The 6 Creepiest Videos Aimed at Children -- powered by Cracked.com

The Media America

In her book A New Religious America, Diana Eck seeks to paint a picture of the North American continent as one that is a diverse and welcoming place to people of all races and creeds. She cites examples from all over the country, showing people of other religions practicing in the United States. Eck seeks to inform the reader with eye opening facts and statistics that are meant to shed light on the issue of diversity in America. On paper this all seems well and good, but it would appear that there are two Americas to contend with, one that does coincide with Eck’s vision of a brighter tomorrow and one that does not. It becomes difficult to read as actions in the book become less apparent facts and more wide eyed and hopefully blind.
Eck begins the novel with the backdrop of American immigration policy of the last sixty years, building on the past to show the progress made by the country in such a short amount of time. She goes on to recount her travels and experiences with people from around the county and the things she has discovered in her travels. She says that these encounters have broadened and deepened her own religious background and hopes to share that with the rest of the nation. She writes on the great influx of Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, Sikhs, and Zoroastrians and how currently there are more American Muslims in the United States than there are American Episcopalians, Presbyterians, or Jews. She uses this as an example of how the people of this country have taken a turn for the better. She looks to this as a fact that we open our arms and welcome with tolerance and compassion. These Muslims are allowed to practice their religion in safety and without fear of persecution, some even practicing in a U-Haul where they work.
In an attempt to seem more pragmatic, Eck moves on to speak on the challenges that are faced when dealing with the multicultural wonderland that she presents in her book. She praises steps taken by governmental institutions and private organizations, such as the interfaith movement, as steps in the right direction and hope for better communication between traditions in the future. She cites examples such as the U.S. Navy commission its first Muslim chaplain and open its first mosque in the 1990’s and the fact that there are presently more than three hundred temples in Los Angeles, home to the greatest variety of Buddhists in the world.
In the final throws of her book, Eck challenges the reader to consider what inviting this mixing bowl of traditions truly entails. She asks her reader to think on the advantages and transformations that would take place with the continual open ended invitation to other cultures and religions, naming examples like American electoral politics and healthcare. According to Eck, by mixing in these other religions, the American public will begin to see improvements in its policies and processes. In reading this though, one must wonder if Eck bites off more than is chewable by the American public because, as the saying goes, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
Earlier in this paper there was mention of two Americas that seem to differ on the subject of diversity and acceptance. One of these Americas, and the one that Eck wrote the entirety of this book from, is what will be labeled the media America. This is the popular conception of the United States. This is the one you see on the television, welcoming immigrants to its shores with open arms and promises of acceptance and love. This is the one that generation Y is so obsessed with that it neuters out any concept of individuality. This is the America that is primed and polished by the MTV and made to look like the promise land. Eck seems to live in this world with no grounding in the actuality of what happens on the ground.
In this class, the subject of diversity in America is a central topic to the very fiber of the course. The class has poured and pondered over statistics and percentages showing the division in the American populace. If these figures have pointed out anything it is this. For every mosque that the media America builds, there are ten times that many in the other American who are frightened and confused by it. For every Buddhist temple in the Los Angeles, there are ten home owners in Nebraska who do not even know what a Buddhist is. This other America, what will be called the ground America, ranges anywhere from cautious enthusiasm to disinterest to violent rejection of the foreign influence. These are the people that make up the majority, people who are ok with immigrant adaptation as long as it does not affect them. When that button is pushed, reactions are garnered and the ground America rears its ugly head.
What people like Diana Eck and others who live in the media America seem to miss is idealism has its place, just as pragmatism does, but when the idealism overwhelms the people who it affects there will be a consequence, no matter how detached Eck may be from that consequence. Just because you polish a bullet to mirror shine, and it sparkles so very prettily to the point where you forget that it is a bullet does not stop it from being a bullet. No matter how desperately the media America wants people to be in love with the idea of blending all the races and religions in to one bland product, that can be sold at $9.99, there will be those in the ground America that will reject it. There are those who value individualism that were not raised by the television.
Right now there is an entire generation that never knew anything that did not come out of the media America. The media America is the gospel to people like Diana Eck, the most awesome goddamn force in the whole godless world, an amusement park that is taken for truth. It is an illusion created for the boredom killing business but given enough power to shape the way people live their lives. People think that the media America is reality and can act based on that, but no force of government in a county like this one will bend people to accept what is natural to reject. I will say it again. The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

I'm sick of experts; I'm sick of being told what to feel; I'm sick of a flickering box telling me what I need; I'm sick of an entire generation raised by the tube; I'm sick of repression; I'm sick of the modern, the shock of the new; I'm sick of twitter; FUCK FACEBOOK!; I'm sick of being in touch; I'm sick of the lack of loneliness; I'm sick of trendy shit; I'm sick of what they call man; I'M SICK OF UFC!!!; I'm sick of bad music; I'm sick of worse movies; I'm sick of money; I'm sick of shortcomings; I'm sick of failing; I'm sick of assumptions; I'm sick of not writing; I'm sick of not doing; I'm sick of no principles; I'm sick of no standards; I'm sick of people taking offense.

I'm still angry but that is all for now.

