Are you happy right now?

There was this show on Animal Planet about the moose, they were talking about how the antlers are a symbol of the moose's manhood: they use them to fight other bulls for the right to have sex with the women.

The moose symbolically rub their metaphorical cocks together.

But apparently, should a moose become castrated, he immediately sheds his current antlers and grows a new set of hideously deformed, permanently soft poop-antlers.

These are the elephant man version of antlers.

Wow.  Not only can they not defend themselves, or get laid, they also have to walk around with a gigantic, symbolically flaccid crown of shame, letting everyone know that they're the king of impotent pariahs.  And for them to hang their heads would only put their inadequacy more up front.

If these moose don't commit suicide, is it only because they can't see their own antlers?  But then again, isn't that true of humans too?  Isn't life, in many ways a game of Indian Poker?

We go through life taking the objective measure of those around us, but don't we all have a blindspot right behind our eyes?  (I originally wrote this up as what I thought was a very solid spec script for Sex In The City.)

Me in my apartment!

"Am I a seven or an eight?  I'm definately hotter than him, theres no way I'm a six, right?  I wish there was someone I could just ask but I don't trust anyone to actually tell me the truth....Maybe the reason women don't respond to me is because of my low self esteem....I just need to accept that I'm at least an eight and a half."

We can take an indirect measure by pairing up with someone, but even then the questions may arise.

"Did I marry too young?  I think I may have sold myself short.  Do the numbers change over time or are we now who we were in High School?  Shit I forgot what number she was and now I can't see it because she's been next to me for the last few years."

Obviously the moose is too stupid to even be sentient, let alone self-aware enough to commit suicide; this is the species where, if a hunter hides behind a tree, it will immediately forget the hunter exists.  But isn't that the way humans are about their own insecurities?  Every time you're actually happy, isn't it only because you've temporarily forgotten about all the things that are wrong with you?

 

"He reminds me of me a lot." - Michael Jackson discussing The Elephant Man on Oprah in 1993; he still had a lot of work to do on himself.

Thank Me Later

Some people think we're in a Golden Age of TV, music, podcasting, and reading material.  Theres a ton of great stuff out there and its all free for the taking, but gold lasts forever and this era will not.  This era is more like a gold rush and if we're not careful, soon we will be living in a ghost town!

Because of the internet, its becoming harder and harder to monetize the work being done by musicians and writers.  After awhile, potential artists will become discouraged and choose more "respectable", high-paying careers as doctors, lawyers and businessmen.  When art is free, making art becomes an act of altruism, and if society needs heroes its because they're in short supply, in as short a supply as gold after there's no more gold left in the ghost town.

In the past and the present, heroes like soldiers, firemen, and everyday joes have gone above and beyond for the greater good. Society just can't pay these heroes enough for all the sacrifices they make.  Because of the nature of the heroism, there's no way to have an agreed-upon payment beforehand, so in the moment of crisis, the hero commits the good deed because he has faith in the goodness of humanity.


In return, society gives them their reward in the form of adoration, with the folk dropping to their knees in gratitude.  That's why we pin medals on the heroes' chests, so the women will know who's cock to suck.  A true hero has so much trust in humanity that he'll refuse taking any money, this is a classy way of saying "Don't worry about it, maybe someday you can pay me back in blowjobs."

Society needs to stop glorifying doctors, lawyers, and businessmen.  These men are not altruists; they're already being compensated enough financially.  Instead we must change the cultural climate.  We must encourage our women to redouble their efforts by giving more and better blowjobs to musicians, writers, and podcasters.

I say this as a public service, I'm not trying to make any money off this shit.

End of an Era...Merica

The lede:  Conservatives more responsive to advertising?  Dig deeper for more on this and other questionable assertions...

Air America went off the air last week and no one cared, but people love to give reasons as to why the liberal station failed while conservative radio has flourished.  

Bill O'Reilly:  Its a sign of the "collapse of far-left media".

Air America:  Its because of tough economic times,  a "perfect storm in the media industry".

Thom Hartmann, a radio host who'd left Air America in 2009:  Air America was "spectacularly incompetent" at running a network and gaining an audience.

Michael Harrrison, editor of Talkers Magazine:  The station didn't know "whether they were a political campaign or a broadcasting company.  They ended up not being terribly good at either."

