I have been, for some reason, dragging my feet on reading new books until I comment on the ones I've read most recently for reasons that are likely irrational. I'm working through my reviews of my paranormal mini-tour and discovered tonight to my delight that I had actually written a passable commentary on Science and the Afterlife Experience by Chris Carter shortly after I read it. I think I am settling on a new format for non-fiction reviews, but this will do for now in the interests of moving forward. I'm not entirely certain it's vital I give a New York Review of Books worthy discussion of a book on the paranormal on this blog that I'm pretty sure only I read anyway. I do want to write a bit about being interested in the paranormal in our age of science and religion but I guess that's coming after.
I think maybe, though, I didn't do an awesome job of covering the focus of the book which is carefully compiled reports of the most credible experiences across three broad groups: reincarnation, apparitions and mediumship. All three sections are incredibly interesting, and it's a good overview of the kind of experiences that people report as evidence for all three topics. Even the mediumship section, a field which has historically been filled with charlatans, introduced a new facet I had never heard of, which are the cross-correspondences, the supposed attempts of departed souls attempting to pass coded messages back through multiple mediums in order to establish some sort of confidence in their authenticity. You may or may not be convinced by that, but I thought the idea was clever and fun.
If you're at all interested in a fair assessment of experiential reports of the paranormal, you can't do much better than Chris Carter and Science and the Afterlife Experience.
Monday, December 22, 2014
Wednesday, November 26, 2014
Celibate but Equal
I was reading a christian man's account of coming out over and over and how dear his community of gay, celibate Christians is and his struggle with it all in general today and it broke my heart a bit. On the one hand, who am I to say he can't have that strong conviction and make that choice and still be perfectly happy, you know?
On the other, I know that my view on being gay pre-gay-sex and post-gay-sex are night and day. Having sex with another man for the first time was the closest I've ever been to a spiritual moment since leaving the church. All my pre-conception about how wrong and guilty I would feel afterward melted away in a feeling of naturalness and completeness. For me it was a moment where the missing pieces all fit into place and I finally had a glimpse of what it meant to take comfort in physical intimacy of another human being. It was the opposite of awkward. It was the opposite of broken. It was a moment of genuine completeness, where I first understood the kind of completeness straight people had with each other, and that I could have that too. And, more importantly, that if a god embodying love existed, there was no way he would object to showing affection to another man that left me feeling so whole.
I guess if I could tenderly offer my advice to the well-meaning and celibate gay christian, it's to commit that particular "sin" at least once. Please don't spend your whole life segregating yourself behind sex-proofed glass because well-meaning straight christians are posing as experts on a topic they have very little actual experience with ,with only 3 questionably analyzed bible verses as their support.
Taste and see if it is good. I promise you, it is.
On the other, I know that my view on being gay pre-gay-sex and post-gay-sex are night and day. Having sex with another man for the first time was the closest I've ever been to a spiritual moment since leaving the church. All my pre-conception about how wrong and guilty I would feel afterward melted away in a feeling of naturalness and completeness. For me it was a moment where the missing pieces all fit into place and I finally had a glimpse of what it meant to take comfort in physical intimacy of another human being. It was the opposite of awkward. It was the opposite of broken. It was a moment of genuine completeness, where I first understood the kind of completeness straight people had with each other, and that I could have that too. And, more importantly, that if a god embodying love existed, there was no way he would object to showing affection to another man that left me feeling so whole.
I guess if I could tenderly offer my advice to the well-meaning and celibate gay christian, it's to commit that particular "sin" at least once. Please don't spend your whole life segregating yourself behind sex-proofed glass because well-meaning straight christians are posing as experts on a topic they have very little actual experience with ,with only 3 questionably analyzed bible verses as their support.
Taste and see if it is good. I promise you, it is.
Fringe-ology review
Having finally decided I'm just going to have to admit my writing is just plain not going to live up to my standards for now, I managed to arrange words into a review of Steve Volk's Fringe-ology, which I recommend highly to anyone who wants to dabble in fringe topics. There are other reasons I dragged my feet on this one, but I'll not go into them now.
Hopefully I can crank out a few more lackluster reviews over the next work or so about a couple more "fringey" books. And maybe pen an essay about why I'm interested in it and I should probably be less hesitant about admitting that. And then on to less fringey things.
Hopefully I can crank out a few more lackluster reviews over the next work or so about a couple more "fringey" books. And maybe pen an essay about why I'm interested in it and I should probably be less hesitant about admitting that. And then on to less fringey things.
Wednesday, November 19, 2014
Getting Goat (a short story based on real goat events)
Everything I have ever written and everything I will ever write is garbage compared to this headline. ht @ErrorJustin pic.twitter.com/kD9V0JnFpL
— Saladin Ahmed (@saladinahmed) November 20, 2014
How I imagine this went down.
******
I'd been working the local beat for two weeks when I got the call from my editor.
"Goat on a roof. East side. Might be a good human interest story."
"I don't know how many humans are interested in goats, Bob."
Bob sighed melodramatically. "Just go check it out. It's a slow day anyway."
On scene were two uniformed cops, facing off with the goat at them from his perch on the roof, scampering angrily to the edge and back to bleat at them defiantly.
"Maybe we should mace the thing," said cop one.
"Really Johnson? You want to be known as the guy who maced a goat off a roof?" Cop two was arching his eyebrow at his partner.
"Nah man, I'm just tired of taking this goat's crap," Kowalksi whined, before dodging the stream of urine now gently arcing over the edge of the roof in their general direction. "Motherfucker!" he cried, scrabbling at his belt for something violent.
Cop two reached out and put his hand on Johnson's heaving outrage in a placating gesture. "Johnson, let's take a moment and see if we can't think of a response somewhere in between doing nothing and tasing a goat, shall we?"
I wandered over to the elderly lady watching the spectacle in her bathrobe from over the fence. "It's so sad to see it come to this." she said. Mrs. Katsch had been neighbors to the indignant goat and her owner for 5 years. "She was always such a good kidd." She said, her eyes brimming. "But she was never the same after the war."
"The war?" I asked incredulously. Although I was not surprised that the afternoon would choose to double down on weird.
"Oh yes, she and good old Colonel Hastings worked together in one of those gulf thingies." She said, waving in the general direction of war thingies in the Gulf of Somewhere Else. "They were part of an elite bomb-sniffing unit or some other crazy thing. Had some hard times don't you know." Mrs. Katsch leaned over the fence and whispered loudly but conspiratorially to me, "Word is, they killed a few people. Or saw a few people die. Or something just horrible like that. But they never talk about it. And after the war, they couldn't stay together for the memories, you know." Mrs. Katsch was tearing up again. "So Colonel Hastings gave her to good old Mr. Newton here, but he's never been able to keep up with the mood swings and the PTSD that poor little thing came back with after the war. That goat only respects one man." And then louder, to the officers still discussing the best way to get the goat off the roof that wouldn't go viral from dashboard cam footage, "That goat only respects one man!"
"And where is Mr. Newton now?" I asked, in what I thought was a very professional tone given the circumstances.
"Oh, he went off to get ... oh here he is now!" she said, waving at the old beat-up pick-up that had just pulled up, with what I presumed was Mr. Newton in the driver's seat.
"Oh thank goodness you're back!" shouted Mrs. Katsch, "the poor dear's just out of control!"
Newton nodded briefly, but not unkindly to Mrs. Katsch while on his way to unload his passenger, a slightly older gentleman with gray in the temple, a cane for walking and a slight limp. After extricating himself from Mr. Newton's assistance, Mr. Hastings set his gaze on the unfolding scene and marched over to the house.
The goat noticed him about half-way over and sat down and watched him with unreadable eyes.
By the time Mr. Hastings arrived at the edge of the lawn where the officers were standing, the scene had gone quiet, pregnant with expectation. He planted himself, looked up and said, "Hello Billy Jean."
The Goat bleated softly.
Mr. Hastings locked eyes with Billy Jean and then asked quietly, but sternly, "Do you want to tell me what's going on here, soldier?"
Billy got up and walked to the edge and bleated at the police. Looked over her shoulder at Mr. Hastings, and then walked back over to him, bleating plaintively.
"Billy Jean, I didn't ask for excuses, I asked what was going on here." Colonel Hastings was having none of it. "Why don't we ignore these fine gentlemen for now and you just come on down here. So we can talk."
Billy Jean looked down uncertainly and at Officer Johnson suspiciously. Billy bleated once.
"Yes, that was an order." said Mr. Hastings in reply.
Billy Jean trotted up the roof and disappeared over the other side. Whatever goat magic she worked to get back down remains unclear, but within moments she appeared around the other side and approached Mr. Hastings almost shyly before stopping just in front of him.
Slowly, awkwardly, Mr. Hasting's knelt, bad leg and all, and put his face close to Billy Jean and talked quietly to her for several minutes, his gaze never leaving her eyes and his hand gently turning her head back to him when she looked away. It ended, to my surprise, with a gentle kiss to her furry nose.
He stood up, and looked directly at Mr. Newton. "Next time Sam, call me before it gets this bad." He walked stiffly back to the car.
"Absolutely Colonel Hastings," said Newton, hurrying around to open the door for a man he clearly admired and maybe feared the tiniest bit.
Colonel Hastings looked back once at Billy Jean and nodded, his face a mask of professionalism, his eyes watering, before Mr. Newton sped him away. Whatever history had made this moment of shared peace possible also making it impossible to stay.
The officers were leaving, Cop Two laughing at Officer Johnson's blustering excuses. Mrs. Katsch walked back inside, "Such a good man," she said.
Billy Jean watched the truck drive away until it was long out of sight. And then looked up at the stars starting to poke through the evening twilight, chewing grass quietly. Momentarily sheltered from the storms of the past by the kind words and steady friendship of the only man she would ever trust.
Tuesday, November 18, 2014
I used to read
When I was in 1st grade, I got a trophy for reading 205 books. When I was in second grade my mom and I would go to the Phoenix Public Library and check out 75 books at a time, 25 on my card, 25 on my mom's card and 25 on my dad's card, and I would read them all as quickly as I could, transferring books from the "to-read" stack to the "read" stack on the floor of our mobile home until there were no more books in the "to-read" stack. And then we would go back and get 75 more. I got a trophy for reading 1005 books that year.
By 3rd grade I had a new teacher who measured reading with a more sophisticated "pages read" system. Continuing our weekly library visits, I read 8,000 pages in 3rd grade, and 11,000 pages in 4th grade.
My 5th grade literacy markers are lost to me as I mostly remember a few other things from the 5th grade. Mr. M was a good teacher and I borked his best compass with a magnet and never owned up to it. This was the peak of my on-again, off-again childhood romance with Angel B. We would "french" after school. My laugh has evolved over the course of my life, and that year it took the form of opening my mouth wide, emitting no sound, and heaving my sides in silent laughter. I once got kicked out of class for laughing enthusiastically but completely silently. Me and my friend Chris B. dominated the soccer league that year. This was the peak of Diana M's crush on me, during which she kicked me in the balls repeatedly during the soccer tournament. She seemed regretful. And then there was the trip to the superstition mountains where Mr. M. held a rattlesnake at bay on a desert hiking trail while the rest of us scooted around it, the braver among us sneaking a peak at the snake. I was not among the braver of us.
By 6th grade, I had been uprooted and dragged to Idaho, and most everyone hated me that first year because my dad was the principle. He was strict and the previous teacher had basically let a nascent Lord of the Flies scenario bloom and they all hated him for not letting them have the run of the place and me by proxy. One lunchtime early on, K, who is now one of my best lifelong friends, crawled over to me on his hands and knees, laughing too hard to speak or stand, and said, "H, H says to zip up your pants before we all puke." That was how that year went. It was also the year I met the first of many Matts, who introduced me to Douglas Adams. So much of that year was spent on the Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy and Robotech, which I had been introduced to by K, which are among the first of my pulpy SF loves.
My reading list more or less remained the same through 7th and 8th grade, discreetly picking up pulpy SF, or Tarzan or Black Beauty, or Wizard of Oz books from the tiny one-room library in Eagle, ID and devouring them as quick as possible. I would sometimes read a novel a night at this point.
In High School, I found old SF short stories. I'm not sure who I discovered first, Isaac Asimov or Arthur C. Clarke, but I devoured their short stories, and then novels. The collected short stories of each, the Rama series and the Foundation series remain some of my favorite stories to this day. I read less Ray Bradbury then, but wish I had read more. And I neglected other classics, which I wish I had not. I still have not finished Moby Dick. The chapter that's purely an encyclopedia entry on the different kinds of whales just tanked me. It never occurred to me I could skip it. This was also my introduction to Robert Jordan and the Wheel of Time series, which was not finished before his untimely death and which I still have not made time to finish myself.
In college I got back into kids books, partly influenced by the women I wanted to get with who were in to YA literature. But I developed and still retain a deep appreciation for A.A. Milne and the two Winnie the Pooh books. The chapter where Christopher Robin tells Pooh he has to leave the forest and grow up still gets me. I was introduced to more fantasy authors during this period, like Terry Goodkind, and the Death Gate Cycle by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, which remains one of my favorite blends of fantasy and SF to date.
It was college where I began to dumb obscene amounts of money into collecting the comic books I'd been deprived of for a while and also where my gaming habit began in earnest. I had been reading comics and playing games throughout my childhood, but it was college where the balance of time shifted from reading novels to reading comics and playing video games. From there the latter two activities slowly eroded my reading time over the next decade or so. At which point social media and glow screen swiping started eating into my comic book reading.
