The Moral of the Story

Here’s a story I heard from our bishop today, who is sadly getting released next week. He wanted to teach one last Sunday School lesson, and as part of it he told the tale of his son’s first wife, who was ultra-conservative in the faith, to the point that if the TV got turned on on Sunday, she’d go and play hymns loudly in the other room to drown out the sound. At one point they went to eat at my bishop’s father’s house (meaning the husband’s grandfather), and there was the grandfather, watching the Superbowl. This made her so angry that she went upstairs for three hours and didn’t speak to anyone, though the sound of hymns came through the ceiling every so often.

So what’s the moral of this story? And before you answer that, keep in mind that the name of my bishop is Thomas L. Monson. Which means the name of the grandfather watching the Superbowl was Thomas S. Monson. (Yes, that Thomas S. Monson.)

I won’t give a moral to this tale myself. My bishop’s point was that you shouldn’t marry a spiritual fanatic (unless you’re also a spiritual fanatic) because it will just make both of you unhappy; instead, marry somebody on roughly the same spiritual level as you (you know, as long as both of you are at least active members), but I leave it up to you to draw your own conclusions.

Red

There is a certain word going around nowadays. A word that I’d previously never heard in this context outside of obscure British slang (by obscure, I mean obscure in the States) but at some point within the past two or three years became a common term. A word that a lot of people throw around, perhaps without thinking exactly what it implies, or what the connotations associated with it may be. A word that, personally, rubs me quite the wrong way. And that word is:

Ginger.

Admit it, when you think of the word “ginger”, the image that most likely pops into your mind is similar to the one above. Nearly gone are the days when people use the term “redhead” or “carrot-top” (thankfully) or, heaven forbid, “people with red hair”. No, for whatever reason, the term du jour to refer to this particular segment of the population has become “ginger”. And let me tell you, it’s become a little bee in my bonnet. Every time I hear the phrase used to refer to a person with auburn-y hair, it gets my hackles up. But why should a simple descriptive term cause me any stress at all? The answer is simple: the problem with the word is that it’s got a certain connotation associated with it that has never been a positive one. It’s a slur, pure and simple. And I think that most people who use it fall into two categories: those that don’t think it’s a slur, and those who don’t think slurs are offensive. (I guess there’s a third group: those who really are deliberately trying to offend, but I’m not even going to make the effort to address them, for obvious reasons.)

To the first group, those who don’t think it’s a slur, I’m here to say: yes, it is. Every time I’ve heard it used it has been in a negatively discriminatory way, even if it’s been used in a joking way, like the Christmas card with a redhead kid on Santa’s lap that says, “Santa loves all kids. Even ginger ones.” Ha ha ha bite me. The word conjures up the image of some poor schmuck who bursts into flame at the first ray of sun and is generally doomed to be either a goofball, a hick, a sassy firebrand who is never satisfied with anything, or extremely angry, but always, always somebody who stands out for all the wrong reasons. And the strange thing about what being a “ginger” means is that it runs the gamut of personality traits, even if they are all negative ones. This sets it apart from other similar stereotypes like blondes being dumb or Asians being good at math or black dudes being scary rappers or whatever in the sense that there’s not really anything else unifying the group other than hair color. When somebody tells a dumb blonde joke, the punchline is that the person does something stupid. When somebody tells a ginger joke, the punchline is that they’re a ginger! Like that is inherently hilarious! Ha ha! Redheaded kids get beaten more often! For some reason! Why? Who knows? They have red hair! Isn’t that funny?

I guess when somebody’s called a ginger, it also means they look funny. The odd thing is, that’s almost always a double-standard. Sure, there are a lot of frumpy redheaded girls out there, but when most guys think of a redheaded woman it’s usually someone who’s quite attractive; a Kirsten Dunst, or an Amy Adams, or a Julianne Moore, or maybe a Felicia Day for all the nerds. But when you ask girls to think of a redheaded guy, some may think of Conan O’Brien (whose attractiveness is debatable), or perhaps Ron Howard (whose unattractiveness is not debatable), but most nowadays think of, well…

At a recent FHE activity in my singles’ ward, the subject of “attractive redheaded men in the media” came up, and out of all the girls there only one could think of anyone at all (Conan), while a few liked Rupert Grint despite his looks and another few went for Neil Patrick Harris (but come on, he doesn’t really count; that hair is waay too light to be truly red). And even all those examples are more attractive due to their goofy charm than their actual physical attractiveness. None have been viewed generally on the same level as your Brad Pitts or Matthew McConaugheys.

But even taking the double standard into account there are certain redheaded girls who’d probably be more secure with themselves if they had been born a brunette or whatever. Like a girl in my singles’ ward whose looks I would describe as “nice”, but insists on the “ginger” moniker, to the point that she’s bringing up the fact that she’s a ginger in the most irrelevant of situations: “You like my sweater? It matches my hair, ’cause I’m a ginger” or “Yeah, I’m in college now, but I used to be in high school, where my nickname was ‘The Ginger’”, or “These are good cookies. Hey, that makes me think of gingersnaps! Like me! A ginger!” (ok, that last one was fudged a bit, but it wasn’t far from the truth.) The point is, it seemed to me like she was trying a little too hard, like she was pre-emptively bringing up the word to show that, “Hey, I’m just like you guys! I call redheads gingers too! I can make fun of myself too! I’m just like everyone else! Self-deprecation makes everything better!” Methinks she doth protest her gingerosity too much. But you see, that’s the point! That need wouldn’t exist if “ginger” were just a descriptive term. But it’s not. It’s a slur.

As for the second group of people, those who don’t think that slurs should be offensive, it’s a little trickier, as this problem goes far beyond the “ginger” label. There is a certain trope on TV Tropes called Acceptable Targets that describes this phenomenon pretty well. Basically, an acceptable target is a person or group of people that society thinks it’s still OK to make fun of and hold prejudices about. Obviously the particulars vary based on the society and time period involved, but basically it means that you can perpetuate whatever stereotypes you want about a certain group of people, usually in the name of comedy, and it’s considered OK to laugh at it, no matter how offensive it may have been otherwise. And while it can be argued that certain groups may have it coming to them or are deliberate lifestyle choices (such as becoming a lawyer, or watching Star Trek) that can be easily left behind, others are ethnically-based or otherwise based on some aspect that is difficult or impossible to change. This has especially become prevalent lately as a backlash to political correctness, and perpetuated by TV shows where nothing is sacred (your South Parks and your Family Guys, for example), to the point where, if somebody cracks a joke about an Acceptable Target, and you don’t laugh or you find it offensive, it’s you that has the problem and needs to lighten up, not the creator or the comedian.

This is where the self-deprecation comes in, as with the girl in my ward I described earlier. Lately it’s been applied more and more to members of the Church as well, such as Mormons who liked the Book of Mormon musical. Sure, there are bits that are funny (like the missionary who keeps confusing details of the Book of Mormon story with The Lord of the Rings), but there is so much offensive material that I believe it’s impossible for an active member of the Church to see it and not come away feeling at least a little offended. And while some may express that sentiment, there are plenty who laugh right along with it, because “Ha ha! See? Mormons are cool! We laugh at the same things as everyone else! We’re totally into the self-deprecation thing, because we’re just like you! There’s nothing wrong at all with associating the Church with baby rape jokes!” Not to mention the comedians that still make the polygamy jokes. “Oh that’s not us, that’s the Fundamentalist splinter groups! And it’s a good thing it’s not us, ’cause that means I can laugh at the joke too! Ha ha! What a bunch of weirdos!” And that’s sad.

The funny thing about the Acceptable Targets thing is that people don’t even think about it most of the time. Most people just accept the jokes without a second thought, unless that joke is either unacceptable by society’s standards (like making fun of veterans), or applies to them personally, or possibly a close friend, and even then there might be an excuse of, “No, it’s OK. My friend makes fun of himself more than I do,” to which I reply, see the example about the girl in my ward again. There’s probably a segment of people who read this post who, when going through the ginger parts, thought, “Oh, come on, Jeff. You just need to lighten up. Life’s too short to be offended by something as dumb as the word ‘ginger’.” who then felt a little more uncomfortable when I brought up the same idea with regards to Mormons (assuming said reader is a member of the Church). It’s never a big deal unless it applies to you. And then you can either let it pass without comment, indulge in some self-deprecation so people think you’re cool with it, or actually get up in arms about it and get the additional label of someone who just needs to “lighten up.” But whatever the reaction on your part, the term is still offensive, and it still hurts.

In conclusion, be careful of what you say and who you’re saying it about. Don’t call people with red hair “gingers”. No matter what you or anyone else says, ginger still means this:

And that’s sad.

To end this post on a completely unrelated note: here’s a comic that I found that describes about a third of the posts on this blog (but ironically not this one). I don’t know why it’s transparent, but I’m too lazy to fix it:

Nerd Marriages

I recently had an open discussion on Facebook about nerds and marriage, and I wish to post it here, to save for posterity (and future reflection). However, since I didn’t get anyone’s permission to post their comments, I am assigning everyone an avatar to protect their identities.

Serious question for people: if you’re a nerd, is it better to date/marry: 1)a nerd with similar interests, so you have very specific things in common, 2)a nerd with different interests, so you don’t have conflicts over weird things like Kirk v. Picard but can at least appreciate nerdiness in general, or 3)a non-nerd, to provide a counterbalance?

 

I think “nerd with different interests” for me, but I think it depends on the general level of nerdiness and the tolerance of your partner for said nerdiness. I wouldn’t mind a non-nerd as long as he is willing to put up with my fondness for Rescue Rangers and the occasional fanfiction……

 

Oh, but they do need to enjoy Harry Potter!!!

 

 

 

Any of the above can work.

 

 

 

You need a combo of all three: She needs enough nerdy things in common with you that you can talk to them about it without driving each other crazy. She needs enough opposing nerdy interests to expand your interests and also put you in your place and point out reasons why you’re wrong. You also need her to be non-nerdy enough to tell you when you’re going WAY overboard, driving away friends, sounding like a freak and you need to come back down to earth.
(I of course would have no personal knowledge of these occurrences)

Honestly, if you’re a nerd, take what you can get. I once had a “list” of things I’m looking for. Over the years I have become nerdier and my list has shortened to, well…nothing.

 

 

I was going to suggest the nerd label might not be the strongest characteristic on which to base marriage; but after reading [Snoopy], well, he does have a good point.

 

 

You definitely both need to be nerds, at least to some extent. What you like won’t matter too much, since there will inevitably be some crossover that will let you have things in common.

 

 

My wife doesn’t consider herself a nerd but has enough of a solid appreciation for some essential nerdly things (E.G. Star Trek, Harry Potter) that we can talk about such things. I guess, though, if you’re going to marry a non-nerd, the essential characteristic you should look for is patience so she can listen to you ramble about something without getting frustrated with you.

 

My wife is a definite non-nerd and it works for us

 

 

 

I think that it’s important, when you’re dating, to introduce her to the things you like (e.g. Star Trek) and see how she likes them – both for compatibility’s sake and to see if she’s down-to-earth enough to appreciate good things like that despite the stereotypes. She doesn’t have to convert to total nerdiness to appreciate or even love those things. I believe it’s equally important to understand that the pseudo-obsessive dedication to nerdy things is incompatible with marriage.
You have to relax your nerdiness and let go of those things to some extent. And as your love grows for her it’ll be easier to do that, and you’ll find joy in doing it =)

 

 

Marry whomever you love. You’ll realize your differences later in the marriage no matter how much you look for similarities.

 

 

 

(But that doesn’t mean the marriage will be more difficult. Just different.)

 

 

 

This question could be posed with equal validity having other substitutions for “nerd,” and IMHO, the eventual answer has to be that the quest is for someone who will value who we are, irrespective of their own packaging.
I’ve been thinking about [Snoopy]‘s response, and I do wonder whether we might get “nerdier” as years go by and we don’t have certain “counterbalance.” On the other hand, as one who still feels nasty side effects years after having once settled, I always urge people to stick with their standards. There are unfair expectations, and then there are vital ones. (For instance, we get into trouble if we contemplate finding a non-respectful person or a non-responsible person, etc.)
In your early dating, once someone has come up to a minimal, reasonable bar, perhaps just be sure that, even if they’re not what you might have initially thought you wanted, you’re going out with them because you’re considerate, but never do so because you’re desperate.

I’m with [John Lennon]. WAY too much analytics here… This is a question for after you get married, not before. In other words, don’t purposely limit yourself…
And level of nerdiness is as solid a basis for marriage as favorite football team. It will affect conversation, but isn’t a matter of any real consequence.

 

Look for someone with similar interests AND different interests; and if Kirk vs. Picard is going to be a deal-breaker in a relationship, then I’d say there are bigger issues at hand here. I’m not trying to be mean, I’m just sayin’. I never liked country music, yet developed a fondness for it after dating two different guys because THEY liked it and I liked them.

 

But [Abdul Alhazred], overanalyzing is what nerds DO!
Also, I find the rainbow of responses from different backgrounds quite interesting. If I may conglomerate them somewhat, it seems that you’ll eventually find things in common if you love them enough, but mutual nerdiness is usually a plus. But it can be a minus unless there’s patience involved.
I guess I ask because I’m unsure of a few things. Like how would you even start dating someone if your interests aren’t similar? There’s nothing to talk about! On the other hand, I’ve found if your interests are too similar, then break-ups can happen over stupid things, like the girl who stopped doing stuff with me because she thought the movie Sucker Punch was a deep, emotional, female-empowering piece, where I thought it was mindless action-schlock that didn’t know what its point was and was actually a bit misogynist to boot. We weren’t actually dating, and otherwise we had a bit in common, but everything sure dropped off after that. I also had a girl dump me because I didn’t like horror movies, and I wasn’t into doing the wacky art projects she loved doing (although I liked her work and told her so). So I thought I’d at least solicit a few opinions to help me understand it better, but…
It just seems like happy dating/a happy marriage is like having faith. If you don’t have it, you can’t understand it, and if you do have it, no explanation is necessary. And that’s frustrating.

Also, Kirk vs. Picard wouldn’t be a problem, because Sisko wins anyway.

 

 

 

Ah, but you didn’t say similar interests, you said nerdiness. Could be two different things. I think the point is that you start pursuing someone because you are attracted to them… But the reason why you are attracted to them may be completely different every time. And sometimes something that attracts you to one person may repulse you in another, so it is hard to qualify.

