The Most Dangerous Kind of Politician

My Friends,
   I have zero faith in the political process.  I think it is an antiquated, obsolete and detrimental way to make decisions for society at best.  At worst, and a little closer to reality, any politician who has any chance of getting elected has already been bought and paid for by various interests to finance their campaign.

One example of this fuckery, albeit a dated one

Or, if that's not the case, any sweeping fundamental change they would want to make, beyond the passage of new legislation, would probably get blocked or get them assassinated.
   Bearing this in mind, its very easy to dissociate myself from all the noise.  Even moreso when everything politicians say is typically flawed or constrained by present modes of thinking.
   Enter the Boston Marathon Bombing.  Not having a television means I get to miss most of the news coverage but some does creep into my facebook newsfeed.  One such gem I noticed was that Stephen Harper was taking shots at Justin Trudeau for his comments regarding the bombing.

Trudeau's comments were:

“Now, we don’t know now if it was terrorism or a single crazy or a domestic issue or a foreign issue.  But there is no question that this happened because there is someone who feels completely excluded. Completely at war with innocents. At war with a society. And our approach has to be, where do those tensions come from?"

And Harper's criticism was:

“When you see this kind of action, when you see this kind of violent act, you do not sit around trying to rationalize it or make excuses for it or figure out its root causes.  You condemn it categorically and to the extent that you can deal with the perpetrators you deal with them as harshly as possible and that is what this government would do if it ever was faced with such actions.”

Both quotations taken from the National Post.

   Let's deal with Harper's buffoonery first.  He takes the notion that thought should precede action and rips it apart.  He wants action.  ANY ACTION, so long as it vindicates the national honour.  Forget preventing future violence, just condemn the perps (or whomever we have conveniently labelled the perps) and punish them harshly to satisfy the mob's biblical need for revenge.
   I'm reminded of a line by rapper The Game in his song "120 Bars,"  where he references another rapper talking shit about him.  Game says, "He don't write his own raps so I gotta forgive him."  This is how I feel about Harper et al.  These fucks don't actually write their speeches and they have PR teams to make sure that they portray a certain image so how am I really supposed to get mad at him for shit he didn't think up?  Bearing this lack of accountability in mind, I have to approach Justin Bieber's Trudeau's comments with the same wariness but also the same magnanimity.
   So obviously he didn't write his own comments.  But given the circumstances that's kind of a drag because HE'S SAYING SHIT THAT ACTUALLY MAKES SENSE.  If you read my blog with any regularity, you have probably read the words "root" and "cause" several times, as well as derivatives like "causality."  For example, I use such terms extensively here, here, and here.  So needless to say my spider-sense tingled when I read these comments from Trudeau.  And here is where the danger lies; its easy to dismiss the "why plan when you can react" rantings of Harper for the idiocy inherent in those words, but when Trudeau comes at me with a message that makes sense, its tempting to forget that he is part of an establishment which actually cares little for root causality and fundamental, structural change.  In fact, such change is anathema to the political establishment because the viability and necessity of the establishment itself would have to be questioned.

"People are not elected to political office to change things, they're put there to keep things the way they are." -Jacques Fresco

   It's important to mention I have no problem with Trudeau personally (or Harper for that matter), but I recognize that they have to play a game where the main guideline is "say the right thing."  But knowing that (and I think we all know that's what politics is on some level), the best course of action is not to accept the most appealing set of lies, but to reject an establishment predicated on lying altogether.  I know this is hard; politics paints things as epic battles between "your side" (aka "the right side") and everyone else. You begin to see things as a fight for right and you put your support behind your champion/politician.  It feels good when your champion gains traction because you feel a part of it.  Conversely, when your champion loses you feel indignant, but righteously so.  And motherfuckers love them some righteous indignation.  

   Furthermore, when one of these champions name-drops something which is of interest to me (i.e. causality) its tempting to focus my attention on their struggle for me and my interests.  But politicians wear causes like pantsuits...

...and what was fashionable one day might not be fashionable the next.  If something is empirically (objectively) right however, it is beyond public opinion and the tyranny of the 51%, a realm which the politician calls home.  A politician may hit on the right note every once in a while but they only have as much integrity as public opinion allows them to have, otherwise they're out of a job.  Or assassinated.

   So as you struggle to be free always remember that people are gonna say things which at face value may seem amenable to you but always dig deeper, because there are a lot of diversions which will give you that feeling of doing right without actually doing any right.  I am reminded of a part in Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead, when "looter," Hopton Stoddard approaches architect and protagonist Howard Roark to build a temple for him.  Roark, not being religious, is initially reluctant but Stoddard has been briefed by antagonist Ellsworth Tooey on exactly what to say to Roark to get around his apprehensions.  Through the use of words and words alone, Stoddard convinces Roark that they are actually on the same page and that Roark IS religious in his own way, leading Roark to relent and build the temple.  This is how I feel about Trudeau's comments; they have been calculated to get around the defences of a growing number of critical thinkers disaffected with the political establishment.  But like the words of Stoddard, they are just so much hot air.

