slated in
mused at 9:19 pm
there’s really a whole lot to be said for simplicity. more and more i think i am running into that truth. my room wouldn’t be a basically unusable mess if i had less stuff; i’d write in my journal if i didn’t have a dozen of them; i’d have already registered all the domain names i intend, if there weren’t so many ways to go about it. quite furthermore, i’d have built this site to be much futher along to where i’d like it to be, if there weren’t so many different ways to do it; CMS’s with which to do it; other sites in mind to build.
but.
i’m suddenly feeling terribly lazy. i want a clean slate on a lot of things… my packrattish nature is not caring overly much today. clear the slate and find the choices and go the worthwhile ways.
i’ve been at this computer screen too much the past few days. i’ve learned a lot and enjoyed a lot; and i’m not done with most of it, even if some was accomplished, and much much more was gleaned. but i need some time away. where’s my head? it’s on this stuff, in a way… it’s on the ideas that grow, particularly when i’m alone.. but they’re ideas that push through with motivation. motivation, for me, has usually always been someone else. i like myself fine, but i don’t terribly need anything from myself. ... so, so many ways to go. and i finished the cookie dough ice cream today.
slated in
mused at 3:01 pm
When is enough, enough?
Truthfully, usually long past ‘too much’.
Quasi-recent personal experience disallows me ever the straightforward answers:
- If you love her, fight for her.
- If you feel like you’re being a fool, you probably are.
it’s usually both.. necessarily both, whether to win or to lose.
If you love/want someone who doesn’t seem to love/want you back the same way/with the same intensity/intentions, then you fight for the person’s attention/affection, or you walk away (there are in betweens, but they are all pretty miserable if your feelings are strong for the person, and they’ll all lean/end with the one or the other.)
If there’s someone else in the picture.. a third person…
Then everything is compoundedly more complicated/confusing/frustrating/agonizing/painful. And in turn, as each of those are so terrible, one must convince themselves that the opposites have a fighting chance.. such that the hope is greater and the desire for the person is stronger.
And the loss will be all that more awful.
When is enough, enough?
imported from email conversations:
From: alicson
Sent: Wednesday, May 05, 2004 1:48 PM
Subject: Re: RE: washpost (sent to me from another friend)
this article talked about how what they’re doing is terrible.. and i get the gist of what’s going on. but i haven’t actually seen much of these photographs (not really any) and i only really know what’s going on beause of the big scandal that was discussed on the radio one morning on my way to work… and about military action on this militaryguy who had probably suffered a cruel doctored photo prank… i know the sexual stuff is extra bad to them.. i don’t actually know what’s being done to them of a sexual nature, tho.. besides photos with them naked… honestly? i’m not really surprised about any of it. what outlets are really offered to these soldiers over there? the behavior is unacceptable, but who’s responsible for educating them/ curbing them, anyway?
From: Alberto
Subject: Fwd: washpost
Sent: May 05 2004 12:34:24
It’s really rather terrible. The worst part is that in the Islamic religion, modesty is highly revered. It’s a sin and a shame to be naked in front of another man.
It’s wrong to be a homosexual or to be involved in homosexual acts. So the military people are having them do these grotesque things to them and it’s doubly bad for them.
I’ll send you the new yorker article about it that goes into a lot more detail.
really well written too.
-me
From: Alberto
Sent: Wednesday, May 05, 2004 2:09 PM
Subject: RE: RE: washpost
http://www.newyorker.com/online/covers/?040510onco_covers_gallery
Pictures.
http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?040510fa_fact
The Article.
The now infamous Taguma Report was drafted in February, so this has been going on a while. What doctored photograph are you talking about? Re: The not being surprised part…first of all, you pride yourself in not really being surprised by anything, so I guess that isn’t new. And what else is being done besides these pictures?
“Breaking chemical lights and pouring the phosphoric liquid on detainees; pouring cold water on naked detainees; beating detainees with a broom handle and a chair; threatening male detainees with rape; allowing a military police guard to stitch the wound of a detainee who was injured after being slammed against the wall in his cell; sodomizing a detainee with a chemical light and perhaps a broom stick, and using military working dogs to frighten and intimidate detainees with threats of attack, and in one instance actually biting a detainee.”
It’s a systematic process of breaking them down, humiliating them, and sodomizing them. And in terms of regulation and oversight…that’s the question, isn’t it? How high up does this go? Who encourages/discourages this? Why was the report issued in February…3 months ago, and why is nothing being done until now?
