Seven Backyards - Noel McFarland

“HOW GOOD IS YOUR COTTON ?”

Several cotton farmers were whiling away a winter afternoon around the pot-bellied stove. They soon became entangled in a heated discussion over the supposed merits of their respective religions. Old Jim, eldest of the farmers, had been sitting quietly, just listening to the raving, when the overheated group finally turned to him and demanded, “Who's right, Jim? — which one of these religions is the RIGHT one?

“Well”, said old Jim thoughtfully, “you know there are three ways to get from here to the cotton gin. You can go right over the big hill. That's the shortest, but it's a powerful climb. OR, you can go around the east side of the hill. That's not too far, but the road is rougher'n tarnation. OR, you can go around the west side of the hill, which is the easiest way and it's also the longest.

“But, you know”, he said, looking them all squarely in the eye, “when you get there, the gin man don't ask HOW you come....He just asks, “MAN, HOW GOOD IS YOUR COTTON? ”

— clipped from an old “Reader's Digest” magazine about 5 decades ago, and carried in my wallet ever since! (N.McF.)!

For additional reinforcement on this topic, now go to the “happy-dogs-rendering-tolerance” cartoon, which pretty well sums up this whole endlessly repeating dead-end paradigm. Maybe I'm missing something here, but I fail to detect where any form of real “intelligence” enters this picture....Do we “need” to kill each other over what is (or is not) in our respective heads, OR merely because of the varying ways in which we may (or may not) individually choose to express our diverse spiritual inclinations and insights????....OR, merely because of which WORD one may (or may not) choose to apply to the concept of God????.... [Further insights: see Jared Diamond (1992) — The Third Chimpanzee.]