Stay Thirsty,

-Andre Guantanamo  

   

Sharing Scraps

My Friends,
   An earlier post from today detailed one part of my adventures from yesterday regarding the aftermath of a traffic collision.  This post could be considered its direct sequel, or perhaps a spiritual successor in that its concerns so-called "good intentions."  However, in this case it was less about people using good intent as a mask for petty, retributive malice, and more about people honestly believing they were doing right and being obstinate toward the suggestion that there efforts might be misguided.
   As I walked away from the scene of the aforementioned collision,

More or less, exactly what I looked like walking away except I wasn't wearing a leather jacket.

I approached that bastion of upscale retail, Jackson Square.  For those not familiar with Hamilton, Ontario, that would be sarcasm.

   Anyhow as I approached it I noticed two reps from "Because I am a Girl" soliciting sponsorship for third world girls.  One girl called to me as I was crossing the street.  I supposed I looked like an easy mark for a charity as my attire (yoga pants, yoga mat on backpack, FiveFingers shoes, lilac-coloured bandana and skateboard in tow) bespoke a left-leaning individual burdened with a goodly amount of liberal guilt.

   I let her run her pitch to me about some girl from whereverthefuck-istan who, through the efforts (money) of sponsors had risen to become the first female lawyer in her proud country.  FTR I don't think too much of the legal profession but for this girl's sake and since we were about to butt heads on more important issues I feigned like I was impressed by this young 3rd world girl's achievement.  

   The chick giving me the speech, let's call her Mary Sue, gave me the full sales pitch which included well-worn lines like:

"I'm gonna level with you, we're out here fundraising today"

"It's really not so much about the money" (a direct contradiction to the first line)

"Have you ever been to a developing country?" (I guess this was used as an icebreaker to gain my empathy)

When she had exhausted her supply of anecdotal stories about minor achievements in third world shit-holes (with me, all the while smiling politely and trying not to come off like a smug, cynical asshole ) she came out with it and asked me if I would like to support her cause.

I don't know if she was taken aback by my frankness, but she asked me why so I began asking her why the hypothetical street girl turned lawyer was impoverished and she told me something indistinct about not enough schools.  When I asked her why there were no schools she said there was no one to build them.  I of course, asked why and she said she didn't know and asked me if I knew.  Without getting too in-depth I explained (none too eloquently, as if often the case when your audience is not receptive) that the reasons for the impoverishment of the third world were structural and that in-the-box solutions like charities only helped a sick system limp on a little longer when it should be allowed to fail.  As I explained this her eyes seemed to glaze over.  I went on to talk about just like there was absolute poverty in some parts of the world there was relative poverty here in Canada which was also structural. Not grasping the distinction between absolute and relative, she started protesting that noone in Canada or the US was starving and they all had a place to sleep if they wanted it.  I wasn't about to argue her on this point but I felt tempted to say "google any number of Indian reservations or Camden, NJ, or Detroit, MI or Baltimore, MD or Florida slavery."  I didn't mention these things because I wasn't wanting to convey the notion that we should focus on domestic problems at the expense of international ones (the Libertarian platform) but rather that things are tough all over and that all of these problems are connected.  

   Like I said though she was unreceptive, and though the conversation remained cordial I don't feel I expressed myself well.  The tragedy of the situation is that the world needs good people like her, filled with passionate intensity to do the right thing, but it needs them to be better educated about causality and what leads to poverty, crime, violence, and the abuse of females.  

   Me throwing what limited money I have at the problem is not gonna solve the problem.   That doesn't mean that we should never use our monetary resources to help others.  By all means, buy someone a sandwich or a coffee or whatever, but understand that the more valuable gift is your time.  Real charity, that is to say, charity that actively works to bring about the day where charity is no longer required, does not require large, established foundations to redistribute cancerous debt-based currency after it has taken its cut.  It simply requires good, educated people to take account of the eventualities of their actions and modify their behaviour accordingly.

Stay Thirsty,

-Andre Guantanamo

Demystifying Rape

Note: I have had this mostly written for a few weeks now but life happened and I never finished it.  There are a few women I have discussed this topic with who have expressed interest in reading my "male" perspective (lol) when I'd like to think of it more as a human perspective.  For the record I don't bear any malice toward anyone trying to help a disenfranchised group, I just want to spread awareness that we are all a disenfranchised group.  And even if some of the things I write here piss some of my feminist friends off, please note that it was written with love and serious deliberation.  Special thanks to my relatively new friend, Lauren with whom I had my first serious conversation today.  Our exchange served as the impetus to finish this off.  Hopefully there will be many more mutually beneficial discussions in the future.  Who knows, maybe some longboarding too :-)

"I despise rapists.  For me you're somewhere between a cockroach and that white stuff that accumulates at the corner of your mouth when you're really thirsty."

-Cyrus Grissom, Con Air

"What's worse than rape!?"

