• Omer M. Mozaffar
The sunglasses, scowls and black leather make it easy to forget that the Wachowski Brothers' mega-popular "The Matrix" (1999) is a dystopian superhero movie, if that makes any sense. The story is an exciting but familiar origins story. We experience and recognize its Frankenstein mythology telling us that our creations, the machines, have conquered us. We see its Orwell/Kafka environment, sometimes taken straight from Orson Welles' "The Trial." And we appreciate its fantastically choreographed martial arts (at least early on, paying homage to video games and Hong Kong movies). And, the philosopher will appreciate the conscious exercise in semiotics. Perhaps, the greatest fun of this movie is the popcorn entertainment. But, for me, even though the movie invests itself so much in its coolness, the overarching appeal of "The Matrix" is its mysticism.
The machines have evolved into increasingly complex insects, and may someday evolve into humans, who would then construct something that conquers them. The zombies here are not moaning, dismembered nuisances, but are well dressed adults with combed hair. The Messiah is a skeptical biracial computer hacker supported by a rainbow coalition of cyber-warriors.
When we reduce God from a conscious, active, interacting reality to an abstract concept, then the end result is an agnosticism encaged in arbitrary dogmatics. Meaning, for many of us: God is there somewhere as a concept in our minds, but He is largely irrelevant, and imprisoned by rules we have established for Him, rules preventing any escape into the rest of our consciousness and being. Further, when we reduce our personal relationships to abstract concepts, then the result is two-fold. First, we experience an apathetic somnambulance. Second, destruction gets interpreted as mere ugliness. Meaning, for many of us, life is a purposeless collage of sights and sounds we are sleepwalking through - rather, daydreaming through - alongside countless acquaintances but with very few friends, while hoping for something but not caring. And, as we devour the earth with our petty appetites, we avoid considering the legacy because it is not a happy thought. Test it. In those scenes where countless people die, how much do you feel it, if at all?
Taking the point further, "The Matrix" replaces the connection between the human hearts with terminal screens. I feel as though I just described 70% of the college students I have met, and 90% of the high-schoolers I have met; I don't expect that these numbers would have been that high in 1999. Even in my case, I spend far more hours in the day looking through the smooth, bright, colorful screens on my electronic devices than I do looking at other textured, breathing humans, face to face. I have multiple classes each week online, looking at the pixelated expressions of my sometimes pixilated students, and they feel almost real.
On the flip-side, many of us yearn for the beyond. Part of the appeal of the Jedi in the "Star Wars" movies is the sense that they have tapped into that unseen and can make use of it. But, that is also part of the appeal of "The Godfather" movies, in that the Dons have tapped into something (perhaps base) about our humanity and can control it, without any need for mysticism. And, part of the appeal of "The Matrix" is the same: there is entry into and control over the unseen world. In "The Matrix," however, the unseen world is not the metaphysical, but the metadigital.
In addition, many of us yearn not for the beyond, but for interaction. Video games provide us with full lifetimes. The DVD sets of season-long television shows provide family members we can invest in. Online videos clips provide us with acquaintances; pornography is the lonely man's or woman's intimate conversation.
And, then there is the ultimate tool for reaching the beyond and for interaction: religion, and within religion we have mysticism. With the digital realm, we can expect, then, a rise of a cyber-Christianity, cyber-Judaism, cyber-Islam, cyber-Hinduism, cyber-Buddhism, etc., as well as cyber-religions that have no embodiment in the analog world. The seeds have already been planted on websites and video games. The question, then, according to "The Matrix," is: will they be constructed as organic processes resulting from human yearnings, or will they be merely opiates serving the greater system?
But "The Matrix" ventures further than religion, into mysticism. We often lump together many diverging traditions into "mysticism" or "spirituality." We pigeonhole these diverging traditions - the Gnostic, Hasid, Kabbalist, Sufi, Vedant, Yogi, and Zen - together as the stuff of Joseph Campbell, as though they are the same rose with different names. But, the goal, for example, of the Sufi is in some ways the complete opposite of the goal of Zen. Though this practice of merging traditions is akin to grouping all novels together into one category, one point that is common among all of them is that they branch from paths that already assert that there is more to reality than this material realm. Regardless of whether or not there is any truth to any of the claims of any of these paths, these particular mystical traditions emanate for those who seek more than the ritualistic practices of the masses. If the masses seek a connection with the unseen, the aspirants of these mystical schools seek entrance into it. Now, in our digital era, "The Matrix" expands the aspirations into a virtual mysticism. Again, this is an expected result. "It's the questions that drive us," says Trinity. In the language of mysticism, it is yearning. As Rumi says, "Do not seek water; seek thirst." The mystics have larger questions: there is something more, what is it? Some mystics, because of their enormous curiosities, seek a rush to feel real. That is the story of Mr. Anderson (Neo).
