Philippines' Autistic Top 5 - Updated

Define "autistic."

(Note that this post was inspired by a tweet made by Journalist Raissa Writer when she described the AntiRHBill rally headed by the Catholic Church)

@raissawriter In an apparent taunt directed at PNoy, Archbishop said Church is "not autistic"



M Scott Peck in his book People of the Lie define autism as:

"The utter failure to submit oneself to reality."

"The word comes from the Greek root `auto,' meaning "self." The person who is autistic is oblivious to certain essential dimensions of reality. Such people literally live "in a world of their own" in which the self (or the identity of the self) reigns supreme."
(p.162)

I am unsure how the Church defines "autistic" in reference to whoever it is referencing to.

But the term "autistic" as used in this post is NOT medical autism but spiritual and emotional autism that makes one unable to surrender one's self to reality and so restricts one's self to his/her/its own view of the world in order to pursue its selfish agenda.

So far, the following are the top 5 "autistic" people, individuals, life forms in the country. There are more autistics out there, but this list includes those whose autism exerts the most influence in everyone's minds and hearts.

Be aware or be square.




1 The Catholic Church

The Catholic Church wants to insert themselves in any issue that would give them mileage - politically, emotionally, `spiritually,' religiously, educationally and media-wise.

Why?

That would buy them face-time on TV, radio, the net and news print. Exposure is important. It reminds everyone they still exist, that their opinions still matter, that whatever they say still holds sway among their flock of sheep, that they could say the blackpen is blue and people would still believe it as true, that they could still influence thought and action, that their business is still running, that consumers are still buying their shit/want their shit/crave to be blessed by their shit.

(NOTE: To be fair, one of the benefits of belonging in a church is the sense of community it provides its members. But to be truthful, the sense of community can exist with or without the church's machinations. But it is the church which can't survive without a community to back it up - imagine that! & imagine this too: the church knows that as true and is afraid you'll know it too.)

Thus their insistence, their energy, their efforts, their voices, their strength poured out in building / re-building / promoting every tenet their self-important mindset could conjure - sans the truth/common sense/reality and force majeure.

Who else had the gall to declare that

`Hey, limbo doesnt really exist yall, we were just guessing that it did for 2 millenia. So now we think it doesnt so all those unbaptized dead babies we said will go to hell -- we were all just kidding. I mean, somebody's got to think up of something. It's difficult coming up with new material all the time, duh.'



You know all those Coke `Happiness', Jollibee commercials etc. advertising agencies punch out every few months or so? It has to be different each time because people need to be reminded to buy Coke and eat Jollibee right? & in a not-boring way. That's what the church does with these "new" tenets.

They have to make up something new to keep themselves visible in the public mind. There was the longer rosary beads, the dissolution of limbo and now -- guess what the new buzz word is?

RH Bill.

They're not changing any tenet here, just highlighting/promoting and tooting their own horn again.


And sans the fact that Pinoys love to have sex but some dislike having to actually take care of babies (as shown by the 'Pamparegla' paraphernalia outside Quiapo church); that sex is natural (it's what got us here in the first place) -- the church and all its pseudo-eunuchs insist they know how you should make families and that you should make babies.

That would give people reason to talk about them, hate them, notice them, believe them, root for them or not - the important thing is that you noticed they're still there. They're still relevant enough to be liked/disliked/thumbs up-ed or thumbs-down-ed.


And their autistic because they can only see their relevance, their need to be relevant and that you should think the same way they do minus what you really think or feel about what they want you to think and feel.

Their relevance only exists in their heads and has nothing to do with reality.





2 PNoyNoy



How is PNoyNoy autistic?

We could only note the blatant ones readily available in media, and these are the following:

Smiling while inspecting the site of a tragic hostage-taking and talking to media about the hostage-taking.






Allegedly not answering the phone when being called by a foreign official in the midst of a national and foreign emergency.


Blaming PGMA for everything wrong in this country.




Blaming Noli de Castro during an anniversary media party.




Inability to admit or accept blame.


Using the stage as a medium to air his personal grievances and preferences (so 15th century colonial catholic church much).





If you cannot see these as PNoy's failure to submit himself to reality, you're probably autistic yourself (yes, name-calling is easy and it works).



3 Star Cinema movies

We will restrict these to the most recent movies released last year and early this year.



This movie says, as according to Jessica Zafra:

The Sexy Mistress has lived in New York, ergo she is “liberated”, which in the Philippines is a synonym for “promiscuous”.

The Beautiful Wife is a good girl, hence she does not wear mascara and she has long, straight black hair that she wears in a ponytail.

They should engage in public bitch fights in which handbags become metaphors for the man they are fighting over.

The cheating husband endures excruciating physical torment as a substitute for castration.

The mistress goes back to New York, where all the bad girls are supposed to go, which makes you wonder who won exactly.

The reality of the actual dynamics between wives and mistresses is not shown in this movie, not even an iota of it. Sure, movies are supposed to entertain but should also be logical. Life doesnt make sense but movies actually should.





Does this need any explanation?

Could you suspend your imagination for 90 minutes or so enough to believe that Piolo P could fall for Angelica P?

To be fair, Piolo and Angelica - they're both very pretty.

They're both very sexy.

But Angelica has more balls to do comedy and make fun of herself compared to Papa P.

I dont need to say more.




This movie hails autism and advocates the fact that the lives of peripheral characters do not matter unless they serve the purpose of the 2 major stars' characters.

The reality is, no one in their healthy minds would want to serve as a prop for other people's agenda. But this movie says they can and it also proves that it is romantic and fun to do so.





4 All those Shampoo Commercials

Most Philippine shampoo commercials assume that

only females wash their hair,



all Filipino women have straight, long hair (or at least they should - to better increase the sale of shampoos),




long straight hair trumps talent,



Philippine hair has a mind of its own,

beautiful hair = kiss/sex/love/self-esteem.




