You keep me up with your silence

You take me down with your quiet
Of all the weapons you fight with
Your silence is the most violent

– Tell Me How, Paramore 

* * * * * *

I used to think that people were so lucky to have friends to spend time with (because I hardly have any) but lately I’ve noticed that even for people with many friends, their relationships have become more and more fragile and fragmented. It’s so easy to cancel a date, so easy to keep messaging “Let’s get together sometime,” telling yourself that you’re doing your part to maintain the relationship, and just never actually show up.

I have no idea what we’re all supposed to do about this. I do know that this is very, very bad news for all of us, and probably the main contributor to anxiety and depression. Uncertainty = anxiety. When the world is telling you that your generation is a failure, when the job market is telling you that your hard-earned skills are useless, when advertising is shitting on your values and repackaging your most precious emotional experiences to sell you laundry powder, what truth and worth is left in life except the love and trust that we have in our relationships? And how are we supposed to feel when it turns out that we can’t trust each other to be there when we say we will? How many of us can honestly say that love exists in our relationships – even in the ones where it did exist before?

the fucking laundry powder

I’m tired of getting over it
And starting something new again
I’m getting sick of the beginnings

By the way – it should go without saying that I rely on my girlfriend for human company and that I’d be totally isolated without her.

I think this is why having a significant other has become virtually a necessity in our social landscape. It’s evident simply from the sheer number of articles discussing why you don’t need a significant other – why must you deny it if the pressure wasn’t so strong to begin with? – and if it affected you so, it must be something you feel internally, too. I’d even go so far as to say that the pressure to have a significant other is a personal desire that is projected onto others as an external, societal pressure, so that you don’t have to face the fact that it is something you desperately want. Nobody shames people for not having a boyfriend or a girlfriend – that just isn’t a thing that happens.

SO’s are a necessity now because the monogamous romantic relationship has become the only type of relationship wherein one person can be reasonably expected to reliably be there for the other; it is the only relationship wherein it is acceptable to demand to be a priority, to demand that the other keep his or her commitments and not make excuses. This is something that most people seem to have become uncomfortable in asking even from close friends and family members. There is the fear of being labeled “clingy,” the shame experienced in the perception of having fallen down the list of another person’s priorities, and the pride involved in the unwillingness to admit that you value their presence enough that your feelings were hurt by their absence – if it is apparent that they don’t feel the same about you, how could you admit to the way you feel?

I can’t call you a stranger
But I can’t call you
I know you think that I erased you
You forgot me but I can’t forget you
And I won’t replace you

There is this need to keep up the illusion that our own lives are filled with exciting experiences and opportunities. Our real relationships are sacrificed at the altar of the illusion. Why should you feel bad about someone failing to show up at your apartment for a quiet night in, when you could just as easily go over to four clubs in one night and meet a dozen hot strangers? Maybe: because you and your friend missed an important conversation about your problems, your fears, and your plans, and instead you wrecked your liver with shots, your lungs with cigarette smoke and your eardrums with a hundred decibels of awful DJ’ing; and you met a dozen strangers who will never mean anything to you, and that you will never see again apart from the next nights of irresponsibility and running away from the pain of disconnection (if that).

I feel like I may have asked too many rhetorical questions in the course of writing this.

I’m procrastinating about my paper right now. I know this is the only ticket to getting out of here. And even then it’s more like standby booking than sure seating. But still…

When I think about this disconnection, I think about you. It makes no difference in the grand scheme of things, and the things I’ve described are true even if I had never met you… but the truth is that I think about this because of you and the hope you gave me that things could be different. For a short while, they were. It was all the difference in the world.

And now you’re gone. Yes, you’re still around. But your face is like a bolted door. And you don’t smile anymore. How do you do that? How do you close yourself off so completely? How did you learn not to need anyone (except your girlfriend, I suppose – though I suspect you could get by without her just fine if you had to)? I want to know, because sometimes this pain is almost more than I can bear.

The truth is that need you in my life. And this is as absurd as any ridiculous crush I’ve ever had, even if I now only want you as a friend. Even more absurd – a crush people can understand, but to want a friend so desperately? How much of a loser can you be?

