Thinking Outside of the Heart-Shaped Box

With brilliant titles like this, it is inconceivable that my name has not yet become eponymous. At the very least, I should be hired to write the cover stories (and their respective titles) for the New York Post. But enough complaining about the lack of recognition that I deserve...I am here to make a point which is of equal importance but more appropriate for the occasion. So, what is this critical point? Some of you think that you already know; you are thinking "Not another article written by some lonely, pathetic jackass bitching about Valentine's Day and not getting laid!"...and there you go with being presumptuous in your guessing! Of course, I admire your gusto for being assertive...but I am the only sagacious motherfucker around here...so shut up and sit down, bitch! Learn your place!

Which brings me to the point I'm trying to make...what a coincidence? My first paragraph is a presage to the rest of my article...imagine that? Yes, as a matter of fact, the preceding passage has pointed out the essence of this article : the problem with people and their insipid desire to create blanket approaches to all aspects of their lives, especially when it comes to their terms of judgement. In order to get everyone on the same page, let us approach this with some "pooled" empirical evidence...ever been in a public place and listened to the conversation of a group of nearby people (or, if you live in New York City, possibly a group of people who live together in the same body of a raving lunatic)? Midway through that conversation, have you ever felt the baton of an orchestra conductor in your hand, as you can now (based on the subject of the discussion and from its general direction) regurgitate every word that comes out of the mouths of the conversation's various players? If you've never experienced this (and then the subsequent desire to beat the discussion group with your baton, since stupidity should naturally be painful), then you should probably stop reading this article, since (in all likelihood) you're probably having enough trouble with these polysyllabic words. Yes, as you have guessed, most people commit that mental peccadillo of "philosophical window shopping", grabbing and adopting the thoughts of others in order to evade that scary practice of being an individual; they allow the contents of another person's brain to be dumped into their own brain, without practicing any form of filtering. Since I've never heard of a gold miner claiming to have found gold when he pulls out a one-ton lump of dirt, I'd imagine that you'd have to be just as retarded to not sift through someone's thoughts when you get a hand on them. Worse than that, I'm sure that most of these people have, at one point or another, found evidence to the contrary of their "adopted" thoughts and, in response, ignored the option of becoming the contrarian since they're comfortable and don't want to bother with that "real" living. Facing possible alienation from their loved ones and friends, there's no chance that these motherfuckers are going to return their respective philosophy to its original creator and shove it up his/her ass in a dazzling display of courage.

And, sadly, they will never know the freedom and utter elysium which comes from one of the greatest ability of human beings : to abstract. To pick apart an idea and identify its parts, to take those parts and split them into smaller parts, to shift the parts around until they find a new concinnity and form a whole new idea...What rapture to be able to do such a thing! And, yet, people don't want to do it! Just as children approach brussel sprouts, people throw temper tantrums and stomp at the mere suggestion of abstracting anything :

Me : So, you say that animals have rights...

PETA Freak : Yes, they have as much of a right to live as we do.

Me : Okay, well, then, for the terms of the argument...what's a right?

PETA Freak : Ummm...what?

Me : Well, in order for this argument to go anywhere, we should probably define what we mean by "right." I would describe a right as a moral principle that applies only to human beings, since morality is only conceivable by human beings. Is that what you're talking about when you use the term "right?" Or are you talking about something else?

PETA Freak : Umm...hmmm... [Angry] I'm not playing your stupid game.

Me : Game? What game? I'm trying to understand what the hell you're talking about...if we don't agree with my terminology, then let's establish a pidgin that will serve for the remainder of the argument...

PETA Freak : What the hell's a pidgin?!? Shut up! Shut up! [ stomping and putting fingers into the ears ] Go away! Go away! I want animals to live! I want animals to live!

