http://www.cnn.com/2006/SHOWBIZ/TV/11/27/michaelrichards.ap/index.html
That's an article showing just how damned silly Jesse Jackson can be. I hate to say that, as the man has done a great deal of activist work in this country. Martin Luther King rubbed off quite a bit on this man, who, understandably, demands equality in the face of adversity.
But it's just a fucking word. It can't be "unprotected." And hell, if we ban the word (were that somehow enforceable), we would just be opening doors for some sort of replacement. Banning a word doesn't ban hatred. It's akin to the war on terror, really. We've become so hooked on this idea that declaring war on a concept or inanimate object will somehow make the thing go away, as long as we keep the propaganda flowing and the angry pundits yelling; somehow, it seems, it will all go away eventually.
Not unlike it's predecessors, the war on drugs and the war on terror, the War on Vocabularism (a word I've handily crafted on my own) is another adorable distraction that will do Mr. Jackson's arguments more harm than good. No racist is going to pick the word "friend" over the word "nigger," especially when there are plenty of quaint antiquities in the racist lexicon to keep them warm for many a long, bitter, hate-filled winter to come. Sure, they may not say it in public, but they'll always be thinking it. Hell, if a black man somehow finds a way to enforce the idea that "nigger" is unprotected, I'm fairly certain there will be plenty of racist douchebags who feel slightly more hatred for the black community because of it.
What Mr. Jackson needs to learn, along with the other purveyors of the Wars on Concepts, is that there is only one key to keeping bigotry out of the mouths of babes - education. Yet for some reason our country refuses to tackle it. The "no child left behind" act has been a colossal failure so far, not meeting its goals. And yet we persist on fighting these wars and even creating new ones when some off-the-radar lame-ass celebrity who dropped from A-list to Z-list faster than anyone I can think of goes off on some bigoted rant that, inexplicably, brings him up a few positions on the totem pole of fame.
The lesson to be learned is this - Exposing racists doesn't really solve anything. Trying to stop a racist from being a racist by preventing him from expressing himself is un-American in the worst way. You can protect your children from monsters like hatred, ignorance and bigotry by telling them they don't exist. Teach them to identify these monsters, hate them and keep them out of our country clubs.
Monday, November 27, 2006
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
Fight or Protest?
Read this: http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/11/20/selective.service/index.html
You'll feel your own way about it, but what amazes me is that the damned draft was eliminated for a reason. Now, had the Iraqis come over here on the boats we sold them and busted down our borders with the missiles we gave them and killed my friends and family with the guns we gave... I'm sorry. I don't want to give some sort of false picture "Hey, look at us, we give out guns to our potential enemies..." That's not true. We sold them those guns.
If all that had happened, certainly, I'd line up, or at least be defending my own home with that crappy samurai sword I bought on eBay and my pellet guns with my pet cat's laser-pointed duct-taped to the barrel. That would be fine. But it looks like, should anyone actually support a renewed draft, I'ma have ta' get my shit arrested.
The guy proposing this suggests that it will be a quicker way to the end the war when, in all honesty, the quickest way is pulling out. Why don't they want to do that? Because it would leave an unstable government? Sure, sort of. But they're more concerned that that "unstable government" will have a taste for "running colors," to quote many an articulate and sensible bumper sticker. And honestly, I would hate that.
I need to quickly address the Iraqi people. As most of you know, my rarely-viewed and occasionally updated blog is the one source of information most post-Saddam Iraqis trust. So here's the deal Iraq - Those of you who hate the US, please hate the government. I know they talk about our "freedom" of the vote and speech and of choice, but what you need to understand is that the vote is just a winding of the key, as it were. Sure, they're on your side when you turn it, but they're left to their own devices and the seemingly random will of those other mechanical devices nearby them. Most of the time they just wander off the table, taking us with them. Yes, we choose the douchebags who run the country, who "speak for us" rather than at us. But we don't control them. As for that age-old idea of rebellion? We can't, we really can't. We've been given opportunity and most of us are taking it to survive. Don't look at us as all being Paris Hilton or George Bush. We all know who they are and most of us don't approve of either of them. Some Americans even wish them death. But there's little we can really do about it until an election comes around.
