Pacific Disconnectedness

The current and hot issue of a government grant worth $4million to a Pacific Business Development group has raised issues with other Pacific Island community groups. A group in opposition raised issues with a process in place for consultation, allocation, and with existing protocols in place via the Pacific Island Affairs. There were questions raised as to accountabilities and expectations not only for the authority but also for the community. This group which opposes the grant I believe is associated with the Labour Party.

The person who fronts the Pacific Business Development group stands on the proposal that for the last ten years or so, Pacific Island people have been funded by tax payers to put mechanisms in place, but statistics in the reality for families and especially school leavers are still the same. I'm not sure what political following this group is, but National Party is a business party. It has demonstrated its ideological belief the minute it came into office by massive redirection of revenues and resources from public and community ownership into the hands of private individuals. Incidentally, the only shareholder for the Pacific Business Development is one individual who claims to have networks with providers and local authorities.

The issue at stake highlights a gap between school leavers and employment. This is not a new realization. In fact I wrote an essay about it before last election in light of young people getting into street gangs, crime and violent behaviour in south Auckland. I even wrote a proposal for a business aiming at bridging this gap, and including a rehabilitation programme for prisoners. I believe there was also interest from Destiny Church at the time in south Auckland.

From my understanding, most of existing Pacific Islands community groups have cultural protocols and expectations. Also most Pacific Island community groups are lenient towards Labour which is familiar with the islands expectations. This relationship is established on a somewhat co-expectation relationship between the votes and allocation of funding and resources. It is probably the same expectation with any other political relations whether Labour or National. But here, a Pacific Island business group which may not be Labour Party orientated, or run by a PI community group with cultural expectations and is offering alternatives and different approaches to issues that has crippled the community for years, has won a multimillion grant from the government is not entirely surprising.

When Taito Philip Field was isolated from Labour, gaps in local communities' stability surfaced to prove how fragmented the support for Labour was. I meant the number was there, but most were just followers without conviction. Voters are there for individual and subjective reasons more than for community stability reasons. This has to change and funding has to show some measures in the impact they have on our societies. Funding has to trigger down to where the real needs are.

Pacific Island communities are better sustained by business, but the means for establishing Pacific Island Business opportunities are too far to reach. At the same time, the disconnectedness among people only deteriorates the conditions to support themselves in terms of market and business.

I know, I have suggested an independent body made up of local chiefs and the likes, to make suggestions and support for betterment of their own villages. Instead individuals and communities gather around political parties, especially the Labour Party. And this is what you get; funding targeting any improvement for the community are opposed by those on the front line of politics. Decisions as to help those in real need don't even trickle down to those who are affected by it in reality.

Because of the lack of an independent community voice, an individual has won recognition from the government. An independent community or village council could have the statistics on their fingertips to make own submissions to the government without tarnish from another political group. Who knows, there might well be some other deals under the table that we are not fully informed of, but the truth is that Pacific Island communities continue to be the prawns of political opportunism, largely due to their own vulnerability to political persuasion.

Im telling you now that social issues affecting the communities are not purely represented by political representatives, not without a cost. Political power is effective but at an expense. Is the current family policies of the last ten years have made any effects on the rate of abuse, violence, crime, prison population, suicide, addiction, diseases and illness? The community should have the freedom to vote one way or another without emotional involvement for the better of the community. The best thing they could do for now is to support this project for a long term impact on our communities, and reserve their political opinions for 2011 General Election.

How can you expect a large Labour support group to be funded by a National government is absurd. The other group which also offered a political representation for the sake of the issues is Destiny. I believe Destiny has its success but it too came with a price. In the light of the Super City along with current emotional involvement with politics, the south Auckland community would be too dependent to help itself. It will have no soul and no freedom, but only to continue with its current means for political opportunism.

It's never too late to start this independent group which researches issues, make suggestions and support for economic developments. This is the spirit the Pacific Island communities have to develop and establish if it's to succeed as a value entity in the future.

If you are interested in the establishment of such a group, why not set up a chat meeting and see where we go from here? The outcome and long term goals are measured in accountabilities to the community and not of a political or religious party altough all are welcome. We have to integrate business, science, and technology with our cultures or we are left behind.

