Recently, while riding my bicycle into town, I was passed by a pickup-truck driven by a lone individual. Affixed to the back of this man's vehicle were two stickers, one reading, “Ravens – Relentless,” the other, “NOTW.” It will not shock this blog's regular readers that I am lamenting the idiocy of the loose affiliation of non-Earth-bound religious fanatics who see themselves as being Not Of This World (NOTW), but so many of them live here that I find it hard to resist.
Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary from 1961 defines relentless as, “Mercilessly harsh, stern.” If one can glean anything from the teachings of Yeshua (also known as Iesu, or Jesus, the Christians' primary god), it is that one should be – always, and without fail – compassionate, honorable, and loving toward others, and that one should treat them as one would like to be treated. This ancient wise man encouraged his followers to be merciful and generous persons whose only wish it was to serve the lowly, to assist the meek, and to give aid to the disenfranchised. In the Christians' bible, one of the only times that Yeshua acted in a truly harsh or stern fashion was when he drove the money-changers out of temple by whipping them with chains in a brazen (but unsuccessful) attempt to rid faith of the sickness of finance. The compassionate individual cares for the Earth and for Nature; he wishes to shelter and to promote the growing and the teeming things, no matter their size, shape, or color; the last thing that the true believer in the message of Yeshua would do would be to drive himself around the countryside in a two-ton vehicle at high speed (burning crude oil and mowing crushing clouds of insects against the front of his car), or to live in such as way as to be dependent on driving. The last thing he would do would be to allow himself to become so enamored of a simple game that he would go out and purchase a sticker for his car instead of using that money to support a starving neighbor or save a dying species. A true believer in Yeshua's message would not to spend his time watching, discussing, or thinking about the intricate details of such a decidedly earth-bound and petty thing as American football – the true believer would spend his time musing about how best to uplift the poor, help the needy, promote the downtrodden, and live in such a way as to cause as little negative impact as possible to the health of this our only planet.
To attempt to love Iesu, football, and pickup-trucks at the same time is akin to trying to walk while sitting and standing. Please, dear friend, remember Yeshua's lessons of humility and mercy, and cast aside the creeping doubt that hides within relentless and unbridled passion.
mentiri factorem fecit © 場黑麥
Showing posts with label ravens. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ravens. Show all posts
28 December 2012
26 October 2012
themed, useless crap
A cold war is being waged in this rural Pennsylvania town between the agents of two trumped-up organizations: the Steelers and the Ravens. From Pittsburgh and Baltimore respectively, the televised efforts of these two professional sports teams have so ensnared the imaginations – and, more importantly, the purse-strings – of the hard-working, blue-collar, middle-class denizens of this sad little place as to have hijacked the identities of people who spend what little free time they get eating potato chips, drinking cheap beer, and staring at self-illuminated boxes.
I imagine that the inner monologue of a fan of one of the many over-hyped national football league (NFL) teams goes something like this: “Do I donate to charity and help feed over three million starving American children or do I spend a hundred and fifty dollars on a ten-foot-high flag bearing the logo of my team? Do I perpetuate obesity and sloth within my family by stuffing cheese-doodles into my mouth as I sit on my financed couch with my eyes glued to an enormous television it will take me the next fifteen months to pay off? Do I send my check to an organization fighting poverty in this country's rust-belt or to a cluster of distant Chinamen cranking out solar-powered pathway lights emblazoned with an image of a highly stylized scavenger-bird designed by a wealthy corporation? You know what… fuck the poor, and fuck the kids – I need this overpriced bullshit so I can put it out in my yard and show my neighbor that I favor a different squad of men-in-tights than he does.”
