Utopia.

A weird thing to think about but imagine your utopia. What do you see in your paradise? In most people’s it’ll consist of sun, sea and other things which just fill you with ecstasy. Now, that thought is shallow so I want you to delve deeper to find your real utopia and who or what would be there, the rules and numerous things that you deem important. You can inform me of yours if you want, since that’s what I’ll be doing now.

Recently, I’ve made a weird decision. I’ve now decided that I’m not patriotic nor do I believe in countries. I obviously believe of their existence because denying that would be nothing short of idiotic, their existence isn’t conditional but I believe they shouldn’t exist and shouldn’t separate. What I mean is that I know count myself as a “citizen of the world” instead of being stubbornly and ignorantly patriotic over a patch of land. Billy and I started discussing our idea of utopia with this ideal. This, would be my utopia.

I believe that there should be no countries, no allegiances to a flag and no national pride. I believe that we’re all in this together, as a race and we should not fret over such petty things as land. First of all, most wars are over holy land and their right to be there and that should be scrapped. Everyone would belong to everywhere and there could be no complaints about anyone unlawfully being there. No religion which govern laws, no reasons dubbed “ethical” when it really means “religion disagrees with it even though the texts are outdated and written thousands of years ago by people who had no science, no understanding of the world we live in and used to eat magic mushrooms to come up with psychedelic euphorias and has been twisted in translations to suit people.” That’s why they shortened it to “ethical.”

I’m pro-choice, obviously. I’m also an atheist and so on but I don’t think you shouldn’t be allowed to practice religion and if you believe in it then good for you. I do not agree with being forced to live by rules because of other peoples’ beliefs. I don’t do that to them yet they continue to do it for me? A simple way to put it is “if you don’t like or you disagree with it, don’t do it.” Government should not be led by a hypothetical entity; it should be led on equality and laws which do not discriminate.

In my Elysium, I see the world being ruled by one government and having no religious ties at all to their laws, speeches or practice. Just one government so there are equal laws, no need for overly complicated economies, equality and numerous other things. I mean, America is one of the world’s most powerful countries and it’s always led by a Christian who brings their faith into account when making decisions. They finish speeches with “God speed” and say stuff like “let us pray…” and I can’t help but think “no”. Religion is outdated, it was done with ignorance and was nothing more than a book of morales to stop sodomy really.

Who doesn’t want equality and an open world? Pathetic patriots who practice traditions “just ‘cause”. It’s a ludicrous idea that they fight for what their ancestors fought for, which completely hinders change. Why don’t they see the error of their ways? They’re too busy being racist ignoramuses as they drunkenly defend Britain from “being taken over” in a senseless pride. I mean, they have no idea because they’re uneducated philistines that don’t think for themselves but follow a conservative paper who put headlines like “MUSLIM OFFENDED BY *something little*” and then they claim it’s a disgrace over a minority saying we’re being overrun and that they take our jobs. If they actually looked into facts they’d know that only 4% of Britain are Muslims and that doesn’t mean they’re all Pakistanis either. I mean surely, ignorance can’t be bliss?

I got side-tracked there but what I mean is that their “pride” hinders change. It’s like it numerous amount of countries. For example, the middle-east is riddled with war over “sacred land” and “pride”. They also govern themselves by Islam and not reason or fairness. There are numerous amounts of dictators who destroy change and govern their land with fear. Why not govern the entire world in a fair democracy? Does it not seem more plausible for it all to be run equally? After all, we’re all the same.

Another thing I’d like to see is equality with animals. I know I may becoming hippy-like now but I’m not like that. I just mean that if an animal - who doesn’t know any better and acts on instinct - bites someone, be it an adult or a child, why should it be put down? Animals act on instinct and survival instincts. They’re not intelligent enough to learn better really, you can’t stop it. If a human felt threatened and feared for its life, it would do the same. What gives you the right to put that animal down? What gives you the right to put any animal down (considering you can’t consult with it) when a consenting person cannot be killed in the same dignity? We’re the most greedy, corrupt, unjust, selfish being on this forsaken planet.

There are numerous other things that I would love to talk about but I’ll spread them out to be in depth but such topics as the environment, selective prejudices and the unnecessary censorship are on my “to-do list” of sorts.

To close, let me ask you this. What is your ideal world?

Definition of “choice.”

What is technically the definition of choice? Well, dictionary.com summarised one context as “the right, power, or opportunity to choose; option”. Then why do people want to revoke choices? There are a number of things which are banned in the world which should quite simply; be a choice. The main things which are banned and that I completely agree with are stem cell research and euthanasia. The reasons these are banned are for ‘ethical reasons’ when in reality it’s because of religious reasons and why should that be allowed? They’ve taken away one of our freedoms and that is choice.

