I'm ill. It fucking sucks. I'm either freezing cold or dripping sweat, my right eye is painful as shit and it hurts to swallow. My body has crapped out on me for some unknown reason and I'm thoroughly pissed off about this. I tried to drink some of my beloved "hangover juice" figuring it could cure something that wasn't a hangover, but no, the acid just stung my throat. What the fuck is up with that? Juice couldn't fix me, I'm now officially screwed.
Also, why all the fucking "juice drinks" that are available? Why would you drink anything that wasn't 100% fruit juice? When I see something advertised as containing "25% real fruit juice" I can't help but wonder what the fuck "real" fruit juice is. Not only that, but if you actually read the ingredients on those things, it's mostly water and sugar anyway! Why not just cut out the middleman and drink a coke? You're not fooling anyone and you're doing about as much damage to your pancreas anyway.
"Premium" bourbon and colas. I know people who fork out extra money to buy the bottles of Jim Beam Black and then mix it with coke anyway, or just buy the premixes. If you're gonna buy good booze, why then just mix it with coke? I've tasted said premium bourbon mixed with coke and it tastes the fucking same as every other bourbon and coke; the same as fucking coke! It gets even worse when people buy proper, big boy bourbon, the kind for sipping with a cube of ice, and then water that shit down! If you don't like the taste of liquor, you're just drinking to get drunk, which makes you about as clever as the 17-year-old tramp-stamped walking herpes dispensers that inhabit the noisiest and sleaziest of nightspots. Kudos.
Why the fuck are pubs so loud these days? I'm not talking about places where bands play, or nightclubs, I'm just talking about generic pubs that have whichever nondescript FM radio station 40-year-olds listen to playing at a good 120 dB (OK, not that loud, but shut up). Here's an excerpt from a conversation I've has with friends about a million friggin' times:
"Hey, you know what we should do? Go out for a quiet pint somewhere."
"Yeah, but where's quiet?"
"Hmmm..."
"Uuuuhhh...."
And then we spend a good 20 minutes discussing why no pubs are quiet anymore. Might juuuuust be me, but I wouldn't think that a quiet little place to go for a pint and a packet of crisps would be such a bizarre ask. Granted, there are a few nice little holes-in-the-wall in the city, but goddammit if we're trekking all the way into Perth just to have a quiet drink.
Alcohol doesn't make you feel better when you have a virus, so my weekly pub trip tonight will probably be a sober one (and suddenly, the reason why it's Tuesday Night Wrist becomes obvious) which pisses me off to no end. And we've come full circle. Fuck everyone, I hate you all. Peace.
Monday, November 29, 2010
Friday, November 26, 2010
An Orgy of Yule-Tide Joy
You know what can ruin a lovely holiday? Going to work the next day. You know what can ruin going to work after a nice holiday? Having Christmas decorations up in November. I come back after four fucking days and the retards up top have decided that it's high time to spread the Christmas cheer by way of tacky red stars hung from the counter and putting every item in stock on special. I fucking loathe Christmas time.
Well, that's a half truth. I love Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day. My liver and stomach hate it, but I friggin' love it. Ever had a drunken argument about socialism with your uncle while your mother serves you freshly cooked garlic prawns? It fucking rules. Ever drunk expensive sherry and eaten turkey wrapped in bacon while listening to jazz renditions of classic Christmas tunes? It rules. Ever gotten so out of it on good weed and better beer that you pass out for 6 hours and wake up to find all your friends sharing cake? It's about the best way to spend your time. Yep, the holiday season is a celebration of life, love, friendship and family. What I can't stand is the month's worth of disgusting consumerism pushed upon you at every turn.
People don't need to be told to buy stuff. They're gonna do it already. The snuggie is living proof of people's inability to not buy stuff. If you want to make money, just think up an idea that's slightly too dumb for words. Then market it. People are stupid, throwing their money at anything that crosses their paths. Want proof? Watch that channel that sells stuff 24-7. That stuff makes money, I shit you not. You don't need to lead this fucking horse to water to make it drink, it's fucking parched. The average person's life is so bereft of stimulation or joy that they NEED a five-second garlic peeler cum potato masher available in turquoise or lavender to fool themselves into thinking that their accounting job is really worth the stress and soul crushing monotony.
I'm not religious in ANY sense of the word. However, there's something about cashing in on people's deepest beliefs to make a quick buck that is really sickening. I know people that couldn't imagine a Christmas without presents, wrapping paper and cards that get read once and then thrown away. It's all they've known, and it's revolting. Everything is being sold to everyone ad nauseum anyway, and during the "holiday season" it gets ramped up into absolute overdrive. Christmas time is so cheap it smells bad. The whole month of December has a tacky glow that makes me want to shower until the grit comes off.
