Lessons in Honesty and Disingenuousness

Entry 01/20/2022 11:34:25 AM: Mentat 1790

I’m in a hell of a rampage right now. I was watching James playing New World last night and for the three hours that I was there, he was making a mockery of the bullshit lines that he feeds me routinely when it comes to Warframe vs. other games. He says that he dislikes farming in Warframe, but there he was in New World fishing and farming through not one or two streams, but several.

All right, I see what the problem with this is and called him out on it.

Then he counters with, “I like killing in in Warframe…”

There’s a problem with this as you can see here:

James is on the left, I’m on the right.  Based on his mission hours vs. total kills he’s averaging about 512.78 kills per hour, whereas I’m looking at 574.86 kills per hour. Further, I’m sitting on (easily) 1,102.69% more materials than he has (if I were to use gross income as an indicator to materials collected in the game).

I’ve completed 5 planets with him on Steel Path and while he might enjoy the killing — he doesn’t do the necessary whole-mode killing required for running a mission — let alone the consistent team support killing for any marathon farming mission that he constantly implies (like doing in missions like Mot (Tier IV Void Survival) in order to entice me to the challenge. Instead of reading it as a taunt, a challenge or a good-natured ribbing; I’ve been reading like a manipulation because I know that he needs to farm for materials.

The logistical problems for this is that he’s too melee main, and for another his kit for Steel Path is too small and niche and needs to not only be examined; it needs to be seriously worked on.

To make matters infinitely worse, he’s using Steel Path to mastering and leveling up weapons he hasn’t even worked with, let alone min-maxed in any appreciable way to running marathon farming runs. What’s he’s doing, is saying it’s his playstyle and coming off as an excuse to me because he has said “…the rest of the game is boring…”

This makes little sense to me as I’ve been playing the game for 8.5+ years and have watched Warframe evolve to what it is today. Steel Path is not for leveling up and is not for min-maxing. It’s was added for players that have spent their time in the normal Origin Map (Solar System on normal mode) and “wanted the challenge”. The developer added enticements to this game mode (inherent Drop Chance, Resource, Credit, and Mod Drop Chance Boosters) to make it worthwhile for the run & gunners to getting the materials that they didn’t farm in normal mode, but even based on the experience of playing what I have, it still pales in the amount of materials I have farmed through the normal map… FOR YEARS

In conclusion, I’m interpreting what James as telling me in two ways. The first is that he’s using the word Playstyle in the wrong manner and is attempting instead of playing a looter-shooter (like Warframe) as though he were playing a roguelite (like Hades for example).  He is then pigeonholing his gameplay in Warframe as though to make it personally appealing and enjoyable, and making people come along for that ride.

This is being silently reinforced based on his want to getting more Steel Essence through map completions and routine fighting the Acolytes that show up, which is a form of farming that he selectively doesn’t loathe. While he admits he wants it for the pre-built Forma — I know that based on his casual conversations, he also aims for god-rolled rivens through luck and gacha-like gambling.

The second is that while he has joked about going to high level Steel Path missions (for the enjoyment), the fact that he has routinely commented on it through the 5 planets, I’m reminded of the saying “There is a grain of truth in every joke”. Because of this, I’m feeling he’s either being dishonest about his intentions, or disingenuous about his needs within the game and because of my playstyle of helping a squad, am being manipulated into helping with the wants and needs.

These conclusions are reinforced ad nausea, ad infinitum when looking at his arsenal (and his profile) and seeing an appalling lack of forma in his weapons and warframes, along with the affinity numbers for what he has used since he started the game, as he has more affinity (XP) from squad sharing and playing in open missions than he does on his own.

Normally, I loathe dishonest and disingenuous people because if I have to read between the lines like I have to finding the truth, then they normally don’t belong in my life. But as I’ve learned through the years, sometimes I need to give a person the chance and the opportunity to come clean and not disappoint me. As Garibaldi said in this scene here.

I know I’m going to have to confront him on this tomorrow. Right now, I’m putting my anger and frustration up to the universe in the hopes of shaking it out of my system.

We just lost power here and we’re waiting to see how long it’s going to be out. Until the next time.

Post Edit: Two hours later everything restored without issue and I’m back. Off to rest relax…

A Couch Potato Review of the Series: Word of Honor (2021)

I am going to warn early as this is also going to be posted on MyDramaList, I am not going to be a gushing fangirl with all sorts of lines like “OMG OMG OMG OMG this is the best Wuxia BL ever!!! (in spite of the high review I did give there). This is more a reflection of how far some countries have come when dealing with LGBT/BL story lines and how far some countries still have to go to accepting the 10%+ of the population that exists within its borders. I’m reminded to reinforce this concept as the late Mira Furlan once said as the character Delenn of Minbar, “…everywhere Humans go, they create communities out of diverse and sometimes hostile populations. It is a great gift and a terrible responsibility. One that can not be abandoned…”

I have to say that after seeing the teaser for it in my recommended videos on YouTube’s main page, I had mixed feelings of sitting there and watching yet another Chinese series that originally had a strongly BL theme to it. Since watching Guardian which also had a strong BL theme in the book and then turning it into a “friend-zone interest”/bromance my taste for these levels of censorship died in the 80s when I was already some years out of the closet and enjoying more positive and independent LGBT cinema works. In fact in my never-ending study in humanities and the aspects of human love regardless of sexuality, sexual identity and even proclivities, I have routinely found that out of all the countries that I have sampled stories involving LGBT/BL levels of relationship, China and Brazil seem to share a 60+ years in the past Hollywood mindset of killing off LGBT/BL characters to even stamping out through censorship and downplaying anything that might show as sexual tension or even sexual attraction between same sex characters.

