Kill Everything

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2009-12-14T20:41:00.001-05:00

The Road Not Taken

2009-12-08T07:12:00.005-05:00

CORRECTION: it turns out Sean hated the book, and tells me "I was oddly attracted to The Road. It was one of those awful books you read that drag you down and make you want to stab the author." So ignore what I say about Sean in the following.

***

I read the book "The Road" a few months back. My friend Sean asked me to do it. More than once, I nearly threw the book across the room because I found it so depressing and dull. But Sean wanted to discuss the book with me, and the book wasn't too long, so I forced myself to finish it. When I got to the end, I wished I'd never picked it up.

Oprah made this a book on her list of must reads? Seriously?

I could summarize my experience of the book as follows:

The entire world is dying. EVERYTHING SUCKS. Oh, we found some food. EVERYTHING STILL SUCKS. I used to have a pretty wife. THEN EVERYTHING SUCKED. We're traveling and people want to kill us. THESE PEOPLE SUCK. Horror! EVERYTHING SUCKS! Moral ambiguity? EVERYTHING SUCKS. Mystery! EVERYTHING SUCKS! A father wants the best for his son, even though EVERYTHING SUCKS. The end.

Sean said he liked the book because it was the first apocalypse story without a shred of hope -- society has collapsed and there's no hope of it ever coming back.

Why this would be a reason to recommend a book, I can't really say.

The other thing Sean liked was the father and son relationship. The interplay between the two characters is the real spine of the book. The father will do anything to keep his son alive. Meanwhile the son is suffering a moral crisis.

"Are we still the good guys?" the son asks.

I have a simpler question -- why don't you have names? The boy, the man, the wife... Isn't this a literary device 14 year old boys use? Isn't this novel little more than the despair of an angry, depressed adolescent, right down to the graphic scenes of cannibalism?

"I didn't want to give them names or describe the characters because I want him to be every man, and I want him to be every boy," says the writing class student. "I want people to be sucked into the story and become those people."

I can't tell you how many creative writing teachers banged us over the head with a stick whenever we tried using this gimmick. Empathy is developed by knowing more about a person, not less. If someone is just "the man" and he gets hit by a bus, I don't care. If he's "Daniel Webster" and we just spent ten minutes talking about his kids over a cup of coffee, I care when the bus crushes his head. That's how humans work.

Yes, yes, yes -- authors can break the rules. There are no rules in writing. I just found the lack of names irritating.

So, yeah, I hate the book. Sean loves it.

And to be fair, Sean is not alone. Tons of people love this book. It won a Pulitzer Prize for fiction. Critics are raving. And then there's the highest modern tribute one can pay to a book -- they've made it into a movie.

I was so genuinely baffled by the positive response the book was getting -- what am I missing here? -- that I went online and read critical reviews. Much to my surprise, a lot of people see the book as a warning about our future. We need to take the environment seriously, or this is the world we'll get. This is how bad things could be. This, they said, is a brilliant book about environmentalism.

Which is bullshit. There is no cry for stricter rules on carbon emissions in this book. The author is very careful to avoid mentioning what happened to destroy almost all the life on earth. The backdrop of doom and gloom doesn't seem political or environmental. It just is.

To me, the despair, the collapse of society, and even the end of the world -- they all feel like an emotional element to the story, and the author's state of mind. He's depressed. The world is hell. These characters are struggling in hell. The father wants to create a world for his son, and he can't. He wants the best for his son, but everything is awful. That's the story.

Saying "The Road" is a book about environmentalism is like saying the movie "The Road Warrior" is a scathing critique of our dependence on fossil fuels.

Evidently the movie tries to make a statement about environmentalism. Some scenes were filmed where real human catastrophes and pollution have created a freakish, apocalyptic landscape.

But the book is not an environmentalist screed. People who say otherwise are simply seeing what they want to see. That doesn't make them wrong, necessarily. It's one of the messages you can take away from the book, if you're so inclined. I just don't see it as intentional on the author's part.

(And for the record, neither did Sean. When I told him there were people holding up this book as an environmental statement, Sean was just as surprised as I was.)

Reviews of the movie "The Road" describe it as grim, powerful, and not for everyone. Clearly it's the must-see feel-bad movie of the year. Not for me, thanks. I don't mind art that's depressing and dark, but the book was enough. I'm not going back for seconds. There wasn't any imagery in the book that I needed spelled out in celluloid.

Taste is a matter of taste, obviously. I'm not saying everyone should think and feel like me. Maybe I'm missing some key life experience that would make the book and movie compelling. But, from my perspective, the book is so pointlessly depressing. It's a suicide note in novel form. If the author, Cormac McCarthy, blows his brains out tomorrow with a shotgun, I wouldn't be surprised in the slightest.

Instead, I would think to myself, "I was right! It was just a suicide note!"

And then I'd feel a sickening and perverse sense of satisfaction.

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2009-12-06T11:21:00.001-05:00

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2009-12-06T11:20:00.001-05:00

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2009-12-06T11:17:00.001-05:00

Lazy Poem

2009-12-04T14:52:00.001-05:00

A Brief Critique of Existentialist Theatre

The actor on stage asks,
"Why isn't anything happening?"

"I was just going to say that!"
yells a member of the audience.

The Big Con

2009-12-02T18:16:00.000-05:00

"I suppose I could work at McDonald's, but that stuff's for pussies. I'd rather deal crack on the street. That's where the action is. That's where the tough guys are. And, okay, selling the shit to school kids is low, but if I don't do it, somebody else will. Besides, these kids are miserable little shits. The rock gives 'em a rush. And it's not that addictive. I mean, I use crack every once in a while, and it's no big deal."

"Sure, I hit my kids a little. But that's just to teach them what's right. People are too soft on their children nowadays. Kids need to know you're serious. And what are words, without force? They're empty, unless you back them up with a smack now and then. What, are you one of those pussy types, thinks kids are precious? Give them an inch and they'll stab you in the back with it. The little buggers are monsters."

"All right, it was probably wrong to cook the books. But you know, we were all making money there, for a little while. We were all making millions. Sure, I cut some corners to make it happen, but isn't that what a CEO is supposed to do? I can't run a multimillion dollar corporation and live like a goddamn Boy Scout. So, I got caught. I rolled the dice pretty good, for a while there. We all made money. Sure, some little people got hurt. But me, my friends, the shareholders -- we were all riding high. For a while. Guess the party had to end sometime."

Now what's your story? And what's my story? And what's everyone else's story?

"Did you see what they did, over there? I knew it! The whole time, I knew it. You can't trust 'em. Isn't that what I told you? Can't trust 'em. They poison the wells. That's what they do. They don't care about us."

THEY ARE US, GOD DAMN IT. Who do you think they are?

When the football team wins -- WE WON.

When the same football team loses -- THEY LOST.

Evil is what other people do. What I do is entirely justifiable.

Oldest con game in the world. People have been running it on themselves since the dawn of time.

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2009-12-01T21:27:00.001-05:00

Chess

2009-12-01T16:26:00.001-05:00

"You can't beat me in chess.

Whenever a loss is in sight,

I flip over the entire board

and wish you a pleasant goodnight."

"I'll win this time, sir --
And won't your face be red!
-- when I pick up the chessboard
and smash it over your head."

"You'd never have a chance!
I'll distract with a battle cry,
scoop up a pointy bishop
and thrust him into your eye!"

"Using the board as a shield,
deflecting your bishop's blows,
I'll scoop up one of your rooks,
and stuff him right up your nose."

And so the chess masters raged,
deep into the dark of night,
plotting every swing they'd take
without ever starting to fight.

Needs a Haircut

2009-12-01T07:50:00.001-05:00

The dispassionate considering of a monster.

2009-11-30T17:10:00.002-05:00

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Watercolour, Pen, Marker

2009-11-29T21:04:00.001-05:00

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A Prayer for Ronald

2009-11-28T08:30:00.002-05:00

You love McDonald's. You love their food. Ronald McDonald makes you happy. If you really met Grimace, you would hug him. You would blurt out, "I love you," and mean it. Tears would run down your face.

