The Problem With Women Today

[Nick]

I just finished one of Alex's post, and boy did I pick a good one. It's like watching a gigantic white puffy cloud come at you, very menacing, disturbing even, but then it hits you, and theres no weight behind it, just a slight breeze.

Do you want to watch us masturbate, Alex? Do you want to see us take a shit? You sound like a pervert whining because you can't find a good spot to drill your peep-hole into. You really do hate purpose don't you, well maybe hate isn't the right word, that's far too purposeful, but there's something going on here that shakes you to your core, and you can't have that.

I mean you really can't stand the idea of knowing that there are people on this planet who actually have one, a purpose that is, especially when they are very AWARE and CONSCIOUS of what that purpose is, especially when they carve out a piece of their self to make room for it.

How many curtains do you need to peek behind, how many holes will you have to drill, how many layers will you have to dig through? You're going to drive yourself mad, Alex, before your time is done here. You know it's going to happen too, because you know you can't leave here until your feel your work is done. This, is your tortured existence, this is your purpose.

[Trevor Salyzyn]

I have been reading 'Letters to a young novelist' (Cartas a un joven novelista) by Mario Vargas Llosa, which I recommend to everyone interested in literature, narratives, discourses, essays...

...

I refer to a Nietzschean 'life'.

Of all that is written, I love only what a person hath written with his blood. Write with blood, and thou wilt find that blood is spirit.

It is no easy task to understand unfamiliar blood; I hate the reading idlers.

He who knoweth the reader, doeth nothing more for the reader. Another century of readers--and spirit itself will stink.

Every one being allowed to learn to read, ruineth in the long run not only writing but also thinking.

Once spirit was God, then it became man, and now it even becometh populace.

He that writeth in blood and proverbs doth not want to be read, but learnt by heart.

Alex, I don't think you get Nietzsche.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

The things that I have told you are only a few. Why have I not told the rest? Because it is not related to the goal, it is not fundamental to the holy life and because they do not lead to dispassion, to fading, to ceasing, to stilling, to direct knowledge, to enlightenment, to Nibbana.

• • • • • • - Samyutta Nikaya, LVI, 31

[Alex Jacob]

Just more posturing. Vain and empty. To have relevance it is YOU who have to show up, not the front. You, Ryan, think I have a fear of your 'purpose' and, really and truly, I don't. I have aversion to what I find fake and insincere in you, to pomp and posturing, an emptiness you represent as grand purpose. (I don't mean you singularly---it is likely that I pay as little attention to you as you do to me---I am speaking more about the whole 'trip' that is played here). Now, the 'attack' takes the form of some windmills y'all dream up for those who question something in the core here: purpose, 'proper understanding of Nietzsche' (which Trevor has? of all people?), and Diebert quotes scripture. In a way I am more useful to y'all than you are to me (and y'all are very useful, but not for the reasons you present).

Why bother to have a forum? Just post some scripture, and then everyone can say: 'Yeah!' 'Heavy!' 'That's what I'D say if I could find the words!' 'Oh Man, right on the mark!'

[Alex Jacob]

Trevor: I would say, honestly, that to 'understand' Nietzsche one has to read between the lines, his lines. Nietzsche is 'understood' when you place what he actually was alongside what he wrote, then it is the comparison that speaks, and reveals. The same is true with y'all. Only a fool would believe what you say (and likely no one does!)---you are consummate liars, invested in your lies---but what is 'heard' when one compares what you say with what you are, that is what reveals. And that is the hidden content one has to surmise, and that is carefully concealed. You are---permit me a rather strong word---cowards.

This is what Alex is trying to bash into your skulls.

[Trevor Salyzyn]

Why should I care about lying? It's one more thing I share with Nietzsche, and part of why I understand him better than you.

[Nick]

Keep digging Alex, you have a long way to go.

[Shahrazad]

You, Ryan, think I have a fear of your 'purpose' and, really and truly, I don't.

I just found out I'm not the only one who can't tell the two boys, Ryan and Nick, apart.