-WO Paul Brenner, The General's Daughter

"There are no negro problems or Polish problems or Jewish problems or Greek problems or women's problems.  There are HUMAN PROBLEMS."

-Jacque Fresco, Larry King Interview, 1974

My Friends,
   I would like to talk about rape.  I think it is an interesting topic because it incites a lot of violent invective and really lays bare our antiquated values regarding the commodity-status of female sexuality.  Mostly, I think it is misunderstood because like so many things in our society, it is reduced to a self-contained problem with people arguing various causes without an understanding of causality itself.
   I guess the best place to start would be right in the thick of it, with the hotly contested issue of whether certain women invite rape by their demanour, clothing, etc...  My simple answer to this would be "no," but I think it is more complex than that simple response.  To say that a woman stands a greater chance of getting raped because she is wearing a short skirt makes her the prime cause (which she isn't) and also negates a few important factors such as where she is, time of day, how many people are around and very significantly, the disposition of nearby males.*  I'm sure there are more factors but these few are the ones that occur off the top of my head.  When we look at a single occurrence of rape, indeed any single occurrence of anything anywhere, we are faced with the reality that it is a product of many factors working together in unison, and each of those factors have a traceable causal origin as well.  This illuminates two things for us: first of all it is very difficult to rightly say that one factor is the cause of anything; and second, we too may be subject to factors beyond our control which may lead us to do things which we might not normally do.  This can be an uncomfortable thought for some people because noone wants to think they are capable of "evil."**
   Dr. Richard C. Lewontin makes a very clear distinction between causes and agents in his series of lectures called Biology as Ideology: The Doctrine of DNA.  I will borrow his example of asbestos, which he points out has been wrongly called the cause of certain cancers.  We find that when we leave the existing industrial mechanisms in place and simply ban a substance, industry is only too eager to greenlight a new, untested, potentially carcinogenic substance which has not yet been regulated.  If the workplaces cancers persist from other carcinogens, can asbestos really be said to be the cause of workplace cancer? No, rather it is an agent or factor in the causal chain which can at most contribute to an outcome.  To call an inanimate object a cause is to fetishize it and endow it with a malice that simply isn't there.
   Similarly, to call sexy clothes on a woman the cause of rape does not take into account the larger causal mechanisms which lead to interpersonal violence, and again fetishizes the inanimate skirt,  If you want any more proof that neither asbestos or sexy clothes are causes in and of themselves, consider all the cases of cancer and all the cases of rape:

Have all the cases of cancer involved asbestos exposure?  Certainly not.

Have all the cases of rape involved sexy clothes?  I don't know the stats, but again I feel confident saying "no."

Simply removing a causal agent will not eradicate an outcome.
   But here's the rub: while we can't say that asbestos is the cause of cancer, we can say that certain types of cancer will not occur without exposure to asbestos.  Similarly, we can say that certain rapes would not have happened absent provocative clothing.  Please note that this is not the same as naming sexy clothes the cause of rape, nor is it excusing the rapist.***  I hope this distinction is clear because very often we get confused about causes and causal agents/factors.  I know I have written about this distinction before but it bears repeating.  Funnily enough, you often see the rudiments of causal thinking expressed in the arguments of firearms advocates who say, "guns being banned would not reduce violence, only (maybe) school shootings.  This is correct in the same way that saying, "banning asbestos reduces asbestos-related cancer, but does not eradicate cancer," is correct.  In all these cases, whether we are talking about banning guns, regulating asbestos, or dressing more modestly so as to avoid rape, we are not actually dealing with the causes, but the the agents.

So, Regarding Rape, What Are the Causes?

   I don't know.  But I have an idea.  This line of reasoning might sound familiar to anyone who has dabbled in my blog before so bear with me.  We must look at rape in the broader context of interpersonal violence.  It's really tempting to look at it as somehow separate and removed from other forms of violence, but in reality, its not special.#  There are no "special" forms of violence: If I murder a black man it is violence.  However, if I murder him while wearing a white hood and screaming "Nigger!" it is still violence.  Certainly it is more salacious and might sell a few more papers but ultimately the violence has been done either way regardless if our different skin tones factored into the equation.  Now, notwithstanding the fact that men can also be raped, women are the primary victims of rape just like it is generally visible minorities who are the primary victims of hate crimes.  And while these added layers of selection and profiling again make the story more salacious, we should not lose sight of the fact that when you reduce these things down to their essential parts they are still violence, no more or less offensive than one white male being violent toward another white male.

Violence is violence.