 

That’s true. I guess I said “nerdiness” instead of “similar interests” because most (if not all) of my interests are pretty nerdy. Plus nerdiness not only implies a certain type of interest, but also a certain level of devotion to whatever interest that may be, to the (extreme) point that someone ends up dumping you based on your taste in movies or something similar. (Though, who knows? That may just have been a convenient excuse.)

 

The other problem with dating is that, as this thread illustrates, EVERYONE has different ideals and standards and things they’re willing to overlook and things they’re going to break up with someone about. All this would be a lot more relevant if everyone thought the same way. Then you would just have to be “enlightened” as to how things work. But there’s not one single way that “things work.” Except for kindness and sacrifice and patience. Everything else is secondary, and there are no rules.

 

This is obviously a very deep question that I shall need time to ponder.

 

 

 

Easy! Every person should marry who they love simple as that. And if you love two people marry the person you fell for second because if the first person was THE ONE you wouldn’t have fallen for the second. (Johnny Depp said that and he’s right)

 

 

There is no such thing as “the one.”

 

 

 

What does that mean? How many other people are you in love with besides your wife?

 

 

 

Just Date/marry whom ever you enjoy spending time with. Appreciate/respect differences. My wife Michelle enjoys sports and I could care less, but I enjoy it with her.

New Name for da blog!

After exactly one month of pondering and consideration (and pretty much no input from anyone else), I have decided on a new name for the blog! It won out over three other finalist names, which fit my vague criteria of “fitting this blog best”, those three names being:

• What the foo?!?
• Does Billy Like Green Eggs and Ham?
• I am Abuk, Master of Locks

All of these have relatively obscure origin stories. “What the foo?!?” is, of course, Pimp Lando’s catchphrase, “Does Billy Like Green Eggs and Ham?” is a quote from Josh Reese that has been my Windows “Question” sound for many years now, and “I am Abuk, Master of Locks” is actually a quote from Betrayal at Krondor but made it into Pimp Lando 5 and has been a random catchphrase for me ever since. Both of these latter quotes, by the way, made it into a random song that I made using Fruity Loops a while back. However, all of these didn’t make the final cut for the reason that they’re a little too specific. “What the foo?!?” is a little too closely tied with Pimp Lando to work for this blog, the Billy one would have people who know us both wonder what Billy has to do with this blog (or, conversely, Dr. Seuss fans might accidentally come here looking for something totally unrelated to this blog), and the Abuk one, though it probably won’t attract a bunch of people looking for Betrayal at Krondor stuff (the character is a pretty obscure one in the game itself, being a random guy that teaches lockpicking and does some shady business deals), it might give some websurfers the idea that this blog is somehow about lockpicking, lock construction, locksmiths, etc. Or maybe people would think I’m named Abuk.

Nobody wants to be named Abuk.

In any case, in the end, “Boom Chicka Wiggy Wagga” wins out for a few reasons. It’s still an obscure reference (specifically, to a movie that Nate Winder and I made with 3D Movie Maker back in high school where some guys are rapping about who turned off their background music, which is where the post picture above comes from), but it’s generic enough so that people won’t get the wrong idea about what this blog is about. It’s just a fun, random phrase that could describe many things but actually describes nothing in particular. And this blog is a fun, random blog that describes many things about me but focuses on nothing in particular (despite similar themes cropping up in many posts). It works, and I’m sticking with it! Update your links!

I will hopefully post the actual “Boom Chicka Wiggy Wagga” movie online at some point, and edit this post to include it when I do.

EDIT: It’s uploaded! Enjoy the wackiness!

New Name for da blog?

So here’s the thing. This blog has been called ¿Le gusta leer? since its inception over six years ago. However, I think it needs a name change. Not because the non-sequitur is absurd (it’s not even really a complete non-sequitur, since it’s Spanish for “Do you like to read?” and has an obscure origin story), but because I want an English name, you know, in case people are looking in search engines or whatever. If you see a site called “¿Le gusta leer?” are you going to assume it’s some guy blogging in English about being single, music, and alphabet monsters? I sure wouldn’t. Maybe a blog about estar sólo, la música, y los monstruos del alfabeto. So I turn to you, faithful readers, for some ideas for a new blog name. What do you think would fit this blog the best, even if it is a non-sequitur (which it may end up being, although there’s gotta be at least some sort of origin story for it)? I may not use any suggestions offered, but then, I might! It’s your chance to be a part of history! A very small part of history, but still!

Names that I will not consider:

• Jeff’s Blog Where He Whines About Being Single
• Anything with the word “jerk” in it (I’m looking at you, Johnathan!)
• Firebert

Also note: the blog name may change, but the “staring down Josh Reese” picture will definitely remain.

Wordle Cloud

(click on that image to get a slightly bigger and hopefully more legible version)

Wordle.net is a website that takes an amount of text and shows you the most commonly used words in a fun collage. The bigger the word in the collage, the more times it was used in the text (after filtering out super-common words like the, a, of, etc.). So I thought I’d put in my blog and see what’s most often on my mind. After a few false starts (apparently just putting in the blog URL nets you the most five or six recent posts; basically whatever shows up on your RSS feed), I ended up copying the text of all the entries, of which there are currently 281 (282 when I post this) into Word, then pasting that into Wordle, and the result is what you see above. I was hoping that it would provide some sort of insight or subconscious message I was putting into things, but I can’t readily see anything groundbreaking. Most of the bigger words are just common English parts of speech. I think I can conclude at least the following, though:

1. I do a lot of comparisons; specifically, similes (using “like”).
2. I apparently write about people and time a lot.
3. I use the word “just” as filler more than perhaps I need to.
4. Um, that’s probably about all I can see, unless you, faithful blogketeer, can see something else.

I think the most amusing words are the ones that are somewhat smaller, but still made the collage because they are at least somewhat common. Words I expected like “married,” “girls,” and “family,” as well as words that made me scratch my head a bit, like “Marco” and “Ben”: things (Travels and my brother, respectively) that I wrote about on occasion but didn’t think were common enough subjects to make it into the collage. Not really a lot of insight here, but at least it was fun to look at.

I also found out, in the process, that if I were to print out my blog in a single-spaced 10pt Arial font from the beginning to the previous post, it would be 214 pages (not counting pictures, titles, or dates). That’s, uh, quite a bit of writing. The last year and a half alone (the front page as of this writing, from Fifths to the Disclaimer and Star Trek post) totaled about 32 pages. For someone who loathed writing stuff for school, I sure do write a lot.

 

Disclaimer and Self Analysis (and, yes, Star Trek)

Some of the responses I’ve received to my most recent post, both in person and in the comments, have prompted me to repeat something that I already touch on in my “About” page. That is to say, this blog is not nearly a complete picture of who I am or what my motivations are. It is, laconically, a place where I post whatever I feel like. And it’s a personality trait of mine that when I feel angsty, I grow verbose, but usually when I feel fine I have no need to record it. When I feel good about life, I’m usually busy being actively engaged in things that I don’t think about posting a giant blog post about why life is grand. So please don’t think I’m suicidal or somewhat mentally unstable because I take a long time and use a Shakespearean allegory to say, in essence, that talking to women (in a romantic sense, anyway) is often scary (which I don’t think is an uncommon opinion). If I seem depressed, keep in mind that it’s usually not long-term and always situational, not clinical. Oftentimes months go by without me posting anything of consequence, and usually during those times I’m fine. I don’t need to go see another therapist.

However, I do believe, as usual, that there’s a deeper issue at work here. Just saying, “I write more when I’m angsty,” is true, but there’s a reason behind it. You see, when I was a kid I didn’t have any friends. Not really. I can think of one person that I can truly call a friend who I met in elementary school, and even he ended up getting leukemia and missing a lot of school. (He’s OK now, and is married with children, by the way, though I haven’t had contact with him in years other than being Facebook friends.) It was probably not until eighth grade and several school-changes later that I finally became, while not popular, at least a normal person who had some friends and fit in somewhere. This change, however, didn’t come about arbitrarily, or because somehow I moved to a school where all the jerks had been purged. It changed because I did a lot of self-analysis. I grew up in a time when there was a lot of “Be Yourself!” and “Don’t Give in to Peer Pressure!” buzzwords being thrown around. Being oneself, however, especially as a young kid who hasn’t necessarily been taught by his parents how to behave himself (probably not from a lack of trying, though, especially from my poor mom), means being someone really different and weird. It didn’t help that I had skipped kindergarten and consequently was not only always the youngest and smallest person in the class, but also a target of jealousy and resentment, even from some teachers. But it was easy to play the blame game and put all of my trials squarely on the shoulders of the mean kids (which was pretty much every kid, even if some of them were at least passive about it). I didn’t give in to peer pressure to do what other kids did, and consequently became that weird kid who picked his nose and corrected the teacher on occasion, who couldn’t sit still and finished his math quizzes five minutes before everyone else so just wandered around the room because he couldn’t stand the ticking clock, who then got kicked down the hill at recess because his favorite activity was to hide in his sweatshirt in the fetal position. “Be Yourself,” indeed. If I were another kid, I’d probably have made fun of myself, too.

It was that last thought that actually began my transformation in the middle of the eighth grade. After being transferred to my sixth school since starting first grade, I finally realized that I was the problem. That may seem silly now, but up until that point I was just acting like the world couldn’t understand me and it wasn’t my fault for being “me”. But I finally got sick of it all and began analyzing my own behavior from an objective standpoint. Nearly everything I did or was about to do, I stood back and asked myself, “If I saw someone else doing this, what would I think of that person?” And if the answer was something negative, I would refrain from doing said activity. This took an enormous amount of effort and mental energy, and of course I wasn’t perfect at it, but it truly did make a difference. Instead of just “being me” and getting mad at the world for not being able to deal with it, I started slowly changing what “being me” meant, and as a result, people were better able to deal with me on a personal level and I became at least somewhat normal and gained friends, some of which I stay in contact with today.

So what does that have to do with this blog? Well, as a side effect of this eighth-grade experience, I learned the important value of self-examination. From that point on I usually tried to keep an objective eye on some of my stranger behaviors and eccentricities, to avoid falling back into the old trap of “It’s not me that has the problem, it’s the world!” that gave me so much heartache growing up. And almost all of the more angsty posts on this blog are a continuation of this very same principle. A lot of my “wah wah I’m still single waaaahh” posts aren’t just venting or complaining, but genuine efforts to understand exactly the problems that I need to personally overcome in order to enter into a successful relationship. Keep in mind that my main audience for this blog is myself and this may make more sense.

Perhaps an example is in order. Let’s take the most recent post. I’d been feeling more and more down and lonely recently, but without any real specifics as to why, as I hadn’t sat down and hammered out the causes to why I’m feeling this way. Then I see that Star Trek review and note some similarities between the philosophies pointed out in that video and these struggles I’d been having. So, to properly focus and delineate exactly what these parallels are, I write that blog post. Yes, at that point I’m still feeling extremely depressed directly afterwards and not ready to change anything, but that’s OK. After some time passes, I reread the post in a more neutral frame of mind. Now I can clearly identify the root causes of the recent depression (I’ve been isolated, I haven’t figured out how to talk to girls without being a jerk, etc.) and I now have a baseline for self-improvement. So I take some steps to begin to remedy the problem (I start going to more ward activities, even if I still don’t really enjoy them, etc.), and while significant improvement may not happen overnight, at least the process can begin.

When I began this blog I described it as a journal I was keeping because I had trouble keeping a pen-and-paper journal. But for me, what I’m doing has never been as important as why I do it. Therefore this blog (or at least the lengthier posts) has been more self-analytical than descriptive. Heck, that’s always been my focus when keeping a journal (for example, this was written in a pen-and-paper journal when I was ten years old, showing that even before eighth grade I always had a bent toward self-examination). Without anyone else willing (or able) to give outside commentary on who I am, this is the best chance I have for self-improvement. This is why I don’t need to see a therapist: this is my therapy! (Plus, the few times I have seen a therapist they almost immediately pegged me in some category or another that I don’t think really fit the bill, then assigned me to write down and fulfill all these goals that I had no motivation or intention to keep, like they believe that the only way to live a happy life is to religiously follow Stephen Covey or something.) This is also one reason why I often have a negative view of myself: improvement isn’t possible if you view yourself through rose-colored glasses. I’m not depressed because I don’t think I’m worth anything, I’m down on myself  because I want to become a better person! These analytical posts also help me identify those cases where the problem really isn’t me, but I still need to do something about it (like, say, move out of Provo) to improve my life.

So why make this blog public? Why risk exposing some of my inner thoughts and feelings out to the world at large, where anybody can come across it and see inside to the various issues I privately struggle with? This is something I’ve often wondered myself and gone back and forth on an answer. But I think one important reason is that self-examination is, by nature, somewhat myopic. I can’t get a clear picture of myself from inside myself. So I put my thoughts out here in the hopes that others will help me see answers that I can’t find on my own. (And granted, all those things are good reasons to go see a therapist, but I’m still not willing to follow Mr. Covey. I’m just not wired that way.) I read and appreciate every single comment I get, even if I don’t respond to them all. And maybe, by seeing what makes me tick, some of you may recognize common elements in your own life, and even if neither of us do anything about it, at least we can empathize together.

In conclusion, please don’t worry about my mental health. For the most part, I am doing fine, and for those times when I’m not, I’m usually not just wallowing in it, but trying to identify root causes and solutions. (I don’t always act on those solutions very well, but that’s a whole different blog post.)

And now for an added bonus: Star Trek VI is one of my favorite Star Trek films. The Cold War allegories are all well and good, but I think a big part of why I really enjoy it (and Star Trek II), and why many people hold the original series over NextGen is the relationships between the main characters themselves and how that defines them, especially the Big Three (Kirk, Spock, and McCoy). All of these three would be very different people without the others. Without Spock and McCoy, Kirk would mostly be a self-obsessed captain without anyone to lean on. Without Kirk and McCoy to humanize him, Spock would just be another cold Vulcan like those that populate Star Trek: Enterprise. And without Kirk and Spock, McCoy would probably just be passed out in an alley somewhere. Even the rest of the main crew draws their strength from their relationships with these three. Sulu, in particular, would be completely unbelievable in this film if Kirk weren’t the type of man to inspire such great devotion that he (Sulu) is willing to disobey orders to serve a greater good.