Only years ago, you started to rot inside. You started to doubt. You buried your love. You decided these people couldn't be trusted. Ronald is a fake. Grimace is a guy in a costume. They're just selling you burgers that are bad for you.

Yes, you'll admit you love the food, but that's not the point. They are liars, salesmen, a con.

Only they're not. They are always sincere. They mean everything they say. There is no sales job here.

Ronald McDonald is pure love. He loves you. He wants you to love him. Why would you deny him your love?

Because it hurts you. It hurts to feel. It's easier to sneer and say, "I'm an adult, goddamn it. And I don't need you, or your love, or your burgers. Screw you, Ronald McDonald."

And you know what? He still loves you. Ronald will always love you no matter how you feel, no matter what you say.

You can always go back to him. He will always take you back. Ronald will take you in his arms and hold you while you sob. And you'll moan, saying, "I'm sorry, Ronald. I'm sorry."

Ronald McDonald is Jesus Christ. He's the CEO of General Motors. He's your President, your Prime Minister. They all want your love, respect, and trust.

You can doubt them, and hurt yourself forever, if you like. But they'll always take you back. You just have to open your heart, hug them to you. They'll always take you back. Always.

Amen.

* * *

Being suspicious of everything is the modern day equivalent of being an intellectual -- and involves none of the hard thinking. It's a way of appearing to know what you're talking about, without actually having a clue.

"Oh man, you trust that corporation? You are so goddamn naive. I've read a bunch of books and seen a bunch of movies, and I know better. All corporations are evil."

That's what the cynic says. And he says it a lot. "You can't trust corporations."

Same with any government.

Same with all special interest groups.

Same with any media source.

Same with "scientists" and their research -- "The H1N1? Oh my god, come on!"

Same with "the right" or "the left" or "libertarians" or "communists" or "anarchists" -- whatever political stripe offends you.

Same with whoever else you want to look at with one raised eyebrow while pretending to have some profound insight -- one that everyone else somehow missed out on.

It so easy to destroy a reputation. "You trust THEM? How embarrassing for you."

Then the cynic collects stories proving their position is correct -- a simple task, if the sin of one particular corporation can be held up as proof that all corporations are sinful. The stories and atrocities can then be rattled off, one after the other, burying any "naive" opponent under the weight of cheerful despair.

The problem is that if you're suspicious of ALL groups, who can you rely on? Yourself, maybe. A few like-minded friends. Your own direct experience of reality can, presumably, be trusted. Your own pet theories.

Clearly fearing all those groups isolates you, makes you weak. You may as well be a caveman living in the woods, terrified of anything that moves, calling it a demon. It's superstition wearing the mask of reason, loathing for everything disguised as rational thought.

Let me be clear: I'm not apologizing for any of these groups. I'm not saying you should blindly trust the government or Pepsi. Trust needs to be earned. What has me irked is the wide-spread assumption that all organizations are evil -- every single one -- with zero evidence. It's passed off as a well-informed position based on extensive reading and thought. But really, being cynical doesn't require any effort at all.

Here, try on the philosophy for yourself. Repeat after me:

"Everything sucks!"

Simple enough?

But why not withhold judgement, until you have a good reason to be suspicious? There's a difference between being wary, and claiming everyone is out to get you. It's rushing to fear and suspicion that makes me so furious.

ENRON sucks, sure. We've got proof, there. When you have proof, it's not paranoia.

"Ah, Nik, hold on. Let me interrupt you. I'm not paranoid -- I've got facts. I have thousands of documented cases of corporate greed and corruption leading to all sorts of terrible disasters."

You know what? I've got thousands of documented cases of serial killers. Do you assume every person you meet secretly fantasizes of chopping you to pieces and eating your spleen? I hope not.

One vampiric ENRON does not mean all corporations are evil, the same way one Jeffrey Dahmer doesn't make all lonely homosexual men cannibals.

Sure, you shouldn't give strangers the keys to your house without getting to know them better. They might not be a Dahmer, but they might swipe your stereo. That level of suspicion makes sense. Wariness.

But don't scream and run every time you see someone in a hockey mask -- particularly if you're at a hockey game.

All of them -- corporations, governments, special interest groups, scientific groups, etc. -- without exception, have at least some good intentions. Sure, they might have an agenda. And you don't? They want your business, your respect, your allegiance, your understanding, your love. Sometimes, in their desperate effort to get you on their side, they'll mess up. But they need you. In their own way, they're trying to serve you.

And, dare I say it? They even love you.

* * *

Ronald McDonald sells hamburgers for your sins. His flesh is the flesh of god. Even the veggie burgers.

And yet you still scream:

"The flu shot is Hitler! All government leads to Auschwitz! Corporations are raping us in the anus! The media is feeding us our own feces! Scientists are building aryan Frankenstein monsters in their labs! It's all Satanic, Nazi garbage! Doom! DOOM!"

And then there's your love for Ronald. It's there. And if you look at it, you begin to understand that your turning away, your pretend hatred, is simply avoiding what is real. Cynicism is a perversion of love. It's a fear of getting hurt. You love Ronald McDonald.

You cry out in pain, "I want to eat that hamburger, but what if it destroys an acre of rain forest? Damn you, Ronald!"

Ronald is not perfect. Neither are you. Have some faith. Ask him to change. Realize that your insisting upon a 99 cent hamburger comes with hidden expenses -- like the destruction of the entire planet. Is that Ronald's fault? Is it your fault?

Embrace Ronald. Kiss him on the cheek. Tell him you're sorry. Let him cook you a hamburger. Eat it. Don't eat with him every day. You don't want to spoil him. Just visit once in a while.

And tell him that you love him.

My Email to ID Software

2009-11-12T06:38:00.002-05:00

ID Software people,

Wow. Your website is awful. Has anyone ever told you that?

I just played the demo for Doom 3 for the MAC. (Yeah, I'm years behind everyone else.) It was a great game. I want to buy it. You know, I want to GIVE YOU MONEY and DOWNLOAD a copy of the game. How difficult could that possibly be?

Pretty goddamn difficult, it turns out. Your website doesn't even have an area where I can buy the Mac version of the game and have it mailed to me, let alone download a version of the game. And Doom 3 has been out for years now. Don't you want my money? I have money! I want to give it to you! And I can't!

Do you see how this is a bad business model?

On some pages, when I click "buy now" (to buy a PC game I don't want) I get the following error message:

PHP Notice: Undefined index: rtcw in E:\web\id\games\wolfenstein\rtcw\c-buy.php on line 7

Whoops. Even the games you are selling, which are of no use to me, can't be purchased.

How difficult could it possibly be? What other business model are you working under? Have all the games you've ever made, in PC and in Mac format, available for download, where people can pay you, using Visa or Mastercard or maybe Paypal. What other option is there? This is such a BASIC idea, I can't figure out how you missed it. This is something all the small businesses are doing. I thought pros like you would be on board.

Yes, people can buy your games in stores. But more and more people want to buy things through their computer. Your online store shouldn't be a lazy afterthought. If you're going to do it, do it right.

Why are you selling T-shirts? No one is thinking, "I wonder if they sell Doom t-shirts at the ID website? I'm going to head over there right now." Stick to what you know.

Quite frankly, it's websites like yours that lead to hacking. Hackers can deliver the product to me better than you can. If I wasn't a moral person, I'd be playing Doom 3 right now, instead of emailing you. Seriously -- when I typed "doom 3 Mac" into google, the first option on the google suggestion list was "Doom 3 Mac torrent".

Whether you like it or not, your business competes with the delivery model of pirates. Right now, their service is better than yours. What are you going to do about it?

You might be wondering why I am sending this email to "jobs@idsoftware.com". It's because I cannot find a button anywhere on your site marked "contact us". I went through every single screen, before giving up. This "jobs" email address was tucked into your "we're hiring" section, and was the only email address I could find. I hope to god you're going to hire someone to make your website worth visiting.

You may be wondering, why do you have me as a (potential) customer in the first place? Because I've been trying to play first person shooters on my iPhone, and it's ridiculous. They're too small. I was playing Duke Nukem on that tiny screen, and my brain said, "Stop. This is not an immersive first person shooter experience. Go look for something to play on your computer."

