The Watchful Pelican

It’s a quiet night

Save for the flit and flicker of a fly

Throwing itself against the electric light.

Sometimes you can hear the cracks

Creaking their way down walls

Or the falling of old tacks echoing

Down beige-coloured halls.

I know those noises well,

Inside the little quietness of my

Beige-coloured Hell.

I could sleep now, turn off,

Keep my head down and

Let all those thoughts clod to scrap

Without sound,

Yet something still stirs by the window sill.

The quietness of the night seems

Ill, not at rest, but stretched

And far less calm than mere dictations of time

Might impress.

It’s too quiet to sleep,

And I rather find dreams

In the unmerciful shadows cast

By electric screens.

Only slow weight draws the lids down,

Berates those brain-cells which thought

Stay open,

These last moments are more than tokens

That stay the natural balm.

Yet those cells are broken.

I wish for deeper sleep,

Yet find me none.

And thus I fill my nights

With nothings, one by one by one.

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

This was written by poet William Ernest Henry. At the age of twelve, he contracted tuberculosis and had to have his leg amputated in order to save his life at 17. However, he survived the process and lived to the age of 53.

Invictus means unconquered.

I recently wrote this post as a comment on The Jimquisition on the Escapist website. He’s a great journalist and, whilst it is an opinion piece, he has some good opinions. He recently did a video on the position of rape and murder in videogames; specifically why we’re ok with violence being depicted in huge quantities, but not sexual abuse. The link is here:

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/5972-Rape-vs-Murder

I wrote this short response, but may expand it later. Just my two pennies if you will, but it’s a thought I’ve been considering for a while:

A greatly argued and well thought out video, Jim. You’ve treated the topic with great discretion and forethought, which is fantastic to see on an internet which can often be filled with knee-jerk reactions. However, whilst I think I agree with you on the points you make about rape being a trickier subject then murder, you raised a brief point that I think could develop the argument further.

Murder and rape are the same thing. Or at least, murder as it is portrayed in videogames can be easily likened to rape. You already mentioned that rape and killing are both domination fantasies, a way to express power dynamics between victim and victor, obviously with the intention of making the player feel like the victor. I believe you are one hundred percent correct; it’s a power fantasy through and through.

However, I think that point also goes hand in hand with the fact that violence is fetishized in games. Ignoring the already Freudian symbolism of swords and guns as is (a little too obvious at this point), the act of death has been portrayed in an increasingly pornographic manner. With the popularity of quick-time events and cut scene, close up executions of the enemy, players are basically forced to watch the grisly dispatching of their foes, coupled with dramatic cinematography and what are essentially money-shots of the blood spatters. Whilst extreme examples include the visceral X-ray shots of Mortal Kombat and Sniper Elite V2, even games which are considered ‘intelligent’, like Deus Ex: Human Revolution, are guilty of these methods of display.

I think this invalidates many of the points you made about rape’s superiority in terms of ‘evilness’ to murder. Violence can be impersonal - very few games treat it as such, given how difficult it is to make something impersonal when it requires direct action by the player to achieve. Death is quick - you must have seen the Gears and God of War executions? These methods of death are anything but quick, stretching out the process for as long as possible without breaking flow, to give the player as excellent a view of the carnage as possible. It is a sexual viewpoint - close up, physical, an act of domination. This is hardly a new point; indeed, many critics seem to think that is why rape has become a taunt. Because, you’re not just killing, you’re also raping in a way.

My point is this; I’m not sure whether this discussion is purely about rape being represented in video games. Anything can be represented in any art form, there shouldn’t be any limits to portrayal and discussion. But it does mean we have to rethink our attitudes to the glorification of player actions. Why should the player character always be right? When we have treated both issues with equal weight, that’s when we solve the problem, rather than repeatedly discounting one and accepting the other.

Addendum: Oh, and in answer to both points about violence being normalised and rape being mentally scarring - is that your experience from talking to those people who’ve actually taken a human life in the real world? My encounters with reports from soldiers say that actually taking a life is an extremely difficult thing to do and you’re never the same afterwards. I think those points seriously undervalue what is actually involved in the action of killing.

