I want to take a moment tonight to talk about stupidity. Like idiocy, which I tackled a little the other day, stupidity seems to be highly misunderstood in our culture.
A customer referred to herself the other day as being “stupid” about computers. Didn’t want to correct her ignorant ass, but lack of knowledge about something is IGNORANCE, not stupidity. You cannot be stupid about one thing and smart about others. If you’re stupid, you’re just stupid. Ignorance on the other hand, not only can be fixed, but is a good thing. I would argue that it might be the BEST thing. It is ignorance, after all that makes us say “Why?” It has been said that necessity is the mother of invention… I would argue that IGNORANCE is the mother of invention. It is from ignorance that all knowledge, all discoveries flow. Without ignorance, we would not have the drive to discover, to learn.
Stupidity is something different. Stupidity is the inability to learn. There are DEGREES of stupidity, but it is not reliant on topic. Some people are abysmally stupid. Like a lady I saw on the road tonight. Driving an SUV, talking on her cell phone, turning left and HONKING at the pedestrian who had the right of way because he wasn’t getting out of her way fast enough. ABYSMALLY stupid. She probably walks around wondering why her life sucks so badly. I am reminded here of something that someone (Christopher Hitchens, maybe?) said about George W. Bush… that he was born on third base and thought that he hit a triple. ABYSMALLY stupid.
Then there are the moderately stupid. Like people in industrial or rural areas who have seen their livelihoods consistently stripped from their hands by thirty years of republican corporatism but continue to vote republican because, of course, ONLY REPUBLICANS CAN GET THEM OUT OF THEIR FINANCIAL MESS. That’s moderately stupid. The moderately stupid can learn and do things amazingly well, but are easily duped. Especially if you start off by telling them exactly what they want to hear.
Then there are the slightly stupid. I count myself in this category. I would say that most people are slightly to moderately stupid. We know things. Sometimes QUITE A FEW things, but we still do things that, on slight reflection, make us go “Oh, duh!” I think that the things that separate the slightly stupid from the moderately stupid is that the moderately stupid don’t have that moment of epiphany.
Then there are those who are not at all stupid. I count Barack Obama, Terry Pratchett and Albert Einstein in this group.
So, please, folks… if you are ignorant about something DO NOT call yourself stupid. Stupid is a very, very bad thing, not something to be proud of. Although that lady who referred to herself as “stupid” about computers, like so many other people in this area, said it with a certain amount of pride in her voice.
And that’s just fucking stupid.
Peace.
Randal
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Barack Obama - American Idiot?
Twice on Thursday I heard (I guess that I now have to call them “former”) Bushies refer to Barack Obama as an “idiot”. And one of these guys isn’t quite bright enough to tie his shoes. Okay, that’s a little harsh, but he’s not bright. I realized that when I found myself explaining to him that we KNOW that humans and dinosaurs didn’t coexist (as some creationists now insist) by the fact that the human bones are in a layer of Earth MILES shallower than the dinosaur bones.
A lot of this “idiot” talk seems focused around the economic stimulus package.
Okay, let’s review and see who the idiots are here, okay?
1) 42% of the economic stimulus package is tax breaks. Yes, you math whizzes, that’s pretty close to half. But the republicans aren’t happy because it’s forty percent instead of sixty percent. Personally, I think that if ANY of the stimulus package goes to major corporations or the wealthy, then we’re getting ripped off. I’ve said it before and, dog help me, I’ll probably have to say it again… the idea that giving MORE tax breaks to corporations will help the economy is so much of a fairy tale that it should actually read like this: “Once upon a time, tax breaks to corporations will help the American economy, and they all lived happily ever after.” IF WE GIVE PHIL KNIGHT A BIGGER TAX CUT, HE WILL NOT OPEN PLANTS IN AMERICA. HE STATED THIS VERY CLEARLY TEN YEARS AGO. HE WILL NOT EMPLOY AMERICANS. PERIOD. He’d probably buy a new yacht or something.
2) Most of the tax breaks are aimed at America’s diminishing and dying middle class. That’s right folks, tax relief for you and me all of a sudden and ain’t that grand? It still amazes me, though, that middle-class republicans will still argue that it would be better for Phil Knight and Bill Gates to get tax cuts than them. Talk about idiots.
3) Yes, there is a chunk of pork in the stimulus package. But 3-A) we are dealing with politicians and they will ALWAYS try to wedge their pork into ANYTHING and 3-B) some of this pork, regardless of how stupid it seems (like a million dollars for a butterfly enclosure) can be spelled like this: J-O-B-S. Think about Ms. Palin’s much-maligned “bridge to nowhere” in Alaska. It was actually from Ketchikan, Alaska to Gravina Island where the Ketchikan airport is. But realize, folks, than when Congress killed that particular piece of pork, they put people out of work. Or, at the very least, they cancelled a construction company’s project which equates to the same. How about if we did this instead… John Keynes, possibly the most quoted economist in history, said that when the economy was bad that the government should pay people to dig holes. Then it should pay them to fill the holes back in. How about if we did some of that, but in a beneficial way. For instance, building a bridge from the Alaskan mainland to Siberia? Wouldn’t it be cool to be able to drive from Alaska to Eastern Europe or Asia? And how much fun would it be to ride the Trans-Siberian railway from Anchorage across the Pacific Ocean to China? Or, to leave from Seattle in your car and wind up ten days later in France or Germany? I think that something like this would not only stimulate America’s economy, but it would do wonders for world peace and understanding.
