Funny story, and if you saw something similar to this a few weeks ago, I’m sorry but I got rid of it because I felt my older instincts of “this is saccharine and must be eliminated” kick in. I had mentioned in the past that I have only started to come to grips with a long history of gaslighting, and bad friendships, the kind that make someone into the Meckenian cynic“One who, when he smells flowers looks for a coffin”, As a refresher, I have had two major groups in my world prior to the CCO and both were disasters, I’ve also been gaslit for about 15 of my 30 years.
I am going to just get the good parts out. because the urge to finish the essay I’ve been working on for the last few months, is at the moment solely based on A) I have to finish a talk on the importance of community for LaRoche next semester and B) I can’t do that, until I get the parts I want to say on paper, and I haven’t figured out how to bring that to bear and I’ve rewritten this damn thing 3 times now. Continue reading 2 AM→
Because I haven’t been enough like Jordan (we’re fraternal, I swear.) I’m kind of reflecting on the meet. I don’t have to work or train today, so now here’s a dryer look at what happened. Jordan calls these “After Action Reports”. What follows reads like someone who can’t write positively about anything is telling you about a positive expereince, because that’s exactly what’s happening. I’m a bit concerned this comes off as ungrateful or something, but I really don’t know how to express anything beyond “yeah, it’s cool.” I’m working on that for part of the 5 Points project, but it’s really just part of a slow, wildly uncomfortable change that I reference near the end about being social. Anyway, here goes:
The truth is, my head was about 50% out of it at the beginning. I am, -by myself-, a fanatical pessimist for reasons I may or may not mention in a future essay. My thoughts are usually that the worst outcome, however statistically unlikely, is the result I’d best prepare for. Effectively, if I’m right, I’m not as disappointed as I would’ve been as an optimist. If I’m wrong, I’m pleasantly surprised. So in the lead-up, all I can think of is the crowd, the new environment, losing control of my head, I have war-gamed every negative outcome, and I don’t want to do this again after its over. I just want to go at least 6 for 9 and for my current deadlift PR (412) to fall because it’s the Pittsburgh zip code and for literally no other reason and go home.
What bothers me about the conversation on shootings is the need to either complicate it or manipulate it to fill a political end.
Two points, one, violence is not complicated, not at its core. It is basic physics with moral implications. One force (the gunman) is either met with resistance or it isn’t. The end result is a loss of life the extent of which is based entirely on how effective the opposing force is.
There’s your “complicated” scenario.
Two. I haven’t said this in a while, but evil is universal. Talking about a motive or some other political thing like “well he supported Trump” or some crap like that solves nothing. Looking at the shooter’s race says nothing (for V-Tech, the LAPD guy or the dude from El Paso.). It serves no purpose than for a particularly unctuous sect of the country to say “you support X, so obviously you must be fine with this.” As if the average Joe supports people being killed because people share some political beliefs.
I’m not sure whether it’s my own predilection for negativity or if this is a more universal problem, but the negative aspects of life, or people or politics are always more visceral and “real” to me than the positives. On a personal level, the incredible kindness of my friends, family and teardown team are not as “present” for lack of a better word as my own feelings of doubt, general hopelessness and a self-hatred I thought I’d left behind after “Disruption”. Continue reading Backblast→
I remember watching from my computer the inauguration of Donald Trump as the 45th president of the United States. After the most contentious (if we’re being charitable) and horribly vitriolic and stupid (if we aren’t) election of my admittedly short lifetime, the inaugural was marked by the opposition effectively rioting, a now famous gif of someone yelling “Nooooo” at the moment of the Oath of Office and the kind of violence that still largely exists on the Left side of the spectrum. This was, if nothing else, going to be a new age of absurdity, emotional arguments and idiocy to rival any given college course you don’t really need for your major. Continue reading Two for Trump→
There is no doubt that identity politics has become a central tenet of the Progressive Left. It is thanks to them that we have trigger warnings, microagressions, hyper-sensitivity rivaling the old Moral Majority of the 90s and the idiotic encouragement of “speaking your truth” as a substitute for the objective one. In this world, comedy can’t be offensive, thought cannot be deep, and even if a white man speaks the absolute truth, his race will become the focal point of his opposition as a substitute for an argument. Truth now is such an inconvenience, that Donna Hughes, professor of Gender and Women’s Studies at the University of Rhode Island declares that “The scientific method is a tool for the construction and justification of dominance in the world…the new methodological techniques were invented by men who were interested in explaining the inheritance of traits in order to support their political ideology of natural human superiority and inferiority”. Continue reading Gaslight→
I remember watching Donald Trump’s inauguration with a three conflicting thoughts
1: Oh my God, Donald-freakin-Trump is actually president. We have reached peak reality TV.
2: This is going to be interesting
3: This is going to be horrifying
To the first point, be honest, does saying “President Donald Trump”, regardless of your political party, STILL not feel a bit weird? Stay tuned for President Sean Hannity or President Samantha Bee, amirite?
Government, taxes, tribalism and the circle of absurdity
Tribalism is a fun thing to watch, but I can’t imagine it’s a fun thing to be a part of. With the pro-abortion people ranting about constitutional rights, there are better than 2 to 1 odds that those same people are pro-gun control, and will engage in mental gymnastics to justify the dissonance. But I’m seeing a particularly fun strain of thought surface that goes a bit like this:
Democrats: Banning abortion is unconstitutional, besides, banning abortions won’t work. Also Democrats: We need to ban guns to protect innocent lives.
Meanwhile, we have the other side of the coin, but switch where you see abortion and guns. Republicans say banning guns won’t work but banning abortions Continue reading Wandering Mind 2→
Last time, I had mentioned a fear about what’s coming because of the lack of depth in the national discourse. I’d like to explore the reckoning that is facing one of the main culprits in that shallowness a bit more, before leaving with a distant hope.
The primarily culprit of this shallowness is a public school system that once taught about Western Civilization, Greek and Latin, and now proudly offers algebra, an overview at history shallow enough to learn nothing from it and an exhaustive overview of the life cycle of a tree. Indeed, it seems the generation was almost set up for failure. We spent 60-70% of our formative years in a system that taught everything that didn’t matter, and were not encouraged to go pursue other opinions and ideas because they were old, boring, irrelevant or inferior. Every child comes out of 14 years of school knowing that they are all special, nobody’s perfect, Pythagoras had way too much time on his hands and the mitochondria is the power station of a cell. How will we do taxes, raise a family, consider the impact of voting for the leaders of the largest, richest, most powerful nation in the history of the planet based on policy and not charisma? Don’t worry about that because everything is going to be just fine in the end and people are basically good.Continue reading 1K: The Bubble→
Finally tonight 