So I was in the shower today, and I thought to myself, "Why do I stink so bad?" It's something I've been thinking about for a while now but today it's really bugging me. My ass smells like, well, ass. All the time. Even after I just shower. I dry the inside of the cheeks, smell the towel to see how I did in there, and BAM! Ass stink! I was washing my ass today and I was practically fucking my asshole with the bar of soap but when I toweled off, it still smelled! Holy mother of fuck, it's annoying. Same with my armpits, too. I was scrubbing my armpits so hard it hurt from my soap-covered nails raking across them. Smelled them and they still stink like sweat and onions. Why? No matter how hard I scrub or how much soap I use, I stink! It's like I'm forever unclean or something. Is it because I don't shower every day? Which is stupid, by the way.
Here's something else: this whole obsession with cleanliness is really stupid. North American medicine is so concerned over prevention of illness, it's just silly. Hand sanitizers lining the inside and outside of buildings, TV commercials pumping propaganda into the minds of the fucking moronic general public, who lap up anything and everything they're presented with and who have no sense of individual thought and autonomy. "Oh no, I don't want to get sick! It's so icky and prevents me from living my effectively automatic existence!" or "I don't want little Suzy getting sick from those dirty MacArthur kids at school!" Please, do everyone a favour and just kill yourselves. I agree that in most cases, a prevention-based strategy is the best approach for dealing with problems. But when it comes to dealing with pathogens, unless it's something deadly like HIV, fuck off and deal with it. Stop shoveling antibiotics down your throats like it's candy. Quit obsessively washing your hands like some deranged psychopath. Just learn to live with it and stop worrying about getting sick. I prefer to take a more European approach to illness and infection. Rather the sterility and prevention, Europe's culture of medicine focuses on the body as a part of the of the environment around it. A philosophy of adaptation and harmony, if you will. Not keeping clean 24/7 allows the body to adapt to the pathogens it will inevitably come into contact with, thereby strengthening the immune system. When something does infect you, the effects are drastically less powerful than with someone who is obsessed with cleanliness. I believe that I serve as a prime example. I rarely get sick. Maybe once a year, perhaps less. At university, I had two roommates (and the girlfriend of one of them who was quarantined in our apartment) who came down with nasty cases of the swine flu. They were puking and weak and bedridden. Me? I was fine. I didn't get sick, I continued on my merry way and laughed and laughed. Now I am not the healthiest person out there. Far from it, actually. The bulk of my diet consists of pizza pockets, chips, chocolate, and Pepsi. I do zero exercise. I am fat as all holy hell. But my immune system is the bomb. Perfectly healthy people get sick and suffer and I don't. I love it.
That's it for now! :D
- K
Friday, 20 December 2013
Thursday, 5 December 2013
Just a few remarks
So I took the dog out for a piss a few minutes ago, and I saw a flock of pigeons at the end of the little patch of grass we usually take her. I watched them for a moment and then it hit me: I'm seeing a lot more pigeons around here than I used to. When I was a kid, there were hardly any pigeons at all. Pretty sure I didn't really notice one until I was at least a pre-teen, and it was still pretty rare after that. Rare enough that I'd stop for a moment and just look at one when one was around, because it was so weird to see them. Back in the day, all you saw were crows and seagulls. And I was fine with that. I like them because they look neat, they're smart, and I like their calls. Especially seagull calls. But pigeons, I don't really like them. They're dumb, ugly looking, and I'm not a fan of their call. So the opposite of my feelings toward the other two. But I'm seeing more them as of late. I wonder why that is. Unfortunately, I don't care enough to even bother Googling it for a few moments, so I suppose I'll never know.