4) The majority of the stimulus package is job creation. People grouse because that “idiot” Obama isn’t going to give us $300 worth of dope money each like that great economic genius George W. Bush did. TWICE! At the beginning and end of his reign of error. Guys, if he has to do it twice in eight years, that means that it didn’t work the first time! Get it? The very definition of insanity (or idiocy, in this case) is doing the same thing in the same way and expecting a different result. Do we want the same thing a third time to see if it works this time? NO! How about we try some long-term creation of jobs instead. Hey, what a concept. Maybe putting Americans to work instead of giving all of our jobs to 12 year old Chinese kids will boost our economy.
No, you’re not going to see the results of this economic package tomorrow. Probably not by the end of this year. Hopefully you’ll start seeing some results before the end of President Obama’s first term. But it is going to take time. It’s taken us almost thirty years of electing one corporatized president after another, each worse than the last, from Reagan to Bush to Clinton to Bush to get our economy in this shape, it’s going to take some time to get it back. And it’s going to take the determination of NOT voting for corporatized presidential candidates anymore. NO president who is beholden to corporations will do right by the American people. Period.
So let’s re-elect this “idiot” Obama who actually seems to have a PLAN for restoring America’s economy instead of just a lot of hot air about it, and then elect some other president without an endorsement deal after that. Or maybe we can overturn the 22nd amendment and just keep President Obama in office until he dies like we did Roosevelt… the LAST president to inherit and fix and seriously SNAFU American economy.
Peace.
Randal
A lot of this “idiot” talk seems focused around the economic stimulus package.
Okay, let’s review and see who the idiots are here, okay?
1) 42% of the economic stimulus package is tax breaks. Yes, you math whizzes, that’s pretty close to half. But the republicans aren’t happy because it’s forty percent instead of sixty percent. Personally, I think that if ANY of the stimulus package goes to major corporations or the wealthy, then we’re getting ripped off. I’ve said it before and, dog help me, I’ll probably have to say it again… the idea that giving MORE tax breaks to corporations will help the economy is so much of a fairy tale that it should actually read like this: “Once upon a time, tax breaks to corporations will help the American economy, and they all lived happily ever after.” IF WE GIVE PHIL KNIGHT A BIGGER TAX CUT, HE WILL NOT OPEN PLANTS IN AMERICA. HE STATED THIS VERY CLEARLY TEN YEARS AGO. HE WILL NOT EMPLOY AMERICANS. PERIOD. He’d probably buy a new yacht or something.
2) Most of the tax breaks are aimed at America’s diminishing and dying middle class. That’s right folks, tax relief for you and me all of a sudden and ain’t that grand? It still amazes me, though, that middle-class republicans will still argue that it would be better for Phil Knight and Bill Gates to get tax cuts than them. Talk about idiots.
3) Yes, there is a chunk of pork in the stimulus package. But 3-A) we are dealing with politicians and they will ALWAYS try to wedge their pork into ANYTHING and 3-B) some of this pork, regardless of how stupid it seems (like a million dollars for a butterfly enclosure) can be spelled like this: J-O-B-S. Think about Ms. Palin’s much-maligned “bridge to nowhere” in Alaska. It was actually from Ketchikan, Alaska to Gravina Island where the Ketchikan airport is. But realize, folks, than when Congress killed that particular piece of pork, they put people out of work. Or, at the very least, they cancelled a construction company’s project which equates to the same. How about if we did this instead… John Keynes, possibly the most quoted economist in history, said that when the economy was bad that the government should pay people to dig holes. Then it should pay them to fill the holes back in. How about if we did some of that, but in a beneficial way. For instance, building a bridge from the Alaskan mainland to Siberia? Wouldn’t it be cool to be able to drive from Alaska to Eastern Europe or Asia? And how much fun would it be to ride the Trans-Siberian railway from Anchorage across the Pacific Ocean to China? Or, to leave from Seattle in your car and wind up ten days later in France or Germany? I think that something like this would not only stimulate America’s economy, but it would do wonders for world peace and understanding.
4) The majority of the stimulus package is job creation. People grouse because that “idiot” Obama isn’t going to give us $300 worth of dope money each like that great economic genius George W. Bush did. TWICE! At the beginning and end of his reign of error. Guys, if he has to do it twice in eight years, that means that it didn’t work the first time! Get it? The very definition of insanity (or idiocy, in this case) is doing the same thing in the same way and expecting a different result. Do we want the same thing a third time to see if it works this time? NO! How about we try some long-term creation of jobs instead. Hey, what a concept. Maybe putting Americans to work instead of giving all of our jobs to 12 year old Chinese kids will boost our economy.
