I haven’t blogged at all recently, for a couple of reasons. Firstly, my computer died, and i’m forced to use a disastrously primitive piece of computing equipment, which could blow up at any given second. And secondly, I don’t really have much to say. So, given that it is fast approaching the end of the year, I thought i’d sum up my year, for those who happen to be interested.
Life:
I discovered a significant amount about myself this year. I appear to be both growing up, and becoming what some would describe as immature. According to the unwritten rule, to be mature means to accept authority without question, to accept the framework on which we are all born, without question, and to give in to a chase for money, without question. To be mature, means to join a race for more, never satisfied with what one already has, we only reach maturity when we have accepted that we are greedy by nature (which, I do not accept). Therefore, I am immature. I would also argue that the most enlightened minds on the planet, exist for those very few seconds after birth, when we see the World as it supposed to be seen, with wonder; untouched and unnamed by humanity.
I like the idea that when a new born baby sees an ocean, he or she has no idea what it is, they do not have a word for it, they do not understand it’s characteristics, they do not know who put it there, what it’s purpose is, they don’t even have a concept of “purpose”….. which, to me, means the new born baby, is the purest and most Worldly form of life, they see the World with a beauty that you and I lost a very long time ago. When we grow up, we concoct these silly little absurd concepts, like “purpose” to suit our economic needs. Along with “purpose” other concepts, that just did not exist before human beings ridiculously invented them to suit certain economic, money making needs, include “race”, “Nationality”, “religion”, “self discipline”, “Sir”, “Boss”, “deserving”, “work ethic” and hundreds more. Who invented these terms?
Anyway, I digressed a little there. As you can probably tell, Philosophy played a huge roll in my 2009. I took a bit of a depressed stage, not understanding the point of me, earlier this year. I struggled to understand why people and friends can live life comfortably, and securely, blindly acquiescing to the notion that those who do not question, or think, or criticise, or employ a sense of reason and logic to the World around them, or even read a book at all in their lives, are able to live an uneventful, secure, blissfully ignorant life. I have no practical skill, no practical skill that is worth anything to the community that I live in interests me in the slightest. I do not want to manage a team, nor do I want to run a bar, or sell houses, or offer legal advice. In fact, I have no real idea what I want from life. I just know that when I’m at work, behind a bar, selling alcohol to rich people, there is a constant voice in the back of my mind saying “what the fuck is the point of all of this? What good is this? Why do you care if someone complains that their coffee isn’t warm enough? Where is the incentive to make money for a socially shielded man who doesn’t know your name and does nothing but criticise you? How fucking absurd is life. ” Yet, those who do not question, and just accept that “that’s just how it is“, will get on just fine throughout their lives. Then, I discovered Jean Paul Sartre and Albert Camus, two beautifully eloquent and logical Existentialist Philosophers, who taught me in 2009 that the little voice in the back of my mind, was searching for meaning and purpose, in a Universe void of meaning or purpose. They taught me that the entire notion that a bigger picture exists, is so horrendously arrogant of humanity, that to embrace it, means we will never be happy, we will always want something more. And so, there is no black and white, no objective realities, just a mix of meaningless, dead, redundant ideas.
Work:
I started University this year. So far, so good. I study Politics and Journalism and Italian language on the side. The one issue I have with University, is it doesn’t seem to be teaching me much. Lecturers appear to be reading out loud, something that someone else has said. They seem to expect our essays, to be full of things someone else has said. Nothing is original, or requires original thought. Even a question titled “What do you understand by the term…….” does not particularly want to know what I understand by a term, instead wanting me to write down what somebody else has said about a specific term. Any form of subjective thinking, and critically analyzing an idea or concept, feels somewhat forbidden.
Despite this slight issue, I do really enjoy University.
Love:
I’ll simply copy exactly what I wrote in my previous blog entry, for those who missed it.
I want to meet someone, who makes me feel like Byron felt when he penned “She Walks in Beauty”. That’s not to say that I haven’t already met her, i’m pretty sure that I have. But, it’s far more complicated than not.
I worked out this year, that my own slightly promiscuous past was the result of my horrendous desire to feel wanted. It wasn’t an attempt to impress friends with my list of “shags“. I’ve never been one to give a shit about impressing people. I have spent the past six months going on date, after date in an attempt to figure out what it is I want. And i’m only human, I have my flaws and my insecurities. One of which, as already mentioned, is my need to feel wanted. Which, I accept is disastrously arrogant of me. But, on a deeper level, feeling wanted does not just resign itself to intimate encounters with nameless blonde haired brown haired black haired blue eyed green eyed tall short thin fat women from nowhere and everywhere, it’s a need to feel that as I person, my existence is not completely pointless, or absurd (blame Camus and Sartre for my assumptions on absurdity).
I do miss having someone to talk about my day with, or to cook with. I miss affection. I miss the feeling of not remembering how life existed without that person. I miss watching a film together, or becoming addicted to a TV show with or play fighting with. I miss planning holidays together. I miss spending weeks before her birthday trying to figure out what she wants and panicking right up until the last minute that she might not like it. I miss it all, especially the bond which certainly doesn’t exist with one nighters. But, in the search for that lasting feeling again, the tendency to let my guard down has crept in, which has never happened before. I discovered in the past couple of months, that I have a fickle heart, in that a simple smile from a beautiful girl gleamed in my direction, has the ability to make me think I’m in some sort of romantic comedy in which we’re going to end up happily married together by the end of the movie.