Yesterday, I heard about a HIV-positive man possibly being cured via stem cells. Now, I’m struggling to find a truly popular and credible source covering this story so it’s a bit hard to find information other than 140 character related tweets about it. It became a trending topic last night and no UK paper is covering this story. Why? I’m not sure, it could be a hoax or it could be another reason. I’m going to go with the latter on this one. If it is true then they’ve finally cured HIV and we should all be celebrating and it should be on the news everywhere that we may have affectively cured it. In my opinion, the reason they haven’t covered this yet (if ever) is because it’s not definite and it’ll probably give a lot of people false hope which isn’t nice. There’ll also be an uproar asking why this is banned and there’ll be more protests - from both sides - and potentially riots so I suppose they’re holding off for now.

If it is true then I feel sorry for the people who may not be able to receive this treatment. They’ll just have to die an agonising and drawn-out death because of things they may not necessarily agree with. What I don’t understand is that religious people condemn it and protest against it because it’s against the invisible-man’s will. We’re letting people die because of a hypothetical God who has a fail safe of faith. “It shouldn’t have to show its work or show itself to you, it should just be worshipped anyway” is the great cop-out of religious people. Their blind faith may have killed a lot of people with the ban on stem cell treatments which is unfair. It should be - at the end of the day - a choice.

Luckily, as I looked into this subject I found out that the UK is behind stem cell research now with Cambridge having £10m donated to them for them to research into it. This has made me happier but I can’t find if the treatment will be given afterwards which is a little confusing. Stem cells has a bright future and could cure many things like cancer but religious and ‘ethical’ reasons may hinder its progress. For example, embryonic stem cells are still being debated but in my opinion there is nothing wrong with them being used. Either way, it should come down to choice. When it comes to your life, shouldn’t you be able to make choices regarding the saving of it? The prolonging of it?

Euthanasia is legal in only 10 places. It’s only legal in about seven countries and legal in four states in America with California thinking of legalising it. That’s a very minor amount and it should be a lot more. According to figures I found online, two thirds of Britons think it should be legal yet it’s still illegal. Why? It’s clearly just a choice. I’m going to go to a simple quote “if you don’t like it, don’t do it.” It seems such a simple quote but in practice it’s more difficult because of people who say it’s not your right to end your life, it’s God’s right.

If it was God’s right to end MY life then he wouldn’t have given me free will. Either way, you can’t force your religious beliefs on people and you can’t make them suffer in their final hour. That’s cruel. Their final hours will consist of them in an inexplicable amount of pain that will leave them begging for it to end and for any way out possible. If you were in their shoes you’d be wanting the exact same thing and it’s only a matter of time so why not it let end on their own terms? Why force your views of how that is a ‘sin’ on them and just let them be at peace? Surely that would be God’s will.

If you want to end it all there is one company in Switzerland which offer this sweet release of death and those saviours are Dignitas (funnily enough, Dignitas is also a gaming organisation which is pretty big in competitive gaming and eSports). They will lay you or your loved one to peace in a pain-free manner. Unfortunately, if you do do this, when you arrive home you get arrested for assisted suicide which is still ridiculous. Why is that an arrestable offence? It’s your choice to end your life. It shouldn’t be anyone else’s but your own. No one should force you to live in the pain because of outdated, traditional views. That’s just immoral and everyone should realise how immoral it actually is.

Euthanasia isn’t ‘assisted suicide’ it’s a relief to the person, a goodbye on their own terms so they can say goodbye to their loved ones and finally pass away in an endless slumber instead of writhing in pain in a personal purgatory-like place. You’d think that the government would recognise all of these advantages, but they don’t. They’re still stuck with traditional thoughts and I see no reason why. That’s one of the reasons our infrastructure is one of the weakest in the UK because we don’t embrace change, we’re frightened by it. Let’s face it, the BNP and UKIP are the most traditional of all and I won’t rant about them now but they have idiotic thoughts which would put our government in reverse at a catastrophic speed. Traditions should be scrapped and we should welcome the new and accept all that is good. Holland, Switzerland and Japan (besides Japan’s debt) are role models to the world that we should live in. They’re liberal and open to change and we should model ourselves after them. After all, wouldn’t you like a change?

So let me define choice for us: “an illusion; an anti-tardis that, in Britain, is ever shrinking whilst expanding for others.” That’s what a choice is now.