Orthodoxy means not thinking – not needing to think. Orthodoxy is unconsciousness.

Monday November 3 2003

The only language in the world whose vocabulary gets smaller every year

It’s been an interesting day. On the plus side, V and I seem to have had some good chats in the comment threads on her blog and mine. Also, someone rejoicing in the screenname FanFicGirl sent me a nice note telling me she’d enjoyed one of my superhero articles, which was pleasant of her.

On the minus side, the Bucs continue to demonstrate their utter willingness to go to any lengths necessary to lose a football game on an even week. Martin Gramatica, who has never previously missed a thirty yard field goal when it wasn’t blocked, needs to miss one for the first time ever? No problem. He can.

Can you get into the playoffs when you’re 8-8? Given that the first play off game would necessarily be during an odd week, Tampa Bay would win it. But then the NFC Championship would occur on an even week, and even if the other team’s bus went off a cliff on the way to the stadium and they had to play their cheerleaders, the Bucs would somehow contrive to lose it. So it doesn’t matter.

However, the Carolina Panthers (who somehow managed to lose against the Houston Texans this week) are playing the Bucs during an odd week, so they’re doomed.

Following this pattern, the Bucs will lose to Green Bay, beat the Giants, lose to Jacksonville (how humiliating), somehow beat New Orleans next time, then lose to Houston (even more humiliating), handily beat Atlanta, then lose to Tennessee, and assuming the Panthers win the rest of their schedule, they should be playing the Kansas City Chiefs in the Super Bowl, and we Bucs fans can get a head start moping during the post season our team will not be part of.

I honestly cannot understand this on-again, off-again play. It’s not injuries; the Bucs play brilliantly with a patched together line up on odd weeks. It’s not coaching, Gruden coaches wonderfully… on odd weeks. For some strange reason, however, Brad Johnson seems to get sucked into a nether dimension every even week, and his place is taken by Bizarro-Brad, who can’t hit a receiver, who fumbles footballs, and who throws interceptions all day long. I’m starting to think Gruden should simply sit Brad down on even weeks and put Chris Simms in, instead. The only problem with that is, Simms might well play brilliantly, and Michael Pittman might end up being kidnapped into a nether dimension and replaced by an incompetent twin…

Hey, the Bucs defense looked really good today, though. Pity Martin Gramatica chose today to miss his first unblocked thirty yard field goal ever…

Enough about that. Other than blogging around a lot today, and guh nashing my teefies at the Bucs on TV, all I really did was read a little more 1984 and watch the insanely overhyped debut of FOX’s Sunday line up.

FOX seems to think that if they really lay into the hype, maybe everyone will forget that one is supposed to debut one’s fall line up, um, FALL, which means, generally, September or maybe early October, not fucking NOVEMBER.

The Simpsons, at least, had the good sense to mock the fact that their Halloween episode was both the Season Premiere, and appearing in November. Other than that, though, this was probably the most tired Treehouse of Horror Halloween Special yet. Or so it seemed to me. FOX followed it with yet another rerun of last season’s 300th Episode, which I’ve already seen three times. Then Malcolm In The Middle came on, and I was astonished to discover that apparently, at some point between tonight and whenever the hell it was I tried to watch this show last (a few seasons back), someone has sucked all the humor right out of it, and worse, apparently Malcolm and Reese are now in their mid 20s, Dewey seems to be a teenager, while older brother Francis looks absolutely no different than he ever has, except, you know, like the rest of the family, he used to be funnier.

But, hey, that’s okay; I was just watching all this to kill time before the one show I was really looking forward to, Arrested Development.

Which really wasn’t very funny.

And just to top things off for me, apparently the goddam Cowboys-Redskins game went fifteen minutes late, so all these shows started fifteen minutes late and ran fifteen minutes over, which made me forget to watch The Practice tonight, because by the time I remembered the damned show was on, it was nearly 10:30, and I can’t watch a show if I’ve missed half of it already.

Chewie was going nuts, barking his canine ass off out in the living room, so I went out to see what was up and could hear voices coming through the wall from Jeff’s apartment. So I walked over and he’s got a bunch of the gang over there (Paul’s gang, not mine) including someone I guess is his new girlfriend, who isn’t very good looking (she’s not bad looking) but makes up for it by being a heavy smoker (but the whole group smokes heavily) and being really really loud and abrasively obnoxious, from what little I saw/heard before I came back.

Jeff was playing a computer game. He’s always playing a computer game. A week or so ago he asked for my help with some class project, which basically involved him going to a website and getting some information and then using that information to set up a Power Point presentation. After reading the instructions, I advised him to go to the website and get the information. He allowed as to how that was logical, but way too much like work, and then he kept playing some computer game.

