May 2009 Archives

What should be done when parents rely on religion instead of medicine to heal sick children?

I doubt that any sensible person would sanction withholding medical treatment for a sick child because of his parents' religious beliefs, especially when it's a case of life and death. So far as I know, courts have always sided for treatment. America is a secular society based on the rule of law. Priests who abuse children are not immune to civil law because they have taken vows (even though the Catholic Church for decades acted as if the clergy was immune, treating abuse cases as an "internal matter"). Christian Science is the most prominent denomination that believes in healing through faith, but they have come to terms with medicine as a practical matter in modern life.
Since the issue seems cut and dried, what is there to discuss? -- the uncomfortable shadow zone between two world views. Secular society gives special privileges to churches, and politicians cannot succeed without at least paying lip service to a belief in God. Yet as we all know, everything that God once took care of has been usurped over time. Just as we don't expect God to provide supernatural medical care, so we don't expect the deity to prevent accidents, divert natural disasters, conquer enemies, or impose divine retribution on wrongdoers. Such expectations were the norm, however, in an age of faith.

For some believers, adapting to a purely secular worldview is abhorrent, and here it is easy to sympathize. Human beings crave meaning, and that often includes a higher meaning. To spend one's life grinding away at work and accumulating possessions isn't an adequate substitute. Even a loving family and success isn't adequate. We are wired to look beyond the material world. It's been said that all the things denied or unknown to science -- beauty, truth, service, morals, compassion, empathy, justice, aesthetics, philosophy, and spirituality -- are the very things that make life worth living.

Sadly for believers who take their religion too literally, being dragged into court is backlash from wanting more meaning in their lives. They have been blinded by promises made in the name of God. The priesthood in every society has prospered on such promises, and now that religion wanes every decade, the priesthood needs miracles and Providence and divine love simply to survive. I think the trap of two worldviews won't end until we arrive at a form of secular spirituality, based on the evolution of consciousness. If someone can experience grace and divine love in their own lives, or if not those things then expanded consciousness, with or without a traditional God, the foundation for such experiences must be their own awareness. Accepting second-hand dogma, however uplifting, always leads to the kind of contradiction these unhappy medical cases exemplify.
Published in the Washington Post

The war of words between President Obama and Dick Cheney has exposed a rancorous divide over national security. Mr. Cheney states flatly that there is no middle ground on the issue. There is no such thing as being half-safe, he declares. On the face of it, his statement is nonsensical. Unless he has a way of screening the thoughts and intentions of every potential enemy in the world, we will always be half safe. But is that the real issue? Aren't we talking about our right not to be afraid as much as our right to defend ourselves? Better be safe than sorry is common sense. Better be afraid all the time is toxic politics at its worst. When the Senate voted overwhelmingly to deny funds for closing Guantanamo, they acted out of toxic motives. President Obama accused them of being irrational, and he was absolutely right.
The issue of national security was a Republican gold mine for eight years, during which time not enough objection was raised over waterboarding, domestic surveillance, and holding detainees indefinitely without bringing them to trial. The tide turned with the new President, but the underlying dilemma remains with us.
Can we be secure without resorting to fear?
The Bush administration profited from fear to a huge extent; therefore, they couldn't resist the temptation to wield it. As if the 9/11 attacks were not terrifying enough, they created bogeymen with no justification. The primary one was Saddam Hussein, who posed no threat to the U.S., had no weapons of mass destruction, and made no alliance with Al-Qaeda. But the detainees being held without trial at Guantanamo were also a bogeyman. We still have no idea who among them was or is a danger to this country, but in a massive refusal to be fair, adult, and rational, we allowed all of them to be lumped together and treated as imminent threats.
Cheney's round defense of torture is morally bankrupt, but the right wing knows -- as it knew in the McCarthy era -- that scapegoating an unpopular minority works. Fifty years ago it was Communists; now it is Muslims of any stripe, including the most harmless. We have been detaining harmless Muslims at Guantanamo for years without due process; we have also been imprisoning dangerous Muslims and others who fall between the extremes. The only way to sort them out is with fair trials, adequate evidence, and rational consideration of potential threats.
Or you can just play the fear card.
In his ongoing efforts to treat the American public as they have rarely been treated -- that is, as adults -- Obama pointed out several rational things:
- Our supermax prisons are safe. No one has ever escaped from them.
- America stands for constitutional principles.
- No one's fate should be decided by one man, even if he is President.
- The issue of releasing potential terrorists is difficult and troubling.
Notice the one thing he left out: fear. That's the difference between him and Cheney. If he didn't play the fear card over and over, Cheney's vision of national security would fall apart, just as McCarthy's argument about Communists infiltrating the federal government fell apart when he couldn't find any. The show of smoke, mirrors, and fear collapsed. In a decent moral scheme, Obama would have pointed out the cruel injustice of holding anyone in prison without charges or the chance to defend themselves. How would any of us like to be in such a position, knowing that we were innocent? It doesn't matter if the accused happens to look like a bogeyman. He's a human being and should be treated like one.

