Penny Hero (dot) Net

I’m really fricken annoyed with customer-service conventions and the way they dictate how to answer questions. I asked a pretty direct question, “can I make a payment using a rebate card?” and a simple “no you cannot” would have been fine. Instead they write 5 paragraphs about what things I can do online, like transfer funds between accounts, pay from an outside checking account, etc.

what a waste of time.

I suppose they’ll get fired if they ever just say “no you can’t” or something. that’s ridiculous when it’s a direct yes or no question.

Just for a second, I’m going to pretend that I’m a political/news blogger…

This story is CNN covering Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s remarks about the Holocaust being a “myth” as part of his argument for the elimination of Israel and the reinstall of a Palestinian state. Now, these comments are absolutely deplorable, unacceptable, and evil. The Holocaust was not a fucking myth, and “[a]ll responsible leaders in the international community” agree, so I’m not worried about this idea spreading and being generally accepted.

I’m not an expert in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and I sure as fuck have never expressed my opinions/views/limited-understandings of it online before, and I also don’t have any actual personal ties to it other than the fact that a few generations ago, my descendants ancestors (thanks rio) came to the US from Lebanon. (and I still have a lot to learn.) Even though I truly believe that the Israelis rightly deserve a home-country, my gut instinct is also to be sympathetic to Palestine, which I also know isn’t too unreasonable of a position; most educated people realize that there is no way to truly “take sides” because the history (like all history) of the conflict is complicated and both the “west” and the “mid-east” parties involved have blood on their hands. Maybe it’s naive to “just want to have peace” or to have a place where both Israeli and Palestine can exist together without neighboring countries and western powers trying to tie each other’s hands behind their backs. No, not “maybe.” It’s totally naive. It’s a sentiment that’s expressed to death in fairy tales and “can’t we all just get along” hippy sentiments.

The world is Fucked Up. (Notice how that’s also a sentiment that’s expressed to death.)

But this also highlights and deepens my understanding of how mid-east leaders must feel like they, and their nations, are being patronized by western national leaders. They’re not allowed to develop nuclear programs, and their peoples are often met with suspicion and hate from our peoples. Terrorism/freedom-fighting is the result of not having any peaceful or recognized avenues of getting their point across to a network of world powers who probably wouldn’t take them seriously anyway, because we’re so invested in Israel (for example), dependent on oil (for example) and in keeping our own version of history popular so that the western population doesn’t start blaming itself and sympathizing with the “other side.”

Statements like this, that the Holocaust is a Myth, is like rhetorical “terrorism” in that he is desperate to support a position that has no legitimate or recognized avenue of expression. Like terrorism, he’s using a tool that is the closest thing we have to being OBJECTIVELY wrong to try to say something about something that’s subjectively right. Palestinian supporters have been trying to have a place to live for decades, and the west, who installed Israel, and Israel itself, isn’t going to just sit down and say “yes, sorry. Here, have your land back.” (look, readers! Another sentiment that is expressed to death!)

Anyway, I’m frustrated with my inability to NOT simply restate what other people say and feel. But I don’t know enough, and I don’t have the right perspective to come up with anything new. I don’t have personal ties to the area, but I still feel so completely tied to this conflict probably because it is so disillusioning. It’s one of those things you learn about the world that makes you realize without a doubt that shit is Fucked Up and that there is no simple solution at all. Its both maturing (like life) and devastating (like death). It’s the same feeling I felt when I started to realize how widespread the illegal sex industry, and people-trafficking industry (CIA pdf, Coalition Against Trafficking in Women pdf, wikipedia + lots of links) is in the US…

*sigh*

Ok. I’m pure tired right now. And there’s no hope for me to find any kind of closure or even try to slap some kind of judgement or solution or strong opinion onto this like many news-bloggers try to do.

Consider me either subvertive, honest, or just plain naive. I don’t care. I want more perspective and I also don’t ever want to have an over-simplified understanding of things like this.

I welcome opinions, information, links, heads of cabbage, and hugs.

Discuss.

(x-posted)

Just for a second, I’m going to pretend that I’m a political/news blogger…

This story is CNN covering Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s remarks about the Holocaust being a “myth” as part of his argument for the elimination of Israel and the reinstall of a Palestinian state. Now, these comments are absolutely deplorable, unacceptable, and evil. The Holocaust was not a fucking myth, and “[a]ll responsible leaders in the international community” agree, so I’m not worried about this idea spreading and being generally accepted.

I’m not an expert in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and I sure as fuck have never expressed my opinions/views/limited-understandings of it online before, and I also don’t have any actual personal ties to it other than the fact that a few generations ago, my ancestors came to the US from Lebanon. (and I still have a lot to learn.) Even though I truly believe that the Israelis rightly deserve a home-country, my gut instinct is also to be sympathetic to Palestine, which I also know isn’t too unreasonable of a position; most educated people realize that there is no way to truly “take sides” because the history (like all history) of the conflict is complicated and both the “west” and the “mid-east” parties involved have blood on their hands. Maybe it’s naive to “just want to have peace” or to have a place where both Israeli and Palestine can exist together without neighboring countries and western powers trying to tie each other’s hands behind their backs. No, not “maybe.” It’s totally naive. It’s a sentiment that’s expressed to death in fairy tales and “can’t we all just get along” hippy sentiments.

