Folks,
For those who think I was joking, I was not. I am seriously looking for nominations for the Shitblog awards. It’s not a joke.
Once again, the Categories are:
The Shitblog Award (Winner, 1st Runner-Up, 2nd Runner-Up, Honourable Mention)
The Pretentious Urban Structure Searching Yuppie-spawn (PUSSY) Award
The Puke-Inducing New-age Kid (PINK) Award
The Blogs Any Bullshit Event (BABE) Award
The Criminally Unstable New-age Teen (CUNT) Award.
The Illiterate Dork Incapable of Original Thought (IDIOT) Award.
Send the blogs you think deserve a prize in to shitblogawards@yahoo.com (It’s a legitimate address)
You nominate the blogs, I choose the category. It’s that simple. Judge’s decisions are final. Winning blogs will be posted here for 48 hours and removed once the threats for legal actions start to flow in. Winners will be notified by email and an insulting note on their tagboards. They can post this achievement on their site if they so wish.
So for those who have nothing better to do with their lives, finally I am here to give your vacuous lives some worth. Go forth, and find me six to ten blogs of your friends, acquaintances or their pets; just six little blogs that you hate. The rewards are plenty. You will aid in the continuous evolution of the human race by enabling the shaming of those who block our next step in evolution by listening to Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera while dancing to Justin Timberlake. You will aid in the humiliation of those who think Madonna is a sexy woman. You will aid hopefully in the suicide of one or two angst filled teenagers who will amount to nothing in their lives yet will have the ability to spread their seed. Come forth, all ye who are sick and tired of bad writing and I will stand by you!
Let us show these fevered egos that they don’t matter in the greater scheme of life. Let me be your guiding light in bringing these spawn of Satan down. We can do it, brothers and sisters. Let me be the lightning rod that conducts their vapid outpourings of anger to the harmless earth of mediocrity. Let me be the agent of evolution, preparing us for the exploration of outer and inner space through the systematic destruction of stupidity! Let us set an example of the ten worst blogs in the world and soon the rest will follow.
Once again, all nominations to shitblogawards@yahoo.com I beseech you my friends, we can afford to rest no longer. The cancer has spread far enough and its time for all good men/women/works-in-progress to come to the aid of the party.
Please do not choose blogs like xiaxue (Google it. Damned if I post the link here). I want really utterly horrible blogs, not the vacuous mutterings of a frustrated tween. For example, here is a sample post from the 2005 SBA Winner:
"coz i was seating in da front 4 seater thingy n behind ma seat iz where pple can stand n he was touchin ma hair!at first i thought it was bcoz i kept turning ma head n then mua lil sis whu was sitting opp mi giggled n told mi in eng"akka u wan to exchange place wid mi or nt ..da fella behind u ah"..I GT IT!I turned n screamed at him to keep farkin handz to himself b4 i give him a tight slap wid mua high-heelz!he gave mi tt -im born-to-a-bytch-mua-mum-taught-mi-to-do-this-look!WTF!!den we reached balestier.hd to gt down n they juz wun give way fer ya to gt down n i had 2 scream loudly in their ears to give way.i thought they only behave lyke tt to gurlz.but guess wht.mua dad gt into da same piece of shit!"
Remember, as it says in the Bhagavad Geetha, “For yours is the right to do your duty, not its rewards. Let not the rewards be the motive for your actions nor let it drive you to inaction”.
karmaNyevAdhikArasthe mAphalesukadAcana mAkarmphalhEturbUr mAthesanghostva akarmaNi.
Ready, Set, Search!
Monday, October 31, 2005
Sunday, October 30, 2005
The Shitblog Awards, 2006
A confession here folks: I hate blogs and the only thing I hate more than blogs are self-important bloggers who think that just because they breathe, it gives every little event of their lives a level of significance normally attributed to major socio-political events.
(For those who want to whine about the fact that I am hitting against bloggers myself when I am one, I would like to say you have the attention span of goat testicles. I had already mentioned in the first entry of this page that I am using this medium only for the lack of something easier. It is easy to have your templates and links set up for you to just enter text. Notice that there is a distinct lack of “frills” on this site? No “tagboard” or glitzy wallpapers? Just grey on black text for easy visibility? This blog is about my views, not me so shut the hell up and go smoke a joint, so your third eye is Squeegeed clean and you can finally see what I am talking about).
Back to my point, I hate bloggers and I am of the firm belief that blogs, along with SMS technology and television together contribute to the ongoing stupidity of the human race, preventing us from making great inroads into the realms of the unknown. Face it, every second wasted on any of these activities, mentioning objects inserted into sensitive orifices and what was eaten that day for breakfast is a second lost forever. A second that could be used to realize how badly we are being fleeced by the powers that be, a second that could be hell, used to feed the hungry and clothe the poor, I don’t know.
Why do people blog about their lives? Does anyone care? Genuinely? I mean, is it such a big deal that you got a roll of designer toilet paper at discount price that the whole world has to know about it? Please don’t inflict dung like “no one forced you to read it”. You are missing the point. My question is, why would anyone want to do that? What is the fascination we have with every little thing that happens in our lives that it needs to be documented for all posterity? Here we have, for the first time in the history of the human race, the ability to learn from the greatest minds from Plato to Aryabhatta. We have the technology to translate any language to a language we can understand and thus enhance our minds with the wisdom of millennia but what do we use the technology for? To write about our latest lingerie acquisitions. Am I the only one who vents frustration at this? What value will we assign to major global socio-political events when brushing our teeth is worth a blurb on some attention seeker’s blog? I bet that right now, more people talked about Jessica Simpson (or some other such succubus) than Rosa Parks, the woman who started off the civil rights movement in the US (for those who forgot, or have the attention spans of aborted guppies, Rosa Parks died last week, the brave woman).
So with that preamble, I would like to announce that the “Shitblog Awards” which I started last year would carry on this year as well.
(For those who are the relics of my previous site with the same name, you might recall I did a bit on the “Shitblog awards” with some rather interesting results, including lawsuit threats.)
Nominations are open from today to next Monday (07/11/2005). Conditions:
They must truly suck, not just be mediocre and banal (like xiaxue or mrbrown).
The language must make you wonder if their originators were born due to an unfortunate accident involving a retarded ape and a drunk iguana.
The site must be filled with glitzy knickknacks that scream “I am a peptobismol pink bubblegum bitch” or “I am an annoying teenager who has crazy delusions that my current studliness will compensate for my obvious lack of intellect and simian ancestry”.
The site must fill you with a sense of dread, that these people may, given the right conditions, occupy powerful positions in industry or politics.
That’s it. Nominations open till the 11th of November, and results will be announced in the first week of January. There are a few categories:
The Shitblog: This is the king/queen of all the worst blogs submitted. Words fail to describe the sucktitude of this blog and our only hope is a premature death and/or vital injury to the reproductive organs will prevent the spread of this cancer.
(Under this category are runner up 1 and 2, and an honourable mention.)
The BABE (Blogs about bullshit events) Award: This is a special award given to a blogger who can be considered the master of the obvious, whose vacuous skull has been harbouring moths from time immemorial. This person considers every little event that happens around him/her as something revelatory. This kind of person would quote characters from “Sex and the City” as gospel. This winner will receive a battery operated battery charger.
The PINK (Puke-Inducing New Age Kid) Award: (Female only, male entries will be considered under extenuating circumstances, like a severe attack of SNAGitis): This is awarded to a blog that is pseudo-feminist “GRRL power!” centred, filled with analyses on what is the latest Beyonce video, how much her favourite girl/boyband rules and how bad the others suck, how miserable her life is, how she has to take eight buses across the city so she can run into her “eye candy” (Anyone whose blog includes the word “eye candy” in the proper context deserves to be put to death without trial) etc. I would go on but it’s making me puke. Extra credit will be given for “Emily” themes. This blogger will win a cyanide-tipped razor blade and instructions with diagrams of wrists.
The IDIOT (Illiterate Dork Incapable of Original Thought) Blog Award. This award goes to the blog that makes most gratuitous use of “dat” (that), “ma” (my), “okiez” (okay), “dun” (Don’t), “lyk” (like), “peepz” (people), “fark” (fuck), etc. Extra credit will be given for those who use the French “moi” for “me”, and even more credit will be given for those who use it in place of “my” or who spell it as “mua”. Extra credit will also be given for bloggers who use the word “shite” (for shit). Such blogs will win a free vasectomy/hysterectomy kit (rusted blade and pincers and a user manual in BIG monosyllabic words).
The PUSSY (Pretentious Urban Structure Searching Yuppie-spawn) Blog Award: This award is for bloggers who are male. Chances are, drugs were involved when they were born, resulting in a tragic case of malformed brains. The AMTA winning teen will claim to have gotten over his multitude of meaningless “relationships” and yet spout utter bile about how much life sucks.
To such a teen, the value of life is placed solely on peer-pressure and conforming almost mindlessly to any of the latest trends while claiming to be someone unique. Such a teen would have quotes by people he has never heard of, scattered liberally around his site without a clue as to what they actually mean. This teen would win a One Man Russian Roulette Set.
The CUNT (Criminally Unstable Newage Teen) Award: This award is a special award given to bloggers who are sheep of other bloggers or websites like xiaxue, Maddox, or any other symbol on the internet landscape. This blogger must be so retarded in the skull that he should take fan worship to a point where it becomes almost illegal. Like his/her cousin blogger (the PINK awardee) he/she apes popular culture’s latest trend but where they differ is while the PINK awardee follows currently famous popular icons the CUNT decides to ape the “underground” popular culture, hoping against hope that he/she will be thought of as “Cool” by association. His/her slavish worship exists only as long as the idol of choice reaffirms their views. Once he/she insults any of his/her favourite beliefs he/she immediately go into a hormone enhanced anger mode, fortunately ending in occasional suicide. This blogger will win a free lifelong pass to his favourite webmaster’s website.