Then TV gets on board! Repeats and Christmas specials abound! I only watch TV when I'm too apathetic to do something constructive (like post on this whiny ghost town) and I find myself so frustrated that push-ups start to look like a fun way to spend the time. It's almost as if it's a massive conspiracy to get us so antsy that we'll all go to the shopping centres to purchase gifts that people don't want to give to people we don't like. In fact, that's exactly what it is. Fuck TV executives, heads of companies and basically every salesman ever. Fuck Christmas time.
I'm going to buy lots of gifts this year. I'm lazy, hypocritical and ultimately unimaginative. But! I'm not gonna be happy about it. If I was a better man, I'd write everyone I care about a heartfelt note telling them exactly why, or write and record them a little piece of music, or something nice and unique. But it's not gonna happen, so suck it up. Everyone who thinks I'm a bad person because of this, post and let me know, I need some hatred.
Well, that's a half truth. I love Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day. My liver and stomach hate it, but I friggin' love it. Ever had a drunken argument about socialism with your uncle while your mother serves you freshly cooked garlic prawns? It fucking rules. Ever drunk expensive sherry and eaten turkey wrapped in bacon while listening to jazz renditions of classic Christmas tunes? It rules. Ever gotten so out of it on good weed and better beer that you pass out for 6 hours and wake up to find all your friends sharing cake? It's about the best way to spend your time. Yep, the holiday season is a celebration of life, love, friendship and family. What I can't stand is the month's worth of disgusting consumerism pushed upon you at every turn.
People don't need to be told to buy stuff. They're gonna do it already. The snuggie is living proof of people's inability to not buy stuff. If you want to make money, just think up an idea that's slightly too dumb for words. Then market it. People are stupid, throwing their money at anything that crosses their paths. Want proof? Watch that channel that sells stuff 24-7. That stuff makes money, I shit you not. You don't need to lead this fucking horse to water to make it drink, it's fucking parched. The average person's life is so bereft of stimulation or joy that they NEED a five-second garlic peeler cum potato masher available in turquoise or lavender to fool themselves into thinking that their accounting job is really worth the stress and soul crushing monotony.
I'm not religious in ANY sense of the word. However, there's something about cashing in on people's deepest beliefs to make a quick buck that is really sickening. I know people that couldn't imagine a Christmas without presents, wrapping paper and cards that get read once and then thrown away. It's all they've known, and it's revolting. Everything is being sold to everyone ad nauseum anyway, and during the "holiday season" it gets ramped up into absolute overdrive. Christmas time is so cheap it smells bad. The whole month of December has a tacky glow that makes me want to shower until the grit comes off.
Then TV gets on board! Repeats and Christmas specials abound! I only watch TV when I'm too apathetic to do something constructive (like post on this whiny ghost town) and I find myself so frustrated that push-ups start to look like a fun way to spend the time. It's almost as if it's a massive conspiracy to get us so antsy that we'll all go to the shopping centres to purchase gifts that people don't want to give to people we don't like. In fact, that's exactly what it is. Fuck TV executives, heads of companies and basically every salesman ever. Fuck Christmas time.
I'm going to buy lots of gifts this year. I'm lazy, hypocritical and ultimately unimaginative. But! I'm not gonna be happy about it. If I was a better man, I'd write everyone I care about a heartfelt note telling them exactly why, or write and record them a little piece of music, or something nice and unique. But it's not gonna happen, so suck it up. Everyone who thinks I'm a bad person because of this, post and let me know, I need some hatred.
Saturday, November 20, 2010
Too Fuck to Drunk
Hello all, post is early this week because I'm away this coming Tuesday. If you can, just imagine this was posted on Tuesday the 23rd.
An article I saw in the Weekend West yesterday, the friggin' front page article, was about a "sexting" scandal in a public school here in Perth. Apparently a fourteen year old kid has been charged with possession of child pornography because he took the video from his phone and put it on his home computer. I just want to tell you all, this article highlights everything that's fucked up about the world. It was a condensed synopsis of retarded behaviour.
So, the story starts thusly: A bunch of teenagers, aged 14 to 16, are throwing a party, wherein a 14 year old girl in invited, supplied with alcohol and then filmed performing sex acts. Said footage is then distributed via mobile phones, before our jailbird protagonist uploaded onto his computer and onto the net, thereby getting caught possessing and distributing child pornography. A comment from the principal of the school where they all attend said the incident was very embarrassing or something similarly non-committal.
