Producers, Moochers, & Looters

Produce, mooch, or loot.

These are the basic ways humans survive. We either produce our own necessities of life, by working for them, or we leech off of someone else's labors, or we take them from others by force. When we are young, we are dependent on our parents to provide for us. We are moochers off of their labors. But they do this willingly, & usually make it clear we have some accountability to them.
'While you are living in my house, you will do as i say!'
This is a commonly heard sentiment in most family units. So while the progeny of humans are technically 'moochers', they tend to be a dependent of choice. You made the decision to reproduce & you take on the responsibility to raise the child.
But this is not about voluntary dependents. It is about society. A healthy society must have a large number of industrious, hard working producers to provide the network of necessities: sustenance & protection. When a society breaks down, & too many moochers or looters run rampant, the producers cannot work hard enough to provide for them, or they become tired of being exploited & rebel against the system (or lack thereof) that has arisen.

1. If you are a responsible producer, you will have a constant battle to fend off moochers & looters. Hopefully, you will live in a time & place where you can protect yourself & your labors with sound collective agencies, provided for that purpose by all the producers. But, if moochers & looters gain control of the protection agencies, they will use them against you, & you will be exploited until you & the other producers revolt & cast out the moochers & looters. This is a constant pattern throughout human history, & will no doubt continue in the future.
2. If you are a moocher, you run the risk of wearing out those you mooch from. It is not a dependable method of survival, as you rely on the generosity of the producers you mooch from, or the benevolence of the looters to share with you from their plunder.
3. If you are a looter, you rely on having superior power or deception to intimidate & fleece the working producers. But if they pool their resources & defeat you, you might be killed in the struggle. It is also an unreliable way to survive.

Producing, with the force of law to protect your labors, has traditionally been the best & most reliable method of human survival. When a culture has a strong base of producers, they tend to be stronger, wealthier, & better suited to survive. Moochers & looters tend to be short lived, as the working producers tire of the excess, useless baggage, & reorganize the system to better serve them.

The challenge is for the producers to craft a system of protection, but not let it be controlled by moochers & looters, as they will use the system to plunder the producers. Typically, the producers just stage a revolution from time to time, and the leaders of the revolutions promise to provide peace & justice for the working producers to live & raise their families.  They promise to make minimal demands on the property of the producers.  But they always degenerate back into a mooching, looting system where law becomes an instrument of plunder, not justice.

The only solution is for the producers to keep a tight rein on the system, provide checks & balances, & a rotating workforce of public servants, so none of them become entrenched & entitled in an elite power structure. This was the attempt of the american experiment, & it worked for a while, until those who became entrenched in power used said power to plunder the producers, as they have been doing increasingly for the last few decades.

So an ideal system for a productive, healthy society is this:
1. Minimal demands for an agency of justice.  Minimal taxes so the producers keep more of their labors.
2. Swift, efficient justice to deter looters, foreign or domestic.
3. Maximum freedom for the producers to enjoy the fruits of their labors, which provide the most opportunity, prosperity, & abundance for all.
4. Checks & balances in the justice system, so that moochers or looters do not gain control.
5. Rotating citizen representatives, managing the system so moochers or looters do not gain control.
6. Strict laws to punish corruption in the collective agencies.

These things will cost the producers the least, while maximizing what they have earned & worked for. This is a recipe for a healthy, prosperous culture. But whenever moochers & looters gain control of the collective institutions, they use govt power to plunder the producers, & build a system of dependency & injustice, until it collapses under its own corruption.

Mysteries of the Universe: Nobody owes you nothing

You were born. Maybe you're grown up, or at least on your way. Perhaps you're confused about why you are here, or what reason there is for your existence. Or maybe you think you know. Either way, here you are. By some accident of nature, the combination of dna, timing, & the twinkle in your parent's eyes, you were conceived, born, & are here for a brief time on earth. You didn't ask to be born, & no one told you what you are supposed to do with your life. You did not come with instructions, & there is no link to the manufacturer's website to reference a FAQ.

