Hahha, that's a joke, but more on that later. Let me start off with a good old fashioned normal rant.
The vast majority of the world has moved on to electronic banking. With the exception of setting up accounts, there is really no reason for you to be going into a bank (barring loans). You can even make complaints online or over the phone. And nobody even has a cheque book (or a chequing account) anymore. So tell me why banks are unable to process transfers on weekends? That makes absolutely no sense to me. If the process is 'electronic' and you can make a transfer on the weekend, why can't it be processed electronically? This is annoying, especially when you transfer on weekends, because it's always the next business day. So if I transferred the money on a Sunday, it won't be approved by my bank until the Monday, and it won't physically transfer to the other bank account until Tuesday. Isn't that insane? But they sure as hell take your money out straight away! Hahaha, of course, they're definitely making sure that's the case. And if you buy something on weekends, that gets processed straight away so that the vendor receives the cash and it's debited from your account right away. So why can't that be the case with electronic transfers? Banks need to lift their game and move into the 21st century!
Distractions are just the worst! Work and social! Bah, I need some time off to just sit and think. Why do people run for recreation? I understand it for exercise, but recreation? Get out! People say they use it to clear their mind, but all I do when I run is think about crap. I can't even focus on running, if a car pulled out of a driveway or came out on the road behind me, I'm sure that would be the last run I would ever take.
I think what all western governments have done successfully is create a climate of fear. Not just against the foreign or 'other' but more the environment of anti-intellectualism. They have trained society to believe that being smart or having different ideas is to be shunned or ridiculed. People have a driving disgust of people who identify as 'left wing' or are 'high achievers'. As I've noted many times on this blog, conservative thinking is not a concept to be lauded or condoned. The status quo is a barrier to a better existence. You need new ideas, you need fresh ideas. The world is not going to get better unless you focus on study, research and development. The world could be a fantastic place, but people are adamant about not listening to intellectuals or academics or artists. They prefer to have their ideology spoon-fed, force-fed to them by the government, or get lost in frivolous, trivial things like celebrity-obsessionism or sports. So where is that going to leave us? I can tell you, absolutely nowhere.
Here's another issue - we are a superficial society. We don't employ the 'smartest' person. We employ the person with the right piece of paper, or the one who went to the 'right' school. Schools don't prepare people to utilise new knowledge. They train us to pass tests. After that, you disregard the information you have learned. It's no longer of relevance to you as a student, or as a person. I feel like that needs to change, so that education can actually mean something again.
Once upon a time, I was the other guy. Now, I'm just me. Maybe God is the unprovable hypothesis? That's an interesting quandry. I'm just misinterpreting everything here. That I can be sure of.
Let's talk about bullies. Not the ones that hit you. The ones who say horrible things about you. The ones who hurt your feelings. Do you remember how that made you feel? Think about to those statements from your schooling days, your younger days. Even if it's happening to you now as teenagers or adults. Do you remember? Afterwards, would they ever tell you to just lighten up and get over it? Or that you're taking it too seriously?
Now I want to talk about this Charlie Hebdo matter. For those of you living under a rock (or America, where there seems to be a permanent rock above the country, when it comes to news outside of the nation), masked gunmen attacked the HQ of a famous comic-based newspaper in Paris, France. They killed 12 people and made their escape. Charlie Hebdo (the name of the paper) is a satirical rag, in the vein of the onion, but focuses on specific skewing of culture and religion. They famously courted controversy by drawing graphic and most likely insulting depictions of the Islamic prophet Muhammed (or is Mohammed - I don't know what the correct spelling is?). This is generally regarded as a no no in the religion and cultures that follow that religion. The staff there seemed to revel in the fact that they annoyed extremists, which is a great thing - but it leads to other unintended consequences, which I'll touch upon later.
After the brutal masscare by the terrorists, a lot of French people and the international Western community have raised the valid point that free speech cannot be silenced, and that killing for these matters is abhorrent (and rightly so). In response, Charlie Hebdo is going to print more issues, and everyone was in a rush to re-post or reblog or share their cartoons over social media. A lot of reference was made to the Voltaire quote "i may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".