First of all, why the hell weren't all the little bastards in the film expelled, charged, sent to juvie, whatever? You have them on film committing a felony. Apparently there's a law that says something along the lines of "just having someone on film doing something isn't really proof of anything" and while I'll concede that yes, film can be faked, a grainy, low quality telephone video which still explicitly and most definitely depicts a felony might be at least very strong evidence? Especially when you know who filmed it using what.
Secondly, what the fuck is wrong with kids these days? Jesus-tapdancing-Christ, am I so out of it that I've forgotten what high school was like? I hear stories of students fighting teachers, getting drunk and filming each other having sex and I can't help but think "do you really think your lives are that special?" Reality television and vapid trash magazines celebrate fame and excess and you suddenly have retards wanting to grow up to be just like the folks on Jersey Shore or whatever mind poison MTV is pumping out and they think that notoriety and self-congratulation are more important than say, learning a skill or talent or not becoming a completely useless, self-obsessed douchebag who contributes nothing to society as a whole except bringing the collective average IQ down a few points! AAAAARGH! I want to tell everybody aged 12-17 out there: It's neither funny nor impressive that you drunk two vodka cruisers then performed oral sex on someone who's name you aren't exactly sure of. In big-person world, that makes you an unpleasant skank who people avoid. If you think anything you've done in high-school, short of getting into a course or apprenticeship, or getting a qualification (you know, those things you should be doing), is in any way important, funny, interesting or noteworthy, you're most certainly wrong. Nobody cares; you have to work to make people care.
It pains me to see this kind of thing happen, it really does. It pains me, not only because there are young lives here that are going to be forever changed but also because, somehow, there is some social pressure to do shit like that. You kind of have to question the stupidity of a lot of different parties when a series of events culminates in people thinking this is OK. And I know it isn't the average high school student doing all this retarded stuff, but you have to wonder if these are just extreme cases of what's happening anyway. Having former teachers tell me that students are getting worse is kinda worrying, I'd much rather have functional bridges than teenage sex videos. Just throwing it out there.
P.S: If there exists a study comparing teen pregnancy rates, drug use, underage sex and drinking with national test scores which take into account the way schooling has changed over the years, I'd love to read it. I don't think teaching was better with the cane and rote learning, quite the opposite in fact. However, there is a difference between effective teaching and just coddling little bastards, and I'd like to see if the numbers reflect this.
An article I saw in the Weekend West yesterday, the friggin' front page article, was about a "sexting" scandal in a public school here in Perth. Apparently a fourteen year old kid has been charged with possession of child pornography because he took the video from his phone and put it on his home computer. I just want to tell you all, this article highlights everything that's fucked up about the world. It was a condensed synopsis of retarded behaviour.
So, the story starts thusly: A bunch of teenagers, aged 14 to 16, are throwing a party, wherein a 14 year old girl in invited, supplied with alcohol and then filmed performing sex acts. Said footage is then distributed via mobile phones, before our jailbird protagonist uploaded onto his computer and onto the net, thereby getting caught possessing and distributing child pornography. A comment from the principal of the school where they all attend said the incident was very embarrassing or something similarly non-committal.
First of all, why the hell weren't all the little bastards in the film expelled, charged, sent to juvie, whatever? You have them on film committing a felony. Apparently there's a law that says something along the lines of "just having someone on film doing something isn't really proof of anything" and while I'll concede that yes, film can be faked, a grainy, low quality telephone video which still explicitly and most definitely depicts a felony might be at least very strong evidence? Especially when you know who filmed it using what.
Secondly, what the fuck is wrong with kids these days? Jesus-tapdancing-Christ, am I so out of it that I've forgotten what high school was like? I hear stories of students fighting teachers, getting drunk and filming each other having sex and I can't help but think "do you really think your lives are that special?" Reality television and vapid trash magazines celebrate fame and excess and you suddenly have retards wanting to grow up to be just like the folks on Jersey Shore or whatever mind poison MTV is pumping out and they think that notoriety and self-congratulation are more important than say, learning a skill or talent or not becoming a completely useless, self-obsessed douchebag who contributes nothing to society as a whole except bringing the collective average IQ down a few points! AAAAARGH! I want to tell everybody aged 12-17 out there: It's neither funny nor impressive that you drunk two vodka cruisers then performed oral sex on someone who's name you aren't exactly sure of. In big-person world, that makes you an unpleasant skank who people avoid. If you think anything you've done in high-school, short of getting into a course or apprenticeship, or getting a qualification (you know, those things you should be doing), is in any way important, funny, interesting or noteworthy, you're most certainly wrong. Nobody cares; you have to work to make people care.
