Andy's Response

"I relegated sex to the lower realm of human gratification, akin to scratching an itch or sleeping."

I'll probably mention this tomorrow to you before you even check your email because once i have something to mention, i have to mention it as quickly as possible or i cave in like a black hole.

how the hell is having sex akin to sleeping? sleeping is not a lower realm of human gratification, or on any realm of gratification. sleeping is absolutely necessary to all individual lives. if you don't sleep, you will absolutely die no matter what. if you don't have sex, you won't die. nothing bad will happen except for in the long run of things, if everyone didn't have sex the species would die out.

as for itching, itching is mostly subconscious. I have never considered itching to be on the 'lower realm" of anything. I reserve the term 'lower' to mean 'garbage, despicable, disgusting, horrible, or not respectable'. Scratching an itch on your arm without even realizing you're scratching an itch on your arm is hardly disgusting or despicable or not respectable.

as for your talk of humans creating 'eternal beauty, that threw me the fuck off. considering the rest of what you wrote is very literal and realistic, it's weird that you would throw the word 'eternal' in there. Nothing humans make has been or will be eternal. everything humans make will eventually dissolve into nothing and creatures in the future won't even know we existed.

also, why the hell did you compare people to dirt? if you were going for the 'we're all elemental' thing, i don't see why it's necessary to pick dirt over anything else that is made up of atoms, meaning everything. Picking dirt obviously gives you the sensational editorial edge of "dirt is a worthless thing that we walk all over and it's worthless because we walk on it but we are dirt because everything is dirt but we make eternally beautiful things so what could be more beautiful than the lowest substance on earth, dirt, forming humans and humans being demigods making chapels and some shit?"

why not pick anything else? why not pick gold? we're as much gold as we are dirt, going by that "we're all just a collection of atoms" idea. the difference between dirt and gold is gold is already naturally beautiful to most people so you wouldn't have that potent emo 'beauty from nothing' angle that you do when you use dirt.

also, it seems you've come to the conclusion that your mind and body should be one entity, which i consider true mostly because i do not see myself as two separate parts, the mind and the body. I am me and everything i think is me and my body is me. However, it seems that you've come to the conclusion that because of this fact, the idea that your body and mind are both one entity, that anything they do is absolutely ok. It seems like you're on the path of having piles of sex just because you can, and just because there isn't a point of life other than to have fun. Go ahead and have piles of sex, but i have witnessed first hand a few occasions where people's mindset changes entirely when they head the direction you're going (and by 'direction you're going' i mean 'the direction i chose to imply you're going so that i could write this next part of the email based on the few words in your blog).

An ironic thing happens when someone realizes that the only purpose of life is to have fun and enjoy things when it comes to sex. the person reverts back into the most primal ape form i have ever encountered. the most prominent example of this is scott. scott doesn't believe in god and because of this realizes that he can get enjoyment out of having sex without the whole religious stigmata of celibacy til marriage and one partner and so forth. He never wants kids and highly enjoys sex, so it makes sense that he would try to have sex with as many girls as possible. He's opening his horizons in order to get a varied experience. The ironic part comes from this-

scott came to these conclusions using the only part of his brain that isn't like all the animals that aren't humans- the conscious one. However, it is the exact same path as the normal animal kingdom: have sex with as many things as possible to bring as many of your species into the world. They are the exact same core idea with completely different intentions, and he has ended up melding and degrading himself back down into a primordial idiot.

The next case is alex. Alex is completely unable to interact with a girl without secretly thinking "boy, how would i get her to have sex with me?" Whether or not he follows through with his 'plan' is not important. He sees girls as things to have sex with, and that's it. Of course this only applies to girls he finds attractive, but that's a given. It seems he is entirely unable to have a communicative and intellectual relationship with a girl. All the girls he doesn't find attractive are fat girls who he is only friends with because they drink together. One thing drunk people don't have is intellectual conversations. I've heard a few that almost come close but they're along the lines of

"Hey man, religion is for the masses, you're all robots"

The girls he finds attractive immediately make him interact with them in a vastly terrible way- he starts talking in a very specific manner and flirting with them. He did this to autumn when she was over playing the railroad game, he talks this way to christina, and i can tell when he's talking to a girl he finds attractive on the phone because he talks the exact same way.

What i am unsure of is if this is a conscious choice that has become unconscious over time with experience, or if it was never conscious to begin with. Or it could still be entirely conscious.

