I am anti-social (and proud of it)

Anti-social, a common label put on people who do not go along with a lot of the bullshit p's and q's of social interaction. I have certainly been labeled anti-social in my life more than a few times. The thing I find is that this issue like others is always framed in the way that the majority is right and healthy while the minority is wrong. A lot of these idiots that use the anti-social label seem to think that most of society is good while there is a small group that just refuses to kind along with the rest. I don't think that's the case at all, rather what I see in the adult world is the same kind of schoolyard bullshit only hidden behind a few more layers of socialization. The same game of domination and submission and the whole know your place in the pecking order that goes along with that. Now in my view, that is what is really anti-social, but for most, that is just reality and people that don't like it just need to grow up.

Well, I say fuck that. Furthermore, if saying that and having that attitude makes me anti-social than as the title of this post  says, I am more than proud to wear that label. The reason for this is that if society must be that way than I also say fuck society. For one thing, there are few people in this world that I feel close to and if I could be in a world without people and maintain the same level of development and civilizations (perhaps via advanced robot technology) than I would take such an option if it was actually available. As a little aside here, maybe my anti-social nature is what makes me feel drawn to cats which I am by the way, that explains the  picture associated with my username. 

Honesty

One of the things I have been pondering lately is the subject of honesty and how its opposite, dishonesty, is really harmful to the individual in the end just as much as it is harmful to the people that person deceives. This post will be a break from my (so far) usual bucket of hate that I spew forth through my keyboard and instead will provide what I think might be some practical advice to people based on knowledge gained from my own experience.

My Revised View of "The Pragmatic Libertarian" Podcast

Well it has been a little while now since I last updated this blog, but as work has been rather overwhelming in the last two weeks ( a blog post on that is probably in the works) I have not had the emotional energy to write a blog post ( it does take a lot of energy to write for me, maybe that's why I had trouble in school). To get to my main point though, I had in a past post done a review by of a podcast called "The Pragmatic Libertarian" by someone named Shawn, who goes by the username Xomniverse. Initially when I wrote that, I gave a mixed review noting that while I found many of his ideas intersting, I had some misgivings about other things he had said. After having listned to more episodes of his podcast and watching many of his videos on youtube, I have revised my opinion to a large extent. I now think very highly of him and find his ideas to be challenging and refreshing as they provide a much needed anecdote to some of the more simplistic cliched approaches to libertarianism that are out there. I would now just like to reccomend his podcast to any readers here that are interested in libertarianism and philosophy and politics as I think you will find much of value in his work. I will now be linking his podcast on the sidebar of my blog.

On The Casey Anthony Verdict: My Brief Thoughts

Well, I have returned again to another round of my blog. The next blog post I had planned was to be somewhat of a semi follow-up to the riot post, but because this story came out and I figure I will do current news from time to time, I figure that I will comment briefly on this story.

As most of you may know, Casey Anthony, the Florida woman accused of killing her child, Caylee, was found not guilty last Tuesday of that charge. I'm not going to get into the details of it, I think most people reading here are probably aware, but here is  a link to a CNN story and video about the verdict.

Now predictably, there have been strong reactions to this story, with many members of the public expressing outrage. In the media, one of the harshest critics of this verdict has been TV show host and former prosecutor, Nancy Grace, who, in my opinion, would be top runner for the award of world’s biggest cunt. Here is a little interview  with Ms. Grace about the verdict. Incidentally, if you want more stories and videos about this, go to cnn.com. 

Blogs and Attention Seeking

Well, it looks as if my last post did not garner the negative attention that I hoped it would. perhaps if I had linked that post below the comments of another blog post dealing with the same issues, I would have been able to attract the hate comments that I was sort of hoping for.


Anyhow, that lead me to thinking about the pros and cons of having one's blog be widely read vs. having very little readership. Having looked at the counter below my article, it's clear that I have not been the only person on my blog and I also have a few comments as well.


Now it's certainly true that for many people, things like blogs, youtube channels, and other assorted things are ways for people to satisfy the human drive for ego gratification (I think that's what I meant to say) which I don't think there's anything wrong with doing. As for myself, I have until recently been a passive observer on the Internet, never actually participating until less than a year ago. The reason I started blogging was that someone in comments section recommended that to me, I had never really given it much thought before. For one thing, I have always been a private person (the reason for my reluctance in online participation period) and my written communication is drastically inferior to my verbal communication, nevertheless, having gotten into blogging, I have come to rather enjoy it, messing around with the design and linking to things, it's all pretty fun. I also feel that as my writing is something that I want to improve upon, it makes sense to practice it and what better way of practicing it than by throwing out random piles of words for all the world to see. So I guess that this blog is as much for my benefit, regardless of how many people read it, as it is for any other purpose. Now as my main problem with writing is the ability to get stuff out on paper (or computer screen) in the first place, I figure that the way to improve my skills as to get as much material out there as I can. Thus, from now on when I write posts, my main focus will be on churning out material, and I won't be as picky about grammar and other stuff as I have been in the past, after all, this is not a school paper. I still will correct spelling mistakes and obvious errors, but other than that, so please no comments about subject-verb agreement or any other crap like that.