Word of Honor carries with it all the typical plots and subplots, contrivances, tropes and hundreds of major and minor characters you’d expect of any Wuxia story. One of the protagonists — Zhou Zi Shu (played by Zhang Zhe Han who I had first caught in another period piece called Legend of Yun Xi) — is a disillusioned and disheartened leader of an imperial force called the Window of Heaven. He imposed on himself the same pain and agony he did while serving as the leader of Window of Heaven: the Nails of Seven Torments which are inserted into a Kung Fu Master’s meridians thereby ensuring that he will only live no more than three years before dying in the sort of agony no one would want to have being deprived of all seven senses and the amount of pain being unbearable. The other protagonist — Wen Ke Xing (played by Gong Jun who I will be looking into more in the future) — that from a tragic past turns out to being the leader of the Ghost Valley (a place of criminals wanting to maintain their criminal lives without ever being part of the human world).

Pros

Wen Ke Xing’s comments towards Zhou Zi Shu when they first met — even when Shu was in disguise — were overtly sexual compared to the heterosexual counterparts both in this story as well as other Wuxia stories I’ve watched. Not to mention the continued overtly sexual and flirtatious comments are definitely a step in the right direction when it comes to the censorship that China continues to maintain on LGBT/BL stories.

Zhou Zi Shu warms up to Ke Xing’s flirtations and attention. While it becomes clear that this happens through prolonged exposure and coming to accept the fact that Ke Xing’s not going to be going away, Shu seems more accepting of the budding relationship going on.

Zhang Cheng Ling’s (played by Sun Xi Lun) acceptance of the relationship between Zhou Zi Shu and Wen Ke Xing without question or social stigmas reminds me of how many kids did the same thing when they found out that their fathers, fathers of friends and complete strangers they encounter in their life were gay or lesbians. This to me has always been a step in the right direction that the younger generations will always be more accepting than the older.

Extra points when it came to Wen Ke Xing’s comments during the second Heroes Conference when he defeated Zhao Jing (played by Wang Ruo Lin) when confronted by all the leaders of the sects attending the Heroes Conference when they discovered he was the Leader of the Ghost Valley even after he was able to prove his lineage leads back to the destroyed sect from the Healer Valley. I don’t often catch when the survivor of some made-extinct sect has been discovered to be the leader of the villains of the story, and his delivery of “where were all the allies when my father was killed” shamed everyone attending to humility a welcome addition I would like to see happen more. Because more often times than naught the lines between good and evil are not only black and white in Wuxia films — they are as unchanging and unmalleable.

Zhao Jing being the center stage of true villainy within the story. Through 20 years of story and grievances, you find out he’s the kingpin of all things evil going on within the story. Wang Ruo Lin pulls off such a character that people can just love to hate from beginning to middle to end as the story unfolds as to how he was involved with all the plots, counter-plots and ministrations that pulled everything together and apart through the majority of the story.

The almost Oedipus-like love/hate relationship between Zhao Jing and Prince Xie — or Scorpion King — (played by Li Dai Kun) going on since Xie’s introduction was positively palpable when he discovered time and time and time again at just how much his godfather used him whenever his godfather could. The way that Li Dai Kun can make such a subtle expression come off as hurt and painful is an honor to his acting teacher and directors in this film. I could almost feel sorry for him as a villain given that his godfather used him every step of the way through this story.

The rich and intertwining stories going on with many of the supporting characters. Namely Liu Qian Qiao or Glamourous Ghost (played by Ke Nai Yu) with Yu Qiu Feng (played by Liu Han Yang), Xi Sang Gui or Tragicomic Ghost (played by Chen Sha Sha), Ye Bai Yi or Sword Immortal (played by Huang You Ming). This is the sort of story telling that can only make the world richer and more living than what westerners do with making the stories so main character-centered.

Ambivalence

I find myself not too keen on the use of the word Soulmate when describing these two (as well the minor set of characters from our Sages of An Xian (played by Yu Zi Kuan, Lu Chun Sheng, Zhang Zhi Wei, Tong Xiao Mei and Yu Zi Kuan) that seems to imply a more polyamorous relationship). While I understand that this might be Ciwen Media/Youku attempts at introducing the concept to China’s mainstream audience in the same way that Longtime Companion (1989) introduced Significant Other to the English-Speaking mainstream, it’s taking a phrase steeped in metaphysical and philosophical knowledge and trivializing it to a euphemism. As though people are that incapable to making the jump from their world into another.

The witless heroes and petty villains of this story. Namely Gao Chong (played by Hei Zi), Mo Huai Yang (played by Wang Bo Qing), Long Xiao (played by Wang Zi Run), his father Long Que (played by Zhang Shuang Li) and Wang Mo Xuan (played by Ren Xi Hong) who I’m sure they had better roles in the book written by Priest, but came off as nothing more than MacGuffins for continuing the story. While I understand that all of these examples are supporting roles to the main character, they seem to be more downplayed than expected and just show up when some plot device needs to be pushed forward and seemed to lack a richer back story I’d come to expect from many of the other characters we were introduced through the 36 episodes.

The occasional CG blunders that pulled me out of immersion and temporary suspension of disbelief. While I understand CG special effects with humans as objects is still in its toddler stage, there were moments when you could clearly tell it was a computer drawn image instead of the actor/actress. Fortunately for me, it wasn’t the sort of routine occurrence I would expect from a low budget series so it didn’t make me regret my decision to truck on with the series.

Cons

I must’ve missed some Eastern/Chinese Mores in the transformation from Shu pushing Ke Xing away from him because he was dying to accepting Ke Xing as a Soulmate to live with through the end of his days. Further there doesn’t seem to be any indication what internal energies changes from Shu to actually see Ke Xing as a Soulmate he could never live without. In fact, because I might have missed the social queue that occurred, it comes off as an 180 degree change without any explained internalized decision how it changed from the character.

The anticlimactic way Zhao Jing was killed off during the avalanche at the end of the series. This painfully reminded me of so many books I’ve read and stories I’ve watched where the writers don’t know what to do with a character/villain hanging by the wayside and instead of letting them be forgotten, choose to just wipe them out through some deus ex machina event to just remove them from the plot. While I might have cheered a moment because it removed a loose end, thinking about it later I would’ve much rather preferred he live out the rest of his days as a mute invalid.

The transformation from pained and tormented villain Prince Xie to two-dimensional and even more petty villain he became fawning over his mute and invalid father while trying to prove just how much of a villain he was and how his father underutilized him through much of the story. If there was a reason to use a dues ex machina to remove a character — I would’ve voted for Prince Xie instead of his godfather Zhao Jing, because it’s clear from a story telling standpoint, he would be used in future stories in some way or another.

The insane way that the theme song for Zhou Zi Shu and Wen Ke Xing gets hammered into the scenes at every frelling opportunity. While I appreciated the extra work that was done for translating everything in the movie (from dialog to street signs to the plaques in the internal scenery, which is definitely more a pro than a con), the fact that the song had to be translated every bloody time it played along with the song playing through several stanzas was enough for me to be off-put wanting to find it. It’s one thing when Chen Wei Ru’s Rice Omelet of Love was used at the beginning of the episodes of HIStory 2: Right or Wrong and a plus when it was used in instrumental form through some of the series… To have it play complete with Lyrics so routinely as to try to artificially manipulate the heartstrings of the audience comes off instead as cheap and cash-grabbing.

The 1950s attitude that EVERYTHING needs to have a tidy ending. Villains are vanquished and dead. Questionable characters defeated and given the choice to live outside of the world they were introduced never to be seen again or killed for their loyalty to villainy, and heroes — other than the protagonists (that will come with the bottom line) — live happy and prosperous. Further, this particular series heavily relies on Shakespearean-like plot tropes of killing off even minor characters if they transgressed against the fealty and filial of their family and/or their Sect Leader. This is why I usually go looking for indie films and series instead; because with them at least they attempt to make it as gray a world and as messy as life can be as possible.

Bottom Line: While it’s clear that it was written in such a way that even the protagonists were going to suffer in the Shakespearean-like way where a non-heterosexual couple has to pay some sort price because it’s not the “norm”, with enough of the Eastern/Chinese Mores learned, coupled with some attention to details that cropped up during the last episode of this particular series, I was able to do what I’ve been doing since I was a toddler. Make the ending the way I wanted it to be. Because of that, even with the twists and turns that were introduced to the story, coupled with how many pros there were to cons (listed and unlisted), I found this to being an enjoyable romp through a Costumed, Wuxia, Period Piece. I might go looking for the epilogue to confirm my suspicions. Whether I re-watch it remains to be seen.

One notable afterthought that comes to mind deals with Wu Chang Gui or the Changing (Impermanence) Ghost (played by Xue Fei). I was incredibly impressed with the vocal resonance which Xue Fei used when he was speaking his lines. While I can’t seem to find any interviews to confirm whether that was his normal speaking voice or if he pitched it specifically for the role — I’m off to watch a couple of movies he did support roles to confirm my suspicions.

