)(*@#$!$* Teenagers

The one night I forgot my mouthguard, was the one night some teenager goes nuts and..I don't know exactly what he did, but it involved trying to smush my mouth with his forearms. I don't know if the kid is frustrated because he can't put me away (I'm much smaller than him) or if he has unresolved issues, either way the idea of ju-jitsu as the "gentle art" seems to escape him.

This is training in a dojo, not a streetfight, you leave a guy's face alone, it's just common courtesy. I 'd like to see him try that shit with one of the bigger guys--I was ready to clock him! But I didn't. I kept my cool. Anyway I'm sure I'd come out lookin' the bad guy: being older, etc. But geez!

We practice passing the guard last night, so at least practice was productive.

A Clear ending for The Mist vs the ambiguous hipsters

Endorsing a horror film and an endorsing one enthusiastically is no small feat. For professional critics who live off their credibility, rather than shill for blurbs, there is real risk in going out on a limb for a movie. Historically, horror films have not favored well in the eyes of the film reviewers. This has changed—somewhat in the last ten years or so—but the torture films have worked overtime to garrote the in roads horror has made.

Which is what, I think partially explains the tentatively positive review offered up by the AVclub.com.

Hipsters.

Sigh.

What can I say that hasn’t been said by wikipedia and angry metalheads?

For the most part, I don’t have problems with hipsters. I’m politically sympathetic to most of their positions (I’m a lefty), and honestly when it comes to film reviews the AVclub is a darn good resource. Their critics know their stuff, and even though Nathan Rabin gets carried away once in a while, they are good writers.

But their commenters! Jesus H Christ in a motorized wheelchair, they can get pretty fuckin’ annoying! I have a middling tolerance for “snark” as they like to call it, and a low, very low tolerance for ironic detachment, which is a vice hipsters really tend to overindulge.

This brings me to the Mist. As I’m scanning the comments I saw the occasional “I liked the movie because...” mingled in with the usual “Darabont is a hack” and the normal cat fighting one finds on any comments section, peppered of course with that oh so precious snark hipsters snort like kitty litter.

I’m not nieve enough to think a movie I consider great will meet with universal acclaim; however, there was a pattern in the comments, something that was touched among my theater compatriots after the film: the ending.

One popular criticism of the movie, as professed by a chunk of the AV peanut gallery, is that the ending was—well, the movie had an honest-to-god-put-a-stamp-on-it-dinner-time-ending. There was a cry for—how do I put this?—uncertainty. The film should have ended with them driving into the mist with us never knowing quite what happened to them. That, in their opinion, would have been better than the over the top megatragedy that plays out.

I must politely call bullshit on this argument.

The driving off into the mist/into the sunset/into the dark/here’s three minutes worth of meandering road footage/we’ll never know what really happened because the future is uncertain/No Fate!/ was effective for the original cut of Blade Runner and a few other works, but by the time Good Will Hunting rolled around it was already a horrible, horrible cliché’. Any director with balls, any artist with ambition (even flawed uneven ambition) would recognize this and shoot for something better. The so-called ambiguous ending has become a lazy cipher, a trick for artists too chickenshit to offend the ruling class of the pop culture scene. Ambiguity, you see, provides room for ironic detachment, which for hipsters—and a lot of people really—is a comfort zone. “Life doesn’t have endings. Things just keep going. You choose what happens next. The viewer is always in control of the story.” Yes, it’s only a movie…only a movie…only a movie.

In other words, our good friends the AVhipsters, who pride themselves on sophistication and ironic detachment, have been angling for the safe, standardized ending, the Hollywood ending, an ending that is merely artificial uncertainty, because accepting anything else would mean that it’s NOT only a movie: it’s a howl, furious, soaked in blood, raging against very real injustices and disappointments.

Hipsters suffer from a condition similar to vampirism; instead of blood, they need irony.

Of course, vampire myths are riddled with supposed weaknesses and wards: wooden stakes, sunlight, etc. Hipsters, as far as I know, have only two real weaknesses:

one, a six foot tall metal head with a knife; and two, sincerity. Hipsters hate sincerity, especially in their art. They don’t know what to do with it, can’t tell it apart from sentimentalism and can’t process it on face value (which is where ironic detachment comes in but I don’t wanna go on a rant).

Well, I doubt anyone will believe me now when I say I don’t hate hipsters, but I’m gonna insist anyway!

As a final note, I’m sure there are plenty of genuine criticisms of The Mist, no film, even great ones, are perfect. Heck, the flaws give them character, but this whole line of reasoning behind the ending is just stupid. If you want to hate the ending at least find a reason that doesn’t espouse a cliché.

The Mist

I’ve watched a lot of horror films. My Master’s thesis involved horror films and terrorism. I’ve seen good ones, bad ones, funny ones, self-loathing ones, but none of them was an angry horror film. Yeah yeah slasher films are gory, lots of people die very theatrical deaths, the torture films are pseudo-topical, hiding behind the screams; too afraid to ever say the words “Iraq” or “united states government” or “Guantanamo Bay.” Dawn of the Dead was a vicious critique of consumerism, but it was, at its heart, a satire.

None of them, not a single one, comes close to capturing the anger of The Mist. Mr. Darabont is pissed, and he’s not gonna take it anymore.

I talked to the screen at this movie. I made exclamations at the screen. “I’ve seen a hundred movies with you, and you’ve never done that” a friend observed.

This film is about politics, class, religion, reason, authoritarianism, the abyss, fathers and sons, war, and yes, gore. I’m sure some out there will say it is heavy handed; I’d disagree, it’s accurate, deadly accurate. As the Milgram experiment, the SPE, and Nazism illustrate, this IS the way people behave when the shit hits the fan. These are the things they say; these are the things they do.

And the fact that the protagonist’s profession is artist is telling, very telling about Mr. Darabont’s feelings not about art, rather the devaluation of the artist in society; mistrusted for the book learnin’ and their thinking.’ What do they know right? They just draw pictures and make pretty sounds!

A reviewer on chud.com compared this film to John Carpenter’s The Thing, and I think he is dead on. They share a common language of paranoia punctuated with Rorschach monstrosity: in each scene the monstrous is never the same. It is flux. The meaning is always just a little bit different.

T-day

There were no casualties over the thanksgiving break.

Discussions between the studios and the wga are supposed to restart today. Will blog more when I learn more.

Requiem

I watched Requiem for a Dream last night. I think I’ve seen all of Darren Aronofsky’s (sp?) films: Pi, Requiem, and The Fountain. All of these films are very good. Shit, the last two are genius. Requiem is an anti-drug movie that isn’t preachy or smug. It doesn’t moralize. In fact, I would that the depiction of drug use, while at times startling, even frightening, is secondary to its success. The film succeeds because it examines the issue of addiction itself; it examines how we think of “drugs,” and how our limited notion of what we can be addicted to affects what we are, in fact, addicted to. Television, prescription drugs, and sex are society’s acceptable drugs; but that doesn’t mean you’re liberated from the dangers of addiction.

It is also one of the most depressing movies I have ever seen, second only to IZO (and for different reasons). IZO’s bloody and bleak nihilism is replaced with tragedy. Requiem stacks tragedy upon tragedy. All of the primary characters meet a tragic fate. And the final tragedy—this isn’t a spoiler—is that none of the characters realize what’s happened to the other characters! They don’t even have the ability to grieve for the sorry state of their compatriots. Their isolation is complete.