   I only hammer this point home because I think that when you correctly place rape in the broader context of violence in general you can actually understand how to deal with it a little better.  For rape to happen, indeed for any violence to happen, it has to be reinforced by our society.  Someone (the aggressor) has to be getting something out of it, because our society reinforces competition, segregation, differential advantage, and jockeying for power.  Sure, society teaches us love and fellowship and good citizenship, etc., but it reinforces the aforementioned competitive qualities.
   Now my twelfth-grade religion teacher once told us that rape is a crime of power, not sex, and I think there is some truth to that.  Certainly it sheds some light on rape if you, like me, are inclined to view our society as a constant struggle for power and advantage,  I think most, if not all interactions in our society can be reduced to some kind of power struggle, and while that may sound overly cynical and Machiavellian## consider some of the common day-to-day relationships we have:

(Apologies in Advance for the Formatting)
DOM           VS.          SUB
Parent                          Child
Teacher                       Student
Boss                             Employee
Client/Customer       Firm/Business/Agency
Alpha Male                Betas
Coach                          Player
The State                    The Person

These relationships are just a few of the commonplace, accepted forms of power dynamics (struggles really).  I don't even want to go into the aberrant romantic relationships where one partner is whipped or, in more extreme situations, scared of the other.
   Moving forward with this assumption of constant power struggles we can see that there are many ways in which to gain the "so-called" upper hand; be physically stronger, be more persuasive, be better looking, have more money, prove someone else wrong, embarrass another, make people laugh.  All of these actions will elevate your status relative to others, and in some cases directly put someone down relative to you.  But the acceptance and social acclaim we feel for these actions make them worthwhile even if someone else has to get punked for us to look good.
   Conversely, if we are those individuals that have just gotten punked, or lost face/honour/etc..., there is a desire to want to restore that face or honour.  The feeling of shame is terrible and it is interesting to watch people in a social situation who have been put in this position try and qualify themselves to others and regain the favour of the group.  So powerful can this feeling of shame be that it can actually make people act violently in search of retribution.  (*If you think about it, this whole shaming/retribution cycle was really the driving force behind the Charlie Murphy True Hollywood Story about Rick James).

"He Totally Just Wrote Me Off Like I'm That Nigga to Steal On"

--Charlie Murphy, recalling the shame Rick James made him feel

   Now I'm not pulling all of this outta my ass and backing it up with pop culture references, at least not entirely.  Dr. James Gilligan, a former prison psychiatrist and current lecturer at NYU is renowned for his work during his time as Director of Mental Health for the Massachusetts prison system.  He brought the violence level down to almost zero when he was brought in due to high instances of suicide and interpersonal violence.

"I have spent the last 40 years of my life working the most violent people our society produces; murderers, rapists, and so on, in an attempt to understand what causes this violence."
-James Gilligan, Zeitgeist: Moving Forward

"The prison inmates I work with have told me repeatedly when I ask them why they have assaulted someone that it was because "he disrespected me."  The word disrespect is central in the vocabulary, moral values systems and psycho-dynamics of these chronically violent men.  I have yet to see a serious act of violence that was not provoked by the experience of feeling shamed and humiliated, disrespected and ridiculed,  and did not represent an attempt to undo this loss of face no matter how severe the punishment.  For we misunderstand these men at our peril if we do not realize they mean it literally when they say they would rather kill or mutilate others [or] be killed, than live without pride, dignity and self-respect."###  -James Gilligan, Social Pathology (Quoted by Peter Joseph)

   If I may be so bold as to suggest that the causes of prison violence may also underlie the violence outside of prison, and if furthermore you may be so bold as to accept that proposition, I think we might have a workable hypothesis for what causes all interpersonal violence in the world, not just rape.  And really why should we discriminate when it comes to different degrees of violence IF we can deal with it all in one fell swoop?  That's a big "if", but I maintain that it is possible if we stop looking at things in the current piecemeal fashion.  Corny as it may sound, we gotta start thinking holistically, or at the very least stop looking at things within the common frames of reference and applying the same tried and ineffective solutions.
   The problem of rape is not to be addressed by narrowing our focus to rape and rape alone; certainly it will not be solved by the passing of new laws or well-intentioned marketing campaigns 

Frankly, I don't give a shit about girls because I am not one.  

I do care about my fellow human beings though.

which only serve to perpetuate duality (us vs. them).  No rather than a dualistic perspective (which if you think about it is the foundation of so many of our obsolete societal perspectives -i.e. venus vs. mars, good vs. evil, demo vs. repub, coke vs. pepsi) we need a unified one.  We need to critically examine our society and find the common thread which condemns us all.  We need to have a knowledge of history and historical precedent but also be careful not to let our past & present conceptions shape our future projections.  (More on that interesting topic another time...)
   Finally I would like to say that we've tried approaching rape and female equality from an isolated perspective for long enough.  Frankly, progress has not moved quick enough for my tastes where it has happened at all.  Female voting and the ability to work seemed like victories but were merely accommodations, much like the "victories" blacks got in the southern US during the 1960s and 70s.  In reality, women's suffrage and women's lib only served to afford women the same level of servitude afforded only to men up to that point.  I recognize these movements for their temporal importance and their necessity at the time.  But now we can do better - we must do better.

He doesn't belong to any gender either.