Today, I have one and a half huge shelves devoted to my "to-read" list, which are overflowing. There are at least 50 books there that I have not read yet, or want to read again before I get rid of them. Among those languishing unread are four books my thoughtful boyfriend got me as presents, and 2 or 3 novels published by a friend. My comics go unread, although I would like to read some more of Marvel's Thor. Although I remain satisfied with the great purge that reduced my comics collection from 17 long boxes to a more reasonable 4.
I play a lot of video games still. I think it's the thing I've been doing the most since I came out of the closet. What drives me to play is a persistent desire to dissociate/procrastinate since coming out (that shit was hard, y'all, although maybe not an eternal excuse) and some kind of mild OCD that enjoys simple worlds with simple puzzle solving and simulated achievement which my brain mistakes for actual achievement. All that adds up to a state where I receive video game tasks like the Labors of Hercules. "Kill one thousand orcs? Yes, I will restore my honor."
Most of my reading from day to day comes form my twitter feed, and the occasional great article that gets linked there. At night I browse the paranormal/woo side of reddit half asleep, hoping to find something imaginative there. My favorite to date is the random poster who laid out a system of higher powers that theorized that Jehovah was but one of a pantheon of gods and he was just the Law and Order aspect.
Which is not to disparage video games or social media, at least not right now. This is just to say my habits have changed.
And good lord do I miss the reader I used to be.
By 3rd grade I had a new teacher who measured reading with a more sophisticated "pages read" system. Continuing our weekly library visits, I read 8,000 pages in 3rd grade, and 11,000 pages in 4th grade.
My 5th grade literacy markers are lost to me as I mostly remember a few other things from the 5th grade. Mr. M was a good teacher and I borked his best compass with a magnet and never owned up to it. This was the peak of my on-again, off-again childhood romance with Angel B. We would "french" after school. My laugh has evolved over the course of my life, and that year it took the form of opening my mouth wide, emitting no sound, and heaving my sides in silent laughter. I once got kicked out of class for laughing enthusiastically but completely silently. Me and my friend Chris B. dominated the soccer league that year. This was the peak of Diana M's crush on me, during which she kicked me in the balls repeatedly during the soccer tournament. She seemed regretful. And then there was the trip to the superstition mountains where Mr. M. held a rattlesnake at bay on a desert hiking trail while the rest of us scooted around it, the braver among us sneaking a peak at the snake. I was not among the braver of us.
By 6th grade, I had been uprooted and dragged to Idaho, and most everyone hated me that first year because my dad was the principle. He was strict and the previous teacher had basically let a nascent Lord of the Flies scenario bloom and they all hated him for not letting them have the run of the place and me by proxy. One lunchtime early on, K, who is now one of my best lifelong friends, crawled over to me on his hands and knees, laughing too hard to speak or stand, and said, "H, H says to zip up your pants before we all puke." That was how that year went. It was also the year I met the first of many Matts, who introduced me to Douglas Adams. So much of that year was spent on the Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy and Robotech, which I had been introduced to by K, which are among the first of my pulpy SF loves.
My reading list more or less remained the same through 7th and 8th grade, discreetly picking up pulpy SF, or Tarzan or Black Beauty, or Wizard of Oz books from the tiny one-room library in Eagle, ID and devouring them as quick as possible. I would sometimes read a novel a night at this point.
In High School, I found old SF short stories. I'm not sure who I discovered first, Isaac Asimov or Arthur C. Clarke, but I devoured their short stories, and then novels. The collected short stories of each, the Rama series and the Foundation series remain some of my favorite stories to this day. I read less Ray Bradbury then, but wish I had read more. And I neglected other classics, which I wish I had not. I still have not finished Moby Dick. The chapter that's purely an encyclopedia entry on the different kinds of whales just tanked me. It never occurred to me I could skip it. This was also my introduction to Robert Jordan and the Wheel of Time series, which was not finished before his untimely death and which I still have not made time to finish myself.
In college I got back into kids books, partly influenced by the women I wanted to get with who were in to YA literature. But I developed and still retain a deep appreciation for A.A. Milne and the two Winnie the Pooh books. The chapter where Christopher Robin tells Pooh he has to leave the forest and grow up still gets me. I was introduced to more fantasy authors during this period, like Terry Goodkind, and the Death Gate Cycle by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, which remains one of my favorite blends of fantasy and SF to date.
It was college where I began to dumb obscene amounts of money into collecting the comic books I'd been deprived of for a while and also where my gaming habit began in earnest. I had been reading comics and playing games throughout my childhood, but it was college where the balance of time shifted from reading novels to reading comics and playing video games. From there the latter two activities slowly eroded my reading time over the next decade or so. At which point social media and glow screen swiping started eating into my comic book reading.
Today, I have one and a half huge shelves devoted to my "to-read" list, which are overflowing. There are at least 50 books there that I have not read yet, or want to read again before I get rid of them. Among those languishing unread are four books my thoughtful boyfriend got me as presents, and 2 or 3 novels published by a friend. My comics go unread, although I would like to read some more of Marvel's Thor. Although I remain satisfied with the great purge that reduced my comics collection from 17 long boxes to a more reasonable 4.
I play a lot of video games still. I think it's the thing I've been doing the most since I came out of the closet. What drives me to play is a persistent desire to dissociate/procrastinate since coming out (that shit was hard, y'all, although maybe not an eternal excuse) and some kind of mild OCD that enjoys simple worlds with simple puzzle solving and simulated achievement which my brain mistakes for actual achievement. All that adds up to a state where I receive video game tasks like the Labors of Hercules. "Kill one thousand orcs? Yes, I will restore my honor."
Most of my reading from day to day comes form my twitter feed, and the occasional great article that gets linked there. At night I browse the paranormal/woo side of reddit half asleep, hoping to find something imaginative there. My favorite to date is the random poster who laid out a system of higher powers that theorized that Jehovah was but one of a pantheon of gods and he was just the Law and Order aspect.
Which is not to disparage video games or social media, at least not right now. This is just to say my habits have changed.
And good lord do I miss the reader I used to be.
Monday, November 03, 2014
In Which I am a Tremendous Asshole
I am sure it will surprise you to learn I have said things I regret on the internet and twitter specifically. If there's a medium better designed for hostile, half-thought chirping at everyone I am not aware of it. Here's an example. Earlier this year I got mad at a famous-ish author/twitterer for how he handled a spoiler that I did not actually care about on his twitter feed. And then I got mad at his author friend for implying right-thinking people prefer spoilers. And then self-righteously unloaded on a 3rd author friend (editor?) for implying I was a child for not liking spoilers by mimicking me with the internet version of a baby voice. Do I still kinda think that last guy was a dick about things? Yeah. Do I wish famous-ish people would not believe their own press releases? Yeah. Am I proud of how I handled myself. Not so much. The worst part of this being that another twitter personality I follow turns out to have written a book on C. S. Lewis I quite liked. And follows those people. And may have seen that exchange. I find it mortifying that he might have seen that particular exchange and how I handled my end of things. He is someone I would potentially like to talk with, but if he saw that would he think the same of me?
More recently, upon the advent of another Apple product, and the requisite hosannas and hallelujahs and golden trumpets that attend such an event, I went on a rant about hype and how much I hates it. I do. I hate hype and hype culture. It's like being in love with the promises of those snake oil salesmen who used to get run out of town on a rail for bilking the gullible out of money with lies. Because it'll be totally different this time. But it is probably unkind and unwise and hypocritical of me to berate others for the "crime" of anticipating a new thing, especially if I'm not going to put out a better argument for why we should collectively ignore the hype machine other than "I hates it." I believe there is an argument to be made there, but I have not yet made it. So, my apologies to all my friends and not-friends and extended twitter family for that rant. I regrets it.
Please, do not put away your rotten tomatoes yet, there is more. Speaking of hypocrisy ....
The universe, in it's infinite, if potentially non-personal, wisdom strives to keep me humble. Shortly after that hype rant my old 4s iphone broke. After briefly debating whether to downgrade or go android or whatever, I decided just to get another iphone, the iphone 6. Because everything I own is apple, because they all talk nicely to each other without much fiddling, because I had been eligible for an upgrade for over a year, because, because, because I'm a hypocrite. A little bit. Or a lot a bit. In any case, my rant was ringing in my mind as I hit the "buy" button.
At this time, I would encourage you to send your rotten tomatoes to British Airways, who will route them to me in good time.
The truth about most of my rants is that the real target is me, and how I am responding or not responding to the environment in which I find myself. The rest of you are all but casualties in my ongoing conflict with myself and my choices. Yes, hype sucks. Yes, Apple hype sucks. Yes, I own their products anyway. I just want to use them though, not worship them like tiny mechanical gods. I have a vision of adulthood that entails picking up a tool when you need it, and putting it down and forgetting about it when you don't. I am still trying to articulate and live up to that vision. And, I don't know if you've noticed, but advertising and consumerism has kind of lost touch with reality in terms of fantastical claims and cult followings. So I believe in any case. But it doesn't excuse me from yelling at everyone else for my discomfort with the beliefs and practices of modern consumer culture and my decisions, hypocritical and not, within it.
So, sorry for yelling at everyone about hype. Sorry for being a hypocrite. When I have an argument to make about it, I'll try to do it here with something resembling coherent logic rather than just chirping at you all on twitter.
More recently, upon the advent of another Apple product, and the requisite hosannas and hallelujahs and golden trumpets that attend such an event, I went on a rant about hype and how much I hates it. I do. I hate hype and hype culture. It's like being in love with the promises of those snake oil salesmen who used to get run out of town on a rail for bilking the gullible out of money with lies. Because it'll be totally different this time. But it is probably unkind and unwise and hypocritical of me to berate others for the "crime" of anticipating a new thing, especially if I'm not going to put out a better argument for why we should collectively ignore the hype machine other than "I hates it." I believe there is an argument to be made there, but I have not yet made it. So, my apologies to all my friends and not-friends and extended twitter family for that rant. I regrets it.
Please, do not put away your rotten tomatoes yet, there is more. Speaking of hypocrisy ....
The universe, in it's infinite, if potentially non-personal, wisdom strives to keep me humble. Shortly after that hype rant my old 4s iphone broke. After briefly debating whether to downgrade or go android or whatever, I decided just to get another iphone, the iphone 6. Because everything I own is apple, because they all talk nicely to each other without much fiddling, because I had been eligible for an upgrade for over a year, because, because, because I'm a hypocrite. A little bit. Or a lot a bit. In any case, my rant was ringing in my mind as I hit the "buy" button.
At this time, I would encourage you to send your rotten tomatoes to British Airways, who will route them to me in good time.
The truth about most of my rants is that the real target is me, and how I am responding or not responding to the environment in which I find myself. The rest of you are all but casualties in my ongoing conflict with myself and my choices. Yes, hype sucks. Yes, Apple hype sucks. Yes, I own their products anyway. I just want to use them though, not worship them like tiny mechanical gods. I have a vision of adulthood that entails picking up a tool when you need it, and putting it down and forgetting about it when you don't. I am still trying to articulate and live up to that vision. And, I don't know if you've noticed, but advertising and consumerism has kind of lost touch with reality in terms of fantastical claims and cult followings. So I believe in any case. But it doesn't excuse me from yelling at everyone else for my discomfort with the beliefs and practices of modern consumer culture and my decisions, hypocritical and not, within it.
So, sorry for yelling at everyone about hype. Sorry for being a hypocrite. When I have an argument to make about it, I'll try to do it here with something resembling coherent logic rather than just chirping at you all on twitter.
Wednesday, October 29, 2014
The Tyranny of Self-Control
Oy, I bet he's gonna get a lot of letters on this one. Andrew Sullivan weighs in again on the GamerGate fiasco and Anita Sarkesian in particular. (My apologies if this is too big of a chunk to quote, but I'm not sure how to cut it down any and still retain context for what I want to talk about.)
With that in mind, I take his point that we don't want to do the same thing for men who are, to some degree, driven by testosterone. Having said that, I worry that he takes it too far back the other way, or at the very least that he and Anita are talking past each other a little bit. I agree it's wrong to demonize men for simply having the urges, the impulses, the dark thoughts. In as much as any feminist is saying that, I agree that's wrong. The unbidden impulse is intrinsically human and not under rational control. Of course, what IS under rational control is what one does with the impulse, how one channels the emotion, how one actually behaves in public.
I think we need to find some happy middle ground between the extremely true "Restricting the natural and harmless romantic expression of LGBT individuals causes needless suffering" and "If you don't give boys hand jobs when they ask they can get really, really sick." I'm not saying Andrew is making the later argument, but it leans too far to that side for my comfort. I mean, that latter argument is a caricature, but it IS a thing that young men actually say and it is one of the end products of a culture that worries endlessly if boys are unregulated boys enough. It's laughable because as grown-ass adults we understand the boy will not actually get "sick" if he doesn't get off right now, and even in the case of blue balls, is something he can give himself a hand with. So the question here is, where are we drawing the line between men being allowed to be fully testosteroned humans and reasonable self-control?