And whilst you can argue that videogames desensitize the player through distance, that same point could be applied to rape. I’m not demolishing the point, I’m just saying it requires a bit more thought.

I may expand on this later, but rape seems to have become a hot topic in the videogame sphere recently, what with that recent Hitman trailer and the Extra Credits video on online abuse. It will need further analysis.

I have this tumblr, I might as well bally use it. It’s going to become something of a side project to my regular Antillium Whelk stuff, somewhere I can put the thoughts in my head down.

Incidentally, I have Antillium Whelk stuff! This is a literary blog taking the form of a fictional Victorian Collection of Curiosities. Do check it out if you have the time, the pics are all from my local Oxfordian museums, and I’d love to hear feedback on it.

http://antilliumwhelk.tumblr.com/

Whose Babylon is this

Which lies neck deep in dust

Smells between the ancient pillars of rotting birds and must?

It’s statues weathered, half-lidded eyes worn like cataracts

And rusted in those decrepit vaults.

Left as dead gods.

I thought I saw someone sleeping on the stones

Amongst the dry leaves and forgotten thrones.

A king once, his cloak a hollow shroud.

Once strong, once proud.
He had such dreams, of halls that broke the sky
Of walls whose slabs were pages of an epic
Each word inscribed in the granite
Each hall a stanza, each corridor a verse.
And the towers would lift each wandering line high
And cry their poems to the universe.

But with every solitary brick
He built a silent, empty tomb around
Until through stones weary, ancient, thick
Escaped not thought, nor sigh, nor tear, nor sound.
And now he sits amongst a graceful wreck,
Gilded and ornate
It makes him sick

Thus Babylon lies waiting in the sands
“Gaze on my works ye mighty and despair”

Yet none can see but those whose eyes
Are already held there.

As evidenced by the fact I haven’t posted anything up here in months, it should be obvious I’ve entered the traditional apoplexy (great word!) of lethargy I’m so used to. It’s very oddd actually; I have plenty of stuff I want to do, it’s just I have no enthusiasm to actually do it, lie all the energy is sucked out of me as soon as the idea enters my head.

I suppose things just don’t happen on their own. This should really have been blatently obvious, but I have a tenency to plan things for so long I forget to engage the first step, the “planning the sequel before you’ve finished the film” syndrome which proves the deaths of so many.

Anyway, I’m hoping to put together a series of reviews at some point, just as an experiment for a new hobby and keep my film-making and writing skills exercised. The brain is as much a muscle as anything else in the body, and it can wither as much as anything else if not used enough.

Just hope I can get on that treadmill!

Man, who came up with exams as an adequate way of testing people’s knowledge in any subject?

I have now finally finished my English and History prelims, meaning that, unlike every other History student, I am free for an extra day. However, I’ve spent a lot of time helping others with their revision. Why they’re taking my advice I have no idea, I’m hardly diligent in the work department. What I want to express is that when I say exams are actually a really strange way of assessing ability, it is not just a selfish complaint, or an excuse for my own inability to do them all well.

Exams are not their to test your knowledge, that much seems certain. They ask you only a small selection of questions on very specific aspects of your subject, many of which are picked by the candidate themselves. What is more, because some themes are almost guaranteed to crop up, teachers and tutors go out of their way to try and have you revise those certain themes in preparation.

They are not a test of knowledge, but a test of exam school. The marks they give you are a numerical representation of how well you’ve looked over your notes, or how well you’ve crammed the night before. Or your sense of timing. There’s something about having only an hour to perform that creates an erroneous sense of pressure and expectation. Oxford academics constantly go on about how university is an opportunity to study what you find interesting, to expand your mind and think in different ways. Then they give you a list of objectives to do within a time limit. It goes completely against their own philosophy. I’m never going to have to write an essay on the economic policy of Offa in an hour. What’s the point?

And the real kicker? They actually make people worse. Timed essays cause people to panic, which to leads to time spent panicking, which means less time is spent actually writing anything. What is more, exams are built up with such a sense of impending doom that the accompanying sense of dread occupies the students mind, squeezing out whatever knowledge might be there. This only makes the student doubt themselves further, and the vicious circle continues rolling into the abyss of self-deprecation.