Interestingly, according to "The Matrix," most of the primary rules of the digital mystical process continue from the analog realm. Meaning, everyone has a worldview. We form understandings about what is and is not possible, and these understandings are mostly dogma resulting from our perceptions of patterns. Just as the world around us is fully logical and comprehensible, so too is the digital world. But, we often restrict the possibilities of the world without justification. Thus, we need to remove those unnecessary restrictive dogmas. In Yoda's language, "You must unlearn what you have learned." In other words, knowledge is a prison as much as it is liberation.
Next, when the aspirant is ready, the guide - Morpheus - finds the aspirant and leads, exposing the aspirant to the world beyond. The key here, however, is that from the perspective of those locked in the material world, the world beyond is imagination. Thus, the concepts of the beyond are, from the perspective of physics, nothing but metaphysics and imagination. But, central to the mystical path is the reality that the world beyond is the actual center - the actual reality - and this world is its shadow. Those who pursue further pursue deeper, discovering more advanced teachers and oracles.
The challenge of the prison of rules is, according to "The Matrix," three fold. First, the structural problem: physics. Even though quantum physics allows the possibilities of numerous religious claims in a way that Newtonian physics could not, it is not physics that prevents us from breaking its rules, but our belief that rules are there in the first place.
Second, inevitability and fate work against free will. If physics is the dogmatic prison of the material, then determinism is the dogmatic prison of choice, further limiting our possibilities.
Third, the devils oppose any growth. In some of the mystical schools, most of the devils are internal. In "The Matrix," moving beyond the devil of skepticism, they are sentinels and agents seeking to protect the system, at times employing failed aspirants. And, it is here we find such hacker groups as Anonymous. They take on the role of fighting off the digital devils, often by way of attacking the real and perceived analog devils of corruption in the system.
But, most central to the spirituality of "The Matrix" is that all mysticism is at the service of (a) promoting the Messianic One, and (b) liberating the masses. Some schools of mysticism place emphasis on a past savior that shall return. Others focus on a future savior that shall appear. Others speak of a savior, whose appearance bears little relevance to the here and now. And, some discount any notions of such a figure. But, some of the mystical schools require spiritual development to work by way of abandoning the masses (and their perceived corruptions). Other schools require immersion among the masses in the process of liberating them from the prisons of the world. Meaning, some mystics live in caves, while others make spirituality and social justice inseparable.
Now, the next two "Matrix" films take different directions in this digital spirituality. That will be the subject of future essays. The goal here is to exclusively explore the first film.
So, was this analysis anything but academic self arousal? Perhaps. But, considering the leaps in cyber-consciousness we have taken since the rise of social media and electronic mobility, we can expect that we will further develop alternate identities and lives in the digital realm. And, consequently, we will develop cyber-religion, cyber-spirituality, and cyber-mysticism. I remember a few decades ago, when urban legends spread about people who lost their sense of reality through role-playing games. Here, we are speaking of something that in some ways is far more substantial, yet in other ways, just as flimsy. The web encompasses so much of our imagination, yet we are repeatedly told that the internet is nearing its limits in traffic. We might not be wearing sunglasses in the digital world, but I think our eyes will hurt. But, all in all, the goal of dystopian films is to prophecy a bleak future, whether we like it or not. This one, however, happens to have a lot of hope to aspire to, because it is also a superhero movie, if that makes any sense.
Page design by Marie Haws
Typical philosophical mumbo-jumbo, justifying ridiculous things by playing fast and loose with language and hoping nobody notices. One example: he supports one of his points by quoting Trinity, "It's the questions that drive us". Except that's not what Trinity actually said. This is what philosophy does; try to appear profound by throwing these clumsy verbal constructs together and spackling over the rough spots by making stuff up.
Jeez, who in their right mind seeks thirst, when thirst is all too ready to come to you?
Coincidently, for the past year I've been working on a "fan edit" of "The Matrix Reloaded" and "The Matrix Revolutions". When the films were released theatrically the Wochowskis included plot specific scenes in a companion video game and anime shorts. The scenes shot exclusively for the game involve the crew of "The Logos" and are actually quite good. The most entertaining character in these scenes is the ship operator "Sparks" played by Australian comedian Lachy Hulme. He is a flippant and unserious character in a story where everyone is dreadfully serious.