For most of your early life, your parents or some surrogate cared for you & saw to your growth, protection, & nurturing. But they are really no different than you. They also were born, grew up, & tried to figure out what to do with themselves. For most of the history of humanity, & for most humans that have ever lived, simple survival has occupied most of our waking time & effort. Our basic needs are few, but they demand our attention:

a. Sustenance. We need air, food, & water to live.
b. Protection. Some kind of covering for our personal bodies, a den or structure to live in, & a habitat to protect us from wild beasts, the elements, & other humans.
c. Sleep. One of the most important reasons for a home & a secure habitat is for a place to sleep safely.

That's it. That is all we NEED for survival. Now, there are other things that occupy much of our time & attention, but they are instinctual drives, & are not essential to our survival.
a. We also have a drive to reproduce, & to pair up with a mate to further our species.
b. We also have a need to play, or to busy ourselves with entertaining distractions. But neither of those are critical for survival.

Your parents took responsibility for your survival during your development years. They fed you, clothed you, housed you, & protected you from predators of all types. Perhaps they still help you with some of the basics, or continue to prepare you to live in this life, as their parents did before them. This has been the pattern for all of human history.

We are born wet, naked, and hungry. Then things get worse.

Survival isn't easy. Not only does it require a lot of our time & attention, there are also other elements working against us:
a. Mother nature. Weather, trees, rocks, rivers, & just about everything we see on earth can kill us. Storms bring lightning, floods, powerful winds, freezing cold, & other natural disasters that constantly threaten our lives. Sometimes things we eat or the water we drink is deadly.
b. Wild beasts. Not so much in our current culture, but we are still in danger from sharks, bears, big cats, wolves, & other animals who want to eat us. Not all of these dangers are big carnivores. We are constantly battling disease & bacteria simply to live.
c. Other humans. This has been the greatest danger that individual humans have faced. Other people wish to harm us, or take our sustenance or means of survival. Or, they may wish to enslave us to work for their personal survival.

So here we are, trying to simply live, & have to struggle against these other factors trying to kill or oppress us. Over the millennia, we have developed strategies to overcome these obstacles.
a. We build protective structures to house ourselves in. This gives us a secure place to find protection from weather, rain, snow, & attacks from wild beasts. We store our food & clothing, & provide comfortable, safe places to sleep.
b. We form collective agencies to protect us from aggressive humans. We pool our resources to provide a protective force to deter those who want to rob, enslave, or kill us. We call this 'government'.
c. We work & develop strategies to produce more & better food, protection, & methods of health care. We use the elements & natural laws to develop technology to aid us in our survival.

For thousands of years, we have adapted to our environment, & have used everything to aid us in our survival. None of these things were given to us at birth, but many of the strategies were handed down through the generations. By constantly learning & advancing in our knowledge base, we have come to this most advanced stage of human society. We are interdependent on each other, & have built upon the lessons of the past. We have concocted a complex system of exchange, by which we provide goods or services for a currency, & use that to buy our survival needs. This system has provided abundance & prosperity for a lot of people in this era. Many do not seem to struggle for the basics of survival, like humans did in past times. Food is varied, cheap, & abundant. Houses are plentiful & filed with amazing luxuries like central heat, piped water, & waste disposal. The ease by which the essentials of survival are provided make some people think it is a natural right. They think that the basics of survival.. food & protection.. are naturally provided at birth, & are owed to everyone, simply because they were born. They think they don't have to (or shouldn't have to) concern themselves with their personal survival needs. They think they should be able to give themselves to other instinctual drives, like reproduction & play. But this is an illusion. Our collective knowledge might provide the STRATEGIES for making survival easier, but they are not something given at birth. SOMEONE has to work to provide the basic needs.