Published in the San Francisco Chronicle

This is a column about optimism and why there's reason to feel it. Over the weekend one of the news shows referred to "morning in America." That was Ronald Reagan's call to optimism thirty years ago. The country was demoralized and just beginning to come out of a long recession. The point of bringing up Reagan's slogan is that in many ways he promised a false dawn while Barack Obama is promising a real one.
Reagan's morning didn't shine on AIDS patients; he thought they deserved what they got. It didn't shine on anyone outside the right-wing agenda, so civil rights, unions, and feminists were out. So was environmentalism (what else to expect from a man who said that if you've seen one redwood, you've seen them all?) There was no light for progressivism in general. Half the reason that Obama's election felt so liberating is that the Reagan legacy of reactionary politics and exclusion was over.
That's a huge reason for optimism, but if you look globally, there are others. The right-wing agenda abroad called for free markets, unfettered capitalism, anti-Communism, and a strong military. That part of the Reagan vision is still with us, and some of it must be counted a success. There are no monolithic totalitarian governments in Russia and China anymore, whatever you think of the present regimes. The Cold War is definitively over. The mood of the world is against bullying superpowers and for nuclear disarmament. These trends may be new and fragile, but the tide seems to have turned. It has also turned against deniers of climate change and opponents of environmentalism.
An even greater cause for optimism is the rise of the dispossessed. When historians look back, this may be the dominant feature of our time. Billions of poor people with little hope for advancement now are getting a place at the table where only the wealthy once sat. I'm thinking of the so-called BRIC -- Brazil, Russia, India, and China -- whose economies have surged and will continue to after the great recession is over.
Just a decade ago, some of these positive trends weren't visible. Even now they are obscured by bad news. The bad news about AIDS in Africa, for example, obscures major economic surges in East Africa. Terrorism and the Iraq war obscure the fact that deaths in war have declined dramatically since 1980.
On too many fronts there is no morning, though. Sri Lanka, North Korea, Sudan, Palestine, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan -- the list of trouble spots always seems to replenish itself. Yet taken all together, these places of strife and oppression don't equal the enmity and danger of the Cold War. Our worst problem as a planet, sudden climate change, may serve to pull the nations together. Old systems are being shaken, and even though nationalism and militarism hold on tight, decade after decade, at least the idea of global cooperation is alive and well.
All told, I think the image of morning in the world is realistic. The good and the bad will always be tangled with one another. But compared to the false dawns that never fulfilled their promise, this dawn could transform the world far more positively than we realize. Our eyes are glued on the economic crisis, but our souls have a higher vision.

Published in the San Francisco Chronicle

A few years ago, I was sitting on my computer when I received an email from my brother, Gotham Chopra.  I panicked as I read the words.  Gotham was writing from a holding cell beneath an airport in an Islamic country – he had been detained by the authorities who were questioning him for suspected activities.  This was several weeks before 9/11.  Suprisingly, they had put him in a cell with a computer and an internet connection – and so Gotham was able to email me!

