic growth, and economic growth depends on how much we consume.

The most important consumer is Ego, since all products obtained (house, car, expensive clothes), improve the imaginary greatness of the Ego. The more commodities or more power we possess, the more important members of consumer society we are.

If we are able to divert our attention from Ego, and concentrate on our internal development and our spiritual birth, our qualities as consumers will considerably drop, since we are no longer attracted to the things that so far fattened our Egos.

As in the recent decades more and more people have felt a need for spiritual birth, social strategy changed accordingly. Spiritual development has also been made a consumer product, which largely supported by the survival instinct of the Ego. The Ego, which has been interested in money and power, now turns towards spiritual development, and disguises itself in the dress of a spiritual Ego. We try to decorate those spiritual clothes by adding more and more spiritual knowledge and experience so as to make it more colorful and individual. With all that, we hope that our spiritual progress will serve the further increase and eternal happiness of our spiritual Ego.

Consumer society is all too pleased to serve us in those needs. A glance at the vivid market of spiritual books, methods and masters will suffice to convince us about that. Nothing has really changed; the pattern of the consumer society is the same, only its contents have been partially replaced.

Spiritual Birth

From the aspect of our spiritual birth and internal development, however, the amount of spiritual knowledge gathered, the spiritual development methods acquired, and the sophisticated spiritual events we have had in our life are all unimportant.

Spiritual birth can only be the result of consciousness. Our internal development therefore does not only depend on our life experience; it depends much more on our ability to divert our attention from the outside world to our internal world. Are we able to turn away from the patterns of Mind, programmed by our Egos, and is there a deep desire to know the true answer to the question ”Who am I?”

The patterns of the consumer society are determined to prevent us from making the necessary adjustments in our orientation by gluing our attention to various consumer products or a spiritual development scheme that involves the Ego. A major element of this spiritual development pattern is that we are trying to understand the contents of our Minds, to analyze our thoughts and emotions. Our attention is thus engaged by the various methods that we are using to examine our thoughts and emotions. That is what we regard as our real internal world, and we create the illusion of toiling on our spiritual birth.

From the aspect of our spiritual birth the–often chaotic–world of our Mind and emotions is not our real internal world. Our attention should not be directed to the analysis and comprehension of these; instead, we need to concentrate on becoming conscious of our existence, to find the center of our Self behind our external life and personal history. That is our real internal world.

In the course of our spiritual world we become conscious of, and alert to that internal center, to that internal world. Once that has been accomplished, our life is placed on entirely new foundations. The Mind stops functioning the way it used to and, together with that, our sense of identifying with the Mind vanishes. The spiritual Ego, our separate little self disappears, and we are permeated by a permanent, light presence. The personality is gone, and what remains is silence and presence, as the real essence of our existence. From that time on, that will serve as the real foundation for our internal development.

From the book: Frank M. Wanderer: The Chant of the Heart: Enjoy the Nectar of Being

Wednesday, June 29, 2016

Is Everything in the Mainstream Media Fake – 6 Examples of Media Manipulation

The world of television and modern media has become a tool of de-evolution, propaganda and social control. Since the reign of Edward Bernays and the rise of the Tavistock Institute in the early 20th century, nearly unlimited resources have been applied to understanding how to manipulate the human psyche through television and other forms of mass media. What we have today is an increasingly sophisticated full-spectrum assault on free will and psychological well-being, and we have come to a point where it is no longer even necessary for media institutions to attempt to hide their blatant work of manipulating public opinion, manufacturing consent, and creating winners and losers in the minds of the already brain-washed public.

Here are 6 examples where truth reveals that the impression the media is conveying to a dumbed-down, unsuspecting public differs greatly from what is actually happening behind the scenes. By looking at these examples in a single location, it is easy to see how the mainstream media is pushes ulterior motives on the public, and how important it is to be vigilant when consuming consumer info.

News Media Lies, Scripting, Omissions and Obfuscations

1. Time Magazine sanitizes their covers for American consumption – Time Magazine is considered a leader in national news, yet they consistently portray a dumbed-down, frivolous image of life in America while presenting an entirely different message to the rest of the world. In the two examples below, their magazine covers feature a different cover story for Americans while sending different messages to the rest of the world.

Source:Buzzfeed

2. CNN is the leader in fake war new coverage - Here are just 2 examples of how CNN has scripted and staged live war coverage to create a sense of drama and danger around people who were not in harm’s way.

