TDR said:
The last part of this quote says to me that it matters not what one does to further certain goals, including STO ones: it doesn't matter that we take from the rich so long as this taking enhances STO behaviour.
The way I see it is out goal of knowledge isn't our only goal. Otherwise STO and STS wouldn't matter, we'd do everything possible to gain knowledge at any cost. So we can easily take it "too far" if all we did was try to gain knowledge and did whatever it takes regardless of who is hurt and how. But we also don't want to take it "too far" in the other direction by thinking that we can be STO right now. Consider the fact that we still eat - we kill other beings, eat them, so that we can live and do our stuff. Pure STO wouldn't do that, but we're not pure STO, and if we want to get anything done in our current situation, we have to eat, which means we have to kill or pay others to kill for us so we can eat. But we can start hunting for fun, start torturing animals (like blowing up frogs with fire crackers as Bush did), etc, which is unnecessary and not helpful to our goal. If your goal is only knowledge, then it's not bad - you learn what it's like to torture and blow up animals for fun, you learn how animals react to torture, you gain some sort of knowledge. But not being psychopaths, and having the goal of STO, we wouldn't be inclined to do something like that.
So I think it's about balance. If we are "too STO" we can't get anything done. If we are "too STS" we're missing the point, we might as well join up with the PTB then. My understanding is that while here, we have to be something in between - strive for STO, but don't lose sight of what is necessary to accomplish our goals, with reason. But in our confusion about this stuff, we have plenty of programs that will tell us that this or that is STS and shouldn't ever be done, period. But these programs do not consider context. Sometimes killing an animal is "bad", sometimes it is "good". Sometimes gaining money is bad, sometimes it is good. Sometimes lying is bad, sometimes it is good. I think in order for us to be able to think clearly about this stuff and really make the best choice with respect to our goals, we gotta deal with those programs. Tyrants promise peace - on the condition that everyone obeys them. So you could say they are peace-lovers if their conditions are met. And if we don't agree with their conditions, we will be an impediment to world peace. But if we consider the greater context, we know that "peace" is only good in a specific situation, and can be bad in another situation like the above, or rather good/bad with respect to our goal of STO. So we'll be seen as peace-haters by the world, a world that tends to be run by programs and absolutes our of context. But fwiw, Jesus seems to agree with G on this:
Matthew 10:34 said:
Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I came to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and a man’s enemies will be the members of his household. He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who has found his life will lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake will find it.
I understand this to be that we should work towards our chosen destiny, and the more we do this, the more we become the enemy of this world. And this means, we will be opposing the entire world and our families will become our biggest enemies, they will be the main tools of the general law to keep us asleep and programmed. But it's not so much the people who are enemies, it's the forces working through them, through their mechanical/programmed/sleeping nature. And the last thing we want to do is to reveal ourselves to them, to tell our family and friends the whole truth about what we know, who we are, what our aims are, etc. Because this truth would also require us to reveal to them what we think of THEM in terms of their sleep, programs, many i's, delusions, etc. It is pretty easy to see what this would mean for us and them. So we don't, we lie, we act, we pretend to be one of "them", and keep our strategic enclosure to be able to continue doing the Work.
TDR said:
And because taking from the rich does not hinder our pursuits -- in fact it contributes to them -- it must be good, for our aims at least. Ignoring the irony of this for now, the other disturbing thing is that it doesn't set boundaries for how far such logic can be carried. If I rip people off dishonestly on eBay, but then donate this money to SOTT, then would not this still be considered "good" according to the above quote, because it helps the aim of spreading STO via SOTT?
The C's recommeded being wise as serpents but gentle as doves. And I'm not sure if "spreading STO" is what we do, I think we choose to be more STO but spread knowledge, and each can use this knowledge to choose STO or STS. One big reason not to break the law is that, it is too risky, it has a huge potential to harm you and those you associate with than help. So while I don't think legal = good/moral/STO, I think legal = safe, and with respect to being "wise as serpents", we don't want to risk harming ourselves and SOTT by doing anything illegal. There is no better way to destroy this entire work than to associate it with any illegal activity, and for that reason above all else (in my view), it is imperative that we do not.
But considering STO/STS, I think "ripping people off" is NOT a bad thing in and of itself, the devil is in the details, as with everything else. Depending on who you rip off, and how, you can do a lot of harm and cause suffering, or none at all. Consider how various coporations legally rip you off by charging huge prices for items that are pretty necessary for modern life, but they charge a lot more than they have to because they want to maximize profits. So people who cannot afford these things have to buy them anyway just to avoid caveman-like existance, and they suffer as a result so that a few CEO's could make millions. Please note what I mentioned earlier about G - he charged his rich students a LOT because they can afford it, and did not charge his poor students at all. He "named his price" but he considered the context, the situation, the people, and ended up hurting nobody. He did not do it for profit either, although any profit he made he invested towards his goal, so it doesn't really count as "profit" for himself, it was his goal that profited, and if his goal was to help others, then the more money he made, the more people he helped, so THEY profited, and nobody got hurt.
