Age Of Information: Not Intelligence

We live in an age of information, but not intelligence; where speed means more than diligence. Do this, get that, eat this, get fat. We wonder why the world is the way that it is and it's because our obsession with doing things faster and "better" has stolen the meaning of dedication and we have replaced honor with fame. We care more if people remember our name than if they live or die. The idea of independence is covered with the idea of security and freedom is valued under safety.
This forces us to think like fake people. Real people struggle with reality and the crushing pain that reality brings. Real people struggle with knowing that there is no way to know everything. Real people, well real people struggle with themselves. Society will say one thing, someone will say something else; then people are left to struggle with discerning what is true.

In this video CollegeHumor shows an intellectual interrogation of religion and portrays it using humor. I feel like if more people were to watch this it would help them to see that it’s not about what you say so much as it is how you say it. I wish there were videos like this for all things in life. What do you think about living in an age of information but not intelligence? How do you feel about real people? What do you think of this video?

Mocking Racism

The idea of mocking racism is one that makes me personally chuckle. In Chad’s post he poses the questions: “Do you think that mocking racism is appropriate? How much do you hate Tosh.O?” To answer the first question I first have to interrogate the word appropriate. I think that when it comes to deciding what is appropriate a person has to look at venue, audience, and timing. If a person is in a setting in which some kind of race humor would be looked down upon then it is probably not appropriate. For example, if at a church that has a body of mixed races it would probably not be the kind of location where dropping a joke of any kind is acceptable let alone jokes that mock racism. However, if you are just chilling at home and you have some people over that is an acceptable venue but you have to be mindful of who your house guests are. Given the perfect situation with the perfect audience, timing is still really important. In fact, it is important in two ways, when telling a joke the timing of the story or joke is really important but when making jokes that mock racism you have to keep in mind current events and make sure that you are not guilty of making a joke “too soon.” To answer Chad's second question: not very much, I don't exactly care about him either way.

Response to Alex's Blog

Alex's blog caused me to think about my childhood and how humorous parts of it were. She said that humor comes in all shapes and sizes and the story I want to share with the world is from when I weighed less than 60 pounds and first demonstrated leadership qualities. I was probably about six years old and I found myself hanging out with my two best friends at the time. The three of us were just boys being boys when I found myself in an unexpected situation. My mother had heard me say a naughty word that I was explicitly not allowed to say and I was to be punished.
I was obviously not correcting my behavior enough in response to spankings so she decided to be innovative and use a different punishment on me and make me be an example for my friends. She dragged me to the bathroom at the end of the hall with our audience keeping a close eye on what was going on and she grinned in victory as she took the bar of soap from the sink and handed it to me. She instructed me to put it in my mouth in order to wash the filth from it. Unfortunately for her parenting strategy, I was an attention-loving child with an audience. I took a bite of the soap. Not only did I take a bite of the soap but I proceeded to chew it up and blow bubbles. I apparently made it look so fun that my friends felt left out and so they tried to get their turn with the bar of soap. It was at that moment that my mom realized that she was going to have to strategize her punishments better for such a formidable opponent.

Comic Relief

When I was a little kid my parents would tell my big sister and I stories before we went to sleep. My dad would generally either read us a book or make up a story for us generally including us in the story whereas my mom would usually just tell us stories about life. One of my most vivid memories of a story that my mom told me was the story of her grandmother's funeral. It was hilarious.
I know that hilarity is rarely associated with death unless someone is talking about Weekend at Bernie’s but this story had something about it that really tickled me pink. That thing that really made me laugh is called comic relief, but at the time I didn’t know it. In the story my mom described the setting and told us all about this backwoods church and all of her relatives and her grandmother’s friends who were there; all dressed in black. She then went on to explain that her father, my grandfather, was one of the people who was expected to go up and speak. As he walked up onto the stage he discovered one of the fundamental laws of physics, Amontons' First Law: The force of friction is directly proportional to the applied load. To clarify, my grandfather slipped and fell on his ass. My mom said that this caused the room to enter an uproarious state of laughter and really helped to ease the mood.
In Elizabeth’s post she asked if I thought comic relief is necessary, which I have to say that I do think that, and she also asked if I think that all movies need it in order to be successful, which I have to say that I don’t. Life without comic relief would be life without peace, without calm, but a movie that lacks comic relief can easily still be successful. One has to keep in mind that comic relief implies that there is something to be relieved from so all of the successful slapstick style comedies don’t use comic relief they use other kinds of comedy. Dramas often abstain from using comic relief because it can lessen the serious tone of the film but that doesn’t mean it can’t still be successful. At the end of the day, comic relief is just like anything else; it has a time and a place.