If you watch this movie here’s some advice. Grab a couple of your favorite foods, maybe pizza, candy, and a tasty root beer, and eat them after the movie. You will need something to make you feel better, and yes I realize the irony in saying that when talking about a movie on addiction, but loving a thing is not the same as addiction :P

untitled

Went to the gas station last night to grab a bottle of water. As I was paying—I believe the attendant was a black female—two black guys in typical hip hop dress entered. I was suddenly struck with fear. I didn’t break into cold sweats or hyperventilate; the reaction was purely internal. I couldn’t get out of their fast enough. I kept visualizing them robbing the store, pulling guns, wreaking havoc. Is it racist if your emotional response to a minority is abject fear despite your best attempts to the contrary? I’m not naïve. No one is impervious racism, bigotry, etc. but in this case there is a sharp division between thought and feeling. I know, in all likelihood they are just kids, and yet my emotional response is extreme. How do you fix that? How do you undo a reaction like that? What’s the cure, more black male friends??? I worry one day that I may have that reaction to someone I’m teaching. What will the solution be?? I feel contaminated.

More notes on the strike

I learned through unitedhollywood.blogspot.com that the average writer is pulling down
62,000.00 a year. Wow. So much for my conservative estimate. I thought most of them would of had low six figures (when working) and it was the duration between gigs that was really killing them. That figure is simply unacceptable.

BTW unitedhollywood is an excellent page to learn more about the strike.

Damnation

Went to the doctor for a check up and Surprise! Need to drain that right ear again.

I had noticed the swelling hadn't gone down; but I hoped it was just slow on that front, much like the left ear.

This time the aftermath is what's getting me. Already took 3 generic alleve, and I'm currently icing my ear.

Change of direction: the writer's strike

Well, unless you are culturally retarded or—you know—actually retarded you’ve heard about the writer’s strike in tinsel town. I know this ain’t worth much in the grand scheme of things, but I support the writers 100 %. This is supposed to be a blog about sexual trauma, and coping with life in its wake. Well, art, particularly good art, makes that process a little easier. So as far as I’m concerned this is a viable topic for my little island in the web.

I’ve been reading around, mostly on huffingtonpost.com and a few other sites, trying to understand the issues at hand: why the writers are striking, why the studios don’t wanna play ball, the sentiment of commenters, trolls, random passersby, et cetera et cetera.

What I’m finding is that most of the folks who support the strike understand the lay of the land—the rules of Hollywood, specifically why writers have residuals in the first place.

For most folks in La La land employment is never certain, every job is a temporary job. Some jobs just last longer than others, depending on how successful the product (movie/tv show) is. Just like fighters, who are only as good as their last fight, writers (and actors and directors, everyone) are only as good as their last film (or tv show). Now there are a few exceptions, but these apply to A list movie stars and A list directors, who have accrued some political capital. (And for the record I have NEVER heard anyone referred to as an A list writer).

Screenwriters, who haven’t seen an increase in home movie sales since 1989, are hurtin’ pretty bad. To my knowledge there hasn’t even been adjustment for inflation. Combine that with the problem of living in or around Los Angeles, a very expensive town to live in even when the economy is good. And for those of you keeping score at home we’re in the middle of a housing crisis and a gas crisis. Things look to get worse in the foreseeable future. I’m not a number wiz, but I reckon the cost of living is about seventy thousand just to make ends meet—most likely by the way my estimate is conservative.

Now the people—I’m excluding film execs et al—who have crapped on the strike don’t seem to have a realistic idea of how Hollywood works.

“Fire the writers and hire a whole new crop! With better ideas! And imaginations!”

Huh? Ok guess what, most of the people who want to work in Hollywood are already there. Where is this magical “new” crop supposed to come from? The market is already saturated. And those fresh faces out of film school? Hmm. You’ve got to be pretty fucking stupid if you’re a NYU graduate and you burn your alumnae network. You will NEVER get to work with Spike Lee, Ang Lee, or any other highly connected NYU alumnus because THEY WILL BLACKLIST YOU. And as for “better ideas,” it’s not that the overall body of writers is poor; but collaborative art and the economics of collaborative art, are labyrinthine. Write 100 great scripts. Now turn them into MOVIES. Five of them might be great, 20 will be middling, 10 will be poor, 10 will be god awful, and the rest will be stuck in development hell. Outsourcing won’t do a damn thing.

“These guys are greedy who do they think they are blah blah”
See above. Really, I won’t type it again.

“This isn’t the studios fault. Things are out of their control”

I recognize the studios can’t see the future; however, they have the resources to approximate the future impact of technologies, and quite frankly if studio execs make bad deals they should be fired. Screw golden parachutes, golden bungee cords, golden showers, a side of effect their departure should not be exorbitant bonuses. As in other corporate structures wealth is overconcentrated at the top—this is not to say that studio execs shouldn’t be paid well, this is a volatile, dangerous executive position in a volatile fickle market—I don’t have a problem with golden handshakes, within reason—they deserve performance based bonuses and penalties. If the studios are as strapped as they claim, having a treasure chest for a rainy day by way of performance based pay, might have provided them with some bargaining wiggle room.

Suffice to say, I’ll be keeping a close eye on the strike.

Further developments in freaky mutations

The “pimples” now resemble traditional scabs---red, dried blood. Huh?? At what point did I bleed? I may wear a freakin band aid for fear of bleeding on the mats. Plus, for a bunch of hardened warriors the guys turn into squeamish little girls when blood is introduced.

Babykicker was at the house AGAIN. Must talk to mother. Sister is using “moving” as cover to be here. She will try to stretch this out as long as she can. Is she still with crazy boyfriend? Another pertinent question to ask mom.

BJJ and Ears

Back at BJJ after a lay off. Was very nervous about my ears, had serious doubts about the ear guards. Couldn’t bring myself to wear them. I didn’t endure a lot of triangles or lapel chokes but when pressure was applied it did appear to bother my ears. They are still sensitive to touch though. Even though my ears were aspirated last week I still feel…bumps…tender spots that feel like they could still hold fluid, the doctor insists they are empty. Will they go away or will they remain? Perhaps I should set up a little savings account specifically for plastic surgery. There are two pimples on my right cheek that are starting to freak me out. For a while they looked like they would merge, then they appeared to improve, drying shriveling up, dry skin pealing away, then they looked they were doing the giant pimple thing WHILE doing the raisin dance. And now? They look like eggs burrowed into flesh As if maggots could pop out at any moment or maybe even a couple of slugs that borrow into peoples heads, making them rabid sex zombies. They will probably scar. I hate acne scars, especially when I go out of my way not to pick at pimples. Hell, I’m considering switching to a weaker antihistamine just so I can start using some kind of acne med again.

It was one of those classes were I felt like I made improvements but was quickly reminded of how far I have to. We worked some judo pins and escapes, then rolled. I didn’t roll more than 24 minutes due to reasons listed above, but wow that first roll was a killer, my conditioning was lacking. A six minute match is a long time to roll if you’re a beginner. Thankfully, the next few rolls weren’t quite as fast paced. Over all, it was a good roll.

Don't neglect the blog

Having your ears drained can be a very painful experience. I was surprised, in fact, by how much my left ear hurt. It was raw, sensitive, before the needle touched the skin, and boy howdy did it seem to last forever. It seemed to last so long in fact, I wasn’t sure how much longer I could remain still. I had to focus and force myself from pulling away.

If you’ve seen the Lynch version of Dune—a fun albeit flawed film—then think of the pain box. Kyle McLaughlin puts his hand in the box, the box cranks the pain level by exponential leaps and bounds but if he moves his hand the priestess will stab him in the neck with a poisoned needle thingy (there are a lot of “thingies” in this version of dune. The bladeless helicopter thingie, the internal monologue thingie, and of course the weird solid light armor box thingie).

So yeah, it was like that. A few days later I had to return and have the right one taken care of. It was unpleasant, but certainly not in the realm of excruciating.

Odd then, that the left ear was a horrible experience, yet I didn’t curse. I like to curse, and people in pain tend to curse; in fact, for the first 12 hours I believe my descriptive lexicon consisted of “golly” “man alive!” and “highly unpleasant”

My memory isn’t perfect but in 29 years I have NEVER even thought the phrase “man alive!” Is that even a real phrase?! Where the fuck did I get that from?? I know not, seems a bit redundant though. Men do tend to be alive.

On the tournament

I got my ass handed to me again. I'm just going to have to work more often at BJJ to develop competency. The good news is I walked away with no cuts, bruises, sprains, etc.

At the gym today, in fact, as I was preparing to do some chest work on a stability ball, someone taps me on the shoulder, I turn around and the guy looks like a middleweight/lightheavy weight. Asks me my name and if I was at the tourney this weekend. We had a nice discussion about training, etc. He told me about another dojo, in town that does ju-jitsu (One kind specifically?? not sure) . That offer more training times. He also mentioned that his sensai was interested in training teachers. I'm seriously considering checking it out; I don't have any plans on switching, but if I can get more drill time, more roll time, more input, I might sign up. I might have to drop kick boxing for the time being though :/

Ah, to be an obsessive personality working through a trauma.

Fabulous Dreams of Death

“The dreams in which I’m dying are the best I’ve ever had”

--Tears For Fears

A sentiment I’ve always related too, albeit it a slanted comparison. I dreamed my sister died last night. As far as my dreams go it was fairly lucid. I didn’t have control or anything, I just remembered a bit more than usual. There were no monsters or parasites or bizarro manifestations of real life counterparts. Nope. The house was the house. People were people. No Lynchian symbolism. No dream logic. Quite simply, her dumb ass finally died in a shower (I was told about this, I didn’t see it unfold) a culmination of years of drug use, drinking, bad eating habits etc. In the dream I was relieved to hear she was finally dead. People could get on with their lives. Everyone was free from her emotional abuse, her callous disregard for others, her valley-girl babykicking horseshit, and her lies. There was a sense of freedom.

Part of me was aware this was a dream, but like I said, I lacked the ability to manipulate events. When I woke up, I was disappointed—still alive, sigh. And I’m not ashamed in the least. It was one of my better R.E.M. experiences, I don’t sleep well as a rule, remembered dream or not. Death, though, seems to stimulate better R.E.M. experiences for me. I remember, years ago, dreaming the death of my best friend, and waking up refreshed. It was off putting for me, but it didn’t change the fact that I slept well. This latest dream seems to establish a pattern.

A few words on restraining orders

They are a bureaucratic mess. My lawyer has referred me to his partner.

Things are tough all over

Last night, 3 am or thereabouts, I called my girlfriend and cried, despairing over my inability to find solace from my sister. Who is the bigger threat now? Two idiots wandering the halls of my psyche hiding in the shadows of the Parthenon, or my sister, real, present, and worst of all, related.

In another show of frustration and impotence, I got manhandled in BJJ, and the entire time it felt like I shouldn’t, that I should be doing BETTER. One guy is actually smaller than me our rolls had gotten competitive. Not tonight. Not a chance. He controlled me from the get go, made me tap—more than once I think. I’m a head of the class kind of guy, I don’t like being the dunce. I need to dedicate more training time on the weekends. After my next paycheck I’ll try and schedule a private lessons.

I realized tonight that not only is my triangle defense lacking, I’m not any good at applying the hold either. I need to give attention to positives too. Triangle defense is incrementally better as is over all conditioning, but conditioning won’t mean much if I can’t win my first match.

I need a shield

I've emailed my lawyer about the nuances of a restraining order. I intend to get one against my sister

This is what the edge looks like

Friday: Sister arrives at the house. How she got in I’m not sure. Parents are away. She isn’t supposed to be here, brings her dog, an abused mutt. Dog has no crate. No private space. I try to hide in my room. I felt slimy, upset. Lost my appetite. She leaves, “will be back around 11.” She leaves her dog so I can’t lock her out (Did she have a key? Did I forget to lock the door?) My condition doesn’t improve; I dread her return. I take a shower, the usual violent scenarios play out in my head. I go to a friend’s place for a few hours; I bring him up to speed. I’m taking care of the dogs this weekend so I return. My sister returns at roughly the same time. I manage to get the dogs walked. I keep them in the back of the house for the rest of the night. Sister leaves.

Saturday:

A little after midnight I receive the following text message:

Boyfriend is acting crazy don’t answer the house phone.

The same boyfriend who is 6”6 and over 250 lbs, the same boyfriend who put her dumb ass in the ER, I don’t fall asleep until after 4 am.

The phone is ringing; the door bangs. I wake up at about 8:20. Caller ID lists the boyfriend’s name. I try to wait it out. More ringing, louder banging, person is moving from one door to another. The fear is too much I call 911. I’m trying to keep my composure. Operator tells me to barricade the door. I do. I’m convinced he’s going to break in any minute now. Operator wants me to explain the situation. I do my best list the factors involved. Someone else picks up the line.

“Oh my gawd, I couldn’t get in, you locked all the doors, thanks a lot!”

My sister has an accent that fuses southern twang with valley girl. She is upset, disgusted by my selfishness.

Dumb
-Struck.
Embarrassed.
Humiliated.

I stammer out an apology to the operator, who tells me something about 911 being for emergencies.

My sister’s words are lodged in my head. How did she get in? Where is she? I look around. I go upstairs. The door to the locked. I call her name. She answers.

I bang on the door, shouting, screaming at her for her insult. Screaming at her for making me relive a break in, for anticipating a violent show down with a much larger man, and for not telling me she was coming over. I don’t remember much of what I said, but “I hate you” was definitely part of the spiel.

It takes me ten minutes, but I finally track my mother down. I am outside, barefoot in the driveway. I yell; I cry, but it doesn’t matter. Sister doesn’t leave the house.

Sunday:

Between 2 am and 9 am she leaves, her dog is gone, but my sister has left a mess behind for me to clean up

Bodies

Haven’t been around lately have I? I was prepping for my first tournament. It was yesterday. I had two matches one no-gui and one gui. I lost both matches too the same opponent, who seemed like a stand-up guy and didn’t appear to outweigh me by much. Surprisingly, I did better in the no-gui than the gui. I went the distance: single 4 minute round plus one round OT. In the gui he caught me in a triangle. I held out as long as I could but when he rolled me I knew I was fucked. I reluctantly brought my hand up to tap, was then surprised by how weakly I tapped, then went into convulsions. I was conscious of this. Normally, if this happens to someone they pass out FIRST. I remember being calm and realizing what was happening to me I took a deep yoga breath and regained bodily control

If there are any white belts reading this or MMA guys let me tell you what I learned from the experience:

1. If one cannot pass guard in the span of a yoga breath, then you don’t know how to pass guard.
2. Do not think of passing guard as merely a transition, it is an offense maneuver that allows you to establish dominance.
3. My instructor taught me to fight for superior position, don’t just say fuck it and go to guard. However, there are plenty of white belts who do this and even from the stand up phase, call it the “flying guard” if you will. Do not let them get away with this. Find a way to pass guard before you hit the ground, submitthem if you know how.

4. My triangle defense sucks, my takedowns need work too.
5. No-gui can move at break neck pace, proper conditioning requires sprint work as well as running a hard mile.

6. Even though my logic behind entering this tournament was sound, try to space out your competitive events more than a few weeks, 2-3 in a four month span, with about a month between each, and even that is pushing it.

Also, I think the massive number of strawberry burns may be indicative of poor form on my part (no one else seems to get them), but I don’t know what exactly I’m doing wrong.

I’ll try to be better about posting this week.

Marriage

Marriage. Not a fan. Not an enthusiastic proponent; I’m not against it either. I’m not sure what it really demonstrates anymore. Am I frightened of “till death do us part?” I shouldn’t be. Divorce is legal, safe, and available pretty much anywhere in the United States. Do I fear the myth of marriage? The timelessness? The adjacent question would be do I fear the myth of divorce? Which in pop culture is often regarded as a miserable experience that is never really over even when its over. It undoes the very physics that Yogi Berra laid down for mortal man. I like the idea of the reception. I really like the idea of a party with lots of food, dancing with my girlfriend, feeding her cake. Yes. I like the romance, the myth of THAT event. I have a pretty good idea of what sort of cake I’d like to have. I saw this one on Food Network. It was a layered cake given the tilted effect, to create an illusion of instability, of wobbliness. On the top the groom is flailing about on the edge of the cake ready to take that plunge into oblivion. I believe the bride looked on in shock or she was reaching out for him. I like both models. All it needs is a Scottish Terrier doing something rascally. Is he peeing on the top layer? Perhaps he’s charging after the groom, willing to take the leap? He is most likely observing the fiasco with detached disdain.

Marriage strikes me as a profound understatement. Get Married? Till death do us part? When they left us in the bathtub something else happened. We were bonded for life. There are moments I wish she would die so I could be released. There are times it’s easier to accept. I can respect it, grudgingly admire it. After everything we are still alive, still together. We haven’t given up, but now it feels like I have a little less say in the matter.

I wonder how many married couples really understand the bond they are supposed to have. Like most things that represent “traditional values” marriage lives in an illusion. It is the thing you have to do, but somehow the requirement of the thing has devalued the thing. It has pragmatic purposes and benefits, but it is supposed to solidify and codify a spiritual bond that I don’t think most people have/find/cultivate/obtain. At this point in my life I think the idea people can will a spiritual bond is folly and profoundly dumb, might as well and try to bend a spoon with your mind, that requires willpower too.

Hmmmm

It just occurred to me I haven’t really written much about my girlfriend. I think there are several reasons for that. One, we are long distance right now and her interaction with my life has been limited. I talk to her almost every day, but since she isn’t here I don’t have much in the way of story time. Two, I don’t want this blog to be a soap opera; fights are fights but the problems are straight forward. Issues of love have a way of spiraling. Three, a modest amount of navel gazing is greasing the wheel of this blog.

The State of Things

You’d think I’d have a lot to say considering I started teaching today. Nope. English is English. ENC 1101 or ENG 101 or Introduction to Writing blah blah it’s the same thing. The schools change only in a vague architectural sense. Some are prisons. Others are disorienting Rorschach blotches, while others are just messes dumped in different parts of the city. The students don’t change and neither does the bureaucracy. As they say in Hollywood, Nobody knows anything. And that’s really that. My schedule is the only things that really changes.

Heck, there isn’t much to report on the martial art front either. I think I’m starting to develop a better sense of body awareness and defense in BJJ, and my punches and kicks are marginally better in JKD.

Home front: Shared the details of my fight (sister) with a friend of mine. He believes that my reaction was understandable. “Had I been there I would have tried to hold you back…until that last comment. I would have helped you chase her down.” He was amazed I didn’t kill her the next time I saw her. Some of my friends think I have amazing emotional control, but if so it is sorely taxed in any familial argument. Although I gotta tell ya, if it wasn’t for the whole anonymity thing, I wouldn’t be using the word “sister.” I might not even be willing to acknowledge a familial relationship, but I’ve got continuity issues to manage so as not to confuse my readership of two.

Sneer

The disgusting vapid mess known as my sister is wandering the house. If I'm not locked away in my room, I'll probably leave the house. She has demonstrated no remorse for what she said.


To his credit my father has tried to make amends in his own nonverbal way.

Slow Down Cowboys

Saw this over at Americablog.com:

Funny, I always thought being a Republican was a lifestyle choice. Now I see that they're born that way. Still, with gene therapy, anything is possible.

From the LA Times:

In a simple experiment reported today in the journal Nature Neuroscience, scientists at New York University and UCLA show that political orientation is related to differences in how the brain processes information.

Previous psychological studies have found that conservatives tend to be more structured and persistent in their judgments whereas liberals are more open to new experiences. The latest study found those traits are not confined to political situations but also influence everyday decisions.

The results show "there are two cognitive styles -- a liberal style and a conservative style," said UCLA neurologist Dr. Marco Iacoboni, who was not connected to the latest research.

Participants were college students whose politics ranged from "very liberal" to "very conservative." They were instructed to tap a keyboard when an M appeared on a computer monitor and to refrain from tapping when they saw a W.

M appeared four times more frequently than W, conditioning participants to press a key in knee-jerk fashion whenever they saw a letter.

Each participant was wired to an electroencephalograph that recorded activity in the anterior cingulate cortex, the part of the brain that detects conflicts between a habitual tendency (pressing a key) and a more appropriate response (not pressing the key). Liberals had more brain activity and made fewer mistakes than conservatives when they saw a W, researchers said.


As a lefty I guess I should be beating my chest and handing out "I told you so's" wrapped in red foil snark. Some in the progressive blogosphere see this as a vindication. Proof of..well, everything they hate about conservatism, but I'm not sold. One, this study seems to be abiding but that most convenient of Western World blunders, the dualism. There are only two political ideologies? Wha?
Secondly, when it comes to politics there are really only two tests that matters:

The Milgram Test:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment

and this one:
http://www.prisonexp.org/

No one is immune. Over two thirds of subjects failed the milgram. Authoritarianism can co-opt any ideological system

Shoot outs

September 13, 2007

Do family dysfunctions generate a gravitational pull? Can you avoid them? Is the only way to do it to severe ties? I got into separate arguments with my father and my sister: two people who seriously test my patience and two people for whom I go out of my way to avoid confrontations, but it is no use. The former will go out of his way to pick and pick and pick at your skin, criticizing everything you do, and when you finally tell him enough he wants to know why your so angry with him? Why don’t you take the time to talk with him? Frankly, he doesn’t listen to anything I say. My sister is similar. She took in an abused dog, one that refuses to eat or drink unless SHE serves it water or food. Her absence is tantamount to abuse. When I voiced my concerns because WE were taking care of it “I need to mind my own business” and “get off your high horse.” She had already dumped two dogs on my mother, and it looked to me she was going for a hat trick. I called her on it.

