Monthly Archives: February 2012

The Most Regretful Scholar Ever

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Has got to be the Pseudo-Aristotle:  He thought and wrote so well, people thought it was Aristotle—and thought that way for centuries, back when Aristotle was still a big name in the philosophy racket. Pseudo-Aristotle (whoever he was) gave away his product and renown to a dead guy who already had plenty of both.

“I realized I fucked up signing Aristotle’s name to the frontispiece when I saw people actually believing it was Aristotle’s, and not this thing I had pulled out of my ass. By then it was too late—I couldn’t convince anyone that I had written it.  People just give me that look that says ‘You?! Sydney Applebaum?* You talk like a trooper!’

“Nor can I repeat the performance. My pseudo-Plato material fell flat when I tried to publish under my own name.

“But I tell ya folks, when I was writing The Rhetoric to Alexander, I actually felt like Aristotle, like I was Aristotle! It was quite a rush, except for the appeal to logos part…”

MANDATORY CORNY REFLECTIONS TO WRAP UP AND PURPORTEDLY JUSTIFY PRECEEDING VERBAGE:

Are we not all Pseudo-Aristotles?

A:   uh No…. totally doesn’t apply to my or anyone else’s situation–in fact, it’s hard to think of anyone who’s less like a metaphor of the human condition than Pseudo-Aristotle, even as portrayed above based on limited documents (i.e., no documents).

AND NOW THE FACTUAL BUZZ-KILL FROM WIKIPEDIA:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pseudo-Aristotle:  SAYS:  there were many pseudo-Aristotle’s, not just one, and people were always a little wise to the counterfeiting rings within the larger philosophy gangs that otherwise just extorted people’s minds for bad ideas and deficient lifestyles.

So the joke’s a bust—it’s all been ruined by the facts. I only post it because I’ve developed severe Delete Phobia.

*Sydney Applebaum as a truly famous guy (destined to overshadow Napoleon!) is a running gag from Woody Allen’s Love and Death.

© 2012, Alan Brech

Morning Joe-Maica

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part 6 under construction (a fake ad) but here’s part 7 for now:

Mika: Willie, go check on Richard Haass when you walk around the block sneaking your tokes or whatever you call it, I think he wandered off—

Transition music:  “Lift Up Your Head” by Everton Blender (on youtube)

SHOT OF MORNING JOE LOGO—bong being removed instead of coffee cup yuk yuk yuk

FAKE ADS:    1.  Our product v. their product, Saruman Industries–not as bad as Sauron

                        2. United Health Care MILF/nymph ad

Transition shot:   Morning Joe-Maica logo–bong gets placed down and spilled and sworn at

Transition Music:  “Blacks in America” by Mutabaruka (also on youtube.com)

RETURN SHOT: casual set shot, as if not on the air yet, w/ Mika saying “We never get to do MY stuff!”

Joe:  You a victim?  You wanna blur your face on da TV like a victim?  Teea-Jay, gwanna blur Mika face like da victim she claim—

Mika:   No! Not that again!…I just want to do some of my material for once…sob…

Joe:  Welcome back to Morning Joe-Maica, wheere  ya been a las’ four minutes? While Willie out lookin for Richard ‘aass and avoidin’ de Bloombaerg patrols our own Mika B got some CRUCIAL  information to discuss wit’ ya’ll (he better avoid a patrol—t’ree times I bail his ass out since ’09—dis time, Barnacle, YOU bail him out, you’re his old white uncle!)

Mika: Thank you Joe, yes, I want to read a poem my 10 year old wrote last week with only a little prompting, assistance and copy editing on my part.  It’s called “The Upper-Middle Class Manifesto.”

Joe:     Oh Jah forgive!  How me gwan face me Hill People affer dis?

Mika: “The Upper Classes are decadent in their extravagance, power, and exploitation.

            The poor are distasteful and equally decadent in their self-destruction.

            The Middle Class is too conformist and insecure to live Truly Beautiful lives—

            their tastes and values more appropriate for bee hives

            than for anywhere where anybody who’s actually anybody actually resides.

            Therefore, it is obvious that God Himself must be upper-middle class, hence His impeccable discretion.

            Check, please!”

Isn’t that adorable?

