World of Jonathan berman

It's time we stop separating children from their parents to see if they grow up completely differently... and I am referring to cats and dogs.

Isn't it a bit cowardly for the board of being nice, The "Human Rights Commission" of Canada and the world to go after comedians for making jokes without any hate, yet they don't go after religions for doing much worse like oppressing and killing them?

Yes, because first God was wrathful, then he was loving, and in the third revision he's just a happy prankster.

If God is only going to show up once every two thousand years, I say we celebrate Christmas with the same frequency.

One reason we may find it easier to empathize with fictional characters is possibly because when strangers exhibit their own lives to the world on social media, it's hard not to see it as attention seeking, so one can theorize that movies are training wheels or "empathy machines" as Roger Ebert once said, towards a more caring and inclusive world.

I'm studying types of lamp shades... how different shade shapes direct light. It's like studying different shapes of beverage glasses except it's light instead of liquid... Not the most interesting update, but I'm high on Strawberry Fanta and it's effecting my ability to objectify reality.

I watched that historical retelling, "Dracula Untold" and when the bad vampires burn up in the sun and turn to ash, I thought they could have saved all that CGI money by just showing photos of Anthony Cumia.

I imagine the same people who believe in Mercury in Retrograde are also terrified of Ouija boards.

People say they don't like cats cos they're dicks, but I like cats because they're dicks, and I think they have every reason to be dicks. Imagine if you were taken from your core parental figure as a baby and put with say... a family of giraffes, who 9 times out of 10 didn't really get you, or listen, just treated you like a machine that serves them? If you adopt a cat, a subtle, beautiful, magical creature, you have to listen to them, through their body language, their slow blinks, their energy, their micro-expressions... cats aren't dicks, they're complex, but if you take the time, they are intensely loving, rewarding little creatures... cats are doing the best they can with the information that they have. Are we?

If you curse the darkness, make sure you balance it out with a celebration of the light. The problem is that most are only capable of discerning between two extremes and are utterly tone deaf when it comes to the gray areas... panning for gold is the hard work, and most just don't know how.

I saw one maggot tumbling over another on a corpse and thought, omg, they are having so much fun! I don't know if this is a Zen observation or a psychotic one, but you know, tomato tomahto...

We need to stop treating actors like royalty. Seriously. If I love your movie, that you didn't write, or direct, or do anything but act in, why should I care about every aspect of your life? It's insane. It's sad... we hear about when an actor's family has a health scare, but not about the homeless who need far more attention. We need to stop giving free stuff to celebrities, and stop paying celebrities to ask the poor to give money they don't have, because those who struggle are exploited for their generosity... when one billionaire could solve the problem with pocket change. A small collection of actors could solve the problem in a day.

We need self discipline.
We need to stop making stupid people famous.
We need to stop obsessing on the lives of actors.
Stop feeding the machine of lies and propaganda and exploitation.
Stop feeding the appetites of fear.
Stop feeding the wolf of pain.

And start believing in ourselves again.

By our every thought and deed, we identify as either a drop of nectar in the ocean... or a poison, but whichever we become, the ocean accepts us and either is pleased by the nectar, or saddened by the poison, but the ocean does not judge the oil or the nectar, rather it accepts them all on enriched and open shores.

That which is a liberation in fantasy if it were to happen in reality is a crime against humanity, and yet, the Christian Right are quick to blame videogames for the horrors on the news and not pornography, and that's because it is their hidden shame that fuels their inhumanity, while those who openly suffer and pleasure in empathy seek to help everyone in society. But for whatever you blame, it is not in the release, but the absence thereof... like the built up tensions within the earth that lead to the greater quakes... so does violence build up in the mind of the suppressed.

We, as a people, worry too much about the way people say things... like when did we all become such particular assholes who are uppity about everything from grammar to word choice to approach? Can't we just be bigger people and respond with kindness toward all of these things, and just let some shit go? I think if we did, we'd all be a lot more relaxed, and start connecting a lot more with those around us, and make serious strides towards a better world.

Cats really act like being covered in fur is a blank check of entitlement, but they’ve earned that. Women who used to wear furs acted the exact same way. Seriously, go look at old photos of Zaza Gabor. They want all the benefits of cat entitlement without the suffering of a hyper sensitive metabolism and a short life span. If these women want to earn their furs, they need to give the same love as selflessly and only live like 15 years. It’s only fair.