Contrast this with the TNG crew. TNG is filled with interesting characters, but none of them are defined by their relationships to each other. Picard would be Picard no matter who his crew is. Riker would be Riker no matter who he served under. The only lasting relationships between the characters is this sort of vague “we’re all good friends” thing, with an occasional romantic overtone shoehorned in by the final season. Don’t get me wrong: most of the TNG characters are great, but they would be the same in a vacuum. Kirk would not be Kirk, or at least recognizable as the Kirk we know, without Spock and Bones. That makes their interactions so much more strong and compelling than anything the TNG crew does for each other.

Consider this: in Star Trek VI (and, for that matter, Star Trek III), most of the crew disobeys orders and even logical sense in order to save one or two of their crew (in III it’s Spock, in VI it’s Kirk and McCoy). The gratitude and heartfelt appreciation the rescuees have for the rescuers is genuine, palpable, and touching. A good example is in VI when Sulu greets Kirk with his bridge crew behind him after the Enterprise and the Excelsior have destroyed General Chang’s bird-of-prey. The looks on their faces say it all: Sulu is glad and proud that he had the courage to put his friends in front of the state, and Kirk is touched, knowing that as long as he has good friends like these, he will be able to make a difference in the universe for the better.

Now take a parallel scene in Star Trek: Insurrection. Picard is ready to beam down to the planet, disobeying orders in order to save a bunch of Ba’ku natives that the Son’a want to move (for legitimate reasons, I might add, though I’m not going to go into that discussion here). Suddenly the rest of the bridge crew show up, and they’re all like, “We’re going to help you!” Picard’s all like “No, you’re not!” and they’re all “Yes we are!” and Picard’s like, “Fine, whatever: Riker and Geordi go do this and this and everyone else come with me and blah blah blah” and everyone goes and, uh follows their orders to disobey orders. The scene falls flat because Picard, while a good leader and a good captain, has always seemed so independent. He doesn’t need his crew to suddenly back his disobedience 100% without question, especially for a cause as dubious as the one they’re defending in the film. Indeed, Picard probably could’ve beamed down with five random ensigns who were sworn to blindly follow him for some reason, and gotten the exact same results. None of the crew seem especially invested in this except for “well, we’re all friends, and I guess good friends help each other out!” It’s the difference between truly devoted, genuine friends, and the kids from Barney and Friends. Sure, they’re all friends on that show, but there’s no substance to it! When Spock died, it hurt, and the scene became one of the most iconic scenes in movie history. When Data died, everyone was all, “Whatever,” and I doubt most casual fans even know he died, let alone how or why.

This is why the original series is so much more fondly remembered than even TNG, which kind of petered out in its film entries. TOS was defined not only by its plots and science fiction, but by its crew and their relationships. TNG was defined by its good plots and interesting characters, but not by their relationships. (As a side note, my favorite Trek series, DS9, was also defined largely by its relationships between characters, though the show itself wasn’t as accessible as TNG or TOS and never quite broke into the mainstream consciousness.) Even in the 2009 Star Trek film (the film that some Trekkies refer to as the New Coke Star Trek), the main part of the plot that doesn’t have to do with insane Romulans is the relationship between Kirk and Spock, and how old Spock knows that the two will never achieve nearly the same level of greatness without each other as they would together. The writers of that film knew that the real heart of the series was found right there, and even if you stripped away almost all of the other trappings of the Star Trek franchise, that core would still resonate.

There you go, Johnathan. Can I keep your money now?

The Undiscovered Country

(Note: while this post is called “The Undiscovered Country” and is inspired somewhat by the Star Trek movie of the same name, it is not a review or even really a discussion of said movie. You can either stop reading now or breathe a sigh of relief and continue on, based on your reason for being here.)

Recently I watched an online review of Star Trek VI (yeah, I know I said this wasn’t going to be about Star Trek, but I have to start somewhere) done by Internet reviewer Chuck Sonnenberg, also known as SFDebris. His reviews of both Star Trek and other sci-fi franchises, such as Babylon 5, Farscape, Doctor Who, and even Red Dwarf are excellent and highly recommended. Anyway, he discusses the title “The Undiscovered Country” and what that means in the context of the film. The title originates from the famous “To be or not to be” soliloquy from Hamlet, where Hamlet is discussing whether he should kill himself or not, but decides against it because whatever awaits after death might be worse. To quote that specific part:

The undiscovered country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will,
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment,
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.

In the film, which is basically a big “end of the Cold War” allegory, Chancellor Gorkon (pictured above), who is a transparent Gorbachev stand-in, comments on this speech, but uses it to refer to the future, rather than death. This explains a lot about the other events of the movie: how perfectly rational people on both sides ended up working together to preserve the war; that is, working together for a chance to work against each other. Not only that, it explains why otherwise moral people (such as the Vulcan Valeris) were willing to go to extremes by assassinating several people, getting Kirk and Bones arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment on an ice planet, and other heinous acts. They would rather live with the reality they were used to, however flawed, than face something new and entirely unknown (in this case, a galaxy where the Federation and Klingons were at peace). This completed the Cold War allegory and the uncertainty of the early 90′s after the Berlin Wall fell and the Soviet Union collapsed. Heck, there were even comedies made on the subject, such as Bill Murray’s The Man Who Knew Too Little, which featured some Brits and Russians working together to try to restart the Cold War to restore their lives to something they were used to.

But let me go back a bit and repeat a line I said: They would rather live with the reality they were used to, however flawed, than face something new and entirely unknown. One more time: They would rather live with the reality they were used to, however flawed, than face something new and entirely unknown.

Using the allegory that an unknown future was as frightening as what lies beyond death (you know, without a religious context) gave me a whole new perspective on several issues I’ve been struggling with, both recent and long-term. As pretty much anyone who reads this blog would know, I am single. Extremely single. And it’s been getting worse, if that’s even a possibility. I’ve been living at home, where I’m lucky if I have a conversation with my parents once a week. I’m fairly isolated in my ward, where most people don’t even know who I am beyond “the redheaded guy I don’t talk to.” And now I’ve been working a job at the Little America hotel doing audio/visual work. This basically means setting up and taking down microphones, lights, projection screens, etc. whenever groups come in to use the hotel’s conference rooms. It’s a solitary job, especially since my only A/V co-worker works a schedule opposite mine, and even in the hour we overlap he doesn’t talk much. About the only friend I have left who lives within a 40-mile radius and hasn’t passed through the social wall of being married is Josh Reese, and while I do hang out with him on occasion (probably about once a month or so), it isn’t exactly socially stimulating, considering what kind of person he is. Other than that, the only social things I do mostly revolve around Annelise and her family, and even then we’re usually talking shop about murder mystery stuff.

In other words, I’m not just single in the married or dating sense. I’m single in a social sense. I’m single in an emotional connection sense. For the vast majority of my time, I’m single in a physical sense (i.e. not in the presence of other people, or at least interacting with them other than a nod as we pass in the hallway). If it wasn’t for this job, I could go for nearly a week at a time without seeing another soul (which did happen several times before I got hired back in June). There may be others in my type of situation, but even so they’re all isolated from each other by nature.

I stand alone.

It’s a sad story, you may be thinking, but what has that got to do with the Hamlet thing? Or you may be thinking, “Well then, go out and make some friends! Nobody’s forcing you to stay by yourself!” I suppose that’s true, though I could justify it by saying that I don’t have the opportunities due to my schedule, or that my ward keeps scheduling activities I have no interest in, or living in my parents’ basement hardly provides opportunities for me to meet people my own age. However, I think that, while these may be obstacles, the root cause runs much deeper.

A couple of weeks ago in a sacrament meeting I did try to jump-start my social life. I sat next to a girl with whom I’d had a short, small-talk conversation the previous week. However, the entire time I was extremely uncomfortable and when the meeting was over I politely excused myself and left (the room, not the church). She didn’t do anything wrong or particularly cold but putting myself in those kind of situations activates a “fight or flight” response in me for some reason. (It also didn’t help that she was nearly a decade younger than me, but I think her being closer to my age wouldn’t have made a big difference.) Why the fear? I’m obviously not happy with my life. Getting to know people leads toward a potentially brighter future, one with marriage, kids, or at least something to do on Friday nights other than play Heroes of Might and Magic III by myself or watch Internet reviews of Star Trek again. What kind of future would be in store? A world of possibilities! An “undiscovered country,” if you will! Ah, you may now see where I’m going with this.

The undiscovered country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will,
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of

Fear of an uncertain future is such a driving force that it drove otherwise rational people to kill in order to preserve the status quo (in the movie, anyway). I have no idea what dating will do to my life. I’ve never had a successful relationship before, and even the unsuccessful ones I’ve had either never got off the ground or didn’t last longer than a month. And that’s only been with two girls ever, one of which got into the relationship because of a “what the hell, I’ll give it a shot” attitude. How do I conduct myself? What’s the difference between the way you treat a girlfriend and the way you treat, say, a sister (besides the obvious physical things, I mean)? Will I still be able to play Heroes? Will that even matter? Where’s the line when it comes to how much of my own life, habits, and customs will I need to change to keep a woman? Do I even need emotional support? I’ve gone a long time without it, and I’m still alive, right? Wouldn’t it be better off for the ladies in the world to end up with someone who doesn’t have these issues? There are probably about a thousand questions I haven’t even thought of on this topic! This puzzles my will! I’d rather bear those ills I have than fly to these others I know not of! At least I know how to set up a 16-channel mixer with several lavalier and handheld Shure mics, along with an SM-58 or two for the lectern, combine them through a Kramer VGA switcher to output on three separate screens, while hanging some parnells to provide a nice podium wash, etc. etc.! Or failing that, write a rock song about cooking! I have no idea how to sit next to a girl in church without it becoming so awkward that I consider fleeing after the sacrament has been passed and spending the rest of the hour in the bathroom! It seems my native hue of resolution is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought!

Thus conscience does make cowards of us all.

Fear of the future can drive some to do things they otherwise wouldn’t do. It also can paralyze those who should do something. I could go on more dates. I could talk to more people. Heck, even Josh goes on more dates than I do. Looking back on my life, it seems every time I’ve been successful socially it has been due to others taking an interest in doing it for me (usually relatives, or Steve Porter). And when that person leaves my life, or at least leaves my daily life, then all the sociality seems to disappear as well. Back at BYU I used to host a game night every week, and we had quite a nice bunch of people show up every week, at least until Steve got engaged. Then it dropped to the five guys who were just into gaming. I moved to a different apartment and set it up again, and once again we had a pretty good turnout until two of my roommates got engaged, at which point it dropped off. But the main reason I held game nights was because that was where I was comfortable socially!! I don’t know how to approach girls at a dance, or at some social dinner, or whatever. But when I’ve got a set of Bang! cards or whatever in front of me I know exactly what my job is. I’m playing this game. I’m making sure everyone else knows how to play. I’m making sure that everyone gets a fair chance to play. I’m trying to make sure everyone’s enjoying themselves. I honestly don’t really care if I win or lose, as long as everyone played fairly. (This behavior, by the way, is somehow wrong? I guess? A lot of people seem to resent it, though for the life of me I can’t figure out why. When playing with family, I’ve noticed Mickey is just as much of a stickler for rules yet seems to catch a lot less flak for it. Maybe I’m just an ass.) My point is there are very few situations in which I am socially comfortable, and they are often ones in which others do not thrive socially. So it’s obvious that I need to step out of my comfort zone in order to progress in life, especially socially. And it’s obvious I’ve got to do it, because there’s nobody left to do it for me, and no girl is going to suddenly call up and ask me out.

I believe I am capable of learning. I believe that if I put my mind to it, I could learn to like dancing, or basketball, or small talk, or whatever, if it served the greater good of meeting people, social support, and dating. But it frightens me. What kind of person would I turn into? Would I be recognizable as me? Would I be betraying everything that currently makes up who I am? Does that really matter? How can one really betray one’s past self, anyway? He’s not going to know. Continuing as I have been has been producing diminishing returns, to the point where, as I said before, I stand alone. But being alone is an ill I know how to bear. Thus conscience makes a coward of me, and I sit alone in the back of the chapel, or at home on weekends.

Marriage, dating, life: all enterprises of great pith and moment. But paralyzed by the fear of the future: with that regard their currents turn awry, and lose the name of action. Thus this weekend I will be playing computer games.

Cherry Rain

Music has the power to inspire, to depress, to lift up, to tear down. But most importantly, it has the power to express oneself and evoke emotions in a way that no other medium can. So I post this remix (above) I recently did of music from Clyde’s Revenge not to show off my skillz or promote a fifteen-year-old game, but to express the overall emotion of the rest of this post in a way that my mere words cannot. Think of it as a film score for this post. Ignore the visuals (which mostly function as a placeholder), and listen as you read.

As evidenced by my most recent post, this past General Conference saw a lot of talks where the brethren urged young men to stop screwing around and get married. I really tried to take this to heart, and immediately made plans with the only girl that a) I had recent contact with, and b) wasn’t either in a relationship or related to me. Unfortunately, that girl happened to be the same one mentioned in the middle of my infamous “confession” post, and this second attempt (just to be friendly again; I didn’t try anything physical other than a hug, I only bought her dinner and the movie, and I mostly listened to her complain about her past boyfriends) ended just about as well as the first. In fact, the outcome was exactly the same the second time around. In other words, I had to do all the work, and even little acts of charity (like me running to the gas station to get her an apple juice when she was sick, so she could perform better in the show we’re doing, since she had previously specifically stated that apple juice helps her feel better when she’s sick) turned into her figuratively spitting in my face (when she left the juice sitting in the dressing room, completely untouched, even after she left). We were going to watch her favorite movie at her house last night, but at the last minute she suddenly had FHE to go to. Deductively, if FHE was actually an important part of her life and not just a convenient excuse, she would have brought it up when I asked if Monday was OK the first time. Or the second time. Not in a text a few hours before.

