This from an alert reader concerning my chart on the increase of disability claims:
"Regarding
the disability graph...heard a story on NPR the other day addressing this very
issue. Turns out that when welfare was "rolled back" in Clinton's
days, people were then switched to disability. States and counties actually
hire companies to manage these transitions to disability. Why? because
otherwise local governments have to pay."
I read the link he included and apparently some woman was switched to disability because she was on high blood pressure medicine and had sleep apnea.
> North Korea acts like it wants to go to war.
Maybe we should give them Michonne.
>
A photograph that I would have bet money didn't exist...
(it's hard to explain how much I appreciate comments like this)
I don't
know any other way to contact you, just wanted to say I love your work, man. If
I only look at one site in a day, it's yours. I thought you might be interested
in a group I'm part of called The Brisbane Atheists. Australia, Queensland; my
second favorite site. I'm Peter, and I think a bit like you.
When the prophet speaks the thinking is done.
I think I could have figured this out for myself...
Day Drinking. Because life is short.
Guy photoshops famous people without teeth...
I think that's fucking hilarious.
Painting the Gold Gate Bridge is never ending. By the time they get to the end, they start over again...
Interestingly, now that they have all kinds of power lifts, power tools, etc, the crew has grown from 8 to 180 and it takes twice as long.
Wedding rings featuring each of their voice waves saying "I do."
Headline #1...
Does anyone remember when it was this easy?
There was
a, as in one, woman who first decided to shave under her arms. What do you think was
her motivation?
Of
course, the same thing could be said for the first man to shave their face.
You have no idea why that first woman shaved her underarms, or shaved her legs, or wore spikes on the heels of their shoes…all you know is
that you do it now because you are expected to do it.
Well, I
don’t accept that as a reason....for anything; especially if someone stands to get rich from me doing it.
Think for yourselves, Gentle Readers. Life is so much easier that way.
And dudes! Some of you wear jackets with three fake buttons on the sleeve and have absolutely no idea why.
Think for yourselves, Gentle Readers. Life is so much easier that way.
And dudes! Some of you wear jackets with three fake buttons on the sleeve and have absolutely no idea why.
Headline #2...
I think our belief that we have discovered ANYTHING absolute in the universe is the height of human centric arrogance.
Words most often said as
sober as possible:
“What seems to be the problem, officer?”
“What seems to be the problem, officer?”
Want to guess what these are?
Disguised cell phone towers.
HAHAHAHAHAHAAHAH!!!!
Let me take them from top left to bottom right:
>Two drunk pigs singing atop a cell phone tower.
>Two elephants playing patty-cake so hard they bleed.
>Two transvestites fighting over a triple D bra.
>Kim Jong-un running into a cellphone tower.
(I really enjoyed inventing that)
Headline #3...
Let me take them from top left to bottom right:
>Two drunk pigs singing atop a cell phone tower.
>Two elephants playing patty-cake so hard they bleed.
>Two transvestites fighting over a triple D bra.
>Kim Jong-un running into a cellphone tower.
(I really enjoyed inventing that)
Headline #3...
That sick bastard!
No matter
what you do, it doesn’t matter. If you weren’t doing it, somebody else would
be. Don't take yourself too seriously and get out there and sell those trinkets.
Jew’s say they are
the only chosen people…by god…look it up.
Is that claim the reason for so much anti-Semitism?
Is that claim the reason for so much anti-Semitism?
Any friend of homemade tamales is a friend of mine.
These are drone strikes in and around Afghanistan...
47 high profile targets killed.
2348 adults killed.
175 children killed.
(citation needed)
2348 adults killed.
175 children killed.
(citation needed)
Think this is silly?
You ought to see the shit I don't post.
A story worth retelling...
When these trees are cut for lumber, it is done above the "swelling" at the bottom. Then birds sit on the stump, take a shit and leave seeds. Some seeds find an old crack fertile enough to support it, and keeps growing; it's roots spreading out, then down the side of the stump. This continues until a full-grown tree anchors itself in the lake bottom. Then over time the stump has rotted out and that second generation tree looks like it's standing on tip-toes, with a void at the bottom where once stood a stump.
