Dear New Zealand, (part of a two-part series)

•10 May, 2013 • 14 Comments

Food:

Pros -

1. I appreciate that aioli is a common dip that comes with fries. I think it’s a lot tastier than ketchup, provided you don’t add sugar to it.

2. I like that Mint Slices are available everywhere. In the US, you have to buy Thin Mints from Girl Scouts in order to get that mint-chocolate fix.

However:

1. I know that you love sugar. But it isn’t necessary to sweeten up savoury dishes. Curries don’t need sugar. Salsa and pasta sauce don’t need suger. It’s actually kinda disgusting when you add sugar to those things. Other things that don’t need sugar are
Ketchup (it’s called “tomato sauce” here, but it’s actually a syrup), salad dressing, and aioli. Seriously, wtf?

2. Pumpkin, beetroot, and kumara are not the only vegetables in the world. They are, however, the grossest vegetables in the world.

3. You do not need to add raisins/sultanas to every dessert item. In fact, I’d prefer if you didn’t use them at all. And please stop adding them to savoury dishes.

4. Dates aren’t yummy. Ever.

5. Banana does not go well with chocolate. Why would anybody want to ruin their chocolate cake/pudding with banana?

6. You can’t wrap everything in bacon. In fact, I suggest you not wrap anything in bacon. Grilled chicken breast stuffed with brie = wow, delicious. Grilled chicken breast stuffed with brie, wrapped in bacon = gag.

7. Bagels aren’t supposed to be hard and stale.

8. “Pizza cheese” and mozzarella are synonymous. If the main cheese you put on your pizza isn’t pure mozzarella, that’s not “pizza cheese.” Pizza cheese isn’t 1 part cheddar (AKA tasty) to 1 part mozzarella. And it certainly isn’t 1 part edam to 1 part mozzarella. That stuff looks and tastes like snot. Pizza cheese is mozzarella.

American pizza. Note the little brown spots on the cheese. This shows that it is mozzarella, and it has been cooked correctly.

American pizza. Note the little brown spots on the cheese. This shows that it is mozzarella, and it has been cooked correctly.

NZ pizza. Note the hundreds of ingredients necessary to hide its bland taste.

NZ pizza. Note the hundreds of ingredients necessary to hide its bland taste.

9. Caesar salad doesn’t have a fried egg on it with bacon. You can call it a “Kiwi salad” but don’t call it Caesar salad. Caesar salad has raw egg mixed into the dressing, and no bacon.

10. Whoever decided to ruin oatmeal cookies by adding coconut to them and calling them “ANZAC biscuits” should be arrested.

11. Sweet chilli sauce is disgusting.

12. The popular candies people call “lollies” like those airplanes, Jaffas, and that crap you put in lolly cake are so gross that I don’t think I would have even liked them as a child.

13. Brownies are supposed to be soft, moist, and chewy. Not dry and hard.

14. Cookies are…(see # 13)

15. “Slice” is too dry and will never be as good as American brownies, pies, cakes, and bars (like lemon bars).

16. Kiwifruit and feijoa aren’t the only fruits in the world. They are, however, the grossest fruits in the world.

Lifestyle:

Pros -

1. I actually appreciate that people who work retail and customer service aren’t taught that the “customer is always right.” That is a bullshit philosophy in the US, and it takes power away from workers.

2. I like that there isn’t as much a feeling of competition to reach to top as there is in the US. Modesty is an important quality.

However:

1. Washing your dishes should be synonymous with cleaning them. That means that you use soap and hot water, and RINSE EVERYTHING OFF when you’re done. No, re-dipping your dishes into that lukewarm, brown soup that was once soapy water doesn’t count as “rinsing.” I know you’ve grown attached to the dishwater, but it is time to unplug the drain. People shouldn’t eat soap residue or old food that’s been stuck to their dishes from a previous meal.

Parting is such sweet sorrow.

Parting is such sweet sorrow.

2. The recommended minimum temperature for a room is 18° C, according to the World Health Organization. Below that, you put yourself at risk for respiratory illness. I’m talking about ambient temperature. Holding a hot water bottle to your body doesn’t count. You are not being tough by refusing to put your heater on; you’re being stupid.

