Gently Cuddle the Police, or Maybe Some Spooning

Is it really a surprise that our espionage agencies spy more than we think and spy on those whom we don't expect?  You are allowed to say yes, just understand this marks you as an idiot.  How did this happen?  Well, slowly and covertly or at times things like the Patriot Act.  Named thusly so we don’t notice the fact that it really the invasion act.  Or those pesky places like Gitmo that have people taken away and never heard from again.  The crimes and trials are never released because it’s too sensitive to reveal.  This is fine in some aspects but it is also allows the government a way of disposing of unwanted opinions and dissenters.  This is a perilous slide.  And no it isn’t from just some shadow organization that operates under cloak and dagger.  It’s from business people like the Koch brothers who buy politicians, universities and whatever they want to negate what they don’t like.  It’s from a few really tyrannical and misguided politicians who think it’s a good idea to keep tabs on everyone, heavily prosecute people for minor infractions, develop and entrench cronyism and several other items that make froth at the mouth with anger.  They get away with it through things like apathy cultivated by gluts of information, misinformation and 24 hour news that is more editorial than factual.

But let’s back up.  I shouldn’t load all the scary things into one paragraph, let’s lay them out one by one so the fear can gestate.  Man, that’s a dark sentiment.  I guess I’ll focus on one scary thing, the police and possibly the fact that NWA was at times correct about their four letter statement towards them.  Moving on we can start with the evolution of the police.  To most of us these are the guys that force us to tap our brakes when driving on the highway and give us small heart attacks when they end up following you until the turn off or pass you.  They are minor but necessary inconveniences in the grand scheme of things.  But lately it seems the mentality of the police is a bit meaner, a bit more aggressive, more like a them versus us mentality.  This manifests itself when cops seem to go out and look for trouble and force a confrontation.  Cough** Andrew Zimmerman ** cough.  Obviously an officer has the right to defend him or herself if they are in an ugly situation.  And it’s hard for a person sitting comfortable behind a monitor to say what level of violence to use when meeting this danger.  But there are specific steps and guidelines for use of force.  It starts with a base level like your voice and conflict de-escalation.  After then of course it immediate goes to your sidearm and deadly force.  Or, well, maybe pepper spray, or a nightstick (still deadly but with a lower mortality rate that guns).  But maybe this could be fixed with some better training around preventative measures and not creating, encouraging, or fostering an environment where the violence happens or escalates.  Simply put, stop fucking making the situation worse until the only answer is shooting someone.  If some idiot runs away because you scare them over an ounce of weed creating a deadly scenario is not in anyone’s best interest.  Think of the paper work.  Or that, you know, you killed someone over a small crime that a lot of people indulge in.

Think that scenario is a really overdoing it?  No, killing a man by mistaking a colostomy bag for a conspicuous bulge in his pants, that is over the edge.  Oh, yeah, the man who was 22 years old and had down syndrome.  So someone who processes information at a slower rate was involved in a violent death with the cops where he, had done nothing wrong and had no weapon.

http://libertycrier.com/22-year-old-syndrome-beaten-police-bulge-pants-colostomy-bag/

So maybe that is a one off.  That’s a pretty extreme example.  But it happened.  Maybe that might call for some severe turn around in training and behavior for the police departments across the nation.  But we aren’t fighting just some policy it’s a mentality, a culture.  A culture of violence and suppression.  Cops violently attacking peaceful student activists?  That happened in the sixties to national outcry and it’s been happening again.  There is a meme of a police officer casually pepper spraying students who were sitting.  I don’t know about you but I am not terrible dangerous when sitting on the ground without a weapon.  I mean I could be singing some atrocious folk music or awful and pretentious poetry slam recitals whatever that is, but really that’s about the worst of it.  I’m rather sure I have mentioned this gentleman, I hesitate to use that word but walking piece of excrement seems a tad judgmental, but he is worth mentioning as an enemy of decency.
I mentioned Zimmerman and the Trayvon Martin debacle which brings me to the somewhat horrifying stand your ground law.  What this means is you can use lethal force with having to attempt to extricate yourself from a dangerous situation.  You don’t need to attempt to leave.  That seems kinda bad.  If walking away stops the problem maybe you shouldn’t be allowed to shoot someone.

Oh, also stand your ground doesn’t seem to work all the time.  Odd that a black woman using that same tactic went to jail.  And yes, I am saying that there is racial motivation here.  But that statement is made lightly as I think all things should be examined.  It could be this lady is interpreting the law incorrectly and she should not be allowed to use deadly force in here circumstance, it could also be that it is easier to shoot to a black man and get away with it if you happen to not be black.  But it doesn seem that Florida is its own little microcosm of fucked up.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/01/08/fla-mom-who-failed-in-bid-to-use-stand-your-ground-law-as-defense-faces-parole/

I am not in any way against the use of the proper amount of force.  I am just questioning, strongly, the choices made.  If someone stood in the way of me getting home to wife and I thought the only way out was violence that might kill the other person I would feel justified in doing so.  I might hesitate, which could be disastrous, but once I committed I would go through that person and I would show little mercy.  I think this an important distinction to make.  I also think it’s important to note that no job of mine has required me to be in situation where this might happen.

Back to the police.  My premise is that there is often a black and white mentality, an us (cops) versus them (criminals and suspects).  And sometimes this isn’t bad.  There are plenty of scum the cops have to deal with.  But they are still people who deserve to be treated something resembling decency.  Or then there is a time someone died in police custody over an allergy.  This case is a man who turned himself in over a misdemeanor charge for pot possession.  He died from a reaction to dairy, something that was brought up before he ate breakfast in jail.  Someone he complained about for quite some time.  Once being brought out for use of an inhaler.  But then ignored later because they thought he might be faking it.  Unsurprisingly after being ignored for some time he died.  Inattention caused a young man to die a totally preventable death.  But let us look at it from the side of the police.  This is some fresh faced whiny kid wasting their time. He is there on a misdemeanor and they have other pressing matters they need to deal with.  They already brought him out once and now he won’t quit wasting their time.  He is just some brat who is probably faking it.  Maybe so, but allergies are nothing to be ignored.  I know people who are so sensitive just taking a bite and spiting it out may still lead to a hospital trip.  And that indiscretion can’t be fixed.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/06/todays-drug-war-outrage-m_n_4225995.html?utm_hp_ref=tw

