The Swamp

From last year: article on the Zanesville, OH man who apparently set his exotic animals free to wander the countryside before killing himself.

If it weren't for the photos of him in uniform and meeting Norman Reedus, I'd call this ridiculous sob story a poor attempt at an April Fool's joke.

Instead, it's a dude's poor attempt at living life. And if it is an April Fool's joke, what a way to casually shame people in the military. This story is all kinds of dumb.

The Sequester Isn't A Joke For Jeff Maryak (Buzzfeed Link)

Johnnie wrote:If it weren't for the photos of him in uniform and meeting Norman Reedus, I'd call this ridiculous sob story a poor attempt at an April Fool's joke.

Instead, it's a dude's poor attempt at living life. And if it is an April Fool's joke, what a way to casually shame people in the military. This story is all kinds of dumb.

The Sequester Isn't A Joke For Jeff Maryak (Buzzfeed Link)

The first comment in the article sums it up:

This post should actually be titled "military industrial complex sponge lacks money managing skills". I say this as a fellow military industrial complex sponge.

I have some advice for reservist Maryak

1) get a job with Blackwater (or whatever they are calling themselves nowadays)
or
2) just hang on a few more weeks; plenty of deployments to Syria and/or Korea coming up.

Are we really supposed to feel sorry for that guy? Buzzfeed could do 100 of those stories a day and never run out of people in this country who are stupid with their money and deserve no pity.

DJs suspended for warning people about there being water in their water.

http://www.azcentral.com/offbeat/free/2 ... -joke.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

That guy deserves two !!s.

bfj wrote:Badass of the Week

I'm looking forward to reading about future badasses of the week.

This guy is awesome, for all sorts of reasons.

Luke and Leia Had Sex

Note to self...stay the fuck out of Sri Lanka.

How does an 8-inch tarantula stay undiscovered for so long?

AB_skin_test wrote:How does an 8-inch tarantula stay undiscovered for so long?

Probably deforestation. I don't think they wanna be near humans any more than we want them near us.

Shirley wrote:The 40-Year Secret Behind Basketball's 'Hershberger' Award

Neat story, and nice that the WSJ put the effort into getting quotes from the various figures that were involved (directly or not).

This is a very bizarre story. Three Canadian kids (from London, Ontario), one White-Canuck, one Korean-Canuck, one Algerian-Canuck, all converted to Islam in High School. Two of them end up dead in a massive Al-Qaeda attack (yes, they joined Al-Qaeda) on an Algerian gas plant that resulted in scores dead and the other (a kid named Aaron Yoon) ended up in a prison in Mauritania, convicted of "terrorist actions".

CBC story, includes some video.

National Post story.

Globe And Mail story.

It's a mystery why these unlikely kids from an easy-going Ontario town chose to convert to Islam and join Al-Qaeda. Presumably they just thought it was "cool".

I love articles like this:

He ruled Rwanda for just nine months before fleeing a revolt and has spent the last half century in exile, powerless to stop the violence that ripped through his country. Now 76 and living on public assistance in Virginia, Kigeli V Ndahindurwa longs to return to the throne—but only if his people want him back.

Closest I got to that was this girl who I worked with in 1993. She had pics of her Grampy in full military regalia on her desk. Stone cold fox and very dignified too.

Chinese man requires emergency surgery after the swamp eel he stuck up his butt gnaws through his colon

I'll stick to de-toothed gerbils, thank you very much.

It's amazing we haven't destroyed ourselves yet, isn't it?

The Mantis Shrimp is the harbinger of blood-soaked rainbows.

10 Things Most Americans Don’t Know About America

This guy nails it. Completely and totally. I'm so mad I didn't read this last year, but I'm thankful a friend just posted it on Facebook. Read it. It's worth the time to.

Throughout history, every dominant civilization eventually collapsed because it became TOO successful. What made it powerful and unique grows out of proportion and consumes its society. I think this is true for American society. We’re complacent, entitled and unhealthy. My generation is the first generation of Americans who will be worse off than their parents, economically, physically and emotionally. And this is not due to a lack of resources, to a lack of education or to a lack of ingenuity. It’s corruption and complacency. The corruption from the massive industries that control our government’s policies, and the fat complacency of the people to sit around and let it happen.

There are things I love about my country. I don’t hate the US and I still return to it a few times a year. But I think the greatest flaw of American culture is our blind self-absorption. In the past it only hurt other countries. But now it’s starting to hurt ourselves.

ETA

Posted that article on FB and started a shitstorm. Even had a friend delete herself because of it.

Jerloma wrote:The Mantis Shrimp is the harbinger of blood-soaked rainbows.

Who runs The Oatmeal? It's by far one of the best websites I'll ever go to. Where else are you gunna learn shit like what you posted and this: What we should have been taught in our senior year of high school.

ETA: Matthew Inman. This was a link that popped up for him in a Google search.