The illusion of our current time (and of times past) is that GOVERNMENT can provide these things. Everybody else can work for our individual needs. And as long as there are enough industrious, hard working people who are driven to work, a few can ride along as moochers, dependent on the producing workers to provide their needs. But if & when the moochers outnumber the working producers, the system collapses, unable to sustain itself. This is the great fiction.. the great deception.. that somehow we can live off the labors of others. A healthy, prosperous society has in industrious, hard working citizenry, & extols the virtues of production. A corrupt society in decline tries to leech off of the producers.

"Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else." ~Frederic Bastiat

But the reality.. the immutable law of the universe.. is that 'nobody owes you nothing'. You & you alone are responsible for your own survival. You might link up with others, to better accomplish that goal, but it is still YOUR responsibility to survive.. no one else has that burden. Your parents might give you a start, but they cannot be burdened with caring for you for all your life. So during this short time on earth, you alone are responsible for your life, & those you take on as dependents. Others may help you, as we pool our resources & labors to improve life for everyone, but nobody owes you anything.

 I have called this simple truth a 'mystery of the universe', because it seems to be very profound & mysterious. In fact, a great many people seem to believe the exact opposite.. that their basic survival needs are owed to them. They think that their existence entitles them to full support, even going so far as to support any children they might have & their their old age. They even feel that their leisure time & entertainment should be provided & subsidized by the producing people around them.

It is pathetic enough that a few insane people live in this fantasy world, where they believe all their survival needs should be guaranteed to them for life, but there are allegedly intelligent social leaders who further this deception.. promising free food, clothing, shelter, healthcare, & even entertainment. In some convoluted reasoning, the labors & increases of others are looked at as some kind of collective ownership. They produce NOTHING themselves, yet they feel entitled to what someone else has worked for. Then these entitled thieves have the audacity to lecture us.. the actual producers of everything they consume.. that we owe them.. WE are responsible to not only tend to their basic needs, but we should set them on the lap of luxury, & pay them to deceive us.

This is the basic foundation of progressive thought. It is why that anything they come up with is flawed. The core premise of leftist, progressive ideals are corrupt, depending on theft & dependency to build a society on.

Intelligent people with basic common sense SHOULD be able to see the flaws, & realize that this central tenet of socialist ideology can only lead to collapse, as dependents outnumber the producers. But the appeal for easy living, free stuff, & a guarantee for living is very strong, & is at the root of all scams: Something for nothing. So they indoctrinate our youth, spoon feeding this madness into each generation, until the whole culture is steeped in delusion. They act as though govt has infinite warehouses full of food, houses, clothes, & healthcare, & all we need is the keys to open them up & hand them out. They do not realize that everything that a dependent consumes.. every bite, every drink of water, every item of clothing, the heat for the house, the waste disposal when they flush.. EVERYTHING they use for their own survival, including protection from thugs or invading hordes, is TAKEN from someone else.

The progressive leeches who preach this folly are EXACTLY the same as those they pretend to help. They produce nothing themselves, but only TAKE what others have worked for. And of course, they do not help society at all, but lead us down the road to destruction. No society can survive without industrious, productive citizens working to provide basic survival needs. No society can survive with madness & folly as their basic philosophical ideology. The universe is hard, & life is difficult. Ignoring reality for some illusive dream world helps no one.

Natural selection: Reducing variability, not increasing it

The primary condition for speciation is reproductive isolation. That is the main 'definition' of a species, that they do not reproduce with other different species. The horse has a genetic link to other horse descendants. These all indicate a narrowing of the genetic material.. a 'devolution' if you will. A donkey came from the same parent species as the horse & zebra, but they are not able to reproduce viable offspring.. they CAN reproduce, but the progeny is sterile.. like the mule. But instead of this indicating an EXPANSION of trait availability, the facts are the exact opposite. It was a narrowing of the gene pool that isolated the horse, donkey, & zebra. All of those animals descended from the same parent species.. we can trace that. But instead of opening up new traits of variability, they lost them. The zebra traits don't come up in donkeys anymore. And new 'species' are not being produced. What we see with the horse genetic line is a branching into a dead end. The variability is lost, as the progeny do not have the variety to pick from in their parent's dna.

