The Edge of Politesse

My eyes feel like fine grade sandpaper.  My tongue peels off the roof of my mouth with the sound of an armpit leaving your side on a hot day.  Organic Velcro.  I may have drunk too much last night.  I can remember everything that happened though, and in some ways it’s little comfort.  I had no plans, which some people take to mean I was looking for them.  I don’t consider myself so much of a hermit that a night inside watching old Seinfeld DVDs is more appealing than a night up at the local, but it is a very funny series.  You’ve twisted my arm.
 
  Truth be told, it was a fun night, I don’t have awful friends.  Of course, I probably shouldn’t have drunk as much as I did; it makes you more amenable to doing embarrassing things.  Mildly embarrassing like singing an off-key karaoke rendition of Rhinestone Cowboy, or terribly embarrassing things like agreeing to see a friend of a friend tomorrow, just the two of you.  Why would I do that?  I don’t even know her, and frankly I don’t even like her.  The kind of girl who discovered makeup at age 12 and has gotten very, very good at the liberal application of it since then.  Must be expensive to go through that much.
 
  It’ll be rude if I just blow her off, and I’d like to consider myself above such rudeness.  Surprising though it may seem, the terminally homebound do have a modicum of decorum and empathy.  We just push it deep, deep down inside us.  Then we tell jokes about it at the annual hermit get-together.  I can’t just cancel on her for no reason, it’ll hurt her feelings, but I don’t want to sell myself too much either.  I’m certainly not a shiny new beamer, but I think she may have long since stopped paying attention to that particular dealership in favour of the used car salesman down the street.
 
  “Meet at the art gallery at 12.”  It’s 9:30 now... how to make myself as unappealing as possible in two and a half hours?  I’ll save ten minutes by not showering, but I should at least brush my teeth.  There’s a lot of sugar in beer... oh, but maybe I can kiss her with bad breath?  Would that work?  OK, the teeth can take one for the team today, I’ll brush them when I get back.  If you put gel in bed hair, it looks cool, but if you leave it as is un-gelled, it looks like you’ve put in no effort whatsoever.  Thank the lord I don’t own any hair gel.  Add in the stubble that’s just short of designer and we have one truly awful sell on the face front.
 
  Track pants and thongs are a given.  The well placed ketchup stain, a little too close to the crotch, makes them truly wonderful “don’t even bother” pants.  The question is wife beater or frayed “Slayer” shirt?  If I had anything resembling upper body strength, the wife beater could be a good sell, but weedy shoulders and a liberal share of the world’s supply of arm hair makes it less wife-beater and more wife-cajoler.  I think the Slayer shirt works better; not only has it not been washed since the mid-nineties, but it has that magical mix of awful traits, “I am a metalhead,” “I have poor hygiene” and “I’m not even trying.”  It’s the trifecta of tremendously unappealing.
  I took a beer with me as I drove to the gallery.  It’s far too early, but who’s going to date someone who’s drinking a VB at midday?  I don’t know why I had a bottle of VB in my fridge, but who could have known it’d come in useful?  I’m not going to enjoy the drink, but it serves a greater purpose.
  
  I wait outside the gallery, sipping my beer, as she walks up to me.  I do not understand the dress sense of people, but it appears that she has gone for “sexy”.  Those pants are far too tight for her.  I suppose I should be flattered that she’s gone to the effort, but it’s barking up the wrong tree here.  Time to get started.

  “Hey sweet-cheeks, how’s it going?”
   
  She goes to answer, but she can’t respond to the pleasantry because my mouth is wrapped around hers.  Her lip gloss tastes like strawberries and lost youth.  I squeeze her bum for good measure.
 
  “Well, hello sailor!  You’re in a friendly mood today!  Got one of those for me?”
   
  Oh dear.  Takes a special kind of lady to want a VB at midday.  I may have made things worse.  No matter, push on.

 
  “Sorry love, none for you.”
  “Hahaha greedy guts!  Come on, let’s go in.”

  Hmmm... no mention of the clothes.  Either she’s biting her tongue or she doesn’t mind the latest in under-the-pier chic.  Maybe this is the latest craze.  Maybe she just has a fetish for unappealing men.

 
  “Do we have to pay?”
  “Nah, it’s free.  I wouldn’t be paying for you!”

  That seems like a harsh thing to say.  Hopefully she’s a little offended.  I half wished you did have to pay admission, I would have asked her to cover me.  She laughs at this.  I don’t know how that laugh didn’t turn me off her last night, it sounds like a cat being raped.
 
  “Wow, from behind you go up to a seven!”
   
  Now that is how you turn off a woman.  Or so it would seem, if it wasn’t for the fact that, upon hearing that, she turned to me, and wiggled her bum.  Apparently a seven is a compliment?  Layers of confusion.
 
   “Yeah, about a seven.”