In this case, i have a better idea than with other people, since he is my brother and i spent great amounts of time with him every day for over a decade. He used to be incredibly shy and uncomfortable around anybody he didn't know. He then joined drama class as a freshmen, which taught him how to be comfortable in front of strangers and, more importantly, how to act. With those two skills you get the ultimate womanizer, and it is because of that that i believe he has to consciously force out his 'flirty' persona. I'm sure it doesn't take much effort by this point.

Anyway, I firmly believe that scott and alex's choices in how they interact with women and think about sex stems from their understanding of the world. Both of them realize the incredibly simple fact that there is absolutely no meaning to life and no purpose, and that they should get the most out of the only part of life that is enjoyable: enjoying it.

However, they do this by reverting back into every goddamn creature that wasn't evolutionarily lucky enough to stumble upon the only fucking thing that makes us different than them. They have worthless, mindless, cold and calculated, animalistic sex with no purpose other than deriving gratification.

that last sentence brings up an unavoidable paradox for me, and one that i am unlikely to ever get over.

I can either be exactly like them and manipulate girls i don't care about into having sex with me just so i can exploit evolution and use it for enjoyment instead of procreation. You'd think on some level this would be my choice because i am constantly talking about not being subject to evolution's tricks and this seems like a blatant smack to evolution's face, but then you realize that by choosing this option i am

1.Being a fucking idiot by building up a relationship with someone i don't care about

and

2.As mentioned way above, following the exact same street evolution wanted me to, while taking a detour around the "get her pregnant!" exit.

The next option is equally or even worse than the first option.

The absolute only other kind of sex there is the kind that means something. Why does it mean something to you? Because you feel you have made a connection with the other person by having sex with them. you've "shed your shield","allowed them to accept you for who you are", "connected on an intimate level that only lovers can understand" and all that other typical sex bullshit you hear everywhere.

What's the problem with these things? We've discussed it countless times, but since i am quite obviously in an essay kind of mood and even more obviously not going to stop, i'll state it again-

The problem is that you aren't fucking 'connected' and the sex doesn't mean a goddamn thing. Why the fuck would pushing your penis into a vagina repeatedly in a rhythmic fashion someone make you more 'connected' with a person you weren't previously connected with? Why the fuck would putting an appendage of yourself inside someone's body make you understand their thought process more? Do their unspoken thoughts and ideas somehow leak into your urethra through their sexual fluids? Can you somehow read their mind as you stare into their eyes with passion?

Absolutely not. You aren't learning anything new about the girl except how wide her vagina is, what shape her nipples are, how much she sweats, and how quiet she can be when you're penetrating her above your 7 year old sister's room. None of these things are respectable or information that opens up new doors for a blossoming friendship.

After having sex with a person who your brain has decided shares features that would be beneficial to future generations, you will then be linked together by chemicals in your brain that react and amplify when you're around that person, giving you an elated warm feeling known as love. 'Linked' is the wrong term. it should be 'shacked by an evolutionary necessity. Without this chemical, men would get women pregnant, leave, and the women wouldn't raise the babies, leaving them to fend for themselves. Humans are worthless fighters when they're born and completely dependant upon being fed and protected for many, many years. Without the chemical, humans all would have died with the first generation.

Love is without question the only addiction that is not only not looked down upon, but expected and promoted. The chemicals released into the brain that cause love are exactly the same ones responsible for creating addictions to cocaine or other drugs that rely mostly on the need to get your dopamine levels back up to a level high enough to enjoy life again.

Why, then, are people with drug problems looked down upon and put into rehabilitation centers when people who are in love are awwwwwed at and approved by everyone? Here's a quote:

"The results were surprising. For a start, a relatively small area of the human brain is active in love, compared with that involved in, say, ordinary friendship . "It is fascinating to reflect", the pair conclude, "that the face that launched a thousand ships should have done so through such a limited expanse of cortex." The second surprise was that the brain areas active in love are different from the areas activated in other emotional states, such as fear and anger. Parts of the brain that are love-bitten include the one responsible for gut feelings, and the ones which generate the euphoria induced by drugs such as cocaine. So the brains of people deeply in love do not look like those of people experiencing strong emotions , but instead like those of people snorting coke."

So what the fuck is the importance of this quote, considering it says exactly what i went over? The bolded parts important. It states right there that ordinary friendship, as in a friendship that is not bound is sex, uses completely different parts of the brain than the tiny part romantic love uses.