The streamer observations continue…

Entry 07/01/2021 09:37:20 AM: Mentat 1655

Shower thought time…

There is a strong logistical problem with being a variety streamer that I’ve seen. I’m going to break this down into two parts: The first is a breakdown of the audience based on categories that I have encountered since I’ve been registered on Twitch back when it was still Justin.TV. The second being addressing possible ways of handling the first through branding and programming. And by programming I mean the games and the genres that the streamer might feel compelled to sit and stream.

Groups

The six groups I have encountered in my wanderings that are as follows:

1. Channel Changers you know the types. They’re the ones that would normally sit on the couch with remote in hand and flip through the channels endlessly in a state of agitation and boredom and looking for something to catch their attention long enough to slake the feeling of boredom they’re experiencing because they don’t want to do something else. While this group might throw a follow much the same way as having a list of favorite channels programmed on their remote, they’ll usually stop by if either the game or the streamer or even both has tweaked them enough to stave off their ever-present boredom.

2. The Game Loyalists much like the channel changers — are looking for a streamer that they can be loyal to based on whatever criteria they have and the games they’re playing… Heavily on the games they like playing. This particular group is both extremely easy and extremely difficult to maintain — even more than the channel changers because if the streamer has stuck to a game based on this group, if the streamer were to change programming to something else, not only can they act betrayed, they will lash out directly at the streamer and sludge the streamer through word of mouth to their friends to unfriend and unfollow the streamer because of that betrayal.

3. The Grazers these are the people that wander from category to category and streamer to streamer based on the whims of the moment, and will stick around long enough to give the illusion of being “loyal”. This will change rather quickly when they see the limited programming of the streamer, as they will start suggesting game they enjoy it will invariably start with the question, “have you ever played…” Depending on the flexibility of the streamer; will continue to suggest the same game or another, sometimes even blackmailing the streamer to play the game for their follow. These sort of people can quickly disappear — even unfollow — if the audience shows less interest in the game, and especially if the streamer is inflexible to the suggestions of playing a game outside of their intended genres/programming. I remember covering this form of audience member here under the fourth bullet point: Take suggestions for new games (or subjects) sparingly.

Another form of grazer are the game players. They just look for streams to play games with instead of going into a completely random and unknown groups in the game. They’re not usually as disruptive as other grazers looking to coerce people into playing their games, nor are they as disruptive about it as show-offs, and even be won over much like Game Loyalists

4. The showoffs: while I would like to think they this group would fit in with the Grazers as Showoffs and Grazers have much in common, it dawned on me that there’s a key difference between the two. Much like the grazers (above), they will wander only one category and from streamer to streamer to show off their prowess in the game either through playing the game — especially if the streamer has opened up the option of playing with viewers, or if the streamer’s knowledge of the mechanics of the game are woefully lacking. Showoffs will usually request to join the game and then play to flex their prowess in the game or will attempt to spout information of the game mechanics of configurations that demonstrate the game’s META in some way or another. Sometimes they might stick around if they think they have something to teach, however like grazers Showoffs will quickly leave if the player has more knowledge or prowess in the game or the audience shows more skill and knowledge than they do.

5. Streamer Loyalists small at best — this one is the one that I freely and liberally admit that I’m part of. That being the sort of group that is attracted to the charm and personality of the streamer and will be loyal to the streamer based on either the physical, emotional and/or even mental qualities that they project. I strongly believe and endorse trying to attract this sort of group because not only can they often give the streamer the sort of core base for a community, they are often the ones that the streamer can bounces ideas off of for expanding their branding and programming. Only problem I’ve encountered with this group is that there’s only a small part of it that will be honest and tell the streamer their perspective and opinion on something; especially if the streamer is having a form of existential crisis with what they’re attempting to project. The rest will — regrettably — do everything in their power to ignore the crisis like a mother telling their child nothing is wrong and will either throw bits, subs or donations at the streamer to make the crisis go away. And if they can’t throw money, they will throw compliments in an almost enabling manner to deny the thought that there is something wrong with the streamer and that he shouldn’t be sharing those problems with them as a method of working them out. It’s a mixed bag between those that want to help the streamer expand, and those that want everything to stay status quo when they joined and followed the stream.

6. The Lurkers that lurk for the sake of lurking the final minority group that I’ve actually encountered don’t seem to fall under the other three groups, and will be there to just lurk. They lurk because of both the game and the streamer and while they might rarely announce their presence they’re usually just there for the background noise going and it’s neither disruptive nor contains any friction that would cause them to leave. While this group might throw the streamer a follow don’t often count in the streamer’s viewer numbers because Twitch more often times than naught will be treated as Fake Engagement and their numbers are either stigmatized, or marginalized at best. And while streamers have an unspoken rule of accepting this group because of the rules of Twitch that cover calling out lurkers or bringing attention to them, at the same time Twitch jumps through all sorts of exception hoops set up to make them count but not count in the grand scheme of things when it comes to their Affiliate and Partner programs.

And while there’s no strongly defined lines for these groups, these categories can be used as a guideline to determine what sort of audience you’re wanting to attract — and more importantly keep — as a self-employed streamer.