Or what about the whole knockless warrant thing?  Those are warrants that allow for entry without notification.  So the police do not have to identify themselves and can, and do, burst in weapons drawn making commotion.  This proves to be problematic for several reasons.  It is acceptable to react within this country violently to those that enter our homes in said fashion unannounced.  If it was an armed burglary it would be acceptable to protect yourself in violent methods.  It is also acceptable for a police officer once fired upon to fire back.  You can see where this is going and has happened.  People have their houses broken into, they don’t know it’s the cops.  They fire back, then the cops who know have few options left after it has escalated to a firefight shoot and kill the homeowner.  The cops have the right to fire back, I am not denying this.  What would be nice is if the situation didn’t happen.  The need for knockless warrants is over stated as these types of situations arrive from it.  There is the occasional need for entry without stating you are cop and simply barging in but there are only so many places this is necessary.  A drug bust is often not one of them.  Drugs are not a good thing but it isn’t akin to violent crime.  It only devolves to that because of search and seizure and America’s war on drugs.  A war we are in no winning.  A war that our neighbors are suffering for (look at what is happening in Latin and South America because of it), a war that is promoting street violence and a war that provides easy money for people with an ambiguous moral code.  If you conjure up in your mind someone who is growing their own pot in their house that image most likely does not equate to an evil criminal mastermind.  This is not a violent sociopath who needs several police officers to barge in announced in fear that stating their intention will cause harm or the subject will evade arrest.  I posit that knockless warrants in many, if not most, cases create more harm than good.

There is also the extreme use of force in calling the swat teams for situation that do not necessitate that show of force.  Seeing several well-armed and rather intimidating officers with large weapons pointed at you can cause many things besides simply unwanted bowel movements.  Like, for instance, fatal heart attacks.  Again I’m not saying SWAT teams are bad or unnecessary.  That is a blatantly false assertion in my opinion.  My opinion is that again these highly specialized teams are being over used for offenses and situations well below what I think is the necessary threshold to have such a reaction.

Violence begets violence.  This is a rather simple truth.  These are just a few examples of problems with unjustified force by police.  So it’s a known problem which needs to be fixed.  But is it simply a matter of implementing some better training.  That would accomplish a lot I am sure but this entrenched culture can’t simply be shrugged off.  It goes past training.  It comes around to things like repercussions and making sure there can’t be easy cover up.  You can’t simply allow an environment that does little to stop things planted evidence to justify a shooting or lying on the stand or falsification of records (he came in with that black eye and broken rib).

There is a way to accomplish this.  And a town in California figured it out.  Rialto, California has a new policy and its genius in its simplicity.  Cameras.  That’s it.  A simple camera mounted to sunglasses.  It can help the police as they now have video evidence of what happens and help the suspects as they now have video evidence of what going on.  Having a camera switched on might make an officer think twice about excessive force.  By might I mean it does.

“In the first year after the cameras were introduced here in February 2012, the number of complaints filed against officers fell by 88 percent compared with the previous 12 months. Use of force by officers fell by almost 60 percent over the same period.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/22/us/in-california-a-champion-for-police-cameras.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

The article also makes mention of the racial profiling made legal in the form of New York City’s ill-fated stop and frisk program.  Something Bloomberg should be ashamed of but he is too busy trying to ruin fat and salt for people (not a terrible idea helping curb obesity just rather fascist in execution).  It’s an interesting comparison.  Our police departments are rather disparate in policy and behavior.  If New York is encouraging random search and seizure while Rialto is putting pressure on their officers for more transparency.  I hope we have more movement towards the Rialto way of thinking.  It would be nice to feel you can trust a cop.  It would be nice to think if them as bastions of public good.  And then we can stop fucking the police and just have a nice cuddle, with hot cocoa in front of the fire and everything.

Ben

The Problem with Bullying

Like countless others I was a victim of bullying throughout most of my formative years.  Like many others I didn’t quite know why.  Like many others I often found myself asking, among other things, if my tormentors were right in their assertions.  They were not right.  It took a long time to figure that out.  It took a long time to figure out that certain things marked me as a target and that I was viewed by other kids as prey.  I hesitate to say that bullying is an intrinsic part of the human condition but it may very well be.  It tends to coincide with jockeying for popularity and merit.  It tends to teach aggression and the power of persuasion.  It tends to instruct how you can influence others and manage social spheres.

I was bullied because of things like my learning disabilities and my attention deficit disorder.  I was also bullied because of my reactions to said bullying and my posture.  My reactions were exactly what my tormentors wanted.  Usually shrinking away from the confrontation, my face contorted in a mesh of defeat, sorrow and confusion.  Other times I was loud and upset, shrieking out at their viciousness.  Those times it seemed were the only ones the teacher would take notice.  Because I caused the disruption I was in trouble.  They would twist their faces in horrible smiles happy that not only had they hurt me but I got in trouble for it.  Had I been older when this started happening and more experienced I would have known how to handle it.  There was also the problem with my posture.  It was slightly slumped.  It showed no confidence in my demeanor.  Nothing about my body portrayed don’t mess with me.  Again things I wish I knew.

But something happened around seventh grade that helped.  A girl was being uncharacteristically mean to me.  She never spoke a word to me before and had never displayed any emotion in my direction, either good or ill.  Al of a sudden in Spanish class she started making fun of me.  Before I noticed what I was doing I turned to her and simply devastated what she was saying with humor.  She was completely off guard, stunned to silence.  I turned away hiding a smirk and ignored here for the rest of class.  She was silent and her clique was silent as well.  I had found my savior.  Quips.  It was still a bit of a struggle for the rest of my school day but by the time senior year of high school rolled around I wasn’t a scared little kid anymore.  I had faced my bullies and I made it out with my dignity intact.  Sadly it isn’t that easy for so many.  Sadly what happened to me is not uncommon and worse still is comparably light.

I think part of bullying mentality is to sever empathy.  Bullying causes crying, distress, depression, and, worst of all, suicide.  The perpetrators see either no connection with the harm they are doing or devalue certain people’s emotion.  That or they perversely enjoy the pain they cause knowing the emotional toll they make.  It all depends on the bully’s emotional maturity.

But there is another big problem with bullying that exists outside the dynamic between bully and those bullied.  It’s the rest of the people surrounding it.  Those that do nothing about it, those that encourage the bullying and those who actually punish the victims (especially if they speak out).

The term has come to be called victim-blaming.  That’s where people who have suffered are further expelled from social interactions and made to suffer more because they brought uncomfortable accusations to light.

