Photo by Steve Schroeder
OK, let's be honest guys. I think about war, the United States, global warming, immigration, sexism, and veganism a lot. The world is a scary and wild, wild place to live in right now, and has been probably as long as there have been humans hanging out. One thing that I've noticed and maybe you haven't noticed is that I don't really use this website/blog/journal as a place for political dialog. My friend Rebecca and I were talking about how this is a very constant and open dialogue between all of us in the paper, stick, and bone world, but not really that present in this computer one. There are amazing exceptions like Regarding and Cowboyz 'n' Poodles, but for the most part I think we are doing a couple of things here;
1) Like everyone, we're living our lives as best as we can and doing as much as we can without going crazy. There are a lot of things that could become completely overwhelming to us, so we keep ourselves busy with pleasant projects and interactions, and also sometimes total bullshit and fighting because we are unhappy with ourselves, our friends, and our world.
2) Aesthetics. Does that make sense? It could be easy to come off uninformed, uninteresting, and pretty self-serving. I think good blogging has a lot to do with an awareness of your community and the communities you are a part of as a contributor or as a reader. I think this can translate into posting YouTube links and writing about what you ate for dinner in response to the thought that your peers already know about the war and have the same awful feelings that you do. In my circle of friends political art has more and more become something of a joke... unless somehow you are famous and your audience is made up of normal people that watch Jay Leno, etc.
I think that those can be valid feelings and ways to deal with the sheer force and constant dark hugeness around us, but I really think it's important that we write and speak honestly for, at least, the sake of journaling and documenting ourselves... if that's what we're, you know, already doing, i.e. blogging. I'm not sure if I'm getting this across carefully enough, I just want to make sure that I remember that I have this document that says "I'm not part of this United States. I didn't vote for this terrible, terrible, hateful man. I didn't say it was OK to bomb or kill anyone. I said NO."
I'd like to share this email I intercepted from my Dad to my oldest brother:
Your blog starts out with an apologist's viewpoint. You seem to imply that Nathan was somehow forced in to going to war. All soldiers have a choice. In this instance not only did he choose to go, he reenlisted; and therefore made a conscious choice to stay in the Army and put himself back in harm's way. Not that I want him to be hurt. I too hope for his safe return. In fact, I alone from our immediate family was the one who sent him a care package during his first tour of duty.
As the old poem from Tennyson suggested "ours is not the reason why, ours is but to do or die," soldiers often do not consider the consequences of their actions. Soldiers throughout the centuries have "bought in" to the notion that they are under command and therefore do not have the right to question the politics. The notion that "I was ordered" was the excuse, or line of defense when soldiers have committed atrocities. I would posit that individuals have a choice. Soldiers have a choice. Therefore, as long as soldiers continue to enlist and continue to subscribe to the system we will have armed conflicts, police actions, and unnecessary wars. The flag waving and support our troops banners and car magnets make me sick. This attitude perpetuates the system. I think as an individual your cousin and any one soldier should be given support. However, I believe this should be on a one on one basis and not part of some campaign. Must we admonish our fellow citizens to support the troops when the hidden message for most of them is that we need to support the war AND the President. I don't see stickers saying I support the troops but I don't support Bush. Are we as a society morally bound to perpetuate this system? I think not.
I want Nathan to return home safe. I never thought he would reenlist. It is sad that for many young people the military is the only option for a career. AmeriCorps and the Peace Corps should pay just as well the military.
I was laid up with my leg three weeks out of the hospital and I made calls and calls for the Kerry campaign. On crutches and still with the metal cage Janet and I went to a candlelight peace march on a cold February evening and then walked for 8 long blocks. We have attended subsequent protests. Personally I faced the draft during Vietnam and was just a few numbers away from being drafted. I had made the choice that I would go to Canada rather than participate. That decision would have probably meant being disowned by my family. I was fortunate in that I never had to make a choice that could have involved such conflict. You and your brothers are fortunate in a similar way since you have not been forced to make a tough choice.
