[an excerpt from The Blasphemy Tour, written as Jass Richards] “We hope you’re enjoying Texas?” the show’s host said, after he introduced Dylan and Rev as his first guests of the day. “Well, we’re a little puzzled by all the American flags. Outside on people’s houses and their lawns—we’ve even been seeing them sticking …
Category: uncategorized
Oct 03 2014
Vote? WTF?
So I noticed the “Question of the Day” feature on the Weather Network website, which typically poses a question along with four response options, inviting site visitors to “Vote”. I haven’t done a survey, but I suspect this sort of thing is not unusual. Which makes it all the more disturbing. Why? Because often the …
Aug 18 2014
Transgendered Courage
Transgendered people are often seen as courageous; they have the guts to take radical steps to become the people they really are. But I don’t see them as any different from people, mostly women, who get nip-and-tuck surgeries, botox, and breast enlargements. After all, they too take radical steps to become the people they feel …
Jul 29 2014
We Won!
“We won!” a neighbor crows to me. Apparently she’d watched a game of some kind on television the night before. “What ‘we’?” I snort. Okay, scoff. “You had nothing to do with it.” She probably spent the whole game, and much of her life, eating potato chips and drinking beer. The conversation ends. She can’t …
May 02 2014
Rethinking Nero and the Gas Chamber Accompanists
One of the most memorable scenes for me from all the movies I’ve seen is the one in The Titanic when it’s clear the ship is sinking, they’re all going to die, and the first violinist of the chamber group looks to each member of the group and receives confirmation that ‘Yes, of course, we’re …
Apr 13 2014
Dismissing Philosophers
“Yes, well, that’s a philosophical question, isn’t it.” So, what, the question’s unimportant? Because it can’t be answered with quantitative certainty? But philosophical questions can be answered with more or less strength, more or less adequacy. Also, since there’s no absolutely right or wrong answer to most philosophical questions, the consensus seems to be that …
Feb 03 2014
Mainstream and Alternative
So I was browsing the movie collection at my online DVD rental site and feeling so very tired and bored with movies by men, about men, for men. My request list had dwindled to almost zero, and I wasn’t finding anything I was interested in. So I decided to check out the “Alternative” section for …
Dec 28 2013
Being Josh
[Another old one, but it still applies…] It’s Monday night basketball, an all-comers pick-up game, supposed to be fun and a good sweat. But week after week I steel myself against the anger, the frustration of not knowing how to correct the problem, and the despair of not being able to even begin to do …
Dec 19 2013
Why do you read the paper every day?
Why do you read the paper (or listen to/watch the news) every day? Certainly not for an objective account of events. Because surely you’re aware of editorial bias – what gets in (or not), where it goes, and how much space it gets there. And reporter bias – who gets interviewed, what gets asked (or not), …
Sep 05 2013
Is it true that some people can’t think?
I watched The Shawshank Redemption recently and was struck by the scene where the guy says that in solitary confinement he had Mozart to keep him company, and they all express surprise that he was allowed to have a record player, and he says ‘No, in here’ and points to his head—and they all look …
fiction
