Christian Missionary Activity as a Prime Mover in the Boxer War.

It is first important to point-out that Christian missionaries did not invent violence in the region of Northern China, where the Boxer War originated. That area had experienced physical conflict for many years prior to the expansion of Christian cultural imperialism. Professor Henrietta Harrison sets the stage by discussing inter-village politics concerning water distribution: “The Jin River Flowed from a spring as the base of the hills west of Taiyuan County town and irrigated approximately thirty villages…These villages depended on the water to grow profitable cash crops and for industries such as paper-making and the manufacture of alum.” Irrigation was “regulated by a series of hatches controlled by village hatch keepers…The prosperity of any individual was often directly dependent on the position of his village in the irrigation hierarchy. Fights, the stealing of water, the breaking of dykes, and lawsuits between villages were common” (Bickers & Tiedemann [eds.], p. 8). But in spite of these conditions, violent methods had been limited to the above tactics. It was only with the introduction of Catholic and Protestant missionaries into the local politics, that war and mass slaughter resulted.

Missionaries pursued an opportunistic strategy that exploited and exacerbated the existing inter-village conflicts. After the Second Opium War of 1860, and the First Sino-Japanese War of 1895, the Imperial Government of China was dominated by foreign powers. Missionaries, primarily from France, Germany and Great Britain, used this new political leverage to gain converts. “Here, their effective intervention in what essentially were ongoing struggles for scarce resources were of crucial importance and brought remarkable results…foreign priests demonstrated their power by winning disputes on behalf of converts and potential converts…Thus ‘conversion’ became a part of the repertoire of collective—and to some extent individual—rural survival strategies for a significant minority in a violently competitive environment...For example, the French Jesuits had gained the reputation for being very powerful as a consequence of their successful settlement of the Big Sword (Dadaohui) affair of 1896…local officials had to offer apologies, pay indemnities, and promise to protect the church…As Rosario Renaud has noted, ‘No power—that of the Emperor excepted—has ever achieved anything like it in Xuzhou’” (Bickers & Tiedemann [eds.], p. 21). As a result, Chinese communities that had converted to Christianity gained dominion in resources and legal disputes over those who did not convert. This created resentments, that would increase the number of recruits against Christians during the Boxer War and result in more casualties on both sides.

Northern China was an ecologically fragile area prone to severe droughts and severe flooding. These were perpetual and unavoidable. It was at a juncture between natural disaster and resentment of Christian missionaries that the Boxers made their appearance. “Facing first floods and then drought, these men had placed their hopes for salvation in…martial arts and spirit possession practices that had emerged in northwest Shandong province between 1898 and 1899. As they understood it, the alien presences in the land and their Chinese compatriots who had turned their backs on their identity by converting to Christianity had knocked the world out of kilter. To restore order and to bring on the rains, the land needed to be purged. In many instances, existing local tensions and conflicts between Christian and non-Christian communities and villages—over land, over water, over participation in community life—further fed the flames. Attacks on Christians spiraled into attacks on missionaries and other foreigners” (Bickers & Tiedemann [eds.], p. xiii).

Early in the struggle, “armed response” to Boxer attacks “was usually led by foreign missionaries” who “had significant advantages over their non-Christian rivals. Their extensive higher-level networks enabled them to share information and acquire superior technology” in defensive fortification and weaponry (Bickers & Tiedemann [eds.], p. 33). This foreign leadership and technology resulted in an amount of casualties that could never have been reached with the more primitive, local weapons. But even this situation of unequal resources was dwarfed by the later military intervention of seven European powers plus Japan. In the end, “perhaps a total of up to 100,000 or more people died in the conflict.” https://www.britannica.com/event/Boxer-Rebellion  

The role of Christian missionaries in cynically exploiting an existing conflict to expand their influence, arming the convert populace, and causing what was once localized minor violence to escalate into a widespread war against Christian intrusion, is clear. History is rife with examples of that signature Christian hypocrisy where clergy, (following a savior who eschewed material gain and counseled people to love their enemies), are instead pursuing power and causing war. It is a sad confluence of belief and power. One can observe it when any religion that thinks of itself as possessing absolute truth, leaves the private realm of personal worship, and enters the political public sphere.

Bickers, Robert & Tiedemann, R.G. (editors). The Boxers, China and the World. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2007.

How the Trump Agenda Serves the Wealthy Elite.

We all know that the United States is (roughly) divided into two politico-cultural camps. So why do we have a president who worsens this divide? Who benefits from our discord?