Exams are not success stories. They are more akin to theatrical performances than real life situations; the build up to the big day, the endless rehearsals, and benefiting those with confidence as much as those with skill. To those taking exams, do not let them get to you. They have been exclusively designed to mess with your head, so don’t act as they want you to. Remember, they are not the be-all and end-all representation of how intelligent or creative you are.

Now, if only the rest of academia would wake up and see that.

It appears my first year is coming to an end at Oxford. It’s been… intriguing. It’s been an entirely new environment - new people, new living space, new topics for chat, new ways of learning. I won’t lie - to begin with, I was incredibly homesick. I’d been uprooted from my natural habitat, and anything that provided some kind of connection to home nigh on brought tears. But I’ve also learnt a few things about myself.

Suffice to say, relationship building is as much a key part of university as the actual subject. Reworking all your friendships from the ground up is the stuff of nightmares. It’s the first day we never really wanted to enncounter again. But, strangely, it appears to be the kind of situation I excel in. When people don’t know me, I feel that I can be anything. I could create an entirely new image for myself, a different life. That’s never the case of course, but it’s how it starts out.

Oxford particularly has given me an odd base from which to work on. I’ve always been a bit of an outsider (a close-to-arrogant opinion of myself, I’m sure) but here I’m just like everyone else. Not average neccessarily, just more part of the group. And it’s given me a lot of insight to myself.

And do you know what? It turns out I’ve become a bit of an advisor. I’ve never found my self giving out relationship advice. Hell, I’m the last person I’d take such advice from. Yet it’s beeen happening a lot. I’ve helped with other personal issues as well, but this year has been particularly hectic in terms of relationships for some people, and I’ve found my self in the role of consoler and “shoulder to cry on”.

Its not a role I would have expected.

Generally, I am not exactly your go-to agony aunt. I’ve always been too distant, too separated from the group. It’s not that people wouldn’t listen to me, it just always seemed there was someone better or closer at hand. Someone who would have more understanding. I just sat back and try to absorb some good life experience. But here, where everyone is just a couple of doors down, it’s entirely different. Does that say something about me and my nature? Or is it purely a result of the situation, and that I will immediately revert back to my normal reclusive self as soon as I get home?

And if I supposedly give such advice, why can’t I take it myself?

It appears I start a lot of my posts with such a statement these days. Hell, its the noise I make at the beginning of every one of my thoughts. Why? I used to think it was a pondering kind of noise, the kind you make when you’re deciding what to have for lunch or what shoes to where or whether to shout at the bastards outside your window for coming back to the accomodation drunk at three in the morning.

Now, I’m not so sure.

I’ve always been a ponderer. Even my friends noticed it; they’d snap their fingers in front of me as I stared off into the horizon of those weird, purple walls in the sixth-form common room. Everyone has those moments, I guess, where something that doesn’t even exist holds them rapt. But they happen a lot for me. I don’t know why. Maybe because I always find something in that middle distance to look at.

To all those who have seen me zone out in the middle of one of their conversations, I apologise. It wasn’t that you had nothing interesting to say, it certainly wasn’t that you bored me. Its just who I am. I am a thinker first and foremost. I’ve always considered my imagination my greatest asset, and sometimes it gets the better of me.

Maybe one day I’ll be able to put it to good use. For now, it really just serves as a distraction. I like my thoughts, don’t get me wrong - I even write them down occasionally and no-one is more surprised than I am for their contents. I just wished they wouldn’t ambush me on a walk out in the meadow, or at a meal with friends.

Its so difficult to explain that pondering noise and that vacant stare away.

What follows is a somewhat tipsy train of thought. I apologise.

We are not the night. We were built for the day. I saw the sun; bright and cold. It gazed, indifferent, like shimmering waste on the lake, so envious, yet looked on still.

We believe in the moon, pray to the satellites that were once gods. Can we keep praying? Only the dregs remain of a paranoid past which screams at the banshees beyond the haunting. Why? We don’t know, only continue the petty provenances of our creed. Perhaps, when the papers finish at last, and all news is good news, we will stop; let the moon on its way. But blood demands we let it sink, and we shall revel as the dusk turns to ruin on the vast sands of our inadequacy.

