ARE PEOPLE MORE HONEST NOW THAN IN THE NINETEEN FIFTIES?

                In my opinion the answer is no!  Dishonesty is a large part of the human condition, just like hate.  We can’t get away from it.  It’s in our DNA.  But thank God for our brains.  It is our brains that inhibit the intrinsic predisposition to be dishonest and hate others.  (Don’t try and tell me you have never been tempted to steal or ever used the word hate.)  Dishonesty and hate have to do with survival. 

                You may think I’m going over the top, but I don’t think so.  I’ve lived a long time having been born in 1933, the first year Franklyn Delano Roosevelt took office.  A lot has happened since then:  War II, Korea, Viet Nam, Granada and the Gulf wars.  And I’ve done a lot of historical reading and a little bit of traveling.  Furthermore, I was a deputy sheriff who specialized in sex crimes, and observed dishonesty at all levels of the social strata and in all occupations – including law enforcement. 

                The modern conception of religion is that the goal of Christianity is to make us more honest and loving, or prepare us for the next life, a heaven reserved for the honest and loving.  But what about the Inquisition and the Crusades?    As a matter of fact and a matter of history, religion has not necessarily made us more honest and forgiving although many will argue otherwise. 

                Take the Koran for example, how often does it mention the word “love?”  The following is taken from the Internet:

There are 70 mentions of love in the Qur’an of those 70,, 45 directly contain hate, Such as those times when it mentions the word love but only to say “Allah loves not” Love is most often used in the Qur’an to provoke hate, Other times it is used in such away (sic) as to steal credit from others or used in such a way that really has nothing to do with Islam like the claim giving islam’s (sic) deity credit for covering Moses with love when he was put in the river so that he would be loved by the enemy when they found him,

And then there is a time or two when it claims Allah put love between mates, but given Muhammad’s commands which encourage men to be whore’s who beat there (sic) wives, The love mentioned there is more like lust not love because Muhammad really didn’t know what the word love meant.

And then there are the mentions of love, Like where it says Out of love for Allah to feed the orphan and captive , In this instances Love is more used as a lure, not a real love. In every instance that love is mentioned it is basically defiled before or after that point with words of hate and violence or mentioned in a way where the word may say love but love is not really what it is, 14 instances where if you read where love is mentioned alone and don’t know the rest of the Qur’an or the context in which it is mentioned it could sound good but when you know the details even those basically amount to blasphemy of love.

            Archeologists excavating three and four thousand-year-old tombs in Egypt’s Valley of the Kings found that most of them had been looted – indisputable evidence that dishonesty has been going on as long as recorded history. 

            The most despicable form of dishonesty is that committed under the flag of  religion.  The Koran and Hadith not only approve but mandate murder, looting and condones pedophilia and slavery.  Nineteenth Century Mormonism also approved theft and murder (Blood Atonement).  Brigham Young instructed the territorial legislature to lower the age a female could marry to age 12.  The cost of immigrating from Nauvoo to the Great Basin was financed partly by theft from gentiles (non believers).  A special group of Mormons called Danites, or Avenging Angels, allegedly participated in the thefts.  It was called “milking the gentiles.”

            Organized crime has been a perpetual nemesis to civilization whether in the form of gangs or sophisticated Sicilians. In 1942 the SS Normandie caught fire alongside New York docks as it was being refitted as a troop carrier.  The Normandie, a huge, French ocean liner was seized by the United States after Germany invaded France.  It was recommissioned the USS Lafayette after Marquis de Le Fayette of Revolutionary War fame.

            Naval Intelligence suspected sabotage as we were at war with Germany.  But their investigation was thwarted by hostile dock workers who were loyal to mob boss, Lucky Lucinano,  who, since 1936, was serving a 30 to 50 year sentence for income tax evasion.  To make a long story short, Naval Intelligence appealed to Lucinano who agreed to help in the war effort.  The dock workers were suddenly cooperative.  The official cause of the fire was a spark from a blow torch.  The unofficial cause was Lucinano ordering the fire. 

            Lucinano went on to use his influence in obtaining the cooperation of the mafia in Sicily, paving the way for an invasion of Sicily by Allied Forces in 1943.  After the war Lucinano was released from prison on the condition he leave the country and never return.  He went to Cuba and then Sicily, his place of birth, where he continued his mafia crime ventures.

            I remember as a deputy sheriff talking with members of the criminal element who unanimously stated that they trusted the mafia more than law enforcement.  I am afraid that organized crime will always be with us, the same as cops, prosecutors, and wars.  In the LDS, Book of Mormon, there are the mythical Gadianton Robbers.  We even find organized crime in the Bible, beginning with the Able and Cain saga.  In the civil action against the polygamist cult, Apostolic United Brethren, AUB, the Utah Supreme Court found AUB culpable in the theft of 1.54 million dollars, and described the defendants as participating in a “pattern of unlawful activity” – in essence a violation of the Rico Act.  AUB, the FLDS and other organized polygamist groups have been labeled by pundits as “organized crime.”

            I have a set of the eleven volume epic, Story of Civilization by Will and Ariel Durant, Will is one of my favorite authors.  In reading these superb tomes I couldn’t help educe that in spite of the series of wars, deception and hatred in mankind’s history; it is amazing that we Homo sapiens are as civilized as we are.

            I believe there is a direct correlation between dishonesty and opportunity – no new revelation there.  There is much more opportunity in the Twenty-first Century than there was in the Nineteen Fifties, what with the Internet and all the other technologies that make identity theft profitable.  Let’s face it; dishonesty is blatant in government, politics, business, sports, religion and in many marriages. Combating dishonesty is big business.  Sometimes the combatants are as dishonest as the bad guys.

            A story worth telling must have an antagonist as well as a protagonist.  There must be an opponent, a villain, a bad guy.  Life is about overcoming obstacles, competition, fighting back and prevailing in spite of unfairness. Islam is about submission.  Yuck!

            Now, I’m not really that pessimistic about the human condition.  There are millions of honest people of all ethnic and social levels.  If there weren’t we would have total anarchy. Unfortunately, dishonesty at its apex I believe is found in politics and religion where dishonesty is used to unify the masses.  Who comes to mind: Hitler, Stalin and Mohammad.  (I’m tempted to include a few other famous icons but I’m probably already in enough trouble.)  And even in the land of the free and the brave, we see mudslinging between Romney, Gingrich and Santorum, vying for the privilege to replace Barak Hussein Obama.  

            Mudslinging, in my opinion, goes beyond disparaging criticism and connotes dishonesty. But sometimes, our politicians and religious leaders, by their actions and policies, invite deprecating attacks. Here is how I see the mudslinging:  Rather than attempting to demonstrate that you are more honest, wise, competent and trustworthy than your competitor, it comes across as, he is more dishonest, dumb, incompetent and untrustworthy than me.

            In following the GOP presidential contest it seems to me more voters are allowing their emotions to dictate their vote rather than a rational brain selection.  And the candidates seem to have forgotten that Obama is the opponent, not each other.  I want the candidates to compete in who can fault Obama on foreign policy, domestic energy, entitlements, Israel, the United Nations, NATO, military, etc., and why he has the credentials to kick Obama’s ass out of the Whitehouse and turn America around.  The pitiful vote numbers in Minn, Mo. and Colorado indicated to me that the masses are getting tired of the negativity.  I think Santorum and Paul’s vote numbers were protest votes.  Both Paul and Santorum are nice guys but do they really have the credentials to beat Obama and turn America around?   

             “All is fair in love, war and especially politics and religion.”  A pithy axiom by Sardonic Sam the satiric cynic.