Social Crapworking

If you're on the internet, and you are if you're reading this. Chances are you also have a tab opened to Facebook or Twitter (or MySpace if you haven't figured out how uncool that site is yet) and if you're a guy statistics say a porn site tab is also in there. The fact of the matter is that the American society from age 11-20 can basically be summed up in two words, social networks.
Now, social networks can be pretty awesome. They can be used to keep in touch with friends who other wise it would be close to impossible to stay in contact with. Find out news of what is going on in the rest of the world or get that douche bag at work fired for posting drunken pictures of him up on your wall. Ok, that's not exactly a good thing but it goes along with what people are really using these sites for.
Instead of using them for the aforementioned reasons most people use social networks for stupid reasons, except the drunken photos one, that one is suppose to be down here; just in case you have no sense of irony. I was on Twitter recently and noticed that one of the most talked about subjects was a thing that happened with musical "artist" (I put this in quotes because it honestly hurts me to say anyone who was on American Idol is an artist) David Archuleta. Now, I don't know what this is about exactly but it appears to have stemmed from a Twitter post from the big D-man himself about gays or something.
My question is, who cares? Honestly? Really people, with all the things that are going on in the world this is what we've come to murder our valuable time with? Whether this Archuleta guy is gay or not shouldn't matter to anyone, Adam Lambert already had that market cornered. More on him in a later post. Here's the problem with social networks, they become a wasteland of rumors and time wasting bull crap. People use them to get into fights and to spread gossip that everyone else swallows like a baby being fed sugar laced milk or something without spending the slightest second to stop and think about how pointless all of it is.
Now, I'll admit, everyone is allowed to talk about something stupid every once in awhile. It's a given right that everyone has their blond moments every now and then. But I think we can all admit that there are some people in this world who are like this all the time, they hardly, if ever say an intelligent thing. Ok, that's fine, there's just a couple out there right? No, they're everywhere. And thanks to social networking sites they're allowed to meet up and then something horrible happens...they multiply!
I'm not sure how it happens but social networks literally make people stupid (this is my own theory, but you just wait, science will be backing me up soon). Facebook and Twitter make people think that they're connected with the world, they believe that just because they follow people they don't personally know or are "friends" with people they've never met that they know what's going on in the outside world. This is not true. Facebook CAN NOT be one's only portal to the news at large, otherwise all that person is going to get is worthless gossip and Farmville invites.
The point is that people need to take social networking sites less seriously. Stop sitting at your computer playing with your digital heroin i.e. Facebook and check out some stuff going on in the outside world. And when you are on Facebook or Twitter try looking up some news sites. It won't kill you to actually put valid information into your head. I could also say something about how these things have obviously gotten taken to seriously when CNN looks up these pointless sites for information, I mean Jesus. And businesses, back off, you owners are just as bad as the people you hire so get over yourselves. Like I say, stop taking the networking sites so seriously
Oh, and parents, stop stalking your kids with this stuff. It just gives them one more reason not to come home from school on the weekends. And yes, that goes for the parents who aren't "friends" with their kids but use their real-life friends to spy on their kids for them.

Come on! Honestly?

