Racism Is Dumb - Science

Racism is dumb. - Science

The physical attributes we assign to race is controlled by approximately 0.01% of our DNA.  0.01%, That’s it.  This means that a human of a different race than yourself is scientifically more similar to you than they are different.  

I was raised in a home where race was never an issue.  It just didn’t come up.  It wasn’t important.  It wasn’t until the school system started to get into history that I was really introduced to the ideas of racism and the horrible things that have been done in times past.  In U.S. history, the two most unfortunate groups of people would be the Native Americans and African Americans, hands down.  Followed perhaps by the Japanese Americans.  We all understand this, and we all continue to pay for it in today’s culture as we try to move towards a better tomorrow.  

It’s difficult for me even today to see the world in color codes. White, black, yellow, red.  It’s just not my first consideration.  I am personally a mutt and have a varied background from Chinese to German and due to my light skin color I am often labeled white.  My friends look at me quizzically when I use the name of Eddie Murphy to remember Bill Murray.  

So when I see the media and people I know get upset over black on white or white on black crime in todays world, it’s difficult for me to wrap my head around the fact that skin color is the most important factor.  If you watch the media it obviously must be the most important factor as there isn’t a headline that doesn’t list the race of those involved.  I’m a police dispatcher and I’m much more upset over the human on human crime that takes place every day in my city.  The domestics, the gang shootings, the robberies, the death of innocent children who happen to be in the cross fire of adults.  As a dispatcher I know there are some bad cops but I also know that most of them are decent people.  Look up what the thin blue line stands for if you don’t believe me.  

I know racism is still alive and well in todays world, don’t misunderstand me.  It’s just not the only thing that should be taken into consideration when a officer kills someone in the line of duty.  I wasn’t there for either of the two cases in the news recently so I obviously will never know all the facts.  I know that both the men that died were resisting arrest after committing a crime.  I really do not understand why someone would resist an arrest for such a minor crime and make it so much worse.  I know that two families will never get to be with a loved one again, which hurts.  I’ve lost a brother due to a car accident two years ago and can at least sympathize with the pain if not the anger.  Two officers have to live with the fact that they took a life while on duty.  I do not believe any of the men involved on either side in both cases are monsters.   They were all human.

That being said, how would you change the laws to make it better if you don’t believe justice was served?  What is your actual solution to such tragedies?  Would you have the officers that protect you and risk their lives every day also risk imprisonment every time they were in an altercation with a human criminal?  Do you think these officers really started their shift that day hoping they would get to kill someone?  That’s a pretty harsh condemnation if you do, particularly since most of us don’t know either officer personally.  (I think most officers just want to make it home to their families everyday.)  Neither of these cases would have made national news if the officer and victim/offender were of the same race.  Should only cops that are the same race of the suspect be allowed to pursue and fight with them?  Call me ignorant or naive if you must, cause to be honest I just don’t understand hate based on race.  If race was the motivating factor behind these officers killing these men then absolutely be outraged.   I’m just not so sure that was the case.


For my fellow 9gagers out there.  Potato.

Family Lost, Never Forgotten.

01/13/13.

My brother Corwin.  They say it was a late morning car crash.  The roads too icy to keep the lane.  He made it to the hospital, but left this world too soon.  The news came crashing in on me, causing cracks in my calm exterior.  As I fall apart with grief my dear friends and family hold me.  Offering what condolences they may, understanding it’s too much.  It hurts how he just recently found a path that brought him happiness with a family of his own.  It hurts, that he is gone too soon. It hurts.  Yet, I know I don’t grieve alone.  Corwin has a large family made up of people he grew up with and those he came to love.  Though time may dull the pain, we will not forget how he touched our lives.  I love you Corwin. 

Dear Corwin:
I still remember howling at the moon with you, as if we were wolves in front of the house underneath the pine tree. You taught me to value family and that wherever you go you can find new pack members to add to one's family. So even though I know you didn't always have it easy, thanks for always taking time to spend with me.
(My last words to him on Christmas Day)

His Reply:

• December 29, 2012
• 

  11:59am

  Corwin D Cornelius

  I am glad to have been able to pass that all on to you Sis and I always got true heart family love for you and yes you are dead right you can make a pack wherever you are Happy new year and belated merry christmas to you as well.

Fitness Apps in Review

On all of the below apps that have social components you can decide exactly how much of your information others can see. I also picked the selection I have because of my cell phone being an iPhone and how the apps work together.  (Zombies is a stand alone app... I mean... it has Zombies what more could you want from it??!)

Zombies, Run! - Git Fit. Escape Zombies.  Become a hero.

iPhone or Android
Expanded Profile on Website 
Cost: $4.99(Got it on sale, usual price is around $7.00)

https://www.zombiesrungame.com

Review:

The fitness portion is hands free and automated after you hit start.  During this time you will enjoy quality voice overs as you are introduced to the inhabitants of Abel.  Between story clips you get to enjoy your own selection of music during which you can have random 60 second zombie chases that can be toggled on and off.  In addition you will pick up supplies during the music portion that can be used to upgrade the town of Abel.

