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Mind Your Business
How many times have you had to turn your back on an artist because you felt that they compromised their integrity for personal gain? Doesn't that bug the hell out of you? What bugs me even more is that people even bother to care. Their career path is their choice, not yours. Owning a CD or DVD or book doesn't make you a stockholder of their career. There has to come a point to where the art and the artist separate. That point is public release. Once the album or song or book or movie is created, good or bad, it stands on its own. If your favorite artist made three great works of art and then (in your opinion) went to the toilet thereafter, you still have all that you ever had, which is those three great works. What really matters is your integrity and how you will handle life's choices when they come at you. Will you fare any better than your "fallen idols"? It's not as easy as it seems. You do your best to handle your career, but when someone offers you a winning lottery ticket, do you decline? And what really is a sell-out? Is it accepting money for your work, or changing creative style to suit a larger audience? To me, it's the latter. In my opinion, Nirvana, Green Day, Bad Religion, and the Offspring never sold out by compromising their style. Their sound never changed, it was the world changed. That is the difference, and it's a big difference. Also, think of the first album you bought that introduced you to the underground scene. Was it a major label album, like Green Day or the Sex Pistols? Maybe the Clash or the Buzzcocks? If a band like Green Day introduced thousands and thousands of people to the underground music scene, just how bad of a thing is that? To me, it's a great thing. Good for Green Day, and every other band who opened that door to strengthen the music I love.
February 27, 2003
Drug Testing
Straight or not, you're shooting yourself in the foot accepting a job that does drug testing. What you do in your spare time is your time, not theirs. To allow them to run tests on you is to give them far more control in your life than they should have. When it comes to drug testing, just say no.
February 25, 2003
Idiots With Toys
Why is it that everybody on commercials end up being stereotypes of the worst behavior we have to represent? People on commercials portray our society as though we all are standing in line to be on Jerry Springer. The men are stupid, lazy liars, and the women are neurotic clean-freaks with unusual fixations on cleaning supplies and household appliances. Want to know what dysfunction is? Watch a few television commercials. Any interplanetary aliens passing by who may tune in to these would have perfectly good reason to obliterate our planet to save us from our pointless lives. Why do commercials do this? Because smart people make bad consumers. The more ignorant and depressed you are, the more you will want to consume. Those with less confidence will seek to find the name brand that they believe will be their ticket to happiness. With a life so vacant and empty, it's good just to feel you possess something. Corporations don't want you "finding yourself". For one, you won't be working in their factories for shitty wages because you won't be such a slave to the dollar. And two, when you're away from work, they need you to be compelled to purchase that new useless, though flashy, doodad. Self-awareness would wreck society. The welfare of our society depends on us to be violent, senseless consumers. Are you doing your part? Are you just like the idiots on commercials? Is your relationship with yourself and others as bad as the ones you see on nearly every commercial? I do hope not. I'd like to think this species has some hope.
February 20, 2003
Gun Control
Giving up our arms is not an option at this point in history in the United States. Not if we care about our freedoms. We have the right to bear arms simply to keep the power in our own control. Outlawing guns would only empower criminals and the government.
February 18, 2003
Social Drinking
When it comes to alcohol, the United States has the collective maturity of a child with stunted growth. To an American, there is no leisure entertainment. There's no leisure anything, for that matter. We are a gluttonous culture that has no concept of moderation. Especially alcohol. In other countries, people drink it with meals. Science has even attributed it to prolonging their lives. Maybe what we cannot comprehend is the fact that they know a thing or two about moderation. The word hardly has a place in the American English vocabulary, and that's really pathetic.
February 13, 2003
Bottoms Up, Kid
I believe that having no legal drinking age would actually make people more responsible about alcohol. The vast majority of Americans start drinking in their teens, regardless of the laws. Turning 21 only means that you're now legal to do what you've more than likely been doing for years. In many cases, 21 year-olds are such veteran drinkers that their drive for intoxication is already beginning to wane by the time they're legal to begin. Denial is a powerful tool for ignorance. How do you feel our society would really change if alcohol became legal at any age? Maybe we could face reality and know that the legal drinking age is ineffective and rarely, if ever, upheld. Would you rather inform your children about alcohol at a younger, more impressionable age, or go with the present system, which puts that power and responsibility in the hands of some idiot at a party whom you probably wouldn't even trust to take out your garbage? Have you ever given a kid a sip of beer or whiskey? It's an acquired taste, and a very effective repellent for children. They'd probably rather eat yams and raw oysters than try beer or whiskey again. At least for a while, and long enough for you to have responsible control on what they deem is cool. Freedom and education will always be more effective than restriction and denial. Whatever a teenager can't have is exactly what they want.
February 6, 2003