[NON BLOG] Birthday Notes

A bit over 25 years ago, at a quarter to seven on Monday the 14th of January, 1980, in the old Charlottetown General Hospital, I was born. I've now reached, and passed, the quarter-century mark.

This feels odd. I'm an adult now, for starters; there's no way that I can pretend otherwise. I'm a person who's sufficiently mature to, among other things, get married or join the Canadian military without having to invoke parental consent. I'm responsible for my own welfare. This may, or may not, explain a certain mild anomie that I've felt lately, which may, or may not, be explained in the terms discussed in Quarterlife Crisis. I find myself at a bit of a loss at how to implement my aspirations, how to achieve what I'd like to achieve.

I've always felt this way, I suppose; feeling the lack of something is part of the human condition. The difference, now, is that I can be called to account for it, or (which is worse) not be at all and left to languish in mediocity. Neither option is acceptable; fortunately for me, neither option is inevitable.

In related notes, thanks to escondidoid for the gift of the book, and thanks again to choreo_m for the card. Both are appreciated. As well, last night's birthday festivities featuring my co-mid-January birthday friend bitterlawngnome were enjoyable--I look forward to the posting of the turnover fiction pieces.

[NON BLOG] Autopsies of Writings Past

Last Friday, I was looking over photocopies of articles that I'd written for The Cadre, UPEI's student newspaper, back in 1998. My mother had kindly photocopied them so I could add them to my resume, soon to be better than ever.

Reading over them, I was surprised how good they were. I suppose that I'd assumed, in the years after I'd abandoned my status as reporter, that the articles weren't good--that they were badly-written or poorly-sourced or something. None of those fears were true, though. One article in particular--an op-ed on the Nisga'a home rule agreement--is something that would fit in nicely with my current content. I was good.

I wish that I had stuck with it. Unfortunately, mildly competitive office politics caused me to opt out. It didn't help that, barely more than a year after I'd begun taking Zoloft, I was still a basket case incapable of handling much social contact with others.

Even so. The articles that I do have will fit nicely onto my resume. Just as importantly, these articles--and my current writings here on this weblog--demonstrate that I have what it takes to become a writer.

Even so. If only I'd been capable of keeping my position with The Cadre.

[NON BLOG] I know him ...

Visiting the website of The Advocate, I was both pleased and surprised to recognize a name in the current case regarding same-sex marriage in New York State (see also The Leader and Newsday.

Attorneys for 25 Ithaca, N.Y., same-sex couples seeking the right to marry said Friday that the state's opposition to gay marriage is akin to the mentality that once allowed slavery and discrimination against women and minorities. "The basis of the [the state's] opposition is that it goes against tradition. If tradition carried on, we would still have slavery," said Mariette Geldenhuys, one of the attorneys for the same-sex couples, who have been dubbed the "Ithaca 50."

[. . .]

Many of the couples attended Friday's 45-minute hearing. "The state makes the same old tired arguments," said Jim Pelton, who owns a house with his partner of seven years. "Civil rights are civil rights."

I met Jim at a retreat in upstate New York this past spring. It's good to know that he's continuing the good fight.

[BRIEF NOTE] Blogging, Post x+2

Via zarq, I found quixotickitten's essay "Words on the Internets (Or Where Stupidity Reigns)". She begins her essay by noting that her early and entirely positive experiences with online communities haven't continued unbroken to the present. This perplexes her:

I pretty much behave on the internet as I do in my regular flesh-and-blood life. I wouldn't write something that I wouldn't say in person. In fact, I'm much less likely to write something I wouldn't dare speak. Words are powerful, and writing them gives them a permanence and meaning that a passing remark in person would not likely possess. I also understand that true anonymity is an illusion; the world is indeed a small place.

