Icons or Iconoclasm?
When my book was in manuscript form I indicated in the chapter Gender
Characteristics, that an extreme manifestation of the masculine gender was iconoclasm. However, before having it published I edited that term out as I felt that iconoclasm had its place in the service of or detriment to society. I take this opportunity to share my thoughts on icons and iconoclasm with you.
The use of icons as symbols of various conditions and beliefs has served as an integral part of Western communications for millennia. We use icons in business, politics, religion, and especially on the internet. They serve as a type of communications short hand.
In the religious sense icons fulfill the feminine aspect of our beings, in that we like to see a physical representation of the unseen. Unfortunately, these icons frequently get worshipped instead of the entity that they represent, which accounts for many spiritual teachers espousing iconoclasm in one form or another.
We use symbolism to represent political parties: the elephant, the donkey, and the hammer and sickle, to identify republicans, democrats, and communists respectively.
The bear and the bull represent the direction of the stock market. We also enjoy destroying the icons of our opposition. Every American paper carried pictures of the statues of Lenin being hauled down after the Berlin Wall was removed, and pictures of the statues of Hussein being hauled down after the American occupation of Iraq.
Symbols frequently represent companies, organizations, and products. Advertising agencies attempt to imbed in our sub-conscious the icons of the companies they represent or the products that those companies manufacture.
The use of symbols and routine practices (which fall into the category of icons) can serve to hold society together. When women used the terms Miss and Mrs. it identified their position in the community, as did the wearing of a wedding band. Also, addressing people with the terms Miss, Mr. and Mrs. signified respect. When I lived in Harlem people called me Mr. George as a sign of respect because I was older. Hispanics would refer to me as Papi. I was raised to be respectful to people in all forms of authority and part of my military training taught me to say yes sir and no sir, and yes ma’am and no ma’am to anything that moved. I can’t remember the last time I heard a young man say yes sir to me. All these practices were icons necessary for the functioning of society; and liberal iconoclasts have destroyed them.
Society now uses material acquisition symbols that serve as icons of worldly success.
Designer clothes, pricey cars, ostentatious home furnishings, and a myriad of electronic gadgets serve as icons of our apparent success in the world. These icons serve to perpetuate the values a materialistic society. To avoid the chaos that results from the breakdown of the family and tribe inherent in materialistic thinking, laws are created to take the place of family values, and a monolithic government that intrudes into every area of our private lives, enforces these laws.
Materialism is the religion of America, its god is Mammon, and its headquarters are in Washington. The religious texts that they use are The Communist Manifesto and the Constitution, the latter serving as a vehicle to institute the former. James Madison described democracy as violent, short lived, mob ruled, and communistic in its attitude toward property, religion, and social thought—being in truth the great “leveler” and the “worst” of all forms of government. The religion of materialism believes in the equality of the sexes—we are all wage earners—and the benevolent power of the government.
There is very little difference between the liberals and conservatives, except that the liberals practice their religion more openly. They don’t believe in matters spiritual, in gender, or in family and they readily espouse this viewpoint. The conservatives mouth the importance of family and believe that they can have family while maintaining gender equality, but it doesn’t work for them. They also think they can have spiritual growth without manhood but that doesn’t work for them either.
It’s time for another round of iconoclasm. It’s time for men—real men—to stand up and rid our society of the materialistic icons that have been imposed upon it. The job is much easier than you might imagine. We have all noticed that neither party has a platform of significance. That’s because of the lack of energy and abundance of apathy prevalent in society today. Virility comes only from men—real men—and they will take the action necessary to smash the materialistic icons of today and restore a spiritually based and gender oriented way of life.
Don’t worry about the wimps; they will scream and yell but will offer nothing—they are impotent and will pass just as night dissolves into daylight. I will address them in a separate article.
Now is the time to recognize the power within you and step up and be counted, and indicate that you are ready to make change. It’s time to get rid of a lot of icons.
