Because every sign of race leads to King.
Because every sign of totalitarianism leads to Orwell.
Because every sign of love leads to Romeo.
Because every sign of love leads to Juliet.
Because every sign of peace leads to God.
Because every sign of sin leads to Satan.
Because every sign of battle leads to Tzu.
Because every sign of intelligence leads to Einstein.
Because every sign of rhyme leads to Seuss.
Because every sign of poetry leads to Shakespeare. (It's wrong anyway.)
Because every sign of fear leads to Roosevelt. (It's wrong anyway.)
Because every sign of hate leads to Gandhi. (It's wrong anyway.)
Because every sign of determination leads to Edison. (It's wrong anyway.)
Because every sign of socialism leads to Hitler. (It's wrong anyway.)
Because every sign of originality...
Leads to Frost.
Well aren't you wrong and an idiot for saying that?
Original thoughts don't exist because everybody is so tempted to quote, to reference, to cite, to prove their vast knowledge of all things that we had hammered into our brains before the age of 18.
And not a single person cares.
And not a single university discourages it.
Wednesday, October 16, 2013
Saturday, October 12, 2013
Marketing
For those that aren't aware, I record music occasionally. Most of it is orchestral piano/violin music (with some other added goodies from guests).
Recently I passed out some samples of my upcoming album (WIP) to my friends and family to see what everybody thought. My sister Serena, step-brother Sebastian and best friends Nick and Mykala told me I should start marketing my music; selling the albums on iTunes, looking for advertisement, etc.
Being a 20 year old college student, this is attractive at first thought. I could use extra money for tuition, a car, an apartment, food, clothes, music equipment, books, you name it.
But I always wonder about marketing. My music is good. Whether or not it's good enough to make money and fame is a different question, but it's an irrelevant question.
I don't want it to be anyway.
The world needs music as much as it needs literature in the form of a physical book (you'll find I'm avidly opposed to eBooks) or as much as it needs grass. If I can give the world music without it costing a cent, then I feel every obligation to do so.
Recently I passed out some samples of my upcoming album (WIP) to my friends and family to see what everybody thought. My sister Serena, step-brother Sebastian and best friends Nick and Mykala told me I should start marketing my music; selling the albums on iTunes, looking for advertisement, etc.
Being a 20 year old college student, this is attractive at first thought. I could use extra money for tuition, a car, an apartment, food, clothes, music equipment, books, you name it.
But I always wonder about marketing. My music is good. Whether or not it's good enough to make money and fame is a different question, but it's an irrelevant question.
I don't want it to be anyway.
The world needs music as much as it needs literature in the form of a physical book (you'll find I'm avidly opposed to eBooks) or as much as it needs grass. If I can give the world music without it costing a cent, then I feel every obligation to do so.
Saturday, October 5, 2013
Wow You're a Hypocrite
I'm talking to myself in the title.
I had a dream last night, where a young girl (as I supposed by their voice) without a face or any discernible features aside from a single hole in the center of her face appeared to me. She called herself "Ulaen".
We sat in a cafeteria eating lunch as the janitorial staff cleaned the tables and prepared for the next rush, which would be at dinner time. Ulaen looked (I think) off into a lounge area and watched one of the women wipe a table clean. I looked too, but then she asked me something:
"Why is that woman talking to herself?"
I noticed that indeed, the woman was talking to herself. From her face, I could tell she most likely had Down's Syndrome.
"I think she's mentally impaired."
"What makes you say that?" she asked, seeming surprised at my assumption.
"Well, based on the fact that she's talking to herself, and the way her face is sort of shrunken in, which is typical of people who have Down's."
Ulaen tilted her head. I didn't know I was in for an interesting conversation.
"Don't you talk to yourself?"
"Well, yeah, I think all people do sometimes, but not extensively or in public."
"So, based on the fact that she looks different, and because she talks to herself with less restraint than you do, you think she's mentally deficient?"
"Well," I sighed, "I get what you're saying, but there are other characteristics that go with it. Sometimes they can only perform simple tasks, and sometimes they're only really capable of comprehending complex thoughts."
