What Do You Scatter? – Thorns #1

by | Apr 22, 2013 | Chinese Proverbs, Thorns | 1 comment

ALERT:  Do you know the person in this drawing?

thorns 1

Do You Scatter Thorns?

Do you excuse your snark and judgment as being hip?  They aren’t hip, they’re thorns.  Thorns meant to hurt and denigrate.  You might get followers and fans and people laughing at your words, but you are hurting others and you will, without a doubt, be hurt yourself in time.  The path you covered in thorns will one day be the path you yourself must follow, and the thorns will be even more plentiful.  Even if you avoid the thorns on the path, more thorns than that will have grown inside your heart and will strangle your love, compassion and care.

What can you scatter instead of thorns?

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Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman

Quote is a Chinese Proverb

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The Eternal Incompetence of the Terrorist – Boston Marathon Tragedy #3

by | Apr 18, 2013 | Boston Marathon Tragedy - 2013, Isaac Asimov | 0 comments

violence 2

Competent

Here is how the Boston Marathon terrorist or terrorists were competent:

  • They succeeded in making bombs that blew up, killed and wounded people.
Incompetent

Here is how the Boston Marathon terrorists were and are incompetent:

  • They failed to figure out how to have an effective and peaceful voice that actually could get something positive done in society.  
  • They failed to learn how to rally for a cause they believed in while still maintaining a loving and caring attitude towards those around them.  
  • They failed to critically think and analyze what it was they were being taught.
  • They failed to understand history and the repeated failure of terrorist after terrorist to accomplish their goal.
  • They  failed to think with any creativity about how they could achieve their goals without violence.
  • They failed to have faith in how things can change and move forward without violence.
  • They failed to understand that their means are not justified, no matter what their ends are.
The list can go on and on.  What would you add?
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Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman
 
Quote by Isaac Asimov,  1920-1992, Russian-born American writer
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Impotent Hate, Potent Love – Boston Marathon Tragedy #1

by | Apr 16, 2013 | Anais Nin, Boston Marathon Tragedy - 2013 | 0 comments

In remembrance of  violence, no.  In remembrance of love, yes.

Impotent Hate

Can you barely see the quote?  That’s because it’s hardly possible to see clearly in the ‘fog of war’.  It seems scarcely possible to see anything else when blood is all around. It seems beyond possible to hear love when hate is so loud.  

Potent Love

But barely does not mean can’t.  We can see love. Always triumphant, always victorious in the end.  That’s because violence is a symptom of impotence. Though it seems so powerful at that moment, so strong, so hard to overcome, it can’t sustain itself.  It falls because it is a lack of power, a lack of ability that led to it, not the opposite.  

Love on the other hand is the essence of power itself. It is power. It is potency.  It is capability. It is triumph.  Always.

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Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman, a runner.

Quote by Anais Nin, 1903-1977,  French writer

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What ‘Facts’ Do You Believe That Aren’t True? – What Science Is #4

by | Apr 15, 2013 | Nikki Giovanni, What Science Is - 2013 | 0 comments

 

I went down to Dallas this past weekend and bought 5 new quote books.  I an going to take a quote from each one over the next 5 days.  Today’s is from ‘Language Is a Place of Struggle – Great Quotes by People of Color, Edited by Tram Nguyen.

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 Facts

I often think about how much people depend on facts and statistics.  It’s 3 hours driving to Wichita so we better leave by 1 if we are going to get there by 4.  I ran my last 10k in 55:54, a personal record and the first time under 56 minutes.  One of those facts is neutral, not a lot of interpretation to it.  The other, the one about my run, is also a fact, but it has some emotional or psychological meaning to me, and perhaps to others who hear it.

Unfacts

But what about facts that aren’t facts at all?  For example, Rebekah Evans (my daughter) wrote an article in her blog ‘The Cellular Scale’ titled, ‘Do small men think like big women?‘. It’s a great read about flawed science, gender bias and ‘facts’ that aren’t. It’s about the Corpus Callosum, a part of the brain that connects the right and left hemisphere. It’s been said for many decades that women’s are bigger than men’s and that as a result women have a more unified brain, can multitask better, etc.  

But the truth is that is not true.  Later studies showed that it isn’t based on male or female, but on the actual size of the brain. The larger the brain, the less proportion of the brain the corpus collosum is, leading to the wrong assumption it had something to do with women or men.   Check it out and see how a ‘fact’ can be delivered and believed by many people due to many reasons not attached to the veracity of the truth.  In this example it lead right into already existing gender bias.  

What do you believe, not because it is true, based on facts, but because it feeds into a need to control yourself or others, or fits a bias you have? 

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Drawing and Commentary by Marty Coleman, factual.

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Quote by Nikki Giovanni, 1943 – not dead yet, African-American writer and activist

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