Moral Morality

Last night Vingent and I had a really later dinner at around 11pm at the local McD, and talked quite a load, on things like our coming industrial training, how our home may possibly be haunted because some daft, superstitious and gutless hallucinating friends of Fan saw some shadow-or-other dashing up the stairs, and how some people can be plain degenerates when it comes to being human. Or humane, for that matter.

But they all don’t quite matter because as some wise person supposedly said, ‘if everyone in the world were good people, then the world would be a very boring place and heaven would be made redundant’. Quite true, save the fact that a realm that doesn’t exist cannot be redundant. And that shadow-or-other might actually be the guardian demon that I’ve always wanted, that is here to watch over me and curse whoever who crosses me without provocation.

But possibly the most important thing we discussed that night was human morality, how it is truly meant to be and the role of religion and our very own will in enforcing it.

Back when I was just a child, there’s the first ever series of anime called Digimon that I was totally crazy over, and as I recall the part of it that really inspired me to be a good guy was the 8 crests and the values and virtues they represent: Courage, Friendship, Love, Sincerity, Knowledge, Reliability, Hope, and lastly, Light, probably some religious propaganda in an otherwise good mix of values. Given its irrelevance, I have decided to interpret Light as simply being a good person, in general, seeing as how darkness has always been wrongly attributed to evil.

Right. So we have these 8 values that would’ve sufficed for us to live in this world peacefully, but only if it came from within ourselves, as portrayed by the very same show. Distort it, or if it comes with ulterior motive, or if it was otherwise forced, then it works too, for a while before it backfires just as effectively as you wouldn’t want it to.

And this is where religion spoils it all. Every one of it. Especially the monotheistic ones. Even the agnostic Buddhism and its karmic claptrap is no exception. Why? Simple, really.

You see, what every single religion out there are saying, to be very honest, direct and blunt without any form of caramel coating, is, ‘do good or else’, and monotheistic ones take it a step further by changing it to, ‘obey me for I am ‘good’, or else’. To spell it out, every religion has this supposed realm called Hell and every evil doer or disobeyers will be sent there, disintegrated in to a billion useless pieces and burned with eternal hellfire as punishment. But what for? What’s fear have to do with anything?

Sure, fear is widely regarded as a very effective weapon, probably even the most effective, if you’re interested in warfare, subtle or open, it makes no difference. It’s also perceived by mankind as the most effective deterrent. But it still is nothing more than a mere weapon. When people forget the existence of such a weapon, or when they have finally disarmed this psychological nuclear warhead, how long will such virtues of humanity last? Not even a fraction of a split second, I’m afraid.

When it comes down to it, people have got to want to do good just because. They’ve got to want to, say, not murder random strangers, and not because it’ll get them a life sentence, death sentence, or eternal youth, burning in flames. That’s why we need to get rid of the ‘or else’ factor. Otherwise, it all seems pointless. People are being ‘not evil’ out of fear. Not because that’s what they want. Because with fear, all one can be is ‘not evil’, because the evil intentions are there, just not acted out because of the possible consequences, and that’s not being properly good. The only way to be a truly good person is to want to be so from the bottom of one’s heart, without any fear or doubt. Only then can people actually help others because they are concerned about the welfare of others. True empathy and altruism, if you will.

And in studying psychology I know more than ever that intrinsic motivation and rewards work infinitely better than any negative reinforcement or punishment. It is infinitely ineffective, detrimental even at certain extents, to rely on fear to enforce morality. Not to mention that in doing so, one is also being a hypocrite, using immorality to enforce morality. I remember as a child my father was (and still is) the kind of person who’d want you to be moral, but would want to do whatever he likes himself. And so I grew up getting caned whenever I told a lie and also whenever he told one and I pointed it out. Point being, people mimic others; so if you want morality out of someone, then first practice what you preach. Leadership by example, if you will; instead of by fear, coercion and hypocrisy.

What I propose here is an ideal, one that will definitely outlast any weapon, including fear. Weapons wear with usage, and will eventually break. Ideals, on the other hand, live forever, so long as they are properly initiated. And as with many old ideals, this one, too will hopefully replace reality one day.

And with that, adieu to y’all.

Visionary nonsense

I had a series of the weirdest dreams today. After this morning’s demo I came home for a nap and before I woke up I was a member of the SAS, in an anti-terrorist op when suddenly I had superpowers. Then after class I took another nap and there was this most bizarre series of dreams where the person I desire to kill the most is trying to reconcile the friendship he fucked up and a complete stranger was shamelessly flirting with me.