And I remembered Doom from my 20s. I'm almost 40. I'd pretty much given up on video games, when my iPhone rekindled my interest.

Your website doused the spark with a bucket of water. If there is a way to make your website any less useful, I don't know how to do it.

Despite the tone I'm taking, I hope these comments prove useful, and light a fire under someone, somewhere. To sum up my thought:

YOU COULD BE MAKING MORE MONEY IF YOUR WEBSITE WASN'T SO AWFUL.

Sincerely,

Nikolaus Maack
[my phone number and mailing address deleted]

The Flu Shot That Ate Your Brain

2009-11-04T17:04:00.002-05:00

There's mercury in the H1N1 flu shot, John Akpata said on his wall on Facebook. Mercury causes brain damage. There's no way he's getting the shot.

Goading him a little, I asked how he felt about fluoride in the drinking water. I knew what his answer would be, as I'd heard John rant about fluoride before. It was my hope he would start ranting about fluoridated water, and scare off people who might take him seriously about flu shots.

John didn't disappoint me.

Fluoride, John wrote, weakens your bones and makes your hair fall out. Toothpaste has warnings on the tube to contact poison control centres if you swallow the stuff. The KGB and Israel used fluoride against their enemies.

John told me to do a Google search on dentists against fluoride. Do a search on YouTube for fluoride.

Of course, if you do a Google search for "UFOs disguised as clouds", you'll find many videos and websites. Just saying.

As he talked about mercury and fluoride, John implied (but never stated outright) that there's some great big government conspiracy at work.

"If I was a first nations person, I would not accept free blankets from Geoffrey Amherst. If I was Jewish, I would not accept a tattoo from Goebbles. I would not accept a cigarette from the Marlborough man, nor a 40 oz from Jack Daniels himself, let alone a flu shot with mercury in it, that medical professionals are losing their jobs for refusing to take."

Equating the flu shot with Nazi tattoos and gifts of diseased blankets seemed to imply there's a conspiracy going on. Which sounds a little insane.

Okay, let's be honest -- it sounds VERY insane.

As I criticized John's position, he grew irritated. He said I was attacking him.

I replied that I wasn't attacking him, just questioning his beliefs.

And really, that's all there was to it. I respect John Akpata as a poet, a public speaker, a debater, and a free spirit. But when it comes to chemistry and health, I'm going to listen to the Canadian Dental Association and the Canadian Medical Association. I value their expertise a little more than John's. They do real research. John surfs Google.

Lately I find myself astounded at people's lack of faith in public institutions. Yes, there are examples of corruption and deceit and profiteering out there. On the whole, though, North American institutions have been fairly reliable. If the powers-that-be say a flu shot is safe and a good idea, they're probably right.

(Several people reading this, including John Akpata, just yelled at their monitors: "Oh my God, Nik, how can you be so naive?!")

Unfortunately for John, I have entered a new phase of my life. Once upon a time, a person would say something way "out there", and I would think:

"Well, could be. Who am I to question their beliefs? It's not like I know any better. Let's see where they go with this. Keep an open mind. Be polite."

Nowadays, my tolerance for "out there" is much lower. If someone says something that strikes me as crazy, I feel compelled to politely speak my mind.

That's why, when John told his friends on Facebook that the flu shot is hitleresque, I felt the need to speak for the other side of the debate.

In our discussion, John summed up what motivates his worldview: "It is not fear, Nik - it is dedication to knowledge."

But what kind of knowledge, exactly? John's study of these subjects seems to ignore the experts, seeking out the fringes. Why listen to crackpots and conspiracy theorists, and not the people who have done years and years of research?

David Suzuki sums it all up nicely. When he was asked if he was getting the flu shot, he replied:

"Yes. I'm just astounded at people. Do they think doctors, scientists and government are out to poison them or something?"

That appears to be exactly what some people are saying.

Martyrs and Masturbators

2009-10-31T11:07:00.005-04:00

I had this dream in which a tyrannosaurus rex has been shot full of arrows. He could also talk. The arrows made me think of Catholic saints and martyrs. I remembered seeing a depiction of a saint shot through with arrows somewhere.

So I googled "arrows" and "martyr" and found out that the saint full of arrows was Saint Sebastian. Some emperor named Diocletian ordered him to be shot full of arrows until he looked like a hedgehog.

I'm not at all religious, so the idea of saints and martyrs means little to me. Saints die gruesome deaths, much like Jesus dying on the cross. Somehow all that pain is supposed to be good for us. I've seen the movie "The Passion of the Christ," and as an atheist it just seemed like a really boring horror movie. That anyone could watch it and think, "Wow, this is so moving and religious," horrifies me.

Whenever I think of Jesus, and how Christians say he died on the cross for us, I have to wonder if Christianity is a masochism cult. There's this idea that enduring great pain and torture is somehow holy. How many people in Western culture are prone to embracing pointless pain because of the Jesus myth?

If you stick your hand in the fire, and it burns you, take your hand out of the fire. There's no reason to hold your hand in the fire for as long as you can.

In art, there are many portraits of Sebastian skewered with arrows. It appears to be a favourite theme. Wikipedia shows quite a few of these paintings, and they're all vaguely interesting.

Then I saw this one...

Sebastian with one arrow. Click for larger photo.

In this painting, Sebastian is basically naked, except for a tastefully draped robe. A single arrow is sticking out of Sebastian's crotch, suggesting it's an erect penis. Sebastian is holding the arrow like it's his boner, and he's masturbating. And the way his head is thrown back, it's as if he's experiencing sexual ecstasy, not pain. Is this a man who has been shot in the gut with an arrow? Or is this a young man jerking off?

Dying for god is a very old idea. Here, we're being show someone dying for Christianity, being martyred, his face turned towards heaven. And he's basically wanking. I suppose the painting is meant to serve as a connection dying for god and physical pleasure.

Trying to find out more information about this painting proved difficult. I did come across someone in a forum talking about how artists would paint "bible scenes" which would allow them to create erotic paintings under the guise of being religious. This reminds me of how in the early 60s, sex films would have to add some "educational" element to their films, in order to sneak past censorship laws.

Is that what's going on in this painting? Did the artist want to paint a homoerotic depiction of a young man masturbating? He took the Sebastian myth, removed most of the arrows, stuck one on the crotch, and took it from there?

The idea of confusing pain, pleasure, death throes of ecstasy, sexual ecstasy, and the ecstasy of god creeps me out. These things probably should be kept in separate boxes, where they can't get mixed together.

That is all.

Parents Are Pain

2009-10-30T10:09:00.000-04:00

Tarzan was raised by apes. There are cases of kids raised by wolves. Charles was abandoned in a sex club as a baby and raised by masochists. They weren't just sexual deviants, engaging in pain play. Pain was their religion, their daily life, their everything.

His parents kept his adoption a secret from him. All the same, being from a different species meant he never quite fit in.

"Show your mother you love her -- beat her with this riding crop," his father said.

"No!" Charles yelled.

"It's okay, son," his mother said. "It doesn't mean you hate mommy! Quite the opposite."

"No! I won't do it!"

"Son, you need to understand," his father explained, "when you whip a masochist, you're not really hurting them. For some, pain is transformed into pleasure."

"And as a sadist, you're not really in charge," his mom chimed in. "The masochist is in charge. The top and the bottom create a script ahead of time, negotiate rules, but the masochist decides how far things go. It's all about role playing."

His father nodded agreement. "That's why mommy and daddy have safewords. Understand? Now come here and slap your father across the face."

"No!" Charles screamed.

So went the terrible-twos for Charles.

It was a particularly confusing time when he reached adolescence. If Charles hit his mother and father, it meant he loved them. If he hugged them, it meant that he loved them. How could he rebel?

Charles settled on indifference. He perfected a cold, detached, scientific demeanour which he accentuated with a white lab coat, clipboard, and glasses. He shaved his head, so that he looked prematurely bald. Whenever his parents did something that required a hit or a hug, he would peer down his nose at them.

