july 6th vlog, where i get my bicycle working for the first time in many years.
Thursday, July 6, 2017
it's not that i'm coming down hard on nina turner because she's a black woman, it's that you blinded yourself to the fraudulence that is so very clearly in front of your blinking eyes for the very precise reason that she is, in fact, a black woman.
it was the same thing with ellison. i didn't come down hard on ellison because he's a muslim; rather, you ignored the reasons you shouldn't have supported him, precisely because he's a muslim.
it was the same thing with ellison. i didn't come down hard on ellison because he's a muslim; rather, you ignored the reasons you shouldn't have supported him, precisely because he's a muslim.
(note: my initial comment was deleted from huffington post. what follows is an approximate reconstruction. it seems that the huffington post only allows comments that are racist, in line with the government's continuing cultural genocide of this continent's indigenous people.)
this article does not explain the part of the indigenous act in question (it just glosses over it as "sexist", which is typical of this government and groups aligned with it) for those that are unaware of it. which is a blood-quantum rule designed to extinguish indigenous membership over a short time period by preventing women from passing on indigenous status. more precisely, and more to the point, it prevents non-indigenous men from marrying into the tribe, which genetic testing tells us is something that has happened frequently in recent history and which biologists tell us is necessary to maintain healthy levels of genetic drift and maintain healthy levels of genetic variability.
this specific legislation, which was brought in by mulroney in 1985, is just a part of canada's longstanding policy of assimilation and cultural genocide towards it's indigenous inhabitants. the trudeau government's refusal to look at this for what it is is a strong signal that the government has no intention of modifying this existing policy at all and that language to the contrary is just a smokescreen, meant to obstruct and confuse from the true intent of continued corporate dominance of indigenous resources, and eventual extinction of indigenous peoples.
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2017/07/06/maliseet-senator-writes-open-letter-to-trudeau-i-am-losing-fai_a_23019779/
this article does not explain the part of the indigenous act in question (it just glosses over it as "sexist", which is typical of this government and groups aligned with it) for those that are unaware of it. which is a blood-quantum rule designed to extinguish indigenous membership over a short time period by preventing women from passing on indigenous status. more precisely, and more to the point, it prevents non-indigenous men from marrying into the tribe, which genetic testing tells us is something that has happened frequently in recent history and which biologists tell us is necessary to maintain healthy levels of genetic drift and maintain healthy levels of genetic variability.
this specific legislation, which was brought in by mulroney in 1985, is just a part of canada's longstanding policy of assimilation and cultural genocide towards it's indigenous inhabitants. the trudeau government's refusal to look at this for what it is is a strong signal that the government has no intention of modifying this existing policy at all and that language to the contrary is just a smokescreen, meant to obstruct and confuse from the true intent of continued corporate dominance of indigenous resources, and eventual extinction of indigenous peoples.
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2017/07/06/maliseet-senator-writes-open-letter-to-trudeau-i-am-losing-fai_a_23019779/
i also got my bicycle fixed today for...
$23.
i didn't realize it'd be so cheap. i would have done it months ago. but, it was $23 and i'm rolling.
i knew all i had to do was put some bearings in it's just....i figured around $50....and it just never prioritized itself.
but, i am ecstatic to be back on my bicycle. it's not an object. it's an extension. an improvement. a bionic betterment. a transhumanist step.
in total, i've spent $55.35. only $4944.65 left to go.
$23.
i didn't realize it'd be so cheap. i would have done it months ago. but, it was $23 and i'm rolling.
i knew all i had to do was put some bearings in it's just....i figured around $50....and it just never prioritized itself.
but, i am ecstatic to be back on my bicycle. it's not an object. it's an extension. an improvement. a bionic betterment. a transhumanist step.
in total, i've spent $55.35. only $4944.65 left to go.
these shoes may or may not be good for skateboarding. i don't know. i don't skate.
http://www.payless.com/womens-airwalk-maddie-mid-top-shoe/77631.html?dwvar_77631_color=chambraydots#start=42&cgid=brands-athletics-airwalk
but, anybody that wants to put this beside a pair of converse or vans and complain about build quality is out of their fucking mind. the airwalks are clearly far better shoes.