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“You can’t pour new wine into old wineskins.” – which means, “You can’t possibly understand a brand new paradigm when you try to fit it according to the defunct rules of a new one.”
Most of the objectioners’ replies here fall under the same old paradigm of American foreign policy, “As Americans, it’s our job to unite as a nation and invade enemy territories and use military force to show them how much more civilized and peaceful we are compared to them!” (This is as foolish and unworkable as it sounds.)
Here’s a brief list of what I’ve seen so far.
(1) The Compare Them to The Enemy Tactic – “Sounds like you are planning to overthrow the government.” The sounds like phrase is the basis of this tactic. If you can show the crowd that this person “sounds like” someone they all hate, then you can turn this discussion into a military campaign.
But Elder’s message isn’t a military cpmpaign. It’s instead a separating ground. Every reply here helps Elder, and everyone else, see whether the poster says YES or NO to the question, “Are you a man of action?”
If YES, then you have the potential to understand Elder’s message. If NO, then you don’t, and you’ll almost certainly try to bend Elder’s message to your old paradigm – which assumes that we should all unite in force to fight the enemy.
When you reveal yourself to be a man of action, and accept Elder’s message, you’ll be free to do whatever you wish! Because, once you accept that you’re a man of action, and accept that your actions must reflect your masculinity, then all of your actions will accomplish a higher purpose.
Thurston slugs it out in the courts, while I help my friends see the spirit world more quickly. Neither he nor I are “better than” each other, and neither he nor I have to decide which tactic “better defeats the enemy”. Because both of our actions reflect a higher spiritual purpose and our own masculinity, we can agree on Elder’s message without trying to force the other to “become a better soldier”.
(2) The Un-American tactic – American means that you’re willign to fight the enemy, and that you’re willing to set aside important questions in order to preserve unity.
(3) The Government Will Provide tactic – If the government wants you to fight an enemy, it has a duty to give you the food, weapons, and training with which to win the war. Or, if the government exists to serve the peoples’ needs, then majority vote lets the government know what “the people want”. Once this is done, “the people” should just wait to receive what they asked for.
But Elder’s message forces you to see that the government can never provide you with what you want. Only the individual man, by his own efforts, can secure what he wants for himself.
The best government can do is take material goods from the “losers” (White men) and redistribute it to the “winners” (women and minorities). And this isn’t what government is for.
in re inf: I was not the one challenged to have a message.
Since I am not trying ceaselessly to knock a massage down then challenging me for a message is not appropriate. Nor will it be recognized by right.
Ever since Marxist materialists have has their belief in an “living constitution” where the meaning changes from the original intent as the democracy demands, we have seen the constitution become a communistic symbol for the marxists.
Russia’s constitution made uder the Bolsheviks was exceelent when compared side by side to ours. So why was their society so different?
Pieces of paper do not make nations, Men who are strong enough to keep their word and resist power do.
congatulations Inf, yet another cler demonstration of your lack of understanding. We have all been there, for society has reason for stupifying us.
Monkey in the mirror is right — we have failed the constitution. The lawmakers and judges in particular. Lawmakers pass laws *contrary* to the constitution. Judges interpret the constitution any way they please, *contrary* to the intent of the constitution. Who can blame the constitution itself for that?
And I don’t see how the constitution is communist.
Thurston, how many people that post comments on this site have a *message*? Where is yours?
Inf- that position of your is hopelessly twisted.
Opinion is not the same as a message.
Opinion is supposed to be the result of consideration of two sides.
As for Bart’s position on democracy.
The induction system of the Greatest Generation who fought WWII were taught this nation was not a democracy, but a republic where the rule of law was the basis of government.
If you read the letters of Adams and Jegferson, Jefferson eventually decried his prior misadventures of espousal of democracy, for he had to see the endless blood lettings in France to finally know and admit Adams had been right all along.