Pro's:  The zombie chases really do encourage you to run faster between their ominous groans and the sonar like beeping that gets faster when you're too slow.   Once you have completed the mission and are on your way home you can continue to do chases as it goes into radio mode for some extra flavor and supply gathering.  If your device is GPS enabled you can also look at your run on a map afterwards for some in depth data of chases, pickups, and speed.  The first mission sets up a nice suspenseful intro.

Con's:  The GPS portion will drain your phone like any other program that uses it heavily.  If you are in an area with poor reception there can be some glitches during chases that cause you to be caught.  The maps of the area you are running aren't always 100% accurate since location by GPS is not an exact science.

Additional Info:   This app was designed for iPhones but has also been released on Android phones.  They offer a 5k training add-on to get beginners into long distance running with some added coaching.  Soon a Zombie's Run! 2 will be coming out as well.  The best part of it all is it's persuaded me to run for longer periods.  I've gone from an average of about 15 min. to 30-45 min!

Striiv:

iPhone/iPod 5 Only
App Cost:  Free


https://www.striiv.com

Optional Equipment:  
Striiv Play - $69.95: A pedometer that syncs with your iPhone/iPod Touch 5 so you don't count steps via GPS.
Smart Pedometer - $99.95 - Touch Screen device that has the Striiv program on it. (No phone required)

Review:

This app at it's core is a pedometer built to motivate.  It keeps records of your daily steps, averages, and time spent walking, and then lets you compete against your friends while also succeeding as a team.  If you enjoy the multitude of Facebook games you may also enjoy My Land which is a built in mini-game that benefits from your efforts.  Energy earned while walking and completing challenges helps you build up My Land and attract animals.

Pros:  My Land can be slightly addictive and make you bummed when you have a bad walk day.

Cons: Prior to it's most recent update the Smart Pedometer didn't communicate with the iPhone app.  This may have been resolved with the latest update but I've been unable to test because we had already switched out equipment.

My Fitness Pal:

iPhone or Android
Expanded Profile on Website 
App Cost: Free


http://www.myfitnesspal.com


Review:

My Fitness Pal is a calorie counter with one of the best food databases I've used.  It's also a social app that lets you encourage your friends as they show progress in their weight loss goals and for logging in regularly.  You can log and keep track of your measurements in a convenient graph.  This app also syncs with Striiv by doing an automatic calorie adjustment based on the activity of your pedometer.  No obvious pros or cons for me, it does what it's supposed to.  The scanner on the iPhone is a bit easier to use than on the Galaxy-Android phone my fiancé has.  If keeping track of calories isn't your style it is skippable.

Aria Wi-Fi Smart Fitbit Scale

iPhone or Android Apps
Expanded Profile on Website 
Cost of Scale: $129.95
Cost of App: Free


http://www.fitbit.com/product/aria/features#wireless

Review:

I know no one needs a high tech scale but I'm a geek and wanted one.  This scale can connect to your Wi-Fi network and automatically update your profile on Fitbit with your weight, BMI, and estimated % of body fat.  The neat thing about the app that goes with the scale is that it has a calorie pedometer that will let you know if you are on track for your daily calorie intake based on your stats.  You can use their calorie counter OR sync it to My Fitness Pal and they will automatically swap weight and calorie data.  The scale can also log up to 7 additional people and know who's who without having to tell it after you set up your profile.  If you have a profile, no one else in the household can know your weight without you allowing them to.  If you're a guest it will be logged onto the online app under "guest".   I needed the scale after stopping my gym workouts(where the scale was) to run around my neighborhood instead.  It helps motivate me to stay on track particularly when my weight is trending towards my goal.  



Maybe Coming Soon:

Gorilla Work Out App -Weight & Equipment Free
Paid and Free Versions 
http://www.gorillaworkoutapp.com

Perspective and Attitude

It’s a New Year tomorrow.  I can’t say I have any burning need to make a resolution other than to stay on the path I’m on.  Philosophy and Psychology…hmm.  Fascinating fields of study.  Started thinking about it after a chat yesterday.  I hadn’t realized how much I had shoved those two subjects to the back burner and it felt like a shock to have them in the forefront again.  It’s not always an uplifting subject and yet it is the key to understanding the world we live in and ourselves.

Can there be wisdom without pain? 

