Baha'i Rants - Latest Comments in Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

Starr* — Thu, 14 Jun 2012 01:46:29 -0000

Recently, a friend of a friend's son committed suicide because of confusion regarding his transsexual nature. My friend sent the Mother links to the "Androgyny Limitless Variety" film (which supports the potentiality mentioned in this blog in the book: Between XX and Xy and gives some other perspectives including the fluidity of DNA, DNA alignment with Source, and Humanity moving into a state of Wholeness through balanced awareness.

http://www.imdb.com/video/w...

The Mother of the son who took his life said the film, although having a light-hearted approach, gave her a lot of insight and understanding and she could now pinpoint some of her own variations within. She also said she felt a God that kept people ignorant of those variations would just be being cruel.

In times unfolding the brain will not have to work in separation and acceptance will be a natural state within civilization.

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

Rocket — Tue, 12 Jun 2012 07:04:44 -0000

Some critical deficiency in the female sex? I know some guys who are convinced that only men can serve on the House because only women can have babies (basically, they would want to do that if they could) and it evens out. I speculate that perhaps in the future, men will constitute the Universal House of Justice, and women will by great majority constitute secular government. Women are less likely to want to kill their neighbors...

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

Justice — Thu, 10 May 2012 04:21:14 -0000

This is great news - that humanity is moving into Wholeness - still one wonders how the BF will deal with people and uhj elections in regards to genderless people?

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

Baquia — Wed, 09 May 2012 15:11:58 -0000

Canada to follow Australia's lead on gender ID on passports: genderless passports under review in Canada

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

Baquia — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 18:21:24 -0000

Interesting developments from Australia:

"The changes mean Australians can identify their sex of choice and select
Male, Female or X. The 'X' choice is available to intersex Australians."

So legally there is no longer a binary distinction when it comes to gender in Australia. This is exactly the point made above which in turn renders the whole issue of male/female permitted/restricted membership moot.

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

sonjavank — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 08:21:05 -0000

thanks B,
I agree, I found Stephen's essay on their website easier to read.

I assume he wrote it, although the website gives the impression that this essay is some sort of offical document.
Perhaps is it for this group calling themselves the "offical U.H.J.", and because of this indirectness or lack of clarity, it has made me suspicious.

Many of the arguments about 'rigal' and the service of women are stated in this 1988 paper,
http://www.h-net.org/~bahai...
which sticks to reliable sources (some of Stephen's references are not, of course I'm not suggesting that makes the argument wrong, just that I would like it if I was directed to a paper that did stick to only using sources that were certainly what Baha'u'llah or 'Abdul-Baha expressed).

However the essay is also filled with the author's interpretations about Shoghi Effendi's motives and then 3/4 of the way through this essay is a reference to a true or appointed U.J.H. made in 1991 and then I realised that the point of the essay was not to discuss the issue of the membership of women on the U.H.J., but is promotion for a splinter group which have their own committee calling themselves the 'official U.H.J.'.
Now I thought, why write such a very long essay, full of various arguments, some good, some I would research before I would dismiss, except as an exercise in deception.

Not a very good way to promote the idea of equality in my view.

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

Baquia — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 20:27:56 -0000

Stephen, Welcome to the internets: please don't cut/paste long text when you can just submit a link that contains that text.

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

rhapsodist — Thu, 20 May 2010 16:51:38 -0000

Hey John, I'd like to talk to you. I'm pioneering in Russia right now, and expect to be here for about 4-5 years. For a long time I disassociated myself with Baha'i life and it was only following the conferences a year ago that I strove to live a life increasingly more in line with the qualities edified in the Writings, and it was at that time I arose to serve the Cause.

That you visit with the native americans fascinates me. I've always been attracted to the culture, the spiritual philosophy, and the history. And it would be lovely to discuss and share experiences with eachother.

My email is rhapsodistnine@gmail.com

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

Baquia — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 00:00:56 -0000

Interesting article about a recent brouhaha in the sporting arena. Is a Female Track Star a Man?

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

farhan — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 14:50:51 -0000

Baquia, after the controversy about the gender of the SA athlete, Caster Semenya, I wondered if you feel that we should do away with gender in sports as well.

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

Craig Parke — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 21:52:59 -0000

Good luck on your path!

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

pey — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 20:14:34 -0000

Yes you did mean to insult us, so don't apologize. Just like saying that people "like us" would so seriously wreck the cause of God. More pompous insults on your part. You should become active again because you understand the modus operandi inside the Bahai community really well, that is subtly insult someone but keep a facade of humility and detachment. You are a bogus person and definitely not my kindred spirit. I like honest people, not flat out liers. Cheers!

