Something has really been eating at me for a while now.

About this time last year a big fight broke out here in my journal over, well, a number of things. One thing in particular was that I got chewed out for being critical of labor unions. Ultimately, what I said was that I believed that unions were flawed and required reform. For this, I was essentially accused of being a cold-hearted, right-wing extremist. Eventually I was even told by my ex-girlfriend (we were still together at the time) that people on my friends list had contacted her and told her that my "anti-union rhetoric" was the modern day equivalent of using the word "nigger" in open conversation. They warned her that what I was saying was proof that I was becoming "psychologically unstable" and "dangerous". My ex left me shortly thereafter for being "psychologically unstable" and "dangerous" and one of the examples she cited as proof was what I had to say about unions; that I was "anti-union".

I am sick and tired of carrying around this memory of false accusations. As someone who has been the victim of a lot of prejudice in their life, I have been and am furious at being accused of bigotry for what I said.

First of all, I'm not anti-union and I said as much when the original argument happened. Second of all, and most importantly, the complaints I had about unions all had one common and integral theme:

PRESERVING THE RIGHTS OF THE WORKERS.

FACT: Unions often drive up wages higher than necessary and drive the number of jobs down which, in turn, keeps many workers from making a living with perfectly good skills and talents because businesses are prevented from hiring them even though they would like to. Many people, including economist and Nobel Prize winner, Milton Friedman, have provided a wealth of evidence to prove this.

FACT: Entertainment unions have taken artistic freedom out of the hands of artists who are forbidden from participating in the entertainment industry unless they pay union dues; you have to pay for the right to create your art. I experienced this first hand while making student films in college where I had my name stripped from the credits because I refused to pay union dues while producing films that I would never see financial profit from.

FACT: Strikes, while initiated with the best intentions, are often survivable only by workers already successful and well-established enough to last out the strike while the far less-established newcomers to the workforce -- people that cannot afford to be unemployed -- are effectively hung out to dry. Furthermore, striking prevents fledgling workers from building a foundation in their chosen career field when they are barred from doing their jobs during the critical stages of early development in the workforce. Evidence of this can be seen in the many young screen and television writers who were forced to abandon their careers when they couldn't afford to wait out the 2007-2008 Writers Strike.

With that said, I think unions are a good thing and I'm glad we have them. I think the workers' right to strike when being treated unfairly is a good thing and I'm glad they have that right. However, it doesn't mean the system doesn't have flaws (only a few of which I have detailed above) and it doesn't mean that that those flaws should be swept under the carpet as "acceptable loses" as they have for so many decades now.

Much anti-union rhetoric comes from fat cats who only want all the fat cats to get fatter at the expense of the hard working men and women that do the hands-on work that drives industry forward. People like greedy corporate exectuives and their cronies. I don't support that at all. In fact, I detest those people and their selfish attitudes. Therefore, you can see why I am so deeply offended by having been lumped together with those detestable people. Especially considering that what I do stand for and am standing for here is giving every worker a fair chance to make a living doing what they're good at doing.

With my criticism of unions I am standing up FOR the workers, not against them. And for this noble stance I'm accussed of supporting greed and being a bigot?!

FUCK YOU. Fuck all of you who made these ugly accusations against me. Fuck all of you who interferred with the relationship between my ex-girlfriend and myself by presenting these accusations to her, whispering your bullshit in her ear during such a vulnerable time in our relationship. And fuck all of you of accusers for wearing your so-called liberalism and enlightment on your sleeve -- you are ignorant and closed-minded and you need to shut the fuck up.

None of you are on my friends list anymore so it's doubtful you will read this, but I've said my piece and now I think I can let this go.

This is awesome:

http://3.141592653589793238462643383279502884197169399375105820974944592.com/

"beatles" searched on Google returns: 54,100,000 hits.
"jesus christ" searched on Google returns: 45,000,000 hits.

Over 40 years later, it's finally official -- The Beatles: more popular than Jesus.

Other things more popular than Jesus:

"jews" searched on Google returns: 50,900,000 hits.
    (oh, the lulz.)
"united states" searched on Google returns: 87,600,000 hits.
    (hmm, really.)
"sex" searched on Google returns: 88,400,000 hits.
    (enh, well, after all, who doesn't like sex?)
"cake" searched on Google returns: 90,100,000 hits.
    (enh, well, after all, who doesn't like cake?)
"shit" searched on Google returns: 102,000,000 hits.
    (enh, well, after all, who doesn't like.. wait; what?)
"drugs" searched on Google returns: 138,000,000 hits.
    (drugs; what you turn to when Jesus isn't listening. which is more often than not, apparently.)
"hollywood" searched on Google returns: 155,000,000 hits.
    (This is where I would make a joke about The Passion of the Christ if I had one.)
"anime" searched on Google returns: 187,000,000 hits.
    (...wtf? really?)
"manga" searched on Google returns: 268,000,000 hits.
    (......okay, this is getting a little weird.)
"japan" searched on Google returns: 651,000,000 hits.
    (fuck Pearl Harbor; we're in some SERIOUS SHI--)

...

