Entries in the 'Society' Category

The Secret To A Happy Married Life

Dr. Michael LaitmanIn the News (from Psychologies): “Observing for 40 years how a couple communicates with each other, psychologist John Gottman can with a 100% probability predict whether they will be happy together years later or their relationship has no future.

“Happy couples see the positive in each other, something for which they can say ‘thank you,’ hug and just be happy that life has brought him or her with such a wonderful person.

“They purposefully build a relationship of respect and gratitude. Unhappy couples, on the contrary, are looking all the time to find faults with a partner, catching his or her every mistake.

“Future unhappy couples look calm when talking about their relationship, but their heart rates were quick, their sweat glands were active, and their blood flow was fast.

“Couples who maintained a happy marriage years later, from the beginning demonstrated low physiological stress. They felt comfortable and confident, which was expressed in a caring, loving attitude to their partner. Even during an argument they can create an atmosphere of trust, warmth and love for each other.

“The main reason for divorce is disregard for the partner. Those of us who are looking for the slightest excuse to criticize and not become used to responding to partner’s requests with respect, miss 50% of the positive things that are created for them, but see the negative where there is none. They kill love. Anger and indifference mean the death of relationship.

“Compassion is the most important indicator of the stability of marriage, and the more we are practicing it, the stronger it is.

“It’s not about gifts, but how we communicate with each other every day: to actively look for a reason to be grateful for anything during the day, not to focus on the negative, not to think badly about the partner if he or she made a mistake.

“The problem of unhappy couples is often that they cannot be happy for each other. To be together and share the joy, the success of a loved one, is as important as to be close during the time of difficulties.”

My Comment: It is puzzling: Is it only in the 21st century that we have begun to understand family relationships? And in the past, was this wisdom not known to our ancestors?
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Preventing A Third Intifada, Part 3

Dr. Michael LaitmanFrom the moment the wisdom of Kabbalah was revealed to a group of people called the Israeli nation, this nation became responsible for everything that happens to humanity and to all of nature in general.

Israel is responsible for every process in the general evolution and for the fact that all of nature should go through different, perfect phases in the course of advancing towards the ultimate goal.

If there is any distortion and this form is no longer perfect, it is Israel’s fault. They then must feel the stronger influence of the forces that evoke it, forcing it to wake up and bring all of humanity to a state of harmony once more..

This is the perspective from which we have to look at all problems, especially current problems and every event in the entire history of humanity. We should understand that all the intifadas and the anti-Semitism in the world stem from our delay and from our insufficient participation in the evolutionary process of the world. We should have started to pull everyone towards connection and unity a long time ago, starting with all of the Israeli nation and then all of humanity. We should have helped humanity become more connected and united and closer to the perfect ultimate form.

Question: Why do you think we are in a delay?

Answer: We can see it by the pressure that is put on the Israeli nation. The Israeli nation is a clear index. If there is an eruption of violence, it means that we are behind in our correction. We actually summon the imbalance of the positive and the negative forces that cannot reach a state of balance between them by our delay and our refusal to bring the system to a state of harmony at any given moment.

All of humanity is in the middle between these pluses and minuses, between the evil inclination and bestowal, the Creator, and the pressures that affect all of humanity and through it, the Israeli nation. It is actually Israel who has to bring all the others to the perfect form.

This is the reason that it hurts me so to see the eruption of terror, but we have to understand that we are the only ones to blame for what is happening. All the nations of the world only carry out the orders of nature’s forces. They have no freewill and they don’t determine anything. This is the reason that we cannot expect them to correct the situation.

It is fundamentally wrong to expect that the Americans or the Europeans will be able to bring peace to the world or that the Arabs will suddenly change by themselves. We have to think only about how we, Israel, take command and control of nature’s forces and arrange the connection within our own nation.

We are not required to establish connections with anyone, neither the Israeli Arabs, nor with our Arab neighbors or the UN. We don’t need to think about others in order to do our job. This work is done within the Israeli nation. But to the extent that we connect among us internally, the power of this wholeness, the unity, the connection and the love, will pour through us unto the whole world and all of humanity will suddenly begin to calm down and connect.