So dear friends, help me source through the vast mental wilderness of blogosphere! Send all entries to shitblogawards@yahoo.com
Let us work together to make the Shitblog Awards, 2006 a resounding success!
A confession here folks: I hate blogs and the only thing I hate more than blogs are self-important bloggers who think that just because they breathe, it gives every little event of their lives a level of significance normally attributed to major socio-political events.
(For those who want to whine about the fact that I am hitting against bloggers myself when I am one, I would like to say you have the attention span of goat testicles. I had already mentioned in the first entry of this page that I am using this medium only for the lack of something easier. It is easy to have your templates and links set up for you to just enter text. Notice that there is a distinct lack of “frills” on this site? No “tagboard” or glitzy wallpapers? Just grey on black text for easy visibility? This blog is about my views, not me so shut the hell up and go smoke a joint, so your third eye is Squeegeed clean and you can finally see what I am talking about).
Back to my point, I hate bloggers and I am of the firm belief that blogs, along with SMS technology and television together contribute to the ongoing stupidity of the human race, preventing us from making great inroads into the realms of the unknown. Face it, every second wasted on any of these activities, mentioning objects inserted into sensitive orifices and what was eaten that day for breakfast is a second lost forever. A second that could be used to realize how badly we are being fleeced by the powers that be, a second that could be hell, used to feed the hungry and clothe the poor, I don’t know.
Why do people blog about their lives? Does anyone care? Genuinely? I mean, is it such a big deal that you got a roll of designer toilet paper at discount price that the whole world has to know about it? Please don’t inflict dung like “no one forced you to read it”. You are missing the point. My question is, why would anyone want to do that? What is the fascination we have with every little thing that happens in our lives that it needs to be documented for all posterity? Here we have, for the first time in the history of the human race, the ability to learn from the greatest minds from Plato to Aryabhatta. We have the technology to translate any language to a language we can understand and thus enhance our minds with the wisdom of millennia but what do we use the technology for? To write about our latest lingerie acquisitions. Am I the only one who vents frustration at this? What value will we assign to major global socio-political events when brushing our teeth is worth a blurb on some attention seeker’s blog? I bet that right now, more people talked about Jessica Simpson (or some other such succubus) than Rosa Parks, the woman who started off the civil rights movement in the US (for those who forgot, or have the attention spans of aborted guppies, Rosa Parks died last week, the brave woman).
So with that preamble, I would like to announce that the “Shitblog Awards” which I started last year would carry on this year as well.
(For those who are the relics of my previous site with the same name, you might recall I did a bit on the “Shitblog awards” with some rather interesting results, including lawsuit threats.)
Nominations are open from today to next Monday (07/11/2005). Conditions:
They must truly suck, not just be mediocre and banal (like xiaxue or mrbrown).
The language must make you wonder if their originators were born due to an unfortunate accident involving a retarded ape and a drunk iguana.
The site must be filled with glitzy knickknacks that scream “I am a peptobismol pink bubblegum bitch” or “I am an annoying teenager who has crazy delusions that my current studliness will compensate for my obvious lack of intellect and simian ancestry”.
The site must fill you with a sense of dread, that these people may, given the right conditions, occupy powerful positions in industry or politics.
That’s it. Nominations open till the 11th of November, and results will be announced in the first week of January. There are a few categories:
The Shitblog: This is the king/queen of all the worst blogs submitted. Words fail to describe the sucktitude of this blog and our only hope is a premature death and/or vital injury to the reproductive organs will prevent the spread of this cancer.
(Under this category are runner up 1 and 2, and an honourable mention.)
The BABE (Blogs about bullshit events) Award: This is a special award given to a blogger who can be considered the master of the obvious, whose vacuous skull has been harbouring moths from time immemorial. This person considers every little event that happens around him/her as something revelatory. This kind of person would quote characters from “Sex and the City” as gospel. This winner will receive a battery operated battery charger.
The PINK (Puke-Inducing New Age Kid) Award: (Female only, male entries will be considered under extenuating circumstances, like a severe attack of SNAGitis): This is awarded to a blog that is pseudo-feminist “GRRL power!” centred, filled with analyses on what is the latest Beyonce video, how much her favourite girl/boyband rules and how bad the others suck, how miserable her life is, how she has to take eight buses across the city so she can run into her “eye candy” (Anyone whose blog includes the word “eye candy” in the proper context deserves to be put to death without trial) etc. I would go on but it’s making me puke. Extra credit will be given for “Emily” themes. This blogger will win a cyanide-tipped razor blade and instructions with diagrams of wrists.
The IDIOT (Illiterate Dork Incapable of Original Thought) Blog Award. This award goes to the blog that makes most gratuitous use of “dat” (that), “ma” (my), “okiez” (okay), “dun” (Don’t), “lyk” (like), “peepz” (people), “fark” (fuck), etc. Extra credit will be given for those who use the French “moi” for “me”, and even more credit will be given for those who use it in place of “my” or who spell it as “mua”. Extra credit will also be given for bloggers who use the word “shite” (for shit). Such blogs will win a free vasectomy/hysterectomy kit (rusted blade and pincers and a user manual in BIG monosyllabic words).
The PUSSY (Pretentious Urban Structure Searching Yuppie-spawn) Blog Award: This award is for bloggers who are male. Chances are, drugs were involved when they were born, resulting in a tragic case of malformed brains. The AMTA winning teen will claim to have gotten over his multitude of meaningless “relationships” and yet spout utter bile about how much life sucks.
To such a teen, the value of life is placed solely on peer-pressure and conforming almost mindlessly to any of the latest trends while claiming to be someone unique. Such a teen would have quotes by people he has never heard of, scattered liberally around his site without a clue as to what they actually mean. This teen would win a One Man Russian Roulette Set.
The CUNT (Criminally Unstable Newage Teen) Award: This award is a special award given to bloggers who are sheep of other bloggers or websites like xiaxue, Maddox, or any other symbol on the internet landscape. This blogger must be so retarded in the skull that he should take fan worship to a point where it becomes almost illegal. Like his/her cousin blogger (the PINK awardee) he/she apes popular culture’s latest trend but where they differ is while the PINK awardee follows currently famous popular icons the CUNT decides to ape the “underground” popular culture, hoping against hope that he/she will be thought of as “Cool” by association. His/her slavish worship exists only as long as the idol of choice reaffirms their views. Once he/she insults any of his/her favourite beliefs he/she immediately go into a hormone enhanced anger mode, fortunately ending in occasional suicide. This blogger will win a free lifelong pass to his favourite webmaster’s website.
So dear friends, help me source through the vast mental wilderness of blogosphere! Send all entries to shitblogawards@yahoo.com
Let us work together to make the Shitblog Awards, 2006 a resounding success!
Folks,
I have talked to many a theist and many a fundy. An argument usually starts like this:
Fundy: JESUS IS REAL!!
Me: Err.. Good for you
Fundy: HOW CAN YOU DENY GOD WHEN THERE IS SO MUCH PROOF?!!!!!!
Me: What is god?
Fundy: God is the Creator, the Almighty
Me: you aren't answering the question. How do you know such a being exists ....
..... arguments tossed around back and forth.....
Fundy: I don't need proof. I have faith
I have noticed this usual tendency unique to fundies. They aim to have an open minded argument about god's existence, and since they then realise they have little or no proof for their stand, they back themselves into a corner and use this standard argument "Well I don't care what you say, I have faith and that is enough for me".
George Smith, in his book, "Atheism: The Case Against God" explains why faith is not a good tool to gain knowledge about anything. I won't go into details but I will illustrate my point with this simple example.
Imagine this conversation
Elfist: I have realised that elves exist. In fact I have one sitting on my shoulder
Skeptic: I don't see an elf
Elfist: It's an invisible one, silly. He brings me good luck.
Skeptic: Well, okay..
Elfist: He also brings bad luck to those who don't believe in him.
Skeptic: Huh?
Elfist: so you see it would be best if you believe in my invisible elf.
Skeptic: Why should I?
Elfist: Or you'll suffer bad luck all your life!
Skeptic: I need some kind of proof before I believe
Elfist: Well yesterday I found $10 on the street, that is proof enough for me
Skeptic: Couldn't it just be that someone accidentally had dropped the money.
Elfist: But the odds against me finding the $10 were so remote! Have you ever found ten dollars on the street?
Skeptic: Not really... I have found small change though!
Elfist: SEE! My invisible elf must exist, because I found $10, you didn't believe in him so you didn't.
Skeptic: Elves are imaginary beings.
Elfist: I don't care what you say. I believe in my elf and that is all that matters. You cannot discount my experience.
Skeptic: I have no business telling you what to believe and what not to believe. It is when you are trying to push your beliefs to me that I react.
Elfist: I never pushed my beliefs on you. You're free to believe or not believe. But if you don't you'll get bad luck
Skeptic: Well, even if for argument's sake you didn't push your beliefs, I would like some proof before I believe anything.
Elfist: I told you the proof! You're just not willing to accept it.
Skeptic: You didn't prove anything. You just cited personal experience. That is not proof.
Elfist: It is. You have to have faith. Then you will see I am right.
(Skeptic resists the urge to bean the Elfist with a large, cumbersome object.)
The argument above shows the typical debate between a theist and an atheist. Theists refuse to prove anything, claim that they have proven it all and the atheist is blind to proof, and then just resort to faith as a final "proof". I have oversimplified certain aspects, but I have made sure the whole thing captures the gist of the debate.
Faith cannot decide anything. Reason depends entirely on proof. A rational argument is one that can be proven beyond reasonable doubt (note: This doesn't make the argument absolutely true). Faith is a belief that is held in absence of, and often in spite of contradictory, evidence.