In retrospect, I should have seen it coming. Nothing had happened in her life to change her fundamental nature. I just wish she had the guts to, you know, clearly communicate her disinterest instead of weaseling around it. But I’ve had that complaint for a very long time now, and I can’t change the misguided notion that most girls have that guys don’t want to hear direct language about how they (the girls) feel. Being one of the guys that falls into the “creepy” camp more often than not, I can tell you right now that the best way to reduce the number of creepy guys in the world is for girls to be direct. True, some of the creepy guys have horrible intentions, but a fair number of them are normal guys who, through no real fault of their own, lack some social skills. Some of them are just extremely optimistic and take what girls say at face value just so they can think they have a shot (i.e. “Sorry, I have FHE” three hours before a planned activity which isn’t even really a date would sound like, “Oh, she’s got FHE; well, I’ll ask again later” instead of “She’s clearly not interested, since that excuse is pretty lame”). If girls would speak clearly, then this misguided optimism would slowly dissipate in the face of truth, causing some of these guys to try to improve themselves instead of pursuing a phantom girl that really loves him but has convenient, pressing business to always attend to. Or even worse, being confronted with so many “maybes” instead of some clear “nos” makes a guy doubt his own judgement, which can either lead to that misguided optimism, or extreme cynicism. “Maybe” will always sound like “no” no matter what it really means. Anything other than an unqualified “Yes!!!!11!” and a big hug, a handhold, and a call the next day from the girl, will mean “no.” So the creepy guy will try to inspire that response, trying with increasing desperation (since he has no idea what he’s doing, and if he hasn’t learned by dating age then society sure isn’t going to teach him), but still just getting “maybes” out of everyone because no girl has the truly giving heart to teach the stupid guy what he needs to know, since she’s afraid he’ll go after her. And being seen in a relationship with a creepy guy ≠a situation any girl wants to be in.

I’m sorry, but the whole “creepy” thing is a pet peeve of mine. I said it in that post I linked to earlier that the difference between “creepy” and “romantic” is often in the eye of the beholder. And more often than not, it’s disconnected from reality. I know a lot of creepy guys are legitimately skeezy: date rapists or whatever. But many are not even close. Many can’t even fathom the idea. (To be a date rapist means that you at least go on dates.) Many creepy guys have a heart of gold, but nobody gives them a chance because of some superficial failing, or because they give off the wrong “vibe,” or because they don’t know that kissing before the third date is OK if dinner was sufficiently extravagant, while saying “I love you” in a month ending in “R” can only be done on alternating Thursdays unless the moon is waning. Or even more obscurely, whenever the girl won’t find it off-putting. While some dashing, charismatic gentlemen are the ones that beat their girlfriends behind closed doors, simply because they have the power to do so. In fact, I would dare say that most wife-beaters are absolute gentlemen in public. I don’t have the research on-hand to back me up, but I would be extremely surprised if that weren’t the case. After all, to become a habitual girlfriend/wife-beater, one must first be able to attract a woman to the point that he can beat her behind closed doors and she won’t immediately break it off or seek help from authorities. And if creepy guys are known for anything, it’s certainly not for being able to hang on to any girl for an extended period of time.

Whenever I hear girls complain about how they have sooo many single girl friends who would love to be asked out but sit at home all the time, I always have to suppress a cynical laugh. As if being a guy meant that you held ultimate power over who loved you. People in general love to play the victim when it’s an impersonal affair (i.e. “Nobody likes me!”) but when any first-person evidence comes up to the contrary (i.e. “You like me? Ew!”) it’s easy to dismiss and go straight back to the “Nobody likes me!” mantra. And this happens quite a lot: a guy sees a girl that perhaps is one of those “girls that are always alone” off to the side at a singles’ activity or something. He tries to strike up a conversation, but gets a cold shoulder. Or even worse, they (seem to) hit it off, only for her to weasel out of a first (or second, or third) date, for no reason discernible to him, other than “Well, I guess I’m a creepy guy. Wish I knew why.” And then the girl complains, “Nobody likes me! I haven’t been on a date in forever! Well, there was that time when Brian asked me out, but ew!” No concrete reason, just “Ew!” And all the girl friends nod, because they also think “Ew!” when it comes to Brian. Note: Brian isn’t anyone specific. In fact, I don’t think I currently know any guys named Brian. Well, besides my boss, but he certainly doesn’t fit into this story.

I’m not saying that a lot of girls aren’t being asked on dates. I know it’s a serious problem. But it’s not a gender-specific thing! There are just as many guys who are getting rejected every day (or aren’t asking for fear of rejection, usually of the confusing weasely variety) as there are girls wondering why nobody asks them out. And there is no greater contempt, no vehemence so directed at a general population, than that of girls towards guys with a fear of getting their hearts ripped out. Hot damn, that’s cold! In short, there’s a lot of anger, frustration, and miscommunication on both sides. It’s not the fault of any one gender. Clarity is the key, people.

Now that I’ve ranted on that soapbox, allow me to go back to my initial premise, and the reason I posted that Clyde’s Revenge remix as a score for this post. This post doesn’t matter. Anyone who reads this post will either sympathize with my viewpoint because they already agree with it, or find a way to justify to themselves why I’m wrong, or why it doesn’t apply to them, and therefore they don’t need to change anything. It would make my day; heck, it would make my year, if this post actually inspired somebody to go out and change their life. But I also know it’s not going to happen. And even if it did, it certainly wouldn’t change anything on a grand scale. Which means I’m doomed to wander through life, going on dates but not dating, all because I have some “creepy” quality that nobody is willing or able to point out to me in a way that I understand, posting repetitive blog post after repetitive blog post about how many times I’ve beat my head against the wall. But since that’s how it’s been for so long, it’s harder to get worked up about it. It’s hard to imagine that life could be any different.

It’s a walk in the rain. You can see the warm glow coming from windows all around you, of happy couples and families. Each house with a lock on its door. You don’t even feel the rain anymore. You’ve been wet so long that you can’t even remember how it feels to be dry, though on occasion you imagine it would be nice. But most of the time you don’t even notice it, nor the chill that has crept into your bones and refuses to leave. You keep walking, because stopping would be even worse. And even the wretched masses won’t huddle together for warmth, for the hypocritical fear of being seen with some bum on the street.

It’s miserable, but it’s life. It’s cherry rain.

Conference in a nutshell – quickly abbreviated version

From three separate talks:

• I need to get married. Also, to stay married a couple needs to go to the temple a lot.

That’s…mostly it. That’s what I got out of it. Interesting.

More better conference nutshells. More…more better…

The Church of Dances of Latter-Day Basketball

Recently my sister Kjersti shared with my family an article written by LDS author Orson Scott Card titled “Holding on to the ‘others’” that I found quite insightful. The article is definitely worth a read, but for those who want a summary, it basically states that in Mormon culture those who excel at sports are traditionally celebrated, while those who are bookish or artistic are usually put off to the side and ostracized, and that’s a real problem. I had a few choice comments about it, many of which I want to share with you here.

What the article really makes me think of was back to the time when I was Elder’s Quorum President in one of my BYU wards. We were trying to reach out to the less-active members of the quorum, and I noted that a lot of them liked playing video games. So I proposed having an EQ activity where we’d have a Super Smash Bros. and Mario Kart tournament in the courtyard of our apartment complex, projected up on a big screen. Since it was right next to people’s apartments it would take little effort for those who live in seclusion to join the party, and it would be a nice change from the sports and/or date nights that formed the basis of every other activity we ever had.

When I brought it up in a ward council meeting, however, I received vehement opposition to the idea. Not from the bishopric, who gave me their full support, but from other girls in the meeting (I don’t even remember what auxiliaries they belonged to) who literally stood up and started yelling (well, speaking loudly anyway) about how that was a terrible idea! Video games are evil! Anyone who plays video games is forcing themselves to be alienated from society! They just need to start coming to those sporting events and date nights if they ever want to learn how to function in the church! If the ward holds a function with video games we might as well be telling those sinners that we fully embrace their corruption!

I was totally flabbergasted. They were so passionate that this was a bad idea that it was like I had suggested that we reach out to inactives by holding an orgy. How could such blatant, short-sighted bigotry exist in the Church? True, an obsession with playing video games can be a detriment to a person, but so can an obsession with almost anything (Church Ball, anyone?). But for a person to suggest that the Church would be better off not reaching out to less-actives in a way that they’d respond, rather than plan an activity that wasn’t a common one in the LDS culture? Yet this sentiment, while not always so loudly and obviously expressed, is very alive and well within the Church.

This is one reason why I’m finding it tough to remain active these days, at least on days other than Sunday. I know the gospel is true, and I’ll defend it to the end of my days, but I’ll be darned if I can find someone in any of my recent wards to whom I can relate. Life isn’t carving pumpkins, playing volleyball, baking bread and going to awkward church dances! I love the gospel too much to go totally inactive, but the social aspect is making it harder and harder these days. Maybe it’s the ward? But I haven’t felt comfortable in a ward since at least 2008, both including times I’ve moved and times where the semester change-over cleared out large chunks of wards, in effect making them different animals. It’s saying something that the most interaction I’ve had with people in my current ward has been with the bishop’s wife. It’s also saying something that the only time I’ve felt entirely at ease with a group of other people this year has been when I was on a cruise and hanging out with my cousin Katrina’s wacky friends who were progressively getting more drunk as the night went on. (I don’t quite know what it’s saying, but it’s saying something.) True, I don’t really want to live the lifestyle they live, but it was really nice to be able to be myself without having to worry about social rules that I’ve never quite grasped yet am expected to follow at church activities.

Speaking of which, Kjersti also recently shared an article detailing how the Church can reach out to singles better. While many points I would make about that particular article I’ve already made before, I think that really, these two problems are related. It falls under one umbrella: people don’t know how to treat people that are different. And often it has to do more with who’s in authority than with any particular side. There have been times where I felt like an outcast because I knew about football in social situations where everyone else was making fun of it. It’s just that right now, more often than not, those in charge in the Church, at least on a local level, are more likely to be sports fans than academics or artistic folks. And it’s definitely true that most of the people in charge in the Church are married (since it’s a requirement for a lot of positions, such as bishop). It’s simple human tendency to listen to those they agree with and discount the other side as ignorant.

I had that point driven home for me recently when I responded to a review by an semi-famous Internet reviewer. In high school he played a lot of Dungeons & Dragons and Magic: the Gathering, but by doing so was ostracized by the public at large and often had to play these “devil games” (which are actually quite harmless) in secret. The reason I felt I had to respond personally to this was that he grew up in Mesa, AZ, and a large group of the people either shunning him or trying to convert him from his evil D&D playing ways, were members of the LDS faith. I posted a comment trying to explain and apologize for the situation, but had it pointed out to me that it wasn’t anything uniquely Mormon, but more human nature for people to ignore or preach at anybody they didn’t understand.

It all boils down to pride. One person or group is in charge, so their preferences are right and they have to make everyone else see that. Or one person or group isn’t in charge, so they feel resentful at the group that is, and especially at whatever that group likes or represents, however benign that thing may be. Heaven knows I’ve been guilty of this more times than I’d care to admit. Would I be happier if every week the Church had activities based on video games, or theater, or intellectual discussions, or even tabletop RPGs? Probably, but then the sports fans would be grumbling about all the accolades heaped upon the “drama freaks.” It’s finding that elusive equilibrium that has proved to be difficult: where we all can come together, united in purpose. I don’t know if that will ever happen. Even the Lord lost a third of the host of heaven because they disagreed. What hope do we have of being all-inclusive?

I’m not saying we shouldn’t try. While we can’t include everybody, we certainly can try to include as many as we can. That was my purpose behind the video game activity in Elders’ Quorum those years ago. I didn’t force those people who were opposed to the activity to come. I do think that leaders both in and out of the Church need to be more cognizant of different groups and their interests & accomplishments. I do think that the current emphasis on sports is waay out of proportion. Even in sports there’s an imbalance toward basketball and football (did you hear about the amazing performance of the local lacrosse team? Me neither). And I do think that, as a body, the Church needs to provide as many different opportunities for different groups to do what they love, even if it’s not the norm.

In short, I hate dances and playing basketball! Give me somewhere else to meet people, please, singles’ wards!

And, as a coda, the Mario Kart activity succeeded quite well. A lot of guys came that I’d never even seen before, and while many of them just as quickly sunk back into the shadows, a few started coming to other activities as well. Even some of the girls that otherwise would have been making bread or something at a Relief Society activity snuck out early to join in. (That actually became a running gag in the ward: on nights where the Relief Society had an activity the elders would plan one as well, and there were quite a few girls who would prefer our activity to theirs. Like when the girls were all going on a campout somewhere and so the guys planned to watch the manliest movie that we could get away with and still call it a Church activity, which ended up being Rocky, for some reason. Some of the girls ditched the campout because they wanted to watch Rocky instead of being in a canyon somewhere with a bunch of other girls.)

New Music Site!

My new site for music has now been inaugurated! This way I can post music on a professional site instead of as an offshoot of my personal blog. It’s still a work in progress, so any comments on how I can improve it would be welcome. For now I imported a lot of the music-related posts from here over to the blog located over there, and will post any music I write over there from now on.

http://parkesmusic.wordpress.com/

Check it out!

Hellish Red Sand

Since I’m still trying to get my equipment replaced before I can redo my more serious projects, such as the ABC Monsters album or commercial music, I did another remix from Clyde’s Revenge and wanted to share it with people. It’s based on this MIDI file:

MV01

I went more rock than synth this time. Take note: the strings would sound better if I had the sound library I’d been using this past year, but for what it is I think it’s fun. The title is based on the background of the level in the game. It repeats once and then fades out.

Hellish Red Sand

I’ve got no philosophical discussion or newsworthy happenings this post. Enjoy this remix anyway!

If you’re really bored, you can see what level this remix is from:

Or perhaps the level that the previous remix is from:

Though I’d just download the game if I were you. (Run it in DOSBox!)

Hey, it all sounds like video game music!

One of the most common comments I’ve had on music I’ve written in the past has been “Wow, that sounds like it’s right out of a video game!” or “It makes me think of Sonic the Hedgehog for some reason” or some variant thereof. This criticism has been one that I’ve actively tried to avoid (as most people tend to not take video game music seriously or hold it in high esteem), yet since I work in an electronic medium and have little access to real live instruments, it’s something that I’m basically going to have to live with until I can afford high-end sound libraries (I was using some of Nate Drew’s recently, but they all got stolen, so it’s going to be awhile).