  It’s not working.  Maybe I’ve misjudged her.  Maybe I’m not as disgusting as I thought.  I’d kill for a woman that was properly put off by overzealous tongue hockey.  A woman who had enough self respect to be properly turned off by a master class in uncouth baiting.  Lord, give me a woman I could drive away properly.


  “This looks like a guy wiped his arse on a piece of canvas.”
   “Hahaha, I know, right?”
 
  That laugh.  That shrill, mindless laugh. The laugh of peroxide blonde high school hook-ups and a love of the Spice Girls.  I’ll never drink again.  I’ll never believe someone when they tell me you need to go out more, meet some new people.  I have this friend, you’d love her, she’s sooooo funny.  Yeah, I’ll bet she is.  I’ll bet she’s such a catch; you try to set her up with your asocial shut in friends.  All those popped collared hair gelled walking machismo aerosols squirting testosterone into crowded deafening clubs must not have noticed her charms, or maybe she’s just not their type.  Maybe a high school education is far too dynamic for the average man.

  “I’m having a lot of fun; I’ve never been to an art gallery!”
   
  Stop the fuckin’ presses.


  “Woooow, this one is pretty!  I love the colours!”
  “Yeah, it’s pretty sweet.  And those flowers look a bit like tits.”
  “Haha yeah, you’re right!”

  Oh come on.  She paused a little there, I thought I’d hit a sweet spot, but apparently the word “tits” is really a selling point.  She brushes her hand over the small of my back as she walks by me.  Darling, calm yourself.  I am but a man with the wittiest of observations.


  “You’re a cool chick, you remind me of my ex.  She was great in bed.”
  “Well, I’m not too bad myself.”
  “I’ll bet, but she had a better arse than you.”
   
  It’s foot in mouth gold.
 
   “Oooooh that sounds like a challenge... but you’ll just have to wait.”
   
  Lady, what the hell is wrong with you?  I don’t know how your brain works, but it’s probably broken when you think that is a come on.  She keeps shooting me these sneaky looks over her shoulders.  What is she trying to say?  Offend me more, I like it.  I’ve been told hetero courting looks strange to the outside observer.  I must not be hetero.  This is the opposite of courting.

 
  “So, do you watch much porn?”
  “Oh... uh... not so much...”
   
  We have an opening.

 
  “Oh man, you’d like it.  Some of the stuff those chicks do, man it’s crazy.”
  “Mmm”
  “Yeah, there’s this one thing, where the chick stands on her head, right...”
   
  I could not hate myself anymore than I do right now.

 
   “...and then drinks it, right from the glass!”
  “Eeeew, that’s gross.”
  “Yeah, it’s pretty hot.  There’s this other thing I saw, where this chick takes a big rubber...”
   
  Part of me is asking why I even know this.  Part of me is hoping this doesn’t come back to bite me.  All of me wishes it didn’t have to go this far.

 
  “Man, that sounds painful; you couldn’t pay me to do that.”
  “It pays pretty good, I reckon you’d be alright at it.  Not one of the really good ones, but you could be alright.”
   
  Is that an insult?  I don’t know.
 
  “Well, thanks for the support.  You never know what the future holds.”
   
  I hope she’s joking.  She probably is, I’m probably overreacting.  She’s grinning.  She keeps looking at me.  This isn’t cute conversation.  I must be the only person that thinks pornography is a private and sparing enterprise.  What a free spirit he is, he just says what comes to mind.

 
   “I had this ex; she used to love the stuff.  I caught her watching it a couple of times.  Having fun without me.”
  “Oh that’s harsh!”
  “Nah it was pretty hot.”
  “Right.”
   
  Her smile fades.  I’m floating in an ocean of relief.  I’d love to watch the dawning realisation that the person she’s been flirting with this whole time is an unpleasant man child break in her mind.  As awful as I feel, it’s nice for the frustration to melt away.  Push on.


  “I bet you love having fun on your own, hey?  Flicking the bean?”
  “That’s... that’s a little personal...”
  “You love it!”

  I give her a shove.  It’s too hard disguised as playful that came off too hard.  You have to push with just the right force.  Too much and you’re just pushing a lady around.  Too little and it’s just a playful shove.  One or two steps out of pace.  The accretion disk of faux pas.  She smiles awkwardly and my heart sings.

  “Hey, there’s a little tour group, we should join in.”
   
  Translation:  I don’t want to be alone with you anymore.  The sad bit is, I’d love to go on a little tour with someone I actually like.  I hope they don’t remember me.  We sidle over and catch the tour guide in the middle of discussing a Picasso.  I shouldn’t sink this low.  She already looks at a complete loss.  Surrounded by people she doesn’t know, standing next to a walking stereotype.  I catch a look at her face... her eyes are inky tide pools of disappointment.

  “It doesn’t even look like anything!”
 
