Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Killing the cat, metaphorically speaking...



You know what bugs me... Hang on, that's not the way to start this...



Let's try this...



Go to a mirror. Look at your reflection. Something you've seen all your life. Sure its changed a bit since, well, every other day, but it's you. Big deal. But try this.

Feel the area of your skull just above your eye sockets. If you're a male, you probably have a ridge there. Females usually don't have this, even though its pervasive through all the races of humanity. This brow ridge is there mostly as an anchor spot for muscles in the face, and for some reason males have bigger muscle scars on their bones than females do (just ask any forensic anthropologist!). There are other muscle scars on other areas of the skull, like behind the ear and the jaw insertions that males seem to have more of than females do. Why is that? We still don't know, but are ya curious?

Now close your eyes. Express happiness. Did you smile? Of course you did. Did you know that people who are blind from birth smile when they're happy? They do. Why? If you go to the animal kingdom, the bearing of teeth is usually used as an expression of aggression. Feral children don't smile. Why do we smile? We think we know, but are you curious yet?

Now just stare at your reflection. See your face? It's composed of atoms, basically. These atoms were cooked up in the furnace of a star, billions of years ago. The carbon in the proteins, the calcium in your bones, the iron in your blood, all that stuff was thrown from a star as it exploded in its final stages of life. Did you hear that? A star died so you could be here. How does this happen? You curious about that?

All those atoms have been kicking around space for eons, millions of millenia. They coalesced into one form in one sliver of time to make you. And you can contemplate that. Imagine how precious that is! All those billions of years and nothing. Now, in this brief period of time, you are here where nothing once was. You, imperfect, spotty, farty, goofy, perverted, bad habit-having you. You can think about this fact. Isn't that amazing? For almost fifteen billion years there was nothing as far as you're concerned, and now you're experiencing it.

The universe is almost fifteen billion years old. That's fifteen BILLION. That's a large number. It's kind of hard to contemplate. Dinosaurs died out sixty five million years ago. One million years ago our ancestors were just going bald and figuring out that the sharp pointy bits of a stick can bring down a big ole beast to eat. We think that a person who is a hundred years old is really old. Balls. Old is the earth. Over four billion years old. Huge swaths of time passed between the beginning of the universe and the formation of the earth, and more huge swaths of time passed between the beginning of the earth and the formation of life. Huge swaths of time passed between the beginning of life and us. Hundreds of millions of years. There were only five hundred thousand people at Woodstock, and if you pretend each person was one year, that is almost 1/800th of the number of years just multicellular life has been on the planet.

The earth! What a wonderful place. It seems huge, doesn't it! It's massive. It's where everything we know... is! All that has happened , all history, all discovery, all murder, love, war, peace, tyrants and saints, from spears and arrows to rockets and nuclear bombs. All of it is here. At best, we've got a plaque, some footprints, and a flag up on the moon, some bits of metal floating around deep space, but who we are, all of us, is here on this huge planet. Now go to the orbit of Mars and look back. We're nothing but a pixel. All we are and know is on this tiny speck of rock floating in the middle of nothing.

All this grandeur, all the improbable circumstances, all the wonderful things, painful and pleasing, that happened for you to get here are amazing in their scope. To be alive and realize you're alive is awe-inspiring, and now that we know what we know about the universe, it's even more mind boggling! Evolution molding us into what we are today, with no reason or purpose, just natural laws and biology. You are the culmination of an evolutionary journey. You did it. You hit the genetic jackpot, and you didn't even try!

All this amazing possibility and room for growth, the terrifying vastness of the universe, the arrangements of atoms that make up the molecules that make up the DNA that make up you- all a natural process. All explainable. And all you have to do to know about it is learn! To pick up a book about genetics, or astrophysics, or evolution, or geology, or whatever you don't know about, and find out that we figured all this out- talking monkeys figured out all this amazing stuff- is truly a wonderful thing. We are a smart and wonderful species, and our curiosity is something that has propelled us to what we are now. For good or ill, it has been there, helping us.

And then, there are the willfully ignorant, the liars, the people who want to scare you into the small, ever shrinking universe that they find comfortable...