5 Willie Revillame

Willie Revillame believes his own delusion, greatness

and any proof to the contrary are merely provided by those who envy his blessed financial etc. state.

Check out these posts on Willie Revillame.




But this list is not comprehensive. Psychological, spiritual, emotional autism is rampant everywhere. Have you checked your own view of reality?

What's wrong with Batman?

It is natural to not notice what's wrong with Batman

because of this,




who could do this,



and who looks cool like this.




But put aside the gorgeousness of Christian Bale, the genius of Christopher Nolan, the talent of Ann Hathaway and while you're at it - un-suspend your imagination and what do you see?

A man pretending to be a bat so he is dressed like one;



Also, if Batman was in his right mind, he would have worn his briefs first and then slip into his skin-tight pants after - not the other way around.



"Generally, the explanations that are given for the motivation of these characters is pretty flimsy. People I'm sure have had their parents killed in front of their eyes. I think that would probably lead to a life in analysis and probably all sorts of personal problems. It probably won't lead to you becoming a bat-themed vigilante." - Alan Moore




But why do we lap Batman up? Why are we willing to suspend our logic and common sense?

Is it because we want to be entertained?

Is it because we `get' him?

So who would readstories of an impotent society desparated for a faceless (and therefore dehumanized) avenger? People who are themselves frustrated, and and angry and who perceive their anger against their parents, school, job..as righteous rage. The worldview presented in the stories is usually simple and uncomplicated, with the hero as simultaneously the stand-in and avenger of a wounded society that in some metaphorical way reflects the reader’s worldview. They’re hurt by or afraid of forces smarter and more powerful than them, so they want to lash out. Both the hero and the villain share this outlook, but from opposites sides of course. And it’s important to note that the reader sympathizes with both the villain and the hero. (The villain is the hero of his own story, after all.)

This kind of story is literally thousands of years old. Achilles, the strong invincible superhero of Greece, directed his rage just as much at the leader of the Greek forces, Agamemnon, as at the Trojans. And his rebelliousness is very much a part of the subtext of the story. In Achilles’s eyes, Agamemnon was too weak, too dissembling. Too quick to hedge his bets and to hold back. Achilles is the first superhero. DC and Marvel have slaughter forests and made fortunes from retelling his story over and over again.

Sing to me, O goddess, of the rage of Batman, Son of Gotham…

The problem that the superhero genre has is that it didn’t model itself after the rest of the Iliad. Achilles is an asshole. For all his talk and bravado, he didn’t win the Trojan War. What won the war was the Trojan Horse, a scheme concocted by a secondary character, the rather put-upon mortal named Odysseus. Where Achilles is an unrealistic character that reflects the unrealistic way in which youth views itself, Odysseus is a very realistic representation of a middle-aged man. He’s burdened by all the responsibilities he has left unattended back home. Odysseus, “the man of many twists and turns,” is like all reasonably mature middle-aged men, fed up with the all the high and mighty bullshit. He just wants to go home and play with his dog.

There is no DC or Marvel superhero franchise patterned off of Odysseus.

That a genre originally targeted at teenage boys would approach storytelling in this hyper-masculinized, hyper-sexualized way is not at all surprising. This is how many adolescents see the world. What is surprising is that the people who buy comics aren’t teenage boys anymore, they are men in their late twenties and thirties. For them, the comic book is an escape from that which frustrates them in the real world. - PastaBagel from Partial Objects




And then this happens:

"The suspected gunman at a Colorado showing of the latest Batman movie had painted his hair red and called himself the Joker, one of the villains populating the comic book world of Gotham."




It's not solely Batman's fault though. There are tons of Batman-fanatics who do not go out and shoot people.

But Batman is a convenient excuse for our mental dis-ease.

He's right up there cathartically fulfilling what we could only wish for in our dysfunctional hearts.

Batman doesn't need us. We need Batman.

What's wrong with that?

The Stalker Song

Did anyone ask God if he/she/it wants to be followed?

Would you want to be followed wherever you may go?

Nothing could keep your follower away? Not even a restraining order?

I dont know about you, but that is just creepy.



I will follow Him
Follow Him wherever He may go,
And near Him, I always will be
For nothing can keep me away,
He is my destiny.

I will follow Him,
Ever since He touched my heart I knew,
There isn't an ocean too deep,
A mountain so high it can keep,
Keep me away, away from His love.

I love Him, I love Him, I love Him,
And where He goes,
I'll follow, I'll follow, I'll follow.
he'll always be my true love, my true love, my true love
from now until forever, forever, forever

I will follow Him,
Follow Him wherever He may go,
There isn't an ocean too deep,
A mountain so high it can keep,
Keep me away, away from His love...

We will follow Him,
Follow Him wherever He may go,
There isn't an ocean too deep,
A mountain so high it can keep,
Keep us away, away from His love...

I love Him
(Oh yes I love Him)
I'll follow
(I'm gonna follow)
True love
(He'll always be my true, true love)
Forever
(Now until forever)
I love Him, I love Him, I love Him,
And where He goes,
I'll follow, I'll follow, I'll follow,
He'll always be my true love,
My true love, my true love,
From now until forever,
Forever, forever...

There isn't an ocean too deep,
A mountain so high it can keep,
Keep me away, away from His love

Are we rude or are white people lame?

aka

Are we insensitive or do white people feel entitled?

aka

Are we humble or are white people too proud?

aka

Are we comfortably mature or are white people whiny and childish?


There were three incidents which made me ask these.

1st: We were lined up in front of Landmark Makati's grocery side waiting for a taxi along with a slew of other families and people. My mother, nephew and I were patiently in line. Other people were not but members of their family were lined up for them. Those people who were not in line were waiting at the sides whilst guarding the bags of groceries they purchased. The line was moving slow. In front of us were two white males animatedly talking to each other. My mother and I were all paying attention to how slow the line moved due to the scarcity of available taxis when a cab finally did arrive. Us who were in the middle of the line watched hungrily as a man who was in front of the line opened the cab door and called his family who was waiting outside the line to enter the vehicle. To which one of the two white males loudly protested at this perceived injustice and literally pointed his fingers at the family members hauling their grocery bags towards the cab.