What is the purpose, she goes on to ask, of being irresponsibly cruel, or violent-sounding, or just plain idiotic on the Internet? Either, she suggests, they minimize the power of the written word in these instances (in which case, why write them in the first place?), or they claim to be protected by anonymity (which tends to be paper-thin). She concludes by asking, "If anonymity is the key to unleashing the ugliest parts of humanity, what does that say about humanity? Are accountability and responsibility the only things that drive people to be nice?"

Possibly. Then again, as I noted on the 6th, that argument's based on the assumption that standards of niceness are shared. See the case of Adam Yoshida, who, in a recent post regarding the outcry against the use of torture by Americans, asked two questions:

1) Why are we outsourcing our torture, thus depriving hard-working American pain technicians of much needed work?
2) Who gives a fuck about terrorists?

Anonymity, in whatever form, might be a sufficient condition for being an idiot online, but it's hardly sufficient. He's demonstrated that he doesn't care about his idiocies, indeed that he's proud of them, no matter that they might harm him, for instance, in this 2002 election. She has two possibilities, and I add a third: Online idiots might sincerely believe in the truth and correctness of what they say. Long experience on USENET has certainly gone a ways towards convincing me.

What does this mean for blogging? That the only bloggers who will convey completely truthful and accurate accounts of their lives and beliefs are likely to be those who are completely convinced of their moral rectitude. A consequence of this is that these bloggers, so strongly convinced, aren't likely to be open to critical discourse. The good bloggers will be those who lie, through actively communicating mistruths or through failing to communicate facts.

(zarq links to a collection of interesting articles on behaviour in online communities, incidentally.)

[NON BLOG] I'm Back, and Happy Birthday to Me

The outage was very annoying, not least since I wasn't able to make my birthday post Friday. Thanks to mhw, roosterbear and choreo_m for their kind words.

More shortly.

UPDATE (4:43 PM) : Thanks to jrittenhouse as well.

UPDATE (6:23 PM) : Thanks to jdhorner as well. Anyone else?

[REVIEW] Cachorro

Last night, I watched the Spanish film Cachorro with a worthy crew at last night's birthday celebrations. This film--Spanish-language homepage here--has managed to get a fair bit of attention since its release (see the New York Times review here, read this article on the making of Cachorro from The Advocate here). The basic plot, of a gay dentist (Pedro) living in Madrid who's left to raise his nine-year-old nephew (Bernardo) once the boy's mother is arrested in India for drug possession and his estranged paternal grandmother (Violeta) tries to intrude, is interesting enough. Certainly, the first half of the movie developed quickly enough.

It's a sad irony that, earlier that evening, I was talking with vaneramos and danthered about how difficult it is for fiction writers to avoid the temptation to resolve everything in a final chapter. Lucky is the writer who can do that without coming off as lazy; lucky, too, the writer who can come up with legitimate excuses to leave ends tangled. Cachorro's writers chose to ignore serious issues untouched. What sort of relationship does Violeta develop with Bernardo and Pedro? How do Pedro and Bernardo sustain their relationship? Where does Manuel go? I'd go into more detail, happily, save that I don't want to spoil the movie. Suffice to say that after a strong first half, I feel about as cheated as the Sex Pistols' audience in the Winterland ballroom.

[BRIEF NOTE] alexpgp on Russian Livejournal Fears

alexpgp has two interesting posts (1, 2) on how many Russophone users of Livejournal reacted to the weekend's shutdown of Livejournal. As always, interesting reading.

[META] If you have a paid account

and it was in existence at the weekend during the downtime ...

http://www.livejournal.com/misc/claim-2005-01.bml

will give you an extension (though not for extra userpics)

[GNXP] Why "Eurabia" Is Like "Jew York City": An Examination of Terminologies

A post by that name is online at GNXP; the comments thread is here.

The apparent popularity of "Eurabia" disturbs me. If any Muslim presence in the non-Muslim world is defined as inherently illegitimate and subversive, how much longer will it be until the very existence of these Muslims is defined as illegitimate? That way lies most of the horrors of the 20th century: outgroups are always vulnerable.