No Compromise

 It's a dog-eat-dog world.

What baffles me so much about any school of thought, politically speaking, is this fear that any compromise whatsoever will result in a runaway avalanche effect at full steam in the other direction. If you compromise on gun rights in favor of gun control, somehow that automatically means that every single gun you own will be immediately confiscated. If you compromise on fossil fuels in favor of green energy, somehow that automatically means that you are in favor of shutting down the oil industry entirely and cut out thousands of jobs. And if you compromise on cracking down on crime in favor of reducing police brutality, somehow that automatically means that you are in favor of hamstringing our police forces and allowing criminals to walk freely on our streets.

As I'm writing this, it occurs to me that this is a mindset that is naturally borne from our American capitalist mentality, the idea that all in life is a competition, and everything to be gained exists within a zero-sum game. In such a high-risk/high-reward system such as modern business, every penny you fail to pinch gets pinched by someone else, and failure to be as diligent and downright ruthless in your methods inevitably results in your business going under. This type of mentality is EVERYWHERE in our country, from our religion to how we grade our students to how we play sports and games - "Stand firm in your beliefs, and give a hundred and ten percent," because anything less than that will mean that the other guy "beats you." So really, I shouldn't be surprised that some of the most successful practices in our country are lead by those least keen on compromise. They've spent their whole lives being spoon-fed this idea that any leeway you give on your ideas is ground that the "other guy" will take, and that once "they" have even a little wiggle room, they will snatch your victory out from under you.

Except there is no victory for any side here. No one will never have enough money or enough energy or enough "freedom" to ever truly "win" anything. Even the filthy rich know this - why do you think they keep trying to get richer? They know that, at any moment, it could all get taken away from them by "the other guy," even if it's a million to one chance. So they keep playing the game as if any step they take that doesn't further their own ends could potentially ruin their entire way of life. Because in the business world, the only thing that truly matters is the bottom line.

This is not a way of life that has an ending. There is no finish line you can cross in life except in death. I don't believe there is any such thing in this world as true good or true evil - all in life is based on perspective. The same decision can appear to be unquestionably right or wrong depending on your perspective. What this means, however, is that when it comes down to it, no idea is ever inherently special. The only thing - the ONLY thing - that makes YOUR values and YOUR ideas and YOUR way of life worth anything at all is that they are YOURS.

You can make any argument you want in favor of your own ideas. Anyone can. And if you're good enough with words, you can convince a whole lot of people that you're right. But ultimately, no one is ever more "right" than anyone else. But we've all been trained to think that we are. I wish I had an answer to this problem, but I honestly don't know how this can possibly change. Even if ninety-nine percent of the country decide to compromise, whether it's in religion, social class, school, guns, energy or crime, the one percent who don't will end up gaining that much more influence, and momentarily be that much more "right." And everyone who's played the game long enough knows this, so in the end, no one ever compromises.

All I can say is that until someone in charge is willing to compromise, we're going to KEEP seeing school shootings, we're going to KEEP seeing the divide in social class, we're going to KEEP seeing the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, we're going to KEEP seeing established energy companies keep progressive companies down, we're going to KEEP seeing religious bigotry trying to undermine anything that challenges its dogma, and we're going to KEEP seeing unlawful police brutality going undeterred. The majority of those in charge of the status quo are convinced that there is no room for compromise, that any leeway they give ultimately undermines their cause, and will ultimately bankrupt them.

Not all in life is business, but this country sure treats it that way.

A Deceptive Statistic

This is a great example of a selective statistic. First of all, it doesn't specify a time-frame. Is this number of deaths in a year? Is it number of deaths specifically in 2012? This could be over any given time period. But moving past that, this statistic is also presumably limited to this particular kind of rifle, because I can say with certainty that the number of deaths from guns *in general* in the year 2012 is well into the thousands.

But wait, you say, the whole point of the argument is to illustrate how little this particular weapon contributes to overall deaths in a bid to reduce the vitriol aimed at this particular weapon. Well, sure, but you're comparing it to *all* murders committed by these other three things. Were there 1,589 deaths by kitchen knife alone, or does that statistics extend to pocket knives? Were those 518 deaths solely caused by ball-peen hammers, or does that include sledgehammers? I'm guessing the open-hand includes being beaten to death as well as strangulation, but the illustrations leave the original creator of this image a gross degree of leeway. If you're comparing the deaths of one, individual type of rifle, then it's only fair to compare those to something just as arbitrary.

These kinds of deceptive illustrations are ridiculously manipulative, and they preach the kind of message that is so easy for proponents of responsible gun ownership to pounce on. In the year 2013, there have been a little over 9,000 gun deaths in the United States. *That* is a statistic. And when the statistics predominantly lean in the favor of your opponents, it is very tempting to rely on fallacious material like this as ammunition to lob against those opponents under the illusion of being unfairly treated. But that statistic does not concern me here (although it ought to concern you). What concerns me is that there are very real points to be made here, and I know plenty of good, responsible gun owners who have reasonable arguments to make in favor of reasonable gun laws. *This* is not one of them, and touting an illustration like this to try to silence the real truth out there is akin to putting your hands over your ears and saying "I can't hear you" at the top of your lungs. It's insulting to yourself, to your peers, to proponents of gun control, and to those 9,000 gun victims in 2013. Instead of making up statistics, why don't we have a real conversation where we can all at least agree on where we stand? To do otherwise is to let another year go by with another 9,000 victims that could be avoided *without* losing the right to your legal firearms.

Evangelion, and why Hideaki Anno hates you

I did not write this. This is a transcript of a copy-pasta of a series of Anonymous 4chan (or 4chan like) image-board comments that, when spun together, weave (in my opinion) a brilliant expose on the background of the Neon Genesis Evangelion anime. As I've illustrated before, Evangelion has played an important role in my life, and this was such a well written dissertation that I did not want it to be lost in obscurity. So I transcribed it, with the aid of an online OCR service, from this image, making only minor grammatical corrections and editing emphasized format for consistency.

If you would like to take credit for this transcript, or know the person who wrote it, please let me know.

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Real talk: if you never actually watched Neon Genesis Evangelion all the way through, everything you know about it is wrong. Although for that matter, even the people who watched it all the way through are wrong about it. Let's talk about the creator: Hideaki Anno, and why he's happiest when you are angry. If you like Eva, Hideaki Anno hates you. That's just how it is. If you can't wrap your mind around this basic truth you are missing out on a lot of hysterical black irony.

It's hard to explain to people who haven't grown up with anime in the 90's (or at least, don't make the effort to go back and watch a lot of older anime) just how revolutionary Evangelion was to the industry. There was an expectation - even from people within the studio - that it would be cancelled within the first ten episodes. They were given a hugely limited budget, which they famously used up before the finale episodes.