You can explain the tree branches somewhat with evolution. But you still don't have the mechanism that enables the leaps between the family/genus/species. As science, the 'amoeba to man' theory is full of holes, yet it is taught as though it is proven fact. The observable, repeatable FACTS are that breeding & natural selection NARROW the genetic availability, until the species reaches equilibrium & loses variability. That is why a brown rabbit is seldom (never?) born in the snowshoe rabbit species anymore. It is why chihuahuas do not produce an occasional wolf. That variability is lost, & the breed is limited to the narrow band of variability. The very science of breeding is contrary to the premise of evolution: that new genetic material is constantly being produced & increasing the complexity & variability within a species. We observe the exact opposite. We repeat the exact opposite.

Even if some 'new' trait is discovered while breeding, now we know it was there.. hiding in the massive dna strands. It might take thousands or millions of generations for it to pop up, but when it does, this did not mean a new trait made itself, just that the hidden gene took a while to hit the jackpot. It is like pulling on a slot machine in vegas.. if you pull it enough times, eventually the sequence will come up that hits the combination you want. That is all breeding & natural selection is, except they get to narrow the variability & reduce the 'losing' combinations. Slot machines don't let you do that.

Why do species go extinct? Because they lose the variability needed to adapt to the changing environment. They don't create genes to survive if conditions change. If there is some variability already in them that increases their survival rate, then that trait will become more prominent. But if they don't have that trait, they die off. That is observable reality, not that species create new genetic information to adapt.

Modern genetics is one of the biggest enemies of the old 'theory' of evolution. Eventually, the facts will overwhelm the beliefs, & the scientific establishment will come up with a new pop theory of origins. But they still are working this one for now. It is everywhere.. tv, national parks, museums, schools.. anywhere science is mentioned, evolution is tacked on, to prop it up as a belief. But real science does not support the theory. All of reality screams, 'NO!'. But since when have humans cared about reality?   :)

Unalienable rights

The american founders ASSUMED the existence of a natural law.. They phrased it like this:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed
In just the previous paragraph, they made an appeal to 'the laws of nature & nature's god'.. There is a presumption of deity, but that is not central to the argument. Most writings in those days made frequent references to god. But let's break this statement down:

1. Self evident truths. These cannot be proven empirically, or observed or tested. They make the assumption, & the rest of the statements build upon it.
2. All men are equal. This was not the common view.. royalty & the ruling elite were considered divinely appointed, & were above the common man. But that had been steadily changing since the reformation, & even before in the magna carta. The quest for human freedom was in full swing. It hinges on the equality of man.
3. Every man has natural, unalienable rights. Life, liberty, & the freedom to pursue your own choices. This was not just for the ruling elite, or the chosen few in power, but for everyone.

These 3 central points provide the basis for the conclusion:

Government is instituted by society for their own benefit, protection, & to secure their natural rights.

IF you assume the earlier premises, the conclusion is logical. But if you deny the natural rights of man, the conclusions do not follow. IF there are no 'unalienable rights', then the world is open & undefined, & anyone can do as they have power & ability. Natural rights are not self enforcing.. like gravity. You can trample someone's rights & not be struck down by an immediate consequence. But if the collective society of man agree upon a canon of LAW, then they have a basis by which to live by. They have a higher LAW to appeal to, when their natural rights are being stepped on. 

The individual can make this appeal, but it requires the collective will & presumption of the existence of natural rights. You could stand up to king george & declare yourself a sovereign individual, but if he has the power to bind you & cast you into the dungeon, your appeals fall on deaf ears, & have no significance. But, if you & a few hundred thousand of your countrymen defy him & stand armed, declaring your sovereignty, your rights are secured.

