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Self Ownership
The Individual Owns their Personal Existence
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The Church of Reality is based on the principle that a person has self ownership. We have ownership rights to our own lives; the right to make our own choices, the right to control our own lives, to make our own important decisions, to be in control of our own bodies, to own property, to have opinions, and to express those opinions. It's about my life, my choice, my thoughts, my body, my property, my religion, my friends, my family, my lovers, my groups, my hobbies, my mistakes, my responsibilities, my survival, my appearance, my identity. I own it - it is mine to control. It is the ownership of oneself.
So - what does this mean? Why is it such a big deal? Owning oneself as opposed to what? Self ownership is an important concept in the Church of Reality because we live in a world where people are programmed to be submissives and to surrender their ownership of themselves to others. The Church of Reality asserts that people should take back self control and repossess themselves by asserting their rights to self ownership and resisting the oppressors that currently enslave them.
Have you ever asked yourself if you are truly free? Or do you assume that you are free because the government tells you to believe that? Some people believe that God or Jesus or Mohammed owns them; that they have willfully given their lives over to a higher cause. A person has the right to choose to devote their existence to a higher calling. I myself have chosen to develop the Kernel of the Church of Reality. I own myself. I'm not part of any cult. My life, my choice. Even if it's the wrong choice, it is my choice to make.
The Church of Reality takes the position that individuals own themselves. We are not a religion that requires that you surrender yourself to us. Cults want you to surrender your will to them. We are not a cult and hope to never become one. We do not control you, nor do we want to control you. We have enough of a job controlling ourselves. We want you to be individualistic, to be a thinker, to be innovative, to be who you are and to bring your ideas and your uniqueness into the community of Realists and share with us as a coequal member of society. We are a team model where members learn from us as we learn from them. But we retain control of our own lives.
To illustrate the issue of self control I found this article that had this illustration.
Perhaps I can best make my point by referring to an experience I had nearly twenty years ago, in one of my classrooms. In one of the segments of Constitutional Law that I taught, I asked my students whether the Constitution had any legitimacy. "On what basis does the United States government presume to rule you?," I rephrased the question. This question took us into a discussion of the subject of "authority." During the course of this discussion, a young man began to ask a series of questions:
"But how else are we going to live, if we don't follow others' [i.e., authorities]?"
"Do you understand how allowing others to direct your thinking and your actions produces conflict within yourself?", I asked.
"Yes, I think so," the young man responded.
"Would you like to learn how to live your life in a more self-directed way, without relying on ‘authorities’ to tell you how to do so?", I inquired.
"Yes," my student answered.
"How will you find out?", I asked.
"By asking you," he replied.
"Let me make certain I understand you: are you saying that you are now aware of how you have allowed others to control your thinking and actions by accepting these people as ‘authorities’ over you?"
"Yes," he responded.
"And now you are asking me to tell you how to stop living this way and take control over your own life? Can I make you a self-directed person?"
There was a long silence, during which one could almost see what was going on in this student’s mind. Finally he declared: "I guess this means that it’s up to each one of us, doesn't it?"
"Do you need me to answer this question for you?", I asked.
"No," my student answered.
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The point here is that the Church of Reality can open the cage door and invite you to freedom, but you have to decide to walk out of the cage and own your freedom. Why have free speech if you don't speak out? Owning yourself isn't just a right, it's a discipline.
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Many people are subjected to ownership by their religions. "You do not own yourself, you belong to GAWD!" they tell you. You have to surrender yourself to Jesus. You have to give up control of yourself to your master, priest, mullah, teacher, group will, or whatever wants to dominate you. That is one of the big differences between the Church of Reality and many other religions. We believe in self ownership and many of them believe in religious/deity ownership and that they are in control of what you can do, what you are required to believe, even what you are allowed or not allowed to think about. You are their slave. You may be a slave by choice, but a person who chooses to be subjugated is still subjugated. Many people who believe that they have chosen that path freely believe it because they are told that they have to believe that they chose that path freely.
In order to explore reality the way it really is, we need people to be explorers, not followers. Followers don't contribute anything to the exploration of reality. Yes, learning is a fine thing and people do need some learning in order to get started exploring. but the Church of Reality expects that at some point that you will begin Intellectual Tithing, which is to contributes something to the Tree of Knowledge. In other words, you figure something out and tell us something that we didn't know. You contribute something exciting that we can build upon. The Church of Reality isn't here to tell you what to believe. We want you to help us explore reality together. In order to do that, you have to own yourself, to be an individual, to think for yourself, to keep your mind sharp, and to be imaginative and innovative. We need you to be you, not to be us.
We don't have a God to tell us what to do. So we have to do the hard work and figure it out for ourselves.
Followers don't come up with new ideas. That's why religions that own you are static religions that don't come up with new and better ideas and don't fix the mistakes of their past. They tell you what to think. You aren't allowed to come up with your own better ideas and help the religion evolve. The Church of Reality is a dynamic religion. We are an evolving religion. We are a religion that is constantly under development. The more minds that are working on it, the better we are most likely to become. We don't have an omnipotent authority figure to tell us what to do through dead prophets who wrote ancient holy books.