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

johnbrowne — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 19:42:08 -0000

I didn’t mean to insult you all, but seriously guys, you so need to get away from each other. Your replies are dripping with anger from immature egos.
I am not a great bahai. Haven’t attended a bahai thing in my local area in years. Virtually all my friends are non bahais.
But I do hope and pray that people that are more involved with the bahai faith, never let people like you lot take over the cause of God, because you would so seriously wreck it.
My visit with native americans awaken in me the need to totally distance myself from the ego driven, which blogs and chat on the net has a good share of. Good luck guys. We all have our problem, and ways of dealing with them.I will leave you to your method, and keep to my own ways, and the good friends I have. We aren’t kindred spirits, and are on totally different paths.

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

Grover — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 00:42:32 -0000

I've sent you an email.

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

davids1 — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 18:05:40 -0000

Reform from a religion similar to Shi'a?

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

davids1 — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 17:55:47 -0000

You can simply create an anonymous email account. Feel free to contact me after you have created one. notabeneloq[at]live[dot]com

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

davids1 — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 16:57:06 -0000

Historical context refers to when and where--the original time and place--from which the James excerpt was taken. The sentence you quoted was not complete, while ignoring James' other positive remarks about academia:

"Facts are there only for those who have a mental affinity with them. When once they are indisputably ascertained and admitted, the academic and critical minds are by far the best fitted ones to interpret and discuss them,--for surely to pass from mystical to scientific speculations is like passing from lunacy to sanity; but on the other hand if there is anything which human history demonstrates, it is the extreme slowness with which the ordinary academic and critical mind acknowledges facts to exist which present themselves as wild facts, with no stall or pigeon-hole, or as facts which threaten to break up the accepted system. In psychology, physiology, and medicine, wherever a debate between the mystics and the scientifics has been once for all decided, it is the mystics who have usually proved to be right about the _facts_, while the scientifics had the better of it in respect to the theories. The most recent and flagrant example of this is 'animal magnetism,' whose facts were stoutly dismissed as a pack of lies by academic medical science the world over, until the non-mystical theory of 'hypnotic suggestion' was found for them,--when they were admitted to be so excessively and dangerously common that special penal laws, forsooth, must be passed to keep all persons unequipped with medical diplomas from taking part in their production. Just so stigmatizations, invulnerabilities, instantaneous cures, inspired discourses, and demoniacal possessions, the records of which were shelved in our libraries but yesterday in the alcove headed 'superstitions,' now, under the brand-new title of 'cases of hystero-epilepsy,' are republished, reobserved, and reported with an even too credulous avidity.

Repugnant as the mystical style of philosophizing maybe (especially when self-complacent), there is no sort of doubt that it goes with a gift for meeting with certain kinds of phenomenal experience. The writer of these pages has been forced in the past few years to this admission; and he now believes that he who will pay attention to facts of the sort dear to mystics, while reflecting upon them in academic-scientific ways, will be in the best possible position to help philosophy. It is a circumstance of good augury that certain scientifically trained minds in all countries seem drifting to the same conclusion."

I criticized Wilber's conceptions about history and science, which have been discredited for decades and his shallow, New Age popular philosophy, neither of which is equivalent to hating him. Nobody solicited my participation. Baha'i is an interesting case study.

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

Grover — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 04:43:46 -0000

Hi Fubar,

Sorry to be an apologist but if you took a look at my reply to David you would see some sort of an answer to your question:

"in general, why is having variations in perspective bad? is postmodernism, pluralism, relativism all bad, or is it just that it has come to be characterized by regressive forms that are so extreme that all other types of variation in perception of "science" have to be banned to avoid the evil excesses of postmodernism?"

My argument was that variation in scientific explanation about a specific system arises due to limited knowledge about that system. This is due to limitations in technology and current understanding available to analyse that system. Variations in perspective isn't bad - its good (unless you're a crackpot who proposes theories without any kind of logic or rationale) - it gives students and researchers theories to test. As more information becomes available, the range of explanations get narrowed down and refined. i.e you go from a "constructivist" type of understanding to a "positivist" type. Another way of looking at it is as the system becomes more defined, the degrees of freedom in explanation decrease. Its pretty much how science progresses. A new field in science is opened, a plethora of explanations are proposed, a bunch of students get stuck in and do the donkey work testing the theories while the professors have tea and biscuits, and eventually, 100 or so years later, you have a pretty good theory. Sometimes you have a quantum leap in understanding because someone has a unique insight that allows a whole arena of science to be opened - e.g. Einstein, Schrodinger and so on.