To return to what I was talking about at the beginning, I think there may very well be advantages in having a relatively unknown blog. The first advantage I can think of is that you can say more controversial things without having to deal with a barrage of angry comments or complaints from a host of whiners who troll the Internet. I wonder if I get even get away with some illicit stuff for awhile, maybe I should devote whole posts to slandering and/or libeling people and see if someone ever picks up on it. As an aside, I oppose such laws and would not take any action against someone who did that to me so if you ever feel the need to make up crazy stuff about someone, I am fair game. I also wonder how along it would take for a blog like mine cloaked in obscurity to be reported by some nanny if I were to post a bunch of porn images on it, not that I would do that. I've also thought about the possibility of posting stupid and absurd stuff for my own amusement, just to liven up the blog a bit. Anyhow, that's all I can think at the moment so I guess I'm signing off here. The font used here is Helvetica, by the way. 

Stanley Cup Riot Apologies: Neither Accepted Nor Rejected

I'm sure many of you (if your Canadian 99.999%) have heard of the little "party" that occurred in Vancouver on June 15th after the seventh game of the Stanley Cup finals. For those of you that have not, here is an article from CNN that should give you a good summary of the events (I haven't read it, I'm just assuming that's the case). I suspect though, that if you have any interest in this article, you will already know enough about this incident so I will not discuss the events anymore at length.
                                                             
                                                          News Video from CBC covering the event.

The purpose of this blog entry is to give my take on the aftermath of the riot and specifically the apologies made by some supposedly remorseful "miscreants" who took part in the events. The first thing I want to get off my chest here is that unlike so many other people who feel that they have to express outrage regarding these events, I don't give a rat's hairy cock about this riot neither do I hold any animus against the people that took part. In fact, if an event like this only happens every time the Canucks get to the finals, then I am pro-riot because it makes the news a little bit more entertaining than usual. Given that, I suspect that we can look forward to another repeat in say, 2028. Now I'm not a fan of hockey in the first place, and for all I care, the Canucks franchise should fold or move to Portland then they can tear down that blight on Vancouver, Roger's Arena (give some of those looters work) and replace it with a bird sanctuary.

On The Title Of This Blog: An Explanation

I have been thinking for awhile about the title of my blog and whether it conveyed what I wanted this blog to be about. I actually went through a number of titles at first, finding that many of them had already been taken. In the end, I settled on something that I thought would convey the way I think, but it may not be as clear to others as it is to myself so a little explanation is in order here.

 I'm the kind of person who has two sides inside myself that fight for domination. The one side is the happy, optimistic side that believes that everything will turn out swell in the end. The other part of me is the negative pessimist that believes that everything will turn out wrong and that the worst outcome is usually the one to be expected. This battle rages on inside me whether I am thinking about my own fate, or the fate of the world at large. Thus, it plays a large part in my commentary on social and political issues as well as the somewhat personal stuff that I write about from time to time. When you read this blog, you may find that some posts seem to come from quite different perspectives. This can be accounted for by whether the optimist or the pessimist in me was more in control at the time the post was written. 

 It should also be noted that not all of my posts fall into either of these categories, some are just random observations and some are just for fun. The fun ones often come from me being in  my pessimistic state, as I often tend to have a dark perverse sense of humour when I am in that state.

Spare The Rod and Spoil The Child?

This is about a story that I came across a few days ago and I though it would be as good a news piece as any to do some commentary on. It concerns the case of Rosalina Gonzales, who pleaded guilty to a felony charge of injuring a child, for what amounted to simply spanking her child with her hand. Judge Jose Longoria seemed to think it was a big deal, saying "In the old days, maybe we got spanked, but there was a different quarrel. You don't spank children." Here is a video from the courtroom.

This is the link to the story that I quoted from and I would recommend looking through the comments below as they relate to an  issue that I am going to bring up later.

Some Further thoughts On Libertarianism and Pragmatism

This is a follow up post to my previous post reviewing the first episode of "The Pragmatic Libertarian podcast." As I mentioned in that post, the description below the title of the podcast on the site reads "Because Liberty Works" indicating that Shawn (the creator of the podcast) believes that individual liberty will lead to good results. The purpose of this post is to discuss what my view of putting libertarianism into practice would be if liberty did not work and specifically how I would feel about it on a personal level.


My main point here is that I really care less and less about the supposed negative results that could happen in a society based on libertarian principles. Both Conservatives and Liberals warn of the dire prospects for society if their plan to control society is not put into practice, but the question I would ask is why care that much about these horrible consequences in the first place. My reason for this is that most people say that I, and the majority of people over college age (high school age for some) am past the supposed "best years of my life." Now, that may or may not be true, the hopeful part of me would like to believe it not to be so, but the pessimist inside is inclined to accept it. As unhappy a conclusion that may be, the happen to see a silver lining in giving up one's hopes and dreams.

Blog Designs

Having been experimenting design wise with my blog, I have gradually become more aware of my looks and dislikes stylistically. I have been changing things around rather frequently trying to find a design that suited my tastes. I may as yet change the template for this blog, I'm looking at some on the Internet beyond the basic ones on this site, but I'm a little wary of making such changes lest I mess up some of what I've already done on this blog. I've also become quite fond of the Georgia font, I use to think Arial was the most readable, but having compared posts using both fonts, I happen to think that Georgia is easier on the eyes. 


I also, by the way, have an empty blog on wordpress with the exact same name as this one that I don't think I'm going to be using. I have to say that the controls were a lot more complicated than the one's here, which is not good for a moron like myself.