Ulaen made a noise that sounded like a smirk.
"So, because she looks different, talks to herself without restraint, and thinks in a different way, she's mentally impaired. That's what you're saying?"
I looked at her with regret. "Okay, fine, you've made your point."
But she didn't. I got up to throw my trash, waving for Ulaen to follow, but she didn't. She stayed at the table and didn't move. Soon, the woman we were having our discussion about was at our table, cleaning it.
Ulaen turned to her, "Hello, how are you ma'am?"
"I'm doing very well, thank you. How are you?" the woman replied.
"Great, thank you." Ulaen replied with a smile.
She walked away and led me out of the food court. "She doesn't seem mentally deficient."
We continued outside into a plaza, but she still wasn't done. She began waving to random people, saying the same general thing each time: "Hello, how are you?" "Hi, how are you doing?"
Nobody gave her a response.
"Look, Ulaen," I said, feeling as though I hadn't explained properly, "there are things anatomically that would explain what I'm trying to tell you about that woman, but I just don't know enough about it to explain it in a way you would understand."
"So," Ulaen replied, "what you have just told me is that even though you don't know enough about her supposed ailment to make a proper, objective judgment, you have deemed her to be 'mentally impaired' because she looks different, thinks different, and talks to herself without restraint."
My eyes cast down.
"Do other people make the same prejudgments based on the same factors?"
They do Ulaen. They do.
I had a dream last night, where a young girl (as I supposed by their voice) without a face or any discernible features aside from a single hole in the center of her face appeared to me. She called herself "Ulaen".
We sat in a cafeteria eating lunch as the janitorial staff cleaned the tables and prepared for the next rush, which would be at dinner time. Ulaen looked (I think) off into a lounge area and watched one of the women wipe a table clean. I looked too, but then she asked me something:
"Why is that woman talking to herself?"
I noticed that indeed, the woman was talking to herself. From her face, I could tell she most likely had Down's Syndrome.
"I think she's mentally impaired."
"What makes you say that?" she asked, seeming surprised at my assumption.
"Well, based on the fact that she's talking to herself, and the way her face is sort of shrunken in, which is typical of people who have Down's."
Ulaen tilted her head. I didn't know I was in for an interesting conversation.
"Don't you talk to yourself?"
"Well, yeah, I think all people do sometimes, but not extensively or in public."
"So, based on the fact that she looks different, and because she talks to herself with less restraint than you do, you think she's mentally deficient?"
"Well," I sighed, "I get what you're saying, but there are other characteristics that go with it. Sometimes they can only perform simple tasks, and sometimes they're only really capable of comprehending complex thoughts."
Ulaen made a noise that sounded like a smirk.
"So, because she looks different, talks to herself without restraint, and thinks in a different way, she's mentally impaired. That's what you're saying?"
I looked at her with regret. "Okay, fine, you've made your point."
But she didn't. I got up to throw my trash, waving for Ulaen to follow, but she didn't. She stayed at the table and didn't move. Soon, the woman we were having our discussion about was at our table, cleaning it.
Ulaen turned to her, "Hello, how are you ma'am?"
"I'm doing very well, thank you. How are you?" the woman replied.
"Great, thank you." Ulaen replied with a smile.
She walked away and led me out of the food court. "She doesn't seem mentally deficient."
We continued outside into a plaza, but she still wasn't done. She began waving to random people, saying the same general thing each time: "Hello, how are you?" "Hi, how are you doing?"
Nobody gave her a response.
"Look, Ulaen," I said, feeling as though I hadn't explained properly, "there are things anatomically that would explain what I'm trying to tell you about that woman, but I just don't know enough about it to explain it in a way you would understand."
"So," Ulaen replied, "what you have just told me is that even though you don't know enough about her supposed ailment to make a proper, objective judgment, you have deemed her to be 'mentally impaired' because she looks different, thinks different, and talks to herself without restraint."
My eyes cast down.
"Do other people make the same prejudgments based on the same factors?"
They do Ulaen. They do.