Gotham was a news reporter for Channel One News at the time.  (He later helped launch Current TV, and helped recruit Laura Ling, one of his best friends, to the network.)  Gotham was overseas doing a story on the rise of Islamic fundamentalism, and had met several notorious leaders.  He was gifted a trigger from an antique rifle by one of them, and had thrown it into his backpack as he rushed back to the city to catch their flight.  When he was detained, he had the trigger, was of Indian origin with an American passport, and was carrying $1500 in cash.  Considering this nations frayed relationship with the US, their suspicions were understandable.

Within an hour, I had tracked down my father, Deepak Chopra who was able to contact friends in the government to tell them about Gotham’s predicament.  Fortunately for us, the authorities had let Gotham go before anyone needed to get involved.  However, I will never forget the gripping fear I had thinking about my younger brother held in a foreign land that had a tense relationship with the US.

When Laura Ling and Euna Lee were detained in N. Korea in mid-March, and Gotham was made aware of the situation by his good friend and Laura's sister, Lisa, we initially had hopes that Laura and Euna would be returned quickly.  Unfortunately, their situation took on the worst scenario – they became negotiating pawns in a much higher stakes game, multilateral talks concerning North Korea’ s recent missile test and nuclear program.  From what we know, and has been reported in the press, Laura and Euna have now been held separately for over two months in a boarding house outside of the North Korean capital Pyongyang.  Without direct relations with N. Korea, the US State Department has in large part relied on a Swedish diplomat who has had two brief meetings with the girls. 

Laura is a vivacious, passionate, kind person whom I have admired and enjoyed being around.  She is one of my brother’s best friends, and he would do anything for her.  And yet, he and Laura’s devoted family and other friends, feel helpless.

Euna, from all accounts is equally an impressive and admirable person with a family situation that has made this predicament all the more agonizing.  Both the Ling and Lee family have been urged to stay as discreet as possible by the US government, citing that their direct involvement in any sort of public form may complicate matters.

As a big sister, who experienced the panic of uncertainty for only a short while when Gotham was detained, my heart goes out to the families of Laura and Euna.  Their feeling of helplessness must be unbearable.

These are two young women who have suffered immeasurably.  They have had little to no contact with the outside world since their detainment and are now facing an unimaginable fear as their case is taken to trial in a legal proceeding that has no precedent in North Korea.  They are undoubtedly scared, and hoping that those of us back home can do something before their trial. 

I pray that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and President Obama, both of whom I admire enormously and have supported with campaign contributions and votes, heed the call to engage with N. Korea in a responsible way to secure these young women's release, as well as address the long term instability of the region.   Talks of a mission by Al Gore, former Vice President and founder of Current TV, would demonstrate to the N. Koreans that the US is serious about a dialogue.  Now is the time to come up with creative, long term solutions, and new ways of conflict resolution, to secure the stability for our future generations.  Letting Laura and Euna go would be a noble step for the N. Koreans to begin this process.

This coming Thursday, May 21 2009, there will be a series of candlelight vigils held across the US to pray for the prompt release of Laura and Euna.  I hope you will join if you can.  Please also support my intent – linked here – to pray for the immediate release of both girls so they can come home. For those of us who feel so helpless, perhaps this is a way that we can make a statement and take some action for these two young women.  Please help spread the word so that we can peacefully bring awareness to their situation.

If you are on Facebook, you can join the group: Detained In North Korea : Journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee, please help.If you are on Twitter, follow @LiberateLaura for updates.  They will both announce more details on the vigils.  Here is the current schedule and locations.

5/21

Los Angeles vigil: 6:30-8:00pm, Stories Bookstore 1716 Sunset Blvd.

Orlando vigil: 6:30-8:00pm, Baldwin Park.

Portland vigil: 6:30-8:00pm, Patton Square Park

NYC candlelight vigil: 6:00-8:00pm, 49th St. at Rockefeller Plaza

Chicago vigil: 1:00-2:00pm, Richard J. Daley Plaza.

Also Read:

• You can help Roxanne Saberi, Euna Lee, and Laura Ling by Gotham Chopra
  
• What the Captured American Journalists in North Korea Could Mean for Diplomacy by Deepak & Gotham Chopra

Mallika Chopra is the founder of Intent.com, a site focused on personal, social and global wellness

People tell me all the time that living in a less toxic home improves their sleep, makes their babies less fussy, and boosts their sense of well-being. Step-by-step, you too can have a healthy home. How? By updating your cleaning products to eliminate toxic chemicals.