But the political repercussions are serious. In the Arab world where the Bush Administration has been trying to state time and time again that we’re here for their own good…to liberate them, to give them freedom, to make their lives better…and then something like this gets out…as if there weren’t enough people to view the Americans as being hypocritical. We’re here as liberators…and then we make the Iraqis simulate sex acts on one another. We say that we are sensitive to their religion, and then hit mosques and do this to the people.
On an international level, Americans pride themselves on being a beacon of democracy. “But Americans are still as capable of torture as anyone else. Rumsfeld said yesterday that it was “un-American” to abuse prisoners—as if Americans were still somehow exempt from the passions that grip the rest of the human race. But we aren’t, and because we aren’t, we shouldn’t dispense with rules that have been designed to contain them.” (washingtonpost/A2328-2004May4)
It’s also about the mentality that rules shouldn’t apply to us because we’re better. On an international level, that’s what pisses everyone off…
it’s a big deal, and though it’s not beyond the realm of possibility that people are capable of doing this to prisoners…a lot of people believe that American’s aren’t actually capable of this. The Administration is also really trying hard to point out the fact that it’s a limited variation of the norm when the truth of the matter is that it doesn’t look so limited. Several of the prison systems in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo are under investigation for this very same thing.
It’s one thing to strive for a higher ideal that is beyond one’s reach, it’s another to deny the facts and issues and to keep the world as black and white as one thought of before. That’s Bush and his Administration’s tragic flaw. Regardless of all of this, we’re still liberators and anyone that doesn’t see that is on the opposing side. We’re good people, and therefore we shouldn’t follow any rules.
-Alberto
From: alicson
Sent: Wednesday, May 05, 2004 5:05 PM
Subject: Re: RE: washpost
so what do we do?
war is bad.
torture is bad.
revelling in other’s suffering is bad.
and we’re not gods and are without God’s powers.
so what do we do as a nation; government; species?—short of what is currently being done.
do you attack the motivations, or stengthen damage-control, or enforce strict policing?
we’re fans of the ‘every angle’ approach, neh?
and why isn’t it being done already, if the answers are reasonable, if not basically interpretable (i started to say ‘obvious’.. but i suppose i can’t) ?
right and wrong. good and bad. circumstances beget motivations beget circumstances…
they hate us. we hate them. why do they hate us? because we didn’t like them enough to treat them accordingly. now we don’t like them because they didn’t like us and treated us accordingly.
and of course it’s not even that simple, but if you’ll step back for a bit… well, it is.
“why should i care?” i know you understand that sentiment.
that can be accordioned short, or long so many times in so many different directions that it doesn’t matter how many things you manage to fix now.
some people.. some things… ..some ideologies.. they just cannot coexist.
human beings become more and more complicated all the time. we ‘evolve’. and we become more complicated. we learn more; we’re aware of more; we’re capable of more.. and that simply translates to bigger, badder bads….—which also allows for greater, gooder goods… (i wanted to say ‘greater, gooder God(s)’.. but offhandedly i’d venture that God has not become much gooder in the past fifty/hundred+ years.. and i wonder whether the desperation for Him is greater now than before,..or not…. a lot of terrible terrible terrible things have occurred in our (human) history. how horrified and indignant and despairing and frustrated and confused and hurt people must have been then—just the outsiders looking in at atrocity—not even the tortured and murdered and mutilated and the innocents so terribly trespassed upon and those from who all grains of decency and human kindness were stolen from… ‘human kindness’.. it’s a whole idea… it’s one word by itself… there simply must be stake in it. and there is. but that’s not what we’re talking about here, is it? now where did this parentheses start..?...) ...yes… greater gooder goods… balance and day and night and all of that… more complicated… bigger… our crimes become farther-reaching, and potentially deeper.. and we have the increasing capacity to be aware of the crimes on a larger social scale, rather than just an individual one. when are you people going to read Grapes of Wrath?
humanity.
constant struggle for good triumph above evil—however we find it/interpret it/label it/create it.
we take very personally the things that we know. our country. our people. our species.
you take personally your news articles.. your knowledge: composed/collected and delivered en masse. of course there’s beauty in that. that with which you are unfamiliar, though, you grimace at.
and that’s prejudice.
and you know that your way of thinking/doing/being is better than others.
and that’s bigotry.
that, my dear, is missing only means, for exercising ‘good’old-fashioned oppression.
and how far away is torture from there?
but you know all of that.
so what do we do?
slated in
mused at 9:19 am
...cont’d from ‘divine right’:
i’ve not yet considered the subject much, but here are some shower thoughts on it…
it depends (of course). what does having all the powers of God actually mean? can you tap into all beings’ thoughts? can you change their memories? change their emotions? know all their pasts and intentions? and if you can do all that, you do know essential futures—how many of those can a god hold in mind, i wonder.. <sub>predetermination is a whole other thing to talk/think about</sub>
slated in
mused at 9:31 am
who do you love most in this world, or out of it?
