The Alphabet Versus the Goddess: The Conflict Between Word and Image by Leonard Shlain

My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I almost gave this 5 stars. The only reason it gets four is that I noticed a couple of what I consider inaccuracies, but they were in obscure areas where I just happened to have different information, and I’m not really sure which of us was right but I think I was. Most of what this book covers as far as mythology, religion and history I have to take on faith, not being an expert, so it bothered me to find a couple of things I do know about that weren’t quite right. These were just little niggling details that I thought could have been researched more thoroughly. But the author warns us up front that although he researched and did his best he’s not an expert in some of these areas.

Over all, though, I think the conclusions drawn make a lot of sense. In nearly every culture that has a phonetic alphabet, there was a kind of culture shock that occurred, first when the alphabet was developed and a lot of people became literate, and later when printing became common. These culture shocks caused waves of violence and/or oppression, especially against women. These periods of time, at least in the West, also coincided with the growth and spread of monotheistic religions and reformations of those religions, particularly those that viewed images as bad and the written word as good. In addition to these effects coinciding with the spread of religion, they also coincided with the spread of scientism and Cartesian ideals, as well as with atheism and Marxism.

I won’t go into much detail, because really the details need to be read as they’re presented in the book in order to make the most sense. There’s too much detail involved for me to remember enough of it for me to make sense. But I recommend this book and, in my opinion, those tiny inaccuracies I think I noticed are excusable considering the amount of information the author sifted through to draw his conclusions.

If you’ve ever wondered what happened to the Goddess in ancient belief and myth, why She vanished, as well as why women have been treated so abysmally at certain times in history in nearly every culture, this makes fascinating and disturbing reading.

My page at Goodreads

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Understanding PIPA / SOPA & Why You Should Be Concerned (YouTube)

P.S. There are two Democratic Senators in California who’ve had my vote term after term, but will lose my support to a third party instantly if they vote for SOPA or PIPA. These bills are just plain WRONG for the United States and for the global Internet.

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I request that you vote against SOPA and PIPA. The Internet does not need any censoring. If people were more educated as regards copyright law there would be a lot fewer violations.

I’m a creative writer whose copyrights have been violated, with some of my poetry and an entire novel. I handled those instances on my own. It cost me no money, since the owners of the sites were cooperative as soon as they learned of the violations by their users. Those instances occurred because of lack of education of the public as to copyright law and fair use, and I don’t feel that SOPA or PIPA would have been the answer. We already have laws regarding copyrights. It’s possible we have too many protections, with a corporation able to hold copyrights (for material produced by employees) in perpetuity rather than just one person’s or their heir’s lifetime. I am in fact in support of returning US copyrights to their former limited time span.

Again, I’m a creative writer, but I think there should be a point at which all intellectual property reverts to the public domain.

The Internet represents the first time that everyone in the US (who can afford or use a computer) has had free speech in my lifetime. All other forms of public expression are controlled by moneyed interests with their own agendas and are not readily or freely available to all citizens as a forum for expression. Please don’t let the Internet’s availability for self-education and expression disappear because a few large corporations think it would be more convenient for them.

SOPA and PIPA are wrong, and they will not protect jobs. They will censor all of us unnecessarily and wrongly. Please vote against them.

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The Kalachakra for World Peace is an event currently taking place in Bodhgaya, India, with the 14th Dalai Lama giving teachings and initiation in the Kalachakra Tantra. You can learn more about this tradition at the Wikipedia page for Kalachakra, and there are videos from the event available at the YouTube page for the Dalai Lama.

If you’d like to read more about this tradition, here’s a web page all about Kalachakra including an ebook about Taking the Kalachakra Initiation.

Finally, a brief video of the Dalai Lama speaking about the commitment to nonviolence:

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Everyone deserves clean, healthy water, including Mama Gaia and everything that grows on her. Please start the year fresh by supporting Waterkeeper Alliance. If you’re on Twitter, you can help by following @waterkeeper and helping them reach their end of year goal of 20,000 followers.

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