"A Very Brave Woman"

It sucks 'cause she probably wouldn't have to do that if care about appearance wasn't so slanted towards women.

Anyone who knows me, knows that I have a vendetta against make-up. Up until that video, I actually despised make-up...but I hate it a lot less if it makes people like her feel better. Must be hard as hell to deal with that stuff. Especially when it's in their teens/younger adult years when it matters the most to the rest of the world.

I've always said that beauty lied primarily in facial structure (if it had to be physical), but I do know people who care about their bf/gf having clear skin. I feel for you ladies (in general) - there's just so much pressure that it's hard not to care about appearance.

But I still don't like make-up. I've never seen anyone who I honestly think NEEDS make-up (not even the chick in this video). I don't find her repulsive, but it saddens me that other people might.

Either way, I think it's admirable that she outed herself like that. Good for her.

- knowledge

Occupy Wall Street...Boss

IDGAF - this is boss as hell. Stay hungry ;)

Is Tuition Really THAT Unreasonable in Ontario?

E-mail from the student federation at my university:

In May of this year, student representatives from across the country voted to call a national day of action in 2012 to demonstrate Canada-wide support for a national vision for higher education. This means on February 1, 2012 students from Victoria to St. John's will be taking to the streets to demand reductions in tuition fees, greater investment in college and university education and measures to alleviate student debt.

Is tuition really THAT bad? I did some calculations and on a bad year, it'll be 8k a year including textbooks. Minimum wage (10.25) for 20 hours a week, for the rest of the year will earn someone roughly 9000 dollars after tax returns and all that crap for students. Now, you factor in that minimum wage isn't even mandatory - there are plenty of student jobs that pay 12/hour at the very least. That comes to around $11000 dollars after tax returns. So that gives students more than enough spending money. If they want even more spending money, they can find plenty of jobs that'll pay 15/hour. Or they could even find a higher-paying job, work less, and still afford this "insane tuition" (which, by the way, is 10000 - ~50000 a year in the United States).

On top of all this, it seems like people forget that OSAP is a privilege; not something that we're entitled to. If you can't work and focus on school at the same time, then the government's nice enough to give you an interest-free until you graduate. I'd even go so far as saying that being able to go to a university in another city isn't something that we're entitled to get a loan for.

WTF gives? Are students just whiny little babies, or am I missing something here?

Occupy Bay Street (Toronto)

For the people that don't know (or the people who saw some sort of sad excuse for a protest on TV), the crux of the Occupy movement is that 1% of the world essentially decide life for the other 99% and control around 42% of the world's wealth. 


The protest is SUPPOSED to be about inequality...when the real issue is capitalism. There are a bunch of people realizing that capitalism doesn't work. Or that it does, but with an end-life. And we're just unlucky enough to be at the pinnacle of it. The very concept of capitalism is competitive...and with competition comes a wider gap. It's funny 'cause it emphasizes hard work, but the longer a capitalist system goes on, it becomes more about luck. I like capitalism; it's the reason I can have the things that I need an/or want. But I'll admit that it sucks for the people who haven't had much luck in it. After all, that could've been me.

I think it's way too easy for the people who are well-off to say "suck it up and deal with it" 'cause they'd like to think that they deserve to be where they're at, and everyone else just brought it upon themselves. But that's not the way the world works - some people CAN'T help themselves...or if they can, it's not enough to actually fix things. But capitalism's never been about equality - which is what democracy's here for (ie. banks mess up the fancy world we live in and we have he right to protest about it). It's the only check we have against that system, and to be honest, it doesn't seem like we have many other "systems" to try out. Power and wealth differences will always exist because it's at the heart of capitalism. I don't think people realize that for someone to do well, someone else needs to do worse. 

I get what they're protesting, but I'm not sure there's really much that can be done. You can prolong a "failing" system by patching the leaks, but it's eventually gonna end up the same way. Given that, there's 2 ways to take this: accept capitalism and the idea that some people flourish and some are **** out of luck, or move towards a more equality-based system where everyone's doing okay. But that leads to another problem. No one wants to be "okay". Everyone wants to be great. No one wants to be okay because we'd all rather be happy, even if it meant risking that we'd be sad at some point. 


The rebuttal here is that it CAN be fixed - that you need to have regulations in place to control the rich who get greedy, which wrecks the economy for everyone else. But until you can fix people, that **** isn't gonna happen. It's especially NOT gonna happen in a system where the rich call the shots. You can't tell people who are the reason we even had or saw success in the first place what to do. Not even if you're the government (unless you're richer than them).

I saw the protest and it does more damage to the cause than anything else. It's a shame it wasn't better-organized. At the same time, the media's doing a good job of diffusing the issue - they use any chance they can get to bring attention to how disorganized it is, rather than trying to explore the different issues and factions. For such a big city, our version of occupy was such a sad demonstration (or maybe a testament to how we don't have it that bad).

A lot of people say that they're identifying the issue, but not proposing a good fix. Maybe 'cause there isn't one. So basically, hey're bringing attention to how we're all screwed and there's not much that we can do. And that's what I'm trying to do here. Here's to hoping (and in some cases, knowing) that some of you guys (will) make it in to the 1% club. ;)

So Trippy!

My friend tried this while he was drunk and he fell over. Try it!

Peace,

- knowledge

No vote = No right to complain?

(Written on May 2)
So today's the day and I still can't decide.

I figure that if I really can't pick, I just won't vote. But then I started thinking: if I don't vote, then am I not allowed to bitch for the next couple of years until the next election? It's not like I'm going to stop paying my taxes this year, so surely, I still have the right to care about how well (or horribly) fiscal management goes.

Does my refusal to be a part of the process exclude me from the repercussions (or benefits...if we're lucky. ha). And if it does, then how is that any different from the next guy who votes for the candidate who DOES end up being the most atrocious tax-money spender?

Does democracy still extend to the non-voters? About 40% of Canadian citizens don't vote. So then I started thinking that maybe voting should be mandatory. Several countries do have this - it's illegal not to vote.

 But would this go against the very concept of democracy? How can people be forced to choose? Would the pressures of mandatory voting actually lend more harm to the process (through random and careless voting)?

Just some questions for the mind, I guess.

Peace,

- knowledge

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Is Voter Apathy a Good Sign of a Democracy?

I'm also putting together 2 years worth of textbook picture fails. Hang tight for that one.

Yearning for Symmetry

No explanation's needed





Peace,


- knowledge