First: Stop believing the myths. In order to make the switch you may need to let go of some deeply embedded myths about green cleaning. Here are the main myths people believe, along with the facts:

Myth #1: "Green living costs more."
Fact: If you buy some good green cleaning products and mix your own formulas for the rest using kitchen cupboard ingredients that cost pennies, you'll actually save money. (My best book for formulas is Better Basics for the Home.)

Myth #2: "Green living doesn't work as well."
Fact: This myth is a holdover from the early nineties when green products were in their infancy and often not as effective. These days the products are just as effective and actually better for your health!

Myth #3: "Green living takes more time."
Fact:This is a myth, plain and simple.

Myth #4: "The government protects us."
Fact: Outside of "signal words" on products (like, "DANGER POISON," "WARNING: May be fatal if swallowed" and "CAUTION: Harmful if swallowed"), there is very little regulation of the chemicals found in commercially available cleaning products. You're ultimately responsible for eliminating toxic chemicals from your home.

Next: Choose natural alternatives. Once you've recognized the need to green your cleaning practices, and you've set a timetable for making the switch, here are the 5 basic nontoxic cleaning formulas that will save the planet, eliminate toxins and save you money:

1.) Baking Soda
A commonly available mineral full of many cleaning attributes, baking soda is made from soda ash, and is slightly alkaline (its pH is around 8.1; 7 is neutral). It neutralizes acid-based odors in water and adsorbs odors from the air. Sprinkled on a damp sponge or cloth, baking soda can be used as a gentle non-abrasive cleanser for kitchen counter tops, sinks, bathtubs, ovens, and fiberglass. It will eliminate perspiration odors and even neutralize the smell of many chemicals if you add up to a cup per load to the laundry. It is a useful air freshener, and a fine carpet deodorizer.

2.) Washing Soda
A chemical neighbor of baking soda, washing soda (sodium carbonate) is much more strongly alkaline, with a pH around 11. It releases no harmful fumes and is far safer than a commercial solvent formula, but you should wear gloves when using it because it is caustic. Washing soda cuts grease, cleans petroleum oil, removes wax or lipstick, and neutralizes odors in the same way that baking soda does. Don't use it on fiberglass, aluminum or waxed floors--unless you intend to remove the wax.

3.) White Vinegar and Lemon Juice
White vinegar and lemon juice are acidic--they neutralize alkaline substances such as scale from hard water. They also kill mold, germs, and bacteria. Acids dissolve gummy buildup, eat away tarnish, and remove dirt from wood surfaces.

4.) Liquid Soaps and Detergent
Liquid soaps and detergents are necessary for cutting grease, and they are not the same thing. Soap is made from fats and lye. Detergents are synthetic materials discovered and synthesized early in this century. Unlike soap, detergents are designed specifically so that they don't react with hard water minerals and cause soap scum. If you have hard water, buy a biodegradable detergent without perfumes; if you have soft water you can use liquid soap (both are available in health food stores).

5.) Mold Killers and Disinfectants
For a substance to be registered by the EPA as a disinfectant it must go through extensive and expensive tests. EPA recommends simple soap to use as a disinfectant. There are many essential oils -- such as lavender, clove, and tea tree oil (an excellent natural fungicide) -- that are very antiseptic, as is grapefruit seed extract, even though they aren't registered as such. Use one teaspoon of essential oil to 2 cups of water in a spray bottle (make sure to avoid eyes). A grapefruit seed extract spray can be made by adding 20 drops of extract to a quart of water.

Caution: Make sure to keep all homemade formulas well-labeled, and out of the reach of children.

Ready to save the planet? Post your green intent and blog about your green successes and struggles, tagging your posts "greener life." We may feature your post in this series!

Intent Voice Annie Bond is the author of four books and thousands of articles. She has been called "the foremost expert on green living" by Body & Soul magazine. She has written the bestselling book, Clean and Green, as well as The Green Kitchen Handbook, Better Basics for the Home and Home Enlightenment.

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