Welcome to this World

Oh, welcome to this world of fools
Of pink champagne and swimming pools
Well, all you have to lose is your virginity
Perhaps we'll have some fun tonight
So stick around and take a bite of life
We don't need feebleness in this proximity

Ask good MacDuff and Donalbain, so many good ideas are slain
By those who would dare not step out of line
But if I have my way tonight and chances are I think I might-
I'll turn those sour minds to grapes of wine

Welcome to this world

Don't judge the boy by what you hear
The words are heard beyond the ear
The heart and mind are focus for this conversation
But be abound in mystery for that so much you do to me
For there are those who drown in adulation

Welcome to this world

If I had a dime for each time that I heard them preach
Well I'd have wicked thoughts upon my brain

CNR Live

The Ghost of Tom Joad

Men walkin' 'long the railroad tracks
Goin' someplace there's no goin' back
Highway patrol choppers comin' up over the ridge
Hot soup on a campfire under the bridge
Shelter line stretchin' round the corner
Welcome to the new world order
Families sleepin' in their cars in the southwest
No home no job no peace no rest

The highway is alive tonight
But nobody's kiddin' nobody about where it goes
I'm sittin' down here in the campfire light
Searchin' for the ghost of Tom Joad

He pulls prayer book out of his sleeping bag
Preacher lights up a butt and takes a drag
Waitin' for when the last shall be first and the first shall be last
In a cardboard box 'neath the underpass
Got a one-way ticket to the promised land
You got a hole in your belly and gun in your hand
Sleeping on a pillow of solid rock
Bathin' in the city aqueduct

The highway is alive tonight
But where it's headed everybody knows
I'm sittin' down here in the campfire light
Waitin' on the ghost of Tom Joad

Now Tom said "Mom, wherever there's a cop beatin' a guy
Wherever a hungry newborn baby cries
Where there's a fight 'gainst the blood and hatred in the air
Look for me Mom I'll be there
Wherever there's somebody fightin' for a place to stand
Or decent job or a helpin' hand
Wherever somebody's strugglin' to be free
Look in their eyes Mom you'll see me."

The highway is alive tonight
But nobody's kiddin' nobody about where it goes
I'm sittin' downhere in the campfire light
With the ghost of old Tom Joad

Alfred Hitchcock Tomorrow Show with Tom Snyder Fall 1973

Alien

Release Date: 1979

Roger Ebert / Oct 26, 2003

At its most fundamental level, "Alien" is a movie about things that can jump out of the dark and kill you. It shares a kinship with the shark in "Jaws," Michael Myers in "Halloween," and assorted spiders, snakes, tarantulas and stalkers. Its most obvious influence is Howard Hawks' "The Thing" (1951), which was also about a team in an isolated outpost who discover a long-dormant alien, bring it inside, and are picked off one by one as it haunts the corridors. Look at that movie, and you see "Alien" in embryo.

In another way, Ridley Scott's 1979 movie is a great original. It builds on the seminal opening shot of "Star Wars" (1977), with its vast ship in lonely interstellar space, and sidesteps Lucas' space opera to tell a story in the genre of traditional "hard" science fiction; with its tough-talking crew members and their mercenary motives, the story would have found a home in John W. Campbell's Astounding Science Fiction during its nuts-and-bolts period in the 1940s. Campbell loved stories in which engineers and scientists, not space jockeys and ray-gun blasters, dealt with outer space in logical ways.

Certainly the character of Ripley, played by Sigourney Weaver, would have appealed to readers in the Golden Age of Science Fiction. She has little interest in the romance of finding the alien, and still less in her employer's orders that it be brought back home as a potential weapon. After she sees what it can do, her response to "Special Order 24" ("Return alien lifeform, all other priorities rescinded") is succinct: "How do we kill it?" Her implacable hatred for the alien is the common thread running through all three "Alien" sequels, which have gradually descended in quality but retained their motivating obsession.

One of the great strengths of "Alien" is its pacing. It takes its time. It waits. It allows silences (the majestic opening shots are underscored by Jerry Goldsmith with scarcely audible, far-off metallic chatterings). It suggests the enormity of the crew's discovery by building up to it with small steps: The interception of a signal (is it a warning or an SOS?). The descent to the extraterrestrial surface. The bitching by Brett and Parker, who are concerned only about collecting their shares. The masterstroke of the surface murk through which the crew members move, their helmet lights hardly penetrating the soup. The shadowy outline of the alien ship. The sight of the alien pilot, frozen in his command chair. The enormity of the discovery inside the ship ("It's full of ... leathery eggs ...").

A recent version of this story would have hurtled toward the part where the alien jumps on the crew members. Today's slasher movies, in the sci-fi genre and elsewhere, are all pay-off and no buildup. Consider the wretched remake of the "Texas Chainsaw Massacre," which cheats its audience out of an explanation, an introduction of the chain-saw family, and even a proper ending. It isn't the slashing that we enjoy. It's the waiting for the slashing.

Hitchcock knew this, with his famous example of a bomb under a table. (It goes off -- that's action. It doesn't go off -- that's suspense.) M. Night Shyamalan's "Signs" knew that, and hardly bothered with its aliens at all. And the best scenes in Hawks' "The Thing" involve the empty corridors of the Antarctic station where the Thing might be lurking.

"Alien" uses a tricky device to keep the alien fresh throughout the movie: It evolves the nature and appearance of the creature, so we never know quite what it looks like or what it can do. We assume at first the eggs will produce a humanoid, because that's the form of the petrified pilot on the long-lost alien ship. But of course we don't even know if the pilot is of the same race as his cargo of leathery eggs. Maybe he also considers them as a weapon. The first time we get a good look at the alien, as it bursts from the chest of poor Kane (John Hurt). It is unmistakably phallic in shape, and the critic Tim Dirks mentions its "open, dripping vaginal mouth."