Stay Thirsty,
-Andre Guantanamo

*I wasn't not sure whether to use the word "male" here or "potential rapist."  Certainly to think that all males are potential rapists is a shade cynical, but to assume that some males could never rape is naive.  Noone is innately good and noone is innately evil.  This is important to understand.

**I don't think there is such thing as evil, just right and wrong.  But evil is a good word for to make a point with. (sic.)

***"Excusing" the rapist should be a moot concept if any of this causality jibber-jabber is sinking in.

#The intent here is not to marginalize any victim so lets set a benchmark.  Either no form of violence is special or all forms are special and all the victims are special cases.  I am inclined to think the latter.  Try telling a victim of a crime that their experience isn't a special case.  Of course it is, even if its just a statistic to you.

##I've never used the word, Machiavelli or any of its derivatives in my writing before.  Feels good, man...

Seeing my Privates

"Our technology has exceeded our humanity"

-Albert Einstein

My Friends,
   A friend of mine posted this link last night about a currently unavailable app called Girls Around Me. The writer of the blog/review recounts telling a group of friends about an app which allowed someone to find people with public facebook profiles in a certain geographic radius.  These didn't have to be people on a friend's list, but anyone who had logged onto facebook from their iphone, basically allowing the user to see facebook users nearby and view their profiles, though it could be set to locate boys, girls or both.  Predictably, the boys of the group thought it was funny while the girl's thought it was invasive and upsetting.  The rationale for the female apprehension was that a guy could find a cute girl at a bar, look at her pics to see what kind of drinks she likes, what some of her interests are and where she is at a certain moment so that he could go intercept her and come off as Mr. Right, either through slick conversation of liberally applied "frosty margaritas."
   By the article's end, the writer describes how his friends, males included, were all uneasy about the invasiveness of the app, and describes how its main function in his eyes was to hammer home the importance of being aware of your facebook privacy settings, and online privacy in general.  I don't take issue with this conclusion, and the company which created the app maintains that people could always have adjusted their privacy settings.  Rather what I take issue with is the knee-jerk reaction to this technology because it is misdirected, as I find most indignation typically is.
   The girls in the article took issue with Apple and Facebook for allowing this app to be created and sold, and of course with the potential rapists and stalkers who would undoubtedly try and use it to rape and stalk more efficiently.  Because if there is anything the ambitious rape/stalker values it is maximizing his preying to prowling ratio.

Possible Tagline: "Girls Around Me: The industry leader in streamlining raping and stalking operations"

...or perhaps...

"Girls Around Me: Rape Solutions for the Modern Predator"

   In the case of the FB/Apple rage and the uproar which ultimately caused the app to be shut down: is this really the answer?  App censorship?  Making something illegal or removing it entirely is not the proper way to deal with a problem but that logic seems to dominate any thinking about problem resolution.  If we ban enough potentially offensive (or actually offensive) things, will the ne'er-do-wells among us, constantly biding their time waiting to pounce, finally get the message that we don't appreciate the threat they pose and leave us alone?  Of course not.  When has a law or a ban or a removal of something ever stopped or curtailed undesired behaviours and interests?  But clamoring for new rules is a lot easier than taking time to think critically and address causes I suppose.
   With regard to the so-called "stalkers and rapists" whom this app served as an enabler for, I have to ask: has this app really been that much of a boon?, and do they even really exist?  Now I don't mean to downplay the problem of rape and obsessive behaviours like stalking, and I am not claiming anything like the stats being overblown because I don't know the stats and frankly even one incident is too many.  But still, do these people really exist?  I don't question the possibility that given a certain sequence of events, moods, and opportunities that rapes can happen.  But when people talk about rapists and other criminals like them, their rhetoric always seems to allude to a shadowy group which is constantly watchful in alleys outside of clubs, waiting for an unescorted girl in a miniskirt and wobbly with booze to swoop in on.

First rule of 'Rape Club'...

Certainly to such a group as this, Girls Around Me would be a boon, revolutionizing the rape game by allowing the predator a menu of sorts, but I question the very existence of this secretive cabal of rapists and stalkers.
   Now remember who is saying this: I am someone who has no problem believing that there are certain powers which pull strings behind the curtains and who are the true controllers of the world we think our "democratically elected" leaders run, however I can't co-sign the prospect that there are rapists everywhere among us**, and certainly I can't co-sign the idea that they are legion.
   Well, one exception comes to mind...
   When I hear criticisms of this technology, I see fear that is not unfounded but misdirected.  People are so worried about the implications of technology that they will still use anyway because it is actually amazing and has the potential to be incredibly useful if everyone completely opened their privacy settings.  But we can't because we have reason to fear being completely open with strangers: why?
   Again we come back to "why," my oft-asked favourite question.  Why should we be afraid of other people?  Like I said, the fear, though overblown, is not unfounded.  Why might someone use this or any technology to hurt us?
   To those like me who fear institutions more than their fellow man: why would you be afraid of an organization or government using this or any social media to spy on you or data-mine you?  Why would they want to data-mine and spy in the first place?
   In my head it is clear that these potential misappropriations of technology in no way reflect poorly on the technology or its creator, but rather on the system which puts us at odds with each other to the point where we would use potentially beneficial creations as weapons.  If you think about it, all technologies are neutral, yet they get blamed for misuse and the violence which is integral to the system which applies them.
   Think I'm full of shit?  Mebbe, but let me quickly demonstrate how any technology can be hijacked for violent purposes:

1. Toothbrush

   What's more wholesome and beneficial than a toothbrush?  It conjures up images of young children learning hygiene and taking charge of their dental health.  But to some, this revolutionary technology has far more sinister applications:

"Late night I hear toothbrushes scrapin' on the floor/

Niggaz gettin' they shanks just in case the war/

pop off!.."

-Snoop Dogg Lion, Murder Was The Case

2. Pencil

   Arguably one of the greatest pieces of technology ever created.  Allows us to solidify ideas on paper and gives us something to chew on when stumped.  But it can be repurposed...

"...My little homey Baby-Boo took a pencil in his neck/

And he probly won't make it to see 22/

I put that on my mama, 'Imma ride for you Baby-Boo'..."

-Snoop Lion, Murder Was The Case

3. Fire

   I don't think anyone needs me to post a picture of fire nor tell of how it allowed us to cook food, smelt metal and power early machines.  Without saying it is more useful than pencils have been, it has certainly been more fundamental to our early development.  However, it too has been repurposed for negative uses:

I suppose we should ban fire now?

4. Rocketry

It can be either this:

Saturn V Rocket, the kind that sent to the astronauts to the moon

Or this:

Trident II Nuclear Missile

Any questions?

***

   I hope these examples make it clear that technology is in and of itself benign.  Certainly some might be inherently dangerous, such as nuclear technologies, but they are not by themselves malicious or violent.  It takes an aberrant and poorly socialized human being (or human species) to look at something and decide, hey instead of using that for the good of all I think I'll use it to kill...

...or rape, as the case may be.

Stay Thirsty,

-Andre Guantanamo

**In a certain manner of speaking, I think there actually are rapists everywhere among us. Perhaps more than even the most paranoid father of virginal young daughters might think.  For I think most anyone can rape or commit a violent act given the right (wrong) circumstances.  It is folly when people, in shock from stories of a horrible crime, ask, "How could someone do that to another human being?," or even worse when they maintain, "I could never do something like that."  

   Well, no one is born evil (evil doesn't even exist) or born a rapist, much less conceived that way.  So the factors which contributed to their aberrant behaviour must be environmental, which means that anyone can be susceptible to becoming a predator or violent if certain conditions are met.  When we are told as kids that we "can be anything," there is actually a lot more truth there than we realize.

   

Logical Disgreement/Beyond Good and Evil

My Friends,
   I was listening to an interview on youtube today and the interviewee, Peter Joseph said something which resonated with me, which I then tweeted:

Probably should have hashtagged his name as a reference

He was talking about the challenges he receives from others based on the views of societal design which he espouses through the Zeitgeist Movement.  After a certain point in a discussion, people who are too steadfast (read: religious/zealous) in their traditional worldviews invariably get offended and uncomfortable and in the worst cases become belligerent.  In any event they become irrational, clinging to outlooks and pre-conceptions which are provably mistaken.  Without commenting on the views which Peter Joseph espouses which can be found here here here and here, I want to comment on the broader notion of disagreement. We tend to think that there is merit to all points of view, or at least that everyone has a right to their opinion, and insofar as that means people should not be forcibly coerced to think a certain way or harassed for their views this is true.  But do all points of view truly have merit?  Does a racist's hatred for someone's skin colour have merit?  Does a misogynist contribute to the discussion when he mistreats women?  

  And of course, were Hitler's views defensible?

   What we are left with from this simple thought experiment is a very clear picture that there are right positions and wrong positions (notice I am not saying good and evil cause there is no such thing), or at least positions which are more right or wrong than others, a continuum as it were.  But if there is indeed a right-wrong continuum, why settle for being simply righter than someone like Hitler, who is very clearly wrong?  That's hardly a challenge, and with that very clear picture of what "wrong" looks like, we get comfortable in a worldview which supports our immediate comfort, not challenging ourselves and our outlooks to see if they can be refined and brought closer to the ultimate right, or at least what we know of right.  We kind of just sit there content knowing that we're not as wrong as the Paul Bernardos, Luka Magnottas, Slobodan Milosevics, etc. which are paraded in front of us so that we have a very clear image of wrong.  

About 1:28 is where Tony expounds upon this point

I think this is where most people fall (fail), at least in my experience.  They know (or think) they are lightyears away from murderers, drug addicts and white slave traders, so they feel that by corollary they are right without ever giving it critical thought.  But do you think that with your "right" worldview you could say, win a debate against Hitler?  Do you think you could argue Trotsky or Marx into a corner?  And while most people in our society likely support his views on some level, could you, if tasked to, hold your end in a discussion with free-market champion, Milton Friedman?  I doubt many could, yet these same people KNOW that (at least in the case of the commies and the nazis) that they are in the right.

