Choo choo! All aboard the Complain Train!
- Thread starter Mister Mumbler
- Start date
Didn't know basketball was so popular in the Philippines, especially not so much as to trump football. Any idea how it came to be so? It is curious indeed.
I'm born and raised African American/Hispanic, and I can't stand basketball. Most of my [black] friends look at me like I'm from another planet when I tell them I don't like it. Not a fan of grape Kool Aid or watermelon either, but if the racist stereotypes are grounded in any form of reality, my dislike of basketball turns the most heads. (I do like my fried chicken, though, so my "black card" is merely suspended in lieu of being completely revoked.) Basketball is about the only sport where the highlights the next day are more compelling than the actual game in real-time. I'd say the same about baseball, though I can tolerate a baseball game given the relaxed pace that doesn't command your attention the whole time, i.e.: I can take a shit during a baseball game and maybe miss one 1 of the 9 innings, and not miss much if anything.
Absent
And twice is the only way to live.
- Jan 25, 2023
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The tough thing, I realise in hindsight, is that I used to be really positivist when I was younger. That is, I used to truly believe in progress. Humane and technological. I thought that we had won ww2 and defeated the Nazis. That the remnants of fascist ideologies would fade with the last dictators (franco, ceausescu, etc). That racism and other prejudices would become jokes of the past. And that technology would liberate us, let us for instance hop all around the planet with minimal cost, financial and ecological. I thought mankind was progressively solving its problems.
So, being today, seeing the rise of old fascists values, the crippling of our (moral, for now) freedoms due to climate urgencies, the spread of anti-scientific obscurantism (what'd the point of discovering vaccines in this kind of cultural context)... it's distressing at an existential level. It's the notion of progress, the idea of evolution, that dissolves. The idea of mankind learning. The idea of a better future is replaces by the immutable same grimaces of humanity. The same limitations, the same taste for evil, the same crippling taste for self-indulgent ignorance and stupidity.
It's always awkward and painful to feel being robbed of a future. To have anticipations cancelled, at an individual scale or at a species, planetary scale. You feel robbed of a lot of life, as you spent your past in a false perception of history. The lie of an overestimated humanity. The wait for something that won't happen. Especially when that something is, literally, everything - everything that concerns mankind, and most forms of life on Earth.
It's difficult to adjust to that. And it raises the question if whether mankind should be forgiven for it. Was there a betrayed potential, or is it truly determined by the animal we are. I don't even know which answer would be the worst.
As often, loss makes things visible in retrospect. I only start to measure right now the high hopes I had deep down for us all.
So, being today, seeing the rise of old fascists values, the crippling of our (moral, for now) freedoms due to climate urgencies, the spread of anti-scientific obscurantism (what'd the point of discovering vaccines in this kind of cultural context)... it's distressing at an existential level. It's the notion of progress, the idea of evolution, that dissolves. The idea of mankind learning. The idea of a better future is replaces by the immutable same grimaces of humanity. The same limitations, the same taste for evil, the same crippling taste for self-indulgent ignorance and stupidity.
It's always awkward and painful to feel being robbed of a future. To have anticipations cancelled, at an individual scale or at a species, planetary scale. You feel robbed of a lot of life, as you spent your past in a false perception of history. The lie of an overestimated humanity. The wait for something that won't happen. Especially when that something is, literally, everything - everything that concerns mankind, and most forms of life on Earth.
It's difficult to adjust to that. And it raises the question if whether mankind should be forgiven for it. Was there a betrayed potential, or is it truly determined by the animal we are. I don't even know which answer would be the worst.
As often, loss makes things visible in retrospect. I only start to measure right now the high hopes I had deep down for us all.
Humans are still just apes gathered around bonfires, plotting to go kill that tribe and take their stuff before they come kill us and take our stuff.
Not sure if it's a Complain thing or a Shower Thought thing, but, fuck me, I hate myself right now.
Currently on a multi day trip to Disneyland in Paris, final night staying at a Disney Hotel ( one of the cheaper ones ), sitting awake at 2:30AM because I'm feeling super bummed out about the thought of this trip ending tomorrow.