just look at the heel:
compare that to any pair of cons or vans on the market. the vans are a little better (than the cons). the cons are fucking trash.
for a walking shoe, the airwalks have to be just about ideal. those backs are key: you could walk to mexico and not get sore heels. it doesn't matter how far mexico is, it's still true.
and look at the bottoms. that's a fucking inch to walk through. this is my problem with shoes: i walk through them. it's going to be a long time before i wear these babies down.
again: i don't know about the marketing battles and the corporate "punk" extravaganzas and the rest of the bullshit. i know that these are far, far better shoes, and that you're fucking daft to suggest otherwise.
$33. canadian. i couldn't imagine paying twice or thrice or even four times that for a pair of shoes that's going to give me blisters walking across town and fall apart in the rain just because the brand is cooler.
just put the shoes beside each other and look. be empirical. examine the facts. there's no comparison. and, suggestions otherwise are daft.
http://www.payless.com/womens-airwalk-maddie-mid-top-shoe/77631.html?dwvar_77631_color=chambraydots#start=42&cgid=brands-athletics-airwalk
but, anybody that wants to put this beside a pair of converse or vans and complain about build quality is out of their fucking mind. the airwalks are clearly far better shoes.
just look at the heel:
compare that to any pair of cons or vans on the market. the vans are a little better (than the cons). the cons are fucking trash.
for a walking shoe, the airwalks have to be just about ideal. those backs are key: you could walk to mexico and not get sore heels. it doesn't matter how far mexico is, it's still true.
and look at the bottoms. that's a fucking inch to walk through. this is my problem with shoes: i walk through them. it's going to be a long time before i wear these babies down.
again: i don't know about the marketing battles and the corporate "punk" extravaganzas and the rest of the bullshit. i know that these are far, far better shoes, and that you're fucking daft to suggest otherwise.
$33. canadian. i couldn't imagine paying twice or thrice or even four times that for a pair of shoes that's going to give me blisters walking across town and fall apart in the rain just because the brand is cooler.
just put the shoes beside each other and look. be empirical. examine the facts. there's no comparison. and, suggestions otherwise are daft.
there's a "vape lounge" in windsor. i've only been in there twice. the reason is because it feels like an after school program, a community centre. there's tvs at either end of the place, with people watching movies and playing video games.
it would be the perfect place for kids to go to get off the street.
but, you have to be an adult to get in
i think the age should be set closer to 16.
http://nationalpost.com/pmn/news-pmn/marijuana-age-limit-should-be-low-not-high/wcm/62cf29f9-6a70-4229-ac1f-99e2ad38239f
it would be the perfect place for kids to go to get off the street.
but, you have to be an adult to get in
i think the age should be set closer to 16.
http://nationalpost.com/pmn/news-pmn/marijuana-age-limit-should-be-low-not-high/wcm/62cf29f9-6a70-4229-ac1f-99e2ad38239f
“if a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is
because he hears a different drummer. let him step to the music which
he hears, however measured or far away.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQYDamOvop8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQYDamOvop8
so, if you understand morality as an evolutionary process - neither absolute nor relative - then how do you apply that understanding in real life?
the homosexuality example was used in the video, and i don't like the way that chomsky handled it. he should have been a little more firm about individual rights at the expense of a culture, because, really, fuck your stupid culture. and, fuck my culture, too.
abolish all culture.
but, let's say that you have this issue where you have this homophobic muslim refugee showing up from an arab country which has historically had scarce resources (what is going on in the region may be described precisely as adjusting from scarcity to plenty) and a system of laws that reflects it, into an overwhelmingly liberal country like canada, which is overwhelmingly liberal precisely because it doesn't need or have any meaningful restrictions on access to resources at all. this may not be all that hypothetical.
you would certainly not want to tell them that they have a right to maintain their culture in a time capsule, and that it's ok if they hate queers because it's their culture and i'm white. that's a disgusting attitude towards everybody - it's caving in on queer rights due to the soft racism of lowered expectations for the primitive arabs. that's what "cultural relativism" is, in real terms: it's wholly, fully, absolutely through and through racist.