"who would decide what the "one truth above all" consisted of?"

Its the "truth" that works best in describing a system and predicting what happens under different conditions. If it doesn't work, then you have some bright spark writing a paper bitching about it and proposing a new theory or "truth". Most times certain explanations only work under certain circumstances and the grand unified theory has always remained elusive.

The fact that all theories in science are not sacrosanct (well except to the one who proposed the theory in the first place and wrote 100 publications on it) in my mind raises science above religion. In my mind, science is more infallible than any religion precisely because it doesn't pretend to be infallible (By the way I'm a science teacher so naturally I'm blinkered lol).

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

fubar — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 03:39:09 -0000

if I understand it correctly, this sounds kinda like cr*p:

davids1 said:
"Scientists perform experiments to determine structure and understand processes, not to make or
construct knowledge that subjectively varies from researcher to researcher. "

please explain how a completely-perfectly unitary perception of scientific structure/process would be possible - as a general proposition.

example 1: an experiment seeks to measure/confirm the speed of light.

example 2: an experiment seeks to measure/confirm how butterflies and milkweed co-evolved.

example 3: an experiment seeks to measure/confirm that human (or other) brain scans can measure the "experience" of heightened spirituality (e.g., during prayer/meditation)

(feel free to use better examples)

---

who would decide what the "one truth above all" consisted of?

how would they come to power?

what would happen if they used their power for evil purposes (to suppress dissident)?

in general, why is having variations in perspective bad?

is postmodernism, pluralism, relativism all bad, or is it just that it has come to be characterized by regressive forms that are so extreme that all other types of variation in perception of "science" have to be banned to avoid the evil excesses of postmodernism?

!!!TIA!!!

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

fubar — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 02:44:19 -0000

re: "Fourth" ...

LOL! thanksfor the chuckle.

so, bahai leadership doesn't know what it is talking about, and one has to go outside bahai to understand developments in culture (or, as you say "historical and philosophical" issues).

I could not agree more.

thanks for confirming that bahai is run by incompetent bureaucrats, and has few competent scholars, at least ones willing to stand up against the thought police in the AO and local communities.

so, what next?

Is MEANINGFUL, REAL "reform" possible in bahai? if so, how?

(can any such reform be sustained given the dominant cultural imperialism, outmoded metaphysics and pervasive paradigm regression in bahai culture?)

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

fubar — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 02:29:25 -0000

invitations are presumably issued by the senators on the committee, or at least the leaders.

fwiw ~ Ronald Reagan introduced greed into the medical system in the USA. at the time, the intentions were at least partly honorable: free market
"competition" was thought to be a driver of "more efficiency".

of course that was a stupid idea, and now "those bastards on wall street" (Richard Nixon) are running the system into the ground in order to maintain profits and inflated stock valuations.

Obama's "socialist" solution will also create corruption (unions, etc.), just not corruption by wall street b*stards.

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

fubar — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 02:18:50 -0000

more silly bs.

there is no "context" required to understand a statement about "human history" and how the "establishment" form of academic culture is hostile to innovation (or outside scrutiny).

anyone familiar with basic organizational theory (people in academia are "smart lemmings"and vicious conformists), or primate behavior, or how tribal culture works, understands the real "context":

you are simply unwilling to get off your high horse, and are full of appalling snob attitude and lies/deception/attacks.

you have failed, so far, to state some very basic information that people want clarified:

1) are you a bahai, and if so, how long, etc.

1a) if bahai - do you actually believe something as stoopid as that "progressive relevation" (as taken at face value) explains human social development
/progress/evolution?

2) do you have a position (of any kind) in the AO? did you help the AO attack Cole/Lee/Dialog/Kalimat/talisman? if not, did you protest the AO's attacks on nonconformists, critics, dissidents? if not, why?

3) in simple, HONEST terms, why do you hate Wilber?

4) did the owner of this blog solicit your participation? if so, for what purpose?

5) did someone else request your participation? if so, who/why?

please - no more lies/attacks, just the truth.

---

note: a "good" answer to #3 could include admitting that Wilber is loved by far more people than you are. (which may simply make him a "ho".)

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

fubar — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 01:52:05 -0000

O.M.G. - davids1: you are unwilling to relate a basic definition (available on wikipedia) of postmodernism to the subject of this blog post?!?!? Un-freaking-believable! more arrogant "bs" and deception/secrecy.

