Because 'God' is just a fad.
April 15, 2014
April 9, 2014
SLOPPP PRESENTS: TOPICAL TROPICAL TRAP SHIT WEEKLY MEGAMIX
TRACKLIST: gLAdiator - Assembly Line Atmosphere - Kanye West Armin Van Buuren X Hardwell- Ping Pong (FuegoBeatz Festival Trap Remix) Simtem - Don't Like Me Riot Ten - Double Cup, Im Pourin (Original Trap Mix_ XOXO - Drumline Wizardbeats - SPICE YungSatan x B.LEWIS - Dreamy PhaseOne x Hydraulix - Bruk Out PoniiBoi - Ya Mamma (Duwell Remix) KiTheory - Open Wound (ODESZA Remix) ID - Under My Sensii (WILLYP Remix) Jameston Thieves ft. Ben Z - Moonlight Tropkillaz x Party Favor- Dat Booty Tyga ft. Lil Wayne - Good Day (TOKEN bootleg) Iamsu! ft. 2Chainz & Sage the Gemeni - Only That Real (Instant Party! Remix) The Chainsmokers - Selfie (Aero Chord Remix) Gold Whistle - ZAP! POW! DIE! (Buzz Trillington Remix) Yo Gotti ft. Young Jeezy - Act Right (NATO Feelz Remix) Yuri Viroj - Pop That! (Original Mix)
via Δuτο uρlοαd
April 4, 2014
February 11, 2013
OK Magazine: So Meta
I was in line to check out at my corner bodega and I happened upon this cover of the current
OK Magazine which teases a headline story about Kanye West "leaking" the story about his wife's pregnancy. READERS NOTE: HER NAME HAS NEVER AND WILL NEVER APPEAR IN THIS BLOG SO GET OVER IT. The Kanye headline might not appear to be anything unusual or significant on the surface; it has the familiar aesthetics routine buzzwords that make this garbage instantly recognizable to just about every demographic in every geographic corner of the US. But the story itself makes this issue worth talking about, because the story goes out of its way to make the point that tabloid sleaze and the mechanics of the industry that go into creating it are at best creepy, at worst unethical.
Pope Benedict XVI Abdicates
Pope Benedict's resignation from his diamond encrusted throne in Vatican City proved a shock to believers and nonbelievers across the world. His short term (2005-2013) seemed plagued by scandal and misfortune, ironic considering that his position is supposedly quasi-divine. And what, you might ask, was the reason for Ratzinger's sudden departure? His statement cited "advanced age" and a physical and mental inability to hold the position of head of the Catholic Church. This, of course, flies in the face of historical precedent and gives credence to theories that the Church is getting ahead of a breaking scandal.
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Sure, it's a hunch...and even though Ratzy is undoubtedly an old fuck, his medical history looks pristine compared to the previous Pontiff John Paul II who was diagnosed with Parkinsons during his tenure. True to the Papal formula, John Paul II served until his death in April 2005, and even made several creepy appearances that demonstrated the extent his mental deterioration shortly before he died. The likely rationale behind this precedent is the confusion of having an "ex-Pope". The ex-Pope concept poses a spiritual paradox for believers, and it is therefore an unideal spot for the church to find itself in following years of sexual abuse scandals and a world which is generally abandoning faith for more logical, intellectual and secular alternatives. If Rat
January 19, 2013
Manti Te'o: A Lesson In Deception
Notre Dame linebacker, and potential 'mo (or queeb/quay) Manti Te'o has dominated the news cycle since a deadspin post broke the sensational story about the All American's deceased girlfriend. If you're reading this blog, you already know the essentials. Girlfriend > dead grandma > dead girlfriend > phone call revealing a hoax...the whole thing is just juicy.
But there's been one missing, crucial piece of the media jigsaw puzzle: Manti Te'o. Until tonight, Te'o has kept quiet (which has only served to add fuel to the fire of widespread criticism of his outrageous story.) The media has, in general, has avoided critique of the Te'o defense, which is more ridiculous when juxtaposed against his previous descriptions of the girl he described as the "love of his life." Late Friday night, an audio only [red flag] interview was conducted and released by ESPN, and if things were bad for the lyin' Hawaiian before, they're about to get even dicier.