I am rambling. I can tell, for the shrill keeening in my memory serves as little tonic to the alternative. If the cries continue, maybe your relationship will heal. But you just keep talking and talking without a horizon to climb, only the echoes to keep the whale company. Did you know it was mourning, or did you carry on spouting your clairvoyant thoughts and leave us normal folk to rot? I know it hurts, like the red hot nail in the palm of my saviour. But he is not my saviour, nor is he yours, but a simple blot without meaning. Take him in your palm and crush.

But my time is ending. Only the fish in times gone past now wait for dawn, The night is young and old and beautiful and terrible, and we are but the serpent in the vine, whispering to the world. Welcome to your life; bitterness incarnate, with an acid tongue reflexively curled around the hand. I am sorry, truly, but the way it must be is curved, not narrow. Life is twisted, but the clouds are shining tonight. My day is here at last.

Well, for those who don’t know, I’m currently doing History and English at Oxford University. I have just finished an essay on Marx and, frankly, I couldn’t be happier that I got it out of the way. No matter what subject your doing, no matter what uni you attend, I suspect we all view essays in the same way.

However, I was very interested in precisely what Marx had to say. I already had a pretty detailed inkling of his theories, but after having read several more of his texts apart from the Manifesto, I feel I now have a very solid grounding. I disagree somewhat with his solution, but his description of the problem is extremely compelling.

Middle-class culture is like a disease. I don’t mean that in a derogatory fashion (well, maybe a little), more in a biological sense. Anything it touches, it makes into a carbon copy of itself. By using cheap commodities and the power of globalisation to create “markets” all over the world, it spreads its view of the society, establishing itself as the superior system. The problem is, one major feature of our culture is the idea of absolutes; we have left and right, public and private, communism and capitalism and that is how it ingratiates itself; it cries out to those who want a middle way, saying it contains the best of both worlds.

But the fact is, there are not two worlds. There are not two options but many. Hell, even within those options, there are more options, all just waiting to be understood and tried. But that’s not what we are taught, because that would be too complicated. Humanity comprehends reality through binaries i.e. opposites as clear as day and night. Its how we best understand the world and we find ourselves shaken to the core if we cannot place things into, say, right and wrong (that would be the biggy.) What Marx suggests is not one of two choices, it is a system of government that has its own rules, its own ways for promoting freedom and justice and all those other things that we believe are purely the provision of democracy.

But as long as the current system prevails, then it is the middle that will survive. The middle route, the fence, the least of how many evils you care to name. We fear extremes; quite literally, we attribute the word “extremism” to terrorism, fascism and a whole host of other evils in the world we wish rid of. I’m not suggesting we go to the extreme of the scale we have at the moment. Just think outside the scales. Once again, I cite Donnie Darko (man I love that film) - “You can’t just lump everything into these two categories and then just deny everything else!”

But hey, what do i know? Either my opinions good, or its worthless. My essay will be good, or it will be bad. I’m either leading a successful life, or wasting it.

Then again, maybe I don’t want to make the decision.

Once again, I find myself up at three in the morning. It would appear now that my sleeping patterns are now completely rewritten. I am quite literally becoming nocturnal. Who knows what might happen?

When in doubt, submit poetry!

What ancient, hallowed earth took you these minds,

Formed from the twisted root and verdant loam?

What distant garden, that man in madness finds,

Did these dwellers call sanctuary or home?

Do they hear the forest’s weeping

As they lie in foregin keeping

Apparent dead, yet softly sleeping.

Did they once hold the pillars of the sky,

Or grip the shifting earth against the ground?

Did they hear man’s long, primordial cry

And guard their babes with shadows all around?

No more the vangards of the wild,

Instead they stay in climates mild

And home, by its own sons, reviled.

As rain comes on, this strong and steadfast soul

Will sprout anew to leave its weathered shell,

Though bark and branch mean little on this gnoll

The seed shall always find where once it fell,

For within the heart of every tree

Regardless of humanity

Lie the ghosts of forests free.

