Welp, he’s my video for today :
I’m thinking I was maybe a bit too harsh.
I mean, I believe everything I said in that video. Conservatism is the political ideology is stupidity. Its media’s real purpose is to hide the actual complex and nuanced realities of life from people so that they do not have to face the harsh truth that they are actually just plain not smart enough to understand the world, let alone have opinions about it.
All of that is true but not useful, as Felicity would say.
And it represents only part of what I want for the world. As I have discussed before, part of me is a fire-breathing truth-spitting iconoclastic ideologue looking to shake the walls of Heaven with my words, and part of me just wants everybody to come together in peace, harmony, and understanding of our mutual shared humanity.
What can I say, I’m a complicated man. I contain multitudes.
I suppose that, just for public sanity’s sake, I may have to choose which side to go with one of these days. I can’t be like Don Rickles, acerbic and insulting one moment then an overflowing pot of human warmth the next.
At least, I don’t think I can do that.
But for now, I am just stretching my capabilities and learning what I can do with this whole YouTube thing. I mean, that’s just my third video of this new era. I haven’t even started to find my real voice yet.
And who knows, maybe tomorrow I will be full of loving kindness.
Like I said. Complicated. Like I am part Martin Luther and part Jesus Christ.
I do have an intent behind the video above. I want to activate shame and outrage in my conservative targets because I want them to get mad enough that they have to prove to me that they aren’t stupid by actually thinking of counterarguments.
And that’s the long game I am playing. If we can get them truly thinking about their opinions and testing them against reality, the side of the angels wins in the long run. Even if all they are doing is looking for ammunition to fire back at me.
So am I just trolling? Well no. I’m not just trying to piss people off so I can laugh at them. I am trying to challenge them in order to make them mad enough that they are willing to do whatever it takes to defeat me – even think for themselves.
But in the interests of full disclosure, there’s part of me that just wants to have people to debate with because that’s my idea of fun.
More fun that just burning my brain cells with video games, that’s for sure.
And I want to contribute to the public discourse. That’s one of the main reasons I want to become a pundit.
The other reasons are more selfish. What can I say, I’m only human.
I want nice stuff too!
But I also think I have a very unique and distinctive point of view that could move the public discourse along by prodding people to think about what they believe and why.
In that, I would be playing the role of the trickster. That’s the trickster’s karmic role, to wake people up and get them thinking, whether that’s with delightful comedy or searing diatribes or insightful political commentary.
And I can do all of those!
And I’m willing to cautiously believe that this YouTube thing might be an actual purpose and a role for me in life.
Certainly if I attract an audience, whether they’re for me or against me, I would feel like I am doing something with my life for once.
There’s got to be some righteous purpose for all the stuff going on in my head.
Or at least a way to make a living.
More after the break.
The first step is change
When I was a “too smart for his own good” bored out of my mind in class because thw work wasn’t even in the same galaxy as being challenging for me, I would look around at my fellow students studiously beavering away at the classwork and wonder what it is that made me different from them.
I eventually came to the conclusion that part of the difference was self-image.
They didn’t think of themselves as the kind of people who get good grades, nor did they want to become that kind of person, so they struggled. Often they came from families where academic achievement was either passively or actively punished because it made the child not “fit in” with their family and/or one ot both of the parents was very sensitive about their lack of book smarts and would undermine the child out of their own jealousy or hurt feelings.
My “advantage”, therefore, was that I came from a very intellectual family where curiosity and learning were very much encouraged by my mother the teacher and there were lots of books lying around that I could read and feed my mind.
But even moreso, I was way too socially clueless for me to know I wasn’t “supposed” to be so overwhelmingly bright and by the time I figured that out, I was far, far too stubbornly prideful to pretend to be dumber than I am for any reason.
Pretty sure I wouldn’t have been able to pull that off anyhow.
The conclusion I draw from this is thus : if you are going to set out to learn something, the very first thing you have to do is make peace with the fact that you are going to become the sort of person that knows that thing.
For example, don’t take a cooking class unless you’re certain that you are ready to become someone who knows how to cook.
If the knowledge conflicts with your self-image, stay home, because no matter how hard you try to put the knowledge into your mind, your identity will spit it right back out again.
Me, I’m socially inept enough to be a total polyglot nerd. There is literally nothing I could learn that would conflict with my self-image and/or my social role.
There would be things it would surprise me to learn, like sewing, but I’m not against it.
SO before you set out to learn something, ask yourself what you assume about the sort of person who knows that kind of thing, and if you want to belong to that group.
I think it could clear away a lot of roadblocks for you.
I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.