3. Just because you like to be uncomfortable doesn’t mean everybody does. There isn’t anything weak or “oversensitive” about not wanting to be soaking wet, freezing cold, or in blistering heat.

4. Drinking until you vomit while you’re half conscious isn’t cute or cool. Telling stories about how often you’ve pissed yourself because you were too drunk doesn’t make you seem hard-core.

5. “Tall Poppy Syndrome” has its problems too. It creates a more conformist culture, and penalises people for being individuals.

6. I appreciate how generous Kiwis are, but there is a tendency for people to continue doing favours and insisting that everything’s okay until they suddenly snap and stop talking to you, without explanation. Communication is a good thing.

Politics:

Pros - Pretty much better than the US in every way.

1. Very little nationalistic jingoistic bullshit. The flag isn’t sacred, people don’t talk about “New Zealanders” or “Kiwis” as a special brand of people, like “We’re all New Zealanders!” No exceptionalism. New Zealand isn’t touted as the “best country on Earth.”

2. Natural resources are respected more. Not that they’re respected as much as they should be, but people rally against mining, oil drilling, and asset sales far more than they would in the US.

3. The indigenous people here are respected more. Once again, I do not think they’re respected enough by a long shot. But Maori culture is incorporated far more into Kiwi culture, and Maori have much more political power.

4. People don’t seem to be as disgusted by words like “socialism” and “communism.” It just never became the big bogeyman that it became in the US.

5. Labour laws are far better. Not great, but much better than in the US. Can you imagine a $13 minimum wage in the US? Ha!

6. The idea that medicine shouldn’t be publicly available is preposterous to New Zealanders. If I told my story of being charged $700 in the US for a pregnancy test and Plan B to a random American, they’d probably say that I got what I paid for. Any random Kiwi would be outraged.

Surgery for my broken elbow would have cost ~$20,000 in the US. It was free here.

Surgery for my broken elbow would have cost ~$20,000 in the US. It was free here.

7. Christianity isn’t shoved down your throat here. In fact, a large percentage of Kiwis aren’t religious at all.

However:

1. Racism is possibly just as prevalent  here. I find it shocking how casual people are when they say disgraceful crap about Maori, Pacific Islanders, and people from all over Asia.

2. There seems to be some resignation based on the fact that we’re not as bad as the US. For example, people who support the Occupy Movement in the US will often say that we don’t need it here.

Conclusion:

New Zealand is a better, healthier place to live than the US, by a long shot. But that doesn’t mean I have to like the food here.

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Posted in Social Environmentalist, VampireOwlCat
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Why can’t we all just get along?

•10 April, 2013 • Leave a Comment

My response to my friend on Facebook’s post:

Do you avoid walking down the street at night for fear of being raped? Do you see pictures of people of the beauty ideal of your gender plastered on billboards, TV, and magazines, to an extent that you cannot escape from them? Do you get tired of being called a bitch for ignoring catcalls or glaring at people who slap your ass? Do you have trouble speaking your mind for fear of being seen as a “bitch,” but also fear not saying anything because you might be seen as a weak female? Do you have to cover yourself from head to toe, and sometimes even your face, in certain countries? No? That’s because you’re male.

Do people follow you around in stores to make sure you won’t steal anything, just because of your appearance? Do people generalise your entire ethnicity as “lazy,” “violent,” or “ungrateful?” Do people call you a n**er when you walk down the street? Are you less likely to get hired or get into a university than a white person with the same or even fewer qualifications? No? That’s because you’re white.

Do you get people spitting at you and telling you to “get a fucking job?” Do you get paid barely enough to survive, no matter how hard you work? Did you grow up in a ghetto that has an almost inescapable cycle of poverty? No? That’s because you’re not poor.

This isn’t about who did what to whom first, it’s about what the consequences are, what we see in our society now. Systematic oppression of specific groups DOES exist, and you simply can’t argue that groups doing horrible things to other groups cancels everything out. Cause and effect exists. When people are enslaved for hundreds of years and then continuously oppressed, it has an effect. When people are treated like they don’t matter, it has an effect. To claim that there is an equal amount of oppression coming from People of Colour and women would be to ignore history and current society.