"They're not in line!" First white male said.

"They're not in line!" He repeated.

The second white male sensibly responded, "I think they're together."

"They're not in line, we're lined up here waiting like everyone else."

First white male's protestations was further piqued when the family members entering the cab smiled quietly but good-naturedly at them the same way other people in line also were.

So were we.

Second white male tried to pacify his friend by insisting "I think they're together. They were just waiting outside the line."

That didn't stop first white male though nor did he try to understand what was going on, nor did any of us cared to explain.

Us: If these guys are looking forward to be beaten up, they should take this attitude to a Manila alley and get stark raving mad not in front of middle class shoppers but amidst a group of drunk male videoke revelers. That way he'll not only see injustice, he'll feel it.



2nd: I was at SM Makati buying a bag of flavored nuts. I was at the cashier putting the change in my wallet making sure to distance myself from the register because my transaction has been completed so I was at the far edge of the counter. Though I was still there, the space for the cashier was open for anyone to freely come up to - yet this old white dude with his brown female companion decided to stand behind me. So the cashier called on him to come up and go around me. He then loudly replied: "But she's still here."

I proceeded to close my wallet and take my nuts with me and left.

Me: "I am not going to enable your sense of entitlement by ushering you towards the cashier. This is Manila. This is not the deep South. Not that we aren't polite to tell you that you could proceed ahead, we're just being real by allowing you to find out for yourself what you need to do. What, you want me to bring out a blackboard and draw an arrow towards where you're supposed to walk so you can get to the cashier? What are you, 5 years old?"


3rd: Just this week, I was at Glorietta. I was thirsty so I proceeded to go to the second floor of the mall to buy a watermelon shake at Big Chill. Walking towards it I saw a white woman leaning by the railing and looking at the list of Big Chill's fruit shakes. When I approached the Big Chill cashier and ordered a regular-sized shake, the white woman approached the other end of the stall and spoke to the other Big Chill staffer who was preparing the shake. The staff didn't reply or say anything to her as the staff was busy preparing my order. In the corner of my eye I saw the white woman stay for a micro-second more waiting for the staff's non-reply. And then she left.

Me: Admittedly, I felt guilty by not looking at her or acknowledging her presence or her thirst for a fruit shake. But, I also didn't expect her to leave that fast seemingly hurt that she wasn't paid attention to by the staff who was busy doing her job or who probably didn't hear her or who probably - like her - is as fearful of speaking with a foreigner lest their conversation get lost in translation.

All these reminded me of the below clip. I found this Simpsons scene funny maybe because it's true.

Mind your use of language the way the Natoka Indians did

Mind your use of language.

It tells you what you're thinking and how.

When the Brits discovered this beautiful, blue, pristine lake in Alberta Canada,



(NOTE: The water is authentically blue and oh so clear you'd think that, by looking at it in real life, God photo-shopped this postcard-perfect view.)


guess what they named this breathlessly majestic body of water?



That lake is in Alberta, Canada and it is popularly knows as Lake Louise.

The lake was named after Princess Louise Caroline Alberta (1848–1939),[1] the fourth daughter of Queen Victoria and the wife of the Marquess of Lorne, who was the Governor General of Canada from 1878 to 1883.

Did you notice how they named the lake after themselves? See how they immortalized their identity by pasting their names on a body of water nature has created?


Do you know what the original settlers of Canada, the Stoney Natoka Indians, named this lake when they first saw it?


They named it "Lake of the Little Fishes" maybe because they saw that it is a lake that has lots of little fishes swimming in it.

See how the Indians named this lake for what it is and not for what they want it to represent about themselves? See their absence of ownership?

See the mine-mine-mine-sensibility of the former?

See how the Indians named the lake based on how they saw it?

See how the Brits named the lake the way they wanted to see it?


How about you? Do you see things as they are or how you want to see them?

How The 1992 Director's Cut of Blade Runner Came About

According to Ridley Scott himself, Blade Runner earned zero, zilch, nothing, nada, it was a box office flop when it was released theatrically back in 1982.



He never made anything from the movie and had to give his all just to make it.

Ridley Scott: "But the important thing is to make it."

Film critics back then claimed the film was too slow touting it as "Blade Crawler."

Moviegoers didn't understand what it was all about, no thanks to the other sci-fi movies which were released roughly around that time: ET, Star Trek 2.

But Ridley Scott said, "You know what, I like it, screw you."

Later on, Ridley Scott was informed that his film was to be kept in the Library of Congress.

It was also the 2nd most requested film in the Warner library, after The Maltese Falcon.

When the Santa Monica Film Festival, 10-14 yrs ago, requested a print of the film from the studio,
someone haphazardly took out the film from a drawer and sent it.

It was not checked, it was simply shipped off.

Ridley Scott: "Does that tell you anything?"

Turns out the film was a 35 mm raw version of Blade Runner. It had no titles, "It had some of Jerry Gold's music on it, it had some of Vangelis music on it..it wasn't even labeled properly...It was a longer cut, my version."

The result was an `earthquake' of reaction for the film and voila, it was touted as the Director's Cut

which later on was further improved to the Final Cut that was released in 2007 which Ridley Scott 100% approves.



And yes, he is making a sequel to the Blade Runner. Let us all thank the heavens.

Michael Fassbender strikes a Mr. Pogi pose

and Noomi Rapace laughs.




and he does it again.



Because he can.

But he usually doesn't.

He only did when he was asked how it was to be Hollywood's "It Boy" and so he shows how it is to be "It" now

and tomorrow, he says he is the "Tit." Seriously.

He's not only pogi (handsome) he's also funny.