Yes, but later, as we glimpse it during a series of attacks, it no longer assumes this shape at all, but looks octopod, reptilian or arachnoid. And then it uncorks another secret; the fluid dripping from its body is a "universal solvent," and there is a sequence both frightening and delightful as it eats its way through one deck of the ship after another. As the sequels ("Aliens," "Alien 3," "Alien Resurrection") will make all too abundantly clear, the alien is capable of being just about any monster the story requires. Because it doesn't play by any rules of appearance or behavior, it becomes an amorphous menace, haunting the ship with the specter of shape-shifting evil. Ash (Ian Holm), the science officer, calls it a "perfect organism. Its structural perfection is matched only by its hostility," and admits: "I admire its purity, its sense of survival; unclouded by conscience, remorse, or delusions of morality."

Sigourney Weaver, whose career would be linked for years to this strange creature, is of course the only survivor of this original crew, except for the ... cat. The producers must have hoped for a sequel, and by killing everyone except a woman, they cast their lot with a female lead for their series.

Variety noted a few years later that Weaver remained the only actress who could "open" an action movie, and it was a tribute to her versatility that she could play the hard, competent, ruthless Ripley and then double back for so many other kinds of roles. One of the reasons she works so well in the role is that she comes across as smart; the 1979 "Alien" is a much more cerebral movie than its sequels, with the characters (and the audience) genuinely engaged in curiosity about this weirdest of lifeforms.

A peculiarity of the rest of the actors is that none of them were particularly young. Tom Skerritt, the captain, was 46, Hurt was 39 but looked older, Holm was 48, Harry Dean Stanton was 53, Yaphet Kotto was 42, and only Veronica Cartwright at 29 and Weaver at 30 were in the age range of the usual thriller cast. Many recent action pictures have improbably young actors cast as key roles or sidekicks, but by skewing older, "Alien" achieves a certain texture without even making a point of it: These are not adventurers but workers, hired by a company to return 20 million tons of ore to Earth (the vast size of the ship is indicated in a deleted scene, included on the DVD, which takes nearly a minute just to show it passing).

The screenplay by Dan O'Bannon, based on a story he wrote with Ronald Shusett, allows these characters to speak in distinctive voices. Brett and Parker (Kotto and Stanton), who work in the engine room, complain about delays and worry about their cut of the profits. But listen to Ash: "I'm still collating it, actually, but I have confirmed that he's got an outer layer of protein polysaccharides. He has a funny habit of shedding his cells and replacing them with polarized silicon which gives him a prolonged resistance to adverse environmental conditions." And then there is Ripley's direct way of cutting to the bottom line.

The result is a film that absorbs us in a mission before it involves us in an adventure, and that consistently engages the alien with curiosity and logic, instead of simply firing at it. Contrast this movie with a latter-day space opera like "Armageddon," with its average shot a few seconds long and its dialogue reduced to terse statements telegraphing the plot. Much of the credit for "Alien" must go to director Ridley Scott, who had made only one major film before this, the cerebral, elegant "The Duelists" (1977). His next film would be another intelligent, visionary sci-fi epic, "Blade Runner" (1982).

Though his career has included some inexplicable clinkers ("Someone to Watch Over Me"), it has also included "Thelma & Louise," "G.I. Jane," "Gladiator" (unloved by me, but not by audiences), "Black Hawk Down" and "Matchstick Men." These are simultaneously commercial and intelligent projects, made by a director who wants to attract a large audience but doesn't care to insult it.

"Alien" has been called the most influential of modern action pictures, and so it is, although "Halloween" also belongs on the list. Unfortunately, the films it influenced studied its thrills but not its thinking. We have now descended into a bog of Gotcha! movies in which various horrible beings spring on a series of victims, usually teenagers. The ultimate extension of the genre is the Geek Movie, illustrated by the remake of "Texas Chainsaw Massacre," which essentially sets the audience the same test as an old-time carnival geek show: Now that you've paid your money, can you keep your eyes open while we disgust you? A few more ambitious and serious sci-fi films have also followed in the footsteps of "Alien," notably the well-made "Aliens" (1986) and "Dark City" (1998). But the original still vibrates with a dark and frightening intensity.

The Universe in a Glass of Wine

Quentin Tarantino on THERE WILL BE BLOOD

Comic: The Circle of Life

Diamondback the Cannible

He moved from town to town, place to place
Killing and eating and serving the chase
Doing the only thing he knew how to do
Taking the life of another

Diamondback they called him and he took it with pride
He had always felt like a rattler deep down inside
He killed just as they did, to eat and survive
Feeding on the passive cattle

A man in one town, a woman in the next
A child, playing, who he happen to vex
Refusal to acknowledge wouldn't spare his meal
All fell to his vicious hunger

Once while taking the meat from his kill
He saw a rattler bite a cat then go still
He blinked and the rattler was gone which revealed
Just the cat... with a rat... in his mouth...

Then, while dining in a hole he had found
A man busted in and pinned Diamond down
He stuck his shotgun in Diamondback's mouth
And screamed as he pulled the trigger

Now the cops made a big deal and the man sat and cried
Diamondback's corpse still lay twisted inside
But anybody whose anybody knows how to deal
With a big ol' rattler whose chose you for a meal
You blow its goddammn head off

In 1863, San Francisco newspapers reported endlessly on the cooked books and financial trickery of mining outfits, and the San Francisco news outlet Territorial Enterprise advised investors to instead put their capital consisting of plague-ridden blankets and Buffalo nickels into San Francisco utility companies. Not out of financial responsibility, or anything; the utility companies were paying several papers bribes for reporting the tips. Still, most people didn't realize what was going on, they just read story after story to the tune of "Oh my God, investing in utilities is so good, you guys."

Except one story.

