Big Brother and the Nanny State

By William R. Toler

When it comes to the overreaching of government, there are usually two paternal personifications: Big Brother and the Nanny State.

Both are invasive in their own right and typically used in tyranical tandem to undermine the liberty this nation professes to harbor.

The Nanny State monicker is applied to governmental regulations and laws which are supposed to be in the best interest of the populous but often eliminate freedom of choice. These hinderances are usually lobbied for by groups of people who think that they are protecting others who can’t make the decisions for themselves.

Big Brother generally refers to the surveillance and control of the people by the government, deriving its name from George Orwell’s 1984.
Headlines across the country have been rife with recent examples of big government, on local and national levels.

Earlier this month, San Francisco banned Happy Meals. In an effort to combat childhood obesity, the city–at the behest of Nanny State nimrods–enacted an ordiance that prohibits “restaurants from offering a free toy with meals that contain more than set levels of calories, sugar and fat,” according to the LA Times. The ruling also requires restaurants “to provide fruits and vegetables with all meals for children that come with toys.”

Researcher: Thermal image of sasquatch caught in Uwharrie Natl. Forest

By William R. Toler

The Tar Heel State has had another sighting of the legendary bigfoot.

But unlike the backwoods witness featured on news stations across America earlier this year, this sasquatch spotter seems to be a bit more believable.

Researcher Mike Greene believes that he captured footage of a bigfoot using thermal imaging technology last year in the Uwharrie National Forest, according to WGHP-TV.

“It can’t be anything else, I mean, it literally can’t be anything else,” said Greene, who used to be a fraud investigator in New Jersey.

Greene set out a candy bar to attract the beast after being awakened by what he calls “Darth Vader breaths.”

The footage shows what appears to be a 7-feet tall, muscular creature come from the woods, pick up the candy bar and return to the cover of the forest.

NCSU Free Expression Tunnel censored by students

By William R. Toler

In a bit of First Amendment irony, the Free Expression Tunnel at North Carolina State University was censored by students after “offensive images and slurs” were painted on its walls.

According to the college’s paper the Technician, a group of students blocked entrance to the tunnel overnight while they used black paint to cover up “sexually explicit picture of black man labeled as President Obama with racial slurs spray-painted on his face.” The News & Observer also reports that college’s chancellor issued a statement saying the message contained “racially charged obscenities and derogatory comments directed to the GLBT community.”

The protesters repainted their own message of “tolerance” incuding the word “diversity” twice and postulates, “Freedom of Speech…at what cost?”

Secret Knowledge: Arena of Faith Part I

By Adam Carlson

A Brief History of Man’s Search for God

Ever since man became aware of his surroundings he has struggled to make sense of what he cannot explain. He looks high and low and attributes these unexplained phenomenons to unseen, higher powers.

During the infancy of the human race, he creates a paradigm of religious thought centered on the belief that everything he could see, feel, or touch contained a spirit-force tying it to all others like it. These spirits could be angered, appeased, or in other ways manipulated by ceremonial rites or actions. Shaman of various importance and potency were the ones who were expected to interpret the signs of nature for the common man and if they were able, intervene where necessary. Scholars refer to this religious archetype as Animism, a term that encompasses the religious belief systems of such peoples as the Druids, most Native Americans, and even modern day practitioners of Wicca.

During the formative years of man, his beliefs evolve and become more complex as society grows out of the hunter/gatherer stage and develops technology for farming, architecture, defense and war. It is here that, out of the cradle of civilization, we see the emergence of theistic thought. Polytheism becomes the standard explanation for the unknown and sometimes contradictory forces of nature and fate. Springing up in Northern Africa, India and the Greek Isles, this religious archetype attributes different aspects of the natural world and its functions as well as different aspects of human nature to different deities who make up a pantheon of gods. These gods are believed to reside in places set apart from the world of man like Mt. Olympus, the heavens, or the Egyptian underworld known as Duat. Furthermore they are also believed to exist within certain forces of nature such as the sun, specific bodies of water, or even within the earth itself. These gods also have free reign to interact or interfere with man and his endeavors.