Had some pretty poor essay results to day, so I stuck this together to try and make myself pull the proverbial finger out. Why have I put it up here? So the good people of the internet can remind me to stick to it.

Oxford Manifesto (kind of… you’ve made one for films, why not here?)

• FFS, focus! Don’t keep looking at Cracked.com articles, stop re-watching YouTube videos you’ve watched a hundred times, stop staring at your Steam list not playing any game just because they don’t work the way they do on the adverts or you didn’t make them. Distractions are all well and good, but only when there’s nothing for them to distract you from.

• Less thinking. Remember at the beginning of your year, when you never jumped around simply because you weren’t sure what other people would think when they heard you? You got quite a serious amount of reading done then, even went to the library to work a couple of times. Getting back to that is no bad thing; thinking distracts you from actually writing the essay. If you have a good idea for the essay through thinking, write it bloody down, don’t just keep skipping about.

• Get into the reading. Face it, you actually like the subject you do, as evidenced by the fact you chose it. When you actually pick up the texts you’re supposed to read, you find them enlightening and thought-provoking. Its only getting into them where you have the problem. Once you’re there, you’re fine.

• Stop boasting about procrastination. The aim is not to reach a certain word limit, nor is it to do as much as possible with as little effort as possible. Its a stupid policy, especially if you get this worked up about a mark that is basically average. If you want to do well, read widely, read thoroughly, and then transfer that to your essay in good time to get it in. Just because everyone else goes on about doing their essay at one in the morning. You’re not them.

• Talk to people a bit more. You are at your most relaxed when your not talking to yourself in your head. Social interaction helps you get your thoughts out in the open, and what’s more, it creates friends. Half of university is about doing stuff, not staring at the laptop and moping.

• Get a schedule and stick closely to it. That’s what you were going to do, until you couldn’t be bothered to make writing a schedule part of your schedule. It never got done. What about all those minor things? Student loan details, bass practice, tidying the place, getting yourself a relationship? Whilst these vary in amounts of effort, and some take a bit of time, you’ll greatly increase the chance of getting them done if you actually plan when to do them. Outline which hours in the day are available and which would be most productive for essay writing, or chores or whatever, and then follow it. You’ll find you might have far more free time than you think.

• And finally; if you put “Consider” in your essay one more time, I will shoot you in the leg.

As should be blatently obvious to everyone operating on GMT, I always seem to submit my posts at about one in the morning, or possibly earlier if Im feeling paticularly adevnturous or lucid. I’d like to think this is because I am at my most enlightened. Really, its just because I waste my entire bleedin’ day.

I spend my time on pointless games, pointless books or, worst of all, “think”. My technique of “thinking” involves jumping backwards and forwards around my room, generally throwing something about at the same time. This weird ritual, for some weird reason I’d love a psychologist to explain to me someday, allows me to descend in to whatever mental fantasy I like. And I do men “descend; I merge into these brief little constructions that can center around films, television shows, stories or computer games I’ve created in my head, future professions I see myself in, paths in life I’ve not taken, etc. etc. On the plus side, I maintain a ridculously vivid and surreal imagination (I once heard some one say on the subject of Avatar, “how does James Cameron come up with this stuff?” I briefly wondered if they were joking.) On the downside, its ruined my life.

Its not uncommon for me to spend hours of every day in these bouts of “thinking”. Time can seem to race past as I jump around in my reverie. What is more, its painfully addictive. I look up at the clock and think “just five more minutes of thinking and I’ll be done.” Which, as you can guess, is never the case. I have never spoken to anyone else who’s done this - its not exactly an easy subject to broach - but many people, mostly writers I suspect, would confess to having done something similiar. As a child. I feel like I’m playing a constant game of ‘the floor is made of lava’.

Well, this never bodes well for my academic work. Had I enough hours where I had absolutely nothing to do, essays might eventually work themselves out. But “thinking” always offers me something to do, so in between my other wasteful activities, I can imagine myself as the subject of the current novel I’m reading.

And the assignment just sits there. Boding.