  It’s just loud enough to echo.  Those shocked looks.  They’d probably be less shocked if I hadn’t selected that exact moment to scratch my nut sack.  Not a passing scratch, a few seconds of committed digging.  Enough time for everyone to see.  The tour guide hustles us on to break the silence.
 
  I like this gallery.  I come here on my own sometimes, just to unwind.  If I had a shotgun I’d plaster the caricature I’m wandering around as all over the latest installation piece by another unnamed art student.  I don’t even know why I’m doing this... is this polite anymore?  Whose face am I saving?  I’m worried I’m having fun.  The tour guide says” modern art” and my brain disconnects.
 
  “Modern art?  More like modern I-fucked-your-mum!”
 
  Her jaw drops.  The group hastily shuffles along but she stays put, shocked and appalled.  OK, I can finish this now.


  “Why are you being such a jerk?”
  “Baby, it’s just the way I am!”
  “You were so much nicer last night, what happened?”
  “Well, you were showing a bit more tit last night.”
  “You’re a dick, I’m leaving!”
  “Are you sure you don’t wanna come back to mine, we can have some sex?”
 
  She storms away.  I can’t help but feel as if I’ve really done something good today, saved her feelings.  I can’t imagine how rejected she would have felt if I had just blown her off.  At least this way, she left with her dignity.  As I leave, the woman behind the counter comes up to me.  Apparently they feel it’s necessary to ban me from the art gallery.  That’s a shame, I like it here.

                                                               *                             *                             * 

  I got a call from a friend today.  The dialogue went something like this:

 
  “So, I hear you were on top form at the art gallery.”
  “Yeah, I know, I felt bad...”
  “You should feel bad!”
  “Yeah, but I think I did the right thing, blowing her off would have hurt her feelings.”
  “Wait... what?”
  “I felt bad making her think I was interested, but I think this way, it’s all worked out for the best.  She can find someone else more her style and her feelings weren’t hurt.”
  “I think it’s best if I don’t see you for a while.”

  I understand why he’d want some distance; it might be a bit awkward between us, especially if she happens to be out with us.  But at least he can rest safe in the knowledge that his friend’s feelings weren’t hurt.  It’s a shame; she seemed a nice enough girl, but just not my type.  Sometimes, it’s hard being polite.  But it’s just something you have to do.

"First World Problems" Is A First World Problem

  Somewhere out there, in the giant throbbing biomass that is the human race, someone has it worse than you.  Objectively, someone has more negative phenomena affecting them than you do.  It's the nature of existence; as long as there is at least two people alive, there will be pissing contests.  Now, you'd think the fact that you're doing better than some other people would be an incredible pick me up.  Life isn't so bad, just look at that guy!  He sucks.  Unfortunately, some of us have brains that just aren't helpful to the "feeling good about life" cause and want to turn positives into negatives, so in the spirit of over-sharing on the internet, here is a list of reasons why not being the least fortunate man on the planet makes me feel terrible.

1)  The suffering of others makes me sad.  I know I've opened with a very lame sentiment, but to be fair, if you aren't at least a little upset that other people are suffering, I envy you.  I wish I could not give a shit like that.

2)  I'm not doing better than others by any work of my own.  I'm a white male from a middle-class family in a first world country.  By default, I'm doing better than billions of people.  As such, the fact that I'm not the least fortunate person on the planet doesn't feel like a miracle I should be eternally thankful for, it just seems statistically likely.

3)  The quality of life I enjoy should bring me a lot of happiness, but because it's been ever-present for my entire life, the fact that it continues to be doesn't actually do anything to change my mood if I happen to feel crappy.  The idea of thinking to myself, "oh, I shouldn't be bummed, I have running water!" just seems asinine to me, because I managed to go from feeling good to feeling bad without the running water ever doing anything different.  I know I should derive some degree of happiness and satisfaction from the relative comfort of my life, but that doesn't actually make me feel any different, which makes my sadnesses and frustrations seem unjustified and out of my control, which feeds itself.

 4)  Sadness, difficulty, frustration and hopelessness aren't objective, so even if someone does have more difficult circumstances than I do, there's no metric to compare how they feel to how I feel, so it's distinctly possible I feel worse than them, which is again totally unjustified.

5)  Their suffering might not be their fault and they may lack the necessary tools to alleviate their suffering, which reminds me how much I take for granted just how many tools I have to alleviate their own.

  I realise just how easy it is to look at this list and say "this is completely selfish and trivializes the very serious suffering of others," but look at number 3.  I know this.  I know that navel gazing and beating yourself up because you're beating yourself up is stupid, but I also know that even if no-one else knows exactly how you feel, you'll still feel the same, and if you feel shitty, you're gonna feel shitty.  It surprises me that society is not more open about emotions in general; we all have them and we all know just how much they can affect you, but yet, we rarely (if ever) talk about or acknowledge them.  And doesn't that just make you sad? 