This time when I was over there, he seemed to feel vaguely guilty (like I give a shit if he gets his school work done or not) because the first thing he said was “every time I try to work my computer crashes, so I’m just playing this game instead”. I told him, dryly, that obviously his computer was trying to tell him he’d never have a career and he should just give up and play games. This was me being critical of his complete lack of a work ethic, but disguising my criticism as an ironic statement. His girlfriend screeched, in this really annoying voice, “DUDE!”, which, I don’t know, must be her equivalent of Kelso from That 70s Show screaming “Burn!” Jeff got annoyed with me and said “well, thanks a lot, Darren”, to which I responded, in my typically laconic fashion, “Hey, it’s the computer saying that, not me. It’s an inanimate object. Impress your will upon it.”

Then I left.

Bear in mind, if this seems more judgmental than is my normal wont, Jeff is around ten years younger than I am, works the night shift at a convenience store, lives in an apartment even smaller than the one I share with Paul (which is hard to imagine) and, oh yeah, has a four year old daughter (out of wedlock) named Amber who is just as cute as you can possibly imagine and really deserves to have a father with a better job who lives in a better place. So, given that he’s asked my help with his schoolwork on at least one occasion, I do feel occasionally aggravated with him when he continues to act as if he’s 15 years old and has no responsibilities whatsoever.

But, never mind, never mind. These are Paul’s friends, not mine.

Paul just got home from work, and he brought a bunch of X-Box games… some kind of Jurassic Park thing, a couple of Lord of the Rings things, and… something else. I guess in the Jurassic Park game you don’t fight dinosaurs, you build your own version of Jurassic Park, which might be cool.

Leaving all that aside, I am utterly shocked by my continual re-appraisal of the brilliance of 1984. It’s not only that I never really appreciated just how great a writer Orwell was before this, but rereading it again now, after thirty years of immersion in our culture, I am continually jolted by entirely original concepts and ideas that have so permeated and influenced our culture that they seem commonplace and cliché as my eyes first absorb them, and then I realize, with a shudder, that, no… Orwell invented the idea of Big Brother. Orwell created the concept of ‘doublethink’. Orwell coined the phrase ‘he who controls the past controls the future, and he who controls the present controls the past’. Orwell came up with the innovative thought control technique of intentionally winnowing objectionable concepts right out of the language that would be used by future generations.

All of this stuff has become common coin for dystopian futurists in the past sixty years, but Orwell invented all of it.

I just think that’s amazing.

And the more I read, the more it strikes me that 1984 really is an invaluable piece of literature, in that as it sets forth an elaborately detailed set of blueprints for a complete spiritual tyranny, it also details, in reverse, exactly how a person has to behave, how they have to think… that in fact, they do have to think, clearly and rationally and lucidly, that they have to remember, and doubt, and question authority, and trust their own mental capacities… in order to be free. Orwell’s 1984 shows us quite irrefutably that a tyrant’s best allies are psychological apathy and mental laziness. If a person simply doesn’t want to think, they’re easily collared… and Jesus Christ, I look around me and I see people, lots of people, who simply don’t want to think, every day of my life.

And in an odd echo of all this, I just took a break and wandered next door, where the gang is all sitting around playing DESERT STORM II on Jeff’s big screen TV. First, I think that game is appalling and horribly disrespectful; I don’t think that, for fun, people should interactively simulate something that is, at this very moment, costing people their lives.

However, Jeff mentioned in passing that in this game, the Iraqis do indeed have weapons of mass destruction, and one of the game scenarios involves neutralizing them. Which simply made me reflect that if Dubya gets re-elected, future history books will almost certainly note that Iraq did indeed have weapons of mass destruction.

“He who controls the past, controls the future, and he who controls the present controls the past…”

I should take the time to note that over on David Fiore’s blog, there is an entry setting forth his particular opinion on what characterization is that is so maddeningly wrong headed I’m not even going to address it, other than to simply snarl “fuckin Fiore” and hit my back button.

Meanwhile, in an archive page that came up when I did an ego search, I see Aaron Hawkins, or someone commenting on his blog, has noted that it is not considered a compliment for a white person to tell a black person he is ‘articulate’, simply because the black person employs proper English, ‘like a white guy’. It is, apparently, considered condescending.

I’m not sure if Aaron, or his commenter, meant this to be yet another justification for why I’m just not cool enough to hang out on the Uppity-Negro blog, but it could very well be something trumped up just for me, since I tend to use ‘articulate’ as a compliment, because, well, I like articulate people and I think being articulate is a good thing.