I waste neither time nor money watching professional sports, preferring instead to read books on different and unrelated subjects, preferring instead to expand my mind by teaching myself languages and learning about organic gardening; I memorize neither statistics nor the success-rate of special trick plays, preferring instead to stay silent during useless NFL-related conversations, preferring instead to plumb the depths of my dark and twisted ego in order to bend it to my will, driving addiction and need from my life; I choose not to look on as angry fat dudes run into each other, preferring the freedom of a vigorous bicycle ride over sedentary slavery to a season of two minute warnings. I admit to puffing myself up here, to hoisting myself aloft in an attempt to differentiate myself from pig-skin-loving simpletons; as a Son of the American Revolution, however, and as a self-respecting and productive artist, I cannot afford to waste any more of my precious life on foolhardy pursuits than I have already wasted trying and failing to satisfy the root of mankind's evil, the ego. This, in my humble opinion, is part of the attraction of professional sports: they very often serve as proxy identities for persons too lazy or weak-of-will to do something unique with their lives worth talking about; they give pack-runners whose existence revolves around the act of consumption a topic to discuss that does not have to do with kids, jobs, or failing health. It is wrong of me to judge and to ridicule people for paying top dollar for jerseys or pennants or banners proclaiming that, “This Is Giants Country,” or something similarly absurd; the words I have written here are just as much driven by a darkly thrusting ego as are the shouted cries of thirty thousand star-struck fans. I am a worthless cunt for spending time crafting this article, but these thoughts well up inside me when I am shredding through town on my velocipede, and I know not where else to turn for release. On some level, I don't give a flying fuck (IDGAFF) what other people do, although I wish sometimes they wouldn't be so fucking flagrantly lame. Oh brother.
© mentiri factorem fecit (場黑麥)
I imagine that the inner monologue of a fan of one of the many over-hyped national football league (NFL) teams goes something like this: “Do I donate to charity and help feed over three million starving American children or do I spend a hundred and fifty dollars on a ten-foot-high flag bearing the logo of my team? Do I perpetuate obesity and sloth within my family by stuffing cheese-doodles into my mouth as I sit on my financed couch with my eyes glued to an enormous television it will take me the next fifteen months to pay off? Do I send my check to an organization fighting poverty in this country's rust-belt or to a cluster of distant Chinamen cranking out solar-powered pathway lights emblazoned with an image of a highly stylized scavenger-bird designed by a wealthy corporation? You know what… fuck the poor, and fuck the kids – I need this overpriced bullshit so I can put it out in my yard and show my neighbor that I favor a different squad of men-in-tights than he does.”
I waste neither time nor money watching professional sports, preferring instead to read books on different and unrelated subjects, preferring instead to expand my mind by teaching myself languages and learning about organic gardening; I memorize neither statistics nor the success-rate of special trick plays, preferring instead to stay silent during useless NFL-related conversations, preferring instead to plumb the depths of my dark and twisted ego in order to bend it to my will, driving addiction and need from my life; I choose not to look on as angry fat dudes run into each other, preferring the freedom of a vigorous bicycle ride over sedentary slavery to a season of two minute warnings. I admit to puffing myself up here, to hoisting myself aloft in an attempt to differentiate myself from pig-skin-loving simpletons; as a Son of the American Revolution, however, and as a self-respecting and productive artist, I cannot afford to waste any more of my precious life on foolhardy pursuits than I have already wasted trying and failing to satisfy the root of mankind's evil, the ego. This, in my humble opinion, is part of the attraction of professional sports: they very often serve as proxy identities for persons too lazy or weak-of-will to do something unique with their lives worth talking about; they give pack-runners whose existence revolves around the act of consumption a topic to discuss that does not have to do with kids, jobs, or failing health. It is wrong of me to judge and to ridicule people for paying top dollar for jerseys or pennants or banners proclaiming that, “This Is Giants Country,” or something similarly absurd; the words I have written here are just as much driven by a darkly thrusting ego as are the shouted cries of thirty thousand star-struck fans. I am a worthless cunt for spending time crafting this article, but these thoughts well up inside me when I am shredding through town on my velocipede, and I know not where else to turn for release. On some level, I don't give a flying fuck (IDGAFF) what other people do, although I wish sometimes they wouldn't be so fucking flagrantly lame. Oh brother.
© mentiri factorem fecit (場黑麥)
27 April 2012
on trucks, ravens, and NOTW
Recently, while going somewhere atop my velocipede, I was passed by a pickup-truck driven by a solitary individual. Affixed to the back of this vehicle were two stickers, one reading “Ravens – Relentless,” the other, “NOTW.” While it will not shock this website's regular readers that I am once again writing about the idiocy of the loose affiliation of non-earth-bound, religiously-fanatical individuals who see themselves as being Not Of This World (NOTW), the dichotomy of the aforementioned stickers was, at the time, quite striking.