I wish you true enlightenment in your rediscovery of noble government and the masculine
SK (#15) said: “If you have a more potent message, and dare to say it…Then why don’t you say something instead of attacking someone else that is bold enough to voice his opinion!!”
SK, first of all, I *have* voiced my opinion on many things.
More to the point however, using that logic I could say to you,
1. Don’t criticize any elected leader unless you are running for office yourself.
2. Don’t criticize any articles unless you write your own.
If we all come to believe that, Mike might as well shut this site down.
The Constitution is something that man has created. What man gives man can take away. Man can issue certificates, degrees, licenses, and titles; he can remove them as well. You received your manhood from your creator. No one can take it away, but it be smothered, suppressed, isolated, inhibited, and stomped upon, but it cannot be taken from you. In my writings and lectures I remind you of the truth and power within you and motivate and assist you to reclaim your manhood.
Man creates governments; especially Western man who attempts to have the government do for him what he was designed to do for himself. All governments will pass. The last 2,500 years has seen one Western government fall after another. Once men lose their influence chaos ensues and governments collapse. The societal grouping natural to the universe is patriarchy. It sustains through millennia. It was designed by the same power that gave you your manhood.
Don’t rely on icons to rule your life. Deal with the real thing, your manhood.
I can’t believe that Madison really equated the constitution with communism. And even if he did, I’m sure it was a minority view. I don’t believe that there is anything in the constitution that says we should share property and wealth like communists do. If that were the case why have we only had socialism in relatively recent history even though the constitution is over 200 years old? If the constitution were communist we would have had socialism all along.
Sorry EG. I have to take issue with you on at least one point. Our Constitution institutes a REPUBLIC, not a democracy. And it has not failed us. How could it? Instead, we have failed it. It’s not magic. We have to work to maintain it. And we have not done that.
After the Constitutional Convention, a bystander asked Ben Franklin what sort of government we now had. He is said to have replied, “A Republic, Madam, if you can keep it.” We have not kept it. We still have a chance to do so, but it’s fading fast.
I’m a firm believer in the Constitution. So far I have not seen anything proposed that would be an improvement ***given the population densities involved***. Patriarchy has many benefits, but cannot deal with situations where some would band together to exercise power over many. The frequency and magnitude of this type of behaviour increases with population density. Which is why other people band together and form governments to protect themselves from such evils. I’m very curious to understand how you would deal with this in today’s very high population density world. Enough so that I really must try to find time to read your book.
The emasculation of the american male has happened..our boys are being raised to wear helmets on their bicycles (which are grossly innefective)..and now its time to reverse this anti-male hysteria!!
To Bart,
James Madison equated the Constitution with communism in one sentence, which I used in my article. Jefferson and Adams agreed with his views. Were these founders of the Constitution un-American?
In my article I mentioned that religious symbols tend to get worshipped instead of the deity that they represent. This is what you are doing regarding the constitution. The constitution is an icon. My belief is that we are here to serve humankind and grow spiritually. If the Constitution inhibits that process, then get rid of it. I do not in any way feel un-American for saying that the Constitution has not worked. I was not created to support the Constitution, but to serve my fellow man to the best of my ability and within the limits of my spiritual understanding.
infidel..
“I suspect that such people haven’t been around much.”
pedestrian is the word youre looking for!!
If you have a more potent message, and dare to say it…Then why don’t you say something instead of attacking someone else that is bold enough to voice his opinion!!
SK (#2) said: “I heard a southern baptist preacher on the radio a few years ago say about the same thing!!”
EG makes some excellent points in the above article about materialism and icons. However, any conservative preacher in America probably could have made the same points (minus all the metaphysics). So I don’t get why some people think EG is *the* guy with *the* message. I suspect that such people haven’t been around much.
The emasculation of the American male was done through feminist lies, news media lies and incompetence, and judicial activism. A lot of that was both unconstitutional and undemocratic. To despise democracy and the constitution as a result and call them communist is just another attack America.
