favorite themes

loss of innocence
loss of sexual innocence
suffering
technology
people who have everything yet remain unfulfilled
voyeurism and exhibitionism
self-preservation
utopia
dystopian utopia
post apocalypse
addiction
fame
super intelligence
child prodigies
murder
torture
social upheaval/revolutions
shame
the obsolescence of intellectual property
undermining authority and power structures
magic
unity/ a shared sense of identity and experience
alternate universes

Race Relations

Race does not exist biologically. All these constructions of race are culturally created.

I'm mixed, so it doesn't matter who I date, or even with whom I'm interacting, it's always going to be interracial.

I personally am only physically attracted to black, mexican, and to a lesser extent white men. I've tried to make myself be physically attracted to asian men but I'm not able.

But what I have to say about my preferences is irrelevant... living on the earth for almost 30 years has given me plenty of time to really observe the way people interact and feel about other groups of people... perhaps being mixed has made it easier for me to interact with other ethnic groups, so I can observe them from the inside out.

Obviously, white people seem to be "all or nothing" when it comes to accepting other ethnic groups... either they're totally cool with minorities or they hate anybody who's not white. Also, a lot of times white people single out a certain group- i.e. middle easterners, jews, gays, etc, and are cool with every group aside from which ever one has been chosen to be scapegoated.

It seems obvious that asian people don't like black people but spend their entire lives wishing they could be white.

Black people seem to be pretty accepting of white people, asians, and mexicans so long as they feel like they're not being disrespected.

Mexicans seem to warm up to white or black people, but I have never really experienced the nuances of how they feel about asians.

It's just like Jerri Blank says- Black on white, outta site, black on sloat, there ain't no hope...

wiki "Darren"

A masculine given name of uncertain etymological origins.

Darren has several variant forms: Daren, Derren, Darin, Daron, Darran, Darrin, Darring, Darron, Darryn, Derrin and Derron.

-> Ironic, because I've heard before that it could be from Iranian, French, Irish, English, or possibly Nigerian origins...

My name, just like so many unknown things in the universe, is essentially a mystery. Ironically, I'm mixed, and have DNA from multiple endemic populations on several continents...

And sometimes I think I really should change my name to D'Airelle LaBonté- but I guess I'd have to move to France first. Ironically, I speak French fluently, and am part French...

reality tv news

This is the true story of six homeless people picked to live on the streets, work together and have their lives taped. This is Homeless Real World.

p.s. I thought I was the first person to come up with this idea, but it's already been done a while ago! I love to watch reality tv evolve, and in a sense, escalate. It's only a matter of time before more and more extreme things become televised, and we're watching our neighbors get killed, tortured, or raped on tv every night.

Last night I started watching Solitary 1.0 on hulu. I had never seen the first one, but seen most if not all of the second season, and I recently watched the 3rd season in its entirety. I love it, and I find it to be one of the most intelligent and interesting reality tv competitions I've ever watched.

[SALT] Managing social collapse (Orlov talk)

With vintage Russian black humor, Orlov described the social collapse he witnessed in Russia in the 1990s and spelled out its practical lessons for the American social collapse he sees as inevitable. The American economy in the 1990s described itself as "Goldilocks"---just the right size---when in fact is was "Tinkerbelle," and one day the clapping stops. As in Russia, the US made itself vulnerable to the decline of crude oil, a trade deficit, military over-reach, and financial over-reach.

Russians were able to muddle through the collapse by finding ways to manage 1) food, 2) shelter, 3) transportation, and 4) security.

Russian agriculture had long been ruined by collectivization, so people had developed personal kitchen gardens, accessible by public transit. The state felt a time-honored obligation to provide bread, and no one starved. (Orlov noted that women in Russia handled collapse pragmatically, putting on their garden gloves, whereas middle-aged men dissolved into lonely drunks.) Americans are good at gardening and could shift easily to raising their own food, perhaps adopting the Cuban practice of gardens in parking lots and on roofs and balconies.

As for shelter, Russians live in apartments from which they cannot be evicted. The buildings are heat-efficient, and the communities are close enough to protect themselves from the increase in crime. Americans, Orlov said, have yet to realize there is no lower limit to real estate value, nor that suburban homes are expensive to maintain and get to. He predicts flight, not to remote log cabins, but to dense urban living. Office buildings, he suggests, can easily be converted to apartments, and college campuses could make instant communities, with all that grass turned into pasture or gardens. There are already plenty of empty buildings in America; the cheapest way to get one is to offer to caretake it.

The rule with transportation, he said, is not to strand people in nonsurvivable places. Fuel will be expensive and hoarded. He noted that the most efficient of all vehicles is an old pickup fully loaded with people, driving slowly. He suggested that freight trains be required to provide a few empty boxcars for hoboes. Donkeys, he advised, provide reliable transport, and they dine as comfortably on the Wall Street Journal as they did on Pravda.

Security has to take into account that prisons will be emptied (by stages, preferably), overseas troops will be repatriated and released, and cops will go corrupt. You will have a surplus of mentally unstable people skilled with weapons. There will be crime waves and mafias, but you can rent a policeman, hire a soldier. Security becomes a matter of local collaboration. When the formal legal structure breaks down, adaptive improvisation can be pretty efficient.