I often like to think of all of us in the trinket business. People get in cars every morning to open a trinket store. The trinkets are made in a trinket factory. Doctors keep the workers healthy enough to make trinkets. Educators give young people the skills to learn to make, sell, advertise, transport, etc. trinkets. Grocers and farmers fuel the workers who make the trinkets.
It's hard to impress someone that thinks like me.
The mother and/or father who allowed this photograph to be taken did not love their son...
It's hard to impress someone that thinks like me.
The mother and/or father who allowed this photograph to be taken did not love their son...
Allowing it anywhere near the internet was just plain cruel.
This is absolutely extraordinary...
This is absolutely extraordinary...
(By the way, sometimes I just take a screen shot of a film clip to illustrate my information. I X-out the red start button in the middle so as not to fool you.
You're welcome.)
You're welcome.)
I would say, for most people, the same thing applies to real life. I don't want to bore you, but I have not experienced this drop in enjoyment by facing my own death face to face. I can truly say that I enjoy ever hour of every day.
Further, you ought to see the look of pure glee on my wife and I's face every morning when we realize the other one survived the night......again. It is, in a word, priceless.
Further, you ought to see the look of pure glee on my wife and I's face every morning when we realize the other one survived the night......again. It is, in a word, priceless.
Perfect grouping in torso targets...great burglar proofing...
There is a move afoot to remove the word "whom" from the English language. "You were talking to who?", sounds just fine to me.
And remember purists, if you had had your way, we would still be using thee and thou.
And remember purists, if you had had your way, we would still be using thee and thou.
North Korea: The nation-state equivalent of the short bus.
The world needs more of these...
I overslept today and didn't have enough time to do all the nothing I had planned.
(just kidding. I'm working very hard on another invented "weapon")
Is this true?
"I've never been good at anything."
You can be good making people feel like they are good at something.
Each pair is the same age...
When I discover that the form has questions on the back.
When I was growing up we had three (3) fireplaces in our house. I swore I would never have one in my own home, and I haven't.
The power company cuts down a bunch of trees. My mother convinced the truck drivers in our area to dump their load in our back yard if it was closer than the dump.
You can't image the feeling you get when the school bus stops and there is a new mountain of trees in your back yard, all of it needing to be cut and/or split.
This is the way my wife looks at me when I make a joke in the middle of a conversation between her and one of her girl friends...
You can't image the feeling you get when the school bus stops and there is a new mountain of trees in your back yard, all of it needing to be cut and/or split.
This is the way my wife looks at me when I make a joke in the middle of a conversation between her and one of her girl friends...
This is so silly. He does this every time he does his job...scoring TD's.
What if everybody did this. You buy a car and the salesman does something like this. The grocery checkout who doesn't make a mistake. The preacher after a baptism.
These children are playing atop a nuclear bomb shell...
These children are playing atop a nuclear bomb shell...
Do they think this looks sexy?
If you walked in on your girlfriend or wife sitting like that, you would probably rush over thinking she in extreme distress.
Few things I find on line make me laugh out loud. This did...and we've all had mornings like this, haven't we...
Few things I find on line make me laugh out loud. This did...and we've all had mornings like this, haven't we...
If you love someone, set them free. If they don't come back, call them up later when you're drunk.
Game of Thrones illustration...
My parents used local law enforcement as a proper discipline technique of their children.
One of my very own...
5 comments:
"You have no idea why that first woman shaved her underarms, or shaved her legs, or wore spikes on the heels of their shoes…all you know is that you do it now because you are expected to do it."
If the trend doesn't hurt people, why be annoyed by it? This is why I think ballet slippers and high heels are ridiculous and why I couldn't care less about ties, hairstyles, etc.