I agree that shaming the impulses is wrong, boys can't help that. They frequently can't even help getting an erection, especially when younger. This does not mean that men are helpless though. This does not mean that the spontaneous boner has to be endlessly celebrated or catered to. That each moment of testosterone rage must be fully expressed. Especially when other people tell them, "that behavior makes me really uncomfortable." I think this is what Andrew is getting at when he acknowledges men must be taught to deal with these impulses and emotions appropriately. I think the contradiction comes in when he seems to want to also retain the right to celebrate the unconstrained male. I'm not sure you can do both, is the thing. If you tell a boy he "You have to control yourself *wink*" are you not just telling him he doesn't have to control himself? Or that controlling one's self is really only for show around the womenfolk and lesser males? You can't simultaneously be teaching respect for the personhood and humanity of women and girls and then be cooing in adoration when he gets in a fight or harasses a girl his penis really wants to have sex with. I mean, this is the central contradiction in the "what we say vs what we do" in "male spaces" that feminists like Sarkeesian are actually protesting. "Baby I believe in your full humanity and dignity but it's really important I objectify a woman a little each day to honor my testosterone."
Is testosterone destiny though? As a testosterone having male I can confirm it is indeed a hell of a drug. Likewise I can confirm it a wholly tamable force given some practice, patience and, you know, social pressure to do so. Ideally this is what we should be teaching teenage boys is it not? "Yeah, that impulse resulting from erection/anger? That's not destiny."
I'm just not sure how Andrew thinks we need to celebrate maleness and male impulses MORE in this culture. As far as I can tell we're now, even at the peak of perceived feminist oppression, still soaked in a culture that encourages men to go with the impulse as much as possible. You want to look at some boobs? Look at some boobs. You want to compliment that lady on the street? Call out to her in joyful male song. You want to fight about it? Get on the internet and fight about it. You want gladiator sports? We have multiple channels and 24-hour a day coverage.
I just don't buy this fear that maleness is in any way in danger of not being celebrated or dominant. And even so, if all that's being asked is to share public spaces, comb hair and behave appropriate, EVEN WHEN HORNY, I kinda think guys are gonna live through that experience. Even further, I think that men being asked to consider the effects of their behavior, to consider not indulging in their impulses quite so much, to THINK OF OTHER GODDAMN PEOPLE rather than their own immediate needs is not so much tyranny as just asking guys to grow up. Just a bit. A man's inner child doesn't need to die, just maybe we could ask that he not drive.
Underlying this belief in the importance of changing other people’s subculture is an argument. For Sarkeesian, it seems that all differences between men and women, or between masculine or feminine identities, are entirely a function of culture, and can only be understood within a paradigm of patriarchy. All I can say is that I disagree. Of course culture matters a lot – but it doesn’t go all the way down. To deny the power of testosterone, or the stark difference it makes in all species on planet earth, can therefore lead you to misread what can and cannot be changed. My view is that there are certain aspects of testosterone that will always make men and male culture different: it’s gonna be inherently more aggressive, more physical, and more sexual in an objectifying way, and more promiscuous. The task of a mature society is not to abolish this difference (which is impossible), but to harness it to more constructive ends.
And so , in advanced Western cultures, we divert male physical aggression and in-group loyalty away from militias and gang warfare toward the spectacle of the NFL or professional wrestling or recreational hunting; we create a culture of sports that can channel a lot of what men want to do in peaceful and socially integrative ways; we allow safe spaces for this kind of culture to exist – and that includes things like violent video games and objectifying porn. And we attempt to offer a model of masculinity that can coopt the pride and ego of a testosteroned will to power into something more gentle. We praise good fathers and diligent husbands.
What a mature society does not seek to do is expunge human nature itself. All such projects backfire, or result in new forms of oppression. And there is a tendency – certainly in Sarkeesian’s work – to problematize maleness itself, to seek to expunge it, to remove all differences between the sexes for the sake of justice and fairness. Her defense will be that she is not attacking men as such – just a “toxic culture of masculinity.” And yet her prose often slips into generalizations that would never be tolerated if used against another group; and it’s hard to see what characteristics of maleness she believes are innate or at least unchangeable.
What worries me in this new era of “checking your privilege” is that men may be punished merely for being men. When liberals actually defend the conviction of the innocent in a murky world of “affirmative consent” pour décourager les autres, you see exactly where this can lead. And my concern is not just that it will not work, but that it may well provoke a backlash that compounds the problem. And that backlash, in turn, will only encourage well-intentioned people to double down on the project.
My initial reaction to this was a little exasperation, but as a novelty, decided to maybe try and see where he's coming from. I think maybe the defensiveness here is tied up in how conservative christians used to talk about homosexuality? As a gay man who stayed in the closet for a loooong time, because of "your impulses should not lead you to sin." talk, I get that might not be a world he wants to go back to. One where self-righteous moralizers define what is "correct behavior" and dictate strict adherence to that code regardless of human nature and differences in that nature. So, for a gay man, not being able to ever express affection for another gay man is a loss of both identity and the chance to be fully human in the way that we naturally are. And it's wrong for someone else to dictate otherwise, especially given the shaky ground critics of gay affection and commitment are standing on (there's a reason anti-gay marriage laws have not held up to judicial scrutiny). The main sticking point being, we aren't actually hurting anyone else by being affectionate with one another. And inasmuch as no one in this society is compelled to live by a particular reading of biblical law, and no christian has ever been promised or should expect to never see people who have different preferences and standards operating in public spaces and certainly has not been given permission to be cruel to people who are, quite shockingly, not the same as them just walking around in public like they own the place, people are quite rightly coming to the conclusion that maybe it's okay if consenting adults love each other and show a tiny fraction of that affection in public and not get killed, ostracized or penalized for it.
With that in mind, I take his point that we don't want to do the same thing for men who are, to some degree, driven by testosterone. Having said that, I worry that he takes it too far back the other way, or at the very least that he and Anita are talking past each other a little bit. I agree it's wrong to demonize men for simply having the urges, the impulses, the dark thoughts. In as much as any feminist is saying that, I agree that's wrong. The unbidden impulse is intrinsically human and not under rational control. Of course, what IS under rational control is what one does with the impulse, how one channels the emotion, how one actually behaves in public.
I think we need to find some happy middle ground between the extremely true "Restricting the natural and harmless romantic expression of LGBT individuals causes needless suffering" and "If you don't give boys hand jobs when they ask they can get really, really sick." I'm not saying Andrew is making the later argument, but it leans too far to that side for my comfort. I mean, that latter argument is a caricature, but it IS a thing that young men actually say and it is one of the end products of a culture that worries endlessly if boys are unregulated boys enough. It's laughable because as grown-ass adults we understand the boy will not actually get "sick" if he doesn't get off right now, and even in the case of blue balls, is something he can give himself a hand with. So the question here is, where are we drawing the line between men being allowed to be fully testosteroned humans and reasonable self-control?
I agree that shaming the impulses is wrong, boys can't help that. They frequently can't even help getting an erection, especially when younger. This does not mean that men are helpless though. This does not mean that the spontaneous boner has to be endlessly celebrated or catered to. That each moment of testosterone rage must be fully expressed. Especially when other people tell them, "that behavior makes me really uncomfortable." I think this is what Andrew is getting at when he acknowledges men must be taught to deal with these impulses and emotions appropriately. I think the contradiction comes in when he seems to want to also retain the right to celebrate the unconstrained male. I'm not sure you can do both, is the thing. If you tell a boy he "You have to control yourself *wink*" are you not just telling him he doesn't have to control himself? Or that controlling one's self is really only for show around the womenfolk and lesser males? You can't simultaneously be teaching respect for the personhood and humanity of women and girls and then be cooing in adoration when he gets in a fight or harasses a girl his penis really wants to have sex with. I mean, this is the central contradiction in the "what we say vs what we do" in "male spaces" that feminists like Sarkeesian are actually protesting. "Baby I believe in your full humanity and dignity but it's really important I objectify a woman a little each day to honor my testosterone."
Is testosterone destiny though? As a testosterone having male I can confirm it is indeed a hell of a drug. Likewise I can confirm it a wholly tamable force given some practice, patience and, you know, social pressure to do so. Ideally this is what we should be teaching teenage boys is it not? "Yeah, that impulse resulting from erection/anger? That's not destiny."
I'm just not sure how Andrew thinks we need to celebrate maleness and male impulses MORE in this culture. As far as I can tell we're now, even at the peak of perceived feminist oppression, still soaked in a culture that encourages men to go with the impulse as much as possible. You want to look at some boobs? Look at some boobs. You want to compliment that lady on the street? Call out to her in joyful male song. You want to fight about it? Get on the internet and fight about it. You want gladiator sports? We have multiple channels and 24-hour a day coverage.
I just don't buy this fear that maleness is in any way in danger of not being celebrated or dominant. And even so, if all that's being asked is to share public spaces, comb hair and behave appropriate, EVEN WHEN HORNY, I kinda think guys are gonna live through that experience. Even further, I think that men being asked to consider the effects of their behavior, to consider not indulging in their impulses quite so much, to THINK OF OTHER GODDAMN PEOPLE rather than their own immediate needs is not so much tyranny as just asking guys to grow up. Just a bit. A man's inner child doesn't need to die, just maybe we could ask that he not drive.
Monday, October 13, 2014
Status Report
I am trying to figure out what the hell I'm doing. My writing is scattered, as are my thoughts to some degree.
There's no going back to being closeted and probably no going back to being christian. I say probably because there are bits and pieces of christian culture, belief and practice I have realized I want to take with me. None of it particularly dependent on christianity per se, but things that exist in the secular world, but are not dealt with forthrightly because of their close association with christianity. The details of that are probably best left for another time, as I am still working out how to talk about it myself. But there is a baby in that bathwater (a metaphor I am desperate to replace), and I don't think it's wise to throw it out. And I want to intelligently strain out the ideas I want, but I am not exactly practiced in rigorous philosophical thought.
The more I marinate in the secular world the longer I realize it contains many of the same problems as the christian one. Problems of pride verging on hubris, an obscene level of unearned self-regard for one's intelligence and uprightness, an odd confidence in the shape and character of those elements of the universe still hidden by shadow and fog, an easy demonization of the other, a subtle addiction to in-grouping, inquisitions and purity crusades, a love of false dichotomies, sexism, patriarchy and blind hero worship; all these are just as present in the world outside the church as in it. On a bad day I think of it as the blind hating the blind. On a better day I just laugh at the absurdity of people who have so much in common pretending that they are from different worlds. We fight because we're the same, so much the same.
The golden line I followed out of the closet has disappeared and I am once again searching for it. But I have not found a new purpose yet and while I have gathered a few kindred spirits I'm not sure I have found "my people" yet. A group I can cleanly point to and declare affinity and resonance of spirit and commonality of purpose. Or maybe I have and I am too deeply engaged in my omphaloskepsis to see how much the same I am too.
And I vent about the complete lack of humility in America in the year of our lord 2014, but I am not overflowing with the stuff myself it seems. Still too eager to tell everyone else what they're doing wrong on any given day if my twitter feed is any indication. And while my frustration with the hypocrisy and unkindness and general shittyness of the culture at large has not really abated, it seems more and more ridiculous to complain about it endlessly while never changing myself.
I still entertain too many delusions of grandeur and not enough disciplines of habit. A sense of purpose is a powerful thing. But I have been swept up in so many purposes that were not my own I am hesitant to jump in again, for fear of being carried farther away in the wrong direction, whatever that is. So I have not been getting an E for Effort. More like a G for Getting by.
Even so, I have an inner world I want to act on in some fashion. Ideas, stories, music I want to express. Career options I want to explore. Resonances to sound out. Existential anxieties I want to resolve, or at least enter a good working relationship with. I'd like to die knowing I gave it a good shot, and passed on some good ideas.
Currently having troubles with the world to self interface though apparently. Please stand by.
Wednesday, October 08, 2014
Max: Chasing the Light Fantastic
I first met Max when he was a wee pup. One of two survivors of hard birth, along with his sister Dana, Max went from sickly to robust puppy health faster than expected and settled into life on the 3-dog dachshund farm my parents ran pretty quickly. He eventually fathered the fourth and last of the pack in Misha, who was a frequent companion on his adventures.
Max loved his family, walks around the block and chasing laser lights and shadows beyond all good sense. I have never met a dog as obsessed with light and shadow as Max was and we all loved him for it. We would worry, of course, when he showed no signs of quitting no matter how long the laser light stayed out and when he would sit for hours on the couch, starting at the floor, hoping a shadow or a laser light would appear so he could chase it. He was prone to wrapping himself in the blankets provided around the house and then poking his nose out when he suspected the outside world might merit his attention. He was companionable, if not overly affectionate, which I always have respect for in an animal, human or otherwise. My favorite memory of him is the time he ran into the house during a dinner party, jumped up on someone's lap and got so excited he immediately stared peeing on one of my mom's friends. I still vividly remember the image of my father holding a still-peeing max at arm's length so he could take him back outside. That was a good dinner party.
Max had over a decade of good living before he lost his father earlier this year to old-age, which in this case was a degenerative neurological disease of some sort that eventually robbed him of the use of his back legs. Sadly, Max did not survive his father for much longer. Max had been fussing quite a bit over his kennel in the last few months, and was prone to wandering a bit aimlessly late at night for whatever reason. Chasing ghosts, or shadows or simply puttering around.
My brother was always closest to Max, and spent much more time with him than I ever did, which is why I'm glad he was there on Max's last day. He got home early, and noticed Max was having trouble even supporting his weight on his front legs to use the yard. And unable to walk in a straight line or move about. He would stop and whine because his legs weren't working well enough to get him anywhere. So my brother picked him up and held him for a couple hours until my parents got home and could go to the vet with him.