who do you trust? who do you completely trust? who do you trust most?
what would you do if you were God, or had all the properties / powers / non-limitations of God?
if you had that absolute power, would you share it?
who is your foremost responsibility to? yourself? the person / people you love? to humanity in general? to the world in general?
with absolute / Godlike power, would you live for yourself—living your life as fully and thoroughly and self-fulfillingly as possible?
would you disregard your powers in the interests of preserving humanity as it is and has been?
would you dedicate your purpose and lifetime (eternity) toward reshaping the humanity and the world / universe in your best concepts of a utopia, or otherwise better existence?
btw.. i can’t imagine Max Faraday in Divine Right (though i’ve not seen or read a word of it yet) can really be omniscient. he should already know the consequences of his actions, then, shouldn’t he? as an entirely omnipotent being, does he still have the mind of a human? cuz he probably shouldn’t..
that’s probably why he’d run into so much conflict, actually. not that there wouldn’t be any, anyways, but having the total mind of a human but all the abilities of something more powerful… well… it’s like having an ant a roach a..cicada that’s the size of a… bus. the havock it would wreak, just doing its own thing, or even doing what it consciously believed was right…
at any rate, he (Max Faraday, or someone with all the powers of God) should have a deeper insight into everything and be able to think in the 10+ dimensions necessary and the infinite+ realities possible that his actions might influence.
at least the world keeps turning without him. that’s good.
would you share power?
would you keep anyone eternally safe?.. —from you?
: cont’d at ‘divine how absolute is absolute power?’...
6:30am is just too early to be sitting at work already, more than twice a week. i’m sooo sleepy. and i’m actually more awake this morning than i’d expect to be. i’ve gotten myself to bed so very late the last two nights.. trying to do several different things.. mom and dad also keeping busy with their very particular projects. work is getting a bit interesting because i’m actually doing the start-to-end of several things now.. truth is, i’ve really not been meeting my potential for a while now. it’s been kind of nice, and kind of guilty. ‘was a time when i would take anything on with confidence that i could reasonably compete with—and probably outshow—anyone on it, no matter their background or mine on the subject. i haven’t really done any such thing in a while. several different reasons i guess.. but i’m starting to get uneasy that i’ll be found out for not meeting the expectations of the world, sooner than later; even though i always know that later, ultimately, the world will owe me more than it even expected to. i wonder how much of a rush i am in, though, or should be. *believer* that, essentially, eventually all things are done and known* so i’ll find me—if i have been any lost, after all. but (when) should i start looking..?
slated in
mused at 2:49 pm
memory is most always clearest by the person who was wronged, rather than the person(s) charged with the wronging.
that in mind or aside, it is a terrible frustration to realize that: a) whatever your hurt stemmed from, the perpetrator does not recall the incident that so terribly impacted you. b) whatever your memory tells you of the thing that caused you pain, it turns out to be, or is alleged to be, false.
it really is a terrible continuance of fundamentally unmendable frustration.
fascinating how you can fall out of being enamored with a person, but still be bound to all the wrongs they caused you. the strife is where the passion collected and remains, at the end, neh?
i wish i understood more. all of it, from the different sides and the stages of growth / movement / interpretation / evolution…
6:11am~
i am so tired today. oy.
yesterday was nice enough. beautiful weather. essential company. all mostly reasonable things.
i forgot how hot my room can get.. it’s all that altitude..
and the basement is going to be a welcomed-back friend.
i hear that if your brain doesn’t get enough water, it gets sleepy. or your whole self gets sleepy, anyway.
i dunno. i’m sleepy/tired.. but i even feel lazy to drink my water that i have here with me.
i understand that work is a necessary function of society/life
but this can’t really be very much way to spend one’s limited days.
not for me, anyway.
but means to an end.
imposition and justification.. most things seem to be fine and well as long as they do not affect others. but to affect others in a way unpleasant to them is widely viewed as wrong.
would isolation satisfy others? no.. that would be selfish and insociable and inhuman and wrong, as well. to not be, is not acceptable. to not be nice, is not acceptable. must be nice, to be accepted. or so powerful that outlook upon you is only of pathetic and suggestive consequence. okay, so.. be nice or be powerful. this is all toward efficiency and idealism, btw. cuz of course you can be of average stock and be not nice. but since there would be that backlash since it is unacceptable social behavior, that’s simply not going to be a very ideal lifestyle for one who wants any sort of an ideal… mm. then we get to the concept of ideals. and an individuals’ personal ideals versus society’s. in fact, of course, a person’s morals and goals as well.
right of an outsider to go and impose their own ideals and methods and expectations on others.
but that’s humanity, right? struggle to be bigger, stronger, better, and to impact as many/much as possible. make them like yourself, or make them like you’d like.
