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A problem resolves itself in proportion to the quality of its description.
I Hate School
1. One reason why I hate the current education system is because it often punishes with no reason.
People without external support (or people whose supposed support – teachers, parents, classmates are even abusive) may get punished by bad grades or being expelled for something that they actually wanted and tried to do right with their whole heart.
I think teachers should be mindful that one instruction that may look to be the same for all pupils is actually perceived quite differently by each of them, and is of different difficulty for each of them depending on their capacity, background and interests and environment.
This is why it was deemed impolite to keep asking people around you for small favors that don’t mean much to you, from the beginning of time in our culture already. It is assumed that the school system is not subject to this, but i want to argue it is.
Something that seems small to one person may actually cause a big hassle to another. This is why many cultures evolve into praising behavior that is helping, and frowning upon behavior that is needy.
2. Let me close this by a story i heard recently, maybe some readers may link to the correct story; i will tell it as i remember it.
A monkey one day decides to organize a race. All animals are invited, and there is a big price to be gotten by the winner, for a small fee to enter the race. The rules will be known in time, and will be the same for everyone.
Animals from far and near gather for the race – hippos, horses, dogs, snakes..
Then the rules are announced: “The one who shall climb the tree the fastest will be the winner”.
Fake History
I think we people crave valuable physical artefacts, In the whole of human history, being in ownership meant better chances of survival. Now being in possession of many physical things has become more a liability then anything.
Then again, even in Buddha’s time (about 2500 years ago) he answered like this:
…
A person’s delight
comes from acquisitions,
since a person with no acquisitions
doesn’t delight.”The Buddha:
…
A person’s grief
comes from acquisitions,
since a person with no acquisitions
doesn’t grieve.”
I guess people in the past weren’t any less greedy about unnecessary acquisitions then we are today after all.
Consumption
We are a generation of men raised by women, I wonder if another woman is what we need.
by Fight Club
I have a comb yet my hair is tangled.
I have wall paint yet the walls are full of horrible graffiti.
I have a full fridge yet I’m hungry.
I have cleaning supplies yet my dishes lie dirty in the sink.
But all I’m thinking about is that i really need to buy a pencil sharpener. After all, my pencils are not sharpened.
We are a generation suffocating in stuff. I wonder if more stuff is what we need.
The Enchantment of the Fountain Pen
The elegance of the fountain pen lies chiefly in its apparent simplicity. Its point, a simple gap in metal, everything else tidily put away in its body.
It is like a drop of ink, transferred to paper by creative thought.
Ink.
It is not in a fountain pen where the writing lies, i realize, nor in the water of the ink.
It is the pigment that shows the word; and in knowing that, the means of transferring it to the page becomes irrelevant.
It does not matter if a diamond is transferred from place to place by bus or plane – its value remains the same.
Be it from fountain pen, pencil or chalk, diluted, old – it is in its nature to color the creativity of man, making it visible to the world.
Just a Million Thoughts in One Moment
I would like to write. I live in a free society, yet, i do not feel i have the freedom to write whatever i desire. I would like to insult, to write senslessly, badly, falsely, to write about controversial topics like noone wrote about them before. But i feel some things, even in this day and age, are still taboo. Its not because what i would say would be wrong, but rather that it would change the image of me in such a way, as to make people look at me in a way that is unfamiliar. Maybe, i want to appear normal, acceptable. There is something holding me back.
My privacy is not private, this information can be accesed by people who would really want to inspect it. But more than people would see my senseless writing, i am worried about something, i can not yet quite articulate. The 90’s were a time of internet freedom, now in 2010’s its like everyone should have developed an internet personality by now. One that is rarely changing, one that clings to what is right or chosen by what is accepted, or simply what is fashion in the society you are currently accessing. I don’t really feel free to post anything anymore. Universities have more power that it was probably invisioned, and apparently threats against those who post on the internet contrary to what is deemed likable by superiors is punishable.
When did another person allow themselves to that kind of conciet, as to make the internet theirs? Have i unconsciously allowed it? Everything is now labeled, and sorted into the appropriate themes. The freedom that the people who previously labored for, a vision that was to become the internet, is tainted. Its saddening, frustrating and just such a huge letdown.
Personally, i wonder what kind of ends should i let myself go to preserve it. I have a body that requires food, yet i am completely dependant on other people to provide for me. If once there was slavery, it doesn’t mean that todays world, which fought relentlessly against the use of the word, achieved that i am not a slave. I am completely dependant, and my masters decide upon my tasks. So i don’t know if im prepared to go to great ends, when people can easily withold resources from me should they decide they do not like my behaviour. They withold my education.
Books used to be free, not? Didn’t people strive so much to achieve knowledge accessible to everyone? Yet knowledge is still kept from people, in the form of accreditations. I may know as much as the next person or more, yet should one person by disliking me withould the scores from me, i will be considered uninformed, nearly ignorant or stupid by those i would hope would hire me. I do what is decided best for me to do. I ask, how can someone else know better then me, never having walked in my shoes before? Can i just once screw up, do something not considered optimal, even if just to learn from it? Does everything need to have a fabricated consequence, as if nature had no laws that would neccesitate something to happen from a cause by itself?
What did we trade our freedoms for, i ask? I wonder if what we got was worth it? Because i did not share the fruits we got in return. I can only see that free i am not. It is decided upon me which days i will sleep. It is decided which days i will work. It is decided upon me when i will read a certain book. It is decided upon me when reading the exact same book will be punishable. I may want to work, but i am not employable at any place that man should even consider as a valid effort. Should i manipulate people into buying inferior products by lying to them? Should i work at producing cigarettes things of that sort, that are, frankly, poisons? Should i deal with beraucracy, which is the task of million upon millions of people chained to their place, small almost as that of the abused chickens they buy their eggs from? Yet in itself, beraucracy never even did feed one single person?
I think im lost, even if slightly… In the midst of it, i hope it is just a misunderstanding, a passing thought, shaped by the way i feel today and gone with the new feelings tomorrow will invoke in myself…
Inception
In a dream, you don’t remember how you got to a place. You know you were a child, you see how the scene is playing out, you remember that. Where did you come from so you could even be born?
What if the whole of your waking reality is only a dream?
zacione 