Evolution has no explanation as to why and how around 1.4 million species of animals evolved as male and female .
- Ray Comfort

To say that the banana happened by accident is even more unintelligent than to say that no one designed the Coca Cola can. - Kirk Cameron

The real purpose is to say the Bibles true, and its history. Genesis is true. - Ken Ham

Oh, absolutely, ... because, you know, the Bible teaches that God made land animals on day six, alongside of Adam and Eve. - Ken Ham

Only Christianity and its teachings can explain the purpose and meaning of this world--and also gives the basis for right and wrong, good and evil, etc.
- Ken Ham

"The Earth is billions of years old. The geologic column is the way to interpret it, and Charles Darwin's evolution is right." That is what they teach in order to be a good communist. Did you know that Russian teachers come to America to study education because the American educational system is considered the best in the world for teaching students these three principals. This prepares them to be good communists and to doubt the word of God. - Kent Hovind

“Who are you gonna believe, the scientists or God?"
(Mewling crowd OF CHILDREN) “God!”
"That's right, and don't you forget it!”
- Ken Ham

Cain promoted the evolutionary doctrine that man can progress by his own efforts… When God rejected his [sacrifice], he became angry at God. Since he could not hurt God, he took out his anger on God’s servant, his brother… Cain’s efforts to “evolve” closer to God met with disaster... The story of evolution continues in Gen. 9:22, “And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brethren without.” ... When the people left the Tower of Babel, they took their false religion of evolution with them. - Kent Hovind

These people are evil. They want to take your awe, curiosity, and wonder and throw it away, replacing it with shame, flagellation, and the "honor" of begging for forgiveness for being human. They lie, cheat, and in some cases, steal, to have their way with your sense of adventure to make it fit in with their tiny little worldview.

Don't let them do this.

Keep your awe. When you look in the sky at night, don't think that it's a pretty decoration created for you, think of it as a frontier to be explored. When you smell a flower, or pet a puppy, or hold a baby, don't think that it was just a whim of a bored skybeast that brought it into your path, think of how the flower came from other plants, whose evolution is directly linked to the evolution of the insects that pollinate it, or that the puppy came from wolves that inhabited human settlements ten thousand years ago, or that the baby came out of the womb in a time where its chances for surviving were greater than its chances of dying by a huge margin, thanks to medicine, science, innovation, and curiosity.

We are cheated by the people who demand reverence for a bronze age deity. Cheated out of our wonder. Cheated out of our awe. Cheated out of our lives.

Give them nothing but skepticism, and don't take them seriously. They don't love you. They want to destroy the only thing you have that is insubstantial but powerful enough to destroy them...

They want to destroy your curiosity.

Song of teh post: Rise Above, by Black Flag
World view of teh post: Skepticism for the win, baby!

Monday, November 15, 2010

Haiku time...



Haiku time again?
How about "PENIS PENIS
PENIS PENIS!" LOL!

Wolves are attacking!
Someone get Sarah Palin!
She is good wolf food.

Ancient form of art...
Poetry, timeless and new...
Nipple Sausage Rot.

Ah! Aqua Buddha!
Let your ice creamy goodness
Ruin my health care!

Someone as funny
and clever as I am still
makes minimum wage.

Burn up that work clock!
Blog and get paid for blogging!
American Dream!

Be wary of me...
I am unstable and wild...
OVER NINE THOUSAND!

There once was a man
From Nantucket... Wait a sec.
Wrong poetry style.

Does anyone have
Change for a paradigm? WOAH!
I just
blew your mind!

Purge these silly thoughts...
Make them work for, not against...
Zen art of bullshit.

Can't sleep? Let me help!
Call me now, I'm standing by
With Iron hammers.

If something is made
of iron materials
is it "ferro"cious?

That last haiku was
something just for the geeks, nerds
and mad scientists.

Sup, brah. You should know
This copy of Windows is
Not Genuine, dude.

"Know what you're doing?"
"Of course! I always do this!"
"Then why are there flames?"

Can't sleep? Let me help!
Call me now, I'm standing by,
With pills and nude clowns.

Bukowski was right!
I write better when I'm drunk.
My liver agrees.

Have you heard the news?
They will kill all Grandmas soon!
Damn you, Obama!