The world is Fucked Up. (Notice how that’s also a sentiment that’s expressed to death.)

But this also highlights and deepens my understanding of how mid-east leaders must feel like they, and their nations, are being patronized by western national leaders. They’re not allowed to develop nuclear programs, and their peoples are often met with suspicion and hate from our peoples. Terrorism/freedom-fighting is the result of not having any peaceful or recognized avenues of getting their point across to a network of world powers who probably wouldn’t take them seriously anyway, because we’re so invested in Israel (for example), dependent on oil (for example) and in keeping our own version of history popular so that the western population doesn’t start blaming itself and sympathizing with the “other side.”

Statements like this, that the Holocaust is a Myth, is like rhetorical “terrorism” in that he is desperate to support a position that has no legitimate or recognized avenue of expression. Like terrorism, he’s using a tool that is the closest thing we have to being OBJECTIVELY wrong to try to say something about something that’s subjectively right. Palestinian supporters have been trying to have a place to live for decades, and the west, who installed Israel, and Israel itself, isn’t going to just sit down and say “yes, sorry. Here, have your land back.” (look, readers! Another sentiment that is expressed to death!)

Anyway, I’m frustrated with my inability to NOT simply restate what other people say and feel. But I don’t know enough, and I don’t have the right perspective to come up with anything new. I don’t have personal ties to the area, but I still feel so completely tied to this conflict probably because it is so disillusioning. It’s one of those things you learn about the world that makes you realize without a doubt that shit is Fucked Up and that there is no simple solution at all. Its both maturing (like life) and devastating (like death). It’s the same feeling I felt when I started to realize how widespread the illegal sex industry, and people-trafficking industry (CIA pdf, Coalition Against Trafficking in Women pdf, wikipedia + lots of links) is in the US…

*sigh*

Ok. I’m pure tired right now. And there’s no hope for me to find any kind of closure or even try to slap some kind of judgement or solution or strong opinion onto this like many news-bloggers try to do.

Consider me either subvertive, honest, or just plain naive. I don’t care. I want more perspective and I also don’t ever want to have an over-simplified understanding of things like this.

I welcome opinions, information, links, heads of cabbage, and hugs.

Discuss.

For shits and giggles, I just googled “slack-ass” and one of my results was this pdf file of the talks given at the Madison Informal Linguistics Conference in 1998. Here’s a quote from the panel examining “-ass”:

This paper will examine the current trend in American English to use words associated with scatology as an emphasizing particle (e.g. ‘-ass,’ ‘butt-,’ ‘’n’ shit,’ etc.), which I will henceforth refer to as the “anal-retentive hypothesis (ARH)”.

Hey, I thought it was funny. Especially because ARH is both a pirate noise and the noise some people make when they really need to go, and finally do!

P.S. Faris says the guy on page 3 is an idiot because “Rusty” is an appositive. And naturally, I’d tend to agree of course.

The whole thing might even be a big joke. or a pretend conference. or who knows.

To-do Today: (notice how NONE OF IT INVOLVES ANYTHING HARD LIKE FINALS!!!)

• meet with WC student #1 at 4
• Call Marci to pick me up
• Call Gav to go shopping
• Go shopping
• shower
• cook something for Geff’s
• go to Geff’s
• go to Daniel’s
• get really drunk
• go home happy (didn’t do. Daniel made me cry. the fucker.)

To-do SOON (like tomorrow):

• email the language/culture kids
• finish White Noise
• return library books
• photocopy House Fires
• turn in timesheet
• reply to starred emails
• find Tim on myspace

“The reader hears the first shoe drop and then strains in agony to hear the second. In dramatic terms, it’s like putting a gun on the mantelpiece in Act I and then having the heroine drown herself quietly offstage in the bath during the interval.” (91)

but it’s hard to know how seriously to take her, because her prose is so caffeinated that you can’t always separate the sense from the sensibility.

http://www.newyorker.com/critics/books/?040628crbo_books1

Dream last night:

We took two vehicles to the beach we usually go to, and I arrived late. I couldn’t find my mom when I got there, but I found her stuff. There had been a big wave of people moving out of town last week so all these couches had been on sale, and when I arrived at the beach, I discovered where all the couches had gone: People had bought them to use at the beach. There were dozens of them near us. It looked like the MU lounge on campus. Our couch was blue and very ratty. everyone else’s couches were varying degrees of new or used or pretty.

I saw my mom in the water, so I sat on the couch and waited. I think my brother was there, but I don’t remember. Suddenly I realized that everyone had packed up their couches and were heading home, but my mom wasn’t back yet so I just stayed there. A janitor approached me, an older man with white hair and a humble and warm personality. He told me I had to go, that this area was about to start up as a Chinese restaurant and they needed to set out all the tables. I explained that my mother was still in the water and if I moved, she wouldn’t be able to find me. I was really distressed, but I was also unnecessarily annoyed and spiteful to the old man. Afterall, he’s just doing his job, right? After some argument, I think he saw that I had some unrelated stress on my mind. He reached out and gave me this giant hug and a sincerely sympathetic smile. He said I could stay, but could I just drag my couch closer to the wall? (the beach was slowly converting into a room… for the restaurant?)