It pains me to see this kind of thing happen, it really does. It pains me, not only because there are young lives here that are going to be forever changed but also because, somehow, there is some social pressure to do shit like that. You kind of have to question the stupidity of a lot of different parties when a series of events culminates in people thinking this is OK. And I know it isn't the average high school student doing all this retarded stuff, but you have to wonder if these are just extreme cases of what's happening anyway. Having former teachers tell me that students are getting worse is kinda worrying, I'd much rather have functional bridges than teenage sex videos. Just throwing it out there.
P.S: If there exists a study comparing teen pregnancy rates, drug use, underage sex and drinking with national test scores which take into account the way schooling has changed over the years, I'd love to read it. I don't think teaching was better with the cane and rote learning, quite the opposite in fact. However, there is a difference between effective teaching and just coddling little bastards, and I'd like to see if the numbers reflect this.
Monday, November 15, 2010
The Last Whiny Man Presents: My Opinion is Different to the Widely Held One!
There are too many bands, not all of them good. In fact, that sentence could just read "there are too many bad bands". You turn on a commercial radio station and it's a veritable all-you-can-eat buffet of banality and vapidity. Then there are good bands, who generally aren't on the radio and are interesting and for winners. However, I've observed an interesting phenomenon recently; bands that are somehow both. Well, not really both, but bands that seem to get folks throwing steaming hot globs of love on them while I sit there, hemorrhaging indifference. Without further ado, here is the comprehensive (read: thrown together this morning based on whatever the hell I was thinking at the time) list of bands that get more love than they deserve.
Foo Fighters: I do not get why these guys are so very very loved amongst rock fans. I understand and accept that Dave Grohl is a nice guy, and he was in Nirvana and all that crap, but judging them on their music alone (the way you should judge any band) I don't see what all the fuss is. People go absolutely spastic over them, but they're just so... generic. They're the dictionary definition of a generic rock band. The weird thing is, it's almost as if they've gone out of their way to stay generic with the times. When they started they were just another post-grunge band cashing in on the death of Kurt Cobain (more cynically than most, I might add) and from there they've slowly de-evolved with the times, touching on all flavours of generic. Maybe that's their appeal, being so inoffensive and bland. But if that's the case... *shudder*
Lamb of God: Describing LoG as "pure American metal" is a pretty harsh thing to do, not for them but for every other metal band in America. It must suck to be associated with them. The sound of Lamb of God could very accurately be described as "what your mum thinks metal is". Chuggity-chug riffs, heavy kick drum and growly vocals are the foundation of metal, I'll give you that, but without anything on top of the foundations, you've just got a big empty space with a bunch of cement in there. And that's what Lamb of God are, musically. The unadorned foundations of a genre without anything on top to make it at all interesting. Lamb of God are the "I'll listen to it if it's on" band for metalheads, inoffensive background chugging while you wait for someone good to play.
The Arcade Fire: For a while there, these guys were indie royalty. Every indie fan I knew loved these guys. I figured to myself, "better see what the fuss is about" and god fucking dammit, I've never been so bored by so many instruments. There's like ten of them, and they're all swapping instruments and playing mandolins and hurdy-gurdies and violins and it should be awesome, but it's just not. No amount of instruments can really hide three boring chords and a samey vocal melody, but good effort for trying, guys. Take a leaf out of the book of Pulp: Common People has 2 chords (count 'em!) and it's about fifty million times more exciting than anything you could do. There's more to music than lots of instruments playing the same thing, and one day you'll come to realise that.
So, that's only three bands, but I have to keep some material in reserve for future issues (read: I ran out of ideas then got bored) so that'll have to do for now. The lesson here is; everyone is wrong but me. Carry that wisdom with you for the next time you get into some crappy band.