"Interesting," the fourteen year old Charles would say, slowly drawing out the word. He had perfected the ability of turning his face into a blank slate, showing zero emotion. "Very interesting."

And then he would scribble a note on his clipboard. At the end of the month, he wrote up a report of his observations and submitted them to his parents -- in triplicate.

"Objectivity!" his father bellowed. "You're ignoring the passion of flesh and rage and pain. That's all there really is! We are meat machines, filled with emotion and violence. Your science is just a mask for your true animal nature. You're in retreat from the body! And you're killing your mother with your objectivity -- do you know that?"

"Where did we go wrong?" his mother yelled at the ceiling. "My son won't hit me! He won't hit his own father! What did we do to deserve such a child?"

Charles started hanging out with kids who were into science. They'd get together on Friday nights and hang out at a local community centre, studying slides of bacteria. They'd go to the library and discuss physics. Sometimes they'd go down to the beach and look for interesting plant and animal specimens. Charles got a paper route, saved his money, and bought a telescope. He'd stay up at late, making notes on stars and comets.

"Why can't you be like little Jimmy Johnson?" his father asked him. "He's experimenting with drugs. He's studying to be a professional dom. They boy has got three girlfriends and two boyfriends. He's getting a Prince Albert genital piercing next week for his birthday. And you! A virgin, at 15! It's so embarrassing."

Charles made a note on his clipboard, then said, "I'm saving myself for marriage."

"You are no son of mine!" his father screamed.

When Charles turned 18, he arranged to go to university with a full scholarship. His plan was to study medicine and specialize in neurology.

"I'm going to rid the world of unnecessary pain," he told his parents. "I'm going to become a pain management expert."

"Your father and I are very disappointed in you," his mother said.

Charles let his hair grow in, stopped carrying a clipboard, and threw himself into his studies. While working hard, he made sure to take breaks for fun and socialization. He was always worried of demonstrating any quality that could be labelled as "masochistic".

During Christmas break with his parents, he unwrapped his present and found nipple clamps.

"They're surgical steel," his mother said. "Easy to clean, in case you bleed a little. Dishwasher safe."

"They were your grandfather's," his father said. "They're a part of our family tradition."

"Thanks," Charles mumbled.

"Try them on," his mother prompted.

"Maybe later."

Charles gave each of his parents a sweater.

"I know it's not latex or leather," Charles said, "but they're very itchy."

"Oh," his mother said weakly, "they seem very nice."

After that particular Christmas, he didn't go home as often. It was simply too awkward. They were all so different.

During his second year of university, Charles got a phone call from his mother.

"It's your father," she said. "He's in the hospital. It's quite serious."

"Auto-erotic asphyxiation?" Charles asked.

"Good guess," his mother said. "Breath play. Your father always was a sucker for strangulation. I guess I overdid it a little."

Charles took the bus home for the weekend. His dad was in a hospital bed, in pain, refusing medication, and seemingly happy. It made no sense to Charles at all.

"Son," his dad said from the hospital bed, "your mother and I probably should have told you this a long time ago."

"We didn't want you to feel weird, or unwanted," his mom said.

"What is it?" Charles asked.

"You're adopted."

Charles let the information soak in for a moment. It made sense. His parents hit him and said it was about love. For him it was just hitting. When they asked him to hit them, it was just pointless cruelty. He never understood, and now it was clear why. He just wasn't wired that way.

"It explains a lot," Charles said, flatly.

"We do love you, in our way," his mother said, and slapped him across the face.

Charles rubbed his burning cheek. He briefly toyed with the idea of punching his father and kicking his mother. These were the sort of gestures they would appreciate, as signs of affection. But he couldn't do it. He wasn't that person.

"I know you guys care," Charles said. "I'm glad you're okay, dad. Be more careful next time."

"You know your old man," he said. "When I get knocked off the horse, I get back on again." And he mimed being strangled and stuck out his tongue.

For the rest of the visit, they stood there making awkward small talk.

Charles rode the bus back to university. As he stared out the window, he thought about his parents and how he was raised. It seemed he would have to resign himself to the idea that he and his parents spoke a different language -- one that Charles would never understand. He'd do his best to avoid their slaps and punches, without striking back. That way, he could stay true to his own nature.

With a start, he realized that so long as he maintained a relationship with his parents, he was enduring a form of masochism. Knowing his mom and dad meant knowing pain.

The Caboose and The Local Chicken

2009-10-30T06:41:00.002-04:00

My two brothers and I are in the caboose of the train. It's going very slowly, almost stopped. When I look out the window, I see we're in more of a subway train than a real train, underground in some kind of tunnel. And our car is no longer attached to the main train. They've left us behind.

I put my hand out the window, and by pushing the walls, I get our caboose moving along the track. Doing this, we catch up to a train and connect to it. Phew. We're moving again.

Only we start talking to other passengers and discover this train is going to a different place than where our original train was headed. We were going out west, to Edmonton or somewhere like that. This train is headed north. Everyone is going to a skiing resort there.

Well, maybe we could stay at the skiing resort.

"Nah, you don't want to do that," say the other passengers. "There's nothing up north but skiing. And you guys don't even have winter clothes."

Damn it. Maybe I shouldn't have pushed the train along like that. Maybe they disconnected us from the main train for a perfectly good reason.

So we get off the train at the next subway stop, making sure we all have our bus transfers. I tell a security guard I see about the caboose being attached to the wrong train. It's quite possible there are passengers in that caboose who have no idea they're headed to the wrong destination.

The female security guard immediately radios this to headquarters.

"Did you have something to do with all this confusion?" she then asks me.

I think about it. Well, I did push the caboose along and connect it to a new train. But that doesn't make sense. It's not possible. So it must not have happened that way.

"No, I didn't have anything to do with it," I tell her.

My brothers, my parents, my partner Michelle, (or some weird shape shifting version of all these people) and I stand on the platform, waiting for a train to our proper destination. Only then I notice that all the trains are lit up red on the schedule board. Apparently there's some alarm test going on, and so all trains are stopped. Crowds of annoyed people mill around us.

"We may as well find a hotel," says my mother. Or Michelle. "It could be hours. Or even days."

"That's ridiculous," I say. "For all we know, it could be five minutes. We should wait."

We all climb into what might be an automobile on the train tracks. Or maybe the caboose again. As we sit there, we see police officers with rifles walking down the tracks. They look like a posse on the hunt for an escaped convict. And they seem to be looking under trains. The sight of them freaks me out and I get out of our car.

"Oh, that's right," my mother says. "The alert is part of an investigation of a terrorist plot. I forgot. And if we see police like this, we're supposed to stop, raise our hands over our heads, and wait for them to pass."

I start to raise my hands over my head, and the policemen see me do this, laugh, and keep walking. I lower my half raised hands. I was the only one who raised his hands.

At this point, I realize I am standing on top of a large boulder that is half on the train tracks, right next to our car. That's weird, I think. There couldn't possibly be a boulder on the train tracks. It would derail a train. Looking at it more closely, I realize it's a giant lizard the size of a horse. But judging by the flies around its head, its dead.

That's when it stands up and starts walking around. This freaks me out and I back away from it. The lizard starts stumbling around.

"I see you found one of our local chickens," laughs one of the police officers from a distance, as he keeps walking away. This lizard-thing is part of the local fauna, evidently. What city are we in anyway?

At this point, our family's pet T-Rex arrives on the scene. He's very irrational and can talk.

"I can count to ten but I'm not sure that I want to," he says, and as he says it I realize he has ten arrows all shot through the bottom of his jaw. He looks somewhat like a saint that has been martyred, except he doesn't appear to be hurt.

This T-Rex, I think, is my own uncontrollable rage.

The T-Rex comes very close to me, and even though he's a family pet, I have to push up on his bottom jaw to prevent him from eating me. Mind you, I'm not sure he wants to eat me.

I'm standing at the hood of the car. The T-Rex is coming at me from the right. And now the other dinosaur -- the "local chicken" -- is coming at me from the left. For some reason I find the local chicken more frightening than the T-Rex.

"Look," I say to the T-Rex, "can you eat that other dinosaur already, before he attacks me?"