[David Quinn]

Trevor: I would say, honestly, that to 'understand' Nietzsche one has to read between the lines, his lines. Nietzsche is 'understood' when you place what he actually was alongside what he wrote, then it is the comparison that speaks, and reveals. The same is true with y'all. Only a fool would believe what you say (and likely no one does!)---you are consummate liars, invested in your lies---but what is 'heard' when one compares what you say with what you are, that is what reveals. And that is the hidden content one has to surmise, and that is carefully concealed. You are---permit me a rather strong word---cowards.

This is what Alex is trying to bash into your skulls.

This is as banal as it gets.

Apart from anything else, what you speak of is hardly revolutionary. It is a very obvious insight that most people in their teens easily grasp. A person would have to be a complete imbecile not to be aware of it.

But more to the point, it has little relevance to the business of reasoning with people and opening up the mind to truth. If the "posturing" done on this forum, or elsewhere, serves to articulate the great truths of life in the clearest possible manner, then what does it matter if it involves postering or not?

It would be like challenging the statement that 1+1=2 with a professor on the grounds that the professor likes to pick his nose on the quiet. The professor puts up a front - he doesn't pick his nose in front of other people - therefore, the thinking goes, his assertion that 1+1=2 is suspect, perhaps even worthless.

The professor would naturally dismiss this objection as pure banality and probably be given pause to wonder at the sanity of the person who brought it up.

In a similar vein, one doesn't have to know about the secret lives of Jesus or the Buddha in order to extract the most out of their wise words. Jesus could have been a drunken layabout for all we know, yet those few gems sprinkled about in the morass of the gospels continue to shine on regardless. Their timeless power to awaken the mind remains undiminished.

This has to be one of your poorest efforts yet, Alex. I'd give 4 out of 10 for the audacity to try and create a smokescreen out of banality, and 0 out of 10 for truthfulness.



-

[David Quinn]

.


-tomas earlier-
I'd like to see Alex go one-on-one with Diebert in The Crucible...


-Trevor-
I second this.

-tomas now-
Have the five judges in mind:

Greg Shantz
Elizabeth Isabelle
Steven Coyle
Katy (from Georgia) http://littlekatydid.livejournal.com
Victor Danilchenko

This would go until about August 15, 2009

Any two individuals are free to use the crucible whenever they like. However, I'm not sure about the idea of having judges. I mean, who is going to judge the judges? We would need another list of candidates for that.

We could just make it simpler and let rationality be the judge.

-

[Alex Jacob]

I don't know, David, that I am attempting to be 'revolutionary'. My understanding is that is how 'you' see yourselves (it is a problem that one must describe a plurality of persons, each different, with one single 'you', but I have no choice). And, I don't consider 'banal' or 'mundane' to be bad words. We are a continuum of different levels, from the ground up to the sky. Anyone who denies or negates either, is a fool.

David wrote; "But more to the point, it has little relevance to the business of reasoning with people and opening up the mind to truth. If the "posturing" done on this forum, or elsewhere, serves to articulate the great truths of life in the clearest possible manner, then what does it matter if it involves posturing or not?"

The first point is a good one. The importance of opening up 'the mind' to reason, and to discussion. In some sense this is done here, and the product is very good. In other significant senses it is an activity that is crushed, if not brutally suppressed. What is suppressed and becomes undiscussable is vast areas within real, terrestrial persons. Basically, all that you group-together and dismiss under the heading of 'the banal'.

Since Trevor seems to think that I don't 'get' Nietzsche---and this is common currency here: the posture that 'we' understand something crucial that 'you' have not begun to grasp---I alluded to the hidden, obscured or invisible side of Nietzsche. It may in fact have been invisible to Nietzsche (pointing to levels of understanding UNAVAILABLE to him), a pretty significant point. To you, I gather, this has no relevance and is again 'banal', but I don't at all see it like that. It is like saying that a man's psychology, his inner content, is irrelevant to some paragraphs that he may have written down at some point. You want to hold up the paragraphs as being the 'true' representatives of the man, and I say this is absurd. Utterly absurd. The paragraphs have to be understood philologically. ('You' have to be understood philologically.)