Joe: (to himself, but outloud)  Oh no, now Me c’yan NEVER face me Hill People no more! I lose my base, now I and I stuck in dis place, TRAPPED inna Babylon… Upper West Side say ‘Come on by Joe, we like ya culture! We like how ya bring da Hill People wisdom to our parties—issa like having the museum come to us!’ But none dem tell ya itta trap—you c’yan leave Upper West Side Babylon! You c’yan go back to ‘em Panhandle! Da Hill People ‘ll KILL me now! Look’a’me skin—it almost white fi so much time inna Babylon!

Mika:  Joe, are you all right? And where’s Willie—

Willie: (entering in a cloud of smoke)—me find da ‘aass man! Him a mad trippin’ out on da street! Mad trippin! (laughs)

Mika:  You left him there?

Willie:  He all right, him gwan quit his Babylon servicing job—says he gettin’ all Irie about Heile! Feelin’ Ras-sy about Selassi, getting’ ovah wit’ Jah-hov-ya, wanna safari wit Ras Tafari, groovin’ to God’s Plan ‘Gainst de White Man…

Joe:  How much coffee him a drink?

Willie:  T’ree cups dis time, made INDIAN STYLEE!!!

Mika:  Well let’s hope a reporter doesn’t corner him on the street and get him to say something he’ll regret tomorrow when he’s feeling evil again…. Well, since we did my material I guess we could just end the show after we do another commercial and then come back with the What Have We Smoked This Morning? segment…. We’ll be right back.

Joe:  She’ll be right back—me a’ Willie gwan discuss da news [(wink)] outside witta people—witta Manhattan massive— big up all da bredren inna Brains o’da Babylon Beast!

Mika:  But Willie just smoked!

Willie:  Nah, Mr. ‘aass cut short me smoke—me gwan talk him down.

Mika:  Well, that was nice of you to temporarily forgo your drugs for a man overdosing from his own drugs—

Willie and Joe in unision:  “Ya c’yan ova’dose fi da ganga!!!”

Mika:  You can if you work for Babylon!

Willie and Joe:  (laughing uproariously ) Whoa, Mika B witta funniest shi’ o’ da morning! (Irie Mika B!)

Mika:  Why is that funny? Or Irie? And why am I Babylon?

TRANSITION MUSIC:  “Johnny Drughead” by Mutabaruka (on Youtube)

COMMERCIAL

THE END

(c) 2012, Alan Brech

The Monolingual Manifesto, English Speaking Version

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I refuse to learn any language which has gender. What a waste!

They say all languages and orthographies are “equal” (of course, they say every fucking thing is equal nowadays, and I’m glad they do—saved my ass from clear inferiority) and yet think of all those wasted keystrokes by poor French secretaries and clericals. So much premature arthritis in the fingers! It’s the French equivalent of Black Lung disease (shhh), and it all could have been avoided with a 3000-year-old invention called phonetics. Even still, French spelling bees are won by Indo-French kids.

The other problem with French is that the language itself is so mellifluous that it makes everything sound like love poetry–“I’m taking a dump” in French sounds better than “What a pretty butterfly!” in German (butterfly in German = schmettelinge, to us something you cough up when you’re sick).

And that’s bad. Yes, bad. Not equal, bad: when your ordinary speech is beautiful by itself, it takes away half the motivation to come up with beautiful or incisive thoughts. No wonder French philosophy is so distracted by the surfaces of language and representation–they got the best surface!

Money talks in France just like anywhere else, but apparently bullshit doesn’t walk very far: it strolls and saunters along the boulevard to the admiration of other BS-artists, BS-critics and BS-theorists.

But human variety is good so we love ‘em—over there, in their place, scared of Germany, disdainful of England, in love with the third world and the colonies they kept there for no reason except to mess up America. Or, if they’re here, in such a small minority they dare not act like themselves. Cultural diversity is great until yours becomes just another dead specimen. In Canada they got a reservation for French people called Quebec or “Le Rez” to them: Don’t let the sun set on your fish-white English-speaking ass up there! But if your English-speaking ass is brown, don’t worry at all—they’re very enlightened about race.

