…and we all know that generalizations are only broad comments and therefore does not apply to everyone.

Here is the original post.

Here is my modified and reversed version.

Have you ever noticed…

• …everyone who tries to advocate an unpopular Biblical doctrine paints himself as heroic?
• …everyone who tries to advocate an unpopular Biblical doctrine paints himself as tragic?
• …everyone who tries to advocate an unpopular Biblical doctrine paints his faith as a different faith from every other faithful follower who has ever followed and come to a bad end from it?
• …everyone who tries to advocate an unpopular Biblical doctrine insists that his path won’t end up where every other follower’s path ended? Which is to say…
• …everyone who tries to advocate an unpopular Biblical doctrine hates it when the historical and logical progression of irrational belief is pointed out?
• …everyone who tries to advocate an unpopular Biblical doctrine paints himself as smarter, deeper, less lazy, and more honest than people who don’t share his faith?
• …everyone who tries to advocate an unpopular Biblical doctrine paints himself as humble, while those who point out the irrationality of the ‘Word’ are arrogant?
• …everyone who tries to advocate an unpopular Biblical doctrine paints himself as nice, while those who point out the irrationality of said doctrine are mean?
• …everyone who tries to advocate an unpopular Biblical doctrine paints himself as courageous, while those who point out the irrationalities of the ‘Word’ are bullies and ruffians?
• …everyone who tries advocate an unpopular Biblical doctrine paints himself as academically sophisticated, carefully nuanced, and wonderfully insightful, while those who point out the irrationality of the ‘Word’ are unenlightened hacks and drooling doubting troglodytes?

I know I preach tolerance and this might come across as extremely hypocritical, but I feel it is something that needs to be said and acknowledged, and that is I hate it when people claim that the world or a country is in decline because of a lack of Christianity –or any other religion, for that matter– and that the best way to revive a society is by having everyone follow this one “superior” religion. I know I said people shouldn’t judge, and I probably should probably take a step back and follow what I preach, but I can’t help but judge people who say those things as narrow-minded. I need to make a few points.

1. Irreligious people are not immoral and completely without virtue. Many of them are very decent people, perhaps kinder and more generous than some religious people.
2. Religion is not God’s word. Religion is human interpretation of God, and there is room for error. Thus each religion has its good points and bad points, and there is no one superior religion which everyone should follow.
3. Difference in religion equals diversity. The only problem is that people refuse to accept difference. If we can learn to accept others for what they are and not try to convert them to our religion and our way of worship, then there is no reason why we can’t all get along.
4. Faith is something which one comprehends with the heart, and not the mind. It cannot be determined by our logic because human logic is too flawed.
5. The truth is out there, but human beings don’t have it. Same reason as that which was stated above.

I have just come back from work. It isn’t particularly rigorous work. I don’t stand on my feet all day. I don’t lift heavy things. I don’t have to smile at customers perpetually even when they’re being jerks. In fact, I’m allowed to lecture my clients, or rather, students, although I don’t like to.

However, there comes to a point when I can’t help but wonder how I’m going to continue with this weekly job of educating people. I’m a tutor. That was what was put on the advertisement. An English tutor, specifically, which means I’m supposed to supplement what is being taught to these children at school, not do the teachers’ jobs. I’m not qualified to do that, and I don’t know if I have the patience. I’ve been doing this job for eight months, and today I discovered that all my attempts to explain more complicated ideas have been in vain, because these kids are so innocent and naive that they looked at me blankly when I mentioned Hitler and Stalin. And they are nine and eleven.

I would have thought that all children knew something about WWII by that age. It was so significant in the shaping of our society, and it was a huge thing for New Zealand and Europe. I don’t know how to even start explaining it in a manner which young children would understand. I know about the annexations, how Czechoslovakia was taken, but these things are all too complicated for children of that age who don’t even know what Nazis are, and their mother wants the oldest one to be able to do well in a scholarship exam with a general knowledge section. I have no idea where to begin; I’m a tutor, not a miracle worker.