likewise, you wouldn't want to sit there and lecture them about the superiority of liberal secularism over muslim backwardsness, no matter how true it may actually be. you don't get anywhere by pushing your perceived superiority in somebody's face.
rather, what you need to do is explain to them that the reason that their religion persecutes queers is that it was developed in a region that has historically had real levels of scarcity. and, the historical scarcity in the middle east is very, very real. it's not the artificial scarcity of western capitalism. it's people dying of starvation, people collapsing due to drought - sometimes due to war, and sometimes due to climate and sometimes due to mismanagement. queer people do not breed, so harsh decisions about resource management required them to be excluded, in order to ensure that the breeding members of the tribe could carry on. there is no such scarcity in canada, so there is no basis for those rules.
if the refugees are reasonable, they should understand this and modify their prejudices. but, if they react with "MUH CULTURE!!!", then the new society has the right - dare i say obligation - to exclude and ostracise them. there is no reasonable argument to hold to concepts of relativism, at this point, now that we've dismantled them using science. that is no longer cultural relativism, but base cultural conservatism, and should be resisted at all costs.
as for today, the oil wealth in these states makes it difficult to generate arguments to hold to the primacy of their books. with the exception of the horn of africa, i am not aware of anywhere in the region experiencing serious scarcity to the point where persecution of homosexuals can be contemplated as rational. criticism of these regimes should consequently not be muted under arguments of "cultural relativism" - that is just a reduction to "they don't know better", and is consequently an expression of white supremacism.
as an aside, the naturalization of morality has an important consequence: it was the last thing that science needed religion for. now that we have a fully naturalistic understanding of morality, we can dispense with religion altogether.
the homosexuality example was used in the video, and i don't like the way that chomsky handled it. he should have been a little more firm about individual rights at the expense of a culture, because, really, fuck your stupid culture. and, fuck my culture, too.
abolish all culture.
but, let's say that you have this issue where you have this homophobic muslim refugee showing up from an arab country which has historically had scarce resources (what is going on in the region may be described precisely as adjusting from scarcity to plenty) and a system of laws that reflects it, into an overwhelmingly liberal country like canada, which is overwhelmingly liberal precisely because it doesn't need or have any meaningful restrictions on access to resources at all. this may not be all that hypothetical.
you would certainly not want to tell them that they have a right to maintain their culture in a time capsule, and that it's ok if they hate queers because it's their culture and i'm white. that's a disgusting attitude towards everybody - it's caving in on queer rights due to the soft racism of lowered expectations for the primitive arabs. that's what "cultural relativism" is, in real terms: it's wholly, fully, absolutely through and through racist.
likewise, you wouldn't want to sit there and lecture them about the superiority of liberal secularism over muslim backwardsness, no matter how true it may actually be. you don't get anywhere by pushing your perceived superiority in somebody's face.
rather, what you need to do is explain to them that the reason that their religion persecutes queers is that it was developed in a region that has historically had real levels of scarcity. and, the historical scarcity in the middle east is very, very real. it's not the artificial scarcity of western capitalism. it's people dying of starvation, people collapsing due to drought - sometimes due to war, and sometimes due to climate and sometimes due to mismanagement. queer people do not breed, so harsh decisions about resource management required them to be excluded, in order to ensure that the breeding members of the tribe could carry on. there is no such scarcity in canada, so there is no basis for those rules.
if the refugees are reasonable, they should understand this and modify their prejudices. but, if they react with "MUH CULTURE!!!", then the new society has the right - dare i say obligation - to exclude and ostracise them. there is no reasonable argument to hold to concepts of relativism, at this point, now that we've dismantled them using science. that is no longer cultural relativism, but base cultural conservatism, and should be resisted at all costs.
as for today, the oil wealth in these states makes it difficult to generate arguments to hold to the primacy of their books. with the exception of the horn of africa, i am not aware of anywhere in the region experiencing serious scarcity to the point where persecution of homosexuals can be contemplated as rational. criticism of these regimes should consequently not be muted under arguments of "cultural relativism" - that is just a reduction to "they don't know better", and is consequently an expression of white supremacism.