You don’t have to tell me
If you ever think of me
You don’t have to tell me, I can still believe

A Few Questions

1. Where do the wild and lonely thoughts that come alive late at night go to sleep in the morning light?

2. When is a prison not a prison?

Spoiler: when it’s a VIP room in Bilibid

3. Why do literary theorists love so much to repeat words in such a fashion: “both fatal and fated to die,”* “both castrated and castrating?”** Perhaps it’s something they’re taught to do in school

4. Is the sudden and exponential rise of interest in large musical productions such as stadium concerts and music festivals a manifestation of the perennial human yearning to belong to something bigger than just oneself? For at these times the mass of humanity moves as one, even if it’s just to uselessly jump up and down like excited infants, or panicking interns

I am definitely missing out

5. I wonder if I could be able to go to the park every day and play there, and if my kitten can go with me.

6. Wonder what my kitten’s doing right now?

7. Why am I on so many medications?

8. So many famous historical figures, especially artists, were (or would have been) diagnosed with mental illness. Who’s to say what’s a mental illness, anyway? The DSM changes like a teenager’s mind about what to do with her life. How many of today’s would-be great artists are being medicated into stupors

9. Continuing that thought, I’d be the last person to say that one should preserve a clear illness just to maintain an artistic productivity. What I’m trying to say is that I wonder how many of the people diagnosed today with a mental illness actually just contain an excess of emotional and physical energy that would find a glorious outlet through an art form? With guidance and encouragement?

10. So much of modern life has to do with finding ways to trigger release of dopamine into people’s brains. There are infinite ways to do this. Phone apps are one of them. Every crop grown, row of jewels matched, like or heart triggers a release. What I wonder is, could the anxiety from being deprived of these things be as strong as actual withdrawal from a drug

11. When will everyone see that the transition of the economy into a renting economy needs more regulation? For as of now, companies involved in the renting industry take massive advantage of renters and rentees alike. (Airbnb of homeowners, Uber of car owners, Spotify of musicians, Steam of game developers, etc. etc.)

12. Why does this house make me so sleepy?

13. Will I be able to trade my board for another with different screw positionings?

14. Hmmm.

15. Why is MØ so emotional that her saddest songs bring a lump to my throat and tears to my eyes?

16. Could it be that a mastery of bokeh is the secret to successful and popular modern photography?

nothing could be better

17. How much of my hatred for popular culture is borne of jealousy and the bitterness of being forever an outsider?

My internal expression forever?

*John Weir,

**David Rudd, University of Boston

Featured image by Leonid Tishkov, from a series about a man who fell in love with the moon and spent the rest of his life with her (Private Moon).

 

Deardevils

I. So today my girlfriend and I went on a date and we both almost died. Almost. We weren’t REALLY going to, but it was a possibility under the circumstances. I mean, “NOW WE HAVE TO MOVE REALLY FAST OR SOMEONE IS GOING TO HIT US!” and “DUCK!” aren’t things you typically have to tell someone during a nice date.

II. I told off an MMDA guy on a sketchy road. He thought I wouldn’t get out of the car, but I did. My mom told me to never to do that again. I think she thought I didn’t know it was dangerous. Fuck, of course I knew it was fucking dangerous. I wouldn’t be able to do a lot of the things I do if I wasn’t so big, because I move rather slowly. (The alternative to being big and strong, by the way, is to be small and fast, when it comes to escaping physical danger.)

III. Someone said that Duterte said that he said that the following conversation took place before the number 911 became Davao’s emergency number:

D: Henceforth, I want 911 to be the emergency number. 

Phone networks: But that’ll be expensive.

D: How expensive would it be for you if I blew up your cell towers?

Of course, he wasn’t really going to blow them up. Duterte’s not into terrorism. It’s an expression of how fucking INSANE it is to say that it’s an unnecessary expense to want to save people’s lives. This is the fucking result  when emergency cases aren’t routed to the best available medical facilities. All fucking right?

IV. I stopped listening to anything that anyone from Ateneo had to say after Bianca Reyes died and NO ONE, but NO ONE, from there had anything useful to say about it. Her [redacted] is headed down the same road. Does anyone care? Of course fucking not. Filipinos are only interested in mourning loudly for their dead, not in preventing people from dying.

