9-9-09!

It's 9-9-09, the day when Satan is upside down and feels like throwing up! It's interesting how humans have always been interested in numbers. 666, 777, 3, 13. 7 is the "lucky" number, 13 is the "unlucky" one. Numbers are connected with the unknown and with finding out how to understand life. Some, in my opinion, take it a bit far and go into Numerology. While numbers can be telling, it's not the numbers themselves that are important, but the patterns they fetter out for our minds.

Just wanted to make a comment on this day. I missed doing 7-7-07. A pity, really.

So, everything's going pretty much alright

Told my mom about this blog, which probably isn't such a smart thing to do, but, whatever. Things have been going kind of neutral, which is nice. I need to shower more often if I want blowjobs; I don't know if I care enough. But, I really like the jacuzzi feeling. I also CC'd Lindsay about the email where I put the blog in for my mom, so now Lindsay will probably see this blog. Hopefully she doesn't get upset about some of this stuff, but I think I've been pretty honest with her anyway. It's probably not so great of an idea to write and masturbate alternatively. Also, am I talking about sex more because I'm thinking about not writing about it because my mom would complain, or to try and push her off so she doesn't read it, or even both? Well, *shrug*, her loss.

Fear can be a Bitch

Oh, the pain that we put ourselves through when making an inaccurate prediction or seeing an image of possibilities going through our head.

Greed With John Strossel

confederalsocialist

Play, religion, fear, oversimplification, extrapolation, combination, genius, autism, imagery, Einstein, beam of light, shopping, paranoia.

What will be done to control humans? What will be done to prevent that which we do not want to happen? Isn't greed bad? Don't we need the government to solve problems that we don't have time for or can't do? More often than not, it seems, the answers are counter-intuitive. Why? Because we start from a position of ignorance, and the world, reality, is so wonderfully complex.

A few years ago, I started with investigation of genius and play, and how it contrasted with school and compulsory learning. I praised learning and thought of compulsory education in quite a harsh way. My mother, who was homeschooling me, agreed that school could be hard work, but that that would give you a good work ethic. She herself got up early, did the daily chores early, and was usually busy, but productively busy; and yes, she had time for her kids.

Yes, school is hard and it can give you a good work ethic. However, this could be done much more efficiently by simply starting up a lemonade stand (or any equivalent sort of business), and adjusting yourself to consumer demand. And why should it be compulsory? Yes, education is wanted. Accordingly, won't parents pay to get the best school possible? And, additionally, the basics that are needed -- reading, writing, thinking -- can all be bought cheaply, if not simply taught by the parent.

But, just toss away those arguments and answer me this: when has it ever been the case that forcing someone to take something that they want... makes sense? Taking some words from Stefan Molyneux, 'it is a Canadian value that people care for the elderly. OK, so now we're going to force you, by taxes, to help the elderly. But then! it's not a Canadian value!, if you have to force people to do it!'

Forcing learning ceases learning, unless the person happens to be a sadomasochist. And then it's probably not learning, per say, that they're after. And yes, there have been cases where teachers have hard-balled their students and their students have benefited. Those students are worse off; they are dependent on the teacher to learn.

And as I look at this post, it looks less like I'm an observer, and more like I'm an angry vengeful ass. But then, with people justifying the use of force against me to satisfy their ideologies, perhaps you can understand this.

But to get back to what I was writing about above: the combination of fear and extrapolation might be behind the fear of greed. Now, what I like about words, and playing with words, is that by using definitions that appear contradictory, their explanation expands the mind, or at least explains my POV. For example: selfishness is the highest altruism.

Now, by this I mean, in part, that altruism doesn't work; in fact, it has the opposite effect than it intended. I don't mean when you walk by a lake and hear someone drowning and dive in and save them - I mean well-intentioned and carefully thought out. Or perhaps I should categorize that as poorly thought out?

It seems altruistic to give food to the hungry. Yet, this places "the hungry" in a parasitical relationship with the giver, resulting in an overall loss. If, instead, you find a way to help the hungry get food on a consistent basis, there is now, at least, a net neutral, and perhaps a net gain. As the saying goes, "Give a boy a fish, and he'll eat for a day. Give a boy a rod, and he'll eat for the rest of his life." And yes, most of this is coming from Strossel's "Greed" video clips.

I'm starting to come to the conclusion that all of our illegitimate fears are the result of our play and imaginative abilities, paranoided. How and why does this happen? Probably biologically-based, in that we have always needed to be on our toes. An evolutionary perspective, yes. The irony of that is that I don't "believe" in evolution. I just keep using it because it makes sense. I turn a blind eye to the age of the earth, mostly because I'm focused on current human affairs (that I might be able to explain things in everyday terms, rather than refer to history and statistics, that it might be easier for others to explain), but it seems quite possible that the earth is quite old.