This was Max's second visit to the vet that week. On the previous visit the vet had seen his back was in pain, but wanted to give him medicine before making any big decisions. That night, the vet agreed his condition had deteriorated badly and unless we had several thousand dollars to spend on expensive diagnosis/surgery/treatment (we do not), it was best to put him to sleep.
That night my brother held Max and he and my mother gave him affection until it was time and then continued to hold him until he went still. It's a short life, but Max fought for it from the beginning and went out with all the love and affection a dog could hope for.
I'm grateful to my brother for being there for him and I'm grateful to have known such an compellingly neurotic dog.
Rest in peace Max.
Max loved his family, walks around the block and chasing laser lights and shadows beyond all good sense. I have never met a dog as obsessed with light and shadow as Max was and we all loved him for it. We would worry, of course, when he showed no signs of quitting no matter how long the laser light stayed out and when he would sit for hours on the couch, starting at the floor, hoping a shadow or a laser light would appear so he could chase it. He was prone to wrapping himself in the blankets provided around the house and then poking his nose out when he suspected the outside world might merit his attention. He was companionable, if not overly affectionate, which I always have respect for in an animal, human or otherwise. My favorite memory of him is the time he ran into the house during a dinner party, jumped up on someone's lap and got so excited he immediately stared peeing on one of my mom's friends. I still vividly remember the image of my father holding a still-peeing max at arm's length so he could take him back outside. That was a good dinner party.
Max had over a decade of good living before he lost his father earlier this year to old-age, which in this case was a degenerative neurological disease of some sort that eventually robbed him of the use of his back legs. Sadly, Max did not survive his father for much longer. Max had been fussing quite a bit over his kennel in the last few months, and was prone to wandering a bit aimlessly late at night for whatever reason. Chasing ghosts, or shadows or simply puttering around.
My brother was always closest to Max, and spent much more time with him than I ever did, which is why I'm glad he was there on Max's last day. He got home early, and noticed Max was having trouble even supporting his weight on his front legs to use the yard. And unable to walk in a straight line or move about. He would stop and whine because his legs weren't working well enough to get him anywhere. So my brother picked him up and held him for a couple hours until my parents got home and could go to the vet with him.
This was Max's second visit to the vet that week. On the previous visit the vet had seen his back was in pain, but wanted to give him medicine before making any big decisions. That night, the vet agreed his condition had deteriorated badly and unless we had several thousand dollars to spend on expensive diagnosis/surgery/treatment (we do not), it was best to put him to sleep.
That night my brother held Max and he and my mother gave him affection until it was time and then continued to hold him until he went still. It's a short life, but Max fought for it from the beginning and went out with all the love and affection a dog could hope for.
I'm grateful to my brother for being there for him and I'm grateful to have known such an compellingly neurotic dog.
Rest in peace Max.
Friday, October 03, 2014
This Week's Questions
Questions that occurred to me this week with no obvious answer:
Is the Christian ideal of service really just social control?
In other words, "is serve your neighbor and especially me" something the higher ups say to keep people in line, while feeling no particular pressure to serve in return? Or, worse, to believe that they "serve" by being fabulously wealthy and successful and that the benefits trickle down?
Or is a society where everybody servers everybody an ideal to strive for even outside of a christian framework?
How many problems stem from the personhood of corporations?
Do people that accept that corporations are people have any room to laugh at the religious for believing in irrational traditions?
Why does our economic theory so closely align with that of dragons?
(Acquire gold, hoard gold, praise and worship gold hoarders, hope one day to be a dragon)
Is the Christian ideal of service really just social control?
In other words, "is serve your neighbor and especially me" something the higher ups say to keep people in line, while feeling no particular pressure to serve in return? Or, worse, to believe that they "serve" by being fabulously wealthy and successful and that the benefits trickle down?
Or is a society where everybody servers everybody an ideal to strive for even outside of a christian framework?
How many problems stem from the personhood of corporations?
Do people that accept that corporations are people have any room to laugh at the religious for believing in irrational traditions?
Why does our economic theory so closely align with that of dragons?
(Acquire gold, hoard gold, praise and worship gold hoarders, hope one day to be a dragon)
Wednesday, September 17, 2014
Percolating Questions
My thoughts have been unclear for a while now, as I'm sure has been apparent, and I've had a hard time picking a new direction. Too many questions, too afraid of the answers I think. A lot of this started when I came out of the closet and started allowing myself to question everything more, although I think some predate it. Come to realize, allowing yourself to question everything is a good first step, but then you need to actually look for answers, which I've more or less been too timid to do I think.
Here are some of the things I'm thinking about in random moments on a daily or weekly basis:
Do I overthink everything?
Having left my childhood religion, what do I think of spirituality?
Is spirituality a thing people need, or a delusion created by religion? (in other words, are the dogmatic atheists right?)
How do I deal with death? Must I proudly embrace oblivion with no hope of anything beyond to be a good person?
Do I really believe in anything beyond a material, clockwork universe? Am I a positivist, materialist?
Do I have an emotional need to believe that the world is weirder, and bigger than it appears because of how I was raised?
Did I receive adequate training in dealing with the disquieting existential questions that arise from being a sentient ape?
What is the shape of my worldview, now that I consciously wish to abandon the one I was raised with?
How many unconscious adventist assumptions still shape my current worldview?
How important is it to me that I be purely rational? Or purely irrational?
Am I allowed to reserve judgement until I've gathered more information?
Do I really want to write?
Would I be any good at writing?
Is there any point where I'm going to stop talking about it and just do it?
Ditto for piano and music.
Ditto for swimming and exercise.
Ditto for Japanese and language.
Am I every going to abandon childish whining about the difficulty of striving and be and adult and strive?
Do I have a clear definition for adulthood? Is it important to have one?
Am I on my way to being a better person?
Just how much damage did a long devotion to comics, games and glowy, tappy things do to my attention span?
What do I do about the amount of injustice in the world?
Is there anything to do about it?
How much of the misery I'm told to consume as "news" am I responsible for?
Do I spend too much time looking at the forests and not enough time at the trees?
How do I coexist with people, when people frustrate me so badly?
How do I exist with myself when I frustrate myself so badly?
Do I need to relax? Or could people stand to behave better?
Where is the fine line between defending my boundaries and being an asshole?
Where is the fine line between being reasonable and being a doormat?
Where is my community now? Where are my people?
Why do I subject myself to the gaming community?
How to I find social groups concerned with bigger questions than "is my game fun enough?"
How do I structure my environment?
Is it important to be choosy about the tools I surround myself with?
Am I too much of a luddite about glow screens?
Is it okay to be tired of staring at glow screens?
Are there more questions about technology to ask than "is it new? is it shiny? does it give me social capital?"
Do I have a better criteria for whether to adopt a new technology and could I convince anyone else to agree?
How do I survive in a culture that seems to value so many things I don't value as core values without seeming like a crazy person?
Am I a crazy person and no one's told me?
Am I too much like my father?
Am I not enough like my father?
How do I fight self-righteousness while still fighting for principles?
What are my principles?
Am I fighting for anything or just whining?
Why do I feel like I'm standing still so much of the time?
What will it take to move forward?
Do I overthink everything?
Here are some of the things I'm thinking about in random moments on a daily or weekly basis:
Do I overthink everything?
Having left my childhood religion, what do I think of spirituality?
Is spirituality a thing people need, or a delusion created by religion? (in other words, are the dogmatic atheists right?)
How do I deal with death? Must I proudly embrace oblivion with no hope of anything beyond to be a good person?
Do I really believe in anything beyond a material, clockwork universe? Am I a positivist, materialist?
Do I have an emotional need to believe that the world is weirder, and bigger than it appears because of how I was raised?
Did I receive adequate training in dealing with the disquieting existential questions that arise from being a sentient ape?
What is the shape of my worldview, now that I consciously wish to abandon the one I was raised with?
How many unconscious adventist assumptions still shape my current worldview?
How important is it to me that I be purely rational? Or purely irrational?
Am I allowed to reserve judgement until I've gathered more information?
Do I really want to write?
Would I be any good at writing?
Is there any point where I'm going to stop talking about it and just do it?
Ditto for piano and music.
Ditto for swimming and exercise.
Ditto for Japanese and language.
Am I every going to abandon childish whining about the difficulty of striving and be and adult and strive?
Do I have a clear definition for adulthood? Is it important to have one?
Am I on my way to being a better person?
Just how much damage did a long devotion to comics, games and glowy, tappy things do to my attention span?
What do I do about the amount of injustice in the world?
Is there anything to do about it?
How much of the misery I'm told to consume as "news" am I responsible for?
Do I spend too much time looking at the forests and not enough time at the trees?
How do I coexist with people, when people frustrate me so badly?
How do I exist with myself when I frustrate myself so badly?
Do I need to relax? Or could people stand to behave better?
Where is the fine line between defending my boundaries and being an asshole?
Where is the fine line between being reasonable and being a doormat?
Where is my community now? Where are my people?
Why do I subject myself to the gaming community?
How to I find social groups concerned with bigger questions than "is my game fun enough?"
How do I structure my environment?
Is it important to be choosy about the tools I surround myself with?
Am I too much of a luddite about glow screens?
Is it okay to be tired of staring at glow screens?
Are there more questions about technology to ask than "is it new? is it shiny? does it give me social capital?"
Do I have a better criteria for whether to adopt a new technology and could I convince anyone else to agree?
How do I survive in a culture that seems to value so many things I don't value as core values without seeming like a crazy person?
Am I a crazy person and no one's told me?
Am I too much like my father?
Am I not enough like my father?
How do I fight self-righteousness while still fighting for principles?
What are my principles?
Am I fighting for anything or just whining?
Why do I feel like I'm standing still so much of the time?
What will it take to move forward?
Do I overthink everything?
An Attempt at Clarity
Some of my conversations about religion might be a little confusing to long-time friends or even the casual observer. The piece I wrote a few days ago discussing gay men, christian or otherwise, and the christian church's reaction to them was an attempt to talk about christianity within christianity's own rule set. I should probably be clear that I myself do not identify as christian currently and probably will not in the future, assuming organizational christianity continues to insist ostracizing lepers is key to following a guy who went out of his way to show kindness to lepers. In other words, I cannot support it so long as their actions and rules seem so completely out of alignment with the broader principles they claim to be founded on.
Having said that, this does not mean that there is no redemption for Christianity, this does not mean I think all christians are intolerant assholes, this does not mean I can't see a way for them to be decent to gay people quite easily within the philosophies of their own religion. It does not mean I want to reconvert either, but I'm trying not to be pointlessly antagonistic when talking with christians about these things. And sometimes I do that by trying to argue one doesn't need to tear christianity down entirely or concede victory to the sexual revolution entirely to find a way to find brotherhood with gay individuals. Indeed, I'm pretty prudish for a gay man and I know many who DO consider themselves christian and DO have gay relationships and, as surprising as this might be to secular and religious alike, DO want to wait until marriage to have sex and value chastity. I'm not quite, ahem, as chaste as that, but I feel for the people in that position, who are actually more or less aligned culturally with the church congregations they want to be party of, and are on the same page regarding the sanctity of marriage between two people, but who the church members refuse to let themselves see as brothers and sisters.
So yes, I have my negative opinions about institutional christianity. I don't believe the modern incarnation is something I really want to be a part of, but part of that frustration is, having soaked in that religion for over 20 years, I can see clearly how there is plenty of 'wiggle' room theologically to abandon the culture war, let go of gay panic, and start being decent to people who are not them again. But in so arguing, I need to be decent to people who are not me, also. So sometimes, I try to write from that point of view, and make the argument using their own internal logic. Whether that's really the most effective kind of writing I should be doing is another question, of course. But I don't mean to dishonestly imply that I'm a true believer. Nor do I want to give the impression that "not of christianity" means "intrinsically hostile to christian people who just want to be better, kinder people."
And lets face it, that's kind of the default isn't it? So much online discourse starts from "you're not in my circle and you're ruining everything." followed by "no, YOU heathens are ruining everything!" Which, frankly, I'm completely exhausted by. So these are my halting, attempts to find my voice and find a way to actually talk to people about this stuff, rather than launch rhetorical cruise missiles from 20,000 ft, not caring who it hurts on the other end. Ideally I want a world where I can talk to Christians, and be listened to, and listen to them, without needing to buy into their worldview wholesale and vice versa. I mean that's basic pluralism, but it seems to be something most of us have a hard time with anymore. And that's not great, you know?
My writing is imperfect. My ideas are imperfect. But I am trying.
Having said that, this does not mean that there is no redemption for Christianity, this does not mean I think all christians are intolerant assholes, this does not mean I can't see a way for them to be decent to gay people quite easily within the philosophies of their own religion. It does not mean I want to reconvert either, but I'm trying not to be pointlessly antagonistic when talking with christians about these things. And sometimes I do that by trying to argue one doesn't need to tear christianity down entirely or concede victory to the sexual revolution entirely to find a way to find brotherhood with gay individuals. Indeed, I'm pretty prudish for a gay man and I know many who DO consider themselves christian and DO have gay relationships and, as surprising as this might be to secular and religious alike, DO want to wait until marriage to have sex and value chastity. I'm not quite, ahem, as chaste as that, but I feel for the people in that position, who are actually more or less aligned culturally with the church congregations they want to be party of, and are on the same page regarding the sanctity of marriage between two people, but who the church members refuse to let themselves see as brothers and sisters.