Appeals have often been made to tyrants & oppressors throughout history, but only those with the power to deter the oppressors gain an audience. The magna carta was signed under duress by the king.. not cheerfully & willingly. American independence was gained by defiance & bloodshed, not by philosophical blathering. We preserve & protect our rights, not by appealing to some mystical force to secure them for us, but to OURSELVES as the architects & authors of self rule.

Natural law has no power in & of itself. It can only provide the philosophical basis for which we fight. Individually, we have little hope in restraining evil, or aggressors, or oppression from the rich & powerful. But collectively, we have the ability to deter by deadly force those who would enslave us. THAT is the american ideal. Together, we can be free, deter evildoers, provide justice, & secure our own basic rights to life & property. No entity will do that for us. No angels will come down from heaven to secure our freedoms. Govt certainly will not do this, as they are at enmity with human liberty. Only as we control them, by force, can govt be a useful tool for our common good. That is what america was built upon, & is the mission statement that drives the ideal. Citizen representatives, ruled by law, controlling & restraining the excesses of human aggression. They will not restrain themselves, & no one will come to restrain them for us. We the people must secure our own freedom, & restrain the growth & excesses of mans manipulations. We have the system in place, but it is eroding. A govt of, by, & for the people is slowly perishing from the earth. The extremes of statism & anarchy are touted as superior to the old fashioned values of self rule, but they deceive themselves. They only offer a return to bondage & oppression, & rule by tyrants.

Our solidarity is not from race, or creed, or religion, or ethnicity, or social status, or country of origin. It is the common longing for freedom.. the quest for human liberty that unites & drives us to fight for our collective liberty. Many people will not 'get' the ideal. They are self absorbed & short sighted, & assume that freedom is free & comes naturally, like the air we breathe. But it is a rare thing in the history of man, & WE, the caretakers of this precious liberty, should not take it lightly, or shirk our duty to preserve it for future generations. The choice is before us. Will we passively allow scoundrels & thieves to steal our liberty, our nation, & our heritage, or will we fight them to extend freedom for another generation?

The Rise of Anti-Science

Western culture has had a lot of ups & downs over the centuries, but one of the anchors for it was the concept of a world of order:
1. consistency in natural law
2. Use of the scientific method
3. the logical pursuit of truth
4. peer review, critical thinking, & skepticism were a balance to 'science by decree'.

These concepts reached their heyday in post ww2 america. Engineers & scientific researchers leapfrogged advancement after advancement dazzling everyone with their ability to harness natural law as a tool.

But to some, these things were not seen as a harnessing of laws of physics, but a creative & almost godlike power. A mystique built up around the fields of engineering & science, & it was a magnet to young people when they pursued a career. The fields of technology were major draws in the middle of the last century in america. Breakthroughs in medicine, manufacturing, computers, & just about every part of human life has been positively affected by these technological advances, & families encouraged their children to be part of that growth & advancement of humanity.

The technological advances brought unprecedented prosperity & luxurious conditions for even the poorest in the nation. And as often has happened throughout history, with prosperity comes complacency & growing lethargy. Hard work loses its appeal, & easy living seems to be an easier route. Why work hard if you don't have to?

But as the culture has declined, so has the magnet for technology. Fewer & fewer american youth desire a career in science or engineering. Non productive elements of society have taken center stage. Sports, entertainment, celebrity worship, money shuffling.. these things are valued & esteemed over the mundane & difficult scientific disciplines.

Now, we are in a time of anti science. Social issues & cultural manipulation is taking place, of course claiming truth or science as a basis. But instead of open scrutiny, mandates. Instead of the scientific method, decree. Instead of logic & critical thinking, truth is declared & propaganda has become the new goal. Truth becomes what the establishment says, rather than something based on reason or facts. Critical thinking is not encouraged, just memorized dogma. History is not taught as dispassionate facts, but to mold a belief. Conclusions are presupposed, & memorized, instead of arrived at by research & thinking. THIS is the greatest failure of american education, which once was a beacon of classic liberal thought.. Now, it is just another state propaganda tool.

