"politically correct"

Some things are bull and it's not worth calling them on it. Some things are bull and they are worth being called out. And today on Cesar Chavez day, I'd like to take this time to call out the bullshit that "multiculturalism" has become. So, we know what multiculturalism is, in general, it's respect for other people and their cultures, "other" being those that are different from YOU. Or at least...that's what multiculturalism is supposed to be about.

But here at CSUMB, that's not what it's about. Not even close. And it's sad really, for a school that is supposed to have multiculturalism as a founding principle of it's design. But then, it's not really CSUMB's fault, because what they're doing is really the same as dozens of other places have been doing for the last decade and a half or so. It's really just a problem that has been integrated into multiculturalism so much, that people barely realize it's a problem.

There are all kinds of different people in the world, asian, indian, middle eastern, black, brown, red, and yeah, that accounts for everyone. Oh...wait, there's still "white" people. It's kinda sad, saying "white people", like there's some kind of grand consesnsus between white people the world over on what they're like. Europe is banding together like never before, and there's still several dozen languages and cultures there.

But this is the problem with multiculturalism, the flaw that has become part of the system. White people are not seen as another group of people with a culture and a presense to be respected right along with the rest, it's seen as the color white is seen, boring, basic, bland, and empty. Descendants of native americans often complain about their "lost" or "destroyed" heritages that they're trying to get back. Blacks often try to create some kind of quasi-africanism and mexicans celebrate the fact that they're not from America.

But white people are constantly told they don't have a culture, and if they do, it's a "bad" one because it's about consumerisim, or capitalisim, or oppression, or racisim. I have met almost half a dozen people(read: PEOPLE, not all are white) who'd side with me to start a "white unity" club on campus, or something to that degree. And I know what you're first thought is: "ZOMG!!! WHITE POWER NAZI RACIST KKK!!!!11" And I know why you thought that too, because that's what multiculturalism has taught you to think. And I wonder, of you reading this, how many of you are white?

There are clubs for Mexicans and they're not racist clubs. There are clubs for blacks and those aren't racist clubs. Heck, I know whites can join at least one of the black clubs on campus. So why is a white club that would do essentially the same thing, respect others, talk about sterotypes and all that, be inherantly thought of as "racist"? Well, I believe the quote given to me by a friend, from the administration here on campus sums it up pretty well: "we don't celebrate white-people holidays."

This is of course, in reference to why we have Cesar Chavez day off but not President's Day. Great as Abe Lincoln or George Waashington may have been, famous as they still are today, they are white people. And celebrating anything white-related is against multiculturalism, and thus, bad, and since you are celebrating something of white people, you must be like white people, and therefore: racist.

This friend's girlfriend told me of how some students tried to start a club like I mentioned above, something just like the other cultural clubs do, the only difference: it was started by white people and about respecting cultures. There was over a month in hearings and trials alone. The school simply would not approve it and their arguments were the expected ones, that, in short, whites are bad.

The University of Delaware had a program that when you signed up for the school it read in short: "all whites are inherantly racist, if you wish to correct this problem, the school will provide services to help." lolwut? Yeah, this university actually said, right in it's cirriculum, what is now a founding priniciple of "multiculturalisim", that all whites are racist and bad. After several years, the school changed it(rather recently I might add), but the ideology remains. How can this be "multiculturalism", when a significant cultural and ethnic group is being racistly discriminated against?

In short, it's not, and it hasn't been for a long time. "Multiculturalism" has become "anti-whiteism", an ideology that all non-white cultures are to be celebrated, not for any particular reason, but simply because they're not white. Which is why I call upon you, whomever you are, if you're reading this, and I don't care what race, ethnicity or culture you are part of, to just stop for a moment and say to yourself: "when I'm respecting other people, am I really including everyone in that?"

I'm not asking for special treatment, I'm asking for you to take a look at the system and really look to see if when they say: "We respect all cultures." that any culture and it's people who desire respect in that system, are given it. Regardless of their skin color, and that people aren't inherantly seen as racist because of something they have no control over. It's not "fair play", it's not "revenge" and if it is, then really take a look at who the racist is. If you think it's fair for whites to be disrespected or treated pooly based on the actions of people with the same skin color in the past, then yeah, the only real racist is the one in your mirror.

And now....

So, it's been a while I suppose, not that enough people read this to really notice, but anyway, I have a good subject for my thoughts...

