This isn’t even borne from a hatred of Kanye West.

It’s born from a love for this:

I work with people who’re smart and often ambitious.  That’s great. But this also leads to stuff getting under people’s skin.

And having a thing that’s got a fun beat and is pretty silly but also has a serious message of “honestly fuck it and enjoy the fact that you have the power to enjoy” is just . . .SAGISTIC ADVICE.  If you don’t like something do better, fix it, find better, and enjoy that you can enjoy good feels all the during!

Also! the track is just WAY better than the following:

So I think it’s funny if we’re in a culture of squawky, opinionated young people who love to hate on something cause it’s got the brand Taylor Swift on it, but thinks a song where you’re doing work if you shake your booty is ok. Shit like that is why anaconda exists.

And also, lol

Something about being untouchable

You know, I’ve always been a little demanding.

It’s true. I remember having my first “Maybe we can’t be friends” in third grade cause he was agreeing with other third graders who were talking shit. I remember thinking it’s one thing if the shit being talked about was legitimate, but I remember thinking that it was just childish insults, and being like “Brah! How yoo gonna, gonna, LOYALTY BRAH.” And of course I bitched to my old man during one of those car rides and he was all “You seem to have expectations that others won’t always have. In this case you have a higher than normal expectation for loyalty.”

And I’m not saying I was right or wrong because in this case, that’s not the point. The fact that I was nutty enough, and my buddy cared enough to pass a back and forth “ANDRE DO YOO STILL WANT TO BE FWIENDS CIRCLE YES OR NO.” and he was all “yes.” and I was all “SOGOODWTF”

I get caught up on, bothered, and bugged by matters of principal more than specific happenings or reasons for them. I care more about understanding a person is driven by short-sighted character motivations rather than identifying what they are. I care more about understanding a person’s prime motivations – and these are the principles. If I wasn’t careful I’d probably be one of those assholes who’d get red in the face and be all *SPUTSPUT**PRINCPLESLES*

And I have to think about this because often, people find themselves stepping on mine without even realizing it.  When I’m bothered by a principle that lead to an issue and people just wanna tell me to feel good I do generally suppress a knee-jerk “DONT PATRONIZE ME YOU STUPID FUCK” before calmly deciding that the person advising me is an idiot/doesn’t care about the principle and should be regarded with respect to that. And that’s not always true. It is the case that I’m capable of being hyperfocused on something small and petty, and have to weigh my battles, and whether or not it’s the time or place or appropriate moment for a disposition.

But I think about it, and I see this sort of conflict happen all the time.  Unless dying, I refuse to drink Fiji water out of principle. (That shit is flown across half the globe on diesel fuel so duane reade can charge you a patronizing premium on top of a premium so you can feel like you’re a superior consumer for drinking retarded water that’s actually bad for the planet and I’m not even an environmentalist. P.S. Fuck you.) And I like to share mine with others – I’m not enforcing it, but I support my own principles by being open about them and thinking maybe one or two others will adopt.  Here’s what I got in return today though:
“But Fiji water is the best!”

Opinion.  It can be an extension of principle, but it’s usually the package that something so unprincipled and unthinking comes in, isn’t it? Isn’t that the difference between my cat’s response and a human’s deeper response? We can deduce an opinion by reflecting on principals, while a cat’ll sheerly get subjective appraisal from it’s senses.  That’s why you can’t convince a cat to be a vegetarian by appealing with ideology.  “Oh, don’t eat that mouse when you can eat murder-free dry food.”  The cat doesn’t care. In the cat’s opinion, killing mice is just the way it should be.

So you know, I feel like a better human for realizing deeper reasons for things like, “Patronizing structures that’re actually undermining viable economic conditions” (dear broke people, stop buying 300 dollar shoes 15 dollar drinks) rather than “I don’t like air jordans.”  But that’s just me.

And then you get into that ethics vs morality thing. And religious principle? And again, there’s that famous story of the preacher who started to realize his friend was a sinner (principled argument) and cut him off. Then he realized his preacher was a sinner and cut him off. Then he realized his whole church was full of sin and cut them off. Then his wife.  And yes, he totally died as a lonely psychopathic fuck in the woods. And how many well principled people can we think of who’re having real problems of disconnect?

Nah, I think there need to be principles about principled. Meta-principles. And we need to agree with them. Basic human rights becomes a thing here. Basic decency. Basic cutesy. Basic reciprocity. These are basic because they guide all interaction that follows. They preclude more pervasive, nasty principles like “Oppress others with your beliefs.”

