I was going to write this blog about smokers, but that'll have to wait until next time. I need to focus on another topic while it's fresh in my mind, and everyone elses. I want to talk about the nightmare that some teenagers have to endure every day of their lives.
Amanda Todd, a fifteen year old girl from Coquitlam, recently killed herself because she could no longer deal with the daily torture she endured from classmates at school. Think about that for a second. How bad would it have to be, to decide killing yourself, is a better option than dealing with another day? I am so upset and saddened that kids are resorting to suicide due to actions of their classmates. I wish I could just talk to these kids for a minute before they end their life, and explain that high school is a blip on the radar of life, and nothing outside of high school is even remotely like high school. The nightmare ends at graduation.
I'm not sure as to the solution to stop bullying. Normally, I'd suggest cracking some heads, and slapping some parents (the parents of the bullies). But this might not solve anything. I am ashamed and embarrassed to say this, but in high school, I'm sure some people would have said that I was a bully. Maybe not the worst of the worst, but I know I did things to other kids that were cruel and uncalled for. Looking back, I regret my actions deeply, and if I ever run into any of the people I tormented, I've promised myself, I will humbly apologize and explain my actions were unacceptable. Unfortunately, the damage is done, and those kids can't erase those shitty days from their memory, and can't undo the fact that they have lived their life with unjustified, low self esteem.
You know how parents always tell their kids, "you're not invincible". I've talked to many people my age and we all agree, we never thought we were invincible. The problem was, we never thought of consequences. I guess the end result is the same, but the cause is very different. The things I did when I was younger scare me. I'm sure my mom loves to read this. The things I did as a teenager should have got me killed, or at least maimed. Not that I was half as wild as some kids I grew up with, but looking back at the way I drove, the way I worked with dangerous equipment, the dumb ideas I had for stunts etc. I was nuts. The thing is, I'm the same person I was then. I'm actually a very cautious person, so why was I so reckless? It's like young children that like to play in the mud, and get dirty. At some point we don't like getting dirty. We like to keep our clothes clean, and care what we look like. Why at some point were those things not important to us? Just like as teenagers, some of us didn't think of consequence. Not sure why, but we didn't, and that's why kids bully other kids. I know it's a bullshit cop out, but it's true. When I would make a mean comment, or throw a banana peel at another kid, it was to get a laugh out of the other kids, and maybe by making other people laugh, I'd be a bit cooler, or more accepted. You see a group of people doing something as a teenager and if you do what they do, you fit in, and that seems to be what is important at that age. Not once did I feel bad for the person that was getting picked on. I'm not a bad person, and now I feel terrible, but back then, it's not that I didn't feel bad, it's that I didn't think to feel bad. I never once thought of the aftermath. I didn't think about how that kid would feel, or how it felt to not be accepted. I didn't think that that kids life might be agony, and they might hate every morning, and couldn't wait for the bell at the end of the day, so they could escape the torture and reticule.
Don't get me wrong, some people are just assholes. They were in high school and will be forever. The nice thing is, those people go nowhere in life. Their shit isn't tolerated outside of high school. They may still be convinced they are in the "it" crowd, but the "it" crowd gets pretty small after high school, and most of them end up working at Footlocker or tanning salons for the rest of their lives.
A small action to gain a bit respect from your peers can be devastating on the receiving end. I don't know how to get that into someones head that hasn't yet learned to think about anyone but themselves and doesn't understand consequence.
I think Pink does an amazing job of trying to help kids through the hell that is high school. She has a lot of songs about what it is to be the loser at school. It sounds like she had a rough time in high school. Let her be a shining beacon of reality. She went for the butt end of the jokes to super stardom. I hope people listen to her, and I'm sure they do, and maybe Pink has already saved some lives and helped people through hell.
I don't know if we will ever be able to get rid of bullying, but I wish we could get the message out to the kids that are living a nightmare, that it ends, it's bad, but it ends. I hope we find a way to help these kids, or protect them, or stop the bullying, because I can't handle anymore tragic stories of kids, that should be having the time of their life, so depressed, they can't go on.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocDlOD1Hw9k
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjVNlG5cZyQ
Thursday, October 18, 2012
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
The Sin of Eating
So I had discussions with a couple of friends this weekend about their diets and their reasoning for their diets. Controlling what goes in your body effects how much energy your have, how long you will live, and your overall health. It seems that's a major topic these days. Everyone has an opinion, or belief. There seems to be good reasoning behind most diets, and yet they all seem so different. But I've come to the conclusion that they are all flawed.