As the adoration of elitism grew, so did education transform as a classic liberal tool of enlightenment to a propaganda tool of indoctrination. At one time, critical thinking was emphasized, & 'liberal' meant an expansive, enlightened, open minded view of things.. a broader view of the nuances in thought, ideology, & critical thinking processes. Now, it is an indoctrination.. dogma is pounded into young people, so they do NOT think or consider alternatives, but have everything neatly defined for them, complete with demonizing any alternate views.

The result has been LESS thought, more dogma, & a subservient electorate. The concept of human liberty is redefined, & revisionist history is shoved down people's throats. Open, scientific method enquiry is squashed, while memorizing indoctrination is employed. The results are clear: Less educated citizenry.. no sense of history or continuity. Dogmatic view of life & simplistic solutions. Bumper sticker slogans, rather than nuanced discussions of issues. Stupidity running rampant, & hysteria valued over reason.

And like in the dark ages, the powers that be try to mandate truth by decree, instead of arriving at it through the scientific method. As a culture, we are moving away from a scientific view of the world, & into a faith based reality. 'Really smart people' make decrees about 'truth', & we are told to believe it.. don't question the experts or their handlers. Critical issues for us are not open to critique or examination, but we are indoctrinated from birth into state centered ideology. It is a giant step backward for humanity, as we surrender our minds to the puppet masters.

Historically, truth eventually overcomes those who suppress it because it inconveniences their agenda. But man has not changed, & his basic tendencies to use power & decrees to control people are still there. There are always various flavors of superstition intermingling in a culture. If one gains prominence, it can dictate the rules & the facts. Reason is suppressed, critical thinking condemned, & questioning authority is punished.

Eternity, from start to finish..

Eternity & infinity are abstract concepts that give us humans a difficult time. We see most things as beginning & ending.. almost everything in our lives has a start & a finish, including our own lives. But the concept of eternity has no beginning.. time drifts on from the past, with NO apparent start, & no explanation. Gurus, holy men, & philosophers have speculated & pontificated about eternity for as long as man has the capacity of thought. But we are no more closer to understanding it or grasping its meaning than when we first defined the term.

1. We have no awareness of eternity past. Eons passed before our brief existence.. Universe after universe could have come & gone, while we were yet unborn. Go back as far as you can imagine.. before any 'big bang', or creative action from a deity. Some theorize that the universe is expanding. How can this be? If matter has been simplifying & spreading out, how can it come together for any reason? Was there a 'beginning'.. a 'start' of matter? Matter is incredible. Life is irrational. All matter should have drifted to infinity in complete equilibrium.. stars burnt out eons ago, & the miracle of life not even a dream. The vastness of our universe is a tiny speck in the face of infinite space. How can there be matter? It is only a collection of infinitesimal, tiny space particles.

2. The existence of an 'Eternal soul' is just as disturbing as if there is not a soul. How is it even possible that life should exist, or that our minds could even grasp things like eternity? Eternity past went on without us.. it can easily go on for eternity future, & our existence a meaningless blip in the face of time. We are a collection of matter & molecules, with a mysterious mechanism giving us life. Mixed in with that is the ability to grasp abstract thoughts, like eternity, & our existence is amazing. Whether we cease to exist at death, or go on in some mysterious supernatural state, the mere ability to see those possibilities is troubling. We went from eternal nothingness, to a brief awareness. And now we try to make sense of our existence. It is no wonder there are so many religions, philosophies, theories, & abstract reasonings to explain ourselves. Our existence is amazing & unbelievable.. impossible, really, yet here we are.

3. Existence is terrifying, non existence is worse. As humans age, we become tired of life.. at least many of us do. How can we face the idea of eternal existence? As terrifying as non-existence is, eternal existence is equally disturbing. Soul or not, our future is grim & mysterious. Will we drift through eternal time & space with some kind of awareness, linked to other souls, or deities? Or will we simply cease to exist, like we did for eternity past?