"We're not the party of 'no' we're the party of 'hell no'."
Sarah Palin's quote surprised me. Considering that the Republican party said "hell yes" to ignoring information about 9/11, sending us to Iraq for no apparent reason, and putting the country into a coma inducing recession.
Have you seen the price of milk lately?
Ever since Obama became president the "Grand Ol' Party", which is actually newer than the Democratic party; not even coming into existence until just before the civil war, has been screaming up and down that the Communists have taken over.
Wrong.
False.
Not true.
1.) Thanks to this annoying little thing called the Constitution my Communist dreamland can't come true. 2.) Obama doesn't have one of those bitchin' Stalinstaches.
Republicans and redneck/crazy people have even compared the Obama administration to Nazi Germany. Now, even if you don't agree with Obama's policies surely some of you can agree with me that this is just a tad extreme.
So what's the deal? We're Americans. We're sorta smart, I mean we invented the McGriddle for crying out loud! Why is everyone suddenly terrified about the country being turned into the U.S.S.R.? Part of the problem has to do with those talking heads that the public likes to refer to as Fox News.
It's almost funny to watch Fox News, they constantly talk about what religion the country was founded on, their anchors cry on air, the women anchors constantly agree with the male anchors on everything (after looking up the definition to third grade words), and they constantly run around screaming how the country has gone to hell in a hand basket. It's almost funny. The reason it's not is because people, believe it or not, take the news seriously.
Not everyone looks at the news for what it's become, infotainment; which is another blog post completely, but as actual factual news. They trust what they hear. The problem with this is that Fox is nothing more than talking heads spewing out Republican talking points. For God's sake they have Sarah Palin as a guest commentator. Sarah F*cking Palin! That's literally the same as Joe Biden co-hosting Countdown: With Keith Olberman. And yes, it's ok to like to listen to what you're favorite party has to say more than the other guys. But you can't just make stuff up like Fox News does. They have been trying to scare the public with false threats of Communism and Socialism. As journalists they should literally be ashamed of themselves, if anyone knows how dangerous a scared public can be it should be the journalistic community. But, I digress.
Back to Sarah Palin.
Everything this women says reminds me of a thousand wolf killing fingernails scrapping down a chalk board. My roommate can confirm that when I hear her talk I compulsively fly into fits of profanity and banging my fist. Never before has a talking points machine been so popular. For this, a talking point machine, is what Sarah Palin is. She has no original ideas, if she does she's never stated them to the public, ever. She just has talking points that is it, that is freaking it! I literally can not state enough how unoriginal this woman is. Not only that, she has helped (in my mind) set back years of progress made by women in the realm of equality. Those thousand cracks that Hilary Clinton put into the glass ceiling Palin has done her best to fix them. She was picked from obscurity because of the fact that she was a woman (tell me any other reason McCain would have for her, or how he even heard about her) and she got immensely popular among male voters for her looks which she has made references to again and again.
Plus, she quit her job as....bloody governor of Alaska, she quite! You can do that? Personally, I think she should try to fix that problem of having the so called "meth capital of America" in her state before she tries again for the big leagues.
My whole point is this, come on people! If you don't agree with Obama fine, but use an actual argument composed of reason and facts, not this whole "he's a communist" bull crap. And don't just listen to Fox News, everyone knows that they wouldn't support a Democratic idea even if it agreed with their rhetoric (like Obama's new drilling policy for instance), get some other, more reliable sources.
As for the health care bill? Hell yeah! In your face insurance companies! Boom!
Oh, and yeah, France, Britain, and Canada (all countries with universal health care) have always and still are totally fascists and communists.