Which leads me to why I write mostly late at night. It seems to be only in this perod, where I’m too exhausted to jump about, too mentally active to sleep. Here is when I generally write out my thoughts or ideas, but they rarely come to much. Its also when I do a fair number of my essays, hence the title of this post; I’ve just learnt an essay I haven’t done over the break may well have to be in for tomorrow. See above. But hell, I’m damn sure I’m not the first one in history to be late with an essay, and I generally get through everything eventually. Given that I’ve written all of this out in my current state shows I’m perfectly capable of reeling off a couple of thousand words.

I just wish I could do it at two in the afternoon.

I wanted to go for a bit more of an exciting theme. So I went crazy. Oh well…

“I can do whatever I want. And so can you.”

- Frank, Donnie Darko

I’ve always been a big fan of ancient mythologies. As far as I can remember, it was the specialist subject I moved on to after Dinosaurs as a child (eight year olds can be so obsessive.)

So, when it comes to Norse, Greek, Roman, Native American, African and various other mythologies, I’m fairly well-read and I’ve come to the conclusion that either humanity is not very original, or there are a set number of deities that have to exist within religion for it to operate correctly. Monotheism has since combined all these various deities into one supreme being (which I think is damaging for so many reasons.) I was thinking of putting these set deities into an ultimate collection, something I called the “absolute tarot”. The Judge, the Mother, the Passion - all of these entities exist in definitive forms in human religion. But the most interesting one, in my opinion, the Trickster.

Trickster is a neutral term for this paticular Aspect. More positively it can be known as the Rebel, the Freedom-fighter, the Defier. The more negative forms are the Lier, the Betrayer, the Traitor. Anansi, Loki, Coyote, Prometheus, even Lucifer himself, all of these characters, whilst not always divine themselves, have done the ultimate - defied the gods and done their own thing, whether that be ultimately good or evil. But why do I bring this up? Because I think monotheistic religions have tried to either do away with it all together, or portray it as an enemy.

Consider Christianity. The closest we get to a Trickster figure we get is Satan in Job or Lucifer in the Apocryphal texts. In both of these tales, the actions are portrayed as the ultimate crime, worthy of eternal punishment. Not only is this a sentence passed down by God. Not only that, it is a judgement that is taught to be accepted by humans as right and just. Do we find a rebel or trickster that works to the benefit of humanity? Well, maybe some of the prophets use their wits to achieve something, but never do they make that ultimate step of defying God himself.

Prometheus on the other hand… well, he goes through an almost eternity of pain (chained to a mountain to have his liver ripped out by an eagle every day, only to have it regrow slowly over night, if you don’t know the story). However, two differences. Firstly, he helps humanity achieve its full potential as a race (I would go so far as to say the serpent does something similiar in the Eden tale by giving us true knowledge, but thats a different debate). Secondly, he defies the rules set down by the king of the gods himself to do it.

I believe we need these characters, no matter how amoral they can be. Precisely because of how amoral they are. Trickster figures are the embodiment of breaking social norms. The ultimate rules set by man are ultimately divine ones, so those who break the divine rules set an incredible precedent to follow. Without a trickster, we have no-one to show us that there is no such thing as an absolute rule, no such thing as a sentence we cannot break, a statement we have to accept. Humanity should never be in a position of absolute restraint. Certainly we must have laws, but we must not think in laws and we certainly mustn’t refrain from questioing why we have those laws in the first place. If we do, we fall into a social mindset that operates only in complacency, accepting things only beacuse that’s the way they’ve always been.

Anyway, to come back to the Donnie Darko quote. The phrase is being said by a character who is divine in his own right, a potent mix of the supernatural and the scientific. But the fact is, he represents Donnie’s own freedom. We maintain a strange illusion that we can only operate within a certain space allocated to us by society. The Trickster shows us the path to freedom.

When it comes to justifying my beliefs, I don’t really think it requires that much justification. Then again, this is often a key feature of belief – it is absolutely obvious to us and anyone who doesn’t think that way is clearly not in possession of as many facts as we are. I am an Atheist, and I confess I may sometimes think that anyone who isn’t just isn’t thinking straight and will probably come around eventually. For this reason, whilst I tell people I am an atheist, I don’t necessarily say why.