Now, I think this should go without saying to all people who do not have pointy heads, and who do possess at least rudimentary levels of… I don’t know… decency… or even intelligence… ration… reason… the capacity for lucid thought… but, anyway: a compliment is a compliment. The word ‘articulate’ does not become an insult simply because Person A is a member of one race and Person B is a member of another race. Whoever wrote this comment also made sarcastic reference to ‘maybe you didn’t get the memo on this’, but, in all honesty, if someone honestly thinks that an accident of birth and circumstance entitles them to redefine the usage of common English words to suit their own self indulgent, utterly childish, narrow minded and prejudicial whims, they are ignorant, they are immature, and they are, beyond all that, simply wrong. ‘Articulate’ means what it means, not what some Caucasophobic pinhead wants it to mean so they can feel sorry for themselves.

Furthermore, if someone genuinely intends to pay you a compliment, and you insist on taking it as an insult when you are perfectly aware it was intended as a compliment, and you in fact have to contort all commonly accepted usage of the language both parties are employing in order to do this, you are an ass. And if you’re only doing this so you can feed your own self righteous need to feel like people are picking on you because of your race, because that gives you justification to dislike someone whom you actually dislike simply because he committed the dreadful sin of being smarter and funnier than you yourself on your own blog, you are a thoroughly despicable, reprehensible, loathsome, and contemptible ass.

I know, I know. White people have no right to any opinion on any statement regarding race made by a member of any minority. I am also aware that minorities cannot be racist and hateful statements directed against whites by minorities are not, in fact, racist. Just as I’m aware that if Alex Kingston goes to the producers of ER and demands that they terminate her white character’s ongoing romance with a black doctor because it ‘sends the wrong message to young Caucasian girls’ about appropriate socialization, that would be racism and there would be riots and she would be fired and never work anywhere ever again in show business. However, if Eriq LaSalle does the same thing on the same grounds… which is to say, he goes to the producers of ER and demands that his black character’s romance with a white doctor be terminated because it sends the wrong message to young black men… well, that’s not racism. That’s ethnic awareness and racial pride and an impassioned advocacy intended to preserve an endangered minority culture.

So, okay, I admit it, I’m dead wrong. If I go onto some white guy’s blog and I say I think he’s a bright articulate guy and those are traits I really admire, that’s fine; it’s a compliment and should be taken as one. But, if I go onto a black guy’s blog and I say the same things about him, well, obviously I am insulting the entire African-American community by implying that the vast majority of them actually aren’t very articulate simply because they speak a colorful urban patois which is just as valid a language as, you know, standard ‘white people’s English.

Actually, I now realize that ‘articulate’ is, in fact, an insult no matter who I direct it to. In fact, any time I compliment any individual, or in any way indicate that I think any individual has excelled, I am insulting whatever culture or race that individual belongs to, by saying that apparently, this individual is an exceptional member of their culture or race. And that’s not acceptable. Nobody is allowed to individually excel these days, nor can we recognize anyone’s unique merits, because by doing so, we insult and degrade everyone else.

No, no. I must never state again that I find any one person intelligent, or witty, or funny, or articulate, or brilliant, or worst of all, special. That simply degrades everyone else. And we can’t have that.

God, I loathe assholes…

---

This process of continuous alteration was applied not only to newspapers, but to books, periodicals, pamphlets, posters, leaflets, films, sound tracks, cartoons, photographs – to every kind of literature or documentation which might conceivably hold any political or ideological significance. In this way every prediction made by the Party could be shown by documentary evidence to have been correct; nor was any item of news, or any expression of opinion, which conflicted with the needs of the moment, ever allowed to remain on record. All history was a palimpsest, scraped clean and reinscribed exactly as often as was necessary.

---

RULES OF THE ROAD

In one of his many invaluable essays on life in Hollywood, Mark Evanier described his first meeting with legendary TV comic and icon Milton Berle. Upon being introduced to Uncle Miltie and shaking hands with him, Mark, who is a pretty witty guy, blurted out without even thinking about it, “Wow, I didn’t recognize you in men’s clothing”. According to Mark, this soured Uncle Miltie on him from that point forward, because Mark had broken Rule Number One When Hanging With Milton Berle, namely, Never Be Funnier Than Milton Berle.

I’m reminded of that anecdote now.

Recent experiences at Electrolite being pretty much entirely similar if not completely identical to my previous experiences at Uppity-Negro.com and TampaTantrum.com, I thought I’d take the time to extrapolate whatever wisdom there is to find in the whole mess. Here’s The Deal, as far as I can see:

If you want to make friends and influence people when you head out onto the blogging trail, at least, as regards your posting comments on other people’s blogs, you MUST NOT:

(a) seem smarter than the person writing the blog you are posting comments to

(b) be funnier than the person writing the blog you are posting comments to

(c) be a better writer than the person writing the blog you are posting comments to

(d) be correct when you point out some manner in which the person writing the blog you are posting comments to was wrong, and/or

(e) Upset The Wimmenfolk On The Blog.