On The Friend-Zone

The concept of the friend-zone used to make a lot of sense to me.  I remember very clearly, in my youth, thinking that there was this perilous social limbo where those who weren't smooth enough to achieve "relationship" status would fall and lurch about like so many zombies, only they were looking for attention and validation rather than brains.  Needless to say, it probably gave away just how little I understood about friendships, relationships, women and the dynamics of social interaction at the time.

Snap forward and... well, I still have a pretty piss poor understanding of friendships, relationships, women and the dynamics of social interaction, but I seem to be less completely awful at it, so let's count it as a victory.  I don't think it's a maturity thing, there are plenty of young people who have incredibly well-developed social skills just as there are plenty of aging dickheads.  The truth is, socialising is somewhere between a natural talent and a learned skill; all the charisma in the world won't save you in the long run if you're a douche deep down, but all the pleasant nature in the world won't help you meet and influence people.  You can learn how to be charismatic, friendly and approachable but people will see through your shit if you're just trying to get them onside.  At any rate, the important thing; I don't get the friend-zone anymore.  I don't understand why it's still in such common parlance.

Meme culture isn't the most enlightened thing in the world, I'll concede that straight away, but it's also an interesting tool for examining what is and isn't considered offensive in our society; racist and sexist stereotypes abound, but they're always stereotypes that society has internalised and no longer considers offensive.  Oh, how witty, you made reference to fried chicken and posted a picture of a black guy!  Coz it's funny, right?  I mean, they love chicken.  Especially the fried kind.  There is a very small fraction of the internet media consuming public that is actually offended by stereotypes like "black people like chicken," "Asians are good at maths" or "being friend-zoned sucks."

Enter the skeptic; being friend-zoned sucks, does it?  I'm afraid I'll have to disagree.

Note 1:  All opinions expressed by the author reflect his state of mind at the time of writing.  These opinions may be different to those expressed in the past or those that are expressed in the future.  Obviously I try to keep that to a minimum but you can't really write about changing thoughts on things without your thoughts having changed at some point.  Change is good.

For the sake of consistency, let's lay out a few definitions.  The "friend-zone" is the title for the theoretical place one inhabits when the relationship dynamic between two people becomes such that one person in the partnership decides that they are interesting in maintaining a friendship, even if they do not consider you a potential sex or life partner.  Getting "friend-zoned" is being told or otherwise becoming aware that you have been put into the "friend zone."  "Stuck in the friend-zone" means one is attempting to change the dynamic of the relationship between two people to include potential candidacy as sex or life partner but failing at their endeavour.

Now that we've synthesized some workable definitions of what all the "friend-zone" and its accrued baggage is, the fun part; tearing into it.  Let me say for posterity that any two (or more) people of any combination of genders can have this dynamic going on in their relationships, but in my personal experience the most common (by a long, long way) is straight men being friend-zoned by straight girls, so that's what I'm going to dig into, out of laziness more than anything.

Number 1)  It strikes me as incredibly rude that people act openly upset when they've been "friend-zoned."  I get it, you're hurt that you wanted something different out of the relationship between you and the other person but didn't get it and you feel inferior because you feel like it's some character flaw of yours that prevented the relationship from going the way you desired.  It's cool, I get it.  However, when you're being "friend-zoned," you're having someone tell you that they like you as a person and want you in their life in the capacity of a friend.  Acting openly bummed about that makes you look like a self-obsessed douche, you're basically saying "your friendship is nowhere near as valuable to me as your body or your availability as a potential partner."  No, that's not totally a demeaning, awful thing to say to someone at all.

Number 2)  It pisses me off to no end when people talk about being "just" friends, especially with people of the opposite sex.  Why the "just"?  Certainly the phrase "we're friends" communicates exactly as much relevant information as "we're just friends."  All the "just" adds is the implication that there's more going on privately between you two than you let on but "friends" is the word that both of you (read:  the one who isn't shooting for a relationship) are most comfortable with.  You're letting everyone else know about your personal shit and reminding your "just" friend of the tension there as well as exactly how highly you consider their "friendship."  Good going, douche.

Number 3 (this is the big one))  It says a lot about our society and in particular how we regard women that the sentiment of "friend-zone" doesn't apply anywhere near as widely to other interpersonal relationships, that is to say, no-one bitches about being "relationship-zoned" or being "sex-zoned."  Seriously, imagine this;  "Oh man, she's totally sex-zoned me.  I really like her as a person but she's only interested in my body."  Admittedly that specific scenario does come up but usually (usually!  Not always!) the genders are reversed and it's not as openly talked about, but the fact that the idea of a man saying it seems odd probably lets on more latent sexism than we'd like to admit.  But this isn't about sex, this is about interpersonal relationships in which sex may be a factor; the binary here is usually between being stuck in the "friend-zone" when what you really want is a relationship.