In Response To Keyu

Racial stereotypes have the potential to be either fairly accurate to the race as a whole or only based on a minority of the population. A common Chinese racial stereotype is that they are very smart people who are driven and academically gifted. This stereotype really shows its head in Chinese comedy. I would describe this kind of comedy as dry and intellectual; the kind of humor that you have to think about to laugh at. While I think that I personally have a dry sense of humor at times I really don’t think that my personal sense of humor holds a candle to some of the Chinese comedy I have been exposed to.

The movie King of Comedy by Stephen Chow is a fairly complex example for all the reason’s Keyu explained in her blog. Based on her representation of Mr. Chow and his involvement with this film I agree with her assessment and even though I don’t find this film all that humorous I did think that it was a work of art. It did a good job showing me another culture and another life. Without doing a lot more research I cannot comment on much more than that where these things are concerned. What I can say is that American comedians and creators of comedies could learn a lot from this film, its creator, and the culture surrounding it. 

Vine

I procrastinated a lot when it came to writing this blog post due to the fact that I wasn't sure quite what to say. I think that vines can be funny but I think that the vast majority of them are a swing and a miss. Some people like to look at other people looking stupid but when it is in such an awkward way (at times) it makes it very hard for me to stay tuned. I myself have some such vines on my account wherein I look very awkwardly stupid and I leave them up there to remind myself not to get to prideful. Back to the point, Vine is an underdeveloped art form that usually misses the mark. When I want to waste hours of my time I have better things to do. In order to help illustrate my point I am going to share six things that are better for wasting hours than Vine.

1. Facebook - It helps me to see what my friends and family (those that use Facebook) are up to and it helps me to keep in touch with them. I can also use it to see what is going on in the world, find obscure things that people I know have recently found, and of course entertain myself by passive aggressively friending and un-friending people. Plus, it is a place I can go to complain.
2. Twitter - See Facebook*. (*replace friending with following and emphasize the complaining)
3. Television - Channel surfing and watching TV is a great way to waste a few hours. 
4. Netflix - In the modern era one of the best ways to consume visual media is to see if it is on Netflix. The appropriate response to finding things on Netflix that you would like to watch is to start binge watching those things.
5. Read a book - Although an antiquated activity that few people in my generation seem to do reading a book is an enjoyable pastime that might actually be good for you. If you choose the right book you can be not only entertained, but enthralled, for hours at a time. 
6. Poke someone - This might sound like it is an annoying thing to do but it isn't annoying to the person doing it. If you can keep at it for hours then that is impressive but if not, at least you are being social. 

My Favorite TV Oldie

Asking me if I have a favorite TV oldie is like asking me if I have a favorite book. There are simply too many for me to pick a favorite. Some of the older shows I really like are Three's Company, Home Improvement, and Married.. With Children. I know they are oldies because my parents enjoyed them but, that being said, they're not super innocent. Three's Company is about three young adults who live together and there are constant references to sex, tons of implied sexuality, and a load of physical humor. Even though this is very different than Home Improvement they share a couple of things. One of the main things that they share is references to sex. There is a good balance in Home Improvement between family values and adult references so that it is a good show for the whole family. Married.. With Children is not a good show for the whole family. It paints humanity in a terrible light as it shows the life of Al Bundy, women's shoe salesman, his kind of whorish wife with her cheetah print, and the two kids they had together. It is raunchy and cheap and hilarious to me and many other fans. So it is nothing other than the fact that I like the shows that I like that makes me enjoy these classic TV oldies.

Never Laugh When You're In Trouble

     Never ever laugh when you're in trouble. I don't mean when don't laugh when you're scared, because that is the best time to laugh, I am saying when you are in the process of being reprimanded or beaten you should definitely not laugh. And you definitely shouldn't laugh so hard you fall out of your chair. 

     Once I was in trouble with my dad because I busted a hole in a wall. I was probably about thirteen years old and I had a bit of a temper and so did my dad. In the midst of his yelling at me I burst out laughing at the utter ridiculousness of it all. It was a poor decision. I ended up having to pay to have the hole fixed after trying, and failing, to fix it myself. On that day I promised to never again kick a wall while wearing Crocs because it was obvious that the wall couldn't handle the Croc's majesty.