However, in this, we see what your stance is, and we see why it is crucial that 'you', as a full person, (like Diebert, like Nick, like Ryan, like Trevor, etc.) cannot and will not appear in a full human form. You appear as characterizations. You are in active denial about who you really are and what you really are, and you perpetrate an elaborate cyber-farce all dressed up in Robes of Enlightenment. Really, you are no longer persons, you have disassociated from mankind. You are (in your own minds) some kinds of Avatars of Truth in gestures of bestowal. This is an exaggeration, of course, but it yet reveals some 'truths' about 'you'.

In my reasoning, I would say that only a fool could risk denying who he really is, and a greater fool would invite others to participate in such a dangerous, dead-end project. In no sense does this mean I don't value 'quest' or 'purpose' in respect to a man's life (you constantly assert this: you bind these two things together: "We represent the Truth of Nietzsche, the Buddha and Jesus. Alex takes issue with us. Alex therefor takes issue with Nietzsche, Buddha and Jesus." It is little short of pathetic that you do this).

It is interesting, relevant, pertinent and necessary to note the following: It is something that writers seek to understand, not readers, (and not religious proselytes). Writers HAVE to see behind veils, I say, and this is my perspective in my reading and in my criticisms here on GF. When Nietzsche wrote Zarathustra, Nietzsche was acutely suffering from the huge failure of his love for Lou Salome, which really represented his failure in regard to Life, the way he defined life, as something lived and seized. ('Banal consideration!' I hear David shout). (He originally rebelled against the Schopenhauerian Buddhistic strategy in the face of life-to-be-lived). In effect, he had no choice but to channel his suffering into other dimensions of his being. Nevertheless, the work is infused with this mood, it is like a fog that weighs on it, it arises from this mood, it speaks about it, but not necessarily directly.

There are many things that open, aware and sensitive people could say about this---a writers relationship to his material, and the difference between what is occurring innerly and what is presented outwardly---and we know that NONE OF THIS is relevant to y'all, because you have canonized Nietzsche, you have made him some sort of prophet or beacon for a path you (arbitrarily) forge away from whole arrays of things relevant to your 'human selves'. You fiercely fight against this characterization because the whole notion of having a 'human self' turns your stomach; it aesthetically revolting for such hardened Warriors of Truth such as y'all. The mere mention of such suppression evokes a violent reaction, and indeed it is this voice you MUST crush inside yourselves. To understand Nietzsche the man in this sense does not negate his vision, his accomplishment, or anything at all like that. (You always take it to mean that). It opens things up to new levels of understanding about OURSELVES.

But anyone with half a brain and some part of a heart knows that one must penetrate the veil of fiction that you present to the world (and one assumes to yourselves), so that one can SEE YOU CLEARLY, to know what you in fact are, and how this differs from what you SAY. And this is why I mentioned narrators and narration, and this is why I play---with abandon---within the possibilities offered by both.

You start from a premise (about yourselves) that presupposes forthrightness, honesty, clear seeing, clear thinking, reasoning and intelligence, and you forge an identity that is a fiction from images that are managed in---this is relevant---a group context. But there is a tremendous dissonance that some note, again between what is said and represented (the fiction), and what appears to be really true. Dozens if not hundreds will appear here and will pretty instantaneously note the dissonance, and you will fight with all your collective might against the revealing of this 'truth' ('banal!' I hear Daffy scream)(I may call you Daffy, mayn't I?). And those who come, will leave, and like hard-cased neurotics you will remain 'whole' and inviolate, at least as far as fictions go.

It is funny to me that you see these recent 'efforts' as failures, whereas I am very pleased with what I have written. I would give this latest effort a 7 or even an 8 out of ten. (I know that none of this will get through to YOU, but you also know that I don't write for you, so all's well!)

Bewildered, you ask:

"If the "posturing" done on this forum, or elsewhere, serves to articulate the great truths of life in the clearest possible manner, then what does it matter if it involves posturing or not?"

It really matters TREMENDOUSLY. Ask anyone who has lived life. (It appears you haven't, that you are still a growing boy, committed to postures and fictions. But, there is still time yet.) Maybe 70% of what I write has been talking about this issue, but it all escapes you.

[Trevor Salyzyn]

Alex, here are 10 things you did not know about me.

1) I've never not had at least one dog. Right now I have one dog and two cats and one hamster. Their names are Spike after the main character of Cowboy Bebop, Stein (his brother Frankie died), Herman even though she's a girl cat, and I don't know the hamster's name.
2) I can babble for hours.
3) When I was little, every sentence began with "You know what?..."
4) One of my favourite things is having tea with friends.
5) I'm not sure if I could go a single day without saying the word "philosophy".
6) I haven't worked a day in six years. Even though I'm only 24, I'm basically retired.
7) I trained my internal monologue to refer to myself in the third person. I don't know why yet, but there must have been a good reason.
8) Terminator 2 was a good movie, Confederacy of Dunces was a good book, Quake1 was a good video game, and Doctor Who is a good TV show.
9) In highschool, I did really well in math and English, mediocre in science, and terribly in social studies.
10) My parents have been divorced since forever.

P.S. the plural of you is "y'all".
P.P.S. I hope I wasn't taking your post to David too literally.

[Alex Jacob]

Is there an 11?

[Robert]

Since this thread has definitively deviated from the op, I just want to point something out.

8) Terminator 2 was a good movie

One thing that's always bugged me about that movie is why doesn't the evil Terminator character just take on the appearance of the good Terminator (Arnold) once the kid has had enough time to trust the good guy... ? You'd think that would be the obvious thing to do.

End of.

Of course, that addition to the scenario would mean no movie and no money, but apart from the special effects that were exceptional for the time, the movie is pretty dumb, imo.

[Trevor Salyzyn]

Is there an 11?

Sure. Number eleven. At one point, I wanted to be an author. After learning how to write a book worth reading, years worth of effort, I decided I liked the freedom and independence that I had imagined authors to have way more than the writing itself. The writing was another chain, and I could have that freedom without writing.

I'm too spirited to care about locking myself to a book.

Spirited -- much better than spiritual, no? Brings to mind the conquests of the human spirit, not the warm and fuzzy effeminate crap that turns my bullshit detector on like a fucking blazing siren. That bullshit detector -- knowing what's real, what's not, what's true, what's false, where there's a con -- that's the heart of philosophy and spirituality and spiritedness. Requires lots of training in logic, as well as independence -- you can't rightly use someone else's bullshit detector. Enlightened people, wise people, don't deal with bullshit. Yeah, I know you think that the big bullshitters are QRS.

the movie is pretty dumb, imo.

I know now why you cry but it is something I can never do.
*lowered into molten steel*
*gives thumbs up*

[Diebert van Rhijn]

Alex, your post leaves much to be desired but it might give some insight in some of your own fundamental misunderstandings about life. Some of them leave me wondering how mature you are actually. Normal people don't talk like you. They don't. You're the real anomaly, not this forum, really. This forum sounds way more human.

We are a continuum of different levels, from the ground up to the sky.

Exactly! But you're presumptuous enough to believe you can penetrate and explore this continuum and become wiser as you go! But that's only to a certain, quite limited extent.

real, terrestrial persons

You often refer to entities that I do not believe exist. Like your 'health' and 'wholesome' qualifications. They're phantoms in your own fevered imagination. There's no real connection to the world here. It shows to me you're not as present in the world as you try to appear to be. Actually much of the criticism you unleash on this forum seems more like a way to describe yourself, to come to terms with yourself. So much of it is somewhere between half-truth and mirror reflection (Narcissus again!). But it explains your continuing pretense though, ones search for ones base contradiction can become an all-consuming matter, for the most part happening subconsciously.

'you', as a full person,

There's no such thing. It's a continuum of different levels as you said before. A bag of contradictions and make-belief. Digging into that is a never-ending distraction. It's a phantom, this 'full person'. One can always add some more!

Writers HAVE to see behind veils,

That's the nature of the writers, their job, their line of work, to dream up veils behind veils. Don't think for a moment they are actually discovering anything not leading to another veil. It would destroy their business!

Things are just what they appear to be. Reality is like that and talking about reality one can take everything at face value. It's addressing the very existence of veils, not the game of never-ending revelation.

open, aware and sensitive people

On which planet do you live? Show me one please? So we can see how open, aware and sensitive this person really is. People are way less open and aware than they try to appear as. That's what you'd learn in the real world!

so that one can SEE YOU CLEARLY, to know what you in fact are

That's really an illusion Alex. Please investigate this idea and find out how silly it is. Some humanistic version of Platonism: some true human essence with all kinds of personal and cultural colors? Short-sighted at most.


[cleaned up]

[Tomas]

.


-David Quinn-
Any two individuals are free to use the crucible whenever they like.

-tomas-
Sure, but in this scenario, I'm throwing them to the lions whether they be willing, or not...


-David-
However, I'm not sure about the idea of having judges.

-tomas-
It would commence on April 15. A three-day break beginning May 14-16, the second, June 14-16, and the last break of July 14-16. The "judges" would be free to comment during the three-day breaks, and Alex & Diebert would only respond to their queries (arguments) at those intervals. The rest of us (but not me) would throw stones at any time though Alex & Diebert would not address them directly until after August 15, or so. Hopefully though, Quinn, Rowden, Solway would remain silent throughout this process (however, see below comment).


-David-
I mean, who is going to judge the judges?

-tomas-
Quinn, Rowden, Solway would do the dirty .. after August 15.


-David-
We would need another list of candidates for that.

-tomas-
No, you three can begin the preliminaries as of now.


-David-
We could just make it simpler and let rationality be the judge.

-tomas-
Alex & Diebert will judge what is rational..

Clearly, the final arbiters will be those who read here.

[Tomas]

Tomas, what do those 5 bloggers have in common? That they are not yesmen?

Having read every jot and tittle here, Katy may not be willing to participate, so Marsha Faizi would be a back-up, and she's had children now out of the nest. If not, I've someone in mind.

Victor has a razor-sharp mind and is not afraid of admitting when he's learned something useful while writing here. His use of name-calling is insightful. Plus, his new avatar is kinder and gentler, ha!

Elizabeth hasn't had many harsh words towards the judges or Alex & Diebert. She admits to faults when they can be proven and has demonstrated a human fraility (honesty) .. plus, has entertained the likes of Kevin Solway when he visited the United States (some time back) with her own reflective words on what she gathered about that peculiar fellow.

Steven Coyle keeps his wordplay close to vest.

Greg Shantz has an interesting perspective and reads here most every day.

There's more.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

Tomas, it would be more fitting to meet you in the cubicle challenging you to describe how the cubicle would be any different than the discussions I already had and am still having with Alex. I'd love to crush your arguments and show how your motives to suggest the cubicle in this case would be seriously deranged. Just you and me: c'mon Tank!

[Alex Jacob]

Diebert: Do you or do you not have an opinion about Terminator 2? Please stop beating around the bush!

PS: I don't DO The Crucible. After I got whupped by Kelly (a 'bloke' who is a girl) I just lost all confidence. Just imagine how you'd have felt: a girl-bloke! (Took a month to get over it).
__________________________________________________________

Trev: "Spirited -- much better than spiritual, no? Brings to mind the conquests of the human spirit, not the warm and fuzzy effeminate crap that turns my bullshit detector on like a fucking blazing siren. That bullshit detector -- knowing what's real, what's not, what's true, what's false, where there's a con -- that's the heart of philosophy and spirituality and spiritedness. Requires lots of training in logic, as well as independence -- you can't rightly use someone else's bullshit detector. Enlightened people, wise people, don't deal with bullshit. Yeah, I know you think that the big bullshitters are QRS."

I like what you wrote, BTW.

But I think your grasp of the qualities needed to see through 'BS' could be expanded.

BTW, do you like pistachio nuts (or any nuts) or do you just avoid them?

[Unidian]

I just found out I'm not the only one who can't tell the two boys, Ryan and Nick, apart.

Ryan is a Nazi. Does that help?

[Shahrazad]

And Nick isn't?

[skipair]

My take on the QRS, after meeting them, is that they're just normal guys. They don't have an excess of all the strange personality oddities that most people have (which is why most people act very weird sometimes<---->much of the time). Many of those quirks are either gone or quickly terminated.

[Foreigner]

Since this thread has definitively deviated from the op, I just want to point something out.

8) Terminator 2 was a good movie

One thing that's always bugged me about that movie is why doesn't the evil Terminator character just take on the appearance of the good Terminator (Arnold) once the kid has had enough time to trust the good guy... ? You'd think that would be the obvious thing to do.

End of.

Of course, that addition to the scenario would mean no movie and no money, but apart from the special effects that were exceptional for the time, the movie is pretty dumb, imo.

Oh, that wouldnt work for a couple of reasons, one) she'd need to get much closer while somehow distancing mr T in order to swap places, but the baby sitter was always nearby as he must be, and 2) she has no idea what already has passed between them to make her turn realistic enough to succeed.

(if ive got the right movie, dont think he was still a "kid" by T2)

[Diebert van Rhijn]

Nick Treklis wrote about one of Alex's post: "It's like watching a gigantic white puffy cloud come at you, very menacing, disturbing even, but then it hits you, and theres no weight behind it, just a slight breeze."

One could look at Alex's attempt with slightly different eyes as well. Lets not underestimate him and assume he pretty well knows what he's doing. And what is it that I most generously assume he's doing? He's attempting to embody Shekhinah in the realm of this forum.

Most of Alex posts seem to embody willfully, intentionally the feminine aspects. They are lush, inexhaustible, detailed, embellished, well composed in a literate sense. At the same time they lack focus, are rather pointless, full of logical errors and assumption, lighthearted, smiling, winking and joking. The posts are oozing mystery and feminine psychology but never lets anyone to close to the mystery: they often try to inspire believe, awe, anger, any emotion really. Disgust would be good enough to start with.

Why would he do this? From some of his posts it seems rather clear he understands quite a bit of the basic attempts at masculinity on this forum. He's not really disagreeing with what is attempted, it's the how, the strategy where he has a strong deviant view on.

Now Alex could of course lay out his view in logical, point-for-point style but he understood that the core of his message would be lost: he wants people to meet, get exposed to the feminine aspect of reality - the aspect he sees as being dismissed and disregarded here too easily, too quickly.

So he introduces his thinking with the very elements that he believes are strengthening his writing and thinking, his being. No matter how illusive they fundamentally are: he attempts various types of humor, jest, stories, a little drama, a bit of emotional play, some references to different development, hinting strongly thereby at the plurality, the variety of the intellectual and philosophical landscape.

Oh, Alex does understand this forum deeply enough, he just does not agree with it being the best possible approach. He wants to infuse, to prove that the feminine aspect is crucial not only to biological life but to the life of the mind, to the strength and fertility of thought. He agrees masculine aspects need to be affirmed strongly because the feminine tends to be all-inclusive and destructive, always seeking to diminish and vanquish the masculine. Knowing this he values the drive and direction of the basic tenets of this forum.

Back to the cloud: seen from the masculine orientation the feminine touch is puffy, at times menacing, disturbing but after the 'hit' becomes weightless, breezy, content less. That's how Alex wants his posts to be. It's his temptation, his instruction. He indeed cannot stand the idea of just having one purpose as purpose has no power without placement and context. Which he believes is lacking here, that the 'purposeful ones' are forgetting where they are and their capacity for purpose diminishes.

David Quinn wrote: "The whole of human history shapes itself around her, much as everyday things around us shape themselves around the earth's gravitational forces. Woman is the centre of all society". Alex believes this too but he would say that this is for a reason and should not be escaped. That without this fundamental gravitation all would be lost.

Alex his points would be more impressive if he indeed could show a more healthy mind, a more complete being, a stronger masculine drive fueled by the presence and acceptance of the feminine force. But here he appears to fail miserably. His grasp on logical processes are weak, his boasting and references to bodies of knowledge rather amateurish and uninformed, his writing style scattered and mostly ineffective. There he is, hiding behind a pseudonym in a Colombian backwater aiming his arrows to people that stepped forward with real names, sites, output and various media projects. The only thing he has left is his mystery: this is what one gets when consumed by the feminine after all.