My initial answer is no.  As a child you can’t truly know not to touch a hot burner until you know it’s sting.  Out of pure survival instinct you will never forget that lesson once learned the hard way.  So are we emotionally wired the same?  Does the pain of our emotional mistakes color our perception forever?  Can our faith and trust ever be truly restored?  Conflicted is how I feel about these questions.  On the one hand I want to hold onto the ideal of approaching every person with fresh eyes and not assume who they are based on preconceptions based on prior experience.  Yet past experience is the stick used to measure every new person you come into contact with.  So far the best I’ve been able to come to terms with this thought is to keep my knee jerk reactions in check by questioning them, particularly when they are strong.  On the other hand it would be foolish indeed to completely discount the past and it’s lessons.  If you did, how would you know not to touch the hot burner?  Yet no where can you learn definitively what past experiences are safe to let go of and which you should cling to.  Often it comes down to what you are willing to risk which is subjective to the individual.  For me… my prerogative is usually to avoid deep emotional pain.  Though this seems like an obvious and natural instinct it is one I’m very aware of.  I see how it shapes my path forward and how I avoid making past mistakes again.  At the same time I wouldn’t alter my past if I could.  Every painful moment of my past has shaped me into who I am and I’m content with this.

 In retrospect the happiness and joy in my past has also shaped me.  It is interesting that pain was the first choice I picked to define the self.  I wonder if it is more of an indicator of my personality or of the human experience in general.  Pain is loud and harsh were happiness and joy tend to be gentle.  So in a way that makes the lessons of happiness subtle and harder to learn.  I imagine every person understands how to hurt another, but trying to make someone happy is a tricky slope to navigate.  I know for starters that my definition and basic necessities for happiness has changed dramatically since I was a child.  It’s enough that I’m convinced one must have a firm understanding of self in order to even attempt a successful relationship.  If you aren’t firm on your requirements for happiness, how can you guarantee that your definition will not change?

At one point I know I was content to be what we termed as a happy cynic.  Happy despite of my lack of faith in the world to be good. Overtime this wasn’t enough.  Trying to be happy while discontent with humanity is exhausting and a losing battle over time.  So I evolved when it was more uncomfortable to stay the same than it was to change.  It took an unhealthy relationship and dropping out of college, but I woke up.  That crap in high school of the glass half full or empty and the bit about lemons finally sunk in.  It’s not that I didn’t understand what they were implying before, I simply didn’t understand how to practically apply it or how much it really mattered.  The realization wasn’t overnight but it was transformative.  How could it not be?  It isn’t that the world became a better place or anything but I saw how focusing on what is good in life is so much better for you.  If you’ve never been on the other side of where you are now, try thinking on the other side for a day and tell me how it goes.  If you don't see a difference you aren't trying hard enough or simply don't understand fully what I'm asking for.  

I suppose if I followed a religion faithfully I may have learned some of this sooner but I'm not convinced this is the case.  Despite being a cynic and atheist for a time I've never lacked for a strong moral compass.  I understand that there are many moral codes in holy scriptures which are good to guide one's life by.  However, I've also seen how some of the scriptures are either taken out of context or held onto out of personal bias to the detriment of others.  If you doubt this you simply have to look at history.  Wars and atrocities in the name of a god to spread a doctrine are not rare, indeed they continue even today.  How often do you find a self-proclaimed pious person who is not also willing to condemn those that do not believe as they do?  My perception may be skewed but I think too often.  

So as I transitioned to my optimistic stage with a touch of caution added I decided to be agnostic. Not only because of history or how religion is too often used as a tool, but because it just makes more sense.  If there is a "supreme power" that created and holds the universe in it's sway I can't for the life of me understand how humans can be expected to truly understand or grasp it's definition or design.  I'm also astounded by the arrogance that makes a person think that this "supreme power" would be so focused on their life when we are but a piece of dust on a grain of sand floating through the universe.  Our survival as a species is so uncertain the majority of religions even have doomsday prophecies.  I think this is because we know on an instinctual level how easy and quickly we could become extinct.  We would of course consider this type of an event catastrophic but the universe would simply see it as a rearrangement of particles.  I guess I just went out on a limb and made my own assumptions but rather than term it a belief I would only call it a theory.  A theory that if untrue would be ok with me in the end. 

I reread the above and think I must seem sorely pessimistic still to some.  If so, I ask you to check your knee jerk reaction and simply accept I'm a strange duck.  I do believe tomorrow will bring a better day.  I do have faith that humanity will progress even if it is kicking and screaming the whole way.  I do have faith in the kindness of strangers.  I do believe that it behooves one to be honest, kind, and generous.  I know that with enough determination and grit one can overcome most anything.  I also accept that I may be wrong.  Which means that I can respect the points of view of others as genuinely as I know how and understand that, though vastly contrasted to my own, they are perfectly valid.  I don't claim complete success on this point but I do consistently make an effort in this direction after I get over my initial reaction.  I am not perfect after all, I am merely me and only me.  

