God

Does God exist? I believe in Him/Her(if I can be so arrogant as to assign God a sex). I don't know God, however. I have neither been able to personally communicate with God, nor feel his presence(lets assume he is male for sake of convenience-not trying to be chauvinistic here). Maybe I was never supposed to establish contact. Or maybe I am not eligible yet, nor do I know a method of gaining that eligibility. And I'm definitely not sold on the fact that religion is the way(more under a future topic - Religion).
Why do I believe then, that God exists? Perhaps it stems from my inability to explain the world or the universe and everything in it. Where did everything come from? I've read theories on the Big Bang and black holes, but where did that come from? If the law of conservation of energy is true, what was the initial form of energy that landed you and me here in this world? Which is why I feel God is not a human form, but a form of energy. Lets leave it at that.
I was introduced to Yoga & Spirituality by my parents when I was in High School. And for a while there, I thought spirituality was the way. I still believe it is, but however I don't feel the need for God yet. The universal question - "Who am I? Why am I here?" has popped up in my mind many a time, but I haven't seriously started to search for an answer yet(maybe Google will be able to tell me one day ;) )
God does not play an active role in my everyday life. And I dont believe things were ever intended that way. We are responsible for our own actions, and to lead our lives the way we want. Imagine the number of coconuts wasted in India during school finals. Im pretty sure god does not intervene. You work hard/work smart and you get ahead. Luck is a factor, yes, but definitely not a function of your loyalty to God. It is more a function of your and other people's life events that are completely out of your control.
I'm not so sure about fate either. It makes life so pointless and uninteresting, to think your life's path has already been clearly charted out - which is why I detest astrologers and fortune columns. "A real man makes his own luck", Billy Zane said in the Titanic. And many a time in life, when I have fallen, or have been disappointed, I have consoled myself saying 'All that happens, happens for the good', and 'luckily' things have turned out alrite so far (Thank God! ;) )
So when I go to temples these days(pretty rarely), I do pray. I've stopped asking for material things. I thank God for everything I have(not sure why, maybe out of habit). And I ask for happiness instead for me, my family and the world. I'm not sure why I ask....maybe its just an expression of my hope, or my wish. I do feel a sense of calm, or inner peace when I'm in a temple though....maybe its the presence of God, or maybe its just nostalgia.
So thats that!

Abortion

Who the hell am I to judge - I'm a man. But I can try and reason.
A woman probably feels she has the right to decide, because it is she who is most affected, whichever way she goes. She may feel it is not the time for her, she may not have the resources to support a child, or the time even. The last thing we want is an uncared for child who strays into drugs and violence. And maybe all she wanted was a one-night stand. Frankly, if you ask me, sex and pregnancy should be different things. People want to have sex way more often than they want to have a baby, and thats the way it should be. What would you choose - hmm, lets see -
a) A 20 minute wildly exciting orgasmic experience or
b) A 20 minute wildly exciting orgasmic experience along with a 20 year responsibility gilded with perks from pregnancy and a painful child birth procedure to school, homework, rebellious adoloscence, college up until marriage
I'll take option a, thank you very much! But thats a different topic altogether, so we wont go there.

But is abortion killing? If you were not allowed to kill a born child, should you be allowed to kill an unborn child? How about all those murderers who have been convicted and serving terms for killing two people when a pregnant mother was the victim? The mother could very well come to the conclusion that she will not be able to provide well for the child after he/she is born - should she be allowed to kill a 2 hour old kid? Is a fertilized egg a life only after it is born? Whats the cut-off age below which its ok to kill? And I've also heard the argument the the fertilized egg is only capable of being a child after so many months, and you are not really killing if you abort at an early stage. Recently the US Supreme Court ruled that late abortions are illegal, i.e., a foetus that is able to survive outside the mother's womb in an emulated environment cannot be aborted.
Or is this about pain/torture(the animal activist theme)? Is the argument really - "hey, an unborn child cannot feel pain, so its ok to abort and its the mom's right, but a born child can feel the pain". In that case, should painless killing be legal - I am sure there are ways - maybe consuming cyanide is one (although you wouldn't really know if it was truly painless until you had it, and if you did, you are already dead).

So I dont know where I stand on this one yet. I'm sitting really - I see sense in both sides of the argument. So I will sit and wait for someone/something to enlighten me. I however dont subscribe to the biblical/religious reasoning behind the pro-life campaign, and dont buy it when people say 'God said abortion is wrong'. God certainly didn't say anything to me. In fact, I don't believe God ever said anything to anyone, but more on that issue under a different post.

Where do I stand?

I was never interested in politics/social issues when I was in India - mostly because it was(and still is to a great extent) rife with corruption, and partly because I was younger and interested only in friends, music and girls. But its different here in the US - things seem far more interesting to me, mostly attributed to Jon Stewart, Bill Maher, National Public Radio and Stephen Colbert(in that order). People have a voice, and it is heard - whatever the medium may be - audio, video or text. In no other country do they take 'Freedom of speech' this literally or seriously. You can pretty much say anything you want about anyone you want - yes, you can call the President a 'dumb fuck' on TV/Radio in front of millions, and wake up alive the next day....very unlikely in India.
And there are many issues out there being publicly debated. So here you go, I write about how I feel about some controversial issues with a healthy headcount on both sides of the argument, recently made popular by the mainstream and not-so-mainstream media.
Initially, I thought I was going to discuss all issues in one blog, and started off with 'Abortion' and it very quickly snowballed into a multi-paragraph argument(I had no clue I would have so much to say - I'm obviously a really bad planner). So this is going to be a 'multi-blog' series and here are some of the issues I feel like talking about:

Abortion
Gay Rights
Global Warming
Iraq
Islam
Religion and God
2008 Presidential Campaign
Vegetarianism

Stay tuned!