Thinking about the transientness of the trip is bringing up a lot of memories and mixed feelings about past transient experiences, then there's also the sudden stress of forgetting to buy or do something, knowing that the chances of returning are slim at best.
So my complaint is basically about human feelings, or just mine in particular. Fuuuuck.
Currently on a multi day trip to Disneyland in Paris, final night staying at a Disney Hotel ( one of the cheaper ones ), sitting awake at 2:30AM because I'm feeling super bummed out about the thought of this trip ending tomorrow.
Thinking about the transientness of the trip is bringing up a lot of memories and mixed feelings about past transient experiences, then there's also the sudden stress of forgetting to buy or do something, knowing that the chances of returning are slim at best.
So my complaint is basically about human feelings, or just mine in particular. Fuuuuck.
America were our first colonizers who bothered implementing a real educational system, so with that came basketball as the first sport introduced to the masses. College basketball is still the biggest sporting event in the country, which is bizarre when all the teams come from a single city so there's no real basis to support a team for 95% of the people watching. Unlike in the US where it's a struggle to keep these kids in college long enough to graduate before they move on to professional sport, college athletes here delay themselves on purpose so they can continue playing college basketball for longer. Moving on to the "pros" is considered a downgrade.
As to why it would trump football, football is seen as a rich person's sport. Which is ridiculous when all you need to play football is a ball and a flat space. My guess is that back then, following football meant having expensive cable plans or good enough internet to stream games. Something most Filipinos did not have access to.
Going to guess, are you a millenial?
Cause I can really relate to that, and I think it's because, growing up in the 90s, things seemed alright. The Cold War had ended, the GWOT hadn't started. Climate change was a distant thing, serious, but with enough time to do something about. Politicians and people seemed to be moderate in their mendacity, or were outliers.
But historically, that's an aberration. The situation we are in now is normal.
OTOH, because it is normal, your ancestors lived in such conditions, and survived, and had children, and the world was made better than it was before. Lots of misteps and backsliding, but for all the terrors of even the last hundred years, we are doing better now. The Nazis were defeated, at least for a time, and while that is not nearly as good as a permanent fix, it's no small thing. Racism was reduced, many people got to live better lives. Even if it all falls apart again tomorrow, I still think that was worth doing.
I'm a Gen-Xer, and this is exactly why I will NOT be telling "the kids these days" how they have it so much easier than we did.
Man, your showers are crises. Maybe change your soap?
Seriously, though, as someone on the ostensible receiving end of old-to-modern prejudices, I completely feel you. I really hoped the old ways would breed out in my lifetime, but neglected the very real fact that old ways can be engrained in new minds. In my heart of hearts, I wish for a day when I wake up in a world where the ignorance of the past is laughable if not forgotten, but I'm immediately reminded that it doesn't take much to instill the idea of unwarranted, ideological privilege in someone 30 years my junior who'll likely go on to teach their own kids the same thing. Prejudice isn't going away in a generation just as it hasn't in multiple generations, and it is a sad fact.
I feel this way whenever I see Trump supporters who're so far from Trump's own level of privilege, but claim it as there own, i.e.: the redneck working at Wal-Mart making $10/hour who wants to "make America great again." Several people have called this idea out: when was America ever "great" for anyone other than a white man? Black people, women, immigrants, the LGTBQ+ community; when was America ever "great" that any of us in the marginalized communities should rally to make it great "again"? I guess "MAGA" fits on a hat, but the reality of "fuck everyone who's not a white male" doesn't work so much as a campaign slogan. Sad fact it is "MAGA" convinces enough ignorant people that their best interests are at the forefront of intent of a megalomaniac who wants only votes and power, and will pander to their basest interests in the least shrewd or clever way to obtain those things for the sheer purpose of obtaining those things, and absolutely nothing more.
Progress is being made, but we have to acknowledge Newton's Third Law of Motion: for every action, there will be an equal but opposite reaction. The more those of us with an sense of decency and reason try to make sense of this life we share, there will be those who disregard those very base things with indecency and irrationality.