It was not only a psychological exploration of what it means to be depressed, but it was a blatant dress-down of mecha and harem anime - i.e. the shit the otaku cult fap to constantly. Psychological breakdowns and meta-commentary are so common in anime nowadays, people don't realize that it's a trend Eva more or less pioneered, along with a bunch of other things.

A large basis for Evangelion - of which Anno has openly owned - is kind of an intensely public therapy session. Anno was said to have a huge disenchantment with the otaku lifestyle, going so far as to say said lifestyle was akin to autism. He fell into a depression. That depression took form in Eva, and basically started tearing apart a lot of what was common at the time.

For example, Eva basically deconstructs mecha and harem archetypes by asking “If fully developed human beings that acted like this existed in real life, and were forced to pilot giant robots, how would this play out?” We're given a hypothetical scenario of how teenaged pilots would realistically react under the pressures of piloting a mecha at the stakes are SAVING THE WORLD. We're given common archetypes - the tsundere, the cool onee-san, the kuudere - and have the show go out of its way to show that they're not walking sex fantasies but actual three-dimensional women: human beings capable of living and operating without your penis to validate them. We're also given the pressures of society that is placed upon people with depression, giving them little sympathy and instead berating them for not sucking it up.

And then, you know, there was Kawou, who showed up at the end of the series for one episode and gave the otaku fan-base a huge case of gay panic when Shinji was kind of on board to ride his baloney pony. With all the harem options available, it was kind of a sardonic twist of the knife to have Shinji go with the dude that shows up out of nowhere instead. The promotional pictures of Kaworu and Shinji hanging all over each other in pin-ups similar to Asuka, Rei and Misato just kind of shove that in their faces all the more.

Hell, to show how much people still perceived Eva to be the passionate shonen romp mecha anime usually they thought it was at the time: Eva was originally aired on a children's time-slot. When people started to side-eye Anno about the show's descent into ugly cynicism, he more or less responded saying children should be subjected to how much life sucks as early as possible (the show was moved to a later and more adult time-slot, regardless, but this is still funny).

Basically, Anno was making a hugely sarcastic commentary to people that didn't actually pick up on sarcasm very well, and as we all know: it back-fired big time. It became a moe-bait titan.

Your thoughts on the TV ending aside, what followed was a vicious backlash. The otaku fan-base lashed out at Anno with multiple death threats (some of which were later featured in the End of Eva movie). They missed the point on a lot of characters, but Rei was probably the one Anno was most furious about, as by trying to break down how an emotionally-dependent, submissive fuck-doll would be REALLY CREEPY and NOT OKAY, he only had her end up being an iconic cultural wet dream.

So, Anno responds by creating the theatrical finale of the series, End of Evangelion, and it was just one giant “FUCK YOU” to the fan-base. The TV ending was a pretty positive, constructive resolution to Shinji's plight, but given the backlash, Anno was basically "OH, YOU WANT MORE EMOTIONAL TORTURE PORN? I WILL GIVE YOU THE EMOTIONAL TORTURE PORN," and he delivers. If you watched EoE without actually watching the series, a lot of that context can go over your head. THAT scene with Shinji in the hospital room with Asuka? That was Anno basically pointing a finger at the otaku fans through the fourth wall and going "THIS IS WHAT YOU'RE DOING, YOU'RE THIS FUCKED UP, YOU SICK FREAKS!" The irony is a large portion of the fandom DIDN'T GET IT and instead praised that scene to show Shinji was ‘maturing’ and ‘growing up.‘

Basically, End of Eva was one of the most beautifully animated middle-fingers ever to be conceived. Like, I have no doubt that a lot of the narrative resolutions in EoE were always planned, but I also suspect that EoE was made to be a lot angrier, and with a lot more spite, than was originally intended. Asuka's last line, the famous ‘I feel sick’ or ‘how disgusting’ (depending on how you want to translate her line), could be interpreted as directed to the fan-base.

And hell, in interviews alter the movie, he's also on record as saying he did End of Eva to ‘bring the fans back to reality’ and also compared fan commentary on his work to bathroom graffiti.

He really hates you.

And now the Rebuild movies, which seem to be a continuation more than a retelling. We're introduced to a new character: Mari, who doesn't seem to exist beyond providing panty shots and talking about how her breasts are too big, stealing the spotlight from Asuka, and selling a lot of figures. Anno was apparently on record as saying he put her in the movies to ‘destroy Eva.’ She's the moe-bait fantasy the otaku nerds clearly crave, and Anno is sarcastically giving it to them. And then 3.0 came out, which was a theatrical-length movie about Shinji's big gay awakening with Kaworu, among other more emotional torture porn trolling.

It's to the point where I'm kind of left delightfully pondering if the fourth Rebuild movie will have an obscenely positive resolution (along the lines of the TV series) or a spiteful miserable one (along the lines of the End of Eva movie). Knowing Anno's track-record, he'll go by whatever he thinks the fan-base will rage at the most, and it's a really hard call because they're both proven to give his fandom a collective aneurysm.

Evangelion is a franchise that keeps being worked on and continued seemingly out of pure spite. It's not even a secret. Anno is quoted everywhere as telling everyone that he hates his fans, that he wants to destroy his own franchise, that this is a thing that he is in fact doing…and he seems to get even more furious when they keep making him a success instead. It's really funny. All the more so is how tragic this irony is as he's clearly invested in telling the story he wants to tell as artfully and skillfully as he can: his own commentary on the rise and pitfalls of human nature and what it means to grow as a person.

It's the ultimate bad romance between a creator and his fan-base and it's tragic how many people miss out on how amazing this is.

So, here you go, it is explained. This is brought to by the collected conversations between me and Muun as we laugh at Anno's life. Enjoy.

P&S - Till the World Ends

Quick AMV I threw together after a couple hours in Adobe Premiere. Took the transformation scene from the anime "Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt" set it to part of "Till the World Ends" by Britney Spears.

"Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt" is a property of Madman Entertainment, Manga Entertainment, Funimation Entertainment and Studio Gainax. "Till the World Ends" is a property of its respective owner. Please support the official release.

Self Pity

I love Stephen Fry, and I generally find him to be particularly inspiring. I'd like to take a look at this quote though, and analyze what he's saying for a moment.