Lost...And Not on a Magical/Crazy Island

As I said before in my last post my social life is not exactly the most exciting thing. In fact I'm pretty sure the only way it can get any more boring is if I crawled into a refrigerator and was shot into space by an atomic bomb like Indiana Jones. Ok, that would be pretty awesome, plus I would forever be labeled as a badass. However, being in outer space would really put a damper on my meeting new people.
I really don't enjoy this realization that I don't really get out much. I'm 18 and college movies are telling me I should be having an amazing time. I shouldn't be isolated at the newspaper like the unfocused workaholic that I am. So, when I received an invitation to a birthday party on Facebook by a cute girl I hardly know I immediately responded by saying "I will totally be there." Now, this girl was nice enough to put the address but failed to put in any directions to the place. Call me crazy but usually an address is easier to find with directions; I guess I could just be the most non-directionally orientated person on the planet but still. No directions, no maps, just an address.
Speaking of maps, Ball State sucks at making these. Not only do they spell streets differently on different maps, they fail to tell you that major roads (like the one I was trying to find) suddenly become renamed at important intersections for no reason. It was the renaming part that was my downfall. While looking for a road called Neely I walked from one side of the campus to the other knowing that somewhere along the way I was missing something. Finally I texted my friend and found out that Neely actually turns into a road called Petty. This road is literally 100 yards from my dorm room and I'd been trying to find it for close to an hour.
Now I'll admit, part of this is my fault. I'm terrible with directions. However, you would think that the university would foresee the problem of confused freshmen with no car wandering around campus might not knowing that Neely had an identity crisis and switches half way through to Petty. This is an easy fix, either make the entire road say Neely or Petty. Or, put up a sign that says "Hey, confused freshman jackass looking for party. Neely is this way <-."
At any rate, while walking down the wrong street I ran into two girls who were going to a birthday party. How many 21 year old birthday parties could be happening on one night?
Apparently two. And they just happen to be on the opposite side of campus from each other.
After I realized my mistake I became bound and determined to make it to my party destination. So off I went.
I finally got on the right street.
The thing is, after all of my turns and twist around campus I had forgotten the house number.
So, what's it like to randomly walk up to parties you see happening on peoples porches? Not to bad as long as you find a nice corner to stand in until you find it to awkward to take anymore.
Well I finally found the right place. An hour-and-a-half late.
When I walked onto the porch of god-knows-who the girl who invited me promptly told me "Hi" before leaving with a group of 20 or so people to go to a Frat house party.
So to summarize: I wondered around campus for about two-and-a-half hours to show up and then promptly be ditched by the person I was invited by, leaving me (a non-drinker) with a group of drunk upperclassmen that I didn't know. To understand how awkward this feels try watching a porno with your parents.
So, I left, found my friends house in the neighborhood and hung out there for a couple hours and walked back to my dorm.
The moral of the story? Always wear comfortable walking shoes.

Not My Scene

There's a freedom with dancing. A chance to express yourself and to let all you worries glide away on flow of the music...that's what I've been told anyway.
Personally, I hate dancing. Unless I have someone to actually dance with I mostly just stand there and bounce on the balls of my feet like the awkward white kid that I am, and when I actually try to dance it's like watching a crack addict have a seizure. So, to say the least dancing really doesn't hold much appeal to me. Needless to say, the same can not be said for those who are gifted with the ability to look like a complete jackass and yet still have the coolness factor to write it off as actual dancing.
Most of the people with that ability are women, and why not? They usually are the ones who blow off steam by going out for a night of "just dancing." This goes back to the first sentence in this little post. From what I've been told is that there's a freedom in it.
I went to a bar last night called the Mad Hatter where every Thursday night they have an 18+ night. Since my social life can be compared to that of a turtle, rarely venturing outside of my shell usually to run back in, terrified (or just pissed off) by the events of doing so; I decided to go and see if I could have a nice night and maybe meet a couple of people.
So I payed my five dollar cover charge, got my little armband that says I was under 21 and sheepishly made my way to the edge of the dance floor. Now I realize I keep getting off topic so I'll finally get to the point of the dancing. When used by college students or teenagers in general, dancing is code for "grinding," which is code for "dry humping in public."
It doesn't really matter what you say there's no getting around it, telling someone that you're going to the club is basically saying "I'm going to go to a dance place to try and find someone to dry hump for a couple of hours and get real sweaty with, I'll let you know about lunch tomorrow."
Now, as I've already stated I do not enjoy dancing, unless I have someone to do it with, which at a dance club there are plenty of people to do it with. The problem for me is the style. It seems like the key is just getting in there and doing it, like ridding a bull, just jump on and hold on for as long as you can. This however goes against my upbringing. Any of the girls who don't walk around in a little pack of "just dancing" short skirts (who somehow can't understand why guys won't leave them alone) just seem to dance with whoever is brave enough to just grab on and go.
Now don't get me wrong, I'm not looking down on this, by all means if I could do this I would (sorry I'm a guy) but I can't and maybe I'm just jealous but I don't really understand it.
First of all, I just know that if I was to try this I would be rejected due to the girl feeling she would be overshadowed by my amazing dancing skills. But mostly, I just can't get over the feeling that just grabbing onto someone's ass like a horny tick is molestation somehow. So I feel a compulsive need to ask "Do you want to dance?"
This is a mistake, never do this, asking someone to dance in a dance club is like driving up to a Chucky Cheese in a plain white van and asking "Do you want any candy?" So just don't do that.
So, needless to say, I didn't dance with anyone. I left five dollars lighter, sweaty, tired, and with a ringing in my ears that hasn't quite gone away yet. I went to the Mad Hatter to see if this kind of thing was something I would enjoy doing; I left realizing that it's not really my scene.