More importantly, love is not based in strong emotions . That is absolutely contradictory to what the entire fucking concept of love is , don't you think? The idea behind love is that you strongly love each other, strongly enjoy everything about the person, and feel a strong sense of connection to them. The idea of love is that someone has come along who you hold above everyone else. To you, they are on a higher rank than your friends and family. From a rational point of view, this would be based entirely in emotions, when in fact it isn't based in emotions.

So what the fuck is love based in? It certainly isn't based in real emotions or thoughts, so what the fuck is love? Love, as mentioned before, is an evolutionary necessity and nothing more. There are no secret passageways to love. There are no hidden meanings to love. there are no perks to love aside from the short term amplification of enjoying life when you're with the person.

So what the fuck is the problem with enjoying life. There is no problem with enjoying life. The importance comes from how you're enjoying life.

Are you enjoying life with an essentially entirely faked relationship held together only by an addiction or are you enjoying life with someone you have genuinely come to care about, someone who has not caused any brain altering chemicals to poison your thoughts, someone who, through actual strong emotions and real thought, has become a person you love being with not due to an evolutionary necessity/trick/scam, but due to finding someone whose thoughts and personality link (and i mean link this time) with yours perfectly?

When you fall into the pit that is romantic love, you are held down by what is expected of you, and see everything through the hazy clouded and waterfilled goggles of an addict. Instead of the person you're in love with pulling these goggles off and wiping the water out of your eyes, they paint little hearts on them.

When you happen upon a person who becomes your true friend, the result is hopefully the opposite- seeing everything completely clearly and objectively, with your friend nudging you in the right direction if you seem to be veering too far off course.

I have come to the conclusion that I cannot rationalize having sex. The only things it can do are cloud your reality or ruin a friendship. This is a terrible concluding paragraph because i just introduced an idea right there that i didn't touch upon at all.

How can it ruin a friendship? Before I have stated that having sex with anyone but someone who isn't already your close, personal, non-sexual friend, is stupid. However, it seems to me that having sex with someone who is your close and personal non-sexual friend can be even worse.

If you have sex with someone who isn't you're friend, you're either going to get gratification and move on, or be tangled in love's spindly grasp.

If you have sex with a close friend, you run the high risk of completely destroying both of your minds, only to be trapped in the same fucking web as two non-close friends who fall in love .

So what the fuck good is sex? It's fucking horrible and I absolutely hate it and don't see any logical reason to have it with anyone. You seem to think I am asexual and don't have any sexual thoughts. I can assure that isn't the case at all, and I can assure even more that that fact doesn't stop me from feeling exactly the way I have detailed in the 40 paragraphs above. I wrote a fucking essay. People say "there is no logic to love" as if that's a good thing .

It isn't.

Listen, Padre, as much as I like the final punch of those last two words up there, I need to add something else here. Whenever I speak to you at length about these things, I worry about seeming like i'm imposing myself. However, many things quickly make me realize every time that i'm not. the first is this- you are really the only person who i can give my complete, thought out, detailed opinion to who will read it, think about it, and come to your own conclusions. If i sent the above to kyle, i am positive he would glance at it, and send me a response that said "See, i know what you're getting at, but does it really matter?" Even if he read it all, it would mean nothing to him because he really doesn't care about seeing the world more clearly.

I almost wish i could, but I cannot say "i'm alright with you completely disagreeing with me", because i'm not. i really do want my close friends to think through things and see them as i do, but i know that can't happen. The difference here is while kyle would say "No, andy, since i disagree with the broad concept, i disagree about the fine points , don't believe anything you just said, and refuse to say that any of it makes sense", you might say "It all makes sense but I don't see it that way" or "well, that makes logical sense so i agree with you."

Of course, that would lead to me saying "well if it all makes sense, how the fuck can you not see it that way?" but that's because i see everything as being a sensical puzzle. Any given topic is a large picture to me. That large picture represents my opinion about it. These pictures are all formed out of many, many pieces and each piece is something about the topic that is logical or something that makes the most sense. Really, logic and sense are the same thing. So, each piece is logic, and if all the pieces make sense to me and form the picture, how the fuck else am i going to see it? Saying "it all makes sense but i don't see it that way" is like putting together a puzzle of a picture of a cow and saying "that is a mighty handsome bird". It doesn't make any fucking sense.

While i am completely confident that the conclusions i have come to make logical sense, i hate people who impose their ideas and try to force you to believe them and i sometimes worry about looking like an imperialistic nazi fuck. However, those people i hate are all people with wrong and illogical ideas, so it's not the same situation. I still associate coming at you with this overwhelmingly one sided opinion as being like those people, though, and i want to assure that you never take it that way.

If you read this, please respond so that I don't have to ask you if you read my long fucking email next time i see you in person. If you don't respond, I will ask next time i see you and if we have time, have you read it then because i can't tame my eagerness to get my word out and hear a response.

Actually i can tame it quite well, but i prefer to get things read in a timely manner. Unless it's books.

On Knowledge and Logic

And suddenly I realize why Andy is right. One cannot be blamed for a mistake in knowledge, but one can be blamed for a mistake in judgement. Knowledge is the accumulation of truth through trial. Judgement is the preemptive knowledge derived from logic. If a man says, "The sun will rise tomorrow because it has always been that way," he is making a knowledge-claim. If the same man states that "The earth will rotate enough to encounter the sun's rays periodically," he is making a judgement. When a man makes a false knowledge claim, he has not experienced that knowledge. But if a man makes a false judgement, he is making the gravest of errors: he is saying that 2 + 2 = 5. To subvert logic is to deny existence and to deny the self. When another person makes a false judgement, it is your duty to correct their error, for to let their false logic exist is to allow untruth into both their life and your own. It hurts your sense of reality when another man's reality is false. Whenever Andy and I get into an argument, it is usually over a false knowledge claim. However, the scariest arguments are the logical arguments, because there is one winner and one loser. In a knowledge argument, both will win because the truth will become clear to both. In a argument of logic, one will succeed in establishing reality, the other will deny it. Learn this crucial difference and you will succeed.

On Sex

For me, sex has been the most confusing aspect of my existence since the first awkward night. After my first sexual experience, I didn't really know what to think. While I assumed the normal "Heck yeah, man, let's go get me some PUSSY" mentality typical of an idiot teenager, I grappled with the deeper meaning. It was imperative that the lowly act mean something other than physical gratification. When my sexual relationship matured, I thought that sex was about connecting with someone in a higher plane of existence, something I couldn't even comprehend. This stuck for awhile, but I was eventually forced back to this lowly plane by the pure bestiality of the act. Compared with art, literature, music, and other higher forms of communication, the actual physical act of sex is bestial, even sinful. I felt like a worm. This is where I have been. Alone and friendless in this ashamed state, I relegated sex to the lower realm of human gratification, akin to scratching an itch or sleeping. What purpose can a bestial act have, thought I, among the spiritual realm of higher meaning?
What I was doing was relegating acts of the body as low and acts of the mind as high. In this I separated the mind and body, instinctively driving a wedge between earthly and heavenly. The problem lies in the fact that there is no heaven, only earth. What I consider my mind is a collection of neuronal impulses floating inside my skull. While some consider this a damnation of human consciousness, I see it as a deification. After all, what could be more holy than something constructed of dirt capable of creating eternal beauty? Human achievement derives from the need to satisfy human desire, thus all achievements are also constructed of dirt.
This is becoming trite. I'll revise this.

Tell Me, Dear

My hands are red and blue, darling, and the smell of cheap laundry detergent fills my nostrils as I write this woeful tale down; down to you, sugar plum. Just for you, sadly, this is all for you. I have no better advice to give than to leave me, drop me, get me gone, for I am nothing and will never be more than nothing for you. I've got this problem, you see, and don't hate me for it, I'm just seeing it in me for the first time, I am, that I've got this problem where I stop my self from doing well. You ask, how could you keep yourself from the joy and happiness, you ask, well I'll tell you, darling, I love failing. There's nothing more exhilarating than knowing I failed when I could have done well. Yes, done better than well, done the best of anyone. Better than all the smart folks who always do well, even better than them. I know I could, sugar, but you see, I can't do that. If I did that I'd always have to keep doing well, doing better than well, and how could I do that, now tell me, dear? I don't have the stamina for that; I'd fall like a pile of leaves, crumble into dust to be walked upon by all those better than me that I'd do better than. I can't do that, I can't do well, how can I do well, tell me dear, I'm all atwitter with the anticipation of an answer. An answer only you can tell me so, please, darling, sweet-pea, my love, tell me how I am to do well?

No. Don't let me know. Leave me and get out of here. Get out before I drag you back in like I always do with my soft words and sweet moans. Oh, darling, I couldn't bear to see you down with me. Down in the muck. Down in the sweet nothing of potential. So get out. You've got so much that I could destroy, and honey, baby, my love, I really want to destroy you.