But here's the thing - extremists are crazy. They don't reason. They don't want to send you well-worded letter in response. They will freak out, and they will attack you. Charlie Hebdo (and other media who love pushing these sorts of boundaries) enjoyed this, and pushed the envelope as best they could. If this was known, why would you want to deliberately incite them? I wouldn't walk into Harlem with a sandwich board draped on me saying "I hate niggers" (if you caught the Die Hard with a Vengeance reference, you and I need to be friends). I'm likely to be killed! Once again, I feel the need to just state that I think racism is stupid and silly and illogical. I'm not about to walk into a dangerous psyche ward and start taunting people. Shit-stirrers are given too much credence, they're given too much respect in society. It's far too lauded.
My wish is that everyone who reblogged or shared those cartoons on social media, should also be re-blogging vile and offensive hate speech that impacts them. I recall Toby Halligan (who is a brilliant comic and a good comedy writer) speaking up in support of Charlie Hebdo. I also know that Toby is openly gay. If he was adamant about this free speech perspective, he should also reblog some of the Westboro Baptist Church's horrific diatribes against homosexual people. But he wouldn't do that because it would directly impact him, and it would offend him and his friends. For the record, I have to state for the foolish among you that I am all for equality and equal rights for homosexuals. The fact that it's pretty much illegal for them to marry in most countries is an abomination and sad indictment on society. If people are jewish, they should reblog some of the horrific propoganda from World War 2 Nazi Germany. If they are black, they should reblog comics of the Ku Klux Klan hanging people. So on, and so forth, you get the picture. If you don't, you are a moral or ideological coward. You cannot pick and choose which free speech you support or will reblog or share.
It's easy to pick on Islam now because it's the popular whipping boy for these sorts of issues. Making so much out of the 'other' and the 'clash of civilisations'. So of course people aren't going to reblog the other stuff. In fact, the antisemetic and race stuff is covered by discrimination legislation, and anti-hate crime legislation. So how come there's one maligned demographic that isn't subject to the same protections? If you wanted free speech to be actually, you know, free, why are there any sorts of protections? White conservatives are just itching to say 'nigger' without fear. You know it.
You can't say you support free-speech if you don't also implicitly agree that hate-speech is a valid form of expression. That's a fact. You cannot argue with that. In fact, if you have to say something hateful but want to face no ramifications for it, you should just say your horrible thing and then say #charliehebdo or #jesuischarlie after. There's your protection.
Youth culture today is all about 'talk shit, get hit' but yet they can't seem to see the irony in reblogging a quote like that, then supporting Charlie Hebdo. This harks back to The Interview. It's a film of little to no artistic merit, but it's all about the assassination of the North Korean leader. Yes, Americans have a laugh at North Korea's expense and so on. But it could lead to diplomatic tensions. If there was an American in custody over there, they would most likely be killed. Just because some people wanted to make a bad film. But let me turn that on it's head. What if the North Koreans made a film about assassinating any Western leader? Yes, imagine the ramifications of that. And I'm still not entirely convinced the North Koreans were the perpetrators of the Sony leak.
Oh man, some distractions, while very welcoming, really put a dampener on momentum. Where the fuck was I?!
These shit-stirrers. Why can't they just live a quiet life? You know, have a good happy life, do whatever you want as long as you are not harming anyone else. Satire has crossed the line into bullying. In western nations, Islam is in the minority, but has been exposed to the same amount of ridicule as Christianity has. But not Judaism. Why, why is that? It seems that it's socially acceptable to pick on a few religions, and not others. Satire is deliberately aimed at harming people now. How? Let's talk about defamation - a tort. The general legal definition is to make a statement made by B, which brings person A into the thought of hatred, contempt, or ridicule in the eyes of person C. Satire has now moved in to a point where it thinks it is welcome to laugh at everything. Conservatives are annoyed because they don't want to step on eggshells. Well I'm sorry, but being polite and making a point not to offend people is common courtesy. Every person is an eggshell.