Carrie says on HOMELAND S07E03 that part of being manic is seeing connections everywhere... but I don't agree with that oversimplification of a definition... people thought I was bipolar for years, since I was little... people still think I am... but I've never been formally diagnosed that, and I believe being bipolar has less to do with seeing connections as much as how you interact internally with the connections your brain makes. Intelligent people see connections as well, we simply process them in a less attached, more interested and digestible way we can turn into a lesson or a curiosity or creative expression... I think the problem with mania is that the connections lead one to spin out of control, while the connections I make actually give me more of a sense of control or understanding, or simply a point of interest... in making sense of the world, or satisfying a curiosity... or creating a chemical reaction that can be used creatively, like mixing two colors to make a third...

It is unwise and imho irresponsible to oversimplify mania or mental illness this way.

We react emotionally because we want to. We choose it subconsciously... a drug that makes us feel alive... but it is an imbalance and balance is not a reaction to circumstance, but a response. We either master our emotions or we are enslaved by them. Blown on the currents of emotional neurochemical reactions like driftwood in water, or leaves on arbitrary winds, but that is all too easy. To feel is important... a beautiful thing even. Feeling puts us in touch with the pulse of our existence, to the muse, to the world, a relay to our senses and all things, boundless between one another... but it is not the end, it is only the beginning. Most people stop here.

But we are meant for greater things, like selfmastery and response beyond reaction. Clarity, measured thought and reason... emboldened to set goals and to reach them. That is the path of true happiness that endures, beyond the fleeting extortion of reactionary living.

When I watch a movie like "The Obama Deception", I am both intrigued and distracted by its precepts. AM I watching an amazing trailer for the greatest Dystopian story never told? or is this just the truth? A documentary? Fact or Fiction.

That the people behind this film like Alex Jones who say that the world is enslaved by the banking system... I heard someone just say, "obviously".... right? Or,*Groan* conspiracies, but just because some conspiracies are debunked... what's that they say about causation and correlation? I believe that we think, and problematically narrowly, that once you can explain a cause and effect, or debunk a mystery, that's it... I believe that be mistaking an echo for reality... we are not machines! We grow, distracting ourselves, but also by teaching us how to wilfully distract ourselves through a multitude of seductions, appetites of the world.

As directed by our puppet masters who direct our thoughts, herding them through carefully cultivated self-shame fuelled self-induced conformity. The appetites of course are enjoyed so it's not really that hard to nudge people. Many of us, if not all of us are asleep to some extent, waking up here and there... who don't even realize that we are fuelling a false emptiness or even a very real one through this carefully directed movie that plays to all our senses... Freedom means, control of the flow of information. Imagine the brain is like a hard drive... well, there's only so much room for so many files and in this way perhaps, through repetition via our senses we come to accept, even demand the gift of our own enslavement. That gift cultivated perhaps through a natural fear and dislocation from reality beyond all of this... but the fact is, it is our responsibility to our children and ourselves to wake up.

I just realized this is also the plot of The Matrix, I've also compared reality to The Matrix, and had experiences from the film, years before the film came out. I'm really not bragging, but expressing a pattern of perspective without that particular influence... but of course those ideas existed before now, before The Matrix, or any other Dystopian film, or my experiences, or perhaps even before I can remember of History...

So, we have to consider this carefully,thoughtfully... breaking down the conversation to the most basic of components... which is best expressed perhaps with a simple question.

and if it is, does it matter? I believe these are two schools of Buddhism being expressed here rather accidentally, I'm really not that smart that I think, oh yes, here is where I'll discuss Theravada and Mahayana Buddhism, I honestly know very little, I think remembering the names was a feat of strength. But I leave that books to those who wish to read them. There are many ways in which to learn, to gain information, the fact is we are reading more today than ever... the question is of course, what is the quality and benefit of the things we are reading?

So many people are on-line so much of their time, but they tell me things like, "Face book isn't meant for this"... for thinking deeply... and I think, why would you want to live your life at all... simply, turned off? And lets not confuse this with letting go, meditating, being carefree, things of a healthy but frivolous nature? I mean some of the time I get, but all of the time? Like you just know you will never be in the mood for reading something deeper? Okay.

Perhaps you get your depth somewhere else. We're just different people, and we all must learn to accept the value for ourselves in what we do, and not expect that from others... that is a by-product of our sickness.

"I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs."
Thomas Jefferson (3rd President of the United States)

The way to control reality, is to control what people do. And to do that you educate them into wanting what you want them to want.