Thursday, September 19, 2013
Journal Entry 12/3/2008 (Dad's Work)
12/3/2008
One thing that I always can rely on when testing social experiments in person is the unknowing compliance of my wife.
As I sat next to her in the hair salon today, both of us sitting in the chairs with those ridiculous metal domes (but only she was getting her hair done), I was reading the newspaper and saw a story about kids in a local middle school getting into a fight over race. The story painted the white child as instigating the black child, because the former mentioned in no specified context that the latter was, in fact, black. Whether or not this was grounds for the black child to punch the while child is another discussion entirely, but that's not what I want to say.
With the recent election of Barack Obama, I've heard constantly on the news that now we live in a "post-racial America". From the moment they began to say that, I already knew it was quite a load. The oppression still exists, the institutions are still strong, the only difference is that now, we have a mixed-race president. The other things didn't suddenly go away, and it seems to me that the people stating that this is evidence of a "post-racial America" are doing nothing but supplying more ammunition for microinvalidation.
I decided, however, that this was obvious, and I'd much rather make a more obvious point. I showed the article to my wife, who was now preparing to lower the dome, and let her look over it. After she finished, I asked her, "What do you make of this?"
She scanned over it again, then passed the paper back to me and said "Looks don't matter".
The irony almost made me sick, and the woman who was sitting next to my wife at the time gave me this look that I thought was understanding.
We still place emphasis on appearance. We can't look over the little things in order to place emphasis on something that is already huge.
A mixed-race president doesn't delete oppression.
-----
And there's still time, dad, and viewers.
Remember: We haven't had another Catholic president since JFK.
One thing that I always can rely on when testing social experiments in person is the unknowing compliance of my wife.
As I sat next to her in the hair salon today, both of us sitting in the chairs with those ridiculous metal domes (but only she was getting her hair done), I was reading the newspaper and saw a story about kids in a local middle school getting into a fight over race. The story painted the white child as instigating the black child, because the former mentioned in no specified context that the latter was, in fact, black. Whether or not this was grounds for the black child to punch the while child is another discussion entirely, but that's not what I want to say.
With the recent election of Barack Obama, I've heard constantly on the news that now we live in a "post-racial America". From the moment they began to say that, I already knew it was quite a load. The oppression still exists, the institutions are still strong, the only difference is that now, we have a mixed-race president. The other things didn't suddenly go away, and it seems to me that the people stating that this is evidence of a "post-racial America" are doing nothing but supplying more ammunition for microinvalidation.
I decided, however, that this was obvious, and I'd much rather make a more obvious point. I showed the article to my wife, who was now preparing to lower the dome, and let her look over it. After she finished, I asked her, "What do you make of this?"
She scanned over it again, then passed the paper back to me and said "Looks don't matter".
The irony almost made me sick, and the woman who was sitting next to my wife at the time gave me this look that I thought was understanding.
We still place emphasis on appearance. We can't look over the little things in order to place emphasis on something that is already huge.
A mixed-race president doesn't delete oppression.
-----
And there's still time, dad, and viewers.
Remember: We haven't had another Catholic president since JFK.
Saturday, September 14, 2013
The Devolution of Our Self-Direction
A while back I forwarded a post about self-directed learning. It got me thinking about how much of our learning process is reliant on our own initiative rather than what information is fed to us in our "schooling".
It never occurred to me until that point that the majority of what I know, now, that exceeds any fundamental understanding of basic concepts in conventional fields (in case I've lost you: two plus two, the cow goes moo, "you and I" not "me and you"), was self-taught.
Meaning, with the exception of basic algebra, basic grammar, basic basic basic, the rest of what I've learned was never taught to me. I taught myself.
So where am I going with this?
I continue to do these sorts of things even in college. Not just by Googling things, but by taking advantage of what I'm paying for. All of my courses consist of things I'm taking seriously: art, psychology, anthropology and global perspectives. They all require quite a bit of work, but I knew that when I signed up for the courses.
I asked someone the other day what some of their classes were. Aside from their major, most of them were pretty ridiculous (by ridiculous I mean a course on how to watch television. No, it doesn't teach the facets of consumerism).