It is... relieving to have this on paper rather than jumbling around in my head.  So I'll end by wishing one and all a prosperous and good New Year.  It shall be an exciting year for me and though it came quickly I will do what is in my power to enjoy it.

Duct Work

The room was caught unaware.  In the beginning, it appeared routine duct work was being done in the communications room.  Indeed, we had all had warning that they would be working today from our supervisor.  It was important to maintain the air temperature and air quality in the room both for the computers and people that manned them 24 hours a day.  One by one we put on the dust masks to protects ourselves from any particles that might get in the air as they worked. This to, was routine. What unfolded next was most unusual.

                It began slowly.  None of us knew what was happening until it was too late.  Like a frog who starts off in cold water and doesn’t realize it’s boiling until it’s doomed.  It was so much like something out of science fiction, I doubt you’ll even believe it.  Whether it was the masks or what they did with the ducts is still under fierce debate.  We started to notice something was amiss shortly after the technicians working on the ducts left.  This is why some say it was the ducts.  Still, others say it was the masks because the technicians never used them and were later reported to have no symptoms.  You would think it would be a simple thing to determine, yet no trace or possible source could be found after the fact. 

This is what happened:

                At first the change was so slow no one noticed.  Like the speed fingernails and hair grow slow.  We thought our discomfort due to the masks at first and were happy to take them off, the work being completed.  Then it was like a switch flipped and discomfort became blinding pain.  The center may as well have been unmanned at this point.  What followed may have well been a mass hallucination. Dispatchers and call takers alike started to morph into some crude mix of human and animal.  Body hair grew and became fur.  Where the masks had been became more of a muzzle then a mouth.  Through the pain you could see the look of horror on everyone’s faces as they watched helplessly.  Then one by one we were blissfully granted the gift of unconsciousness.  I’m told a month has passed since that day.  I’m one of the last ones to wake from the coma.  Miraculously none of us bare a mark of what happened that day.  Collectively it’s been decided, with unspoken consent, not to talk or admit what happened that day.  Indeed as I write this I find myself tempted to get rid of these words, like even writing them down I’ll risk getting locked away in the loony bin.  What type of beasts we may have turned into never came to light. 

50 Shades of Grey

Just finished reading the first book in this trilogy.  And like George Takei might say, "Oh my!"

I must say it was a very surprising book for one that is so popular.  I think it speaks to a darker part of our selves, the parts that want to let go of control.  And such an emotional roller coaster as you cheer for Ana to both embrace her dark side and run as far away from it as she can.

I've often thought that we as humans like to complicate our lives.  That the moment things start to seem dull and complacent we subconsciously start to search for ways to sabotage ourselves or cause drama.  Perhaps from a deep seated need to grow as a person knowing it's not spiritually time to be at peace.  I think that's why we find tv shows, books, and movies so captivating.  It gives us a chance to live vicariously through the characters we love, to satiate our need for turbulence while maintaing peaceful lives.

I thoroughly enjoyed the book, I must say.  Judge me how you will.  If you aren't too conservative, I would strongly suggest this book.   If you are.....Well, it might open your eyes anyway.  Though I must say I've never been a fan of pain and probably never will be.

-

Edit: 5/29/2012

Just finished the last book and have decided this is a Mature Adult version of Beauty and the Beast.  Overall an enjoyable story.

Understand

"I think it's worse than sneaky. It inverts things. As long as all churches are UNDER the federal government, then they are equal. Equal? That's not the issue. This is total dominance by the state--also known as totalitarianism.

Freedom of religion means the churches are superior to the federal government in issues that properly do not belong to Caesar--such as how they view sex and what it means in their lives. If people are placed in a conflict between obeying the law of God and obeying the law of Obama, then freedom of religion is being compromised."  -Anonymous Response to http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rev-emily-c-heath/separation-of-church-and-santorum_b_1311650.html?ref=religion




Obeying the law of Obama? O.o  *shakes head in bemusement*  I truly find it disturbing how little I am able to understand where these people are coming from.  Typically I pride myself on being able to see fairly each side of the coin.  To be able to understand.   I wonder am I as much in my own world as they seem to be in theirs?  I mean.... where did Caesar and the "law of Obama" come into the equation?  Do people really think that the Christian faith is under attack?  Or is it simply that offensive that someone else might have different beliefs and that in and of it self is enough of an assault?  It makes me think of the Crusades because heaven literally forbid anyone disagree.  


totalitarian |tōˌtaliˈte(ə)rēən|adjectiveof or relating to a system of government that is centralizedand dictatorial and requires complete subservience to the state : a totalitarian regime.


We are far from being in this type of system.  My goodness we need only to look at countries like Syria to get an idea of what this might really be like.   Ask yourself, would you really want to live in a country ruled by religion?  Perhaps I just can't understand anyone that takes such an extreme stance on things.  Or at least it seems extreme to me.


"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men." -John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton