A few days ago, What They Play did a little survey on their site, asking parents which of four things they found the most offensive in a video game: a severed human head; a man and a woman having sex; repeated f-bombs; and two men kissing. The results amazed me, but in no way surprised me: More people would be offended by the sex than the severed head.

I find this astounding. I can certainly see why people (and not just parents) would be offended by a graphic depiction of violence. It’s unpleasant to look at. It makes us think of similar things happening to us. Humans, by and large, do not like violence. Fine.

But I can’t use that same logic to explain why people find depictions of sex so offensive. People like sex. When we see images of sex, we think about having sex ourselves, and we enjoy that. Sex is great! Right? Or have I been doing it wrong?

So, we basically have a culture here in which people would prefer that their children see an act committed out of hate and rage that usually results in pain or death, rather than see one of intimacy in which fun is had by all. Are you serious?

So many people argue that they want to preserve children’s innocence by shielding them from exposure to sexual materials, and I cannot imagine how they can think that ignorance equates to innocence. Parents in the audience, I have some bad news for you: your kids are going to have sex. In fact, lots of them already are. Some of them might even be doing so as you read this! It could even be your kids that are doing it! Oh no! Take them to Church, quick!

Now, all right, I obviously don’t want my (possible) future children to have sex at too young of an age. But if my 13-year-old daughter is mature enough to walk into a drug store, buy a box of condoms, and use them correctly, then by gum, she is ready for sex. I don’t want to know about it, and I sure as hecks don’t want to think about it, but I’m just going to have to face it. I have to be able to know that she’s safe. It’s sort of why parents exist, see.

And, sucks as it does for me, that means I am going to have to talk to her about sex, and it is there that parents derive their aversion to sexual content for their kids. When little Amy Lynn and Jimmy Tom accidentally see the man and the woman on HBO taking their clothes off and hugging with their legs, they’re going to wonder what is going on, which is going to lead them along that treacherous path that is the Quest For Knowledge.

“Why doesn’t she have one, Mommy?” little Jimmy will ask, and you will, most likely, let your personal discomfort get in the way and answer with, “Because she’s a girl,” before turning the TV over to Eureka’s Castle. Congratulations. Your son just had a huge opportunity to learn something extremely important about life from you, and you yourself had an equally huge opportunity to forge a bond of trust with him, and you failed.

You’re going to have to talk to your kids about sex. Deal with it. Yeah, it’ll give you the heebie jeebies, and it should! It’s that exact aversion that keeps 99.9% of us from wanting to have sex with children! But unless you want Amy to get knocked up in high school, you will just have to teach her how to wrap a Trojan around a throbbing cock. But she will be smarter for it, and all it will have cost you was a couple minutes of discomfort and a trip to your sock drawer.

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I’m going to catch a lot of flak for this entry, I have little doubt. If you are averse toward opinions that do not conform to that of the average television addict, I would suggest moving on. This one is going to hurt, especially if you live in Texas, ’cause you guys are nuts. Anyway, here goes.

I don’t vote.

I figure what the hell, today’s as good a day to talk about it as I’m gonna get.

Oy, should not have said that…

I have never voted in my life. I’ve never even registered. I have no party affiliation, no favorite candidate, no desire to participate in America’s faux-democratic system, and I never will, so long as I have a choice.

I will pause for a moment while I wait for the bright crimson in your face to subside. Also, please put that fountain pen down. You may remember that stabbing is illegal.

This is not a matter of apathy; I happen to have viciously strong political beliefs. Nor is it a matter of laziness; I expend more energy fending off the endless castigations spewing from the voting masses than I ever would if I just relented and stood in the booth to be counted.

My abstinence from the system is rooted in a simple logical conclusion that I reached as a teenager: Representative governance is inherently flawed such that it eventually and inevitably trends toward corruption and, consequently, oppression. Put more cursorily, a Republic is nothing more than a Dictatorship with the blessing of the people. Even shorter: A desire for power precludes the right to wield it.

That is what a Republic is principally based on, after all: People who desire the power step up and say that they want it, the people decide which ones to give it to, and that’s it. Someone is put in charge, gets to do whatever they want for four years, no accountability, no consequences.

What I wanna…

Have we already forgotten the promises made when the Democrats took over Congress in 2007? And what of the general discourse against the Republicans who held it before them and who still exercise their influence? Is the system really doing its job when it leads to the election of a President that most people did not vote for, and whom is now loathed by the majority of the population? How can we impeach a man for not wanting to admit that he cheated on his wife, and yet let a man who has brought about the deaths of thousands of foreign civilians go scot-free?

And worst of all, why has there never been a middle-class citizen in office? How have we descended into a system whereby only the wealthy have the means to seek power?