So, today I'd like to take a moment to talk to you about 'net neutrality. Which is short for Internet Neutrality. It's a bit of regulation that's trying to go through congress at the moment. I'm sure most of you don't know what it is, so here's the short story.

You pay somebody, be it a school, Verizon, AT&T or Earthlink or AOL to access the internet. You ave given a maximum amount of speed(bandwidth) to go to whatever website you want, read what you want, play games over the net like WoW, or whatever. You are paying, essentially, for a certain size pipe, the bigger the pipe, the more speed you have on the net.

However, several companies aren't happy making billions of dollars from this situation. They're apparently come to the conclusion that bloggers like you and me, need to pay for the pipe on our end. If we don't pay, then the service provider can limit or block access to our page. It would in short mean that we would have to pay every company that does this a fee, likly about the same amount the average person pays for the average internet connection.

Basically, what the change is, is that instead of the user who wants to surf the net paying for a certain amount of access, the pages they are trying to access would have to pay the company in order to get accessed. And as all of us bloggers are aware, there are a lot of people, if not most of the people with websites, who depend on people being able to freely access their page. Whether it be for reading a blog or fan-page of their fav baseball player.

This is a move that is completly unaceptable and should not be permitted, legally enforced if it must. Companies provided internet access for years without this kind of setup, and the only reason they are doing it now is TO MAKE MORE MONEY. Owners and presidents of these companies take home more in a year than most people do in a lifetime. Capitalisim is great and all, but capitalism comes second to freedom. The internet is a place of freedom.

As an artist....

It's kinda funny to listen to people speak and read posts. I am sort of a diversified artist, I write, I speak, and I create(in a variety of forms). As such, it is fun to read things, especially things where somebody has an agenda to promote. It's curious to watch for certain words, certain poetry and writing keys that show that what the person is writing is not simply to get their point across.

It is also to get their point across and have you agree with them, alliteration, rhyming words, sections that read fast, sections with incomprehensible words and sentence structures so confusing they make M.C. Escher's drawings look plausible. Oh, and comparisons, yes, comparisons will abound as they compare the massive complex systems of internal and external politics to something as simple as pouring water into a glass or fixing a taco.

And when you stop and just think about some of the comparisons, even for a moment, you realize how absurd they are. International politics is nothing like a taco! Yet, you remember, that just a moment ago, you were nodding in agreement with them. You were saying to yourself "you know, that's really true". What's true? They didn't even compare anything, they just said international politics are like tacos.

The argument capitalizes on two things, the first: that you won't be thinking. You will get so absorbed into their writing that you will stop thinking for yourself, and just start agreeing. And second, most importantly, that when you are thinking, you're only thinking with your imagination. if they say international realtions are like tacos, then you'll start thinking about how France is the onions, how Italy are the olives, and how the US is the meat, and the UN is the shell. Or something in that order. And then when you confront them on how you think the system works, they'll tell you "yes". So that you will think you understood this great and complicated topic that they put forth when really you just invented it all in you head.

And the final icing on the cake, the bait and switch. That is they will start talking about "international politics" and comparaing them to tacos, and then they will move on to "international relations" and blurr the two together. And while they are similar concepts, they are not excatly the same as each other. And then it's "foreign relations" and they just keep blurring words around until all of a sudden they're comparaing something that is completly unrealted to the original subject.

However, due to your lack of thinking and heavy use of your imagination instead of the logical parts of your brain that would have told you tacos and international politics have nothing in common, you just sit there and nod in agreement.

Now, kindy stop reading, re-read this post and see where I just did it. ^_^

99.99^nth%

You know, germs aren't the spawn of Satan. They're quite healthy in fact, people who get sick and recover are decidedly stronger and more resilient to later diseases, colds, infections and the like.

Yeah, I know why you did it, it's always done in the name of the children. But people, children have some of the best immune systems of all of us. They're designed TO get sick. So that they will become stronger, healthier, and more likly to pass on their genes. It's part of their setup. If you prevent them from getting sick, they will be MORE likly to get sick later in life, and they will be MORE likly to have serious symptons.

Your immune system is only good for about half your life, then it starts going downhill. That's why kids are supposed to get chicken pox, that's why it's deadly to adults. Because a child's immune system is fluid, it's flexible, it's new. And an adults immune system is slow, it is fixed, and the body had not adapted itsself to the threats presented by various diseases

So for the health and well being of your kids, don't be a clean freak, let them get sick, help them get healthy. Isolation from disease is NO defense.