Dream of Waking

There was a good article about religious discrimination in The New York Times (posted here) wherein a soldier who has declared himself atheist finds himself threatened by people in his unit who refuse to respect his (lack of) religion. It also goes on to describe a few instances where being an atheist is used against him in trying to get promoted or even enjoy a thanksgiving meal. Though these are extremes the article cannot begin to highlight how the only religion in the Army is Christianity.

In the Army I am constantly hammered with god this, jesus that. God’s everywhere. Every prayer is Christian. Every religious service is Catholic or Protestant. Even functions that have no need for religion get some god injected into them. The worst offender was early in my enlistment when a couple’s first deployment meeting was offered. It might as well have been called “The God and Sex Power Hour”. It was an hour long sermon. No one told me this was a Christian service. Katie was seriously offended by how this supposed couples meeting was just another way to push god on us.

The Family Readiness Group started putting out a monthly newsletter. This too takes no consideration into the fact that not everyone in this unit is Christian. Come on now, is it really necessary to push god in a monthly newsletter aimed at my wife and other spouses while we’re away? Don’t they think that the Christians in the group are already going to church on Sunday and the non-Christians are doing their thing without the need to remind us that Christianity is the only Department of Defense approved religion? The worst part is that I know it was brought up in an FRG meeting that not everyone is Christian and it’s not necessary to put prayers and inspirational messages in the squadron’s FRG newsletter but the end result was it was God’s way or the highway.

I can’t even watch a little Armed Forces Network (Department of Defense satellite tv) without hearing about god. Every message from the Chaplain’s Corps is a bible verse or prayer. There’s even little messages about “who’s going to be there for you? God.” Hey, you know who else is going to be there for you? Allah. Abraham. Moses. Buddha. Vishnu. The Flying Spaghetti Monster. Xenu. L. Ron Hubbard. Eris. Nobody. Nothing. Do we ever hear about anyone other than Christian God? No.

I find it absolutely ridiculous that the Army and Department of Defense operates “religion neutral” and refuses to recognize religions other than Christianity. Either come out with it and say that Christianity is the only authorized religion in the Department of Defense or quit playing lip service to neutrality. I’ve been handed plenty of Christian religious materials and it’s just as easy to say “no thank you” as it is to not hand them out to begin with and not playing to one religions fiddle would better serve the purpose of seperation of church and state.

Religion is hard. I went to a Lutheran grade school but I knew even then I wasn’t Christian. I can’t believe in a world where an intelligent god and anti-god are constantly vying for my attention and depending on my actions will determine whether I spend an eternity in a heaven or hell. I know that’s oversimplifying things (I know a lot about Christianity, I spent 8 years in Lutheran schools!) but that’s just one of my big beefs. I don’t believe in any intelligent deity which strikes out most religions. In trying to see if any religion fit, Buddhism seemed to fit best but now I don’t think it really fits either.

Buddhism is almost as fractured and diverse as Christianity. I don’t believe in mysticism so that eliminated a lot of Buddhist schools. From what I could tell this left Zen. I’ve read a lot about Zen. Zen fits a lot. In fact I’m a pretty Zen person, I can take a lot of emotional and mental punishment before I start to crack. There’s not a lot of people who can handle bad news or anger like I can.

My problem with Zen is practice. I can’t sit my way to enlightenment. Sitting is supposed to be a period of inflection and inward looking and where you can relax and sort out the mind’s problems. My problem is that I can’t sit and do nothing. It feels like I’m wasting time, like I could be inflecting and sorting out my problems while I work. I don’t feel like sitting and expanding my mind is getting me any closer to peace of mind.

That’s all I want, really. I don’t need the mysteries of the universe explained to me. I don’t need some supreme deity pointing out what’s right and wrong, I can figure that out myself. I don’t need to be threatened with damnation to be a good person. I don’t need karma balancing out the good and the bad, it’ll never equal out.