"god" searched on Google returns: 461,000,000 hits.

Japan: more popular than *G O D*.

Starting learning kanji, motherfuckers.

TGIF. Peace out.

People that think all cops are good are like the people who followed Hitler into the Holocaust. If you are one of these people, please kill yourself.

The past few weeks have had their ups and downs, but have resulted in the following new material.

"Dreamcatcher" "The plight of the redman." This is meant to symbolize what America did to destroy the native peoples that were here before it. What's cool is this was failed project on my hard drive for years and suddenly it came to life this month.

"Mechanisms of War" I managed to pull this off in just over 24 hours. It's also one of the darkest things I've done.

"Last Dance with Lady Liberty" One version of the end of days. Humanities last moments on a another post-Earth planet out there somewhere in the galaxy.

"Boddhisativa" For all the stoners in the room.

This has been stuck in my head all day:

"freedom today / righteousness saved / from the whores behind Babylon"

Did I come up with that or did my brain lift it out of some song? The lyrics to a lot of stuff I listen to isn't on the web so I can't be sure. Maybe it rings a bell for one of you.

Here's a classic Bill Hicks' routine on malls, pop music and Jimi Hendrix. It's amazing how everything he said in the late 80s/early 90s still rang true 10 years later, still rings true today and will probably still ring true in another decade.

If this is true, it might explain why I've developed increasing symptoms of ADHD over the years.

I added these links to my profile for all the social networking presences I have online and figured I'd put it in an entry too. If you're on any of these sites/services and want to add me, click away!

For frail_as_smoke, suggestions for new music to try out, much of which is off the beaten path. These are in no particular order.

( music, music, music... )

I missed some genres like punk, reggae and country, but I started getting carpal tunnel from all the typing. :)

The vast majority of these are on Last.fm with full albums and full tracks if you want to sample them. And if you really want something in MP3 form just let me know as I have all these in my collection and can easily upload them to the web.

I got this from angisdrunk. The way this works is that I make a post of seven interests on my LJ interests list and explain why they're on the list and what they're all about. Then you can leave me a comment to pick seven of your interests and you make a similar post. Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

Here we go...

ween: Probably my favorite band ever. I've always loved the introduction that AllMusic Guide gives them: "Ween was the ultimate cosmic goof of the alternative rock era, a prodigiously talented and deliriously odd duo whose work traveled far beyond the constraints of parody and novelty into the heart of surrealist ecstasy." They've played almost every type of rock music imaginable, switching gears up to a dozen times per album and playing the music as good as anyone in these genres -- often better. And they're so irreverent and zany and out there. Their live shows are epic too.

surrealism: I just have a thing for the surreal. Sometimes reality is just too mundane for me and I need an escape to the realm of the surreal. This includes surreal art -- enjoying the works of others and creating my own. But my interest also has to do with the nature of dreams. I believe they are a surrealistic code of sorts that allow us to understand the real world better by letting the constraints of reality warp and slide thus exposing things we wouldn't and couldn't normally see, but should.

pornography: Like most pubescent boys I had the habit of stealing my dad's porn. In my case, this was a lot of material from the Golden Age during the late 70s and early 80s. I.e. the period during which Boogie Nights takes place, a favorite movie of mine by the way. I've been fascinated with porn ever since, especially feature-length stuff with real stories. This interest probably should be "history of porn" since it's the older stuff that interests me. Now porn is just another part of the run-of-the-mill film industry and it's mainly nothing but eye candy at this point.

lucid dreaming: I've always been fascinated by the dream world; it's like another plane of existence that compliments the real world. I believe our dreams are important and are trying to tell us things. But a lucid dream -- being able to control the dream world -- is the most amazing thing because it's like being handed the reigns of the universe. Sadly, I haven't had a lucid dream in a long time (and rarely remember my dreams anyway) and this interest is likely to get nixed next time I need to make room for other new interests.

eddie izzard: One of my favorite comedians. I love that he doesn't tell jokes or even have a routine exactly; he has ideas he wants to talk about with the audience and he flows from one item to another making hilarious insights with the greatest of ease. He's largely improvisational too and each show on a single tour is noticeably different than the others. He's also very meta and, for example, will do things like sometimes stop after a bit of improv fizzles and mime writing on a piece of paper and say "..never do that joke again." I also respect him for being an open and proud transvestite and for having the guts to typically perform in drag during shows.