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The Fallacy of Material Logic

Before the arrival of Christianity, somewhere in the Pacific had already established Myths and intellectual Abstracts of a heavenly world. Samoa's formal language is rhetoric of metaphors while tracing the footsteps of legends, at the same time carving in the material a pattern of one's tribal ties. The heavenly world is materialized by its symbolic representations in the figure heads of High Chiefs or their next in the hierarchy, are also woven in the material of the arts, entertainment, and crafts. The custom places a significant respect for the heavenly realm in relations to one's own existent. He/she serves a function in the materialization of myths and beliefs, the tools upon which customs are fashioned, and behavior makes sense in the communion of objectives. This is the bind upholding a village then and today. There is one or two central pillars, surrounded by supporting posts. The fale or house is extended to the forefront and the backyard of symbolic meanings of the extended family.

If you take another look, the mythical gods spans existent from the heavenly aspects to the symbolic figureheads, and down to the material that fashions the fabric of social organisation. The ancient world was a complex one, and still is today.

When chiefs engage in the discourse of the morning that they offer extravagant indulgence in the luxuries of poetry. But there is a real pattern of tracing meaning in kinship ties, in biological relations, and the DNA. It is history, it is art, and a function in the elaboration of the importance of status. Fa'a-manusina, fa'alagilagi or singing praise and esteems of existent. A status is associated with skills and talents whether farmers, planters, hunters, and fishermen have earned their titles as they rest. Su'a (paramount titel) for example is tradition to art displayed in the patterns of the pe'a or tattoo. Pili is a mythical being who swallowed a stolen river from another village and spat it out at Vailele hence, flying water. (Vai is water; lele is flying). There is only one small spring in the whole village of Vailele. Because of the people's respect for Pili, they have guarded and maintained the spring from pollution and contamination. It is the only spring that the whole village depend upon during plumbing failures of the modern world. No, Pili doesn't deliver water door to door, but the mention of Pili is a cause to be aware of rules guarding the water!

The morning chorus praises the day as the planter wakes to a sweet song, does not depict a literal term; 'there is a choir singing in the morning to please the farmer for a good day's planting'. Rather the sound of birds waking in the morning is timely to the hour of waking as the planter prepares for a day's work. The sweet taste of pollen is fresh with honey as the Rose of Sharon sprays a morning dew. A creative orator would form descending files of relationships between flaura and fauna in his daily work. Rather than storing data in the computer, man had associated nature with his daily tasks stored in the memory and passed down through the generations. Yes the sound of the wind can remind a fisherman of a particular type of fish that is surfacing without even looking at the sea. He picks up his oar and head for the shore.

The people did not depend upon mythical gods for survival or for growth and protection, they were practicing the principles of natural beliefs in relations to the environment . They brought the gods into earth from the heavenly realm and thus bridged the physical and the abstract. Myths were once a real practice now rest in the tomb of the ancestors. But they have paved the way for Christianity, in the modernization of culture and tradition.

We don't reason direct meaning from the material definition or visible feature, rather the metaphor of a symbolic representation that has and can be brought into being by practical means. No, the gods of the land and the forest do not nurture creation and protect it from the hands of the capitalists nor do the gods purify the streams running within them. Rather the relationship between the gods and the people of nature adopt a conscience awareness of what's essential for survival. The awareness among the village is the bind that makes sense in interpretation of what's protected and respected. The land, it's eco system is integrated with a natural purification system, the villagers survived through time by living nearby streams. Now I wouldn't advise this as too many poison is sprayed either directly or by weed killer, fumigation, pesticides, or discharges from Dairy factories and Industrial waste. The material people among capitalists do not possess the internal awareness of nature that causes to protect the land. Rather material man is aware of how much profit they can make by exploiting raw material, and practically destroying the ecosystem until the land lays bare, and we shall all find another planet for survival.

The Aborigines is one of the longest surviving people on earth, and yet they lived simple lives among nature. Now it is the most threatened as their tribal land continues to be invaded and decimated by so-called modern progress. The Aborigines like other native cultures before Colonisation and destruction of a people, have mythical beliefs, and still practiced today. It is not the gods who are protecting and maintaining them, rather it's the awareness of symbolic meanings that binds, guides, and functions to uphold their survival. It is their belief in the gods and practical quantification to uphold an objective outcome.

When an animal whispers in certain circumstances, other creatures are alarmed of a danger. Man likewise uses signs, symbols, sounds, and abstracts to inform or to warn of a presence of danger. Because man by nature has the ability to communicate through metaphors and symbolic language, modern material man has no idea of a code, or folk law, or custom, protocols, warnings and information from the outside. Lost by his own ignorance, he can only criticize!