One story told of a man named Philip Hopkins who invested his life savings in Spring Valley Water Company of San Francisco on the advice of local papers but unfortunately lost it all. And as what many of us have done after the news of financial hardship, Hopkins slaughtered his family, slit his throat from ear to ear and rode off onto the sunset carrying his wife's bloody scalp. Hopkins allegedly died from his injuries at the door of a saloon, and an old fashioned posse investigated the Hopkins household, finding only two daughters alive. The papers published this horrifying tale and the public put a little less faith in the "Put All Of Your Money In Utilities" financial strategy that they'd heard so much about.

The gruesomeness of that story is matched only by its total bullshittitude. Never missing an opportunity to embarrass other people while twirling his awesome mustache, Mark Twain made the entire thing up, deliberately writing a story that was so ridiculous and sensational that any paper would have to publish it. Shortly after the news brouhaha that followed, Twain confessed to his publisher, who was actually pleased by the increased paper circulation and didn't fire Twain. That just goes to show you: If you completely fabricate a gruesome story for the sake of destroying someone else, nothing bad can possibly happen to you.

-from Cracked.com

Richard Feynman on Social Science

One of the most brilliant men of our time.

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

The Ultra Deep Field

Two Little Birds

Charles Nelson Reilly

Try JibJab Sendables® eCards today!

The Omnivore’s Delusion: Against the Agri-intellectuals

Farming has always been messy and painful, and bloody and dirty. It still is. This is something the critics of industrial farming never seem to understand.

I’m dozing, as I often do on airplanes, but the guy behind me has been broadcasting nonstop for nearly three hours. I finally admit defeat and start some serious eavesdropping. He’s talking about food, damning farming, particularly livestock farming, compensating for his lack of knowledge with volume.

I’m so tired of people who wouldn’t visit a doctor who used a stethoscope instead of an MRI demanding that farmers like me use 1930s technology to raise food. Farming has always been messy and painful, and bloody and dirty. It still is.

But now we have to listen to self-appointed experts on airplanes frightening their seatmates about the profession I have practiced for more than 30 years. I’d had enough. I turned around and politely told the lecturer that he ought not believe everything he reads. He quieted and asked me what kind of farming I do. I told him, and when he asked if I used organic farming, I said no, and left it at that. I didn’t answer with the first thought that came to mind, which is simply this: I deal in the real world, not superstitions, and unless the consumer absolutely forces my hand, I am about as likely to adopt organic methods as the Wall Street Journal is to publish their next edition by setting the type by hand.

Young turkeys aren't smart enough to come in out of the rain, and will stand outside in a downpour, with beaks open and eyes skyward, until they drown.

He was a businessman, and I’m sure spends his days with spreadsheets, projections, and marketing studies. He hasn’t used a slide rule in his career and wouldn’t make projections with tea leaves or soothsayers. He does not blame witchcraft for a bad quarter, or expect the factory that makes his product to use steam power instead of electricity, or horses and wagons to deliver his products instead of trucks and trains. But he expects me to farm like my grandfather, and not incidentally, I suppose, to live like him as well. He thinks farmers are too stupid to farm sustainably, too cruel to treat their animals well, and too careless to worry about their communities, their health, and their families. I would not presume to criticize his car, or the size of his house, or the way he runs his business. But he is an expert about me, on the strength of one book, and is sharing that expertise with captive audiences every time he gets the chance. Enough, enough, enough.

Click here to read the full article.

Cuase that's all it takes.. snapping your fingers..

Try JibJab Sendables® eCards today!

First Born

We are the last of our Tribe, of our name
Hungry Wolves, westward bound, we've shed our locks of love and rage
Laying bone naked in the sun soaked liberty of a no man
Desperate minimum wage

I kill without question it's easier that way.
I kill without question it's easier that way.

Clothed in form.
Nervously gnawing
On my shame and suffering
Trained to kill
Everything.

What have I done?
I slit my father's throat
With the knife that he gave to me, and the promise of his throne.
What have I done?
I tried to be a man
I covered my skin with pain and blood
And killed upon command
What have I done?
My mind is my tomb.
I've given my throne to my next of kin as I wait here in my room.

I wanna evolve.
I want to evolve.
I wanna Evolve.
I wanna evolve.
I wanna evolve, I wanna evolve. I wanna evolve. I wanna evolve.

I'll suffer in secret it's easier that way.
it's easier that way.

Tombstone Blues

The sweet pretty things are in bed now of course
The city fathers they're trying to endorse
The reincarnation of Paul Revere's horse
But the town has no need to be nervous

The ghost of Belle Starr she hands down her wits
To Jezebel the nun she violently knits
A bald wig for Jack the Ripper who sits
At the head of the chamber of commerce

Mama's in the fact'ry
She ain't got no shoes
Daddy's in the alley
He's lookin' for FOOD
I'm in the KITCHEN
With the tombstone blues

The hysterical bride in the penny arcade
Screaming she moans, "I've just been made"
Then sends out for the doctor who pulls down the shade
Says, "My advice is to not let the boys in"

Now the medicine man comes and he shuffles inside
He walks with a swagger and he says to the bride
"Stop all this weeping, swallow your pride
You will not die, it's not poison"

Mama's in the fact'ry
She ain't got no shoes
Daddy's in the alley
He's lookin' for FOOD
I'm in the KITCHEN
With the tombstone blues

Well, John the Baptist after torturing a thief
Looks up at his hero the Commander-in-Chief
Saying, "Tell me great hero, but please make it brief
Is there a hole for me to get sick in?"

