Eric Jonathan Sheptock's Statement of Principles

I've often been bothered by how people distort scripture, science and the words of historic figures or deities in order to make the case for supporting their chosen lifestyle. I tell people to self-validate rather than twisting the words of God, Jesus, Martin Luther King, Jr. or the forefathers. After all, if you're already Hell-bent on living a certain way, why do you seek another opinion??? Your mind is already made up. I also worry that, when I've gone on to the next life, people will attribute beliefs and ideas to me that I never supported or that I was indifferent to. In this blog post, I intend to make my views very clear and unmistakable while creating a permanent record that will outlive me.

Spirituality:

I believe that God can best be described as the “God of Necessary Evils”. He told people to do good, swayed our circumstances in favor of us doing evil, came down hard on those who lived before Christ for not living up to His standard, required the blood of animals and His son in order to usher in salvation and has already told us about the evils that will occur as the seven seals of Revelation are opened. He told Satan she could do her evil to Job in order to tempt him into cursing God, allowing her to kill Job's sons, daughters servants and livestock – all for the purpose of testing Job whom God adamantly told her not to kill. Some of the few scriptures that mention God's love use His requirement that Christ die as proof of the same. In the present, the world is in turmoil, leaving us to wonder why God hasn't set things straight. All of these assertions are supported by a school of thought known as “Finite Godism” which holds that either God has limited ability to eradicate evil or He's complicit with it. I believe the latter.

God's evil is necessary insomuch as it teaches the up and coming lesser gods about what can go wrong in their respective kingdoms and forces them to develop plans for preventing these problems in eternity. These lesser gods include Jesus as the ruler of the New Earth and his equal in the other world that God is working on right now, with each having 144,000 lesser sovereigns – in much the same way that we have a federal government (God/ Heaven), state governments (Jesus & his equals/ New Jerusalem) and local governments (groups of 144,000/ districts of the New Earths). When God has completed this 10,000-year cycle, He'll start on two more worlds.

In early 1994 I read Psalm 82:6 and John 10:34-35, both of which indicate that some men are actually demi-gods. I took this to heart and have put tens of thousands of hours into thinking about and using “the god in me”. This begins to explain a few things about my character, to be sure. I believe that many women are goddesses, though I DON'T believe that the Bible expressly states that. I use my godhood to make people think hard and unemotionally about the grim realities of life, as opposed to adopting a senseless belief because it sounds nice and satisfies their sensitivity. I also use it to promote moral mandates which public officials should live up to and to pressure them into doing for their constituents what they ought. I believe that an objective acceptance of grim realities and the ability to instill these sensibilities into large numbers of people are indications that one may have obtained godhood.

Gender:

It is important to make the distinction between sex and gender. Sex is physical, being defined by your anatomy. Gender is more about your mannerisms – whether you carry yourself in a perceived masculine or feminine way – and the roles you fulfill in the home and in society.

That said, I'm indifferent to the LGBT issue, speaking neither for nor against it. I'm not convinced that God supports it. However, I identify with the left on various social justice issues. This leaves me conflicted – at least until I factor in that God has given people enough rope to hang themselves and I reason out that it's not up to me to judge them for their lifestyle. I associate with them based on our shared interests and always remain willing to be intimate with a lesbian if we should grow close, in effect making her bisexual. I also believe that any nation or individual that not only accepts but also supports the LGBT lifestyle should do the same for polyamory and polygamy. If marriage can be defined to include same-sex couples, why can't we also have harems??? Let people define their own marital arrangements totally and completely.

I believe that society has gender in much the same way as individuals do. That is to say that, while both men and women throw their thoughts and feelings into the mix, any society tends to lean more heavily in one direction or the other. I remember how in the late '70's and early '80's many women were telling men to “get in touch with their feminine side” or to “make themselves vulnerable”. Men were discouraged from thinking that they always had to come through for the family and save the day and encouraged to show weakness. I also remember how that, before these ideas had taken hold in the minds of men, it was common for men to present tough logic that made whomever they were speaking to feel compelled to make sense. Now there is more of an emphasis on letting a person believe as they choose – even if they contradict themselves – without challenging them to make sense of their arguments. People used to want to make sense of their arguments for you – to reason out their beliefs. Now the prevailing idea is that a person doesn't need to answer to anyone for the purpose of making sense of their beliefs or choices. This enables people to live by their personal whims and feelings and in the spur of the moment, as opposed to living by rationale. Let's go back to 1975.

