A RANT ABOUT FEAR.

FEAR! The GODZILLA franchise of films (god bless you TOHO Studios) symbolized, for the last half of the 20th Century, Man's struggle with the horror of nuclear war.

The monster mutant - created by the remorseless H-bomb experimentation of the world's superpowers - grew out of Japanese cultural consciousness as a dark-lampoon excorcising their shared terror as the only NUCLEAR GROUND ZEROES ever. I ought to know, I wrote a paper about it in college.

Of course, I also wrote a paper about the odd homo-erotic relationships between Superheroes and their same-sex sidekicks (Q: Boy Wonder, how do you separate the men from the boys in tights? A: Holy with a crowbar, Caped Crusader!) but that topic hardly ever surfaces in conversation.

FEAR! however, is inescapable for us humans. It is the PRIME first tier emotional response. In college Psych courses I learned how FEAR! grips our lizard-brain and massages out a whole host of hormones for the classic FIGHT or FLIGHT response of all animals. As I've aged and pondered the nature of human fear (I've had some painfully dull decades) it occurred to me that for our sick twist of a species, the response is really FIGHT, FLIGHT or LIE LIKE A RUG!

Were Adam and Eve kicked out of Paradise for eating the fruit of the forbidden TREE OF KNOWLEDGE or for lying about how they were set up and tricked into doing it? Free-will made them God-like and the second they exercised it they started back-pedalling, denying that their choice was entirely their own. I bet it went down like this...

GOD: Adam? The apple? Huh?

ADAM: Eve made me do it! (Sorry guys, I don't see MEN diverting from the established Creation Myth.)

GOD: Oh, for the love of Mike..., Eve? Do tell?

EVE: Well, there was this serpent...and oh Hell, you made me curious gave me Free-will and told me there was only ONE THING I couldn't do here in all of Paradise? What's up with that? I'm pretty sure I was set up!

GOD: Excellent, Eve! You passed the test and may remain with me in Paradise for All Eternity. Adam, you are cast from the Garden and must till the soil, slaughter the animals you named and painfully squeeze out your offspring and die unforgiven. Oh, note to ME! Don't make Homosexuality an Abomination. It's Boy's Night Out on Earth Forever!

Okay, maybe not.

Ironically part of that which makes us God-like and separates us from fish and fowl is the ability to LIE when AFRAID. Try it! Catch a Toddler in the cookie jar or your Golden Retriever in the garbage can and only one of them will make up a story (either way you might need a towel for the floor.)