A History of Lies

I watched the movie "Glory" for the first time yesterday. I support the making of another film with both Denzel Washington and Morgan Freeman. They could be detectives solving a murder mystery. Samuel L. Jackson could be the chief of police. Dave Chapelle would be the new recruit. George Clooney would be the murderer.
Best. Movie. Ever.

While watching "Glory" the character played by Matthew Broderick fights in the Battle of Antietam. I was getting caught up in the suspense, not knowing who would die, or, surprisingly, who would win. I had no idea who was going to win this battle. It's a little sad. I've been an American for 24 years and I have no idea about the bloodiest chapter of my nation's history.

Now before any one jumps to conclusions and calls me ignorant, stupid, and an uneducated swine, I would like everyone to know that I am a college educated individual. And that is where the really sad part comes in. I went to school for 17 years. Seventy percent of my life thus far has been spent on learning. Or has it?

I have taken, at the very least, three U.S History classes. One in High School, and two at the University I attended. And I don't know who wins the Battle of Antietam. In fact there is lots about the Civil War I don't know. I don't know how it ended. I know the Union won, but mainly because this nation is still intact and not divided into several smaller nations. I know it began by a firing on Ft. Sumter (at least I think so) but I don't know who held Ft. Sumter or who fired on it. And why were they firing? I didn't even know the course of the Battle of Gettysburg until I saw the movie Gettysburg. And I didn't know the outcome of Antietam until I saw "Glory". I know more about the Civil War from Hollywood, than I do from the education that I have worked most of my life for.

'How did this come to be?' you may ask. Well, It's simple really. Each of the classes I took went in depth into many areas of U.S. History. The Revolution, Reconstruction, World War I and II, The Great Depression, etc. But each time we came chronologically to the Civil War, the teacher/professor would say, "We don't have time to cover the Civil War. It's far too expansive and long to cover in one week." I guess at the time I should have stood up and said, "Can you at least tell me who started it?"

So there we have it. Both the U.S educational system, and my own pursuits of education have failed me terribly in the case of the Civil War. Eight year olds in China probably have a better idea of what happened in the American Civil War than I do. This system desperately needs to change. To say that something is "too big" to study may be one of the most absurd statements I've heard. Why not have high school classes specifically on the war? Why not drop some topics that may not be as interesting? Is Prohibition really that important? I don't think so. Prohibition: "The Government thought people were drinking too much, so the consumption of alcohol was outlawed. But all that happened was it was driven underground. Crime was rampant for a few years until it was legal again." The End. Show the kids some pictures of the time and you have about as much knowledge as anyone needs to ever have.

Too big to study goes right along the lines of another statement I've heard recently; Too big to fail. I wish our educational system was that way, but unfortunately it's failing perfectly well under its current status.

I'm not too broken up about not knowing about the Civil War. Education is easy to come by thanks to Wikipedia, and it's free. Besides if I read an untrue and unreferenced statement in Wikipedia, at least it's more accurate than what the U.S. Educational System tried to tell me: It's too big to study.

So You Think You Can Prance?

Bit by bit as time has gone by, I've learned to survive independently in this world. Ten years ago I wouldn't have believed it myself, but what 14 year old actually envisions themselves living on their own one day (Other than one from a broken household)? I forgot a payment on my credit card. Of course I was hit with quite a high interest rate. Once I realized my mistake I immediately paid the full amount. It was just a simple switch in my head that I flipped. Most people, upon realizing what they owe would've either thrown away the statement, or called in a furious rage. I base my "most people" statistic upon the ever enduring economy we currently are under. If banks and home owners had been more responsible this mess would not have gotten so bad, but I digress.