In modern philosophy, the notion of metaphorical analogies is reasoned to connect the physics and its beyond to conduce a practical outcome in reality. The ancient man has paved the way to expand the mind in symbols, images, and figures to explain a complex intellectual world. It must follow therefore that man and his/her reality is not a material shell alone. And this reality cannot be reasoned by a rigid material logic.

You can bark at the shadow of yourself against the wall all day, but until you come to the realisation that you are not there, you'll dying chasing a shadow. I understand the position of the materialists that they can't claim something they cannot see, feel, or taste. Incidentally, since the atheists cannot see, feel, or hear God, therefore there is no God!

RELIGION

The topic of religion is always a fragile one in a sensitive environment where discussions and debates between the younger generations and their peers or between genders are often side stepped by passion and politics, and attempts for a common objective cease the opportunity. Recent statistics (Maori TV 4 April 2010) may reflect a behavior among young people of leaving traditional religions for modern ones and later return to their former conventions. Someone has explained this that when young people realize that they are missing their cultures in modern religions that they return to their roots.

So it follows that the young people are brought up in culture and religion especially by their island born parents. When they reach their teens they opt for modern religion, and soon after return to their former religions.

The trend may also explains the existent of modern religion as deriving from former members of traditions. And this is true in terms of sexual orientation where same sex union and homosexual practice are not inline with traditional principles, and deviating members establish their own religions from the roots of the main stem. But the general explanation is conducive to mental development as the individual comes to the realisation of oneself within the social organisation of society.

Children who grow up in cultural and religious families may have no idea of what they are doing in a church or a cultural ceremony. Instead, the pains of maintaining a posture whether sitting or kneeling or repetitious recitals and long periods of not moving or saying anything are associated with their experience. But it is fair to say that children begin to learn their culture and their religion by habits, and in this case some uncomfortable ones. These habits are meaningless to them until their mental developments have kicked in when at a little older age, the penny drops and all of a sudden they're in a brand new world. They owe their discovery of their new persons to their traditional religions and their cultures.

The experience of religion and culture is different from the individual's personal experience. In general, most children may find Harry Porter amusing but would refer to Shakespeare as boring until they have some grasp of the world of the mind and that they can distinguish a dream from an objective reality. I am therefore doubtful about the movement from traditional religion to modern ones as valid when individuals are perhaps bored and opted for alternatives in order to escape long hours of rigid postures and arthritic pains associated with the memory of their religious and cultural upbringing. Now if you associate such pains with an aggressive sermon, you would have a similar experience as a victim of (verbal) abuse. It is common with the young generation to be anti authority especially of their parents.

This may have attracted them to activities across the road where some modern religions do a bit of swinging, clapping, and dancing, and individuals do perform. The sermon and the choir may also trigger that subjective indulgence in the psyche and often appeals to please and developing a need to attend in order to satisfy a fix. I am not going to judge this but I want to know if the performance gains the individual glorification and what does this do for the congregation might attract a few personal following. But I also know someone who had changed his religion because he had found a girlfriend in another church.

There is a hint of personal gratifications in the trends as individuals seek recognitions and satisfaction away from the old boring sermons. You can hear people pray loud in churches, they say the right things and wear nice things, and they give plenty. Hey it's respectful t o wear nice things to church, to pray and worship also as cultural. It is not a fashion statement but cultural expectation always placing the best before God. But meet the same people on the street the next day, and it's a different story. The desire is quickly changed from happiness to anger and aggressive, as you are dealt a blow of verbal abuse or lack of respect for your person. And this is where I have maintained that religion and culture can be the substance of subjective materialism if individuals cannot motivate themselves to or grasp the practical objectives of their beliefs.

It is the difference between Harry Porter and Shakespeare, between the subjective physical and the objective metaphysical. It is the difference between magic and metaphor (analogical, intuition), between wishful dreaming and reasoning. And if one hasn't learned this in his/her growing up, then there is a problem in the translation.

Material happiness is scientifically decoded in the elements of magic mushroom and repetitions of recitals and movements in meditation. True happiness is being able to cope with an imperfect world to sustain a balanced lifestyle. Simply you cannot achieve true happiness by being addicted or seeking selfish desires, but by developing the objective self, the spirit to balance against the material ambitions. It is said that 'a house built on sand is subjected to the cast of the wind, but the house built on the rock endures its might'.