I think that’s the the game I need to always remind myself to wire right. Because here’s the pro of principle as I see:

If we start being cat-thinkers, we may as well be half drunk and half stoned all the time. And actually we live in a huge planet where maybe that’s groovy!  But the problems comes into play when we start bowing to undermining principle – that which’ll step on the right of things to stay reasonable.  When we start being self-obsessed beasts, we’re most manipulable and capable of doing horrible things.  All you have to do is threaten one’s well-being and boom, they’ll do anything because they have no residual principle to fall back on.  Face it! This’s what gave socrates the courage to famously drink poison.  The wrong principles is what’ve let horrible military regimes do wrong things. The right principles (or at least the most outstanding ones) are where my balls in life come from. This’s how I know confidence in what I say, and principle is how I can detach from any situation where I may have pride and ego get in the way. Principle is how I can humble my actions and see how maybe I’ve been wrong and can be listen. Principle is what BYPASSes that self-concerned bestial programming, and what makes me better as I get older.  The righter principles stand out harder.

So, with that said I have some weird-ass principles. Sure.  I have some special experiences that’ve shaped my beliefs in certain ways that . . . I’m just not cool with certain forms of patronization.  (That isn’t to say that you can’t be yourself, just don’t encourage me to feel good about principled failings.) But sometimes . . . I see a response to a principled argument that’s outright twisted opinion!

And.  .. yeah, I don’t think I’m wrong to lose respect for that person as a person.  I start to see that you should treat them more like a really smart animal if they can’t get the reasoning behind an argument and follow through.  This may even be a little embittering, but I think it’s correct. That’s what some really smart adults are proving to me anyway . . . it makes for less contention, and let’s you move onto bigger and better things faster. Namely, your principles.

So yeah. I know how silly it sounds. I know I can be made out to be a fool sometimes and shove my own foot in my mouth, but every time I have an eloquent thought, it’s really just something coming from a place of principle and that’s why it’s articulated that way. I know I should be careful, I know I shouldn’t expect everyone’s belief systems and ethos to match mine . . .but the way I see it, refining, revising, evaluating, and considering one’s principles is ALWAYS the #1 path towards personal evolution. And weighing others, seeing where they come from, that’s where this leads to a power.

The point of this entire rant is, don’t be a stupid fuck who squabbles opinion. Or oppresses with opinion. Or is just loud about your opinion any time you have a chance to make one, and have no qualms with how unthinking and arbitrary it is because you have the power to be loud.  (Don’t these gaggles recognize that they lead to gossip because their own thinking is uninteresting and unstimulating? The following is a great paraphrase for all discussions / solicitations for validating feedback of opinion:  “Squawk. Squawk.”)

Anyway, this entire diatribe is a weak-ass attempt to expose that that lack of principle = human shortcoming. Any time there is contention or conflict, consider taking a step back and recognizing the principle – the driving cognition that frames all following attitudes, thoughts, beliefs, ideas and phrases – and debate (see: not argue) that.  That’s a discussion worth having about anything, from fucking bubble gum, to war regimes, to cosmic stars.

Anything else may be discussion that’s falling short of a good conversation and talk.

~The Best

I might aggravate good thoughtful young people with my thoughtful aggravations.

But mine are the best and that’s why this page exists, so deal with it.

Till the day I die, I’ll get to know that I spent part of my 28th year of life living with and being pissed off by 18 year olds.

Grand 18 year olds.

Wonderful ones, really!

Who almost wholly pissed me off,

despite being great. All of them! (Cept one.)

Wonderful people who I’m sure none of whom will end up being a louse.

(Except one. But his mom will make sure he isn’t homeless so whatev)

I realized (way late) things younger people can make more evident than older people, and it’s a fallacy that’s coming out with a certain style of thinking.  And everyone’s guilty of it across all age groups – it’s just something the youth can make more evident than just about anyone else.

Picture this:

A bunch of folks are sitting in a room smoking a hookah, and one of them says “I think Godzilla is the most wonderful movie ever. The romantic interlude between the protagonist his female counterpart is the greatest love story ever depicted in film.”

If you disagree with this statement, it is self-evident as absurd. But if you try to understand this statement, you’ll probably at least try to put yourself in the speaker’s shoes.

Now if they’re the shoes of an old cool professor type, you might assume things that you don’t know, that they saw some godzilla that you haven’t seen that had a surprisingly good love story? Or that they’ve watched too many movies and it’s given them an interesting perspective.

But, if that speaker is a 14 year old kid, you just really can’t do that, and when you learn that they’re talking about the last godzilla that just came out on blue ray you might have to spew mental energy to go “hang on, hold yer horses. . . . have you seen every movie ever made?”