While writing that check, my mind was going through this simple explanation, "I signed a contract and said if I didn't pay up, this is what I owe." It was simple to me. Some people however, don't seem to understand this concept. Or perhaps they don't understand that typically one should use their credit card like a debit card. I'm not really talking about the people who have credit cards for emergencies, or the ones who use them to pay off education. Mostly I'm talking about the irresponsible greedy people who have $20,000 of debt because they bought too many clothes and jewelry and can't help themselves. I have one word for these people: STOP. If these people have as much time on their hands and as much fictional money, the least they can do is donate some of their used and unused purchases to goodwill and other places. How come no one goes in debt because they donated $20,000 to charity? Why isn't there that impulse in some of us? This is the reason I don't hold much hope for humanity. We're greedy, irresponsible people who only look out for ourselves. We take what we don't need and don't give what we don't want.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not entirely negative. Most people are friendly enough to strangers and most people obey the law. But we look out only for ourselves, and sometimes those who are close to us. Nothing more than that. There are good things in this world, people who are wholly selfless. But I can't help but think there are other people out who will take advantage of another person's kindness. I've seen and heard it happen before and I don't expect it to stop.

Anyway the point of all this is, spend wisely and don't abuse your credit card. If we can stop doing that, then maybe we can move on to other things, like focusing on helping other people. Or maybe improving our education and health care systems. What's amazing to me is people don't like to pay taxes, but some of them love to owe money to corporations that they wouldn't be in debt to if they had been a little more responsible.

The Burn of Salt

I guess it's a pretty popular thing now to go up on stage and interrupt someone's acceptance speech in what is maybe that person's happiest moment.

I'm not quite sure when everyone hopped on board the asshole train in this country, but count me out because I am a human being. I have respect for other people and the more I look around, the less of that there seems to be.

If Taylor Swift had punched Kanye West in the balls, I don't think anyone would've minded, except for Kanye. And now this has spread to the Academy Awards. I assume it won't be long before making an acceptance speech is the last thing anyone wants to do because of inconsiderate people lurking in the shadows, waiting for that perfect moment to jump in. Hell, I bet It'll be the focus of some new reality show.

I consider myself to be a decent person. I have my faults, but who doesn't, right? Yet, despite my outward kindness towards others upon a first meeting, and subsequent meetings if applicable, it seems I'm always left disappointed. A good, solid, and perhaps, long lasting friendship starts to form, good times are shared and eventually I end up left behind. If I went wrong, apparently I'm not self reflective enough to see where. I'm not all that social of a person. It's rather difficult for me to find someone I really enjoy hanging out with. Yet I do like to hang out with people, but it seems to be such a rare event in my life. And it seems to be a recurring theme that people that I've chosen to hang with, eventually decide they have something better to do, and I'm left with my thumb up my ass. If I was flaky, like never showing up, I would understand. If my temper flew off randomly when I'm in public, I would understand. And if I never talked or said entertaining things I might understand. But I do my best to show up, engage in the conversation and though I have a temper, it usually shows up in the privacy of my home, not where others can see it.

I used to wonder why precisely I never hung out with people. Now it seems that I don't want be left in the dust again. It's rude to cancel for arbitrary reasons, or say you've made plans for the same time after we discussed our plans together. If you don't want to hang out, just say so, it's less painful and my time won't be wasted.

All I want is a reliable friend...

A Prancing Pony is a Beautiful Thing

I can't quite focus on the negative things right now, I guess today is a pretty good day.

This past weekend I discovered an extremely simple, girly and fun game through Adult Swim Games. It is called Robot Unicorn Attack. If you have played this, then you have seen the utopia that we all dream of. It is a game that consists of nothing more than a robot unicorn dashing and jumping from one far off ledge to another while chasing a fairy butterfly entity and bashing through silver stars. There is so much purple in the game, your retinas will be burned out by the color. All the while the song "Always" by Erasure will be stuck in your head and you will leave home humming it to yourself. There is no point to the game. You just dash from ledges and plow through stars to earn points merely so you can brag about it to your coworkers.

Sorry Chile, you had your earthquake too late, Haiti got all of the attention.

One of the good things about the Olympics being over is all these companies can stop trying to be so damn motivational during their commercials and go back to the same old boring crap they do best for the next two years.