The story (linked below) is an example of how a family who was wronged by one person is shut out by the community, ostracized and demonized for besmirching the name of a popular person.  Being attacked isn’t enough harm but having to be harassed, and not simply you but your whole family, just because you seek justice afterwards.  Worse still the case was dropped.  The cliff notes version is a 13 year old girl, coerced (but not forced) into drinking was raped by a 17 year old boy at a party.  Then she was left outside in 30 degree weather just outside her house overnight.  There was good chance that this second part could have killed her.  The family was then made fun of, taunted, the mother lost her job and the charges against the boy (and the others involved) were dropped.  This was most likely due to the boy’s family having deep connections to the community.  What strikes me is the girl who was assaulted and left for dead is blamed.  The community reacted violently to the idea of prosecuting the young man.

http://www.kansascity.com/2013/10/12/4549775/nightmare-in-maryville-teens-sexual.html

Sadly this is only one of several instances.  There is alos the case of bullying continuing on after the teen committed suicide.

http://mashable.com/2013/10/15/bullying-teen-brags-facebook/

But it is not simply the community who is at fault for this continued cycle of victimization it is the authorities themselves.  Police, it seems, treat sexual assault victims with no tact and nothing but suspicion.  Turning an already harrowing experience into something much worse.  And we wonder why there are so many young suicides and unreported sexual assaults.  Society it seems delights in not only making it difficult to move on from the trauma but to forcibly remind the young victims of what happened daily.  But not simply remind to smear their faces in it smugly and blame them for what befell them.

http://sexologist.tumblr.com/post/69181120051/i-accompanied-someone-to-the-police-station-to-report-a

Why is this happening now more than ever?  I’m not sure it is happening more, I simply don’t have the stats, but I do know that with social media we can distance ourselves from the reaction and the fallout.  Regardless of your capability for empathy you can’t see someone crying on the other side of Facebook.  The anonymity takes out the emotional response.  Some kids need to see what harm they cause the torment they create.  Some of them realize it’s wrong to bully by seeing that and making that emotional connection.  Some simply delight in the pain in some perverse manner.  But the internet takes away that reaction and only leaves the sense of doing something funny.  I think about it thusly.  Kids aren’t emotional intelligent enough to understand their actions oftentimes.  That’s part of the reason the knock out game exists.  They don’t think to the part of sucker punching someone to knock them out might have deadly consequences – like passing out while upright and hitting their head causing brain trauma resulting in death.  To them it’s simply something that is fun and they didn’t mean anything by it.  They have already run away by the time the victim falls or recovers.  Our dismay media conglomerates have done nothing but advertise and sensationalize this trend making it spread all the much faster to impressionable kids.  But the problem often is bad kids are caused by bad parents.  You only need to pass one test to become a parent, or fail it depending on your outlook.

But social media bullying isn’t relegated to kids only.  Wither twitter and Facebook and all these venues popular posters are able to influence mass swathes of people.  In this case a man with a popular twitter decide to take to task a rude airplane passenger.  I in no way disagree that the lady was rude, selfish jerk but was this the best method in which to deliver a lesson.  In that I heartily disagree.  He stole her anonymity here and posted it all over the internet.  He posted her name, her picture, as well as her words but all from his point of view.  He was judge, jury and executioner.  Sadly news sources seemed to delight and cheer him on.  I was rather disgusted.

http://huff.to/1ccdtuS

But, fortunately, as I have found for every rotten awful person there tends to be someone wonderful who stands up and fights for others.  Sadly they are often beaten savagely as in this man’s case.  A hero this man was brutalized for standing up for a bullied teen.  Even more importantly he said he made the right choice and would do so again.

http://touch.sun-sentinel.com/#section/-1/article/p2p-78238298/

I don’t tend to think of society as broken I simply see it teetering on edge and it needs more positive examples like the man above to counteract all the atrocities committed by the bullies, those who sweep the uncomfortable stories under the rug and those who lash out at having their perfect world disrupted.  I can hope bullying will get better.  But what I will do is stand up to those who I see doing it.  Step in when I see a fight happening.  Be like that man and help my community.  That is what I can and will do.  I hope others will feel and do the same.

Ben

The Problem with Pop Music

The first glaring issue with pop music is that at its basest level is pop boils out any nuance and risk in favor of appealing to a mass audience.  To get a large mass audience you aim for the lowest common denominator.  To do that you churn out predictable uninspired overproduced nonsense.  True artists will often eschew this tactic, and its potential hordes of money, to pursue loftier ideals of harmonic bliss.  But the urge to give in to letting money dictate you musical choice and not simply follow your inspiration is not limited to the pop genre.  A lot of people will find a particular demographic and exploit them.  Not because the musicians are just that metal, or really into soul, or what have you, but because it will make money.  I understand wholeheartedly and don’t judge this action.  It is simply consumable entertainment and the value is assigned by the listener.  But pop music is unabashed in it naked money grab and its simplicity.  More so that other genres.  It’s in the name: popular music.

Something interesting to point out is that some artists begin their careers as simply pop musicians and at one point manifest into purveyors of music that has depth.  A shining example would be the Beatles.  Not all of their music is wonderful or original (some seems to be blatantly lifted) or innovative but quite a lot is.  They cast off the boy band simplicity said a whole lot less about holding hands.

Current pop music seems to fall into a few reasonable tidy categories.

   I don't want you
   I want you
   I do what I want, isn't that awesome/Parents suck

The “I don’t want you” category is being filled to brim by Taylor Swift and her secret total private so no peaking notebook of breakups.  She’s the more vapid version of Adele.  You might argue that Taylor isn’t vapid.  You might try to point out that she writes her own music.  This indeed puts her above other pop musicians (not a enormous victory).  But lyrics like “we are never, ever, ever, ever [and it keeps going] getting back together” don’t seem so terribly eloquent.  Thoreau begged simplicity (however he did so by repeating himself three times) but this was not quite what he had in mind.  But still Taylor Swift does seem far and away the least likely to erupt into a pile of shapeless atoms as she has enough integrity to hold herself together at least.  Other pop stars seem likely to combust.  And her writing, while simplistic, at least follows some manner of logic.  Other songs hold only true that lyrics make sense if sung impassioned.  They ignore lyrics before and after hoping that the listener will as well as they merrily hum away or join in with windows firmly rolled up as they drive about.

Need some examples?  I’ve got a few.  I subjected myself to sitting through the horrors of pop music videos on Vevo to try and understand the lyrical content.  I came away with a deep need for alcohol and console myself for not taking an easier path in life like these soulless idiots (too harsh?).  Take the inane gibberish of Selena Gomez’ I love you like a love song.  Hey, remember when your English teacher told you never to use the word you are describing in its own description?  That title begs that Gomez didn’t.  Also real fucking original title.  What the fuck does it mean to love someone like a love song?  If it’s like this one its over in three minutes, uninspired and easily forgettable.  Not quite the impression I’d want to make regarding love and you can extrapolate the double entendres there.  Then there is the lyric, “hypnotized by your destiny”.  That sounds like something the Ultimate Warrior might say (i.e. insane).