And it is absolutely essential to acknowledge history and to understand the roots of our problems. An economic system that was built by rulers and elites for the purpose of continuing their rule is not a healthy one. Comparing an economic system that systematically oppresses the poor to ones that liberate them, and saying that they are both valid, strikes me as strange.

Capitalism is a relatively new system that came about through the evolution of human greed, dissociation, and violence. It is an adaptation to specific times of scarce resources and hostile climates. Anarchism and communism are as old as human history. They evolved through humanity’s natural affinity for community, communication, empathy, and culture. There are things that are objectively detrimental to the human mind, and things that aren’t. To ignore this fact is once again to ignore cause, effect, and human history.

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More self-improvement BS

•10 April, 2013 • Leave a Comment

Just in case y’all didn’t know how I feel about the New Age movement, the following posts are a good place to start: [1] and [2].

Stop. Just stop.

So this picture was on Facebook. I think I can sum up how I feel about it with my comments:

Because we are all responsible for how we affect others. Nobody lives in a vacuum. Language drove our evolution and is a powerful tool for hurting, helping, starting wars and revolutions.

To which, somebody replied:

I agree but it points out that you have a choice on how you react to other people’s words and actions. Tricky as it may seem but these words remind me that no matter what, I AM in control of my emotions/feelings.

So I responded:

Nobody is in complete control of their emotions. And this attitude blames the victim and takes any responsibility from the perpetrator. The body and mind are very similar. Just as you wouldn’t say, “How can someone hurt your ‘body’ when your ‘body’ is part of you?” Emotional harm is very similar to physical harm.

If somebody breaks my arm, would you put any responsibility on me? Maybe I didn’t defend myself well enough? Or if I hadn’t been there in the first place, they wouldn’t have anybody’s arm to break? Some people are better at martial arts or self-defense – does that mean that those who aren’t are partially responsible for being physically harmed? Similarly, just because some people have more control over their emotions or thicker skin, does not mean that EVERYBODY has the same amount (or should have the same amount) of control over their emotions.

I was bullied [badly] as a child. I will NEVER blame myself for how I was affected by that. I will never claim that I was responsible for having my feelings hurt.

When a white person calls a Black person a racial slur, the responsibility is the white person’s. I will never say that the Black person was too sensitive, or should have controlled their response. The N-word was used to psychologically and physically oppress and enslave an entire race of people for generations. THAT is the power of words.

I get very exhausted with a lot of people of the New Age persuasion, who continuously focus on the self without acknowledging that as humans, self-improvement is interconnected with community and social awareness and responsibility. I would not be the person I am today without my friends, teachers, and family. They supported me and helped me improve myself. They acknowledged when they were responsible for hurting me emotionally, as I was with them. There needs to be social pressure on those who do harm to act like decent human beings, and focus needs to be taken off of the victim, as our culture is so obsessed with blaming victims for everything bad that happens to them.

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A note for leftists who oppose the Israeli state (TW: Nazis and anti-semitism)

•19 February, 2013 • 8 Comments

1. Israel does not control the US. The US controls Israel. That tiny country doesn’t have all our politicians in their pockets; there are no Magical Jews(TM) who control the New World Order. Britain chose Palestine as the place for the new Jewish state because it was an advantageous spot in the Middle East to have a military superpower. The US supports Israel for the same reason.

2. The Nazi holocaust wasn’t “overhyped.” Just because other holocausts in history have been under-represented and underreported, does not mean that the torture and slaughter of 10 million people was over-hyped. That’s a false dichotomy. Let’s not forget the reason why the US joined WWII: Imperialism. They didn’t give a toss about the holocaust; they just didn’t want to lose power. No country joined WWII to save the Jews, and Jews weren’t the only people murdered in the holocaust.

3. The state of Israel isn’t “Jews.” It is an imperialst state, behaving the way that empires have always behaved. I am Jewish, yet I am not Israel – I have never supported Israeli policy or even the existence of the state (or any state for that matter). Just like opposing the Israeli state isn’t the same as being anti-Semitic, Jews are not Israel. There is nothing inherent about being Jewish that makes me more likely to want to slaughter and steal land from Palestinians.