The bloggers are bright and alive today, beseeching their readers in the Super Tuesday states to go out and vote for their preferred candidate, often stressing that participation in the system is one’s civic duty, a blessing from our forefathers, a righteous privilege that must be exercised at the exclusion of all other obligations. After all, the country is a mess! We need to bring in new blood to get us out of it!

There are other options, though.

It’s systemic…

The solution to our problems is NOT to be found via the system. The system is the problem, and worse yet, it is also self-perpetuating. Vote for the people who preach change all you want; You have no assurance against the notion that they are only flourishing their sweet words to get your support. When they don’t come through on their promises, you’ll go back to the polls to vote for the next wealthy snake oil salesman, and the whole thing will repeat. Each vote that you cast guarantees that the system will survive.

The cycle needs to end. Already, the majority of those eligible to vote do not do so. One might conclude that this means that the government no longer represents the will of the people. This is completely true, and always has been. That is clearly not enough, however, as we can plainly see that the government still exists, corruption and all. Nevertheless, if the state of things can reach such a deep trough that 100% of Americans lose faith in the system and refuse to participate, instantly, the government will be invalidated, the offices of those with power will become void, and the entire machine will fall apart to at last be replaced.

Of course, we all know what will take its place. We’ll draft a new so-called Democracy, with new ideas designed to minimize government, assure accountability, and promote the will of the people. If that sounds familiar, you are reminded of the Americans of the late 18th century who already tried that. Look at where we are now and tell me if they were really so visionary.

Here is my plea to you: Do not vote today, and do not vote in November, or ever again for that matter. The promises of change are mere words, spoken by individuals who would say anything to taste the sweet nectar of power. Want to really make a difference? Help the old lady next door take out her garbage. Adopt an abused child. Give money to cancer research. Recycle. But don’t try to effect change by voting for the people who say they’ll do all of those things and then some. They won’t. They don’t have to. They’re in charge.

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My soon-to-be brother-in-law sent-me-this video about global warming. It’s the best discussion of the issue I’ve ever seen, although I was a little disappointed that the author eventually took a side on the whole thing, even though I ultimately agree with him. One way or the other, it’s put global heatering on my mind, so, what the hell, let’s rant.

What do I think?

Here’s the thing: Can we really deny that belching smoke into the sky is bad? I mean, gods, if just my farts are enough to make my cats sneeze, imagine what a coal plant is capable of.

But are we really causing the planet to heat up? I mean, yeah, Earth is definitely warming, we can’t pretend it isn’t, but is this really all our fault? There is evidence to suggest that Mars is experiencing planetwide climate change, too. If that’s the case, it raises the question of whether Earth is simply a victim of a rough patch in the local solar cycle. Maybe we haven’t done anything wrong at all!

Awesome, right? We can go back to deforesting now? No big deal?

Man, no. This isn’t a black-and-white thing, no matter how badly the activists on either side want it to be so. The choices are not, “Humans are microwaving freaking everything,” and, “Humans never do anything bad to the planet ever.” It’s probably a mix of the two. Personally, I do not believe that we are 100% to blame. I believe that this is part of a normal solar/geological process. Maybe we have a hand in it, sure, maybe even the majority hand, but the kicker is this:

What I believe is irrelevant.

If we are at fault in any way (whichwemightnotbebutitdoesn’tmatter!), it behooves us to knock it off, and not to save the planet! Who cares about the planet? It’s just a damn rock! The issue here isn’t saving Earth; it’s saving us. There are so many things that we need in order to survive, and Earth can only really provide us with those things when we leave it to do its thing. We need oxygen; plants make oxygen when you leave them alone. We need a reasonably temperature-regulated environment; the atmosphere and local land features keep the climate steady if we don’t mess with them too much. We need to not be immersed in water higher than our noses; the ocean doesn’t go up that high if we stop adding water to it that’s supposed to be ice in the North danged Pole.

Shut up shut up shut up.

Part of my problem with this debate is that, as with all debates, people are taking sides and treating it as an epic, good vs. evil confrontation. People who believe in global warming think that those who do not are evil, and vice versa. It’s retarded. It’s why I hate debate so much.

I believe that the issue of harmful climate change is being used as a political platform above all else (on both sides!), and it’s sad. It’s just another manifestation of the awful state into which all power-based political systems are doomed to descend: a system of greed. Those who desire power will do anything to get it, and damn anyone else. The politicians do not care whether Earth’s global climate is metamorphosing in any way: they just want their power, and they’ll say whatever they need to say to get it.

I hate that this is a political issue. It’s more important than that. You know what? Yes, it’s entirely possible that global warming isn’t something we need to worry about. But with all the energy that’s going into pissing about whether climate change is real, we could have made big progress towards fixing it by now. When the money you would spend deciding on something is equal to what you would spend ending the debate and just playing it safe, people need to clam up, swallow their pride, and go do the work, whether it needs to be done or not.

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