Foo Fighters: I do not get why these guys are so very very loved amongst rock fans. I understand and accept that Dave Grohl is a nice guy, and he was in Nirvana and all that crap, but judging them on their music alone (the way you should judge any band) I don't see what all the fuss is. People go absolutely spastic over them, but they're just so... generic. They're the dictionary definition of a generic rock band. The weird thing is, it's almost as if they've gone out of their way to stay generic with the times. When they started they were just another post-grunge band cashing in on the death of Kurt Cobain (more cynically than most, I might add) and from there they've slowly de-evolved with the times, touching on all flavours of generic. Maybe that's their appeal, being so inoffensive and bland. But if that's the case... *shudder*
Lamb of God: Describing LoG as "pure American metal" is a pretty harsh thing to do, not for them but for every other metal band in America. It must suck to be associated with them. The sound of Lamb of God could very accurately be described as "what your mum thinks metal is". Chuggity-chug riffs, heavy kick drum and growly vocals are the foundation of metal, I'll give you that, but without anything on top of the foundations, you've just got a big empty space with a bunch of cement in there. And that's what Lamb of God are, musically. The unadorned foundations of a genre without anything on top to make it at all interesting. Lamb of God are the "I'll listen to it if it's on" band for metalheads, inoffensive background chugging while you wait for someone good to play.
The Arcade Fire: For a while there, these guys were indie royalty. Every indie fan I knew loved these guys. I figured to myself, "better see what the fuss is about" and god fucking dammit, I've never been so bored by so many instruments. There's like ten of them, and they're all swapping instruments and playing mandolins and hurdy-gurdies and violins and it should be awesome, but it's just not. No amount of instruments can really hide three boring chords and a samey vocal melody, but good effort for trying, guys. Take a leaf out of the book of Pulp: Common People has 2 chords (count 'em!) and it's about fifty million times more exciting than anything you could do. There's more to music than lots of instruments playing the same thing, and one day you'll come to realise that.
So, that's only three bands, but I have to keep some material in reserve for future issues (read: I ran out of ideas then got bored) so that'll have to do for now. The lesson here is; everyone is wrong but me. Carry that wisdom with you for the next time you get into some crappy band.
Monday, November 8, 2010
The Worst Kinds of People
Seriously, what the fuck happens to people when they age beyond forty? Do their brains just go "nope, that's it for me" and take an extended break until death? That has to be it, it's the only explanation I can think of. How fucking stupid do you have to be, to go out wearing an unflattering shirt showing some tourist rat-hole you went to back in the nineties and a blank look on your face and wrestle with a fucking EFTPOS machine for a good ten minutes because you can't tell the difference between the cancel button and the credit button. Seriously, all forty year olds (notable exceptions are legends like Richard Dawkins and the mighty men of his ilk) have this dumbfounded expression permanently plastered on their mug, as if the entire world is this great, mystifying construct put there to confuse and irritate them. Here's the thing, shithead, the world ain't that tricky, you're just a retard.
Anyone who goes on about the "good old days" should be shot. In the face. Life wasn't better in the "good old days" you retard, you had a tiny TV with a good 3 channels, there was no such thing as the internet and university was only for rich folks. If someone can look you in the eye and tell you, straight faced, that life was easier or better "back in the day" you should slap the rose tinted glasses right off their faces. Technology rules, get on board.
Then you get the moral argument. "Kids these days" or some crap along those lines. Hey, you know what? My generation wasn't responsible for slavery, apartheid, world war two, vietnam, the state of the environment, economy or education system. That was you fuckers. This is your legacy to the next generation, a completely fucked planet with more problems than we know what to do with. Thank the scientists and inventors behind computers, microprocessors and basically all the information technology advances which give us a bit of a fighting chance to save the planet from itself.
Fuck baby boomers. Terrible fucking people. All that baggage from your parents dumped on us as you greedily consumed all you could leaving a bastard platter of crises for the next generation to solve. So if you see a baby boomer slowing down the line at a convenience store, bitching about computers, complaining about the morally bankrupt young people or spouting some ridiculous crap about how life was easier in the 60s, kill them. I'm encouraging you to pick up a blunt instrument and bludgeon to death any baby boomer who isn't actively trying to undo the twisted legacy they're leaving. I'm advocating murder here, people, get murderin'! I fucking HATE baby boomers.
Anyone who goes on about the "good old days" should be shot. In the face. Life wasn't better in the "good old days" you retard, you had a tiny TV with a good 3 channels, there was no such thing as the internet and university was only for rich folks. If someone can look you in the eye and tell you, straight faced, that life was easier or better "back in the day" you should slap the rose tinted glasses right off their faces. Technology rules, get on board.
Then you get the moral argument. "Kids these days" or some crap along those lines. Hey, you know what? My generation wasn't responsible for slavery, apartheid, world war two, vietnam, the state of the environment, economy or education system. That was you fuckers. This is your legacy to the next generation, a completely fucked planet with more problems than we know what to do with. Thank the scientists and inventors behind computers, microprocessors and basically all the information technology advances which give us a bit of a fighting chance to save the planet from itself.