Now all this seems like it’d give me a whole lot of question marks and whatnot but actually it also gave me something to laugh about, especially after the demo that didn’t go as well as expected and the mock open book test where despite it being an open book test, I realized if I were to write all the points the lecturer was looking for, it would’ve taken me an hour to answer a single question. And earn about 40 marks for a 25 mark question. Guess I’ll have another if I screw up tomorrow’s Japanese test 2.

People around are starting to get interview offers for their industrial attachment. Now I’m wondering when I will be getting mine. Worse yet, am I getting mine during important days like presentation or midterm? Or at all? And still? This seems like the semester with the least happenings. And this seems to make time pass very fast. Kind of like working, only shittier.

Adieu to y’all. And check this out guys. This will hopefully be the future of education. Hopefully.

Natural Selection Or Overpopulation?

Today, I am somehow reminded of the problem with humanity. We have long since brushed off natural selection from our kind, and thus we are the most overpopulated species in the world.

In the shower I thought to myself, has any human been sterilized to inhibit breeding like many pets have? Have humans ever been killed off due to overpopulation like many other animals, the crow being a very good example? No.

Many people yap on and on about how we must preserve the ecosystem and whatnot by not killing animals and keeping forest reserves and other usual bullshit, but these so-called environmentalists are okay with pest extermination, just because they are pests to humans. Aren’t we also disrupting the food chain by exterminating food of some animal that will be food for some other animal that will eventually be our food? Or we kill off animals that are overpopulated ‘because their numbers disrupt the ecosystem’. Then what are we? There are more than 4 billion humans in the world and we are not disrupting the ecosystem? Yes. Even when we’re usually beyond the top of the food chain? Yes. Why? Because we overbreed livestock and kill them off for food. Yeah, right.

All this is because we chose to exclude ourselves from the winnowing of natural selection. Everyone deserves to live. Then what? Livestock don’t deserve to live? The veggies don’t deserve to live? And don’t start with veggies aren’t alive or anything along those lines, please. Otherwise you’re probably not intelligent enough to understand all that I’m writing and you’ll be wasting your time reading all this. And so to all the vegetarians and vegans out there, please get some things straight. If you’re practicing that kind of diet because you don’t want to kill animals, then that is having double standards.

What’s the problem? Why do we face this problem? Simple, actually. We put ourselves on an imaginary pedestal; one that even if existed, we’re unworthy of. Egocentric people who don’t know their place start by bullshitting about how we are the most advanced of all living things and so it is our duty to protect others and all that nonsense. So what if we’re the most advanced beings? Well I’ll tell you so what. So it means we must take it upon ourselves to rule the planet and continue overpopulating the planet. And since we’re so great that natural selection don’t work on us, it don’t matter if I’m weak I’ll still go find a mate that’s equally weak and so give birth to a weak offspring that will not have a chance in brutal society when he grows older.

To cut to the chase, we’re breeding suffering. Many ‘souls’ exist to suffer unnecessarily. And since suffering is contagious, well, you should see where I’m going by now. All because we gloat. We claim to be what we’re not. As a result we turn the world upside down and end up fighting against each other because each has their idea of what’s right. Which are all wrong to begin with. And the properly right solution is also wrong because that’s being inhuman, immoral or whatever. And so we doom ourselves to this irreversible cycle of wrongs at every turn and no way of turning back, because it’s centuries too late. Or should I say two millennia?

I’m saying all this because I know I carry defective but dominant genes in me and so I wish to just die off before I succeed in passing them on. And this is quite what I’d call learned helplessness, a term I learned yesterday, and this term has explained my misery that began since the 17th of November 1990. Because whatever I do that is great is not being received positively because that’s what’s expected of me and any expectation that I don’t meet, I get skinned for it.

Adieu to y’all. Don’t think about it, people. Some mistakes can never be corrected, especially when it’s 2011 years too late.

How Everything Flies

It’s been a long while since I last read through every blog of every single friend of mine. Not that I did recently. Just surfed through a few that had made a positive impression in my life. And did I find many points of interest.

Don’t know why, but after that short surf, I actually thought of calling each of them out for a long chat to sort of reminisce about the good old days, though knowing me, there probably isn’t much to talk about. There may not even be any good old days to begin with.

I thought to myself ‘it’s not just distance that makes the heart grow fonder. Time does that as well’. And indeed, though some have been nothing more than mere friends of friends, their lives after we parted seemed so… colourful, for the lack of better words. Sometimes you see them put up some ridiculous story about how they were involved in some dilemma inducing situations so bizarre you thought it could only ever happen to you, you’d think ‘wow’, and for once, really understand the kind of situation they’re in. True empathy, for once.