You're against affirmative action? Then you're a racist! Never mind that I refuse to pity another fellow man and that I expect him to overcome adversity in order to rise to the top, just as I have done with my own life...no, do not even think about anything I subsequently say and just assume that I'm a freakin' honorary member of the KKK. You don't believe in God? Then you're a damn Communist/Socialist/Anarchist! Never mind that I love money and consider capitalism as nearly sacrosanct... no, just think of me as an enemy of the United States. You weren't totally against the Iraqi war? Then you're some sort of belligerent sycophant to the war hawks of the U.S. government and believe their lies about WMD! Never mind that I might consider recent U.S. military actions as possibly part of a long-term strategy to surround Iran with U.S.-friendly real estate and then provide support to its local subversive forces, who no longer want a theocracy above them...no, don't wait for my explanation of my views and just think that I'm really angry about September 11th and that I want to convert the bodies of any foreign people into some sort of miasma. You think that homosexuals should be able to marry each other? Then you're against the sacred institution of marriage! Well...actually, that's pretty close. I tend to think of marriage as a superannuated "sheep" tradition, and I couldn't care less about who is for it, who is against it, who is doing it...blah, blah, blah. Couldn't give a fuck. But I digress... the point is this : don't be so obtuse that you will not (not cannot, because you can, stubborn fuck) weigh the words being presented to you. Think in the abstract about what a person has said, evaluate those thoughts, and, hopefully, find your own fecundity and think of something original. Trust me...we can never get enough of the stuff. It's good shit.

So, let's go through an exercise to get the point across, shall we? Now, for years, I've seen the "love of love" permeate through my little universe, and even though love should never be unconditional, I understand the said benefits of love, so I can see why people rave about it as they do. But there is a problem with this picture : if I am to do any more than empathize with those who lobby for unconditional love, I find myself in the untenable position of declaring hate as an abomination...and that, my friends, is a travesty of justice. Not to hate? Not to hate?!? Not to oppose, to confront, to castigate? Not to know the joy of opprobrium in the face of stupidity? If I'm not allowed to hate the whole of a person, can't I just hate a part of them? No?!? What a horrible world that would be! And, for too long, we have suffered without the lack of a day to celebrate hate, to herald our defiance of others, to rejoice over the fact that "we" are not "them" because, in official terms, "they" suck. So, I propose a new day, a day that will be a symbol of all the appropriate hate in the world. It will be called Garibaldi's Day, named after the Italian revolutionary who loved to defy dictators and was generally always kicking ass. (No, we're not naming it Che Guevara's Day, you Commie-lovin' fuck.) Now, if you have not yet shaken off old customs that were referred to earlier, you will probably say that I hate Valentine's Day. Well, that's not true, you slow-learnin' fucktard. In fact, I still want Valentine's Day to exist because it deserves a place on the calendar since, on that day, :

Guys get laid
Girls get laid (and, usually, are not left empty-handed).
The economy (especially florists) gets a nice bump.

So, everybody wins. I'm just suggesting that we extend the same cordiality to hate that we do towards love. If we're supposed to be unconditional in our love, shouldn't we love hate? All right, forget the sophistic bullshit...in any case, it could work! Instead of a cherub-like Cupid, we could have the Furies of Greek mythology, who were the goddesses of vengeance and who would torture you with their sharp claws for your disloyalty to your gods or loved ones. As for presents to send to "dis"-loved ones, you would have options. You could send the Claws of the Furies, covered in blood...or you could send a charred heart filled with feces, blackened by a roaring fire... or, instead of a card bearing messages of love, it could instruct them on how they could fold the card in such a way that they could carve their own eyes out. And, better yet, we could make it even more festive with costumes! Let's say that you go to work on Garibaldi's Day and that you dress up as the person you hate the most in your office. Imagine the surprise and antics which would ensue as you look and mockingly behave like that person, right in front of their very eyes, as tears of mirth roll down the faces of yourself and your like-minded colleagues! Joy! Utter joy!

Will such a day ever come about? Probably not. But I can enjoy the thought of it, as well as I enjoy the ability to abstract. And, maybe, with time (and a little more abstraction among the populace), I might yet find myself in the company of others for that day. In the meantime, though, I'm gonna go ahead and grab that Kim Jong-Il costume, just in case. Never can tell; once in a while, dreams do come true.