So yes, I have my negative opinions about institutional christianity. I don't believe the modern incarnation is something I really want to be a part of, but part of that frustration is, having soaked in that religion for over 20 years, I can see clearly how there is plenty of 'wiggle' room theologically to abandon the culture war, let go of gay panic, and start being decent to people who are not them again. But in so arguing, I need to be decent to people who are not me, also. So sometimes, I try to write from that point of view, and make the argument using their own internal logic. Whether that's really the most effective kind of writing I should be doing is another question, of course. But I don't mean to dishonestly imply that I'm a true believer. Nor do I want to give the impression that "not of christianity" means "intrinsically hostile to christian people who just want to be better, kinder people."
And lets face it, that's kind of the default isn't it? So much online discourse starts from "you're not in my circle and you're ruining everything." followed by "no, YOU heathens are ruining everything!" Which, frankly, I'm completely exhausted by. So these are my halting, attempts to find my voice and find a way to actually talk to people about this stuff, rather than launch rhetorical cruise missiles from 20,000 ft, not caring who it hurts on the other end. Ideally I want a world where I can talk to Christians, and be listened to, and listen to them, without needing to buy into their worldview wholesale and vice versa. I mean that's basic pluralism, but it seems to be something most of us have a hard time with anymore. And that's not great, you know?
My writing is imperfect. My ideas are imperfect. But I am trying.
Sunday, September 07, 2014
Today's Quotes from Technics and Civilization
"Of all forms of wealth, money alone is without assignable limits. The prince who might desire to build 5 palaces might hesitate to build five thousand: but what was to prevent him from seeking by conquest and taxes to multiple by thousands the riches in his treasury?" (p. 24)
"...to think in terms of mere weight and number, to make quantity not alone an indication of value but the criterion of value--that was the contribution of capitalism to the mechanical world-picture. So the abstractions of capitalism preceded the abstractions of modern science and re-enforced at every point its typical lessons and its typical methods of procedure." (p. 25)
"Capitalism utilized the machine, not to further social welfare, but to increase private profit: mechanical instruments were used for the aggrandizement of the ruling classes. It was because of capitalism that the handicraft industries in both Europe and other parts of the world were recklessly destroyed by machine products, even when the latter were inferior to the thing they replaced: for the prestige of improvement and success and power was with the machine, even when it improved nothing, even when technically speaking it was a failure." (p. 27)
Technics and Civilization, Lewis Mumford
Thursday, September 04, 2014
Apocalypse Dreamin'
All the gods are dead
and the sky is gray.
I went for a walk,
On the world's last day.
I'd be getting warm
At the hellgate in L.A.
Here it's raining blood
On the world's last day!
and the sky is gray.
I went for a walk,
On the world's last day.
I'd be getting warm
At the hellgate in L.A.
Here it's raining blood
On the world's last day!
Tuesday, September 02, 2014
Friday, August 29, 2014
Fruits of the Spirit
"I imagine a future in the church when the call to chastity would no longer sound like a dreary sentence to lifelong loneliness for a gay Christian like me. I imagine Christian communities in which friendships are celebrated and honored—where it’s normal for families to live near or with single people; where it’s expected that celibate gay people would form significant attachments to other single people, families, and pastors; where it’s standard practice for friends to spend holidays together or share vacations; where it’s not out of the ordinary for friends to consider staying put, resisting the allure of constant mobility, for the sake of their friendships. I imagine a church where genuine love isn’t located exclusively or even primarily in marriage, but where marriage and friendship and other bonds of affection are all seen as different forms of the same love we all are called to pursue.
By shifting our practice of friendship to a more committed, honored form of love, we can witness—above all—to a kingdom in which the ties between spiritual siblings are the strongest ties of all. Marriage, Jesus tells us, will be entirely transformed in the future, barely recognizable to those who know it in its present form (Matt. 22:30). Bonds of biology, likewise, are relativized in Jesus’ world (Mark 3:31–35). But the loves that unite Christians to each other across marital, racial, and familial lines are loves that will last. More than that, they are loves that witness that Christ’s love is available to all. Not everyone can be a parent or a spouse, but anyone and everyone can be a friend."
— Why Can’t Men Be Friends? | Wesley Hill
(via More than 95 Theses)
I appreciate that this article is primarily arguing for the need to call for stronger bonds of friendship within churches. To re-establish a norm whereby men can be close emotionally, without fears of gay panic on their own part or being seen as potentially gay by outside parties. For one thing, I think it would, in the end, go a great distance to getting evangelicals to understand that gay relationships relationships can be as meaningful as their own. Once you've admitted that men can be close, even devoted to each other emotionally, and not necessarily sexual you can maybe start to see how some men, who aren't sexually attracted to women but to men, would choose to express that devotion and emotional attachment physically. In other words, it would only do wonders for straight men to remove the specter of terrifying gayness, the expectation or fear that men who are emotionally close must inevitably fornicate. And maybe, just hopefully, humanize gay men in the process.
Having said that, I lament the frame of "the call to chastity" for gay people who want to remain church members in good standing. I'm not going to say that the author of the article, a church-loving gay man, doesn't feel a call to chastity. I am however going to push back on the notion that straight patriarchs like to propagate: that God is calling all gay men to chastity. I refuse the many subtle and not-so-subtle hints that the bible is "pretty clear" on two gay men who love each other getting married because it is not. I push back on the notion that discomfort with homosexuality comes directly from the bible and not from culture warriors who have been pushing a culture war against homosexuality for the last 50 years.
I want to remind gay people and the church members who can't abide gay people that the fruits of the spirit are "love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control" and suggest that if you can't exercise any of these traits in relation to your gay brothers and sisters that maybe your attitudes toward them don't stem from the bible or biblical principles at all. I want to suggest that the self-control indicated here is not the self-control you think everyone else should be having in how they show loving affection towards each other but the self-control you should have in learning to treat people with kindness and respect, even if their differences make you personally uncomfortable.
I want to remind the biblical enthusiast that there are exactly 3 verses dealing with homosexual sex, none dealing with committed homosexual lovers, and an avalanche of texts exhorting people to practice love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. And that maybe if not fellowshipping with gay people because of 3 verses conflicts with countless others asking that you take them in and feed them and love them and fellowship with them that maybe you have misunderstood what God is asking you to do.
I'd like to suggest there is a difference between worshipping a God embodied by love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control and worshipping a document with more specific rules written for other times and places. I would gently suggest it is vital the modern Christian decide whether they worship the letter of the law as they think they read it or the spirit of the law behind it. I would further suggest that when the letter of the law conflicts with the spirit of the law, the spirit should win or you really just worship the book. To belabor the point, if the letter of the law brings you to act without love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control then the letter of the law as written or interpreted or implemented is a product of man's culture, not God's love.
I've never seen my mother, a good christian woman, happier than when she realized she didn't have to create an artificial distance between herself and gay people, and therefore her son. That maybe God was not calling the church to drive some sinners from the church but not others with the "good" sins. That maybe her natural christian instinct to practice love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control was not limited by whether the person she was dealing with was gay or not.
I'd like to suggest that what God has called people to is strictly up to the person called, and is not something someone outside that person's mind is going to be qualified to comment on. I'd like to suggest that the church has a surprising lack of training on distinguishing the difference between being moved by the Holy Spirit and being moved by one's own cultural biases. And that this particular lack of training is their biggest stumbling block in showing the fruits of the spirit to the secular world.
I'd like to suggest that the culture war against gay people and against gay marriage has far more to do with the cultural biases of some believers and the cultural biases of pop culture warriors than it does with God's love. And I say that because the culture war against gay people has does not yield the fruits of the spirit and it does not lead church members to act with love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control towards gay citizens.
I would suggest is is strange when Christians cry persecution and foul play when it is suggested that they could practice love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control in regards to gay marriage. I would suggest that it is passing strange when Christians insist that marriage, which they believe can bring a couple closer to God and yield the fruits of the spirit in their lives, would then task themselves with making sure homosexuals are deprived the opportunity to know God in this way.
I would suggest that when gay Christians report no feelings of judgement or conflict with God's law when they are physically and emotionally intimate with their partners, when they believe that relationship has helped bring them love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, that maybe it's not the holy spirit that moves christians to disfellowship them.
I would suggest that if non-celibate gay christians are integrated into church congregations, and what they bring is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, then they are, and may God forgive me for this pun, fruits of the spirit.
I would suggest that while teaching men to form intimate but chaste emotional bonds again is great, it does not necessarily follow that this is the only path God has provided for gay men, any more it is the only path for companionship God has provided for straight men. I suggest that there is a lot of room in love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control for devoted homosexuals to share a kiss and hold hands in order to show their affection for one another, and that chastity is not the consolation prize God gives gay people for creating them different. Where is the love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control in demanding chastity in other consenting, devoted adults, but reserving the option of enthusiastic not-chastity for your own relationships?
Reasonable people can disagree. But as far as I'm concerned, no "fruits" allowed in your congregation? No fruits of the spirit then either.
By shifting our practice of friendship to a more committed, honored form of love, we can witness—above all—to a kingdom in which the ties between spiritual siblings are the strongest ties of all. Marriage, Jesus tells us, will be entirely transformed in the future, barely recognizable to those who know it in its present form (Matt. 22:30). Bonds of biology, likewise, are relativized in Jesus’ world (Mark 3:31–35). But the loves that unite Christians to each other across marital, racial, and familial lines are loves that will last. More than that, they are loves that witness that Christ’s love is available to all. Not everyone can be a parent or a spouse, but anyone and everyone can be a friend."
— Why Can’t Men Be Friends? | Wesley Hill
(via More than 95 Theses)
I appreciate that this article is primarily arguing for the need to call for stronger bonds of friendship within churches. To re-establish a norm whereby men can be close emotionally, without fears of gay panic on their own part or being seen as potentially gay by outside parties. For one thing, I think it would, in the end, go a great distance to getting evangelicals to understand that gay relationships relationships can be as meaningful as their own. Once you've admitted that men can be close, even devoted to each other emotionally, and not necessarily sexual you can maybe start to see how some men, who aren't sexually attracted to women but to men, would choose to express that devotion and emotional attachment physically. In other words, it would only do wonders for straight men to remove the specter of terrifying gayness, the expectation or fear that men who are emotionally close must inevitably fornicate. And maybe, just hopefully, humanize gay men in the process.
Having said that, I lament the frame of "the call to chastity" for gay people who want to remain church members in good standing. I'm not going to say that the author of the article, a church-loving gay man, doesn't feel a call to chastity. I am however going to push back on the notion that straight patriarchs like to propagate: that God is calling all gay men to chastity. I refuse the many subtle and not-so-subtle hints that the bible is "pretty clear" on two gay men who love each other getting married because it is not. I push back on the notion that discomfort with homosexuality comes directly from the bible and not from culture warriors who have been pushing a culture war against homosexuality for the last 50 years.
I want to remind gay people and the church members who can't abide gay people that the fruits of the spirit are "love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control" and suggest that if you can't exercise any of these traits in relation to your gay brothers and sisters that maybe your attitudes toward them don't stem from the bible or biblical principles at all. I want to suggest that the self-control indicated here is not the self-control you think everyone else should be having in how they show loving affection towards each other but the self-control you should have in learning to treat people with kindness and respect, even if their differences make you personally uncomfortable.
I want to remind the biblical enthusiast that there are exactly 3 verses dealing with homosexual sex, none dealing with committed homosexual lovers, and an avalanche of texts exhorting people to practice love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. And that maybe if not fellowshipping with gay people because of 3 verses conflicts with countless others asking that you take them in and feed them and love them and fellowship with them that maybe you have misunderstood what God is asking you to do.
I'd like to suggest there is a difference between worshipping a God embodied by love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control and worshipping a document with more specific rules written for other times and places. I would gently suggest it is vital the modern Christian decide whether they worship the letter of the law as they think they read it or the spirit of the law behind it. I would further suggest that when the letter of the law conflicts with the spirit of the law, the spirit should win or you really just worship the book. To belabor the point, if the letter of the law brings you to act without love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control then the letter of the law as written or interpreted or implemented is a product of man's culture, not God's love.
I've never seen my mother, a good christian woman, happier than when she realized she didn't have to create an artificial distance between herself and gay people, and therefore her son. That maybe God was not calling the church to drive some sinners from the church but not others with the "good" sins. That maybe her natural christian instinct to practice love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control was not limited by whether the person she was dealing with was gay or not.
I'd like to suggest that what God has called people to is strictly up to the person called, and is not something someone outside that person's mind is going to be qualified to comment on. I'd like to suggest that the church has a surprising lack of training on distinguishing the difference between being moved by the Holy Spirit and being moved by one's own cultural biases. And that this particular lack of training is their biggest stumbling block in showing the fruits of the spirit to the secular world.
I'd like to suggest that the culture war against gay people and against gay marriage has far more to do with the cultural biases of some believers and the cultural biases of pop culture warriors than it does with God's love. And I say that because the culture war against gay people has does not yield the fruits of the spirit and it does not lead church members to act with love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control towards gay citizens.
I would suggest is is strange when Christians cry persecution and foul play when it is suggested that they could practice love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control in regards to gay marriage. I would suggest that it is passing strange when Christians insist that marriage, which they believe can bring a couple closer to God and yield the fruits of the spirit in their lives, would then task themselves with making sure homosexuals are deprived the opportunity to know God in this way.
I would suggest that when gay Christians report no feelings of judgement or conflict with God's law when they are physically and emotionally intimate with their partners, when they believe that relationship has helped bring them love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, that maybe it's not the holy spirit that moves christians to disfellowship them.