Therefore, faith and reason are two completely opposite ways of having beliefs. Theists claim that faith is the more superior of the two, while atheists completely disregard faith and stick to reason. Theists claim that faith can do what reason cannot, i.e. understand god.
This is a faulty and often dangerous argument. Faith has no inbuilt checking systems. One can accept ANY argument based on faith. If I say "I have faith that earth is flat" there is no way of checking my claim without reason. Only reason has tools to check claims. Faith is essentially not even a tool to gain knowledge of anything as it is completely devoid of methods of checking claims. In fact, once claims start to be verified it is beyond the realm of faith.
Therefore, when a theist says "I have faith in god", she is at best, telling you what state of mind she is in. The strange thing is, fundies expect us to take their faith at their word as evidence for god's existence. I have yet to see any objective proof offered by a fundy. They use the old "unknown parameter" argument followed by the faith argument. It goes something like this: Do you know where the universe came from? No? I do. God did it.
That is as good as saying "I don't know but I think an unknown being, for an unknown reason created a universe using unknown mechanisms. I am not going to prove it. What I said is proof".
Faith in a deity is therefore a waste of time, and is unnecessary, and often unhealthy. To claim that god exists, based only on faith is a fallacious argument because people can have faith in anything which need not be true.
I prefer truth to comforting lies.
I have talked to many a theist and many a fundy. An argument usually starts like this:
Fundy: JESUS IS REAL!!
Me: Err.. Good for you
Fundy: HOW CAN YOU DENY GOD WHEN THERE IS SO MUCH PROOF?!!!!!!
Me: What is god?
Fundy: God is the Creator, the Almighty
Me: you aren't answering the question. How do you know such a being exists ....
..... arguments tossed around back and forth.....
Fundy: I don't need proof. I have faith
I have noticed this usual tendency unique to fundies. They aim to have an open minded argument about god's existence, and since they then realise they have little or no proof for their stand, they back themselves into a corner and use this standard argument "Well I don't care what you say, I have faith and that is enough for me".
George Smith, in his book, "Atheism: The Case Against God" explains why faith is not a good tool to gain knowledge about anything. I won't go into details but I will illustrate my point with this simple example.
Imagine this conversation
Elfist: I have realised that elves exist. In fact I have one sitting on my shoulder
Skeptic: I don't see an elf
Elfist: It's an invisible one, silly. He brings me good luck.
Skeptic: Well, okay..
Elfist: He also brings bad luck to those who don't believe in him.
Skeptic: Huh?
Elfist: so you see it would be best if you believe in my invisible elf.
Skeptic: Why should I?
Elfist: Or you'll suffer bad luck all your life!
Skeptic: I need some kind of proof before I believe
Elfist: Well yesterday I found $10 on the street, that is proof enough for me
Skeptic: Couldn't it just be that someone accidentally had dropped the money.
Elfist: But the odds against me finding the $10 were so remote! Have you ever found ten dollars on the street?
Skeptic: Not really... I have found small change though!
Elfist: SEE! My invisible elf must exist, because I found $10, you didn't believe in him so you didn't.
Skeptic: Elves are imaginary beings.
Elfist: I don't care what you say. I believe in my elf and that is all that matters. You cannot discount my experience.
Skeptic: I have no business telling you what to believe and what not to believe. It is when you are trying to push your beliefs to me that I react.
Elfist: I never pushed my beliefs on you. You're free to believe or not believe. But if you don't you'll get bad luck
Skeptic: Well, even if for argument's sake you didn't push your beliefs, I would like some proof before I believe anything.
Elfist: I told you the proof! You're just not willing to accept it.
Skeptic: You didn't prove anything. You just cited personal experience. That is not proof.
Elfist: It is. You have to have faith. Then you will see I am right.
(Skeptic resists the urge to bean the Elfist with a large, cumbersome object.)
The argument above shows the typical debate between a theist and an atheist. Theists refuse to prove anything, claim that they have proven it all and the atheist is blind to proof, and then just resort to faith as a final "proof". I have oversimplified certain aspects, but I have made sure the whole thing captures the gist of the debate.
Faith cannot decide anything. Reason depends entirely on proof. A rational argument is one that can be proven beyond reasonable doubt (note: This doesn't make the argument absolutely true). Faith is a belief that is held in absence of, and often in spite of contradictory, evidence.
Therefore, faith and reason are two completely opposite ways of having beliefs. Theists claim that faith is the more superior of the two, while atheists completely disregard faith and stick to reason. Theists claim that faith can do what reason cannot, i.e. understand god.
This is a faulty and often dangerous argument. Faith has no inbuilt checking systems. One can accept ANY argument based on faith. If I say "I have faith that earth is flat" there is no way of checking my claim without reason. Only reason has tools to check claims. Faith is essentially not even a tool to gain knowledge of anything as it is completely devoid of methods of checking claims. In fact, once claims start to be verified it is beyond the realm of faith.
Therefore, when a theist says "I have faith in god", she is at best, telling you what state of mind she is in. The strange thing is, fundies expect us to take their faith at their word as evidence for god's existence. I have yet to see any objective proof offered by a fundy. They use the old "unknown parameter" argument followed by the faith argument. It goes something like this: Do you know where the universe came from? No? I do. God did it.
That is as good as saying "I don't know but I think an unknown being, for an unknown reason created a universe using unknown mechanisms. I am not going to prove it. What I said is proof".
Faith in a deity is therefore a waste of time, and is unnecessary, and often unhealthy. To claim that god exists, based only on faith is a fallacious argument because people can have faith in anything which need not be true.
I prefer truth to comforting lies.
Wednesday, October 26, 2005
We're an anal-retentive, juvenile, prudish society, are we?
Recently the local papers were all agog with news of bloggers being charged in court/being tarred and feathered for their views for everything from posting racist comments, to calling a teacher a "frustrated old spinster".
Racist blogs:
What the hell is wrong with us? Are we that thin skinned that we can't take a bit of racial jibbing without foaming green in the mouth and yelling for the cops? Are we that juvenile in our mindsets that we cannot differentiate an idiot from a true racist? I am Indian by race and I have learned to accept certain racist tags as meant in just good humour, from having humungous schlongs to smelling like coconut oil, I have heard a fair share of "racist" comments and innuendo. But come on! Back in India we used to make fun of the Sikhs as being stupid, Sindhis (from the Sindh province of PAkistan) as being downright stingy, Marwadis (those from Rajasthan) for being selfish, Bengalis for being lazy bums, and Tamilans for being unscrupulous, you name it, but it was all in good fun. What the hell happened to that?!
Here's a racist joke: What do you call a Singapore Indian in NUS? A: Visitor
What do you call an Indian national in NUS? A Sweeper. There I made a racist comment. Now sue me for "insulting" my own race. Shit.
I read with interest this thing about bloggers being charged in court for making racist remarks against Malays and muslims. Okay, fair enough they may have stepped too far and all that, but then I read this woman actually went OUT OF HER way looking for racist blogs and then reporting them to the authorities. Right. The last thing we need before we step into police state scenarios, busybody citizens.
This woman obviously has WAY too much free time on her hands. Let me try to trace the mental pathway of these people.
Step 1: Surf around the web looking for websites on the latest high-end banality of our culture
Step 2: Find a blog that insults your religion.
Step 3: Finish hyperventilating.
Step 4: Read more and more, forward to all your friends for their "opinions".
Step 5: Report the site to the police, the SPCA and the Plumbing Mothers' Association
Step 6: Insist on pressing charges, thus ensuring the continued atmosphere of fear in the country, suppressing any points of view that may appear to be dissident.
Now what is offensive? If a christian tells me "I am going to suffer in hell", can I sue him? If a muslim tells me if I don't submit to Allah I will surely perish, can I sue him? What constitutes offensiveness? I think it's far more offensive to insist that someone will suffer eternally in hell for his/her beliefs or the lack of them than any amount of "Fuck"'s or "Shit"'s. Does that mean all evangelising shoul be stopped? Will the religious agree to that?
Whatever happened to not giving a damn? I mean, is it that hard to just click the "BACK" button or the little X in the top right hand corner that closes the window? Why read something you find so offensive? There are THOUSANDS of blogs that are openly racist. Will suing and incarcerating a couple of local stooges who should have known better scare away the millions of bloggers all over the world who are probably laughing their asses off at this juvenile display of bully-power? Is it even reasonable to expect people to be "non-racist" here when there is and will always be an element of racism which can never be eliminated? As long as these two idiots who got arrested didn't physically harm someone, why create such a fuss over a blog entry? Are Singaporeans that stupid, that they can't be trusted to read a blog entry without going on a religious riot?!
I don't blame the government for taking action. Those idiots broke the law and they were punished accordingly. I blame the thin-skinned colostomy-bag who actually complained to the cops, and CONTINUED to function like some vigilante, on the lookout for racist blogs. Sheesh, get a life, my self-appointed crusader!
Blogs on Sex:
These I truly feel sorry for. The papers reported increasing trends who blog about sex and immediately issued threats, citing statutes and penal codes that govern pornography and such. Sigh, when will we learn? Someone wants to blog about having it up with a dead hamster, what is it to the rest of us?! Isn't the government giving free publicity to these blogs by reporting so intensely on them? "Publicity" that they probably do not need or want? Imagine a thousand leery pimple faced boys sending you pictures of their collective schlongs.