Johnnie wrote:10 Things Most Americans Don’t Know About America

This guy nails it. Completely and totally. I'm so mad I didn't read this last year, but I'm thankful a friend just posted it on Facebook. Read it. It's worth the time to.

Throughout history, every dominant civilization eventually collapsed because it became TOO successful. What made it powerful and unique grows out of proportion and consumes its society. I think this is true for American society. We’re complacent, entitled and unhealthy. My generation is the first generation of Americans who will be worse off than their parents, economically, physically and emotionally. And this is not due to a lack of resources, to a lack of education or to a lack of ingenuity. It’s corruption and complacency. The corruption from the massive industries that control our government’s policies, and the fat complacency of the people to sit around and let it happen.

There are things I love about my country. I don’t hate the US and I still return to it a few times a year. But I think the greatest flaw of American culture is our blind self-absorption. In the past it only hurt other countries. But now it’s starting to hurt ourselves.

ETA

Posted that article on FB and started a shitstorm. Even had a friend delete herself because of it.

I dunno. When I read "every society in history collapsed because ... " it sounds like bullshit to me, and it just becomes an excuse for someone to push their own preferences. Depending on how you define "dominant" and "civilization", every dominant civilization has not collapsed. Western European/Christian Civilization has dominated the planet for hundreds of years. England hasn't collapsed. The US hasn't collapsed. Germany got obliterated for six years, and now they are doing fine.

So it ends up being "every dominant society has collapsed ... except the ones that haven't collapsed yet." Which is like saying that every person in human history who ever lived has eventually died, except for the 7 billion people who haven't died yet.

…except the one that hasn't collapsed yet.

And the study of all those humans who have died, how they lived and died, provides important knowledge toward improving the longevity and functionality of those 7 billion humans who live today. Well, if one cares to look for that knowledge.

Or, eschew looking, and just assume some of those dominant 7 billion humans will live forever. Or twice as long as any human has ever survived in recorded history. See how that works out.

I'm gonna say that most societies (great or otherwise) in history collapsed because someone came in and conquered them. The long, drawn-out decline due to prosperity and the gays is actually fairly uncommon. Usually, it's the Mongols.

howard wrote:…except the one that hasn't collapsed yet.

And the study of all those humans who have died, how they lived and died, provides important knowledge toward improving the longevity and functionality of those 7 billion humans who live today. Well, if one cares to look for that knowledge.

Or, eschew looking, and just assume some of those dominant 7 billion humans will live forever. Or twice as long as any human has ever survived in recorded history. See how that works out.

I agree that it is always worth looking at other situations and other empires to see if there are any lessons that can be useful for us. But the world is just so much different from the time when the Ostrogoths and Visigoths were invading the outer provinces of the Roman Empire, that I don't know how much important knowledge can really be gained from Rome.

I am curious - what do you mean by your references to the one civilization that hasn't collapsed yet, or twice as long as any human has ever survived. I'm missing it.

There is only one dominant civilization, extant today, that has not collapsed.

There is a conceit that today's dominant civilization will outlast the prior record holders. That is what I was clumsily trying to convey; I did not mean to infer that conceit to you. Sorry if I did. The two ideas, that the current dominance will stick around indefinitely, and that it will stick around longer than any other, often go together.

The 'it is different this time' paradigm is another recurrent failure of human imagination. Visigoths; Al Qaada; illegal immigrants. Fuck if I am learned enough to intelligently discuss the similarities and differences. From the Pharoahs, to the Greeks, to the dictators of the 20th century. The "it is different this time" conclusion is an ancient tradition in human error. But, hey, there is always a first time.

Human nature has not changed as long as man has written about human nature. Maybe it will, but the assumption that it will is bereft of supporting evidence.

Of course, terms must be clearly defined.

If you consider everything from the birth of Jesus to today as one long period of rising and sustaining global dominance stretching 2000 years, well that is one thing.

But if you consider the Egyptians, Hebrews, Persians, Greeks, Romans, Mongols, Muslims, then finally Western European/Spanish/English/American as separate rises and falls of dominant civilizations (plus all the Eastern and South Asian empires of which I am quite ignorant and have not listed), that is a different thing.

I took your "Western European/Christian Civilization" description, with the subsequent mention of England and America to fit in the latter. And that has been running about 500 years, give or take.

ETA: Shit, didn't mean to diss the Incas, Toltecs, Olmecs and Aztecs. Sorry homies. But imagine how permanent things must've looked during Montezuma's time. Right up until the dude with the horses and guns showed up.

To avoid talking past one another, such definitions are necessary. But, however you divvy up the centuries, I think my main points hold up. Everything rises and falls; no culture or social organization lasts forever, or much longer than earlier similar groups. The idea that this one is special and different is as old as the pyramids, and as broken as the nose of The Sphinx.

plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose

howard wrote:Of course, terms must be clearly defined.

If you consider everything from the birth of Jesus to today as one long period of rising and sustaining global dominance stretching 2000 years, well that is one thing.

