I am not on anyone's side...

...because nobody is on my side. So it seems, sometimes.

Bonus post for slacking in June...

So there's this miscreant. I have no idea who she is though I'd not dignify her tasteless antics with a name if I did. She's no good, a bad news type. She thought it would be a good idea to piss on an American flag and post a video of such with ranting about "fuck nationalism" or something like that. I find it all disgusting and dishonorable. I would like her to leave this land if she does not like it to that degree. North Korea might be an agreeable place, though their tollerance for her shenanigans may be somewhat less. I hate this woman.

...And I find myself jumping to her defense, and this is what's making feel like an ent. People, predicatably, are jumping down her throat. Great, she deserves it. What she doesn't deserve are death and rape threats. Really, people? Rape as a punishment, as revenge? That's savagery. I want all those people to leave this land as well. Actually, I'm more likely to want them dead. Is that too much? Am I overstepping? I don't care if they "don't really mean it" or "just said it on the internet". It's evil. THEY are evil. ...And I don't want them. I hate them.

Can I go live with the rational adults, please?

Digital World: Another view

Seriously? I didn't post in June?
Hey, there's not much internet in Utqiagvik. Yes, I was there. If you want to know what it looks like, stare at a blank sheet of dingy paper and get a raven to fly by every once in a while. Never has a monochromatic bird seemed so...colorful!

So, here it is July... and I have a cop out post. There are not many blogs that I read religeously (ignore the DECADE+ old blogroll), but Tamara Keel's is one of them...actually kind of the only one... but anyway...
She seems to agree with me. :P

I was actually checking out a neighbor's electric chainsaw. Pretty neat! I think I'll get one when the old Poulan bites the dust, but that thing is like a cockroach: just won't die. At about a dollar a fill, the thing will run all afternoon for a five, so I'd have to a lot of sawing to make a 300 dollar battery op one worthwhile, but the idea of a saw that does not idle intrigues me more than a bit.

Clue

Allow me to jump to conclusions:
Islamic terrorism.

Funny that I had to scroll to Al Jazeera to find the "t" word.

How many cartoonists, out door shoppers, and music lovers must die before we admit that not all cultures are worthy of the same level of merit? Before we stop trying to placate? And where are the Muslims saying "that's not us?" Certainly not in Mecca.

Sorry for the week-late Twitter post. Been off world for a bit.

Twitter edition! Time machine

Then: Fire James Comey!
Six months later: how dare you fire James Comey!
Humor me: Google those who called for his firing... in 2016. See how many suddenly like his work.

I swear, if our president found a cure for cancer, the beltway left would find something bad to say about it.

Anarchy!

Yup, nothing should be illegal.
Nothing.
All things should be legal.
All THINGS.
Ah? Ah?
See what I did there?

Things don't cause problems. People cause problems. People are greedy, power hungry, selfish, stupid, and even disenfranchised and abused. People in those categories do things that are not always sociable. Some times, it seems that things are an integral part of the plot of a tale of woe, but they are scenery, if you think about it.

Drugs are not a problem. Addiction is. You don't need a drug to be addicted, in fact, people are at this moment ruining their lives with social media addictions. Sure, they don't go knock off a pensioner for another Facebook hit, but their addiction is no less real. It's just that face book didn't rot anyone's teeth and isn't smuggled from poor nations in the body cavities of poor people. Frankly, it's easier to blame the inanimate drug than to try to find out why people take it... isn't it? That's why drugs are illegal, isn't it? Alcohol consumes lives at a startling pace, but it remains legal. Remember when it wasn't? Would a sane person want to go back? Alcohol prohibition built the mob that the FBI had to be built to take down. Oddly enough, now that drugs are illegal, we had to build yet another TLA to take on the problem with guns, accountants, and blood. It's called the Drug Enforcement Agency, and like the FBI, they can literally get away with murder in the name of a McGuffin.

Am I advocating drug use? No, though marijuana seems to fit the "mostly harmless" category (don't give me the gateway drug spiel, none of my pot head friends would ever want to switch). However, drug use is missing the point. Or not... how have our laws against drugs done in combating drug addictions? Drug addiction is fought by social workers, not police.

This principle here, the idea that things are neither good nor bad, extends everywhere. There is a tendency, however, to blame things for the actions that people perform. This is absurd. It denies the fact that people are not suddenly tempted to do something bad by the presence of an object. People that would kill with a gun would kill without one. People who would get addicted to PCP would likely get addicted to something else. This behavior has roots, of course, and that ought to be focus of the law and the rest of society. Perfection can never be achieved, but that's no excuse not to try harder.

The first step to really cleaning up societal decay is focus on the people, divorcing the silly notion that things are bad... or good.

Nothing should be illegal. Harming others should be.

Digital World

I don't like Nelson Mandela.
You must support apartheid!
I hate apartheid.
You must be a communist!
Gahhhhhhh!