But there's been one missing, crucial piece of the media jigsaw puzzle: Manti Te'o. Until tonight, Te'o has kept quiet (which has only served to add fuel to the fire of widespread criticism of his outrageous story.) The media has, in general, has avoided critique of the Te'o defense, which is more ridiculous when juxtaposed against his previous descriptions of the girl he described as the "love of his life." Late Friday night, an audio only [red flag] interview was conducted and released by ESPN, and if things were bad for the lyin' Hawaiian before, they're about to get even dicier.
The Te'o defense now includes the admission that his accounts of meeting the purported "hoaxer" were forged. Manti explains that this was a cover-up to prevent his peers, teammates, and family from getting the impression that he is "weird". As it turns out, nothing convinces people you're a normal guy quite like a national media inquisition of your sanity.
One would assume that an honest Manti would have no reason to decline a video interview, as his reaction should be genuine if he's telling the truth. The last thing his PR team wants is doubt and when you don't show your face in 'the big reveal', you brew up a mess of speculation. Jeremy Schaap, the ESPN reporter conducting the interview, admitted that Te'o seemed genuine and "unflinching" in his responses, but eventually conceded that audio alone was probably a "bad choice".
It's going to be amazing to watch Te'o squirm through this process as more facts are uncovered, followed by the subsequent, douce-chilly "come-clean" press conference. But the fact remains...Manti Te'o is, at best, so dumb that there's no reason for him to be in higher education in the first place;at worst a compulsive (and excellently terrible) liar. I'm putting my chips on the latter.
October 28, 2012
LIVE FROM NYC: HURRICANE SANDY
Batten down the hatches! Board up the windows! Hurricane Sandy is set to land in NYC around 12pm EDT tomorrow, but as we've seen countless times before....it's the lead-up to the storm that proves most entertaining. I'll be liveblogging the chaos from my apartment on E 90th Street, in case you're interested in seeing stuffy Park Ave'ers freak out about a little rain/wind.
7:36 PM EDT (10/28/2012) - Subway service has been shut down. MTA hasn't announced when it will resume or even when they'll be making a decision about reopening. If you are a white person who happens to be stuck above 110th Street, may God have mercy on your soul...you're not going anywhere.
7:36 PM EDT (10/28/2012) - Subway service has been shut down. MTA hasn't announced when it will resume or even when they'll be making a decision about reopening. If you are a white person who happens to be stuck above 110th Street, may God have mercy on your soul...you're not going anywhere.
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| A 24/7 fruit stand packs up in preparation for Hurricane Sandy on 90th Street & 3rd Ave. |
7:52 PM EDT (10/28/2012) - Here's weather.com's impossible to understand "Interactive Tracker" of Sandy's projected path, if you want to play along at home: http://www.weather.com/weather/hurricanecentral/tracker/2012/sandy
8:02 PM EDT (10/28/2012) - All's quiet on the Eastern Seaboard. Forecasts indicate that the rain should start early tomorrow morning around 2am.
8:21PM EDT (10/28/2012) - Grand Central Station is locked and shut down.
8:02 PM EDT (10/28/2012) - All's quiet on the Eastern Seaboard. Forecasts indicate that the rain should start early tomorrow morning around 2am.
8:21PM EDT (10/28/2012) - Grand Central Station is locked and shut down.
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| "KloZed 4 dA hurricane. sux toO b u SMH" |
October 18, 2012
AMERICAN IDIOT: Lil Wayne
Some video footage of recently incarcerated rapper Lil Wayne has cropped up on the web, where we witness Wayne answering deposition questions in a civil suit he's filed against producer Quincy Jones. Contained in the video is some of the best recorded footage of the juxtaposition between [for lack of better terminology] street 'attitude'/vernacular and traditional or common English. I just read the previous sentence back to myself and I have apparently aged 40 years more than I was aware.
My sudden outbreak of old-ness aside, there's something inherently infuriating that comes with watching a millionaire entertainer act out like a 5 year old, whilst attempting to retain the rough and tumble attitude and broken english that we've come to associate with the high crime, inner city population. Wayne, at one point, lays his head in his hands and refuses to answer the line of questioning that Jones's attorney presents, only answering with reductive mumbles of "I don't recall" and "I can't remember". Later in the video, when asked what image he is presenting to the media- Wayne again shoots down the question, is told by the presiding judge that he must answer, and decides to inform the attorney that "he [the judge] can't save you in the real world". One can extrapolate that Wayne saw the judge's support of the line of questioning as backing up /siding with the attorney and wanted to remind him that rational debate has no place in his world and violence would reign supreme if the joust were happening in a different context. It's really just an embarrassing 6-minute display of the apathetic and anti-intellectual approach that is "cool" to a substantial block of young people. It's par for the course for Lil Wayne, we've seen this and much worse from him before....but god damn is it frustrating to see him thrive while there are tens of thousands of infinitely more talented (and better adjusted) artists that aren't able to scrape by.