The funny thing is, Singaporeans are obsessed with sex, and our obsessions do not have a reasonable outlet. Pornography is nearly impossible to find; prostitutes are either too expensive, or too scary, or just too weird (think that girl walking around in a tiny skirt and translucent top around Orchard Towers is a good catch? She's a guy); sex education in school is lousy with most teachers petrified of daring to tell the kids the truth about sex apart from the context of pregnancy or AIDS; and there are no strip joints or adult movie theatres to release that backed up load of juices, apart from just having sex. Singaporeans, like all other human beings LOVE sex but they can't get enough of it so they turn to things like reading about people who actually get it on. I can see nothing wrong with that! Can you?
Suddenly the talk is about whether this sort of thing should be allowed. Some readers commented, "Oh it's so disgusting!", "I was repulsed..."
Others thought these bloggers ought to be dealt with in some way or another. Whatever happened to just clicking on the close button?
A few people wondered if their kids would find it... Come on. If you leave your kid unsupervised on the internet, you know, he/she DESERVES to find porn. If you are that busy that you can't take care of your own spawn, then don't expect the government to do it for you.
This leads me to a brilliant new solution that a lot of you don't know about. The next time you come across a blog you don't like, you know what you can do? Now stay with me because this is probably absolutely radical...
You know what you can do? CLOSE THE BLOODY WINDOW! Don't like?! Don't read! It's THAT simple, yet brutally effective. How's that for a solution? Disgusted by a blog? Don't bother running to the authorities about it. Just close the window. BAM! Problem solved. Now don't think it's that simple. A lot of you still have trouble with that concept. Sometimes the seemingly simple solutions elude us and we get all flustered and angry, ready to take action. Just take a step back, breathe deeply and "CLICK" on the little X. There! It's gone for ever! Go to sleep.
Are we going to evolve to be a bunch of civilized people who are willing to laugh at ourselves, and learn from others, or are we going to forever remain defensive and sheltered, like little babies? Come on people, I have more faith in you than that.
Recently the local papers were all agog with news of bloggers being charged in court/being tarred and feathered for their views for everything from posting racist comments, to calling a teacher a "frustrated old spinster".
Racist blogs:
What the hell is wrong with us? Are we that thin skinned that we can't take a bit of racial jibbing without foaming green in the mouth and yelling for the cops? Are we that juvenile in our mindsets that we cannot differentiate an idiot from a true racist? I am Indian by race and I have learned to accept certain racist tags as meant in just good humour, from having humungous schlongs to smelling like coconut oil, I have heard a fair share of "racist" comments and innuendo. But come on! Back in India we used to make fun of the Sikhs as being stupid, Sindhis (from the Sindh province of PAkistan) as being downright stingy, Marwadis (those from Rajasthan) for being selfish, Bengalis for being lazy bums, and Tamilans for being unscrupulous, you name it, but it was all in good fun. What the hell happened to that?!
Here's a racist joke: What do you call a Singapore Indian in NUS? A: Visitor
What do you call an Indian national in NUS? A Sweeper. There I made a racist comment. Now sue me for "insulting" my own race. Shit.
I read with interest this thing about bloggers being charged in court for making racist remarks against Malays and muslims. Okay, fair enough they may have stepped too far and all that, but then I read this woman actually went OUT OF HER way looking for racist blogs and then reporting them to the authorities. Right. The last thing we need before we step into police state scenarios, busybody citizens.
This woman obviously has WAY too much free time on her hands. Let me try to trace the mental pathway of these people.
Step 1: Surf around the web looking for websites on the latest high-end banality of our culture
Step 2: Find a blog that insults your religion.
Step 3: Finish hyperventilating.
Step 4: Read more and more, forward to all your friends for their "opinions".
Step 5: Report the site to the police, the SPCA and the Plumbing Mothers' Association
Step 6: Insist on pressing charges, thus ensuring the continued atmosphere of fear in the country, suppressing any points of view that may appear to be dissident.
Now what is offensive? If a christian tells me "I am going to suffer in hell", can I sue him? If a muslim tells me if I don't submit to Allah I will surely perish, can I sue him? What constitutes offensiveness? I think it's far more offensive to insist that someone will suffer eternally in hell for his/her beliefs or the lack of them than any amount of "Fuck"'s or "Shit"'s. Does that mean all evangelising shoul be stopped? Will the religious agree to that?
Whatever happened to not giving a damn? I mean, is it that hard to just click the "BACK" button or the little X in the top right hand corner that closes the window? Why read something you find so offensive? There are THOUSANDS of blogs that are openly racist. Will suing and incarcerating a couple of local stooges who should have known better scare away the millions of bloggers all over the world who are probably laughing their asses off at this juvenile display of bully-power? Is it even reasonable to expect people to be "non-racist" here when there is and will always be an element of racism which can never be eliminated? As long as these two idiots who got arrested didn't physically harm someone, why create such a fuss over a blog entry? Are Singaporeans that stupid, that they can't be trusted to read a blog entry without going on a religious riot?!
I don't blame the government for taking action. Those idiots broke the law and they were punished accordingly. I blame the thin-skinned colostomy-bag who actually complained to the cops, and CONTINUED to function like some vigilante, on the lookout for racist blogs. Sheesh, get a life, my self-appointed crusader!
Blogs on Sex:
These I truly feel sorry for. The papers reported increasing trends who blog about sex and immediately issued threats, citing statutes and penal codes that govern pornography and such. Sigh, when will we learn? Someone wants to blog about having it up with a dead hamster, what is it to the rest of us?! Isn't the government giving free publicity to these blogs by reporting so intensely on them? "Publicity" that they probably do not need or want? Imagine a thousand leery pimple faced boys sending you pictures of their collective schlongs.
The funny thing is, Singaporeans are obsessed with sex, and our obsessions do not have a reasonable outlet. Pornography is nearly impossible to find; prostitutes are either too expensive, or too scary, or just too weird (think that girl walking around in a tiny skirt and translucent top around Orchard Towers is a good catch? She's a guy); sex education in school is lousy with most teachers petrified of daring to tell the kids the truth about sex apart from the context of pregnancy or AIDS; and there are no strip joints or adult movie theatres to release that backed up load of juices, apart from just having sex. Singaporeans, like all other human beings LOVE sex but they can't get enough of it so they turn to things like reading about people who actually get it on. I can see nothing wrong with that! Can you?
Suddenly the talk is about whether this sort of thing should be allowed. Some readers commented, "Oh it's so disgusting!", "I was repulsed..."
Others thought these bloggers ought to be dealt with in some way or another. Whatever happened to just clicking on the close button?
A few people wondered if their kids would find it... Come on. If you leave your kid unsupervised on the internet, you know, he/she DESERVES to find porn. If you are that busy that you can't take care of your own spawn, then don't expect the government to do it for you.
This leads me to a brilliant new solution that a lot of you don't know about. The next time you come across a blog you don't like, you know what you can do? Now stay with me because this is probably absolutely radical...
You know what you can do? CLOSE THE BLOODY WINDOW! Don't like?! Don't read! It's THAT simple, yet brutally effective. How's that for a solution? Disgusted by a blog? Don't bother running to the authorities about it. Just close the window. BAM! Problem solved. Now don't think it's that simple. A lot of you still have trouble with that concept. Sometimes the seemingly simple solutions elude us and we get all flustered and angry, ready to take action. Just take a step back, breathe deeply and "CLICK" on the little X. There! It's gone for ever! Go to sleep.
Are we going to evolve to be a bunch of civilized people who are willing to laugh at ourselves, and learn from others, or are we going to forever remain defensive and sheltered, like little babies? Come on people, I have more faith in you than that.
Monday, October 24, 2005
"Doesn't it strike you as mildly ironic, that the people who are against abortion are people you wouldn't want to fuck in the first place?" - George Carlin
Fundamentalists who are against abortion, do this: Go find a pregnant teenager, let her have the baby and raise the bloody kid. You wanted the kid, you raise it. Let's see some commitment to your sick cause.
What is so strange is, these fundamentalists are so caught up on other peoples' lives. I wonder why.
They're against masturbation.
They're against pornography.
They're against abortions.
They call themselves "pro-life".. They are against all things that are fun in life and suddenly they are "pro life". What kind of life would one lead as one of these idiots? They are perpetually having their noses in other peoples' business, condescending, self righteous annoying idiots. Each and every one of them is just against everything that is good with life. They are against knowledge, they are against tolerance, they are against acceptance of alternative lifestyles, they are against rock music, they are against ALL music that is not of their group, they are against sex, they are against gratuitous frontal nudity, they're against against against.. Sheesh... Oh yeah right, they're so filled with life! They simply exude vitality and joie de vivre! They're the ultimate party people! Their idea of a good time is probably sitting up and singing christian praise songs, my idea of a good time is lots of wild, crazy sex. It's obvious who are the ones filled with life. These pro-lifers are also the worst warmongers who are more concerned with the preborn than the postborn.
They wouldn't bat an eyelid in sending your kid off to Bumfuckstan to die for your beliefs but there's no way in hell they're gonna let your teenage daughter get an abortion! I mean, what message are we sending these kids?! Abortion is okay? Does that mean promiscuity is okay?! *GASP* Sigh, logic is not apparently their strong suit.
I don't give a rat's ass about abortion. If a woman wants one, hell, it's her choice, not mine. It's shouldn't be anyone's business what she does with her body.
What's more, most of these pro-life slugs are men. What the hell does a man know about a woman's body (apart from the interesting bits)? I mean, do women come about and tell me what to do with my penis ('god' forbid!)? Do they have a right to? If not, then what right do men have to pass judgment over something as personal and emotional as having an abortion? Besides, aren't there too many people in the world already? Why don't these scumbags just adopt one of these "abortion survivors"?
"If you are pro-life, don't block abortion clinics! Lock arms and block cemeteries."
-Bill Hicks
Fundamentalists who are against abortion, do this: Go find a pregnant teenager, let her have the baby and raise the bloody kid. You wanted the kid, you raise it. Let's see some commitment to your sick cause.