The T-Rex seems dazed, confused, and babbles endlessly. I'm not at all sure he's going to help me out.

It sucks being stuck between two demented dinosaurs, but the situation seems more awkward and annoying than genuinely dangerous. I have some nervousness, but nothing too serious.

Portrait Gallery Protest: response

2009-10-29T06:18:00.003-04:00

I sent a portrait to MP James Moore. After not receiving any word for a long, long time, I sent another message to Moore's staff, and got some more run-around. The following scanned letter showed up in my email box yesterday.

James Moore's Response, shrunk a little to fit this website.

The key words are:

"Unfortunately, I never received the portrait you sent me last year."

The rest of his response is filler, and ignores almost everything in my letter. As most politicians know, don't answer the question they asked, answer the question you wish they asked.

Hence my big questions go unanswered:

"To those of us outside the process, this looks corrupt, incompetent, and bizarre. What is going on? What are you politicians doing? Is there any way to bring you all to your senses? Can I help in some way?"

It's also interesting that the response letter makes no promise of there ever being a permanent location for the portraits. Instead, the filler says how wonderful it is that this is a resource traveling all over Canada, and "web-based applications" are expected. I find this strange, as I distinctly recall Moore saying on CBC radio that of course everyone wants a permanent gallery for the art, and that idea is very much on the table. Have things changed?

It's really tempting to call bullshit on Moore never receiving my portrait. I mailed the tube from the Sparks Street Post Office. It's literally across the street from Parliament Hill. I could have walked across the street and just handed it to security.

Second, how do staffers lose a BIG BLACK TUBE WITH STEEL ENDS?

Of course, it is possible it got lost. Sure. Stranger things have happened.

Mind you, if you don't want to deal with some crazy artist mailing you a portrait, "losing" it is a great strategy.

I wonder if his staff will somehow manage to lose the next portrait I mail them?

The Politics of Pain

2009-10-26T12:07:00.002-04:00

[Derek and Charles run into each other on the corner of a sidewalk. After some small talk...]

Charles, in mid-sentence: ...and that’s why I think...

[Derek winces in pain, and Charles stops talking for a second.]

Charles: Derek, are you okay?

Derek: Yeah, it's... my balls.

Charles: Your balls?

Derek: Yeah, they just hurt sometimes. It's a medical condition -- Spontaneous Testicular Agony, or STA. Nothing anyone can do about it. Makes it a little tough to walk, now and then. The pain comes and goes. It's not an uncommon condition. Apparently 15% of men get it at some time in their life. There's not a lot of research into it, but... You know... It's not lethal, so I guess people are researching cancer and AIDS instead.

Charles: That's terrible! I wish there was something I could do.

Derek: Well, that's kind of you, Charles... But, like I said, you can't do anything. No one can. There’s no known cure.

[A slight pause. Suddenly, Charles gets an idea.]

Charles: Maybe I can help!

[Charles punches himself in the balls.]

Derek, horrified: What did you do that for?

Charles: Solidarity.

[Charles punches himself in the balls again.]

Derek, concerned: Stop it! Punching yourself doesn't help me. Cut it out.

Charles: I just want to demonstrate that I understand what you're going through. You see, in politics it's important for people to band together, fighting for a common cause and... Hang on, my balls aren't hurting enough.

[Charles punches himself again.]

[Some people -- men and women in business suits walk by. Charles yells at them.]

Charles: People in pain here! You're just ignoring them! FTA, Frequent Testicular Ache, you assholes! Don't ignore the truth! When will you all wake up?

[And he slaps his balls for good measure. The people look startled for a moment, then quickly walk by.]

Charles, shaking his head: Did you see those idiots, ignoring us? Ignoring the plight of FTA? It makes me sick.

Derek: Okay, first -- it's STA -- Spontaneous Testicular Agony. And look... I'm in pain because of my condition. I don't punch myself in the balls. I'm just suffering. I don't want to suffer. I want to be free from pain. You ARE free from pain, but you're deliberately hurting yourself. Can you see how I'd find that a little insulting?

Charles: I don't understand.

[He punches himself in the balls again.]

Derek: You don't have to punch yourself in the balls to help me. In fact, if you're not in pain, you're in a better position to help me. When you're in pain, you're doubled over and moaning. If you're not in pain, you can actually do stuff. Petition the government, or help me carry groceries, or whatever. Understand?

[Charles shakes his head and punches himself in the balls again.]

Charles, in pain, the last one was a little too hard: Solidarity. Jeeze... Ow...

[Derek, confused, takes a few steps back. What is with this guy? He looks at Charles more closely, as though inspecting him for signs of madness. Looking down, Derek notices for the first time that there's a bear trap closed around Charles' left foot. Based on the colour of the wound and the way the blood is all dried, the bear trap has been on the foot for a long time. And it obviously hurts. Clearly Charles has been walking around with this massive wound and trap for some time.]

Derek, flatly: I just noticed... You have a bear trap on your left foot.

Charles, reluctantly: Yeah, I do.

Derek: Does it hurt?

Charles: No, not really. [pause] Well, maybe a little. [pause] Quite a lot, actually, now that you mention it.

Derek: Shouldn't you get it looked at, or something?

Charles: No, no, no. It's not a big deal.

[And then he punches himself in the balls again.]

Derek: Wait. I don’t understand. You see me in pain. So you want to be part of the STA cause -- whatever that means. So now you're punching yourself in the groin. Meanwhile, you have this bear trap on your foot. Shouldn't you be dealing with your own pain, instead of punching your balls?

Charles: Oh, the bear trap is no big deal. Sure, I limp a little. Yeah, my left foot stinks of rot and stuff. But it's not as painful as punching myself in the nuts.

Derek: It looks real bad. I bet if a doctor fixed it up, you could get better, not be in pain.

Charles: You don't understand. It's not important.

Derek: Why?

Charles: It's just my pain. It's not interesting. It's not part of a political cause, like your pain. There are hundreds of thousands of men out there with FTA...

Derek, correcting him: STA.

Charles, quickly: STA -- something could be done about it. Nothing can be done about my stupid pain.

Derek: Well, someone could take the trap off your foot.

Charles: No, no. You're missing the point.

Derek: What? Are you afraid of your own pain, of dealing with it? Is that it? Is that why you're focusing on my STA and ignoring your own suffering?

Charles rolls his eyes and shakes his head: Now, listen. You don't get it at all. You're starting to become one of those people who victimizes themselves. Your balls hurt, I'm trying to help you, and you're pushing me away.

Derek: I'm victimizing myself? You keep punching yourself in the balls!

Charles: I'm doing that to help you!

[He punches himself again.]

Derek: How does that help me?

Charles sighs: You really don't get it. I thought you'd be more enlightened about this, because of your... See, your pain is... It's part of a social problem. By embracing your pain, I can better understand it and better help you. It's political.

Derek: Your being doubled over in agony is political?

Charles: Exactly.

Derek: Why doesn't the pain of your foot matter?

Charles: It just doesn't.

Derek: And your pain isn't political?

Charles: Right! Now you get it.

[Pause. Derek stares at Charles for a while.]

Derek: I'm going to take the trap off your foot.

Charles, scared: No!

[There is a brief struggle. Derek tries to pry the trap off but Charles pushes him away. Derek renews his efforts, knocks Charles to the sidewalk. The two of them struggle on the ground.]

Charles: No! Quit it! Stop!

Derek, triumphantly: There!

[The trap clatters to the ground, and Derek kicks it away.]

Charles: You bastard! What did you do that for?

[Derek and Charles slowly get to their feet.]

Derek: You were in pain. I thought I'd help you.

Charles: And how does that help me, exactly?

Derek, annoyed: You had a trap on your leg. I took it off. What did you expect me to do? Go out, buy a trap, snap it closed on my left foot, in solidarity?

Charles: Well, that certainly would have made more sense!

Derek, in disbelief: What?

Charles: If you had a trap on your foot too, you'd be showing some understanding of my suffering. Empathy. A bond. A political movement could rise up out of that! Instead, you just yanked the trap off my leg!

Derek: You really believe this nonsense?

