Me today

Bye bye, bitches (How often do you allow yourself to update a sense of self? Almost often.)

If offered three chests - a chest of gold and jewels, a chest of medicine and a chest of books - which one would I opt for? Well, it really depends on what kind of medicine and how good and rare the books? Ultimately, I think I would go for the chest of gold, because with that kind of money, I would be able to invest in my own science institute or my own university. But mostly I would plot how to get my hands on all three.

As I exit my comfort zone – quite literally, getting on a plane and fucking off to wetter pastures – I am considering the person that is me and my excess or lack of conviction. This is such a long post, that I literally changes as a person during. It is true I have always prided myself on NOT being an ideologue of any kind and my principles have been set intellectually rather than intuitively, but still – I watch and listen and read and intend to identify myself as well as some of the people I agree with.

I have so far come up with four principles, though I can only remember two at this point. 

The media – I am an absolute advocate of the freedom of speech and expression and choose to never speak ill of anyone who isn’t already speaking/doing ill, or is a hypocrite or is condescending. But in an argument on whether the media is responsible for something, I will always stand on the side of the media. I believe that there is ghastly shitty freakish dumbass media in this world, but also that there are people – journalists - whose intelligence, commitment and education far surpasses that of normal lot and their reports cannot be skewed regardless of peer and editorial pressure – their integrity is enamel. To say that the media is shit, you’ve clearly been rolling in the mud on the wrong side of the spectrum of the media available. Though, also, there is no such thing as one truth. We’re humans, not traffic lights. 

The dead – I have absolute respect for the dead (I mean the bodies, not the souls), and will never dig them up (archaeology), steal their possessions (grave robbing and looting, also in other name archaeology), ogle their remains (museums and the like), photograph them (either in museum or in an accident or war) or allow a dead body to be treated disrespectfully. Regarding the soul, that is not my problem. We are all given pretty fairly same opportunities to be good or bad people and to weave the same amount of stories and if you’ve chosen to waste your life on being a lame dick, than that’s the story of you. Whether you were dealt the hand of a slave, king, model, writer, inventor or a drug smuggler, how you changed the lives of others for the better – with deeds or words – that was the sort of a soul you were.

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*(I think my third principle is judging a society based on how they treat their women, disabled, elderly, LGBT, journalists and artists.)

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The fourth ISN’T that I cannot consider people who look down on creativity or don’t read truly good people, or say things like: I never cared too much about some old paintings and statues gathering dust in museums…  But that is another adamant conviction.

I know I am not a feminist and that I am in many ways a lazy Marxist, that I think we’ve never existed in a better world and that we, thankfully, have a long way to go – because achieving a state of perfect living condition would take too bit a toll on creativity and invention, our two most fundamental splendours. I don’t think we are treating this planet nicely, but I also believe that when it gets tired of us, it will rid of us and forget us in a hiccup of a time. I think western civilisation is superior to others, but I also think that the same person should be capable of equal balance of ambition and tranquillity. I’ve decided to stand against the death penalty, and in my old age understand what ‘quality of life’ actually means.

I can explain this in more detail, wait.

Not a feminist. I fucking disdain 3^rd wave feminists and their retarded fucking outcries of injustice regarding big-tittied characters in video games and knobheads giving ‘how to pick up chicks’ seminars. Who the fuck cares, really. It has nothing to do with civil rights, humanity, our well-being and freedom of expression – it infringes on the rights of expression and distracts from issues that are genuinely disheartening. Do these dumb bitches have ANY idea what actual oppression of women looks like?  I am bisexual, or pansexual to be more exact, meaning that I am attracted to everything beautiful, aroused by many things that inspire an emotional, sexual, passionate part of me, and to love I choose exclusive rarities who embody all of the above and more. I am also overly emotional, so it’s not unusual for me to stop and cry at the sight of an amazing forest scene or garden or mountains or a painting or a street or a freak arrangement of details creating an amazing world we live in. Though I’m not so quick to generalize, like, saying I love ALL forests, all mountains, all flowers or horses or books. Every day. No, emotions come in big fat waves and I have always prided myself on being able to be extremely happy or extremely sad and everything in between.  I can dread, I can rage, I can worry, I can be inspired, I can be excited, I can imagine, I can even hope, though I am not much for a hoper.

The General keeps asking me how I feel about going. Am I sad? Am I happy?

I can be many many things at the same time. Like a pancake cake. I’d be a good pancake cake.

But I digress. 