I always hear that self-pity does not get you anywhere. But every time I try to look at life a different way, I find myself at a loss for what to replace that self-pity with. I mean, what am I supposed to feel about myself INSTEAD of self pity? Am I supposed to imagine that I'm actually awesome? Replace self pity with self confidence? Sarcasm aside, I feel an enormous reluctance to believe any positive thing about myself simply out of fear of being mistaken. In my opinion, the only thing worse than feeling self pity is feeling self aggrandizing, particularly when it's unearned. I see so many people who just think they are the bee's knees, and honestly, I find myself disliking them even more than the self-pitying introverts I'm familiar with. As positive as a quality as self confidence is, to demonstrate it often makes me feel severely lacking in humility. And the last thing I would want to do is come off as someone so out of touch with anything that they don't even realize how lacking they are. That, to me, feels much more dangerous than self pity. I guess that's what it comes down to - self pity may be negative, but at least in doing so, I feel secure. Secure in the knowledge that I'm not over-estimating myself, not overstretching my limits, not biting off more than I can chew.

I know all the old adages - shoot for the moon, and even if you miss, you'll land amongst the stars. Or it's better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all. Or one must not walk too carefully in life only to arrive safely at death. But frankly, those maxims seem hollow and contrived. Easy to make such a claim if you've already made the journey. When you look back and have some success to bolster you, courage is easier to come by. But when you have more failure than success behind you, you begin to think that you haven't been cautious enough.


How would you advise that I overcome this particular mental roadblock, Mister Fry?

Pony Pony Yukai

Song: "Hare Hare Yukai" by Aya Hirano
Footage: Equestria Girls
Program Used: Adobe Premiere Pro CS5

Saw the musical number from Equestria Girls, and thought it would fit pretty well with the opening to Haruhi Suzumiya.

Just a little note about gun control

(Time of original posting: Tuesday, December 18, 2012 at 9:58am)

There are two sides to any issue. I know quite a few gun owners who have an immense respect and appreciation for gun safety. They take every precaution, they most certainly do not treat their guns as "toys," and go to great lengths to educate themselves on the subject. There are probably quite a few gun owners on a hair trigger who see their guns as their last and only resort in any given conflict or situation, but I do believe that the majority of gun owners are respectable citizens just like anybody else. A lot of gun owners probably hear about these school shootings and, between bouts of grief for the horrible tragedy, probably feel an intense hatred towards the shooter, as the shooter inevitably paints all gun owners as trigger-happy malcontents who are an inch away from blowing the head off the nearest innocent bystander. You could be the safest, most precautionary gun owner in the world, follow all the rules, and do everything right, and all it takes is one trigger happy lunatic for the people around you to see you as an unstable, gun-toting maniac.

I can honestly appreciate that.

That said, it is easier to get a gun license in this country than it is to get a driver's license. It is easier to buy a gun than it is to buy a pet. You can walk into a Wal-Mart and pick up parts and ammo for any number of weapons, from concealable handguns to high caliber rifles. Many gun owners are not generally fans of regulation, but in case it wasn't abundantly clear, we regulate just about everything in this country. We regulate alcohol, we regulate prescription drugs, we regulate tobacco, we regulate vehicles, we regulate movies, TV shows and video games by age group, and yes, we regulate guns.

Anything that is potentially harmful, anything that you wouldn't want a child to pick up and play with, anything that could hurt or kill someone if handled incorrectly, is and should be regulated. It's not tyrannical to try to keep these things out of the hands of someone who doesn't know how to or has no intention to handle it correctly. I'm not saying gun owners are unintelligent - quite the opposite, many of my friends and family own guns, and they are very smart about the way that they handle them. We're not asking that gun owners give up their right to bear arms, we're just asking that they be smart about it. We know that you know how to handle your weapon. We're just asking that you go through the right channels to make sure that it's the intelligent gun owner like you who gets the gun, and not the psychopath who decides to shoot up a school.

Halo Fan Fiction

More shameless plugs for the last few fics I've made. Absolutely loved Halo 4, and I've been on a Halo fan fiction kick ever since I finished it.

Daybreak's Bell » reviews
Post Halo 4 - The UNSC Infinity has found Installation 01. As the Master Chief explores its ruins, he comes across a Forerunner artifact that lets him commune with the Librarian. What secrets lie within these ancient ruins? What plans does the Librarian have in store for the Chief? And who is this mysterious new Promethean who comes to his aid? Chief x Cortana

Halo - Rated: T - English - Drama/Adventure - Chapters: 6 - Words: 40,052 - Reviews: 163 - Updated: 3-16-13 - Published: 11-11-12 - Cortana & Master Chief/John-117

When The Dawn Breaks reviews

Post Halo 4 - Sometimes, war takes things from us that we're not prepared to part with. What happens when John is forced to accept that a part of himself is now gone? And how will he react when they try to replace her with someone else? Implied Chief x Cortana. One-Shot for now, may continue if reviewed enough.

Halo - Rated: T - English - Drama/Hurt/Comfort - Chapters: 1 - Words: 2,918 - Reviews: 44 - Published: 11-7-12 - Master Chief/John-117 & Cortana - Complete



  

When You Need Me » reviews

"Wake me…when you need me." That was what he had told her. Seven months, eighteen days, eleven hours, thirty-seven minutes, and twenty-two seconds ago. Chief x Cortana, Post Halo 3.

Halo - Rated: K+ - English - Drama - Chapters: 5 - Words: 23,576 - Reviews: 80 - Updated: 8-13-12 - Published: 6-21-08 - Master Chief/John-117 & Cortana  - Complete

The Internet vs. Real Life

Watch the above video before reading.

Okay, have you watched it yet? Good.

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Ok, yeah I get the message. I just don't think it applies to me.

The world he's talking about is the one's that's been trying to shove itself in my face from day one. I never remember enjoying life as much as this guy seems to, even before the internet, cell phones and social media. Honestly, I feel like I've been waiting for the internet my whole life. I much prefer my internet life to my real one. The internet is what really opened my eyes to the world. Without it, the world would be unbearable to me. I look at the life this guy chooses to live, and I get flashbacks to the isolation and tedium of my life before I discovered the internet. I look at the life this guy desires, and I can honestly say that it looks utterly boring, despite all the fun that he seems to be having. And I'm happy for him - I'm glad he's found something. But that life is not for me. Maybe if I had the internet, a cell phone, and social media earlier in life, I would feel differently. But I was never allowed into the life I'm currently living until the latter years of high school, and by then, it was sick of the real world. So just as a kid who turns 21 sees alcohol as the forbidden fruit, to me, the internet, tv and video games were the forbidden fruit for most of my childhood. And these things will forever carry that stigma for me. Nothing about this video has convinced me otherwise.

I made a thing

I set the Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex opening theme song "Inner Universe" by Origa to the opening animation for the anime "RahXephon." Synced up surprisingly well.