TDR said:
The majority of contributors to that forum (rightly) came to the firm conclusion that this behaviour is not appropriate -- even after making the argument that the greedy record companies have too much money anyway and are themselves STS.
Concluding otherwise would be to pass judgment on what was deserving for another person/entity. Passing judgment in this manner is an STS activity, is it not?
But if we refuse to obey a tyrant, are we not also passing judgement that he does not deserve to control us? If we spread knowledge to others, who use it to escape his control as well, are we not passing the judgement? You could argue that we own ourselves, and each person has the right to own themselves and not be controlled, but we don't own the money, because money is not part of "us". But who says that the money belongs to the tyrant? He acquired it from the wealth of the planet itself, and the planet belongs to no one. He used the resources of the planet to make the money. So he just decided it it his, and we can decide it isn't. It may not be legal based on the laws of the land, and with respect to LEGALITY and the consequences of breaking the law we shouldn't break it, but with respect to objective reality, I don't think "ownership" exists. The universe is a giant resource to be used and learned from, but ultimately nothing is ours, we use it in ways appropriate with our goals, and move on.
Consider what we do with energy. We learn to prevent others from feeding on "our" energy. The energy is not "us", it is a resource that we acquired from elsewhere so we can use it. We can get more of it, we can lose it, etc. It does not belong to anyone, it's just there. And when this energy is in our possession, it's not "ours" either, we're just holding it so we can use it as we see fit, but just holding something does not make it yours, does not mean someone can't just knock it out of your hand if you're not paying attention or trick you into mechanically giving it to them - so we learn to pay attention, and learn to be less mechanical so we can preserve the energy and use it. But in order to hold something you need to get it. In a pure STO world, other STO beings may give it to you, and you give it back freely, it is a cycle/balance of giving to all by all, and everyone using it to benefit all. But in our world, just like nobody just gives us money or food, nobody will give us any energy. And just like we have to GET food by killing it which gives us energy, we have to GET money. And if you accepted eating as necessary to get anything done in this world, why would money be different? We have to use STS means to get it just like we use STS means to get energy from our food. But what makes us different from those at the top of the pyramid that have all the energy/money, is that once we get it, we spread it to everybody, we don't keep it or sit on it and get more stuff for ourselves.
Also, about those record companies. If you think taking money from them is judging that they don't deserve that money, then NOT taking money from them is judging that you don't deserve it, and that they do. Why should they have it and not everyone else? I don't think there is such a thing as "deserve" - it is a subjective concept. So they have it for only one reason - because they could get it. They have it because they got it. And in the same sense without passing judgement on ourselves, what is "wrong" with us having this money? Why can they, but not us? Fairness? Legality? Wrong/Right? Deserve? Earn? All subjective STS nonsense osit. The only objective reason - they have it because they got it. We don't have it because we didn't get it. If somebody feeds on our energy they don't care if we deserve this energy or not. They just do it because they can. And if we are not watching our own energy, we'll lose it. Nobody cares about whether it was ours, or whether they stole it, or whether it is fair, or whether we or they earned it etc. All that is artificial subjective nonsense that doesn't apply in the universe. They did it because they could, and we lost it because we couldn't hold on to it. It is upto us to learn to hold on to it and to prevent THEM from feeding on it so that we can use it. And it is upto us how we use it - for self, to get more and more of it, or to give it to others. But note that the manner in which we do this is important. Because if we just want to give energy to others, then why not let others feed on us? But we do something different, we decided that we want to CHOOSE the manner in which we serve others, not by being an unconscious well of energy for STS.
Legally" and "Officially", and with respect of not associating this forum to any illegal activities for reasons already outlined, I'd not go around telling people that they should download music for free. But as always the devil is in the details. How much harm is done to others when you do it, and how much benefit to you and others, etc? You can think of it in terms of deserve/fairness/legal/earn etc and other "subjective" morality, or in terms of objective morality - with respect to who benefits and how, and with respecto which goals etc. And then make your decision, considering the context. Just remember your goals and be conscious of them and of what you do and why, and who benefits and who is harmed and how. If you're just harming somebody's ego, it may hurt, but is that necessarily so bad, etc. But to be pure STO is just not feasable, after all, we are 3rd density residents :)
Anyway just my thoughts, I could of course be wrong, but that's just how I understand it right now, fwiw.