   Now what I AM NOT SAYING is that people should work on their rhetoric so they can appear smarter than the person they are discussing with.  Nor am I saying that they should raise their voice in order to bolster themselves against an opponent with more clout and the support of the audience.

The truth does not need to be supplemented with force.  Lies do.  In fact there are books and articles about how to be a good liar but none about how to tell the truth.  

The truth kinda just speaks for itself.

What I AM SAYING is that...well let me just post a recent tweet, also a quotation from Mr. Joseph:

I actually hadn't tweeted this yesterday or the day before like I meant to so I just tweeted it now (avec le petit hashtag).  Hopefully noone calls me out for fabricating evidence when needed.

If you really wanted to effectively refute Hitler, the commies or the laissez-faire capitalist types, you would have to know their failings.  Instead most people would fall back on criticisms of evil, which on top of being completely irrelevant, are qualitative.  After all, Hitler didn't think he was evil.  He probably genuinely hated Jews and saw them as a legit threat.  And based on his eugenics program he probably had more than a passing interest in science or psuedoscience.  Yet most even today with so much knowledge at our fingertips would still not have the chops to explain to Hitler why a eugenics program is retarded and furthermore why the "Juden" were not responsible for the Weimar republic and the Treaty of Versailles.  Could you do it?  I think I could.

   However, would Hitler accept my argument?  It would make sense but it would put a visible crack in his theories which is where all his power rested.  In a very tangible way he would associate being proven wrong with failure and the loss of power because all of his power was predicated on mistaken assumptions.  So Hitler would instead get angry, stick to illogical/provably wrong assertions, resort to name-calling, question my intellectual background, question my life experience, then tell me to go back to my Macbook and have an espresso at Starbucks with all my hippie friends.  

   Interestingly enough this sort of close-minded response is similar to what I get from a lot of people on Facebook when I discuss with them.*  Typically I question deeply-held convictions which have little to no relevance and it basically stirs up lots of shit.  When asked to rationalize obsolete perspectives it invariably ties back to their own life observations rather than scientific ones.  Life observations are unreliable of course because we have been scientifically proven to see what we're looking for.

   Even when someone does manage to keep their composure and elect to refute what I am saying with logic, it is typically no more than name-dropping something/someone to do with science, pretending to agree with misinterpretations of parts of what I am saying, and then using extreme examples and figurative language to illustrate the ultimate outcome of their own bastardized perceptions of what I am saying.  It can be frustrating.

   Now it may sound like I think I have all the answers, but I most certainly do not, nor do I think I do.  Instead I have one advantage which most people lack by choice: I hold NOTHING sacred.  I question everything.  There are no givens, there are no upward limits of what is possible, there is no human nature.  All of these convenient assumptions and others which allow most to go on day to day in ignorance of the ultimate outcomes of their actions are up for debate.  And what I find more than anything is NOT that I have the answers, but that the people who hold on to their sets of assumptions don't.  

   All you have to do is ask "why?"

   Why is the worst question but also the best question and if you have ever asked it to someone in authority you have probably been disappointed by the answer.  This habit of unsatisfactorily answering this most important of questions is learned early on by people and carried on throughout most of their lives.  And if you follow the why ladder you will find one of three outcomes 1) An answer, if they know what they are talking about.  2) "I don't know," if they are honest enough to admit they don't know what they are talking about, or 3) Anger.

***************

Now I want to reiterate that I don't profess to have all the answers.  I simply try not to hold onto a premise past its usefulness (It is bitterly ironic that in a culture of such disposability we are unwilling to repair or replace our beliefs).  I think everyone should adopt this practice of critical thinking, as that is infinitely more important than what particular belief you happen to hold.  But criticism must start at the self and the premises you hold and that is a hard pill to swallow.  If I were to make up an itemized list of practices to embrace off the top of my head it would be something like this:

1) Question EVERYTHING!  Question the motherfucking ground you stand on if need be.  If you don't know the answer to the question go learn it.  If you do know it, seek different perspectives.  Yes, I know 16 & Pregnant is on but this is more important

2) Find the Truth that makes you squirm.  So you found an explanation? Fanstastic! And it tells you that everything is in good working order and that things are operating as they should?  Well, if thats the case how do you reconcile it with crime & poverty statistics and 1 Billion+ starving people on the planet?  What about your own poverty?  Sure, life may seem grand when you have an iPhone 4 and 60" plasma but could it be better?  The answer is invariably yes.  When you start looking at reasons why it isn't and those reasons make you uncomfortable you are on the right track.  

Note: If the answers you find in your quest for truth equate to "Pack your sunglasses cause the future is looking bright" then they probably aren't taking a lot of things into consideration.