Thurston, you are a little too suspicious. America is not the Great Satan.
To Bart,
Call it what you will. How else did we get to where we are? The emasculation of the American male was done through the courts and legislature. It didn’t just happen.
Connecting the constitution to the communist manifesto and democracy to communism is despising democracy. You didn’t say you despise democracy, but you still show it.
Slandering the constitution and democracy this way is un-American.
Bart America is a Mobocracy because Americans did not want to keep it the Republic which it once was.
Most Americans cannot even read simple words of founding documents to know the cheese has completely slipped off the cracker in this land.
Most do not care.
John Black, Reagan and Bush had no problem selling WMD and Nerve gas to Iraq for them to use eventually on their own people. Since all Governments’ enemies are the People it wshes to lord over, we cannot claim to be horrified nor surprsed about what he did.
We did the same thing here to people called Branch Davidians.
It is clear that we have been part of the problem. Thus the only justification for us being there to try and fix it.
But since it is not about us righting our wrongs, it is still wrong.
Funny how MMX has such a self-serving and strange interpretation of EG’s critics. And it’s funny how I’ve never actually heard EG’s critics say what MMX says they think.
MMX, are you lying AGAIN?
To Bart,
I didn’t say I despised democracy; I quoted John Madison, one of the founders of our constitution. However, I do not think it is a good form of government and it is in its death throes. Plato considered democracy to be the worst form of government before absolute tyranny set in. I trust that you see tyranny closing in on us on all sides.
You appear to be new to my viewpoint. I believe in patriarchy; a form of societal structure that can withstand most forms of bad government because it never lets the government intrude into the operation of the family and tribe.
“the American occupation of Iraq”
You mean LIBERATION of Iraq.
“The religious texts that they use are The Communist Manifesto and the Constitution, the latter serving as a vehicle to institute the former. James Madison described democracy as violent, short lived, mob ruled, and communistic in its attitude toward property, religion, and social thought—being in truth the great “leveler” and the “worst” of all forms of government.”
Sounds like you are planning to overthrow the government. So what do you offer in place of democracy, which you despise?
A lot of things can be said about this article.
Artfldgr recently mentioned “shamanistic thinking” – the notion that things are filled with magical powers, and whomever has those things will be granted those powers over others. So, for example, a magic wand will immediately and indiscriminantly grant its possessor all sorts of abilities. And also, by being elected President, anyone will automatically be given presidential qualities.
Icon-worship reflects “shamanistic thinking” – and critics of Elder’s message have done so from the shamanistic outlook. They get mad that your thinking doesn’t have those magic powers, and then demand that you fix your work in such a way that these powers are imbued into it.
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Instant gratification is another form of icon worship. Asking for detailed materialistic summaries of spiritual ideas reflects a need for super-simplification, a wish for a “bottled form” of your work to be immediately consumed and understood. (It’s as if they’re yelling “FEED ME!” so you give them a fishing pole and a map of where the fish best strike, only they throw it away in disgust…”)
Instant gratification is shamanistic, too. If a thought process can’t produce instant gratification, then it doesn’t have enough power.
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Elder has also said that the will is a masculine principle, while belief is a feminine one. Icon-worship represents belief, the process by which we allow our icons to fight other icons, rather than allow ourselves to fight other people. But when we let our icons fight for us, we cannot bring about anything new. Old icons must fight along old rules, while we can fight however we please, whenever we please.
Jesus warned us that we cannot pour new wine into old wineskins. Similarly, we cannot bring about productive change using old icons.
Way ahead of you on this one Elder.
The perversions of symbols which become more sacred than the things they were supposed to represent is all throught human history.
From the brass serpent, to the Temple, to our Flag.
the people forget their puspose and worship the item. Just like men are trained by porn and the media to worship women.
it is a painful process to be delivered from ones false idols.
I heard a southern baptist preacher on the radio a few years ago say about the same thing!!
Digesting this……give me a few hours.