But let’s not leave out Bieber’s crappy lyrics.

“As long as you love me
We could be starving
We could be homeless
We could be broke”

Why lead with starving?  Should it not be the opposite direction?  Broke often only implies not having money past bills and securing basic necessities.  Homeless is worse but you could have some food and prospects.  Starving, well that’s reasonably awful.  That view of love is nice but you can't subsist on an emotion.  Marriages break up over money all the time and that the lesser of those three things.  The whole song is a childish exercise that equates to puppy love/first love.  Here every emotion is raw and powerful.  The emotion so new and unknown is intense.   A mild attraction if it’s the first time can be confused with the power of love.  Here we see someone emotionally inexperienced.  That’s the problem with teenagers.  They have enough intelligence to piece together cohesive thoughts but enough emotionally maturity to be anything but annoying to those in another age bracket.

The “I want you” category has a bit more variety.  It’s full of the garbage our love is powerful even though we’re twelve nonsense, the barely hidden meaning ‘we should bang’ nonsense (which as an adult is rather uncomfortable to listen to young people sing), and the I’m better than the other person nonsense.

An especially ridiculous example of this is the song “Want U Back”.  I can forgive the texting vernacular in the title.  I can forgive the hypocrisy… not actually, nothing in this song, catchy as might be, is forgivable.  It is full of ad hominem and bullshit.  Insulting someone by saying you’re simply better is not a good argument.  She probably followed the Avril Lavigne school of bitchy cattiness.  But I shouldn’t insult Avril she’s dating the lead singer from soon to be playing in elevators band Nickleback.  No one deserves that fate not even hollow, fake brats (Gosh, I’m sunny today).

The song is absolutely horrendous.  It treats the boy as a thing.  She only wants him because another person has him.   The aforementioned boy was supposed to be so ruined after the breakup he couldn’t bear the sight of another female.  She only wants him as a lifeless husks incapable of feeling anything besides pain and remorse.  Also the lyric “You didn’t think this through” just points to the sheer ego of the singer.  It’s said with no shame.  You dumped this guy and he got another girlfriend.  He didn’t think it through because you say his new ersatz girlfriend isn’t as good as you.  Yeah, I think he should stay with this ‘worse’ girlfriend.  But this echoes the mentality of instant gratification and ego.  I’m better simply because I believe so and because I’m better I should have what I want now.  The fact that I don’t have this now is unfair and that’s why I’m mad.

For the “I do what I want, isn't that awesome/Parents suck” genre it’s awful and unbearable to anyone but kids.  The reason being what kids think is cool is bucking authority, insulting authority but doing so in relative safety without expectations of repercussion.  You know, the world no one lives in because it’s an immature fantasy.  This is reasonably harmless and is the younger idiot brother of songs about real rebellion from people/bands like  Bob Dylan, Rage against the Machine, Pearl Jam and others.

The our love is powerful is almost cute so I won’t really muck it with it as much.  It’s still childish but that’s because like all the rest it’s aimed at teens and tweens for their obsessive consumerism.  There is always a few gems in the rough but they are more often than not overshadowed by bad behavior.  The industry seems to reward rather than punish bad behavior.  This is where the adults come in.  To us these teen aged and young twenty somethings are jokes.  They are ill mannered disasters to be mocked.  This exist for our derision and to watch garbage like the E! Network and poke fun at them.  While secretly we wish to indulge in some of their lifestyle.

They are the worst of us and they are a fantasy.  A way for us to live out a desire of being blissfully ignorant.  Of being animalistic and needy.  Full of false unearned and unconditional bravado.  So many are worshiped blindly.  Are they the problem or are we the problem for enabling them.  Would they have been such disasters of role models before our attention and money or did it ruin them?

The perfect case study is the evolving train wreck of Miley Cyrus.  She had inklings of this disaster in motion earlier but her notoriety has skyrocketing with her MTV gyrations.  He last two music videos were awkward attempts at sexy.  Her twerking with a giant bear costume is nothing short of confusing.  Her predilection with showing us her tongue is frustrating.  Her immense need for nudity and attention to her body is rather unnerving.  Put your bits away Miley.  I’m sure your male fanbase has grown by leaps and bounds.  More importantly for the love of all things good  put your tongue in your mouth.  You were licking a sledgehammer.  That is not sexy, it’s unclean and gross.  It’s too bad your father is too consumed by you churning out small mountains of cash to be concerned with the fact you’re having a slow flaming psychotic break in front of America.  It’s entirely possible she’ll shave her head, have multiple failed marriages, and a bad reality television show like another house of mouse star.

I hope you are proud of yourself Disney.  You’ve unleashed your unholy army of witless teenage sex symbols to slowly lower the IQ of a generation of Americans.  Maybe it’s our fault for letting it happen but dammit Disney you should have know better.

Ben

The Problem With Video Games

As a gamer in his thirties E3 confirmed something for me.  The gaming industry is deeply flawed and doesn’t care about me anymore.  Microsoft is in full on consumer rape mode, Nintendo thinks I need a tablet for a controller, and Sony thinks not being Microsoft is a feature.  Sadly Sony is somewhat right.  These three parties along with mainstream publishers/distributers have been systematically dismantling the industry and creating this bastardized version of aggravation and disappointment.

There have been warning signs for some time.  First there was DRM.  Implemented to fight piracy with the same draconian mindset of the out of touch film industry (let’s make everything 3D and charge more!) DRM is an insult.  Online communities have been bitching about the practice for years and threatening boycotts.  But there is no solidarity.  Why?  Because gamers are competitive and conditioned consumers.  We bitch online about all the bullshit but we still end up lining up for new release day like excited sheep.  I have escaped this cycle for the most part by using Gamefly but that might end soon, but more on that later.  Then there was DLC.  Then there was always on internet access.

The reason these things keep coming is that we don’t vote with our wallets.  The outrage never goes further than the internet.  We still buy the junk.  I’m to blame too, I’m part of the problem.  Case in point I bought Diablo 3.  I regret this decision because it only strengthened the resolve of the gaming companies.  Games have slowly acquired a list of flaws that we allow.  It was not commonplace to sell unfinished games.  Now a game is rushed through development to meet the schedule.  DLC is preplanned before the product is even released.  Nintendo the last stalwart against this has slowly and quietly reversed traction on DLC.  And Nintendo’s policy has always been about the game.  They built consoles around games.  The Nintendo 64 was built around Mario 64. Sony and Microsoft build a console and developers create games for them.  Sure they probably take some feedback but games are made to fit the platform not the platform is made the games.  This is a wholly different mindset.  I just wish Nintendo would make a console with a regular controller.