In the meantime, I’ve resolved that, if I’m limited by funds and libraries and therefore can only write video game music, I might as well try to make it the best video game music it can be (for purposes of this post, when I refer to video game music I don’t mean the full orchestral scores you get out of Halo or whatever, but the more electronic sounds associated with games like, well, Sonic the Hedgehog). And even in that medium there is much that can be done to elevate music above the mediocre or utilitarian. Consider the following: back in the mid-90′s, there was a DOS game released called Clyde’s Revenge. It was a typical sidescroller of the time and the game itself, while fairly fun, was nothing particularly exciting or groundbreaking. The music was a general MIDI soundtrack done by a guy named Garret Thomson, and a typical track would sound like this:

MV14

It’s kind of funky, but nothing really to write home about. Now compare it to a remix I did in 30 minutes, using the same MIDI file:

Enter the Magnets

Still video game music, still using virtually the same notes even, but the latter is something I’d put on a playlist and listen to on its own, while the former is fairly blah. And it’s that skill I can work on and even market: writing music that can both enhance a game and stand on its own.

In conclusion, I don’t really have a though-provoking or controversial point regarding the state of video game music or my skills as a composer. I just did this remix and liked it, so I wanted to share it. That is all. Enjoy the Magnets!

Oh, what have I unleashed? (Also, ABC Monsters)

(The above is a picture of the Cruncha from the ABC Monsters album, by Johnathan Whiting. For the music MP3′s, see the bottom of this post.)

Nearly a week ago, I made an infamous blog post. For me, it was just another one of those angsty posts I make on occasion, the kind where I get all my issues out so I can go on living, the kind that this blog used to be entirely comprised of, but in recent years tapered off after Facebook and such allowed people to find the blog more easily. This one was not really different. I’ve been going through some hard times recently, and needed a place to unload. At first I considered making it a private post, or keeping it public but deleting the Facebook notification that pops up due to my RSS feed (which I have done for this follow-up post). However, when enough time passed that the note popped up in Facebook, somebody had already “liked” it and another had made a comment, so I thought, “what the hey, let’s see where the chips fall.”

And fall they have. My most popular posts according to my site stats may still be the one with the picture of Frederic Chopin and Michael Jordan, and the one where Mickey Mouse tries to commit suicide, but this post has generated more feedback among people I actually know than any other post I’ve ever made, even more than the Glenn Beck post where I offended people. It’s probably due to the publicity that the robbery brought, as well as the reposting of it that Nate did on the robbery Facebook page, but for some reason everybody is giving their two cents, both in comments here and on Facebook, and in real life. I’ve never had so many people say to me, in person, “I read your blog post, and (etc.)” before. Frankly, it’s a bit surreal. I haven’t figured out quite how to respond to it all. So I’m going to do my best here, addressing a few points that seem to be common among comments and offering a little more insight into what I’m feeling and stuff.

First of all, as I said in the comments previously, it’s funny that so many people have complimented me on my courage to follow my dreams when I’ve felt like it’s just an inability to settle down. It’s rare that people follow their dreams to the bitter end, and apparently that’s impressive. But what people may fail to realize is that most people don’t follow their dreams to the end for a reason. That reason being, even though it’s inspiring and makes for a feel-good story, it’s really difficult and probably fairly stupid, and the failure rate is way higher than the success rate. Also, a whole lot of luck is required, luck which I seem to be running low on.

Secondly, just to address common responses to the robbery itself: we have no leads. Yes, it does sound like an inside job, or at least the work of somebody who had been into the office before. However, we have no method of figuring out who it could have been, since Nate and I can’t think of anyone we’ve offended recently that would do something so heinous. At this point we’ve pretty much resigned ourselves to the fact that we may never figure it out and, barring a miracle, we’ll just have to rebuild. Donating would help a lot on that front. This stuff is expensive, man!

Thirdly, one of the more curious reactions I’ve personally had is the fact that suddenly there’s a lot more support than I thought I had at first, both in words and in donations (Thanks to those who have donated, by the way! We’re on our way to rebuilding, but Nate would appreciate some more). I really do appreciate the vocal support. It’s just that, at the end of the day, I’ve still got to deal with everything. I can’t monetize good intentions. Actually, my gut reaction makes me think of times like when a certain relation of mine said he was very proud of me, then turned around and refused to pay $10 for a CD of my music I was trying to sell. Experiences like that have turned me into a believer of the “talk is cheap” principle. And before I offend anyone, this is really my fault, not anybody else’s per se. It’s my inability to turn people’s good impressions of my work into something I can make a living off of that’s causing me a lot of my stress. Maybe I need an agent? Or at least a good marketing person? I apparently can’t do it myself. Of course, I also can’t afford to pay a marketing person right now, so damned if I do, damned if I don’t.

The sudden publicity and responses have been a little disconcerting. I’m really not used to getting any sort of emotional support from any quarter. I didn’t really grow up in a loving, huggy family, and my natural introversion has precluded large groups of friends. In fact, I get along best with people that also have kind of a cynical edge to them (like Johnathan, who wrote a long, awesome comment about our friendship on the last post and still called me a jerk). Because, like Johnathan said, a lot of the jerks of the world are really people who want to be kind and caring but don’t know quite how to pull off the good first impression. The world frowns upon such people, which dampens their enthusiasm to try to improve themselves. So I make it a point to befriend those types of people, because everybody needs somebody to believe in them. Because I know what it’s like to be there. I’m there almost all the time myself. And believing in someone isn’t just saying, “Hey, you’re great!” because talk is cheap. On the other hand, the people who have responded, both in word and in donations, are certainly doing what they feel they can, and it wouldn’t be fair for me to marginalize their contribution because I have a personal bias against perfunctory, superficial kindness. I truly am grateful for the thought. My point is, I’ve gotten a bunch of support, but I’m ambivalent about a lot of it. And, hard to hear or say as it might be, that’s the honest truth.

Also, basically everything I said in the previous post had been percolating for a while. The robbery just brought it to a head. As a result, I think people have assumed that all the opinions I expressed came about as a reaction to the robbery, which may be another reason I’m not quite sure how to deal with it all. This is stuff I’ve been dealing with for a loooong time (and even posted about on occasion) but now suddenly people are concerned? Intellectually I understand the external circumstances that garnered that post a lot more attention, but I’m just not used to people caring, so I probably come across as kind of a jerk about it simply because I don’t know how else to react. If I just say, “Thanks to everyone! I love you all!” I don’t feel true to myself. In a way, it’s the same problem that I posted about years ago, where I compared myself to Arnold J. Rimmer from Red Dwarf in a few ways, one of them being that my psyche just doesn’t know how to deal with people being kind to me.

In many ways I just wish I could go back a month or two, where my concerns were my own and nobody else really knew or cared. It may have been hard, and a canker on my soul, but at least I knew how to deal with it. However, at least now I feel like I may have turned a corner. I can’t wallow in misery knowing that people out there do care, no matter how easy that may be. People need a reason to get up in the morning, and for a long time I haven’t had a compelling one, but now there may be a sliver of light. Come the day when I finally do get organized to start selling professional-quality work, I may have a base.

To conclude, I apologize to anyone who might feel marginalized by my lukewarm response. This has been a rather rambly post, and perhaps not the kindest way to respond to people, but at least it’s been honest. And the world needs more honesty. That way love becomes love unfeigned.

And truthfully, thanks for the support!

—–

On a different topic, since all the work from the ABC Monsters album Johnathan and I were working on got stolen, we are going to have to do the whole album from scratch. Therefore, so you can at least get a taste of what could have been (and at least partly of what is to come), I’m posting all the demo tracks we had made up to this point. Most of these tracks just have my non-polished vocal tracks with MIDI accompaniment, but I still like ‘em! Please leave feedback!

(Links have been temporarily removed. Sorry for the inconvenience!)

Jeff’s confession

Facebook link to group

So recently my workplace was broken into and Nate Drew’s and my stuff got stolen. The video and link above go into details, so I won’t bother to here. What I feel I need to do, even if it’s just for the sake of my own soul, is to confess how I feel about both it and the larger picture in which it is a relevant part. (Warning: stream-of-consciousness rambling may occur. Consult physician before reading.)

I hate asking for charity. I absolutely hate it. Almost as much as I hate one-on-one interaction with strangers outside of a professional or task-oriented setting. It just causes so much stress on my psyche that it viscerally sets up my “fight or flight” response. Which is why, when Nate set up a Paypal thing, I was very nearly against it. I have a strong need to be independent; to pull myself up by my own boot-straps. This is mainly because I am so bad at it. To wit: regarding the things I had stolen, only the external hard drive was purchased by me. The computer was purchased by my parents as a graduation/five-month-early Christmas gift. The synthesizer was my dad’s, which I claimed after he died. The MOTU box was Nate’s. All the software was Nate’s. Heck, even the headphones I was using belonged to Sheldyn. Almost none of it was truly mine.

In addition, I’ve been irresponsible. Not just because I’ve been living with my parents (again) since I graduated. I was in college for ten years (off-and-on) for a few reasons. College provided me with a steady job (working at BYU vending). College let me live on my own, thanks to cheap student housing prices (yes, they were overpriced relative to the amount of space and privacy that you were allowed, but absolutely speaking I paid less than $300 per month, which was reduced to barely $100 during spring/summer). Also, I was basically promised that I would find my spouse during my educational years. So in order for that to come true I tried to stay in the system for as long as possible. Were the classes I failed due to me wanting to stay in college longer? No. Or at least not consciously. But whatever the reason, I was basically in a university environment, trying to do well socially, until I was old enough to be that creepy guy in the student ward, at which point I knew it was time to leave. (Side note: didn’t find a spouse.)

But now I’ve graduated. I’ve moved on. Is my life better now that I’ve left Provo, that place where I apparently was being pressured into marriage so much that I didn’t get married? (That’s right, I used my own declaration-of-self essay in an ironic way. That’s how cynical I’ve become.) I’m writing music for a living! Hasn’t that always been my dream?

Here’s what’s gone wrong on that front (and I’m not talking about the robbery). I’m not writing music for a living. At all. I’m writing music, and maybe I’ve earned, what, $500 since August? That’s not a living, not in a first-world country, anyway. That’s not even gas money (a drive from Riverton to Salt Lake and back five days a week). And the whole way along I’ve been told, “Don’t worry. Our projects will take off next month. Soon you’ll get a real paycheck.” And then I tell my parents, “Don’t worry. Soon I’ll be able to afford to move out of your basement,” or my rat-hole where I live like a troll, according to my stepfather, “and then I’ll be a real adult, instead of whatever ‘quarter-life’, Peter Pan syndrome, half-adult in arrested development I seem to be now,” (not a literal quote I’ve told my parents). And my parents (and probably other people too) wonder, “Why don’t you get a real job? Surely you can at least live with some roommates as a single guy working at the local Target or whatever. Or maybe even an office job, what with the bachelor’s degree under your belt.”

But I can’t. I can’t do it. Because doing it will mean that I give up everything I’ve worked for so far. All of the years in school, pursuing a degree in the lowest-paying field in which they offer degrees at BYU. Knowing that a person needs a great deal of interpersonal skills and charisma to even have a chance to succeed in the business, and also knowing that I’m the opposite of a self-promoter. Yes, I’ve posted a lot of music on this blog, but that’s mostly because I want people to share the experience I have listening to this stuff, not because I want to be all, “Look at me! I write awesome stuff!” And even those types of posts have tapered off (the previous post to this one notwithstanding), mostly because I realized that my approach to music is radically different from a lot of people’s (which also leads to stuff like this post when I get frustrated that nobody hears it the way I do, and I’m not talking about the perfect pitch angle, either), and I doubt I’ll find anybody who feels the same way as I do about the type of music I listen to.

In any case, due to whatever traumatic childhood reason I feel like pulling up (there are many), I don’t interact well with strangers. In the cases where I must (such as, oh I dunno, my entire frickin’ mission), it scares the hell out of me. More than anything else I can think of right now. Why? Because I have only a limited understanding of proper social conduct. When I talk, I talk. I’m often rude without knowing it. I’m often condescending without meaning to be. I’m fairly cynical. Often I don’t even make sense to myself. This blog post probably won’t make much sense, when all is said and done. I’m usually so nervous about putting across a bad first impression that I end up either saying the first thing that comes into my head (which more often than not is not something normal) or just existing in an awkward silence. And I think all the time I spend alone only serves to exacerbate that problem; since, when I’m alone, I can say whatever I want about whatever and nobody’s around to be offended or confused. And I do spend quite a bit of time alone: when I’m at home I’m in my “rat-hole” to avoid the condescension of my stepfather, and when I’m at work I usually have headphones on. Even when I’m out doing Poison Ivy Mysteries stuff I’m usually trying to keep busy solving problems. And it’s easier to be social there, because I have Annelise (and often her family) as a crutch.

On occasion I do try to break out of the box, reach out to people, overcome my fears and weaknesses in order to strengthen other people (and maybe get a date?). But then I’m confronted with a fact that I’ve had demonstrated to me over and over again, both from personal experience and from observation: people are selfish creatures, in so many ways. And if you don’t know the right way to deal with people, they’re more often than not unwilling to cut you any slack. My most recent attempt was with a girl who I shall not name on this blog. I tried extremely hard to be her friend. She’s had a stressful life, and I thought she could use someone who understood a lot of her situation, and how she may feel socially. Yet I had to do all the work in maintaining the friendship. I called her, but never got a call. Everything we ever did together I had to arrange. It was this damn song all over again, only I wasn’t even trying to date her (though at first I wouldn’t have been opposed to the idea). Eventually I realized that, while she was always complaining about how much her life sucked and how much she wanted friends, it wasn’t my friendship that she wanted. I don’t know whether it was something personal or whether she would rather wallow in a despair-filled yet familiar situation rather than risk something potentially life-changing. In either case, the outcome was the same, and when I stopped putting forth an effort she didn’t even bat an eye.

Anyway, that was a digression. Back on topic, I’m not a self-promoter, and I don’t do well one-on-one with people I don’t know, or just know casually. And both of these skills are necessary to land a job in the composition profession and get projects from clients. Which is why my job with Nate is one I am loath to give up. Most of what I do comes from either Nate himself and the clients he channels, or from Annelise and the murder mystery company. I don’t have to get out there and hobnob with the clients, separating myself from the crowd. It’s not me that’s important, it’s my music, and I prefer to let it speak for itself, instead of relying on my questionable social graces to land projects. So if I give up working with Nate, I give up working in the field. Even the ABC Monster album I was doing for reasons other than making money with it, as neither I nor anyone associated with the project so far has any sort of experience or know-how when it comes to marketing an album. (For the record, I’ve been doing the ABC Monster album for two main reasons: 1. to gain experience writing several different types of songs and have something to put in my portfolio, and 2. to show faith in Johnathan’s artistic abilities in a more substantial way than compliments can, much like Annelise and Nate have done regarding my musical abilities. Anyone can say, “hey, your work’s pretty good” with varying degrees of sincerity, but if somebody actively solicits your talents then you know they’re not just humoring you. He draws some good stuff, and it’s about time the world recognizes it.)