Anderson Cooper fakes Syria war footage by dubbing in sound effects and playing chaotic video next to a Syrian correspondent. In the video you can see how in one tape the correspondent is a safe environment, then you see the footage aired by CNN with dubbed in theatrical effects:

In this CNN clip of coverage of the first Gulf War in the 1990’s, anchorman Charles Jaco makes a joke of war coverage in Saudia Arabia and demonstrates how the news is overly sensationalized for American audiences, and how hosts pretend to be in danger when they are not. At 7:00 in this clip Jaco quickly puts on a ridiculous gas mask for obvious theatrics while talking to a guest:

Manufactured ‘Reality’ TV

3. The Biggest Loser – Americans should by now already know that ‘reality shows’ are staged. The popular TV show, Biggest Loser, where overweight people compete to lose the most weight for the entertainment benefit of the rest of the world, lies about the circumstances of the training and weighing regimen of their contestants while using underhanded methods to generate phony emotional responses from their contestants.

“They want the drama, the tears, the fights, the tears, the triumphs and the tears. Producers would push you to cry because that’s what makes good TV. They continually asked questions like “Do you miss your kids?” Needless to say, I broke down more than once…

Have you ever wondered how the contestants manage to lose a staggering 12 kilos in a single week? We don’t. In my series a weekly weigh-in was NEVER filmed after just one week of working out. In fact the longest gap from one weigh-in to the next was three and a half weeks. That’s 25 days between weigh-ins, not seven.” -Andrew ‘Cosi’ Costello, former contestant

Source: Courier Mail

It turns out that many of the so-called ‘reality’ shows are actually scripted theatrical presentations that count on the viewer’s suspension of disbelief to garner ratings. More info on the many fake ‘reality’ shows can be found here, and here.

4. Nationally scripted local ‘news’ – The comedian and talk show host Conan O’Brien has done a service for America by compiling overtly ridiculous cases of local ‘news’ broadcasts that were simultaneously repeated verbatim in dozens of markets nationwide. This is proof that you simply cannot trust the authenticity of what you are seeing on news broadcasts. Watch these stunning and blatant examples of this in the following videos:

Digital Image Manipulation is Ubiquitous in the Media

5. Manipulating Images as War Propaganda - There are many examples of how newspapers around the world photoshop images of war in order to influence public opinion. All sides in a conflict will do this as propaganda, so it is important to remember this when consuming news on international conflicts and to be alert for phonies. The images below of the recent conflict in Syria show how easily images are manipulated for the purposes of propaganda:

6. Advertising Industry ‘Touches Up’ Images of People – The practice of digitally ‘touching up’ actors and models in images and videos is an overt industry standard. Yet most people, whether they’re aware of image manipulation or not, still process television and print images on the sub-conscious level as if they were, primarily because everyone is doing it, and our bias for ‘normal’ has been socially reconstructed to adopt advertising lies as normal.

This process is demonstrated in the following video where an ordinary looking woman is transformed into a lusty beauty queen for the purposes of selling more products to consumers.

Conclusion

Whether for marketing or for manufacturing consent, the media industry is guilty of using subtle and not-so-subtle tactics to influence our conscious and subconscious minds to influence our opinions and behavior. There are countless other examples of these practices, and discerning, awake people would be well served to be vigilant of this when consuming modern media in any form.

You don’t have to be paranoid these days to acknowledge that you’re being lied to and that the institutions we should be able to depend on for bringing us an objective view of world are anything but objective.

Source

Saturday, April 2, 2016

Beyond Beauty – 10 Beautiful Yet Deadly Carnivorous Plants

Over many million years of evolution, nature has created some most unusual and bizarre plants that attract, trap and digest animals. The list of animals that fall prey to these plants includes anything from small vertebrates and water fleas to nematodes and butterflies. Famous as ‘carnivorous plants’, there are more than 600 of these fascinating species found all over the world. Having colonized a wide range of habitats, each type of plant is yet characterized by particular environmental conditions. Let's take a look at some of the most beautiful but deadly ‘meat-eater’ plant species.

10. Nepenthes

Nepenthes are an interesting looking plant genus, native to the Old World tropics and featuring about 100 species. Also known as 'Asian pitcher plants', they colonize a wide variety of tropical habitats, ranging from sea level to cool mountain regions.