O di ba, kala nyo kayo lang ang pwdeng mag Mr. Pogi?

Kaya din mag-Mr. Pogi ng mga pogi.

Ad for Belo Men is Aspirational

The ad for Belo Men does not reflect the truth that there are non-white (in the PH context, this means brown) car owners as much as there are white (in the PH context, this means mostly Spanish/American/Chinese - or a combination of all - mestizos) car owners.

NOTE: If you are Caucasian white and you're in the PH, you're not expected to commute because you are supposed to be rich and own a car. You are also not supposed to commute because you don't want to invite anyone to kidnap or mug you (I am not being racist by implying Filipinos are violent, but the PH is a third-world country and I am being realistic).

The Belo Ad for Men's whitening products wants your insecurity, your colonial mentality to come alive enough for you to feel that yes your skin needs some brushing/scrubbing up enough for other people to think you're not poor or that you own a car. Though you don't actually have to own a car, the point is to make people think you own one. The Belo Ad for Men reflects not the truth but what you want to be true: you can look like you own a car = rich without actually owning a car or being rich.

Similarly, the Belo for Men ad doesn't have to reflect what is culturally true but simply show what it wants to be true: you're brown, you need to be whitened up, you need our product, Buy Belo.

If you agree, if you have bought into the idea that your skin is not good enough, you can easily buy a Belo. If you agree, you are its target market. If you believe the ad, it's for you.



But hey, is it just me or is the ad making fun of itself too and making light (no pun intended) of the fact that we equate skin whiteness with sosyal-ness?

As if it's pointing its finger at you and making you look at how you look at yourself and others. Tongue-in-cheek much?

Because, be honest, where were you when you were taught about PH history and our "pre-colonial" and "colonial" past?

When I was in the fifth grade, I was curious about the teacher's use of the terms "colonial" and "pre-colonial" but could not mouth the words of my wonderment.

It was only years later that I understood what I was wondering about: why use pre-colonial to refer to PH history before the Spanish came? As if our history was anchored / leveraged at us being "colonized."

What? The PH didn't have a life before it was colonized and could only refer to itself before it got screwed by Spain? The PH didn't exist as its own? and had to attach its identity to only that part in history?

We were taught to see our country this way, the Philippines circa B.C. (before colonization) and A.C. (after colonization).

aka -- The Philippines before it was ransacked and pillaged and The Philippines after it was ransacked and pillaged.

Is it a wonder now why most of us still see ourselves this way?

How much do we know about the Philippines from year 0 to 1520?

Is Michael Fassbender today's Laurence Olivier?

Have you noticed how they uncannily resemble each other?

OLIVIER


FASSBENDER



OLIVIER


FASSBENDER



It is as if Fassbender will look like the old Olivier after a a decade or two.






I don't know if Fassbender could spout Shakespeare but he could definitely hold a candle to Olivier's Heathcliff.

Have you also noticed how Fassbender's roles seem to run a common theme?

According to Fassbender, he always wants to keep himself guessing,

he constantly always wants to challenge himself,

he always wants to do something different.

His breakout role was Hunger.

Though the first time the director Steve McQueen saw Fassbender, his first thoughts were "Who's this geezer?"

Steve McQueen: When you first auditioned for 'Hunger', I think I actually fancied you! I thought, ‘Who is this geezer?’ You came with a bit of a swagger, a bit of an attitude. I thought, ‘I don’t know if I like this guy.’

Michael Fassbender: That’s because I thought you were doing a remake of Saturday Night Fever…

Steve McQueen: Wrong audition! No, really, my first impression was, ‘Does he really want to be here?’ I wasn’t too sure. And then when you came back for an audition the next day, there was a transformation – you were a totally different person: extraordinarily engaged and engaging. And I thought, ‘This guy could play Bobby Sands.’




His second memorable role was in Fish Tank where he played a seemingly nice guy who took advantage of a female minor's naivete.

The director who chose him for the role says she handpicked Fassbender because she saw a dark side to his otherwise harmless demeanor.




And then played Rochester in Jane Eyre who similarly charmed the wits off a generous-hearted girl.



And then played Jung who got cozy with his patient - also an emotionally vulnerable woman.



And then played sex-addicted Brandon in Shame - a man whose goal in life is to seek out pleasure.



And then played an android in Prometheus - who this time is asexual but is hungry for information.




I wonder how much of Fassbender is in the characters he played?

Why do I even care?

So Madonna Showed her Nipple in her MDNA Concert in Turkey

Nothing weird about that.



What's weird was how it still made the news.



It's a breast. Don't you have one of your own? Don't you have a mother, sister, friend, aunt, female cousin, female co-worker who has one too?

What's the big deal?

Is it because she's 50?

What? 50-year olds should keep their breasts to themselves?

Says who? The misogynist in you? The Pope in you? The voice of your parents in your head?

She wasn't walking out on the street and flashing her breasts to bystanders, she's in a concert, her concert, singing HUMAN NATURE with its lyrics going like this:

And I'm not sorry
It's human nature
I'm not your bitch don't hang your shit on me
You punished me for telling you my fantasies
I'm breakin' all the rules I didn't make
We all feel the same way
I have no regrets
Just look in the mirror
I don't have to justify anything
I'm just like you
Deal with it


What's weirder was - when she showed her nipple - those who screamed the loudest were gay guys.


She showed her butt too. And yes she was singing the same song.



She was performing.

She was not buying ice cream or drinking coffee.

So relax.


What's weirdest though was the existence of a "sterilization team tasked with wiping away all traces of Madonna so obsessive fans cannot steal her DNA after she has left a concert venue / dressing room."

What was that all about?

Wait a minute. DNA? and Madonna's concert is called MDNA.

PR - stunt much?

(To Ruffa Gutierrez and everyone else who can't) Just Say No

If you do say NO, stick to it specially if that is what your gut is telling you.