Thus the dilemma that has been presented. I can either 1)stay with Nate and earn maybe $1000 a year if past paychecks are any indication, especially with the robbery setting us back quite a bit, 2)start pursuing my own projects in the musical field, which for me and my charisma and self-esteem, seems about as possible as Josh Reese getting married: sure, it’s possible, but in all practicality it has a very low chance of occurring. Or 3)give up on music altogether and work at some office job or something.

Practicality dictates that I should take option #3. Common sense dictates that I should take option #3. My parents would love to see me take option #3. If I was serious about providing for a family, or even going on dates more expensive than “watching a movie on my mom’s TV,” I would take option #3. But, against all reason, against all common sense, against all rational judgment, I’m taking option #1. I have been since August. And I can’t logically explain why, other than that it’s something I have to do. (And yes, I know I already provided that link earlier, but I’m putting it in this post twice, for it’s really the best explanation I have.)

And now this finally brings us back to the robbery. Nate set up a Paypal donate link to help us recover the stolen equipment, but I’ve had a real problem sharing it with people. Aside from just the general human instinct to act self-sufficient, I can’t ask people to support me in this illogical and irresponsible career decision I’ve made, even if at the same time I’m not going to change it anytime soon. It’s the sort of doublethink world in which I apparently live. Why should I ask other people to donate their hard-earned money, which they should otherwise be spending on their own families or at least on people who have real hardships, toward the purchase of a computer and related gear so that I can go into work and write music instead of getting a job where I can afford to buy, well, anything at all? Does the world need me to write silly songs about monsters or background music for a show about extreme vacations more than it needs me to settle down and actually start raising kids? By asking for donations, I’m implicitly saying that yes, it does. And I can’t, in good conscience, allow people to donate money so that I can avoid responsibility and playact at having a real job.

So if you have read all this and still want to donate money, then please do. Nate really needs to rebuild his equipment and business. But don’t do it for me.

Music from each month!

This year has been a super busy year for me, both in general and especially in the music-writing field. In January I signed on as an intern at a company called the Visual Marketing Group, which produces various film, TV, and video projects. This internship turned into an actual job once I graduated from BYU in August. Also, I have continued writing music for Poison Ivy Mysteries this year. We’ve written a total of three more shows this year; combined with the four from last year, that makes seven shows, each with from four to seven songs in them. Even taking into account that Nate Drew (who is also my boss/co-worker/guy who got me the job at the VM Group) wrote about half of that music, that still means I’ve written nineteen songs for them so far (nine in 2010). In addition, Johnathan Whiting and I have been working on an ABC Monster album, with a track for every single letter of the alphabet. Although the final version is not yet ready, all the songs have been written (at least first drafts), so that adds another twenty-six songs I’ve done this year. I also did a Travels Megamix for Mrs. Fields’s retirement thing back in April, in which I took twenty songs from Travels and techno-ized them into a ten-minute long dance remix. Plus, working at the VM Group has given me the opportunity to do tons of little and big TV and film projects, including commercials for companies like Fris coffee and Check City, some MLM videos, industrial trade-show kiosk videos, as well as some music for a documentary about the life of David O. McKay that airs on BYU TV every so often. Probably the biggest project on that front has been working on a show called Xtreme Tourist that actually isn’t out yet, but should be next year. Nate and I have been working recently on the first season: twelve half-hour episodes, which adds up to dozens of cues that we’ve been writing in the past two months or so.

Add to all this the random songs that I write anyway for practice, experimentation, or simple stress relief, and I’ve probably written more pieces of music this year than I can count. So, to show you, my faithful blogketeers, some of what I’ve been up to, I’ve decided to upload some stuff I’ve written in the past year; at least one thing from each month.

January

January didn’t start too busy, as I didn’t get the internship until near the end of the month. However, I did begin writing music for the PIM sci-fi show, even before the show itself was written (I was reeeeally excited for this show).

• Death: The Final Frontier Opening: A fairly transparent rip-off of the opening of Space Quest I (which was itself kind of a parody anyway), but it works.

February

In February we spent most of our time working on the David O. McKay documentary. For some reason I don’t actually have the music tracks I wrote for that separately (I was using a different computer then), so in order to hear it you’ll have to go watch the actual documentary (found on BYU TV’s website here). Nate did most of this, but a few specific points where my music shows up are 00:29:40, 00:55:01 (actually an arrangement), and the part with the Nazis that I can’t find right now. That’s right, Nazis. Also, the first draft of the android song came about during February.

• Harp: But so I don’t leave you high and dry with no MP3, here’s some random harp thing I did when I was bored during February. It doesn’t go anywhere and is obviously unfinished, but here it is anyway.

March

March saw me working mostly on the Travels megamix, which I’ll post under April’s section. Also, work for the rest of the PIM sci-fi show was finished during March. And I think the Fris coffee ad that I did the music for happened during March, though I don’t actually remember. That ad, though, led to one of the funniest, most random, and probably most sacrilegious moments I’ve had this year, when Nate opened a project he was working on (a documentary on LDS painter Del Parsons) but somehow got the voiceover for the coffee ad attached to the beginning of it. When it was played, a slideshow of beautiful paintings of the Savior was shown, along with Cuban music and a deep, seductive Latin voice asking something to the effect of, “Why do you drink coffee? Is it the rich, warm taste? The dark, flavorful aroma?” We couldn’t stop laughing for about ten minutes, and I still can’t look at a Del Parsons painting without wondering about the dark, flavorful aroma of coffee.

• Lockdown: I’ve posted the android song already, so allow me to post what was definitely my favorite song for the show, even more so than said android song. Lyrics are by both me and Johnathan Whiting. Listen for references to both Super Metroid and Doctor Who.
• Different: This song has no real name, but I wrote it a day or two after the Fifths song I’ve already posted, and I actually enjoy it more.

April

Finishing the Travels megamix wasn’t the only project on the table in April. Work for Club Mystique, the next PIM show, was begun. Also, some random VMGroup projects were worked on during this time, including music for a Check City ad (which they didn’t end up using). In addition, I helped Randy McNair with his senior project Monster in the Woods, though I mostly supervised fellow composer Kristina Austin as she actually wrote the score, so I can’t post any of that as my stuff.

• Travels Megamix: When we did this in April at Mrs. Fields’s retirement show, we actually got all of the main cast back to sing it, save Josh Ludvigson and Stephen Dunn (though he came to rehearsals, he wasn’t able to come to the actual performance). I never got them all in for recording, though, so the only version I have has me singing all the songs. Also there was a slideshow/video that went along with it, which I uploaded to YouTube.

May

May was when most of the work for Club Mystique was done. However, it was during this month that I started taking classes again to finish up my bachelor’s, so my internship work lessened quite a bit (also, the whole company moved from Provo to Salt Lake during the next month, so there wasn’t a whole ton of music needed at this point anyway).

Also, this happened. MOVING ON.

• The Heist: From Club Mystique. Part of the premise of the show is that a group of mobsters is meeting to decide who the successor will be, as the boss is retiring and moving to Mexico, and to prove their worth, three mobsters (really just random audience members) are going to pull three offstage heists. In the end all of them backfire, but whatever; it’s good fun. This song is proof that it’s difficult to write MIDI jazz songs without them sounding horrible (though the sax part sounds OK, thanks to Mickey Murphy coming in to record on an actual instrument). There exists somewhere a version with Criss Rosenlof singing, who played the part in the actual show, but I have no idea where it is (somewhere on Nate’s computer), so instead you get to listen to my temp track. Lucky you.
• Preston’s game music: My former roommate Preston Cowley, was working on a video game with some fellow students at BYU for their final project for some class, and he got me to do the music for it. I don’t actually remember what the game is called, but it involved exploring caves and using light to create holes or something (it made more sense in context). Anyway, the music is basically just mysterious ambience, kind of a cross between the Protoss themes from Starcraft and some incidental music from the Lucasarts game The Dig.

June

June, along with January, was probably my driest month when it came to music. I was going to school and working full-time, and since the VM Group had moved their offices to Salt Lake and I was still living in Provo, I rarely came in to work on anything.

• Rachel – No joke, this is the only thing I could find that I did in June. It was to be for a video on mormon.org, but I have no idea if it actually got posted (I can’t find it). It’s just as well, since this version isn’t complete, most glaringly in the mix.

July

In July I began what is probably the most ambitious project I’ve done in a while. Earlier in the year Johnathan had shown me some drawings of some fun monsters he had done for letters of the alphabet, along with some fun little rhymes to go along with them, like a children’s book. Then, in June, to give me something to do until I graduated and could work for him fulltime, Nate asked me to start working on an album of some sort, and left what kind of album it was up to me. For some reason I thought of Johnathan’s little monster drawings and thought it would be fun to do an album about them: a song for each letter monster. So we began collaborating on it, Johnathan on the art and lyrics, and me on the music, and soon I began pumping out the songs, a project which is still ongoing. This was basically all I worked on musically, as I was still taking classes.

• D – Can You Dig the Digg? – This was the first song I worked on. All I did was write the opening bit (mellow guitar), but then Johnathan sent me a message saying he pictured it more as a hip-hop thing. So I did both. It’s funky!
• Z – The Zither goes Hither and Thither – Even with all the other ABC monster songs that came afterward, this is still my favorite one. It may change somewhat, however, because it’s got the controversial phone call bit. That was added more as a reference to a remix of the Gato theme from Chrono Trigger that is way too silly for words. The epilogue at the end isn’t quite up to par with the beginning, but is still pretty good.

August

In August the most monumental event in years occurred: I graduated from college! Hooray! With my new degree and newfound time, I was ready to dive headlong into the career I had been preparing for for so long, and fortunately, I had a place in which to do it. Working fulltime at the VM Group gave me a lot more opportunities to not only write music, but do it on a professional level, and my output increased dramatically at this point. This was to be fully realized starting in September, however, as most of this month was spent with finals, graduation, moving, etc. What work was done during this month was mostly done on refining existing music rather than creating new stuff.

• G – Oh, Gee! Look at the Gigant! – Apparently I can’t find anything that I started in August, as this ABC Monster song was written on July 30 and the next one wasn’t started until September 3. Oh, well; it’s close enough. Between the steamy Zither and now the Barry White-esque Gigant it’s clear that I need to start dating more.

September

Like I said before, fulltime work at the VM Group provided quite a bit of opportunities. And, like every month for the rest of this year, work on the ABC album continued.

• Precorp – This was my first big project for the VM Group, and my first paying job since graduating. It’s basically an industrial video for a kiosk for some trade show for the manufacturing company Precorp, which for some reason YouTube doesn’t want me to upload (not due to copyright issues or anything; it just keeps timing out) so you’ll just have to imagine ten minutes of people putting screwdrivers into things. Keep listening, as there are actually seven different cues, so if you don’t like one, wait a minute and another will soon fade in. My favorite is probably the third one, because it kind of sounds like U2. Part of the penultimate one ended up making it into an ABC monster song that I haven’t posted anywhere yet (you’ll have to get the album when it comes out!) Keep your ears open during the fourth one for a Poison Ivy Mysteries reference to “Testin’ the Mic!”
• M – Mea is a Monster! – I got into some trouble over this one. Johnathan had written this for his niece, who’s barely over toddler age, but apparently she got scared by it. I still really like it, but we haven’t hashed out if it just needs a little less scariness or a complete redo (or whether we should just leave it, as I think that most kids over, say, three years old would probably be fine with it). The final version will have an actual little girl sing the non-monster lines, but for now, it’s just me.

October

Continuing work for the VM Group, October was the first month we worked on music for Xtreme Tourist (XT for short), a new show about a guy who goes on vacation to random places and films how awesome it is. Also, during October we wrote the stuff for the newest Poison Ivy Mysteries show Shadow of the King. I also wrote a bit for another Check City commercial, which they actually used this time!

• The Wizard Song – Written for Shadow of the King. The actual name for this song should be “Wobblety Bobblety” or “Hibbety Jibbety” or some other such nonsense, but meh. This song was obviously based on The Sword in the Stone, though it gets very different about halfway through, and the ending was both inspired by Gustav Holst’s “Mars: The Bringer of War” and the music at the end of the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode “The Best of Both Worlds, pt. 1″. And hey, this one actually has Criss singing it, as opposed to “The Heist”!
• Pirates! – For an XT episode about Cancun. This type of track is actually atypical of the type of music that we usually put in the show (we usually try to do more metal/alternative stuff), but it’s probably the most interesting to listen to.
• Commercial Bumper – This was a bit I wrote for the very first XT episode I worked on (Hawaii), and just for some continuity I try to work it into every show I do, usually as a shorter version for a commercial bumper.
• P – The Paw Paw’s Poem – This ABC monster song’s got a bit of a Johnny Cash vibe. That’s all I got on this one.

November

November saw us working hard on XT, since the first season was due to be finished by December 1 (it later got moved back a little bit). I was writing perhaps two or three cues a day at the beginning of this month, stepping up to four by the middle. Due to some family emergencies the end of the month wasn’t as productive, but it soon picked up again.

• Kite Surfing – From the Belize episode. This is much more typical of the stuff we wrote for the show. We were writing a lot of these types of track each day, so musically it isn’t all that groundbreaking, but it’s not supposed to be artsy or deep. Instead it’s just supposed to build up excitement and make you want to go kite surfing in Belize.
• Oh, Wendy – From another Cancun episode (yes, there are two for some reason). This accompanies footage of the host’s wife and how he’s grateful that she could accompany him on that particular trip.
• U – The Undergator Lives Underwater – Obviously a bit of a Jaws reference. Once again, too scary? I mean, these are monsters, after all. We’re not doing an album about ABC fairies or ABC ponies. If kids can take Coraline, this stuff ought to be a piece of cake.

December

This month obviously isn’t over, since we’re only eight days into it, but already I have written quite a bit of stuff (most of it for XT).