as an aside, the naturalization of morality has an important consequence: it was the last thing that science needed religion for. now that we have a fully naturalistic understanding of morality, we can dispense with religion altogether.
chomsky tends to do this, sometimes: he talks about biology without
talking about natural selection. it makes you wonder if he's holding on
to some creationist baggage. it might not even be intentional; he might
not really realize it. he might also be suffering from the fallacy of
descartian dualism, which wants to separate morality from science, even
as he identifies it at the start, in some kind of inverted defiance.
bringing in natural selection is the way to make proper sense of what he's saying.
the idea of morality as a genetic faculty is maybe a little undeveloped, but it makes sense if you assign a specific region of the brain to it. i'm not on board with chomsky's ideas of innatism; i'm all about the tabula rasa. but, that means relative to existing structures inside the brain, which are kind of mini-organs. but, then what?
well, then those born with specific tendencies that maximize success of reproduction will be more successful. but, this will depend on different environments. and, we can look at two specific kinds of moralities that have existed in history to see how selection can shape morality.
nietzsche refers to these as master and slave moralities, but they are just as well referred to as nomadic and civilized moralities, respectively. a nomadic society is going to have harsher limits on access to resources that may require it to behave in ways that settled societies may view as barbaric. strong selective pressures may be required to cull free riders from the group. conversely, a civilized society is going to put greater focus on preventing conflict, as it maximizes total gene expression, and resources are plenty, anyways. a moral system in a civilized society should look something like mutual aid. from these two different scenarios, different concepts of morality arise via the process of natural selection.
that does not mean that any system of morals is interchangeable with any other. it means that systems of morals should make sense relative to selective pressures. and, one should then argue that capitalism is incoherent precisely because it is a nomadic system of morals applied to a set of civilized societies. it is a mismatch, and consequently turns the selection on it's head. it is when things get criss-crossed like this that species end up extinct.
i consequently agree with chomsky's position on relativism and foucault, i just wish he had brought in the machinery of natural selection to better present his argument in truly biological terms.
bringing in natural selection is the way to make proper sense of what he's saying.
the idea of morality as a genetic faculty is maybe a little undeveloped, but it makes sense if you assign a specific region of the brain to it. i'm not on board with chomsky's ideas of innatism; i'm all about the tabula rasa. but, that means relative to existing structures inside the brain, which are kind of mini-organs. but, then what?
well, then those born with specific tendencies that maximize success of reproduction will be more successful. but, this will depend on different environments. and, we can look at two specific kinds of moralities that have existed in history to see how selection can shape morality.
nietzsche refers to these as master and slave moralities, but they are just as well referred to as nomadic and civilized moralities, respectively. a nomadic society is going to have harsher limits on access to resources that may require it to behave in ways that settled societies may view as barbaric. strong selective pressures may be required to cull free riders from the group. conversely, a civilized society is going to put greater focus on preventing conflict, as it maximizes total gene expression, and resources are plenty, anyways. a moral system in a civilized society should look something like mutual aid. from these two different scenarios, different concepts of morality arise via the process of natural selection.
that does not mean that any system of morals is interchangeable with any other. it means that systems of morals should make sense relative to selective pressures. and, one should then argue that capitalism is incoherent precisely because it is a nomadic system of morals applied to a set of civilized societies. it is a mismatch, and consequently turns the selection on it's head. it is when things get criss-crossed like this that species end up extinct.
i consequently agree with chomsky's position on relativism and foucault, i just wish he had brought in the machinery of natural selection to better present his argument in truly biological terms.
another way to say it is this: the boomers have nothing to teach you. don't bother. skip right to gen x.
i mean, i don't know if chomsky's generation is the greatest, but they look pretty great, side by side.
if you're going to force me to pick a boomer, i'd choose somebody like dawkins over zizek with absolutely no second thought put to it.
i mean, i don't know if chomsky's generation is the greatest, but they look pretty great, side by side.
if you're going to force me to pick a boomer, i'd choose somebody like dawkins over zizek with absolutely no second thought put to it.
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