Both arguments were similar in structure. I don’t pretend to be an angel,(yet both of them LOVE to say I’m moralizing). I really don’t want to spend a lot of times on the details. I said nasty things, and I’ll say more in years to come, but Christ, I have to admit there are something I even I can’t anticipate.

My father accused me of studying the martial arts so I could be beat him up. Huh???(That’s been one of his things lately, he’s been criticizing me for taking martial arts). If he really believes that, his paranoia is worse then I’d suspected. Hell, it looks like he’s taking a swan dive into senility. He KNOWS I’m using the martial arts as a way of coping.

And my sister? In what may be the world’s first coup de gras (sp?) of both cowardice and shit slinging, from her car fifty yards away yelled that I shouldn’t talk about taking care of her dog since I let my girlfriend get raped.

Take a minute to let that one sink in.

Well, I don’t know how anyone else would have reacted, but I broke into a full sprint and she hauled ass out of the cul-de-sac, didn’t even pause for the stop sign at the top of the hill. What would I have done if I caught her? I don’t know, but since she was in a car, there’s not a whole lot I could have done, which I suppose is for the best.

And keep in mind I wasn’t looking for trouble in either case.

Both my father and sister are classic babykickers. My sister has splintered our family and my father, well, he vacillates among accusing my mother of trying to sabotage him when something goes wrong, screwing HER over, and desperately trying to lap up the attention of my sister, giving her anything she wants, no matter how many people she betrays, no matter how many rules she breaks That poor dog is just going to be another name on her list.

I really don’t want anything to do with either of them anymore. Hell, I don’t even know which one disgusts me more. I have no way to quantify behavior like this.

A few days ago ABC News reported that an autopsy of Chris Benoit’s brain had, in fact, been done. The results: the brain of an 85 year old man with alzheimer’s. Woah. In the tiny sphere of smart marks some have called the autopsy absolution, while at least one reporter has claimed that the only thing it proves is that Benoit had head trauma. Huh???

When I think Alzheimer’s I think two things: gaping holes in memory and dementia, lots and lots of dementia. Considering the accelerated age of the brain (85) lets assume Benoit experienced both, because when I hear “brain of an 85 year old man with Alzheimer’s” I don’t think “oh this must have been the early stages” I think “this is the mental equivalent of a hell dimension.”

His ability to grapple with reality was seriously handicapped. His judgment was impaired. The legal definition of insanity is rooted in one’s ability to discern right from wrong. If reality was constantly shifting under his feet then I fail to see how the autopsy DOESN’T absolve him. How can you know right from wrong when you could be reliving in the events of August 2006 (arbitrary date) when it’s August 2007. In his mind Benoit could have been reliving a match or worse reliving a fight with Nancy.

But this narrative faces a few potholes. One, why didn’t anyone NOTICE this??? Two, WWE vigorously denies Benoit manifested any mental ailments. In a company stricken by group-speak, a complete failure of critical thought isn’t unusual but missing advanced Alzheimer’s? I dunno, something is rotten in Stanford, CT. Correction: Something is STILL rotten in Stanford, CT.

I don’t think the story has completely unraveled yet. Congress will be holding hearings on WWE quite soon. They’re already in deep do-do because of the recent steroid expose’. If anyone in that company is trying to cover their tracks they are playing with fire.

BTW Short version

After yelling at mother (no tantrum just yelling) the coworker apologized. I don't think my mother or the coworker really understood what upset me, but seeing how this is a person who never apologizes I decided to accept it and live and let live

Hi there

Been away for a few days, enjoying the time I had with my girlfriend, but I'm a little distressed. Most of the visit went ok, but near the end I experienced virtual tantrums. In my head I lost my temper and shook her but never outside the boundaries of my imagination. This is one of the reasons I wanted to move away from her in the first place, learning to cope with that emotional harmonic is difficult for me because I have thrown violent tantrums in the past, never around her though. I've had a couple of major depressive episodes in my life and the last one expressed itself through screaming, crying, tossing, the kind of displays that tend to be a deal breaker in a relationship. If you've ever seen Punch Drunk Love--and if you haven't you should--my relationship to anger parrallels that of the Adam Sandler character. Regardless of the tempo of reality I experience anger as a slow creeping, crawling build, and when I explode people look at me with a "gee wtf was that about?" or "that uncalled for" look on their faces. She was unaware I was having these thoughts until a few days ago.

I'm making things sound worse than they are. We had a good time filled with sex, talking, eating, exercise (mostly me exercising) watching movies and more sex.

There is danger in fighting fools

Something happened at work today that really pissed me off. I was answering phones. Etc when my mother was relating a story to coworkers in another room. I grew up in the South during the pre Hispanic immigration boom. My parents would have to constantly spell our last name for people. One day, when I was 2 or so, I corrected someone and spelled the last name for them. Another coworker quipped that it was the only time I had ever spoken up for myself. This “woman” has known my mother for years. She is a good nurse, but an ass, loud and obnoxious. In addition she must be one or more of the following: stupid, because I was in earshot (and she, as always, was the loudest person), classless, because she has, as far as I know, a basic idea of what happened to me, ignorant, because she doesn’t really know me as well as thinks she does as she has never spent any amount of time with me that I would consider revealing in any way.

Her comment made me angry…but I didn’t say anything. And I’m not so sure if that was the proper recourse. By not saying anything one could say I strengthened her case, but if I had said something I…don’t think I could have stopped before making a scene. Nor am I convinced taking action would have been productive. She belongs to a very special class of people: the baby kickers.

What separates a baby kicker from your usual asshole isn’t that she’d kick a baby, that would be too generic; rather, when said baby would cry SHE’D turn around and get upset. “This baby is annoying! She hurts my ears! Someone make her shut up” So I risk her making a scene in an office environment that can get pretty high pressure in a short time span. I don’t know where maturity stops and authoritarianism begins.

Also, after thinking about it later, I’m disappointed in my mother. Why didn’t she stand up for me? We will have to have a talk about this later. It didn’t bother me at the time, but the more I think about it the angrier it makes me.

On a more pleasant note my girlfriend is coming to town tomorrow. She is big on table top RPGs particularly the old Changeling game. Well, the new one came out and I’ve already bought her a copy. I’ve also got her some Newman’s Own lemonade, which is the greatest mass produced lemonade in the history of ever. IF you haven’t tried it, get off your ass! It’s gotten harder and harder to find in the last three years. Hell, I hadn’t found anywhere that sold for well over a year, but I finally found a place. Now if I could only get my hands on a pint of Stephen Colbert’s Americone Dream.

BTW When I hear the phrase “Americone Dream” my mind fills with a certain Spanish insult.

