Just Being Dead

I've been reading about the death of the first Australian soldier in Iraq and the foul up over the return of his body.

The press is working overtime to turn this guy into an Australian hero. Whether he died a hero in battle or as a result of a stupid accident, the fact of the matter is that he's dead. I can sympathise with the contractor who made a mess of the return of his body - I have to freight goods around the world and it's not easy complying with all the requirements of different customs. In the end, it doesn't matter which body got flown to Australia because this guy is still dead and inside the coffin is rotting flesh.

I can't see why anyone's death makes the news - it's ridiculous because in the end, that's the ultimate fate of all of us. It doesn't matter what we believe because we die anyway. The overwhelming evidence is that life is totally meaningless and all we can do is make the most of our time on earth.

There is no belief or cause worth dying for because we die anyway. How can deliberatly bringing forward our deaths change anything on this earth? I often hear "We're doing this so that 'so and so' didn't die in vain". We all die in vain.

The younger brother of football hero Pat Tillman's comments at his brother's funeral:

Thanks Pat. [toasting him with a glass of Guiness beer] I didn't write shit because I'm not a writer. I'm not just going to sit here and break down on you. But thanks for coming. Pat's a fucking champion and always will be. Just make no mistake, he'd want me to say this: He's not with God. He's fucking dead. He's not religious. So, thanks for your thoughts, but he's fucking dead.

We live for nothing, we die for nothing.

This life is so difficult, so contradictory, so dishonnest - we can never believe anything we're told. The Catholic Church is a prime example. Half their dogma isn't even in the Bible. If there is a day of judgement, any one sent to "Hell" should ask God to take some responsibility for the insane world we are born into.