Here's something else that's been going on: my "smart"phone is a piece of junk. Why are they even called "smart"phones anyway? So the ability to go on the internet and download makes them smart? Or is the fancy new voice command ones that can look things up for you automatically? I was wary getting mine earlier this year, and it's given me nothing but trouble since I got it. It's a Samsung Galaxy Ace II X. Sure, it can do a lot but it sucks at everything it does. The internet is unbearably slow and clunky. I stopped using that function entirely. When I want to look something up, I just use my laptop. The interface, which requires its own OS for whatever reason, is slow and laggy. I go to open up an application and it just sits there, sometimes for more than 10 or 15 seconds, before it opens it up. Even when I'm making a call. The touch screen, that stupid touch screen, is either unresponsive or too responsive. Either it won't register what I touch or it'll open an application that I barely grazed my arm past when I'm moving it around. Typing a text message is a headache and the so-called predictive text is a pile of shit that always brings up the wrong word and never has the right one in the list of similar words. The only things I use it for, besides calling and text messaging, are as a flashlight using the flashlight application and helping me stargaze using the Google Sky Map application. But then things got even worse. This past month, I've noticed the battery life taking a sharp dip in longevity. I only turn on wifi to check my email, screen brightness is low, and power saving mode is constantly on. When idle, the screen is off. But if left overnight, it loses between 20% and 30% of its battery life just sitting there. On top of that, the thing's been constantly freezing. Leave it idle, press the home button to turn on the screen and nothing happens. Stays off. Misses calls and doesn't get messages. Requires a hard reset to get back on. This has been happening multiple times in a day. So I've had it. Moved over my important data to the micro SD, reset it to factory default, put the SIM card in my trusty old Evergreen, boxed it up and put it away. I don't care that my warranty still might be in effect or that this particular phone is not representative of all smartphones. I don't want another one. They're a pain to deal with and I don't understand how you goddamn people can't go a day without them.
Phones should be used as phones. Calls and text messaging. Not all this other extra junk. People pay these $100 phone bills for all this shit that phones don't need to do. All this data and unlimited calling and text messaging to anyone and everyone and shit. Fuck off, I only pay $35 per month and that gets me all I need. Unlimited calling and text messaging to five people of my choice, which is all anyone ever needs, 50 airtime minutes, and I forget how many non-five people text messages I get because I don't text message every person I meet. And data is a fucking retarded thing to have on a phone anyway. You're already paying an internet bill. You want to look something up? Go on your desktop and Google it. You're lost and need to use Google Maps or that GPS feature? Tough goddamn luck, you should have done what normal people do and meticulously plan your trip at home before going. Print out a map, mark your path and major landmarks. You also don't need to livetweet your life or constantly update your Facebook. No one gives a shit. No one. Put down the phone and live your goddamn life. By taking the time to try to memorialize the events in your life, you're missing out on them. Just enjoy and don't get caught up in the other BS. Because you'll look back on those photos and posts and all you'll remember is "Gee, I remember posting about this when it happened!" This stupid interconnectedness fad is really pissing me off and I wish we could just scale it back a bit to how things were before smartphones and social networking were big.
Speaking of things that piss me off, besides phones, tablets. I swear to God, tablets are the most useless pieces of junk on the market. It's like a laptop! With no keyboard. And no processing power. And a shit OS. And no compatibility. And expensive as all holy hell. Anyone who finds those things convenient should be taken out back and shot repeatedly. Anything a tablet can do, and laptop can do infinitely better. They advertise these things as being useful for school or work. But have you tried actually typing on these things? Keys are the only form of input that should ever be used for typing. The raw physical feedback you get from hitting them gives you a sense of what you're typing and when you've made errors. I don't know about you, but when I take notes for university lectures, I type very quickly and in shorthand to get every bit of info being said. With a touchscreen keyboard, there are too many variables at work and you're never sure if you've actually hit the letter or not. Sometimes it takes multiple strokes to make sure your typed character is inputted. I've seen commercials on TV for these tablets with detachable keyboards. Seems convenient, but you know what else has keyboards? Laptops! You also can't upgrade the parts of tablets, either. You pay hundreds of dollars for a piece of hardware that will be obsolete in a few years and that you can't take apart and make better to accommodate the evolution of technology. I have a desktop that I bought on sale earlier this year and once it can't handle what I want to put on it, I'll just order some parts online, open 'er up, and install them. In fact, I've been thinking of ordering a new graphics card soon so I can play some of the more recent PC games that have been coming out.
Anyway, that's it for now. Thanks for reading!
- K
Here's something else that's been going on: my "smart"phone is a piece of junk. Why are they even called "smart"phones anyway? So the ability to go on the internet and download makes them smart? Or is the fancy new voice command ones that can look things up for you automatically? I was wary getting mine earlier this year, and it's given me nothing but trouble since I got it. It's a Samsung Galaxy Ace II X. Sure, it can do a lot but it sucks at everything it does. The internet is unbearably slow and clunky. I stopped using that function entirely. When I want to look something up, I just use my laptop. The interface, which requires its own OS for whatever reason, is slow and laggy. I go to open up an application and it just sits there, sometimes for more than 10 or 15 seconds, before it opens it up. Even when I'm making a call. The touch screen, that stupid touch screen, is either unresponsive or too responsive. Either it won't register what I touch or it'll open an application that I barely grazed my arm past when I'm moving it around. Typing a text message is a headache and the so-called predictive text is a pile of shit that always brings up the wrong word and never has the right one in the list of similar words. The only things I use it for, besides calling and text messaging, are as a flashlight using the flashlight application and helping me stargaze using the Google Sky Map application. But then things got even worse. This past month, I've noticed the battery life taking a sharp dip in longevity. I only turn on wifi to check my email, screen brightness is low, and power saving mode is constantly on. When idle, the screen is off. But if left overnight, it loses between 20% and 30% of its battery life just sitting there. On top of that, the thing's been constantly freezing. Leave it idle, press the home button to turn on the screen and nothing happens. Stays off. Misses calls and doesn't get messages. Requires a hard reset to get back on. This has been happening multiple times in a day. So I've had it. Moved over my important data to the micro SD, reset it to factory default, put the SIM card in my trusty old Evergreen, boxed it up and put it away. I don't care that my warranty still might be in effect or that this particular phone is not representative of all smartphones. I don't want another one. They're a pain to deal with and I don't understand how you goddamn people can't go a day without them.
Phones should be used as phones. Calls and text messaging. Not all this other extra junk. People pay these $100 phone bills for all this shit that phones don't need to do. All this data and unlimited calling and text messaging to anyone and everyone and shit. Fuck off, I only pay $35 per month and that gets me all I need. Unlimited calling and text messaging to five people of my choice, which is all anyone ever needs, 50 airtime minutes, and I forget how many non-five people text messages I get because I don't text message every person I meet. And data is a fucking retarded thing to have on a phone anyway. You're already paying an internet bill. You want to look something up? Go on your desktop and Google it. You're lost and need to use Google Maps or that GPS feature? Tough goddamn luck, you should have done what normal people do and meticulously plan your trip at home before going. Print out a map, mark your path and major landmarks. You also don't need to livetweet your life or constantly update your Facebook. No one gives a shit. No one. Put down the phone and live your goddamn life. By taking the time to try to memorialize the events in your life, you're missing out on them. Just enjoy and don't get caught up in the other BS. Because you'll look back on those photos and posts and all you'll remember is "Gee, I remember posting about this when it happened!" This stupid interconnectedness fad is really pissing me off and I wish we could just scale it back a bit to how things were before smartphones and social networking were big.