The Commander-in-Chief answers him while chasing a fly
Saying, "Death to all those who would whimper and cry"
And dropping a bar bell he points to the sky
Saying, "The sun's not yellow it's chicken"

Mama's in the fact'ry
She ain't got no shoes
Daddy's in the alley
He's lookin' for FOOD
I'm in the KITCHEN
With the tombstone blues

The king of the Philistines his soldiers to save
Put jawbones on their tombstones and flatters their graves
Puts the pied pipers in prison and fattens the slaves
Then sends them out to the jungle

Gypsy Davey with a blowtorch he burns out their camps
With his faithful slave Pedro behind him he tramps
With a fantastic collection of stamps
To win friends and influence his uncle

Mama's in the fact'ry
She ain't got no shoes
Daddy's in the alley
He's lookin' for FOOD
I'm in TROUBLE
With the tombstone blues

The geometry of innocence flesh on the bone
Causes Galileo's math book to get thrown
At Delilah who's sitting worthlessly alone
But the tears on her cheeks are from laughter

Now I wish I could give Brother Bill his great thrill
I would set him in chains at the top of the hill
Then send out for some pillars and Cecil B. DeMille
He could die happily ever after

Mama's in the fact'ry
She ain't got no shoes
Daddy's in the alley
He's lookin' for FOOD
I'm in the KITCHEN
With the tombstone blues

Where Ma Raney and Beethoven once unwrapped their bed roll
Tuba players now rehearse around the flagpole
And the National Bank at a profit sells road maps for the soul
To the old folks home and the college

Now I wish I could write you a melody so plain
That could hold you dear lady from going insane
That could ease you and cool you and cease the pain
Of your useless and pointless knowledge

Mama's in the fact'ry
She ain't got no shoes
Daddy's in the alley
He's lookin' for FOOD
I'm in the KITCHEN
With the tombstone blues

The Federation of American Natives

Because we do not believe that what our Country is hurtling towards is
the True America. We can not accept that which is fed to us. We do not
believe that there should be a world community, a world government. We
will never be a people as one because our differences are what make us
human. Because you believe that everyone should stand on their own two
feet. No one should be given hand outs. People need to earn their
place. They need to be aware of consequence. Because you believe all
this to be true, You are a True American.

Shaman of Snakes

And in this there is serious danger. For not only has it always been the way of multitudes to interpret their own symbols literally, but such literally read symbolic forms have always been - and still are, in fact - the supports of their civilizations, the supports of their moral orders, their cohesion, vitality, and creative powers. With the loss of them there follows uncertainty , and with uncertainty, disequilibrium, since life, as both Nietzsche and Isben knew, requires life-supporting illusions; and where these have been dispelled, there is nothing secure to hold on to, no moral law, nothing firm. We have seen what has happened, for example, to primitive communities unsettled by the white man's civilization. With their old taboos discredited, they immedietly go to pieces, disintegrate, and become resorts of vice and disease.

One cannot help remarking , however that since about the year 1914 there has been evident in our progressive world an increasing disregard and even disdain for those ritual forms that once brought forth, and up to now have sustained, this infinitely rich and fruitfully developing civilization. Americans abroad, from the period of Mark Twain onward, have been notorious exemplars of the ideal, representing as conspicuously as possible the innocent belief that Europeans and Asians, living in older, stuffier environments, should be refreshed and wakened to their own natural innocencies by the unadulterated and boorishness of a product of God's Country, our sweet American soil, and our Bill of Rights.

It is this: that in a small community like Athens the relationship of the creative artist to the local social leaders would be forthright and direct, they would have known each other since boyhood; whereas in such a community as, say, our modern New York, London, or Paris, the artist who would be known has to go to cocktail parties to win commissions. and those who win them are the ones who are not in their studios but at parties, meeting the right people and appearing in the right places. They have not been quite enough engaged in the agony of solitary creative work to press beyond their first acquisitions of marketable styles and techniques. And the next consequence is "instant art," where some clever individual with as little formal agony as possible simply renders something unforeseen - which is then criticized and either advertised or suppressed by either friendly or unfriendly newspaper folk, who have also had a lot of socializing to attend to and, with insufficient time for extra-curricular study or experience, find themselves baffled before anything really complex or significantly new.

-Joseph Cambell

WE LIVE IN A TIME OF NO FAITH. PEOPLE BELIEVE IN NOTHING. IT USED TO BE THAT EACH HAD THEIR OWN VERSION OF GOD BUT NO MORE. WITHOUT GOD, WITHOUT OUR GURUS, PEOPLE PLACE LOOK TO OTHER THINGS TO FILL THAT VOID THAT THE ABCENSE OF FAITH HAS LEFT, LIKE PUTTING FOUL WATER ON AN OPEN WOUND. GANG GREEN OCCURS, AMPUTATION BECOMES NESCESSARY, BUT ALL THE WHILE PEOPLE STAND IN THE BACK AND SING SAVE THE WHALES.

To See What Condition My Condition Was In

Grandfather's Old Ram

Only a Fraction

This is only a small taste of the numerous photos, videos, and other visual stimulae that i brought back with me, but at least it is a taste.



Click to see in full size. If you are one of those who would like to see all of the 800 photos, let me know and I will burn a cd for you to feed on.

My Friend; Far to the West

What do people fear most?


Two magazines, Country Living (95.99% white readership) and Ebony/Jet (99.99% black readership) did surveys on .....'WHAT DO PEOPLE FEAR MOST?'

The results were interesting, to say the least..

Country Living magazine's top three answers were:


1. Nuclear war/terrorist attack in U.S.


2. Child/spouse dying/terminal illness.


3. Terminal illness/self.


Ebony/Jet magazine's top three answers were:


1. Ghosts


2. Dogs


3. Registered mail


No Kidding!


AND TO GO WITH THIS ONE:



TWO QUOTES:

ONE PITIFUL, ONE GOOD

'My friends, we live in the greatest nation in the history of the world.