But is DLC really so bad?  Yeah, they sold armor for your horse in a video game.  And people bought it.  You don’t need to protect your horse you just get a new one.  There is no attachment to animal in the game.  I can’t even compare it buying a an accessory for a doll or action figure.  It provides nothing except a shiny pixilated reminder of how much an idiot you are and that you don’t deserve to manage your own credit card by yourself.  This was bought by the same type of person who watches late night QVC and really thinks they might need a diamonique encrusted salad tong combination ball scratcher.  Of course then you need to figure out where to store the salad tong combination ball scratcher, with your other cutlery or your with your unmentionables.

There is the argument that DLC is good revenue for the publishers and developers to combat the used games empire built up by Game Stop.  You can sell back you game to this retailer for pennies on the dollar and then they resell it a few bucks cheaper than full price.  And gamers have been flocking to the model.  Problem there is that the publishers and developers get none of the money.  It’s not really a problem but they want a part of it.  I can’t blame them they spend tens of millions to produce a game that has around fifteen hours of game time.  The DLC can’t be traded in and goes directly to the people responsible for the game.  But perhaps the idea of making a game that has replay value and more than a few hours of game time might be a better choice.  Oh yeah and day one DLC is insulting.  Also exclusive content based on where you buy also insulting.  Sell me a whole product not a partial one.

Then there is this always on internet bullshit.  This was bad with Diablo 3 and worse with the newest Sim City.  At least in Diablo they had some features that were rather useful.  Easy to drop in and out of any friends game in seconds.  That was cool.  The game kinda sucked but that’s okay.  Also quick note, developers please stop making games primarily set in gloomy atmospheres.  If the majority of the game takes place in a burnt down, cobweb infested wasteland with two colors in your palette I hate you.  A few colors are pleasing and makes me not hate to look at the screen.  You can have a cohesive but visually diverse landscape (see Bioshock Infinite or the Elder Scrolls games).  But inevitably with always on internet there is a server problem the day of release.  This is the at the maddening height of fanboys fervor when the thirteen year olds are all sweaty with excitement.  Then the crash happens.  All that joyous excitement turns to impotent, internet rage and vile expletives.

But the reaction of the gaming companies is interesting to note.  Mostly complete indifference and lying from the publishers and distributors while the developers mostly apologize profusely.  EA simply tries to ignore the issue of Sim City and ignore the press.  Give nothing to feed the trolls, eventually it will die down.  The internet has a short attention span and gaming will have a new target in a week or so.

This take me to the new batch of console coming up.  Nintendo has some exciting games ready to launch.  They have Mario in a cat suit.  The internet may not be ready for this.  Also new smash brothers, new Mario cart, and new various other Nintendo only products.  If you notice Nintendo is very tight on it’s licenses regarding their intellectual property.  You’ll never see Mario on the Xbox, or Playstation.  You won’t see him on mobile devices as well (discounting the Gameboy).  Nintendo banks on its games.  The problem is they have also banked on novelty and ugly annoying controllers.  I want a regular controller.  I’m sick of motion control.  But I still might end up getting the Wii U at one point.  I wish I could quit you Shigeru Miyamoto.

Then there is Microsoft.  The Xbox One is an affront to gamers.  It is region locked (sorry travelers and soldiers), has always on requirements (sorry rural internet or no internet users, those with connection issues), it flat out rejects used game (sorry Gamefly users and people who swap games with friends).  It’s basically a box of pure hate.  In my mind it is now the Hate Box.  I use Netflix on my Xbox 360 now.  I love streaming Netflix this way.  But I also use my Xbox to play used games that I rent from Gamefly.  I like to play offline because online multiplayer makes me want to gouge my eyeballs out and beat up teenagers.  The first time I played Halo 3 some asshat teabagged my corpse in like ten minutes.  He did so with complete disdain and the effortlessness of a person who has done this many time before defiling the faces of people avatars for his own odd pleasure.  I stopped online play shortly after.  The online lobbies of choosing games suck as I want recreational players not kids who have been playing this game online for months and doing nothing else.  Yeah, you are better than me.  I’d be good too if I had nothing to do other than waste my free time sticking my digital junk in faces.  The Xbox One has a bunch of cool features but you know what I wanted?  A gaming console.  I did not want an entertainment conglomerate.  Oh yeah and if someone bans you guess what happens to your games?  Un-fucking-playable.  It's not like there have been bans before n online gaming for no good reason.  That never happens.  Also online support for video games are useful filled with the most helpful individuals.  Wait, no, they are awful swamp trolls from where the places nightmares go when you awake who delight in ruining your happiness and providing the worst support imaginable.  Why?  Because fuck you that's why.

Sony just ended up winning by saying they weren’t going to do what Microsoft did and treated it like it a was feature.  Not fucking people over is not a feature.  But there is an issue at hand.  The Xbox One will still sell.  It will sell a whole bunch.  Because there are some cool exclusive games coming out and Microsoft doesn’t give a shit about people being pissed.  They aren’t walking back their bullshit anytime soon.  Sony isn’t an angel here.  They are changing their online policy to make you need to pay to play online with friends.   So if you have both console you need to pay ten bucks a month to utilize features.

There is a reason indy developers and mobile games are eating up the profits from these guys.  Their target audience is two segments somewhat savvy adults who are getting annoyed and kids.  The kids will bitch until their parents relent.  The adults are where my hope lies.  If sale of the new Hate Box suck they might wake up.  They might realize having a Kinect have to be on might be not awesome.

If I had my way here is what my dream console would have.  Good games first and foremost.  A decent controller with a goddamn start button (stop taking away my buttons and adding lies).  Also stop making me buy battery packs.  Wireless controllers can come free with a wire that charges through your system like the PS3.  Make an integrated easy to set up wireless internet.  Don’t charge me for some ridiculous dongle.  Don’t need a system update every five seconds for every game (I’m looking at you Sony).  Every time I turn on my PS3 I need to update something and wait twenty minutes to play a game.  Make downloads possible in the background.  I shouldn’t be locked into a loading screen while I wait.  Don’t make me use the cloud to save.  An option is great.  Also give me more than one save spot.  If I want to start a new game I shouldn’t have to save over my other game.  Maybe the industry doesn't want people to replay their games anymore.  This auto save thing is annoying I should be able to turn it off I want.  I should never have to talk to a server as offline gaming is important.  You know like the ability to have friends over who sit on the couch next to you and play coop that way.  Have an easy interface built mostly around games.  I’m buying a console not a computer/cable box.  I don’t care about internet search on my console, it's stupid and you're stupid for thinking I care.  I have smart phone for that.  Speaking of smart phones don’t let that be an integrated part of the gaming experience.  Games are already going in the wrong direction half the time with countless sequels to crappy predictable franchises simply to grab money I don’t need extra peripherals.  Just let me sit down after a long down and shoot an alien in the head.  Games should be fun not frustrating.  You are taking away my fun and replacing it with shiny pretentious garbage.  Graphics and processing power is not that important to give that up.  Just make a good product that is how you protect you investment.

I guess more than ever now is a good time to be a PC gamer.  Steam must be feeling pretty good about themselves in the coming months.  But y prediction is that gaming community will continue the slide into bullshit and allow publishers to put restraints on use.

Ben

Beer is Good For the World

Beer was probably found and not invented because beer is just that kind of thing, always helping out.  If beer was person he’s be your cool uncle who sneaks you into bars then keeps a watchful eye out for you all night and makes sure you went home safe.  The reason beer was discovered, and not invented, most likely  had to do with wild yeast.  Wild yeast is like the best goddamn Pokemon or something, gotta catch it all.  The film Beer Saves the World supposed some ancient human had this wet container of bubbling barley.  The rain filled up the container of barley and wild yeast had sexy time with all the sugars and primitive beer.  Because man is curious he probably drank the stuff.  He might have been pissed because he had hoped for dry and not bubbly barley.  However being the kind of guy who soberly decides to drink strange and new things decided fuck it I spent some time picking that stuff I’m not wasting it.  That was the proposed first experience with beer.  Three of the four main ingredients were there; barley; water; and yeast.  Hops as all that was missing.  That’s what gives beer it’s bitterness and aroma.

Beer is awesome.  It basically invented itself because it was tired of waiting.  The stuff was staple of diets for many civilizations.  Any old films got it wrong.  Egyptians didn’t drink wine they drank beer.  What do you think those monks brewed?  Beer.  Hey, you think beer is one of those predominantly male things that’s all about bro-skies and chauvinism?  Fuck that.  Some cultures only had women brew beer.  They were the brewsters , yes brewster is the feminine term for a brewer.  Certain cultures only had women brew.  Plus the word sounds like a drunk rooster.  Maybe the bastard won’t wake me up at five in morning.

Okay, so maybe beer is an equal opportunity thing and maybe people drank it for sustenance as it had the essential nutrients you needed (and was often of  much lower alcohol content so it’s not terrible for the kiddies to have it) but what else is so good about it.  What about healthy drinking water.  Eat that and you doubts Kyle.  Part of the brewing process is you know boiling, which tends to kil all manner of not so happy things.  And this is before things like germ theory.  Germ theory was before people knew that you shouldn’t handle “dirty” things before touching food.  Remember in the medieval times everything was fucking dirty.  Sewage treatment plants were the things goring in your pot before you hucked it out the window… into the street… where people were walking.  Again why men were supposed to walk on the outside closer to curb and protect the women from the splashes of actual shit.  That coat laying down thing.  So a lady wouldn’t soil herself in feces.  Those poor coats.  And backs… ick.

Well, what about those wine snobs and spirits enthusiast you?  Kyle, you just don’t give up do you?  Beer is complex as has lots of meaningful varietals just like more traditionally elegant spirits like whiskey (or whisky depending on the country of origin), or wine for that matter.  How many glasses is there for wine?  Two?  Paltry in comparison to beer.  The pilsner glass, one of many different beer glasses, has multiple styles alone.  You can pair beer with food just as well as wine or spirits.  Oh, and if you judge beer off of the large breweries you are not a smart beer drinking.  All of Europe mocks you.  And a good chunk of the states.  Beer matters.

Independent brewing, which is starting to come into its own in the States, is trying to change the perception of what beer and should be.  Sam Adams one of the biggest of the Indy’s (and yes they are still considered and independent brewer they haven’t hit enough barrels per year yet) helps out independent breweries through programs so there is wider distributions of malts, hops, barley and other items crucial to the brewing process.  These companies help each other out.  Like the time in 2008 when, shudder, there was hops shortage and Sam sold theirs (20,000 lbs) at cost to other craft breweries.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Adams_%28beer%29#2008_hops_shortage

They don’t just help each other out.  They fight for clean water.  That stuff they boil anyway to get all the nasty stuff out they still want it clean.  That’s why brewers are fighting against fraking.  And not fraking in the sci-fi expletive sense fraking as in that environmentally dangerous resource draining practice that lets some rather nasty stuff get into ground water.  But it’s okay water should be practically flmable and totally undrinkable right.  No?  Okay fuck fraking.  Oh, and certain companies are trying to fight this by saying there is trade secrets in the whole fraking process.  So you can’t really review it.  Fuck the whole poisoning the environment thing it’s damaging for you know the process.  I only wish I was joking this was a real ruling by a real judge in real American (versus fake America).  Yeah, fuck fraking.

“A judge in Wyoming has denied a lawsuit by environmental groups against the Wyoming Oil and Gas Conservation Commission demanding that the list of chemicals in fracking fluids be made public, ruling such lists are trade secrets that may be withheld under Wyoming’s open records law.”

http://grist.org/list/beer-brewers-are-joining-forces-to-fight-fracking/

http://www.commondreams.org/further/2013/03/29

So beer actually has essential nutrients for you, was a centerpiece of history, it discovered itself, it creates brotherhood, it helps local economy, and it fights against environmental doom.  Oh yeah, and the star spangled banner came from a drinking song.  But drink responsibly, I don’t want any of you assholes giving beer a bad name by driving drunk or acting the fool.  Don’t be that guy.

Ben

We are all fucked but let’s blame the Millennials anyway

“Millennials are lazy, entitled narcissists who still live with their parents.”  Time Magazine cover story.

Thanks Time magazine, you give me the warm and fuzzies.  By the way good luck with that whole print magazine thing, I’m sure it’ll turn out great for you.  I’m sure Egon was wrong when he said “print is dead” all those years ago.

But anyway, to be blunt, fuck you.  How dare you cast aspersions on an entire generation and so casually write off people.  Lazy?  This is an extremely competitive market with people competing desperately for jobs far below their skill set and  education.  My generation is a group of people saddled by debt from unwieldy, and let’s face it unfair, student debts.  We compete for subpar jobs with employers who face no repercussions for paying us a s little as possible and treating us a poorly as possible.  There is a reason people are protesting.  There is a reason there are so many people quitting their day job and jumping into start ups.  We aren’t lazy as a whole.  We are not necessarily hard working as a whole either.  But to survive and do reasonably well my generation needs to be either lucky or scrappy.  And luck only cuts it for part of the time.