Charles: It's not nonsense. You just don't understand how politics works.

Derek, with finality: You're a lunatic.

[Derek walks off]

Charles, yelling after him: That's right! Run away from the man trying to help you with your PTA! You coward! Self-victimizing son of a bitch! Don't you want PTA to be cured?

Derek, from a distance: STA! STA!

Charles: STA! That's what I said! I tried to help you, and what do you do? Knock me down and take the bear trap off my leg! You jerk! You idiot! You political know-nothing!

[Derek is long gone. Charles whimpers a little, feels his leg. He limps over to where Derek threw the trap on the ground, picks it up. He looks it over. With a grunt he pries it open, then he snaps it closed on his leg with a clang and a crunch.]

Charles: Ah. That's better.

END.

My Beard Is Magic

2009-10-23T15:15:00.002-04:00

I had a cold and decided not to shave. As my facial hair grew, I became more committed to the cause. Now, officially, I'm growing a beard. I got a permit from the City of Ottawa and everything.

You think it's easy, growing a beard? You think just anyone can do it? Facial hair is hard work. Beards don't just grow themselves.

"It must be nice," a coworker named Natasha said to me. "Growing a beard. It keeps your face warm. I was just outside in the cold and my cheeks hurt."

"You should grow a beard too," I told her.

She looked at me, blinking. "I can't."

"And you never will with that kind of attitude."

Confused, she walked away.

The hardest part of growing a beard, so far, is the advice I'm always getting. Everyone who has a beard -- or just knows someone with a beard -- wants to help guide me through the experience.

"Shave the part on your neck. It gets itchy."

"Be sure to trim your moustache. That can get kind of gross when it hangs down over your lip."

"Comb it. You don't want food and crap in it."

"Be careful when you get a cold. Snot in a beard? Disgusting."

"If you shampoo it regularly, it's easier to get through the itchy stage when it's first growing in."

The only useful advice came from a guy named Doug. I told him how everyone is bombarding me with grooming tips, and he laughed.

"I grew my beard out of laziness," Doug said. "Forget shaving the neck. Forget shaping the beard. If you have some kind of important social engagement coming up, get it trimmed so you look vaguely presentable. But the whole point of growing a beard is not having to shave in the morning."

Looking at Doug, you'd never guess his philosophy. His beard is neat, graying, and very presentable. Yet at heart, he is a slacker.

I've totally adopted Doug's beard philosophy. A beard is manly laziness. Being furry has cut five minutes off getting ready in the morning. That's five more minutes of pointlessly surfing the Internet before running out the door to get to work. You can't put a price tag on that.

Laziness is key for me. But a lot of guys make strange mystical statements about their beards.

"It's manliness," Andrew told me. "It's authority. It's a symbol of patriarchy and power."

And it's a way for Andrew to hide his blotchy skin.

All the same, Andrew may have a point, though. Consider all the dictators throughout history. Who would have taken Hitler or Stalin seriously, if they had no moustaches? Would Sadam Hussein have had any power if his face was chilly? What about Che Guevara and other revolutionary leaders? And what about Jack Layton? Clearly, if you're male and you're going to be a leader, you need hair on your face.

My beard is multi-coloured. If you look closely, you can see the individual hairs are various colours: blond, black, brown, red, and gray. All the same, people tell me the beard suits me.

"It slims your face," one woman said.

"It makes you look like a professor," another woman told me.

And that's another weird thing -- beards are part of the intellectual costume. I'm not sure why. Are thinkers simply too busy pondering the universe to pick up a razor? Can you be taken seriously as a male philosopher if you're not bearded?

If you want to be evolutionary about it, beards are a secondary sexual characteristic, and indicate a man is mature and fertile. A beard is pubic hair you can show in public without getting arrested. It's sexual.

"They're a turn on," Dawn told me frankly. "A hairy man is a sexy man."

With all of these things in mind, I confronted my partner Michelle with some specific questions about beards.

"No," she flatly told me, "your beard is not magic. And no, it doesn't make me want to obey your commands. You wish."

And then she just stared at me like I was a crazy person.

Of course my beard is only three weeks old. Maybe it needs to be more developed. Then I'll be able to control the minds of women, amass crowds of loyal followers, and become dictator of a small European country.

I have the beard.

Apocalypse Delayed Due To Sunshine

2009-10-16T06:19:00.005-04:00

The next time I see someone carrying a sign that reads, "The End Is Near," I'm going to punch them in the face. It's that kind of bullshit that has ruined my life, and ruined the lives of many others. Why make any plans for the future? The apocalypse is imminent!

I was convinced, over and over again, that we are all going to die, and soon. Then we didn't. And that sucks even more than a fiery death.

(Fuck nihilism. Fuck it in the ass until it moans in pleasure. Then it will stop being nihilism.)

About a year ago, back when we were still friends, my crazy friend Andrew sent me an article by email. In it, an economist predicted people will be rioting for food in the streets of America within ten years. The economic system will collapse. There will be chaos. Thousands upon thousands of people will die in terrible ways.

Andrew, being an anarchist, was delighted. This collapse will be a tremendous opportunity. When one system dies, another system has to show up. Anarchy's guiding principle is "no rulers". If everything falls apart, there won't be rulers, and, voila! You've got anarchy. Isn't that great news? Aren't you glad the cataclysmic destruction and death will serve a useful purpose?

The article annoyed me. I was skeptical. Frankly, I just skimmed the article, not giving it much weight.

Later, Andrew and I got together in person, and he wanted to talk about the article. Immediately, he sensed my disbelief.

"You don't understand," Andrew said. "This economist is a respected man who has predicted things no one else predicted."

Andrew gave me some examples, which I quickly forgot. I can't even remember the economist's name.

"Still," I said, grumbling. Which isn't much of an argument. I was having a hard time putting my feelings into words.

Andrew launched into a familiar rant about how the economic machine can't continue. The planet itself will stop humanity -- there will be terrible environmental disasters. The Wall Street assholes keep cutting corners and it's going to catch up to them. Consumer excess and debt can't continue. The death of capitalism will be the result. Andrew stated all of this with the same certainty most people reserve for the sun rising and setting. Apocalyptic doom just has to happen.

Irritated, I said, "Maybe I'd be a little more willing to believe you, if you didn't sound so happy about the deaths of thousands of people."

Andrew's delight in destruction borders on being sexual. If some economist somewhere says the world is going to end, Andrew has no choice but to believe. It's not fair to call him a pessimist. They expect the worst and are miserable when they get it. Expecting the worst, Andrew is overjoyed when he gets it.

Andrew's death wish was one reason I was doubtful of doom. The other reason was more personal. People have been telling me the world is going to end since I was a child. And much to my surprise and disappointment, the world is still here. And I'm here too.

It all started with the TV movie, The Day After. The way I remember it, I watched the movie on the edge of my seat, alone, 13 years old, unable to breathe, totally awed and horrified. The movie depicted the world ending in a nuclear holocaust. The rest of the details escape me. All I really remember was the way it made me feel.

We're all going to die.

Everyone at school talked about The Day After. Most of my friends had watched it too. Evidently our parents were either lax in supervising us, or thought the movie was educational. One key point of the film stayed with us all, and was discussed over and over -- at the end of the film, text appeared explaining the movie depicted the best possible outcome. A real nuclear war would almost certainly be much worse. The movie gave us all nightmares.

Not long after that, a history teacher discussed nuclear war with us, his students. He confided to the class that if he saw a mushroom cloud blooming on the horizon, he would run towards it, hoping to die in the initial blast. Because there was no way he wanted to live though the hell on earth that comes after a nuclear war.

Should he have shared these sentiments with a roomful of kids? Probably not.

Later that same year, we had a presentation in the school auditorium. It was first thing in the morning. An enthusiastic and convincing presenter explained to us that we are all doomed. He had some impressive slides to back him up. Thanks to global warming, the food supply will be totally gone. The ice caps will melt and the world will flood. The destruction will be cataclysmic. And it could happen as soon as ten years from now. It would definitely happen in our lifetimes, by the year 2000 for sure. Death, chaos, and the collapse of civilization was at hand.