• Hang-gliding – From the Rio de Janeiro episode. It’s kind of like kite surfing. Both the activity and the music, I mean.
• Song 4 – After a while Nate and I realized we couldn’t score every single episode, so we started reusing tracks. To that end, I wrote a few that didn’t actually fit with any footage but that we could just plunk in anywhere. This is one of those tracks. Oddly enough, I don’t think we’ve actually used it in an episode yet, but we’re not done with the series! Actually, I don’t know if it will ever be used in XT (it’s a little too muddy) but I like it anyway so I’m posting it.

Well, there you have it. A smattering of what I’ve been doing all year, especially the latter half.

Follow-up to the previous rally post

For those who may be wondering what the “hidden agenda” behind the Rally to Restore Sanity was, Jon Stewart himself outlines it, and surprisingly, it has no liberal bias, nor does it make a political stance to activate our youth into tearing apart the foundations of democracy, or whatever else news outlets had made it out to be.

If that doesn’t work:

http://www.comedycentral.com/videos/index.jhtml?videoId=363864&title=jon-stewart-moment-of-sincerity

I hope that’s a message we all can rally around. (Although, I’m not familiar with many Mormons who would be Jay-Z fans, but I’m sure there are some out there.)

And, for more awesomeness, the top 100 best protest signs from the rally. (Careful: may contain profanity and/or silliness.)

Rally to Restore Sanity, and why it’s needed

Over this past weekend, I had an interesting political discussion on Facebook about Jon Stewart’s upcoming “Rally to Restore Sanity” and Glenn Beck, and I wanted to preserve it for posterity’s sake. I have changed some of the names to protect the innocent (and the guilty) and to edit a few superfluous comments out. I just thought that the argument presented by the opposition represents exactly why politics right now is so divided that a call to take it down a notch is sorely needed. So, in order to have a change of pace from my usual “check out my new music” and “wah wah I’m still single waaaah!” blog posts, I present some political discussion for you!

My First Status Update (referring to this video): I think the moment I lost all respect for Glenn Beck was the moment when he basically stated that everyone who liked Jon Stewart and his upcoming rally were victims of some sort of Manchurian Candidate plot.

The first few responses were short comments like most people get on their status updates, things like “ha ha ha” and “Come on, everyone likes Angela Lansbury!” Then the first comment appeared from who I will call the Glenn Beck fanatic:

• Glenn Beck Fanatic: I’m pretty sure he never said that. Good luck finding the clip. [referring to the unedited Glenn Beck clip]
• Me: While the Manchurian Candidate thing may have been an exaggeration on Colbert’s part, the fact of the matter is that Glenn does believe that the rally’s some sort of secretive plot to “activate the youth” who watch the show into voting in all the left-wing liberals who will push the evil socialist agenda, instead of what it really is: a plea to both sides of the extremely polarized political landscape to listen to each other.

That may have been a little more charged than I probably should have put it, but the response I got maaaay have been an overreaction:

• GBF: I don’t think he has any strong feelings on the rally itself. I agree that he believes that the show is used to “activate the youth” but I don’t think it’s all that secretive. It seems to be working on you. Mock Christians, mock Conservatives. It’s the liberals who are cool. We’ll see what the rally turns out to be, but I have a hard time believing that it’s a plea to both sides to listen to each other when he’s made it very clear that he has nothing but contempt for the right.Honestly, I couldn’t care less what John Stewart does. I don’t understand why you care so much what Glenn Beck does. If you actually watched or listen to his shows, I think you’ll find very little to disagree with him on. Restore Honor, restore the Constitution, return to God and faith. Such hate! Perhaps you should get first hand information instead of just believing everything John Stewart tells you.

It took me a little while to figure out how to respond to this inanity. My first instinct was to respond saying, “Oh, yeah? Sounds like Glenn Beck has been brainwashing you to hate all liberals!” Of course, despite being basically the same argument, with the same amount of factual evidence, in reverse, it probably wouldn’t have helped matters and would’ve been an oversimplification. So instead, after much thought, I responded with this long post:

• Me: Thanks for the Ad Hominem attack, it really helps the discussion.

  All right, prepare for a long one. I understand that both Stewart and Colbert have a liberal bias. It’s one reason I had to stop watching both shows shortly before the ’08 election: they were so obviously pro-Obama that it was driving me crazy. And there are some issues that I disagree with them on, such as abortion and gay marriage. And the fact of the matter is that it isn’t personally Glenn Beck so much that I have issues with. Sometimes I like Glenn, especially when he was on CNN. I’ve just lost respect for him, in the same way I lost respect for John McCain (who I voted for). McCain had to compromise a lot of his values and “maverick” tendencies to win the Republican nomination in 2008, and it alienated his moderate base and destroyed his credibility. Since joining Fox News Glenn has had the same issue: in order to keep his job, he’s had to toe the line of the station: push the conservative agenda. Sometimes you can see that he isn’t entirely happy with it, especially when he gets people with *really* right-wing opinions on his show and he doesn’t quite know how to respond (*cough* Stu *cough*). I appreciate what he’s trying to do; I just think he’s constrained by his network and has to keep his message in line with theirs. And in many cases, he uses straw man arguments and sweeping generalizations to boil a complex issue down to a rallying cry. Ergo, he has lost my respect. (And this isn’t just a Glenn Beck thing; Gretchen Carlson, according to her credentials, is an extremely savvy intelligent person who was valedictorian in her class, yet says some boneheaded and/or simplistic things on the air at times because there’s an agenda she’s got to push.)

  Now you may say that Jon Stewart and especially Colbert do the same thing, and to an extent, that’s true. First of all, they’re comedians. Their main goal is to make a living making people laugh, and at first glance it may seems that they accomplish this by skewering the right all the time, especially Colbert’s pundit character. However, Jon especially has grown a bit disenchanted with the Obama administration, as have many of his former supporters. Nowadays I think The Daily Show consists more of taking Congress and the White House to task for being do-nothings due to partisanship than they do taking jabs at Republicans alone or Fox News. He even recently had Jimmy Carter on the show and drew some interesting parallels between him and Obama: both are charismatic, intellectual, well-meaning, good-natured people who were elected mostly because people wanted change from a previous corrupt administration (or one that was perceived to be corrupt anyway; I’m not going to argue that topic here) and who turned out to be ineffectual in carrying out their promises. He’s not a socialist who wants to send your grandparents to death panels, but rather a charismatic man who hasn’t lived up to his ideals. I think that is a reasonable assessment of the situation that doesn’t resort to name-calling, slogan chanting, or extremism. Jon may not embrace the right, but he certainly doesn’t think that liberals are all cool. That’s something even Bill O’Reilly has talked about.

  Which brings us to the purpose behind the rally. Ignoring Colbert for the moment, Jon’s rally is a call to restore reason, a call which, if you’ll pardon the wordplay, is a reasonable one. For example, Congress recently defeated a bill to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”, a bill which even 64% of Republicans said they support. It should have been a shoo-in, so why didn’t it pass? Because there were ridiculous back-and-forth bickering about amendments to the bill supporting military spending that reached a point to where neither party could agree to pass it as it stood. It is that kind of thing that Jon is trying to fix: not the evil left-wing or sinister right-wing agendas, but the fact that the political landscape is so divided right now that a bill that more than two-thirds of the Congress supports cannot get passed!

  Colbert’s schtick is that he distorts the truth, but it’s a reactionary distortion. Most of the time when he really “nails” people, it’s not because he disagrees with their policies, but because he likes to point out logical fallacies in their arguments. Hence his “March to Keep Fear Alive” is not so much a personal attack on Beck’s rally as it is a general statement on the “Us Vs. Them” mindset. There are some parallels to Beck’s rally that Colbert plays up for humorous effect, but the main purpose is to point out the fallacy that the political world is made of black and white issues.

  Also, it really gets my goat when people say that they trust Glenn mostly because he’s a member of the Church, like somehow Church membership makes one impervious to error (and the associated implications that those who aren’t members of the Church somehow don’t know what they’re talking about, and that members who disagree with Beck must therefore have weaker testimonies). That has nothing to do with Jon Stewart; it’s just a pet peeve of mine. If you like Glenn for other reasons, that’s fine, but don’t bring this point up.

I don’t feel that I need to elaborate on that. I still stand by everything I said. The response was this:

• GBF:I don’t believe there were any ad hominem attacks in my comment.I appreciate you sharing your thoughts, Jeff. I’m sure we still disagree on a lot but I admit I was assuming some of your biases based on the arguments I’ve had with others….I apologize for that. I hope you’ll return the favor since I never mentioned or even alluded to Glenn Beck being a Mormon.

To which I responded:

• Me: I think that implying that I’m filled with hate and follow Jon blindly would be a personal attack, but that’s neither here nor there. I brought up the Mormon thing mostly because most people I talk to cite that as their first reason they listen to Glenn, and I just wanted to forestall it here. Like I said, if you like Glenn for other reasons, more power to you. And I apologize for implying that you were part of that group.

It was clear that she had no idea how to respond to any of my points and so tried to back out gracefully. I give her points for that; however, leaving with two parting jabs about the Mormon thing (which I responded to) and the ad hominem denial (which is demonstrably false) showed that she wasn’t quite as conciliatory as perhaps she wanted to appear. Oh well, people are people. As a side note, another person who had no connection to the first had this to say, complete with my responses:

• Person #2: That Glenn Beck clip he showed was so heavily edited that there’s no telling what the actual context was or what he really said. That seems to be typical of Colbert who does this stuff just for comedy and to mock the right. It seems to me that his whole rally to keep fear alive is the same way, just a mocking jab at Glenn’s rally. I didn’t sense any plea for people to listen to each other. It’s just a way to be absurd while trying to project the fear-monger label onto people he doesn’t like.
• Me: Well, Colbert is someone you’ve got to watch with a somewhat cynical eye, for he doesn’t mean a lot of what he says as his pundit character and I think his particular rally is more for laughs than for any effective political strategy (and also to be a counterpoint to Jon’s rally to stir up attention). My status update? Meant in the same way. But it’s not the parody rally I’m concerned with; it’s Jon’s rally that I defend. I don’t truly believe that Glenn Beck said Jon Stewart is brainwashing people, but merely that he is trying to stir up people to action that have had no real voice in politics (which he *is*) and that that is somehow a bad thing (which it isn’t). This is also why I’ve tried to find the original Glenn Beck clip online but haven’t been successful; if someone can find it, please let me know!

I still haven’t found it.

EDIT: Yes, I have! Thanks, Rachel!

• Person #2:I don’t have cable TV, or satellite, or anything of that sort, so I don’t see Glenn’s show on Fox. The few clips I see from time to time don’t really impress me. He has the show on Fox because it allows him to reach a wider audience, but I’m not sure a visual medium is really his thing. (I mean, who wants to see a dough boy like him in HD anyway, right?) Radio is what he’s really good at, and I have listened to his radio show for about 7 years now, and greatly enjoy it.

  I do like that he’s Mormon, but that’s not the reason I listen to him. If that were the sole criteria for liking someone then I should love Harry Reid too, and yeah… that’s not gonna happen. My dad also won’t listen to Glenn because he still swears a bit too much, and he calls Glenn “that foul-mouthed Mormon.” (My whole family is also Mormon, btw.) I do like that Glenn’s membership in the Church helps give him a perspective similar to my own, though.

  The reasons I listen to Glenn are that he’s honest, and genuine, and is really trying to help bring people together while informing them about the history of this country, and the dangers that it faces today. I actually even like Glenn better than Rush, because Glenn’s not so political. Rush talks politics all day, but Glenn tends to focus more on values and digs deep into things that aren’t even on Rush’s radar. Is Glenn perfect? No. But I really believe he’s trying to be, and I respect him for that.

• Me: I will admit up front that I haven’t listened to much of Glenn’s radio show. Usually my radio dial is set to KSL (the main Utah news station), and so I occasionally get bits and pieces of Sean Hannity’s show (who, for me, falls under the same category of Rush at times, i.e. he may have some good points but they’re lost amidst rhetoric and he wins arguments by talking loudly over anyone who disagrees), but I have seen Glenn’s show, both on CNN and on Fox News. And when he was on CNN I found him a more sympathetic character. Which just says to me that since he moved to Fox News he’s had to change his message and methods to fit with the network’s agenda. That, to me, does not suggest integrity nor honesty, even if his aims are noble. At least with Colbert you *know* it’s an act; with Beck, you can never be sure. Plus there are tons of logical fallacies in his arguments, especially his demonizing of “progressives” which doesn’t even make sense, considering that being a progressive during the 1930′s where he pulls a lot of his examples meant a completely different thing than it does now. Also, if it weren’t for progressives, a lot of public works projects (like highways, libraries, and public education) would have evolved differently (presenting: the Doritos public library! $2 to get in!). The history he teaches is history with a conservative bias, just as he accuses the history books of having a liberal bias.

  I could bring up some other examples, but I digress. Most of that is just policy disagreements, not actual problems. I do appreciate that he believes in standing up for what he believes is right; what I don’t agree with is the simplification and polarization of the political landscape that he contributes to. And when he, a figure on a news channel and not a comedy channel, attacks a man for putting together a rally to “restore rationality” to politics, I lose respect for him.

I bring this exchange up mainly because person #2 here, while still being on the side of GBF, was more willing to discuss his viewpoint in a reasonable manner without resorting to hate speech. If you want to have a rational discussion, this is the way to go about it.

There were a few more comments after that, from Ben and Annelise:

• Ben: Don’t you understand, Jeff?!? If only you’d LISTEN to Glen Beck, stop believing everything Jon Stewart tells you, and start believing everything Glen Beck tells you… wait, now I’m confused… who is brainwashing who? And who sounds brainwashed?
• Annelise: There is an article in Forbes Magazine a couple of months ago about Glenn Beck as a business man. I liked it alot…it actually made me like him a bit more because the whole point of the article was to point out that Glenn Beck is also an entertainer and in it for the money. So…read it. He admits that some of the stuff he says is for the shock and entertainment value. http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2010/0426/entertainment-fox-news-simon-schuster-glenn-beck-inc.html
• Me: I’ve actually read articles similar to that one (and now I’ve read that one too), but I’m afraid that it doesn’t gain him any respect from me. If Glenn had a show on Comedy Central (or whatever the “right-wing version” would be) then I’d be more apt to treat him as an entertainer. But he’s on Fox News, whose tagline is “Fair and Balanced”. And, as has been evidenced on this very page, many people take him at his word, even believing him to be an honest and sincere man when he’s really in it for the money. In many ways, it makes him the anti-Jon Stewart: while appearing as a force for political change and a right-wing leader, he really, according to his own words, “..could give a flying crap about the political process.” While Jon, appearing as a comedian and never claiming to be more than such, obviously deeply cares about the political process and what it’s doing to the country.
• Annelise: Yeah… I was going to say that my only beef with him on THAT point is that he hasn’t come out and said…HEY!!! I’m an entertainer…at least not to the masses…how many people actually read Forbes (well…quite a few I would guess…but you know what I mean.)