Life, the Church, and Everything

Last week, I heard a minister say that "God loves life." And given how strongly the church has argued against abortion, contraception and gay marriage, this statement appears largely true. This week, a senator even made the statement to the effect that every incidence of pregnancy, even those that come from rape and incest, is a gift from God. Everything the church does seems to promote the idea that everything you do throughout your life should be helping you to go out and make more life - and as much of it as you possibly can. The feeling has even pervaded outside the church, from people asking men and women when they're going to settle down and start a family, to families that have boasted 10-12 children. Even in the realm of science, the inarguable purpose of our evolution seems to be to reproduce. In the old days, it wasn't uncommon for a man to remarry 3-5 times, each wife giving that man as many children as she can, from the year she hits puberty to the year she dies. And in the old days, when famine, disease, poverty, war and all manner of ills threatened to wipe out entire civilizations at every turn, this made absolutely perfect sense.

This year, the Earth's population has hit 7 billion. I assume you can guess where I'm going with this. Human beings have been giving birth for millenia. And given how many humans there are, we've obviously become remarkably good at it. Not just us humans, but every animal, plant and microbial life form today is here because of the miracle of birth. But while I'm not arguing at just how chemically and genetically improbable and amazing that birth can even happen at all, I do think it's rather an overstatement to call birth a "miracle" given how regularly it occurs, and as many teenagers can attest to, how easy and unexpectedly it can happen. In fact, with childbirth these days so easy and prevalent, and with the only thing plummeting faster than death rates being the resources needed to sustain those not dying, to put childbirth on such a pedestal as to call it a "miracle" is not only shortsighted but foolhardy. The need to go forth and multiply as it stands now, more than being non-applicable, is actually counter-productive to the overall health of the planet we live on. I know the belief of the church is that man has inherited the Earth to do with as he pleases, but make no mistake, the Earth will not support us for much longer if we keep devouring resources like it's going out of fashion.

But that's not even the main reason I'm writing this. Rather, I'm arguing that since the need to constantly, constantly reproduce no longer applies, at least for the time being, then it the notion of bearing children no longer takes precedent over human happiness. A person can afford to not be life-giving in every major decision they make about their lives. It doesn't always, always have to be about making babies all the time. We can actually do things with our baby-making body parts that don't result in a baby. And guess what? The human race won't die off as a result!

The human race as a species will keep on kicking if you decide not to have children in your lifetime. It will also continue onward if you decide you want to have safe sex. Other couples will in fact continue to have children if you should decide you're not ready and want to have an abortion. And the world will most certainly keep spinning if two people of the same sex decide to get married. And by the way, how is a gay couple getting married any different than an infertile couple getting married, in terms of life-giving relationships? And while we're pondering that puzzler, consider that if gay couples ever decide to adopt (and we manage to grow up and stop presuming that gay couples are unfit parents), how much of a great service they would be doing the world by providing a loving home to an otherwise forsaken child.

If you do want children, and can safely do so, by all means, have children. But you should, by no means, be required to do so by your government or your faith! In fact, no matter what your belief, you should always make the decision to have children with great prudence, because in case no one told you, a child is an enormous responsibility. Children come at great pains to the mother, at a great financial burden to both parents, and if the parents aren't healthy enough, fit or willing to be good parents, that child runs the enormous risk of growing up suffering and doomed to go down a troubled and unfortunate path. There are obviously exceptions to this, but if you want to gamble your life, your spouse's life, or the life of your child on those odds, then that's all on your head when you make that decision. We are human beings! We may not have all the answers, but we're smart enough to look to the future and realize that if a child is born into a particular situation, or of a mother who is too young, financially insecure, or worse, the victim of rape, that either the child, mother or both will not survive, or worse, be doomed to a life of misery and hardship, that in situations like these, we have the power and responsibility to change it.

Because - and please follow me here - there are worse things in this world than not having a baby!

No, we shouldn't all be mandated to suffer or die just to bring yet another life into being under any circumstance whatsoever. Not everything is about making babies! There are worse things in this world than not having a baby! Foster homes and shelters are filled to the brim with homeless children, and those who don't find homes usually end up in our prisons. And our prisons have become so full that it's become profitable to run them like a business! There are worse things in this world than not having a baby! Food, jobs, land, fuel and many, many other finite resources are already tapering out! If we bring many more children into this world, we're only putting more strain on our already dwindling resources. If we strain them too much more, there will be nothing left for the children we are so eagerly squirting out. And let's be clear: I am by no means denouncing childbirth entirely. If you are healthy, secure and ready to be a parent, then by all means, reproduce as much as you like! But are under no obligation to do so! There are worse things in this world than not having a baby!

The world doesn't need another baby right now! The only reason you should be having children is because you want to! And even if you do, you have options. Adopt! There are thousands, millions of children already born who need a home! Get married to the person you love regardless of whether your union can produce children! And if you don't want children at all, that's fine too! Have safe sex! Enjoy your life, regardless of whether you're having kids or not! And if you're not ready for a child and an accident does happen, you are not obligated to have that child if you have reason to believe it will ruin your life!

Because, say it with me now: There are worse things in this world than not having a baby!

Here's what confuses me: if God loves life, why would he require such terrible strains in order to produce it, when we could easily minimize those strains while maintaining a good balance of life in equitable conditions? Especially since the whole point of life, after creating more of it, is to die and go to the afterlife? To me, when there is not only such little need for prolific propagation of life in this age, but actual negative consequences to it, the argument to continue to propagate life sounds likes it's coming from institutions who stands to profit from such an overabundance of life.

A prison warden who cares only for lining his pockets for keeping more and more inmates; a business owner who has to pay his workers less and less because with all the competition for the jobs he's offering there will always be someone willing to work for less; political leaders who earn their votes from an uninformed electorate because our school systems can't afford to keep up with our surplus of children; our government who continue to throw more and more soldiers into war as cannon fodder; and yes, even a church whose uninformed masses continue to add more and more falsely acclaimed validity to an already overblown institution. Call me a conspiracy theorist, but this level of atrocity still seems much more likely than a God who just loves life so much that he wants us to go to every imaginable length - from repeated painful, dangerous and possibly lethal childbirths, and the absolute inhibition of either enjoying sex for its own sake or for spending your life with your loved one if they happen to have the same parts as you - to have children just so they can go on and go through the same process, and all of whom only ever achieve their actual happiness in an afterlife that nobody can describe.

Which seems more likely to you?

A New Chapter - A Year in Retrospect

So it's been a while, a long while, since I updated this blog. Mostly because I know nobody reads it, but it might help to jot some thoughts down for now. It simulates having actual, meaningful conversation, instead of just shooting the breeze like I do with most of the people I speak to. And this isn't to say the people in my life don't invite conversation, it's just me being reclusive and not believing anyone would truly understand.