It happened so suddenly that none of us were really prepared. It was like watching the Titanic go down and wishing that there was something I could do to stop it, but there was nothing. At least, that was how it felt at the time. In retrospect, it really wasn’t that serious. People come into your life, and people leave it, to quote/paraphrase a favourite actor of mine. Most of us still have one another; it’s just that one of my friends decided that any sort of fraternizing with her enemies equated to ultimate betrayal, or something rather.

Personally, I think whoever tipped her and another person off about said non-existent betrayal was having them on. It was a plan to make them both look like idiots in front of the entire fandom–to isolate them and weaken their powerbase, and it bloody well worked. My friend deleted her forum, which I’ve been frequenting since I had been writing Pirate Kingdom of Troy, and now she’s trying to delete all traces of herself on the internet, it seems, so that she could start afresh. I cannot blame her, as this little episode caused her to lose what credibility she had, and I believe that as it spreads, it would seriously shake the power foundation of that other person who also foolishly persecuted an innocent accused of ‘drama-mongering’.

Remember how your parents used to tell you that you can’t judge books by their covers or people by their appearances? (Well, I hope your parents did.) Unfortunately, although we know not to judge things by the way they look, we still do.

I am one of the most unremarkable looking girls around. Everything about me is pretty average. I’m not slim, I’m not tall, I’m not pretty. My eyes are well hidden by glasses, and last year, I didn’t have the best fashion sense. It was jeans, sweatshirt, sneakers, and maybe a dull coat for when it was very cold. Make up didn’t even feature in my daily routine. People treated me as if I was invisible. I had to walk around them, or they would walk straight into me.

I had a makeover at the beginning of this year, and the change was remarkable. I wear high-heels now( whether they be boots, cut out booties, peep-toes, or just traditional black pumps), and eyeliner, eyeshadow and mascara–that is so I don’t look like a hungover version of my mother. My clothes are coordinated, feminine, and classy; I actually have skirts and dresses in my wardrobe now, and no more polar fleece, except for those days when I can just hang out at home and not see anyone outside of my family. I wear perfume, and I have remembered that I pierced my ears for a reason. The change in the way people treat me has been phenomenal. They now walk around me–and I’m not even about to barge into them. They hold open doors for me. All in all, they take me a lot more seriously, and they respect me. I had expected a little change following the makeover, but that much was just surprising. Maybe even I take myself more seriously now that I look the part. I certainly feel more confident in a pair of high-heels–the sway and the rhythm feels good.

So what does all of that say about our society? I’m afraid it’s not good news. We are shallow people, in other words. Material wealth and sophistication impresses us, despite the fact that we know we shouldn’t. We are always judging others based on our first impression of them, and more often than not, it is a first visual impression. There might be a few people who don’t do this, but they are a minority. In general, we do judge books by their covers.

So, if you want people to respect you and take you seriously, the first thing to do is to look the part. It could be just improving your posture, or you could have a full-blown makeover the way I did. Just a little change goes a long way.

It really has been quite a long time since I’ve updated this blog. I guess fiction writing has taken up most of my time, as well as all that coursework. I’ve been quite deliberate in ignoring the world, actually, so I can concentrate on all the other things which occupy my time. There is no room for pointless cyber crusades against situations I cannot change; those are reserved for holidays when I have nothing else to do, although I have been engaging in an argument about why Kingdom of Heaven is the way it is. I love that film. Maybe I should do a review of it sometime.

I have been pondering about the narrow path. In the New Testament, Jesus says that the path to Heaven is narrow. Traditionally, people have most interpreted that is following one set of extremely strict rules, and that all deviants would go to Hell (or at least not reach Heaven and get eternal life). However, it seems awfully cruel to me. Why would God exclude so many people from His presence? Is he not supposed to be a God of Love, and not the God of Discrimination?

I’ve pondered this for a while, and at one time, came to believe that there were many many narrow winding paths which led to the same destination in the end. That didn’t seem quite right either, so at last, I have come to a conclusion. Acceptance and love for others, no matter how much they deviate from your set of beliefs, is the only way to Heaven. We find it hard to love and accept those who are different from us. In fact, many of us (including myself) do not quite manage it. Since it is so difficult, then is it not the narrow path? If we can all practise acceptance and love, then we won’t have to wait until we are dead to get to Heaven. If you truly love someone, you try your utmost not to hurt them. If we all care about one another to that level, then we will have created Heaven on earth. And that, my friends, is a wonderful thought.

Seriously, I have not read a good fantasy book in a very long time. All right, I have not had much time to read fantasy books, but I have picked up a few recently, and I am appalled at the quality. Have my expectations gone up, or have the standards gone down? I was reading a book about a battle between the Greek and Atlantean gods, and the main character, who is an Atlantean god bound in human  form, is basically the author’s wet dream. In his human state, he is helpless and is a prostitute. She has him whipped, castrated and basically puts him through more hell than I put my characters through, but here’s the twist–he’s not horribly scarred. No, he’s Artemis’ toyboy, and she simply just heals him after everything.

 That’s not even the worst of it; the Atlantean and Greek gods say ‘okay’. That really puts me off the story. ‘Okay’ is American slang. It doesn’t belong in anything set before 1900, much less a time before Troy was destroyed. Honestly, is it just me who’s feeling that fantasy novels aren’t what they were?

The thing with some people is that they don’t do proper research before making arguments–or accusations, in this case. I uploaded the latest chapter of my crossover on Friday, as per usual, and I got a review not long after saying that I’d confused the meaning of ‘hermaphrodite’ with ‘androgynous’, which I did. So I fixed it, and planned on writing the thank you note to the anonymous reviewer when I next updated, but then today, I got this:

you can erase this review as well but that does not change the fact that you
are stupid and a noob. LOL. and you even had the guts to change the chapter
after erasing my review? STUPID NOOB! nothing changes the fact that you do not
know the difference between a germaphrodite and adrogynous! STUPID IMBECILE!
do us all a favor and quit writing all together!

Truth is, the first review got pushed down to the second page. This person only checked the first page when there were nine pages of reviews. Did they really think that their review was so brilliant that it was going to stay on the first page forever? Or did it not occur to them that someone can have more than one page of reviews? I don’t know which one it was, but either way, my respect for this person plummeted. Sure, I’m grateful to them for pointing out the mistake, but it really shows that a big vocab list doesn’t mean intelligence. So, if said reviewer is reading this, thank you for pointing out the mistake, but note that your review is going to get relegated to the third page, or the tenth, sooner or later, just like all the other reviews. Have you noticed that no one else complained about me deleting their reviews, even when they weren’t on the first page?

And for your information, quitting writing is not on my agenda. It might be yours; I mean, common sense is necessary for authors, and if you can’t figure out that there is a second page when there is a drop box with page numbers…well, you know what it means.

Yeah, I’ve had my first week, and it’s run me ragged, not because of the work load (even if I have to catch up with the reading because I’ve been too busy watching Gossip Girl today), but  because I was not fully enrolled until the second day. It just really annoyed me, because I hate having unfinished business.

And one hour in class just isn’t very good for socializing, you know? One of my goals this year is to meet more new people, and it’s sort of difficult for me, because, let’s face it, I’m shy. I’m the type of person who cannot start a decent conversation in real life. I have no problem with typing conversations, or long drawn out monologues, but I guess muses don’t work when it comes to spontaneous exchange without text. I did meet someone when I went to do my placement test for my Chinese course, but I haven’t seen him since.

Well, let’s make a correction to the above paragraph. I am getting to know some people in my classes. History is much too interesting for socializing during class. I love that class, even if  I do have to write a three thousand word essay for it. It shouldn’t daunt me. I’m the girl who can happily write seven thousand words of fanfiction a week. (Not quite, but I did reach that number this week, although it included a snarky reply to the person who sent me that second illiterate flame.) However, academic writing and creative writing are as different as men and women–interpret that any way you will. Then again, the head of History seemed to like my subtle sarcasm that I used for some essays last year. Perhaps I should try that again.

Yeah, I’m procrastinating right now. It’s easy to tell, isn’t it? Having nothing to say, I speak interminably, or rather, write interminably. That’s paraphrased from some guy writing about humanists during the Renaissance. The lecturer mentioned it during class the other day.