A little ramble

Are you ready? Ok, breath all your air out....now hold it. You're dying, tick tock tick tock. Every second that goes by is one more second where you're brain is not getting that precious thing known as oxygen. Five more minutes and you're Terry Shivo. Two more after that and you're a door stop. Life is strange in the fact that the line between life and death is so thin, some people even find it hard to see.
I had a friend recently who was murdered. Life is strange. For all of the complexities that go into it, all the things that have to fit together just right for life to work and then, a man pulls a trigger. A trigger is a button if you think about it, so in essence you push a button and boom. There goes a life. Do me a favor, hit your space bar.
Click
You just killed someone. Boom.
Now what makes me bring this up? Well I don't know to tell the truth, I've had a strange couple of weeks and maybe it's the fact I've been stressing all that time and now I've realized that maybe I should chill out a bit and relax, life isn't all about that thing I've been stressing about. Life isn't to short. It's just not as defined as we think it is, not so clear cut if you get my meaning.
So what's my whole point of even writing this? To tell the truth I'm not even sure. It's a mix of hope and dark thoughts and who knows what else. When I began writing this I was slightly depressed but now I'm in a decent mood. Oh yeah I remember, slavery, that's what it was.
We're all slaves, slaves to technology, slaves to tiny trivial things in life. Sex, music, phones, facebook, all these trivial things. What do you consider to be living? As we've already discussed it's a very fine line.
Boom.
So I give this challenge to you, stop being a slave, we all are. Slave and hypocrites. Is that really life?
It's a fine line isn't it Terry Shivo?
Two minutes, 120 seconds, two ticks of the big hand on the clock. Alive....dead.
A push of the button, a space bar. Alive...dead.
Ok, you can breathe again.

Ethical question

For some of you out there it may be surprising for you to hear me say that I have dreams of becoming a war photographer. I've never been in a fight, I'm jumpy, and I have never had a strong desire to serve in the military. Anyway, that's the dream. I'm not sure why. But, that is not the main point of this post. This post is about a recent photo of mine that ran in the Daily News several days ago. I'm choosing not to post the photo for a couple of reasons. 1. It's old news and available for anyone to see on the Daily News' website. 2. The photo itself is not the main point of this post. Instead I wanted to talk about why I felt the urge to take the photo.
The photo is one of a man who had died of a heart attack and is being put into the ambulance on a gurney with a sheet covering him. Now there are several reasons I felt compelled to take the photo, mostly because I thought that it told the story, which is what photos are suppose to do. But there was another reason, this is why I mentioned the want to become a war photographer. I'd never seen a corpse before. I've seen bodies at funerals, we all have. But this, this was different. There was not the safety buffer of having the nice clothes and make-up to add color to the body. It's hard to explain but it's just a different situation. At any rate I saw this as my chance to start getting used to death, to get used to pointing my camera at the lifeless. I saw this as an opportunity to get a taste of what will be coming my way in the future. This was my Guinea pig; if I could summon up the courage to photograph this I'd have my foot in the door to photographing death in other forms. We all have our own fascination with death and destruction. Mine is that I want to have the chance to say "I've seen things you can't imagine." I don't know why but I do. Perhaps in that there is a sense of brotherhood for anyone who has seen the edge of human existence and been pulled away from it. Or maybe I'm just a damaged or "bad" person. Who knows, but that's how I looked at this. My first baby step towards my future.

Ok so it's been over a month since I've posted something but I'm back and ready for action mostly because I'm bored. The latest news comes from the podcast front where soon Bobblecast will take on that all to easy to target Bill O'Reilly. According to him saying Happy Holidays instead of Merry Christmas starts a snowball effect of socialism and destruction of civilization. Now, I realize this is coming after Christmas but since Sam and I have been away from school for around 4 weeks now we haven't had a chance to comment on this funky idea. Anyway if anyone has any other fun news stories for us please let me know.