Lets face it. If you followed a good, health eating guide, you'd just not eat anymore. Everything is bad for you, or the environment, or your moral standards. If we were all vegan, and glutton free, and only bought within the "100 mile diet", and only ate organic, and didn't eat processed foods, we would have really nothing to eat, except some local, expensive fruits and vegetables, part of the year.
People like to subscribe to one type of diet, and stick to it as if it's the one and only solution. This isn't religion, you can pick more than one.
The human body in an amazing thing. It can process so many types of foods. We have adapted over many thousands of years, to get our energy and nutrition from any source we have available. We also have an ability to remove harmful toxins from our foods. Take alcohol for an example. Alcohol is a poison, not unlike cyanide, or arsenic. If you drink a vast amount of alcohol, it will kill you. If you drink slightly less, you will vomit and pass out. These are probably signs of your body telling you, this is a poison, don't take too much. But if you have a very small amount each day, the long and short term effects are negated by your liver. Our bodies evolved to have livers, so that toxic or poisonous things can be taken out of our bodies, to prevent harming ourselves. If you ingest large amounts of poison, on a daily basis (a bottle of booze, or a case of beer lets say) your liver will be over worked and will at some point fail, but if you keep it to a small amount, your liver will probably last indefinitely. That's the wonder of the human body, it can handle almost anything, IN MODERATION.
Also, everyones body is different, and we all have different requirements in out diets. We are always told that salt is bad and avoid it at all costs, but that's because most foods these days have too much salt in them. But salt is not bad, the average person just needs less of it, but take someone that runs marathons, and sweats a lot, they often deplete the salt in their bodies, and need to take in extra. People also like to avoid carbohydrates, and calories as much as they can. This is simply because people are in the habit of taking in more energy than they are using, but if you lead a labor intensive life, and have a fast metabolism, you might seek out as many carbs and calories as you can stuff in your face. What works for one person, might not for someone else. People that are allergic to peanuts, probably shouldn't eat them, but that's not to say that peanuts are bad for everyone. Everyone reacts different to different foods. One diet wont work for everyone.
Did you ever think about the alternative to what you are trying to avoid? Some people try so hard to avoid something, that they might be putting something far worse in their bodies. Take the atkins diet, or people that use aspertame instead of sugar. Is fake sugar healthier than real sugar? Or are you just replacing diabetes with cancer? Sugar isn't bad, people just eat too much of it. Moderation people.
All the different diets try to avoid one thing, whether it's meat, or animal products, or gluten, or carbs, or growth hormones, or preservatives, or fat, etc. But cutting one or two of those things out is not healthy eating. I can eat gluten free, and have greasy, deep fried, KFC chicken, with bacon on it. Is that healthy? I can be a vegan and eat potato chips and twinkies for every meal. Is that healthy?
There's always a catch. If all farmers were to only grow organic products, production would drop approximately one third. That means there would be one third the amount to go around, which means a lot of people, would starve to death. The world needs a lot of food to feed the masses, and humanity has found a way to deliver. People complain about the way it's been delivered, but offer no solution to produce food as cheap or as fast as it's being done.
Choosing to avoid one specific thing just seems like a waste of time. I doubt that thing that you are avoiding is harmful if you eat it in moderation. Instead I offer the simple advice of common sense. Most of us could afford to eat less meat, less gluten, less processed foods, and less junk food. We could replace said foods with more fruits and vegetables, and foods with better nutritional values than doughnuts, and Doritos. Subscribing to one diet, does not make you healthy, in fact it's probably harmful if you don't research the best way to approach that diet, and know what alternatives best replace the things you are trying to cut out. You know what is healthy and what isn't. Moderation is the key.
Lets face it. If you followed a good, health eating guide, you'd just not eat anymore. Everything is bad for you, or the environment, or your moral standards. If we were all vegan, and glutton free, and only bought within the "100 mile diet", and only ate organic, and didn't eat processed foods, we would have really nothing to eat, except some local, expensive fruits and vegetables, part of the year.
People like to subscribe to one type of diet, and stick to it as if it's the one and only solution. This isn't religion, you can pick more than one.