3) Look at the broader picture and attempt to find root causes.  All too often we deal with issues in a reductive and individualistic sense.  We would attempt to deal with air pollution by dealing with industrial emissions for example.  First off, this negates the fact that there are other causes of air pollution and that even the emissions themselves are not causes of pollution, simply agents of the cause.  The cause would likely be irresponsible industrial practices.  Irresponsible industrial practices would then be relegated from cause to agent when the broader question of "what causes irresponsible industrial practices?"  Similar to a "why ladder" is a "cause ladder."  Climb it til you find that squirmy truth.

The answers are simple if you are honest and reject false concepts like good and evil.  

4) False dualities.  There is a position beyond a and b.  Far too often we get labelled by people as this or that for expressing an opinion which is contrary to what theirs is or simply for asking a question.  This whole idea that "if you're not one, you're the other" is a detrimental oversimplification and it hinders the pursuit of truth by attaching to people a set of beliefs that they don't necessarily hold.  Also, it is a way of attacking someone with an unpopular label without refuting their argument. 

"He's a heretic/communist/liberal/muslim/fascist/etc!"

4B) As an unofficial side-rule don't waste your brain following politics.  I did mention that I do have lots of FB debates but they are never about politics, except if I am explaining why the political system is useless, ineffectual and insulting.  Neither party is right cause they are not trained to be right.  They are institutionalized entities out for self-preservation even if it means catering to the financial interests who hold their purse-strings.  Those campaigns and conventions don't buy themselves you know.  For a more practical analogy, asking me what I thought about Barack Obama's or Stephen Harper's last proposed legislation is like asking me what I thought about Justin Bieber's new song.  Does it matter? 

Seriously, politics is about as useful as a cock-flavoured lollipop.  Stop getting excited and/or angry about new legislation and stop voting, you're just letting them think they matter.

5) Rethink/Relearn what you "know" about people.  The debate about so called human nature has unfortunately been reduced to another false duality, nature vs nurture.  If you don't believe in one then it must be the other.  Of course the truth is more complex than this, and assumptions about man in a state of nature as a greedy,profit-maximizing, hoarder (which only serves to legitimize the current paradigm we live in btw) are completely untenable given the level of knowledge we have.  I personally think this is the most important conversation to have because what we think about human beings and their nature ultimately frames our conceptions of what is possible for the world.  So if we assume that man is a the aforementioned greedy, profiteering hoarder since his inception, then society would necessarily have to be, well as shitty as it is today.  But is he?  Go learn about it.

6) BEING PROVEN WRONG IS NOT FAILURE.  This is hard and it often takes me at least a few minutes to (grudgingly) admit that I was mistaken about something.  It sucks when you go and fact check something you said and realize you spoke more than what you knew when you should have said "I don't know."  But admit when you are mistaken and move on.  Remember though, unless you are a hate-monger who has mobilized millions of angry people based on your lies and rhetoric, the admission of error will probably not be your total and utter downfall.  In fact, it will be liberating.  Trust me on this.  I have been wrong about so much and there is a certain joy that comes from laughing at how stupid you used to be because it is a measure of how far you have come.  

   

   I think that's all I got as far as suggestions but I will share with you two quotations from Ayn Rand.  Though I care nothing for her theories on economics, she had some incisive observations about right and wrong.  I will share two:

"There is no such thing as a contradiction.  If you find there is a contradiction, check your premises, one of them is mistaken."

"People who argue that things are not black and white are really saying, 'I am unwilling to be wholly right, please don't judge me as wholly wrong.'"**

   To tie things back to my original tweet, there is no logical disagreement.  If there is a disagreement, someone is espousing a mistaken view, or misinterpreting a correct one.  If it is a failure of communication between two parties who essentially agree then it is not a logical disagreement.

ADDENDUM 27 June 2012

   On thing I forgot to mention when I wrote this post was perhaps my major stumbling which I need to work on: I must work to communicate myself more effectively.  Basically its easy to explain things to people if you can get them to drop their religiously-held pre-conceived notions, but if you can't get them to that point you might as well shout a brick wall.  Whether it is my cocksure attitude, my intellectual words, or simply the people I endeavour to discuss with, I have had limited success in getting through to people.  I can understand this, I often deal with people who have profited greatly from the paradigm we live in.  I by comparison have not profited as much and it still took me many years to come to terms with certain realities.  So if even someone like me, who really suspected something was not quote right since I was a kid, can take years to come to grips with the distortion of natural law we are living in then I can only imagine how much harder it would be for someone totally content.  Still with respect to this hindrance of attachment to the current paradigm, I must work to inform others without coming off like a preachy Jeremiah who alienates people who who need to be eased into new ideas.

Stay Thirsty,

-Andre Guantanamo

*Not a direct violation of Godwin's Law, because I could have used Friedman, Trotsky or Marx instead of Hitler and still made the same point.  

**The original quotation used the terms good and evil which I have already expressed my disdain for.  The substitution of right and wrong is applicable and more apt for this post.