4. Anti-Semitism isn’t radical. Hating anybody because of their culture or ethnicity (and yes, Judaism is also an ethnicity) is bigoted. Screaming that “Jews control the world!!” doesn’t make you unique or edgy. Saying “Hitler had the right idea” doesn’t make you a groovy anarchist (by definition, if you support Hitler, you are not an anarchist).

5. If you are not Jewish, stop saying “Jews.” I know this is amusing because I just said it several times, but I am Jewish. “Jew” is a term that is, more frequently than not, used in a derogatory way by non-Jews (goyim) towards Jewish people. Just say “Jewish people.” I know it’s four syllables instead of one, but as long as you don’t have a speech impediment, it shouldn’t be a problem. Whenever I hear a goy say “Jew,” I cringe and wait for some anti-Semitism to be vomited forth. Seriously, stop.

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Political correctness

•12 February, 2013 • 1 Comment

Holy fucksticks, I’m sick of people whining about “political correctness,” as if it’s making their lives unlivable.

We have two choices: We can make life more comfortable for marginalized groups, or we can make it more comfortable for the privileged.

When we focus on the privileged, we are saying “fuck you” to the oppressed – after all, what’s more important is that people be “allowed” to say oppressive things, rather than that people have even a small part of their lives where they don’t feel constantly oppressed and discriminated against.

When we focus on the marginalized, we inevitably make some privileged people uncomfortable. That’s just what happens. Some people just can’t handle the social pressure that comes with creating safe spaces for marginalized groups. They call it “censorship.”

I’m not big on dichotomies, but in this case, it is real. We either focus on one or the other. So what will it be? Upholding the status quo and allowing privileged people to keep their power over others? Or giving voices to the voiceless, to those who are frequently ignored or spoken over?
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The worst movies I have ever seen

•5 February, 2013 • 3 Comments

1. Bloodrayne

Okay, so I have a weakness for vampires. I just had to see it. And it had the woman who played the Terminator in T3, so I thought it couldn’t be that bad.

I honestly don’t know why I forced myself to finish it. If anything, the worst thing of all was realizing how desperate Ben Kingsly must have been to have agreed to be in that movie. The acting was shockingly awful, there was completely arbitrary, unnecessary, and gratuitous sex and violence, and the plot was atrocious.

2. Shame

This is an example of a movie that critics loved, that had excellent actors and excellent acting, but the plot and general feel were horrible. Despite the large amounts of sex, the movie struck me as extremely puritanical. It portrayed sex in a violent, sickening way, over and over again.

There were exhaustingly long shots of seemingly nothing, with deafeningly loud, swelling orchestral music (one example was a scene where the main character is staring at a woman on a train for what seems like fifteen minutes). The entire film’s purpose seemed to be to make the audience as uncomfortable and nauseous as possible, with no actual message or even plot. I left 15 minutes before the end, due to being incredibly disturbed and triggered, and feeling like my ears had been assaulted. Once again, I shouldn’t have waited that long.

3. Southland Tales

Another example of a film that had long, pointless scenes and a poor plot. Instead of no plot, it was all over the place and confusing. It was difficult to tell who the main characters even were, and it didn’t make a lot of sense. In addition, the acting wasn’t very good, and there were scenes of people acting absolutely crazy for no reason. I was especially disappointed in Sarah Michelle Gellar, who I know is capable of good acting. I turned it off 3/4 of the way through.

4. Being John Malcovich

Virtually everybody I know loves this movie. Sometimes I wonder if perhaps my soulmate will end up being one of the few other people in the world who hated this movie.

I was watching it with my parents, so I watched it all the way through. The thing that gets me hating a movie more than anything else, is when there is absolutely no moral message, and none of the characters have any redeeming value. It’s more than that, too – The Godfather was about villains, but it was very educational regarding the structure and philosophy of the Mafia (I actually found the Godfather quite boring, but it’s not bad enough to be on this list). In the case of this movie, all the characters were assholes who didn’t care about anybody else. They did assholish things with little consequence. Oh, and there’s this really cool speculative fiction twist which apparently redeems the entire movie in some people’s eyes. There, I just told you the whole story.