I do not tolerate feminism, because what feminism is today is rich privileged mostly white bitches whining about unsubstantiated horrors that make for click-baits on the YouTube channels that are fuck too many. My family is a family of strong women, generations back – and not privileged rich bows-in-their-hair curly plantation girlies, but women who have worked their way to reputation and status and dependability  from the start up each. Am not talking about Hillary Clinton types, either, blind with greed and political ambition. My great grandmother ran a tavern.  She was the strong woman of her town. My grandma, her daughter, was a hat maker, but she was also known in our city, because all women knew her, respected her, bought the hats from her, gossiped in her shop and she worked very hard, had so much money that we never wanted for anything and she never ever needed to be mean or break any laws to be well off – just hard work, keen eye for business and depending on nobody. My mom was a scholar and a journalist and she took the side of young aspiring artists around these parts, growing into an eminence in our part of the country. She was always extremely just, level-headed and awfully educated in her articles. If she wrote something, it was The truth. Those days nobody fucked around with a journalist, because there wasn’t any tabloids to muck up the waters yet, or at least if there was one, it was not considered journalism. My mother-in-law runs a small farm. She can chop a 3tf log in half with a swing of an axe. She will go on a vacation and cook three times a day for the family, because that is the sort of a person she is. Church-going. Tending to older neighbours. Pig-slaying. Handling the finances of her local Working Invalids Association.

None of these women would in a hundred years cry ‘injustice! We are oppressed! We are offended!’ That is not to say they wouldn’t kill a man if he looked at them funny or laid a hand on anyone that they care about. With a dough-roller. 

My Marxist bit. I haven’t studied the guy too deeply, or obsessively, but some of the stuff he said I agree with and just kind of hopped along. I agree there is no worse form of governing than democracy, except every other one, and that we get the politicians we deserve. The society I exist in shows enough greatness to be considered okay, but still so lame as to show it’s dark side every opportunity we get. As my country goes, it is still fairly low on crime. Though it’s been a weird week, regarding.

So, socialism it is. Fact is, I cannot abide the concept of someone being more important than another in society – that there are people whom we are supposed to bow to and whose lives are worth more and that’s final. That, if there was a train coming and there was an old king and me on the tracks, people would save him. An inbred old fuck who spent his life leeching of other people’s money. I am not saying that between Malala and me I wouldn’t save Malala, but not because she’s declared superior. In a conflict between rich inbreds and the working class, I will side with the working class. There are too many Trumps, Kochs, sheiks and Jong-Ils in this world to convince me the economic elite is able to make the right decisions for everyone else. In an ideal world, yes, I would follow a de-facto king into battle, but I have never abided costumes. A war is never won. It’s always just postponed. There is not good or bad side. The victors make sure they rip the ‘just stories’. We spoke about Magic Mike-like evening in jest yesterday, about how Tinka was appalled to see women of some money and reputation behave like drunk fucking animals at the sight of a male stripper. How is that woman worth more than Tinka, because her husband sucked more money from a withering company and the whole family now drives Ferraris? 

The planet. I know we are treating is awfully. I know we are scraping of its skin, drilling into its body, fucking up the air and the oceans, ripping out things we call precious, spilling its oily blood and throwing the organic balance between all living things out of balance. I know that. I just don’t care. Firstly, because this planet has been infested by obnoxious life-forms many times before and lastly, because there is not a damn thing we can do to this planet that won’t be utterly and entirely forgotten in a million years or even less. We’re melting the ice? Who the fuck cares. It’s not going to go into space. It will freeze right back after this party’s over. Species going extinct? They always were and we haven’t even noticed 90% of them. Overpopulations? Clearly you’ve never been to Norway. Exterminating the forest?... haha. Between the forest and humans, I guarantee you, forest will have the last laugh.

The ENVIRONMENT, however, what WE are supposed to live in, that’s an entirely different story. Environmental criminology won’t notice a tree being murdered, but they will notice a tree being stolen from the government. When we are referring to overpopulation, we are actually referring to ghastly poor infrastructure of too-fast growing cities in regions of the world that’s been caught unprepared for the modern era. I’m thinking India, because that’s the shittiest country I’ve ever been to, with truly too many people living in cities that are very badly built and nobody thought to try to enforce laws on people who – literally – still consider it okay to shit in the street. Their waste disposal is so thoroughly lacking, that Delhi is one big garbage pile and their holy rivers a cesspool.  A lot of civilisations have gone from farming feudal wooden-spoon village societies to modern metropolis’ in too short a time. There are African cities that have tried becoming Europe-style cities in too much of a hurry, with too few elements considered. Too much of the environment got raped on account of it. And don’t even get me started on killing whales so that cosmetics can be manufactured. Are you fucking shitting me? By the way, did I ever tell you about the giant lake of drinking water that’s under the Northern America, that we’ve all but sucked dry by now? Why, may you ask? Well, that’s because in North America their very arid and very vast plains have been irrigated so as to make soy fields, so that we can now have soy in everything, but mostly fuel. Ye. It gets interesting, as soon as you look at anything closer. Didn’t you ever wonder why news are so full of which celebrity has new butt implants or who’s sleeping with whom? Puffy cushy blindfold much. Though in truth nobody really cares. We adapt unusually well. We could probably live inside a volcano if push came to blow.