      Another time I was at church and I had cut Sunday school so that I could walk to Taco Bell with my friends. When I got back there was still time left int he service so I decided to fool around with my friends. We went out to the sign leading into the church and we sat on it. Apparently we were distracting passing traffic and the police had to come and remove us from the sign. That is another bad time to start to laugh at the situation you are in. There was no way to explain our sober behavior to the nice police officers though so I was forced to chortle. It was interesting to explain to my parents why they had to pick me up from a security holding location. 

     Finally, the story you were all waiting for, I was told to sit and wait. This was right after I got a concussion and I was supposed to wait to be checked out. I was sitting and waiting and listening to my coach tell me what I had done wrong to get lit up the way that I did. I just started laughing. I laughed myself off my chair and onto the floor. And that's how you piss off a football coach.

A Day Wasted

As one wise man once said “A day without laughter is a day wasted” – Charlie Chaplin
Do you think that laughter can cure anything?

Charlie Chaplin once said, "A day without laughter is a day wasted," but I feel like you laugh a lot more when you spend a day wasted. In fact, if you're messed up I assure you that your day will be better, that is unless you are a bed wetter. I promise, if that's where you're at then you're less fit than the cat in a hat to do anything but look at that pile of fat. The drink, the drink, the toilet and sink, filled with your nonsense up to the brink. I wonder if dear Charlie knew this or if he went Aussie and drank of the piss. As far as the question of healing with laughter, do you feel better hereafter?

My Thoughts On "Funny Bone Humor"

       "Funny Bone Humor" is an under-appreciated art form in some ways and it is a load of dumb luck in others. People who intentionally look for it/create it, like Steve-O, have had to find the line between pointless pain and humor in order to exploit it. There are tons of fail videos on Youtube which are cringe-worthy and funny; and cringe-worthy and not funny at all. Looking back on recorded media for similar kinds of comedy brings me back to The Three Stooges. 

       The Three Stooges were an iconic group of slapstick comedians who had their hay-day in black and white. They are the classic humans associated with physical comedy and they were a huge inspiration for the creator of Tom and Jerry. If it weren't for the Stooges there is a chance that the modern genre of comedy wouldn't have become so developed by now. That means that the world could be a less funny place. If the world weren't as funny as it is, a lot of people would probably struggle to cope with life. 

       In my life there are a lot of examples of this kind of humor. One of my favorite early memories is when my friends and I as kids would practice being hit so that we could be tougher and my friend Tiger punching a tooth out of my mouth. It was hilarious.

Taking A Break

In life sometimes people need to take a break. If I were bolder I would have posted just that line and hoped that my readers would understand that it was a reference to an incontinuity theory implying humor. Instead I am going to explain different kinds of breaks. Each day when I complement a passerby that is a break in their day. A disruption. When I decide to comment on another person's conversation or laugh at another persons joke that is a break in their lives. In the natural order. Sometimes. Things. Break. But sometimes they just keep going on. 

A Sticky Note

Itch, scratch, itch, scratch,

Letter, match, letter, match,

Find the things you seek and need,

Give yourself what you need to feed,

I require the words of men,

Scribbles, scrabbles, what then?

Pictures, stories, moments suspended,

Far surviving though it's time has ended,

Ink, blood, tales flood my ears,

Tales of my fears,

Fire, burning the houses and,

Books thrown out by king's demand,

Interesting it is to be a page,

Infinite possibility in any age,

White, yellow, light, mellow,

Even if I am only used for a nice polite hello.

WWJD: Probably Not What You Think

In a recent blog post by my friend Mary she links a clip to Jimmy Fallon's show wherein he does his famous thank you note bit. One of the jokes he makes during this bit has to do with WWJD bracelets and how Jesus probably wouldn't have worn them. Personally, I think that is kind of obvious.. since he would definitely wear a WWID bracelet. Cruddy joke aside, I think that there are a lot of things that Jesus would do, and did do, that are not what the common modern person would think. He spent time with undesirables, hookers, and the lower class. Those things seem to contradict what a lot of his followers choose to do with their time. He never seemed to be the kind of person who would exclude people, be racist, be stingy, be obsessed with artwork of himself, pay for stained glass, care if people dressed up for their day off, or do any of the other things that his followers seem to do for him. However, he would tell people to love each other, to break laws that were unjust, to be humble, and lots of other positive things that most people just don't do. People seem to forget that Jesus was a loving, peaceful man who once went to a party and turned water into wine. He taught that one does not "fish for men" by refusing to cast nets and acting superior, he does so by connecting with them where they are and leading them from where they are to where they need to be. So when asked the question WWJD, the answer really seems to be "not be a dick."