Clearly, the people who comprise Trump’s base, white people who feel that they have been left behind by Washington, whose jobs have disappeared, who blame our first African American president for policies they feel have disenfranchised them, whose advantages are vanishing as they lose prominence to other cultures; surely they will not benefit from Trump’s policies. This president is dedicated to cutting their health care, polluting their air with coal plant emissions, depriving them of their birth control benefit, gutting the EPA that protects them, whittling away at the national parks their children will inherit and providing them with less of a tax-cut than the wealthy one percent. As a private businessman, he has sent their jobs to foreign sweat shops. But he promises to consider them; to restore their dominant past over the non-white population that is going to have superior numbers in 20 years time. He fuels the culture war through racist and anti-immigrant sentiment, through pandering to white supremacists, through attacks on football players kneeling, Confederate statues coming down and border walls going up. He soothes their fears while robbing them.

Who benefits? His class. The wealthy elite. If they do not have to pay for healthcare and birth control; if their businesses thrive because they are not regulated by the EPA and pollution laws; if their taxes are reduced; they benefit...in the short run. In 1930s Germany, wealthy industrialists backed the Nazis to unseat a socialist Weimar government. They thought that they could control the Nazis through money. They were wrong. At present, the US is not in the same situation regarding Trump and his anti-semitic & white supremacist supporters. Trump is a nationalist racist who is reacting against the Obama years; but he is not a Nazi. However, it is the goal of Steve Bannon to replace moderate Republicans with candidates who are white supremacist & anti-semitic. His thinking is longer-term than Trump's and momentum is on his side. If he is successful, it will not end well. The nationalism, hatred, violence and division we are seeing in our streets and our government will become stronger.

Presidents have the potential to be unifiers. Government has the potential to be a tool that protects all of its citizens. But that is not the United States of today.

Today, the wealthy elite buy the politicians loyalty. They fund the campaigns of those who promise to serve their desires. Most of these politicians are themselves part of this wealthy elite. And the current President of the United States is the wealthiest of these politicians. Trump, his agenda, his Republican Party, with the complicity of wealthy Democrats, will continue to skew the laws to benefit the wealthy at the expense of the non-elite citizen and the environment.

There is a way out of this quandary; a way to claim government for all of the people: The general population of common citizens would have to make an effort to involve itself in the political process in a manner that served their own interest for fair government. They would need to work on the following three tasks: 1) Education for unity over division, that exposes who benefits from culture wars where the rest of us fight over scraps. 2) Limitations on campaign contributions so money does not control the peoples’ representatives in government. 3) A permanent vigilance by the populace against injustice and privileges of the wealthy.

The reality of the present is that the populace is divided. While the rich harvest the trees, white people are fighting with people of color and immigrants over the fruit left rotting on the ground. Those who are not involved in this culture war are docile in front of TV screens and game consols, too distracted, too apathetic, too tired from work and life’s stressors to become involved. A change in our thought, our action and our direction is necessary. Unfortunately, people normally participate en masse as a last resort; when basic human needs are threatened for a significant number of their class.

Will people getting fed-up with the culture war and being robbed be enough of an impetus to fix this problem? That’s up to you. There are a couple of places to begin. A couple of organizations attempting to correct the problem of the wealthy elite’s power:

One organization is Indivisible. Their objective is to defeat the Trump agenda. You can connect with a local chapter through their website at https://www.indivisible.org/  

Another organization is Common Cause. They are a non-partisan, grassroots organization, attempting to limit campaign spending and make government responsive to all citizens. They can be reached at http://www.commoncause.org/

The battle to regain the United States for the rest of us will be long. Even after the elite have lost their stranglehold on national politics, the populace will need to remain politically active, and well-educated regarding the wealthy opposition, to prevent their resurgence. So get involved, pace yourself, be patient and be persistent.

From Civil Rights 1961 to the Women’s March for America 2017. Dissent Against Prejudiced Politicians.

In Mississippi, on September 25, 1961, an African American “farmer named Herbert Lee, the father of nine, an NAACP member who braved the terror to attend voter meetings and drive [Bob] Moses around the country, was shot dead in broad daylight, by a state legislator named E.H. Hurst” (Gitlin, p. 141). Injustices committed during the early Civil Rights Movement are suffocating, terrifying, oppressive episodes in recent US history that most people, particularly those outside of the African American community, would prefer to forget. But history presents valuable lessons that are obviated by forgetting. Humans are the same biological animals whether we are discussing humans of the 10^th Century, the 20^th Century or the 21^st Century. Though there has been significant social evolution over the past 1000 years, we still retain qualities, behavioral and biological, that can instruct us about who we are and how we will respond in a given situation.