Movies that I liked, that were crapped on by critics

1. The Cell

In addition to being cinematically gorgeous, The Cell had an interesting sci-fi angle to it, and was surprisingly psychologically accurate. The acting wasn’t bad, and the story was interesting and satisfying. I found it amusing to no end when a film critic denounced it as “psychologically inaccurate” with no explanation as to why, as if film critics are well schooled in psychology.

2. Glitter

There are a lot of “finding your dreams” movies out there, but few with as much heart and honesty as Glitter. Instead of ending with the main character “making it” as a singer, it begins with it. It shows the ups and downs of being a part of that world. I found Mariah Carey’s acting to be very good (see Precious for another example). In addition, the love story arc ended surprisingly and realistically, with her showing real courage by leaving an abusive relationship – the relationship that began her career in the first place. She did not “get the guy” in the end, despite it looking like a romantic drama at the beginning.

3. Twilight

I’m putting this one here, because a lot of people claim to hate it, though I don’t think they really do. The widespread hatred of Twilight seems to be more of a “hate fad” than anything else (see Justin Bieber for another example). People love to hate it – they create a culture of belonging, through that hate.

First of all, the cinematography was gorgeous. The town was portrayed well, with all its cliffs, beaches, and gray, cloudy landscapes. The only acting that I found sub-par was that of Robert Pattinson, who seemed a bit wooden – but it didn’t really ruin the movie for me. A lot of people seem to love mocking Kristen Stewart for her “not smiling,” and “showing no emotion,” which betrays more the assumptions that our culture has about how women should behave than anything else. Stewart plays her character with honesty and integrity – which is difficult to do, given the fact that Bella is quite one-dimensional in the book.

KristenStewartEmotions
Just gonna leave this here.

The plot was very interesting, just like in the book; Meyers created her own vampire world with its own rules, and it was detailed and imaginative. Catherine Hardwicke told Meyer’s story accurately and beautifully, which is hardly surprising, given that her directorial debut, Thirteen, was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival.

But the biggest objection to Twilight – I kid you not – is that in the Twilight world, vampires sparkle in the sunlight. That’s it. Apparently this fact threatens a lot of men’s masculinity; after all, masculinity is a very delicate thing. An entire meme began: “Still Not As Gay As Twilight,” which was not only homophobic, but sexist as well. People’s desires for the vampires to be more violent than they were, calling them “fairies,” just showed how intolerant and bloodthirsty a lot of audiences are today.

 

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Hardcore monogamy

•19 December, 2012 • 12 Comments

I have spoken about this issue before, addressing feminist critiques of marriage, and the assumption that all open-minded people are polyamorous.

Learning about free love

I was happy to be introduced to the ideas of polyamory and free love when I was in my teens. I thought it was interesting, and wonderful that people could be fulfilled in those types of relationships. However, as I got older, I was more exposed to the harsh judgments of people in the polyamory community, radical leftists, and anarcha-feminists who were into free love.

I do not care about people having different types of relationships. Why would I? That would be like caring what gender somebody’s partner was, or what race they were. I do not care about my friends being in different relationships, telling me about them, explaining their logistics and politics. Just as I don’t mind having friends from different cultural backgrounds describing their cultural history.

I do not even mind people criticising societal pressures to be in monogamous relationships, or talking about the evolutionary history of polygamy or the political history of monogamy. What I do mind is people condemning the type of romantic relationship that I am fulfilled by. That, to me, is the same as condemning my choice to be monogamous. And I am not just monogamous, but hard-core monogamous.

Jealousy and relationships

I am a jealous person. I will not condemn myself for it or feel bad about it; I have spent plenty of my life doing that, and it did not improve my life or anybody else’s. I am not abusive or restrictive towards my partners – I tell them up front how strictly monogamous I am, and that I have insecurities. If they wish to be with other people, they can, just as long as they’re not with me. I am one of the most communicative partners you can find. I make sure that my partner and I have verbally agreed to a monogamous relationship. But I cannot, and will not, be in any other type of romantic relationship.

