I HATE BOTOX

I hate Botox. I hate collogen. I hate plastic surgery and wrinkle creams. I hate makeup. I hate anything that purports to make you look "20 YEARS YOUNGER!!" I hate anything that makes you feel bad about being old.

As you go through life, you tend to make the same facial expressions in similar situations. I know I smile big, laugh loud, and have some intense looks when involved in a discussion. I also know that as I experience life, and take care of (or fail to) myself, these life choices are impressing themselves into my body for life. I know the fact that I am generally a happy, upbeat person now will effect the way I look basically for the rest of my life.

Isn't this fascinating? My life is etched into my face. Why would I want to erase years of experience and life from my face? Why, basically, would I want to remove wrinkles? Aging is a beautiful thing, and we need to relearn how to age with grace, not fighting kicking and screaming.

I recently watched a Craig Ferguson monologue where he attributes the rise in valuing the youth to the 50s, when marketers believed that hooking the young on their products would serve them better, as that's when people begin deciding their brand loyalties.  Unfortunately, he claims, this turned into an overvaluing of youth, which eventually turned into an overvaluing of stupidity, and that this is "why everything sucks."

Obviously, I'm not going to go that far (although I do like his reasoning and conclusions), I do still think we overvalue youth.  People need to celebrate the experience written on their faces.  Unfortunately, I do think the way society is structured does not generally lead to "happiness."  People get so caught up in their daily grind that they lose sight of what they're doing it for, and that misery also gets etched into their faces.  I think as life has gotten less communal that the emphasis on youth has increased, as youth is now associated with freedom and energy, where their lives have become monotonous and boring, basically.  People want to get back to that, instead of enjoying what they have.

These products are marketed to make you feel miserable about yourself, or at least remind you that you are not happy.  So Enjoy your old age.  If you don't, no one's going to do it for you, and you'll go to the grave looking ugly and feeling wretched.

FiveThirtyEight: Politics Done Right: Life After the Death of the Public Option

Why doesn't the public option have the votes for passage? You'd think that a provision that is both fairly popular and money-saving was a good bet for passage. But the insurance industry really, really does not like the public option. We'd previously estimated that its lobbying influence has cost the public option something like nine (9) votes in the Senate.

This is an unpleasant truth. But just because it's an unpleasant truth doesn't mean that it's not the truth.

This is a problem. When a perfectly reasonable and useful idea can't get passed because special interests with a lot of money scuttle it, our democracy is broken. I don't even think insurance companies are necessary. The fact that they have power and money makes this whole thing even more absurd.

WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON IN HEALTH CARE?!

I love Barack Obama. Let me start by saying that. Let me also say that I do believe that our health care system needs of overhaul. But seriously, man, what were you thinking? Did you really expect to just give this to Congress and have them work it out? Congress is a shit-show, and this debate has gotten so muddied by the fact that WE HAVE NO PLAN.

Let me back up a minute. Obama's been pursuing a very ambitious domestic agenda, and I agree that we need some changes. Unfortunately, by handing over the task of crafting a piece of legislation to Congress, he's handed over the framing of his message to them. Yes, he handed over his message by handing over the legislators, and too many of them are simply not on his side. They either oppose the type of reform he wants (Blue Dogs Dems) or oppose reform period (Republicans, although they wouldn't admit to being characterized that way). Now, the debate has gotten framed entirely around a handle of components (public option, employer mandate, etc.), and the debate and negotiations have boiled down to the inclusion or exclusion of these components.

This is to the detriment of the American people. This type of framing (which occurs all the time) shuts out alternative, innovative solutions. Obama could have easily framed this differently to come out with more innovative solutions. It has become pretty clear to me that when something like the "death panel" claim becomes a rampant part of the national discourse (a claim that is pretty clearly bullshit to anyone with half a brain), you have lost control of your message.

Personally, I think Obama needs to decide on something and fight for it. I know how he feels. Psychologically, I understand how much he wants to do something that everyone can agree with. Unfortunately, sometimes, people don't want to agree. I don't believe the Republicans are honestly trying to contribute to a solution. Obama needs to get behind some specifics and fight for them, because otherwise, he's not going to be very happy with what he gets.