So, back to my week. It was dull, pretty much. I had some nice outfits, but considering this is not my fashion blog, I won’t mention them here. You might find some detailed descriptions on Style of Mine when I actually get around to posting there. I want to take photos of my outfits, but I really can’t be bothered posing or going off to get the camera. I’m so lazy, but you’ve probably realized that by now. I have a Chinese oral assignment. The topic is so boring that I am running out of things to say. Just what can you say when you’re greeting a total stranger at the airport? And no, I can’t be sarcastic and silly in my usual creative way, because this is Business Chinese, so it’s formal. Unless, of course, I make up a back story about the journalist and the businessmen she’s meeting. Not sure whether my partner will agree to that. Most people don’t get my sense of humour. I’m still not sure whether it’s my fault or theirs.

I did go shopping on Friday. It’s a highly unhealthy activity for the wallet. I bought scarves, a black, gloves, and my first ever pair of skinny jeans.  Seems like I’m all set for winter. Now, if only I can find some decent cold-weather day dresses…

They might have some of the best make-up, shoes, and handbags around, but I’m boycotting any Yves Saint Laurent products. I have nothing against the man himself, but rather against what his daughter is about to do. She is trying to auction off national treasures looted from China by the French armies which had invaded in the 1800’s, and will not return them to their rightful owners unless China does something about the ‘human rights’ in Tibet. Media exaggeration about the Tibetan situation aside, did the French consider ‘human rights’ when they invaded China and looted the capital city? I think not.

As a country, China cannot sue, but as a people, we can boycott this woman’s company. We might not get our treasures back for a while yet, but we have to show them that we do care; that we have national pride and that anyone who offends us will not get off scott-free. The politicians might not be able to do much to her, but the consumers can.

What is it with me and illiterate flamers? I’ve had two flames so far (not bad for a two year career in fanfiction) and both of them are written by people who cannot use the English language. If I’m going to get flamed, then I’d at least expect to be flamed by someone who knows not to neglect the shift key.

Here’s the latest little gem:

This is the crappist wolverine ooc i’ve ever read.

A) he would never would alow anyone to treat him as you have Aragorn treating
him. B)(he’s not stupid, and he would never act as you have written him. C) He
would not mistake middle earth for france (as old as he is he most likley been
a lot of times) being and allied soldier for wold war II.
_

/individuals/w/wolverine.htm
or
http://en./wiki/Wolverine_(comics)

But given this stated comic sarts in the 70’s he’s aready
60 i’d say he’s older then argorn who’s 83 i think.

_

So given i grew up whith these comics and toons for oh 30 years or more. Let
me just ask – are you fucking stupid? how old are you ? 12? – cuase–you would
have to be to write this shit..plus tolkien is probably rolling in his grave.

This sounds like Ego-eimi, I have to say. He even uses the two fullstops. And he’s supposedly thirty (or older)! It makes you wonder about the education system of the seventies.

Here’s my response: (haven’t actually posted it yet. I hope the person gets it.)

Wow, you’re thirty? Rude language aside, let me just say that your English language skills are dismal for someone who would have supposedly gone through elementary school. May I suggest using spell-check and capital letters at the beginnings of sentences? That would give the impression that you passed elementary school.

 

As for Wolverine, comic-wise, he would be extremely OOC. However, I’m using the X-Men movies for a basis.

As I’ve said before, if you’re going to flame, do as Flame Rising does and leave a signed review or an email address so that I can actually get back to you. My flamer friends all do it. The responses are the reason why you flame. Flames which don’t offer a way for the flamed person to get back to the flamers just makes the flamers look like they know that they can’t out-argue the person they flamed.

So lately, I’ve rediscovered my passion for fashion (and shopping for fashion) and spent many hours on the internet looking for trends and style tips. I came across this site. Untouched World is a New Zealand company which specializes in wool blends using merino, silk and possum fur. I browsed through their winter collection and fell in love with this:

Untouched World Ombre Sweater Dress

This chic item is perfect for winter day wear (or evening wear for less formal events).  It would look great with a thick red belt, a red hat, red gloves, or a pair of black tights with red boots. (I do have thing for red. Can you tell?) The dress is made of  a merino, silk and possum fur blend, which I imagine would make it wonderfully soft and warm. The only problem was the price. Unfortunately, NZ$340 is too much for a student to spend on any dress, no matter how nice.