The energy crisis and global warming are difficult issues. I find it incredible that you would challenge my environmental record. I began recycling before it was popular by taking cans and stuff down to American Can Company when I was in high school. I tried to instill similar habits with you guys. In Ashland I choose not to use the house air conditioner and saved energy by sealing everything up before I left for work. At your mother's old house in Astoria I tried to work on recycling and even created a hose system to use the wastewater from the washing machine to water the rear yard. (I have been trying to develop a similar system in Salem.) I rode a bike to work, to my doctor's appointments, and lived without a car in Ashland for many months. To this day I try to minimize my energy consumption. And all this time I had thought your " choice" of not owning a car was a financial one, not an environmental one. I do not in any way want to deny you the pleasure of having a reasonable work environment. However, I do still see irony in your touting of extra cold as an acceptable use of energy.
Now I'd like to end on a lighter note. Wait, this isn't any lighter. Ritchey wrote this entry about animal testing in June and it gave me hope that my friends that eat meat and read her blog would read it and possibly feel something. All of this is very tricky. How do you articulate such deeply emotional material that lives inside of you? Do you know what I mean? Like, I FEEL IN MY BONES that anyone and everyone should be allowed to get married. I FEEL IN MY BONES that it's wrong to bomb countries for "being terrorists." I have a lot of these feelings.
This entry is inspired by a series of videos that Claire and I are going to start producing for an Urban Honking blog that is TBA. Our goal is to create videos without shock or "you should feel horrible" tactics on subjects that we feel are very important. We want you to be confident in passing these videos along to your homophobic cousin in Florida, your meat-eating immediate family, your pro-war co-workers, etc. I feel like our audience is very like-minded and understanding and I'm pretty uninterested in preaching to the choir, or preaching at all, really. It's going to be a fucking nightmare trying to make this project work, but we're going to give it our all. I'm sure this will take many months and you will probably forget about this and then be (hopefully) pleasantly surprised.
If you don't know about these things, check them out: The Panama Deception, Waco, The Sexual Politics of Meat, Life and Death, and Lies My Teacher Told Me.
Fuck it, watch this.
Truly,
Jona
Jona, it makes me so extremely happy to read this. I stayed up really late and got a message from Flint this morning that said "READ THIS!". I am so excited. I believe that the expression "preaching to the choir" is being over-used. It is such an easy thing to declare to protect oneself from discussing anything political. It is like, someone opens their mouth and then the persons around them saying "I already know all that". Which is totally untrue, I consider myself as someone who reads the news A LOT, I am a news addict, I get my news from so many sources, still, I learn something new in every single discussion I have with a friend about the current world situation. We need to encourage communication in any form. No one is too dumb to ask questions. We are being told to just "SHUT UP!" from so many sides already, let's show more patience and listen to each other.
The people who think we talk about the same things over and over too much are the same ones who eventually go to war.
Wow, I can't wait to see these videos. I would love to hear more.
This is an interesting problem that I think about a lot. The aesthetics of how to work out this dialogue. How to do these things artfully--with wit, focus, intelligence, and above all, how to make it universal. How do we make effective art? There's this sort of implied division between art ("our" art) and politics. All the more reason to bring them together.
I wish Warren had a blog.
Also do you guys want to make some political songs together as "The Resistance??"
For a long time, I felt that the most effective form of resistance/ protest was just living your life as if the revolution was already won. By making the art you want to make and ignoring the culture of repression and ignorance in this country, I imagined, you could become an example to others and subversively create hope.
I still feel this way but I also don't think it's enough anymore. I really admire your call of taking the discussion out into the blogosphere.
i have a sense of fear inside of be that has become a huge part of my every day life caused by theses issues and the anxieties they induced. i feel nauseated every day with all of these thoughts, and my fear of apathy and out of the fear of not knowing what to do or say or think or how to react. i am utterly horrified by the way the world is turning and, even in my attempts to spread good thought and morale, along with initiating activism in people i know, i still dont know how to get across what i want to say. i hope you dont mind the projection im giving this entry throughout the internet. you sum it up clairvoyantly, and leave the best of resources through your links. also, im more then willing to help fund, distribute, and help this idea you have with claire.
ive seen hope before in crowds and in individuals and its so beautiful ive cried before over it. i know that this is how you get people to care; making videos and mediums and talking to people. something is accomplishable through all of it and i want to see it happen.