V. Since I think American / Filipino marketing is stupid bullshit, this puts me decidedly at odds with some of my professors.

A few terms ago, I got into a pretty bad confrontation with a professor during a presentation. To the point where I began slouching against the wall in disdain and she had to tell me, “Stand up straight.” I thought I was doing a good job of keeping my cool, but later one of my friends in the class told me that it was a patently hostile exchange, and my rage was obvious to everyone in the room. I told myself I’d never let it happen again… which is why I didn’t go to class yesterday. Nothing like that has happened again yet, but I felt like it was a possibility, so I pre-empted it.

Marketing and Multiculturalism

I.

It’s a predominantly American thing to want to manipulate reality instead of adapting to it (for examples: turning up the heat indoors instead of putting on more clothes, killing inconvenient wild animals instead of learning to avoid them, massacring natives instead of negotiating fair terms of land ownership). And since Filipino culture is mostly derivative of American culture, we buy into that shit too, wholesale.

Australians don’t massacre the frankly terrifying creatures in their land, but fatalities from animal attacks there are fairly rare – certainly much more rare than American fatalities from their fucking insane citizens who are constantly shooting each other en masse.

 

Bedouin tribes in the Saharan desert survive the oven temperatures sans airconditioning because of the design of their clothing. Black and white people can mix without making a huge deal of it in British society. The tendency to be uncomfortable with the unfamiliar / different, and the unwillingness to adapt and coexist without conflict, is a very American thing. I’m of course not saying they are the only culture like that (Bonjour, France!) but American culture is the most infectious of all.

II.

This tendency is the whole basis of marketing as we know it. They openly admit it in one of the definitions: To manipulate demand. Manipulate. Not to understand demand and therefore meet it in ways most advantageous to both supplier and consumer. Not to know the truth, but to force what you want to be true.

You don’t need a fucking iPhone to be happy, but they’ve made you believe it. I walked down the seaside boulevard once without a bra and no one grabbed my fucking tits (I think they will do that in Bombay or Calcutta, though). I look tired without makeup? I am, your girlfriend kept me up all night.

Heh.

III.

They talked about the best thesis. “They were so passionate! The panel asked them why they chose a bear for packaging and they had the research on hand to prove that bear shapes hypnotize people into buying cookies…” You think you can run a business on passion and trivia? Show up to  the SEC with a briefcase full of passion, fill out your tax returns with the trivia you memorized? Your product will sell, or it won’t. That’s it.

IV.

The problem now isn’t not enough goods manufactured, but not enough goods sold. Do you realize what a GREAT problem that is to have? That we humans have made production so efficient that supply far outweighs demand? The role of marketing is supposed to be the efficient distribution of goods – to make sure everyone can have what they need and nothing’s wasted – but now we use it to sell people stupid shit. We have people spending thousands on concert tickets, clothes, movies and dinners out,  when their houses are so dirty and poorly maintained, they eat fucking garbage all the time, they’re at work all day, then stuck in traffic, they never see their children anymore. Because they’re so convinced they NEED those things that they don’t, at the expense of things that they do.

Don’t get me wrong, I think a lot luxuries are nice to have. But it is absolutely fucking insane to neglect one’s basic needs to attain the nice non essentials.  And that’s exactly what marketing now seeks to make people do. So fuck them. I’m in this field and I know its purpose. I am different. I will do things differently.

Why I’m Angry All the Time

You all don’t want to take care of yourselves because you don’t see the point of living long. You don’t see the point of living long because your lives are miserable and you wish they’d end hard and fast. I used to be like you for most of my life. I didn’t want to die, but I didn’t really want to live either. I’m not like you anymore.

“You like cats / dogs / fish / plants / children?” I love all things breathing. That includes humans. I love all of you because you are alive. I hate all of you because you make yourselves and each other miserable and destroy everything.

The opposite of a lie is not a different lie. The opposite of a lie is the truth. The opposite of “You’re a sucky writer” is not “You’re the most perfect writer in the world” but “You write about interesting topics, but you curse too much for your work to ever be accepted by a respectable publication.” (Also: The opposite of “You are a worthless fat pig” is not “You are the most beautiful girl ever” but “You eat too many cookies and not enough broccoli.”) Lies (insults and undeserved praise) obscure the truth; and knowing the truth is the only way to learn.

