civilization – Stepping Stones

Munich’s Cycle of Vengeance in View of the Israel-Hamas War/Palestinian Conflict

An analysis of the 2005 Spielberg film Munich in the context of the Israel-Hamas war and Israeli-Palestinian conflict that identifies universally significant themes of profound current relevance.

Preface: Either With US or Against US

“Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make:
Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists. (Applause.)”
—President George W. Bush on September 20^th 2001 inaugurating the ‘War on trr’ (sic).

This article analyses Spielberg’s 2005 film Munich for its thematic relevancy to the Israel-Hamas War and resurged Palestinian Conflict begun by the October 7^th attack; and more essentially, to the globalised ideology of counterterrorism. Before doing so, I outline in this Preface the context in which I interpret the current war and significant themes from the film.

Annihilation

What’s the meaning of this? Who’s to say? (Certainly not me…)

I don’t know what this is.
Maybe it’s an inane mixture of things. Or something novel and deep. Guess it depends on who (or what) is reading it.
Maybe it’s nothing but with something in it. Or something but with nothing in it.
It’s not for me to say, even though I’m the author. Actually, because I’m the author.
Just technically ‘the author’. See I wrote this here thing, I did, but who’s to say I am the authority of its meaning? (That question may or may not be rhetorical, according to preference.)
As a matter of fact (technically just an expression, BTW), it’s each reader that decides the meaning of what(ever) he/she/it is reading, as determined by the law of Intertextuality (and quite authoritatively at that, FYI). See, this fantastic law ‘deconstructed’ (as it likes to say [not that I really know what it means]) the myth of ‘authorship’ by revealing that the actual producer of meaning is [drumrole]… the reader! Ergo (just using this word ‘coz I like how The Architect said it in Matrix 2), each ‘meaning’ is equally valid (praise the law of Equality!)—and, ergo, implicitly untrue.
Case in point: commenter says this “post” is “garbage”. Therefore, he/she/it (‘they/them’ from now on) is actually right on both counts—provided only that they meant what they said. Then again…
…what they said might be totally untrue—who knows? (Rhetorical?—who knows?)

Transhumanism: Religion in Plain Sight – Part 3

This article features a selection of quotes from the book Homo Deus, each accompanied by my notes, comments, and references to related media.

*Transhumanism: Humanity in ‘Upgrade Mode’*

Part 3 of this article series features my expansion of Ncaps 31-40 for the book Homo Deus (as discussed in the Introduction, which also includes the full list), as a basis for identifying points of significance and referencing a variety of relevant media.

Themes covered in Part 3 include Dialectics of Government, Principles of Revolution, Submission to Authority, Continuity of The Establishment, Emotional Decision-Making, Elite Minority Rule, Conceits of Modernity, Social Instability, Civilized Barbarism, Collectively Believed Fictions, Society as Entrapment, Hindsight via History, Suppression of Awareness, Ideological Bio-Engineering, Prophetic Sci-Fi, Modern Forms of Religion, Rationalized Immorality, Incongruous Speech, Hypocrisy of Civilization.