Fuck baby boomers. Terrible fucking people. All that baggage from your parents dumped on us as you greedily consumed all you could leaving a bastard platter of crises for the next generation to solve. So if you see a baby boomer slowing down the line at a convenience store, bitching about computers, complaining about the morally bankrupt young people or spouting some ridiculous crap about how life was easier in the 60s, kill them. I'm encouraging you to pick up a blunt instrument and bludgeon to death any baby boomer who isn't actively trying to undo the twisted legacy they're leaving. I'm advocating murder here, people, get murderin'! I fucking HATE baby boomers.
Friday, November 5, 2010
I'm On Facebook Right Now, As We Speak!
Saw The Social network last night. The fact that the events that caused Mark Zuckerberg to be the world's youngest billionaire were set in motion by drunken, angry blogging aside, I really enjoyed it. As I quoted to my dear friend Fen after the movie: "Huh... that didn't suck. It actually... really didn't suck." There are a fair few lessons in that film that we can all take to heart.
1) No project is too big if you're passionate and willing to put the work in. I know this sounds like "reach for the stars" or something similarly hippie bullshit, but it's really closer to "fuck all those who tell you that you can't." If you have an idea and you want to make it big, just tell every naysayer to fuck off until you're rich.
2) Read the fine print. Eduardo Saverin got well and truly shafted, both in the film and in real life, because he didn't read the fine print of a contract he signed. How you can sue someone after the events described in a contract that you signed come to pass is a bit of a mystery to me, but it doesn't take away from the fact that it could have all been avoided if he had read the writing at the bottom.
3) Remember who your useful friends are. Sean Parker may have been charismatic person, but he was ultimately an unreliable, impulsive idealist who brought out conflict in Zuckerberg and Saverin. There's nothing wrong with idealism, but the paranoid rantings of a coke-head getting caught with underage girls probably doesn't help the company.
4) If ever you're bored, or a chick breaks up with you, or you're drunk, or whatever, start a blog. There is absolutely nothing bad that can come out of ranting impulsively on a permanent medium.
All wonderful lessons that we can apply to our own lives, but the biggest lesson, without a single drop of doubt in my mind, doesn't come from the film, but the people that watch it and then say stuff like "woooooooooow, it really changes the way you look at facebook." Uuuuhh... does it? It was invented as a platform to easily communicate with people you'd only just met, be able to recognise if someone was available, interested or taken and to trawl for booty. That's really it. If you're using it for any more than that, maybe we should have a talk, because you're clearly doing it wrong.
I feel no attachment to facebook beyond convenience. I don't hate the folks I have on there (maybe "friends" is a bit rich, but whatever) and it's a great way to share inane crap. The ease and efficiency of setting up an event and just inviting all the douches you want there without the use of a telephone is great, saves me precious seconds that I could use to get angry. However, if you are one of those people who feel that they couldn't live without facebook (probably the same people that said that about their mobile phones in high school), you've taken it a step to far. It's there to streamline life, not enrich it. It's meant to close the gaps between socialising, not replace it. If social networking was a drug, you'd all be hopeless junkies on the street because you couldn't tell the difference between use and abuse.
If you're shocked that facebook was set up as a ploy to ensnare users so the founders could create big bucks from advertising, grow a brain. EVERYTHING is exactly what I just described. I wouldn't be surprised if advertising executives were clamouring to fellate Mr. Zuckerberg for the rights to advertise on the site. It's so brilliant I wish I'd learned how to program. To everyone who feels an emotional attachment to a virtual pin-up board that only your friends can see, you're an idiot. A really lame idiot at that. Which brings me to lesson number five:
In the movie of life, you aren't the main character by sitting on facebook sending out a status along the lines of "Samantha Dipshit is a little hungry, KFC time wooo!" You're that extra who's on screen for about 3 seconds that no-one noticed. Take a lesson from the bald guy at Harvard in the movie; people are inventing shit all the time. Just think up a new big project. Maybe you're current big project is a whiny blog. But that's OK! Don't fret, but don't rest on your laurels. Keep thinking and imagining and trying new ideas and see what happens. You might die aged 52 working at a supermarket. Or you might become a billionaire. Whatever works. Wait, shit, that did become "reach for the stars." Fuck it, it doesn't matter, watch The Social Network, absorb its wisdom.