But if you consider the Egyptians, Hebrews, Persians, Greeks, Romans, Mongols, Muslims, then finally Western European/Spanish/English/American as separate rises and falls of dominant civilizations (plus all the Eastern and South Asian empires of which I am quite ignorant and have not listed), that is a different thing.

I took your "Western European/Christian Civilization" description, with the subsequent mention of England and America to fit in the latter. And that has been running about 500 years, give or take.

ETA: Shit, didn't mean to diss the Incas, Toltecs, Olmecs and Aztecs. Sorry homies. But imagine how permanent things must've looked during Montezuma's time. Right up until the dude with the horses and guns showed up.

To avoid talking past one another, such definitions are necessary. But, however you divvy up the centuries, I think my main points hold up. Everything rises and falls; no culture or social organization lasts forever, or much longer than earlier similar groups. The idea that this one is special and different is as old as the pyramids, and as broken as the nose of The Sphinx.

plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose

I was thinking about Western Europe as an entity, and thinking they have been on an upward trend for 1000 years. Though it wasn't until they beat the Turks at Vienna in the 1680s (?) that they became number one. Italians, Germans, French, English all fought each other during those centuries, but I see them as basically one civilization, with a helluva Intramurals program.

And re the Aztecs, I do agree that if aliens appear on our shores with an entirely new set of guns, germs, and steel, we are fucked.

I'm hoping you guys read the rest of the article too since, ya know, he makes some great points about the insular selfishness and willful ignorance of Americans. Basically, 'MURICA and not America.

The rise of interconnectedness of trade and communications also complicates long-term historical analysis, and discussions like this.

The definition of where one civilization ends and the next begins, in the 21st century. With shared technology, a common global economic system based on abundant cheap oil (relative to energy prior to 100 years ago) and the US dollar, and the decline of Christianity in the role of guiding the ruling class, is China today a different civilization than that in Germany or Mexico? Vietnam? India?

One way to look at it, dominance today is much more complete, and has truly encompassed the entire globe. Western Civ won a victory impossible in prior centuries. And all disputes are merely intramurals now. (Assuming these Taliban fools don't win the next round.)

Lets say we in the Christian west are on a steep decline. And in 50 years, China will have achieved economic, military and cultural dominance over the globe. How different will cultural life be for the average global inhabitant? Forced to change their religion? Give up rock and roll/hip hop? No more American Idol?

How different is cultural life of the current Chinese white collar urban worker to that of an American, separated from relative wealth?

Maybe culture has become global, thanks to oil and technology. Making this time really different, as changing the terms of the discussion completely.

Hey Johnnie~

I liked the article. A lot.

howard wrote:Lets say we in the Christian west are on a steep decline. And in 50 years, China will have achieved economic, military and cultural dominance over the globe. How different will cultural life be for the average global inhabitant? Forced to change their religion? Give up rock and roll/hip hop? No more American Idol?

I think about this, and maybe this is just "this time it's different," but I cannot see the Chinese really taking over Europe or the US like that, in a sense of hostile domination and control. I can see them becoming a dominant power, and taking over our King of the World role in places like the Middle East. But I think we are just too far away, with too many advanced weapons, for China to take us over.

Plus, why would they want to? Do we have resources they would want?

I can the US becoming (continuing to become) an authoritarian dystopia, which would affect our cultural life. But I think that is more likely to come from internal causes, not China.

Johnnie wrote:I'm hoping you guys read the rest of the article too since, ya know, he makes some great points about the insular selfishness and willful ignorance of Americans. Basically, 'MURICA and not America.

Why would I read the article? I'd rather comment on it.

I was suggesting Chinese dominance just as a for instance. Not suggesting how likely or unlikely.

The mere definition of what is 'dominance', cultural or otherwise, has changed with globalism, economic and otherwise.

The nature of power and wealth is (if only for the last few decades) quite different, manifested through multi-continental corporations and digital representations of currency. Backed by military power that can prevail only by near extinction of the human race.

This time is fucking different, I suppose. Gold standard >>>Dollar standard>>>Petrodollar standard>>>Plutonium standard. The winner may only be dominant for a matter of minutes.

Global trade is a huge factor in the interconnectedness of today's powers and the idea that today's powers face different threats than historical ones. But I'd say global communication is an even bigger factor. There can really never again be an instance where one major power sneaks up and attacks another. We all know what each other is doing at all times. That, combined with the global trade (and global immigration) and the much more complete understanding of history (now that we can write it down and remember it) leads me to believe that you can't easily say that what ended some ancient power (say, Rome) will also happen to us.

Hodor

Regardless of how cute a thing may be, if it can eat through a tree...probably gonna wanna avoid it.

Jerloma wrote:Regardless of how cute a thing may be, if it can eat through a tree...probably gonna wanna avoid it.

Trying for Reddit Karma just for way too real.