What is so strange is, these fundamentalists are so caught up on other peoples' lives. I wonder why.
They're against masturbation.
They're against pornography.
They're against abortions.
They call themselves "pro-life".. They are against all things that are fun in life and suddenly they are "pro life". What kind of life would one lead as one of these idiots? They are perpetually having their noses in other peoples' business, condescending, self righteous annoying idiots. Each and every one of them is just against everything that is good with life. They are against knowledge, they are against tolerance, they are against acceptance of alternative lifestyles, they are against rock music, they are against ALL music that is not of their group, they are against sex, they are against gratuitous frontal nudity, they're against against against.. Sheesh... Oh yeah right, they're so filled with life! They simply exude vitality and joie de vivre! They're the ultimate party people! Their idea of a good time is probably sitting up and singing christian praise songs, my idea of a good time is lots of wild, crazy sex. It's obvious who are the ones filled with life. These pro-lifers are also the worst warmongers who are more concerned with the preborn than the postborn.
They wouldn't bat an eyelid in sending your kid off to Bumfuckstan to die for your beliefs but there's no way in hell they're gonna let your teenage daughter get an abortion! I mean, what message are we sending these kids?! Abortion is okay? Does that mean promiscuity is okay?! *GASP* Sigh, logic is not apparently their strong suit.
I don't give a rat's ass about abortion. If a woman wants one, hell, it's her choice, not mine. It's shouldn't be anyone's business what she does with her body.
What's more, most of these pro-life slugs are men. What the hell does a man know about a woman's body (apart from the interesting bits)? I mean, do women come about and tell me what to do with my penis ('god' forbid!)? Do they have a right to? If not, then what right do men have to pass judgment over something as personal and emotional as having an abortion? Besides, aren't there too many people in the world already? Why don't these scumbags just adopt one of these "abortion survivors"?
"If you are pro-life, don't block abortion clinics! Lock arms and block cemeteries."
-Bill Hicks
Friday, October 21, 2005
Guess who said this?
I am a socialist, and I follow the teachings of Jesus Christ, who was the first socialist, just as Judas was the first capitalist.
Give up? It was Hugo Chavez, President of Venezuela and the man who defied the Bush junta and nationalized the nation's oil wealth. He also, must to Shrub's chagrin introduced welfare programmes and social justice that would go a long way in ensuring that Venezuela doesn't end up like Argentina and Chile.
This is the man whom Pat Robertson claims "would aid muslim fundamentalists". Yeah, right. An avowed catholic would LOVE to let in muslims into his country to screw things up. Don't these idiots do any research before running their mouths off?
I am a socialist, and I follow the teachings of Jesus Christ, who was the first socialist, just as Judas was the first capitalist.
Give up? It was Hugo Chavez, President of Venezuela and the man who defied the Bush junta and nationalized the nation's oil wealth. He also, must to Shrub's chagrin introduced welfare programmes and social justice that would go a long way in ensuring that Venezuela doesn't end up like Argentina and Chile.
This is the man whom Pat Robertson claims "would aid muslim fundamentalists". Yeah, right. An avowed catholic would LOVE to let in muslims into his country to screw things up. Don't these idiots do any research before running their mouths off?
Monday, October 17, 2005
Mr. William Melvin Hicks, 1961-1994
He was the greatest of them all, the last of the great social satirists in the mould of Jonathan Swift, dressed up as a stand-up comic. Born in Valdosta, Georgia, the most Midwestern town in the US in a typical white, christian, southern family he turned out to be one of the greatest social satirists of the 20th century. Unlike other great stand-ups like Richard Pryor or George Carlin, Hicks wasn't funny because he told jokes. He was funny because he did what no one else did, lifting up the curtain that covered the real America. The America that he felt, told its citizens they lived in the Land of the Free and yet continued to bomb poor nations, exercising control over the media and generally ensuring that the populace remained dumb, watching fifty six channels of American Gladiators, watching those pituitary retards bang their skulls together and congratulating themselves on "living in the land of freedom".
Bill Hicks started performing at the age of 13, and story goes on how he held an english class spellbound with his routines, resulting in the teacher having to give him time at the beginning of the class so she could conduct the rest of the class in peace. His initial inspiration was Woody Allen whose routines he tried to copy before moving on to his own material. Their styles of delivery were rather similar, both masters of the deadpan punchlines. Subsequent years found him sneaking out of his house to perform at the Comedy Workshop in Houston with his best friend Dwight Slade, as the youngest duo there. Bill and Dwight, helped by their friend Kevin Booth were performing at different venues up until his senior year when his family moved to Little Rock, Arkansas. Bill then went solo, barely graduating from high school. The year was 1980 and Reagan was elected president, ensuring good standup material for any comic who dared. From then on he was firmly on the performing circuit, playing at nightclubs all over the country, appearing on the David Letterman show twelve times (and in his final appearance being the only comic to be ever completely censored from the show, an event worthy of a book by itself), and establishing a strong underground fan following.
He was a big celebrity in England where the fans adored him but his name was still relatively unknown in the US, something that was to be the state of things all the way till his death. He died of pancreatic cancer, a very rare type of cancer that almost never struck anyone as young as Bill. It seemed that nature wanted to get rid of him before he could do too much damage.
Bill Hicks was probably one of the few standup comedians who didn't make the audience just sit back and laugh in a detached manner. His intensity on stage ensured that audiences were either enthralled or repulsed by what he said or did. The angrier Bill got, in general, the funnier he was (Although a couple of times he just completely lost it). One could see the intensity and the force of conviction with which he delivered his best material. Audiences who came in expecting a normal standup comic who talks about airline food and toilet seats were in for a rude shock as he cleaved right through topics like drug "Abuse" ("I've had some killer fuckin' times on drugs"), pornography ("It is not an adult feature unless at the end of it, someone's gooey"), war ("Watching a missile go down an airvent... pretty fuckin' amazing, but couldn't we use the same technology to shoot food at hungry people?"), popular culture ("I have a new show, on CBS... It's a half hour game show entitled 'Let's hunt and kill Billy Ray Cyrus'. I think it's fairly self-explanatory each week we let the Hounds of Hell loose and chase that jar-head, no talent, cracker-asshole all over the globe till I finally catch that fruity little ponytail of his, pull him to his Chippendales knees, put a shotgun in his mouth, 'POW!' and we'll be back the following season with 'Let's hunt and kill Michael Bolton' "), advertising ("if you are in advertizing or marketing, kill yourself"), and christian fundamentalists ("Ever notice that those who believe in creationism look really unevolved?").
He was always on the fringe, rejecting mainstream entertainment as being too dumbed down and watered down to avoid stepping on any corporate toes. His rants against popular media and culture are legendary in their ferocity, vigour and most of all truth. For example, his take on the "Britney Spears of his day," Debbie Gibson:
Have you seen that little mall creature at work? "*singing*Shake your love....." what love are you shaking Debbie? You're 12, you've got no titties, and your music SUCKS. Go back to the mall that spawned you. This is not a matter of perception, this is not a matter of taste, i can prove this to you on an etch-a-sketch
WHEN did we start listening to pre-pubescent white girls?! I must've missed that fucking meeting. We have the greatest knowledge of all time at our fingertips, the greatest thinkers OF ALL FUCKING TIME, but no, what's that fucking little white girl saying?! Let's go put Debbie Gibson's thoughts on a compact disk, so they'll never be destroyed. Is it me? Maybe it's just me and i'm over-romanticising the past, but i remember when music had conscience, music had taste and music had balls man, does anyone remember that at all?
"You know Debbie Gibson writes all her on songs?
NO?! Fucking spoon me off a chair!
Uhuh, she writes all her own songs about all her own personal experiences..
Yeah what's her next song?! "Mom, why am i bleeding?"
On the New Kids on the Block:
"Cause you know, if you play New Kids on the Block albums backwards, they sound better. "Oh come on, Bill, they're the New Kids, don't pick on them, they're so good and they're so clean cut and they're such a good image for the children." Fuck that. When did mediocrity and banality become a good image for your children? I want my children to listen to people who fucking rocked. I don't care if they died in puddles of their own vomit. I want someone who plays from his fucking heart. "
(Now just substitute Beyonce for Debbie Gibson and any filthy boyband for New Kids on the Block)
No cow was too sacred to escape his cleaver. He took on politicians like Reagan and Bush with relentless fury, and with them he was eerily prophetic.
On Reagan:
"Ever notice we live in a world where good men are murdered and mediocre hacks thrive? John Kennedy murdered, Gandhi murdered. Martin Luther King murdered. Jesus murdered. Reagan... wounded."
On Bush I
People ask me where I stood politically you know. It's not that I disagree with Bush's economic policy or his foreign policy. But that I believe he was a child of Satan here to destroy the planet Earth. Yeah, I'm a little a little to the left there, I was. I was leaning that way.
On the First Iraq War:
We sold Iraq "farming equipment" which Iraq then "converted". How do they do this? "Simsalabim simsalabim aa salabim sim sim sim salabim." Wow! It was a chicken coop, it's now a nuclear reactor!" "This war's for Aladdin." Farming equipment which they converted into military, okay, you got me I'm curious, exactly what kind of farming equipment is this? "Oh okay, well it's stuff for the farmers of Iraq." Yeah? What? "Ooh okay, ar well ooh one of the things we gave them was for the little farmer, a new thing we came up with called er the er, flame-throwing rake." "No it was for the farmer, see. He would rake the leaves and then just turn around Boooo." "But you know what the Iraqis did with that?" There's no trees in Iraq, what are you sending them rakes for, you asshole? "We could have done our research better perhaps yes."