We are realists and we have to do the hard work. We have to fill in for the missing invisible cloud being that remains hidden and silent. The Church of Reality requires that you think for yourself. You can't do that if someone else is doing your thinking for you. You have to own yourself, take control and make your beliefs your own personal beliefs because you thought about it and you concluded that you are in fact correct. If you happen to agree with other Realists, then great minds think alike. If you happen to disagree, then we figure out who has it right.
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We are not owned by the government. We are not subjects and government property. Government exists solely for the purpose of serving the people and for no other reason. Any government that thinks otherwise is out of bounds and is exceeding it's authority mandated by the people. The people are not given rights and liberties by the government. The people are humanity and we have intrinsic rights and liberties that we acquired through evolution. Nation States are artificial human constructs that are designed to serve and not to rule us. We are a free people and we own ourselves. We are not owned by nations or kingdoms.
People have a mistaken idea that they have a duty to serve their country but the opposite is true. The country has a duty to serve the people. When realists come together to fight as a nation in a just war, we do so because we serve the people who we share a nation with. We fight for the freedom of the people. Many nation states think that they own their people. They think that the young men are property and that the nation state can assert an ownership right and enslave them to become mercenaries to the nation's cause regardless of if the cause is just or not. A Realist is not subject to these assertions because our lives are our own. We may choose to serve a national cause but we cannot be compelled to do so. We serve only if the cause is a just cause and only by our own choice.
Governments are artificial human constructs that exist for the sole purpost of serving the people and for no other reason. The government is always subservient to the people.
Realists avoid the reciting of pledges to artificially constructed entities such as nation-states or religions, including and especially our own. To pledge to a nation-state is to give up your self ownership to an artificial entity that is supposed to exist to serve the public. We assert the dominance of our self ownership over government by refusing to participate in government lead self worship. Instead, those who serve the public should be encouraged to say a pledge to the people for whom they serve and to express hope that they will do a good job as a trusted servant of the public.
Governments that work right are a valuable resource to the people for whom they serve. Humanity has both individual and collective elements and it is the balance of the two that makes for an ideal society. Each entity must know and respect the place of the other. Personal freedom is reserved for the individual and should not be intruded upon unless there is a compelling state interest to do so. However, someone has to fill the pot holes and fix the roads that we all drive on and the right kind of government provides valuable resources to enhance the exploration of reality. So there is an important place for public education, social programs, law enforcement, taking care of the sick, the poor, and the elderly. There is value to public funding for the sciences for the purpose of the exploration of the universe that we live in.
Government crosses the line however when they limit out personal freedoms and abridge our right to control our lives. Examples of when the government crosses the line include:
- Laws that prohibit women from having the same rights and privileges as men.
- Laws that impose the values of one religion on another.
- Government that recognizes fictional deities, or expresses a preference for one form of religion over another, or establishes a state religion.
- Government that gets involved in leading prayer.
- Government that oppresses people because of their sexual orientation.
- Government that prohibits sex between consenting adults.
- Government that demonizes or discriminates against Atheists.
- Government that denies women birth control, or that denies them access to abortions, or in any other way forces them to bear children or not bear children against their will.
- Government that denies death with dignity services, or government that would pressure the dying to kill themselves to save money.
- Government that prohibits the legitimate and responsible use of mind altering substances for the purpose of obtaining religious insight and inspiring creative thinking.
- Government that prohibits the individual from obtaining and using substances to treat medical conditions where the individual sincerely believes that the use of the prohibited substance has a medical benefit.
- Government that puts itself or corporations ahead of the needs of the people.
We as Realists see good government as an extension of ourselves, so in owning ourselves we also own the governments that serve us. It is important for us not only to realize that, but to assert it whenever necessary. Government is like a small child who often gets out of place and exceeds it's boundaries. We have to make sure that we keep it disciplined so that it doesn't develop a habit of bad behavior and forget who is the master and who is the artificially constructed servant.
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If everyone has ownership rights to themselves, their lives, their choices, then it's logical to assume that if everyone's rights are the same, that we have to respect the rights of others. In order to expect rights, we have to be able to give rights. To expect others to honor our intrinsic value, we have to honor the intrinsic value of others.
The Church of Reality is based upon the idea that we are one planet, that we are all here together, and that we have to figure out how to get along with each other. We need a peaceful society where we can work together for the purpose of exploring reality as it really is and the positive evolution of the human race. In order to do this people must be secure in their own rights and freedoms and have a sense that every individual has intrinsic value even if we don't agree with each other. We also assume that the rights of people are the same so that whatever rights we expect, we have to respect those same rights for other people, even if we personally feel that other people don't deserve the same rights as people like us. |
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Respecting the rights of others is the first step towards respecting your own right to self ownership. People have an intrinsic sense of fairness and often when people are harsh and judgmental towards others, they find it hard to accept their own intrinsic value.
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Newsflash |
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The IRS has approved the 501(C)3 tax exempt status of the Church of Reality. |
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Please link to us, discuss us in online forums, and blog about us. Every time anyone thinks about reality the world becomes a little smarter.
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The Church of Reality is a non-prophet organization.
"Reality®" and "Church of Reality®" are registered trademarks of the Church of Reality.
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Self Ownership