Speaking of things that piss me off, besides phones, tablets. I swear to God, tablets are the most useless pieces of junk on the market. It's like a laptop! With no keyboard. And no processing power. And a shit OS. And no compatibility. And expensive as all holy hell. Anyone who finds those things convenient should be taken out back and shot repeatedly. Anything a tablet can do, and laptop can do infinitely better. They advertise these things as being useful for school or work. But have you tried actually typing on these things? Keys are the only form of input that should ever be used for typing. The raw physical feedback you get from hitting them gives you a sense of what you're typing and when you've made errors. I don't know about you, but when I take notes for university lectures, I type very quickly and in shorthand to get every bit of info being said. With a touchscreen keyboard, there are too many variables at work and you're never sure if you've actually hit the letter or not. Sometimes it takes multiple strokes to make sure your typed character is inputted. I've seen commercials on TV for these tablets with detachable keyboards. Seems convenient, but you know what else has keyboards? Laptops! You also can't upgrade the parts of tablets, either. You pay hundreds of dollars for a piece of hardware that will be obsolete in a few years and that you can't take apart and make better to accommodate the evolution of technology. I have a desktop that I bought on sale earlier this year and once it can't handle what I want to put on it, I'll just order some parts online, open 'er up, and install them. In fact, I've been thinking of ordering a new graphics card soon so I can play some of the more recent PC games that have been coming out.
Anyway, that's it for now. Thanks for reading!
- K
Monday, 2 December 2013
The dog is sniffing around my room
So I'm a pretty big video game enthusiast. I play often, I collect systems, I read a lot about them; they're a pretty big part of my life. But what in the hell is wrong with the gaming community in general? I swear, they're the most whiny, self-entitled, vocal group of people on the face of the planet. They're quick to dismiss any new hardware or software as shit, flame the living hell out of people who are actually interested in the products, and demand perfection from the people making the things. Except that everyone has their own different opinion on what constitutes perfection, so there is no way to make anyone happy. I realize that this happens in every other industry out there, but the gaming community is just so damn vocal about what they want and don't want. And even when they are given what they want, they're all like "You assholes only gave us this because we had to ask for it. You should have done this in the first place!" And the damn divide between "casuals" and "hardcore gamers". Not to mention the dreaded console wars. Does it actually matter in the long run? Who cares if someone else is enjoying something different from you? I don't know about you, but I game to have fun and relax. I'm not really into competition or online gaming (well except for Pokemon and Mario Kart), but even when I do, it's more to have fun with like-minded people, not to get the highest score or to crush the n00bs. That's why I absolutely love Nintendo's Miiverse on Wii U and soon 3DS. I can play a single player game, post about it on a forum where people are playing the same game, and read comments from other people enjoying the game. There's no shit talking, no "I'm gonna beat your bitch ass down" mentality (although that could just be a product of the moderation). But even if there wasn't moderation, I don't feel the need to shit talk. I just want to express how much fun I'm having. And I can do that because I know that the community is supportive and having fun too. But outside of that, it's an ugly world. Angry, angry people shitting on each other 24/7. People take the industry WAY too seriously. Do they forget that it's an optional form of entertainment? Like TV, movies, books, and comics. I know people can get into some pretty heated discussions about their fictional universes, but you never really hear tell of the crazy shit going on in gaming happening in the other entertainment realms. Well, except for maybe the Trekkies and comic book people. But I never heard tell of someone shooting and killing another person over an issue of Spider-Man (which is what happened recently in a PS4 sale). Just... stop taking games so damn seriously and just have fun at your own pace. And stop calling yourself "gamers". It's pejorative, loaded, and is overcentralizing to your identity.