By way of readiness, Orlov urges all to prepare for life without a job, with near-zero burn rate. It takes practice to learn how to be poor well. Those who are already poor have an advantage.

--Stewart Brand

I'm very interested in social collapse...

news

Saturn's largest moon has 'active ice volcanoes'

-> never heard of cryovolcanoes before! :)

Scientists discover the gene that makes some drinkers violent

Make room for the remarkable folding car which takes up a quarter of a single parking space

Step aside, keyboards, laptops, and 9-to-5 jobs. A survey of more than 1,000 Internet activists, journalists, and technologists released Sunday speculates that by 2012, those quaint relics of 20th century life will fade away.

The mobile phone will become the primary means of Internet access across the globe, and DRM will be well on its way out the door by 2020, according to a survey of Internet leaders, activists, and analysts.

UPDATE 1-Genzyme says FDA OKs stem cell transplant drug

Couples are 'madly in love 20 years after they first meet'

Fabric can wipe away toxic chemicals: study

Rich, poor in dispute over rainforest cash

-> last 2 are kind of old, it's from 12/4, but I've always been interested in material science, basically for the construction of super light yet fashionable space suits...

indigenous nudity: an argument against unequal education

Since I was a very young child, I've always realized that the world is very far from perfect, which leaves me frustrated and confused as to why it's not the utopia I've always felt can, would, and should exist. After I learned about Marxism in elementary school, it seemed, as a philosophy, the most humane of ideologies. For many years, I just assumed that society would inevitably evolve into Marxism- a society in which everyone could be equal, happy, and find meaning in life regardless of what it was. Do what you want, and get what you need always seemed like a pretty equal and fair deal, for everyone. I've always wanted equality for all humans, I don't know why globalism is still trending towards capitalism and stratified societies. I often wonder if oppressed peoples at this point enjoy struggling, since they're all agreeing to do so in face of corporate machines. Money still isn't real, everyone is still just agreeing that class differences exist, even though they don't. Money is only based on faith in the first place- an idea to which everyone continues to subscribe. Is it that there's always supposed to be large groups of people left without power, with no chance for upward mobility?

I've also always been interested in anthropology, even now I can't believe how different humans' lives are around the world. While I do find these small leftover groups of people interesting in their primitivism, overall, I'm perplexed, shocked, and even offended that anthropologists choose to leave large groups of humans "out of the loop" so to speak, that is allowing all these tribal people's to continue new generations of members without technology, without advancement, without knowledge or the chance to do something good and/or productive for the world. You know what I'm talking about- we still see anthropological reality TV all the time on cable. These groups of people are without the potential to evolve into something better than they had been in the past- more advanced societies are now leaving them decentralized. Studying and documenting these peoples' daily lives, although interesting, and perhaps relevant to social science (which I do not take seriously in any way and find to be a joke) in the end is pointless; there's no way these small societies will continue to exist in face of rapid technological and social evolution common in first world nations. Allowing these whole other groups of people to produce new generations of humans without power or opportunity is in fact wrong, selfish, and evil on our parts. It's not equal nor fair. Living in a developed nation, I see it as my duty to bring these people kicking and screaming into the 21st century.

To make a long story short, these people are living like fucking animals, spreading diseases to one another, and carrying on like savages. It's almost 2010, this is completely ridiculous. In fact, it's racist and prejudice to allow people to live like this in a modern world. I'm not attacking these stupid tribal religions, in fact, I find christianity and islam a million times more offensive, more delusional, more ridiculous, and way more detrimental to the world on all levels. At least when these people are "sacrificing coconuts to their monkey gods" they're not discriminating against queer peoples and encouraging child molestation like catholicism, or killing gay people on the street on a daily basis, as muslim countries like to do. These religious fanatics are no better than Hitler, in fact they're worse considering the burden of accountability the Internet and the rapid spread of information now provides- now everyone knows what's going on, so we can't pretend as though we never knew.

It makes me sad that modern humans choose to not give every child in the world the same opportunity for success, health, wealth, and happiness. I've always been a supporter for equal education, for all the world's children, because we are all connected. Who even knows if a "worthless and primitive" drinking goat's blood and doing dances against the evil spirits in the middle of the desert could be the one to solve the problem of pollution, world hunger, or discover life in other areas of the universe. In fact, by not putting all the children on the same level, we are overall doing the whole human race a disservice; by including everyone and their unique abilities and talents into the general consciousness, the species would evolve and progress faster. The law of accelerating returns. I'm an Aries, so I'm always really thinking about the soul's purpose, the very essence of the meaning of life. It burdens me with the perception of being because I am everything and everyone. All I want is the best for everyone, and to live in a peaceful and happy world full of equality, dreams, and love.

actuality tv

I forget that reality TV can encompass so many different types of programming. A while ago I was watching Tribal Life (I LOVE love love anthropology shows) and they kept billing it as reality TV. Reality TV as an umbrella term.