This is a girl I know. She posts pictures like this on Facebook all of the time. Life is good. If this post saves appropriately you can click ’em to see the picture bigger.
I’m going to be austere on this rant. I know, a lot of the time, I sensationalize on here (if you aren’t easily offended, see my attacks on Muslims, Catholics, and Kony 2012). The main point of this web site is to be offensive, so that’s understandable. Hell, we have a “come at me, bro” disclaimer at the bottom of the page. This evening, though, I would like to discuss, frankly, the Trayvon Martin situation down in Florida. I’m not going to re-explain everything because chances are you either were linked to this by me through Facebook or you somehow located this article in the internet mélange, so you know the basic details.
I have never been, nor do I ever expect to be, an advocate for firearm bans – a position that runs counter to most of my stances and is especially curious to many since I have never even handled a gun. In fact, I consider people who would stoop to using a gun offensively or in self-defense as sissies. That is not a critique of hunters, officers of the law, service members, or gun enthusiasts who are responsible with their weaponry, by the way, more at people who carry a gun to appear tough (thugs, rednecks, etc.). Yet, even in the face of school shootings, drug wars, suicides, and other atrocities committed with guns, I still don’t support gun bans. Perhaps, like several of my other ethical positions, I would prefer to get to the root of the problem and fix that – I don’t know. In any event, while I’m not anti-guns I’m also not pro-guns, and castle doctrine laws – particularly ‘stand your ground’ laws like Florida’s – I think go a little too far.
Regardless of above, the Trayvon Martin situation has exposed some interesting things I’d like to point out. They stem from this: my social network is pretty much split on the matter down race lines. Not a peep from any white people I’m subscribed to (and, honestly, if I unsubscribed they were probably not the kind of people who would post about this) and outrage from any black people I’m subscribed to. This brings up a couple of quick observations.
About the first one. I don’t have an answer, really. I realize that I’ve been particularly nebulous so far about my feelings on the matter so let me state the following as clearly as possible: This was a racially motivated act. George Zimmerman was not acting in self-defense, he is being a manipulative abuser of an already suspicious law. George Zimmerman should go to jail for life. Yes, I’m aware Zimmerman is Hispanic. Why was it racially motivated? I’m confident that the majority of the doubting I’m hearing about Martin’s activities stem from the color of his skin and I’m also confident that if Zimmerman had killed a white child, I would not be hearing any doubts about that child’s wholesomeness. I’m also pretty confident that it would be a much bigger news story – not that it isn’t big already. My apologies if you’re experiencing some dissonance with me right now. We’ll have to disagree.
About the second one. My feeling is that if black people view this as racial, it should be taken seriously. This isn’t Al Sharpton on stage bloviating: these are your friends and coworkers expressing their concern and their feelings (though I’m surprised I haven’t heard from Al yet, maybe I just haven’t looked hard enough). At the very least, you should speak with them about it so that you can better understand what’s going on. If you’re already doing that, great – if not, it’s never too late. Why would you try to talk your friend down about a feeling or just outright discount them? Argue with them all they want about whether Obama is responsible for gas prices or the taxes being taken out of your paycheck. But I think it’s safe to say that if I’m viewing such a discrepancy between my light-skinned friends and dark-skinned friends, it’s probably a universal trend. I could be wrong, and that’s fine.
That’s all I really have to say. Please check out the links below for more information. The last one sort of explains my feelings about it being racially motivated.
I’m thinking about going through and deleting some of my touchy friends: those armchair activist fucks. Why? Because there are so many things I want to say about that Josephy Kony video … and I can’t; at least not without a bunch of responses from people who will get upset at my towering intellect. So there’s the fatuous excuse of wanting avoid anything involving a Kardashian or Justin Bieber. Of course. I wouldn’t be me without saying something like that. Along that same line, this douchebag has the gall to call himself a filmmaker?
But let’s dig a little deeper here: Are all of these people (we’re up to 38 Facebook shares as of this writing) going to sit there and tell me that something like this:
… would have sparked a revolution on Facebook? Even though if you read the Wikipedia entry it’s pretty goddamned clear he’s not a good man. NO! If I’d posted that when I found out about Kony it #1 would have been on MySpace and #2 have been met by dead internets silence. Why?
Because it’s not relatable. It’s not tangible.
Feeble American brains, soft and underused from all of their Next Top Model, Cupcake ATMs, and the Party Rock Anthem don’t react in any way to a big block of text unless, ironically, it’s about something completely useless – see the Rush Limbaugh debacle or the furor surrounding Congress passing a bill that adds a word to a section of US law. So how can we dress it up and give it a spray tan for American consumption?
I’ve got it! Let’s have this self-righteous dick dreamer parade his kid around to get them all ready, then spend 30 fucking minutes telling them about this person who was affected by Kony’s atrocities! We’ll do it with flashy graphics, poorly edited footage, dramatic music, and McDouchenstein’s languid drone over the top of it. Americans love it when you appeal to their desire to make the world a better place for their kids!
Let’s gloss over the fact that only somewhere between 30-35% of the money our organization received actually went to Uganda. Or that there are so few LRA members left, and that Kony hasn’t been active for six years. Let’s also skip past the fact that what we’re taking all that time to explain is really, at most, two or three sentences. [For reference: Joseph Kony is the leader of an extremist Christian group called the Lord’s Resistance Army, based out of Uganda. He is known for committing terrible atrocities against innocent civilians – especially children – in the name of the Christian God. Though many attempts have been made to capture him, he remains free to this day, his current whereabouts unknown.]