I had no idea your dad was such a well-spoken fella. I want him to teach me how to do that washing-machine hose thing, because I feel extremely wasteful every time I do a load of laundry. Do you have to use a special soap so you don't kill your garden?
If you and Claire need any help making the videos, let me know. I'm totally on board with the message behind this post.
I am so proud of this entry. I love Warren's email. I am proud of you and can't wait for the new blog. And the thing about a blog is that it FEELS like preaching to the choir, yet anyone can read it. While most of my comments are supportive, I regularly get comments arguing with my stances on various things. So it IS a dialogue with the world, however big your "internet viewing stats" world is. And it is important to be honest. I am very bad at being measured, at trying to persuade with calm thoughts. No one was ever won over by a furious rant, but that's what I do. This entry has inspired me to try a different tack, which will be hard. But if recent events have taught us anything, it's that we have to stay on the moral high ground, and not sink into the pit these people have created. Last night I dreamed that I was saving Whiskers from a demonic element. I love you.
I have always been very frustrated by the "political art isn't cool" vibe. There certainly is bad political art, just like there is bad non-political art, but stereotyping political art is pretty lame in my opinion. There is lots of bad art in the world, but bad art that teaches you something suddenly becomes important art. And what does it matter if your "famous"? I know a lot of people that listen to your music- if you can get one 16 year old kid to think that riding a bike is cooler than driving a Hummer than you have done an amazing thing.
The most successful artists I know also happen to be the most political people I know. I don't think that is a coincidence.
Jona,
This post inspired me in a deep way.
I decided to get more political in my output, as you know because I asked you and Claire to help me with a video.
I thought I should post this here so people can see what this post inspired.
Here is a video we made yesterday that was inspired by this post.
hey Jona, i enjoy reading your blog. I wanted to ask, when you said "I FEEL IN MY BONES that anyone and everyone should be allowed to get married.".. did you mean same sex marriages, or anyone and everyone meaning if I wanted to marry my dad, or first female cousin because we loved one another that we should be able to? By the way, I'm not being sarcastic I'm just trying to figure out your views on the subject.
Sam, I was referencing same sex marriage. First cousins? Sure man, I'm pretty much into the government only restricting us when it's for our fundamental safety. It doesn't seem like marrying your Dad would be the greatest idea, but I'm not going to go into that right now. Dr. Drew! He knows.
Oh man. The art/politics thing has been my prime quandry ever since 2003. Politics/life has been easy as pi. If you have some long plane trips ahead of you, pick up 'Letters of Robert Duncan and Denise Levertov,' It's their corespondences on how they, as poets, should respond to vietnam. It brings me close to an emotional meltdown.
You guys should really check out the immigration episode of the show 30 Days. You can download it for free via iTunes right here.
SO GOOD. Pass it on!
I immediately thought about this picture : http://shop.textalk.se/shop/299/art17/6017-pic-14b8f2.jpg
Hello, I would like to say that I love this posting, and the idea of the videos, and you should really do this stuff! Plus, I wrote a poem about this "preaching to the choir" topic, because I was equally annoyed by the use of it as an excuse to never talk about anything "political" or whatever. if anyone would care to read it.