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I'm too busy telling them how shit awful their music is.
I had a pretty good track record with cell phones for the past couple of decades, but the one I have now, I've dropped more than all the phones I've had previously combined. Finally broke it with $250 left to pay it off. Fuck me...
I loved the 90s and I wasn't even aware of any of those things, I was just young and healthy and didn't worry about anything. Also, parties and booze and good times.
- Feb 7, 2011
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I bought a piece of art that's 40"x40" and needs to be hung on my wall. No one makes a frame that's 40"x40" so it has to be custom made. Custom frames are $140-$200.
Fuck that noise.
I 3D printed some brackets and attached them to my wall, now it looks like my art is floating. It cost me $0.20 in plastic, 15 minutes to design and about 4 hours to print.
Fuck that noise.
I 3D printed some brackets and attached them to my wall, now it looks like my art is floating. It cost me $0.20 in plastic, 15 minutes to design and about 4 hours to print.
It's too hot!!! I'm sweating and I don't want to be here!
Also, some of my houseguests don't wash their hands after using the bathroom. Nasty.
Also, some of my houseguests don't wash their hands after using the bathroom. Nasty.
I'm pretty sure that's a hanging offence. Remind them of their health obligations, and direct all complainants to take a number.
Given the whole covid epidemic, washing hands should be a thing. I mean, it should have been a thing beforehand as well, but still.
(Also, Jennifer Lawrence, if you are reading this, not washing you hands does not make you quirky.)
So today i need to complain about an idiot douche who is wrecking my life: Myself
An hour ago i nearly lost my car in a traffic accident. accelerated a a downwards ramp onto the autobahn (freeway). Wet asphalt - guide rail right, two lanes, a sound-barrier on the left side for a few hundred meters. About 60 km/h: aquaplaned, lost control. Was already readying myself to get grip again and crash into the right side onto the guard rail, or drift into the wall at left. After a second or so all the luck in the world made the right move for me: Got a little grip front/left wheel. Whole car slid 180 degrees over both lanes and came to a stop.
(I restartet it, and while 3 cars followed a few seconds later - and one guy looked me in the eye (Me pointing wrong way on the autobahn ramp) I could get myself on the road again.)
What the fuck am i doing? I know this damn ramp. Drive it every day. Already knew it is weird when wet (Combined bad street+ramping down and sideways - my car is light but large frame, small cheap tires). Already slipped once there (for a meter or so).
Sheer mundanity and shock rattled some things loose again with me. I am in a terrible mood again.
Edit: deleted existential rant
An hour ago i nearly lost my car in a traffic accident. accelerated a a downwards ramp onto the autobahn (freeway). Wet asphalt - guide rail right, two lanes, a sound-barrier on the left side for a few hundred meters. About 60 km/h: aquaplaned, lost control. Was already readying myself to get grip again and crash into the right side onto the guard rail, or drift into the wall at left. After a second or so all the luck in the world made the right move for me: Got a little grip front/left wheel. Whole car slid 180 degrees over both lanes and came to a stop.
(I restartet it, and while 3 cars followed a few seconds later - and one guy looked me in the eye (Me pointing wrong way on the autobahn ramp) I could get myself on the road again.)
What the fuck am i doing? I know this damn ramp. Drive it every day. Already knew it is weird when wet (Combined bad street+ramping down and sideways - my car is light but large frame, small cheap tires). Already slipped once there (for a meter or so).
Sheer mundanity and shock rattled some things loose again with me. I am in a terrible mood again.
Edit: deleted existential rant
Geez louise, I'm glad you're okay!!!! D: Car accidents are really scary stuff and can happen to anyone. Don't beat yourself up too bad. I remember I once went the wrong way around an island. Thankfully I didn't get into an accident, but I easily could have. Cars are fun but can cause a LOT of problems.
Haha I think I will!I'm pretty sure that's a hanging offence. Remind them of their health obligations, and direct all complainants to take a number.
Yeah the whole covid thing makes it even worse! :X And seriously, get a grip girl.