We haven’t spent anytime together in well over .

I’m thinking about what happened again. Grr. I’m gonna watch wrestling….hopefully that won’t make me angrier.

On the good and the bad 2

I related a story of my own. It happened, I believe, before zero hour, but I’m not sure. I was reading The Lucifer Effect by Dr. Zimbardo, the man responsible for the Stanford Prison Experiment. The book uses the SPE as a springboard into the nature of evil and authoritarianism as an expression of evil. I began the book before zero hour and was determined to finish it even after that horrible night. In the background I had the television on. Food Network was running one of their big challenges. The contestants were making cakes, HUGE cakes celebrating the glory that was Food Network, the golden calf of a certain kind of foodie and lovers of food porn everywhere. As in most Food Network competitions, the participants had to move their cakes from their respective kitchens to the display table. One group simply couldn’t move it, the mammoth cake was simply too much. They struggled and struggled; they got nowhere. They were on the verge of being disqualified. Out of nowhere one of the participants from an opposing group came over to help, then another participant, and so on and so on. It took everyone, at least six people to move this cake; but they moved it, and the live audience cheered.

Goodness comes in small doses, unexpected places, the gaps.

From this day forth

I’ve decided on a name: zero hour. Dramatic, yes, but it defines things in the cleanest way possible, without insulting me.

Life before, life after. Zero represents the pivot, the transition, the center point.

On the good and the bad

At the reunion I got into a discussion with a former classmate about evil. This was the classmate to whom I clumsily revealed the events of late April. We bounced around a bit, but I wanted to share a few of the details. Like any good conversation about evil we discussed the holocaust. I had taken a graduate course: the holocaust and film. She had read a few books on the subject, and visited one of the camp sites. The holocaust was about …well it was about a lot of things. Without going off on a tangent it is, among other things, about the capacity of human beings to inflict suffering and to cope with suffering, and the strange microcosm formed by representatives from both groups as they etch out a gaunt coexistence.

This, in turn, led us to talk about goodness. I’m afraid I can’t do her story justice—and I might get the details wrong-- but here goes. In the barracks a woman preached: God, etc. There were insects in these barracks, nasty ones torturing the prisoners. The woman said that even the insects should be loved. Of course the prisoners scoffed. These bugs were hateful things, eating them alive.

There was a cruel SS guard (there usually is in these stories). But the guard wouldn’t bother the women, while they were in their barracks, thus allowing the women to practice their religion. As it turned out, she refused to enter thPublish Poste barracks because of the same bugs.

I suppose the power of the “good” in this little ditty depends on which you’d rather be, eaten by bugs or at the mercy of an SS guard.

Ten Year Reunion

I went to my high school graduation this weekend. It began as unreal. Many-a-girl had gained quite a few pounds. In most cases I think it was pregnancy weight, but I wasn’t gonna risk asking that question. The guys weren’t much better, that’s not to say that everyone was morbidly obese, but I’ve always been a bit weight conscious. (My weight hasn’t fluctuated much at all). When people broke off into clusters, and I found myself watching from afar THAT’S when it felt like high school. I wasn’t excluded or an outcast in high school. It just always felt there was this large emotional gulf between me and everyone else; I experienced this even with the groups of people I was friends with.

Most everyone attended, thirty five out of a possible forty one. A large chunk of my class have advanced degrees—several J.Ds, at least two Masters, and one M.D.

I told one person, about what happened to me. I try not to just so I don’t have to answer a lot of questions about my girlfriend. Unfortunately, my inner monologue collapsed on me, so I didn’t have much of a choice. Her reaction, of course, was shock and concern.

Getting my asked kicked: its raining very bad men

I will be elated when the BJJ class becomes a true Gui BJJ class, and not merely an opportunity for high school wrestlers to throw me around, content to pummel me with their superior stamina and knowledge of strength based grappling. Don’t get me wrong, I think it is good to mix things up. Its good for BJJ practitioners to get a taste of Greco-Roman and Freestyle wrestling, but we’re not being instructed in classical wrestling so its really frustrating when we start to spar and those wrestling fucks chuck the stuff we learned out the window and wale on me. Wrestling sparring is like a sprint or trying to run a fast mile. Your conditioning has to be tip top. Although mine is certainly above average, I got a painful lesson last night in how wanting it is. How wanting? About 15 oz of vomit wanting. And the worst part about that was I couldn’t do it in the dojo where there was a bathroom, nooooooooo. My body waited until I was on the road, in what felt like the longest ten minute drive in the history of ever. I was light headed. I was exhausted. When I got home I lay prone in the bathtub while the shower blasted a stream of water that beat my chest like some kind of machine gun percussion instrument.

Twelve minutes. That’s the time total I did sparring drills. I had breaks for christ’s sake! I am wracking my brain trying to figure out how to get my body into proper shape for the Martial Arts and now I’ve got to work on conditioning on top of everything else. I have patella femoral syndrome (knee problems) I don’t even know if I can run a hard mile safely! Fuck fuck fuck!!!

I need short burst, intense cardiovascular training. I need power. I need skill, flexibility, and the knowledge to facilitate these things, and kids I am scrounging for it.

Don’t mean to whine. It’s just frustrating. I have an easier time being out skilled than I do being beaten by poor cardio. The first is external, the latter is internal.

The bad man is gassing

My groin is feeling better, not 100% but I’ve been playing things conservatively. Even though I didn’t want to, I skipped BBJ tonight to give it more time to heal. I did some weight training though (back), and 45 minutes on an elliptical rider.

My tummy is feeling a bit queasy.

Trauma and Body Blows

I just experienced a moment of absolute frustration. My girlfriend was raped and I couldn’t do anything. I lay on the floor wondering if my last meal would be a Stouffer’s French Bread Pizza (supreme). I’d be lying if I said my dive into Martial Arts had nothing to do with the event. Clearly it does, in fact, I’m almost certain I want to work towards a black belt, but that would mean staying here.

I was accepted into the film MFA production program at University of Miami, but I deferred for various reasons: not sure if our relationship could stand the stress, cost, and they waited to the last second to tell me. I hadn’t even looked at the campus. If I stay here I’m going to have pursue another degree of some kind. I am, unfortunately, one of those poor unfortunate souls addicted to student life. I have an MA in lit, but theory isn’t my passion, although some aspects of it fascinate me. The world of nine to five bores me, I tire of it easily. Academics are paid in free time moreso than cash, which does allow them opportunities to pursue other interests, but like I said I’m addicted; I never said I loved it passionately. There are times when I’m disgusted by the beaurocracy, the absurd tendency to overspecialization. You can’t just get a degree in creative writing, you have to focus on fiction OR poetry OR nonfiction etc. This discourages experimentation and gives the Ivory tower a little bit too much say in what qualifies as good writing—genre writing, no matter what anyone says, is seriously downplayed.

Make the bad man stop 2

I’ve tried to tread lightly with the groin injury today, and boy howdy I hate treading lightly. I kept an ice pack between my inner thigh and my scrotum on and off for about eight hours today. I think I succeeded in sterilizing myself; my girlfriend will never have to worry about a leaky condom again.

I’m lucky to have parents who run their own medical practice. I didn’t even know there was such a thing as ibuprofen cream.