Can't sleep? Let me Help!
Call me now, I'm standing by
your bed with a snake.

Lady in red boots
stomping on my scrotum smiles.
She is paid quite well.

If god is both all
knowing and powerful then
why do the tunes suck?

Someone pass me a
Vicodin and a gogurt...
I'm on a journey...

Can't sleep? Let me help!
Call me now, I'm standing by,
I'll bring the Boone's Farm.


Song of teh post: TV Party, by Black Flag
Poet of teh post: Fiendly Grimmish Writes/such bad poetry that you/will shit yourself dead.

Monday, November 1, 2010

In Defense of a Liberal Worldview (I are Seriose voter, this are Seriose stuf)



There are a few things I feel that I should clear up before the vote tomorrow. (FOR CHRIST'S SAKE ARE WE GONNA HAVE TO GO THROUGH THIS AGAIN!?!?!?) Mainly due to the fact that there are people who value rhetoric over reality, furious to functional, imaginary over intelligent. (SERIOUSLY! THESE FUCKWADS ARE THE ONES THAT GOT US INTO THIS FUCKING MESS!!!!!) If you told the average tea party enthusiast (THEY CALL THEMSELVES TEABAGGERS! TEABAGGERS!!!!!) that most likely their taxes went down under Obama's administration, or that the best way to economically run government isn't to let corporations have more rights than citizens do, but to carefully balance available taxable income with social and political programs, you'd get a firm, yet reasonable debate. (BULLSHIT! THEY CALL ME HITLER!!! COCKBAG, DOUCHEHEAD, SHITBRAINED, GOPHERFUCKING, ASSHAMSTER, DICKSTAIN, BALLRIPPING, HYPOCRITICAL, TOADMOLESTING, MOLESTACHEHAVING, VULVALANCING, KNOW-NOTHING MERCURY ADDICTS!!!!!111ONE!!) I find that informing these wonderful people of some non-revisionist history, some basic science, and some social theory can help them see our side of the picture. (YOU HAVE TO NAIL THEM TO A CHAIR AND STAPLE THEIR EYELIDS TO THEIR FOREHEAD BEFORE THEY EVEN GET THE NEURAL IMPULSES TO ACKNOWLEDGE THE FACT THAT SOMEONE WHO DOESN'T SHARE THEIR RELIGIOUS/POLITICAL/ANTI-SCIENCE VIEWS EVEN EXISTS IN THEIR FUZZY LITTLE XENOPHOBIC BRAINS!) What follows is some hard, painful truths for these misguided people (DICKS!!!!) and some helpful suggestions for dealing with them. Naturally, most people of a conservative bent aren't as fanatical as these people, and will accept evidence, but there are a few of you (I'M NOT A COYOTE WITH A WITCH FETISH WHO DRINKS HER OWN URINE FROM A BABY'S SKULL. I'M YOU!!!) who need to hear the following...




Evolution: (What you gonna believe? Science or tribal shamans with no hygiene and little reasoning power during their short, miserable lives?)

It happens. It's happening now. It has happened in the past. It will happen in the future. Deal with it. Just because you "don't believe" in it, or that you offhandedly dismiss anyone who does as a "Darwinist" or "Evolutionist," doesn't mean that it isn't FACT. If you bothered to Google "evidence of evolution" you'd be inundated with facts, facts FACTS! It can't get much clearer than "you're wrong". No amount of sticking your fingers in your ears and screaming will stop it.
How to fix this problem...
All you have to do is deny any modern medicine or technology to these science deniers. One round of blood letting and humor testing, complete with leeches and prayer, and you'll see these people running back to science, maybe even learning a thing er three.

The Founding Fathers (I gots a boner for teh flavah of teh slave owners!)

Ok, here's the deal. Imma give you a few quotes, and you tell me if they came from the founding fathers or www.atheists.org members...
"The way to see by faith is to shut the eye of reason." "Religions are all alike - founded upon fables and mythologies." "History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government." "The divinity of Jesus is made a convenient cover for absurdity." "Every new and successful example, therefore, of a perfect separation between the ecclesiastical and civil matters, is of importance; and I have no doubt that every new example will succeed, as every past one has done, in showing that religion and Government will both exist in greater purity the less they are mixed together."