The same way a remix artist would take their favorite songs, isolate portions, and rearrange compositions in order to create something new. I applied the same approach to these fan edits. I recently finished the 104 minute cut of "Reloaded" which I call RELOADED_REMIXED. I sent a DVD copy to Andy Wochowski and Joel Silver. Like any artist I would like my work to be seen by as many people as possible. In a letter I sent with the DVD I suggested that releasing these fan edits would be a good way to create renewed interest in a decades old property. Last night I recieved the DVD I sent to Andy Wochowski along with a letter from their lawyers saying "they do not accept unsolicited material." oh well.
Sinc fan edits exist in a legal grey area, the only way anyone could see my work is through clips I've posted on YouTube:
http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=tGS5If5pVxY
I had occasion to make a quote to an evolutionary atheist the other day -- a real one, not the phony who's permitted to harass you continually on this site for your religious beliefs.
The atheist, who hopes to have a popular book heralding that "atheism will replace religion," had declared that for one thing, sporting events have replaced churchgoing.
Oh, fiddle de dee. Sporting events were invented by and for organized religion, from the Seth vs. Osiris games in ancient Egypt to the Greek Olympics to "John 9:16" or whatever it is some guy always gets on camera to show on TV sports.
Leo Tolstoi, as he lay dying, the story goes, predicted that music and the arts would, for the young, replace what the religions had lost. That was in 1910. By 1917, my friend Merci's brother Alex had played the very first Jazz concert in Carnegie hall; jazz, having gathered that much social respectability, subsequently became a major form of religious experience for the young all around the world, growing into all sorts of different forms with hypnotic beats and has only lately been showing signs of behaving like take-it-or-leave-it music.
By the second war-baby boom every hip kid understood he was to grow up to be a musician, painter, philosopher, writer; whatever was "the arts." That's how kids who got into nuts-and-bolts sciences like chemistry and engineering wound up being "nerds" in Campbelline-style "mythology". Not hip at all. No religious experience there.
Even "hip," originally "hep," has mystical etymology, so I read. It's "hepicat," some bantu-group term for "one who knows," like a witch doctor or wizard. (By the way, they named me "Tomadiata." Thank you, nice to meet you, too).
Movies have followed suit, as Omer's difficult task of limning the parallels between "the Matrix" and various schools of past mysticism shows. Where Harry Potter films represent a childish desire for mystical religious experience, "Matrix' represents a postpubescent one.
Being not un-current in pop mysticism (and there's really no such thing; if it's "popular" it's just another hysteria), I see other sources for this mish-mosh of a movie slohsed with tasty bad-guy-shoot-em-up icing. "Reality is actually a holograph," goes the one, which is a distorted version of an excercise where one imagines reality as run through with limitless wires parallel and at 90 degrees, accompanied by the sound of "billions of buzzing bees," after which, one is told to remember that neither exists, yet, any perceived reality is spread across such a grid.
No religion's be-and-end-all motive is "Let's you do good things for your neighbor, sacrifice most of your spontaneous feelings about anything, help the poor and vote for people with the kindest-looking expressions." This attitude is what began destroying them back in Tolstoi's time.
Nor have schools of mysticism been of much help or much use. Like these movies, schooled pathways are paint-by-numbers predictable and strewn with "guardians" and "demons" and all that crap. Correspondingly, how many times can you see a vision of, say, a Holy Mountain upon which God The Shiny Exists and, while earning an apple from your behatted teacher for seeing it, being bored with the damned vision? "Perhaps you are ready to move on to the one with the green computer numbers, Grasshopper."
That ain't how it works. It is to seek sheer, previously unimagined spontanaeity of whatever unknown one does not know he is capable of encountering in every previously unknown way. In comparison, these movies can seem pretty silly -- which is why Ed Wood was entertaining, too.
I hope the little green goblins guarding this page allow this one through, for a change.
>quantum physics allows the possibilities of numerous religious claims
malarkey
Reply to: When we reduce God from a conscious, active, interacting reality to an abstract concept, then the end result is an agnosticism encaged in arbitrary dogmatics.
Another dose of meaningless religious babble.
First, a definition. Agnosticism means humanity cannot make a valid decision on whether a God exists or not.
Which is all part of the larger con game. There is no God. There is no reason to believe in a God. But these not-so clever religious types think they can talk us into it.
Well, no. There is no God.