Some things to say can't get cliché or old
since they've been said so much but still ignored
and even singers need reminding why to sing
cause not even I am of the Good I'm painting
although you may've heard these songs before
I preach because there is no choir
Dear Jona,
Joel and I were just discussing why you would delete his comment on this post. We wonder how you don't see the humor in erasing a comment to a post that is speaking to discussing difficult truths of the human condition. It is as though you have created a forum for care bears to discuss weighty issues and if anyone but other care bears wants to join the conversation, then suddenly all of your care bear clouds go gray and it starts to rain and you all have to run inside. I am a care bear that has a little rainbow on my tummy. They call me Cheer Bear. Joel didn't cuss, or call you names. (at least not on this particular comment) I believe the ability to communicate with a variety of people, with a multitude of differing ideas is the best tool we may have to understand and cope with the world's problems. We believe in what you are doing. We want to be a part of it. If a brother excludes his brother from a conversation on a blog, how can we expect the Jews and Palestinians to reach an understanding? What's up with that?
Sarah/Joel,
The reason I deleted Joel's post (I re-published it since we're talking about it now) was because it isn't contributing anything to this dialogue at all. Joel's post is about Joel and Joel's feelings. The only thing I get out of Joel's post is a defensive reaction to this post and his banned status at UrHo. I have never banned or deleted any other commenters or comments from either UrHo or teamyacht.com. I agree that communicating with a deep variety of people with differing views is extremely important and that's what this post and our new video show will be all about. Joel is an exception.
Joel, the tone of your comment started off sincere and helpful then totally changed once you started writing and thinking about how we banned you from UrbanHonking. From there it's all downhill sarcasm and worthless advice. Here's what I mean:
Branch out! Invite the retards to the party, there might actually be something good out there beyond the bubble. Honestly, what's the worst possible thing that could happen?
1) Branch out? Re-read this post. That's where the co-workers and immediate family come in. We're going to ask the initial viewers to share the videos with people the know have different/opposing political views.
2) "Preaching to the choir" is a phrase and not a literal expression, although I invite, and always have, anyone of any faith to be a part of any discussion I've held. I don't see how anyone is excluded. (not counting you)
3) You were banned from UrHo because of how you treated people. Not because of swearing, not because of your "edgy" humor, but because you were thoughtlessly offensive.
If you want to be involved in my internet projects why don't you just ask? Instead of trying to shoot it down and offering nothing but veiled sarcasm, please just tell me you want to help or be a part of it and you won't try to sabotage it like you have my other projects.
cheers. helpful site: http://www-sul.stanford.edu/depts/ssrg/kkerns/wcolor.html
Hmm....
We live in a very complicated world. People's opions are formulated by others / projections / and what feels socially acceptable. Those of us with with more feelings are possibly more capable of walking to our own drum, making are own music, art, business and thought.
I can only hope that those who are fortunate enough to not only be creative but have access to this discourse, are capable of taking this (creativity & discourse) out of the blog-vid-o-sphere.
Please take your generosity, time, feelings and thought to everyone. Be human and interact, change the social discourse so that people feel comfortable being who they really are. The more you do it, the more you'll see it.
This isn't to say that 'blogs' don't cut it, they're great and they can make the difference. But actions can too. Maybe today is a good day to riot. Cause rukus. Not get married. Talk to your grandmother and father about their life and tell them why you think FOX news is a sham. Stand up for yourself. Ride that bike. Write that letter (by hand). There is still time to change the 'the hearts and minds' of the U.S. The rapture isn't here yet. The sun is still warm and that tomato in your garden tastes as good now as it did 200 years ago.
Thanks.
Yes! I am very excited for these videos.
I noticed a while ago the animal rights group on campus showed PETA videos and used all PETA free zines and flyers and signs at their demonstrations, even though everyone I taked to in the group really didn't feel PETA's tactics were affective at reaching a wide audience, and were VERY effective at angering a lot of people who then become unreceptive to even discussing the abuse civilization does to animals.
I also feel like "political art" has become some kind of joke, but I personally feel like art is inevitably political because it exists in the world, and I'm not sure anything can exist outside of politics, however unfortunate that might seem. My songs are equally personal and political and they really have to be. I don't intend them that way, it's how they manifest themselves.