As of now, I've been working at Pitt for about a year. The past year has seen some breathtaking changes for me. Within a year, I've gone from having practically no money in the bank and relying on my parents for food, clothing and shelter, to earning an annual salary with money in savings. Within a year, I've moved into my own apartment, started buying my own food, cooking for myself, cleaning for myself, and having to worry about a dozen things having to do with keeping my life together. And within a year, I've started going to the gym on a regular basis, managed to drop ten pounds, and even start running. Today, I ran a mile in seven and a half minutes.

It's come at a cost though. I don't know if it's just the summer lull, or the fact that I'm not in school anymore, but I feel like I don't get to do much with my friends anymore. I still see people - Thursday nights, I see some friends from Pitt for movie night, Friday's (usually), a group of friends from CCAC for D&D or something social, and starting next month, every other Saturday will see me gaming with another group from CCAC. And Sunday, for the last year and a half, I've been gaming with another group from Pitt. So it would seem that I'm getting my share of social activity in.

Yet still...I don't know. It doesn't feel like it's enough. Maybe it's because school's not in session, and anime club isn't going on - which would add another night to that list. Maybe it's because two or three of those aforementioned meetups have been skipped for the past week or more - either by me or by DM ruling. Maybe - and this is something that might really become an issue later - it's because I don't have anything in common with my coworkers. Everyone in my office is either married with kids, or at the equivalent age. But I don't even seem to have anything in common with the student workers either, who are closer to my age group. One is even a film studies major. But she's quiet as a mouse, and every time I approach her, I get the feeling that she's either intimidated by me, or creeped out.

It doesn't help that I'm hyper sensitized to just this reaction from people. Ever since I started going to Falk at age 5, and I was identified with the moniker of "booger-breath," people have generally avoided me. I don't know if it's out of shyness, their own self-consciousness, but every time it happens, I can't help but feel that I repulse them somehow. Maybe I didn't shower well enough that morning, maybe I didn't put on enough deodorant. Maybe my clothes don't fit me right, and they make me look like a fat slob. Maybe I am a fat slob - God knows dieting and exercise haven't changed that. With a barrel chest atop ballet dancer legs, I'm about as awkward and unbalanced and gangly as one of those creepers you see on the bus. Every time I look in the mirror, all I can see is a creeper. Nothing I do seems to change that, and everyone around me seems to, even if unconsciously, reinforce that belief whether it's true or not. I'm not even saying that I believe it is true - but it would sure help my self confidence level if people acted like they genuinely wanted to be around me.

This got off track real fast, but really, I have nothing positive left to say. Maybe I need to see a therapist. All I can say is, I wish I wasn't so sensitive. I wish I didn't care. I wish I could just let it roll off my shoulders, I'd be so much happier of a person. But I can't. I get so jealous seeing people being open and honest with each other, and seem genuinely happy to be around each other. I get so jealous when someone can speak their mind, and people will actually listen to them. I get so jealous when I see people who get noticed at all! If I'm ever noticed, it's usually so that I can be avoided. Failing that, I don't get noticed at all, or worse, just simply ignored.

I wish it didn't bother me. I wish I didn't care. But I do. I feel so dis-empowered to do anything about this. I feel like it's me against the world. And the world is kicking my ass.

Amazing Video

Homophobia, Sexism and Gender Roles

I had another sociological thought. I don't know whether or not this thought is unique, old news, or completely baseless, but here it is.

Homophobia isn't just homophobia. What homophobia also implies is a rejection of the shifting gender roles that non-heterosexuality represents. Or, to put it more crudely, if you're a homophobe, you're also probably a sexist.

Think of it this way - what do you think of when you hear the expression "boys will be boys?" Ladies, how many of you would actually have a good time at a golf course, a sports bar or a gentleman's club? Guys, do you ever wonder why girls always seem to go to the bathroom in packs? There are certain expectations that come with being a boy or a girl, at least in the western world, and they seem largely inescapable to a lot of people, and more importantly, have been the norm for the better part of a generation.

To include homosexuals in the heterosexual majority's definition of gender roles would be to confuse decades  of sexual identity. To the majority, men were people who watched football, drank beer, lit their farts on fire, and were plagued with the uncontrollable desire to get into womens' pants. To the majority, women were people who were wanted to dress nicely, keep a domestic household, were naturally nurturing and caring, and all wanted a decent man to settle down with. If you find these stereotypes insulting, that's good - so do I.

The problem for people that grew up steeped in these gender roles is that, for the longest time, homosexuality was considered an oddity, a fluke in the system, a life-choice, something that wasn't accepted, and generally treated like a defect - anything except as part of the norm. When the 70's hit, however, and the civil rights movement made the issue more widely known, and over the years, equal rights' activists began petitioning for equal treatment of gays, the heterosexual majority is faced with the possibility of  these "oddities" suddenly becoming part of the norm. Suddenly, the definitions of "man" and "woman" has to be slightly, but oh so unacceptably altered to accommodate men who weren't interested in women and women who weren't interested in men. So much of our gender roles revolved around the things we did to attract mates, that to change that, even just to accommodate different views, turns the entire world upside for people who grew up knowing only heterosexual gender roles.

And here's where the sexism comes in. For the longest time, particularly in the workplace and the professional world, the rules, the styles and the norms have been dictated by men, and generally represented masculine sensibilities. When women attempt to move up in the workplace, it usually has to be according to men's rules. She'll often wear a suit, and most of the time, and coworkers she will be speaking to and negotiating will be men, introducing the possibility of sexual harassment and abuse. She earns less money on average, and will hold fewer roles of authority as men, not to mention maternity leave. And this is all because the rules of game, as it were, have been created and dictated by men to create an environment suitable for men to thrive and succeed, without any regard for the feminine viewpoint.

And this will probably stay largely unchanged, even if the number of working men and women in the professional western world were completely equal, because the people in charge want it this way. The system is run by men who follow rules set by men to appeal to masculine sensibilities. If there were more women in power, these rules and norms would change, even if only slightly, and allow for a blend of rules and norms that appeal to both masculine and feminine sensibilities. But this won't happen, at least for a while, because women are at a distinct disadvantage having spent most of history in the back seat.

But what if the definition of masculinity itself were to change? What if the world of men were to suddenly shift to accommodate men who weren't really all that interested in which sports team won last week, or who the latest girl is on the cover of Maxim magazine? Homosexuality threatens the male power in places like the workplace because it allows non-masculine values to pervade into the very men the system is designed to empower. In the mind of the male majority, women are rather easy to segregate. This is not as true for homosexual men.