I do not want to end up like the couple who don’t trust each other. Or the couple who ban each other from talking to exes. Or the couple who claim to love each other within a few days of getting together. It is extraordinarily rare that I meet a couple who appear to actually belong together, often my instant reaction in my mind is quite pessimistically: “they wont last long“. This feeling of rarity affects my own life. It’s incredibly rare for me to see someone, and smile simply because they’re there. I’m constantly dating people I know just don’t suit me, or maybe it’s my fussy nature finding flaws.
Entertainment:
I discovered quite a deep love for poetry this year. Lord Byron, Sylvia Plath, Wordsworth, Keats, Kerouac, Ginsberg and Dylan Thomas, among many more.
Plath, for the way she dealt with turning a tortured mind, into the work of genius, is by far my favourite poet of all. To have the ability to turn ineffable feelings into beautiful language, is something I’m in awe of.
Lord Byron, Wordsworth and Keats, for the ability to romanticise the World on a level that speaks to me quite profoundly.
On January 9th, I intend to make my way down to The Tate Britain in London, to view the Turner and the Masters exhibition. To have works by Turner, Titian, Rubens, Rembrandt and Canaletto in the same place at the same time, is far too good an opportunity to pass up.
On a more superficial level.. I have a horrible addiction to The Sopranos and Lost. Seriously addicted. I could talk about them both, for hours on end. I’m counting down the days until the final Season of Lost begins. I want a Dharma tshirt!
Beliefs:
When two or three Muslim men blow themselves up in England, we suddenly decide that Islam itself, and it’s believers should be viewed with a degree of suspicion. Yet, when two, three, four, five, or more white British middle aged men get convicted for child abuse, we do not practice that very same logic, and decide all white middle aged men should be viewed as potential paedophiles. Why is that?
I’m not entirely sure why the City that I live, is very much more racist and Nationalist than it’s ever been before. The war cry of the stupid: “I’m English! I was born here! I’m a second class citizen in my own Country!” Is more and more common. Why? For what reason? White British, or Pakistani Muslim, it’s all a social construct, it isn’t based on science or fact or anything other than divisive mechanisms that humanity put in place. Cut us open, and we’re all red, the same red. Science has pretty much proven that biological determinism just doesn’t exist. We cannot distinguish intelligence, or work ethic, or a need to be criminally active, with a race. What we consider to be distinctive “races” are simply social constructs that we as humans, have invented. Therefore, racism and nationalism are largely futile, pointless, and fantasy, as well as being moronic, meaningless, useless, and childish.
We now in fact, put working man against working man. The BA strikes have left most working people deciding that the workers are in the wrong. They chose to ignore the fact that greedy incompetent management is solely to blame, instead choosing the blame the workers. Another social construct designed to keep the masses obeying whatever the top guys say.
It’s a new phenomena. For Centuries, the whole concept of white and black, did not exist. It was used as a tool of Capitalism in the early days of the USA and Colonial Africa and India, in order to divide white working class people and black/Asian working class people from forming alliances and challenging the powers that be. Before that, White Brits were killing each other, because one section was Catholic, the other was Protestant. Or one section was Royalist, the other Parliamentarian Republicans. We have always found pathetic excuses to hurt each other. Race, religion, and ethnicity is relatively new in that regard.
The cry of “They’re taking all our jobs!”. For every one Pakistani gentleman that gets a job over you, another ten White Brits will be given a job ahead of you. Are you starting from the rather moronic premise that White Brits deserve first consideration for a job, before any other colour or religious belief purely because they were lucky enough to be born here? If you owned a business, and a Muslim candidate for a job was far more suited than his White counterpart, why on Earth would you chose the White Brit? Why is colour, ethnicity and race even an issue? What the fuck is your problem? There is absolutely nothing British or English about the EDL and the BNP. They are utter scum.
Religiously:
I disregard all organised religion as highly divisive illogical myths filled with flaws, that just would not exist, had an all powerful, all knowning God actually created them.
That said, I do not disregard the idea of spirituality. In fact, I find the essence of humanity to be at odds with the essence of the materialist World that we inhabit, and so spirituality; as a mechanism to take ourselves away from that materialist nightmare, is a wondrous thing.
To find out just who we are, our strengths and weaknesses as human beings rather than good little workers, has been of monumentous importance to me over the past year. I’ve submitted myself to books on Taoism and Buddhism, I fill my bedroom with candles and incense sticks, which have a profound relaxing affect on me, much like the feeling I get, with the mellifluous nature of a serene mind, when sat overlooking an ocean void of all human touch, on a warm summer evening. The feeling of carelessness, unattached from reality for a tiny moment is so incredibly important to me. And so spirituality, and getting to understand myself has worked to both relax me, and paradoxically, make me more conscious of my shortcomings, unable to figure out (as of yet) how to correct them.
2010:
I want a weekend in Paris.
I want a weekend in Venice.
I want to fill my brain with relatively useless information, about Roman history, and Art, and Tudor history, and Political Philosophy.
I want to love someone.
I want to continue to question everything around me.
I want to read more Sartre.
I want to embrace romance much more.
I want to eat healthier and become a bit fitter physically.
I want a better job, that I actually enjoy and involves helping those who need it, rather than those who don’t.
I want to take up Photography again.
I don’t want to turn 24.
Too much to ask? One can dream.
Posted by futiledemocracy 
We can live without religion and meditation, but we cannot survive without human affection.