Reply to: it is not physics that prevents us from breaking its rules, but our belief that rules are there in the first place.
If you can get rid of the belief, you can see reality as it is. Nothing in our experience even suggests the presence of a Deity.
Reply to: central to the mystical path is the reality that the world beyond is the actual center - the actual reality - and this world is its shadow.
Let me define "con game." A very large group of people want to recruit followers, and have them donate money to keep the leadership in Bentleys and corporate jets.
What will people "buy"? After a massive brainwashing campaign, people "buy" the idea that loved ones don't really die, but continue to exist in spiritual form. This belief gives them great comfort.
But the Bad Guys turn this around, and claim, "The only way to obtain Paradise in the afterlife is to die killing our enemies." And, since the Bad Guys are con men, every intelligent person is their enemy. The only way to perpetuate the con is to dumb people down.
Reply to: one point that is common... assert that there is more to reality than this material realm. Regardless of whether or not there is any truth to any of the claims of any of these paths
That's the con. There is a material realm, and a supernatural one, and the only way to enjoy the benefits of the supernatural is to stand up and shake hands every time a religious leader enters the room. Instead of placing him in handcuffs as a cheap con man, if you need me to explain how a more sensible world would deal with them.
It's not surprising that movies would eventually create a visual lure into a belief in the supernatural. Or attach a plausible scientific explanation. But there is no God, it's only a movie, and we see the purpose behind the con. It doesn't fool us for a second. Embrace the path of Neo, who saw through the lies that his first reality told, and grasped the more important truth: There is no God, no alien overlords, no Matrix.
The real battle takes place inside your mind. Intelligence vs. the stories they want us to swallow.
In particular, God is NOT a conscious, active, interacting reality. That's only the con they think they can sell us.
At this particular moment in time, we're all immersed in the Republican Presidential debates. Michelle Bachman is gone. Rick Perry is gone. Is America rejecting their agenda?
Each side picks one representative to present the best case for their position. That's how it works.
Reply to (Tom Dark) a real evolutionary atheist, not the phony who... for your religious beliefs.
I'll tell you why this bothers me. The Pew Research Group did a survey of Muslims living in America, and found a growing idea being taught, that 9/11 was not a crime committed by Muslims, but was a charade orchestrated by the American military, possibly the President at the time, to create a bad image for Islam in America.
Lies. Tom Dark lies. Omer lies. I'm asking them to tell the truth. We have recovered the cockpit recorder and we can hear the hijackers yelling "God is great" in Arabic as they rock the plane, trying to keep the passengers from reaching the cockpit.
First, I'm asking Tom Dark to confirm that he calls proponents of modern Evolutionary theory "intellectually dishonest" when he posts on other sites. And clarify what he means by that.
It's clear that Omer is using the "Far-Flung Correspondents" to discuss his religious beliefs, not movies. To give the impression that American Islam consists of free-thinkers, instead of having a Rule Book written by a terrorist named Mohammed in 600 AD, and no deviation from Mohammed's rules is allowed. The 9/11 hijackings were an act of jihad, in the way that Mohammed defined it. And many American Muslims are simply lying about that.
Am I attacking Omer for his beliefs? No. I don't make personal attacks. I am attacking the institution of Islam. Omer doesn't run it. All I ask is that Omer stop lying about me.
Reply to: (Omer said) "The Matrix" replaces the connection between the human hearts with terminal screens. I feel as though I just described 70% of the college students I have met, and 90% of the high-schoolers I have met.... I have multiple classes each week online, looking at my students...
So, I'm curious. When you go online with these students, do you ever tell them that the forces behind 9/11 haven't been identified for sure? That people in the American government wanted to make Islam appear evil? Because that's exactly the lie that Tom Dark has told about me several times.
As an atheist, yes, I am trying to expose the stupidity of religion. I believe that if we can talk about the issues, and expose the lies, religion will shrivel up and disappear. But it would require a lot of honesty.
Leaving your mind open to new experiences is great. But pretending there's a supernatural realm out there is wrong. Not until you prove it honestly. Your imagination doesn't count.
I've been researching this issue for a while. In addition to the PEW Surveys in 2007 and 2010:
American Muslims hesitate to publicly discuss their views regarding what really happened on 9/11, because they fear the government will investigate them if they speak out. Muslims For A Safe America conducted a survey. 307 Muslims who are American citizens answered questions at their booth at the Islamic Society of North America’s 43rd Annual Convention in Chicago in September, 2006.
.