In Mississippi of 1961, elected officials like E.H. Hurst set examples, as political leaders, concerning racism and suppression. These examples emboldened other racists to commit hate crimes as well. As a presidential candidate, Donald Trump also set an example. By now we are all familiar enough with Trump’s prejudiced comments against minorities and physical assaults against women, that a litany is unnecessary. Enough progress has been made during the ensuing 56 years between Hurst’s and Trump’s examples that our elected officials no longer shoot targeted minorities in cold blood (they leave that to the police). We have socially evolved enough that opportunists like Trump employ only racist language to obtain office. The instructive similarity between 1961 and 2017 is that the examples politicians set have material consequences in society.

The Southern Poverty Law Center documented “what has become a national outbreak of hate, as white supremacists celebrate Donald Trump’s victory. In the ten days following the election, there were almost 900 reports of harassment and intimidation from across the nation. Many harassers invoked Trump’s name during assaults, making it clear that the outbreak of hate stemmed in large part from his electoral success.” Here are some examples:

A Sudanese-American family in Iowa City, Iowa...found a note attached to their door that read, “You can all go home now. We don’t want niggers and terrorists here. #trump.”

In Tuscola County, Mich., a Latino family was shocked to find a wall of boxes scrawled with “Trump,” “Take America Back,” and “Mexicans suck.”

While a Chinese-American high school student was getting gas, a white man approached her to say, “Can’t wait for Trump to deport you or I will deport you myself, dyke yellow bitch.”

On the Las Vegas Strip, a white man punched two black men and attempted to assault a black woman. After the attack, he chanted “Donald Trump!” and “White Power!”

In Sarasota, Florida, a 75-year-old gay man was ripped from his car and beaten by an assailant who told him, “You know my new president says we can kill all you faggots now.”

In Minneapolis, middle-school boys leaned out of a school bus to yell, “Grab her by the pussy!” to a man walking with a female colleague.

In Albuquerque, New Mexico, a woman caught a stranger trying to take the “I’m With Her” bumper sticker off of her car. When confronted, the perpetrator asked her if she was a Jew because she “looked like one.” “Get ready for your next exodus lady,” they told her, “because we’re about to clean out this country.”

The report is at  https://www.splcenter.org/20161129/ten-days-after-harassment-and-intimidation-aftermath-election

History never repeats itself verbatim. It is unlikely that we will see an exact replica of Civil Rights Era reactionary injustice. But the evidence is clear that Donald Trump’s hate speech against women and minorities has emboldened a profoundly ignorant segment of the US to expand upon his language with acts of hatred. Interestingly, there is also a historical parallel among political organizations between 1961 and 2017. The anonymous racists of the 1961 Ku Klux Klan are mirrored in 2017 by the anonymous trolls of the Alt Right who perform cowardly, incognito attacks, like their predecessors.

The day that this writing was penned, there occurred the largest demonstration in US history: The Women's March for America. The Washington Post estimated that the march had more than a million attendees nation-wide.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/womens-march-on-washington-a-sea-of-pink-hatted-protesters-vow-to-resist-donald-trump/2017/01/21/ae4def62-dfdf-11e6-acdf-14da832ae861_story.html?utm_term=.8af24a6c399b  Internationally, the conservative estimate by reputable news agencies is that 2 million people in 75 nations joined the million US women’s protesters https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jan/21/protests-around-world-show-solidarity-with-womens-march-on-washington#top 

Demonstrations are a fine and positive expression of vision. But they are not enough. Professor Todd Gitlin, whose book is quoted at the beginning of this article, spoke to NPR a week before the event. He used the example of Tea Party demonstrators, who turned protest into permanent organizations and elected representatives to Washington. Gitlin indicated that the progressive, anti-Trump demonstrators should do the same. If we are going to turn the tide against Trump-inspired hatred, we need to follow Gitlin’s suggestions. Individual commitment to organizing, not just protesting, is the answer. The author of this article, for one, will be contacting the website of the Women’s March for America. He will chose a partner organization with whom to volunteer, as soon as this is posted. Here is the link to their national website’s list of partners:

https://www.womensmarch.com/partners/

Gitlin, Todd. The Sixties. Years of Hope, Days of Rage. New York: Bantam Books, 1987.