With one exception.
There is the protest. Most of the time a huge waste of time and energy, if only because the government seems to respond strictly to exit polls. For whatever reason a survey you could easily lie on is more trusted than a few hundred thousand people yelling to you that you might just be wrong in one breath.
Now, there are the douchebags who are there just to protest. And a lot of them have WAY too much time on their hands, painting Hitler 'staches on Bush and devil horns on Cheney, affording the media and the government a much easier target with which to debilitate the entire movement against them or their policies. Not to mention the huge possibility of government infiltrators, a concept relegated more often to nutjob conspiracy theories than to the simple fact that that's what CIA agents are trained to do.
What do we do in this case? It's hard to say, and that's how they'd have it. Protest and you're crazy. Become apathetic and you're not doing enough. Work on a campaign for a person or an issue and you might not fade away. Vote and you give someone a chance based entirely on faith, despite the separation of church and state. When this intermittent chance to change things is our only option, its obvious, at least of late, that we understand this is our chance to do something. But it isn't satisfying. I'll agree with Bush on one thing - We do want immediate change. We are desperate for instant gratification in this country, and if Bush actually does feel the way his mouth says he does, I'll gladly say I agree with him. But I'll also point out the fact that change doesn't seem to be in his nature at all. Being uncompromising on every issue doesn't make you decisive. It makes you stubborn. Yet we, as a whole, sort of voted for him. Four years later, we sort of voted for him again - we didn't change. We had the chance for instant gratification, but we refused it. I can't doubt that we deserve our freedoms, I just think we need more opportunities to express and use them. Like everyone else, I don't have a plan, I just know I'm dissatisfied, and I don't expect the Democrats to fix a damned thing. They've already forced the Republican PR machine to take the image of moderate, uncompromising, uniting and collaborative. With a few strokes they've taken advantage of every little early weakness the Democrats have shown.
My only solution right now? Draft Karl Rove.
You'll feel your own way about it, but what amazes me is that the damned draft was eliminated for a reason. Now, had the Iraqis come over here on the boats we sold them and busted down our borders with the missiles we gave them and killed my friends and family with the guns we gave... I'm sorry. I don't want to give some sort of false picture "Hey, look at us, we give out guns to our potential enemies..." That's not true. We sold them those guns.
If all that had happened, certainly, I'd line up, or at least be defending my own home with that crappy samurai sword I bought on eBay and my pellet guns with my pet cat's laser-pointed duct-taped to the barrel. That would be fine. But it looks like, should anyone actually support a renewed draft, I'ma have ta' get my shit arrested.
The guy proposing this suggests that it will be a quicker way to the end the war when, in all honesty, the quickest way is pulling out. Why don't they want to do that? Because it would leave an unstable government? Sure, sort of. But they're more concerned that that "unstable government" will have a taste for "running colors," to quote many an articulate and sensible bumper sticker. And honestly, I would hate that.
I need to quickly address the Iraqi people. As most of you know, my rarely-viewed and occasionally updated blog is the one source of information most post-Saddam Iraqis trust. So here's the deal Iraq - Those of you who hate the US, please hate the government. I know they talk about our "freedom" of the vote and speech and of choice, but what you need to understand is that the vote is just a winding of the key, as it were. Sure, they're on your side when you turn it, but they're left to their own devices and the seemingly random will of those other mechanical devices nearby them. Most of the time they just wander off the table, taking us with them. Yes, we choose the douchebags who run the country, who "speak for us" rather than at us. But we don't control them. As for that age-old idea of rebellion? We can't, we really can't. We've been given opportunity and most of us are taking it to survive. Don't look at us as all being Paris Hilton or George Bush. We all know who they are and most of us don't approve of either of them. Some Americans even wish them death. But there's little we can really do about it until an election comes around.
With one exception.
There is the protest. Most of the time a huge waste of time and energy, if only because the government seems to respond strictly to exit polls. For whatever reason a survey you could easily lie on is more trusted than a few hundred thousand people yelling to you that you might just be wrong in one breath.