Jesus said; '..I am with the least among you'. It is the opposite of; 'I am with the most popular among you', or 'I am with the most rich', or 'with the most pretty...'. It is when you have experienced life at the bottom that you may gain some real understanding of the human heart.

In our modern world, mental development is taken over by material desires and magical abstracts, individuals cannot grasp an objective form of themselves during times of disappointments, they end up loosing it all in a narrow edge of their reality. Violence and crime including suicide and the option to die is increasing in our modern world.

If Jesus is the rock, and the foundation of your house is built upon the rock, then you will endure the tough times of the material world. And if you have experienced reality at the bottom of the material world, then you will have some idea of the nature of the human heart. And that stands a lighthouse in the dark of the modern world. We need religion now more than anything in our ever destructive material world, for our survival is evermore depended upon a solid rock.

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DICHOTOMY

Like most nationalistic governments, the sitting government campaigned on issues of crime, and its coalition partners raised the level to more severe punishments. It's a passionate appeal on the face of victims, but a conscious plot on the political opportunist. But this doesn't divert the fact that social issues of justice are borne of a conscience. Today as yet another National MP is found to be innocent of alleged crimes, we are reminded of an existing dichotomy. The so-called justice system is divided in its deliberations by racial features.

There general issues of social analysis are relative to religion, to culture, to gender, and race. But within these are personal struggles that are never heard, or surfaced amidst the fear driven tactics of political propaganda. European women, homosexual and lesbians have dominated offices of human rights and resources, it has established an industry in alliance with its socialist political arm. The mainstream media highlights possible exploitations and at the same time quick to identify its own victims within the same regime. And the rest is just a formality, a system of self compensation is established by the system for the system. In the absence of others, a dichotomy exists; the one part is totalitarian rule, and the other part is the excluded.

The conscious plots of political opportunism are non issues in terms of logic and social analysis. The just borne by a conscience are the real struggles that need to be exposed internationally. How our families are confronted by racial discrimination at the work place, at schools, at the sports field, on the road, at public office and sometimes in church, least of all places.

We are severely convicted of crimes of poverty and crimes of passion. Those who are not us are discharged and freed from crimes that are deliberately thought out. Tell me a government MP who claimed he doesn't know how to arrange a budget is found not guilty of misusing public money! Similar charges were enough to imprisoned a non European MP. At the same time, an unemployed hungry man is sent to prison for stealing food. Where is justice?

For reasons of race, an innocent student is subjected to coercive experimentation by the system and he ended up in hospital. While in hospital, his teeth were so neglected that he couldn't afford to fix them. His jaw bone was infected from inflammation of his teeth, a cancerous nerve spread to his throat. An ex student without an income relies on a benefit for daily subsistence. He was considered too expensive to be operated on and was just left in the too difficult basket to die.

Some of those students are smart but are psychologically damaged during their education to ensure they don't succeed, and thus their families don't. It serves to subordinate their culture and their race in the underclass. For some of those children are very gifted, but after an education they either end up in prison, or in hospital, or on the streets.

Discriminations because of race is not explicit and hardly anyone will admit to it. But everyone knows the reasons behind some serious decisions. Most complaints on the basis of race are denied because they are either non life threatening, or the evidence can't be materialized. And the authorities usually listened to their own kind over a non European. Some of our stories are fobbed off at the front counter are joked down and never exceeded beyond the front desk.

As a result of deprivation because of race, hunger and malnutrition is an effect of injustice. But the consequences affects the future generations. That defective gene is passed down the line and towards the future.

It is very important that every speck of racism is documented, voiced, and reported no matter what. It is the only way we can try and raise our own voice for the media and the system it protects will never give us a chance to voice our struggles.

Can you really believe a right wing Maori woman appointed to represent Pacific Island issues will truly reflect our struggles? Or does she only add another image along the likes of Paula Bennet don't you think?

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PI immigrants, a dying race...

If you knew before hand, why would anyone want to migrate into a foreign country only to become a subject of an oppressed minority ethnic group? It is a possible reality never visited by would be immigrants, mostly from the Pacific and the third worlds. That reality is somewhat oblivious in the clouds of excitement when one is certain to enter an advance economic nation. The dreams of material possession overtakes all things reasonable. But to deny this opportunity is a big let down considered to be a loss of a life time chance.