8. Are the tapes of Osama Bin Laden claiming responsibility for the 9/11 attacks real or fake?
REAL 126 (41%)
FAKE 129 (42%)
DID NOT ANSWER 52 (17%)
7. Did the U.S. government organize the 9/11 attacks?
YES 106 (35%)
NO 151 (49%)
DID NOT ANSWER 50 (16%)
17. Do you believe that your personal phone calls are being listened to, or that your personal mail or email is being read, by the U.S. government?
YES 205 (67%)
NO 78 (25%)
DID NOT ANSWER 24 (8%)
In private, Muslim homes, American Muslims often argue that no “real Muslim” would have carried out such attacks against civilians. And, that the 19 young Muslims could not have successfully hijacked four planes using knives smuggled onto the planes, and then flown three of the planes — unchallenged by US air defenses — into three buildings including the military headquarters of the US. Many also believe that alleged plots discovered since 9/11 were set-ups by government informants, entrapping Muslims who posed no real threat to America. (end)
Homeland Security has recordings, that suggest the hijackers strapped boxes to their chests and claimed to have bombs.
What (some) Muslims don't realize is, the constant lies and false information they receive from their peers... isn't common in America. Unless you're listening to a Christian cable program.
http://www.911enemies.com/
Hello everyone,
Thank you for your comments.
@Steve Vanden-Eykel - Sorry to disappoint you.
@Ray (@RaySquirrel) - The link didn't work for me. May I ask you to post a different link?
@Tom Dark - Most interesting points, Mr. Dark. Indeed, one of the challenges of even labeling something as "religion" is that other aspects of life (like sports and movies) fulfill the definition. I like this line quite a bit: "That ain't how it works. It is to seek sheer, previously unimagined spontanaeity of whatever unknown one does not know he is capable of encountering in every previously unknown way. "
@Mike Arnold - Mmm...okay. Rather concise.
And, last, I see Bill Hays is still upset that I proved he's a fraud. The question is, when he called for the murder of Muslims, including myself, was he lying or telling the truth?
Omer M
I enjoyed this piece and it gave me something to think about. Of course, I noticed the references to a prophet and religion in the Matrix series. I thought it also referenced the search for identity as in the Ghost of the Shell series.
I am not an atheist and do not believe that religion will shrivel up and die. There are good things about the new technology as well as bad things.
I will be interested in read what you feel about the other two movies and how you conclude this discussion.
What I need from Tom Dark is a retraction. Not silence, not a promise not to do it again, but a statement admitting that he knew all along that I'm not an agent paid by the American government and he lied about my motives.
When you read the transcript from the flight recorder... you get a better sense of the problem with Islam.
The transcript: During the sentencing phase of the 2006 trial of Zacarias Moussaoui, the contents of the cockpit recorder of Flight 93 were played for the jury. On April 12, the government released a transcript of the recording, but not the recording itself.
The document is stamped "GOVERNMENT EXHIBIT P20056T 01-455-A ID." The last entry in the transcript has the timestamp 10:03:09, consistent with the crash at 10:03.
Key:
Bolded text = English translation from Arabic
09:31:57 Ladies and gentlemen: Here the captain, please sit down keep remaining seating. We have a bomb on board. So sit.
09:33:20 We just, we didn't get it clear ... Is that United 93 calling?
09:33:30 Jassim.
09:33:34 In the name of Allah, the most merciful, the most compassionate.
09:37:36 Everthing is fine. I finished.
09:38:36 Yes.
09:39:11 Ah. Here's the captain. I would like to tell you all to remain seated. We have a bomb aboard, and we are going back to the airport, and we have our demands. So, please remain quiet.
09:39:21 Okay. That's 93 calling?
09:39:24 One moment.
09:39:34 United 93. I understand you have a bomb on board. Go ahead.
09:39:52 Executive jet nine fifty-six, did you understand that transmission?
09:39:56 Affirmative. He said that there was a bomb on board.
09:39:58 That was all you got out of it also?
09:40:01 Affirmative.
09:40:03 Roger.
09:45:57 In the name of Allah. In the name of Allah. I bear witness that there is no other God, but Allah.
09:47:31 Unintelligible.
09:47:40 Allah knows.
09:48:15 Unintelligible.
09:57:55 Is there something?
09:57:57 A fight?
09:54:59 Yeah?
09:58:33 Let's go guys. Allah is greatest. Allah is greatest. Oh guys. Allah is greatest.
09:58:41 Ugh.
09:58:43 Ugh.