So I moved, dissappointed that I had to wait there and couldn’t go to the water, but baffled about his hug.

Finally my mother returned and asked what happened. By this point, our couch was a bed, and we both sat down on it to talk. In conversation she said something like “it’s a good thing you’re going to be an [embassador] here at this hotel.” [I forgot the name of the job] and at first I almost said “yeah, I know.” but then realized I had no idea what she was talking about. I asked. She reminded me that I’d talked with her before about getting a job after I graduate and she had found me one. All I had to do was have two kids, and to bring them to work every day to sit at the edge of the swimming-pool-fountain with the guests and I could have the job.

I was incredulous. “So this means, not only do I have to have kids, but I have to be married?!”
“naturally, yes.”
“And these two kids have to come out of ME??” [I was really disturbed by this for some reason].
“yes, of course”
“This means I have to give up grad school, getting a phd, [I listed four distinct things, all a sequence but I can’t remember them now.]”
My mother didn’t say anything. We argued for a while, she being very polite and calm, and me being angry but stubborn. I was not going to get married and have kids just so I could have some embassador job at a hotel.

But, at the same time, it is a done deal and maybe I could enjoy it, I thought to myself. So I asked, “how much does it pay a year” This whole time, the old man was watching our argument and I came to understand that he wasn’t really a janitor, but he was possibly the owner of the hotel, and that he really cared about me and wanted me to have this job.
My mother hesitated, and then replied: $2,000 a year.
“WHAT?!” I was again pissed. I came to understand that this kind of job-structure was meant to keep the wife dependent on the husband but give her more official responsibility and public personality than him. And my own mother was selling me out to this.

But then there was the old man, who seemed to really care. He genuinely thought this was a good opportunity for me. I felt guilty for being “ungrateful” even while I felt angry that no one seemed to think that I could go out and get a phd.

Basically I refused the job, and refused the chance to have a family. [and it was like a package deal. i take the job and I find love and kids with it].

A strange dream. Obviously connected to the stuff I was thinking about with geek girls. the characters in the story weren’t really from my life. my mom was nothing like my real mom, and I’ve never seen the old man before.

Anyway, dreams will be dreams.

Quote from Malidoma Patrice Some’s autobiography Of Water and the Spirit:

My visual horizon had grown disproportionately. I was discovering that the eye is a machine that, even at its best, can still be improved, and that there is more to sight than just physical seeing. I began to understand that human sight creates its own obstacles, stops seeing where the general consensus says it should. But since my experience with the tree, I began to perceive that we are often watched at close distance by beings that we ourselves cannot see, and that when we do see these otherworldly beings, it is often only after they have given us permission to see further–and only after they have made some adjustments in themselves to preserve their integrity. And isn’t it also tru that there is something secret about everything and everybody?

From page 225, chapter 18.

It’s incredible because it’s implying that this habit we have of hiding parts of ourselves behind masks, or revealing more or less of ourselves to trusted people is a divine and wholesome practice. That it preserves and protects something inside ourselves. The analogy here is a person’s ability to see things in the non-physical world. If they were literal and visibly present all the time, something of their purpose, their essence, and their power would disintegrate. The non-ness, or the hidden-ness is part of their structure and substance.

Have I mentioned lately that I love this book?

The livejournal version of my post about girls and linux is still getting some discussion. I replied to a user’s post, and I wanted to re-post this part of the conversation here too, just for fun. I like that blogger gets more attention from search engines than livejournal, plus I want to save this in a non-lj space.

Basically, davev1968 said, “stereotypes exist because they are, at least in part, true.” This is a really common response to people who are trying to deconstruct stereotyping language or ideologies. So I replied in part:

…however, I do also want to remind everyone that stereotypes and the “reality” they describe have a more complicated relationship than just the idea that they “have some grain of truth” or they are “generally actually true.”

One perpetuates the other and reinforces the other unless you make yourselves conscious of it and work to deconstruct it or work against it. Stereotypes are not “natural” as you describe them. They are constructed by people trying to describe reality, but then they themselves reinforce that reality and make it difficult to break out of those destructive patterns. to say that they are “natural” is to take a back-seat and simply “accept” things that aren’t always true. It used to be that it was “natural” for blacks to be slaves, and women to be submissive to men. While these are more extreme examples, it’s still exactly the same social structure that makes it happen.

Altering these “less extreme” stereotypes like girls-hate-geeks means fostering discussions like this, reminding people that the world is always more complicated and deserves to be described by things other than stereotypes. Once that ball gets rolling, intelligence will really seem more attractive, and it will be more “normal” for women to be as “intelligent” as men.

So, there’s some stuff. I wanted to save this for later for if I ever have to defend the world’s complexity and destroy people’s lazy tendency to over-simplify things again.

heh. ok. get me the fuck away from my computer. I have homework to do.