Music, Church, and Recent Realizations

Howdy all...

I figure that it's been long enough since I wrote anything here... So I'll be combining a whole bunch of things I've been thinking about lately into one big entry. As the title kinda eludes to.... I'll be covering a mix of just random thoughts and recent activities I've had the chance to partake in.

Alright, I'll begin today's entry with a reference to a song that is completely amazing for all the wrong reasons... And I mean the kind of amazing that makes you cringe... Kesha's "Tik Tok", yyeeeeeaaaahhhh... Well, so I'm driving around College Station running errands listening to the radio when this song comes on. Let's just say it took me about 10 seconds of listening to those lyrics before I decided I NEEDED (yea... that's in all caps. The rate at which I was becoming more and more stupid simply listening to that song was enough to urgently push me to turn it off) to shut off my radio... The other one that ticks me off more than anything else is Asher Roth's "I Love College". I mean, seriously??? Just listen to the lyrics of that song, I was completely unaware that the point of college was to drink, get high, and make women take their clothes off. Don't get me wrong, I love the ladies, but dang... Going to college is supposed to mature you as a person, not make you less so. Now ladies and gents don't get me wrong again... I'm all for having a good time, ESPECIALLY now in college, before the real world comes along, but getting crazy drunk, high, and getting with every member of the opposite sex at a party is just ridiculous... But who knows... Maybe that's just me...

Anyways... We'll move on. From a personal "Journal" standpoint, I finally became an official member at Living Hope Church on Friday, and went to my first Hope Group on Monday. If there is something that I'm looking forward to the most about being a part of the church, it's the Hope Groups. The group of people that were there were so much fun to hang out with. We had a potluck, prayed for a bit, and wrapped gifts for those who aren't as lucky as we are. All and all, I had a major blast, and it's an AWESOME retreat from the Corps lifestyle for a bit.

So right now in Political Science, we're talking about the Cold War, and the whole East vs. West thing. I was doing my required reading (for once) and it kind of tied in with a Star Wars (Yep... I'm a MAJOR Star Wars nerd, and proud of it yo!!) book where one of the main characters, Luke Skywalker was sitting around thinking about how it was hard to draw lines between good and bad, black and white, dark and light. Well, it got me thinking about how much this world has changed on a global scale politics wise as well. I sat around thinking about my grandparent's time, where the bad guys were the fascist Germans and imperialist Japanese, and my parent's time where it was the USSR vs. the West, Communist vs. free world. Sometimes I wonder if life was really that simple, that cut and dry back then. I dunno, occasionally I find myself completely overwhelmed with what goes on around this wonderful world of ours and wishing that I could just jump back a generation or two, where life (at least to me and modern day standards) seemed to be somewhat less chaotic. Guys went from high school, did the military thing, got out and got themselves a respectable job, raised a good family, etc. etc....

Politics was good vs. evil, and none of this terrorism stuff where the enemy could be a major in the U.S. Army....

Maybe I'm just prematurely looking forward to the day I retire, set my family up on a ranch somewhere in Texas, or maybe Idaho, where all I need to worry about is groceries every once and a while, and taking care of my horses... Haha!!! Boy do I look forward to that day.

Anyways, I hope y'all are all living the good life, thanks once again for taking the time to read this new post, and leave a comment below if you care to with your name!!! I'll write another one of these next week save some incredible event that demands my writing about it sooner!!

---Dieu Defend Le Droit

My "howdy" 's, Fort Hood and the face of religion.

First of all... Welcome y'all to my new blog... Over the past few weeks or so, a lot has been happening in both the general world / my little world (ie. my life) and I dunno... I've always been the kind of guy who likes to share my experiences and viewpoints with others, and for those of y'all who I haven't talked your ears off doing so yet, count yourself amongst the lucky ones I suppose... :D

Anyways, I wanted to write my outlook on something about the recent Fort Hood shootings that has bothered me, (one of the many things that is) on my facebook status... After writing what I wanted to, I chose to update my status, where I was politely reminded by facebook that my status was too long. So somewhat disgruntled, I moved over to the "Notes" section, thinking I'd write something there. After writing a line or two, I realized that there wasn't a real good way to make a general announcement to everyone I had completed it. This bothered me because I'd like outlook from y'all on my viewpoints... you know, generate some discussion and stuff!! So I figured, what the hell, lemme give blogging a try!!

Back to what has been going on as of late... Last Thursday's incident at Fort Hood hit me hard... Especially since I'm pursuing an Army contract myself. I was just saddened by the fact that someone would attack the very people who are fighting for our country and it's ideals, and the fact it was a soldier shooting his buddies seems so foreign to me it was hard to take. The fact that someone would shoot innocent and unarmed (just to clarify... Very few troops on base actually walk around with rifles... They were unarmed.) bystanders... It's just insane that this event has so many different layers of disappointment for me.

Today I was on the world's most reliable news source, Fox News... :D And I read an article on how Major Hasan (the shooter), proclaimed by his family, a few people who know him, and a few radical religious figures to be one of staunch Muslim faith, frequented strip clubs right outside of Fort Hood. Obviously, it isn't that this little factoid that upsets me more than his shooting his colleagues and fellow soldiers in cold blood... No, what really saddened me, and was brought to my mind by this article is how some people such as this Major Hasan claim to be extremely religious, a fervent follower of it's values, and yet go around to places such as the ones mentioned earlier and find it necessary to kill others in the name (because we know any god is in complete support of people killing other people in cold blood!) of his religion. And I'm not raggin' on Muslims, there are plenty... PLENTY of examples of people like this in every religion. But I'm focusing on him because it ties into my next point. If you have people running around committing these awful acts of violence in the name of their religion, it just gives a bad name to the other followers.

This makes up a great deal of why this whole incident has saddened me. It is just another example of a so-called "strong follower" of the Muslim religion running around killing people ruining how many people look at the religion. As a matter of fact, I read an article a few days ago on how some of the leaders in the U.S. military are worried about backlash against Muslim followers in our great nation's many fighting forces. I have had the privilege of moving around the world multiple times, and over half of my life has been spent in Muslim countries. I've known too many awesome people who follow the Muslim faith, and I've been around the block enough times to know that the majority of the Muslim world would (and does) denounce actions such as the ones taken by Major Hasan. The fact however, that many people bunch the religion and many of it's followers under the same group as the likes of terrorists and others who commit such atrocious acts ticks me off big time. And to hear that people are going to take their anger out on other soldiers, those who signed themselves up to stand in the same very dangers as their battle brothers around them, SIMPLY because they follow a certain faith is ridiculous. I just don't understand how it's possible to do such a thing. I dunno, this issue has been bothering me a lot, especially since moving back to the States where I've experienced an instance of this kind of bashing, and I wanted to get this off of my chest....

So how's that for a first post?? I'm really excited about this, and I look forward to sharing more conversations and life stories with y'all!! And to those of y'all who read through this entire thing, I appreciate it!! I know that Politics isn't everyone's cup of tea... But who knows, maybe I stirred a bit of interest in y'all... We'll see what it's like for y'all to leave comments, I'm hoping y'all don't need to actually make a blog of your own to do so!! :D

Until my next post... Y'all take care of yourselves, and if we haven't talked in a while hit me up!!! I know I haven't been very good about keeping track of all my past friends and acquaintances, but I promise if y'all say howdy here, I'll get back to ya!!

--Dieu defend le droit