I don't agree with transgender people in the US military.
You hate transgender people.
I continue to serve side by side with them, treating them like any other person.
But you said...
No reason to be uncivil...

I hate the EPA.
Do you like dirty air and water?
I hate pollution.

My profession is the profession of arms.
You're a warmonger.
I am a pacifist.

I love God.
I thought you weren't religious.
True.
But... you like Richard Dawkins!
And?

None of these statements contain a grain of contradiction. The world is not digital. You can be somewhat between this and that. It is also possible to carry on while disagreeing with somebody else. The big point, however, is that I tire of people assuming that because I believe one thing, I must believe another that I don't really. The above strangeness all come from my personal life and encounters with other people. What, everything needs to be monolithic? I thought I saw the world in black and white, but for crying out loud...I'm positively nuanced!

I know I'm not, but sometimes I feel like the last sane man. Is it so crazy to be willing to fight for peace? Can I call somebody unfit if they can't run a mile and a half? Do we really need to fine ranchers for making ponds in their backyards in order for Lake Eerie to not be on fire? The middle path is always the hardest to defend, but I think its worth it. That's where wisdom lies, not because you're riding some fence or not taking sides or even being a misanthrope, but because you are thinking and applying morals to all of life. We should not accept sweeping generalizations for tweaks to society. We should strive to do right in all things, never overreaching or compensating. We should not root for "our" side, but for what is right. We ought not fear what might happen, but what does happen...and maybe not flip out and assume when somebody says a thing that there is all this subtext behind it.

I realize I soapboxed there, but I'm annoyed at so often having to throw that "well, actually" flag. Soon, I'll expound on what I think right is. I meant to do that today, but somebody accused me of liking communism because I didn't like apartheid. Yeah. Like its one or the other...
Tune in next week for why I think nothing should be illegal.
Haha! You have to come back now! That's insane!
Yes, yes. Insane.
Watch the insane man!

In closing, for real, to quote the great Alissa Rosenbaum, there are no contradictions...check your premises. At least one will be false.

Science!™ vs science and a proposal for the First Lady of the United States

I'm lost. I don't know what to do. The First Lady has not provided me with instructions. Should I just eat what I want to? This is so confusing! I'm actually kind of offended that I am cared for so little. So, not lost, but offended am I. I need to be ordered around because I am unfit to decide things for myself. Why won't the First Lady order me around self righteously? Heartless fascist!

On a quasi related note, I want a burger. I have not had one in ages, and even though I know it will flush my guts out, I want one.

On a genuinely related note, what I'd really like to see the First Lady lead the charge on is science in schools. I came across an article on the esteemed Beeb about scientists being unable to replicate experiments...both of other boffiny types, but more distressingly, their own.

Looks like we need to get back to basics on the science, eh? I have noted that way too much "science" these days is theory, hypothesis, dogma, or, worst of all, lies. Science is based on the scientific method, wherein the scientist devises an experiment to test a hypothesis. Bonus points for publishing, obviously, but the key is to question, then test. You then go into the test not with an answer in mind, but with an open mind. The results are what they are, and if they can't be replicated, the experiment is defective of the hypothesis is wrong. Not difficult, unless you are using science as propaganda, and that is not something any scientist should tolerate. There is no room for dogma, prejudice, or persuasion in science. A thing is true or false, and if neither can be proven, you are off in the realm of theory.

I leaned all this as a kid, but it seems I was lucky.

More science! All the science! So much science! But let's do it for real...
Take it away, First Lady!

No Justice, no peace

Please allow me to indulge in an almost pointlessly long hypothetical rhetorical experiment.

Cool, thanks.

You turn on the news (ha ha, how quaint!)... okay, you click on done link at whatever the cool kids read on the internet, and you see that Neil Degrasse Tyson has been invited to speak at OBU... only the student body is so enraged that they are setting things on fire, smashing car windows, and blocking access to the admin buildings on campus.

What do you feel?

Is there any excuse for this?

But Chuck, you made a bad analogy! NDT is awesome and nobody could possibly disagree with him! These other folks are EXTREMISTS! They are fomenting HATE!

Uh-huh.

So what if it were Richard Dawkins? Spike Lee? Robert Mapplethorpe? Does it matter? Have we really reached the point where we tolerate setting things on fire better than ideas we disagree about?

I'd like to see a much more robust response to these thugs. Yes, not protesters, but thugs. Protesters do not break things. Thugs do. I'm puzzled why it is that there is any sympathy for them. This is not how to be an adult, this is not how to be a citizen of a free republic... our really anything else save a banana republic.
These thugs need to be arrested and charged with the crimes that they are committing. To let them go is to abridge justice...

Someone once said that a nation gets the the criminals that its justice system deserves. What do we deserve? Lawlessness and riots? At this rate, yes. If we do not bring the thugs to justice, there will be no peace.
Time will tell.