From Communism to Globalism. One Hundred Years Since the Russian Revolution of 1917.

Next year will mark the 100^th anniversary of the 1917 October Revolution in Russia, which brought us the first Communist experiment. There is little argument, even from orthodox Marxists, that the various revolutions favoring Communism have failed to attain their promise. They all established governments that progressed to the phase of Dictatorship of the Proletariat. But none were capable of progressing to the final phase: the Collective Ownership of Property. The next three paragraphs will be spent briefly elucidating the reasons for those failures. They are the predictable and pedantic expressions of hindsight, but they must be stated for clarity and the sake of a well-balanced critique. Following that will be a discussion of the benefits communism provided.

The reasons for this failure have as much to do with the nature of governments as they do with the nature of people. Governments are not designed to give away power; they exist to concentrate power into a few hands so that goals can be accomplished. Bureaucracies as well are generally seen as successful when they expand their functions and purposes. It is a constant struggle in Representative Republics to contain the size of government. Whether one approaches the State from the right or the left of the political spectrum, efforts are frequently, though certainly not exclusively, centered on limiting the role of government. Leftists, from a human rights perspective, are often attempting to curb the excesses of laws which limit personal freedom. Those on the right repeatedly find themselves working to curb government size, taxation and spending. Understandably, both sides also have political projects that serve to expand the role and size of the state apparatus.

People are also not designed to make themselves powerless and useless. Humans did not rise to the top of the food chain by being anything less than brutal and rapacious. Natural Selection is frequently subtitled “survival of the fittest” for a reason. One might argue that individuals who choose to lead a violent revolution, seize power and usurp the position of the previous ruling class, are less likely than the rest of us to surrender that power and control in the end. But it wasn’t just the nature of governments and the nature of people that undermined the success of Communism. An important additional factor was that Karl Marx never provided a mechanism for governments to give away power and property once they reached the phase of dictatorship. Without a framework that would provide a check on these regimes, they remain stunted in a situation of totalitarianism, unable to advance.

Advocates of Communism have argued that their vision was never permitted to advance because centralized authority was necessary to defend national borders against outside attempts to overthrow their regimes. In their view, the dictatorship phase was required to be extended until the victory of worldwide Communism. At that time, the transfer of power and property to the people could be completed. However, Communists always knew that Capitalists would go down swinging. They weren’t simply going to surrender wealth and influence as soon as the first revolution succeeded nationally. If Capitalists put-up a violent opposition within the borders of a revolutionary nation, they could equally be expected to fight the threatened spread of Communism abroad. The short-sighted excuse that enemies were responsible for the continuation of dictatorship is a transparent failure to take responsibility for one’s own actions or worse, a lie designed to justify continued autocracy. If an authority is unwilling to surrender power and wealth when it is smaller or national, how much less willing to surrender power will it be when it is global and has no opposition?

While those of us living under Capitalist and Democratic systems are familiar with the defects of Communism, we are less familiar with benefits it provided to its’ populations. From the perspective of the world’s poor, (its’ agricultural, industrial and unemployed workers), communism provided a way to meet basic needs. The systems these people were revolting against were autocratic and oligarchical. The priorities of these systems ignored inhumane working conditions, twelve hour work days and inadequate pay. The barest essentials of food, clothing and shelter, were not fully available to the populace. The goal of the Russian Revolution of 1917, from the viewpoint of the poor and workers facing the rifles, was to provide their children with enough to survive. This is why most historic revolts occurred at the onset of Russian winters; especially after a bad harvest. To those whose goals were greater distribution of food, shelter and clothing, the Russian Revolution was a success. At least, one can admit that the USSR succeeded where the Capitalist West continues to fail.

Another benefit was the provision of a dissenting, if imperfect, voice against the greedy rich in the world. Communist nations continually propagandized against the chief shortcoming of non-communist nations: the penchant to place profits above human need. Propaganda, along with the sowing of Communist parties in Capitalist nations and the threat of Bolshevist expansion, encouraged western reforms. Societies based on free markets were obliged to answer the challenging communist question: “What are you doing for those who are not rich?” Some responses, like the Kennedy-Johnson War on Poverty, failed. Some programs, (like Social Security, Job Training, Public Housing or School Lunch), remain as a social safety net today. The United States tolerates a good deal more Socialism than it would have without that dissenting voice in the world.