The postmodern influence in bahai culture will clearly not tolerate the kind of absurd "sexism" that the whole issue of the exclusion of women (defined in conventional or postmodern terms) from member on the UHJ represents.

the "fickle finger of fate" clearly had bahai in the cross-hairs of oblivion when the UHJ was first formed, and shortly after that a large expansion of bahai membership took place in the USA that was significantly composed of people with postmodern tendencies.

side note: again, I protest your arrogant, pathological posts that are full of lies and distortions, and appear to be perfect examples of Jungian "projection/transference" (shadow). get a therapist.

Integralism requires scepticism. It is "so sceptical" that it is "sceptical of scepticism". (joke)

Wilber is an industry.

Anti-Wilber is the corresponding industry. The Anti-Wilbereans are usually (but not always) boring, narrow, and unwilling to attempt to come down from their ivory towers long enough to
apply philosophy/transcendence to social problems or relate it to "popular culture". Many of them are sad that they never got to go to one of Wilber's naked pool parties, or other similar post-counterculture gatherings, and are simply being pissy little nit-pickers. This can be largely explained by basic primate (monkey) behavior, and the need that some snob-academics have to be "dominant" and "smarter" ("pricks").

Wilber will be far more successful/influential, and more widely read, than most "narrow" philosophers that are too cowardly to apply their philosophy to problems of injustice, "popular culture", "paradigm regression", etc. (or for that matter - the bahai dads)

Is that good? bad? irrelevant?

Answer: it depends on your PERSPECTIVE.

Some "pricks" in academia make a living terrorizing students and anyone else that they can because they are jealous of people that are actually brave enough to try to change the world on a significant scale.

---

anyways ..... postmodernism is all about pluralism/relativism (which can only exist in post-industrial cultures: "information cultures".)

After WWII, the USA (similar for europe) moved from a society where most people worked on farms or in factories to one in which most people worked in offices.

This economic shift had a profound impact on culture, which made a corresponding shift - away from premodernism (farm) and modernism (factory) toward postmodernism (office).

As the absolutes of pre/modern life were cast aside (1st by beatniks, hippies), pluralism/relativism become increasingly possible, then was integrated into the mainstream - via the counterculture, arts, academia, mass media, etc.

Grover - google "sokal affair" for a good description of the "real world" problem of postmodernism (lit. crit./deconstructionism) and science - as it relates to the "culture wars" - attacks by the academic far left/feminism/socialism on the "culturally constructed nature" of science. Deconstructionist postmodernists basically think that "science" is an instrument of "european racist/imperialist/capitalist phallocentric culture". blah blah blah. lots of pure manoora.

Note: the "good" part of postmodernism is that it rejects the "absolutes" of modernism (the idea that male/european industrial/capitalist civilization is "superior", and is the ultimate form of culture, etc.).

the "bad" part of postmodernism, in its "paradigm regressive" form (Gebser) is that it attempts to state that "there are no absolutes" - as an absolute!

YES, IT REALLY IS THAT SILLY.

the postmodern (pluralist/relativist) basis of stating that "there are no absolutes" is that since all "reality" is "culturally constructed", everything is "local" and can not be considered "universal". absolutes/universals are vestiges of "imperialist projects".

zzzzzzzz.

Again, read Albanese on the "dominant" (non-metaphysical) forms of religious culture in the usa, and how they have been ***ignored by the mainstream***.

If you have access to the material, the following article contains a (simpatico) "academic" analysis of Wilber and some similiar theorists:

Isenberg, S., and Thursby, G. (1984-6). Esoteric Anthropology: “Devolutionary” and “Evolutionary” Orientations in Perennial Philosophy. Religious Traditions, 7(9), 177-226.

(note: no online "www" version exists anymore)

Or:

http://integral-review.org/...

Alternate URL:

http://66.102.1.104/scholar?q=cache:0PvLSkyiH6sJ:scholar.google...

Described at:
http://www.doaj.org/doaj?fu...

Title: The Evolution of Consciousness as a Planetary Imperative:An Integration of Integral Views
Author: Jennifer Gidley