And therein lies the issue: to the heterosexual majority, homosexuality mixes up gender roles. Having spent an entire lifetime keeping men and women separate in their minds, and having to suddenly deal with what amounts to girly men and butch women. This is not to say that these stereotypes are the reality, but it makes little difference in the mind of the heterosexual majority. The easiest coping mechanism is, of course, to reject homosexuality, and anything else that doesn't fit into their heterosexual gender roles. A generation of men in the office don't want to have to deal with the fact that their male co-worker may have more in common with Suzy down the hall then with them. And the unfortunate women of that generation, who were cowed by their parents and teachers into their narrow gender roles, are presented with a troubling conundrum: either the roles pushed upon them were meaningless, outdated, and sexist, making their entire life's struggle seem unnecessary...or homosexuality is just a fluke and their gender roles are exactly what they thought they were. It's almost always easier to reject change than to reject your own reality, and that's not even getting into the religious aspect.

Homophobia is sexism taken to its logical conclusion. Sexist men don't want to tolerate women stepping into their world, so naturally, they wouldn't want to tolerate men who (in their minds) act like women stepping into their world either. Being as offended as they are by femininity in women, is it really so hard to believe that a chauvinist would feel the same way towards femininity in men?

And this needs to change. Is a world ruled by people who only acknowledge a part of its people as people really a good world for all people? More to the point, does our view of ourselves, as men and women, really change all that much if we include gays and lesbians and everything in between?

Does "masculine" necessarily have to be synonymous for "likes women?" Does feminine also have to mean "likes men?" And more importantly, do we want these terms to mean these things? These terms hold only as much meaning as we allow them to have. With as many people as there are, even just in the western world, it's impossible to escape the hold of labels. Can we at least agree on what these labels mean? Because we've all been labeled, and whether you realize it or not, you use labels constantly. And if you're using labels knowingly, use them wisely. Doing so is essentially drawing a line in the sand between people you consider "normal," and people you consider "abnormal," and thus, "sub-human." And if you're going to put entire gender roles in the latter category, all you're really doing is labeling yourself as a "bigot."

Creativity

I define creativity as more than just a love for a particular craft. What I feel isn't the longing to write for the sake of writing. For me, the result is what counts. When I feel creative, what I feel is that there is something lacking in the world. There is something, something very specific, that need to exist. And it doesn't exist yet, so I need to create it. By any means necessary. Writing just happens to be how I do it.

A Betrayal of Identity

I don't usually talk about my personal shit in these notes, but there's something that's been bothering me since before even becoming what the world classifies as an "adult."

So, when I was 20, I dropped out of college. I had stopped going to classes, and basically spent my days locked inside the hermitage that was my dorm room. I wasted time online, I ate junk food, I slept whenever the hell I wanted, I didn't excercise at all, and basically didn't leave my room except to eat and to occasionally socialize. And while even then I recognized that being an overweight, lethargic, unproductive, class-flunking drain on my parents and society was a bad thing, I couldn't stop myself. I couldn't change my behavior, because at long last, I was finally doing whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted, with no immediate consequences. And I didn't even think it was all that bad, because at least I wasn't hurting anyone or getting drunk or stoned. All I really did was sleep. Even as I stopped going out to see my friends, even as I started having nightmares that started to blend in with my reality, I clung to that lifestyle of hedonism and parasitism.

When finally the ball dropped, I was brought home feeling like a failure. While both my parents were above and beyond college graduates and both my younger siblings were making better grades in high school than I ever did, in that moment, I was the loser of the family. Whatever spark drove people to better themselves, to pursue something to the point where they could work themselves past their limit, I didn't have it. I had no motivation. I maintain that I still don't, and that I only keep trying to impress my family, my friends, and all the people that matter to me. There is nothing, not a pursuit, not an art, not an ideal, not a single thing I have or know of that can drive me to the point the world expects me to be moving at.

Four years have passed since then. I'm a college graduate, I have a relatively steady job, I excerise twice a week, I have a regular social life, and there is not a single day of the week that I'm not doing something. And that makes me lucky - I'm finally fitting in, I'm finally doing something, I'm finally just about the way I'm supposed to be.

Only I'm not.

I'm so far away from what I feel like I'm "supposed to be," that I don't even know who I am anymore. I'm being productive, I'm doing things right, I'm excercising, I'm taking responsibility, I'm working, I'm out of my bed every morning with something to do that day.

And that's not who I am. That's not who I've ever been. That's not who I want to be. Everyone I know would ask why I wouldn't want to be in the position that I'm in. I'm three months out of college, and I already have a steady job. I'm doing things exactly right, and I'm incredibly lucky to have managed to get here. Why wouldn't I want to be me? What's there to complain about?

If this is the way I'm supposed to be, if this is what life is supposed to be like, why do I feel more like a conformist than a success story? Why is 'the way my life's supposed to be' so far removed from the 'me' that I see in the mirror? I would give anything to go back to that life of slacking off and doing nothing in my dorm. This is a person who gets up before noon, who works out, who keeps himself active. This isn't me! All I want to do is NOTHING! Why isn't that possible? Why isn't it possible to even function in this world without doing the exact OPPOSITE of the most primal urge in my body?

I've done it, haven't I? I've got everything a well-rounded, functioning individual should have. This is supposed to be what everyone should aspire to be. This is supposed to be a good life. Why is it so hard for me to enjoy it? Why would I want to give all this up to go back to living like a mollusk in a cave? That's not supposed to be what I want...so why is it? What makes me so different from everyone else that makes me crave doing nothing so much? Doing nothing is CLEARLY not a virtue...I have six years of experience to prove that much. But why am I someone who wants nothing more than to just...exist, and do nothing else? Why do I find the life of a bacterium preferable to the awesome one I have? I have everything a man should want - wonderful friends, wonderful family, and a future ahead of me.

Isn't this supposed to be enough?

Homosexuality and Sexual Deviance Within Our Society

Time of Original Posting: Tuesday, April 19th, 2011 at 2:26am

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I've been meaning to pen these thoughts down for a while. Had a discussion with someone about this tonight, and it got me thinking about a line of thought that I've had for years: society's treatment of people of different sexualities - gays, lesbians, transexuals, and everything in between - is comparable to its treatment of people with fetishes - BDSM and stuff like that - namely, that they'll tolerate it as long as it doesn't come up in polite conversation. The NIMBY rule is the word. As long as it's kept on the down low, no one will make a fuss about what you do with your private life. Many people have already taken advantage of this fact. The most polite, refined and conservative people in the world might just have some of the most perverse or scandalous fantasies that come to life behind closed doors, and get away with it because of that key point: "behind closed doors."

When you break it down, sexuality fits evenly within the broad range of fetishes and kinks of the human sphere. There are things that get us off, and things that don't. Whether that be whips and chains, hot wax, or someone from the same sex, it all falls into the category of "things that turn us on." Some are more conservative, some are more extreme, some are not allowed by law (underage partners and rape, to name a few), but no matter what you're into, you will be accepted by society as long as nobody finds out about it. Out of sight, out of mind. There are some things the world at large just doesn't want to know about.