No, you’re not going to see the results of this economic package tomorrow. Probably not by the end of this year. Hopefully you’ll start seeing some results before the end of President Obama’s first term. But it is going to take time. It’s taken us almost thirty years of electing one corporatized president after another, each worse than the last, from Reagan to Bush to Clinton to Bush to get our economy in this shape, it’s going to take some time to get it back. And it’s going to take the determination of NOT voting for corporatized presidential candidates anymore. NO president who is beholden to corporations will do right by the American people. Period.
So let’s re-elect this “idiot” Obama who actually seems to have a PLAN for restoring America’s economy instead of just a lot of hot air about it, and then elect some other president without an endorsement deal after that. Or maybe we can overturn the 22nd amendment and just keep President Obama in office until he dies like we did Roosevelt… the LAST president to inherit and fix and seriously SNAFU American economy.
Peace.
Randal
Monday, February 16, 2009
Getting Shot
I play video games. I also work in retail electronics. What this means is that I track new video game releases. What THIS means is that I know that there is a new Fifty Cent (the rapper, not the price) video game coming out. The first one was universally panned by reviewers and sold like radioactive dog crap, but I guess that some egos just can’t be stopped.
The net result of a new Fifty Cent video game coming out is that I am again swamped by media reports and fans telling me how many times Fifty Cent has been shot. I believe that it is eight… if I am wrong, please do NOT correct me, because I don’t really care all that much. My point is that the guy’s been shot a lot of times.
Which begs my first question… and no offense to Mr. Cent… but just how stupid do you have to be to put yourself in the position of being shot more than once? I mean, aside from… say… being a police officer or in a war. And in those professions, getting shot a couple of times… say two, three, five, whatever… earns you a pension. But EIGHT? Come on, Fifty, you’re among friends here, you can tell us… how many of those shots were in the head? And do you still have a slug lodged somewhere in your reasoning centers?
Part of the problem here is that kids and especially (yes, I’m going to say it, cover your ears liberals) black kids and conditioned to believe that it’s cool to get shot. Granted, this has not changed since I was a kid, or probably back to the invention of guns before that. I mean, when a neighbor would return from Viet Nam with a cool new bullet scar to show us, us kids loved it. The gorier the better. But there was a hierarchy. A vet who got shot was WAY up there on the “wow that’s cool” scale. Some redneck who got shot by some girl’s daddy was way down toward the bottom. Probably the bottom was when some idiot got drunk and shot himself. (I say HIMself not to be a sexist, but because women seem almost entirely immune from this particular form of stupidity.) But kids today don’t seem to question why the person got shot. Getting shot… FOR ANY REASON… is cool. Therefore, the more times that you get shot, the cooler you are. This seems to be another argument against evolution to me. Evolutionists, can you explain to me why people who venerate getting shot as a worthwhile survival skill keep surviving?
To me, we should venerate people who manage to get shot once and then are smart enough to get themselves out of the situation and not get shot anymore. I’m fortunate enough never to have been shot, despite being surrounded by adults when I was a child who loved that wonderful combination of beer and shotguns.
Yes, yes, I hear my liberal friends out there whining now that kids like poor little “Fitty” don’t have any choice but to be in a gang. BALDERDASH! Of course they do, with some help from the adults in the ‘hood.
First off, stop venerating the stupid gangs. Stop teaching your damn kids to venerate the gangs. Yes, I realize that, a lot of times, gangs are the only way to make money in the inner cities, so how about this… STOP TEACHING YOUR KIDS TO VENERATE MONEY SO DAMNED MUCH! I can’t think of one gang-banger posing rap star who doesn’t profess Christianity. Well, hypocrites, Jesus not only said “Don’t kill each other”, he also said “Hardly will a rich man enter the gates of heaven”. So if you’re really a Christian, venerate personal growth higher than money and STOP KILLING EACH OTHER.
A quick side-note here on the term “baby-daddy”. I think that a big problem with urban culture is the removal of not only the role of father from the lives of these kids, but the loss of the TERM “father” itself. I was deprived of that title by a mentally ill, manipulative ex-wife. I honestly can’t understand how males will deprive themselves of it voluntarily. I shudder thinking of the day when I’ll be filling out a form with a “relationship to child” box on it with the options “Grandparent, sibling, aunt, uncle, mother, father, baby-daddy”.
Having said that, I will use this reprehensible term in the next paragraph because it is appropriate. A lot of these “baby-daddy’s” are little boys of little life experience.
Girls… women… ladies… sisters… stop being gang ho’s. I mean this sincerely. If you have a baby, and the kid’s baby-daddy was in the bloods, and winds up getting killed because of that association, teach the kid better. Leave the gangs. I realize that it’s not always possible to find a safe place in today’s cities, but find as safe a place as you can. And as far away from the gangs as possible. Teach him how stupid it is to hate each other based on your neighborhood or what color doo-rag someone wears. After all, here are so many BETTER reasons to hate someone.