But I am not sure if I can say this generally! For me, personally, nothing I create or experience exists outside of politics, and I think that is part of being critically engaged with the world. Part of my engagement, the great engagement, the circle we stand in.
MORE TALKING!!
More Questions!!
Lovingly,
Erin
I think your videos are a super awesome idea. it's so important to reach out to people who have strong opinions and ideas which may be opposed to your own in a way which doesn't corner them into getting defensive.
I think I'm not quite clear on this particular segment of your post, though:
"I just want to make sure that I remember that I have this document that says "I'm not part of this United States. I didn't vote for this terrible, terrible, hateful main. I didn't say it was OK to bomb or kill anyone. I said NO." "
Are you refuting this kind of thinking? identifying it as a placation? Because I think it's important to remember that even if we didn't actively participate in making things the way they are, even if it wasn't our idea and even if we fought against it, we are still actively supporting existing policy by participating economically in our civilization. Even if I become a tax resistor, I still pay rent: My landlord pays taxes. I still buy food at the store: My grocery pays taxes.
I started thinking about this during the last presidential election when I met so many apathetic non-voters who didn't like the way things were, and justified their non-voting by claiming to 'not participate in the system'.. but it can be a fallacy even for awesome conscientious people who are trying to do their best without going totally insane.
It can seem like this this thought process is a gateway into an endless cycle of totally impotent guilt and frustration. but i don't think it has to be.
I think that the key is to remember that it's not about personal purity. It's about trying to do our best to improve the situation which exists. We can remain aware of difficult situations and of our role in them without allowing that knowledge to paralyze us.
I guess it's about being calm, staying aware, and continuing to do rad shit.
like i said before, i'm not sure what your initial intention was with that quoted section, so this whole comment may well fit squarely into the 'no duh' file, but it's been kind of an important concept and spur-to-alertness for me and i thought i'd share it.
thanks for doing so much rad shit and for writing about it with such clarity. you are really neat.
i am into the sorcrr person. he or she is smart and has identified this trap i fall into. there is a degree to which it is impossible to not be complicit as long as we are part of the economic system, and we have to be part of the system to survive, so we have to change the system.
Jona, I think the video idea is a good one. I'm always down to help with projects (no doubt). I don't think it really matters if its called "art" though. Art is kind of an ego thing. Entertainment carries more weight in this country, so it's more important to make videos that are funny and entertaining and carry a message. Art is more for aesthetic purposes, which is why its harder to mix art with politics. There's plenty of ways to define art though, so whatever.
One point I wanted to bring up though is about your comment on animals and vegetarianism. I see too many vegatarian friends quick to pass on certain foods, but won't think twice about drinking a coke or eating some weird corporate junk food with zero nutritional value because it says it contains no animal products! If you put your emphasis on where your food comes from, for example locally grown vegtables, ethically raised meat, you're joining a sustanable environment that creates less waste and less polution to your surroundings as well as eating much healthier. I would think that shipping prepackaged products kills off way more wild animals in the long run, creating polution in oil based plastic packaginges, creating more waste and wasted energy.
Animals eat animals in nature and creating this idea of "wrong vs right" seems shortsighted to me when the problem is a much deeper form of consumerism. There's obviously quite a few problems with the meat industry in this country, but most countries have much higher standards for food, so in my opinion this seems like a misdirected solution to the problem.
Eric, that is so true, about pre-packaged and shipped foods, and healthy choices, etc. The deeper issue for most vegans I personally know, though, is the issue of cruelty, of inhumanity. Animals may eat animals in nature, as vegan-haters are always quick to point out, but it must also be admitted that we humans no longer live "in nature." We live in cities and drive cars and take antibiotics and eat multitudes of things that do not exist in nature. So it seems to me that suddenly claiming that something is "natural" and therefore must be "right" is a little misguided, given the current state of things. I mean, animals also rape and kill each other in nature, and practice cannibalism, and eat their own young, etc. How come meat-eating is the only time we exalt acting "like animals?" The issue is the desire to exempt ourselves from a cruel, disgusting, unhealthy cycle of food production (that is, like you point out, much worse in America). For me, and for the other vegans I know, it's not so much a calculated choice based on evaluation of economic and environmental factors (although that is part of it) as it is a very visceral awareness of the awful conditions of the animal's life, the terrible pain it lived in, the brutal, disgusting, violent manner of its death. Treating animals like robots, mass-producing them with zero regard for their quality of life...it's reprehensible, and I believe more and more people are coming to realize that no culture can call itself "civilized" while it tortures millions of animals every day. These things, like many human rights issues, are simply so blatantly unacceptable that all other considerations take a backseat to the intense need to purge all such products from our lives.