4. Some people seem to be mad at god &/or the universe, throwing tantrums because they exist. Man is not comfortable with his existence, but needs an explanation. There is a 'why' that gnaws at us, that no other life forms or matter seem to have. This angst is an awareness of eternity, & it's awful implications. If there is a god involved in our existence, we do not know why, or have a definitive reason. He has shrouded the explanation & himself in mystery. Holy men, witch doctors, philosophers, & spiritual gurus speculate, but we do not really know. The universe is awful, terrifying, & too vast for our finite minds to grasp. So we either cling to someone else's explanation, or avoid the subject, living in denial about our eternal fate. If there is no god, our tantrums for understanding fall on eternal darkness, devoid of any reason or meaning. God or not, the universe is terrifying.

5. If there is not a god or some kind of supernatural power, life is short & pointless. If there is a god, it is short & uncertain, & we still do not know why we exist. It may still be pointless, & our existence just as fleeting. We live. We die. The universe goes on until all the stars burn out in eternal darkness & silence. Or, if there is some kind of divine order, we don't know what it is.. even a vague definition of heaven or hell is only a blurry glimpse into something we do not have the capacity to understand.

When I gave my heart to know wisdom and to see the task which has been done on the earth (even though one should never sleep day or night), and I saw every work of God, I concluded that man cannot discover the work which has been done under the sun. Even though man should seek laboriously, he will not discover; and though the wise man should say, “I know,” he cannot discover. Solomon c. 1000BC

Life is a Journey

It is said that life is a journey, not a destination. Few of our views remain fixed for all our lives, but we change as we grow in knowledge, experience, & awareness. I grew up in a secular home.. no church, very little politics.. & as i went to school, i learned all i needed to know about life (so i thought).   I was a liberal hippie.. crazed with sex, drugs, & rock & roll. The back to land movement was very appealing to me, & i was an early advocate to 'save the earth'. I became an atheist, & explained everything with naturalism. Evolution, & animal instincts were the only real motivations in life, & naive theists or altruistic ideals were for the superstitious & deluded. I voted for mcgovern in my first election, & did not believe in absolutes in morality.  But, i was a philosopher even then, & was fascinated by discussions of abstract thinking. So by college, my indoctrination from the 'world' was complete. Here were the tenets of my faith.
1. no god
2. man is an accident of nature.
3. no morality
4. love & altruism was for fools
5. man is the lord of his environment
6. grab all the gusto you can, you only go around once
7. the educated elite are supreme.. only deluded superstitious people cling to illusions
8. democrats were the educated elite, & would control the stupid masses

There are probably a few more tidbits of leftist indoctrination in there, but you get the idea.  :D

My problem was i was still looking for truth. I was intrigued by life, & wanted to know. That quest led me to an encounter with the Living God. My whole world crashed around me, & EVERYTHING changed. ALL the sacred tenets of my faith (i didn't call it that, then) became suspect, as i looked for a basis for my views, & valued reason & thought over blind faith. It was not immediate.. i voted for carter in '76, & was still liberal in many of my views.. and still am, in the more classic liberal sense. But now my views are more along these lines:
1. God is
2. man is a creation
3. man has accountability for his thoughts & actions
4. Love & altruism were genuine traits, originating in the divine
5. Man is not in control, & is an arrogant fool in the face of the universe
6. Live your life circumspectly, as you will answer for your thoughts & actions
7. Liberation of humanity, spiritually & physically, is the goal
8. Freedom from control, & liberty for the individual, is the ideal, not dictatorial rule

These are all completely antithetical to my original views.. but since the root was changed, it is to be expected that the branches & fruit would change, too. I now see the progressive left as enemies of humanity, & especially the american ideal. Their view of god is not important, since they miss the basic point of freedom. There may still be some tweaking in my world view, but this is where i am in my journey.