And why does the age of the earth matter? It didn't, not until it became a focal point for whether someone had credible belief in Christianity or not. So, no, it doesn't really matter if you don't care about God. Of course, it does matter if you're focusing on things that relate to it, such as history and geology, but not as much if you're focused on current psychology. Not that having an understanding of early humans and their psychology won't help, of course.

A lot of governmental worries are based upon seeing the consequences of going from our tyrannical system that works primarily because of all of the free marketeering keeping it going, and seeing all of the chaos that would result in restoring things to their proper anarchic (an-archy = no archons, i.e., no rulers) state of things.

Likewise, the paranoia shown (in my opinion) that the person who John Strossel interviewed 4:25-5:18:

"I know your dirty tricks!"

shows a consistency in his outlook about how John Strossel and those who profit from what they do, are evil bastards just looking to get money.

The question then becomes, for me at least, How can people not see the truth that's right in front of them? Additionally, let's put another twist on it: How can atheists be so blind to the truth that Christians have? I'm an atheist; I'm also an anti-theist who thinks that Christians are delusional. Do I think Christians should be tied up in a straight jacket? Heck no! That would be just as insane as a Christian wanting to put an atheist in a straight jacket for fear that the devil in the atheist might do the Christian harm.

However, both the atheist and the Christian would say of the other, "That guy is delusional." Christians on YouTube (such as Yokeup) have said that atheists don't exist: they just reject God! They're afraid of being accountable. 

What seems to often be the case with paranoia and fear is what is called projection (such as the Christian need for being accountable to God for their sins). And it is poo-pooed. If you're projecting, you're an irrational emotional child in need of psychiatric treatment. Why not self-examination? Because an outside professional authority must do it.

You'll sometimes "catch" anarchic atheists doing it, as with this 9/11 conversation:
9/11 truth
9/11 not controlled demolition
re 9/11 not controlled demolition
9/11 not controlled demolition part 2

While juniorbaconchee seems to be irrationally holding onto his belief that 9/11 was a conspiracy, if he is right, then does it justify his emotional response? That is, why is he so emotional over this? He spent nights, apparently, horrified at what his government could do. It reminded me a lot of the Christian response to Hell, and their urging of atheists to be saved that they might avoid the same fate. Problem is, if the Christians are wrong, it's a big hubbub over nothing. That would mean that they're basically glorified drama queens.

And what if the Christians are right? Then God is a fucking strange being. 2000+ years and he hasn't come back, He's his own son and his own father, he has a holy ghost that impregnated Mary, but she's a virgin, he used to intervene (when events weren't as verifiable as they are now) and doesn't now; everything, including babies, are miracles now (to make up for all of the miracles that should be happening), yet we have overpopulation; the bible is the perfect word of God and yet it was written by fallable men and so it has to be interpreted over and over, and how would a book that makes its own prophecies make sense anyway?; and why, after all this has been made excuses for, would I pick Christianity over another religion, which probably says that Christianity is false (the same way that Christianity says that all the other religions are false) and all of the Christians are going to their hell? And, are we going for truth value, or emotional value? I say it provides neither. God loves you, but if you don't love him back you're going to hell? Some love. Oh, but we're wretched and need God's love. Yeah, must be great for your self-esteem. Please, just admit that it's faith and stop trying to rationalize it. Be honest about your delusions; that's how you get rid of them, y'know?

That said, I'm still wondering if Christianity is entirely based on having been raised in the religion. Can an atheist become a Christian later in life, having examined all of the evidence? Would love to hear about it.

Low Clicks On NeoBux

Why? Why are the clicks so fucking low as of late? 66 referrals and 65 clicks. That's an under-1.0 average. It's depressing...

Slaps face. DUH!:
http://www.neobux.com/forum/?frmid=9&tpcid=77806
I was having problems with DDOS and Neo saying it "wasn't available, too! That's probably a lot of what's behind the low clicks.

Tax Refund: Pissed

I found an income tax refund check a few days ago. It was marked from last year and worth $40. I try to have as little to do with taxes as possible, so finding the tax refund check was both a pleasant surprise, and an annoyance. The most I have to do with taxes, I guess, would be having my money stolen from me because I'd rather be getting money than not, and then having it being returned to me because my income was low enough. I don't know - should I be insulted that they were giving me back the money they stole?

Lindsay had a chore to run; about 10 minutes. Unfortunately... about 40 minutes later, we're heading off to Wal-Mart to get some potatoes (for potato salad), and to cash the government check (I tried to think that to myself without wincing as I went there). Then she asked if there was anything else that came to mind that I'd like. There was: fig newtons. We went to that section and tried to find the cheapest ones. $2.98 was what we found, and another brand that whose price we weren't sure of, so we included it.