Why assume peoples' motivations? I wear a plaid jacket with decorative pocket-flaps; am I a brainless slave to crowds or does the garment appeal to me visually and have sentimental value?
Maybe Clark pit-shaves because he likes how bare underarms feel. Perhaps Clay doesn't because he thinks Sky Creator dislikes hair-trimming. And maybe Clarice pit-shaves because her sister taught her how and for no other reason. None of them is more "right" or "wrong". The religious one's probably a bit kookier, but not "righter" or "wronger".
It baffles me that you spend so much time enriching and decorating the world around you and yet you don't like it when people do that to themselves if the decoration doesn't meet some arbitrary bar of originality. Nobody's original. Everything's an iteration—the words you're reading right now are, and so too is every thought you've ever had and ever will.
Worrying about originality is a silly waste of time. Surely you wouldn't say "water is boring because there's lots of it". Why, then, make similar claims about ideas and behaviors?
It would be one thing if people followed trends only because other people did, but in reality, very few people do that. They want to feel belonging and don't know how else to get that feeling, they know they won't get a job if they don't, they touched some garment as a youth and really liked how it felt so they wore ones like it ever after, or perhaps they're just too busy living their life to give a shit. I could go on...
Also: that Elizabeth Taylor GIF is wonderful. What a look!
I think what really bugs me is that we have been brainwashed by companies to buy and use their products to the point that people are thought less of if they don't fall in line.
Maybe you don't watch much TV, but half of the ads try (and succeed) to convince you to hate yourself the way you are...buying their product will "fix" it.
Further, I fear that marching lockstep down fashion road makes it much easier to march lockstep down all groupthink ideas, forgetting that your thoughts matter.
It is our nature to game social situations to our advantage. Attention-seeking, self-promoting behavior is as natural as underarm hair. Why change it if it's innate to us?
heh
I dislike "you are a cog in a buying machine" consumerism, but trends in arts and fashions will exist regardless of whether the "brainwashing" behind them is concentrated in corporations or spread out across many smaller groups. One of the good things about the internet is that its breadth of content can engender greater variety of trends. The net can have the opposite effect, too, of course; as with any technology, it depends on how it's used.
It's healthy to be skeptical of marketing but I can't be bothered unless it's clearly harmful, and even then, I tend to not care much unless it's egregiously so. I want drug advertising stopped, for example, but I don't care much about ads for high heels, tennis racquets, sugary foods, vehicles, ladders, etc.
Matt, you are not concerned that people who all dress alike, smell alike, etc, will all think alike? Knowing that the same techniques are used to influence your spending habits and your thinking and critical thinking skills...i.e. they have been bought by people who may not have their best interests in mind.
Deodorant companies don't care how you smell. They only want to sell you deodorant. Gillette doesn't care about your appearance. They want to sell razors. I just don't want to think I MUST do something because I was convinced to do it by the very people who stand to take some of my money.
I appreciate your comments very much. Keep them coming.
But you're not convinced, nor am I, nor are most people, really. Marketing—especially shotgun-type mass marketing like TV or banner ads—has always been a very low-return business, often with views-to-purchases measured in fractions of a percent.
And no, I'm not concerned that we'll all become fungible drones. As much as it is in our nature to follow trends, it's also in our nature to pursue the new and different for their own sake. Ironically trend following itself often shakes up and changes other trends, e.g. rock and roll started out as a small fad up against the status quo yet it eventually became an entrenched norm itself, ditto punk rock, metal, etc.
It's bullshitty speculation on my part, but I'd say our desire to explore comes from our evolution as wide-ranging nomads; the seeking of new places and things seems hard-wired.
Overall I would just say trend-following isn't inherently bad. It certainly can be, but it's like any other behavior or technology in that the use is what matters, not its mere existence. So yes, high heel marketing probably leads to bad things, but bad enough to regulate it? I'd say no. The fact that we're both using computers is a very human trend, and that's a good thing overall.
There's a balance to be found between sociality and individualism. Either taken to extremes is probably not a good thing...
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