The second reason I don’t explain it is that I don’t think many people care. I’m British, and most of my friends seem fairly irreligious themselves. The friends I have who are Christian are nice enough to accept it and leave me to my beliefs without any pious attempt at conversion. The friends who aren’t know and don’t give a damn. Its a little bit of a joke to them actually (probably due to the fact I refer to myself as a godless heathen repeatedly). Justification has never been required.

Finally, I tend to show respect to other religions and the beliefs their followers hold. Being a student of Humanities, religion crops up repeatedly and has always been an interesting and enlightening subject for many reasons. Because of this, I don’t like trying to justify myself because I rather suspect I will use arguments that undermine the core of what people believe and will, ultimately, insult them. That won’t by accident either – deep down, I probably do have incredibly harsh opinions of religion and the effect it has had on history.

However, recently many factors have solidified my opinion of God etcetera, so I feel a ritual coming out might be useful. Wording it is the problem. I’m probably not going to do the whole “intelligent design” versus “evolution” thing, as I believe the scientific and logical evidence is overwhelmingly in favour of the latter. Equally, I’m not going to argue about Atheist morales, because I believe all human beings have an in built morality (a subject for a later time perhaps?)

Instead, I want to say why I’m an atheist as a pose to an agnostic. I want to say why I think there is no God, as a pose to a very low possibility of his existence. These days, its an extremely thin line. Few people out of the world’s considerable population have taken the leap of being completely nihilist in terms of God, but I rather suspect a much larger section are thinking “well, it certainly seems that there is no God, but how can we know for sure?” Most of my irreligious mates operate along the same line.

To begin with, I accept that line of reasoning – sort of. As a rationalist and materialist, I have to rely on the evidence, of which plenty exists in potentia. In theory, there could be evidence that unequivocally proves the existence of a deity mentioned in earth’s many scriptures. However, I don’t think we’ve found it yet by a long shot. That evidence we thought we had has been in no uncertain terms smashed by biology, physics, geology and many other disciplines. I don’t think we will ever find evidence for a God’s existence, at least not one that we’d interpret in a human manner.

If we were to find evidence of a higher power, consider what qualifiers it would have to fit to be “a God”. It would be capable of incredible feats of physics-defying power, creating matter and energy out of nothingness. It would have to be able to spontaneously form all the complex workings of life in a moment. Not only that, but to fit religion’s great qualifier of a universal judge, it would have to be intelligent to the point of the defiance of regular chronology (knowing the past, present and future all at once), it would have to run and keep track of all processes in the universe whilst simultaneously telepathically communicating with the human race and judging every single one of their actions. Why would such an all-powerful cosmic being be interested in us? Or judging our actions? They hardly matter in the context of, you know, the sum of everything ever.

But wait, there’s more! Currently, for God to occupy the gap which we have so neatly created for him, he would have to have existed forever. What? You’re asking me not only to accept all of the above, but that it has no definitive origin? Now I know theists like to wave the banner that states that “something cannot come from nothing” but the fact is it also denies logic to have something so ridiculously complex exist for all of eternity. You’ve not given us a logical choice, only increased the number of illogical ones.

Why does this force (that also has to operate outside conventional time and space) have to be intelligent? Why has it talked to you specifically? It’s far more likely that this force is as much a result of the laws of physics as any other naturally occurring force in the universe. Just because we haven’t discovered what it is yet does not mean God is automatically an answer, or even a possibility. The problem with God is, by the principles very nature, it must deny conventional logic and rules to operate. If it is not timeless, all powerful or all knowing, then its not God. This is, in my opinion, where the argument for agnosticism falls down. We can never find evidence for something that inherently defies our evidence-based approach of looking at the world. It would cause centuries of scientific discipline to be rendered pointless. What is more, and this is much more personal to me, I think a God that did exist would have a much greater influence in our existence than the most basic scientific rules explain. My reasoning: if God is a creator then shouldn’t he be creative? Shouldn’t he be like a great painter or composer or, most accurately, a gardener, tending and experimenting with his creation? If he has expended so much effort in creating a universe, why then let perfectly mundane natural features ruin it with cataclysmic efficiency? To watch? If so, he is little more than some cosmic child looking at us through a grand goldfish bowl, completely devoid of emotion and empathy, as creative and caring as a nebula or black-hole – thus, not God, but just another naturalistic operation.