And therein lies the problem. Sexuality lies so predominantly in a person's identity, that to keep it behind closed doors would seem like a denial of one's true self. Every time someone acts flamboyant or butch or in any other way openly displays their sexual preferences, they are keeping true to their identity by refusing to keep their interests out of public view. But there are a number of gays, lesbians and transsexuals, just as there are straight people with embarrassing or shameful fetishes (even some illegal ones), that fit into society by keeping their desires under wraps.

When people reveal these fetishes and kinks and sexualities, that's when they stand out. It is our ability to control our urges and not let them dominate our lifestyle that allows us to fit in. By refusing to conform, gays and lesbians stay true to themsevles to be sure, but they also expose themselves to the scorn of the unforgiving majority. This is not to accuse or antagonize, but merely point out that by keeping such desires a secret, people are able to fit in and be accepted. It's noble to be yourself in the face of oppression, but consider this - the inability to control ones desires is the sole reason laws exist.

The reason we lock up rapists and child molesters is because we have agreed, as a society, that the people who desire to commit these acts and cannot (or choose not to) control these impulses are too dangerous and/or not allowed within our society. These criminals might also make the argument that they are simply "being true to themselves" but the act is so heinous that their arguments fall on deaf ears.

Homosexuality and bisexuality is not forbidden by law, at least in some states (as far as I know - I'm not counting marriage, simply the sexual act itself, but I could be wrong. Feel free to correct me if I am). But that does not change the fact that it is the minority among the sexual preferences of the masses. As far as hollywood movies and the MPAA ratings are concerned, heterosexual pairings in missionary and other vanilla positions are the norm, and anything that strays from that (homosexuality, deviant sexual positions, and anything kinky in the slightest) gets an NC-17 rating - and therefore, only viewable by people who actively seek it out, i.e., the minority.

If you have a fetish - or a sexuality - that deviates from this norm, unless society changes in your lifetime (which is a rare but not unheard of occurence), you're going to be subjected to these pressures for the rest of your life. The choice remains - keep it a secret and be accepted, but feel that you're not being true to yourself, or expose your desires to the public and hope that by doing so, others might follow suit, and try to avoid the slings and arrows of the misunderstanding and judgemental masses.

This is probably not news to you if this is the case, but you should also know this - you are not alone. Even amongst the hetereosexual community, there are those with various kinks and fetishes, some of which would be shameful and embarrasing and completely upset their social life if it ever came to light, who must face the same choice. Their fetish or kink may not be so thouroughly rooted to their identity as yours, but then again, maybe it is. There are entire communities that organize around certain fetishes for those that know where to look, as I'm sure there are amongst homosexuals. These communities evolve, usually under the radar, but as a place where people can be open about their deviant kink or preference.

You are not the only ones who must sometimes pretend to be something you're not, pretend to find something appealing, when what you really want is on another buffet table altogether, and know that if anyone at the table knew this, you'd be shunned. I hope you can take comfort in knowing that there are those, even amongst the heterosexual community, who understand and share in your predicament.

To summarize, we all have desires. Those desires stretch the full range of availability, from what society considers "normal" to what it considers "deviant," which can include fetishes, homosexuality, and perverse felonies. But the most important thing to take away from this note is this: what makes us "normal" are not these desires we feel, but our ability to contain them.

We all have desires, many of them not even sexual. The desire for food, power, and money, to name a few. Those who cannot control these desires, to the point where they steal or harm others to satisfy them, are punished for it. We have been raised all our lives to control our desires, no matter what their nature is, for the sake of fitting into society, because if you don't fit in, the way tthe law sees it, you cannot contribute and help society grow. Our code of laws exist to keep these desires in check. How we fit into society is based soley around how we manage all of our desires.

You can be open with yourself if you wish, but there is no shame in keeping your desires a secret, especially if they are embarrasing, scandalous, or especially felonous. For this latter group, the adviseable method is, of course, to keep your desires a secret and never practice them, even behind closed doors. There have been those who have absconded to third world countries that won't penalize you for commiting them, and we've all seen the results of their failed attempt to do so discretely. Our newspapers are full of stories that are testament to what happens when something like that gets out.

But for the rest of us, simply meeting the right person, getting to know them, confiding in them, trusting them with your kinks or sexual preferences, discovering against hope that they either share your desire, or are willing to accommodate it, and finally being able to enjoy what you love doing the most behind closed doors in a consensual and harmless manner, in my opinion, is the most logical and livable approach to dealing with a devious desire. You can still keep your job, your friends, your life, and still be able to escape into your fantasy world when no one else is around - essentially, having your cake and eating it too.

Of course, it would be nice if the world were an open and accepting place, where everyone could express themselves freely, but the sad truth is, it isn't. It may never be. It won't change until enough people expose themselves until it can compete with the majority. But those who do will suffer the consequences. Those that make this sacrifice in the hope of bettering the world for those in their community have my respect and support, but if what you desire is to simply be at peace with the world and your desires, the above method is surely the best approach.

Orson Scott Card's Theory of Genetic Destiny

Time of Original Posting: Wednesday, January 12th, 2011 at 3:22pm

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Excerpt from "Xenocide," by Orson Scott Card

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We spend most of our time acting out our genetic destiny. Take the differences between males and females. Males naturally tend toward a broadcast strategy of reproduction. Since males make an almost infinite supply of sperm and it costs them nothing to deploy it. Their most sensible reproductive strategy is to deposit it in every available female-- and to make special efforts to deposit it in the healthiest females, the ones most likely to bring their offspring to adulthood. A male does best, reproductively, if he wanders and copulates as widely as possible.

The female strategy is just the opposite. Instead of millions and millions of sperm, they only have one egg a month, and each child represents an enormous investment of effort. So females need stability. They need to be sure there'll always be plenty of food. They also spend large amounts of time relatively helpless, unable to find or gather food. Far from being wanderers, females need to establish and stay. If they can't get that, then their next best strategy is to mate with the strongest and healthiest possible males. But best of all is to get a strong healthy male who'll stay and provide, instead of wandering and copulating at will.

So there are two pressures on males. The one is to spread their seed, violently if necessary. The other is to be attractive to females by being stable providers-- by suppressing and containing the need to wander and the tendency to use force. Likewise, there are two pressures on females. The one is to get the seed of the strongest, most virile males so their infants will have good genes, which would make the violent, forceful males attractive to them. The other is to get the protection of the most stable males, nonviolent males, so their infants will be protected and provided for and as many as possible will reach adulthood.