I wish people would take their education (and their money) seriously.
It never occurred to me until that point that the majority of what I know, now, that exceeds any fundamental understanding of basic concepts in conventional fields (in case I've lost you: two plus two, the cow goes moo, "you and I" not "me and you"), was self-taught.
Meaning, with the exception of basic algebra, basic grammar, basic basic basic, the rest of what I've learned was never taught to me. I taught myself.
So where am I going with this?
I continue to do these sorts of things even in college. Not just by Googling things, but by taking advantage of what I'm paying for. All of my courses consist of things I'm taking seriously: art, psychology, anthropology and global perspectives. They all require quite a bit of work, but I knew that when I signed up for the courses.
I asked someone the other day what some of their classes were. Aside from their major, most of them were pretty ridiculous (by ridiculous I mean a course on how to watch television. No, it doesn't teach the facets of consumerism).
I wish people would take their education (and their money) seriously.
How Do You Feel? (Dad's Work)
How do you feel:
When the model's come and gone
She'll talk to you but not for long
Because how could anyone like her
Feel something like that from you?
How do you feel:
When the tall suited guys flex their dollars
The visionaries come and soon they're martyrs
Because how could anyone like you
Stand up to someone like them?
How do you feel to be at the bottom of the food chain?
How do you feel to be lost in your one-way troubles?
How do you feel to be stamped by the Doctor's, Professor's, Noble's name?
How do you feel to be crushed underneath the rubble?
You're average, normal, mediocre square wavenothingspecial
But you try, try, again and again.
To prove that you're here.
To get them to hear.
When the model's come and gone
She'll talk to you but not for long
Because how could anyone like her
Feel something like that from you?
How do you feel:
When the tall suited guys flex their dollars
The visionaries come and soon they're martyrs
Because how could anyone like you
Stand up to someone like them?
How do you feel to be at the bottom of the food chain?
How do you feel to be lost in your one-way troubles?
How do you feel to be stamped by the Doctor's, Professor's, Noble's name?
How do you feel to be crushed underneath the rubble?
You're average, normal, mediocre square wavenothingspecial
But you try, try, again and again.
To prove that you're here.
To get them to hear.
Sunday, September 8, 2013
Our Philosophical Unity
I've always been curious about something for as long as I've been doing this.
My friends and I have been in debates and arguments with racial realists on the internet. They try to justify their racism by claiming that their belief in a hierarchy of superiority has scientific backing. This is also known as "scientific racism".
Many of them make a comment that I find incredibly ironic: That philosophical arguments have no substance.
Yet, the foundation of their own arguments is in the reliance on philosophical unity.
Philosophical unity is a natural sense of connection a group of people feels when they are connected through their language, appearance, attitude, and aspirations. There are little barriers in western society between people who are native to that area, so it's easy for them to get along.
So to settle another argument, the fact that more diverse areas tend to have a lower amount of trust says nothing about diversity, but in the masses' general mistrust in others who aren't a part of their circle of philosophical unity.
Race (or ethnicity, but either way you're probably calling it the wrong thing) does not have any inherent importance. Neither does nationality, until you actively participate in it.
My friends and I have been in debates and arguments with racial realists on the internet. They try to justify their racism by claiming that their belief in a hierarchy of superiority has scientific backing. This is also known as "scientific racism".
Many of them make a comment that I find incredibly ironic: That philosophical arguments have no substance.
Yet, the foundation of their own arguments is in the reliance on philosophical unity.
Philosophical unity is a natural sense of connection a group of people feels when they are connected through their language, appearance, attitude, and aspirations. There are little barriers in western society between people who are native to that area, so it's easy for them to get along.
So to settle another argument, the fact that more diverse areas tend to have a lower amount of trust says nothing about diversity, but in the masses' general mistrust in others who aren't a part of their circle of philosophical unity.
Race (or ethnicity, but either way you're probably calling it the wrong thing) does not have any inherent importance. Neither does nationality, until you actively participate in it.
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