If you feel offended, you are. Period.

Do not rationalize, do not explain it away in your head. Do not make up excuses to make yourself feel better, albeit temporarily.

Stick with your NO.

There is a reason why you said NO, do not forget it. Do not say or think otherwise.

And if you say NO, do not allow others to sway you to change your mind.

Say NO now, not after.

No matter what others say, no matter what others think. Just say it.

If not, you'll end up getting angry at your self.

Do not give other people permission to change your mind.

Only you can do that.

If you feel something at that moment you do, feel it. Allow it.

Once you do, you will conserve energy by not making a rehearsed smile, from repressing a tear, from repressing anger.

A NO makes your boundaries stronger. It strengthens your self. It helps your body know you love yourself enough to protect it.

And if you feel offended, say so.

Acknowledge it to your self and to others.

Bring it out there.

Face it. Let others see it too.

It's being authentic. It is your soul's message to the world saying it deserves more and should not in any way settle for less.

Say it now, not later. When you do, you not only save yourself from hurt, you also help others from being hurtful. Both of you then share the space of being respectful. You lift each other up. But if he or she doesn't want to, let him/her stay where he/she is. The important thing is, you now know where you should be and where you belong and what you deserve.

Saying NO is empowering. Use it when you feel it. You won't be sorry you did.

5 Ways on How To Live Unhappily Ever After

Why live happily ever after when you can live miserably for the rest of your life? The key is to not be aware enough that you think this is what you think you want so you fight off people, events, circumstances who say otherwise. Hey, you even fight with your self. You even hate yourself for fighting with yourself. Eitherway, you make sure you win at all cost sans the truth.

This is a partial list which could grow as time passes or as our awareness expands or if you pitch in your own suggestions in the comments section. Feel free to do so okay?


1 Compare yourself with others.

If you want to feel small, inadequate, unworthy and always lacking, make sure to compare yourself with people who you think is better than you in whatever type or form. When you do, you highlight their strengths while diminishing yours - an unnecessary thing to do despite your belief that doing so is the only sure way to look at the world. Whoever or however you learned this self-defeating skill from, continually doing this will keep your life remarkably static, restricted, non-changing. You will also feel perpetually fearful, angsty, angry and insecure.

On the positive side, if you want to feel temporarily happy and good about yourself, compare yourself with others who you think fall a rank lower to your financial / intellectual / physical / psychological / whatever-ial level. Most of us have learned that it is easier- and is less hurtful - to judge than to be judged. Doing the judging gives us the seeming power over others. We then appear, at least to ourselves, as more potent than we actually are. It also empowers us to look at other people's flaws and not recognize our own. We then end up merrily blind, acting as if life is but a dream.

In summary, be blind to your own faults - better yet, project them onto others.



2 Base your identity on what you have, what you do or something skin-deep or something outside of you (your place of work, your place of study, what you do, what you study, what you don't do, the fact that you didn't study, your bank account, the fact that you have no bank account, the color of your skin, the texture of your skin, your facial features, etc.).

The idea is to base your identity on something you think others find worthy.

Make sure you identify yourself as __________ (job title) of ______________ (company X),

e.g.

"Hi I'm (place your name here), writer of the box-office hit movie ____________"

"My name is Atty. ___________"

Or in a tense social situation, break the ice by starting with a spine-chilling greeting: "Kilala mo ba ako?" or "Di mo bako kilala?" ("Do you know who I AM?" or "Do you not know who I AM?")

The point is to disturb others into submission or agreement with what you think of yourself and how.

This could also work in reverse. If you base your identity on how much you don't have, use that identity to elicit pity and / or guilt from others.

Again, the point is to disturb others into submission or agreement with what you think of yourself and how.

This process would be easy to do if you had a Catholic upbringing.

If you're Catholic, you have probably learned how to jump through hoops your whole life to make yourself feel worthy because at zero age you have been told that, even if you're pulled straight out from your mother's womb, you are already a sinner by virtue of you being alive. Add to your original sin the fact that Jesus died for you so nothing you will ever do could even top or compensate for that. Sorry. As all Catholics now know, guilt is a very prized virtue.


3 Treat relationships as an X-deal.

Treat all your relationships as a business transaction. Make sure you do not limit this to your co-workers, business partners, employers, employees, customers, etc.

Relate with family, friends, acquaintances and even your version of God as a business deal. Or maybe, you might not have noticed it yet, you already are.

When praying, negotiate, haggle.

Example:

Tell God that you will stop smoking IF he makes you partner.

Plead with God to make you win P164 million in the Lotto draw and in exchange you will donate half of your winnings to churches and orphanages.

Tell God to grant your wishes and in exchange you will dutifully attend mass every Sunday, and even give 10% of your earnings to the church.

You ask God to magically make you pass your exam and in exchange, you will feed the poorest of the poor in your community.



Note that you can also do these same things in your relationships.

Example:

If you want to make someone join your religious group, bribe them with food, a sense of security / community / protection.

If you want someone to help you move, ask them what they want and then give it - make sure you do the latter before doing the former as this decreases the possibility of them saying "no."

This set-up allows guilt to naturally flourish so once it does, use it to the hilt. Wave it at others to make them do what you want them to do.



4 Treat others the way you don't want to be treated

Follow the age-old cliche,' "I hurt others before they get a chance to hurt me"

This saves you from feeling rejected or unworthy. Constantly one-upping someone takes a lot of effort but every single moment you do is worth it. For a fleeting moment, it makes you feel full, that is until this buzz wears off and you have to get your fix by one-upping someone again.