I would suggest that if non-celibate gay christians are integrated into church congregations, and what they bring is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, then they are, and may God forgive me for this pun, fruits of the spirit.
I would suggest that while teaching men to form intimate but chaste emotional bonds again is great, it does not necessarily follow that this is the only path God has provided for gay men, any more it is the only path for companionship God has provided for straight men. I suggest that there is a lot of room in love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control for devoted homosexuals to share a kiss and hold hands in order to show their affection for one another, and that chastity is not the consolation prize God gives gay people for creating them different. Where is the love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control in demanding chastity in other consenting, devoted adults, but reserving the option of enthusiastic not-chastity for your own relationships?
Reasonable people can disagree. But as far as I'm concerned, no "fruits" allowed in your congregation? No fruits of the spirit then either.
Thursday, August 21, 2014
Today's Agnostic Prayer
To whom it may concern,
to whoever's on the line,
To whatever mingles with us,
Invisible or divine.
Whoever takes the credit,
I just wanted to say,
I'm happy to be down here,
On this material plane today.
You may not really be out there,
You may not have a name,
I don't know what's really going on,
But I'm grateful just the same.
to whoever's on the line,
To whatever mingles with us,
Invisible or divine.
Whoever takes the credit,
I just wanted to say,
I'm happy to be down here,
On this material plane today.
You may not really be out there,
You may not have a name,
I don't know what's really going on,
But I'm grateful just the same.
Tuesday, August 19, 2014
Emotionless Eggheads at the top, Idiots with feelings at the bottom
The best line of dialog that ever happened in community happened in their last episode on NBC. They find Russell Borchert, who has been hiding in a bunker for 30 years, trying to build a machine with feeilngs, because:
Abed: That’s an emoticon. That person wants to convey happiness, but they can’t do it with language, so they misuse punctuation to form a smile.
Russell: *sighs* That is so … stupid! Only an idiot would think of this! Idiots won!
This about sums up my feelings about the world right now.
No, I don't know how to fix it either.
:(
Russell: But without an emotional component, computers would strip us of all humanity and create a society with emotionless eggheads at the top and idiots with feelings at the bottom. And I refuse to let that happen, and that’s why I’ve spent — What? What is that?
Britta: It’s a video of a Kitten
Russell: And why are those people arguing about it? And what’s that?
Britta: It’s a video of a Kitten
Russell: And why are those people arguing about it? And what’s that?
Abed: That’s an emoticon. That person wants to convey happiness, but they can’t do it with language, so they misuse punctuation to form a smile.
Russell: *sighs* That is so … stupid! Only an idiot would think of this! Idiots won!
This about sums up my feelings about the world right now.
No, I don't know how to fix it either.
:(
Monday, August 18, 2014
Facebook Slaying
Pulled the plug on Facebook today. Harder to do than anticipated! I have more ties on there than I thought I did I think. Facebook made it easier by being unable to resist one last attempt at manipulation on the logout page itself by putting up random pictures of my friends and telling me they'll miss me. I suppose I can thank them for not overtly drawing tears onto algorithmically detected eyes? How creepy is that though? Facebook doesn't speak for my friends, and should not pretend to in any circumstance.
Of course, leaving Facebook is like trying to kill the hydra, so no sooner had I suspended Facebook, than I reactivated it by logging into Spotify. I then discovered that since I made my spotify account with my Facebook login, I would need to unsubscribe from spotify entirely and recreate a facebook-less acount and then re-subscribe in order to keep using it. After growling briefly, did just that. Spotify account unsubscribed. Slightly less manipulation from Spotify but still passive-aggressive, "You're too dumb to know what you're doing so lets remind you of all the good things you can't possibly want to give up." from them on the unsubscribe page. Social media are like abusive exes when you try to leave. Super not into that bullshit. Goddamn professionals should not program web pages that say anything other than:
"would you like to deactivate your account?"
*yes*
"Account deactivated, thank you for your business."
So, Facebook account redeactivated.
In the meantime, sharpening my sword and watching patiently for more heads to sprout.
Of course, leaving Facebook is like trying to kill the hydra, so no sooner had I suspended Facebook, than I reactivated it by logging into Spotify. I then discovered that since I made my spotify account with my Facebook login, I would need to unsubscribe from spotify entirely and recreate a facebook-less acount and then re-subscribe in order to keep using it. After growling briefly, did just that. Spotify account unsubscribed. Slightly less manipulation from Spotify but still passive-aggressive, "You're too dumb to know what you're doing so lets remind you of all the good things you can't possibly want to give up." from them on the unsubscribe page. Social media are like abusive exes when you try to leave. Super not into that bullshit. Goddamn professionals should not program web pages that say anything other than:
"would you like to deactivate your account?"
*yes*
"Account deactivated, thank you for your business."
So, Facebook account redeactivated.
In the meantime, sharpening my sword and watching patiently for more heads to sprout.
Sunday, August 17, 2014
Some more Solipsism
I am shaking up my online world in bits and pieces this week. I'm quitting Facebook tomorrow, perhaps temporarily, perhaps not. I'm having second thoughts about it, but wrote a big long essay about how Facebook is built on business practices I find gross so I think I'm committed. But it is true, I hate everything about it. It's not a free service. It's just the price isn't money it's tiny little advertising pitches in the corners of your eyes, a complete surrender of the concept of online privacy and consent to disclose information all to sell you and our valuable metadata. Metadata is the precious ambergris of our generation. We the fat, simple whales tagged, tracked and skimmed for our precious, valuable clicks and buys and likes.
I do go on. Facebook sucks, and we all know it and it's not just the geocities era website aesthetic. I don't think I can build better friendships on a platform so comprised at a core level in terms of basic human decency. I choose not to do it. I wish there was something LIKE Facebook, except not devoted to tracking and manipulating it's users, but there isn't, not yet. Although the field is WIDE OPEN for a better way to engage on the internet. Twitter is apparently thinking of tweaking people's timelines similar to the way Facebook uses and algorithm to manipulate user feeds. InterNOT.
That was a Newsradio reference, which you should know because that show is wonderful.
I just switched my Goodreads name to my Twitter alias, which seems to confuse people. I'm increasingly enjoying going by that name. I'm increasingly considering going by the name in real life to new people. I've been in a rut, mentally and spiritually for quite a while now and using that name helps me imagine other ways that I want to be. Not that I plan on going by a new name every time I try to make a behavior change, but I have been trying to get past some possibly fictitious barrier in my life for a while now. From someone who is HERE to someone who is THERE and I think once that switch finally decides to flip it will be a noticeable change. In which case the new name will seem more appropriate. Also, I've been increasingly liking the idea of having a secret name with my tribe and a public name for the world, which, of course, I got from my latest rewatch of Dune. The point here is, this makes sense to me on a level that I believe is not unreasonable. And once I finish sorting it out it will seem more reasonable. No, my secret name is not Usul. On a related note, personally I am convinced Captain Von Trapp was Fremen. It's the only thing that explains the names he gave his children.
I just figured out how to embed my goodreads reviews in my blog, so that's exciting. Now I just need to figure what the hell is up with my blogs. I like Contents May Settle, I like having a space to try and write more polished things, or more formal pieces not, say, about me, myself and I. Many of my "reviews" don't really hold up to my own standards though, which makes me feel inclined to post them here, which is a more, uh, experimental place. Or maybe I could stop being lazy and make a better blog site for myself, with tabs for reviews, blogs, micro-blogging, social media. And maybe some bigger projects should I ever figure out how to wrangle my anxiety and undiagnosed ADD enough to actually finish things. Maybe the process will be, first impressions on goodreads, and then the reviews I want to flesh out I can post on CMS. Works in progress will go here.
Twitter can stay as long as it doesn't try to emulate its big brother too much. I try to follow people who post interesting links to articles in my general areas of interest and trying to stay out of silly fights with famous authors and it's been more useful.
I think I actually need to start taking notes if I want my reviews to get better. Just so I can quote some of the better lines and maybe help my thoughts come together. The truth is the books I've been reading have been sparking good trains of thought and I want to talk about them coherently. Notes would help.
Other than that, I think I need to start exercising, reading more, avoiding LCD screens more and getting into the forest to stay sane. You know what I like about trees? They don't try to sell me shit based on the pattern of my footfalls.
Upcoming pieces, which I've been dragging my feet on and should abandon but would like to actually finish:
Some thoughts on Terry Pratchett's the Long Earth and the ideas therein.
What's smart about Mieville's the City and the City and why I misread it so badly when I first started it.
A 4 book review opus plus essay dealing with paranormal topics, because why not and I want to.
About 8 short stories that I really want to write.
Some brief thoughts on this summer's movies. You know that little movie Guardians of the Galaxy? It's good. You should see it.
Some thoughts on spirituality versus secularism and my struggles with it.
That seems like enough to start, I guess?
That's the haps. That's the peeps. That's the lint swirling around the old navel.
The Long Hello
The Long Earth by Terry PratchettMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
If you're looking for some light SF reading, you could do much worse than the Long Earth. I find it interesting that people are accusing this of being stealth YA material, because it read to me much more like the classic SF stories I love which are big on ideas and light on complicated prose. I love the exploration here of the Long Earth, and western civilization's tendency to push ever westward into unexplored territory. I love the push and pull between Lobsang and Joshua as two oddballs off to explore the multiverse. I even love the attempt to work old mythology into the premise, which works surprisingly well.
This is a classic adventure story more along the lines of Journey to the Center of the Earth more than anything. The premise here is so big that the potential implications of the discovery on datum Earth and humanity as a whole are only barely touched before it works its way to the big cliff-hanger finale. I like the little touches of Pratchett's humor and I like how weird it gets to towards the end.
While other discerning readers may want to quibble about the ending, or the writing style or what-have-you, all I'll say is it consistently kept me turning pages because I had to see what they discovered next. That's good enough for me to recommend it.
-1 star for the cliffhanger ending, because I hate cliffhangers.
View all my reviews
Tuesday, July 15, 2014
Don't Come Over
Don't come over
We're probably all depressed
We're all so downbeat
We can't even get dressed
You're too cheerful
It's probably for the best
We just lie here
With this hollow in our chest
We thought you'd like it
If you wouldn't be our guest.
So don't come over
We're all naked and depressed.
Friday, July 11, 2014
Addendum
I know that last was low-hanging fruit, although likely fruit that doesn't hang quite so low as you would be led to believe, but it's just one of those things that nags at me. I just don't know how we fail so many guys so dramatically in teaching them how to socialize without making a complete ass out of themselves and I think we should talk about it more.
Wednesday, July 09, 2014
The Many Perils of Phallic Photography
I've never quite felt in tune with "guyness" whatever that means. I understand I have and exemplify many of the positive and negative traits of high-testosterone havers. For instance, I constantly decry the ubiquity of mansplainers, who basically seem to train themselves on irrelevant trivia and wait for opportunities to jump on minor mistakes in order to establish themselves as some kind of authority on just about anything. And I do that in a very mansplainy way that might be construed as a way to say, "actually, I think I've got some important information to deliver authoritatively to you." So yes, I am that which I decry and practice projection religiously even though I have never actually worked in a moving-picture theater and was not raised in some kind of freaky A/V cult.
That said, there are some behaviors I have never gotten, and do not still continue to get. Consider, for instance, the dick pic. Or rather, don't consider it because who cares about a random guy's dick? Basically no one, except for the dick addicted (not that there's anything wrong with that!) trolling for pictures on the internet, which is why it's so odd that the sending of dick pics and, more broadly, the inappropriate injection of crass sexuality into what was otherwise a polite conversation of new acquaintances is widespread enough that I don't even have to explain more than this and you know EXACTLY what I'm talking about. I mean, goddamn successful, famous and wealthy adult men apparently do this constantly, and not just the ones named "weiner" by a saucy universe. And if you don't, please peruse Straight White Boys Texting for some depressing examples of the phenomenon. I genuinely don't understand how many guys make it to adulthood and think an appropriate meet-n-greet with a stranger that has put forward absolutely no sexual indicators of any kind is an unsolicited close-up of their junk. Or that they're horny. Or that hey, do you like sex? Because they and their dick think about it all the time and this is important information for everyone to know. Basically, how do so many guys get to adulthood without realizing that their dick and its arousal level aren't particularly fascinating to the general population?
Even in my gay dating phase on internet sites, I had to screen out the "got pics" guys whose profile picture was a torso and thought "dtf?" was an a nice way to say hello. I mostly just ignored them, but it was all I could do not to reply, "Got a command of language and words and interesting ideas you can express with them?"
Of course, I endlessly consider whether this is just a matter of prudery on my part, and maybe there exists a diverse network of well-received dick picing from random strangers all around me that me and my prudish mind are sheltered from that people just aren't talking about. But I kinda doubt it. "I got an unsolicted dick pic and I liked it." hasn't even busted into the top 100 on the pop charts as far as I'm aware.