Finally, folks, SNITCH! Snitch like crazy! It amazes me that people will watch their neighbor killed by gang-bangers and then allow themselves to be convinced that it won’t happen to them if they don’t snitch. WRONG-O, brothers and sisters. If you snitch, that gang-banger goes away and that seriously reduces your chances of getting shot. At the same time, you might be able to get in the witness protection system and get OUT of the poisonous environment that has bred gangs.
Okay?
So to all of my gang brothers and sisters… to all of my brothers and sisters who feel trapped by the gangs… and to “Fitty”…
Peace.
Randal
The net result of a new Fifty Cent video game coming out is that I am again swamped by media reports and fans telling me how many times Fifty Cent has been shot. I believe that it is eight… if I am wrong, please do NOT correct me, because I don’t really care all that much. My point is that the guy’s been shot a lot of times.
Which begs my first question… and no offense to Mr. Cent… but just how stupid do you have to be to put yourself in the position of being shot more than once? I mean, aside from… say… being a police officer or in a war. And in those professions, getting shot a couple of times… say two, three, five, whatever… earns you a pension. But EIGHT? Come on, Fifty, you’re among friends here, you can tell us… how many of those shots were in the head? And do you still have a slug lodged somewhere in your reasoning centers?
Part of the problem here is that kids and especially (yes, I’m going to say it, cover your ears liberals) black kids and conditioned to believe that it’s cool to get shot. Granted, this has not changed since I was a kid, or probably back to the invention of guns before that. I mean, when a neighbor would return from Viet Nam with a cool new bullet scar to show us, us kids loved it. The gorier the better. But there was a hierarchy. A vet who got shot was WAY up there on the “wow that’s cool” scale. Some redneck who got shot by some girl’s daddy was way down toward the bottom. Probably the bottom was when some idiot got drunk and shot himself. (I say HIMself not to be a sexist, but because women seem almost entirely immune from this particular form of stupidity.) But kids today don’t seem to question why the person got shot. Getting shot… FOR ANY REASON… is cool. Therefore, the more times that you get shot, the cooler you are. This seems to be another argument against evolution to me. Evolutionists, can you explain to me why people who venerate getting shot as a worthwhile survival skill keep surviving?
To me, we should venerate people who manage to get shot once and then are smart enough to get themselves out of the situation and not get shot anymore. I’m fortunate enough never to have been shot, despite being surrounded by adults when I was a child who loved that wonderful combination of beer and shotguns.
Yes, yes, I hear my liberal friends out there whining now that kids like poor little “Fitty” don’t have any choice but to be in a gang. BALDERDASH! Of course they do, with some help from the adults in the ‘hood.
First off, stop venerating the stupid gangs. Stop teaching your damn kids to venerate the gangs. Yes, I realize that, a lot of times, gangs are the only way to make money in the inner cities, so how about this… STOP TEACHING YOUR KIDS TO VENERATE MONEY SO DAMNED MUCH! I can’t think of one gang-banger posing rap star who doesn’t profess Christianity. Well, hypocrites, Jesus not only said “Don’t kill each other”, he also said “Hardly will a rich man enter the gates of heaven”. So if you’re really a Christian, venerate personal growth higher than money and STOP KILLING EACH OTHER.
A quick side-note here on the term “baby-daddy”. I think that a big problem with urban culture is the removal of not only the role of father from the lives of these kids, but the loss of the TERM “father” itself. I was deprived of that title by a mentally ill, manipulative ex-wife. I honestly can’t understand how males will deprive themselves of it voluntarily. I shudder thinking of the day when I’ll be filling out a form with a “relationship to child” box on it with the options “Grandparent, sibling, aunt, uncle, mother, father, baby-daddy”.
Having said that, I will use this reprehensible term in the next paragraph because it is appropriate. A lot of these “baby-daddy’s” are little boys of little life experience.
Girls… women… ladies… sisters… stop being gang ho’s. I mean this sincerely. If you have a baby, and the kid’s baby-daddy was in the bloods, and winds up getting killed because of that association, teach the kid better. Leave the gangs. I realize that it’s not always possible to find a safe place in today’s cities, but find as safe a place as you can. And as far away from the gangs as possible. Teach him how stupid it is to hate each other based on your neighborhood or what color doo-rag someone wears. After all, here are so many BETTER reasons to hate someone.
Finally, folks, SNITCH! Snitch like crazy! It amazes me that people will watch their neighbor killed by gang-bangers and then allow themselves to be convinced that it won’t happen to them if they don’t snitch. WRONG-O, brothers and sisters. If you snitch, that gang-banger goes away and that seriously reduces your chances of getting shot. At the same time, you might be able to get in the witness protection system and get OUT of the poisonous environment that has bred gangs.
Okay?
So to all of my gang brothers and sisters… to all of my brothers and sisters who feel trapped by the gangs… and to “Fitty”…
Peace.
Randal
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Petty Partisan Balderdash
Judd Gregg, President Obama’s nominee for commerce secretary, in a spectacular show of partisan politics, has withdrawn his name from consideration for the cabinet position.