09:58:44 Oh Allah. Oh Allah. Oh the most gracious.
09:58:47 Ugh. Ugh.
09:58:52 Stay back.
09:58:55 In the cockpit.
09:58:57 In the cockpit.
09:58:57 They want to get in here. Hold, hold from the inside. Hold from the inside. Hold.
09:59:04 Hold the door.
09:59:18 There are some guys. All those guys.
09:59:42 Trust in Allah, and in him.
10:00:14 Ahh.
10:00:15 I'm injured.
10:00:16 Unintelligible.
10:00:21 Ahh.
10:00:22 Oh Allah. Oh Allah. Oh Gracious.
10:00:25 In the cockpit. If we don't, we'll die.
10:00:29 Up, down. Up, down, in the cockpit.
10:00:33 The cockpit.
10:00:37 Up, down. Saeed, up, down.
10:00:42 Roll it.
10:00:55 Unintelligible.
10:00:59 Allah is the Greatest. Allah is the Greatest.
10:01:01 Unintelligible.
10:01:08 Is that it? I mean, shall we pull it down?
10:01:09 Yes, put it in it, and pull it down.
10:01:10 Unintelligible.
10:01:11 Saeed.
10:01:12 ... engine ...
10:01:13 Unintelligible.
10:01:16 Cut off the oxygen.
10:01:18 Cut off the oxygen. Cut off the oxygen. Cut off the oxygen.
10:03:02 Allah is the greatest.
10:03:03 Allah is the greatest.
10:03:04 Allah is the greatest.
10:03:06 Allah is the greatest.
10:03;06 Allah is the greatest.
10:03:07 No.
10:03:09 Allah is the greatest. Allah is the greatest.
10:03:09 Allah is the greatest. Allah is the greatest.
I don't have any problem calling this an act of jihad. My problem comes from Omer calling me a fraud. That's how innocent men wind up in prison, when no one protests when these kind of lies are told.
The hijackers heard the passengers on the other side of the cockpit door and decided to cut off their oxygen, then roll the plane, before they committed suicide. Suicide as an act of martyrdom in the name of their god Allah.
Islam is responsible for the 9/11 attacks. Not a branch of Islam, but the twisted logic behind letting a terrorist claim his authority was given to him by God in a dream.
Hi Roger. I wanted to make a few comments about your review of "A Separation" and the font size here doesn't hurt my eyes as much as the other pages.
You wrote, "Certainly some of Iran's punishments for adultery seem medieval. To untangle right and wrong in this fascinating story is a moral challenge"
Your review is the most educated comment this film will receive, but you can't explain the real problem without crossing some lines.
In 600 AD, a man decided to start a new religion. Every morning, when he woke up, he would give his followers a few new commandments from God, based on his dreams the previous night. He thought young women should be sold to older men as property. He wanted the law to recognize the right of older men to own women, to take away the right of young women to leave their husbands. In a desert community, children were an important source of wealth. Mohammed wanted a man with five female children needed to see them as assets, not burdens. That is the background of Islam's divorce laws. They deny women the rights we assume they should have, to be recognized as people instead of property.
Toward the end of his life, Mohammed had enemies. He would invade a village, line up 200 men at the side of a ditch, cut off their heads and bury thair bodies in a mass grave. He enjoyed the sense of power it gave him. His morning prophecies began to reflect his joy at killing his enemies.
This would not be a major problem today, except Islam teaches that Mohammed's rules came directly from God, and any Muslim who disobeys the rules of Islam must be punished severely. Which made sense in 600 AD, and no sense at all today.
Omer goes on-line with high school students and talks them into following the rules of Mohammed. That is an insult to every thinking person today. Mohammed's rules have no place in a modern society where women are struggling to make a living without being owned by the richest men in the village as part of a harem.
Your comments are spot-on, but they don't address the real problem. A society that reinforces the belief that Mohammed's rules are the Word of God, the word of Allah, makes their citizens crazy. How does a set of laws based on protecting the rights of wealthy, older men to own girls, to have multiple wives, to treat marriage as a legal way to own a young girl and force her to have sex with you... going into a mosque for prayer five times a day to hypnotize yourself into believing a supernatural Deity has given Muslims this rule book to make them superior to Jews and agnostics... that's the problem.
It's not that Americans see Iranians as harem-keepers. The law of Islam allows a wealthy man to have four wives at a time. Is that a harem? Well, it's easy to confuse the two.
By going into this background, I understand more about the movie. And I cringe when I read about a modern Muslim in America telling children over the Internet that the laws of Mohammed come from a supernatural Deity.