Blaming monogamy

I recently went to a conference, where somebody spoke about free love. They suggested that domestic violence was caused by monogamy, instead of its obvious causes: A history of abuse, misogyny, entitlement, and patriarchy. The idea that domestic violence is caused by jealousy is laughable. Yes, people sometimes are triggered by jealousy to hurt their partners. They are also sometimes triggered by anger. Is anybody going to seriously claim that people in poly relationships don’t get angry with their partners? So why is it that most people don’t physically hurt their partners when they’re angry? Why don’t most people hurt their partners when they’re jealous? Why is it that most domestic violence is perpetrated by men? Is somebody going to claim that men feel more jealousy than women?

Domestic violence usually involves a feeling of entitlement. That the partner is owed sex, or “respect” (i.e. constant agreement). This has little to do with how many partners a person has. It has everything to do with our entitlement-based society, where women are treated as objects to be owned by men, and parents are entitled to beat their children (leading to aggression later in life). Our culture believes that parents own their children, and people own their partners.

Monogamy isn’t ownership. If my partner wants to be with other people, I won’t stop them. I just won’t be with them too. It’s really that simple. It will hurt me, and I can’t change my emotional response just because some people think it’s conservative to feel jealousy. But I will not bar my partner from ending the relationship, or seeing other people afterward.

Arguments against monogamy

The person at the conference I referred to also compared seeing other people to “deciding to take up Moorish Dancing,” as if they were both similar hobbies. This is a ridiculous comparison. First of all, people don’t become attached to Moorish Dancing – Moorish Dancing doesn’t cause you to release oxytocin. You can’t fall in love with dancing the way you do with a person. It is frankly offensive to human beings to compare them to hobbies. Sex for me is an incredibly intimate thing, something to be shared with a person that I find very special, where we essentially share our souls. Some people do not feel this way about sex, and that is fine. But I would want my romantic partner to feel this way about sex, because I would want them to feel that way about sex with me. And I don’t want somebody who can switch off their emotions at will, depending on who they’re having sex with.

I’ve had poly friends compare romantic relationships to friendships. That is how they explain lack of jealousy. But I have a hard time believing that people in poly or free love relationships don’t feel jealousy. Sure, many of them don’t feel sexual jealousy. But I have never met somebody who didn’t sometimes feel like their friend was spending more time with another friend than with them, and this made them feel bad. Or that their parents gave a sibling more attention. That is jealousy, and romantic jealousy is simply another type. It is not ownership, as so many claim – after all, you don’t think you own your parents or friends, do you?

My best friend and I have a special bond. Nobody else has that specific type of bond with me or her. Romance is another unique bond. For me, I will only have that bond with one person at a time. I do not feel the need to feel it with more than one. I do not think about other  people in a sexual or romantic way when I am with my partner. Many people who criticise monogamy see it as stifling. Why? I’m not stifled by my desire to be with only one person at a time. And they’re not stifled either. If they were, I wouldn’t want them to be with me. I don’t want to be the reason my partner feels held back.

Distrust and jealousy are not evil

My last point will be the one that many people, poly or monogamous, may have trouble with. I am not a trusting person. I have struggled with this all my life and have finally accepted it. If a parter accuses me of not trusting them, due to my jealousy, I cannot deny it. I have never completely trusted anybody in my life – not my parents, not my best friend, not my partners. Trust is something that grows with time. As my partner shows themself* to be trustworthy over time, my trust will grow. Will I ever completely trust them? Probably not. And I frankly don’t see anything wrong with that. If my partner behaves in a completely trustworthy way, yet somebody gives me definitive proof that they’re cheating on me, am I going to ignore that proof? Of course not. That is why I don’t believe that anybody completely, 100% trusts anybody else, or needs to.

Jealousy and distrust are not evil emotions. They can trigger abusive behaviour, but so can anger. That has more to do with the individual, not the emotion. And I really wish that people would stop demonizing some of my emotions.

*I use they/their/they’re/themself as gender neutral, singular pronouns

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