The Start of Something Good

I've decided to begin chronicling my daily life. I know, that's sort of the point of blogs. But here's the rub, most blog's about folks' daily lives are really boring. "I went to school today and I hated it lol!" is all I read anymore. Actually I don't read blogs because I read one like that and generalized all blogs from that. The point is I'm not going to be giving you, my faithful reader, the play by play of my boring life. Instead, I think I'll try more interesting things. As an example, let me tell you a story.
There once was a writer who became famous for writing very interesting stories that no one could quite understand. He wrote of incredible heroes wielding mighty swords to slay monsters and save princesses. He wrote murder stories, where the culprit ended up being the protagonist. He wrote children's stories and romance novels and was widely praised for his illusory and somewhat normal writing style. Critics loved him because he remained starkly ambiguous. Normal folk loved him because the stories were simple and didn't require any deep thought. His success as a writer was unequaled, and indeed, he became "the writer of the generation."
There was a problem, though. This famous writer lived a life consumed by fear. He was constantly afraid that someone would figure him out. He knew that one day, one person would realize that he was writing about absolutely nothing. That was the key to his success. He wrote about absolutely nothing. He always started a story without knowing where it was headed. This aimless writing style was the critics' ambrosia, as they declared it so ambiguous and beautiful that it had to mean something. But it didn't. The sum of all the epic prose and moving dialogue was nothing. Thus the writer lived in fear.
One day, the writer saw his death in the form of a young woman with green eyes. At a book signing, in the line of enthusiastic fans, he saw her. She moved so easily and steathily, hiding, then appearing with leonine eyes, full of bloodlust, that stared directly into his cowering soul. He knew his death was fast approaching. This girl knew his secret, knew his embarrassing and career ending truth. He quickly stood up. Without a word, he walked off and destroyed his hollow life.

One

And so his journey led him to places unforeseen and unknowable: lands that existed between the realms of dreams and imagination. Entire nations as metaphors. Kingdoms, empires, worlds, all flittering upon the edge of coherence. Time vanished, as did his memory of the beginning. When the future becomes the past, and the past becomes as tangible as the rough earth below, the start and end points of the journey blur with the rest of the inocuous, vacant moments of relevancy. Today he witnessed the birth of his son, yesterday he felt himself die, tomorrow he will begin the journey for the first time, again. The images dancing through his conscious mind seemed only to exacerbate the volcanic pressure building within his skull, expanding his perspective but hindering his sight. Ambiguities and possibilities, philosphies and egocentricities, wisdom and desire.

Eggnog Shootout Part Two

The still point. The space between the last action and the next action. The infinite amount of time between the realization that you are about to be shot in the back and the actual being shot in the back. That point sucks.

Such were the thoughts of the stranger as he stared down his own arm, down the barrel of his gun, to the disproportional face of the bastard that sold him tainted eggnog. It wasn’t even about the eggnog, he realized out loud. “This barkeep lied to me, but more importantly, this barkeep disrespected me. If you, gentlemen,” referring to the dozen odd heavily armed patrons, “were in my situation, would you not want to kill this man? I know I certainly do.”His soon-to-be dispatchers cocked their guns. This was not good. The stranger’s fancy words would do him no good, here, as these weren’t men accustomed to reason.

A bead of sweat formed on the furrowed brow of the stranger, reflecting the fires that lit the bar. Slowly, it slid down his face. He slowly exhaled, and the droplet fell to the floor. A pool of urine was slowly forming around the left leg of the barkeep, who was frozen in place by the tension of the moment. The immense silence was only disturbed by the bartender's girlish whimpering. A long, near fatal moment transpired until the sound of a man's slow gait entered the bar. Step, step; another man, unaware of the explosive situation in the saloon. Step, step; louder, closer. Step, step; the unmistakable clanging of spurs. Step, step; all attentions firmly fixed on the intruder. Step, step; finally, the man stood outside of the swinging doors of the saloon.

Here’s that still point, again. Here’s the point when time stops and you can move between everything, looking at every angle and through every perspective. At this moment, we have what one might call an interesting situation. You have the stranger, completely innocent, simply wanting to regain his slighted honor. You have all of the local patrons, utterly contemptable, meddling in other people's affairs. But then we also have a variable, an unknown, a factor that will throw all predicted outcomes out. Another man with the dubious task of unleashing the floodgates of hell. So what will happen? Well that’s the thing with these still points; you can see everything except the very next moment.