Gregg, one of the republican nominees that President Obama promised, cited as his reasons a change of control over the 2010 census from the office of commerce to the office of the President’s Chief of Staff, Rahm Emmanuel and disagreements over the stimulus package.
Now I’ve looked into this change of control over the census, and honestly, it seems like a nonsense move on the president’s part. Frankly, since the census is what determines voting districts, I think that if you’re going to shift power there it should be from commerce to Secretary of State, the office that controls elections. Failing that, President Obama, LEAVE IT ALONE! Choose your battles more carefully, Mr. President. This move, like the senate hearings on steroid use in professional baseball a couple of years back, strikes me as a remarkable waste of your time and our money.
I believe that the partisanship here comes in where the stimulus package is concerned. If you remember, Mr. Bush started and ended his term in office with “stimulus packages” that consisted of sending most Americans checks for $300. I say “most” Americans because if you, like me, owe the IRS money, you never saw your $300. And look how well those “stimulus packages” worked.
House republicans introduced a “stimulus package” in response to the one sponsored by the President that consisted entirely of tax cuts for the wealthy with NO ESTIMATED COST TO THE AMERICAN PEOPLE! I’m sure that when that package went down in flames, as it was sure to, that republicans started putting pressure on Gregg to withdraw. Let’s face it, when someone holds the purse strings on your career, you bow to what they want pretty quickly.
Brothers and sisters, this is sabotage, pure and simple. In the words of Rush Limbaugh, to whom our elected republican officials cow-tow, the republicans want the President to fail. This after years of Mr. Limburger and his rude, foul-mouthed cronies at F-word news telling us that, whether we like the chief executive or not, we have to do our best to support him.
Brothers and sisters, when you look hypocrisy up in the dictionary…
So now I bet money that, four years from now, when President Obama runs for reelection, we’ll see republican ads claiming that he failed on his promise of a bi-partisan cabinet. Yeah, guys… if you don’t let your kids play, what do you expect to happen?
To any of my brothers and sisters in New Hampshire, write to Senator Gregg and let him know that you’re not happy with this partisan gamesmanship. As President Obama said when Senator Clinton attacked him during the primary, now is the time for us to build America up – not the time for us to tear each other down. Republicans, get over yourselves. Newt Gingrich is gone. It’s time to lose his poisonous policies and get the republican party back to being a legitimate political party, not a party of corporate-controlled attack dogs interested only in the power to make their rich friends even richer.
Peace.
Randal
Gregg, one of the republican nominees that President Obama promised, cited as his reasons a change of control over the 2010 census from the office of commerce to the office of the President’s Chief of Staff, Rahm Emmanuel and disagreements over the stimulus package.
Now I’ve looked into this change of control over the census, and honestly, it seems like a nonsense move on the president’s part. Frankly, since the census is what determines voting districts, I think that if you’re going to shift power there it should be from commerce to Secretary of State, the office that controls elections. Failing that, President Obama, LEAVE IT ALONE! Choose your battles more carefully, Mr. President. This move, like the senate hearings on steroid use in professional baseball a couple of years back, strikes me as a remarkable waste of your time and our money.
I believe that the partisanship here comes in where the stimulus package is concerned. If you remember, Mr. Bush started and ended his term in office with “stimulus packages” that consisted of sending most Americans checks for $300. I say “most” Americans because if you, like me, owe the IRS money, you never saw your $300. And look how well those “stimulus packages” worked.
House republicans introduced a “stimulus package” in response to the one sponsored by the President that consisted entirely of tax cuts for the wealthy with NO ESTIMATED COST TO THE AMERICAN PEOPLE! I’m sure that when that package went down in flames, as it was sure to, that republicans started putting pressure on Gregg to withdraw. Let’s face it, when someone holds the purse strings on your career, you bow to what they want pretty quickly.
Brothers and sisters, this is sabotage, pure and simple. In the words of Rush Limbaugh, to whom our elected republican officials cow-tow, the republicans want the President to fail. This after years of Mr. Limburger and his rude, foul-mouthed cronies at F-word news telling us that, whether we like the chief executive or not, we have to do our best to support him.
Brothers and sisters, when you look hypocrisy up in the dictionary…
So now I bet money that, four years from now, when President Obama runs for reelection, we’ll see republican ads claiming that he failed on his promise of a bi-partisan cabinet. Yeah, guys… if you don’t let your kids play, what do you expect to happen?
To any of my brothers and sisters in New Hampshire, write to Senator Gregg and let him know that you’re not happy with this partisan gamesmanship. As President Obama said when Senator Clinton attacked him during the primary, now is the time for us to build America up – not the time for us to tear each other down. Republicans, get over yourselves. Newt Gingrich is gone. It’s time to lose his poisonous policies and get the republican party back to being a legitimate political party, not a party of corporate-controlled attack dogs interested only in the power to make their rich friends even richer.
Peace.