Rule E comes mostly out of my experiences with Aaron Hawkin’s Uppity-Negro blog. He gets a lot of female posters and like any of us male geeks would be in that admirable position, he is thoroughly whipped by them. If a new reader comes along and does anything whatsoever to offend the babes on Aaron’s blog, that new reader can expect a cold shoulder from Aaron roughly the size of the Greenland glacier. I don’t really blame Aaron for this; for a male geek, positive female attention is a jewel beyond price, and if I ever had any women posting to my blog who weren’t related to me by marriage, I’d most likely dance and sing like a puppet on a string when they cracked the lash, too.

I should add to this that I’ve learned, from Electrolite, that one Must Not Be Whimsical, Oblique, or Overly Geeky When Posting To A Big Important Political Marketplace of Ideas Type Blog, because those guys just have no time for Theodore Marley Brooks or Cornelus van Lunt references, regardless of how amusing or entertaining you and some others may find them.

Now, I am posting this to point out that while these may be the universal Rules of the Road on other blogs (and as far as I can see, they are, indeed, pretty much universal) you can ignore them here. I don’t care if you:

(a) seem smarter than I am, I like people who are smarter than I am, as long as they’re not jerks about it;

(b) are funnier than I am, then I get to laugh at your witty remarks, and hey, that’s all good;

(c) are a better writer than I am. Although I’m in a peculiar place as regards writing skills; good enough to be better than nearly all the amateurs out there, not good or lucky enough to be a professional at it. So if you are a better writer than I am, you are probably a professional writer and therefore do not have time to post comments on other people’s blogs, so this probably doesn’t matter, as relates to this blog;

(d) correct my mistakes; unlike apparently 95% of the remainder of the human race, I am under no illusions as to my own infallibility and simply don’t care if someone points out that I am wrong about something. Being wrong about things does not strike me as either a character flaw or a shameful embarrassment; we are all wrong about a lot of things every day of our lives, and that’s just how that works;

(e) Upset My Wimmenfolk. Well, actually, I shouldn’t say I don’t care if you upset my wimmenfolk, I do, the very thought deeply offends me. However, it’s just that the wimmenfolk at this point on this blog are my mom, my cuz in law, and my sister in law, and if you do something to upset them, I strongly doubt the authorities finding what’s left of you will be able to identify you without a DNA comparison. My mom, and any woman who marries any of the males in this family and stays married to him for any length of time, are perfectly capable of taking care of themselves. So offend them all you want; it’s a self correcting problem.

Oh, and I like geeky references and would just adore whimsical, cleverly elliptical posts to my comment threads, although I suspect I’d get annoyed if someone started posting a whole lot of Harry Potter-speak here, just for one example.

If there is a universal rule on this blog, it is quite simply, Do Not Be A Bigger Asshole Than The Blogger. In fact, if you can avoid it (and most of my small number of regular posters avoid it with style and panache) Don’t Be An Asshole At All. I am quite a big enough asshole myself to supply all the assholiness necessary for any blog, and I will continue to keep this blog well furnished with stupid remarks, doltish mistakes, whiney rationalizations, and defensive recriminations by the ton lot, there can be no doubt. You need bring none of your own asshole nature with you, I have plenty and am always willing to share.

---

THE INEVITABLE DISCLAIMER

By generally accepted social standards, I'm not a likable guy. I'm not saying that to get cheap reassurances. It's simply the truth. I regard many social conventions in radically different ways than most people do, I have many many controversial opinions, and I tend to state them pretty forthrightly. This is not a formula for popularity in any social continuum I've ever experienced.

In my prior blogs, I took the fairly standard attitude: if you don't like my opinions or my blog, don't read the fucking thing.

Having given that some more thought, though, I'm not going to say that this time around, because I've realized that what this is basically saying is, 'if you don't like what I have to say, tough, I don't want to hear it, don't even bother to tell me, just go away'.

And that's actually a pretty worthless attitude. It's basically saying, 'I don't want to hear anything except unconditional agreement and approval'. And that's nonsense. This is still a free country... for a little while longer, anyway... and if you really feel you just gotta send me a flame, or post one on my comment threads (assuming they actually work, which I cannot in any way guarantee) then by all means, knock yourself out.

Unless your flame is exceptionally cogent, witty, or stylish, though, I will most likely ignore it. You do have a right to say anything you want (although I'm not sure that's a right when you're doing it in my comment threads, but hey, you can certainly send all the emails you want). However, I have an equal right not to read anything I don't feel like reading... and I'm really quick with the delete key... as various angry folks have found in the past, when they decided they just had to do their absolute level best to make me as miserable as possible.

So, if you don't like my opinions, feel free to say so. However, if I find absolutely nothing worthwhile in your commentary, I will almost certainly not respond to it in any way.

Stupidity, ignorance, intolerance... these things are only worth my time and attention if they're entertaining. So unless you can be stupid, ignorant, and/or intolerant with enough wit, style, and/or panache to amuse me... try to be smart, informed, and broad minded when you write me.

---