~7:32am
soooo sleepy.
8:12am~
seriously. this energy being expended on keeping my eyes open makes it difficult to find energy for anything else (e.g. work).
and what i’m doing at work isn’t so terribly tiring at all…
and while i didn’t sleep early last night, it was certainly earlier than usual.
..though i did have to get up a bit earlier than usual, also…
but i guess what it is, is all the accumulated nights of not very much sleeping, for whatever reasons.
i need back those evenings, not long ago, when i would stop whatever i was doing to say, “screw it all; i’m going to bed. life and all this stuff will still be there tomorow.” yes. i must have those nights again.
8:43am~
lucky those who are staying in bed today. that’s where i belong, too.
‘guess there’s not much urgency to check my email today, then.
10:55am~
at least i’m more awake now. Also making progress formulating how to transfer / integrate aim profile site here.
11:41am~
said the rabbit to the bumblebee: “you can’t you can’t you can’t catch me!”
i played one game of tetrinet yesterday (a game I adored, and haven’t played in ..two-three years?) with old friends i haven’t seen in… almost two years? it was happy all around. ‘though there were people missing.
been thinking lots of things lately and today.
i think my not feeling well-ness recently has been—at least partially—a fair amount of (extra+?) stress. —but that doesn’t have so much to do with the thinking things lately, actually. things i’ll note, very briefly:
i really do like (especially green, lately) seedless grapes.
people are not equal. they’re just not. one of the best ways i think we deal with this, is that some of us choose to believe that every person is born into their respective lives very purposefully. the child with abusive parents, the old man who dies without family or caring friends, the woman enslaved to entertain others through her torture-wrenched pain. circumstances. but deliberate circumstances, if you believe in karma, or predetermination. but human beings are not each born equal to each other. and do not lead equally painful / carefree / comfortable / humiliating / educating / heart-aching / etc.etc.etc. lives.
today i came across the statement that “the world is dying.”
for some reason, maybe the timing in my life, or in my day, or whatever less reasonable reasons, the sentiment irked me. the actual feeling it evoked from me was.. i guess a mixture of disdain and offendedness. “the world is dying”?? there are some terrible terrible things going on in the world. the environment is not being treated very sustainably. and the humaneness of humanity (humanity of humanity) certainly is a questionable thing —but that has been true on one level or another throughout our known history of “sentience” on this planet. when i was younger, maybe seven years old or so, i was constantly being told that someone i knew wasn’t well, and was dying. some 15 years later, they’re as wrong about it as i always felt they were. but you can encourage death by insisting that it’s there. something like how you can make a ghost real through thinking about it. the thing is (back to this planet dying stuff), this world isn’t dying. look at that sun! the other day’s rain! my mother smiling at me when i came home! my brother singing in the shower, my computer connected to millions of computers around the world, people reading and writing books and painting and singing and running and picking flowers and stepping on insects and hunting deer and driving high-emission vehicles and shooting men and enhancing nuclear weapons and… is that what everyone’s talking about? is that the “planet is dying” stuff they insist on? i understand the sentiment. i’ve expressed it before. the thing is, the planet isn’t dying. we’re certainly making things much worse for ourselves than they could be/would be/should be, but to say that the planet is dying… for whatever reason, again, that upsets me today. the planet could be blown to bits at any moment, yes. but so could you. are you dying? maybe. we’re always getting older. and as far as i know, we haven’t yet figured an alternative to morality. so we’re all going to die. but i think i would be unhappy/offended to hear someone tell me that i am dying. it implies a lack of hope to me. and a discardation/disregard for all the life that does exist. (probably didn’t help my outlook on any of it that the statement was made in religious context: “Only one who has risen can save a world that is dying.” grrrrrr. so much for appreciation and faith in humanity. i ask you, is that grateful? all that glitters is not glory. that’s my general thought on that. i’d write more, but more or less of my point is out (however poorly-formed and -written). and when am i going to get my nap in, today?
word choices really are important.. the nuances of difference in meaning/tone of each word, whether due to definition, or current/cultural interpretation, or other unique/personal imprint,.. semantics and poetry.. all with intention to convey an idea or feeling, or to impose one or the other (or others) upon others. and varying vocabularies, and especially varying contexts, and even sometimes fleeting moods, all affect the message. fundamentally it’s all simply about communication. a comma or alliteration shouldn’t make much difference when it comes to communicating a point.. but it can make every difference of importance significance.
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