Branding & Programming

The fact of the matter is, there’s no easy answers for this sort of consultation and any recommendation for how to pull each of these groups — even with the fluidity of these categories is going to come off as either a rumination or a miasmic mess given the lack of sleep I’m running on today. With that in mind, any of the ideas I might have and share should be weighed with the same grain of salt that the Fake Buddha Quote implies.

I know from experience that small variety streamers have many strikes against them when it comes obtaining a loyal audience core because out of the six groups, they have to rely heavily on finding the streamer loyalists to creating that audience base. Changing games often within a stream and during the week can often drive off the Channel Changers and the Game Loyalists because changing games (and interests) that often will cause them to find someone that is less prone to changing based on whim and need.

As a way to counter this problem when you’re starting as a streamer, perhaps stretching the schedule out to instead of daily changes to perhaps either spanning through several days to even weekly instead. Because, one of the things that I noticed in my wanderings through small streamers is the lack of consistent scheduling going on when it comes to their variety programming. In one instance, I’ve seen one picking stream games and ideas almost at random and working on the concept that if you throw enough shit at the wall something might stick.

Another issue based on an all-over-the place-schedule for streamer opens them up to grazers and showoffs and can actually cause a streamer quite a lot more issues if there are a bunch of grazers visiting with many different interests in games. I remember for example one streamer that tried to placate his audience (mostly grazers), and ended up having something like 300+ games that he had in his steam account that he played once and never touched them again. Ironically I stopped by to check him out a few months later and while I was lurking heard him routinely mention having all those games that have never been played and with empty promises and words about playing those unplayed games. Needless to say, I never looked back again.

I still stick by what I said in Self-Employment and the Wonders of Streaming: Part I, when it comes taking suggestions sparingly. Look at taking suggestions as an opportunity for something in the future, and if you want to reinforce the thought about being flexible through them up, just be very careful of saying yes routinely to new games, especially if they require money to playing them.

After that? *shrugging* it boils down to the very things I have beaten the dead horse on that I learned when as a political activist and lobbyist:

• Be Honest and Truthful
• Be Trustworthy and Kind (and if you can’t be kind when it comes to dealing with an issue, at least be compassionate)
• Be upfront and forthcoming
• Be respectful
• Be steadfast with your ideals (and that ideal is the brand you’re attempting to convey by your presence, as well as your demeanor)
• Be loyal to your audience and brand
• Know the difference between networking and self-promotion,
• Learn how to juggle your time wisely and apply yourself to that time. and lastly
• Learn the limits of your personality, and continue to push that limit to being better than you were yesterday

Amusingly the “be” qualities listed were taught by an organization I had little part in (Boy Scouts of America). Regardless of their history and their issues — truth is truth and did shape the way I approached politicians when I was lobbying for LGBT rights as well as how I deal with my business interactions outside of the Internet.

That’s it.. I’m waffling… Until the next time.

Existential struggles with the term “Ally (to the LGBTQIA+ Community)”

Entry 06/04/2021 08:40:42 AM: Mentat 1631

Solvitur Ambulando – Latin Proverb attributed to Saint Augustine which means problems are solved by walking.

I’ve pretty much went back underground in the gay community because quite frankly, I once again got tired feeling like the token queer among the crowds. Don’t get me wrong, it routinely happens with me… partially because I get tired of having to edit out my thoughts to exclude lingo and phrases that most heterosexual people don’t have a clue on. Partially because sometimes I really get tired of dealing with education on things most heterosexuals are completely oblivious of.

I don’t usually stick around long within the community — both publicly and underground because too often I find the community to being so uptight in politically correctness it’s suffocating. Couple this with being patronizing when they’re trying to shut up or squelch discourse that involves anything other than complete agreement to the point originally made.

While this hasn’t happened just yet and I’m enjoying the company that I’ve been finding; thanks to my looking for entertainers (on Twitch, YouTube and other areas) I came across a subset in the community that it’s a sort of blend between the binary of heterosexual and homosexual…

Allies (to the LGBT community).

Normally I have little problem interacting with folk that declare their allies to the community as they often are better educated to the lingo and don’t bat an eye when folk get together and dish it up. Most seem all right, but one of them left me wrestling with all sorts of personal issues I didn’t think/want to be dealing with when it comes to entertainment. This was the reason why…

He had similar interests as I did and I thought that I take the opportunity to interact and learn from the man, and at first I got what I expected. There was the sort of belittling that comes from the fact that I have a very bad habit of using words that aren’t normally used in everyday conversations. While I’m more than willing to explain the word for anyone that doesn’t understand, I have also maintained the habit that my best friend and high school mate Bob used to have in that whenever he said, “Mike, talk to me like I’m an idiot…” or “talk to me like I’m an 8 year old…” and I learned that whenever he said that I would simplify what I was trying to convey. And when it comes to new people I meet — if I routinely go off like that — if they say something similar (after I tell them the story) — I’ll continue to simplify things.