Politics:

I believe that we need to break away from a two-party system – to stop flip-flopping between two parties that take turns at screwing the country and the world. While the development of a third viable party may be more than a decade away, the end of partisan politics might not be. We're shifting from partisan politics to a more intentional form of gender politics. Women make up 20% of the current congress. Hillary Clinton is a viable 2016 presidential candidate. DC already has a female mayor (whom I can see Hillary tapping as her veep) and might soon have six female council members on a 13-member body – making seven of 14 elected officials women. I support Clinton for president insomuch as this may be the closest we come for a long time to disrupting the usual flow of American politics.

Furthermore, women have said many times over the years that they can do better than men at a number of things including the U.S. presidency. While I'll withhold judgment, I want them to have the opportunity to put up or shut up. If a woman does better than men, I'll be among the first to laud her.

I am a Marxist/ Communist at heart who believes that Acts chapter two lays out a good model for society. I also believe that a society that is run by women wouldn't and couldn't be Capitalist, due to the aggressive elements of Capitalism being drawn directly from the male mentality – like the “austere man” mentioned in a parable Christ told and the ever-present notion that people who don't earn enough money to survive should be left to die – that they should have their social services reduced and eliminated. Let's not forget about the male propensity for war – over oil, land and the right to oppress. That said, not all men are capitalists; but the staunchest capitalists are all men. Even so, male aggression is also capable of doing much good. That's why I promote it under certain circumstances.

International Affairs:

While working with two women from France (both of them multiracial) on a project that addresses what it's like to be in a relationship while homeless, I asked them many questions about France. The three of us and others whom we spoke to agreed that the French people probably experience greater freedom than Americans. I believe that many Americans have been influenced by McCarthy-ism to think that Marxism, Socialism and Communism are wrong. Americans are not – for the most part – free thinkers. While the U.S. is not experiencing the turmoil of some African nations, it is far from being as free as some European nations.

My French lady friends (whom some know as “the Love ladies”) reminded me that France refused to fight in the Iraq War and that Bush 43 had much animosity toward Sarkozy because of it. They also told me that Bush 43 and his Iraq War did much to ruin America's image around the world – a fact that I was already keenly aware of but didn't mind having further reinforced.

National Affairs:

This country has yet to reverse the damage done by slavery and Jim Crow. After mistreating Blacks for centuries, racists politicians in 1972 began to adopt policies that led to mass incarceration of Blacks – in effect beginning the shift from outright oppression of poor people to a narrative that enabled them to blame poor people for their own plight. These policies have culminated in the unjustified killings of unarmed Black men by police and the riots that these murders spur. All poor people must band together in revolution against their capitalist oppressors and effect full systemic change that ensures that everyone will have their most basic needs met. We can't let it suffice that they stop the unwarranted violence by police but must push for a system that reverses the socioeconomic disadvantages of Blacks and other poor Americans.

Local Affairs (Washington, DC):

Washington, DC is being further gentrified with each passing day, though its poor population is not as destitute as Baltimore's. The administrations of Tony Williams, Adrian Fenty and Vince Gray have handed the city to the wealthy and well-to-do beginning in January 1999 and running through December 2014. Muriel Bowser has shown herself thus far to be quite different from her last three predecessors and is focused on addressing the plight of the city's poor. Whether or not she'll actively reverse any of their draconian policies like we need her to do remains to be seen.

Conclusion:

This concludes my running list of stances. I hope that no one confuses my stance on these issues while I live or after I'm gone. After all, a person needs only to do a Google search to gain an understanding of me. This reminds me of yet another thing that my French lady friends told me. French men often prefer to argue for hours about something that can be proven with a simple Google search. Don't misunderstand me or argue about what I stood for. Just Google me.

Thank you.