Then the whole world will come out of the global crisis it is in and all the disputes in the UN and all over the world will come to an end and everyone will quiet down, unite, and hug. It will be a wonderful good state, one great global commune, and it all depends on how the Israeli nation establishes the internal relations between its people.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 11/13/14

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Preventing A Third Intifada, Part 2

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe wisdom of Kabbalah reveals the plan of creation, the upper forces, to us. We discover that they are actually one unique force that operates on us, on all of reality, and which influences us in many different ways.

Thus humanity understands how it can affect its fate. It is impossible to change the actual process that leads us from the initial state to the ultimate state, but we can hasten it, understand it, and participate in it consciously with all our hearts and minds. Thus we are incorporated in it with all our feelings and sensations on different levels of our perception and our participation.

First, we can incorporate in it only by passively observing what is going on without really understanding. But later this incorporation becomes increasingly more active.

The ultimate state determines that all of humanity will achieve unity in perfect harmony by attaching to the whole world on the levels of the still, vegetative, the animate, and all the forces of nature that are revealed to us today and those that are yet to be revealed.

Therefore, we should see how we can connect and unite as much as we can among us and with the whole of nature, on the still, vegetative, and animate levels in the state we are in now on this level..

This means that we should worry about the unity of all of human society and about a healthy ecology and a healthy connection with the environment in order to bring us all to harmony and to good mutual connections.

Once we establish such a harmonious sphere, the very next moment this sphere will change its form and become an ellipse and we will have to correct it again and make it into a sphere, because a sphere is the perfect form for the total connection.

This sphere will become deformed over and over again and we have to constantly bring it back to the harmonious state. Keeping harmony in every state is the ideal way to advance by participating in the natural evolutionary process.

Question: What conclusions can we draw from this regarding our current state in order to prevent the eruption of terror on the part of the Arab citizens in Israel?

Answer: I approach the problem globally. It may be an intifada, different types of anti-Semitism, wars, natural disasters, typhoons, or tsunamis. If we discover a phenomenon that disrupts the perfect harmony at any given moment, it is a sign that we are not keeping nature in the correct state.

It is our duty to keep it in a state of harmony. The wisdom of Kabbalah tells us that it depends on the Israeli nation, on the group that Abraham founded. Of all of humanity, he chose those who can influence the right form of humanity and each time, bring it to a state of harmony..

It turns out that one small part of humanity called Israel, which stands for Li Rosh (my head), determines how all the other nations will behave and to what extent they will connect into one round sphere.

Abraham gathered these special people and founded a group and passed on the method to them, the knowledge, and the reins to lead humanity. Since then, the whole evolutionary process depends on the Israeli nation. New people can join it if they feel that they belong to this process and to this idea and this is how the evolutionary process of the world goes on.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 11/13/14

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Using Money For The Good Of Society

Dr. Michael LaitmanComment: As of today, most people are in a very difficult situation, and the main concern of every person is his livelihood. Unfortunately, not everyone has enough income to meet even their basic needs. The subject of money arouses many fears and other feelings associated with the inability to earn.

Answer: That’s right, but it is necessary to understand that everything depends on existing values. If we say that humanity is beginning to change its perception today, this is only the first stage that exposes the inability of a person to fulfill himself according to previous values. These values were created by people who wanted to obtain money and power in the world at the expense of others because the world was dominated by money.

In fact, the world is dominated by a few dozen families that over the course of hundreds of years have accumulated power that made it possible for them to control the world. And all the governments that we are familiar with are subject to them.

These families determine which needs must exist among the world population and in what form. These values are designed to cause people to work and provide those in control with more power and more profit.

We see that we are found in a state in which these rules are worthless. If humanity discovers that it cannot continue to develop as it did previously, this situation is called the recognition of evil.