Our whole history can all be interpreted as people blindly acting out those genetic strategies. We get pulled in those two directions. Our great civilizations are nothing more than social machines to create the ideal female setting, where a woman can count on stability; our legal and moral codes that try to abolish violence and promote permanence of ownership and enforce contracts-- those represent the primary female strategy, the taming of the male.

And the tribes of wandering barbarians outside the reach of civilization, those follow the mainly male strategy. Spread the seed. Within the tribe, the strongest, most dominant males take possession of the best females, either through formal polygamy or spur-of-the-moment copulations that the other males are powerless to resist. But those low-status males are kept in line because the leaders take them to war and let them rape and pillage their brains out when they win a victory. They act out sexual desirability by proving themselves in combat, and then kill all the rival males and copulate with their widowed females when they win. Hideous, monstrous behavior-- but also a viable acting-out of the genetic strategy.

Yes, I'm afraid of commitment

Time of original posting: Sunday, November 15th, 2009 at 10:34pm

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You say we're afraid of commitment. Damn right we are!

Commitment means change, a change we have to live with, when everyday, we fight our inclinations to do what we would otherwise do, but be reminded of our commitment, and ask ourselves "Am I sure about this? Can I really go through with this?"

Commitment is the hardest thing anyone can ever do. If the people that ran the world were more committed to their jobs, do you think we'd have half the problems we have today? Asking for commitment from us is asking us to rise among the best men in the world.

Think for a moment, how many people do you know who are actually committed to what they do? You might know some - certainly we know a few - but compare that to the number of people you've seen, met or even heard of, who shirk their duties, slack off on the job, quit, cheat on or leave their partners, fall off the wagon, go back to drinking, smoking, and doing the things they absolutely enjoy doing but inevitably destroy themselves and all they stand for by doing it.

Commitment is hard. Ask anyone. Asking us for commitment is to ask an enormous undertaking on our part. And don't pretend like you're shouldering the same burden by asking us to commit to you, because you're not. The only reason you'd ask it of us in the first place is if you stood something to gain from us being committed. Without our commitment, there's nothing to stop us from taking off and doing as we please, and that scares you. If we were to commit to you, our options suddenly become limited, whereas you know exactly what to expect from us, and gain the right to expect it. The things we expect from you, however, still remain within your right to withhold.

So who wins out in this situation? Why should we be expected to commit to you, when we're still so insecure about the world? We don't know what else is out there, shouldn't we be allowed to find out? If we have to suddenly settle down and be yours just because of your own insecurities, shouldn't we be allowed to have our own?

And why now? Are you afraid of what we might find out there? Do you think we'll find something so beautiful that we'll leave you? You say commitment is a sign of trust, but really you want us to commit to you because you don't trust us. You don't have faith that we'll stay on our own, without tying knots or making promises. You don't have faith in us or our character, and if you don't know us well enough to know what to expect, than you have no right to assume we're ready for commitment to begin with.

The only purpose commitment serves is turning chance into predictability, only it's our chances that are being taken away, while you've already made your decision to cash in your chips. Sure, commitment can lead to the creation of good and wonderful things - communities, riches, children - but that's a responsibility that's beyond a lot of of us. You expect us to be gods when we are but men, with the same weaknesses and insecurities. Say what you will about the differences between human beings based on gender or age, the differences are minute, we're the same where it counts, and commitment is no small matter. It doesn't matter who we are, how old we are, if we're male of female - if we're not ready to commit, it's because we have insecurities exactly the same as you, and if you were in our shoes, you'd be saying the exact same thing.

Think about that next time you're about to ask someone to make a commitment to you. And when you realize what you're about to put them through, how about instead, you take a leap of faith yourself...

...And don't.

Religulous

Time of original posting: Thursday, January 8th, 2009 at 4:40 AM

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I first saw Religulous when it came out last fall, and I just recently saw it again on DVD. I searched the internet for Bill Maher's long, drawn out diatribe at the end of the documentary, and, unable to find it, I transcribed it directly from the DVD onto digital paper. You all may think that this is an astounding waste of time, but I found his words to be so moving and meaningful, that I just had to reiterate them.

(Excerpt from "Religulous" by Bill Maher)

“The plain fact is religion must die for mankind to live. The hour is getting very late to be able to indulge in having key decisions made by religious people, by irrationalists, by those who would steer the ship of state, not by a compass, but by the equivalent of reading the entrails of chicken. George Bush prayed a lot about Iraq, but he didn't learn a lot about it. ‘Faith’ means making a virtue out of not thinking. It’s nothing to brag about. And those who preach faith and enable and elevate it are our intellectual slaveholders, keeping mankind in a bondage to fantasy and nonsense that has spawned and justified so much lunacy and destruction.

“Religion is dangerous, because it allows human beings, who don’t have all the answers, to think that they do. Most people would think it’s wonderful when someone says ‘I’m willing lord. I’ll do whatever you want me to do.’ Except, that since there are no gods actually talking to us, that void is filled in by people with their own corruptions and limitations and agendas. And anyone who tells you they know - they just know - what happens when you die, I promise you, you don’t. How can I be so sure? Because I don’t know. And you do not possess mental powers that I do not. The only appropriate attitude for man to have about the ‘big questions’ is not the arrogant certitude that is the hallmark of religion, but doubt. Doubt is humble, and that’s what man needs to be, considering that human history is just a litany of getting shit dead wrong.

“This is why rational people, anti-religion-ists, must end their timidity and come out of the closet and assert themselves. And those who consider themselves only ‘moderately religious’ really need to look in the mirror and realize that the solace and comfort that religion brings you actually comes at a terrible price. If you belonged to a political party or a social club that was tied to as much bigotry, misogyny, homophobia, violence and sheer ignorance as religion is, you’d resign and protest. To do otherwise is to be an enabler, a mafia wife, with the true devils of extremism that draw their legitimacy from the billions of their fellow travelers. If the world does come to an end here or wherever, or if it limps into the future, decimated by the effects of a religion-inspired nuclear terrorism, let’s remember what the real problem was: that we learned how to precipitate mass-death before we got past the neurological disorder of wishing for it. That’s it. Grow up or die.”

-Bill Maher

(EDIT: Please note that while I agree in a large part with Bill Maher's statements, I am not disagreeing with the existence of God. My disagreement is that human beings are capable of knowing anything about the existence of God, and that literally interpreting religious texts is detrimental to one's grasp of God and man. Turning to religion for the purpose of morale guidance and support is good. Turning to religion for answers as to the origin of man and earth, and the answer to what happens after we die, is less favorable in my opinion, but it gives potentially false hope. Again, this is simply how I choose to live my life. You are all welcome to live your lives how you choose to. Bottom line: "People will generally believe whatever makes living easiest. Who are we to take that away?" - Anonymous.)