First and foremost, I reject the idea that being in a relationship is inherently superior to being single, even if you do have an interest in pursuing someone who doesn't share that interest.  Like everything in life, relationships aren't always great.  Sometimes, relationships are difficult.  Sometimes, you do feel lonely, scared, ignored, unattractive or unappreciated, even if you are in a relationship.  Sometimes, you have to work hard to make it work, you have to bite your tongue, make compromises and answer difficult questions.  The anxieties, flaws and errors that are a part of every human being don't suddenly become OK just because you paired up.  In fact, usually they come into sharper focus because if you're trying to be open and honest with someone, occasionally the less-than-great stuff comes out.

You hear phrases like "at least you have relationship troubles" muttered bitterly as if you're a rich guy complaining to a beggar that you don't have enough fifty dollar notes to wipe the caviar from your lips.  I'm sorry, I didn't realise your existence was so shitty that my problems are like dream vacations for you.  Because, you know, it's not as if you're of any value to society or other people being single, may as well let everyone know just how valueless you are, right?

Please.

One day, someone is going to have the moxie and the wit to actually have a "relationship-zoned" bit and mean it.  I can see it now; it'd be a more elegant delivery of something along the lines of:

"Oh, dude, you got relationship-zoned?  Oh man, I'm so sorry.  I can't believe you're gonna have to consider their feelings and wellbeing to a greater degree than you usually do before you do anything that involves them!  Sucks that you'll have to deal with your own emotions and human vulnerability by opening yourself to another person yet also deal with theirs as well as they open themselves up to you.  Man, I hope you don't miss being potentially available to new sex and/or life partners now that you've opted for a monogamous pair bond!"

OK, that was pretty awful, but there's a point nestled in there somewhere.  I believe it's something along the lines of "relationships can suck too and also offer a new set of challenges."  Yeah, that'll do. 

I'm not going to say being attached is better than being single.  They're just different.  But bitching about being stuck in the "friend-zone" makes you sound like a 12 year old.  Relationships don't magically happen after you've been a "great friend" for X amount of time.  They're a different creature.  Sometimes they come out of friendships, sometimes they don't.  As crazy as it sounds, if you feel that way about someone, maybe you should sack up and make a move, rather than being passive and impotent.  Yeah, you might get rejected.  It happens.  Plenty of fish in the sea, maybe you can still be friends and maybe, just maybe, if you believed your own bullshit about "valuing the friendship" in the first place, you wouldn't be worrying about whether or not they like you, because you VALUE THE FRIENDSHIP.  Maybe.

Note 2:  I realise that it comes off as at best ironic and at worse condescending for someone in a relatively new relationship to say that relationships aren't all that great and that being single is just as good and blah blah blah but there's no possible situation I could be in that would render this easier to read objectively.  If I was single, I'd seem like I was rationalising it.  If I was engaged/married it'd seem even more condescending than it is now, if I was in a poly relationship it'd seem even more condescending still and having a fuck-buddy is just being single with organisation.  No, seriously, if it's just sex, legitimately a physical exchange without emotional attachment, there's no difference to being single except you have a regular sex partner.  Not saying it's bad, just saying.  Anyway, although it may come off as condescending, at least I've been honest with it.  I'm happy with my relationship right now and I prefer relationships in general, but that doesn't mean they're always better than the alternatives.  Sometimes they suck, but sometimes they don't, and you can always minimise the amount of suck by being mature and open to communication.  Last Whiny Relationship Advice, out. 

Skipping Class Is Rad.

  The current set of generations who were born or brought up in a time when computer technology and the internet were readily available find themselves at an interesting point in the history of education.  Some tech-savvy Gen-X, Gen-Y and iGen (I shit you not, those are real names for the last 3 generations of people, according to journalists who make up words) may see the days when the idea of "class attendance" is phased out of the curriculum.  They may see a time when all education is done purely online, with a university transformed into a purely social institution.  Bear with me.

  So, as it stands right now, most university units have a reading component and a lecture component.  It's understandable that lectures were done in the past because there was no easier way to transmit as much information as they needed to in a more efficient fashion; textbooks would have to either be huge or miss chunks of information, you'd need a book for every class, it'd be expensive and unwieldy.  Unfortunately, you'd need some books, otherwise it'd be impossible to give students the background they needed before certain lectures, or give them problems to do without having to write them for every lecture.  So the lecture component and the reading component had a certain harmony, balancing each other out.

  Thing is, lectures are an awful medium for transmitting information, they're time consuming and impossible to follow at your own pace.  The only real advantage they offer is live demonstrations, assuming one needs them.  If it were possible to have all the information written down somewhere, accessible to all at their leisure, no matter where they were, in one small device, then you wouldn't really need to go to the lectures.