Today a person has seemingly become freer. On the one hand, he doesn’t belong to his owner, but on the other hand, desires that have developed in him hold him captive. The idea is that the desires of a person are not developing early in life towards something higher: I have a wagon, now I want a car, I have a small car, but now want a big one, I have a big car and I want an airplane.

Our desires are developing not only quantitatively but also qualitatively. A car or an airplane instead of a wagon doesn’t create something different in principle. Instead, the previous desire has simply been realized and new needs are being felt.

Ultimately, we are found in a limited and tense situation in many respects. First, within the present structure of society, I am not prepared to supply myself with the necessities for existence. Second, I cannot develop as I developed in the past. Third, I see the end of this development on the part of nature. Fourth, I feel that I am not fulfilling my new desires and needs that have suddenly grown in me because they don’t belong to the level at which I have become disappointed.

Historically, our development has always moved naturally into a new stage under the pressure of circumstances. But this way of development is very long and difficult and is accompanied by disasters that happen regularly, and we see that these disasters are increasing.

We are talking about climatic changes in the direction of global warming or cooling and are phenomena with which we cannot contend. Humanity could really find itself in such a situation where only a small group of people will arrive at the new stage of development, in the best case a billion people, or even less.

Isn’t it better to learn from the past, as stated in Talmud Babyli, Tamid 32a: “A wise person sees the outcome,”  and to begin to develop ourselves only through new methods? This is the question. It follows that everything depends on explaining the situation in which we are found so that humanity will understand its causes and in what direction we must advance.

Until now, humanity has developed an educational system that is made up of schools, kindergartens, colleges and universities. There is no place in which people are not given education. And even though one third of the population doesn’t know how to read or write, it is possible to present an explanation of the Integral Education method to most of the population, and this will be enough. Everyone else will just join in, almost unconsciously just as they now live.

For all of those people that can be reached, it is necessary to give an explanation and bring them to an understanding that the solution to the problem is in changing the person. But this requires effort and work on his part, and a person must work on this. And, the work required to ensure a rational standard of living won’t take more than two hours a day.

All the rest of the time a person will work to ensure coverage “money” for himself for the fulfillment of the new needs that the society creates in him. And for these needs, there are no limits, since we create them through social connections and through the participation of a person in society.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 8/30/12

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We Don’t Want To Study, We Want To Enjoy!

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: There are many social networks today. How do you see their development? What will be the values, processes, rules, and feelings they offer?

Answer: I would start with a short review. The general tendency of the network is to allow people to connect.

This connection should become increasingly more developed so that everyone will feel life unlimited by time or space. It is about the psychological development of the user who understands and feels himself and the world more and more. It isn’t by chance that people came up with the name “Internet”— an internal network between us.

This network should be internal, not because of communication channels and endless other options of connecting, but thanks to a direct and open mutual connection. Thanks to that, we will know how to open ourselves to cooperation and to filling ourselves and others. This is called a bilateral mutual connection from me outwards and from the inside towards me.

If we clean the virtual space of the dirt within it, the only thing left will be many desires that are trying to find fulfillment and that eventually don’t receive anything. This emptiness should accumulate as such a general emptiness that it will push us to a more qualitative development. The next phase is to teach people how to connect correctly in order to fill themselves.

This approach is totally rejected at the moment, of course. I would try to interest Internet owners to develop new programs, especially in order to educate users. Working with psychologists and programmers, we have to develop special games that will subtly attract people to a new form of connection.

It isn’t about courses and not even about short clips. A person doesn’t want to study. He wants to see and to enjoy. People love to watch programs about delicious food hoping that it will fulfill them, like sex that fills them instantly. They see themselves as kings and rulers and they enjoy this adventure.

This means that they want to feel good immediately:”Connect me with the source of pleasure, with a simple direct channel without any preconditions.” This is the reason we have to develop  software that will make a person feel pleasure each time he changes himself, even a little.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 2/7/13

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The Influence Of The Jews On The Nations Of The World

Dr. Michael LaitmanBy studying the long periods of the Jews in the Diaspora and the exile of two thousand years, we can say that same phenomenon recurs over and over again.