I hope you'll join with me as we try to change it.'

-- Barack Obama



''Life's tough......it's even tougher if you're stupid.''

-- John Wayne

This is Real

Lonesome Day

Hell's brewin' dark sun's on the rise
This storm'll blow through by and by
House is on fire, Viper's in the grass
A little revenge and this too shall pass
This too shall pass, I'm gonna pray
Right now all I got's this lonesome day

Maru and the Giant Box

What piece of work is a man! How noble in reason! How infinite in faculty! In form and moving how express and admirable! In action how like an angel! In apprehension how like a god! The beauty of the world! The paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust? Man delights not me: no...

The Grand Inquisitor from The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky

For those who have not read the Brothers Karamazov, a brief explanation will give the context. Ivan, the second oldest in trio of brothers, speaks to his younger sibling, Alyosha, about various things pertaining to religion and God. Alyosha, who has decided to join the clergy, believes himself pious and displays the arrogance of one so young who has devoted himself to the church out of "compassion for his fellow man". What begins as pity toward his older brother, develops into horror and finally a sense of understanding. If you enjoyed this, read the rest of the novel. It is filled with gems such as this.

The Ringling

Click to see more.

A Sense of Place

Toward Hopeless Damnation

Insight Meditation Instantly Online! Now All I Need is Your Credit Card Number

While conversing with a friend recently, I had my own exposure to the true face of American Buddhism. She told me a story of a woman who was very wealthy because of her husband’s success. This woman had recently built a very extravagant and obscenely expensive home, but was complaining of how, “It just didn’t feel right”. Luckily this woman knew just what to do. She phoned a group of Buddhist monks, who just so happened to be in the area, and procured their services to come and bless her new embodiment of ignorance. The monks obliged, for a price of course, and, being a gracious host, the woman offered to feed them while they were in her home. When asked what they wanted to eat for their dinner they said Kentucky Fried Chicken.

This story is a living example of the fogged glass that the West views Buddhism, and all Eastern religions and cultures for that fact, though. We look to these “mystical” cultures to provide us with some sort of answer to the emptiness and boredom that is so prevalent in our society. Our lack of identity leads us to emulate others in an attempt to bring some sort of peace to our lives. This ignorance and all of the traditions and world views it poisons would be the emphasis of my class. In some small way I would attempt to, at least, get the class to admit to this lack of understanding.

As Westerners, our culture loves to over romanticize everything, and Buddhism is one of the worst victims of this obsession. The typical pattern is to pick and choose which parts we like and follow them as we see fit. Westerners commit this atrocity with their own religions, but it seems to be more severe with Buddhism. An example of this would be the fascination with the practice of meditation. Westerners think of their yoga classes and believe that is all there is to the art of meditation. “Meditation is the familiarization of the mind with an object of concentration.” (Notes) The whole point of Buddhist meditation is to move along the Noble Eight Fold Path and achieve Enlightenment sooner. To meditate without this goal at heart, a devotion to the “four wishes”, and a lack of commitment to the teachings of the Buddha is to wallow in the pool of our ignorance. It achieves nothing except to stroke the ego and feed the vanity of the parties involved. “This sharp distinction in kind between the means and ends of the Buddhist religious life is probably a special case of the sort of casual relations seen in the ancient doctrines of karma, where the effect of an act is not another act but an experience of the consequences. We lie in the beds we make; we do not simply keep making beds.” (Bielefeldt 237) As a culture, we have developed factories to mass produce new beds so that we never have to face the consequences of our actions.

One of the founding principles of Buddhism, tied into the fabric of every thought and action, is the art of compassion. While most would take this term at its face value, the Buddhist concept of compassion is so much more that it takes eons for masters to achieve true comprehension of what the Buddha taught. Defined, loosely, as the release from suffering, compassion to the Buddha is not always what the West’s “compassionate” reaction is. Through the use of upāya, or skillful means, the Buddha sees into the heart of the suffering being and chooses what is best for that soul and the souls of all. This can include death of the being, as we see in the story of the Buddha on the raft.

The Buddha recognizes a man who, in his heart, desires to kill all those on the raft as they are crossing a river. The Buddha slays the man, saving all aboard and the man himself, for the murder of those people would have affected his karma negatively and caused a rebirth in one of the hell realms. The Buddha spends only an instant in hell for this because of his immense compassion for the man and the passengers of the raft. (Notes) In the Skillful Means of Vimalakīrti Sutra, we see a Bodhisattva whose very act of living in a particular place is an act of compassion for all suffering beings. Through his upāya he directs many lay people and even some of his fellow Bodhisattvas down the true path to enlightenment.

“And thus with innumerable skillful means, the elder Vimalakīrti brought benefit to living creatures, and using his skillful means he made his body appear to be sick. And the kings and ministers, the elders and the householders, the priests and princes heard of his illness, and thousands upon thousands of people cam to inquire after his health. And Vimalakīrti made use of his illness to receive them and to preach to them the Law.” (Strong 182)

In the West, the current obsession and fear based practice is the attempt to save everything from destruction, be it natural or man made. People scream for all the humans of this planet to stamp out violence and rid the world of conflict. Westerners look to Buddhism as an example of peaceful, non-violent monks who live in harmony with everyone and everything. Most see Buddhists, not even making a distinction between the laity and the Sangha, as pacifists who debate rather than resort to any kind of physical violence. As demonstrated in the teachings of the Buddha, the true compassionate act would seem eccentric and sometimes barbaric to the Western world.

