Another sort of low-effort #askhubski post, you guys.
So today anthropology sort of clicked for me and now I find it fascinating enough to be reading about it in my off-time, which I have precious little of, so that's saying something. I remember a few months ago mentioning to theadvancedapes that I really wasn't into anthropology at all which made me chuckle, while also wondering - what are things that you had a one point convinced yourself you would like/not like, do/not do, or care/not care about, but that you ended up changing your mind about, and why?
Hopefully this question makes sense. And I mean it in both a positive -> negative and negative -> positive sort of way.
I feel the same. I lost my father four years ago. I had a daughter two years ago. To a lesser extent, there are now several people in my extended family that are gone and missed. As the years pass, it feels as if a larger portion of myself is undefined. In a very real way, aspects of myself are dead. The people that parts of myself relied upon are no more. I used to listen to the older people in my family reminisce about the deceased. Now I am having those conversations. It doesn't stop hurting.
Thanks for the candid comment ButterflyEffect, I'm sorry for your loss. My wife was 12 when her mom died. She's 34 now. There's no doubt that she thinks about her mother every day. When there is a big moment in her life, whether it be a sad moment or a happy one she will often tear up and say, "I wish my mom were here." -I don't think that will ever stop. As a parent myself now, I can say that it makes you realize how incredibly important your role in your child's life is. Keep following your passions in life, what parent couldn't be proud of that?
First off, thank you, mk, and istara for the support. This is something that is very hard to explain to some people, at least for me. I'm still young enough where almost all of my friends still have both of their parents, so saying something like that is completely foreign to them. The response is usually abrupt and uncomfortable, because that's how it makes people feel when they've never had to deal with the death of a parent. I don't know if this is the case with your wife, but even something seemingly insignificant can act as a trigger to that kind of rush of emotions.When there is a big moment in her life, whether it be a sad moment or a happy one she will often tear up and say, "I wish my mom were here."
I am so sorry. I lost my mother as an adult, post 30, and not a day goes by when it doesn't hurt. Your pain must be overwhelmingly worse than mine. I guess there is not much we can do except live on and take what joys we can with the ache that will always be there.
Do you think the creation of Israel was a beneficial thing? It's probably not what you mean, but destroying the infrastructure that's already in place would be a shame for the whole world (especially everything medicine-related). Many people I talk to say they should have created Israel somewhere "empty" to avoid all these conflicts, but as far as I know, it has not worked too well with Birobidzhan. Nobody wants to move to the middle of nowhere.
I think we'd still be fighting WWII if Israel didn't exist. Europe treats Jews like shit. England created Israel because they treated Jews the least like shit, and their benevolence was "get the fuck out of the country." At the time of the Treaty of Balfour, Israel was effectively empty, from a European standpoint - at least as empty as Guyana or Uganda. Unlike those other two, European settlers weren't trying for permanency in Palestine, they were protecting the road to India. The first bits of what became Tel Aviv were purchased from Turkey during the 2nd Aliyah - in the name of a middleman because Jews weren't allowed to own property. Israel was every bit the "get the fuck out of my country" exile that Australia was, the difference being the Zionists were more keen to comply because they were sick of being hunted to extinction. Meanwhile, the turf upon which Israel was established was just another Ottoman hinterland. The only thing that set Israel apart from any other British colony is it was granted autonomy; when Britain crumbled after WWII the Israelis had nowhere else to go. So they fought.
I don't know if you can access Australian content where you are, but I'm still seething from watching this documentary on Monday night.
There were no such thing as Palestinians. When was there an independent Palestinian people with a Palestinian state? It was either southern Syria before the First World War, and then it was a Palestine including Jordan. It was not as though there was a Palestinian people in Palestine considering itself as a Palestinian people and we came and threw them out and took their country away from them. They did not exist. Golda Meir, as quoted in the Washington Post If I were an Arab leader, I would never sign an agreement with Israel. It is normal; we have taken their country. It is true God promised it to us, but how could that interest them? Our God is not theirs. There has been Anti - Semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault ? They see but one thing: we have come and we have stolen their country. Why would they accept that? David Ben-Gurion The Israelis treat the Palestinians like shit. They will do so until there are no more Palestinians. The entire drive of Israel's occupation of Palestine is to eliminate Palestine. On the flip side, "Palestine" belongs to anyone who wants to pretend to be Palestinian. Arafat was Egyptian; he spent a total of 4 years in Palestine as a kid. Hamas is Iranian; the PLO was Libyan. Israel was established as a European nail house for the Arab world so Palestine has become a nail house for Israel. There are uncomfortable parallels between the Israeli treatment of Palestine and the American treatment of Apaches, the French treatment of Gypsies, the Australian treatment of Aboriginals, etc. It's an ugly-ass situation and the Israelis regularly commit outright evil. But it's Israel that gives the Middle East a model other than Wahabi Islam.
I used to think I would never date a man but now I think I would go to a movie, hold hands a little, share popcorn etc. but not go any farther.
For me it was the Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy. Although full disclosure: I already owned a fair amount of Run DMC and LL Cool J Among others. I was pretty sure Rap was dead until I found Dalek.
I used to think politics was boring and kind of a waste of time, but now I understand politics to be very important for how societies operate in that politics is a close cousin to group dynamics. I used to think the same thing about economics, but that's changed as well. I also used to have this thing about friendship. For me to consider someone a friend, we'd have to get along really well and be supportive of each other, but also in the same general geographic region. Now, I don't think that last part is very important, but I do think that the willingness to maintain a friendship has to be there on both sides. Unfortunately, I now realize how many people think about friendship along the lines of how I used to think. Lastly, I used to say that I would not date a girl with more body hair than I have. This is no longer the case, though it's not like I'm a huge fan of body hair now or anything.