But it didn’t stop there. Even after I sometimes got belittling statements from the person anytime I attempted to share wit, wisdom and information that I collected through the years and through the fact that I maintain a very long memory of the things I’ve encountered in my life. While it might have been meant to be positive (e.g., “Baldelli’s flexing again”) the word choices definitely don’t feel positive when said with a straight face and a weird tone in the voice.

The cherry on the sundae came one day during a more competitive PvP games that I only watch casually while getting a feel of streamer while playing such games. At the time he was playing with friends, and it was going rather well. I enjoyed the banter, I enjoyed the game play and I enjoyed the general attitude of the stream. Then after something rather sexual or suggestive was said, the worst possible phrase was dropped after the suggestive comment: “No Homo.” It was then I began seeing the person differently.

I began seeing the jocular banter less as amusing, and reminded me more and more of the bullshit attitudes hyper– and toxic masculine jocks would say and do around each other in order to prove their masculinity. This wasn’t feeling like a safe zone, and it was rapidly give me the sort of nausea I used to have dealing with the jocks in high school.

I began struggling with my beliefs of inclusion (based on the principles of //Infinite Diversity in Infinity Combinations) and that in community building — there are all types of people and not everyone I’m going to come across is going to share my beliefs in the same way. So some leeway must be given to the differences in people that don’t strongly ally with my own…

Only problem is for me “No Homo” is a homophobic phrase even in casual conversation, and especially in the gaming community. As we’re playing video games and having casual banter, we don’t need to redefine our sexuality and sexual identity when the realm isn’t remotely physical and not remotely in the realm of sexual advances.

I took a break for a couple of weeks after feeling this nausea and this existential crisis because I didn’t want to make a rash decision like I routinely do when dealing with hatred or anger, or willful ignorance and believe that as cooler heads will prevail when I take a break from it. And that’s what I did for the next couple of weeks.

I came back and it seemed that when playing alone for the entertainment of the community — the man was easier to get along with, but it sort of spiked me when the instant I showed up in the channel (and remained invisible as I normally do to lurk and observe), the man quickly identified there was someone watching him and tried to call them out to talking (typing) in chat. This went completely against the advise given to him two weeks prior to not pay attention to the audience numbers given to him and admitting that he was going to play for the enjoyment and not the numbers. So in essence, he was being a hypocrite.

It didn’t matter that that he was 200% better behaved when not in voice chat with his friends, hypocrisy is a form of lying and blatant lying like this often makes me question so many of the other truths said by a person.

So this morning as took my 3.5 mile (5.6 km) walk this morning and as I was working out the draft for a story I’m writing somewhere, I found my brains wandering back to what it meant to me to being an Ally to the LGBT community. And then I began remembering who I did call ally…

I’ll admit right now before I laundry list my beliefs, I was spoiled by these people whom I call ally, and I refuse to negotiate anyone that doesn’t come close to these qualities.

• An ally is like my best friend Bob who didn’t hesitate to take my hand when I was a teenager and scared shitless of the dark to walk me home through the fields. All the while holding my hand and ensuring me nothing was going to hurt me in the dark.
• An ally is like my Ancient History Teacher — Mr. Rogers — who after seeing one of the class bully constantly picking on me, came into the class and humiliated the bully by pointing out he respected me for standing by my beliefs and never cowing into the bullies and cowards.. (Consequently the bully stopped picking on me after that moment).
• An ally is like Brad and a host of other people that have LGBTQIA+ family members and look at all the homophobic comments in confusion as those folk perfectly natural and positive influences in their lives.
• An ally is like my old work-mate Jose who — happily married for more than 5 years at the time — would compare notes with me on a man’s beauty, and would even play matchmaker when I didn’t have the guts to go up and ask the man for a coffee date.
• An ally is my friend’s husband Paul who knowing I was gay and is a very close friend to his wife; never once felt threatened at our closeness because I was a man. He would even ask me how to handle his wife’s condition when she would be running on auto-pilot through her migraines and her flare-ups. And finally,
• An ally is like my friend Glenn and a host of more people I have encountered in my life, who while might have found homosexuality repulsive personally came around and never once made me feel bad about being human, following my head and heart. He showed me respect and even urged me to pursue a relationship with a person he never truly understood.

In the end I walked away from that person and his community. While actions do indeed speak louder than words, when one is more concerned to reinforcing one’s sexual identity thereby allowing that to take precedence over creating a positive, and healthy safe space for all — then being an ally to the LGBTQIA+ community is nothing more than words on a screen to ease some hidden guilt that needs to be first addressed. I personally can’t abide or stomach my disgust and nausea to educating the wrongness of such a hollow claim, as it’s a path only that person needs to walk and learn from.

Until the next time.  Happy Pride Month…

You Do All of this… For a Follow?

Entry 10/28/2020 10:14:12 AM: Mentat 1478

The other day someone asked me the question as I’m still teetering on throwing a follow to an artist and Twitch Streamer, “You do all this for a follow?