However, no matter what action the awakened one chooses for the suffering being, it is always in the best interest of all beings trapped in samsara. To submit to this sort of authority is something that American Buddhists rebel against because of their distrust of those with any sort of power. “All this suggests something else that is fundamental to the orientation of Buddhist thought and practice: the wish to relieve suffering can in the end only be rooted in a feeling of sympathy (anukampā) or compassion for the suffering of both oneself and of others. This feeling of sympathy for the suffering of beings is what motivates not only the Buddha to teach but ultimately everyone who tries to put his teaching into practice.” (Gethin 64)
The transmission of Buddhism from country to country is an important factor in how we view Buddhism today. Each nation, beginning with India and the Shakymuni Buddha, received Buddhism differently because of various reasons. Competition with local religions and spirits, leaders choosing what versions they agreed with, and translations of only certain texts created unique variations of the Buddhist tradition in Asian countries such as Laos, Cambodia, China, Japan, and Tibet. In China, Confucianism and Taoism where strongly rooted in the cultural lives of the people and the state controlled what Buddhist texts were allowed to be translated. This is common among other Asian countries, and, in some cases, completely choked off the Buddhist religion all together.

Where some resisted though, others flourished. While Japan refrained at first, its inhabitants found Buddhism to be incredibly compatible with the native religion of Shinto. The two fused together and created a syncretic system that thrived and produced many different schools with Zen Buddhism emerging as the dominant school. Zen quickly became the “ideal” form of Buddhism to the Western nations, many thinking that all there was to Buddhism was the Zen tradition, and it was not long before it was distorted and twisted into what the West thought was the quintessential Buddhist. Zen was adopted, mutated, and spat back at the Eastern nations in an attempt to identify themselves with all of the “peace loving monks”.
“In India itself Buddhist monasteries were gradually deserted and all that remained were crumbling monuments to the past.” (Gethin 276) The closing point of my lecture, and certainly the most important because of its relevance, would be Buddhism in America. Buddhism here suffers from the same sickness that infects all of the endeavors taken on by the American populous today. It is a sickness that rots any intentions that one may have in these undertakings. That sickness is naivety. “Another characteristic of white Buddhism is, or certainly has been, its naivety.” (Fields 204) This country is one that, by comparison to all of the other Buddhist nations, is still very young, and that youth seems to deem with it a sense not only undeserved entitlement but also impertinence. The traditions and wisdom found in a true teacher are thrown aside because this young American read a Wikipedia article, because most of them do not even read books anymore, on Zen Buddhism. Our society is one that is based in instant gratification and the long dedication required by Buddhism does not mesh with this polluted “American Dream”.

This is all compounded by the lack of national identity found in the United States today. This is one element about America that is disturbingly unique. We are not a Buddhist nation, nor will we ever be. We do not have a national language and any attempt to attain one is met with calls of racism and exclusion. We are a melting pot of every culture and idea that immigrates to our country and therefore we can not unite under a common standard. We are so caught up in a vain attempt to not offend anyone that we lose sight of what we are. This leaves citizens with an absence of identity. They do not know what it means to be an American, except for what is fed to them by the television. So, the Volvo Buddhist and the evangelical Buddhist all go looking for something to tell them who they are, and with American Buddhism bearing the weight of these laity acting as monks, it dilutes the teachings of the Buddha. To these people, there is no merit, there is no enlightenment. There is only having a man in a funny outfit bless their monument to attachment so that they can feel better about it. “All of these American factors run counter to the Asian Norms.” (Notes)

Laser Cats 4

Video Recaps | Full Episodes | Webisodes

The Gilded Age by Mark Twain; Phillip Sterling

Cast Out

The old diamondback sturgeon came swimmin’ along
Minding his business one day
Rooting and sniffing and urging to spawn
In the mud flats of san pablo bay

A scent came around so he followed his snout
He found what was to his surprise
A golden morsel, a tidbit, a tight bunch of grass shrimp
Was there right before this buck’s eyes

He circle round twice and he took a big whiff
Then sucked up this savory meal
Then came a jolt and to the diamondback’s surprise
Through his lips cut the cold, barbed steel

In a panic the old diamondback sped to the north
He sped to the east, west and south
But the harder he swam, he still could not break free
From the "tugging" that pulled at his mouth

The old diamondback sturgeon came swimmin’ along
Minding his business one day

The Century of Self

We, shamed to show our neighbor our lust and sin, throw our desperate anger into the big melting pots of art, entertainment, and, above all, religion.
While our brutish human reveals himself in all of the afor mentioned things, religion is the element most covered in our stains of projection. The religious mind is one that punishes and condemns all actions of the brute. Because we are made in our lord’s image, this transfers some sort of divinity to us and gives them the right to point the finger at us in shame. We look to religion to help us process these “evil” desires and a blanket answer to the question of why. We ask this question because of our desire to know causality, but we are too scared to look our answer in the face because this answer stares back at us from the mirror. Religion spoon feeds us the devil because the devil tempts us with all that our instinct would lunge at. Our self preservation is the sin of narcissism.
Because we look to religion to cover the open wound of the inner animal, we are left feeling unsatisfied in the end. To seek so desperately for an answer in the emptiness leaves one with a further feeling of loss and regret, still suffering from the fear of ourselves. What Freud calls for, and in truth must happen, is for the bandage to be ripped away and the wound allowed to heal on its own. “No mention has yet been made of what is perhaps the most important item in the psychical inventory of a civilization. This consist in its religious ideas in the wildest sense- in other words (which will be justified later) in its illusions.” -Freud

Reflection

I have come curiously close to the end, down
Beneath my self-indulgent pitiful hole,
Defeated, I concede and
Move closer
I may find comfort here
I may find peace within the emptiness
How pitiful

It's calling me...