Speaking of gaming, I've been pouring tons of hours in Pokemon X ever since it came out. By the way, I'm using Pokemon instead of Pokémon because I'm typing on my netbook, whose numpad is accessible only through hitting function key+F11, so alt codes are a pain to type. Anyway, so Pokemon. Like I mentioned previously, I'm into competitive battling. Well, sort of. I don't do it often. Even online social interaction scares me... But I love reading about it. The strategies, IVs, EVs, and the like. I raise Pokemon just for fun and use them on the in-game battle institutions, like the Battle Maison in X and Y. I've been doing this since LeafGreen but each generation has seen me getting more and more sophisticated with my raising. LeafGreen, I didn't care about even natures, let alone EVs and IVs. I raised my in-game team up to level 100 and thought they were pretty cool. My Impish Espeon, Bold Lugia from XD with Psycho Boost, and... that's all I can remember. Wrong natures and no knowlesge of EV placement. Then I got Pearl later on. Never got into raising stuff in that one, actually. Platinum, though. That was a turning point for me. By then, I learned all about Smogon and EVs and IVs and movesets and started raising stuff in that one. I remember raising a Weavile, Jolly, and probably a few other things. I didn't breed for IVs though, because I knew it would take probably weeks to get one perfect Pokemon so I said fuck it, it doesn't matter and I don't care. Who cares about an extra few stat points? Even some moves, like priority moves and support moves, baffled me. Why would I want to use a fighting type Quick Attack? Quick Attack sucks because it's so weak! And why would I want to waste a turn setting up Substitute when I can just outright attack? I was so naive. Then I got HeartGold as a birthday present. That game... That game is the best Pokemon game I've ever played, hands down. A remake of my favourite games, Gold and Silver, with up to date mechanics and so polished! Meeting gym leaders outside their gyms for photos, your Pokemon walking with you and playing around when you speak to them, the music, the visuals, the GB Sounds, Cerulean Cave and Seafoam Islands returning to their former glory, and the legendaries from other regions to catch! I could keep going on but needless to say, it was perfection. I also got into breeding for shinies in that one. It worked maybe once... But holy damn, did it ever work well. I hatched a shiny Shroomish on my 8th or so egg, with a Jolly nature and Poison Heal. He is now a proud level 100 shiny 252 Atk/252 Spd Breloom with Spore, Substitute, Focus Punch, and Seed Bomb and is holding a Toxic Orb. Of course, I still didn't care about IVs at this point so that was whatever. So I raised a crap ton of stuff this time around and raised them all up to level 100 because of the copious amounts of places with high level trainers to grind against, like the Pokemon League second run and gym leader rematches. Then out came Black and White. I was starting to get more of the hang of things. Did my level 100 raising, mostly against the Elite Four second round, bred some shinies (Emboar, Chandelure), but it was mostly the same as HG. Black 2 was my next time. This time, I really started thinking about in-depth movesets to use. Priority moves, entry hazards, defensive cores, offensive combinations, and mostly the use of Choice Scarf Moxie Salamence and Choice Band Technician Scizor. Also Multiscale Dragon Dance Dragonite and Stealth Rock Skarmory. Oh baby! The PWT trainers were no match for me! And now I'm on X. This time, my breeding has REALLY ramped up. Because of the new Destiny Knot mechanics and the introduction of the Friend Safari where every Pokemon is guaranteed to have to 2 perfect IVs, 5 perfect IV breeding is so easy I can do it in just a few short hours. And boy have I done it a lot. A new Skarmory with Spikes (although I like Stealth Rock better but SR isn't accessible by Skarmory until Pokebank comes out), Mega Charizard X, Technician Breloom, Gliscor, and most recently Mega Gengar. All with 5 perfect IVs, the imperfect one being the attacking stat it doesn't use, except for Skarmory who doesn't have perfect speed, but Skarmory doesn't really need to be fast unless it has Taunt, which mine doesn't. Speaking of Taunt, my Gliscor has Taunt and he is AWESOME. Next on my plate is probably Protean Greninja. I also read about the Truant/Entrainment Durant combo for easy Battle Maison winning, so I might give that a go. Not sure if I even want to bother with perfect breeding Durant, since all its purpose would be is to set up Entrainment then switch out to a Protect/boosting move sweeper (read: Mega Blaziken). Choice Scarf and perfect speed, that's all I need.
Well, that's all I have for this evening. Sorry about the huge paragraphs; the topics are so related within them that I had trouble finding a good point of separation. It's late and I'm too tired to proofread everything, so if you read this and see any typos or other errors, let me know and I will happily make the necessary changes.