Randal
Friday, February 13, 2009
On The Appendix and the Clitoris
Thank you for your patience. I now have my new spectacles and am able to write again.
Thank God.
I frequently find myself chasing my tail on the question of evolution or creation. When I catch it, I come to the conclusion that neither can be true without the other. Neither is more compelling an argument than the other. Evolutionists can’t explain where the spark of life came from that fired the first single-celled living creatures on the Earth. Creationists cannot explain dinosaur bones and the remains of early civilizations without sounding… let’s face it… quite mad. Evolutionists cannot explain this spark of intellect that allows me to write this blog, or the spark of intellect that allowed the creation of the computer upon which it is written, or the network upon which it is published. Creationists cannot explain our genetic relationship to the chimpanzee, a relationship that is closer than that of rats to mice.
But there are also areas that NEITHER argument can explain, and I’d like to address two of these today. And yes… one is the entry about sex that I promised you. So I warn you now – the second half of this deals with frank sexuality in a frank manner. If the God-gift of sexual pleasure disturbs you, you may want to stop reading now or soon.
The first thing that I’d like to address is the appendix. Many people around my age and younger still have our appendixes… when I was young, doctors began treating appendicitis with drugs. Many people around my age and older no longer possess their appendixes. The cure for appendicitis, up until about thirty or thirty five years ago was appendectomy – the removal of the appendix surgically.
But the questions that I put to both creationists and evolutionists are “Why do we have an appendix? What purpose does it serve?” Creationists provide no answer to this, although it also begs the question of the literality of the Bible, to wit: to those who claim that our physical being is created in the image of God, does God also have an appendix? Evolutionists can provide at least half an answer to this: that the appendix once served a purpose, and now no longer does.
What the appendix is at the best of times is an utterly useless, benign piece of flesh that resides in our abdomen, serving absolutely no purpose. Ever. At the worst of times, the appendix becomes a hand grenade residing in our abdomen, simply waiting to explode and kill us. For those who argue for “Intelligent Design”, I would say that this is supremely UNintelligent design. And to the evolutionists who claim that it once served a purpose, I would ask “Once that purpose was made redundant, why did we not outgrow the appendix?” When we lost the need for a tail, we lost our tails. When we lost the need for fangs, they became the much more attractive “canine” teeth. When we started wearing clothes and lost the need for bodies covered with fur, most of us stopped growing fur, for the most part, on any place that we routinely cover except our genitals, which need much more specific temperature control than the rest of our bodies.
The second thing that I’d like to address is sexual pleasure and, more specifically, the clitoris. Both creationists and evolutionists argue that the purpose of sexuality is reproduction. I would argue that that is not true, but that the purpose of sexuality is pleasure, with reproduction as a side-effect.
The primary reason that I say this is that there are so many sexual acts that are pleasurable, but no procreative. Oral sex. Anal sex. Masturbation. Even just the pleasant pastime of so many teenagers when they’re in a situation where they might be caught of rubbing their clothed genitals together until one or both experience orgasm. The generation prior to mine referred to this as a “zipless fuck” thanks to Erica Jong. My generation called it “dry-humping”. I don’t know what it’s called now. And here’s where we have to take the wonderful little clitoris into account. The clitoris serves absolutely no reproductive function, except for the fact that it’s easier for a woman to conceive after an orgasm. It’s EASIER, but not necessary. There are a number of women out there who conceived children with little or no sexual pleasure. My grandmother (she and I spoke very frankly about this issues) once told me how much she hated and dreaded the thought of sexual intercourse. She was married to my grandfather when she was thirteen and had her first child at fourteen, so I imagine that sex was a torment for her. After my grandfather’s death, she eventually even stopped going out socially entirely with men. The reason, she said, was that all of them “just wanted to get into the bed” with her. And yet, despite this, she bore eight children. Counterbalance that with a former girlfriend of mine who finds it very difficult to reach orgasm through any kind of stimulation EXCEPT cunnilingus. This is an utterly useless action procreationally, but from what I understand, it feels really good recreationally.
So, to my creationist brothers and sisters… if God gave us the gift of sexual pleasure to encourage us to mate like animals in a zoo and produce more little humans, then why do non-procreative sexual activities still feel good? Man and the great apes are the only animals on Earth where the female possesses the capability of sexual pleasure. If God intended pleasure as an encouragement for procreation, then why is sex either non-pleasurable or actually painful the female of most species? And if He intended this as a reward for us only, then why do female great apes ALSO experience sexual pleasure and orgasm?
To my evolutionist brothers and sisters… Why does the clitoris exist? What need arose for the survival of the species that required female apes and humans to feel sexual pleasure, where our cousins the monkeys, and, presumably, our mammalian progenitors didn’t?
Hopefully I’ve now made each side feel insecure enough to stop the pointless, fruitless arguing about which is right and made each consider that without the opposing view, their view does not… CAN NOT work.
Peace.
Randal
Thank God.