The traps of these plants are passive pitfall traps, shaped like a pitcher, that do not move. These remarkably stable traps are filled with liquid which contains surface active substances. This liquid ensures that the victims are completely wetted and cannot escape once they have fallen in.

9. Cephalotus

Cephalotus has a very small area of distribution in southwestern Australia and it contains just one species, Cephalotus follicularis. It is also known as the 'Australian pitcher plant', as the plant has pitcher-shaped trap leaves.

It catches prey with the aid of pitfall traps. The whole process takes place in three different zones: the attraction zone, a slip zone, and a digestive zone. The trap opening is constricted by a collar, so once a victim falls into it, they are unable to climb back out again.

8. Heliamphora

This long-lived, evergreen perennial herb that develops simple or branched shoots from a rhizome is none other than Heliamphora. Collectively known as 'sun pitchers', these plants have a well-developed root system. The tubular leaves of the plant serves as the trapping organ. The funnel-shaped pitchers are filled with water and formed as pitfall traps. When insects fall into this liquid and drown, they are digested with the aid of bacteria that live in the liquid.

7. Byblis

Sometimes also called the 'rainbow plant', Byblis is a small genus of carnivorous plant which catches its prey using passive adhesive traps.

The leafy surfaces of rainbow plants are densely covered with glandular hairs, which are nothing but the traps. This trap secretes drops of mucilage to attract flying insects. As soon as the prey lands on this sticky slime, it gets stuck and then slowly starves to death.

6. Utricularia

First described in 1753, Utricularia is the most widely distributed genus of the carnivorous plants. Also famous as ‘bladderworts’, the tiny traps of this genus are the most complex and sophisticated found in carnivorous plants.

These little traps are bag-like structures which are suspended from the leaf braches. The trap opening is surrounded by snare-like antennae. Together with hairs and glands, the antennae attract the prey toward the valve opening. Once caught, there is no escape for the prey.

5. Sarracenia

Found exclusively in eastern Northern America, this genus has about 8-10 different species. The most attractive feature of these plants is their tubular leaves with a wing-like seam.

Usually Sarracenia species trap insects using pitchers with nectar and the slippery footing around the lip. It is also observed that the pitcher fluid has an intoxicating and anesthetic influence on various insects.

4. Pinguicula

With more than 80 species, the genus Pinguicula seems a bit plain at first glance. But these plants contain their own subtle beauty and complexities. Also known as ‘butterworts’, most of them are terrestrial and herbaceous rosette plants.

Leaves of butterworts have long-stalked glandular heads which produce sticky mucilage at their tip to ensnare the prey in ropy strands. Also, most Pinguicula species have a musty odor, which may serve to attract prey.

3. Aldrovanda

Similar to the genus Dionaea (see below), Aldrovanda species also use the snap-trap method to catch their prey. An herbaceous floating aquatic plant, typically pale green in color, it is also known as the ‘waterwheel plant’.

It contains leaves similar to those of the Venus flytrap. As suggested, to catch passing prey, a snap trap mechanism is used. The trap lobes are equipped with trigger hairs which cause the trap to close quickly and completely.

2. Drosera

The genus Drosera comprises more than 150 species, which are certainly the jewels of the carnivorous plant world. Also known as 'sundews', these plants are capable of self-pollination and self-fertilization.

Sundews have active adhesive traps. Their prey is also attracted with the aid of optical signals. Using stalked mucilaginous glands covering its leaf surface, the plant captures insects. In fact, to catch the victim, all species of sundew are capable of moving their tentacles toward the blade center.

1. Dionaea

No one can deny the divine beauty of the ‘Venus flytrap’. Known as one of the most wonderful plants in the world, this species features probably the best-studied traps of all carnivorous plants. The genus Dionaea includes just one species, the Venus flytrap, a relatively small rosette plant which produces shoots in the spring.

The fast moving trapping leaves of the plant are snap traps with marginal bristles. As soon as the prey is sealed in, the trap closes and secures the prey; its soft parts are broken down, digested and absorbed. The digestion completes in about 10 days.

Today, it is hard to ignore the conservation status of some of the carnivorous plants. The growing interest in rare plant collection and habitat destruction are the two major factors affecting the survival of these incredible plants. Thus, combating illegal trade could help ensure their conservation.