Thanks for reading,
K
Speaking of gaming, I've been pouring tons of hours in Pokemon X ever since it came out. By the way, I'm using Pokemon instead of Pokémon because I'm typing on my netbook, whose numpad is accessible only through hitting function key+F11, so alt codes are a pain to type. Anyway, so Pokemon. Like I mentioned previously, I'm into competitive battling. Well, sort of. I don't do it often. Even online social interaction scares me... But I love reading about it. The strategies, IVs, EVs, and the like. I raise Pokemon just for fun and use them on the in-game battle institutions, like the Battle Maison in X and Y. I've been doing this since LeafGreen but each generation has seen me getting more and more sophisticated with my raising. LeafGreen, I didn't care about even natures, let alone EVs and IVs. I raised my in-game team up to level 100 and thought they were pretty cool. My Impish Espeon, Bold Lugia from XD with Psycho Boost, and... that's all I can remember. Wrong natures and no knowlesge of EV placement. Then I got Pearl later on. Never got into raising stuff in that one, actually. Platinum, though. That was a turning point for me. By then, I learned all about Smogon and EVs and IVs and movesets and started raising stuff in that one. I remember raising a Weavile, Jolly, and probably a few other things. I didn't breed for IVs though, because I knew it would take probably weeks to get one perfect Pokemon so I said fuck it, it doesn't matter and I don't care. Who cares about an extra few stat points? Even some moves, like priority moves and support moves, baffled me. Why would I want to use a fighting type Quick Attack? Quick Attack sucks because it's so weak! And why would I want to waste a turn setting up Substitute when I can just outright attack? I was so naive. Then I got HeartGold as a birthday present. That game... That game is the best Pokemon game I've ever played, hands down. A remake of my favourite games, Gold and Silver, with up to date mechanics and so polished! Meeting gym leaders outside their gyms for photos, your Pokemon walking with you and playing around when you speak to them, the music, the visuals, the GB Sounds, Cerulean Cave and Seafoam Islands returning to their former glory, and the legendaries from other regions to catch! I could keep going on but needless to say, it was perfection. I also got into breeding for shinies in that one. It worked maybe once... But holy damn, did it ever work well. I hatched a shiny Shroomish on my 8th or so egg, with a Jolly nature and Poison Heal. He is now a proud level 100 shiny 252 Atk/252 Spd Breloom with Spore, Substitute, Focus Punch, and Seed Bomb and is holding a Toxic Orb. Of course, I still didn't care about IVs at this point so that was whatever. So I raised a crap ton of stuff this time around and raised them all up to level 100 because of the copious amounts of places with high level trainers to grind against, like the Pokemon League second run and gym leader rematches. Then out came Black and White. I was starting to get more of the hang of things. Did my level 100 raising, mostly against the Elite Four second round, bred some shinies (Emboar, Chandelure), but it was mostly the same as HG. Black 2 was my next time. This time, I really started thinking about in-depth movesets to use. Priority moves, entry hazards, defensive cores, offensive combinations, and mostly the use of Choice Scarf Moxie Salamence and Choice Band Technician Scizor. Also Multiscale Dragon Dance Dragonite and Stealth Rock Skarmory. Oh baby! The PWT trainers were no match for me! And now I'm on X. This time, my breeding has REALLY ramped up. Because of the new Destiny Knot mechanics and the introduction of the Friend Safari where every Pokemon is guaranteed to have to 2 perfect IVs, 5 perfect IV breeding is so easy I can do it in just a few short hours. And boy have I done it a lot. A new Skarmory with Spikes (although I like Stealth Rock better but SR isn't accessible by Skarmory until Pokebank comes out), Mega Charizard X, Technician Breloom, Gliscor, and most recently Mega Gengar. All with 5 perfect IVs, the imperfect one being the attacking stat it doesn't use, except for Skarmory who doesn't have perfect speed, but Skarmory doesn't really need to be fast unless it has Taunt, which mine doesn't. Speaking of Taunt, my Gliscor has Taunt and he is AWESOME. Next on my plate is probably Protean Greninja. I also read about the Truant/Entrainment Durant combo for easy Battle Maison winning, so I might give that a go. Not sure if I even want to bother with perfect breeding Durant, since all its purpose would be is to set up Entrainment then switch out to a Protect/boosting move sweeper (read: Mega Blaziken). Choice Scarf and perfect speed, that's all I need.
