Posts Tagged bizarre
Chicago Teachers Strike After Venom Is Banned From Classrooms
Posted by Keith Spillett in General Weirdness on September 18, 2012
Chicago’s pro-Venom teacher strike has entered its second week with little hope of a quick resolution. The strike, started by teachers in response to Mayor Rahm Emmanuel’s order to shelve the controversial “Cronos In The Classroom” program, has left parents struggling to find childcare and students ecstatic over not having to be crammed into overcrowded classrooms while being pushed from standardized test to standardized test like a mindless herd of cattle.
Chicago teachers began using Venom songs to help students improve in reading and mathematics. One unit of the program, “Algebra with Abaddon” teaches 8th graders by using problems like this: Chuck has 25 human heads collected for the Dark Lord Satan in his basement while Li has only collected 12. If Li collects 5 heads a month and Chuck only collects 3, when will Li have more heads than Chuck and get to wear the Mark of the Beast?
The program, started by former Flesh Eating Head Wound bassist and 9th grade Chicago public school English teacher Matt Strobe in 2006, was meant to teach basic skills in a way that is fun and engaging. “Much of what students see in the classroom feels disconnected and alien. Many of our students are heavily involved in Satan worship and animal sacrifice. The program was meant to speak to them in a language they understand and can relate to,” declared Strobe during a recent interview with the Chicago Sun Times.
The program was being used in fifteen schools when Emmanuel pulled the plug on it. In spite of being wildly popular with the students and being cited as a major reason that attendance has dramatically improved, Emmanuel felt the program had to go. “Obviously, there were issues over the content of the Venom songs being used. Satanic murder rampages are not something a school should endorse. Still, that wasn’t the main issue. We stopped the program because test scores in math and reading had declined,” said Emmanuel in a press conference last Monday.
The program has been replaced with one called “Consumer Magic”, a series of units meant to teach test taking skills and breed mindless obedience to authority figures and corporations. “Consumer Magic” has been tested in several cities and has led to higher test scores and a stronger willingness by students to engage in positive social activities like shopping and repeating what well-educated adults have already said.
For teachers, the end of a program like “Cronos in the Classroom” was enough to send them to the picket line. One possible compromise is the introduction of a program called “From Bathory to The Boardroom”, a mix of satanic, death-affirming values, corporate ideology and time tested learning strategies. The program is being considered by both the teachers union and the city and might offer a way out of the current impasse.
Free Market Anatomy
Posted by Keith Spillett in General Weirdness on December 6, 2011
The Silent Majority
Right Lung, you work hard everyday to move oxygen into the blood stream. I often find myself thinking that right lungs are the hardest working organs in the body. What you do is a thankless job. You are one of the good, hardworking organs. Many of the other “piker” organs like the liver, the pancreas and the embarrassingly lazy appendix spend their days lollygagging around and benefiting from all the sweat and toil you put in. They reap the same benefits as you for one tenth of the work. Now I ask you, is that fair?
What do you get for all your labor….nothing. Bossed around all day by the Brain. Sure, the Brain sits up there enjoying the good life while you pump oxygen 24 hours a day without a break. Only like 10 percent of the Brain even does anything, Lung. But it feels entitled to tell you what to do? Who gives it the right? The Brain thinks it knows everything, but let it spend ten minutes trying to convert angiotensin I to angiotensin II. Puh-lease!
The Brain wastes all this time consulting with different useless departments like the cerebellum, the parietal lobe and the frontal lobe all the while using the precious oxygen that you generously provide it with. Sipping coffee and making policy decisions while you pump away. Enforcing its sadistic code of anatomical correctness. They redistribute your oxygen to every organ regardless of how hard they work and you get nothing but the short end of the trachea. What is your reward for all of your effort? Nothing but lectures on how you should produce more oxygen just because the body is running or underwater. You go underappreciated while the other organs bask in the rewards of your effort.
Right Lung, I want you to know that there is another way to live. I’m not sure if you are aware of this but the body is essentially a communistic system. All the organs benefit equally, no matter how important their contribution is. What is your incentive to work harder than say, the Left Lung?
As we all know, human nature clearly shows us that we can only be happy if we are pitted against each other in bloodthirsty competition for control of all of the vital resources of the body. Cooperation between the organs has left the lazy viscera sitting pretty while the diligent, enterprising ones do all the work. Instead of allowing this madness to continue, I propose we move towards an “every organ for itself” system.