It took a while to find a cash register that somewhat open. Three times Lindsay hinted me to another one after she had asked me to stay in the lane and keep our spot. Then, in cashing the check, I needed to give the social insecurity number (forgive us lord for we have SINned), my last name (which I had to say and the cashier type) assigned to me, my birthdate, and the social insecurity number assigned to me. Why the fuck did I have to give the SIN twice and thereby need all the more money to give to the lord (Vodka for the kind gospel ladies for a nice night out!) and two lambs to sacrifice instead of one (and those Vodka ladies are supposed to do that too, but they don't for some reason. Unless you see them do it, that is. Huh.)? Beats me. "Security measures." Yeah, 'cause when you ask for your money back from the government, they're a real bitch about it. It reminded me of something I'd heard about lotteries: the ones that tend to be winners are put in the middle of the room to keep the shy people from playing them, thus keeping them from winning. Makes sense.

The fig newtons packages cost the same, but I was so pissed off that I didn't care. Bought both and left. The car was hot, apparently, and Lindsay said so, and, "My fault, huh?" and I didn't respond. She asked if I was alright. Usually I made that joke myself:
"Wow. The car's hot."
"Yeah. Your fault." But, I was pissed. I held back the thought of, "Yeah, and you're not exactly that hot." Talk about the possibility for drama, what with girls already as paranoid about their image as they are.
"You don't handle anger too well."
"Yeah. Go ahead and talk, just don't expect input."

She commented on how there wasn't much we could do about the situation. I responded with, yes, we could, but the bulk of the work had already been done; after you traumatize someone early in life, you don't need much semantics to hold it together. It becomes embedded in society, and what's left is the crash that would need to come for things to change. I can't do anything about taxes immediately, but I can certainly talk about them. The most important thing to figure out and establish is that taxes are not a necessary evil. Precisely that has held us back for such a long time.

Oh my - what can I do about taxes? I can listen to confederalsocialist on YouTube and Stefan Molyneux on FreedomainRadio.com or on YouTube (stefbot) and figure out how to better articulate my thoughts on taxation, as well as be able to get concrete arguments to use against the meme. As with atheism, immunization against religion occurs after much thought has been given unto the subject; you can't be immunitized against something you've never thought about.

What can I do about taxes? Discuss them with other people. Literally, the main thing holding taxation together is the thought that it is morally upright to do so - well, perhaps not morally upright, but (again) that it is a necessary evil. Take that away, and the stack of cards crumbles to the ground.

The trauma behind taxes is akin to the trauma behind school... and akin to the trauma behind God. Everything connects.

Over the Hump

I miss Lindsay.

She woke me at around 2:30 PM; she had given me extra time to sleep. However, instead of being nice to my sleepiness, I only felt tired and stressed.

She also asked about mowing the lawn as payment for the food. I said I'd do it. She left, and I fell asleep, which I didn't realize until I found myself drowsily awake again at 11:30 PM, for no apparent reason. I felt stressed and suicidal; I went outside to have some gasoline. It had helped me in the past, it would help me now. It's said to kill brain cells, and I think of it like this: dead brain cells, or shooting myself in the head out of depression? Yeah. Dead brain cells.

I huffed some and got a relaxing high. It was such a relief. I kind of wonder if the gasoline doesn't react with something in my brain and thereby neutralize it for a while. Perhaps the brain cells that I'm "killing" are the ones that are depressing me. After I got back down from the buzz, I spent some time outside to air the gas out of my system, both with breathing exercises, and spitting into the grass, which probably isn't too great for the grass.

Then I went back inside and couldn't decide on whether to sleep (to take advantage of my still-drowsiness) or stay up just a little past 12 am so I could log the PTCs in. I'm going with the second option. And then I wondered why Lindsay wasn't around. It seemed far past when she should have come back. Was she avoiding me? I thought about it for a moment and began to feel sad. I missed her.

I missed her? The thought registered in my brain as, almost, excitement; and then, equally, with annoyance and disgust. I was gleeful that I missed her because that meant that I might now have feelings for her which is what we had been waiting for? I mean, that's nice, but what a twisted way of viewing it! Missing her being a good thing - go figure! But yes, I do miss her. And I hope that she isn't avoiding me.

Audience Likelihood

Audience likelihood. I've been wondering about that. About 6 months ago Richard Coughland made a video where he said that he's still be saying the same shit whether people were listening or not. And I'm wondering two things:
#1. How having an audience would/will affect me. Say, if I had 1000 people reading my blog.
#2. Why they would come, and why they would stay.

Would I even want an audience? I know that I kind of do, since I started this on Jeff's suggestion. It would be a pity if he weren't reading it. I suppose I'll send him the link.

What interests me the most right now, is why an audience would come and stay. There would have to be something about my blog that would be interesting to them. Not that I would change my diary to reflect their wants entirely, but I could certainly react to their responses and get some discussion going, I guess. It's kind of an odd feeling to think of combining your private thoughts with public debate.