Posts tagged freedom
How To Dismantle Your Apartment in Less Than 6 Weeks
One year ago at this time, I did something noone prepared me for: I reduced everything that I own to the size of a suitcase. Why? My wife and I had decided to move to a foreign country which was almost 3,000 kilometers away. Shipping the contents of our apartment (furniture, dishes, my homestudio equipment…
New Religion Claims: “Copying is Holy”
We all know about Catholicism, Buddhism, Islam and so on plus the major cults and sects like Scientology, etc. But you probably haven’t heard of the “Missionary Church of Copying”, yet, have you? Today is Easter, yesterday was the international day of books and yes – Copyright so – in a weird way – all of…
Din & Denial in the Digital Garden of Eden
Remember the days when a piercing was shocking? Or a tattoo? Nowadays, you have to implant ‘devil horns‘ under your skin, get eyeball jewelry or other forms of bodymodding to turn some heads. The practices applied range from splitting your tongue, permanently cutting your ears into elves-shape, to drilling holes into your skull! Who wouldn’t…
For A Fistful of Dollars: How the Religion of Money Fooled Us into Domestication
It was John D Rockefeller who said “I believe the power to make money is a gift from God” and he was not the only one who thought like this. In fact, it was one of the cornerstones of Puritanism and the foundation for terms like “hard working American”. What it means is this: I…
Why You Can’t Buy Time at Seven-Eleven
Last year at this time I was sitting in Middle Europe, waiting for spring to break through grey skies. Now I’m sitting in the Middle East, watching the sun go down over the ocean and drinking Arabic coffee. What’s the difference? What has happened since last year? Two things: 1. I quit my job working…
On Power, Authority, and Egypt
Analyzing the Revolts In a long analysis of the Egyptian unrest and the possibility of the overthrow of the Mubarak presidency, long-time left-of-center middle east observer Juan Cole wrote in “Egypt’s Class Conflict“: Why has the Egyptian state lost its legitimacy? Max Weber distinguished between power and authority. Power flows from the barrel of a…