But you all don’t want the truth, do you? If you find out the truth it means you have to DO something about it, to grow and change, and it’s TOO HARD for you, isn’t it? Vegetables aren’t delicious, reading is boring, housework is for maids… I know, I know. Someday I’ll leave and I’ll never have to deal with you all again. I’ll throw food and money at you from a long way off. A long, long, long way off.

Victim Blaming Vs. Victim Responsibility pt. 2

The selfish lifestyles of the middle / upper class have created nasty inhuman individuals whose lives are so wretchedly poor that they no longer have anything to lose.

I’m sure someday we’ll solve this complicated social problem because we’re obviously the smartest people in the world. But for now, unless you’re rich and smart enough to be kept safe all the time (you always have your own car / driver, you have people around to look after you, you know what situations to avoid) you WILL face these inhuman individuals, and they WILL hurt you if they can.

Those slogans you see around? “My clothes are not my consent”? Those were created by rich white girls who have approximately 0.00000% chance of being gang-raped and left for dead. They don’t know you. They don’t know your situation. Why would you let them influence your behavior? They’re not your mother, they’re not your best friend, but most importantly, they’re not you. You owe it to yourself to understand your situation and protect your weaknesses.

I don’t want this online movement to make you ignore the danger of your reality. Like I said, someday we’ll solve everything – I’ll make the feminist equivalent of The Playboy Mansion where we’ll all live happily ever after and bond in sisterly love or whatever. You gotta stay alive for that. I’m barely in my twenties, dammit, give me some time. For now, I have these tips for you:

1. Glasses lessen the slut factor of any outfit by about 70%. If you have 20/20 vision, use a pair without lenses.

2. Fix your walk. It’s probably the most little-known yet significant factor of how criminals select their victims.

3. During events that end late at night, do not rely on transportation from vague acquaintances or flaky friends. If there’s no other transportation available, skip the fucking event. It won’t kill you, but a rapist might.

4. About 90% of guys who approach you when you look hot are just brimming with shit. Say you have a boyfriend or something. (Note: if you want a boyfriend who likes you for you, try dating someone who sees you often not looking your best. Like a PE classmate or something, god I don’t know.)

5. Become healthy and strong. work out a lot. eat vegetables. i’m sleepy

Sex, Solved

I.

What’s the difference between a partner and a fuck buddy? (Barring stupid games of sexual manipulation)

PARTNERS

Person 1: I’m headed to this place.

Person 2: I’m headed there too.

Person 1: Wanna go together?

Person 2: Sure!

* * *

FUCK BUDDIES

Person 1: I’m headed to this place.

Person 2: I’m headed somewhere different, but I can go your way for a bit. Want me to come?

Person 1: Sure!

II.

There was someone, once, who would see me when she was around. She promised me nothing. We knew there was no future at all for us. She made it clear for me in the sweetest way.

She touched me and held me outside. Sent me money when I was broke. (That was nice.) Fucked me just how I like it. Toasted me with sweet wine at brunch, and said: Everyone here knows that I want you.

She was never mine, and I was never hers. Everything was so… good…

So many people have promised me the world. No one has delivered. It’s somehow all worse when they try and fail, than if they never try at all.

III.

In this society, people want everything to be simple. It’s ALWAYS or NEVER. It’s THE WHOLE SHITLOAD or NONE AT ALL.

There’s nothing unusual about someone sprinkling pepper on his food, but if you see that same person eating bowls of pepper, then you know he’s got a problem. In some aspects of life we do understand the concept of moderation. Right? So why do people think they have to be BORING NERDS or STUPID SHITS? Why is it ROSS or JOEY, when Ross is a martyr whose goodness is unsustainable and unhealthy, and Joey is disgustingly selfish? Why is it that people think I must feel only SWEET PLATONIC ADORATION for someone or WANT TO USE THEM LIKE A FUCKING WHORE? No one seems to understand how it’s possible for me to respect and admire someone and also desire them sexually.