>Lastly, I used to say that I would not date a girl with more body hair than I have. This really does depend a lot on how much of a bear you are. If you're bald male stripper waxed head to toe, sack to ass crack, I would say it was somewhat demanding. If on the other hand you're a bearded mountain man with a thick pelt of hair from your shoulders to your ankles, then it's more reasonable.
I'm far more open to spirituality and exploring what spirituality means to me than I have ever been in the past. In the past I was quite hostile to spirituality, as I connected spirituality with religion and also pseudoscientific types of thinking. I think my new found openness stems from discussions with philosophers and futurists currently focused on constructing 21st century world views for scientifically-minded people that are still interested in exploring phenomena that cannot be directly tested with observations or confidently explained with theory. I'm also more compassionate and understanding about people's own subjective understanding of the universe (as long as it doesn't affect policy-making).
I love me some psuedoscience and futurism, but I'm still 100% Scully when it comes to spirituality. I can't help but roll my eyes at friends who decide to believe in such things, like my friends who recently decided to take up Wiccan for fun, or taking any of it seriously. It just feels like the comfortable beliefs that humans gravitate towards when there's something they don't understand, and then viciously defend when contrarians inevitably arrive with something tangible or objective that illuminates their previous dark corner. How do you reconcile the two?
do people use the word 'Scully' to describe a skeptic person? because i would enjoy that reference (if it does in fact refer to x-files). loved that series.
you don't. but i think skepticism can be a euphemism for introspection, and identifying tacit features of a personal or psychological nature.
Compassion and kindness for one, I used to think kindness was overrated and all the people who praised it were just trying to market some image of theirs. My attitude towards social change, I used to think revolutions were good and the people against them should be killed off
Hm. Well, I think at one undefined earlier point in my life I believed in stuff like souls and the afterlife. Actually, definitely. I definitely believed in the afterlife, although I was more inclined towards the reincarnation sort of angle. I think I was at least convinceable on ghosts and spiritual activity, i.e., inclined to believe that they could possibly exist. I think my whole take on reincarnation was that if souls existed it was the most logical way for souls to exist and be recycled. It also prevented me from feeling utter despair at my life. NOW, I don't believe in souls, the afterlife of any sort, ghosts, or any of that sort of esoteric stuff. I find it both uplifting and immensely liberating (although most people don't). I used to think I had to desperately fight to make my mark on the world and that if I didn't, my entire existence was useless. It drove me to despair. I used to think that I had to "justify" my existence by somehow making a permanent mark on the world. It drove me insane that eventually we all die and on a long enough timeline, we all disappear. It seemed to make existence pointless unless you could somehow do something amazing - and even then, eventually, world's gonna blow up (or whatever) and we're all going to be forgotten. It drove me into very depressive fits. I used to not understand "the point of life." I thought I had to prove to someone out there that I was worth existing. Now I believe the only point of life is to live it. To enjoy it. You may or may not make a mark on the world and it's okay. Yes when we die, poof, that's it. The magic of existence is in existing every single day. No one has to justify their life. They just have to appreciate it. EDIT Oh I know! I remembered an easy one. Back in middle school I thought it was something like inherently evil to smoke pot. Harder drugs? OMG THEY WERE GOING TO KILL YOU. I remember I started changing my view on this when I started reading a book on Ecstacy that I checked out of - of all things - the school library. Since then let's just say my views have changed considerably. But don't do meth or heroin, kids.
referring to all of middle east - about 9 months ago: "Nuke 'em" "wat?!" "Nuke 'em all" "WAT?!" "That is the only way there will ever be peace over there." While I still don't agree with this at all...I'm starting to see that there may be some truth in it. I really don't see how there can be a solution to the myriad of messes in the middle east. Even if some super genius computer spat out a 100% proven solution, the egotistical leaders / UN / military / rebels / uninformed Americans would still find some reason to continue the mess.
I'll take a crack at this. The first thing to understand is that the modern history of the Middle East is one of abject destabilization to the advantage of the Western Powers. Kipling called it "The Great Game" and we've been playing it since Napoleon invaded Egypt. The modern Middle East didn't evolve; it was partitioned out of the carcass of the Ottoman Empire partially by WWI; partially by the Treaty of Versailles. Pakistan is actually "PAKIstan" - it's an acronym for Punjab, Afghania, Kashmir, Sindh & BaluchiSTANhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pakistan#Etymology. This is the level of sensitive nation-building the region was saddled with. The next thing to understand is that Iraq and Iran were run as vassal states of the British Empire, then vassal states of the United States. Attempts at democracy were deliberately put down by, well, us. After that, consider that Saudi Arabia was "Arabia" until the baddest warlord on the block clobbered everyone else. Not that long ago, either - Abdulaziz bin Saud drove out the al Rashid in 1932. It's still a one-family rule - figuratively, the Hatfields beat out the Clampetts less than 80 years ago and Jed called the shots until Truman, Jed Jr until Carter, Jed's brother Jethro through Reagan and Jethro's brother Judd through Bush II. Finally, keep in mind that nation states aren't really "the thing" in Islam and that whereas the Civil War was fought over boundaries and autonomy, much of the middle east has been fighting over the existence of boundaries and the necessity of autonomy. The Muslim Brotherhood of '50s Egypt really and truly is Al Qaeda. There's this idea that the Middle East has always been a maelstrom of violence when in fact, it's been a maelstrom of violence while the US, England and France carved up the former Ottoman Empire for oil. The Ottomans weren't exactly great dudes but most of the violence of the recent middle east is directly attributable to foreign meddling.
forwardslash the markup for URLs is borking occasionally. It won't let me format this correctly.
Ahhh, yeah, apparently urls with #'s in them choke. Will fix. e: done.
Hense the need for a super genius computer. #thefuture :P