The mere existence of purportedly Communist nations, also prevented the level of economic exploitation one sees in unrestrained Capitalist Globalization today. If one had told a patriotic US factory worker in 1960 that the fall of Communism as a revolutionary force would mean that her job would go overseas, she would have been incredulous. US citizens thought that the absence of revolutionary Communist alternatives would lead to prosperity for all; that world markets would expand, producing a boom in production requiring more factories and higher wages at home. Instead, the wealthy 1% have used the lack of ideological competition as an opportunity to divide the spoils of the world amongst themselves. In 1960, the idea of shipping jobs and factories to poor nations, where residents would tolerate low wages and inhumane working conditions, would only have worked briefly. Workers would have recognized, (and would have been told by Communists), how badly they were being exploited. They would have then, as people did in so many situations, taken the guns offered to them by Russian-and-Chinese-backed Communist insurgents, and seized the means of production. Capitalists knew that their investments were safer in the US and Western Europe, so that’s where most of the factories stayed.

Globalization has led the international work force back to the exploitative days of the 19^th Century. Now, as then, unions are ineffective against greed. Since aggressive union activity in overseas workplaces would result in plant closure and relocation to another poor nation, there is little challenge to owner demands. Current treaties provide for some regulation around factory safety, working conditions and environmental destruction. However, these are only the first of Globalism’s treaties. They have to appear somewhat benign. But how long will the initial treaties last when there’s always a poorer community to where owners can build a factory? Communities where governmental leaders are willing to make human and environmental concessions for a kickback? And in regards to regulation of treaties, who pays the regulators if not the politicians that are bought by the rich in so-called democratic elections?

The rich are only becoming more wealthy and more powerful, as fortune is concentrated among fewer and fewer corporations. Over time, the methods of globalization will become even more sophisticated; more easily and deftly used by international businesses. We are only at the beginning of globalization. The trajectory is not pointing towards economic justice.

The answer to this dilemma is relatively obvious: Governments need to be more representative of the people they govern. There need to be limits on the amount of money given to electoral candidates in republics. The elected governments of those republics must then produce representatives to world councils which regulate international treaties & commerce in the interests of the people. The currently labeled communist nations like China and Vietnam are an animal never envisioned by Marx: nations run by a self-styled Communist dictatorship, but supporting a Capitalist economy. They and other non-democratic nations must abide by agreements that make provisions for worker’s rights and environmental protection, in order to do business with the democratic nations. We must find some way to regulate the power of currently unregulated businesses if we are to stop worker exploitation and environmental degradation.

This is a long struggle. The steps to success are not clear. Getting big money out of election campaigns has thus far proved an intractable problem. International networking and agitation by activists committed to preventing global corporate domination, has not been as effective as the efforts of big business to network and attain its’ goals. It’s a tall order. But in the end, a world with less exploitation of workers, healthier environments and more democracy, is a worthwhile objective. Since the opposite scenario is to permit less than 1% of the world population to control and exploit the rest of us, what choice do we have?

The Electoral College: Enforcing Reactionary Minority Rule.

The Electoral College was created with the ratification of the US Constitution. It was conceived during a time when states were far more politically distinct than they are now, and considered themselves to be self-governing bodies that existed almost as separate nations.  This College leveled the playing field between more populous and less populous states. It allayed smaller state fears of domination by larger states regarding presidential elections.

But the Civil War changed all that. Much of a state’s individual latitude and independence from the whole was curtailed with the South’s failure to secede from the Union. Prior to that war, Americans referred to their country as these United States. After the war, we became the United States. The Electoral College is a vestige of a time when separation of state and federal spheres of influence were considered necessarily more clear. So without its perceived original necessity, why do we still have an Electoral College? The answer is that less populous states still fear that they can be overwhelmed by the more populous ones.

Unfortunately, during two recent elections in our young 21^st Century, the existence of this body has produced a tyranny of the minority. Admittedly, it is a slight minority. In the Bush vs Gore 2000 election, Al Gore won the popular vote by over 540,000 ballots, but still lost the election due to the College. In the Trump vs Clinton 2016 election, Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by over 2 million ballots, but still lost the election due to the College.