And so for my morning’s shower thoughts as I was cutting my hair, shaving off the week’s worth of scruff and washing self and important bits, I thought about what I said in response, I actually do more (than just this)…

The thing is that I’m not a casual homo sapiens. I have never worked out the whole casualness or the slow process of working on trust, understanding, compromise and all the other elements for the three important elements in human interactions. For me to commit to anyone — in love as well as friendship — I’m either all out, or all in.

This is also why I often put people under microscopes as I try to figure out their personality, their quirks, and whether or not the energies that they emit to the world are the kind of energies that will mesh with mine, and either not clash or create the sort of negative frictions that will often drive me away.

The funny thing is that as I work out the words “litmus test” when it comes to my actions, and how people often react negatively to the thought that friendship should never be tested for but instead should simply be the milestone from the passage of time, I challenge such people with such an attitude. After all, we’re all taught that trust is earned… If it is earned, what did you have to do for that earning to be agreed upon from that person? Yes, it was a test no matter how much people deny it. You either did so consciously or unconsciously and the person either passed it or failed it and you decided all internally whether to continue your interactions with that person or walk away from them.

The difference between my actions and other peoples is like the attitude of my being all in or all out. It’s made clear from the start that I’m doing this for my purposes and I’m very up front to in your face. Although truth be told, I’m not always making it clear until someone makes protest to my actions and/or activities. As I’ve been getting older, I’m making the assumption that people will be able to easily figure out that this is how I always am. What you see is what you get…  Although the more that I think about this, the more that I realize that younger folk aren’t as open as they often try to imply and will even more commonly try to read between the lines than take things at face value, not to mention make some pretty wild assumptions based on the information I give them…

• Like because I’m gay (and single), I’m trying to get into their pants… eye roll And it doesn’t seem to come into consideration that I will even go so far as to explain to them — ad nausea, ad infinitum — that I’m Demisexual.
  • Never mind the fact that after Damion (which ended back in 2008), I am simply no longer looking. After him and what I learned from my previous two partners; what could a fourth possibly teach me that Tommy (unwavering loyalty), Darin (blind faith) or Damion (unconditional understanding) taught?
• That I’m playing some sort of game with people…
  • I might be more Radical Faerie than I often like to admit, and coupled with the ADD-like symptoms (namely distractibility and inattention) since the car accident 36 years ago, I often simply follow the flow of the conversation (questions and answers) without trying to cause too much of the self-consciousness issues that my intense attitudes produce in others. Not to mention sometimes there’s a method to my madness when I seem all over the place. After all, I might be easily distracted or inattentive, I however do maintain a longer than average memory span and will often wait a long while before returning to a line of questions/discussions because I’m trying to work out an idea in my head of the person’s personality based on Abductive Reasoning.
  • It’s also been attributed that my questions and my litmus test are far from a game and are quite serious.. Like Diogenes and his Lamp looking for a [honest] Human Being.

Why though? Why else… It’s based on the all in or all out attitude that I have with people.

When I follow, I treat that person like a friend. Because people don’t often realize in their ability to make follows nothing more than a tag for the person, for me it means so much more.

• I drop everything when they ask for help. And if I can’t, I will make them the top priority at first opportunity.
• I give where I can — even if it’s simply giving a shoulder to lean on and an ear to listen to whatever they want to talk about. After all, Kahlil Gibran described it best in his prose…On Friendship.
• I will give the shirt off my back if possible, and failing that whatever resources (knowledge, as well as anything else I can lay hands on) to the friend.
• Even though I can flitter from person to person as I try learning more and more about humanity and the changes between the each of the generations, don’t for once think I’m going to easily forget a person. My memory spans the time from about 18 months to the present (and for those that don’t know my age, that’s from 1965 to the present), people from my childhood and high school are often amazed how much I remember of them when the come knocking on my door, not to mention how quick I am to help them when they ask. I graduated from high school in 1983.

So, even though I approach all people based on the mantra John Walter Wayland said when it comes to being a Gentleman; see how much faster that applies to being a friend.

Time to use this pulpit for something else. Not sure what as I have other thoughts I might want to reflect on another day.

Until the next time.

The Parochial Tendencies of Society

Entry 01/11/2015 09:18:19 AM – Mentat 846

As I sit here this morning while I wait for my coffee to brew and debating whether I should enjoy an English Muffin for the mid-morning break, I was struck with an interesting thought as I reviewed a conversation with someone on one of the dating website I have a membership with… That thought being: When did we (as a people) become so parochial?

Men on the dating site seem to be completely uninterested with any sort of communication with anyone outside of a specific driving range (which seems arbitrary based on personal tolerances for driving distances); so much so that they will ignore any comments, notes, compliments or assertions made in their direction. The man I mentioned moments ago is getting ready to make a transcontinental pilgrimage to a city that I had spent some time in has made it pretty damned clear in his profile that he wants to shed not only his possessions but any emotional entanglements old and new for this trip. In fact the primary reason for his conversation with me has to do with my knowledge of the area he’s moving to. Whether it’s going to continue from there remains entirely to be seen; though I suspect it’s going to end as abruptly as it began. Watching the dance of people that I see and encounter (here in the Tundras of New England) they seemed determine to only pay attention to whatever is in their immediate vicinity and often ignore anyone that falls outside the qualities to determine validity (sight and more importantly touch).