But that’s a waste of breath.

Obviously, that person didn’t.

Obviously, what you should garnish from their statement is that this movie has a surprisingly enjoyable love twist for them, and maybe you can dig that too. And that becomes reasonable, far less absurd than the haught taught to this person as an ideal way to go around presenting your enjoyment of movies.

And that’s a thing I’m worried about after sitting around and hearing how a buncha youths who’re more normal than me hang out, that this sort of haughtiness gets by more an more.
I can see it with man-children, too.

And when I bartended – something that’ll put you in the service of all sorts of man-children – I found that about a 3rd of the boys who were drinking, and who should’ve really been at home getting some epic video game experience on, is that they’ll work really hard to intellectualize about a beer. They sound like Sim characters more than people.  One will hold up their craft beer and go “HOOBA HOOBA, HOOBA HUA.” and the Beta males might go “ooba. Ooaahh . . . ”  And the first will have a sip and go, “. . .Hoobaaa! Hooba haa. Hooba hooba ha! :-)”

Because, the topic isn’t really beer. It’s who knows important enough shit to make important mouth sounds about beer.

I am ranting all this because, there is a style of thinking that goes with making these mouth sounds.

You can bluster and mew about . . . anything, even the greatest godzilla movie, but you shoot your credibility in the foot as soon as you try to oversell it.

And in line with that, PEOPLE, not just the youth (but we’ve got to be especially careful to train youth to do the opposite when encountering this for reasons I’ll maybe babble bout) – some people try to oversell their credibility to make these HOOBA HUAAAA 🙂 mouth sounds in anything.

It leaves no room to say the phrase “I don’t know” which is actually rather marvelous – because, it’s marveling that you haven’t learned something yet.

It doesn’t leave room for someone to BE the smart one to say “let me find that out tho” and use something like . . . a magical smartphone to access the vast wealth of human knowledge.

And the more “Hooba HUaaaaa!” you add to the room, the more you exponentially squelch that slow and deliberate approach to finding something out after a marveled “hm I don’t know.”

The blustering Hooba huaaa:-) leads to competitions to who can say the most ignorant thing the fastest and most assertively, and who can argue and defume that.  And I think it takes a lot of time to stop your thinking to point out stuff like “Defume isn’t a word man.”  I mean, during this, you can think of nothing else, which makes it a form of thought control to force someone to engage your babble and drivel.

^I mean at least with this shit, at least you can leave at any time.

(Knowing tho that ericisthebest.  Because that’s the site’s name.)

Anyway, this entry started off with a cheesing of the youth.  And what I really wanted to point out is that this tendency to HOOBA HUAAAAA 🙂 is more distinctive, and uglier on the youth because

1) The youth has the greatest capacity to learn. They can watch and breath more . . ..languagemoviesmusicidealsnumbersletterssymbols than anyone else. So when they’re wasting their breath and time stopping to announce what is “the greatest” anything it’s like, whoa, it’s more obvious that said young person would rather contain their self in a lil thought-box more than expand on it.

2) What limited context you have! It’s easy to assume a young person hasn’t watched a whole lotta movies or drank a whole lotta beers in our above examples. Maybe that’s why their conjecture comes across as more desperate.

But I’ll also end with pointing out : tired, old people do the same. They just do it more profoundly, and possibly less obviously if you treat the blusterer with authority. Cause especially when it comes to racial, ageist, or even many cultural arguments, that sort of preclusive thinking of “oh of course, hooba huaa! can kick in.” People who have to narrate absolute context instead of have that peaceful, slow, deliberate, painstaking, observational roundabout style, or at least who can engage that, they come in all shapes and sizes.

And today I just want to not be reminded of youth who might not do this extra hard. I feel like it’s rarer and rarer to meet a “hmm, let’s figure this out” person who’s slow and deliberate and under 35. Instead people want to activate sense words like “See” and “listen” and then dictate (limit) what you take in. Junk like elitedaily and thoughtcataglog expose this plainly, and that’s written by kids.

(Fookin thoughtful kids. More or less.)

Meanwhile, it’s a super power to appreciate what you don’t know and figure out how to know. And that’s made more beastly with smart phones and web access.

The real trick still comes about when using that power wisely and learning when to present that you know what you’re talking about, and that you know how to know what you’re talking about.

#Rambleoff

~The Best

titties

This page is just a placeholder. I have to organize this site to make it better than the current best. But I’ll also be adding lots of drivel and crap whenever I feel like it, cause as the best I get to decide that, and not you.