I want to grow penguins the way they grow watermelons in Japan... in squares... and I'll call them Squarenguins. We need more square-shaped pets for the Minecraft kids.

I find it interesting that people believe in all kinds of things from God to ghosts to what people say on TV, but never take a moment to truly question any of it through the powers of Reason and very repeatable experiments. (Fight or flight). We live in a world where no one's sure about anything except the things that cannot be proven and I have to wonder why that is.

I knew something was wrong with my dad when I first found out he kept birds. First of all, you're saying you'd rather live with a dinosaur than your own youngest son, and why would you want to keep a dinosaur in a cage? Hey bird, you were made to fly, so I'll put you in a lifelong situation in which you cannot do that. That's insane.

A friend of mine added me to a group called "FU Trump" and everything posted therein I can safely say is nothing I have any interest in... like there's a post every day about Donald's son getting divorced and I could not care less, and I don't know anyone who cares, and no one comments on those posts, and I think people just talk about things they don't care about, and the world gets a little more apathetic and divided.

I'd like to start a social experiment where we only talk about the things that inspire us, bring out the best in us, and stop obsessing on the things that outrage us...

Remember the story of the two wolves, and if you don't know it, look it up, because it's important. Or look at it this way: We all have a garden in the world, and whatever we do and share is what we cultivate and grow in our garden... so if you want to feel better, if you want the world to be better, you have to take responsibility for what you're planting and watering and growing in your garden.

I see too many people who feed their own egos by obsessing over the things wrong with the world, but not spending enough time creating something to give people an alternative, and that's what we need to do. Give people healthier choices... but we also can't demand they appreciate them... just make them, and eventually when they get sick and tired and want something better, there you'll be, like a bridge over trouble waters...

People always argue the offended, saying, "react to the intention" The problem being particularly in text, this is easier said than done, because we all bring our headspace and triggers to the text. Even when we are clear and seemingly unreactive, open and listening, we still bring our bias and our preferences and our past to the text... which means as a writer it must be stated that the more controversial an idea, the more clear your intention must be... and even then people will misunderstand and misinterpret. The clearer your intention, the more capable the reaction of others can be met with open arms.

What if the people who accuse the compassionate of being SJWs or out of touch are simply misunderstanding that their full-throated preaching is not rooted in they themselves feeling like victims, but simply that they are reaching out in support of actual victims?

They incite people by saying inflammatory things on Twitter with the sole intention of getting a reaction, example: Owen Benjamin tweeted out:

A woman is being raped by a black man, and if you call him a nigger, people will be more upset about your use of the N word than the actual rape, and by anyone arguing with him, he asserts it proves his point, but this is where he's wrong. This is faulty thinking. Racist, violence inciting, Bigoted, Hateful, Demanding, and Petty Negativity. Hypocrisy.

And what are you accomplishing with this kind of discourse? As if you can't be upset about both without taking away from the other? So it's as if he believes he's pointing out to people their misplaced outrage, and they'll just realize he's right and start caring more for the actual victims... seems like a pretty stupid way to try to get through to people, and I'd go so far as to say this is just an excuse so these racist bigots can feel like their hatred and racism is protected and if you call them on it, they'll hide behind the first amendment anyway. But deep down we're talking about racist bigots, true racist bigots... and this form of bigotry and racism is a weed in the mind of the truly pathetic.

The problem is that a Trump presidency has legitimized the attitudes of the bigot and the racist, so now they've all crawled out of the woodwork to spout their hate... but their time will come, and the walls will close in on them, the houses will crumble and fall, they'll be banned eventually from the social media sites... so for the most part we just have to wait them out... a little longer.

I hate people who speak in acronyms, like I don't have so much in my own mind that i can expected to also keep up with your terminology.

I understand cigarettes, but only like the first two drags, after that it don't make sense to me. If you need more nicotine than two drags, you're just indulging, and life is all about balance.

I disagree with the late Patrice O'Neal on a lot of shit, but he's 100% spot on when he says the best relationship is one where the woman loves a man, and the man likes a woman. This is 100% truth. That doesn't mean he doesn't love her, it means a man has to like you as a person for this to last. It's more important that we be lovable, and it's more important that she be likable.

Movie trailers are either spoilers or false advertising, either way, you should avoid watching them. All you should know before seeing a movie is: What genre is it, who's in it, who directed it, who composed the music, and how's the cinematography? That's it. Everything else should be an unknown.