Now, there are the douchebags who are there just to protest. And a lot of them have WAY too much time on their hands, painting Hitler 'staches on Bush and devil horns on Cheney, affording the media and the government a much easier target with which to debilitate the entire movement against them or their policies. Not to mention the huge possibility of government infiltrators, a concept relegated more often to nutjob conspiracy theories than to the simple fact that that's what CIA agents are trained to do.
What do we do in this case? It's hard to say, and that's how they'd have it. Protest and you're crazy. Become apathetic and you're not doing enough. Work on a campaign for a person or an issue and you might not fade away. Vote and you give someone a chance based entirely on faith, despite the separation of church and state. When this intermittent chance to change things is our only option, its obvious, at least of late, that we understand this is our chance to do something. But it isn't satisfying. I'll agree with Bush on one thing - We do want immediate change. We are desperate for instant gratification in this country, and if Bush actually does feel the way his mouth says he does, I'll gladly say I agree with him. But I'll also point out the fact that change doesn't seem to be in his nature at all. Being uncompromising on every issue doesn't make you decisive. It makes you stubborn. Yet we, as a whole, sort of voted for him. Four years later, we sort of voted for him again - we didn't change. We had the chance for instant gratification, but we refused it. I can't doubt that we deserve our freedoms, I just think we need more opportunities to express and use them. Like everyone else, I don't have a plan, I just know I'm dissatisfied, and I don't expect the Democrats to fix a damned thing. They've already forced the Republican PR machine to take the image of moderate, uncompromising, uniting and collaborative. With a few strokes they've taken advantage of every little early weakness the Democrats have shown.
My only solution right now? Draft Karl Rove.
Monday, November 13, 2006
Ouch...
Number 1: Boy was I wrong.
Number 2: I am NOT the only person who hates this usage of the word "Random."
Number 3: I am in no way the anrgiest person, or at least I'm one of the least articulate detractors. Check it out on the one, the only, UrbanDictionary.com.
Number 2: I am NOT the only person who hates this usage of the word "Random."
Number 3: I am in no way the anrgiest person, or at least I'm one of the least articulate detractors. Check it out on the one, the only, UrbanDictionary.com.
Oh My God, That's SO Random!
This is a word people need to stop using. After reading some quite well-formed Dane Cook bashing today, I was quite happy that my dislike for him of late has been echoed, and much better-put than I ever could have. But then I kept imagining how one of his all-too-loyal fans might respond to some of the things I've read. It's almost guaranteed that you'd see someone using the word "random" to justify something that isn't actually comedy being funny.
The problem is that you can't describe a person as random. Well, maybe Dane Cook you could. Some people would call it an unfortunate accident that his genes combined just the way they did to make him who he is. But outside of the selection and formation of who one is, a person cannot, by defnition, be random.
One can say random things, certainly. But one's humor can't be random, and just because you didn't expect something in a conversation doesn't mean it's random. It's a non-sequitir. You could certainly say "You must have picked that interesting or funny observation at random from the items in your brain." Then you'd be speaking what we like to call English.
I'm certain I've suffered this mental block before, using random as an adjective. And I'm almost certain that its showed up on UrbanDictionary.com as meaning "funny." Be specific when you use the word. And don't let it define your love for Dane Cook. And then realize you don't. Dane Cook is evil. Not just because he's successful. But because he's successful by saying nothing.
The problem is that you can't describe a person as random. Well, maybe Dane Cook you could. Some people would call it an unfortunate accident that his genes combined just the way they did to make him who he is. But outside of the selection and formation of who one is, a person cannot, by defnition, be random.
One can say random things, certainly. But one's humor can't be random, and just because you didn't expect something in a conversation doesn't mean it's random. It's a non-sequitir. You could certainly say "You must have picked that interesting or funny observation at random from the items in your brain." Then you'd be speaking what we like to call English.
I'm certain I've suffered this mental block before, using random as an adjective. And I'm almost certain that its showed up on UrbanDictionary.com as meaning "funny." Be specific when you use the word. And don't let it define your love for Dane Cook. And then realize you don't. Dane Cook is evil. Not just because he's successful. But because he's successful by saying nothing.
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