The question isn’t how I combine the two, but why they were ever separated in the first place. If everyone felt and nourished sexual desire only for people they respected, that solves the whole problem of rape culture / sexual harassment / “it’s complicated” – type relationship where one is screwing the other emotionally. That’s how sex is supposed to work between humans, because of this whole society thing that we have where we aren’t compelled biologically to fuck everyone all the time to propagate the species. (See: every other living thing on earth.) We have these complex brains that make sex a socially complicated thing. It’s not just for making babies anymore. It means a lot of things. It’s difficult to handle. That’s why children aren’t allowed to have sex. That’s why you need to think and act like an adult if you want to have sex. And that all starts, again, with consideration for another person’s thoughts and feelings.

“But we agreed it was just sex!” Shut up. Humans rarely ever say what they really mean. Most communication is nonverbal. Babies and children understand situations and build relationships with others without knowing a single word. You communicated things without words. You made promises with your kisses. I know you didn’t mean to, but you did. Your words don’t excuse you. And if someone did this to you, their words don’t excuse them either. If you’re going to nitpick a previous agreement to escape your obligation to take care of the feelings of the human being you’ve been fucking, you’re not a person who’s trying to have a connection with someone else; you’re a freaking lawyer. Put your dick away and take your shit to court where it belongs.

IV.

I have sex with someone now. She reads this… (Hi!!!) We talk. I like to make sure that she’s fine, and she does too.

I know it sounds like bullshit, but I really do think that someone else can make her happier than I can.

I won’t claim a heart that I can’t care for.

Your dear heart is probably more precious than you think. And if I stole it by mistake, I’m going to give it back because hearts belong with whoever (whomever?) can care for them the best.

But since we’re both going this way…

Victim Blaming vs. Victim Responsibility pt. 1

 

this is gonna make him stop when he’s got his dick out

Buried this for a long time because I am having a lot of trouble polishing this concept but I’ve seen a recent resurgence in anti-slut-shaming whatevers online and I’m going to rush this series to help sort out this issue, before lots of girls decide to join y’alls in your hallucinatory world where real rapists can be fended off with catchy slogans.

Concept introduced to me by Jason Pargin.

* * * * * * *

I. Definition and Examples

Blame is an accusation leveled against a person for some undesirable situation (whether true or untrue). Blame implies guilt; that the person has done something wrong and should be punished for it. For example, if a thief broke into your house and stole your stuff, he is to blame for the crime.

Responsibility is an obligation for someone who has the ability to prevent some undesirable situation, or to bring about a desirable situation. Someone can only be held responsible if they have the ability to take action. For example, if a thief broke into your house and stole your stuff because you didn’t lock your door, you wouldn’t go to jail for it. You didn’t commit a crime. But you will still bear the consequences of your irresponsibility. If he is caught, you might be inconvenienced by the legal process of prosecuting him. If he isn’t caught, say goodbye to your stuff.

Another example: Terrorists are to blame for 9/11 because they bombed the towers. The US government is partly responsible for 9/11 because they created international policies that inadvertently made it easier for terrorist groups to form in the Middle East.

Another example you won’t like: Rapists are to blame for rape because they committed the rape. Victims who voluntarily put themselves in vulnerable situations are responsible for their own rape because they had the choice not to, and they did not make that choice.

II. Purpose 

The purpose of outlining responsibility is not to assign fault but to understand what actions are necessary to prevent the situation from happening (again). The alternative is to keep getting your stuff stolen, keep getting your citizens killed, keep getting raped all the time, because the world is cruel and life is unfair.

Once again, narcissist

I.

The main distinction between children and adults is that children have no ability to take care of others. If intelligence were the distinction, then prodigies would have to be classified as adults, and the cashier lady at school and Wilben Mayor would have to be classified as children.

This is because the ability to take care of others can only come after a person has learned how to take care of herself. This takes time and experience, and children just haven’t lived long enough to gather experience.

II.

Narcissists and borderlines are essentially children who never grew up. It’s officially recognized in psychology that children are narcissistic by nature. This basically means everything is about them, everything – including negative things. So it isn’t just the definition of narcissism that you’re used to, the one of the guy or girl who thinks they’re hot shit. If Mom is having a bad day and acting like a dick, a child will think it was his fault, because he can’t yet understand the truth that other people have lives of their own, with problems and feelings that have nothing to do with him.