I'd like to ask some of our folks if life in New Zealand has improved their total well-being? But I should be careful not to incite emotions in the mention of street gangs and their abuse of alcohol and drugs, and the violent consequences that has polarized south Auckland. The violence is just too much, folks who used to step in to stop fights have learned not to for their own protection and for the sake of their families. That was a value associated with parenting; good parents stop children from fighting. Now it's like turning a blind eye or to encourage them to beat the hell out of another kid.

Against the backdrop of socialist liberalism, the older folks are quietly disappearing in the background while the younger generation emerges. The sights and sounds of the modern is missing that natural tone, mixed with a voice of authority. But those within it know very well it is not authoritative, but love that stabilizes a sense of belonging to a family, a member of a culture and religion. It makes one feel the part that is recognized and be, he/she is family.

Now the spoken language is fading in the background as the younger generation embeds a modern identity. What used to be the voice of culture and religion in the home is now the realm of the individual. Culture and religion are no longer a bind of a group, but a right of the individual. It is a right for one to choose his/her gender, to decide if there is a god, and what must be the right thing to do. And this is the fate of our folks, totally stripped of principle values, the material basis of development is established.

Our social inheritance is modified into a material development. Tradition, language, culture, and arts are all subjected to new interpretations materializing the gap between generations. The modern is total material. But that's exactly what we desired to achieve in a foreign advance nation before we left our homelands behind. To be in the new, the modern, and inevitably the material.

Some have successfully established their new homes, we have cars and among other things which makes us happy. However in the realm of the material world, happiness is an individual thing. The family used to celebrate individual success by sharing with members because everyone benefits from a members contribution. Now an individual's success is one's own ambitious glory as he/she sets sails for the world.

For those left behind, issues arise for us especially during periods of economic depression, the weight of economic frustrations for the middle and upper middle class is heavily weighted on our families. Economic reformation means the lost of employment, less income, and stress is manifested into violence and crime, and family break-ups. [Yes, education, the law, and God knows what have taught personal responsibilities, but it has never stopped the root cause of violence].

Right now under the National government, people are loosing jobs in droves. And at the same time, hard measures are put against to receive a WINZ benefit. When this happens, some families some times go without any income due to stand-down periods or for penalties for not showing evidence of an interview for a job and so on. And this also goes for those who endure long term illness.

In the actual search for a job or for a house, our people are the first to be fired and the last to be hired. We have the same qualifications and experience as anyone else, but there is such a thing as institutionalized racism which influence the decisions of the old hands in responsible positions.

In the most likely chance of attending an interview whether its for a job or for an accommodation, institutionalized racism has various faces. The interviewer or employer takes one look at you and that's it. He/she usually says something like; 'this is for those who can speak English perfectly', or in case of looking for a house, 'this is for those who are who seriously in need of housing', or 'you look like the partying type, etc'. And if you are lucky enough to have an interview, you will find yourself in the back foot of counter arguments and interjections to show that they really are not interested in what your saying, and have made decisions without knowing anything about you.

And if you are waiting in a queue whether at a WINZ office or a doctor's surgery, you turn up and waited in an empty waiting room to watch people coming and going while you are still sitting there two hours later. Sometimes you leave without seeing the doctor because you have another appointment. Other times you are told the person you had an appointment with is away and no one else is available to see you.

The old hands who have learned about us through the media has generalized all of us in the behavior of a few. These old hands have made up their minds about us, and have decided on the basis of media generalizations that we are not worthy to be employed, or to be seen before those that are not Polynesians or Pacific islanders.

So, in periods of economic depression, we are double hit from employers and landlords and at the same from WINZ among other social services.

In a time of most need, we need our families, we need our culture, and our religion for physical and moral support. This is obvious in families who are bound by a religion, they are strong to stand against the negative social trends. But for some who are isolated, the burden may be so stressful that extreme reactions could end up with harm not only to ourselves but also toi our families.

There are holes within so called safety nets when mechanisms are not in checked for such institutionalised behavior as racism. Some of our folks within these organizations are themselves institutionalized for the sake of their jobs, and tend to turn a blind eye if they themselves are not leading the condescending impositions.

So it's time to teach our folks back home about the reality of New Zealand. It's time to teach them that while material desire is a choice, it comes at a human cost. The cost of oppression has destroyed many families, their culture and religion. We are social people and our livelihood is balanced by the principle values engrained in our identity from our tradition, our culture, and our religion. This is thinned out during the era of material indoctrination of our minds, our children, and their future. If there is nothing left of our inheritance among the survivors, then we are a dying race.

The Science of Helping

In the current climate of Earthquakes and Tsunamis, we have come to learn about the destructive power of nature. For an objective observer, it's difficult to see anything constructive about Earthquakes and Tsunami so I guess the best way to approach it is prevention. We are talking about environmental protection in terms of drilling and mining the earth or discharge of polluted waste on the ocean on the one hand, and strengthening building structures to withstand the destructive impact of such forces on the other hand. The ultimate goal is to save lives and property.

I'm not an expert on the devastating power of nature, and most of us describe the occasion as we see it. We hear the sound of the wind and thunder of lightening, but we feel the wind against our bodies and see trees falling and swaying against it. All these are collected by the senses and associated with feelings of excitement, cold, fear and anxiety, loss and grief. There is much worry about relatives and loved ones who are not around, but lingering is a feeling of acceptance of the fact that not much anyone can do about it.

A Hurricane may be described by the height of angry waves of a rough sea in contrast with the calm of the Tsunami while there is turmoil force below the surface.

A material scientist may describe environmental events from the theory of Tectonic plate movements, and many scientists will reject that pollution and farm or industrial waste have anything to do with it. But at the same time, we have access to so much information to construct a theory that chemicals released from farm and industrial waste including nuclear ones are washed to sea and absorbed by the sun. These may heat condensation to upset the wind flow and cloud formation. When it rains it discharges the same chemicals upon the environment and absorbed by water and vegetation contaminating the food system. At the same time, forests are cut bared for commercial interests, leaving land bare to be carved up by floods and landslides.

Facts are presented and fabricated for political and economic reasons while the truth expresses human relation. And there is an unsettled feeling of anger hovering over the Climate Change debate. If disclosure is achieved, either capitalists will lose everything to pay for the earth, or WWIII is inevitable to deny the consequences. But that is not what this is about...

It is about helping your fellow human. How can you distinguish the issues from behaviour likened to that of a Hurricane which is visibly angry from the behaviour that is calmed but you are not able to see the turmoil below the surface? I'm not going to make a judgment in here but often most assessments are consistently based on visible evidence. Now to make this a bit more interesting, try helping persons from different cultures. Ok, the truth is we have victims of war and natural disasters looking to establish among us, and we also have our own underclass struggling with the usual economic consequences.

Then you will also have the helper who adopts the material science method of collecting visible evidence to structure visible outcome. Yes the material system always favours the material approach where resources are directed at areas where accumulation of evidence is visible. And for varying diversities among the needy, those seeking help from different cultures are either forced to behave like the angry waves of the sea, or subjugating their reality by remaining calm and go without help.

The people in positions responsible for distribution of resources are the same as the people on front lines of helping. It's not that they can help it, but the system accommodates a rigid method only suitable for the one material type. In the absence of social responsibilities inherent of public services, the private sector not only favours contractors from the one group of society, but is also profit driven as to a service delivery.

It is likely that society will only deal with one type of problem that is physical and visible in nature. But we have learned that an issue not only describes the physical and visible facts, but also the feelings and senses associated with emotions that are often under the surface. This makes up the reality of human, relative to a diverse population of many different cultures. It is the reality here and now.

The reality of the modern is presented by physical and visible facts the feelings and senses associated with emotions that are unique to specific groups. But their needs are undercut and deprived by the narrow scan of service delivery based on the need to show physical and visible facts. These statistics are necessarily for the sake of funding and or profit. But at a consequence of the exclusion of those that are different by true nature.

When we describe a people now, we consider the environment as background of the physical and visible presence sustaining either the characteristics of an angry Hurricane or that of a calm Tsunami. These are then relative to a specific group of the many cultures of our society. The fact is; whether it's planet movement that has upset Tectonic plates or the long line effects of Climate Change, it has destroyed our earth, our homes and cultures. But in the rush for survival we are giving up our humanity to the demands of physical nature itself, the material type alone.

The collection of environmental evidence from feelings and senses makes up the emotions that make meaningful purpose in our relations with other humans. It is the awareness that we recognize ourselves among others. If we should restrict this awareness to the material type alone, then we are not different from the animal creatures of nature making sense only by filling an appetite or material desire. In the absence of our humanity, there is no meaning to life. When gold loses its luster the material value is nullified and the visible system based upon it shall come crumbling down…

The case of Peter

After separation from his family, Peter went AWOL in a short period of depression. And when he came to, he decided to upgrade his skills and to find a job and new life elsewhere. After realizing his chances of finding a job locally were remote, he equipped himself with a new plan and enrolled at University to improve his chances.

Driven with new found energy to achieve a certificate, he got on with the job. On the first term, lectures were attended and papers researched; a novelty until all of a sudden he felt something was happening. Peter was picking up hostile messages from university students and teachers alike. He became a subject of a psychological experiment as the Police among other professionals were publicly profiling the South Auckland serial rapist. Peter connected the dots and he came to terms with a psychological reality.

Halfway through the term, Peter couldn't concentrate on his study as he became increasingly paranoid. He left and sought help at a mental asylum. The search for the psychological serial rapist stepped up another notch, but whether it was part of a psychological environmental creation, Peter's nerves were disconnected as he was falling apart. To this he was introduced to experience the effects of psychotic drugs in an attempt to null his brain under the label 'schizophrenic'.

Living on the edge of mental sabotage, his nerves were wrecked and emotionally crippled as he attempted to hold on to reality. He moved from health care to half way houses and was introduced to share the experience of persons suffering from mental illness. Instead of nullifying his brain with psychotic drugs, Peter attempted to think through the experience. The psychological experiment damaged his nerves but he had managed to save his mind. And considering his ordeal in a psychological environment, he is lucky to be alive today.

But he is left with a social phobia and a nerve disorder of the central nervous system. No one among the professionals from the university or lawyers and counselors admitted to any experiment. Pete had to get on with life, and the very reason he wanted to improve his chances is back on the agenda, but his profile is now public domain with extraneous attachment. He is turned down before even attempting to find a job. He is denied services or relegated to the back of the queue.

The coercive treatment is felt in the gutter, but something else picked him up. This is the difference unique to Peter and remains a valuable personal experience. He is privileged to have experienced such extraordinary phenomenon.

Peter is classified an invalids status, but he engaged in a self help community program helping others. Slowly his therapy was nursing his nerves as he is confronted by the very regime which savaged his humanity in the first place. They are professional personnel involved in community agencies, who continue with the same psychological treatment of targeted subjects, the targets of political agenda.

After ten years of voluntary work as he helped his nerves and preserved his mind, his only form of income is terminated without warning. Considering his illness was a result of a deliberate and professional method of brainwashing innocent individuals, his persecution continues as he is treated with no respects or dignity and without human rights.

The fate of Peter is decided by powers beyond him as he holds on to sanity. It is the difference that makes sense in his isolation and alienation. This sanity has restored some feelings where Peter has re-established his relationship with his family. It is what has now almost restored his sanity in coordination with his nerves, his feelings and thinking. It is his belief that saved him in times of darkness. It is the only rock of stability in foreign land where we as strangers have no rights, and are treated without respects or dignity.

Whether you have ended up in prison, on the streets, or in a hospital, whether it's your fault or not, don't lose faith. It is your rock of salvation. Let all those anger and helplessness go and learn to forgive. It is the practice of humility to forgive your trespassers as if you are worth the savaged treatment. Learn to be humbled in the face of adversity. It is at the bottom of the gutter where you will realize extraordinary enlightenment. But you need faith in order to realize the power of God and the possibility of miracles.

Pete doesn't know where to get the next feed, but in all the darkness he was thrown into, he had never resort to evil! Starving for a day or two can definitely help with obesity, and during the lent season it is experience as we reflect upon the principles of humility in temptation. It is humility to ask for help and be known as such. But you are breaking barriers of submergence in the dark of emotional and material self. Think of Jesus and his persecution for no reason of his own other than to speak the truth. He is spat on, beaten, humiliated and left at the bottom of the gutter.

Learn to be humble in the face of adversity. You will experience the result in the long run. You will understand the nature of evil as you remain peaceful within yourself even if you have nothing but the shirt on your back.

Peter has authorised his story to be made available for therapeutic treatment, community sharing, and education. All is required is an acknowledgment of this site in your public projects.
Thank you and God bless,

Peter

link: copy the image ["Social Relations.jpg"] and the link ["http://www.gihtrust.co.nz/Pacific.html] to save on your site