In the end, everyone has their thing. I mean, no one living in modern America could ever live a perfectly environmental life. We are all leaving monumental ecological footprints, no matter how "good" we try to be. There are hypocrisies and miscalculations in the vegan lifestyle, but the same sorts of criticisms could be applied to many different subsections of the "progressive," environmentalist movement. What about people who refuse to drive cars, who ride bikes everywhere, but still eat meat? It takes more gas to produce a lifetime of meat-eating than you would expend if you drove a car sometimes. And the list could go on and on. Until we are living in caves, naked, eating leaves, we will not ever be able to live a truly environmentalist lifestyle. So while I think it's valid and important to raise these issues--the shipping of pre-packaged food is something that is WAY too overlooked in the vegan community, for sure, and Coke's human-rights and environmental offenses, etc. etc.--I don't think that it de-values veganism as a whole. We will all spend our whole lives becoming more and more informed on various issues. And in the end, there's only so much one person can do in their own life.
"Treating animals like robots, mass-producing them with zero regard for their quality of life...it's reprehensible"
Totally agree with that.
Obviously its not a black and white issue, and I don't expect anyone to live in a cave (although that's kind of a cool idea, maybe for a week). But personally, on a day to day basis, I would rather consciously eat an animal (and understand what I am eating) than drink a Coke. This is because I don't see meat as being the underlying problem. I see negligent a capitolism, laziness, and a disconnection to our food sources as being larger, more dangerous attitudes that have lead to the problem with meat consumption in this country.
I found this Nationmaster site recently through a thread on Momus's blog (http://www.nationmaster.com). "A massive central data source and a handy way to graphically compare nations."
I can't post this graph unfortunately, but I ran a comparison in the US with soft drink consumption, municipal waste generation, and obesity just for fun. Not so surprisingly, the US leads by far in all categories. The US does NOT lead with life expectancy, its down at #48. I couldn't find any stats on veganism, but I've never met any vegans abroad so maybe its a little early for stats on that.
From what I gather this country has the most access, and yet seems to feel some of the least amount of responsibility about it (lowest recycling, for example.). The above mentioned thread was about how the acceptance of evolution is lower in the United States than in Japan or Europe (Did we develop from earlier species of animals?) which seems to explain how the US can separate themselves from animals if they don't feel they are even related to other forms of life somehow.
