Action Movies

I think the first time that I heard the phrase politically correct I was in elementary school. I likely filed it away under the category of "Do Not Understand". As time passed, it transitioned into the categories of "Vaguely Understand" and later on, "Irritated By". This was mostly due to the fact that, like many items that start with politic, it was mostly bullshit. A word used by many different people with definitions as vague and winding as the persons that used it. As I have found, a word that means many different things is often a not very useful word at all. For some, it meant polite, for others, inoffensive, and for a select subset, it meant phrases that could be uttered without taking any risk whatsoever related to meaning or intent. But that is not the definition I am writing about today. The definition I am indirectly writing about today is the second. The inoffensive. Now I do make general attempts in my everyday life to avoid being abrasive. I do not take pride in being edgy, and any edge I have is probably something that has been hammered into my psyche and will remain there regardless of whether or not I want it to be. There is a certain type of individual though, that takes pride in their edge, whether it be sincere or not. I think most of them used to be employed by the type of news magazines that are speed read by quietly desperate shoppers as they wait for their extruded foods to be rung up. The demise of the print industry seems to have forced many of these people online, where their edginess cannot be limited by the liability minded eye of an editor. These people take pride in violating the politically correct, the inoffensive media, with the pretense of speaking a truth that is commonly ignored. This is mostly bullshit. There have been writers who create a new lens of perception by virtue of their manner, showing a new level of reality by living as a different sort of life. Bukowski comes to mind, and though I know he's a pretty good read, god who'd want to be such an asshole? These online antagonists are not some of these writers.

The reason I bring them up is due to a recent article regarding so called men's rights activists and their disappointment in the new Mad Max movie. Apparently a movie starring Tom Hardy, whose recent films have featured him as an enormous mercenary who kicks Batman's ass, and as a member of a team who takes out snipers with a rocket launcher, is serving as the focus of a feminist plot to defraud men of their natural right to see action flicks where women serve only as objects to be saved, led, or viewed. Now I enjoy action movies, and truly enjoy seeing explosions and whatnot. The Avengers movie for example. EVERYTHING explodes. It's great. I do not however feel that there is a serious lack of male-driven cinema that I can go see if I want to watch a lone hero kick copious amounts of ass. The concern of a number of these MRAs is that a movie they want to see has a female cast which apparently kicks various amounts of ass and is an affront to the action movie industry, and them in particular. Women succeeding and blowing things up is apparently feminism. If that's feminism, then that is awesome. However, I do not know that it is in fact feminism. I would be more inclined to say that it is more likely just a movie with people in it. Something one could reasonably expect from a studio that wants to make money and put butts in seats. If it isn't normal, then it should be.

I think what it really comes down to is a group of guys who really want to hold on to the idea of men as the sole heroes, despite the fact that reality does not work that way. Even the US Army, a notoriously slow and convoluted organization is starting to accept that women can and should be allowed into combat roles. The blowback from that idea is that women are less capable (Okay, watch this, or read this) or that there is a risk of rape. Personally, I think anyone who is willing to rape a fellow soldier, let alone anyone, should be fed into a wood chipper. It's not like this is a new idea, either. Other nations have been sending women into combat for quite some time, and it seems to have worked out well. I personally know plenty of men and women who have achieved incredible feats. On the Pacific Crest Trail, I encountered both Scott Williamson (Bink), a badass like you would not believe, and Heather Anderson (Anish), who I had the opportunity to hike with for an hour or three on her record setting hike, who is a badass on another level. Both of these people are legitimate heroes, and their impressive feats exist independently of their gender. I would certainly appreciate it if these MRAs understood these facts, rather than ignoring reality in favor of a fantasy of dominance.

I understand if this is wandering and somewhat indirect. The general theme of this is that there is a group of pseudo-edgy jackasses who are pissed off that the Mad Max movie will be featuring women. These guys should appreciate that there are plenty of women that are way cooler than they are, and should respect rather than resent that fact. I fully expect this movie to be awesome, and I plan on seeing it, and not thinking about gender roles for one minute. If you have any thoughts on this, please comment away, and if there is some idea I've got that you think is absurd, please feel free to share your thoughts.



I also linked to a blog written by someone who has some very impressive thoughts on the subject of women in combat, https://lifeistaboo.wordpress.com/2015/05/15/women-in-combat/

Reflections On the Cave

As befits a bear, I often think about the cave. Not so much the cave in which I reside as much as Plato's. Now I really enjoy the image of Plato and Socrates hanging out in their man cave, drinking some beer, possibly with some yet to be named herb (Pliny wasn't born for another 500 years...) providing some sublime aromatic characteristics. While hanging out, staring at the wall of this cave, watching the flickering shadows, they might begin discussing the nature of these shadows. Now these guys weren't the sort to just accept that a shadow is a shadow. They'd want to know where it came from, and why. Being two Greek dudes living in roughly 400 BCE, they did not have a great idea as to the origins of these things. That didn't mean they didn't have their theories, and even if they didn't have the means to measure the world around them, they could measure their own perceptions. Now that they had a couple drinks to wind themselves down, and had started considering their shadows, they might have begun to wonder how these shadows might compare to the objects they would see in their everyday lives. What was the difference between the real things they saw and the shadows? What would the shadows mean to someone who spent their entire life in a cave, seeing nothing but the shadows of passers by, muddled the light of a setting sun or a dying fire? What if that which they saw clearly in their own lives was nothing more than the shadow of a truer reality, seen through the smoky filter of their own eyes, illuminated by the fires of their own preconceived notions, waning and waxing with the tides of their own emotion? Out of the incoherency of their own discussion, a concept arose; a concept of reality as something not quite real, a muddled picture of a clearer universe, seen like the shadows on a wall by a prisoner chained to the floor of a cave, able only to see that which was illuminated by a fire behind him. These shadows would be the width and breadth of his existence, knowing nothing more, he would know he had no limitations. What would separate us from this prisoner? We cannot conceive of something we've never experienced, as the prisone could not conceive of anything outside the cave.

I'm no philosopher, and this is no treatise on Platonic solids. But this is something I think everyone should consider. Just because you can observe reality, does not necessarily mean that it is crystal clear. Keep in mind that you are looking through a mirror that is clouded with a lifetime of expectations, flawed by your own imperfect biology. The next time you damn another's ideology consider that they may be seeing the same world that you are, and are conveying it as honestly as you do, but are simply viewing it from another angle, through their own filter. So do not be so sure that you are right and they are wrong. It may not be so black and white.

Also if this is all getting s little too involved for you, maybe you should grab a friend and a beer, head outside, and watch your shadow by the fireside until it makes sense. And if you've never read The Allegory of the Cave, do so. Here's a nice picture. 

Bears with Furniture.

At some point, one or more persons described single men as bears with furniture. Namely, inhuman, hairy, hungry beasts with a knack for getting into the trash. Now some may take offense at this comparison, but as someone who has spent a decent percentage of his life in the woods, eating whatever was at hand and dreading the next time I had to shave, I cannot help but embrace it. As I reach a point in my life where I am beginning to acquire my own furniture, both literal and metaphorical, it only makes sense to adopt this title. Bear with furniture here, prepared to begin logging the occasional thought about this life. Read if you like, don't if you'd rather not.