What else did you sell 'em? "Okay er one of the other things we gave 'em was a new thing... for the farmer." "The, er, armoured tractor." "No, see, farmers when they farm look over their shoulders at times and they won't see a tree and they'll hit it maybe and there'll be a wasps nest in the tree and the wasps will come in and sting 'em." "So we put four inches of armour all over the tractor. And a turret to shoot pesticides on the wasps." "Yeah but you know what the Iraqis did with that?" "Can't trust 'em." I'm so sick of arming the world and then sending troops over to destroy the fucking arms, you know what I mean? We keep arming these little countries then we go and blow the shit out of em.
On Fundamentalist Christians and Creationists:
That's another good thing about Bush being gone, man, cos for the last 12 years with Reagan and Bush, we have had fundamentalist Christians in the White House. Fundamentalist Christians who believe the Bible is the exact word of God, including that wacky fire and brimstone Revelations ending, have had their finger on the fucking button for 12 years. [Eyes roll back in head] "Tell me when Lord, tell me when. Let me be your servant Lord." Fundamentalist Christianity - fascinating. These people actually believe that the bi.., er, the world is 12 thousand years old. Swear to God. What the..? Based on what? I asked them. "Well we looked at all the people in the Bible and we added 'em up all the way back to Adam and Eve, their ages - 12 thousand years." Well how fucking scientific, okay. I didn't know that you'd gone to so much trouble. That's good. You believe the world's 12 thousand years old? "That's right." Okay I got one word to ask you, a one word question, ready? "uh huh." Dinosaurs. You know the world's 12 thousand years old and dinosaurs existed, they existed in that time, you'd think it would have been mentioned in the fucking Bible at some point. "And lo Jesus and the disciples walked to Nazareth. But the trail was blocked by a giant brontosaurus... with a splinter in his paw. And O the disciples did run a shriekin': 'What a big fucking lizard, Lord!' But Jesus was unafraid and he took the splinter from the brontosaurus's paw and the big lizard became his friend. And Jesus sent him to Scotland where he lived in a loch for O so many years inviting thousands of American tourists to bring their fat fucking families and their fat dollar bills. And oh Scotland did praise the Lord. Thank you Lord, thank you Lord. Thank you Lord."
And finally, the classic gem on musicians (and drugs):
Drugs have done good things for us, if you don't believe they have, do me a favour - take all your albums, tapes and CDs and burn em cos you know what, the musicians who made that great music that has enhanced your lives throughout the years? Rrrrreal fucking high....
And these other musicians today who don't do drugs and in fact speak out against them? Boy, do they suck! What a coincidence! Ball-less, souless, spiritless corporate little bitches, suckers of Satan's cock, each and every one of them. Gnorr. "We're rock stars against drugs cos that's what the President wants." Aw, suck Satan's cock. That's what we want isn't it, government approved rock n roll? Whooh, we're partying now! "We're rock stars who do Pepsi Cola commercials."
For all his apparent hate-spewing manner on stage (“Fuck you, you inbred, mouth-reading, American Gladiator-watching cracker piece of shit! Evolve!” ) Bill was ever the idealist. His rants showed a man who was naive enough to wonder why on earth is mediocrity being bandied about like a virtue. He seemed to be shocked at the mad hysteria and hypocrisy behind drug laws (The drugs that do absolutely no good for us are legal, like nicotine and alcohol, while drugs that enable us to see how badly we are being fucked everyday are not, coincidence?). He quit doing drugs but never did he deride ALL his drug experiences as bad. He always gave an honest view, that there are some good drugs and some bad ones, just like there are good and bad relationships.
Bill's no-compromise attitude ensured his forever remaining in the underground circuit in the US where audiences were accustomed to the "ha ha" "he he" humour of standup "artistes" like Carrot Top, or more recently the redneck gang calling themselves the "Blue Collar Comedy Tour". Bill Hicks was just too intense and honest for them. He never backed away from offending the audience but it was never done in hate, but rather out of sheer frustration.
He usually ended his routines with this gem:
The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your doors, buy guns, close yourself off. The eyes of love, instead, see all of us as one. Here's what we can do to change the world, right now, to a better ride. Take all that money that we spend on weapons and defences each year and instead spend it feeding and clothing and educating the poor of the world, which it would many times over, not one human being excluded, and we could explore space, together, both inner and outer, forever, in peace.
Bill Hicks died for our sins.
He was the greatest of them all, the last of the great social satirists in the mould of Jonathan Swift, dressed up as a stand-up comic. Born in Valdosta, Georgia, the most Midwestern town in the US in a typical white, christian, southern family he turned out to be one of the greatest social satirists of the 20th century. Unlike other great stand-ups like Richard Pryor or George Carlin, Hicks wasn't funny because he told jokes. He was funny because he did what no one else did, lifting up the curtain that covered the real America. The America that he felt, told its citizens they lived in the Land of the Free and yet continued to bomb poor nations, exercising control over the media and generally ensuring that the populace remained dumb, watching fifty six channels of American Gladiators, watching those pituitary retards bang their skulls together and congratulating themselves on "living in the land of freedom".
Bill Hicks started performing at the age of 13, and story goes on how he held an english class spellbound with his routines, resulting in the teacher having to give him time at the beginning of the class so she could conduct the rest of the class in peace. His initial inspiration was Woody Allen whose routines he tried to copy before moving on to his own material. Their styles of delivery were rather similar, both masters of the deadpan punchlines. Subsequent years found him sneaking out of his house to perform at the Comedy Workshop in Houston with his best friend Dwight Slade, as the youngest duo there. Bill and Dwight, helped by their friend Kevin Booth were performing at different venues up until his senior year when his family moved to Little Rock, Arkansas. Bill then went solo, barely graduating from high school. The year was 1980 and Reagan was elected president, ensuring good standup material for any comic who dared. From then on he was firmly on the performing circuit, playing at nightclubs all over the country, appearing on the David Letterman show twelve times (and in his final appearance being the only comic to be ever completely censored from the show, an event worthy of a book by itself), and establishing a strong underground fan following.
He was a big celebrity in England where the fans adored him but his name was still relatively unknown in the US, something that was to be the state of things all the way till his death. He died of pancreatic cancer, a very rare type of cancer that almost never struck anyone as young as Bill. It seemed that nature wanted to get rid of him before he could do too much damage.
Bill Hicks was probably one of the few standup comedians who didn't make the audience just sit back and laugh in a detached manner. His intensity on stage ensured that audiences were either enthralled or repulsed by what he said or did. The angrier Bill got, in general, the funnier he was (Although a couple of times he just completely lost it). One could see the intensity and the force of conviction with which he delivered his best material. Audiences who came in expecting a normal standup comic who talks about airline food and toilet seats were in for a rude shock as he cleaved right through topics like drug "Abuse" ("I've had some killer fuckin' times on drugs"), pornography ("It is not an adult feature unless at the end of it, someone's gooey"), war ("Watching a missile go down an airvent... pretty fuckin' amazing, but couldn't we use the same technology to shoot food at hungry people?"), popular culture ("I have a new show, on CBS... It's a half hour game show entitled 'Let's hunt and kill Billy Ray Cyrus'. I think it's fairly self-explanatory each week we let the Hounds of Hell loose and chase that jar-head, no talent, cracker-asshole all over the globe till I finally catch that fruity little ponytail of his, pull him to his Chippendales knees, put a shotgun in his mouth, 'POW!' and we'll be back the following season with 'Let's hunt and kill Michael Bolton' "), advertising ("if you are in advertizing or marketing, kill yourself"), and christian fundamentalists ("Ever notice that those who believe in creationism look really unevolved?").
He was always on the fringe, rejecting mainstream entertainment as being too dumbed down and watered down to avoid stepping on any corporate toes. His rants against popular media and culture are legendary in their ferocity, vigour and most of all truth. For example, his take on the "Britney Spears of his day," Debbie Gibson:
Have you seen that little mall creature at work? "*singing*Shake your love....." what love are you shaking Debbie? You're 12, you've got no titties, and your music SUCKS. Go back to the mall that spawned you. This is not a matter of perception, this is not a matter of taste, i can prove this to you on an etch-a-sketch
WHEN did we start listening to pre-pubescent white girls?! I must've missed that fucking meeting. We have the greatest knowledge of all time at our fingertips, the greatest thinkers OF ALL FUCKING TIME, but no, what's that fucking little white girl saying?! Let's go put Debbie Gibson's thoughts on a compact disk, so they'll never be destroyed. Is it me? Maybe it's just me and i'm over-romanticising the past, but i remember when music had conscience, music had taste and music had balls man, does anyone remember that at all?
"You know Debbie Gibson writes all her on songs?
NO?! Fucking spoon me off a chair!
Uhuh, she writes all her own songs about all her own personal experiences..
Yeah what's her next song?! "Mom, why am i bleeding?"
On the New Kids on the Block:
"Cause you know, if you play New Kids on the Block albums backwards, they sound better. "Oh come on, Bill, they're the New Kids, don't pick on them, they're so good and they're so clean cut and they're such a good image for the children." Fuck that. When did mediocrity and banality become a good image for your children? I want my children to listen to people who fucking rocked. I don't care if they died in puddles of their own vomit. I want someone who plays from his fucking heart. "
(Now just substitute Beyonce for Debbie Gibson and any filthy boyband for New Kids on the Block)
No cow was too sacred to escape his cleaver. He took on politicians like Reagan and Bush with relentless fury, and with them he was eerily prophetic.
On Reagan:
"Ever notice we live in a world where good men are murdered and mediocre hacks thrive? John Kennedy murdered, Gandhi murdered. Martin Luther King murdered. Jesus murdered. Reagan... wounded."
On Bush I
People ask me where I stood politically you know. It's not that I disagree with Bush's economic policy or his foreign policy. But that I believe he was a child of Satan here to destroy the planet Earth. Yeah, I'm a little a little to the left there, I was. I was leaning that way.