My sudden outbreak of old-ness aside, there's something inherently infuriating that comes with watching a millionaire entertainer act out like a 5 year old, whilst attempting to retain the rough and tumble attitude and broken english that we've come to associate with the high crime, inner city population. Wayne, at one point, lays his head in his hands and refuses to answer the line of questioning that Jones's attorney presents, only answering with reductive mumbles of "I don't recall" and "I can't remember". Later in the video, when asked what image he is presenting to the media- Wayne again shoots down the question, is told by the presiding judge that he must answer, and decides to inform the attorney that "he [the judge] can't save you in the real world". One can extrapolate that Wayne saw the judge's support of the line of questioning as backing up /siding with the attorney and wanted to remind him that rational debate has no place in his world and violence would reign supreme if the joust were happening in a different context. It's really just an embarrassing 6-minute display of the apathetic and anti-intellectual approach that is "cool" to a substantial block of young people. It's par for the course for Lil Wayne, we've seen this and much worse from him before....but god damn is it frustrating to see him thrive while there are tens of thousands of infinitely more talented (and better adjusted) artists that aren't able to scrape by.
"Virtual Crack" or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love The Web
I might need to change the theme of my (seldomly updated) blog from my thoughts on atheism in America to some sort of "why the internet is the best shit ever (and i mean ever, ever) and how we've already taken it for granted...less than 20 years into mainstream adoption" soapbox where I tell you that anyone with the ability to read this has witnessed a modern miracle. Honestly, I don't think many people would disagree with the overall sentiment there and most just haven't taken the time to, or aren't reflective enough to put it into that sort of context. It may be the case that a similar cultural reaction followed the printing press in 15th century Europe, but I'd contest that it is important to consciously recognize what an impressive and useful concept we've discovered. I think we're hindering potential progress by allowing technology to become a mundane, almost burdening staple of our lives that is more of an expectation than an exciting portal into another "world" (ANOTHER WORLD, MAAAAAAANNN!)
Recently, I've discovered that I need to "sync" my online presence with my tangible meat-body. It's been therapeutic to abandon the shame of spending hundreds of hours each week I spend learning by watching documentaries, reading news articles/opinion/book excerpts, and engaging in meaningful and impassioned debate with others online. The time I spend online is accelerating the speed at which I am able to consume information, and I've chosen to spend a substantial chunk of this time doing things which I think will help me grow and evolve. Sure I've watched the past 2 years worth of the "FailArmy" YouTube weekly series, and I have a stage-4 terminal hook on every TV sitcom, but I honestly enjoy the time I spend accomplishing the objectives that primary school and college led me to believe was, indeed, learning. Wikipedia is well on the way to making learning "cool", and there's nothing we need more in the world right now than anything we can get that resembles a learning Renaissance. What I'm referring to is a redefinition of traditional learning, but couldn't that be just another really, really good side effect of a connected planet?
So why is it that we already feel entitled to modern tech, and every mouth-breather Tea Bag rally participant and strikingly dull/apathetic teenager feels tech-savvy enough to complain about their iPhone? Silicon Valley can't completely thwart responsibility, as their marketing campaigns were/are based on their tech being a lifeline, rather than a better-than-the-last-one magic wand that waves you in to a different dimension. Their strategy is vulnerable to the reality that any slip-up creates immediate animosity, which eventually leads to (apparently) a weird arrogance that obscures the larger picture benefit of possessing the tech at all. But we also need to consider that the public at large has gone all-in on a concept that it seems to reject at some fundamental level. If you can fix a computer, you're still a geek. If you've got a World of Warcraft character that's higher than level 50, you still probably live in your parents basement. These notions are the remains of a foregone era and contribute to the level contempt that many have to their precious technology. It's better to yell at or slam your phone than it is to put on your thinking cap and work through the problem (consequently learning the software in the process.) We want to take our stuff out of the box, turn it on, and GO. No assembly required; nonexistent learning curve. As we move forward, I'd like to see more necessity for manual processes and a deeper understanding of the tools we're all now using. Who knows, maybe when we reach Singularity, we will have been able to deselect the dull, uninspired masses. Oh god, I think I just advocated eugenics.....uh, nothing to see here, move along!