For starters, Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary from 1961 defines relentless as: “Mercilessly harsh, stern.” If anything is to be gleaned from the teachings of Yeshua (also known as Iesu, or Jesus), it is that one should – always, and without fail – be compassionate toward others, and that one should honor and love others as one would honor and love oneself. The teachings of this wise man focus, perhaps more than on anything else, on becoming a merciful and generous person whose only wish is to serve the lowly, to assist the meek, and to aid the disenfranchised. According to the Christian bible, the only time that this Yeshua acted in a truly harsh or stern fashion was when he drove – by whipping them with chains – money-lenders from temple in a brazen (yet obviously unsuccessful) attempt to rid faith of finance.
Next, the compassionate individual cares for the Earth and for Nature; he wishes to shelter and to promote the growing and the teeming things, no matter their size, shape, or color; the last thing that the true believer in the message of Yeshua would do would be to burn crude oil in an unnecessarily large (and lifted, or modified to ride higher and with inferior aerodynamics) truck by driving himself around the countryside in his two-ton vehicle at high speeds, to mow through clouds of insects, crushing them against the front of his car, or to live in such as way as to make any form of driving a (supposed) necessity. The last thing he would do would be to allow himself to become so engrossed in a foreign-born game that he would go out and purchase a sticker for his car instead of using that money to support efforts aimed at environmental conservation and the preservation of the myriad species.
And, finally, the true believer in Yeshua's message would not to spend his time watching, discussing, thinking on, or musing about the intricate details of such a decidedly earth-bound and petty thing as American football – the true believer would spend his time discussing, thinking on, and musing about how best to give to the poor, to help the needy, to uplift the downtrodden, and to live in such a way as to cause as little negative impact as possible to the health of this, our only planet.
To attempt to love Yeshua, football, and pickup-trucks at the same time is akin to trying to walk while sitting and standing; please, dear friends, remember the lessons of humility and mercy, and cast aside the creeping doubt of relentless and unbridled passion.
場黑麥 mentiri factorem fecit
For starters, Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary from 1961 defines relentless as: “Mercilessly harsh, stern.” If anything is to be gleaned from the teachings of Yeshua (also known as Iesu, or Jesus), it is that one should – always, and without fail – be compassionate toward others, and that one should honor and love others as one would honor and love oneself. The teachings of this wise man focus, perhaps more than on anything else, on becoming a merciful and generous person whose only wish is to serve the lowly, to assist the meek, and to aid the disenfranchised. According to the Christian bible, the only time that this Yeshua acted in a truly harsh or stern fashion was when he drove – by whipping them with chains – money-lenders from temple in a brazen (yet obviously unsuccessful) attempt to rid faith of finance.
Next, the compassionate individual cares for the Earth and for Nature; he wishes to shelter and to promote the growing and the teeming things, no matter their size, shape, or color; the last thing that the true believer in the message of Yeshua would do would be to burn crude oil in an unnecessarily large (and lifted, or modified to ride higher and with inferior aerodynamics) truck by driving himself around the countryside in his two-ton vehicle at high speeds, to mow through clouds of insects, crushing them against the front of his car, or to live in such as way as to make any form of driving a (supposed) necessity. The last thing he would do would be to allow himself to become so engrossed in a foreign-born game that he would go out and purchase a sticker for his car instead of using that money to support efforts aimed at environmental conservation and the preservation of the myriad species.
And, finally, the true believer in Yeshua's message would not to spend his time watching, discussing, thinking on, or musing about the intricate details of such a decidedly earth-bound and petty thing as American football – the true believer would spend his time discussing, thinking on, and musing about how best to give to the poor, to help the needy, to uplift the downtrodden, and to live in such a way as to cause as little negative impact as possible to the health of this, our only planet.
To attempt to love Yeshua, football, and pickup-trucks at the same time is akin to trying to walk while sitting and standing; please, dear friends, remember the lessons of humility and mercy, and cast aside the creeping doubt of relentless and unbridled passion.
場黑麥 mentiri factorem fecit
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