I believe in actions. My own actions. The world is full of people trying to point the finger and blame someone else. I’m trying to reduce my own amount of blame. And I’ll work my way to enlightenment. Or maybe I’ll play video games to enlightenment. And I’ll suffer my way to enlightenment. I firmly believe there’s a price to be paid for every thing you do and I won’t skimp on the bill by pointing the finger and I won’t try to drown my problems in alcohol or drugs. I’ll suffer through every agonizing second of this existence and if it gets me nowhere, oh well. I’ll still be dead and nothing’s changing that. Everyone dies.

That’s how many points I missed promotion cutoff by this month.

Size 7.5 Wide. Desert tan. Hot weather type. Army standard issue.

I give up my sizes (top, bottom, hat, gloves, boots) about once every three months. Once every three months someone (usually supply) needs my sizes for god knows what. I cough up the same sizes every time; Small-Regular, Small-Short, 7.25, 8, 9.5 Regular. This last time we went to get new uniforms before this deployment I got small boots. I got small boots because the guy there told us not to go by the size we usually wear because these were different boots. The boot he gave me that he said was 9.5R was too big. The boot that felt closest to fitting was 7.5W. Whatever. I’m not wearing them right now, my boots are fine.

So I didn’t wear them until about three months into the deployment. 7.5W is too fucking small. They don’t fit. I can’t get them swapped out because I’m in Iraq and there’s not shit that can be done out here about it. Oh well, one pair of boots down the drain. It’s a good thing the Army buys us new uniforms while we’re in country, hopefully I can get a new pair of boots that fit.

Wrong. Even though I give up my sizes once every three months, supply decided to go with what I was issued more than nine months ago. A size I’ve never worn before as I’ve always worn size 9.5R boots. Every pair of boots I own are size 9.5R and every pair fits except these two pairs of worthless boots. So since I’ve got a brand new pair of boots that I know don’t fit I thought I’d take them to my supply guy so I can get them sent back and get a proper pair out here that do fit.

Wrong again. My new supply guy must get off on fucking other soldiers because he basically told me I could go fuck myself. He said he can’t (or won’t as I believe is the case) send them back and I could try to find someone who wears a 7.5W boot (no one) and give them to them and let me get the right size when they get their stuff or else I’m stuck with boots that don’t fit. So I’m stuck with boots that don’t fit for a second time.

So if no one wants these brand new 7.5 Wide, desert tan, hot weather standard issue Army boots, then I’m either giving them away to some Iraqi kid who needs them (most likely) or throwing them in the trash (out of spite). Because 7.5W boots are worthless to my 9.5R feet.

Or why Descent is awesome and Earthworm Jim can go fuck himself.

Recently you’ve reopened and called for new developers to revitalize your classic properties. Names like MDK and Earthworm Jim have been bandied about. Let’s be honest; those weren’t your biggest sellers. The one people recognize is Descent.

Now Descent 3 was good. It had pretty graphics, fun weapons, and clever robots. But you spend too much time in Descent 3 looking for something to shoot and too often that leads to trips to the surface, outside of the labyrinth confines Descent is best known for. When (not if) Descent 4 is made, please take the game straight back to its roots. No helper bot, no outdoors. Just you, your weapons, a maze full of robots lusting for your death, and a really good soundtrack. These are what made Descent and Descent 2 great.

Furthermore, the Material Defender works best as a the silent type. I’ve gone over this before (somewhere), Descent 3 ruined the Material Defender by giving him a voice and making him anything more than a faceless mercenary. Using the lame story to string along the levels was lame. This time, keep it simple. There’s the mine, there’s robots in there somewhere. Here’s your gun.

Please Interplay. Make this happen. And don’t fuck it up.

Edit on 28MAR09: Somewhere in time, this article was edited. It wasn’t edited by me. I don’t know who edited it. It’s a shadow of its’ former self and missing everything bad I had to say about the promotion system and I don’t have the will to work up a furor and write all out again. So here’s the long and the short of it; if you suck your first sergeant’s dick enough to get a board appearance, you’ll get promoted to E5 or E6. Leadership abilities or job proficiency be damned.

Original: The Army’s promotion system beyond E-4 is garbage. It is not designed to promote the best people for the job but the ones who play to system’s requirements.

Lots of words ahead that no one will read. TLDR: Working hard won’t get me promoted so I have no desire to work hard.

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