"What a cheerful way to start the school day," I heard one teacher mutter to another.

We're all going to die.

Then there was my own personal craziness -- I was suffering migraines, I had no idea what they were, and I was telling no one about them. It was my crazy secret. Trying to make sense of them, I assumed I had some kind of terminal medical condition my parents didn't want to tell me about. If the nuclear war and the global warming didn't get me, then surely these brain seizures would.

We're all going to die.

It baffled me that everyone knew this -- we'd all seen the same movies, presentations, and arguments. Why were people going about their lives like we weren't doomed? What the hell was wrong with everyone?

Every now and then, I'd wake up and think, "We're all still here, but not for much longer." Anyone who was optimistic and cheerful struck me as a gullible idiot.

When my 21st birthday rolled along, it reminded me of how much time had passed. And I was shocked. I couldn't believe it. Why was I still alive? Why was the world still here? This was not supposed to happen. They told me -- over and over again -- that soon we would all be dead. And yet, here we all were.

I felt cheated. Lied to. Ripped off. Angry.

What would I have done with my life, if I hadn't believed them? Would I have studied more? Would I have made something more of my life? Would I have taken part, instead of standing on the sidelines, sneering at everyone else's stupidity?

Soon, I will be 40. And the world continues to be here. I am still here. It's completely baffling and goes against everything I used to believe in.

I explained all of this to Andrew. "I can't keep living like the world could end any day. I've lived my whole life assuming any minute we could all die. And we haven't died. And it's really starting to look like we won't be dying in flames. I need to start assuming we're still going to be here. Do you understand that?"

I don't think Andrew could comprehend my point of view.

"Oh, the end is coming," he assured me. He tried to explain how global warming really will kill everyone. "They just got the timeline wrong."

He talked about the recent "economic crisis" in great detail, arguing that these were cracks in the weakening structure. These were signs that the towering world of capitalism would soon come tumbling down. And his arguments were all extremely reasonable, intelligent, well thought out, and beautifully constructed. He quoted great thinkers and referenced studies. He compared European and American economic systems. Andrew was very convincing and well informed.

But so were the makers of The Day After. And so was the presenter on global warming. And so were all the other people who assured me that very soon we would all be dead.

Plus Andrew so obviously wants the world to end. He craves it the way a drunk craves liquor. Sweet, sweet destruction, where is your fiery kiss?

Persuasive men and women have been predicting the end of the world since the world began. Whether it's the rapture, an environmental apocalypse, nuclear war, or entertaining disaster movies -- humans appear to revel in the idea that everything could suddenly and violently die. When the "due date" for destruction passes, and we're all still here, everyone quickly forgets. And then we latch on to the next "due date".

"Y2K, man! Get ready!"

(pause)

"2012, baby! Get ready!"

Yes, there will be huge global changes. I believe global warming is real. I know enough about the economic crisis to realize how close we were to a huge disaster. We're just now starting to crawl away from the edge of the cliff. We could still topple over the edge.

But for the sake of my own sanity, I have to assume we aren't all going to die. I've decided to be optimistic. Yes, there will be wars and disasters and death. There might even be rioting over food. But I am going to assume, from this point forward, that the world will be here, things will have some sort of stability to them. I will continue to be alive.

If Andrew were still talking to me, I think he'd tell me my optimism is completely insane and naive. How very goth and emo of him.

It reminds me of another time Andrew and I were in deep in debate. I told him I'd decided to be happy. Not exactly a huge revelation, for most people, but it was something new to me.

Andrew tried to talk me out of it. For two hours, we sat on a bench, in the cold, passionately debating the matter.

"Are you sure you've thought this through?" Andrew asked me, genuinely concerned.

I was stunned by his reaction. I'd always known Andrew was unconventional, but this went far beyond eccentricity. He saw the pursuit of happiness as a bad move.

Andrew argued that all good writers are crazy and in pain. Therefore, if you want to be a good writer, you should seek out craziness and pain.

I countered that not everyone who is in agony is a good writer. "If you want to be a good writer, you should spend your time working on your writing. Doesn't that seem more productive?"

In the end, we agreed to disagree. But that was the beginning of the end of our friendship. Andrew wants to be in pain, miserable, and eagerly awaits the tsunami that will bring down civilization. He chooses death.

I've decided to feel good, be happy, and hope civilization is smart enough to avoid destruction. I choose life.

Turns out a friendship can't survive a difference of opinion that big.

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Walmart

2009-10-15T06:13:00.003-04:00

Where do I fit in, among all the weirdness of the universe? Where is my truth? How do I find it? Where should I even be looking?

When in doubt, turn to pop culture.

In the movie Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, there is a room full of cups. Most of them are ornate, jewel-encrusted goblets of great splendour. A ghost appears, and explains your task -- figure out which one is the genuine Holy Grail.

The villain of the movie makes it to the room before Indiana Jones does. He decides the grail is a gold, jewel encrusted cup. When he drinks from it, he dies. The villain made the wrong choice.

"He chose poorly," the ghost says.

Many people complain about their television, and the world at large. Everyone is screaming: "Buy, buy, buy! You want the jewel encrusted cup. You know you want it. Take it. Take it!"

Some people fall in line. They want the latest gizmo, the best car, the greenest lawn. They want all that stuff. And it's destroying the planet.

Others say this is all nonsense. "Simplify your life," they say. "Live small. Work only as much as you need to, and consume only as much as you need to. People have confused want and need. Reject the jewel encrusted cup. Take nothing. Live small. Want is a dirty word. Want nothing."

(Not even the Holy Grail?)

Personally, I find the excess of the jeweled cup offensive. No, I don't need a forty inch flat screen TV with satellite, thanks. I don't own a TV, I don't own a car, I don't own a lot of junk. My computer and my iPhone are pretty much my only "big" consumer goods.

But I also find the "want nothing" philosophy of the simplifiers puritanical and oppressive. ("You have an iPhone?" they gasp in horror.) Their push to simplify and live small goes beyond telling me not to purchase material things. The way they express their "want nothing" can bleed into all wants, of all sorts, leaving me feeling like desire itself is somehow suspicious and evil.

These are the two extremes of modern times I'm confronted with -- bury myself in junk or live as simply as possible. Take the jewel encrusted cup or take nothing. WANT or DON'T WANT. GREED or SELFLESSNESS. PLEASURE or PAIN. HIGH or LOW.

It's the story of the Buddha all over again. How weird is that?

Quickly summarizing...

Prince Siddhartha is living a life of excessive wealth. His parents have gone so far as to protect him from seeing anyone suffering from old age or sickness. All Sid knows is beauty and excess. In other words, the jewel-encrusted cup.

One day, Sid wanders from the compound, and experiences death and sickness for the very first time. Horrified, he casts aside all his wealth. He joins a group of monks, fasts and meditates endlessly, trying to achieve enlightenment. In other words, he tries wanting nothing.

After starving himself and embracing suffering for years, Sid realizes, quite sadly, that he is no better off than before. He has not achieved enlightenment. Being in complete misery -- wanting nothing -- hasn't worked. Being in opulent wealth -- having the jewelled cup -- didn't work.

It is only then that Siddhartha experiences enlightenment. He discovers "The Middle Path". Don't embrace suffering, don't embrace opulence. Go for the middle ground.

Back to Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade:

When Indy arrives in the room, he wants the Holy Grail. The ghost explains the challenge. Indy scans all the cups. In a corner, ignored, covered in cobwebs, Jones finds a plain, wooden cup, not a single gem on it.

"This is the cup of a carpenter," he says, and takes it. And it is, of course, the real Holy Grail.

"You have chosen wisely," the ghost says.

Neither jewelled cup nor nothing, the wooden cup, the Holy Grail, is the middle ground of the Buddha. It is enlightenment.

The problem, it would seem, is WANT. The sellers and the simplists both see WANT as out of control. You either exploit it or repress it. You're either a drunken lout at the bar, guzzling beer out of control. Or you're a pious non-drinker, regularly going to AA. Drinking in moderation isn't usually mentioned as a viable option.