On the First Iraq War:
We sold Iraq "farming equipment" which Iraq then "converted". How do they do this? "Simsalabim simsalabim aa salabim sim sim sim salabim." Wow! It was a chicken coop, it's now a nuclear reactor!" "This war's for Aladdin." Farming equipment which they converted into military, okay, you got me I'm curious, exactly what kind of farming equipment is this? "Oh okay, well it's stuff for the farmers of Iraq." Yeah? What? "Ooh okay, ar well ooh one of the things we gave them was for the little farmer, a new thing we came up with called er the er, flame-throwing rake." "No it was for the farmer, see. He would rake the leaves and then just turn around Boooo." "But you know what the Iraqis did with that?" There's no trees in Iraq, what are you sending them rakes for, you asshole? "We could have done our research better perhaps yes."
What else did you sell 'em? "Okay er one of the other things we gave 'em was a new thing... for the farmer." "The, er, armoured tractor." "No, see, farmers when they farm look over their shoulders at times and they won't see a tree and they'll hit it maybe and there'll be a wasps nest in the tree and the wasps will come in and sting 'em." "So we put four inches of armour all over the tractor. And a turret to shoot pesticides on the wasps." "Yeah but you know what the Iraqis did with that?" "Can't trust 'em." I'm so sick of arming the world and then sending troops over to destroy the fucking arms, you know what I mean? We keep arming these little countries then we go and blow the shit out of em.
On Fundamentalist Christians and Creationists:
That's another good thing about Bush being gone, man, cos for the last 12 years with Reagan and Bush, we have had fundamentalist Christians in the White House. Fundamentalist Christians who believe the Bible is the exact word of God, including that wacky fire and brimstone Revelations ending, have had their finger on the fucking button for 12 years. [Eyes roll back in head] "Tell me when Lord, tell me when. Let me be your servant Lord." Fundamentalist Christianity - fascinating. These people actually believe that the bi.., er, the world is 12 thousand years old. Swear to God. What the..? Based on what? I asked them. "Well we looked at all the people in the Bible and we added 'em up all the way back to Adam and Eve, their ages - 12 thousand years." Well how fucking scientific, okay. I didn't know that you'd gone to so much trouble. That's good. You believe the world's 12 thousand years old? "That's right." Okay I got one word to ask you, a one word question, ready? "uh huh." Dinosaurs. You know the world's 12 thousand years old and dinosaurs existed, they existed in that time, you'd think it would have been mentioned in the fucking Bible at some point. "And lo Jesus and the disciples walked to Nazareth. But the trail was blocked by a giant brontosaurus... with a splinter in his paw. And O the disciples did run a shriekin': 'What a big fucking lizard, Lord!' But Jesus was unafraid and he took the splinter from the brontosaurus's paw and the big lizard became his friend. And Jesus sent him to Scotland where he lived in a loch for O so many years inviting thousands of American tourists to bring their fat fucking families and their fat dollar bills. And oh Scotland did praise the Lord. Thank you Lord, thank you Lord. Thank you Lord."
And finally, the classic gem on musicians (and drugs):
Drugs have done good things for us, if you don't believe they have, do me a favour - take all your albums, tapes and CDs and burn em cos you know what, the musicians who made that great music that has enhanced your lives throughout the years? Rrrrreal fucking high....
And these other musicians today who don't do drugs and in fact speak out against them? Boy, do they suck! What a coincidence! Ball-less, souless, spiritless corporate little bitches, suckers of Satan's cock, each and every one of them. Gnorr. "We're rock stars against drugs cos that's what the President wants." Aw, suck Satan's cock. That's what we want isn't it, government approved rock n roll? Whooh, we're partying now! "We're rock stars who do Pepsi Cola commercials."
For all his apparent hate-spewing manner on stage (“Fuck you, you inbred, mouth-reading, American Gladiator-watching cracker piece of shit! Evolve!” ) Bill was ever the idealist. His rants showed a man who was naive enough to wonder why on earth is mediocrity being bandied about like a virtue. He seemed to be shocked at the mad hysteria and hypocrisy behind drug laws (The drugs that do absolutely no good for us are legal, like nicotine and alcohol, while drugs that enable us to see how badly we are being fucked everyday are not, coincidence?). He quit doing drugs but never did he deride ALL his drug experiences as bad. He always gave an honest view, that there are some good drugs and some bad ones, just like there are good and bad relationships.
Bill's no-compromise attitude ensured his forever remaining in the underground circuit in the US where audiences were accustomed to the "ha ha" "he he" humour of standup "artistes" like Carrot Top, or more recently the redneck gang calling themselves the "Blue Collar Comedy Tour". Bill Hicks was just too intense and honest for them. He never backed away from offending the audience but it was never done in hate, but rather out of sheer frustration.
He usually ended his routines with this gem:
The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your doors, buy guns, close yourself off. The eyes of love, instead, see all of us as one. Here's what we can do to change the world, right now, to a better ride. Take all that money that we spend on weapons and defences each year and instead spend it feeding and clothing and educating the poor of the world, which it would many times over, not one human being excluded, and we could explore space, together, both inner and outer, forever, in peace.
Bill Hicks died for our sins.
Sunday, October 09, 2005
Common myths fundies believe when they think they are debunking evolution
Myth 1: Evolution is an atheistic world-view
Fact: Evolution is 1> Not a world view. It is a scientific theory. A world view is a system that has beliefs about 5 main subjects: God, reality, knowledge, morality, and humankind. Evolution has no views on God, knowledge, and morality. 2> Evolution is not atheistic by nature. There are many theistic evolutionists around. (Miller is a good example of a Roman Catholic Evolutionist. There are also many theistic evolutionists in my alma mater, the National University of Singapore.)
Evolution never talks about what is the purpose of life, what we should do, what started life &c. It merely gives a mechanism (Natural Selection) that explains diversity of life on earth.
Myth 2: Evolution disobeys the second laws of thermodynamics, hence it is not possible
Fact: This is really an old argument, oft repeated by fundies who seem to lack knowledge of basic science. Let's see what the second law of thermodynamics says, shall we?
The second law of thermodynamics states that, in a closed system energy transfer is never 100% efficient. There is always some energy that is released as unusable energy (usually as heat, sometimes as light or sound). That's it.
Fundies argue that this means that we can never have order from a state of relative disorder. Therefore we can never have more complex organisms from less complex ones.
Let's see the flaws of this argument shall we?
Firstly the second law of thermodynamics talks of closed systems. The earth is not a closed system, living systems are not closed systems. End of story.
Does the fundy let go here? No way. She argues that well, the second law of thermodynamics somehow applies to open systems as well, that addition of heat to an ordered system would cause it to go disordered.
This firstly is not mentioned in the second law of thermodynamics. I will get to refuting this argument too in a moment, but first, no text book describes this as a law of thermodynamics. All it says is the SLT applies to closed system. The earth and living systems are not closed systems, so the law doesn't apply to living systems. End of story again.
Now about the argument that SLT dictates that addition of heat would result in disorder. There are two ways of refuting this, one that questions the fundy's use of the word "order" in relation to masses of living tissue, but I prefer this more simpler approach. Let me give a counterexample. We all agree that diamonds contain carbon in a highly ordered structure right? Right, ever figured out how they are made? Typically, graphite is heated to 3000oC at over 100, 000 atm pressure. What do we get? Diamond. The fundy immediately says that well, DNA or life molecules don't do that! Well that's why life evolved on earth where the conditions were right, for the chemical reactions to proceed at reasonable rates and the end products to remain stable. The earth does not heat up to 3000C. That's why no known life forms exist in either Jupiter or Venus.
Does the fundy let go here? NO! She then pulls Astronomer Hoyle’s argument: Abiogenesis is like a tornado moving through a junkyard and assembling a Boeing 747.
Firstly evolution doesn’t talk about the Origin of life. Darwin titled his book the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection or The
Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. As he himself says in the Origin (my favourite quote) There is grandeur in this view of life,
with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the
fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.
Darwin was silent about the Origin of life. Anyway this analogy Hoyles used is highly flawed. Complex systems do spontaneously arise. The very
tornado that he refers to is a complex system.
Anyway, Biological molecules have very different reactivities and properties as compared to a junkyard heap.
Myth 3: Evolution is just a theory. It is not fact.
Fact: Here the fundy displays his lack of knowledge of basic science again. True evolution is "just" a theory. But then again so is the "theory" of gravity, Relativity "theory" and Quantum "theory".
Let me again explain what theory means in a scientific setting: A scientist observes a fact of nature. (For example, apples fall down). The scientist then devises hypotheses to explain the fact. (For example, invisible fairies pull apples down trees, masses attract each other with forces etc..). He then tests these hypotheses using empirical experiments, or mathematical deductions. Whenever a hypothesis is found to contradict findings of the test, that hypothesis is rejected. (Something a fundy never does. All a fundy does is try to look for data that agrees with his hypothesis, and then attempts to prove it with that data). Only when the hypothesis, after rigorous testing is found to explain the observed fact accurately (within limits of experimental design and statistical error), is it given the title theory. As for me, I believe in evolution as much as a fundy believes that 2+2 is 4.
What alternative does the fundy offer to evolution? A mysterious being, using unknown mechanisms, created life on this planet for a mysterious purpose. Occam's razor will tell me which theory is more plausible. Heck common sense tells me to go with evolution.
Myth 4: Evolutionists themselves don't agree with evolution.
Fact: Tell that to S. J. Gould! Like any science, evolution has various "schools of thought". Some believe that it happened gradually, some believe that it happened in sudden bursts. But they still believe that evolution happened, because they did the research and found it so. The exact mechanism maybe somewhere in between what they believe but that doesn't make it false!
Myth 5: There is no proof...