So, I am not worried about this planet one little bit. Our living conditions may in time become interesting, though.

Believing we live in the best possible time, thus far. Granted, on the surface it looks like we live in a time when crazy seems sane. The western world, flawed as it certainly is, is good at one thing above all other: we tend to implement some admirable laws. We abolished slavery sooner than others. We started treating the elderly and the disabled better sooner than others. We enabled women to be more than just baby-making machines sooner than others. We put a tremendous emphasis on medical science and education, resulting in some amazing medical revolutions and amazing philosophy, diplomacy, consideration of peaceful solutions and arts. We are beginning to consider truly everyone equal, regardless of some moronic religious bullshit, or their gender, social status, colour, what retarded bullshit they post on YouTube and level of their harm to others. The reason, I think, why religious cults are not prohibited, is because the stupid deserve to be led by the greedy. Why do we allow masses to vote on the most important issues? Because it shows you what the mass is ready for or not. Why even the wisest must surround themselves with ‘no’ men and women? Because no human is able to make the right decision on their own without tremendous council. One may think they are doing the best thing ever, but that may only apply to Happy Land of Everyone is Brainfull. Marie Therese met with decades of opposition from the masses when she declared everyone must go to school as a child. Like, who the fuck did she think she is?! Kids need to help on the farms and in shops, nobody has time for them to do such nonsense as writing and reading and learning to keep their mouths clean. 

It is possible we are the ones who will fuck all of this up. That it won’t be a comet or a virus or aliens that gets us, but our own awful greed. But so far, I think, for all our flaws, we are on the right path. We’ve certainly come a long way from throwing babies off cliffs for being born malformed or being able to rape girls just because you were rich, calling it the right of Prima Nocte.  Or knowing to wash your hands between shitting and eating.  Or burning books and people… Though that one is not so far in the past so as to give me conviction to say that’s never happening again. I mean in the Western society, not the fucking Islam, where they are burning books and beheading women for not wearing enough blankets on her when going out as we speak.

I did consider punishment such as hanging for people who rape, but this was when I didn’t think much of prisons. There was once a time when putting me in a small room and forgetting me there for ages sounded just about right. Leave me a few books and forbid me to speak and I’m yours. Monastery, prison, college dorm, whatever. I needed nobody, only a roof over my head. But then that odd renaissance happened, when the General told me to fuck off with my constant coffees and movies requests and told me to get myself some friends who will like coffee and movies as much as I do, and 8 years later, I am surrounded by like-minded individuals that I miss dearly if I don’t see them twice a month, if not every day. Now the idea of having to be locked away from everybody, from my movies and coffee comrades, frightens me. Throw in the condition of the 3^rd world prisons and you have yourself the punishment befitting the crime. 

Same applied to my understanding of ‘the quality of life’ – that sometimes it simply isn’t working and some people would be better off dead. I still remember every small thing I left behind to die rather than trying to help it, every kitten, every baby bird, every flower, every bee even. It hit me too late – the realisation, that no matter how fucked up your life is, if someone clever enough comes along to lend you some advice or assistance, the quality of a life can go from 0 to full tank within the hour. 

… and so on and so forth. I could rant like this for days, but I’m getting bored already. There are many things I stand by, many rules, many opinions. Prostitution should be legal. Everything on the Internet should be free. If you break a rule, for no matter how noble a cause, stand strong while you pay for it (unless they maim or kill you.) I am 100% against death. I am 100% for the Socratic method. I think being religious is shameful to your intellect. I don’t care if there is some dorky entity that guards the skies or what the fuck, but I believe that adults who worship characters from books and use them as an excuse (calling it tradition also) to act like fucktards, are wrong.  I like blankies and coffee mugs, baby animals and males with large muscular thighs. I like computer games, YouTube videos on philosophy and politics and going to the movies so I can eat – literally – buckets of popcorn. I don’t think there is a way to visit, properly, every city and village on this planet, but I would fucking love to have a go at it. I love all art. I hate the thought of running out of time. Above all, I am someone who can feel everything in between those two emotions and I want to experience situations that will put the frames to the lot. 

There is no place where I find more serenity and contemplation than libraries and museums, though I also think that half of art history is stuff made so that rich people could look at nice titties. Just because something portrayed is pretty, doesn’t make it art. 

The world is changing. I am changing. This is me now, as I depart. What will be on the other side of this experience, will it be devastating or mundane, amazing or gut-wrenching, lonely or in love, it is impossible to tell. If I could choose, I’d choose all of it. I don’t want anybody I love to die, clearly, but everything else is game. Once more I embrace Neggins’ wisdom: You can be in a land of shit and feel like gold or in a land of gold and feel like shit, the decision what state of mind you’ll employ is entirely yours… Now quit whining, lose that weight, get that energy and stop taking everything so fucking personally.