1) No project is too big if you're passionate and willing to put the work in. I know this sounds like "reach for the stars" or something similarly hippie bullshit, but it's really closer to "fuck all those who tell you that you can't." If you have an idea and you want to make it big, just tell every naysayer to fuck off until you're rich.
2) Read the fine print. Eduardo Saverin got well and truly shafted, both in the film and in real life, because he didn't read the fine print of a contract he signed. How you can sue someone after the events described in a contract that you signed come to pass is a bit of a mystery to me, but it doesn't take away from the fact that it could have all been avoided if he had read the writing at the bottom.
3) Remember who your useful friends are. Sean Parker may have been charismatic person, but he was ultimately an unreliable, impulsive idealist who brought out conflict in Zuckerberg and Saverin. There's nothing wrong with idealism, but the paranoid rantings of a coke-head getting caught with underage girls probably doesn't help the company.
4) If ever you're bored, or a chick breaks up with you, or you're drunk, or whatever, start a blog. There is absolutely nothing bad that can come out of ranting impulsively on a permanent medium.
All wonderful lessons that we can apply to our own lives, but the biggest lesson, without a single drop of doubt in my mind, doesn't come from the film, but the people that watch it and then say stuff like "woooooooooow, it really changes the way you look at facebook." Uuuuhh... does it? It was invented as a platform to easily communicate with people you'd only just met, be able to recognise if someone was available, interested or taken and to trawl for booty. That's really it. If you're using it for any more than that, maybe we should have a talk, because you're clearly doing it wrong.
I feel no attachment to facebook beyond convenience. I don't hate the folks I have on there (maybe "friends" is a bit rich, but whatever) and it's a great way to share inane crap. The ease and efficiency of setting up an event and just inviting all the douches you want there without the use of a telephone is great, saves me precious seconds that I could use to get angry. However, if you are one of those people who feel that they couldn't live without facebook (probably the same people that said that about their mobile phones in high school), you've taken it a step to far. It's there to streamline life, not enrich it. It's meant to close the gaps between socialising, not replace it. If social networking was a drug, you'd all be hopeless junkies on the street because you couldn't tell the difference between use and abuse.
If you're shocked that facebook was set up as a ploy to ensnare users so the founders could create big bucks from advertising, grow a brain. EVERYTHING is exactly what I just described. I wouldn't be surprised if advertising executives were clamouring to fellate Mr. Zuckerberg for the rights to advertise on the site. It's so brilliant I wish I'd learned how to program. To everyone who feels an emotional attachment to a virtual pin-up board that only your friends can see, you're an idiot. A really lame idiot at that. Which brings me to lesson number five:
In the movie of life, you aren't the main character by sitting on facebook sending out a status along the lines of "Samantha Dipshit is a little hungry, KFC time wooo!" You're that extra who's on screen for about 3 seconds that no-one noticed. Take a lesson from the bald guy at Harvard in the movie; people are inventing shit all the time. Just think up a new big project. Maybe you're current big project is a whiny blog. But that's OK! Don't fret, but don't rest on your laurels. Keep thinking and imagining and trying new ideas and see what happens. You might die aged 52 working at a supermarket. Or you might become a billionaire. Whatever works. Wait, shit, that did become "reach for the stars." Fuck it, it doesn't matter, watch The Social Network, absorb its wisdom.
Monday, November 1, 2010
Whoops, You Got Me!
Arguments between creationists and evolutionists reach new levels of dumb sometimes, watching two people who know nothing about anything yell at each other. Sometimes they're actually interesting arguments, but people tend to get angry or upset about the topic so proper discussion becomes very difficult. There does seem to be one consistent theme throughout these "discussions" though, and that is this: No-one involved is a fucking expert.
I wholeheartedly endorse discussion between regular people; it shows you have a brain cell. What I hate, with a fiery passion that threatens to consume almost every single person in Uganda, is when people quote facts that they plucked from a book or website with a sense of airy superiority, as if they'd stumbled upon the argument to end all arguments and only they are privy to its brilliance. You know what, shithead? There's a good chance we've heard it before.
I bet you think you're so fucking smart that you could reference the 2nd law of thermodynamics, or the observed instances of speciation, or the differences between micro-evolution and macro-evolution, or the difference between evolution and the origin of life. Yeah, I don't give a shit what side you're on, if you argue it stupidly, you're an idiot. If you think that your brilliant delivery of an idea that had been widely published as much as decades previous was enough to change people's deeply entrenched worldviews, you've got some serious ego problems, kid.