This kind of analysis is not usually posted on the Internet. I'm not asking you to post it. If you attended "A Separation" with a professor from a law school like Michigan, this is what he would tell you. The American system protects the rights of underage children. The Iranian system protects the rights of husbands to control their wives as property. That's why married women who commit adultery are flogged in public, on display in the town square on Saturday morning, so all married women will get the point. Having sex outside of marriage deprives your husband of his right to bear children with you.
I will be short. In response to Atehist vs religion.. who is right who is lying... guys looks like we all are "Extremists" in our opinion and this is the root cause of all evils.. lets focus on our believe and dont push others if they dont agree.. lets tolerate each other...
Freedom of speech if for everyone and so is freedom of lisenting and reading and even ignoring...
You are making too much of The Matrix; basically, it is a
Martial Arts trilogy: tiresome, repetitive and pointless.
The only truly interesting aspect is the Costuming, as Neo
eventually winds up wearing the garb of a Jesuit Priest,
which has never been mentioned, to my knowledge.
It is a futile exercise in pseudo-religion, without God.
Teilhard de Chardin would be proud.
A useful insight for understanding the Matrix is to rewatch _The Shawshank Redemption_. Consider the scene where the hero is reborn spewed from the sewer in both movies. Consider the theme of institutionalization. Salvation lies within. And Rita Hayworth in a red dress!
-Will
For the longest time I could not understand what the author meant by "cyber-religion", but I think I’ve figured out why it doesn’t make much sense. The problem is that the author has understood abstract concepts, such as religion and feelings, as something corporeal and physical. So when he argues that religion will become abstract and cyber, with “no embodiment in the analog world,” he is merely predicting the future of something that is and always has been true. Religion and mysticism have always been incorporeal, abstract ideas, conveyed intellectually from person to person. (Think of the Torah, Bible and Qur'an.) The presence of the internet does not give religion and mysticism a new medium in which to exist (insofar as they are intellectualized ideas); it only gives them a new medium through which their concepts can be transferred and disseminated.
However, the essay does a good job connecting The Matrix to Sufism. I've never connected the two of them before reading this.
Reply to: I see Bill Hays is still upset that I proved he's a fraud. The question is, when he called for the murder of Muslims, including myself, was he lying or telling the truth? Omer M
I'm actually quite pleased with the comment. It reveals character.
I think it reveals something important and almost unbelievable about character.
I've been working on two scripts involving the Fort Hood shootings, 9/11 and how America reacted to them. During my research, I came across one constant:
Muslims lie.
I offer this as an observation. Even in situations where there's a truthful answer, Muslims will lie in order to show their dislike for their opponents. In order to insult them. It's like an inside joke they're sharing with other Muslims.
I would like to ask Omer "How did you prove I'm a fraud?" Oh, why not? "Omer, I'm curious. How did you prove that I'm a fraud?"
Maybe you could explain how you define the word "proof" as well. I identified myself as an atheist. What is fraudulent about that? I posted a transcript from United 93's flight recorder. Are we agreed that the hijackings were carried out by devout Muslims who understood more about true Islam than you ever will?
Omer, I assume you post on this blog because you want to raise people's opinion of Islam. You do realize that by telling these obvious lies, you are LOWERING our opinion of American Muslims?
Reply to: he called for the murder of Muslims, including myself
In the news this week, Seal Team 6 parachuted into Somalia, invaded a pirate camp and killed nine Muslims. That mission was ordered by President Obama. You might have confused the President of the United States ordering the death of Muslims in Somalia with something I did. Whatever you're thinking of, it asn't me.
ALL THE PEOPLE WHO boldly proclaim there is no God are really to be most pitied among men.
These are the people who walk among this beautiful creation and are no longer part of it. They have ceased to be human beings and have allowed their minds to become so corrupted and biased that they no longer say a single sentence without it some way being linked to their fear of being wrong.
They know the odds are zero. They know DNA is an actual code. They know their consciousness did not just clump together at random. . They know they love. They know they see beauty. They know something cannot come from nothing. They know they have freewill
Yet they deny the most obvious and fundamental things of life because they know if they dont---they are toast. These people are fightin for their lives. They have done the deed and for them--God canNOT exist--for if He does they will be paraded around as the fools of the universe.
What a powerful bias--they're the OJ Jury cubed. Reason means nothing---deny it all. In their arrogance they have no need of saving, no need of a Father, no need for the one who gave them everything. As I said...who could deserve more pity?