And in my darkest moment, fetal and weeping
The moon tells me a secret - my confidant
As full and bright as I am
This light is not my own and
A million light reflections pass over me

Its source is bright and endless
She resuscitates the hopeless
Without her, we are lifeless satellites drifting

And as I pull my head out I am without one doubt
Don't wanna be down here feeding my narcissism.
I must crucify the ego before it's far too late
I pray the light lifts me out
Before I pine away.

So crucify the ego, before it's far too late
To leave behind this place so negative and blind and cynical,
And you will come to find that we are all one mind
Capable of all that's imagined and all conceivable.
Just let the light touch you
And let the words spill through
And let them pass right through
Bringing out our hope and reason ...
before we pine away.

Undoing the Bear Trap from My Leg; Resetting it for the Next

All this is excessively interesting, but there’s also a black, gloomy, unnerving sadness about it, so that man must forcefully hold himself back from gazing too long into these abysses. Here we have illness — no doubt about that—the most terrifying illness that has raged in human beings up to now:—and anyone who can still hear (but nowadays people no longer have the ear for that!—) how in this night of torment and insanity the cry of love has resounded, the cry of the most yearning delight, of redemption through love, turns away, seized by an invincible horror. . . In human beings there is so much that is terrible! . . . The world has already been a lunatic asylum for too long! --Friedrich Nietzsche

I have failed. To remain in this lunatic asylum is not only unhealthy but it grinds into me as a weaponsmith forging a new blade on his grinding wheel. My failure lies in that, when presented with an opportunity for reprieve and regeneration, the trap snaps shut, and I am left here, dying from blood loss. That is not the entirety of this seeping, seething failure. This trap is not new. I know it well. I know the teeth and hinges. I know its rusty metal. MY LEG BEARS THE SCARS OF THIS TRAP. My true failure to myself and to others is that, when this trap ensnares me, I do not chew my leg off to continue on. I need to. I tell myself I need to. But I look behind me and that backward glance costs me my resolve. So I watch my reprieve slip away over the horizon. I reach down and use all my anger to force the trap open again and reset it for the next time the golden chariot swings my way. I throw my rage at these inanimate things that take the punishment without question. fuck. goddamn.

i'm sorry.

The World Set Free

The World Set Free

The book in its entirety.

H.G. Wells predicted, 40 years before its conception, the splendor and pure terror of man's most wondrous spectacle.

The Brutal Song of the Warrior King

Civilization is Crumbling

Huck Finn Chapter 22: The Tale of Col. Sherburn

My True Form

RECEIVE MY EXCREMENT!!

Puscifer in Las Vegas

New Puscifer in Vegas Promo

Killing is Making a Choice

To a universal sense for everything belonging to the sacred sphere of religion, every man joins as artists should, the endeavour to perfect himself in some one department.

A Continuing of that Endeavour

Do I Need to Explain it?

Growth and Consequences; Neither are Present in the Current State of Man

This is merely to document the time. 4:31 in the am, Eastern Standard Time.
It will undoubtedly turn into something over time. Discard its current legs and grow new ones that fit its new lifestyle in high society. It will learn from the best universities how to ignore what is good for us and settle in its own waste. It will be taught how love the sound of its own voice so that it drowns out any questions that might be asked of it. It will learn to think like others, dress like others, talk like others, eat like others, fuck like others, puke like others. It will learn these things and at the end of the day when it is lying alone in its bed. When there is nothing else to fight off the suffocating boredom that is eating away at it. It will lay there and wonder. How did it end up here when it was birthed for the simple purpose of documenting the time.
As i stare down at my bloody hands resting on the keys, i wonder too. I wonder how many of these posts i will see tomorrow? How many will i talk to? Will one of them, while driving and undoubtedly using their cellular phone to send a text message to their friend about how wasted they were the night before or how many times they fucked the person they don't remember or how they shot heroin into both their balls and now they have AIDS because they shared a needle with someone they didn't know but was told was cool by their friend of a friend, slam into me while i am walking and kill me? How many will look me straight in the eye as lie? Lie, like i lied when i told them i gave a shit. Cat gets bit in the throat by a rattlesnake who gives a shit what kind it was. It's dead. What do you care? Who gives a shit what I say? because it is still 4:30 in the fucking morning and I can't sleep for the worry.
But who am i to say any of theses things? I don't know. I don't know what to write. All I know is that first you have got to get mad. you have got to say I'm a human being GODDAMMIT!! MY LIFE HAS VALUE!!! But what the fuck is that supposed to mean. This is this. Is that some fag-ity bullshit you ever heard? Isn't that a statement? JUST BECAUSE A MAN DOESN'T DO ALL HIS CRYING THROUGH THE END OF HIS PENIS, HE IS GAY! HE IS A FAG! Dude you don't fuck your girlfriend? Dude.. are you gay or something? You don't think with your dick?!? Man, you must be gay! Restraint is for gay people dude!! FUCK THE SHIT OUT OF HER AND LEAVE HER IN A DITCH BECAUSE YOU CAN'T COMMIT TO ANYTHING BECAUSE YOU ARE SCARED OUT OF YOUR MIND THAT SHE WILL THINK YOU INFERIOR BECAUSE YOUR FATHER NEVER GAVE YOU ANY RECOGNITION!
if you can't have mindless sex than what's the point of living am i right?

fuck it. it's almost 5. the cat is still dead. and andy warhol is still recognized as a legitimate artist.

WHERE IS THE AUTHENTICITY IN THAT? where is the justice?

He Comes in the Night; FOR YOU!

The Night Sky