This is why slacktivism is so popular: you can film some guy who lost his legs, overlay some inspirational music, post it on YouTube, and you are SOLID GOLD. Your video will be viral, and will have brought asinine Americans to tears. They’ll claim it changed their lives … and promptly forget about it two weeks later.
What’s really going on is that Obama’s already on top of this shit. Just like he got Osama, he’s gonna fucking get this guy. Yeah, it sucks that he’s basically been on the run since being pushed out of Uganda in 2005/6 (he may be deathly ill, according to some reports). It sucks he had armies of children, and traded girls away to assholes. He’s a shitty, shitty human being. But you’re still all assholes.
I’m going to go find myself a dog that lost its legs to record and overlay with some sad music for idiots to spread around. Shit – someone already beat me to that?
The following items are for homos:
Assholes. If anyone ever comes over to my place and my Mr. Coffee isn’t good enough for them, I will be introducing their genitals to my fist.
Wait… so Sandra Fluke isn’t a slut?
…
Guess I’ll stop sending her hookup emails.
You no-sense-of-humor-having babies. Grow the fuck up and learn that you’re:
Nobody needs to apologize for burning the Quran. And I hate that you assholes are putting me in this position because I normally don’t support burning books, even religious texts – in fact, I don’t support burning Qurans. But they got burned. So the fuck what? I’m going to tell you the same thing I tell these faggoty Christians.
The morals and things taught in religious texts are perfectly fine when they don’t include harming other people – like the being kind and helping the poor. Fucking dial it down. If you’re going to believe in a Space Grandpa, you need to not be serious about that fact. Dumbbeitches.
Catholic Church: Change your stupid religion now or get the fuck off of my planet. This needs to have happened yesterday.
I’m all for discussions about things that run contrary to my feelings when they are based in reality. The Catholic Church, though, has decided they are in some kind of fantasy world where Space Grandpa cares about contraceptives and queers. They’ve been proven wrong about these two items – like 100% fully wrong – and yet they continue to cry “freedom of religion” over the ability to espouse nonsense. The President even took it seriously! Freedom of religion doesn’t give people the freedom to be homophobic. (Or to be against a logically sound idea like contraceptives, but that’s not what this is about.)
So here’s the deal. Because Catholic doctrine refuses to accept that there is nothing wrong with homosexuality, I refuse to tolerate their views. I’m opinionated but I’ll at least be respectful to you when we disagree – no longer with the Catholics. And this is going to be a scorched Earth/break eggs thing: to anyone I know who is Catholic, you will be subjected to insults and I’m not going to apologize. You can either deal with it and request change in your religion, or you can have a big old cry about it. Either way, it’s happening.
Dumb bitches. “Oh, he signed a document…” He signed a document based around idiocy. Suck a cock and choke on it.
So that faggoty guilt-status shit is running around Facebook again about bullies. 99% of you won’t put this as your status for an hour!
First of all, Facebook doesn’t work that way any more. I hate that peoples’ feeble brains can’t even think to change it.
Secondly, I was bullied and I don’t resent one second of it. I would not have become a somewhat passable human being without the horrible experiences I endured at the hands of the people beating me up or making fun of my poor ass.
Stop hating on bullies, you noodlegazers.
Apple’s iPad and the Human Costs for Workers in China
There have been several articles in the media lately about the manufacturing process for the myriad electronic devices we use. From concerns about human rights violations to the state of the American economy, there seems to be a general feeling that something needs to change. The article above is just a small piece of the pie that represents the problems we face not just in making the things we like but also compensating those who make them.
Apple has a feedback page (http://www.apple.com/feedback/) where you can tell them about problems or give them suggestions. While they don’t respond to those e-mails, they do take them into account. I’m urging everyone to submit feedback to them: Let Apple know that we want a change. Give them the confidence that it’s what we want. Here’s what I said, and feel free to copy/paste if you’d like.
Your company gave us the first personal computers. It gave us the best way to play music portably. It gave us the first real super phone. It gave us the first real tablet. It even gave us a wonderful store to visit in order to buy these products and to take them if we ever have any issues with them.
It is understood that demand and cost have made overseas plants a necessity. But the company that gave us all of those things has to also be able to find a way to get those jobs back to America.
Your company has already demonstrated beyond question the value and stability of its products – from the devices themselves to the software that runs on them. Paying a little more or waiting just a bit longer for them seems like such a paltry trade-off for knowing that it was built in the country where the workers’ rights are taken seriously.
Everyone claims that transforming the supply chain would be an intensive and excruciatingly long task. Steve told President Obama that those jobs are not coming back. But he also said, “The people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.”
Let’s do this – because if any company can, it’s this one.
Please share this around your circle of friends. Maybe if enough people bring it to the spotlight, Apple will know we trust them to be the ones to revolutionize yet another facet of the world. We also have to be ready to eat our own words on this one – if they somehow pull it off and there are delays and/or price increases, it’s something we’re going to have to accept with the knowledge that they will eventually return to the levels we’re used to.