Roger has a new article posted on the Home Page, an online conversation about "A Separation""
Roger Ebert: More than any other recent film -- at least among widely popular films -- it inspires its audiences to step outside after the screening and continue the conversation.
Asghar Farhadi: I like to put a question mark around the issues I'm concerned about. This is a way of inviting the viewer to critique, without my views getting in the way. I prefer to add numerous question marks to every issue. I think a cinema that asks questions is preferable to a cinema that is stylistically critical... (my film) has evoked a lot of discussion, which is exactly what I hoped would happen. Seeing people gather in little groups after each screening to discuss the film: That's exactly what I wanted, and gives me a nice feeling.
From a review on ReelViews: One key aspect of Farhadi's story is to develop all five of the principals - Nader, Simin, Termeh, Razieh, and Hodjat - into decent-but-imperfect individuals. We admire and sympathize with them, Termeh most of all. There are no villains and no easy answers. Each of the adults tells a lie or conceals a truth, and Termeh ends up trapped in the middle, the film's most evident victim. Her parents repeatedly state that they want what's best for her but, in trying to protect her, they merely deepen the hurt. The most affecting moments of A Separation involve the girl and the way she expresses love for her father. In one instance, she is forced to lie for him. In another, he coerces her into giving up a dream in order to express her belief in him.- JB
Why would you be forced to lie? Because they live in a sick society where telling the truth can result in a long prison sentence, or a public flogging.
Farhadi had to submit a script to the Iranian government for approval before he could film. If he raised the wrong issues, he could be banned from making future films.
There's an obvious truth here and no one should expect Farhadi to say it out loud. He places question marks around the issue.
The best future for Termeh is to leave Iran, move as far away from Islam as possible, and never, never mention anything to do with Islam in her life, ever. That's what her mother wants to do, but she can't say so, the character can't have that clear motive.
So, the first point of the discussion is, the film points toward problems, but it never says "Islam isn't working." If you grow up in Iran with daily calls to prayer, it may be impossible to conceive of a society withoout Islam. Here in America, we never, never imagine a society where... OK, you are invited to join a club. Omer goes online and tells children to ignore the criticism of Islam. But what Omer never tells them is, if you are a Muslim and you break their rules, they will cut off your right hand and your left foot. By joining their club, they think that you agree to follow their rules, and their rules are insane. Omer doesn't want children to know the truth about Islam, or that the best course of action is simply to "Walk Away From Islam" and get out of the environment where the insanity destroys lives and makes everyone lie in order to protect themselves.
"Quantum physics" was the result of bigger brains than yours going through old religious tomes and coming up with concepts they then attempted to spell out in mathematical formula. Therein, among a zillion other things considered woowwwweeee Science these days, one will find the concept of an entity occupying more than one space at once, for instance.
How really effing stupid, in addition to just garden variety uneducated, do you have to get, not to know things like that? Einstein got the idea for the simultaneity of time from reading Madame Whatsername, Tesla cited a Vedic passage for the place to start to explain what gravity really must be, and all this other stuff.
If those great minds were as damn dumb as these latter day Junior Scientists who think they can tell the good from the poppycock, we wouldn't even yet have the electric coffee grinding machine. You can thank Tesla and one of my own relatives for that, by the way.
Ebert: For example, this is the kind of Tom Dark comment I treasure.
Your mind is a fascinating place, Omer.
What I find disturbing is the implicit approval of the actions of Anonymous and other hacker groups. They're no more than willful children, inventing monsters under the bed and then attacking. They're anarchists who don't realize that anarchy isn't freedom--it's the exact opposite. (Think about it--you'll work it out.) They're attacking "the Man" using tools provided by "the Man;" once "the Man" is vanquished, what will happen to those tools? Where will the new tools come from? Certainly not from the likes of Anonymous! They don't seem very self-aware to me.
I appreciate the Warchowski brothers trying to make philosophy & mysticism cool, I really do, but all those fighting scenes make me yawn- except for the freeway fight on the 101 (film 2). Ok, my commute COULD be worse.
What puts a smile on my face in these movies is that when they are in The Matrix the characters are all decked out in cool leather suits, long trenchcoats, coats with many buttons, slick hairdos, alligator shoes, shiny boots, sunglasses, etc, but in the real world they scuffle around in what appear to be sweats and three day old unwashed pajamas. If we could look at their feet they would probably be wearing Ugg boots and bunny slippers. It reminded me of Frances McDormand's phone sex mom in "Short Cuts".