Unplug Your Brain from the TV MatrixWritten by Katherine Westphal
In movie The Matrix, humanity was enslaved by machines that plugged into their brains and created an artificial reality, while sapping their energy. Only when people unplugged from this Matrix would they begin to see, feel, and live in real world. It is not too different from how many people live a good chunk of their lives plugged into a television set. The TV creates an artificial reality, and drains people of their valuable time and energy...and money. It is only when a person unplugs from television ‘matrix’ that their real life begins.It is amazing how much of people’s views of reality are dictated by TV screen. Ideals, morals, norms, paradigms, world views and belief systems are all projected into people’s minds, through such diverse vehicles as ‘soap opera’, ‘documentaries’, ‘televised sports’, ‘reality shows’, 'news', 'WWF', and even 'cartoons'. The reason TV has this power is that brain has several major areas that react differently to world, and to TV. One area of brain is more primitive, emotional, non-rational part. This part is not able to distinguish between what is real and what is not. It simply reacts to situations on an emotional basis. The other part of brain is logical part, part that analyzes situations logically and deciphers what is real vs. what is not real, like TV. Together they help an individual survive. The problem with television is that it largely shuts down center of brain which deals with critical thought. When a person is watching television, primarily his or her emotional center is reacting, and emotional center reacts to images as if they were real. That is why a person can become so engaged in a movie or soap opera or even a sports event. That part of brain does not truly understand that it is not real.
| | Why do some hate more than others? (B)Written by Terry Dashner
Why Some Hate (B)Terry Dashner…pastor of Faith Fellowship Church in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. It’s entitled, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to World Conflicts (Alpha 2002/Steven D. Strauss). It cost $18.95 at a Barnes and Nobles book store in April 2003. But, even at that price, it was a real bargain. Why? It has taught me insanity behind world conflicts today. The fighting makes no sense at all; nevertheless, fighting continues unabated. Let me begin by introducing some countries of world that hate other countries particularly. According to Steven Strauss, author of book above, whole world is at war. Says he, “The world is a crazy place, and it seems to get crazier by moment. If Islamic extremists aren’t attacking United States, then Serbs are attacking Kosovo, Palestinians and Israelis are killing each other, or Protestants are blowing up Catholics. North Korea is digging what former President Clinton has called ‘a big hole in ground,’ supposedly to hold nuclear weapons intended for use against their estranged brethren in south.” Strauss continues, “A few years ago, Thailand made some economic mistakes that affected entire Southeast Asian economy. The entire Pacific Rim was then jarred, and for a while, whole world was on verge of recession. The downturn in Asian economy then caused an already hurting North Korea to become even more aggressive toward its rival South Korea.” Because world is connecting through trade, it is becoming smaller and inexorably linked in a chain whose links affect each other. In other words, ripple effects from one are bound to reach world wide no matter how small country. This is “cause and effect.” This is power of a unified world market. Today there are 192 countries on earth (2002 statistic) and in past half century, almost every one of them has been involved in more than one conflict. Some have had many (ibid. page 5). Of course it might not surprise you that U.S. has had most conflicts in past 50 years. Why? We’ve become everybody’s big brother who guards over little brother to keep him from getting beat up by school-yard bullies. We have become world’s “police officer,” for lack of a better term. If we look at world’s conflicts by region, it is Middle East that wins “most conflicts” category for 20th century (At beginning of 21st century, 43% of its countries were at war).
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