Whenever they came into a new country, the Jewish people looked for shelter and a place where they could dwell and survive, and they could survive only by strongly uniting among them. Therefore, having no choice, we became closer when we were in exile, and the correct mutual relations were formed between us, not because we wanted it, but because we forced to do so.

Our positive attitude towards one another affected those around us. We brought science and culture to the people in the country where we lived and that country began to prosper.

But the moment we got used to a certain place, the ego grew between us, as did competition, and we became alienated from one another. These negative relations were reflected in the people that surrounded us and thus summoned in them hatred and accusations against us. As a result, we were expelled from that country and the country would deteriorate.

The internal state of the Jewish people was always conveyed to people they lived among and brought them either prosperity or recession.

Therefore, if we begin to get closer to one another today and establish the right mutual relations between us, we will summon a positive attitude on the part of the nations that surround us on every continent.
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From KabTV’s “Short Stories” 10/24/14

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A New Way Of Thinking About Money

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: As Einstein said, we cannot solve our problems on the same plane that we create them. What kind of new thinking must we develop regarding money?

Answer: In the past, people depended on money much more than today. There was no social security, no health or retirement funds, nor any kind of social assistance for single-parent families or those living below the poverty level and so on. In all such cases, people had to have money to cover themselves.

If we were suddenly to refund those sums that were subtracted for the maintenance of schools, kindergartens, and hospitals from a person’s salary, his salary would grow by a third. But he would certainly not keep this money for difficult times. He would waste it, and if something happened to him, he would be the responsibility of society.

We see that our development obliges us to advance in such a direction that money, meaning coverage for all kinds of different expenses, will pass more and more into the hands of society. Clearly, it must be utilized correctly and not for political games.

If we see that people are concerned that their salary is not enough to maintain their home, to pay for services and food, so it could be that we must advance in this direction.

For example, it is necessary to make a general accounting for a city’s inhabitants as to how much is necessary to pay for water, gas, and electricity for everyone. The problem is that we will need to educate people to plan economically for every need, since without education there could be many more expenses than today.

But regarding the basket of commodities, we absolutely can do this. By allocating a particular sum from everyone’s salary, we can supply everyone with coupons with which they will be able to use at a store to get whatever groceries they need for a month. We could even organize a weekly delivery.

In addition, I would also suggest creating storage facilities for various things. Instead of people keeping things in their attic and throwing them away later, it is worthwhile to provide them for general use by others. When you need something, you would come and take, if not yours, then goods that belonged to someone else. This relates to clothing, children’s toys, and other things, even kitchenware.

In this manner, we could utilize not only household items, but also our professional services. For example, we could organize various systems for offering services to each other that we cannot pay for by ourselves. Once a week, every professional would work voluntarily for a number of hours and everyone would be aware of this. We would not need to pay for these services with money even though it is available. It follows that we would receive a meaningful addition to our salary.

Comment: In the meantime we believe that money gives us independence and we don’t want to depend on each other that much.

Answer: Home economics realistically demonstrates how much water, electricity, gas, and fuel I need, how much I can allocate for renovations, how much will be left for food, clothing, etc. If we write down all of these items, then a person will be convinced that he will always remain in a deficit (minus). Is this called living with money? He simply has pictures in his hands with which children play. If we explain all of this logically, basically people will move away from independence like this.
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From the program “A New Life” 9/02/14

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The Cost Of A Kilogram Of Pleasure

Dr. Michael LaitmanIn the Talmud Babyli Berachot, it is written: Go and make a living from one another. And as human beings we make a living from one another. Yet very rapidly our profit will be in discovering the unique pleasure of the connection between us.

Warmth, concern, and admiration give us a feeling of going outside of ourselves to such a level of connection that is independent of the body. We create a place where we feel tranquillity and pleasure, a dimension in which everyone is found in a general atmosphere of warmth and goodness. A person will feel that he is living with desire and fulfillments that are disconnected from the body.