Entitled?  Narcissistic?  Maybe.  But I have a few counters for this.  One is starkly obvious.  We aren’t as old or experienced.  Experience has yet to teach many of the generation that they aren’t special.  They are unique and wonderful, we all are, but they aren’t inherently better than others.  To butcher Socrates we can think of it this way, the more I know the more I understand that I know so little (“The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing”).  That’s a hard pill to swallow.  It makes sense to me now but when I was an idiot teenager I thought I was brilliant.  I really did.  I thought my life would be simple and without great difficulty as I got older (immensely foolish)  How could I have possible think I was so smart?  It isn’t sheer arrogance it’s simply the foolishness of youth.  Immaturity.  It is only cured by time.  We can’t simply judge a group of people at one age against another group at a more advanced age.  We also cannot judge them when our society has changed so drastically.  It simply is unfair and unrealistic.  And that is another thing that confuses me.  The older generation either is unwilling to admit this, willfully ignorant, completely oblivious, stupid, or looking through rose colored glasses.

Our culture does us no favors.  Just look at the dismay state of education.  It is simply an incubator.  We hold onto the youth for a certain amount of years and let them fend for themselves after.  We remove so much content from schooling in the hopes of pushing them through faster and more efficiently that we no longer care about the quality of the time spent.  We teach to the lowest common denominator far too often.  We let bad behavior and poor decisions go unpunished.  We teach the children that not trying is a valid method for success.  Why should they put in effort?  Parents have no issue complaining to a teacher.  Administration has less concerns with educating children than with keeping things in line and prepping them for the next test.  Testing is ruining our schools.  They are rewarded or punished on these tests.  Why should schools do anything but simple prepare the kids for it.

We coddle these children.  We prevent them from harm.  We tell them they are special.  I understand every kid gets to play mentality but you don’t hold back the star.  We celebrate mediocrity in schools.  Children leave school ill prepared for the world at large.  We expect them to pick up the slack at paid schooling.  We force college education on them because we failed them at lower levels.  The institutions of education are failing our future generations and we stand idly by uncertain and confused.  I know many times I deserved lower grades or certain reprimands but I coasted by.  It taught me awful behaviors that I had to later unlearn.  I cannot simply coast through life.  I cannot rely on simply being smart.  The world isn’t handing out opportunities.  But for some reason as a much younger man I thought I was owed an opportunity.  I knew I was smart.  But that means nothing.  I’m just a number, a few letters on a piece of paper on a resume to some HR person. The paper they shuffle through (emails now) don’t convey that so simply.  Having it so easy for so long was not conducive for a strong head start in my career.  For my hubris and foolishness I suffered many years moving from one shitty job to another slightly less shitty job.  Now I have a moderately respectable big boy job I’m not ashamed of.  I figured it out on my own through hard work.  I dealt with ignorance and cocksureness saddled on me by an older generation too weak to say, “things are hard out there.”  If only they hadn’t expected me to magically grow up at eighteen and come to a conclusion on my own.

I’m not saying it’s easy to tell your children they aren’t geniuses.  I’m not saying it’s easy to tell the young that things are rough out there and it might not get better.  But it’s worth it.  Children don't need friends.  They need parents.  Tell them no and tell them often.  Protect them but without insulating them.  And don't you dare complain it's hard.  Tough shit.  It's your responsibility as a parent.

Living at home?  Fuck you twice.  What do you expect us to do?  We know that salaries have gone done and the price of education has gone up (while the worth of education has gone down).  We know the market is competitive and saturated.  We know in order to survive people are taking whatever they can get.  And yet we complain that this generation moving home is simply out of shiftlessness.  Business seems more ruthless that ever.  The employees rights and benefits shrink as time passes.  The new work dynamic is mercenary work.  Jump from company to company slowly increasing your salary.  This replaces staying with the same company until you retire slowly working your way up and being rewarded for diligence.  The boys club is here and it’s here to stay for quite some time.  Good luck breaking into the group.

But times will change.  The boomers will eventually have to retire.  And the thing that should be pants shittingly terrifying is the people in charge will be us.  You eat up all that social security you assholes.  Leave nothing for us.  That’s fine.  You had your chance for change and your fucked it up.  You traded in the love ins and hippy rebellions for suits.  You ushered in a new era of greed and ruthlessness.  You have created and endless series of wars and acts of aggression.  You have lied and misled us.  And you have the nerve to call us self obsessed?  You think you can live comfortably in your golden years when we have to power.  You think it’s a good idea for the people how control your fate to be angry.  Guess what happens when some who was withheld power for so long finally gets it?  I envision a lighting strike in the background, a maniacal laugh and an old man releasing his bowels at the realization.  But maybe we as a generation who have seen the ruthlessness of those we look up to won’t mimic the behavior.  We might not behave in the same manner.  I fucking hope so.  Just because we were shit on doesn’t mean we should behave the way.

We are a generation of lost souls abandoned by our elders forced to fight amongst ourselves.  We are your creation.  You saw our anger and rage when we protested the 1%.  We saw your casual disgust and intolerance.  We can hope there might have been that rekindling of spirit you once had.  Maybe a remembrance of what happened in Ohio at Kent state all those years ago.  You railed against the police as dogs of your parents generation and yet you do the same to us with no sense of irony of hypocrisy.

We are a generation who is slowly finding its voice.  We are a generation of who lived through numbness of the nineties after the saccharin bullshit of the eighties.  We survived the awkwardness of the first decade of the century.  We are slowly coming back to coherence and we are angry.  Will we continue to cycle?  Will we cast off our yoke only to make those younger than us suffer?  I don’t know.  I have hope for us to be better.

But what can be done now?  The obvious answer is to educate the older generation and the media.  If the media who control what we consume and reaches the whole of society perceives my generation as slackers those are the hearts and mind that must be won over.  But it won’t be particularly easy.  Fortunately the way we gather news is in transition like so many other industries.  I get most of my news online.  I barely watch television and the print medium I read is books.