The human body in an amazing thing. It can process so many types of foods. We have adapted over many thousands of years, to get our energy and nutrition from any source we have available. We also have an ability to remove harmful toxins from our foods. Take alcohol for an example. Alcohol is a poison, not unlike cyanide, or arsenic. If you drink a vast amount of alcohol, it will kill you. If you drink slightly less, you will vomit and pass out. These are probably signs of your body telling you, this is a poison, don't take too much. But if you have a very small amount each day, the long and short term effects are negated by your liver. Our bodies evolved to have livers, so that toxic or poisonous things can be taken out of our bodies, to prevent harming ourselves. If you ingest large amounts of poison, on a daily basis (a bottle of booze, or a case of beer lets say) your liver will be over worked and will at some point fail, but if you keep it to a small amount, your liver will probably last indefinitely. That's the wonder of the human body, it can handle almost anything, IN MODERATION.
Also, everyones body is different, and we all have different requirements in out diets. We are always told that salt is bad and avoid it at all costs, but that's because most foods these days have too much salt in them. But salt is not bad, the average person just needs less of it, but take someone that runs marathons, and sweats a lot, they often deplete the salt in their bodies, and need to take in extra. People also like to avoid carbohydrates, and calories as much as they can. This is simply because people are in the habit of taking in more energy than they are using, but if you lead a labor intensive life, and have a fast metabolism, you might seek out as many carbs and calories as you can stuff in your face. What works for one person, might not for someone else. People that are allergic to peanuts, probably shouldn't eat them, but that's not to say that peanuts are bad for everyone. Everyone reacts different to different foods. One diet wont work for everyone.
Did you ever think about the alternative to what you are trying to avoid? Some people try so hard to avoid something, that they might be putting something far worse in their bodies. Take the atkins diet, or people that use aspertame instead of sugar. Is fake sugar healthier than real sugar? Or are you just replacing diabetes with cancer? Sugar isn't bad, people just eat too much of it. Moderation people.
All the different diets try to avoid one thing, whether it's meat, or animal products, or gluten, or carbs, or growth hormones, or preservatives, or fat, etc. But cutting one or two of those things out is not healthy eating. I can eat gluten free, and have greasy, deep fried, KFC chicken, with bacon on it. Is that healthy? I can be a vegan and eat potato chips and twinkies for every meal. Is that healthy?
There's always a catch. If all farmers were to only grow organic products, production would drop approximately one third. That means there would be one third the amount to go around, which means a lot of people, would starve to death. The world needs a lot of food to feed the masses, and humanity has found a way to deliver. People complain about the way it's been delivered, but offer no solution to produce food as cheap or as fast as it's being done.
Choosing to avoid one specific thing just seems like a waste of time. I doubt that thing that you are avoiding is harmful if you eat it in moderation. Instead I offer the simple advice of common sense. Most of us could afford to eat less meat, less gluten, less processed foods, and less junk food. We could replace said foods with more fruits and vegetables, and foods with better nutritional values than doughnuts, and Doritos. Subscribing to one diet, does not make you healthy, in fact it's probably harmful if you don't research the best way to approach that diet, and know what alternatives best replace the things you are trying to cut out. You know what is healthy and what isn't. Moderation is the key.
Monday, January 9, 2012
A total colapse of Domocracy
When I think of what the role of a government should be, what comes to mind is far different from what we've ended up with here in Canada, and in the USA. The government is supposed to be a body that acts in the best interests of the people on matters such as justice, safety, development, providing necessities, sustainability, providing a financial structure and things of that sort. All of those things can be provided on a very small scale. You could have a government that reprosents a very small population, and still be very successful, and yet, we have governments that are ruling vast areas, and millions of people. When dealing with such a wide variety of landscape, and cultures, you are going to have drastically different needs from a governing body, and yet, we get a blanket solution, that doesn't really meet the needs of the majority.
Take the USA for instance. 50% of the country wants Republicans to represent them and 50% want Democrats. The Dems and Reps have very different ideas on how the country should be run. Wouldn't it make sense to find out where the majority of Republican supporters live, and draw a line, separating them from the Democrat majority area, allowing each area to have their desired government? Instead of a constant battle between the two parties, each could rule the area that supports them. Wouldn't that make a far higher percentage of the public happier with their government? If that would work, why not break it down smaller? Why not have each state be their own country with it's own interests, and own way of governing. I know there would be some kinks to iron out, but the way the system is now, has more than a few kinks to iron out.