I know, I know, I'm preaching in a vacuum here.. and even if there was some directive I could offer to set us on a better course...it's far too grandiose and unrealistic of a mission to even consider. We've got more urgent matters to attend to. I can only hope that as time passes, we begin to recognize the game changer we witnessed as the cables were laid and the world became, for the first time, connected.
Recently, I've discovered that I need to "sync" my online presence with my tangible meat-body. It's been therapeutic to abandon the shame of spending hundreds of hours each week I spend learning by watching documentaries, reading news articles/opinion/book excerpts, and engaging in meaningful and impassioned debate with others online. The time I spend online is accelerating the speed at which I am able to consume information, and I've chosen to spend a substantial chunk of this time doing things which I think will help me grow and evolve. Sure I've watched the past 2 years worth of the "FailArmy" YouTube weekly series, and I have a stage-4 terminal hook on every TV sitcom, but I honestly enjoy the time I spend accomplishing the objectives that primary school and college led me to believe was, indeed, learning. Wikipedia is well on the way to making learning "cool", and there's nothing we need more in the world right now than anything we can get that resembles a learning Renaissance. What I'm referring to is a redefinition of traditional learning, but couldn't that be just another really, really good side effect of a connected planet?
So why is it that we already feel entitled to modern tech, and every mouth-breather Tea Bag rally participant and strikingly dull/apathetic teenager feels tech-savvy enough to complain about their iPhone? Silicon Valley can't completely thwart responsibility, as their marketing campaigns were/are based on their tech being a lifeline, rather than a better-than-the-last-one magic wand that waves you in to a different dimension. Their strategy is vulnerable to the reality that any slip-up creates immediate animosity, which eventually leads to (apparently) a weird arrogance that obscures the larger picture benefit of possessing the tech at all. But we also need to consider that the public at large has gone all-in on a concept that it seems to reject at some fundamental level. If you can fix a computer, you're still a geek. If you've got a World of Warcraft character that's higher than level 50, you still probably live in your parents basement. These notions are the remains of a foregone era and contribute to the level contempt that many have to their precious technology. It's better to yell at or slam your phone than it is to put on your thinking cap and work through the problem (consequently learning the software in the process.) We want to take our stuff out of the box, turn it on, and GO. No assembly required; nonexistent learning curve. As we move forward, I'd like to see more necessity for manual processes and a deeper understanding of the tools we're all now using. Who knows, maybe when we reach Singularity, we will have been able to deselect the dull, uninspired masses. Oh god, I think I just advocated eugenics.....uh, nothing to see here, move along!
I know, I know, I'm preaching in a vacuum here.. and even if there was some directive I could offer to set us on a better course...it's far too grandiose and unrealistic of a mission to even consider. We've got more urgent matters to attend to. I can only hope that as time passes, we begin to recognize the game changer we witnessed as the cables were laid and the world became, for the first time, connected.
August 27, 2012
The Disconnected Life
I'm laying back on my couch, writing this post from my iPhone via the miracle we refer to as the 4g data network. In front of me sit two working MacBook Pros with 18GB of combined RAM and nearly a terabyte of total hard drive storage. Yet, earlier today, in an incident which could only have been caused by the dark lord Morgoth, these computers were instantly rendered useless. The internet...turned off.
Seconds turned to minutes, and minutes to hours; at the time of writing this I've been down for 5 hours. Even with a completely capable (albeit sporting a cracked screen) smartphone and a lightening-fast mobile connection, I can't help but feel isolated, unprepared for some disaster. If I might happen to need to know the highest grossing Patrick Swayze film...I'm totally fucked. I bet it's Dirty Dancing. No, wait, it could be or Red Dawn. I'll be right back. I've got to switch to my imdb app and find out...this is going to bug me
***writers note: "Ghost" is the top earning Patrick Swayze film with an international gross of $517.6 million***
Seconds turned to minutes, and minutes to hours; at the time of writing this I've been down for 5 hours. Even with a completely capable (albeit sporting a cracked screen) smartphone and a lightening-fast mobile connection, I can't help but feel isolated, unprepared for some disaster. If I might happen to need to know the highest grossing Patrick Swayze film...I'm totally fucked. I bet it's Dirty Dancing. No, wait, it could be or Red Dawn. I'll be right back. I've got to switch to my imdb app and find out...this is going to bug me
***writers note: "Ghost" is the top earning Patrick Swayze film with an international gross of $517.6 million***
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