Everyone Is A Bit Psychopathic

The video above is a little long but honestly I find it fascinating. It calls into question a field that we all know is a little bit messed up. We live in a society where norms are disorders and disorders are normal. We live in a society where everyone is medicated or we think they should be. In this video there is a testimony of a man who sees this but is still a part of our society enough to where he follows societal expectations. He calls for a first step of acknowledgment, not action, which is probably the best way to fiat longterm change.

The Theory of Catching

Often times we act with the best intentions but our results couldn’t have been worse had we tried. In fact, there are times in which not doing anything is better then doing something but do we? No! It is not in our nature as people to just let things be we feel the need to make everything “better” if that is expressed by “The White Man’s Burden”, “The Communist Manifesto”, or any other idea in which we are expecting ourselves to intercede on the behalf of someone who we consider to be lacking can be equally shown as our need to try to catch things as they fall, pick up broken pieces or really anything else caused by what we think is “chaos”.
This morning I watched as my towel fell to the floor of my bathroom. A normal phenomena to be sure except for one thing, my shaving mirror was sitting upon it. I know, I can hear all of you as your minds scatter to attempt to save the mirror with your minds but it wasn’t needed. I myself just watched as the towel hit the ground and my mirror rolled off of it gently to the ground and no damage came to either one. Right now you are all thinking that this is an anomaly or a miracle but please just think about all the times that you have tried to catch something and ended up batting it away and causing probably more damage than if it had just been allowed to fall. The amounts of cell phone screens, glass cups, sunglasses, and other small fragile objects that have been launched at the hand of a well intentioned person is probably higher then the number of “miracles” like mine simply because there are far more attempts to save then there are people willing to just let whatever it is fall. That doesn’t mean be careless and never try to catch anything it just means that you need to only try to catch what you are sure you can, not the things that will make you feel bionic if you actually manage to touch.
This “Theory of Catching” can also be directly correlated with how we should treat people. If we know we can catch them we should, but sometimes we just have to watch as they fall. I know that I have tried to catch people who didn’t want to be caught and in the end I do more harm then good in those kinds of situations. We all think that we can help but when we really think about it we know that some situations are outside of our control and we just need to accept that and move on. Nothing is worse then investing in someone who doesn’t want it and falling alongside them. It can’t be avoided, if someone you place yourself close to falls you will fall too, perhaps just not as much. It’s like we are all on a bed sheet, when one part depresses the whole area near that part is forced into a depression as well, the farther away the shallower the depression. Sometimes the sheet needs to tear and we need to just let the person depress their self; so that we can stay where we are. Just because we are acting with our best intentions doesn’t mean that we are really doing anything helpful; we can’t help them all so sometimes we should just watch as they fall.

I'm All Set

“The world is your oyster,” a sweet friend of mine once told me. Immediately I smiled, then I started to wonder what that could possibly mean. Does it mean that the world looks like crap from the outside but on the inside it’s all shiny? Does it mean that sometimes when you get through the rough stuff you find a pearl? Does it mean that if you can figure out how to break your world wide open you can get sustenance? I guess what it really means is a matter of perspective.

Another famous saying is “when life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” When I was younger I really hated that saying because I wanted to ask the question, “If life only gave you lemons where do you get the sugar or the water?” Now that I am older I can honestly say that you have to work for the sugar and the water, in fact you will probably have to work for the lemons. Lemons are meant to signify the hard times that life sends our way but I choose to see them as the moments that help you to appreciate the better times. If every moment of life was happy then how could we appreciate the times that aren’t? Without lemons how can we appreciate how good lemonade is? Life is lemonade and the lemons just help each and every person to appreciate the sweeter times. 

In high school I had a teacher who was famous for a handful of catch phrases or tag lines such as “if you’re not cheating you’re not trying,” and “perception is reality.” Applying the second tagline to “the world is your oyster” can yield surprising results. For some people it means that if you find out how to do something you can be rewarded and for other people it means not everything is how it seems. For me it means if I can figure out how to get into the world then I can use life’s lemons as a delicious ingredient in my feast. Because if the world is my oyster and life gives me lemons then I guess I’m all set.