Some other fun facts stated about the US:
Lowest overall tax rates as a percentage of GNP
Highest purchasing power
Highest individual worker productivity (but in both cases, other nations have been catching up)
Highest percentage of families earning two paychecks
Highest average household debt (double next nearest, UK)
Lowest average household savings
Biggest trade deficit
Biggest current account imbalance
Lowest investment levels as a percentage of GDP
Highest inequality of income (Gini)
Highest disparity between CEOs' pay and other workers' pay
Lowest percentage of unionized workers
Smallest middle class
Highest percentage of people below the poverty level
Highest percentage of below-poverty-level children
Most deaths from malnutrition per million
Highest healthcare expenditure as percentage of GDP
Highest doctor's incomes
Lowest percentage of population covered by public health care
Highest infant mortality rate
Highest toddler death rates
Highest rate of death in 15-24 year olds
Highest premature death rate
Highest number of people who think healthcare system needs fundamental change
Highest percentage of single-parent families
Lowest percentage of girls who are still virgins aged 20
Lowest percentage of sexually active single 15 to 19-year olds using birth control
Highest teen pregnancy rates
Highest teen abortion rates
Highest rates of reported police brutality
Biggest percentage of its population in prison
Largest number of death row inmates
Largest percentage of houses with a handgun
Largest number of handgun murders
Highest murder rate
Highest rape rate
Highest armed robbery rate
Lowest percentage of people using public transport
Highest annual air miles per person
Lowest average price of gallon of gas
Most oil energy used
Most carbon dioxide per person released
Most carbon monoxide per person released
Most CFCs emitted
Most major oil spills
Most forests cleared
Most coal burned
Most debris inhaled per person per year
Most municipal waste produced per person
Least glass recycled
Least paper and cardboard recycled
Shortest paid vacations
Least news as percentage of all TV
Most manufacturing employee turnover
Most employees fired
Lowest voter participation levels
Lowest number of referenda (zero)
Largest number of political scandals
sources from the above:
http://imomus.livejournal.com/
http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/8Comparison.htm
Now we're getting tangental, which is good.
I second Mr. E*ROCKs take on entertainment vs. art.
and...
I'd wager that America is by its own sheer nature, the only nation where the populus is fortunate enough to contemplate the ethics of what they put in their mouth.
The argument shouldn't be which is better, who is right and wrong... it should be about how we can get people to think in a more sustainable fashion, then become more sustainable.
Sure raising robot animals is bad. So is raising robot people.
I find myself very conflicted right now. I love being an American. I couldn't imagine being anywhere else. I also know that what E*Rock is pasting is true. It's tough as hell to be an American today. I also agree we artists have been tangental for quite some time.
What do we do now? Where do we go? What do we sing? Who do we sing to? If we paint something great, do we invite lots of people to see it? What if they're (attendees) rich and actually buy it? Do we take the money so we can pay our interweb bill? What if we know where that money comes from? What if they're really cool, really rich, and really, paying? What if they are like Nike and shit, or like someone being paid by Nike to pay me, is that still cool? If it's through a second party that has no ties to Indonesia, China, or Vietnam I'm still cool, right? What if Kobe likes my tones, B? I gots to eat, right? I gots to be sustained. That is the goal, overall. Total sustainabilty at no cost to robots, cows, kids, or Cats that need vegan cat food, laotions be damned.
Love,
Joel Conrad Bechtolt
Jona,
I found this post to be, for lack of a better term, deep as all get-out. And insightful. I wish you well in your undertaking in making videos and a blog regarding topics that are difficult to touch without coming across as self-indulgent. That, to me, would be hard. How hard? I sure as hell couldn't do it. Not ever.
Such a tightrope we all must walk!
I sure hope to see these videos, but seeing how they will be posted on Urbanhonking I can't. No hard feelings or drama, it's just the truth. I said inflammatory things over and over again after being warned that if I did so, I would get banned. So UrHo banned me for life. Not from just commenting, but from actually viewing any of their site. I sit here hoping some "homophobic cousin in Florida" will be able to fill me in on the discourse, if not, I'll have to count on my "meat-eating immediate family" to get it all straight and to share the good news.
I love the new ideal of an all inclusive policy that includes different backgrounds, viewpoints, and philosophies. Honestly, what I wouldn't give to be a "pro-war co-worker" right about now, sitting here on the cusp of profound disclosure!
But alas, I am probably typing this to myself. This will be deleted as soon as it is posted. I am but a 403 Error speedbump on the path to "enlightenment."
Am I the only one that finds it odd that you say "I'm pretty uninterested in preaching to the choir" when all those that don't don a robe and sing in the right key are excluded from the debate?
Branch out! Invite the retards to the party, there might actually be something good out there beyond the bubble. Honestly, what's the worst possible thing that could happen?
Love,
Joel Conrad Bechtolt
PS: If I'm still banned, I get it, I do tend to swear a lot!