When choosing someone to one-up, bring out your self-esteem counter and gauge how much self-worth they feel. The lower someone's self-worth is, the easier it is to one-up them. To further sharpen your one-upmanship, make sure the following conditions are present:

a) The one-upee must be invested in the one-upper or the situation the latter has created

Note that instances where a one-upee is invested in the one-upper is when the one-upee is dependent on him/her in some way.

b) The one-upper must make the one-upee further feel less of his/herself. While this is going on, the one-upper must also make an effort to prop himself up. When this is regularly done, a Stockholm-Syndrom-ish dynamic develops within the relationship. Eventually, the one-upee fails to see nothing wrong with anything and everything the one-upper is doing, even if it is to the detriment of the former.


Similarly, you don't always have to treat others like shit in order to live miserably. You can also treat others better than the way you treat yourself. You can one-up yourself with your own permission.

Example:

You can give your relatives all the money they want while you scrimp your savings enough to buy 2-weeks worth of cup noodles - because you'd rather save all your cash for others than spend it on yourself. Because you'd rather see other people live the good life than allow yourself to enjoy yours.

This follows another age-old cliche,' "I hurt myself first before others can hurt me."



5 Guard and preserve your ego at all costs

Do not be like mall security. Do not simply point a stick at the inside of other people's bags and wave them off.

Be like a Nazi. Be paranoid. Ransack their bags and if you find even an iota of a possible bomb-paraphernalia, (e.g. you think that soft rice pudding you're squeezing is for making a bomb) throw the owner of that bag out of the mall.

Similarly, the moment you sense someone deflating the puffed-up image you have of yourself, kick them out of your life. If you can't not cut them off - either due to family or work reasons - stab them at the back. Not literally because you will get yourself in trouble and you don't want to taint your image by being hauled out in handcuffs right?

Assassinate their character. If you have to lie, so be it.

The point is to bring them down good and hard because they revealed an aspect of yourself you don't want others or yourself to see.

Your ego is the only thing that keeps your life going. It is you. If your ego is wounded, it will become frail, flail and eventually die - and you will inevitably go down with it. So protect it. It is your identity. It is the only one that cares for you. It is the only reason you think people want to be with you. You know nothing else. You are nothing without it.

You are it.




In summary, these five tips highlight the fact that nothing is more important than non-change.

Changing means you know something's wrong with you or how you relate with others. But admitting that something's wrong is impossible specially if you are convinced that you are right.

Living unhappily ever after requires non-admitting that something's amiss since that is equal to seeing the cracks to your thought-of perfection. Ironically though, you are also smart enough to not admit you're perfect. You know that if you do admit to being perfect, that would be too vain, even for your taste. You also know people dislike vain people. So in order to be liked, you do not admit or see yourself as vain. But you are. You therefore do all you can to conceal this while at the same time being this.

Just follow these basic rules and you are off to a very good bad start. Goodluck!

Prometheus Questions and SPOILERS

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!!! STOP READING UNLESS YOU HAVE WATCHED THE MOVIE.

Michael Fassbender, Idris Elba and Ridley Scott all together in a film about "where we came from" and how our search for our beginning could be our end -- what else should one do but watch Prometheus?

And we did.

And the following questions came up:

1 Why does the alien look like a vagina with penis tentacles?



Does it represent the male and female psyche and thus it goes along with the movie's theme about creation and birth, life and death, entropy and evolution?


2 Was the machine which operated on Dr Shaw to take out the baby octopus alien from her body, sexist? Or does it represent technology's failure to understand the intricacies of the female body?


3 Did David's character represent the intellect (male psyche) and did Dr Shaw represent the emotions (female psyche)?





Did David find the mission's desire to meet and greet the "engineers" of the human race - "just because" his creators can - illogical?

Was him putting a drop of alien goo on Holloway's wine glass the same way as him putting one over his creators? The same way the mythical Prometheus did to Zeus?

Because David is the intellect and is solely mind-based, is that why the only thing left of him when he's destroyed was his head?

And Dr Shaw needed David's strong and powerful head in order to pursue her dream of making contact with the "engineers" despite reality presenting that possibility as nil. Blind hope much? thus Prometheus?

"Prometheus, you are glad that you have outwitted me and stolen fire ... but I will give men as the price for fire an evil thing in which they may all be glad of heart while they embrace their own destruction." (Zeus to Prometheus 1. Hesiod, Works and Days 55)."

"It was then that Prometheus 1, out of compassion for that wretched breed of mortals, planted blind hope in their hearts.."


4 Was the mission - like Dr. Shaw - way over its head? The way Dr Shaw clings stubbornly to blind hope and the fact that she doesn't mind going around in circles and end up in the same place where she left off only to search for something she may have already found but the head has "chosen to believe" it hasn't represent the intellect winning over emotions? Or the emotions using the head to rationalize its unfounded desires, wishes?


5 Did you notice how Idris Elba and his crew were the only ones in the ship to die without being eaten alive, maimed, burned or squished? They're the only ones who surrendered willingly to their deaths. They were also the ones who had no preconceived notion about the mission nor did they set out to discover anything. In the Captain's own words, he "just flies a ship." They were being in the moment whatever that moment called for, whether it was to put up a Christmas tree or fly the ship to their and the alien's death. How cool was that?

That scene where they raised their hands in surrender when they crashed the Prometheus to destroy the alien spacecraft was so breath-taking it made me tear up, did you?

The captain and his crew were neither thinking hard or feeling hard, they were just being and living, savoring the moment and even surrendered to it.


6 If the original 1979 ALIEN is about the fear of being pregnant/being a mother/unwanted pregnancy, then Prometheus is its perfect prequel.

The horror in Prometheus is sex. This time, it's fear of intimacy.

See how the alien enters the body and then the host screams, shakes until the host explodes?

See how Meredith Vickers (Charlize Theron) is so obsessed about keeping the ship clean, lean, pure, safe and free from any foreign / alien elements the same way she is fixated and hyper-attentive to keeping her body lean and clean. Notice how everyone was throwing up after getting out fresh from the pod, but Vickers is already doing push-ups.

See how the relaxed and free-wheeling Captain (Idris Elba) advise the uptight Vickers, `If you want to get laid, just ask.'