If things were on a smaller scale, there would be more accountability. You couldn't rely on votes from people all over the country, you would have to impress the people right at home, in your state, and make sure you keep them happy, or you'd be voted out.
I find that when dealing with the federal government, I am constantly frustrated, and feel my tax dollars aren't going to where I'd like to see them go. I think the federal government is very inefficient, and wasteful of resources. Mind you, the BC provincial government seems equally incompetent. I'm glad the city I live in does its best to separate itself from the provincial government. They opt to use their own police force instead of the RCMP, and are trying to get out of the Greater Vancouver Regional District, so they can run their own hospitals and such. Why are police and hospitals something that needs to be run on a provincial or federal level? A police officer that lives in the city he works in probably knows more of the problem areas, knows the culture, and knows they layout. Why send someone from the other side of the country, to do that job? They might not speak the same language, they might not understand procedures or happening that are common place in that particular city. Not to mention it cost more money to uproot someone, and train them to be able to work all over the country.
A lot of small, successful companies fail after they try to expand. The reason for that is efficiency. As a small company expands, they need more space, more employees and more resources, which raises overhead, and it can be difficult to increase income in proportion to overhead. You might need to hire a manager, or secretary, when one wasn't needed before, and neither of those people are producing a product, so overhead goes up, but production only slightly increases. Or things that used to get done in house, now get subleted, to keep up with demand, increasing the cost of that procedure.
Smaller is better. What better way to control every aspect of something, than to have it small enough to to do yourself. The federal government has lost touch with the bulk of the population and no longer provides the service it is supposed to. The inefficiency is costing millions of dollars that are needed to help the country stay afloat, and help it's people. If you look at the percent of the population that is working in one way or another, for the government, you understand how wasteful the government is. If government was run on a much smaller scale, you could manage with fewer employees. There are too many Chiefs and not enough Indians, which is causing overlapping jobs and major delays in the ability to process anything, and it's costing us as tax payers.
Take the USA for instance. 50% of the country wants Republicans to represent them and 50% want Democrats. The Dems and Reps have very different ideas on how the country should be run. Wouldn't it make sense to find out where the majority of Republican supporters live, and draw a line, separating them from the Democrat majority area, allowing each area to have their desired government? Instead of a constant battle between the two parties, each could rule the area that supports them. Wouldn't that make a far higher percentage of the public happier with their government? If that would work, why not break it down smaller? Why not have each state be their own country with it's own interests, and own way of governing. I know there would be some kinks to iron out, but the way the system is now, has more than a few kinks to iron out.
If things were on a smaller scale, there would be more accountability. You couldn't rely on votes from people all over the country, you would have to impress the people right at home, in your state, and make sure you keep them happy, or you'd be voted out.
I find that when dealing with the federal government, I am constantly frustrated, and feel my tax dollars aren't going to where I'd like to see them go. I think the federal government is very inefficient, and wasteful of resources. Mind you, the BC provincial government seems equally incompetent. I'm glad the city I live in does its best to separate itself from the provincial government. They opt to use their own police force instead of the RCMP, and are trying to get out of the Greater Vancouver Regional District, so they can run their own hospitals and such. Why are police and hospitals something that needs to be run on a provincial or federal level? A police officer that lives in the city he works in probably knows more of the problem areas, knows the culture, and knows they layout. Why send someone from the other side of the country, to do that job? They might not speak the same language, they might not understand procedures or happening that are common place in that particular city. Not to mention it cost more money to uproot someone, and train them to be able to work all over the country.
A lot of small, successful companies fail after they try to expand. The reason for that is efficiency. As a small company expands, they need more space, more employees and more resources, which raises overhead, and it can be difficult to increase income in proportion to overhead. You might need to hire a manager, or secretary, when one wasn't needed before, and neither of those people are producing a product, so overhead goes up, but production only slightly increases. Or things that used to get done in house, now get subleted, to keep up with demand, increasing the cost of that procedure.
Smaller is better. What better way to control every aspect of something, than to have it small enough to to do yourself. The federal government has lost touch with the bulk of the population and no longer provides the service it is supposed to. The inefficiency is costing millions of dollars that are needed to help the country stay afloat, and help it's people. If you look at the percent of the population that is working in one way or another, for the government, you understand how wasteful the government is. If government was run on a much smaller scale, you could manage with fewer employees. There are too many Chiefs and not enough Indians, which is causing overlapping jobs and major delays in the ability to process anything, and it's costing us as tax payers.
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