She then went on to quote the article stating how much money Glenn makes and how little he actually cares about politics and how much he cares about creating controversy and making money. So basically, proving my point.

Anyway, after this I posted another status update: Note to self: Don’t criticize Glenn Beck unless you have too much time on your hands.

This prompted some responses, in most of which I’ll preserve the (shortened) name of the commenter, except in certain cases (while editing comments superfluous to the discussion):

• GBF: That was your choice to keep going.
• Me: It sure was.
• Katie H. S.: I actually really appreciate your brilliance from earlier today. You are one smart guy, Jeff. And while I disagree with you here and there on it all (I’m about as far-left as you can get), I thought your arguments were beautifully articulated and would like to send you as my congressman. But as for “[GBF]” — DISLIKE.

  Glenn Beck makes me ashamed to be Mormon.

• GBF: …There were so many problems with Jeff’s argument that I gave up. We’re not going to agree. But that’s okay, part of the Gospel is loving everyone in spite of our differences. Even if that person is Glenn Beck.

This is probably the last thing I’ll hear from our Glenn Beck Fanatic. She had so many problems with my argument that she had to give up? I would think that a lot of problems in an argument would make it easier to argue against. You know, your shot is less likely to miss and all that. Sure, maybe you can’t address everything, but at least you could address something.

Anyway, the discussion continued:

• Katie H. S.: Thanks for preaching. Do you feel better now?
• Me: Thanks, Katie! I consider that extremely high praise, coming from you. I’m probably about as moderate as you can get (in fact, the pundit that I think I agree with more often than not is KSL’s Doug Wright) but these days “moderate” is almost a swear word. I don’t have answers, but I know enough to recognize that nobody has all the answers.
• James S.: Jeff I love what you’re saying. I think that a very large majority of people feel the same way but don’t say anything for fear of the, as evidenced here, righteous indignation of those on the far ends of both sides. So thank you for your adept assessment of the current situation. I was inspired. Keep up the good work.
• Katie H. S.: ‎”Righteous Indignation?” That’s awfully kind of you — most Mormon men just call me a bitch
• James S.: Give me some credit, I’m sure I haven’t heard close to what you could be indignated (not sure if that’s a word) about. I was more referring to the other person’s comments. Personally my beliefs are probably a lot closer to your side of the road.
• Steph B. F.: I just read the WHOLE commentary et al on your last post, and I agree with Katie, Jeff you are one smart guy. You were, in every way, what you said you were: a moderate. There needs to be more moderates in the world. Isn’t that a golden rule as well? “Moderation in all things”?

  I loved the way you researched all angles and represented all sides. I don’t know much about Glenn Beck except that his “fans” seem to be super right-wing and very vocal (even mean?) about it. And you are correct, Jon Stewart is a comedian, though not an uneducated one. I am in the same boat as you, Jeff, I am an independant and committed to what is fair to all and ethical. I can’t go with one party or the other for fear I will be crushed by their agendas.

  Katie– keep on keepin’ on. I get frustrated with the “vote/be Republican or go to hell” political atmosphere in Utah, too. It makes me almost desperate to get out of the state. Good luck with your endeavors. You’re not a bitch (unless I am, too…..probably I am ), you’re a strong, intelligent woman.

  [GBF]– I don’t know you, but you seem to have conviction. That’s good. I’m impressed that you seem to be so well-versed on Glenn Beck. I’m not sure I could stomach him. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a Patriot and I love my country and the Constitution, but maybe some of us see all of that in a different light than you do. Thanks for giving us a chance!

• Steph B. F.: Sorry to take up so much space Jeff! Thanks for the excellent food for thought!
• Ben: Wait, are we supposed to love everyone, or just the Mormons? Now I’m confused. Because I love Jon Stewart. But he isn’t Mormon… and it seems some people come across as a little hypocritical when they rant about how awful Jon Stewart is and then tell me to love everyone… Can someone please bring logical and order back?Restore rationality, if you will?If only someone would hold a rally.
• Me: Thanks to everyone for your responses! And to Steph: don’t worry about being long; after my diatribe previously I don’t think you have anything to apologize for. Also, I’m glad that I have so many bitches on my side! Or strong, intelligent women, you know, whatever.
• Annelise: Go bitches!

That’s the end of the discussion as of right now; though more people may add to it in the future, I think this is good enough to preserve the general tenor of what happened.

The point of preserving this, besides as a good summation of some of my political stances, was to show that we truly do need a voice for moderates, but since moderates don’t normally scream loudly the media ignores them. I truly have high hopes for this rally and I hope it becomes more than a footnote in history, but even if it doesn’t I still have high hopes for this country. At least it may motivate people to get more informed and from more than one source, as fear only holds sway over the ignorant. Also, I’m sorry, but Glenn Beck makes me angry, especially in light of things like the article Annelise posted.

Also, but damn, a lot of people said “bitch.” I mean, what the hell?

Am I Wrong to be Single?

Note: this post originates as a final paper for my Persuasive Writing class. The topic given was “marriage” and under that topic we were allowed to write about whatever we wanted. Originally I was going to write about how it’s OK for spouses to have different interests and hobbies from their partner, but as I was working on that I realized that I didn’t care. I therefore changed my topic to something much more close to home and the result is what you see here.

Enjoy!

As a single student attending BYU, I have felt a lot of pressure to get married. Every day it seems that some sort of reminder crops up that marriage brings eternal happiness, emotional strength and resolve, and stability; in effect, it provides meaning in life. Classes are offered on how to make a happy and successful marriage. The entire social structure of a singles’ ward is designed to help young men and women meet and court each other, with the end goal of matrimony in mind. Happy couples litter the landscape of the campus like wildflowers, showing the rest of us how wonderful life can be once a person has found his or her special someone. One of the main focuses of the Church is marriage and family life, and the basic unit of the Church is indeed the family.

This environment creates a lot of pressure for people like me to get married so I can share in the wonderful blessings that come with the territory. However, despite my best efforts to win a girl’s heart, I have not been successful in this regard. Recently it has been more difficult to work up the enthusiasm and effort required to date, court, and marry. My situation is not unique: there are large numbers of students at BYU who desire marriage, yet have all but given up hope for themselves. With such a pro-marriage environment such as BYU, how did this happen? Could the constant emphasis on marriage actually drive people away from doing the necessary things needed to get married?

Young people today face an increasingly complex world, one in which it is difficult to find a role. Some psychologists have termed this the “quarter-life period,” an emerging adulthood between approximately 18-29 years of age where a person has grown out of adolescence but has not fully assumed all of the roles and responsibilities of traditional adults. Generations in America before World War Two usually went straight from schooling into the work force at early ages. With the developing affluence of the post-war period, more training was require to compete in the job marketplace, and as a result of spending more time in schooling before entering a career, the teenage culture developed an identity of its own that had been missing before. As time moved on and the job market became even more complex and demanding, young people have had to put off establishing their careers well past adolescence. Identity exploration, instability, possibility, self-focus, and parental conflict – issues normally associated with adolescence, have extended into people’s twenties, creating a sense of limbo for many young Americans.¹

The environment at BYU and elsewhere in the Church can be highlighted to define this stage of life for students and members of the Church. Nowhere is it more apparent than in the phenomenon that is the singles’ ward: a place where the members are too old to go to their parents’ ward as a child, yet haven’t moved on to the next stage of life, that of marriage. Although the basic elements of the ward organization exist, the auxiliaries and other organizations have often been modified or done away with altogether in order to fit the needs of this unique unit within the Church. Many of these altered organizations are put in place precisely to encourage the social interactions that will hopefully lead to marriage. A friendship committee may be set up, to organize ward date nights. The activities committee takes a large chunk of the ward’s time and budget. The Sabbath Day committee organizes events such as Break-The-Fast, Sunday ward prayers, or Linger Longers to provide more social opportunities. A lot of lessons taught in singles’ wards tend to focus more on dating and marriage than on more traditional gospel subjects such as faith, prayer, tithing, or temple attendance. In short, nearly every aspect of the singles’ ward is geared toward getting people out of the singles’ ward and into marriage.

So into this pressure cooker of a pro-marriage environment come these new “quarter-life” people: those who are still unsure of their future career, who are trying to become independent of their parents, who haven’t yet discovered their identity. A healthy identity is essential to the well-being and happiness of a person. Those with a strong sense of who they are tend to be more decisive, sure of themselves, and act with confidence. Conversely, those with a negative identity, or those who associate their identity with negative groups or connotations, tend to be more reserved, unsure, and lax in decision making. “Identity diffusion,” or a lack of a strong sense of who oneself is, often leads to a lack of orientation and ambivalence about life. A healthy sense of identity occurs when a person associates him or herself with positive groups, or believes that he or she has something good to contribute. One of many good environments to be in to cultivate a strong sense of identity is, indeed, a marital one.² This is probably a main reason why the Church and BYU emphasize marriage so much: to help young people overcome their “quarter-life” stage and become functioning adults.

Spurred on by the many pro-marriage messages he receives, along with a desire to establish a positive identity, a young man comes on to the BYU dating scene with optimism. Examples of couples getting together, becoming closer, and getting married are all around him. However, for whatever reason, he is having little success. Dates, while numerous, always seem to end with polite disinterest. Despite his best efforts, he cannot find a girl with whom he “clicks.” Repeatedly hitting his head against a wall, he soon begins to date less and less. Eventually, years have gone by and he is poised to leave BYU, still as single as ever. What happened?

This young man has now an established identity: that of a single person. Since he has lived for years in this state, it is where he feels most comfortable, and therefore, where he defines himself. The problem comes, however, with the connotations associated with being single, especially at BYU. As has previously been mentioned, it seems that every aspect of BYU society, particularly singles’ wards, is geared toward getting people married. Therefore, if a person goes through the system, doing his best to provide opportunities for marriage yet not getting any success, the only alternative is that he has achieved failure.

Often well-meaning bishops and other members exacerbate this problem by reacting to singles with pity or patronizing comments designed to help. Statements such as “What is it going to take to get you married?” or “Quit being so picky,” or “You just need to date more,” while well-intentioned, simply exacerbate the feeling of failure many singles feel.³ When my brother was single he was asked on a consistent basis why he wasn’t married yet. He confided in me once that the response he wanted to give was, “Well, I was dating someone, but she died.” Pause. “Feeling awkward? That’s how I feel when you ask me about marriage.” The example may be somewhat extreme, but the sentiment is clear.

In addition, there exists what Dr. Bella DePaulo calls the “soulmate mythology,” or the idea that marriage to one’s soulmate will solve most of a person’s problems and allow them to live happily ever after. As she puts it, “The soulmate promises an all-in-one solution. Find that one perfect person and you have—for starters—your best friend, your sexual partner, your comforter and caretaker, your cheerleader, your escort to every social function, your consultant on matters large and small, and the one and only teammate you will ever need in home management, money management, and vacation planning. And that list doesn’t even include any of the potential coparenting possibilities. The soulmate mythology is the ultimate seduction: Find that one right person and all of your wishes will come true. Find that one perfect person, your All-Purpose Partner, and your path through the rest of your adult life is set. And it will be a happy path, indeed.”⁴This myth is alive and well at BYU, perhaps even more so than in the world at large.

Single people are often stigmatized by society as immature, self-centered, and insecure. In a recent study, undergraduates at the University of California were ask to define what the characteristics of married people were, as opposed to single people. Over half responded that married people were caring, kind, and giving, where only 2% described single people using the same terms. This was despite another study in which single people and married people rated their own satisfaction in life at about the same level. In addition, the study showed that most people believed that the older a single person got without marrying, the more self-centered, more envious, less socially mature, and less well-adjusted they were perceived to be.⁵ This attitude is prevalent within the Church and the BYU society, displaying its colors most prominently in the oft-quoted but apocryphal statement mistakenly attributed to Brigham Young that any single male over the age of twenty-five is a “menace to society.”

So what does this all add up to? In essence, as time goes on, single people at BYU feel like they have failed at getting married. They have missed out on finding their soulmate and all of the wonderful blessings associated with that. Since they’re not married, society tells them that they are selfish, immature, and inferior. And since their identity has now been established as selfish, immature, and inferior, who would want to marry them? With so much pressure, disappointment, and disapproval heaped upon them, many simply give up, resigning themselves to a miserable single life.

By living in such a pro-marriage environment, single people tend to feel a great burden of disapproval and inferiority. In this way, by creating and maintaining this environment, those who are seeking to help the cause of marriage are, in fact, hindering it. Fortunately, the Church has realized this and in recent years has published articles in the Ensign to help single people feel better about not yet being married. This is a good start; however, to truly see improvement, perhaps the emphasis of BYU and singles’ wards need not be happiness through marriage, but simply happiness despite marital status. In this way those who have been unlucky in their relationships may find the self-esteem they need to make something of their life other than being the unhappy single guy or girl.

1 Atwood, J. D., & Scholtz, C. (2008). The quarter-life time period: An age of indulgence, crisis or both? Contemporary Family Therapy: An International Journal, 30(4), 233-250.

2 Montgomery, M. J., Hernandez, L., & Ferrer-Wreder, L. (2008). Identity development and intervention studies: The right time for a marriage? Identity, 8(2), 173-182.

3 Chris Brough, “Seeing beyond Single,” Ensign, Jun 2004, 36

4 DePaulo, B. (2006). Singled out: How singles are stereotyped, stigmatized, and ignored, and still live happily ever after. New York, NY US: St Martin’s Press. 247.

5 DePaulo, B. M., & Morris, W. L. (2006). The unrecognized stereotyping and discrimination against singles. Current Directions in Psychological Science (Wiley-Blackwell), 15(5), 251-254.