(no subject)
Because it's a god damn tradition now!
Repost from a couple of years ago... I was lazy last year.
Dear All,
Happy V. Day. Have fun.
I love Amy, passionately, madly, completely. That having been said: I've taken the excuse of Valentines Day to make that unnecessarily public and saccharin statement, and would like to repost something I wrote back in 2005, based on a repost from a couple of years earlier.
Enjoy...
Fuck You day
I hate Vallentines day with a passion that is rare among the happily coupled. There are several reasons for this, but the ones that really stick out are the blatant comercialism, the fact that it makes more people feel bad than good, and simply because anyone who needs a state-rattified holliday to remind him that he (or she) loves someone is a sick fuck who doesn't deserve chocolate.
Blatand commercialism is always a bad thing, but doubly so when it actively detracts from my emotional or spiritual life. I have never been a fan of any major event (Mother's Day, Father's Day, DeBeers Day, etc) that is primarily designed to up the revenue of greeting cards stores and chocolate companies. Don't get me wrong- I love chocolate! That having been said, I am sickened and disgusted when chocolate is the only reason I enjoy a "holliday" designed the promote love. Love is a wonderful and glorious thing, and using it as an excuse to buy dead-tree cards and cheap greasy chocolate cheapens it immensely. Instead of feeling warm and fuzzy by doing something nice for someone I love, I feel like a consumeristic whore without an imagination.
Then there's the issue of single people on Vallentines day. Invariably, I have single friends who feel bad. Looking at myself, I realize that I not only have something they desperately want, but that I am mindlessly happy with it, and really couldn't give a rats ass about anyone other than myself and the target of my undying love and salivations. Realizing this, I feel about as lowly as I possibly can, not because I have something they don't, but because I don't care. They feel bad, because they're lonely, I feel bad because I'm not, and ultimately everyone suffers. Vallentines day is the one day of the year that I actively prefer being single.
Ultimately, it's a matter of ideals. I have no problem loving the people I do. I admit this openly. I tell them this. I make it a point to be good to them year round. If anyone were to tell me "you should rub her neck so she knows you love her. Do it for ten minutes," something inside me asks two questions: "Why? Am I not good enough?" and, more importantly, "What? Why only ten minutes?" This second one is the ugly one. Besides the fact that I am already made to feel guilty for not buying Hershey Hearts or whatever for the woman I fancy, I'm told to do it on one specific day. Can you imagine how cold the world would be if we only showed love on Vallentines day? I know a lot of people who wouldn't get laid nearly as often as they do now. Heck, when's the last time you kissed someone without meaning to show one iota of love? Imagine you only did that one day a year. I know I don't, and so I refuse to honor any holliday that sets aside one day out of 365.25 in the year for love, inversely denying the existence thereof for the rest. That's sick folks. Just plain sick.
In the light of these arguments, I would like to propose something a little bit different. Instead of choosing on day to focus on love and the rest of the year to go about out normal, petty, selfish and abrasive business, let's focus on love all year long, giving our time on February 14th very specifically to a little suggestion by Andrew C. Bulhak-- mostly so it can stay out of the rest of our lives.
-Anselm
Fuck You Day
(or: the guerilla repurposing of a Hallmark Event)
by Andrew C. Bulhak
In a few days it will be the 14th of February; the day when we think of all the people who have profoundly touched our lives and say to them those special words: "Fuck You".
Most people know this day as something else; a Hallmark event during which neurochemically induced temporary insanity is celebrated by spending large sums of money on flowers, chocolate and greeting cards, and wallowing in artificially-induced sentiment. The problem with this holiday is that it excludes those who are not out of their skulls on phenylethylamine. Those who are not in relationships, who do not have a Special Someone in whose name to pad the coffers of florists and gift companies, are marginalized and rendered invisible. If you're not in a relationship, or looking to be in one, you're nothing. Even in this age of political correctness and all-inclusive niceness, this is one form of discrimination that is still wholeheartedly embraced by people who abhor most forms of prejudice and bigotry.[1]
Fuck You Day is not so viciously discriminatory. We may not all have lovers, but we all have irritants. Into every life a little shit must fly, and when shit happens, there's usually an asshole responsible. And there are many forms that these assholes come in; they can be family members, co-workers, classmates, ex-lovers or so-called friends; or they can be strangers; bureaucratic Nazis who refuse to cut you the least bit of slack, or obnoxious neighbors with execrable taste in music, or just the glorps who steal your slack.
For lesser irritants, a simple, confident, decisive "fuck you" will suffice. (Or, if they're an ex-lover, a bouquet of dead roses or gift-boxed roadkill may be particularly appropriate.) But there are some for whom something more elaborate is in order. Something that drives home the message with a personal touch and a perversely loving attention to detail. In short, we are talking about pranks.
Before we proceed any further, faithful reader, we must stress that we do not advocate beating people up, torching their homes or any other such act of unimaginative, meatheaded stupidity. A truly righteous act of vengeance is best worked with imagination, originality and no small dose of irony; in a way that comes out of nowhere and causes the target to realize that they have brought their fate unto themselves; that the trap that has snared them has been lain by themselves. In an ideal prank, the victim is subjected to an act of humiliation mirroring (symbolically or actually) the behavior that first brought them to the prankster's attention and singled them out for a Fuck You Day gift; it would be especially apt if, looking back on the incident, the victim could see several ways he or she could have avoided falling into the trap -- each of which would have required them to stop acting like an asshole. It goes without saying that they should have no recourse; nothing to press charges over, and preferably no tangible evidence pointing to the perpetrator.
Some of the best pranks have an element of subtlety and finesse, a Zen quality of minimalism, in which the prankster's role is merely that of an instrument of fate and the will of the universe (which has a somewhat ironic sense of humour). Additionally, a well-thought-out prank doesn't even have to directly affect the subject; a prank can take the form of a message, in the form of some inexplicable, mediagenic spectacle, which, whilst leaving most observers confused, strikes the terror of the Gods into your intended's heart.
So, this Fuck You Day, think of all the people who have vexed and frustrated you, and let them know that you care.
[1] (Unlike that other holiday, Fuck You Day does not discriminate against those who are happily in love or otherwise not totally disillusioned with the meat market. Rather than saying "fuck you", one can say to the object of one's desires "I want to fuck you". Evolutionarily speaking, it's direct and to the point, without all the superfluous mendacity of flowers, romance and adult-contemporary ballads; and in every relationship honesty is always a good thing.)
Repost from a couple of years ago... I was lazy last year.
Dear All,
Happy V. Day. Have fun.
I love Amy, passionately, madly, completely. That having been said: I've taken the excuse of Valentines Day to make that unnecessarily public and saccharin statement, and would like to repost something I wrote back in 2005, based on a repost from a couple of years earlier.
Enjoy...
Fuck You day
I hate Vallentines day with a passion that is rare among the happily coupled. There are several reasons for this, but the ones that really stick out are the blatant comercialism, the fact that it makes more people feel bad than good, and simply because anyone who needs a state-rattified holliday to remind him that he (or she) loves someone is a sick fuck who doesn't deserve chocolate.
Blatand commercialism is always a bad thing, but doubly so when it actively detracts from my emotional or spiritual life. I have never been a fan of any major event (Mother's Day, Father's Day, DeBeers Day, etc) that is primarily designed to up the revenue of greeting cards stores and chocolate companies. Don't get me wrong- I love chocolate! That having been said, I am sickened and disgusted when chocolate is the only reason I enjoy a "holliday" designed the promote love. Love is a wonderful and glorious thing, and using it as an excuse to buy dead-tree cards and cheap greasy chocolate cheapens it immensely. Instead of feeling warm and fuzzy by doing something nice for someone I love, I feel like a consumeristic whore without an imagination.
Then there's the issue of single people on Vallentines day. Invariably, I have single friends who feel bad. Looking at myself, I realize that I not only have something they desperately want, but that I am mindlessly happy with it, and really couldn't give a rats ass about anyone other than myself and the target of my undying love and salivations. Realizing this, I feel about as lowly as I possibly can, not because I have something they don't, but because I don't care. They feel bad, because they're lonely, I feel bad because I'm not, and ultimately everyone suffers. Vallentines day is the one day of the year that I actively prefer being single.
Ultimately, it's a matter of ideals. I have no problem loving the people I do. I admit this openly. I tell them this. I make it a point to be good to them year round. If anyone were to tell me "you should rub her neck so she knows you love her. Do it for ten minutes," something inside me asks two questions: "Why? Am I not good enough?" and, more importantly, "What? Why only ten minutes?" This second one is the ugly one. Besides the fact that I am already made to feel guilty for not buying Hershey Hearts or whatever for the woman I fancy, I'm told to do it on one specific day. Can you imagine how cold the world would be if we only showed love on Vallentines day? I know a lot of people who wouldn't get laid nearly as often as they do now. Heck, when's the last time you kissed someone without meaning to show one iota of love? Imagine you only did that one day a year. I know I don't, and so I refuse to honor any holliday that sets aside one day out of 365.25 in the year for love, inversely denying the existence thereof for the rest. That's sick folks. Just plain sick.
In the light of these arguments, I would like to propose something a little bit different. Instead of choosing on day to focus on love and the rest of the year to go about out normal, petty, selfish and abrasive business, let's focus on love all year long, giving our time on February 14th very specifically to a little suggestion by Andrew C. Bulhak-- mostly so it can stay out of the rest of our lives.
-Anselm
Fuck You Day
(or: the guerilla repurposing of a Hallmark Event)
by Andrew C. Bulhak
In a few days it will be the 14th of February; the day when we think of all the people who have profoundly touched our lives and say to them those special words: "Fuck You".
Most people know this day as something else; a Hallmark event during which neurochemically induced temporary insanity is celebrated by spending large sums of money on flowers, chocolate and greeting cards, and wallowing in artificially-induced sentiment. The problem with this holiday is that it excludes those who are not out of their skulls on phenylethylamine. Those who are not in relationships, who do not have a Special Someone in whose name to pad the coffers of florists and gift companies, are marginalized and rendered invisible. If you're not in a relationship, or looking to be in one, you're nothing. Even in this age of political correctness and all-inclusive niceness, this is one form of discrimination that is still wholeheartedly embraced by people who abhor most forms of prejudice and bigotry.[1]
Fuck You Day is not so viciously discriminatory. We may not all have lovers, but we all have irritants. Into every life a little shit must fly, and when shit happens, there's usually an asshole responsible. And there are many forms that these assholes come in; they can be family members, co-workers, classmates, ex-lovers or so-called friends; or they can be strangers; bureaucratic Nazis who refuse to cut you the least bit of slack, or obnoxious neighbors with execrable taste in music, or just the glorps who steal your slack.
For lesser irritants, a simple, confident, decisive "fuck you" will suffice. (Or, if they're an ex-lover, a bouquet of dead roses or gift-boxed roadkill may be particularly appropriate.) But there are some for whom something more elaborate is in order. Something that drives home the message with a personal touch and a perversely loving attention to detail. In short, we are talking about pranks.
Before we proceed any further, faithful reader, we must stress that we do not advocate beating people up, torching their homes or any other such act of unimaginative, meatheaded stupidity. A truly righteous act of vengeance is best worked with imagination, originality and no small dose of irony; in a way that comes out of nowhere and causes the target to realize that they have brought their fate unto themselves; that the trap that has snared them has been lain by themselves. In an ideal prank, the victim is subjected to an act of humiliation mirroring (symbolically or actually) the behavior that first brought them to the prankster's attention and singled them out for a Fuck You Day gift; it would be especially apt if, looking back on the incident, the victim could see several ways he or she could have avoided falling into the trap -- each of which would have required them to stop acting like an asshole. It goes without saying that they should have no recourse; nothing to press charges over, and preferably no tangible evidence pointing to the perpetrator.
Some of the best pranks have an element of subtlety and finesse, a Zen quality of minimalism, in which the prankster's role is merely that of an instrument of fate and the will of the universe (which has a somewhat ironic sense of humour). Additionally, a well-thought-out prank doesn't even have to directly affect the subject; a prank can take the form of a message, in the form of some inexplicable, mediagenic spectacle, which, whilst leaving most observers confused, strikes the terror of the Gods into your intended's heart.
So, this Fuck You Day, think of all the people who have vexed and frustrated you, and let them know that you care.
[1] (Unlike that other holiday, Fuck You Day does not discriminate against those who are happily in love or otherwise not totally disillusioned with the meat market. Rather than saying "fuck you", one can say to the object of one's desires "I want to fuck you". Evolutionarily speaking, it's direct and to the point, without all the superfluous mendacity of flowers, romance and adult-contemporary ballads; and in every relationship honesty is always a good thing.)