chaos: Some may mistake this for a juvenile flirtation with anarchy, but that's not what I'm about. I believe the universe is chaos and it's our role as conscious beings to rage against it and bring order whenever possible. In that sense, chaos is the yin to our yang. Without it our lives would be mundane and meaningless. Also this interest has to do with celestial photography because looking out into deep space is a window into pure chaos. And it's infinitely beautiful and humbling at the same time and that really impresses me.

asg: This is a band I discovered in the past year or two that is based out of North Carolina. Like Ween they are genre defying, but in it different way. There is consistency from song to song, but their brand of rock is quite unique and can't be pigeon-holed into one genre or another. They're like a blend of stoner rock, alternative metal, psychedelia and even a bit of punk rock. They're also very melodic metal which is something I really go for in terms of music. I'm really surprised they haven't caught on in the mainstream as their music is accessible and each album has been significantly better than the last. They're due for a new one so it'll be cool to see if they finally break through this time around.

Since I've had little luck creating new pieces this week, it finally occurred to me today that I should go back and improve upon old stuff. In one day I redid three pieces into fresh new works! I'm really pleased with the results and I feel like I'm coming out of that creative funk I was in. Anyway, here we go:

Growing Young, mk II	Growing Young (original)
Megaprime Generator, mk II	Megaprime Generator (original)
Road to Cubensia, mk III	Road to Cubensia (original)

I tweeted this yesterday: "If only Twhirl would do the things that @troynt's Twitter Script for Greasemonkey does. That would be the best of both worlds." Oh yes, I've been sucked into Twitter like lint into a vacuum cleaner. And I used to totally trash it as just being more "Web 2.0" timewasting. I'm such a hypocrite, lol.

Also, btw, I definitely *do* recommend Twhirl and/or @troynt's Twitter Script for Greasemonkey -- they're awesome, check them out. In fact, if you haven't ever used Greasemonkey, check it out too. There's so many ways to make your favorite web pages do things and look the way you want but that the site developers either haven't done or won't do. A great one is the LJ Ads Butler which gets rid of the advertisements for those of you using Plus accounts.

On that note, anyone have any suggestions for interesting people/groups/things to follow on Twitter?

I found some really sweet digital art and digital-influenced art over at this zine/community site called ImagineFX. I would love to create on the same level these people do...

"Sunset" by jfliesenborgh	"Lithium" by fpicini	"Test-room" by ivo
"H2O" by RawSunlight	"Reactor" by xoco	"Mecha" by Kimagu

I've got like a dozen Photoshop projects going, but I'm stalled on virtually all of them. I've wasted so much time this week on ideas that haven't worked. Hours and hours spent executing different ideas only to wipe the slate clean of crap not even fit for the reject bin. Oh well, it's all good practice at least.

In the meantime, I did come up with one little thing I like. It's like my current emotional state visualized:

"A Long Way from Om"

Did you know that Dave Grohl put together a QOTSA-style metal super group called Probot? He compiled an album's worth of material with tons of guest musicians and put it out about five years ago. It has it's ups and downs, but I have always loved the song "Dictatosaurus". I think it's loosely about the Allies taking Europe back from Hitler in WWII. For one it references D-Day. I love the way the chorus goes, it's really melodic and it soars almost gloriously and yet the meaning of the words is pretty ominous -- i.e. we're coming to kick your ass, motherfucker.

"Dictatosaurus"

all set systems on and ready move forward level reads ok click, drive prepare to break away one target today is d-day! soaked in lies and fears after all these years when the sun will rise the monster's gonna die from now on, things are gonna change 'cause we know why and how who you really are from now on, things won't be the same 'cause we know what you're doing and we know where you're hiding we know everything

next step engage all procedures code, enter signal loud and clear star-shell sparkling high in the sky all together we'll make this dream come true raised in blood and tears after all these years as the sun goes down a new world comes along from now on, things are gonna change 'cause we know why and how who you really are from now on, things won't be the same 'cause we know what you're doing and we know where you're hiding we know everything

I have been waiting for years for someone to put this on the web. In 1994 we celebrated the 100th anniversary of film as a medium and in commemoration of that event this nine-minute short film was put together of highlights from that century.

Seeing all these great movie moments condensed and concentrated into less than 10 minutes, fired off at rapid succession, great quotes and great moments rising to the surface amongst the blur of passing time -- it is truly awe inspiring to me. Perhaps it's because I've always been a fan of classic film, but I think it's really because movies are our dreams realized. And there's something magical about that.

Come watch your dreams unfold.