  Oh, wait...

  The idea of having a large session wherein information that is readily available online is spoken at you in a large room is a holdover from the past.  Now, that's not to say that there should be no classes; live demonstrations saved my arse a couple of times when I was studying engineering (although they ultimately did not help me enough to prevent my eventual failure and subsequent booting out of the university) and discussion sessions, study groups and tutorials are a big help, especially in communications and arts units.  In addition, the social aspect of the university experience is equally important, with the various clubs and the ubiquitous tav.  But lectures?  They're for old people that don't know computers.

  Skipping class to socialise (and commit crimes) is not being a delinquent.  Well, maybe it is.  But it's also a considered stab at the luddites of today, a stride towards the future, to possible transhumanism or at least a lot more down time.  And that's why skipping class is rad. 

On Achievements

People achieve things every day, without even realising it. The fact that you dragged your lazy corpse out of bed to go to a job you dislike is an amazing achievement; sure there are consequences if you don't, but god damn if your body puts in its two cents about it. Being tired and cold blows, I'd rather be in bed.

Yeah, that's setting the bar a bit low, and yeah, it does kinda trivialise the idea of "achievement" if we reward ourselves for just doing stuff we have to do. But let's not lie to ourselves, we do that anyway. All the time. Even high achievers. Sometimes, you have to tell yourself "well done" when frankly the "well" is a bit of a stretch. Sometimes stuff was just done, with no merit and no point, and it will be forgotten in the sea of little moments that make up life.

The sports-minded confuse the shit out of me for just that reason. Now, I'll concede, I partake in the odd sporting event, I don't mind the odd weekly run around with friends and frankly it makes me feel better about the amount of food I shovel down my throat on a daily basis, but it's social, there's no pressure to win and no training or drills to run. Rock up, play your ball-games, joke with friends, leave. Nice and easy. The kind of folks who go out, join teams of people they've never met and then proceed to spend weeks bonding by training together, getting all sweaty and out of breath, beads of perspiration peeking out from their pores and tumbling sensuously down their cheek to the nape of their neck... I wouldn't do it myself, but I don't begrudge you if running laps is your preferred weeknight time sink. What I've never understood is this idea that after a hard game/training session/season, players have somehow earned a reward. Call me old fashioned, but you didn't earn shit. Common sense dictates that if you joined the team of your own accord, you must have wanted to play, so right there you're signing up for difficult, tiring shit right there. It's inevitable, because you're gonna want to win (or at least have to fake it because you're surrounded by over-competitive dickheads), as will the other team, and it's likely that at some point, you'll play a team that has skills equal to or greater than yours... the challenges you face are neither unexpected nor abnormal. In fact, they're kind of a package deal with the whole "playing sport competitively" thing. So... how exactly have you "earned" a post match drink? I won't take it away, you're probably thirsty and I'm not gonna tell someone not to imbibe fluid, but let's not kid ourselves. You didn't earn shit. You did a thing you paid to do. Oh, you played hard and gave it your all? Well fucking done, you want a medal? Why would you ever not play hard, if you're trying to win? You shouldn't be rewarded for playing hard, you should be punished for not playing hard enough if you suck.

So, will I tell the football team not to hit the bar afterwards? Sweet Jesus no, number one they'd probably beat me up and number two, why wouldn't you want to hit the bar? It's fun. I do it all the time. The great thing is though, I don't have to rationalise doing stuff I enjoy to myself. I don't have to play football/till the fields/solve field equations to "earn" a beer. It's a beer. Just drink one if you want one.

It is my theory that as a society, we've become so meritocratic that we cannot look at joy without looking at achievement. We cannot enjoy something without associating the feeling of enjoyment with the feeling of having "earned" this enjoyment. The idea that anything worthwhile can only come as a result of unpleasantness is so entrenched in our society, drilled into us from the moment we're born, we accept it as some sort of fundamental truth.

In some ways, it's a valid model. Sometimes you do have to work hard to get to the good points. But more than Catholic guilt, more than white guilt, how many people find themselves afflicted with the dreaded lack-of-achievement guilt? How many people feel bad for doing nothing with their time? I won't lie, even I fall victim of this sometimes. Sometimes, I do feel shitty for not fulfilling arbitrary goals I assigned to myself with no rhyme or reason. Shit like feeling bad because I didn't practice guitar much today, didn't read that article I meant to, didn't do that uni work that I could have, didn't do any number of little things that would have allowed my broken psyche quench its thirst for some sort of box to check off, some sort of little trophy I can mentally award myself.

Upon consideration, it's mental. Having objectives to complete is part of life but it doesn't constitute life. Objectives and tasks are the little things that get in the way of living. The idea that you can't have something good unless it's reward for some sort of unpleasantness is nonsensical, encouraging people to do pointless shit to get their achievement fix or puncturing the fragile balloon of self esteem an individual may have by implying that their lack of productivity implies some sort of personal inadequacy.