Give up?

They are all from our founding fathers. People like Franklin, Jefferson, Madison, et al, they were convinced that the health of the country was inversely proportional to the association that it has with the church. "But we have god on our money!" "The pledge of allegiance has god in it!" Please. Look up when those things were added and under what circumstances. Then we'll talk. By the way, Darwin is on British money. They consistently outperform the United States in almost every standard of healthy societies. And they're the lousiest performers in all of Western Europe. Makes you think, if you could.
How to fix this problem...
These people want a religion based society rather than a secular government? Tell them to go kick it in Iran or Somalia for a while. Then ask them if they want Jesus with that constitution burger.
Also, just because it isn't in the constitution doesn't mean its against the law. Federal taxation pays for social security, medicare, etc. So unless you're totally off the government tit, don't bite down.

This isn't "your country." (Ahm takin mah countree back frum teh socialist nazi communist atheist muslims whut done runed it!)

We all live here. When we were bitching about Dubya (who was an abomination unto the lord, I know 'cause he told me (the lord, not Dubya)) you told us to love our country or to get out. Now you want to take your country back because we aren't stupid or mean enough to tell you to love it or leave it. Double standard? Surely you jest! (By the way, I'll see your Aqua Buddha and raise you a Swift Boat.) We all live here, get used to it. SO WHAT if you gotta press one for English? SO WHAT if you can't go to a gas pump without seeing a furrin language? SO WHAT that the gay neighbor wants to get married to his boyfriend of twenty years? SO FUCKING WHAT? Abortion is not murder, gay marriage will not lead to your wife leaving you for a truck driving dyke, your taxes aren't the problem. And to pretend that only your type of people deserve to live here is doing a disservice to all the people whose lives have been made better and more fulfilled because of the diversity in our country. In other words, you're a dick, and if there's a hell, I hope it's full of Mexican tormentors.
How to fix this problem...
Take off your Jebus or Mohammad blinders for two minutes, look around you. These are things that take a minimum of thought, so think for a minimum amount of time, and you'll see that we are sharing this country with a huge and diverse group. Not everyone believes what you believe, and nobody wants to make you believe what they believe. Be a dick about your own life, but let others live theirs.

Companies love you! (and that sweet, sweet lifeblood money that your children will undoubtedly fork into their gaping maws when they can afford the necessities in life, like diet Coke and Hummers.)
This should be a 'nuff said argument here. Companies don't love you. They want your money, not just from you using their products, but they don't want to pay taxes on their money. They want to get it all. "But the law of competition is sacrosanct!!" Dammit, no. You know what happens when competition is allowed to fulfill its natural destiny? One entity wins. Think about it. Do you want your children to go to Wal-Mart high, or to have to pay their taxes to Pepsi.gov? Regulation keeps behemoth multinationals from controlling everything!
How to fix this problem...
Apart from not buying from huge meganational corporations, there's not much left to do. The wave of deregulation is a huge and all encompassing one, and apart from a massive shift in our cultural consciousness, we, in the immortal words of Epicurus, are fukt.

And finally...
Liberals, please listen carefully... ('cause if you don't I'm going to beat you with a fetus)
If you know you're right, don't be afraid. These people have no argument that doesn't revolve around mistakes, so point out those mistakes. Be ruthless. Call out bullshit when you hear it. Who cares if they say "liberals can't take a joke" or laugh in your face? When you stand up for your beliefs as they're doing, you're going to get a few swings, maybe a few altercations under your belt, but every time that happens you figure out how to erode their posts a bit. This is a great country, with room for a wide array of opinions and philosophies, but if someone is so insanely, thigh suckingly, arse wideningly stupid that what they're saying doesn't make sense, then call their shit out! "Obama is a Muslim!" "BULLSHIT!" "The left are all nazis!" "COME ON, YOU IDIOT!!!" "Anyone is Hitler!" "OTHER THAN HITLER, NOBODY IS HITLER!"

In other words, tell them to...
GROW THE FUCK UP!!


Sorry. I'm normally pretty full of levity, but this has... irked me.



Song of teh post: We Are 138, by The Misfits
Angry Liberal of teh post: Everyone that understands that Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck aren't the torchbearers of the illumination.