I’m not talking about the family we’re born into. Blood is thicker than water and all that, but let’s face it — unless we’re totally alienated by that family we’re born into, we often keep in touch with them regardless of the distances. No, what I’m talking about the family of choice that we create, establish and reinforce when one reaches adulthood and ventures out into the world.

I recall from my history and literature classes in high school, stories from the Renaissance when the postal networks were establishing and how people would maintain both correspondences in love and dalliances as well as the various letters involving friend and equals, swamis (gurus and other religious teachers) and their disciples, as well as teachers and students. Many of these non-romantic letters going well beyond the lessons that brought them together to establishing friendships that lasted as long as those to people closer to home. As for romantic correspondences, there have been books written about them that rivaled the sort of love that comes from meeting someone closer to home. It had become a continued (and eventually established) form of communication for romantic, platonic and professional communication through the expansion into the world and into the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries.

I have my proof in the treatises of Alice A Bailey that correspondences and written communications had reached midway into the 20th century. Written communications that continued to be there well after the establishment of telegraph and telephone communications in the latter part of the 19th/early part of the 20th centuries. Even though radio communications were here at the time, it’s not really used (which had been more for military and transportation services than for the everyday “Joe”). And yes, even through the advent of the CB Radio fad of the 70s.

Yet something shifted toward the end of the 20th century. With the establishment of the Internet for households of the common man and heralded the dawn of the Information Age, this had a way of opening up the world to everybody and allowing them communication with people halfway around the world as equally and easily as across the street. It had given an extension on an expiring thoughtform that had been created in days gone by. That is to say, there had been a brief revival of the concept of the long-distance love affairs. Of writing e-mails (along with Instant and Real-Time Communications) with someone one found mentally and emotionally attractive across the vastness of miles. Yet somewhere near the dawn of the 21st century that novelty wore off. With the ability to obtain instantaneous information and coupled with the growing skepticism and cynicism (based both on personal experience and word of mouth) that the person you might be talking with might not be where they’re saying they’re from or even who they actually are; the mindset changed into a sort of common sense rule from looking (and perhaps even reaching out) globally to only dealing with folk locally. If there is any such global interchange it is done publicly and casually, much like those of a fan or casual follower with no more interaction than to either sing the praise of who they follow or to respond their approval in the forms of likes, re-tweets or simply watching with words unsaid.

I see that there are exceptions to these new rules. Those folk that have made relationships work in spite of the distances. And while I knew of some folk — straight and gay alike — in the last 20 years work beyond (or perhaps in spite) the distances between them, I seem to have noticed since the inception of the 21st century it’s more the acts of the young. But these of course are only the exceptions. Not the general rule…

So it raises the question… Well several questions as I sit here and review what I said versus the thoughts I still haven’t committed to writing: Is long-distance correspondences (romantic and/or platonic) an instrument for the young?† As we (humans) get older, more weather-worn, more skeptical and of course obtain more baggage along the way, do we lose the necessary naïveté and faith that make such long-distance correspondences possible? Do we become more parochial as we get older wanting our gratification, satisfaction and perhaps even our continued ability to learn something only to be done from a local perspective?

Or it is something more intrinsic? Does the everyday man simply lack the elements of (blind) faith, (long-distance) trust and of course the fortitude of character and determination to making such romantic and platonic relationships (regardless of the distance) work?

If the last supposition (posed in the form of a question) is indeed true, what does that make me? Exceptional?

For even at the half-century mark, I continue to maintain contact with those that are willing to continue correspondences regardless of the distance. Friends that I have never met, I continue to strike up conversations with them whenever possible. In Canada, in other parts of the United States (Florida and California for example), occasionally even farther than that. I continue to put out the feelers for new communications in the hopes that it will flourish into something more than just casual and more importantly — personally distant. I continue to do so, sight unseen… When mood or common interests seem apparent, I am trying to make that connection. By listening and sharing either in earnest or in humour, with insight, with sagely advice handed down to me by my grandmother and with whatever observations and opinions that I form on my own I offer it without hesitation in the hopes that it will build the bridge necessary for friendship to flourish.

If I am the exception to the rule, why does it often feel like I’m on some parapet, soap box or mosque tower projecting my thoughts out into the void and yet no one seems to hear the underlying message? Or worse… With the common sense handed down to me and my inherent ability of working in means and averages (I never went into statistics, but I admit having a modest grasp of it), are the exceptional so isolated that they are all crying out in some form or another and simply not being heard? That there’s just the right sort of distance between these voices that they cannot hear each other?

In conclusion, as I said to Mr. James Radcliffe, so I should take my own advice… I have thrown this stone into the pond with this entry. Now I just need to wait — patiently — for the ripples from this action to reach all parts of the pond.

Until the next time.

† (I’ll exclude professional because money drives that and there will always be that for self-employed individuals and companies.)