There is a ridiculous amount of hypocrisy in all of this. If you support free speech, then people are allowed to say extreme things and believe extreme things. I am disgusted by hate speech. Those defending satire but not hate speech don't get it, because they are hypocrites. But we know that's already a crime in some places. Say something your government doesn't agree with? Jail. Look up something your government may be paranoid about? Jail. You catch my drift. They only support free speech as long as you say things that support the Western, white, Christian hegemony. Anything else is not welcome. And yes, I'm aware of the hilarious irony that I don't believe in unchecked free speech, while spouting some very radical ideas here. But the difference is, what I'm saying is not designed to induce hatred, or designed to offend someone.
Me? I don't support unchecked free speech. From the above, you can see that free speech can easily descend into extremism of all kinds. I believe in qualified free speech. It harks back to a variation on the Voltaire speech "I will fight to the death your right to say what you want, so long as you don't deliberately set out to hurt others". This harks back to my eggshell diatribe above. Everyone is different. Individuals as distinct from cultures and so on. You may send out a message, but the meaning of that message is entirely up to that other party. You can't guarantee anything. Things won't always be taken as a joke.
There is also another inherent danger in all of this. Moderate or borderline lapsed Muslims don't support extremists. Never have, never will. The simple fact is that the vast majority of the victims of the war on 'terror' (aka islam to all the right-wingers out there) as well as the victims of terrorism have been poor Muslims. Indisputable. So who are the overwhelming victims here? A few thousand comparatively rich white folk, or millions of others? That's right, we know what the answer is. But if you are trying to justify offending something central to their religion in the name of good fun, you won't push them in to extremism, but you will push them to indifference when these sorts of insane attacks happen. And that's a terrible tragedy.
Wow, that was crazy epic, I wrote well.
Now, I want you to remember the bully story from earlier. If you truly believe in free speech, you should have just allowed the bully to keep talking. That's their right. If you don't agree, you don't believe in free speech! It's a joke, you should get over it. Do you not have any self worth? A cartoonist shouldn't have to die for a drawing. But just because you can provoke outrage, doesn't mean you should.
Okay I better start doing my best to close this one up. 3 hours until I am done with today.
Can I talk about another issue? Sarah Ellen! She's this 16 year old who is famous throughout the world due to social media. Let me chart her rise - she became famous a few years back when she uploaded a video of her on youtube waving her eyebrows around to music. News over the country reported on it, because anything over 300 views is considered viral in Australia. Not just that, but news in this country just consists of infotainment, and young idiots just scour social media and the web for stories to 'entertain' not educate or inform. But that's a rant I'm sure I've already had.
In that time, she has uploaded further videos showcasing her quirky but fun sense of humour. She's now picked up millions of followers, and has made many celebrity friends throughout her travels and promotional ventures, and she's now got a modelling contract. But when I first saw her eye-brow wiggling video, I knew she would be famous. Why? Because of her looks. You can't deny that she has a ridiculously pretty face. They market and promote her as a girl next door. But goddamn, I can tell you I do not know any girls who look like that. So is her fame a result of her mind, or her physical attributes? Come on, do I even need to ask the question? We all know the answer. She shouldn't have to be sorry for it, she should take all opportunities as they come. But what message does this send to young girls? As long as you're pretty and upload photos or videos of yourself to social media, you too can earn a better life?
Alright! Ahh, what else can I possibly even talk about today? I still have 2.5 hours to go, so I can't just stop there can I? I feel like I could write more, but I'm also feeling exhausted. This has to be one of the biggest posts I've ever done.
Wow! This is larger than the size of an undergraduate level university essay.
Niceness or naivete? I'm not sure which is which. I could be the bad influence here!
Arghh some people are just so incompetent! I can't believe it, but I should have expected it. Oh man! 90 minutes?! I can't do this! I could just fall asleep right here.
Is there anything so weird as anyone trying to find another job while they have a job? It's all about subterfuge and weird behaviour. Am I burnt out? I mean not just now, but overall. Over everything? I don't know. I could be. But there's not really anything I could do about it. Not now anyway. It's now down to an hour to go. I'm still just as clueless as I was at the start of this day. Or even the start of my life. But I will resolve to keep an open mind this year.
Hmmm I'm just going to call it here.
Joaquin out.