The message, on some level, is that you cannot trust yourself. Your WANT is a horror.

I'm not being entirely fair. I'm sure the simplists will think it's okay to settle for a wooden cup. That, they might say, is enough of a sacrifice. At least it's not jewel encrusted opulent wealth.

But for me, the key here is WANT. I am allowed to want things. There's nothing wrong with it. And if I'm going to want, I may as well want something genuinely big and real and life changing -- something sacred.

Like an iPhone.

Sorry, just kidding. I mean, like the Holy Grail.

There's a reason I'm talking about the Buddha and Jesus. WANT has a religious, spiritual aspect to it. Rumi wrote love poems about his beloved, God. Rumi wants to merge with the root of the universe, wants to lose himself in Her. He WANTS it, and uses love as a metaphor for this desire. Christians talk about letting Jesus in their heart, their love of God. Love, want, desire is a driving spiritual force.

That version of want is entirely lost in the war of want. Demand the death of all desire, and you lose so much more than excessive wealth.

(Mind you, Buddhism is slightly more complicated than this -- by eliminating WANT, you can achieve enlightenment. But of course, wanting not to want is a want. You can get stuck in an infinite loop of weirdness as you struggle to find the middle path between desire and no desire.)

I think everyone has a secret WANT inside them. It probably has little to do with material goods. This desire is real and it's sacred and it's the truth. It's a quest for the Holy Grail. It's a quest for enlightenment. A desire for personal growth. Self awareness. Knowledge. Personal fire and magic.

That WANT is buried under tons of rationalization, advertising, thought-junk, and fear. It shouldn't be exploited and it shouldn't be denied. Your personal want, your path, your purpose, needs to be pursued. It takes real digging and insight to get to it. And it's worth finding.

When you can cast aside all propaganda and advertising, only then can you ask the big question:

"What do I want?"

Once you know that, you can chase your personal Holy Grail.

That makes it sound easy. It isn't. Advertisers take our genuine desires and distort them into wants for commercial goods. For example, this Diet Coke commercial takes all the trappings of Indiana Jones, and applies them to getting a soft drink from the fridge. It includes the ghost of the Holy Grail informing you that by choosing Diet Coke that you have chosen wisely.

But that's what happens when you look for profundity in pop culture.

Morality Isn't Free

2009-10-11T19:03:00.003-04:00

Freegans believe in trying to live without spending any money. This means digging food out of dumpsters, scavenging for furniture, clothes, etc. The idea is that you won't have to work as much, or at all, and you won't have to spend money.

Some would say this puts you totally outside the evil capitalist system. Romantically, some see this as a return to the ways of the hunter-gatherer.

While its heart is in the right place, it's these last aspects of the philosophy I find ridiculous. A freegan is not a hunter-gatherer and they're not outside of the capitalist system. They're still as dependent on capitalism as ever. They require its garbage.

Think of it this way: there's a horrible, repressive kingdom with a wall around it. The kingdom is pure evil. You want no part of it, so you leave the evil kingdom -- and feed off the garbage they throw over the wall.

Have you really escaped the evil kingdom? Are you really "outside" of it? Have you cut all ties with it?

Don't get me wrong. I'm a firm believer in reduce, reuse, recycle. I've picked stuff out of the garbage before -- books, a table, picture frames, and so on. On some garbage days, I put "good stuff" out early, so people can take it. All of this is a good idea. I'm all for it.

The City of Ottawa even has official days where you put things out in the "trash" with a note on it, and people are encouraged to take whatever they can use. Mind you, they tend to spoil everything with bureaucratic rules. They want you to do it on "official" days.

Another aspect of freeganism makes sense -- self-reliance. Why buy a quilt when you can make one yourself? Why buy art when you can make your own? Why buy tomatoes when you can grow your own?

But to call freeganism a return to the hunter-gatherer lifestyle is romantic drivel. You're not out in the woods, gathering berries and hunting small game, dressed in clothes you made yourself. You're not reliant on yourself and nature. You're jumping into a dumpster and taking out the goodies you find. While that might be noble and good, saving resources, you're no hunter-gatherer. You're reliant on yourself, and that grocery store, and the staff not padlocking the dumpster.

So many people are weird when it comes to money. There's this twisted notion that money, itself, is inherently evil and the source of all our troubles. Starting with this faulty premise, not earning or spending money is seen as good. Which means the greatest thing you can do, right now, is not have a job, not contribute to the system, and try to live outside of it as much as you can.

You know, instead of admitting you're in the system whether you like it or not.

Many politically-minded humanoids consider a particular brand of sneakers to be pure evil. Let's call that brand Ekin.

(Gosh, what company could I be referring to?)

Buying Ekin sneakers means you're contributing to horrible slave labour. Is stealing Ekin sneakers as bad as buying them? What if you jump into a dumpster and find discarded Ekin sneakers -- is that less bad than buying or stealing?

According to the logic of (some) freegans, if you don't pay for it, the transaction is somehow less evil. When you pay, the profits go to the evil Ekin company. If you don't pay, they get no profits, so it's okay.

But when do Ekin sneakers become bad? I would argue they are bad when they get made in a horrible, slave-labour way. Whether you buy them, steal them, or dig them out of the trash, they're still inherently bad. Owning them at all (assuming they really were made using slave labour) is inherently wrong.

Same goes for bananas grown in a third world dictatorship. Buy them, steal them, or dig them out of a dumpster, it's still morally wrong to have those bananas at all.

Personally, I don't think capitalism is pure evil. But if you think capitalism itself is inherently evil, then everything you get out of the dumpster is a product of an evil system. Therefore, whether you bought it, stole it, or rescued it from the garbage, it's still evil. It doesn't matter if you spent money or not.

A ridiculous and nasty example: buy it, steal it, or get it from the trash, is it ever moral to own a lampshade made from human flesh? Sure, you didn't make it. And if you stole it or got it out of the garbage, the person who did make it won't profit from it. But the lampshade is still evil. Someone died to make it.

Taking food, clothing, or anything out of a dumpster has many good aspects to it. It's good for the dumpster-diver. She saved money. There is also a benefit to the environment. She saved resources that would have been wasted. It's green and it's good and it benefits us all.

But it's no escape from capitalism. And it's no return to a hunter-gatherer world, except maybe as a loosely fitting metaphor.

There are a lot of people trying to escape "the system" and live outside of it. They're doomed to fail. Whether you like it or not, we were all born into a world with established rules. If we don't like those rules, we can try to have them changed. That's the real point of feminism and the civil rights movement.

Turning your back on the game and saying, "I'm not playing," won't get you very far. You were born into this game and there's no escaping it.

Sadly, that seem to be a lot of people who think "escape" is the best and only alternative.

Portrait Gallery Protest (continued)

2009-10-06T06:58:00.005-04:00

How slow the wheels of government turn. Specifically, the Minister of Heritage and Culture takes forever to answer his mail. Way back in November of 2008, I sent James Moore a portrait, in protest of the killing of the National Portrait Gallery.

In late July early August of 2009, I had some communication with a Mona Bennan via email.

I'm starting to lose my patience.

***

Ms. Brennan,

I replied to your email August 1st. It's now October 6th. Can I expect a reply from you or James Moore soon?

I sent my original portrait gallery question and portrait in November of 2008. It's now almost November 2009. Is a year the typical amount of time it takes to receive a reply?

http://killeverything.blogspot.com/2008/11/portrait-gallery-protest.html

I am beginning to feel slighted.

What happened to the portrait I sent? Why is getting a response taking so long?

Thank you for your time.

Nikolaus Maack

***

I'm feeling the need to send James Moore another portrait -- by registered mail, this time.

***

UPDATE.

I just received this automated reply from Mona Brennan's email address.

***
I will be out of the office starting 14/09/2009 and will not return until 15/10/2009.

Vous pouvez communiquer avec Diane David au numéro XXX-XXXX du14 au 28 septembre
***

Is that the lamest out of office reply ever? She's out of the office until the 15th of October. From the 14th to the 28th of September, I can talk to Diane on the phone. Evidently, after that, I'm on my own.

Ah, government. You are a slippery eel in a sea of ink.