The bad management explanation seems pretty widely accepted by people affiliated with the station, supposedly there were four or five different management teams over a six year period, and for the most part, each had very little experience in radio.  And some former Air America hosts have found homes on other stations.  But that still leaves the question as to why liberal radio fails to approach the success of the conservative radio "goldmine", which includes people like Rush Limbaugh, Glen Beck, O'Reilly, and Sean Hannity. 

NPR's David Folkenflik points out that the real counterweight to those conservative voices isn't in radio, its in websites like The Huffington Post and The Daily Kos.  Oh yeah, that's right:  liberals actually read, whereas conservatives like being read to.  And as many others have pointed out:  liberals actually think, whereas conservatives like being told what to think.

They love going to church, where a guy reads from a book and tells you how to live your life.  They love the military, where a guy barks orders at you and if you disobey you can get shot or put in the brig.  Radio is such a great fit for these people.  They don't have the time or intellectual capacity to sift through the internet, gathering information and evaluating it on its merits.  They don't want to think for themselves, they want to be given their marching orders over the loudspeaker.

So doesn't it seem likely that conservatives are more responsive to advertising?  During elections, they always seem to fall for the lies told in political ads. Remember these classic hits?

• Al Gore claims he invented the internet.
• John Kerry lied to win medals in Vietnam.
• Barack Obama pals around with terrorists.
• Harold Ford wants to have sex with our white women.

All of these slanderous ads had profound impacts on each campaign, but how often do you hear about a liberal ad changing a race?  Almost never, because people who swing that way aren't as easily swayed by commercials.

Perhaps even more than during his campaign, after he was elected, George Bush was able to control public perception using what amounts to the same exact technique as the ads for Head-On.

 

If you repeat the same thing over and over again, conservatives will believe it.  This is why they're such a great target demo for advertisers, and you can bet these advertisers are willing to pay extra for air time in front of these easy marks.  Meanwhile, liberals have such a skeptical view of advertising.  Ad-men just don't get much bang for their buck trying to fool those fact-obsessed rational assholes.  

Did you ever listen to Air America and hear one of the hosts do one of those in-program ad reads, where the host'll talk about some product as though its still part of the show, when in fact its a paid advertisement?  It always sounded so incongruous, like, who does Ed Schultz think he's fooling?  But when a conservative host does it, you can almost picture the dumb yokels nodding along, thinking "wow, this sounds like one heck of a product, thanks Rush!"

And by the way, have you listened to top 40 radio in the past ten years?  Its music for stupid people who crave conformity and repetition.  If commercial success in radio is contingent on catering to that type of person, the failure of Air America is a sign of our success as human beings. Head On!

That Full Feeling

Apparently there's been this cooking show called Nigella Feasts, and it stars what is probably the hottest fat woman on TV other than Joan Holloway.  I stumbled across it one morning before work and almost ended up undoing the shower I'd just taken.  Instead I DVR'ed it.  The episode was called "Solitary Sensations".

Joan Holloway

vs

Nigella Lawson

This show's been denounced as food porn by many health advocates; they say this in part because the food is shot like a nice set of fat tits.  Nigella happens to have some of those, and they're showcased quite prominently as she sensually moans while savoring the food.  Its no joke, this is a cooking show that you might very well (have already) jerk(ed) off to.

But ultimately the porn is for the ladies.  As with a lot of girl fantasies, there has to be some back story, some emotional rationale for the indulgence.  With this show, the indulgence is indeed the food, and the back story is "see, curvaceous women can be sexy too...why not stuff my fat fucking face?"

Bloggin'!

I'm trying to find the key element to making the reader say "totally, dude!" instead of "obviously, douche."

Fucking Bums

Two of my favorite podcasts are "Jordan, Jesse, Go!" and "Comedy and Everything Else".  Most of the other ones I listen to have lengthy ads for audible.com or a subscription fee; these podcasts don't, instead they occasionally ask for donations to defray their costs.  

"In the past year, we've probably made 100-125 hours of programming.  Of course, we give it all away for free, so we pretty much rely completely on people's voluntary donations to support us". - Jesse Thorn of "Jordan, Jesse, Go!" 

This works out nicely for me; they're giving me the option of doing nothing.  But for some reason, when they ask for donations, they seem like beggars and cheapskates, even though I'm the one who's freeloading.

Glaceau-Brand Glaceau Smart Water: Put It In Your Mouth

Why is this water shaped like a phallus?

Oh yeah, because bottled water is for women and homosexuals.