Finally, I also want to argue against the specific stance of agnosticism, which I believe comes in two parts. 1) The human issue - “I don’t mind God, it’s his fan club that annoys me”. Agnostics often refuse organised religion and the various churches of the world based on errors in human nature as a pose to religion itself. Whilst I accept that humans are fallible in may aspects, and that the teachings of some religions should be examined and remembered, I still believe there is something dark at the heart of all religion, a particularly self-righteous and conservative view of the world which specially emphasises the worst parts of the human psyche. Especially one particular element, which happens to be my second part. 2) The mystery issue - “There are some things man was not meant to know.” Many agnostics believe that we can never know if there is truly a god because we can never have all the evidence. To this I can only answer – bullshit. The thing that makes humanity biologically unique is our ability to question and progress. There should be no subject that is not within reach of our curiosity. Between them, the sciences, the humanities and the arts have tried to argue on some of the most basic questions of the nature of everything. If we can’t fully argue it now, we build new machines, gather new evidence and make new arguments. We should never just stop simply because we are delving into something “forbidden”. It is this one aspect of religion that I truly loathe – that you accept what you are told not only without question, but with the proviso that you will never question it. It is this complete destruction of the curious human spirit that truly turns me against religion.

Anyway, that’s a brief summary. There’s a lot more to it, but be aware that I am writing rather early in the morning, when I should really be sleeping. I might post in the future on the subject of my atheism, but for now I’ll leave this strange ramble as is. Peace!

Well, it looks like I’ve found the perfect time to post blog updates -

i.e. At about 1:00 in the morning, with a headache, music blaring from my headphones. Good times!

atheisticminimalist:

We already have one, but having another couldn’t hurt.

Why can’t I write my thoughts down? I would like to think that my fingers can’t really move across the keyboard quick enough to keep up with my head, but of late I’m starting to doubt whether I have anything of worth to write. Sure, for some people posting what they had for breakfast is as natural to them as eating said breakfast, but I feel I couldn’t articulate what I want to say in any format that would seem appropriate to anyone except me.

Take for example my storyline ideas. I’ve recently become very interested in the film industry – I have downloaded scriptwriting software, starting becoming familiar with editing and have applied for work experience at BBC film. I have endless ideas in my head for storylines for movies ranging from indie on shoestring budgets to huge blockbusters. The thing is, I feel all of them would seem surreal at best to anyone who doesn’t get my imagination. This probably sounds hugely arrogant from the reader’s point of view - “You couldn’t possibly understand my genius because you are not in possession of as incredible an imagination as myself.” Its a little more than self-centred, self-deprecation though.

The fact is, I doubt my ability to do almost anything. The only exceptions to this seem to be acting (which I’ve done a fair bit of) and possibly poetry. This has two major effects. Firstly, I do myself down at every opportunity. I suspect it becomes a little annoying to anyone who knows me – many of my sentences are punctuated by “know”, “I”, and “can’t”. The other is that I can come across as a bit of a praise whore. Any time I am actually complimented or praised for something I have done, I tend to try and squeeze it out for as long as possible in order to prop up my inner deflated confidence.

When it comes to ideas or storylines or theories or whatever, the fact is I don’t think I’m better than anyone else. In fact, I’m probably pretty shocking. However, this opinion may solely be a product of that deflated confidence I mentioned earlier. The real issue is that it acts as a fabulous disincentive for me to do anything. There’s an old saying that goes along the lines of “If you’ve never failed, you’ve never tried” and the fact that I don’t want to fail as I suspect I will, I don’t try. And that in turn means I don’t then take that first step to actually writing something, or speaking my mind, or one of a thousand things that might actually result in something worthwhile.

Then again, I might just be lazy. That’s also a possiblity.

Attending the debate on Trident. Should be interesting… hopefully.

Late update, the Tory party H.Q. has been attacked. Windows were smashed and protesters got to the roof. I always miss the fun stuff.