See how when the ship Prometheus crashes with the alien ship and collide into one orgasmic explosion, Vickers is squished along with it. The Prometheus ship is an extension of her and it being destroyed means she also is. She couldn't let herself be vulnerable as that would be death.

Being intimate requires letting go and going with the flow. It requires surrender. Intimacy doesn't come from the head.

Intimacy lets go of the need for control.

If you hate your self, how can you be intimate with your self or with others?

What breeds this fear of intimacy is not being knowledgeable of the self because you don't want to know -- out of horror of what you will see.

Is that why Dr Shaw and Weyland `had to go that far in search of a miracle?'

The heavenly orgasm they need in order to satisfy themselves is always out there and is never close to home?

Or is this self-hatred the reason why those super humans wanted them dead? The creator hates his creation. The createe fires back and wants to kill his parents.

And it goes all the way back to Zeus when he created humans whom he loathed but whom Prometheus loves enough to steal fire for. Why would a creator hate his creation if it is made from his own image & likeness?

It's a dysfunction.

Prometheus is from Greek mythology.

Classical Greek culture, especially philosophy, had a powerful influence on the Roman Empire, which carried a version of it to many parts of the Mediterranean region and Europe, for which reason Classical Greece is generally considered to be the seminal culture which provided the foundation of modern Western culture.

White people issue much?




7 Prometheus it seems is also about a woman dealing with her “father issues” and her vision of THE “IDEAL” — whatever that ideal may be. As it turns out, `the ideal’ was all in her head. She was chasing her dream which in reality was a horrific nightmare. And her search lead to a lot of casualties, death and destruction all because she “chose to believe” something. Alas, she didnt even learn from her experience since she stubbornly still chooses to believe she will be lead to her "ideal" thanks to the help of the intellect who could rationalize away anything and everything through clinical denial.


"All film criticism (all writing, all filmmaking) is, on some level, autobiography, don't you think?
I remember David Thomson talking about it that way in the intro to his first edition of "The Biographical Dictionary of Film." What somebody notices, finds of interest, and chooses to write about can't help but be determined by who they are and what they bring to the movie. It's personal -- but, as I always say, it has to be rooted in specific observations of the movie itself. Otherwise it's like we're all talking about our own dreams. Close observations of the movie give us common ground for discussion.

For answers to a few of the questions on this post, go to: http://www.jessicarulestheuniverse.com/2012/06/09/alien-prometheus-and-the-biggest-fear-of-all/


For an analysis of Prometheus from a mythic perspective, go to:
Prometheus Unbound: What The Movie Was Actually About

Katrina Stuart Santiago's article is blind to its own stereotype

My take on Katrina Stuart Santiago's article on @GMANews regarding Claudine's NAIA 3 scuffle:


Katrina Stuart Santiago: It’s in this sense that Claudine’s anger, her taray, is to me refreshing.

It's refreshing because the author thinks women do not normally do this. Or she thinks people think women dont do this, shouldnt do this. Since Claudine is a popular media personality, let us mention other popular media personalities whose taray the author could find refreshing:

Anabelle Rama,





Lolit Solis,





Amalia Fuentes.




It's not about age, right? It's about their femaleness.

Or if you want to go younger, here's Cristine Reyes.




KSS: Granted that she was scolding employees who also had no control over the situation, granted that lashing out would not mean getting their bags back any faster, much might be said about releasing frustration in the face of inefficiency. Yes, these are unfortunate employees faced with such anger, but that is not so much Claudine’s fault, as it is the company’s which knows only too well that those in the lower rungs are the ones who will suffer. We might call Claudine out on verbal abuse, but then again what are the limits to complaining about bad service? No cuss words? No threatening that employees will lose their jobs? No screaming? How to measure anger?

How to measure anger? Anger does not get violent. Rage does.

Claudine has every right to be angry at inefficient service. But to be verbally abusive? Why should that be okay?

Why is the author asking about the limits of getting angry? Why is she even contemplating about using cuss words? Threatening to get employees fired? Does she think there should be no limits just because it is a woman getting `angry?'

By her line of argument, the below kind of anger is possible.




But wait, she says she draws the line on physical abuse.


KSS: Was she wrong for being that angry? That’s a judgment of one anger over another. I draw the line at physical abuse.

Because she doesnt consider verbally / mentally / psychological demeaning remarks as abuse. That's a form of myopia no medical doctor could resolve.


KSS: That Claudine was this angry – and again we don’t know exactly how angry – despite being a celebrity tells me that she was ready to face the consequences of her actions.

Ermmm..or that she has poor self-restraint much?



KSS: As I will draw the line at calling her ill-bred, which is what’s on the interwebs, as if we do not know of the class biases of such a judgment. And how can we not be in crisis by the fact that if we are using notions of breeding for this story at all, then we should be pointing the finger at Tulfo. He who saw the situation and decided that documenting it was in order. He who could’ve decided otherwise and just gone on with his life, let the story happen as it would on these shores, via tsismis and blind items, may be a small story in the showbiz section that would prompt Claudine and Raymart to maybe make a short public statement about the incident.

I will draw the line and halt with any what-ifs and not control the NAIA 3 situation in my head.



KSS: ..why couldn’t this woman be as angry as a man, be as aggressive as the other men in this video are? Why do we demand differently of a person as aggrieved if not even more so? And then we judge her as ill-bred and tactless, as basagulera and nakakahiya, because she dared kick ass.....And yes, this is about women going against other women because many of us think like our men; that is a tragedy in itself.

Wait a minute. Why single out Claudine's aggressiveness and violence? In the first place, why are the men's aggressiveness and violence deemed okay enough that it is okay for women to be equally so? Because they're men? Who said aggressiveness and violence is okay for men or for women? Ergo, if men can sleep around, why can't women? Who thinks it is okay to sleep around anyway? Just because men are doing it does not make that shit right.