Abstract: In this article I aim to broaden and deepen the evolution of consciousness discourse by integrating the integral theoretic narratives of Rudolf Steiner, Jean Gebser,and Ken Wilber, who each point to the emergence of new ways of thinking that could address the complex, critical challenges of our planetary moment. I undertake a widescan of the evolution discourse, noting it is dominantly limited to biology-based notions of human origins that are grounded in scientific materialism. I then broaden the discourseby introducing integral evolutionary theories using a transdisciplinary epistemology to work between, across and beyond diverse disciplines. I note the conceptual breadth ofWilber's integral evolutionary narrative in transcending both scientism and epistemological isolationism. I also draw attention to some limitations of Wilber’sintegral project, notably his undervaluing of Gebser's actual text, and the substantial omission of the pioneering contribution of Steiner, who, as early as 1904 wrote extensively about the evolution of consciousness, including the imminent emergence of a new stage. I enact a deepening of integral evolutionary theory by honoring the significant yet undervalued theoretic components of participation/enactment and aesthetics/artistry via Steiner and Gebser, as a complement to Wilber. To this end, I undertake an in-depth hermeneutic dialogue between their writings utilizing theoretic bricolage, a multi-mode methodology that weaves between and within diverse and overlapping perspectives. The hermeneutic methodology emphasizes interpretive textual analysis with the aim of deepening understanding of the individual works and the relationships among them. This analysis is embedded in an epic but pluralistic narrative that spans the entire human story through various previous movements of consciousness, arriving at a new emergence at the present time. I also discuss the relationship between these narratives and contemporary academic literature, culminating in a substantial consideration of research that identifies and/or enacts new stage(s) or movements of consciousness. In particular, I highlight the extensive adult developmental psychology research that identifies several stages of postformal thinking, and recent critical, ecological and philosophical literature that identifies an emerging planetary consciousness. In summary, my research reveals an interpretation of scientific and other evidence that points beyond the formal, modernist worldview to an emerging postformal-integral-planetary consciousness. I posit that a broader academic consideration of such an integration of integral theoretic narratives could potentially broaden the general evolution discourse beyond its current biological bias. The article concludes with a rewinding of narrative threads, reflecting on the narrators, the journey, and the language of the discourse. Appendixes A and B explore the theoretical implications of the emergence of postformal-integral-planetary consciousness for a reframing of modernist conceptions of time and space. Appendix C holds an aesthetic lens to the evolution of consciousness through examples from the genealogy of writing.
Journal: Integral Review
Issn: 15533069
EIssn:
Year: 2007
Volume:
Issue: 5
pages/rec.No: 4-226

--------

I'm off to oregon tomorrow on vacation, will be back at the end of the week.

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

farhan — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 06:13:05 -0000

Pey wrote : I suggest again Farhan that you look at my link

Pey I did look at your link; the documents are difficult to read on my screen and date back to 1976. I certainly would not like to bring up a stale subject with people who are not interested, but I would be happy to discuss these issues in Baha’i Studies or on a relevant thread.

My contribution to the present thread has been very clear and to the point: Yes gender is not always clearly established between “male” and “female”, the vast majority of societies do attribute one gender or another and have never yet made a special status for ambiguous genders, the UHJ complies with whatever gender science and society attributes to a person and if one day states make specal provisions for intersex people, the UHJ would no doubt have to reconsider the situation. For the moment this is not a high priority issue for the planet.

I also believe that for the present time we are power oriented because we have learnt that this is the way to survive in a hostile society. In time when society will be more mature, we will become service oriented, more concerned with “taarof” than with “aberou” and no one would envy those serving on the UHJ to the point of requesting gender reassignment in order to enact their dreams for leadership.

As usual, when my responses contradict other opinions, I get comments on my personal life or someone comes up with an entirely different subject like how the AO reacted in LA to someone 33 years ago.

Re: Can a Woah-man! Serve on the UHJ?

farhan — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 03:23:46 -0000

Pey wrote: I suggest again Farhan that you look at my link, start discussing topics like in that link in your community and get out of your Ruhi safe zone.

Pey, I looked at your link and the subjects are certainly interesting for Baha’i studies sessions in which I participate regularly, but not the kind of activity that our community needs urgently at this time.
There is an appropriate time for everything. Doing the right thing at the wrong time or not dispatching our time appropriately to each priority can have disastrous effects. It would be like a fire-man drawing attention to deficient paintwork on a fire engine during a catastrophe instead of participating in saving the victims. At this time in the history of humanity we are in dire need for reconciliation, harmony and collaboration. If we introduce a red herring for the purpose of establishing our own intellectual transcendence instead of focalising our efforts to urgent issues, we are disabling our common efforts. At this time Ruhi activities are by no means a “safe zone” and take a minor part of my time because of my present activities and isolation which will hopefully change in the near future. However, I firmly believe that Institute activities are a vital and urgent part of our efforts towards community building, but in no way the only activities needed.

As to how fire men who draw attention to paintwork on fire engines during a catastrophe are treated in the US community, all I can say that I have never seen such a thing in my community and I cannot judge what happens in another community.