I frequently find myself chasing my tail on the question of evolution or creation. When I catch it, I come to the conclusion that neither can be true without the other. Neither is more compelling an argument than the other. Evolutionists can’t explain where the spark of life came from that fired the first single-celled living creatures on the Earth. Creationists cannot explain dinosaur bones and the remains of early civilizations without sounding… let’s face it… quite mad. Evolutionists cannot explain this spark of intellect that allows me to write this blog, or the spark of intellect that allowed the creation of the computer upon which it is written, or the network upon which it is published. Creationists cannot explain our genetic relationship to the chimpanzee, a relationship that is closer than that of rats to mice.
But there are also areas that NEITHER argument can explain, and I’d like to address two of these today. And yes… one is the entry about sex that I promised you. So I warn you now – the second half of this deals with frank sexuality in a frank manner. If the God-gift of sexual pleasure disturbs you, you may want to stop reading now or soon.
The first thing that I’d like to address is the appendix. Many people around my age and younger still have our appendixes… when I was young, doctors began treating appendicitis with drugs. Many people around my age and older no longer possess their appendixes. The cure for appendicitis, up until about thirty or thirty five years ago was appendectomy – the removal of the appendix surgically.
But the questions that I put to both creationists and evolutionists are “Why do we have an appendix? What purpose does it serve?” Creationists provide no answer to this, although it also begs the question of the literality of the Bible, to wit: to those who claim that our physical being is created in the image of God, does God also have an appendix? Evolutionists can provide at least half an answer to this: that the appendix once served a purpose, and now no longer does.
What the appendix is at the best of times is an utterly useless, benign piece of flesh that resides in our abdomen, serving absolutely no purpose. Ever. At the worst of times, the appendix becomes a hand grenade residing in our abdomen, simply waiting to explode and kill us. For those who argue for “Intelligent Design”, I would say that this is supremely UNintelligent design. And to the evolutionists who claim that it once served a purpose, I would ask “Once that purpose was made redundant, why did we not outgrow the appendix?” When we lost the need for a tail, we lost our tails. When we lost the need for fangs, they became the much more attractive “canine” teeth. When we started wearing clothes and lost the need for bodies covered with fur, most of us stopped growing fur, for the most part, on any place that we routinely cover except our genitals, which need much more specific temperature control than the rest of our bodies.
The second thing that I’d like to address is sexual pleasure and, more specifically, the clitoris. Both creationists and evolutionists argue that the purpose of sexuality is reproduction. I would argue that that is not true, but that the purpose of sexuality is pleasure, with reproduction as a side-effect.
The primary reason that I say this is that there are so many sexual acts that are pleasurable, but no procreative. Oral sex. Anal sex. Masturbation. Even just the pleasant pastime of so many teenagers when they’re in a situation where they might be caught of rubbing their clothed genitals together until one or both experience orgasm. The generation prior to mine referred to this as a “zipless fuck” thanks to Erica Jong. My generation called it “dry-humping”. I don’t know what it’s called now. And here’s where we have to take the wonderful little clitoris into account. The clitoris serves absolutely no reproductive function, except for the fact that it’s easier for a woman to conceive after an orgasm. It’s EASIER, but not necessary. There are a number of women out there who conceived children with little or no sexual pleasure. My grandmother (she and I spoke very frankly about this issues) once told me how much she hated and dreaded the thought of sexual intercourse. She was married to my grandfather when she was thirteen and had her first child at fourteen, so I imagine that sex was a torment for her. After my grandfather’s death, she eventually even stopped going out socially entirely with men. The reason, she said, was that all of them “just wanted to get into the bed” with her. And yet, despite this, she bore eight children. Counterbalance that with a former girlfriend of mine who finds it very difficult to reach orgasm through any kind of stimulation EXCEPT cunnilingus. This is an utterly useless action procreationally, but from what I understand, it feels really good recreationally.
So, to my creationist brothers and sisters… if God gave us the gift of sexual pleasure to encourage us to mate like animals in a zoo and produce more little humans, then why do non-procreative sexual activities still feel good? Man and the great apes are the only animals on Earth where the female possesses the capability of sexual pleasure. If God intended pleasure as an encouragement for procreation, then why is sex either non-pleasurable or actually painful the female of most species? And if He intended this as a reward for us only, then why do female great apes ALSO experience sexual pleasure and orgasm?
To my evolutionist brothers and sisters… Why does the clitoris exist? What need arose for the survival of the species that required female apes and humans to feel sexual pleasure, where our cousins the monkeys, and, presumably, our mammalian progenitors didn’t?
Hopefully I’ve now made each side feel insecure enough to stop the pointless, fruitless arguing about which is right and made each consider that without the opposing view, their view does not… CAN NOT work.
Peace.
Randal
Saturday, February 7, 2009
A Quick Note
Hi, readers.
I wanted to apologize for taking so long between posts, and let you know why. I haven't abandoned my blog. I am in the process of settling into a new apartment, so my time has been limited. The primary problem, though, is that my vision recently suffered some sudden changes that make it impossible to write (because i can't clearly make out the letters on the screen) until my new glasses arrive.