Normally I do my leg workout on Tuesdays but thought better of it, opting to do my shoulders instead. I didn’t do any cardio work at the gym, rather I just did a beginner JKD workout at the dojo. I think it was 85 degrees in there. Add that to the one hour workout and I think, considering my injury it’s a sensible cardio workout. Once this heels I’m going to start attending both the level 1 workout and the level 2 workout proceeding it, but learning the choreography of these combinations is driving me batty. Plus, I feel a little guilty. I’m not exactly a wiz when its my turn to hold the..er..target thingies. I don’t like thinking I jipped someone out of their workout (even the beginners seem light years ahead of me).

I’m starting to rethink my whole approach to weightlifting, cardio, etc. I need to develop a workout that will promote better flexibility, focus on increasing strength even at the cost of muscle mass.

I need power, I need speed, I need better endurance, and I need better flexibility.

I hope I’m not going to have to make a lot of changes to my diet.

BTW While I’m thinking MMA, my partner tonight was pushing me to keep my guard up, but is it me or do a lot of the UFC/Pride/WEC guys employ a low guard? Mere sloppiness or is there a tactical reason for doing so?

Make the bad man stop

BBJ was nasty tonight. We spent most of practice doing drills where the man in the guard position couldn't use his hands, AND he had to keep an open guard. This drill is a great way to build endurance and make you stronger in the guard position...Too bad my left inner thigh told me to go fuck myself. On the very first drill I felt something...pop?...give?..I'm worried. If I'm lucky I merely pulled my groin, if I'm unlucky I tore it. SO naturally I had to tough it out and cycle through the drill as many times as Sifu ran it. I'm icing it now, and it ain't easy trying to ice your inner thigh without freezing your testicles.

When I came home there was glass all over the kitchen floor all the dogs were loose, and somebody peed on the side of my bed. Suffice to say I was nonplussed.

BTW A Sifu is like a Sensai. I think the difference is a sufi is a title for Kung Fu practitioners...at least I think that's what it correlates to.

Saturday Night

I'm watching Saturday Night's Main Event. Why? I have an extra chromosome....an extra chromosome made of wrestling! Seriously though, I'm not expecting much.

JKD

I've mentioned before I've started taking a class in BBJ/Submission Wrestling. I'm also taking a beginner's course in Jeet Kune Do. The more I learn about JKD the more I like it. (I think Bruce Lee's impact on history has been severly underestimated).

I went outside to practice some boxing combinations, but I could only remember two! So I did my best to flow from one to the other and alternate lead hands.

If anyone could recommend some training texts for beginners I'd be much obliged, as I need something to compensate for my absent mindedness.

Re: Benoit 2

There was something else I wanted to make note of from the comments. If I understood correctly someone was taking issue with the length of the piece. Originally, I had submitted this as a reader column/letter to the fans for PWinsider.com, so it was intended as a long piece from the get go, not a series of easily digestible nuggets. I admit sometimes bloggers can get carried away; I don't think 'puter screens are conducive to sustained periods of reading, but every once in a while I think it needs to be done.

Re: Benoit

I was very nervous about the Benoit column. Would anyone like it? Would anyone sympathize? Would there be trolls? Would anyone who read it even bother to respond? The answers to all of those questions has been a resounding yes. Heck, this place is starting to look like a real blog.


I hope one day we have all the answers to the case, but it seems unlikely. At one point, Chris Newinski (sp?) , who has become an expert on concussions, petitioned for a gander at Benoit's grey matter. I don't know if he got the chance; i believe the body has been cremated.

Its easy to play armchair detective in this case. There are a dizzying variety of clues, red herrings, puzzling symbols, and half-truths. But if I were a betting man I'd call this death by a thousand cuts or even insanity by a thousand cuts. In other words I don't think it was steroids in and of themselves but steroids plus concussions plus the stress of constant little injuries plus the grueling travel schedule plus et cetera et cetera.

Benoit Is Us: Facing Evil Head On

I've been working on this post for sometime. If you are visiting this site by way of PWinsider.com thank you for stopping by. Be advised this post is not for the feint of heart. Also, I'd like to thank Dave Scherer for agreeing to post a link.

Benoit. Chris Benoit. The Wolverine. The Rabid Wolverine. The Crippler. The Canadian Crippler. Former WWE Heavyweight Champion. The man who won said championship at the main event of Wrestlemania 20 at Madison Square Garden. Revered as quite possibly the greatest in ring worker of all time. His technique, superb. He could adapt to any style: lucha libre, Japanese, American Strong, hardcore, Sports Entertainment. So gifted was Chris Benoit at his craft that at the 2000 Royal Rumble, after losing a 20 minute match with Kurt Angle, he, and by he I mean Benoit, received a standing ovation from the crowd. It wasn’t the first time. It wasn’t the last. If we lived in the Marvel Universe, Benoit would have been a mutant, or at the very least, rumors of genetic mutation would have dogged him to the grave.

Then again, no one really knows what dogged Benoit. The stories twist and turn on themselves, but something dogged him. Something chewed at his mind—chewed up his mind. He killed his wife. He killed his son. He killed himself. For me, Benoit was a personal hero. Some guys had John Wayne, others had Clint Eastwood or Michael Jordan; I had Chris Benoit.

I’m hesitant to talk about this, how Benoit relates to me. He is survived by an ex-wife, two more children, and his parents. Whatever my connection to Benoit, its pails in comparison to theirs, and then there’s the parents of his wife Nancy, who I imagined are pretty fuckin’ pissed at Chris for taking their daughter and grandson to an early grave. Still, I’m compelled.

My girlfriend was raped. I was forced to watch, the barrel of a gun pressed against my head. (If I’m extremely unlucky she’ll be reading this right now). We thought we were going to die, but we didn’t. We survived, but survivors need reasons. They need reassurance that life is worth living, that despite all the evil and cruelty in the world Hawaiian pizza is great, that the letter to a certain Virginia about a certain fat man wasn’t bullshit, that people still love them, and that Chris Benoit is the best in the biz.

{So what do I do? I just lost my favorite reason, but I am more sad than angry, more frustrated than betrayed, yet I feel all these emotions as does every wrestling fan.}

I don’t know if the memory of Chris, both the character and the person, can be rehabilitated, that seems too just, too fair; fairytales, despite their popularity, exert no influence on physics, have no sway in the kingdoms of chance and uncertainty.

There is something I want to address though, something that has maddened me as I listen to hotlines and lurk through message boards and chat rooms:

“We will never understand why Chris Benoit did what he did; and we shouldn’t, that will make us more like him”

I’ve heard several variations on this asinine drivel over the last few weeks and I’d like to take the time to squash it now. It is time for this bad idea to do the J-O-B.

First, I’d like to accuse anyone subscribing to this philosophy as engaging in an act of moral and intellectual cowardice. You are horribly misguided. Second, I’m going to prove it…once I subsume my rage.

(pausing to subsume rage, which sits in my throat like a hot ball of iron)

What facilitated the crime is secondary, ( I am concerned with the “why” not so much the “what”) and I cannot speak to the nuances of the case, but Chris Benoit killed his wife and child because he was afraid of losing them, a gruesome act, yes, but a normal part of the animal kingdom. It happens every day, whether it is in the wild or by domesticated pets.