Children are also “borderline” by nature – that is, they’re needy and dependent. So why isn’t narcissism and borderline behavior considered pathological in children? For the same reason that constantly shitting your pants is normal for a six-month-old baby, but not normal for a teenager: because some behaviors are developmentally appropriate only for certain ages.

That’s why it’s completely useless to insult the sadness and confusion of teenagers. You wouldn’t insult a baby for having dirty diapers because she literally can’t help it. It’s the same for teenagers, poor creatures. Making fun of their behavior without any helpful solutions is a waste of time.

So when I use “borderline” and “narcissist” I describe only the age group 21+. This is obviously an arbitrary age I’ve picked, because people mature at different rates according to their life experiences and when their hormones decide to calm down / their prefrontal cortex develops. I’m just assuming that 21, in general, is the age when most people start to become the person that they will be for the rest of their lives.

III.

Egotists and narcissists often look alike. An egotist is a real adult; a narcissist is a child standing on stilts. A push in the right place will knock her over. A narcissist is always afraid of this happening, and thus is constantly on the defensive.

IV.

Halsey: “Are you insane like me? Been in pain like me? Do you tear yourself apart to entertain like me?
Do the people whisper about you on the train, saying that you shouldn’t waste your pretty face like me?”

Hayley Williams: “There’s no one road. We should not be the same. But I’m just a ghost, and still they echo me. They echo me in circles.”

Only narcissists seek for others to copy them exactly, to validate their harmful behaviors. Egotists encourage others to adapt to their own personal situations – in other words, to learn to be happy with their own lives, whether or not that involves imitating some of the egotist’s own behaviors – because egotists know that what is right for them may not be right for others. This understanding is only possible when a person is capable of seeing outside of herself, outside of her own life, to perceive the needs of another person.

V.

I happened to cross paths the other day with someone who used to know [redacted]. I told him that I loved her, and that she had a boyfriend and I was glad for it. He was completely confused by this statement. He tried to insinuate that I’m just waiting for my chance to swoop in and claim her. (“You just have a big crush on her!”)

It’s impossible to explain to a complete narcissist what it’s like to have the inclination and ability to care for another person because they have no experience of doing that. The pathological narcissism of an adult-aged person is completely different from the natural narcissism of a child, because a child has no choice. A narcissist chooses not to learn to take care of others.

How could I explain to him that it’s possible for me to find someone attractive, and to not want to claim her as my own because I know that she’s happier with someone else? All he knows is “mine” / “not-mine”; and nothing that isn’t “mine” means anything to him.

Sociobiological Factors of Addiction (Or, Why You’ll Never Be Truly Happy) pt. 1

Modern society is built to facilitate addictions, because people who aren’t addicted to anything are hard to control. On the other hand, it’s extremely easy to control a person, or a group of people, who are addicted to something: simply offer them more of the thing they’re addicted to, or threaten to withhold that thing from them. This method of manipulation is currently the basis of most human interaction these days, between everyone; between individuals, institutions, citizens and governments, even between nations.

Examples:

“If you do your homework, I’ll give you a cookie.”

“If you fix the garage door, I’ll give you a blowjob.”

“Stop cutting classes or I’ll downgrade your phone plan from LTE to cans on a string.”

“If we don’t go to war against mostly innocent people, we’re going to lose our oil supply.”

“Sign over your national resources for foreign exploitation or we’ll stop sending you Nutella and overpriced pop stars.”

Addiction is the most powerful method of manipulation, bar none. This is because people who are addicted seem like they are doing it all themselves, of their own personal choice.

Examples:

“I’m going to do my homework because cookies are delicious, not because I am an obese pre-diabetic child and my blood sugar is either always super way up, making me hyper, or super way down, making me sluggish and irritable.”

“I’m going to fix the garage door because I love you and I love having sex with you, not because you would never give me a blowjob otherwise.”

“I’ll stop cutting classes because I want to be a good student and eventually a productive member of society, not because losing access to Twitter for more than an hour at a time causes me to palpitate with anxiety.”

“I’m gonna go to war to defend my country, not because I can’t stand the idea that we might have to start using trains for long-distance travel like those barbaric Europeans with their international high-speed rails.” 

“I’m going to support APEC to facilitate economic progress and trade relations within Asia, not because I believe everything that white people in suits tell me.”