I'm a fan of the slacker ideology. Do enough to achieve the necessary and disregard the rest. If you're happy with doing just any job, by all means, don't shoot for the stars. You don't NEED to constantly striving for that last little goal that will supposedly bring happiness. You don't NEED to constantly go one better than the Joneses. You can be happy with your lot in life. You can have enough stuff, you can be exactly where you want to be. I'm studying to get a job that won't slowly kill me over 40 years, I'm working to afford beer and petrol and everything else is done because I myself want to. How many people can honestly say that about their lives? How many 40-year-olds can look at what they have and say "this was by my design"? I'd wager the numbers would be a tad lower that you'd think.

Don't do stuff just for the sake of doing stuff. It's pointless and stupid. Do exactly what you want, for whatever reason you want, and if you're still not hurting anyone when you finish, than society can collectively suck it because you just beat its over-achieving, more-is-better fatass ideology. Good for you.

On Subtle Discrimination and On Paranoia

It is my firm belief that the average person is not malicious at heart. Despite the sheer number of dickheads perpetrating dickheaded acts on a daily basis, it gives my mind a degree of stability to believe that these trespasses against reason and my own comfort and convenience stem more from ignorance than any actual desire to inflict harm. You can't really hold something against someone when they didn't even know it was a problem... they're not psychic or anything, because no-one is, because psychics are a bunch of frauds from A through to Z. People's ignorance means they might not know what constitutes dickheaded behaviour, and given sufficiently terrible information, one could come to believe that dickheaded behaviour is actually positive and helpful and so continue to perform acts of subtle, well-meaning dickheadry.

If you're having trouble conceptualising that, imagine someone who, having been raised in a racist household, was under the impression that non-whites were subhuman. From birth, their home environment was quietly antagonistic to non-whites and they had never had enough exposure or interaction with non-whites to realise at a young age that they're people too. However, they grow up to be a pretty nice person (save this one serious character flaw) and as an adult, having internalised this bias to the point that they accepted it as a truth of the world, they meet a non-white person. Now, if they were an otherwise decent person, they probably wouldn't lash out at them, especially if they saw other white people treating them with kindness. However, they also view them as subhuman, so how do you reconcile that? What you get is the most subtle kind of racism, wherein they treat the person perfectly pleasantly, but with an almost dismissive condescension. Shit like walking on eggshells, clarifying stuff to them needlessly, not really listening to what they have to say... that kind of thing. It's the same for basically any bias, against homosexuals, the handicapped, people of different faiths... any bias you can think of.

What sucks about this specific kind of prejudice is that it seems to come from a good place. To the person committing it, they aren't being racist, they're being tolerant and accepting. The problem lies not with their intentions but from the misinformation they've been fed. It's upsetting that some prejudices, racism, homophobia and religious intolerance in particular, are so ingrained in certain parts of the world that these little subconscious biases are more common than one might think.

On a completely separate topic, I'm finding it harder and harder to believe the world is getting more free given how willingly people seem to want to give up their freedoms. Rationalisations like "if you aren't doing anything wrong, then you have nothing to worry about" are a nonsense, assuming a concrete definition of "wrong" and also assuming a completely fair and impartial law enforcement system that has no agenda or biases. Both of these assumptions are inherently flawed. This is purely personal, but I've never understood why people were so comfortable being filmed without permission, particularly in public space.

Food for thought.

I Can Think Of At Least Two Things Wrong With The Title Of "The Hunger Games"

I'm gonna head this off at the pass before it gets brought up; I haven't read the books, I don't care if they were "better" than the movie, I don't care if it explores the characters better. I don't care. Lately the hot ticket has been movie adaptions of incredibly popular books and series marketed directly at fans of the books. This wasn't always the case. Did you know Fight Club was a book before it was a movie? Yeah, true story. The movie has to be one of my favourite films of all time yet I haven't read the book, because I don't need to, because they are two separate pieces of art. Film is a different medium to books, with different strengths, weaknesses and approaches. A good adaption stands alone from the material it was derived from. With that in mind, let's review The Hunger Games, shall we?

The Hunger Games is a beautiful film to be bitchy about, because it did a lot of little things badly. Overall it was an enjoyable film, and by all means I encourage you to see it if you have nothing better to do, but it's the little things that prevent me from saying it was actually "good." It was shot quite nicely, especially the archery scenes. I liked how personal it felt when Katniss shot arrows, in such a way that it wasn't mechanical, nor aggressive. The close angles and avoiding the whole "camera following the arrow really fast" gimmick really gave you a sense of control and calm that reflects Katniss' personality. And on the subject of Katniss, can I get a hell yeah for positive female role models? Jennifer Lawrence's performance as Katniss Everdeen (what a stupid fucking name) was a high point for me, largely because of the fine balance she struck between vulnerability and strength. It would have been very easy to portray her as an aloof ice-queen, but instead Lawrence gives the character incredible depth. Her Katniss is incredibly warm and almost maternal in her interactions with her younger sister and later a young tribute in the arena, strong and independent in hunting/battle scenes and awkward yet oddly endearing in personal scenes, especially with the character Peeta. The result is that she comes off like a real person, with complex underlying motivations, opinions and feelings. She's scared shitless of what she faces, but isn't a whiny bitch about it. Admittedly near the end the movie drops the "strong female character" ball, but that's a fault of the writing and not the performance.