Well, that's all I have for this evening. Sorry about the huge paragraphs; the topics are so related within them that I had trouble finding a good point of separation. It's late and I'm too tired to proofread everything, so if you read this and see any typos or other errors, let me know and I will happily make the necessary changes.
Thanks for reading,
K
Sunday, 1 December 2013
Anonymity: God's gift to man
It's quarter after two in the morning, so I really need to be heading to bed. But first, I want to rant about something I read this evening. It was a post on some website about how internet, specifically sites like Facebook and Twitter, allow for greater honesty and better self-regulation. I formulated this retort, which, in my mind, was genius, but whatever. The site was acting all wonky and wouldn't let me post due to some internal server error, so here's my response:
"I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to disagree with this article. Honesty, while somewhat subjective, ultimately boils down to behaving in such a way that is in closest accordance to our true selves. Facebook, Twitter, and what have you force us to be ultimately dishonest, focusing on how we wish to be perceived by our social group, not who we really are. We try to look our best as it appears to others, not as it relates to who we really are. If we were who we really are, then we wouldn't need to bother thinking long and hard about what we post. As such, I consider social networking largely a waste of time.
Anonymity is the ultimate way to achieve honesty on the internet. Behind the veil of anonymity, we can share what we really think and feel without a fear of being personally judged. If someone thinks you're an asshole, who cares? One anonymous person thinking another anonymous person is an asshole is hardly consequential. Everyone has thoughts and desires that would be deemed unfit to be shared with the general public, but as anonymous users, we can share that previously taboo information. Even the trolls on 4chan are being who they really are: trolls that feed off of the discord they create.
If you truly believe that Facebook and related services cause people to be more honest, you are likely going through life with rose-coloured glasses, thinking it's a wonderful place and everyone is great. While we try to act like we genuinely care for one another as community, it's just to keep up appearances for a society whose rules are largely disconnected from the individual. As a species, human needs and wants all begin at the level of the individual, which supersedes the community indefinitely. It's simply part of our biology. We're all ultimately self-serving and egotistical, which really shows when speaking in an anonymous community. Everyone's an asshole, you just need to dig deep enough. And that core of our being as humans, that essence of self-serving "asshole-ishness", for lack of a better term, is the closest thing to true honesty that exists in the human spirit.
Your article was well written, but I reject your premise and conclusion."
I thought it was a pretty good response, given that I pretty much typed it all out without thinking about it too much and relied on my immediately available personal beliefs.
Oh yeah, it would probably help if I included the link to the article itself:
http://thenextweb.com/insider/2012/04/14/living-in-the-sharing-economy-is-the-internet-making-us-more-honest/
So anyway, off to bed.
Thanks for reading,
K
"I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to disagree with this article. Honesty, while somewhat subjective, ultimately boils down to behaving in such a way that is in closest accordance to our true selves. Facebook, Twitter, and what have you force us to be ultimately dishonest, focusing on how we wish to be perceived by our social group, not who we really are. We try to look our best as it appears to others, not as it relates to who we really are. If we were who we really are, then we wouldn't need to bother thinking long and hard about what we post. As such, I consider social networking largely a waste of time.
Anonymity is the ultimate way to achieve honesty on the internet. Behind the veil of anonymity, we can share what we really think and feel without a fear of being personally judged. If someone thinks you're an asshole, who cares? One anonymous person thinking another anonymous person is an asshole is hardly consequential. Everyone has thoughts and desires that would be deemed unfit to be shared with the general public, but as anonymous users, we can share that previously taboo information. Even the trolls on 4chan are being who they really are: trolls that feed off of the discord they create.