I support the public option, mostly because I don't understand why health insurance can't be run by the government. I'm not saying the government needs to run health care (a la Britain), more like the government should provide health insurance (a la Canada). The conservatives fear a government takeover of health care, but unless the free market can really provide better service (which I don't believe it can), I see no reason why the government can't get involved. I'll re-outline some of the philosophical underpinnings of this in a later post (you can go back to an earlier post, if I didn't delete it, with my initial ramblings on the subject).

TRUTH AND HOW YOU KNOW IT

I don't know if I have any loyal readers (most, if any, of you, are probably just friends of mine), but to anyone who knows me, I am wont to argue against statements of absolute truth or moral certainty. You'll be a bit surprised to find me now arguing in favor of truth in probably the strangest places to find it: psychological and emotional motivations.

This basis for this thought starts with a conversation with my girlfriend (love of my life, of course :) ) where we were discussing a conflict that had arisen. During this conversation, I traced the things she had said, connected them with other things she'd said and believed, and tied them all down to a psychological understanding of her motivations and emotions in making the statements that she did. As I reached the conclusion of my understanding, we were both filled with this sense, this resonance inside of us that the explanation that I was making was true, that these were, in fact, the thoughts and motivations that caused the actions we were talking about.

In the middle of writing this post, the reverse happened, where I realized something about myself that I had kept buried. More often than not, we attempt to rationalize them into something else, or refuse to admit them, or dismiss them as untrue. These are egoistic responses, designed to protect your fragile psyche from the possibility of failure or truths that may hurt you, and we all do them. However, if you work with your mind on a consistent basis (which I should be doing more of, I'll admit), you'll very quickly notice the feeling you get when this comes up.

Quite often it's a feeling of resistance. Your mind is searching for alternative explanations for the feeling it doesn't want to admit. Commonly, this results in attacking the source of the anxiety, usually another person, in an attempt to deflect the criticism. Sometimes it's just flat denial. It's not true, you won't believe it. Sometimes it comes out as a form of apathy, where you don't care in order to prevent yourself from feeling hurt by it.

All of these feelings may come up in different situations, depending on causes, and it is only through practice dealing with these feelings that you can let go of them when they come up and not let them control you. The inability to deal with your own faults and work with them will only cause suffering.

We're all working on these type of things, and if you believe in personal growth, becoming intimate with that which is preventing you from being the person you want be will help you eventually not be overpowered by those feelings.

The only TRUTH is the one that exists within you.

(FYI, this post has been back-dated. I started writing and forgot about it, hehe.)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8166413.stm

Amusingly, the caption under the photo said something about only children growing up to be "little emperors." Not really examined in the article, but I was wondering: is China's one-child policy going to leave China with a country full of people with "only child syndrome," i.e. an entire country of bratty, selfish people with entitlement complexes. How would that impact international politics as China sets itself up as a major player on the world stage?

We already know that Western countries in general suffer from a sense of entitlement and patrimony. Just look at our relationship with most poor nations; most people view them from one of two categories: they are a resource to be exploited (sweat shops, etc.; a view that stems from feeling more entitled to their resources than them), or we need to give them money and food so they don't starve (i.e. foreign aid; I don't disparage people who are trying to help, but they need control of their country back, not handouts). Both viewpoints stem come from a sense of superiority ("we need to help them," as opposed to "we need to allow them to help themselves.").

If China becomes a major player, I can't even begin to imagine how this dynamic is going to shape up. We're already arrogant, Russia's defensive, and the EU just feels meek and timid. No one is going to step in between a fight with the US and China. Granted, right now, we have enough self-interest to cooperate: they buy our debt and manufacture our goods, and we both buy each others' goods. We're huge trading partners. Unfortunately, I have to believe that as resources start getting scarce (which they will, whether you choose to admit it or not), we'll increasingly see each other as competitors, not only for resources, but for superiority.