The tendency towards drugs, the attraction to rioting and revolution, the attempts to relax through medicines to silence the emptiness inside, all testify that we must find a new tool, a new desire and new senses for true pleasure.

Nature pushes us relentlessly towards a kind of global connection. We see what impressions are created with people in discussion circles and connection games and how they love to play together like children, to sing and dance. Adults, educated and level-headed, are ready to behave like little children. And the need for these simple pleasures continues until the end of life.

There is an additional step to this that is still hidden, and a person yearns for it subconsciously. This is to break away from living only on the level of an animal. We have already reached a state where we are ready to provide ourselves with the necessary standard of living required for our corporeal lives.

But our ego, our distortion, prevents us from doing this. And in the meantime, the need for the next level of development, the level of Adam, is becoming clearer in people. The central role in this belongs to the media.

The means of communication today have already reached dimensions that make it possible to be closely involved with the analysis and study of the paths of future development in humanity. It is not enough to provide facts about them, nor is it enough to just stay in one place like today; rather, people must be attracted to a new form of pleasure.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 2/10/13

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Rising Above The Gaping Emptiness

Dr. Michael LaitmanDepression is one of the problems of modern humanity; it appeared at the turn of the 17th – 18th century in forms characteristic of the aristocracy of the day. People that led idle lives, didn’t know what to do with themselves, with what to occupy themselves. Based on this, they secretly began to raise the question about the meaning of life; on one hand, everything seemed to be there, and on the other hand, there was nothing.

To distract people from these thoughts and dampen the growing emptiness, society began to encourage romance, sex, and small wars. Then the development of various technologies began, and sports, travel, and the pursuit of fashion became popular. Everything was focused on keeping a person busy, giving him a sense of fulfillment instead of focusing on the true answer to the question “Why am I here?”

In parallel, print media, radio and television, and soon the Internet were developed, which further filled leisure time and all of a person’s resources. The Internet is filled with a vast variety of information that plugs the emptiness that arises within us.

But despite this, no matter in what a man is engaged, there is a greater and greater sense of inner awareness of worthlessness, insignificance, and the limits of his existence. The question of the meaning of life subconsciously gnaws at any person, be they more or less educated. This wormhole is inside of him, and he needs to do something with it.

This longing by the masses has caused a significant level of depression, and in order to address this, the masses are offered sedatives and other recreational drugs. Under the banner of struggling for a healthy humanity, government health agencies prohibit smoking, but instead they are slowly killing people with recreational drugs.

The by-product of ignoring the truth and not focusing on finding the right answer has led to everything being permitted. Humanity isn’t limited in any type of behavior, meaning sexually or drug related. Fulfill yourself with anything, just so the depression isn’t felt. This approach has led to the masses being willing to kill everyone and everything, including oneself, since he is no longer afraid of anything.

Searching for the meaning of life is most difficult because in order to find it a person must rise above oneself. A person can’t rise above oneself except in the case, by the will of fate he finds the wisdom of Kabbalah. Although it’s also a long path, at least one sees some kind of a perspective, not through feelings but through logic.

It turns out that depression is a problem for all humankind. The sooner humanity will move forward under the influence of the Internet and the overall development, more and more people will feel the insignificance of life, its limitations, and short term.

Subconsciously we feel that much greater potential is inherent in our lives than the one in existence now. For a person wasn’t created to live like an animal, meaning to be engaged in oneself, one’s offspring, and the arrangement of one’s own life to the grave. A person has some internal embryo that requires its own self-actualization and realization. On one hand, there is this embryo in each person, and on the other hand, this embryo can be suppressed.

Today, the most important industry of the world is the entertainment industry, which takes huge amounts of money, resources, etc. Even this industry has already been experiencing a setback and we are no longer satisfied by Hollywood and other mass entertainment venues.

A person has become impatient in the search for the meaning of life. A person cannot watch an online video clip that lasts more than five minutes. A year later, it will be shortened by a minute, and then by another minute. A question gnaws at him “Will I find something here? If not, then I won’t even want to watch.” After all, viewing long clips only increases the void, so it’s better not to watch them.