If you truly believe that Facebook and related services cause people to be more honest, you are likely going through life with rose-coloured glasses, thinking it's a wonderful place and everyone is great. While we try to act like we genuinely care for one another as community, it's just to keep up appearances for a society whose rules are largely disconnected from the individual. As a species, human needs and wants all begin at the level of the individual, which supersedes the community indefinitely. It's simply part of our biology. We're all ultimately self-serving and egotistical, which really shows when speaking in an anonymous community. Everyone's an asshole, you just need to dig deep enough. And that core of our being as humans, that essence of self-serving "asshole-ishness", for lack of a better term, is the closest thing to true honesty that exists in the human spirit.
Your article was well written, but I reject your premise and conclusion."
I thought it was a pretty good response, given that I pretty much typed it all out without thinking about it too much and relied on my immediately available personal beliefs.
Oh yeah, it would probably help if I included the link to the article itself:
http://thenextweb.com/insider/2012/04/14/living-in-the-sharing-economy-is-the-internet-making-us-more-honest/
So anyway, off to bed.
Thanks for reading,
K
Here I am again
Well well, this here is my second blog. My first one was school related. It was a part of my Cultural Psychology class at university. But this one here is my personal blog for ranting and raving about the things I think about and what I'm doing, if I feel like sharing. I imagine most of the things I'll be posting will be boring, just relating to my daily life. Y'know, stuff like what I'm watching on TV/Netflix, things I'm eating, video games I'm playing, etc. But who knows? Maybe I'll wind up spewing out something half-way thought provoking. Don't count on it, though. I likely won't update on a regular schedule. But this is more for me than any anonymous people out on the internet, so I don't really care.
Here are some of my interests, just so you'll have an idea of that I'll be posting about:
Television, video gaming (I'll be posting about this a lot, so be warned), internet browsing, science and technology, psychology, philosophy, education, astronomy, culture, zoology (AKA pets), how much I hate most people, food, sleeping... So there you have it.
And lastly, a little info on myself outside of my listed interests.
- I'm 24 years old as of this post.
- I'm male.
- I'm from Atlantic Canada.
- I have an Honours degree in Psychology from university.
- I'm in a long-term relationship with a woman (about 4 years now).
- I'm unemployed but looking for work (specifically in the field of research).
- I'm lazy as shit.
- I'd like to believe I'm highly intelligent.
- I have high social anxiety and am often depressed (note: I do not in any way fit the diagostic criteria for Major Depressive Disorder), but manage to function well enough when I'm out and about.
- I'm largely self-obsessed, if you couldn't already tell.
- I'm one hell of a grammar nazi. Nothing pisses me off more than people who cannot properly communicate in written English despite English being their first language. Either write with academic proficiency or don't write at all.
There are tons more I write about, but I'm sure that information will become evident in future posts.
Thanks for reading,
K
Here are some of my interests, just so you'll have an idea of that I'll be posting about:
Television, video gaming (I'll be posting about this a lot, so be warned), internet browsing, science and technology, psychology, philosophy, education, astronomy, culture, zoology (AKA pets), how much I hate most people, food, sleeping... So there you have it.
And lastly, a little info on myself outside of my listed interests.
- I'm 24 years old as of this post.
- I'm male.
- I'm from Atlantic Canada.
- I have an Honours degree in Psychology from university.
- I'm in a long-term relationship with a woman (about 4 years now).
- I'm unemployed but looking for work (specifically in the field of research).
- I'm lazy as shit.
- I'd like to believe I'm highly intelligent.
- I have high social anxiety and am often depressed (note: I do not in any way fit the diagostic criteria for Major Depressive Disorder), but manage to function well enough when I'm out and about.
- I'm largely self-obsessed, if you couldn't already tell.
- I'm one hell of a grammar nazi. Nothing pisses me off more than people who cannot properly communicate in written English despite English being their first language. Either write with academic proficiency or don't write at all.
There are tons more I write about, but I'm sure that information will become evident in future posts.
Thanks for reading,
K
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