So here's the advice I wish someone, one goddamn person, in twenty or thirty years of life would have given to these poor clueless bastards:
Sometimes, you will meet someone who is attractive to you. And your body will respond very strongly and you will get a funny feeling in your pants and it will seem very urgent to let the other person know that you are now interested in sex with them and you have a funny feeling in your pants and would they like to see your weiner? STOP right there. It is very important to engage other senses and ideas in this moment. Take a breath and assess the situation. Have you and this person even exchanged words yet? If not, control your rampant libido for 5 seconds and say "hello!" with a friendly smile, or another suitably neutral greeting. It is vital to continue to control your sex drive at this time. You will want to drop your pants or send them a picture of your wang, and it is important to RESIST those actions when you first meet someone. In actual fact, you can assume that at any given time, in any given situation NO ONE is interested in your dick pic and whether you are horny. Which isn't to say that's actually true at all times, you may have an admirer who quite likes imagining your dick pic, but for the sake of making good impressions and setting up romantic and/or sexual encounters down the road and giving everyone else a fucking break, it is important to assume that no one gives a shit about your dick or your horniness and that therefore maybe it's best to keep it to yourself for the time being. Not that these things are anything to be ashamed of! Just that they're likely not things that other people who don't know you or aren't into you are going to be interested in. NOT sending a dick pic is rarely a deal-breaker in the dating world, so this is usually a safe course of action. And, frankly, everyone knows guys, especially young guys, are aroused by light breezes. So the simple fact that an attraction has given you a boner will not be of particular note to strangers or potential lovers. Shapely clouds give guys boners, it's really not that much of a compliment.
From this point on, it is important to have practiced reading body language. Reading body language, and in some cases understanding plain English, is vital in achieving the remotest chance at sexual interaction with this new person that you know nothing about but are suddenly incredibly attracted to. If they ignore your greeting, or shy away from you, that means they're not interested in what you're about right now. This is OKAY. It's important to accept that the reality that your sexual attraction will sometimes be completely, utterly and hopelessly one-sided. Even though, at times, your body will be screaming "you and me are a perfect mating pair and we should do it a lot!" this will likely NOT be the response of someone who's just met you, and doesn't know you very well. But do not despair! While a "Not interested," can be disappointing, the truth is the faster you accept a "No, I don't think we're a good match." the sooner you can get to finding someone who things you ARE a good match and maybe wants to see your dick.
NOTE: In the early stages of meeting someone, it is STILL important not to send an unsolicited dick pic or mention your horniness in a conversation about her (or his) aunt's funeral. While a strong sex drive will make you impatient, it is important to understand a lifetime of hurt and other mitigating factors will make many men and women cautious about jumping into bed with random strangers. They like to do things like exchange words, and assess whether you're capable of spending time together without it being about you or your photogenic penis all the time, or whether you'd be fun to hang out with even if you're not having sex, or whether you're dangerous, or whether you're just someone who likes to sleep around a lot and will drop out of their lives as soon as you've notched your bedpost. For instance, many people are looking for a man who does more than ignore them while playing games, talk about horniness and send dick pics in lieu of actual conversation. If you're a gay man in Portland, the odds of finding another guy who's kind of into that is pretty high. Otherwise, the odds are lower than you probably think they are. Sometimes people want to spend time with you without hearing about your horniness or your viral penis pictures for a WHOLE DAY. This is okay, you still have your hand in emergencies. NOTE: It is still important to masturbate privately and not mention it to someone who has otherwise not yet expressed any particular interest in your sexuality. "I was thinking of you as I masturbated" is the kind of statement best left for well after consensual sexual activities have commenced somewhere down the line.
By this point, you are probably frustrated. "Well, when CAN I talk about my horniness and my endless supply of personal penile erotica?" The sad truth is, the occasions where injecting your personal state of arousal into a random conversation are extremely limited. If you're ever in doubt, you should absolutely NOT mention your arousal or your penis in normal conversation, even with potential sexual partners. I want to assure you at this point, if you are a young man, and you are sexually attracted to someone, you will have a tell. You will have about 20 tells. The other party will, I promise, at some point pick up on the fact that you are interested in them. Stating explicitly what everyone can see as the obvious truth is absolutely not necessary in these early stages. And honestly, when someone is interested in your sexuality, it will likely not be subtle from their end. All you need to do is talk, be friendly, be flirty (but WITHOUT mentioning your penis or your horniness!) and anyone who thinks you have potential will flirt back, or will smile at you, or get nervous, or will shift their body so it faces you or will put there hand on your hand, or will kiss you. This is not necessarily the go ahead for a quick dick pic or an unsubtle sex joke, or wild pelvic grinding but keep smiling and talking and maybe kissing! Unambiguous signs that a dick pic or a sex joke might be appropriate are: they have sent you a naked picture and are requesting one from you. Success! Free your phallus from zipped oppression and sext away. Or they will make their own unsubtle sex joke, at which point you can be like, "ooh, yes let's have sex please now that you've suggested it." As unintuitive as it may seem, NOT immediately talking about your boner complete with photographic illustrations, and continuing to NOT do those things as you talk to people you find almost unbearably attractive, can eventually lead to being invited to do both of those things! Your attraction to them will slip out in the way you act and talk, so please rest assured there's no need to snap a dick pick and and make a joke about sex so they know you are a person interested in sex. They get it. They have already assumed or noticed that.
So try it! Have patience, practice reading body language, practice getting rejected (learning from rejection is a great way to learn how to meet the right person and BE the right person! I promise!) and eventually (sooner than you think!) you'll figure it out and land a hottie! The sad truth about socializing is it takes practice to be any good at it, and it takes practice to control your sex drive long enough to have any chance of a rewarding sexual interaction with people you are attracted to. For instance, it is important to learn to distinguish between signs of interest and signs of disinterest. By all means express your interest, but in the realm of dating, conversation more subtle and restrained than "Here's my dick, I am horny." will go a long way in winning you friends and lovers. The happy truth about socializing is you will get better at it, as long as you keep putting yourself out there, learn from your mistakes, listen to feedback on how your actions affect the people around you, and honestly try. Remember, just because your social interactions might be awkward now, it doesn't mean you are a bad person, or can't learn it, it just means you haven't learned it YET. If you can set aside your ego, and to some degree your raging sex drive and infinite catalog of instagrammed erections, it only takes a few months to (or less!) to learn how to read people better and learn how socialize more effectively. And more effective socialization will lead to, wait for it (really, wait for it), more opportunities at sex and love!
You can do it. I know you can. But, for the love of god, stop sending pictures of your dick and horniness updates to people you hardly know. You're a sentient adult and adults are capable of self-control, even when they are very aroused. You can do it. It will be great.
That said, there are some behaviors I have never gotten, and do not still continue to get. Consider, for instance, the dick pic. Or rather, don't consider it because who cares about a random guy's dick? Basically no one, except for the dick addicted (not that there's anything wrong with that!) trolling for pictures on the internet, which is why it's so odd that the sending of dick pics and, more broadly, the inappropriate injection of crass sexuality into what was otherwise a polite conversation of new acquaintances is widespread enough that I don't even have to explain more than this and you know EXACTLY what I'm talking about. I mean, goddamn successful, famous and wealthy adult men apparently do this constantly, and not just the ones named "weiner" by a saucy universe. And if you don't, please peruse Straight White Boys Texting for some depressing examples of the phenomenon. I genuinely don't understand how many guys make it to adulthood and think an appropriate meet-n-greet with a stranger that has put forward absolutely no sexual indicators of any kind is an unsolicited close-up of their junk. Or that they're horny. Or that hey, do you like sex? Because they and their dick think about it all the time and this is important information for everyone to know. Basically, how do so many guys get to adulthood without realizing that their dick and its arousal level aren't particularly fascinating to the general population?
Even in my gay dating phase on internet sites, I had to screen out the "got pics" guys whose profile picture was a torso and thought "dtf?" was an a nice way to say hello. I mostly just ignored them, but it was all I could do not to reply, "Got a command of language and words and interesting ideas you can express with them?"
Of course, I endlessly consider whether this is just a matter of prudery on my part, and maybe there exists a diverse network of well-received dick picing from random strangers all around me that me and my prudish mind are sheltered from that people just aren't talking about. But I kinda doubt it. "I got an unsolicted dick pic and I liked it." hasn't even busted into the top 100 on the pop charts as far as I'm aware.
So here's the advice I wish someone, one goddamn person, in twenty or thirty years of life would have given to these poor clueless bastards:
Sometimes, you will meet someone who is attractive to you. And your body will respond very strongly and you will get a funny feeling in your pants and it will seem very urgent to let the other person know that you are now interested in sex with them and you have a funny feeling in your pants and would they like to see your weiner? STOP right there. It is very important to engage other senses and ideas in this moment. Take a breath and assess the situation. Have you and this person even exchanged words yet? If not, control your rampant libido for 5 seconds and say "hello!" with a friendly smile, or another suitably neutral greeting. It is vital to continue to control your sex drive at this time. You will want to drop your pants or send them a picture of your wang, and it is important to RESIST those actions when you first meet someone. In actual fact, you can assume that at any given time, in any given situation NO ONE is interested in your dick pic and whether you are horny. Which isn't to say that's actually true at all times, you may have an admirer who quite likes imagining your dick pic, but for the sake of making good impressions and setting up romantic and/or sexual encounters down the road and giving everyone else a fucking break, it is important to assume that no one gives a shit about your dick or your horniness and that therefore maybe it's best to keep it to yourself for the time being. Not that these things are anything to be ashamed of! Just that they're likely not things that other people who don't know you or aren't into you are going to be interested in. NOT sending a dick pic is rarely a deal-breaker in the dating world, so this is usually a safe course of action. And, frankly, everyone knows guys, especially young guys, are aroused by light breezes. So the simple fact that an attraction has given you a boner will not be of particular note to strangers or potential lovers. Shapely clouds give guys boners, it's really not that much of a compliment.
From this point on, it is important to have practiced reading body language. Reading body language, and in some cases understanding plain English, is vital in achieving the remotest chance at sexual interaction with this new person that you know nothing about but are suddenly incredibly attracted to. If they ignore your greeting, or shy away from you, that means they're not interested in what you're about right now. This is OKAY. It's important to accept that the reality that your sexual attraction will sometimes be completely, utterly and hopelessly one-sided. Even though, at times, your body will be screaming "you and me are a perfect mating pair and we should do it a lot!" this will likely NOT be the response of someone who's just met you, and doesn't know you very well. But do not despair! While a "Not interested," can be disappointing, the truth is the faster you accept a "No, I don't think we're a good match." the sooner you can get to finding someone who things you ARE a good match and maybe wants to see your dick.
NOTE: In the early stages of meeting someone, it is STILL important not to send an unsolicited dick pic or mention your horniness in a conversation about her (or his) aunt's funeral. While a strong sex drive will make you impatient, it is important to understand a lifetime of hurt and other mitigating factors will make many men and women cautious about jumping into bed with random strangers. They like to do things like exchange words, and assess whether you're capable of spending time together without it being about you or your photogenic penis all the time, or whether you'd be fun to hang out with even if you're not having sex, or whether you're dangerous, or whether you're just someone who likes to sleep around a lot and will drop out of their lives as soon as you've notched your bedpost. For instance, many people are looking for a man who does more than ignore them while playing games, talk about horniness and send dick pics in lieu of actual conversation. If you're a gay man in Portland, the odds of finding another guy who's kind of into that is pretty high. Otherwise, the odds are lower than you probably think they are. Sometimes people want to spend time with you without hearing about your horniness or your viral penis pictures for a WHOLE DAY. This is okay, you still have your hand in emergencies. NOTE: It is still important to masturbate privately and not mention it to someone who has otherwise not yet expressed any particular interest in your sexuality. "I was thinking of you as I masturbated" is the kind of statement best left for well after consensual sexual activities have commenced somewhere down the line.
By this point, you are probably frustrated. "Well, when CAN I talk about my horniness and my endless supply of personal penile erotica?" The sad truth is, the occasions where injecting your personal state of arousal into a random conversation are extremely limited. If you're ever in doubt, you should absolutely NOT mention your arousal or your penis in normal conversation, even with potential sexual partners. I want to assure you at this point, if you are a young man, and you are sexually attracted to someone, you will have a tell. You will have about 20 tells. The other party will, I promise, at some point pick up on the fact that you are interested in them. Stating explicitly what everyone can see as the obvious truth is absolutely not necessary in these early stages. And honestly, when someone is interested in your sexuality, it will likely not be subtle from their end. All you need to do is talk, be friendly, be flirty (but WITHOUT mentioning your penis or your horniness!) and anyone who thinks you have potential will flirt back, or will smile at you, or get nervous, or will shift their body so it faces you or will put there hand on your hand, or will kiss you. This is not necessarily the go ahead for a quick dick pic or an unsubtle sex joke, or wild pelvic grinding but keep smiling and talking and maybe kissing! Unambiguous signs that a dick pic or a sex joke might be appropriate are: they have sent you a naked picture and are requesting one from you. Success! Free your phallus from zipped oppression and sext away. Or they will make their own unsubtle sex joke, at which point you can be like, "ooh, yes let's have sex please now that you've suggested it." As unintuitive as it may seem, NOT immediately talking about your boner complete with photographic illustrations, and continuing to NOT do those things as you talk to people you find almost unbearably attractive, can eventually lead to being invited to do both of those things! Your attraction to them will slip out in the way you act and talk, so please rest assured there's no need to snap a dick pick and and make a joke about sex so they know you are a person interested in sex. They get it. They have already assumed or noticed that.