This one as been refuted even more times than the SLT argument. Darwin's entire Origin...was basically a data book. Fundies always claim that they never see "one kind" evolve to "another kind", and yet they never explain what they mean by "kind". Speciation has been observed in labs and in the field. (African Cichlids, Farroe Island mouse, primrose speciation, bacterial resistance to antibiotic.. the list is endless.. refer to www.talkorigins.org ) When one species is shown to split into two then the fundy claims its still not two "kinds"... what does she expect? A horse giving birth to a pig? Evolution has never claimed that! Fundies love to use straw man arguments like these.
There is also ample proof from the fossil record of intermediate forms (refer to archaeopteryx. yes it is an intermediate form. It has birdlike feathers, wings and beak, and reptile like bone structure tail and nostrils, the horse, even elephants have very well documented evolutionary paths with intermediate forms. Even humans have a fairly good fossil record) this is getting tiring. If you are interested, www.talkorigins.org and www.infidels.org/library has more information. Apart from the commonly debated archaeopteryx, there are plenty of other reptile-bird intermediates: Sinornis and Concornis are two further fossils that have more derived characteristics than archaeopteryx but still maintain some reptilian characteristics like toothed jaw, skull structure and separate metatarsal bones in the hands. As for reptilian-mammalian forms, there are plenty of fossils that show a very good evolutionary history of early mammals. Any good textbook in vertebrate biology will give you the information. I recommend Janis & Pough’s Vertebrate Life (Prentice Hall) though. Lots of pictures.
Myth 6: Evolution says man evolved from monkeys and apes
Evolution says man and ape evolved from a common ancestor. Man did not evolve from apes, Man is an ape. A smart one. (I can almost hear the fundies shriek like banshees now). DNA similarities, physiological similarities, even behavioral similarities have only gone on to strengthen this view. This is a far more logical deductions than the ones fundies believed in, that man can from dust.
Myth 7: The Bible says man is made in God's image...
Well, that's up to you. Theistic evolutionists believe that evolution is merely a mechanism showing how god created everything. But for fundies, look in the mirror. "Now say this, god looks like me, right up to the spittle lips, bandy-legs and buck teeth. He is filled with the same hatred for science as I am. As Darwin himself said: For my own part I would as soon be descended from that heroic little monkey, who braved his dreaded enemy in order to save the life of his keeper, or from that old baboon, who descending from the mountains, carried away in triumph his young comrade from a crowd of astonished dogs- as from a savage who delights to torture his enemies, offers up bloody sacrifices, practices infanticide without remorse, treats his wives like slaves, knows no decency, and is haunted by the grossest superstitions. (C.D. – Descent of Man)
Myth 1: Evolution is an atheistic world-view
Fact: Evolution is 1> Not a world view. It is a scientific theory. A world view is a system that has beliefs about 5 main subjects: God, reality, knowledge, morality, and humankind. Evolution has no views on God, knowledge, and morality. 2> Evolution is not atheistic by nature. There are many theistic evolutionists around. (Miller is a good example of a Roman Catholic Evolutionist. There are also many theistic evolutionists in my alma mater, the National University of Singapore.)
Evolution never talks about what is the purpose of life, what we should do, what started life &c. It merely gives a mechanism (Natural Selection) that explains diversity of life on earth.
Myth 2: Evolution disobeys the second laws of thermodynamics, hence it is not possible
Fact: This is really an old argument, oft repeated by fundies who seem to lack knowledge of basic science. Let's see what the second law of thermodynamics says, shall we?
The second law of thermodynamics states that, in a closed system energy transfer is never 100% efficient. There is always some energy that is released as unusable energy (usually as heat, sometimes as light or sound). That's it.
Fundies argue that this means that we can never have order from a state of relative disorder. Therefore we can never have more complex organisms from less complex ones.
Let's see the flaws of this argument shall we?
Firstly the second law of thermodynamics talks of closed systems. The earth is not a closed system, living systems are not closed systems. End of story.
Does the fundy let go here? No way. She argues that well, the second law of thermodynamics somehow applies to open systems as well, that addition of heat to an ordered system would cause it to go disordered.
This firstly is not mentioned in the second law of thermodynamics. I will get to refuting this argument too in a moment, but first, no text book describes this as a law of thermodynamics. All it says is the SLT applies to closed system. The earth and living systems are not closed systems, so the law doesn't apply to living systems. End of story again.
Now about the argument that SLT dictates that addition of heat would result in disorder. There are two ways of refuting this, one that questions the fundy's use of the word "order" in relation to masses of living tissue, but I prefer this more simpler approach. Let me give a counterexample. We all agree that diamonds contain carbon in a highly ordered structure right? Right, ever figured out how they are made? Typically, graphite is heated to 3000oC at over 100, 000 atm pressure. What do we get? Diamond. The fundy immediately says that well, DNA or life molecules don't do that! Well that's why life evolved on earth where the conditions were right, for the chemical reactions to proceed at reasonable rates and the end products to remain stable. The earth does not heat up to 3000C. That's why no known life forms exist in either Jupiter or Venus.
Does the fundy let go here? NO! She then pulls Astronomer Hoyle’s argument: Abiogenesis is like a tornado moving through a junkyard and assembling a Boeing 747.
Firstly evolution doesn’t talk about the Origin of life. Darwin titled his book the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection or The
Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. As he himself says in the Origin (my favourite quote) There is grandeur in this view of life,
with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the
fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.
Darwin was silent about the Origin of life. Anyway this analogy Hoyles used is highly flawed. Complex systems do spontaneously arise. The very
tornado that he refers to is a complex system.
Anyway, Biological molecules have very different reactivities and properties as compared to a junkyard heap.
Myth 3: Evolution is just a theory. It is not fact.
Fact: Here the fundy displays his lack of knowledge of basic science again. True evolution is "just" a theory. But then again so is the "theory" of gravity, Relativity "theory" and Quantum "theory".
Let me again explain what theory means in a scientific setting: A scientist observes a fact of nature. (For example, apples fall down). The scientist then devises hypotheses to explain the fact. (For example, invisible fairies pull apples down trees, masses attract each other with forces etc..). He then tests these hypotheses using empirical experiments, or mathematical deductions. Whenever a hypothesis is found to contradict findings of the test, that hypothesis is rejected. (Something a fundy never does. All a fundy does is try to look for data that agrees with his hypothesis, and then attempts to prove it with that data). Only when the hypothesis, after rigorous testing is found to explain the observed fact accurately (within limits of experimental design and statistical error), is it given the title theory. As for me, I believe in evolution as much as a fundy believes that 2+2 is 4.
What alternative does the fundy offer to evolution? A mysterious being, using unknown mechanisms, created life on this planet for a mysterious purpose. Occam's razor will tell me which theory is more plausible. Heck common sense tells me to go with evolution.
Myth 4: Evolutionists themselves don't agree with evolution.
Fact: Tell that to S. J. Gould! Like any science, evolution has various "schools of thought". Some believe that it happened gradually, some believe that it happened in sudden bursts. But they still believe that evolution happened, because they did the research and found it so. The exact mechanism maybe somewhere in between what they believe but that doesn't make it false!
Myth 5: There is no proof...
This one as been refuted even more times than the SLT argument. Darwin's entire Origin...was basically a data book. Fundies always claim that they never see "one kind" evolve to "another kind", and yet they never explain what they mean by "kind". Speciation has been observed in labs and in the field. (African Cichlids, Farroe Island mouse, primrose speciation, bacterial resistance to antibiotic.. the list is endless.. refer to www.talkorigins.org ) When one species is shown to split into two then the fundy claims its still not two "kinds"... what does she expect? A horse giving birth to a pig? Evolution has never claimed that! Fundies love to use straw man arguments like these.
There is also ample proof from the fossil record of intermediate forms (refer to archaeopteryx. yes it is an intermediate form. It has birdlike feathers, wings and beak, and reptile like bone structure tail and nostrils, the horse, even elephants have very well documented evolutionary paths with intermediate forms. Even humans have a fairly good fossil record) this is getting tiring. If you are interested, www.talkorigins.org and www.infidels.org/library has more information. Apart from the commonly debated archaeopteryx, there are plenty of other reptile-bird intermediates: Sinornis and Concornis are two further fossils that have more derived characteristics than archaeopteryx but still maintain some reptilian characteristics like toothed jaw, skull structure and separate metatarsal bones in the hands. As for reptilian-mammalian forms, there are plenty of fossils that show a very good evolutionary history of early mammals. Any good textbook in vertebrate biology will give you the information. I recommend Janis & Pough’s Vertebrate Life (Prentice Hall) though. Lots of pictures.
Myth 6: Evolution says man evolved from monkeys and apes
Evolution says man and ape evolved from a common ancestor. Man did not evolve from apes, Man is an ape. A smart one. (I can almost hear the fundies shriek like banshees now). DNA similarities, physiological similarities, even behavioral similarities have only gone on to strengthen this view. This is a far more logical deductions than the ones fundies believed in, that man can from dust.
Myth 7: The Bible says man is made in God's image...
Well, that's up to you. Theistic evolutionists believe that evolution is merely a mechanism showing how god created everything. But for fundies, look in the mirror. "Now say this, god looks like me, right up to the spittle lips, bandy-legs and buck teeth. He is filled with the same hatred for science as I am. As Darwin himself said: For my own part I would as soon be descended from that heroic little monkey, who braved his dreaded enemy in order to save the life of his keeper, or from that old baboon, who descending from the mountains, carried away in triumph his young comrade from a crowd of astonished dogs- as from a savage who delights to torture his enemies, offers up bloody sacrifices, practices infanticide without remorse, treats his wives like slaves, knows no decency, and is haunted by the grossest superstitions. (C.D. – Descent of Man)
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