Small to medium side note, I much prefer actual books over reading off tablets.  I enjoy having the tactile sensation of pages turning as well as the smell of the pages, the ink and the binding.  I don’t have a terribly well defined sense of smell (due to an enlarged adenoid and deviated septum) but the old book smell, is one I have a great fondness for.  “The vanilla smell in old books comes from Lignin, a compound that is essential to trees having the stiffness to grow tall. Lignin comes out naturally in the paper pulp process which led to its prevalence in newspapers and book pages.”*

Of course turning the tide of media is not an easy job.  But places on the internet are the best forums for my generation to start.  Simply because most of these newer forums are controlled and visited by my generation.  The older “standard” news outlets are more and more borrowing from the internet sources.  Perhaps if there is an uproar there a cogent argument about the hypocrisy of the older generation may penetrate the culture.  Perhaps all that is needs is a push.  Our society is already gaining much ground in sexual equality perhaps economic and generational equality can come on it’s heels.

Ben

http://freshnews.gorhamsavingsbank.com/2011/10/bad-news-%E2%80%93-%E2%80%9Cbook-smell%E2%80%9D-%E2%80%93-a-casualty-from-the-move-to-digital-books/

Attention Deficit Disorder

I am going to attempt to explain what it’s like to live with A.D.D., a much maligned and over hyped cognitive disorder.  I hope to give some insights so those without this disorder can have some appreciation for it.  Jumping topics slightly, something that I should hopefully cover later on as it would also give illumination… did you know there have been some really cool improvement on the light bulb lately.  Yeah, it seems boring but improving the light bulb can have a profound effect.  How many light bulbs in you place of living?  In you place of work?  In highways and other places.  If we cut down on power expenditure we improve things dramatically.  Back to my earlier point… a lot of people use ADD as an excuse.  I remember when I was in high school people would self diagnose themselves as ADD.  I would self diagnose them as jerks, idiots and lazy douche bags.  A bit harsh, true, but I’d watch a person complain about lack of focus when they don’t understand what that really means.  I do this as I constantly repeat in my mind that at in twenty minutes I have to excuse myself from class and walk to water fountain  to take an adderal pill.  Did you ever notice adderal starts with the letters add?  And why is it A.D.D.?  It isn’t adding anything.  You’re subtracting from your focus.  The weird thing about the problem is you need speed, or an upper rather, to calm you down.  Sort of.  You need more energy to maintain focus.  The hyperactivity part is not intrinsic to ADD.  Hyperactive is a bullshit term most of the time.  Its mainly applicable to boys.  It isn’t hyper (again extra) it’s the norm.  Young boys have a tremendous amount of energy and a biological need to expend it…  It’s like telling a scorpion not to sting.  You stupid frog in the parable take that… Anyway.  School isn’t designed for the needs of young boys.  Expectations to sit quietly in your seat and absorb knowledge are not built on the true nature of boys.  Of course it’s not a good idea to let the miscreants run rampant and swing from the rafters but an innovation might be needed.  So I would watch them, quelling my rage, as they joked about ADD.  They knew nothing of the sort they just wanted and excuse, a crutch, a reason to avoid shame.

There seems to be a large chunk of people being labeled ADD wrongly.  I think this is simply the culture enabling bad parenting.  Drug your children and avoid responsibility.  Many problems can simply be helped along by time and work.  There is no test to become a parent, well there is but that’s more confirmation than a judgment of metal and psychological ability.  I don’t condone anything so Draconian as restricting parenting to ‘deserving’ individuals I simply hope that more moms and dads make time to improve their children through good parenting, which is laborious and often thankless, over cheap and easy fixes.

I sit at the computer rubbing my eyes and trying to get through this report.  I’ve pulled the information from the core platform brought it over into excel for scrubbing.  Pivoted the data and charted it.  I bring it to another workbook where I change it again from presentation.  Then  suddenly, and unbidden, a thought enters my mind.  It take over my entire thought process and I cannot purge it.  No further action can be undertaken until I see this tangent to fruition.  What happens to those puppetry of the penis guys when they get older?  Does it have a measurable effect in older age.  Is it better or worse for health reasons.  How would you explain to your grandchild why you have to wear really baggy pants as an adult because you need more room due to helping along gravity.  Then I sit unsure if I should be dismayed or amused.  I go get coffee and shake the thought from my head.  I sit down moments later and return to my previous work.  Things like this happen at least three times a day.

Perhaps it is part of the of the creative process for some.  But I cannot have a linear thought for long period of time.  It’s like surfing the internet, or specifically wikipedia.  One thought begets another and the chain can be hard to trace back.  I can sit still now as an adult and I’ve trained myself to deal with things but I have difficulty not checking my phone.  I have to set constant reminders and schedules.  I keep them in my smart phone for easy access.  I’ve made a habit of checking it rather often.  It’s not that my memory is bad my focus just weakens from time to time unpredictably.  It’s like a shield  Some thoughts simply bounce right off.  Some are so strong them blow through.  Others simply slip in once the defense have gone down from the constant barraging attack.

The arch nemesis of anyone with ADD is that fucking windsock puppet thing in front of car dealerships.  I hate that god damn thing.  It jumps and move unpredictably.  It calls to my eyes.  It’s isn’t terribly interesting or entertaining.  But… I… can’t… look… away.  Fuck that thing.  I wish sometimes I could have a better filter for random thoughts.  I wish when one takes hold I could file it the back of my mind and say I’ll think about you later when I have  moment but I need to get this done.  It does not happen.  It is an electric current.  It is immediate and must be satisfied to the end.

This is problematic for many reasons.  It makes reading a nightmare.  I just counted ten books on my night side table.  Four of which I have started at one point.  If I don’t finish a book within ten days it grows discarded.  I might pick it up again and finish it might wait there forever a mark of shame.  It might wait patiently for its turn.  It might eventually get filled away on a bookshelf.

Video games are not as bad as they are intrinsically more engaging by nature.  You are interacting more directly and much less passively.  But still some game sit partially played, possible never to be finished.  My Netflix queue grows faster than shrinks.  My want to consume always higher than my time set aside.

I’ve worked hard to control and constrain my ADD.  I look for no pity.  But I do want people to stop self diagnosing or using drugs to treat this.  The erratic nature of the disorder is only a flaw depending on the lifestyle you choose.  Office cube rats is not the most conducive environment for such things but I manage just fine.

Perhaps this post gave an idea of what it’s like to think in a non-linear fashion.  And sadly not an intentional non-linear fashion more of a o disjointed fractured version of linear thought.  A topic is started and along the way focus drifts and the path back to the original topic is gone and you wonder how you got where you are now.  My method of combat has been time, patience and effort.  The three things that I’ve found cure most everything.  If you have cognitive disorders or learning disabilities (I’m also dyslexic) I feel for you.  I appreciate your struggle and I hope you find a way to improve yourself through it.  My problems have usually been my best teachers.  They have given valuable tools in learning how to function better.  The skills I developed through my efforts have been critical in getting me where I am. 

Ben