THAT, sir—is a digression–a digression, and then a repetition of a digression followed by a self-referential referential repe- kshsh!… (system restore)…oh, slow boot…shit, windows is updating the previous update again…ok, here we go:

Gender has got to be Language’s biggest folly. As a last gasp of Anglo-American imperialism, let’s try to expunge gender from the languages of continental Europe. Come on Anglo-America, we still got it in us—and they know it would be good for them! I’d rather they imitated us in that regard than listened to rap. So let’s not use rap in our mind-warp campaign, how bout:

     One definite article to rule them all,
     One indefinite article to find them,
     (unless the phonemes clash, then use the other one)
     One form for each beast and thing
     One pronoun to describe them!

Perhaps Tolkien is too Anglo to win them over, so instead we could dress it up as women’s liberation or equality or some High Minded Guilt Trip to which Europeans are so susceptible. We’ll use some Frank Luntz verbal-jitsu techniques and call gender in language “sexist grammar” to really make them feel guilty until they abandon it…

Then, maybe then, I’ll learn your language.

© Alan Brech, 2012

Alpha Scholars Say Suck My Theory!

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It is unfortunate when academic debates in the social sciences devolve into thinly-veiled personal references, even when those debates are held at unrelated conventions:
 
Professor A. Nuss: My theory is bigger–it encompasses more case examples.
Professor B. Stiality: My theory is harder, more robust–it requires fewer exceptions and special circumstances for it to work
Professor C. Menn: Oh yeah, my theory lasts longer–it covers a much greater period of time!
Professor D. Ildo: You’re all douchebags–my theory delivers a bigger cognitive payload right in the readers’ face where they love it.
Professor A: Look–all the chicks love my theory.
Professor B: Your Mama doesn’t count!
Professor A: My Mama was a great social scientist, so suck my theory!”
Professor C: No, suck my theory!
Professor D: Gargle my data and swallow my hypotheses!
Professor A: Choke on my conclusions, one at a time!
Professor B: You don’t have conclusions, you just have reconfigured jargon.
Professor A: (hurt) “Reconfigured jargon,” eh?… Wow, that’s kinda personal, kinda hurts…(recomposed) ahh peer-review this, schol-liar!
Professor C: Just suck the theory, get it over with, pretend it never happened, and I won’t remind you until I develop a new one–in about ten hours ah-hah!…
 
Warren Peace: My book’s the biggest, so suck my novel!…
Professors A, B, C & D: (puzzled)…. What are you doing here?
Warren Peace: I thought this was a convention for Victims of the Signature Effect (ViSE).
Professors: It is, but this is the non-fiction and academic section–you want down the hall. Look for Alison Wonderland, Belle Jar, Lord O’Flies, Onda Waterfront, Anne M. L. Farm–
Warrren: Yes, yes, thank you, I think I can make my way there now–
Professor A: Now you might also look for Tequila Mockingbird, she was our keynote speaker for the ViSE convention last year–
Warren: –Yes, yes, thank you, I’ll just–
Professor B: Now if you run into Sergeant Pepper or Colonel Ingus, then you’ve walked too far and gone into the military section–
Warren: –Yes, thank you, yes–
Professor C: And if you see Sy Lent Knight, then you’re obviously in–
Warren: –the Christmas Carol section, right, so I’ll just be–
Professor D: ViSE people don’t call them “carols”–you know, sensitivity and stuff–but yes, that would be the Christmas Song section of the ViSE convention–
Warren: –to which I am late to my subcommittee meeting for people inadvertantly named after great novels they’ve never finished reading, thank you gentlemen and ladies–
Professors A, B, C & D: See ya at the closing ceremonies. Pat McGroin will be speaking!
Warren: …I thought it was the attorney David Boies who was to speak.
Professor A. Nuss:  Not since he changed his middle name and got rid of “Lykes”–
Professor B. Stiality:  –He’s a coward ’round here. ‘Not welcome at ViSE no more.
 
(c) 2012, Alan Brech

Guys B Stupib (part 27)

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Cast of characters:   J.C., a generic Everydude, and Bergda, a generic Everywoman-who’s-slightly-better-than-every-other-Everywoman

J.C. Penny: Wow, she’s so beautiful
Bergda Orf Goodman: Yeah with ten pounds of make-up.
JC: No one wears ten pounds of make-up like she does. I would sleep with her if she wore that mask.
Bergda: The make-up artist responsible for her beauty would probably be more willing to sleep with you, and better at it too.
JC: What’s she look like?
Bergda: Like a guy!
JC: What about with make-up?

(C) 2012, Alan Brech–you can’t make this into a movie without my ok