Congratulations, you’re a bit more like Chris Benoit now. Are you going to murder someone? Do I need to call 911? Is a suicide watch more appropriate? Of course not, knowing why he committed murder is no different than listening to a Judas Priest song. Maybe you don’t believe me. Maybe you think I’m being glib. Then consider this. There is an entire science devoted to the study of crime: criminology. Criminologists study crime statistics, the power of the media on crime and how it shapes our perceptions of crime. They study the impact of crime on victims, and the hold trauma can have on a person’s life. And yes boys and girls, they study criminals. Why they do it, what happens before, during, and after the act; and they construct profiles. Oh yeah, guess what! Do you know who is most likely to steal from you? Rape you? Murder you? Most likely someone you know, and often times someone you love.

Hmmm, but if we follow the logic of the given quote to its conclusion, that means criminologists are more like Chris Benoit because they understand more about trauma and the nature of evil! Folks, we are gonna need a lot of prison cells.

No, it is the refusal to understand what Benoit did and why he did it that really makes a person MORE like Chris Benoit, because he, in a state of ignorance, with no sense of context, is far more likely to fall into a hell like Benoit’s because he lacks the tools to see the signs, to diagnose the symptoms in himself or someone he loves! This is why genocide happens over and over again. It is why rape is used as a tool to terrorize entire populaces, and it’s why no one who knew Benoit anticipated his descent: ignorance makes us susceptible to evil! What’s wrong? You don’t want to know what made the SS commit atrocity upon atrocity against the Jews? Wonderful! Consider yourself one step closer to being part of the next SS. Evil doesn’t merely thrive on ignorance; evil works through ignorance.

Human nature isn’t pretty. We are capable of astonishing ugliness, all of us, Benoit, McMahon, me, and you. I’ve studied terrorism. I’ve studied pedophiles. I’ve studied the holocaust—and god damnit I didn’t let the nightmares stop me--been the victim of a heinous crime, and with each book I read, each film I watch, I become less and less like them, and in return they are demystified, stripped of their gimmicky boogie man powers, and I see them as they really are: broken people. If you don’t have the constitution to plunge into these materials the way I do, that’s ok, some of it is gruesome stuff, but don’t sit there and tell me that you are preserving your humanity or keeping yourself pure from the taint of evil because we’re covered in it. Your shit, my friends, does in fact stink.

There is another reason though. One that is more important. Chances are that the “men”—I use the term to denote biology only— who violated us will never be caught. My girlfriend and I will not have the satisfaction of staring them down in a courtroom, in the presence of a judge and a jury of our peers. We will never know why one of them raped her, nor will we know why the other never made a real effort to stop him. Ignorance hurts. Now consider the family of the deceased. Chris’s parents will never know what made their son, a quiet kid who loved to read, into a killer. He threw all his passion into become a professional wrestler, an entertainer, someone who takes pleasure in making other people happy, not crushing them under the heel of his boot. Nancy’s parents will never have the chance to confront Chris, never have the opportunity to interrogate him “Why did you kill our daughter? Why did you kill our grandson? We trusted you” But it may be Benoit’s remaining children who suffer the most. They must have more questions than surely you or I could anticipate and they burn, these questions, like a drop of uranium on their broken hearts. Their loyalties divided: the shame, the agony, and the guilt reaching cancerous levels. What could heal such astounding suffering? I don’t know, but every time someone says “We will never understand why Chris Benoit did what he did; and we shouldn’t, that will make us more like him” they deny the survivors the balm of knowledge. They make it sinful—evil—to search out those answers. I will not stand for this. I will not accept it. These survivors have a right to know why they have been made to suffer, regardless of whether or not it makes anyone feel icky inside.

Feel the power of Owie

My chest bone hurts! Another night another BBJ beatdown.

A few words on the bad guys

A Decree: A few words on the bad guys

I will not refer to the two perps as men, not ever again. They do not fulfill any definition of man that I find worthy. I am not trying to dehumanize them. They aren’t animals they aren’t monsters. I think it is fair to refer to them as children, stupid children, or ignorant, or assholes or bastards or dicks or perpetrators or perps but I think I like children best. These were the crimes of powerless children, fumbling desperately for some form of control. They couldn’t exert it over the direction of their own lives; they lacked the gravitational pull of intellect, the energy generated by character. They made us powerless, afraid, but they were never in control. They were fumbling idiots who stormed into the wrong apartment, could never agree on a course of action. What they took from us was temporary, whether they know it or nor they are wanted me—children, wanted by the police. They have no idea how fragile their own lives are. When those lives crumble, we will be waiting to confront them. The moment they wronged us they surrendered any hope of true empowerment.

I have no thirst for vengeance though. I believe in the justice system, flawed as it is, I believe in justice not merely as an idea, but as an achievable goal. They should be tried by a community.

I have very definite ideas of what should happen to perpetrators. But I will bring this up in a separate post.

Heros and Villians

So far, most of my posts have been short, as I'm trying to establish a pattern of blogging, while learning the ropes. Very soon, sometime tonight, I'm posting an extended--very extended entry--tying together aspects of the Benoit family tragedy and a pattern of response to the tragedy I've observed within the community of smart marks (wrestling nerds). Although I'll deal with Benoit (and a few references to what happened to us) I believe the discussion can be extended to issues of trauma and power writ large.

Oy

You know that feeling when you're at a loss for words? Imagine experiencing that every time your girlfriend needs your support. I need a speech writer. I'd like to expound on this, but I just got my ass kicked in a Brazilian Ju-Jitsu class. Ah, the healing power of violence.

Night Lights.

A few nights ago. I was lying in bed trying to go to sleep. I became scared. bam! out of nowhere. I don't even think any though triggered it. I couldn't sleep without a night light.
I'm living with my parents right now--it's a long story I'll go into it later--their marriage is strained. They sleep in different rooms. Some nights I don't feel comfortable unless I sleep in her room with three dogs.

I think about my girlfriend, wondering if I failed her. I've almost succeeded in convincing myself I haven't. We made it out alive. Most of the guilt I felt about the rape has subsided, but now I feel guilty for a different reason. I've experienced...hot flashes of rage..as if I was suddenly reach out and strangle her, screaming rabid vitriolic garble. I would never hurt her, but when I experience THAT I get a little scared, a little afraid.

When the bastards slip into the dark the only people you have left to hurt are the ones you love. And as the poetry gods would have it, your the only one around to prevent it. In other words, I have a conflict of interest.

In Search Of...

I'm currently looking for Trauma related resources. If anyone out there in the great wide can suggest possible links drop them in the comments section.

A Perfect Circle - Counting Bodies

Triumph! I figured out how to post videos on my blog. Instead of giving you a thirty minute spiel on politics, I decided to post this video; cut to a remix of a track by A Perfect Circle, which can be found on the Emotive album.

First Post

The genesis of this blog begins with a rape, not mine, but one I was forced to watch at gunpoint. Then again, a very good argument could be made that I was raped too, but I don't wanna do that today. I just want to set the stage. For now, just know that I'm male, I like prowrestling, the UFC, and reading among other things. You'll get to know more about me as time goes on. I don't want this blog to be exclusively about anything because I find it boring, but if you are curious about how sexual trauma affects males, well boy howdy you have struck gold.