My Dirty Dozen

I have said it before but it bears repeating. 

I blog for cathartic reasons. It helps me vent. 

For those of you who read it and agree with some or most of what I write, "thanks". 

For those of you who write nasty comments about what I write 
"don't read the damn blog". 

No one makes you read it, it is simply me using a forum I think sucks, ( i.e., social media) to vent. 

This is not great literature. 

It is just some jerk (me) writing to get things off my chest and it is a lot cheaper than a therapist. 

So, today's rant is "My Dirty Dozen". 

No, the title has nothing to do with the movie made in 1967 starring Lee Marvin and Telly Savalas and Clint Walker and Jim Brown.

Though despite its violence and the criticism of the movie at the time I actually thought it was a damn fine movie.

No, my dirty dozen is a list of things I am just sick of and tired of hearing, reading, or even being forced to deal with. 

Number 1 is cancer. I hate it. If we are so damn smart as a species, after all the billions have been spent on research, I think it is time to kill it or defeat it or in some way not always let it win. 

Now after watching a wife face stage 4 terminal brain cancer for 41 months, no doubt I have a personal bias, but let me tell you, try and find someone, anyone, whose life has not been harmed or negatively touched by this evil disease. So, cancer tops my list of my own personal dirty dozen.

Number 2 is the "Fallacy of the Commons". For those of you not familiar with the original work I would suggest you read the original but the gist is simple. 

There is a certain amount of space on this earth and if we each use only our fair share and do not get greedy it can sustain us all, but invariably one or more of us gets greedy and tries to gain an advantage and use more than their share and the result is that the earth suffers. 

I am tired of it. I am tired of greed and the Wall Street mentality and the materialistic mentality that seems to have become the only definition of "winning". 

( I am also tired of all the pseudo intellectual types who criticize the essay without even having a clue what it was about but that is a rant for another day). 

Number 3 is the concept of "esse est percipi" or that "perception is reality". For years I used to think this was some great philosophical truth and that it was not what was real that was important but what people thought was real that made us act as we do. 

Bull shit. 

"Esse est percipi" is just a guise for cultural relativism (including immaterialism) which is a guise for rationalization of one's bad behavior. 

In short, "I do what I want to do because as I see the world that which do works for me". 

Number 4 is apathy. 

I am sick of people not caring. 

A few days ago on highway 188 in Texas I saw a family of ducks, a drake, a hen and 5 baby ducklings huddles in the middle of a damn road terrified to move because trucks and cars speeding at 85 miles an hour where too damn busy or unconcerned to slow down to let them cross. 

So I stopped and pulled my Ford 150 across both lanes and blocked traffic for 3 whole minutes until I got them over the road and into a small stream of water along the road way for which I was cusssed and given the finger at least 8 times. 

Well guess what, if you are so damn apathetic you cannot take a few minutes to empathize with a terrified family of ducks your ass needs to be taken off this planet and I don't care if that sounds harsh. I mean it.

Number 5 is "sport hunting". 

Now there is a damn oxymoron if I ever heard it. 

After existing on this planet for thousands of years and facing mortality, death, and the loss of existence, how anyone can find any pleasure in killing something, especially an animal is just beyond me.. 

I know death is part of life but "sport", give me a break. 

I have friends that still hunt for fun. Truth is they are not my friends, I tolerate them, as my associates, for inside my soul, I pray to God they experience all the pain and fear and terror of facing their own mortality soon. 

Number 6 is cruelty. 

Frankly, this should be a capital punishment offense. 

To quote some famous person, "lex talionis  or an "eye for an eye"would be appropriately applied here.

I am sick of dogs tied outside and seeing possums hit on purpose by idiots who think its funny and sociopaths who beat women and who hit kids, and so on and so forth. 

My new rule. You enjoy/inflict cruelty, you need to leave the gene pool asap.

Number 7 is bully's, which I have found are usually just cruel cowards. 

They want to be cruel all the time but can only do so against lesser creatures. I am tired of physical bullying, cyber bullying, and bullying in any form. 

I have an offer, you want to abuse, ridicule, put down, embarasss, intimidate, terrify, pick on, some one call me.

I am more than ready to give you a target personally.

Number 8 "the legal system" in the USA. It is not fair, it is not equitable, it is not justice, it is bull shit. 

Rapists walk while a pot head does ten to twenty. It is more "bull shit" and I am tired of the talk of reform. 

It is simple. 

Those who commit violent acts go to jail or get put to death, non-violent acts do social work, no muss, no fuss.

Number 9 is "the Internet". 

Yes, I realize it brings enormous knowledge to our fingertips, it makes the world smaller, it has a thousand positives, but it sucks. 

It has depersonalized us and it has made bullying and slander and libel, and defamation easier and allows lies to multiply. And it lets cowards hide behind anonymity. 

It is a tool that used only for good, might almost be worth having. 

And yes, I realize I sound like my grandfather but the truth is its harm has far outweighed its good, and that is my opinion. 

I recognize most, if not all will disagree with me, but I think it was a sad day and the beginning of devolution for humans when the Internet came "online".

Number 10 is "religion". 

Notice I am saying religion, NOT GOD. 

GOD is great, GOD is just fine, but religion, which are basically sects or fraternities or segregated cults that use anything they can misinterpret as being from GOD to justify their own beliefs and behavior is just getting ridiculous.

And I am not just sick and tired of Islamic radicals, I am just as tired of the ultra right wing Christians, the middle of the road Methodists, the silly Buddhists, I am sick of all of them. 

Jefferson wrote a Bible one time that had in in it (supposedly) only the words that Jesus actually spoke. 

Read it. It makes a hell of a lot more sense than anything else out there on religion I have read and I have read well over two hundred freaking books on the cults of various religions. 

Number 11 on my list is a much simpler issue. It involves leaving dogs and kids in cars. 

Stop it. 

Aside from the fact it kills a kid or three each year and about 100 dogs it is barbaric. 

Don't take your kid or dog and leave them alone in a damn car, hot or cold. It is scary, insensitive, cruel, stupid, inconsiderate, and irresponsible. 

So just fucking stop it. Do not leave a helpless creature alone for a second, What the fuck is wrong with people? 

Number 12, may seem anti-climatic but it is my biggest, my dirtiest of my dirty dozen and it is "ignorance". 

As a matter of fact with the exception of cancer and the Internet I think every one of my dirty dozen can be categorized as a form or subset of ignorance. 

Killing for sport is ignorant. 

Bullying is ignorant. 

Apathy is ignorant. 

So hey, maybe I saved the best (of the worst) for last. 

Ignorance is no longer acceptable. If you are ignorant then shut up and keep it to yourself and if you are so ignorant as to open your mouth and advertise your ignorance, do not be surprised when people like me start pointing your ignorance out.  

An associate of mine once said, " Stupid I can fix, but ignorance is not fixable".

So, the above is my rant for the day. Read it at your own peril.