Obviously, for individuals interested in social progress, (environmentalism, peaceful international resolution of conflicts and human rights), this situation is intolerable. These elections, held ransom by a regressive, provincial, undereducated, minority in the middle of the country, is a travesty that has supplied the US two hostile presidents: The first, a war-mongering, anti-woman, anti-LGBTQ and anti-environment Bush, who turned our $127.3 billion national surplus into a $1.2 trillion deficit in his pursuit of killing 250,000 Iraqi civilians.  << http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2015/aug/27/occupy-democrats/liberal-group-blames-bush-raising-deficits-credits/ >>  The second, a proudly racist, sexually assaultive, anti-Constitutional and frankly socially embarrassing demagogue, whose fulfillment of destructive potential awaits.

So what is to be done? How do we get rid of the vestigial and unnecessary Electoral College, whose results have produced such destructive politicians elected by the ignorant minority? The immediate answer is that nothing, besides a revolution that few want, will produce a change for the short term. The Republicans understand that they need the influence of this anti-cosmopolitan minority for victory. They control the Presidency, the House and the Senate. They will soon pack the Supreme Court to the fullest of their ability. Logistically, reform is untenable.

But the country is continuing to change. The most recent election was an angry backlash, by threatened conservative white people who know that their influence is dwindling. Without a doubt, the election of our first African American president brought the howling racists out of the woods. Just listen to the rhetoric of Trump’s supporters. But by 2060, 56% of the population will be composed of non-white people. << http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2015/07/06/its-official-the-us-is-becoming-a-minority-majority-nation >>. Some say this will happen by 2043. << https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Majority_minority >>. Little of this data takes into account marriage between individuals of differing ethnic background (a phenomenon that Trump voters would no doubt call miscegenation). Inter-ethnic marriage will quicken the process. For now, the domination of the anti-cosmopolitan minority in the center of our country persists, and may continue to exist for a short while after the majority of our citizens are non-white. But eventually, the Electoral College will fail to prevent progress. While this chronology does not satisfy citizens who seek immediate gratification, it does arm us with a positive prognosis for a more peaceful and just future. It is unfortunate that there will be suffering caused by reactionary-elected demagogues in the meantime. If anyone has a solution, please feel free to post your views on my blog. As ever, I invite conversation that will inspire knowledge, humor and the spirited community capable of getting us though the next four years.

Lesbians, Gay Men & Population.

One of the greatest challenges facing humanity today is that our population is continually increasing. Consequently, we are using-up the world’s resources. In addition, the industrial activity that produces products for an expanding population increases global warming. We will continue to expand our population, consume resources and worsen global warming, until there is a crisis in a particular resource (food, water, energy, land, etc.) Conflicts will ensue over the remaining scarce resource.

Even before that crisis occurs, we will have destroyed the diversity of flora and fauna on the planet. Plants, whose chemical composition could provide advances in medicine, will disappear and we log and encroach upon their habitats. Beautiful, unique animal species will die off. Governments will find excuses to lease national parks to corporations for pillage of scarce resources. We will leave a poor, ravaged environment to our children.

Is there a way to have human beings voluntarily chose not to reproduce? Well, we do have two populations who reproduce much less than the average. They could save us from environmental destruction and the impending ecological crisis: Lesbians and Gay Men.

But how do we expand the lesbian and gay populations in a way that is democratic? Sure, we could isolate the genetic material that produces lesbians and gay men, thereby engineering a larger percentage of humans to have same-sex proclivities. But genetic engineering carries with it some frightening possibilities for abuse. The moral question of choosing an individual’s sexuality for her makes this route impracticable.

This is not, of course, the only obstacle. Prejudice against lesbians and gays, particularly from ignorant and dogmatic religious quarters, continues to exist. The ignorant and dogmatic resist efforts by same sex couples to live in peace without discrimination. Freedom from harassment by the prejudiced is essential both for human rights and for success of any program to make lesbians and gays a larger percentage of the population.

At present, the most logical, democratic route to avert ecological catastrophe is to remove barriers of discrimination from society, thereby encouraging the free expression of lesbian and gay self. In addition, if we provide unhampered access to services for any lesbian or gay man who wishes to have children with her/his genetic heritage, this will expand the percentage of humans whose sexual expression does not lead to reproduction.

A final, perhaps more fanciful suggestion, is to encourage as many gay men as possible to donate to sperm banks. (Come on guys, fifty bucks, free porn and a doughnut.) A larger percentage of gay genetics in the donor pool would do some good. Now all we need is a movement and a lot of plastic cups.

This is the beginning of a discussion. I am open and eager to hear answers that are improvements on my suggestions. I will modify this paper accordingly.

For pensive, rational non-fiction book reviews, see greatnonfictionbooks.blogspot.com

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