I can assure you, I've heard a lot of arguments about the origins of life and the biological and chemical processes that brought life to this point. I've given up trying to educate and discuss with people, because people think that education is a democratic competition. I've got news for you, son, it isn't. Reality isn't democratic and it doesn't give two shits about your feelings, it's arguable whether or not reality could even be defined to "exist". Reality is going to be the way it is regardless of how you phrase your argument. Cut the semantics and cut the emotional bullshit.
The world is a big, angry, scary, fucked up beautiful place. I can't remember the last time I read an article about science or philosophy and didn't take a moment to reflect on the beauty of the world. I don't care how you were raised, what epiphanies you've had, what you've read or what lectures you've listened to. I don't give a shit about any of your subjective, flawed and ultimately unreliable experience. What I give a shit about is looking at this brilliant world, this amazing universe we inhabit and finding out exactly how it works. If I was a more rigorous man I would be a scientist, so I could peek behind the veil of reality and see the cogs working. What I am is an amateur writer, a lazy journalism student and an acolyte of the art of bullshit detection. I understand semantics, I understand word games.
Stop competing over your worldviews, you retards. Stop trying to convince people you're right and convince yourself. I mean really convince yourself. Don't believe anything you hear, at all, ever. Hold everything up to the light of skepticism and be prepared to feel cold, alone, small, insignificant and scared. Be prepared to doubt, to question and to be unsure about everything you do and see and hear. I've had so many people try to convince me of THIS or THAT or even THOSE that I've lost track, and the only conclusion I can reach is that chemicals self replicate, electrons fire and we are aware of this. I'm aware that perceptions have been tabulated, behaviours predicted and laws and theories formed. If you want to argue about that, be my guest.
Life is nonsensical, unfair and fleeting, and that's the way it's gonna stay. The least you can do is try and figure that shit out before awareness ceases. Get on board.
I wholeheartedly endorse discussion between regular people; it shows you have a brain cell. What I hate, with a fiery passion that threatens to consume almost every single person in Uganda, is when people quote facts that they plucked from a book or website with a sense of airy superiority, as if they'd stumbled upon the argument to end all arguments and only they are privy to its brilliance. You know what, shithead? There's a good chance we've heard it before.
I bet you think you're so fucking smart that you could reference the 2nd law of thermodynamics, or the observed instances of speciation, or the differences between micro-evolution and macro-evolution, or the difference between evolution and the origin of life. Yeah, I don't give a shit what side you're on, if you argue it stupidly, you're an idiot. If you think that your brilliant delivery of an idea that had been widely published as much as decades previous was enough to change people's deeply entrenched worldviews, you've got some serious ego problems, kid.
I can assure you, I've heard a lot of arguments about the origins of life and the biological and chemical processes that brought life to this point. I've given up trying to educate and discuss with people, because people think that education is a democratic competition. I've got news for you, son, it isn't. Reality isn't democratic and it doesn't give two shits about your feelings, it's arguable whether or not reality could even be defined to "exist". Reality is going to be the way it is regardless of how you phrase your argument. Cut the semantics and cut the emotional bullshit.
The world is a big, angry, scary, fucked up beautiful place. I can't remember the last time I read an article about science or philosophy and didn't take a moment to reflect on the beauty of the world. I don't care how you were raised, what epiphanies you've had, what you've read or what lectures you've listened to. I don't give a shit about any of your subjective, flawed and ultimately unreliable experience. What I give a shit about is looking at this brilliant world, this amazing universe we inhabit and finding out exactly how it works. If I was a more rigorous man I would be a scientist, so I could peek behind the veil of reality and see the cogs working. What I am is an amateur writer, a lazy journalism student and an acolyte of the art of bullshit detection. I understand semantics, I understand word games.
Stop competing over your worldviews, you retards. Stop trying to convince people you're right and convince yourself. I mean really convince yourself. Don't believe anything you hear, at all, ever. Hold everything up to the light of skepticism and be prepared to feel cold, alone, small, insignificant and scared. Be prepared to doubt, to question and to be unsure about everything you do and see and hear. I've had so many people try to convince me of THIS or THAT or even THOSE that I've lost track, and the only conclusion I can reach is that chemicals self replicate, electrons fire and we are aware of this. I'm aware that perceptions have been tabulated, behaviours predicted and laws and theories formed. If you want to argue about that, be my guest.
Life is nonsensical, unfair and fleeting, and that's the way it's gonna stay. The least you can do is try and figure that shit out before awareness ceases. Get on board.
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