I appreciate YOUR appreciation of my words, and ask that you bear with me.
Thanks.
Peace.
Randal
I wanted to apologize for taking so long between posts, and let you know why. I haven't abandoned my blog. I am in the process of settling into a new apartment, so my time has been limited. The primary problem, though, is that my vision recently suffered some sudden changes that make it impossible to write (because i can't clearly make out the letters on the screen) until my new glasses arrive.
I appreciate YOUR appreciation of my words, and ask that you bear with me.
Thanks.
Peace.
Randal
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Doing Better Business
Had two ideas for blog posts today, struggled to figure out which one I wanted to do. One was about sex, the other was about business. So I think that what I’m going to do is take care of business tonight – we’ll do sex tomorrow night.
I was webchatting with my bro-in-law the other night after I helped him set up his camera, and he made the observation (beloved by republicans everywhere) that if we JUST give American businesses more tax cuts, they will somehow miraculously start bringing jobs back to America.
Guys.
Come off it.
We have been steadily giving away the farm to corporations for almost the last thirty years. It’s gotten to the silly point where Microsoft pays less in taxes than I do. It’s insane. Obviously, even more tax breaks are not part of the solution.
If you want to know what I think that the answer to bringing jobs back to America is, keep reading. If you don’t, peace.
You still here?
Okay, I think that the ONLY thing that will make American businesses bring jobs back to America is to make them play by OUR rules wherever they do business. Phil Knight, you want to hire a 12 year old Chinese kid to make your Nike’s? Too bad. Child labor is illegal in America, it should be illegal for American businesses to do it anywhere they go. It’s not suddenly legal for me, as an American citizen to rob banks or steal cars just because I happen to be in China or Mexico at the time. Okay, so no more twelve year olds. So when you hire that seventeen or eighteen year old, you’re going to pay them a dime an hour, right? No, you’re not. You’re going to pay them a minimum of $6.55 per hour AMERICAN. That’s right – American Minimum Wage. I think that in Mexico that’s somewhere around a billion pesos per minute. Okay, so now you’re employing an eighteen year old for $6.55 per hour. So you’re going to work them twelve hours per day, six or seven days per week with no overtime pay, right? WRONG! Anything over eight hours per day or forty hours per week gets paid at 9.23 per hour, as American law stipulates.
Might as well bring that job home, huh?
And yes, I will address again one of the dumbest arguments against employing Americans that I’ve ever heard… if we make more stuff here, stuff will cost more. Yes, it certainly will. But with more Americans working, there will be more money in our economy so that we can afford the higher costs.
Guys, I’m not sure how we’ve allowed so many of our companies to become international outlaws, flouting America’s labor laws wherever they go, but it’s time to put an end to it. It will also help our relations with the other countries of the world and may even make us a smaller target for terrorism.
After all, to paraphrase Mr. Bush…
They hate us for our freedom to piss all over them.
Peace.
Randal
I was webchatting with my bro-in-law the other night after I helped him set up his camera, and he made the observation (beloved by republicans everywhere) that if we JUST give American businesses more tax cuts, they will somehow miraculously start bringing jobs back to America.
Guys.
Come off it.
We have been steadily giving away the farm to corporations for almost the last thirty years. It’s gotten to the silly point where Microsoft pays less in taxes than I do. It’s insane. Obviously, even more tax breaks are not part of the solution.
If you want to know what I think that the answer to bringing jobs back to America is, keep reading. If you don’t, peace.
You still here?
Okay, I think that the ONLY thing that will make American businesses bring jobs back to America is to make them play by OUR rules wherever they do business. Phil Knight, you want to hire a 12 year old Chinese kid to make your Nike’s? Too bad. Child labor is illegal in America, it should be illegal for American businesses to do it anywhere they go. It’s not suddenly legal for me, as an American citizen to rob banks or steal cars just because I happen to be in China or Mexico at the time. Okay, so no more twelve year olds. So when you hire that seventeen or eighteen year old, you’re going to pay them a dime an hour, right? No, you’re not. You’re going to pay them a minimum of $6.55 per hour AMERICAN. That’s right – American Minimum Wage. I think that in Mexico that’s somewhere around a billion pesos per minute. Okay, so now you’re employing an eighteen year old for $6.55 per hour. So you’re going to work them twelve hours per day, six or seven days per week with no overtime pay, right? WRONG! Anything over eight hours per day or forty hours per week gets paid at 9.23 per hour, as American law stipulates.
Might as well bring that job home, huh?
And yes, I will address again one of the dumbest arguments against employing Americans that I’ve ever heard… if we make more stuff here, stuff will cost more. Yes, it certainly will. But with more Americans working, there will be more money in our economy so that we can afford the higher costs.
Guys, I’m not sure how we’ve allowed so many of our companies to become international outlaws, flouting America’s labor laws wherever they go, but it’s time to put an end to it. It will also help our relations with the other countries of the world and may even make us a smaller target for terrorism.
After all, to paraphrase Mr. Bush…
They hate us for our freedom to piss all over them.
Peace.
Randal
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