That ball-dropping is one of the major issues I had with the film, however. Pretty much up until the final quarter of the movie, Katniss is everything you could want in a female heroine. Strong enough to go toe to toe with any other competitor, never in thrall to some dude, never a damsel in distress even when she is in distress... then Peeta is wounded and oh, what's that? She loves him now? Since fucking when? You just spent the entire previous part of the movie establishing that she doesn't feel about Peeta the way he feels about her, that she has a guy she likes back home, that she's a strong independent woman who don't need no man, but then suddenly, for no reason other than he apologises for something awful he did to her in the past (I won't explain what that is but it was seriously a dick move), oh shit, love happens. I shit you not, it's like the writers realised that they had written themselves into a corner in that there was no obvious resolution to this weird romantic subplot they tried to shoehorn in, so they just defaulted to her falling in love with the only dude in the area that wasn't trying to kill her. She had quite literally tried to kill him in the previous act for professing to have a crush on her. I'm not saying that her character would never fall in love, we had previously established how empathetic she can be, but the way the romance was established and executed was... well, it was a detriment to an otherwise incredibly strong character.

When I said the movie was shot well, that doesn't mean it necessarily looked good all the time. Any scene with CGI looked about as smooth and elegant as the fucking Phantom Menace, which is pretty much unforgivable in 2012. The outside shots of the airships looked so out of place to the organic feel of the trees and woods that surrounded them, the futuristic city was had no depth or feel in panoramic shots and seriously, how hard is it to make a convincing flame effect these days? The two scenes that involved clothes with flames on them looked like a friggin' 1st year computer animation student's last-minute-final assignment. For a movie with such hype and budget, it was disappointing to say the least.

Speaking of aesthetic inconsistencies, this movie has a love affair with them. I'm more than willing to accept the whole "it's the future and people dress weird" thing, but why then do Woody Harrelson's and Christopher Plummer's characters dress really... normally? Everyone around them is dressed in clothes of weird colours and cuts, with both genders slathered in foppish makeup, yet two of the main characters that you see quite regularly dress in modern-day suits and waistcoats. Why? Why would those clothes be available in this clearly very bizarre time? It just makes them look... well, out of place, really. Despite being experienced denizens of this future world, their costumes don't reflect it. That's a very specific nitpick but I just can't believe it fell through the cracks. Even Wes Bentley's character dresses tastefully, albiet with a weird beard design, so I guess it's OK? Maybe? The food was strangely schizophrenic as well, flitting between weird futuristic pastel coloured goops and more standard, traditional fare like fish and roast chicken, although food doesn't evolve like fashion, so it's probably not a fair and equivalent bitch.

I'd like us all to admit right now that shakey-cam fight scenes are the worst kind of fight scenes. "But Last Whiny Man! They give you a sense of being in the battle! It's immersive and you feel every clang of the swords!" Hey, guess what? Go fuck yourself. It's not fucking immersive when I'm sitting in an uncomfortable chair, sipping watered down Coke Zero and getting dizzy because I can't focus on any action whatsoever. The final battle on the Cornucopia (I did like that they used that word, then designed a giant metal one... that was nice) is a particularly seizure-inducing clusterfuck. Three people in a space that couldn't be more than 5 square metres and the camera is still flying around like a housefly on PCP. I literally had no idea what was happening to who until it abruptly stops so Katniss, Peeta and obligatory-Aryan-beefcake-villain Kato can have a Mexican standoff. Then Kato, a trained killing machine from birth, who has joked about killing children earlier in the movie, gets his first piece of character development to tell us that he's dead inside? What? You spent absolutely no time establishing his character as anything but heartless killing machine, then expect us to accept that he actually feels remorse and now doesn't want to win The Hunger Games, the exact thing he's been trained to do since birth. Sorry dude, no sale.

Also, what the fuck is the point of making a "game" out of something where oustide entities can assist players? If people like players enough, they can send them shit to help them win... so wouldn't the favourites always win (assuming no freak accidents or the favourites just sucking at staying alive)? It makes no sense.

So yeah, a few glaring faults, sure, but other than everything I just mentioned, the movie is a pretty fun time. Definitely not in the "great" pile, but certainly not in the "suck" pile.