I dare say I’ve never felt such nostalgia before. No idea why I’m feeling it now. And towards people that I hardly ever converse with, if ever. And how they even made that positive impact to begin with is also beyond me. All of a sudden I feel so lonely.

Perhaps this is what it feels like to truly miss someone, even if it’s someone that I was never close with. Still, why am I feeling this, I’m still trying to figure out. Could be that I desire more than just that plain hi-bye friendship. Maybe what I wanted was to be proper friends with these people. Or maybe I’m just regretting not doing that back when we had ample chance for interaction. Whatever the reason, I feel like there’s something to hold on to still, although deep down inside I know there’s nothing.

This is the first time in who knows how long that I realized how heartrending the past can be. Worst part of it is that there was something that I could’ve done, but didn’t, and only after it’s way too late did I realize that that something was worth doing. Guess I’ll be expecting a teary dream tonight as well.

Well, adieu to y’all. Damn, I’m getting softer and softer with time. That’s not a good sign.

P.S.: The extreme heat and dry winds of CNY that we all know and hate are back. Let's see how long will they last.

Well, too bad for you, you're not who you wanted to be.

A few things have changed since the beginning of time. People start to realize that the earth moves, not the sun; people realize that illnesses are caused by biological factors, not some witchdoctor’s curse. People gain knowledge and wisdom over time. People change their knowledge base according to prevailing evidence, which normally gets closer and closer to the truth.

Some others, well, let’s just say that they hold on to the idea that earth is the centre of the universe. Long story short, they’re satisfied that 1 and 1 is two and don’t want to know what the fuck is multiplication or division.

Thus is the birth of ignorance. This, unfortunately, chose not to die off just yet. No doubt where there is civilization there’s surely a fraction of idiocy. I chose not to discover how long has ignorance been part of humanity, but the fact remains that over the countless years instead of dwindling the number of ignorant fucks have been overpopulating the world.

I quote from an idiot, ‘if asked a stupid question, give a stupid answer’. This is why the number of such people increases. What we should do instead is educate them so that they need not ask such questions. Unless they are pranksters, in which we should not only ignore entirely, but also get infinite light years away from. The distance is because these people usually stand out like faeces in a golden toilet. And they’re loud too. So get as far away as ever possible so that you don’t hear them being happy or sad for all the wrong reasons. Like getting happy when someone commits a traffic infraction.

The worst thing, they’ve never looked at themselves through a mirror. Or any kind if reflection for that matter. They call others idiots when they’re no better off. They should really know that if one’s got nothing constructive to say, it’s best to keep quiet or you’ll risk hurting feelings, or worse, get beaten up if you happen to offend another member of your idiotic species.

Another thing people fail at is differentiating grades from intelligence. Having good grades don’t mean intelligence. I’ve repeated this too often I don’t feel like elaborating again.

Ah yes. Nowadays intelligence is measured not just by how easily you are understood, but also how easily you understand others.

How heartrending it is to notice such people more easily during the festive season. And you thought every last hypocrite in the world has sold themselves to the evil that is politics.

Well, adieu to y’all. I suppose idiots celebrate harder and louder than others.

Chinese New YEOUCH!

I am now back from my parents’ hometown. A little town in Perak called Padang Rengas. Or is it even a little town?

It’s been 13 years since I was last here. The last time I was here I was just a kid, so everything seemed so big to me. But now I realize how the supposed town is just a long street. The exact opposite can be said about me, from the perspective of my relatives. Last time they saw me I was just a kid. Now I’m 20. If I were to go in without my father, they’d probably have pointed a shotgun at me like they would any other intruder. And now I go back there entertaining their children like how they used to entertain me. I felt the kind of shame for troubling them before as much as I felt the frustration of having to deal with a bunch of hyperactive pubescent kids.

And it was a mistake to be bringing the laptop back there. Because the moment I took it out the kids claimed it as theirs and played all the way until 4 in the morning, which they choose the noisiest NFS games and blasted the revs beyond sleepable tolerance.

Bro Brendon had it worse. His laptop and iPhone4 was robbed for as long as we were back there. By kids who had iPhones themselves. And a VAIO.

All that aside, it was fun being back there. Seeing old relatives, spending a lot of time enduring the whack kids’ bullying together with my cousin, and bullying them back with really lame jokes.

But being back there, I hadn’t time to handle what actually mattered most at the time. Stuff like my IA documents, for instance.

And my trip to Klang was cancelled because Vingent’s ride was sabotaged. Well, sort of.

Adieu to y’all. Now to continue making use of my few hours of ACTUAL holiday.