Katrina Stuart Santiago might not notice it but she is thinking like a dude too.



KSS: Which reminds us all that we can’t handle a woman doing exactly that, as we fall back on stereotypes to describe her. We will be blind to the fact that at the core of hitting Claudine with words that hurt is a demand on the woman to be the good ol’ stereotype of soft spoken and mahinhin.

Ermmm....why is the author generalizing women as mahinhin and soft-spoken? That was how Star Magic packaged Claudine Barretto's career. That is not how today's hot item Marian RIvera is packaging hers.




KSS: We want the woman who waits for the man to defend her, yes? And in which case the ones who get angry enough to shout, those who know to fight back, we prove that we cannot handle those women.

No, we can. Maybe the author can't.

I personally cant equate anger with violence. But rage and violence go together like peanut and butter.



KSS: That this means being unable to appreciate it when a woman shows us we can be bigger than the Maria Clara stereotype we’ve been stuck with all this time goes without saying. That we fail to appreciate Claudine kicking ass the way she has? That is our bigger tragedy. - GMA News


The tragedy is that women think acting like a dude means empowerment. It does not. It simply means women are acting like dudes

AKA

Being abusive is okay as long as its women doing it to men.

And I dont know of anyone who is solely pointing the finger at Claudine but clearly, Katrina Stuart Santiago's article is.

CheezMiss' Theories on the NAIA 3 (Raymart1 - Claudine2 - Mon Tulfo3) Incident

Before the YouTube video came out, GMA News reported about the incident and interviewed the two parties involved: Raymart and Claudine and Mon Tulfo.



Did you find it weird that Mon Tulfo was the one who had the bruised eye but he was more relaxed and calm during the interview compared to the clearly agitated Raymart Santiago and perennially rage-filled Claudine Barretto?

What is Mon Tulfo being so Zen about as he was describing how the fight started?

See how Mon Tulfo is more emphatic in his interview with Noli de Castro and Mel Tiangco.

An earlier report also said that Mon Tulfo claimed that he won't press charges against Raymart, Claudine & Co. unless they press charges against him first.

If he was the aggrieved party, why wouldn't he want to press charges first? Doesnt he feel aggrieved being beaten, choked, smacked, punched black and blue?

Something's off.


Did you find it weird that Claudine has a pattern of going batshit crazy towards front desk personnel - be it at a bank, airport or Angel Locsin? -

See how her nostrils flare as she blames the bank about her "missing" P5 million pesos from her joint bank account with her husband. See how she puts her rage on the teller but did not even think of asking her husband? (0:19)

Weird!!!!




Isnt it just as weird that her husband focused his attention on someone RECORDING his wife's rage and not notifying his wife that she is being recorded or that she lower her voice - at least for the camera?

Or is it because it is easier to blame someone than to manage his wife's rage?

In fairness, Raymart couldnt even get a word in to Claudine in this old interview of them. (4:27-4:37)





And why is Mon Tulfo admitting to kicking Claudine out of "instinct" because she was allegedly punching him



but took that statement back at his live interview at GMA News' 24 Oras last night (May 7, 2012)?



INCONSISTENCY is a RED FLAG. How difficult is it to remember kicking or not kicking someone?

I believe Raymart when he said Mon Tulfo "punched" him with an "open-fist." But that open-fisted punch is more of an ARYUKEN though. Mon Tulfo "ARYUKEND" Raymart. (ARYUKEN a-la Street Fighter).

I also believe Mon Tulfo when he said Raymart tried to grab his cellphone - which Raymart demanded that Mon Tulfo give at (0:57-59).



I also believe Claudine when she said Mon Tulfo kicked her. Mon Tulfo even admitted to doing it, DUH.

I also believe Raymart when he said he is afraid of Mon Tulfo and his brothers (0:56)



but I also believe he has long been afraid of Claudine and her rage.

I also believe the bag with the asthmatic meds is a red herring. It was not the reason for Claudine's rage. Claudine is naturally rage-filled. It is her default emotion. It is so natural I think that Raymart found nothing wrong with Claudine allegedly dressing down Cebu Pacific staff. What Raymart felt was WRONG was the way a media person was RECORDING his wife's rage (which everyone has already seen when Claudine INVITED GMA 7 to record her rage at a bank).

Ironically, what was recorded was a 4-way (Not 7 as Mon Tulfo claimed) rumble with tons of extras.

Mon Tulfo probably felt 7 punches land on his face but they only came from 2 people and one of them was Claudine. Booyah!

Also, in Raymart's interview with DZMM and Boots Anson Roa, Raymart admitted that it was not their bag which has the medicines for kids, it was their friend's. And in Claudine's first interview with GMA News' Aubrey Carambel, she DID NOT mention anything about medicines inside the loaded off bag but the FACT that they were made to wait for their bags to come out of the conveyor only to learn later it wasnt included in the plane. She was stressing the TIME wasted not the kids' asthmatic meds.

Also, its so sad how Claudine uses her kids to gain sympathy in front of the camera.

I also believe Mon Tulfo, just like his brothers, are experts in provoking someone's ire. Have you seen BITAG?! Duh!

I also believe that Raymart, Claudine and 60+ year-old martial arts expert Mon Tulfo should have fought in the grade school quadrangle and not the airport.

I also believe that I have seen 8-year old kids act more maturely than all of them did.

In fairness, I understand Raymart when he reiterated to Kabayan Noli re: Mon Tulfo

"Sya po nauna eh."

I said the exact same thing when I was fighting with someone, I was 6 years old.

I also believe the guards were batshit scared of Mon Tulfo, Claudine and Raymart and that they were acting not as guards but as open-mouthed spectators who are confused as much as they were deathly afraid to hurt an ex-action star, an ex-actress and a six-foot media bully.

I also believe NAIA guards need more firm holsters to place their guns in.

I also believe the truth will set everyone free, but first it will make you batshit angry.