The problem is when a person opens a book or becomes engaged in some business, he is afraid to stop such activity due to an even greater disclosure of emptiness, insignificance, worthlessness, and lack of response to this gnawing question; therefore, he tries to preempt it. Therefore, people decrease their Internet discussions and talks over the mobile phone, limiting them to short phrases like ‘See you tomorrow! Later!” as if they want to leave something for the future. And what do they have tomorrow? The same emptiness that is today, but it seems better to break in the middle of a conversation, as though there was something to talk about afterward.

A person has to feel that there is a future! And there is no future! Somehow today we still can see it. Perhaps it looks ghostly and foggy, but we can still lie to ourselves about it. But day after day this feeling passes by, and in the hands of humanity, there is nothing that can plug this void.

No matter what, this emptiness remains and becomes more gaping, black, and grim. So, the younger generation quietly parts with this life, since it is much easier to forget everything while under the influence of drugs and to leave quietly rather than carrying this darkness internally.

We are faced with a huge problem that we lack the desire and ability to solve. Only Kabbalah gives an answer to this problem. However, until people don’t become completely disappointed, they won’t hear us out.  We must be ready to present them with the Kabbalistic wisdom in a way they can understand. It should become clear that only we have the answer, and the answer is only to reach the infinite, eternal, perfect existence, which is not concentrated in our body, but among us, in the sense of our own “I.”

My body, the animal substance, dies after some time; however, the human being in me is forever. So I need to separate the “I” from what I now consider myself, pull it out, isolate it from my body, and start raising, nurturing, and shaping it. This is the human being in me that I must realize.

Question: If a person is on this path, will his depression fade?

Answer: Yes, but other problems will certainly start to appear because a person has to develop himself. However, they all will end up breaking away from their animal. After rising above the body, the person will remain there for eternity and in perfection. The wisdom of Kabbalah provides a real answer that is realized by ourselves in our world and inside us. Here we do not depend on anyone and no one can restrict us! This is our freewill. To realize this we don’t need any special tools; everything is in our hands.
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From KabTV’s “Short Stories” 10/23/14

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Transitioning To An Altruistic World Order

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How do you see the transition to an altruistic new world order?

Answer: On its own, the world cannot smoothly reach a state in which it would begin to reduce the production of commodities, consumption, and services to reasonable limits, for then the economy would simply die. People would not know what to do and they would rebel.

So, capitalism will need to artificially maintain the employment of people and find something to keep them busy with. In spite of it all, this would be a big problem. There would be rebellions, demonstrations, civil wars, and even world wars, until humanity came to the decision that it must be educated anew to reach a new world order in which we would manufacture only what is necessary, and people who are freed from work would be involved in integral education. Or, it is possible to say it this way: All the rest will be involved with spiritual work according to the general rule, “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”

The wisdom of Kabbalah recommends not waiting until suffering forces a person to think and reach an understanding that he needs a new education and to do something about himself. The wisdom of Kabbalah offers a scientific way to reach this state now, meaning to understand that the future of humanity is still only in the moderate, rational consumption of everything that a person needs for a normal existence.

All the rest of his resources and possibilities must be directed toward creating a single society in which the Creator will be revealed because, from the start, he exists in this world only for this purpose.

We must be able to show and tell everyone that there is no other way and this is what the wisdom of Kabbalah offers. We are now faced with a choice of which way: in the natural way, in the way of in its time, which is the way of terrible blows until we become smarter, or to go in the right and intelligent way, consciously, which is what the wisdom of Kabbalah offers. With this, we re-educate ourselves not by force but by beginning to change our world, meaning by gradually reducing its consumption and production accordingly and by arranging for equal distribution to everyone accordingly, and so on.

There is no smooth, egoistic way toward this state since the egoistic way is directed toward excessive manufacturing. In this manner, it contradicts our call to provide rational quantities of food, products, and services.
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