Aren't we all...
I've realized that I'm much younger than I thought. Not
because of committing another stupid blunder, but because
I've failed to fully grok something that I "knew" in an
intellectual sense. And this is it: people will believe
that any sort of metaphysical-sounding bullshit is
intelligent.
Maybe a week or so ago, someone (I've
forgotten the name, my apologies) posted a link to Peter
Suber's Nomic
page (as a snippy but well-deserved jab at the Debian voting
process), which I read with
great interest (unlike most of what happens on
-vote, but back to the point). I wrote a paper for
my economics course based on comparing a memetic
view of economic modeling and Nomic. And it was complete
bullocks. I made vague generalizations, swept theory under
the rug, and filled up pages with "look at me, I'm smart"
circumlocutions. The whole thing vaguely made me want to
vomit, but I am cursed with a inability to fill blank space
on a deadline and I tend to take what I can get. So I go to
class
today, and not only was the paper handed back to me with a
perfect grade, but the majority of the lecture was based on
stuff I said. It's depressing.
Somewhere in the middle of all this, a friend of mine wrote
some very interesting literary stuff in her online diary
(elsewhere). I hadn't had a real discussion with her in a
while, and she's one of the few people left these days who
seems to actually care about this stuff, so I just went off
on how I saw A Clockwork Orange and associated things
through Barth and Snow Crash and my own (lack of) religion
and whatnot. I tried to be honest, because I rarely have the
chance to, even (especially) to myself, but it still felt
far too dense and wrapped up in metaphysical indirection (or
perhaps $20 vocabulary). And in responding she flattered me
just enough to really get my goat. She says I treat here
like she's more intelligent than she is, but I feel like
it's closer to treating her like she's dumb enough not to
see through me.
The third
thing that got me thinking about this topic was an article
forwarded to alt.music.jungle by Lee Stoiser. I know,
unfortunately, that there are very few if any people here
who feel the same kind of connection to this culture that I
do, so I can't imagine anyone will experience the same sort
of disgust watching someone ripping into it for the sake of
their own
mental masturbation. But I read it and I said to myself,
"This is what you are doing, however much it's exaggerated.
And you should be ashamed." I know that it's the content
pissing me off as much as the form, but still.
Maybe I'm developing an ____-complex? (oh, fill in the
blank yourself, you know who I mean.)
Been listening to: Outkast, Pet Shop Boys, Seba. Some things
are still good...
Elsewhere
It was a day for clipping and saving.
argent wrote:
The problem is: the Internet is overflowing like
a septic tank full of rotting condoms, and every day more
and more people standing there with their finger in the dike
are realising that the thing on the other side isn't the
sea.
The horrid thing is, it's true. Not necessarily of any
specific place, even -- of everywhere. But I still feel
guilty. At any rate, his presence will be missed.
Then I read the school's newspaper today and found out
that someone I "knew", but didn't actually know, died. And I
remembered when I was still in high school and he showed me
around the place, and how impressed I was with the spirit
and individuality that he was able to maintain. I said to
myself, "there must be something good about this place if he
can thrive like that, if it hasn't burned him out the way my
milquetoast suburban town has done to me." I decided to come
here, but
I never found an excuse to talk to him, never went out
to the place he lived off campus, or anything. I didn't see
him around very often, but every time I felt that I should
have thanked him. And I feel
guilty.
It's funny how what you do, and what you don't do, are often
flip sides of the same cowardice.
"Once you hear music, it's gone, in the air. You can
never listen to it again."