So try it! Have patience, practice reading body language, practice getting rejected (learning from rejection is a great way to learn how to meet the right person and BE the right person! I promise!) and eventually (sooner than you think!) you'll figure it out and land a hottie! The sad truth about socializing is it takes practice to be any good at it, and it takes practice to control your sex drive long enough to have any chance of a rewarding sexual interaction with people you are attracted to. For instance, it is important to learn to distinguish between signs of interest and signs of disinterest. By all means express your interest, but in the realm of dating, conversation more subtle and restrained than "Here's my dick, I am horny." will go a long way in winning you friends and lovers. The happy truth about socializing is you will get better at it, as long as you keep putting yourself out there, learn from your mistakes, listen to feedback on how your actions affect the people around you, and honestly try. Remember, just because your social interactions might be awkward now, it doesn't mean you are a bad person, or can't learn it, it just means you haven't learned it YET. If you can set aside your ego, and to some degree your raging sex drive and infinite catalog of instagrammed erections, it only takes a few months to (or less!) to learn how to read people better and learn how socialize more effectively. And more effective socialization will lead to, wait for it (really, wait for it), more opportunities at sex and love!
You can do it. I know you can. But, for the love of god, stop sending pictures of your dick and horniness updates to people you hardly know. You're a sentient adult and adults are capable of self-control, even when they are very aroused. You can do it. It will be great.
Tuesday, June 24, 2014
Upon Receiving, part 2
Upon receiving your notification today
Upon receiving your interest on Facebook
I remembered your face
the countless times
you screamed at me
for all my many
and varied
INFIDELITIES
which never existed
any old place
outside of your head
and I cringed
because I remember
the infidelities were yours
and you punished me for it
and I am not
particularly
INTERESTED IN THAT
Upon receiving your interest on Facebook
Upon reflecting on my abiding interest in men
I remembered your daughter
and the pets who died
well after leaving my house
including Max
who I
LOVED
and how you
continued to punish me
by insisting
I was responsible
for what you did
that I was in charge
of
YOUR FEAR
and I thought maybe
I might decline
because while I should forgive
and to forgive is divine
I'm not convinced I'll know you
if you say hello
and I hear
"HAIL SATAN"
Upon receiving your interest on Facebook
I remembered your face
the countless times
you screamed at me
for all my many
and varied
INFIDELITIES
which never existed
any old place
outside of your head
and I cringed
because I remember
the infidelities were yours
and you punished me for it
and I am not
particularly
INTERESTED IN THAT
Upon receiving your interest on Facebook
Upon reflecting on my abiding interest in men
I remembered your daughter
and the pets who died
well after leaving my house
including Max
who I
LOVED
and how you
continued to punish me
by insisting
I was responsible
for what you did
that I was in charge
of
YOUR FEAR
and I thought maybe
I might decline
because while I should forgive
and to forgive is divine
I'm not convinced I'll know you
if you say hello
and I hear
"HAIL SATAN"
Upon Receiving
Upon receiving your notification today
Upon receiving your interest on Facebook
I remembered your son
And how you told the rest of us
his friends
YOUR SON
that because he had revealed to you
of his abiding interest in other men
and for refusing to be ashamed
he had now been sent to his mother
where he could
as I recall
"SERVE SATAN"
Upon receiving your interest on Facebook
Upon reflecting on my abiding interest in men
I remembered your son
And how you taught love
but could not abide love for other men
for fear of not being loved
by the man-god of love
but not
MAN-LOVE
and I thought maybe
I might decline
because while I should forgive
and to forgive is divine
I'm not convinced you'll know me
if I say hello
and you hear
"HAIL SATAN"
Upon receiving your interest on Facebook
I remembered your son
And how you told the rest of us
his friends
YOUR SON
that because he had revealed to you
of his abiding interest in other men
and for refusing to be ashamed
he had now been sent to his mother
where he could
as I recall
"SERVE SATAN"
Upon receiving your interest on Facebook
Upon reflecting on my abiding interest in men
I remembered your son
And how you taught love
but could not abide love for other men
for fear of not being loved
by the man-god of love
but not
MAN-LOVE
and I thought maybe
I might decline
because while I should forgive
and to forgive is divine
I'm not convinced you'll know me
if I say hello
and you hear
"HAIL SATAN"
Friday, June 20, 2014
Much Effect About Nothing
MASS EFFECT 3 SPOILERS
So, in very timely fashion, I have finally finished the mass effect trilogy this week. Which, naturally, brought me to the much-maligned ending of the series. Having played the original 3 choices and then again with the extended cut DLC with the same save file, I have some thoughts. I guess.
I should probably mention first, that I didn't hate it. I scratched my head a little, but I've seen much worse endings in other games and other SF stories. This ending is roughly the same as Matrix Revolutions or BSG, which I didn't hate either, but also didn't love. I feel like there was as philosophical bioware-esque decision tree in bioware where they got to choose the ending they were going to give to people and, for some reason, they chose hand-wavey philosophical navel-gazing that unnecessarily undercut earlier narrative, gave very little closure on what had come before and introduced a number of unnecessary plot holes. So I consider the ending mediocre, with problems, but acceptable. What can I say, I have a soft spot for philosophical wanking, no matter how out of place or wrong-headed in context.
But before we get into some critiques of the story's ending, I'd like to discuss the ending in terms of gameplay, which actually irritated me a little bit. In terms of what you're expecting as gameplay leading up to the end, we more or less expect it to play out like the previous two games, some hard waves of tough enemies, culminating in a boss fight or two against the illusive man and maybe another reaper. In fact, I fully expected to actually reach the citadel with my squad, and fight my way to the control room through cerberus and reaper forces, fight the illusive man and win. The game gives this impression so strongly I can only assumed they changed their mind about it at the last minute for monetary, deadline, or political reasons. So it was disappointing not to fight through a corrupted citadel to start. The real kick in the nuts gameplay-wise is the actual final bit of combat you do, which is a completely obnoxious slow motion sequence where enemies you would normally eat as an appetizer for lunch, rush you in slow motion and you are given an unsteady gun with sloppy controls to fight them. It feels incredibly cheap, especially on a ps3 controller, which made it near impossible to beat that stupid shielded marauder. After the sixth stupid death because of all the stupid, artificial ham-stringing, I just switched to narrative difficulty so I could finish the story from here. All in all, it wasn't really a triumphant finale in terms of gameplay, which is a bummer, because it could have been. Not that the end fights in ME1 and 2 were really all that epic and challenging, but because they delivered on the promise of the story up to that point. You get to do what you set out to do and fight fun(ish) bosses.
Which brings us back to the story. I basically consider bioware stories glorified "choose your own adventure" books, so it doesn't really bother me when I make a choice and get a brick to the face, because that kind of goes with the genre. But the original ending was kind of a head-scratcher even given my low expectations. For one, they kind of kill any mystique associated with the reapers. There were exactly two moments that really interested me in the first game. The plant/spore consciousness on Feros and the conversation with Sovereign, where you realize the ship is actually alive and the real villain. Those moments were fun. And through most of 1, 2 and 3 they use those moments sparingly and keep the reaper's motivations mysterious. In fact, they outright state several times that the reaper consciousness is playing on fields we can't comprehend, for reasons we'll never understand and I was okay with that. It didn't really matter why they were doing what they were doing, just that they were dark machine gods and we were going to stop them.
So, you can imagine my dismay when the collective reaper consciousness explains its purpose in two sentences.
1. Machines always fight their creators.
2. Selective harvesting of organics is what keeps synthetic life from wiping out organic life forever.
See, not only is that unknowable, it's not even complicated. So basically the awe and terror of dark gods harvesting humanity is reduced to a fart noise. Personally, it would have been perfectly satisfying to kill the reapers or defeat their dark purpose, without ever understanding why they're doing it. It's a better metaphor relating to technology anyway: we're not sure what we're doing, but we're going to keep trying. Plus it has the benefit of fitting everything that came before in the story.
Which is the second problem with the original, and to some degree the extended, ending: it doesn't really fit what the story is about previous to that. Like I said, I'm a fan of metaphysical and/or philosophical navel-gazing in my SF, but not when you just dump it randomly into a story that heretofore has NOT been particularly philosophical. I like the movie Solaris, but it's weird, artsy SF from start to finish. This game is mostly an action space adventure which dabbles in certain themes yes, but is mostly about over-coming all odds, defying authority and doing what you think is right anyway and yes, the relationship of the geth to the Quarians (and the rest of the galaxy). But I wouldn't say it's a philosophical treatise about man's relationship to machines up until this point. It's mostly a series of smaller character arcs, action-packed military adventure and SF short story style missions. So it's really jarring for the game to turn around at the very end and tell you it's about something different than you thought it was, and oh yeah the bad guy (in this case the illusive man) was right all along. So they write a story about defying corrupt, evil, incompetent authority at every turn only to end by insisting that actually authority was right all along and don't you feel foolish. I like story twists fine, but not when they seem like a gratuitous "haha fuck you" to the audience. To be honest, all 3 original endings just seem like either the result of running out of money or time. Or a writing team that just couldn't decide so they wrote a compromise that pleased no one.
Beyond those problems, there were a number of plot holes and plot threads left extremely dangling that, for me, the extended DLC more or less resolves. Playing the ending again with the DLC enabled, I was relatively satisfied with how things wrapped up for both the paragon and singularity endings. I spent two games trying to make sure my choose-your-own adventure ended with the geth and the quarians reconciled, and it was nice to see that work didn't go to waste, like the original ending implied. In fact, after the DLC the only issues I really have are the ones mentioned above.
As for Shepherd dying, I was fully prepared for that and think it's a fine choice. They more or less telegraph the fact that she's going to sacrifice herself for the galaxy at the end of the game through more or less the entirety of ME3. You say goodbye to everyone at least once, sometimes twice. And while I do wish there were some way I could have arranged events that left Liara and my femshep popping out blue babies happily ever after, losing a long, happy life just makes it a more dramatic sacrifice, right? So yeah, I'm okay with hero's journeys that end in the ultimate sacrifice. That's kind of the deal with choosing heroism as a career.
So yeah, they made some truly gob-smacking choices in gameplay and story right at the end there, but the extended DLC smooths over most of my issues with the original ending. Enough to provide closure at any rate. And even with the remaining problems, well, it doesn't really sour what came before. The gameplay is still quite fun and the over-arching story was never really what I was there for anyway. I enjoyed the smaller character arcs much more (especially Tali, Jack and Garrus) and those are tied up long before the main story ending. And hey, overall it's still pretty good for a choose-your-own-adventure.
So, you can imagine my dismay when the collective reaper consciousness explains its purpose in two sentences.
1. Machines always fight their creators.
2. Selective harvesting of organics is what keeps synthetic life from wiping out organic life forever.
See, not only is that unknowable, it's not even complicated. So basically the awe and terror of dark gods harvesting humanity is reduced to a fart noise. Personally, it would have been perfectly satisfying to kill the reapers or defeat their dark purpose, without ever understanding why they're doing it. It's a better metaphor relating to technology anyway: we're not sure what we're doing, but we're going to keep trying. Plus it has the benefit of fitting everything that came before in the story.
Which is the second problem with the original, and to some degree the extended, ending: it doesn't really fit what the story is about previous to that. Like I said, I'm a fan of metaphysical and/or philosophical navel-gazing in my SF, but not when you just dump it randomly into a story that heretofore has NOT been particularly philosophical. I like the movie Solaris, but it's weird, artsy SF from start to finish. This game is mostly an action space adventure which dabbles in certain themes yes, but is mostly about over-coming all odds, defying authority and doing what you think is right anyway and yes, the relationship of the geth to the Quarians (and the rest of the galaxy). But I wouldn't say it's a philosophical treatise about man's relationship to machines up until this point. It's mostly a series of smaller character arcs, action-packed military adventure and SF short story style missions. So it's really jarring for the game to turn around at the very end and tell you it's about something different than you thought it was, and oh yeah the bad guy (in this case the illusive man) was right all along. So they write a story about defying corrupt, evil, incompetent authority at every turn only to end by insisting that actually authority was right all along and don't you feel foolish. I like story twists fine, but not when they seem like a gratuitous "haha fuck you" to the audience. To be honest, all 3 original endings just seem like either the result of running out of money or time. Or a writing team that just couldn't decide so they wrote a compromise that pleased no one.
Beyond those problems, there were a number of plot holes and plot threads left extremely dangling that, for me, the extended DLC more or less resolves. Playing the ending again with the DLC enabled, I was relatively satisfied with how things wrapped up for both the paragon and singularity endings. I spent two games trying to make sure my choose-your-own adventure ended with the geth and the quarians reconciled, and it was nice to see that work didn't go to waste, like the original ending implied. In fact, after the DLC the only issues I really have are the ones mentioned above.
As for Shepherd dying, I was fully prepared for that and think it's a fine choice. They more or less telegraph the fact that she's going to sacrifice herself for the galaxy at the end of the game through more or less the entirety of ME3. You say goodbye to everyone at least once, sometimes twice. And while I do wish there were some way I could have arranged events that left Liara and my femshep popping out blue babies happily ever after, losing a long, happy life just makes it a more dramatic sacrifice, right? So yeah, I'm okay with hero's journeys that end in the ultimate sacrifice. That's kind of the deal with choosing heroism as a career.
So yeah, they made some truly gob-smacking choices in gameplay and story right at the end there, but the extended DLC smooths over most of my issues with the original ending. Enough to provide closure at any rate. And even with the remaining problems, well, it doesn't really sour what came before. The gameplay is still quite fun and the over-arching story was never really what I was there for anyway. I enjoyed the smaller character arcs much more (especially Tali, Jack and Garrus) and those are tied up long before the main story ending. And hey, overall it's still pretty good for a choose-your-own-adventure.
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