If one lung produces oxygen really well, I say why punish it for being good at its job? It should be allowed to keep as much of the oxygen as it makes. This way all of the weaker organs will die off and the strong ones will be left to create a better body, without free-riding, parasitic entrails. Let’s face it, you will not be free until the body stops coddling the slothful and the shiftless.
A truly free market anatomy promises each organ will be judged on its merit as an individual and not held back from producing and consuming anything it wants. When the body stops forcing all of the organs to work together in some socialistic form of “harmony” and begins to compensate organs for what they contribute and no more, then, and only then will we be free.
Even A Blind Watchmaker Can Find A Nut
Posted by Keith Spillett in Existential Rambings, Pointyheaded Highbrow Stuff on May 24, 2011
Vladimir: So….you take a watch and you put it in a bag….
Estragon: What type of bag?
Vladimir: It doesn’t matter.
Estragon: Well, what type of watch is it?
Vladimir: Again…not important. You put the watch in a bag. Now, you take a hammer and you smash it.
Estragon: Wait…What?
Vladimir: Just see if you can follow me here. You smash the watch into a hundred pieces….
Estragon: Is it a digital watch or a nice one?
Vladimir: It doesn’t matter….You take the watch and you smash it into….
Estragon: Well, why are you smashing the watch?
Vladimir: Okay, that’s really not important! The important thing is…
Estragon: What kind of lunatic would break a perfectly good watch?
Vladimir: It’s a metaphor. Nobody is really breaking a watch with a hammer. The idea is to prove a point.
Estragon: But how can you prove a point using an example that is completely unrealistic.
Vladimir: I don’t know. It’s not important! Just listen.
Estragon: Well, if it is a digital watch with one of those plastic bands it’s not going to break with a hammer
Vladimir: Fine. It’s a Rolex. A really nice gold Rolex.
Estragon: A Rolex is really expensive. Why would you want to break an expensive watch? And I don’t know if a hammer will break a Rolex into a hundred pieces.
Vladimir: Fine. It is an inexpensive magical watch that magically will break into a hundred pieces. Can I get back to my point?
Estragon: Sure.
Vladimir: Okay, so you break the watch. You shake it up in the bag?
Estragon: Uh-huh.
Vladimir: Does it re-form into the same watch?
Estragon: Well, of course not!
Vladimir: SEE!!!!!
Estragon: See what? I’m not sure I follow.
Vladimir: Evolution is impossible.
Estragon: Wait…What?!?!?
Vladimir: Something has to be there to assemble the watch if it’s going to come back together, right?
Estragon: I guess.
Vladimir: And the watch has been reassembled into a perfect whole, right?
Estragon: That is what you said.
Vladimir: Well, then there has to be a watchmaker who has a plan, right?
Estragon: Uhmmm. Okay. So, who is the watchmaker?
Vladimir: GOD!
Estragon: Wait….WHAT?!?!?!
Vladimir: God is the watchmaker! Otherwise the watch would still be in pieces.
Estragon: Wait…so God reassembled the watch?
Vladimir: YES!
Estragon: Why?
Vladimir: What do you mean why? He’s God. He doesn’t need a good reason.
Estragon: So, God just goes around putting broken watches together? We’re not sure why. That’s just what he does.
Vladimir: Exactly. He loves us. Maybe he wants us to have a nice watch. Maybe he wants us to be happy. That’s for Him to know.
Estragon: If he wanted us to be happy, why didn’t he just stop us from breaking the watch in the first place?
Vladimir: Free will!
Estragon: So, wait, he loves us so much he is willing to fix the watch, but he won’t stop us from breaking it?
Vladimir: Exactly!
Estragon: That’s not a very efficient system.
Vladimir: Well, He doesn’t have to be efficient. He’s God. He doesn’t have to explain anything.
Estragon: Well, if he’s going to go around smashing watches, I think he owes somebody an explanation. That’s pretty rude. If he smashed my watch I’d be really angry!
Vladimir: Okay…forget the watch. We’ll use another example. Pick something.
Estragon: A piece of ham
Vladimir: So, you put a piece of ham in a bag…
Estragon: Ham….in a bag?
Vladimir: Yes! And you smash it into a million pieces.
Estragon: Uh-huh
Vladimir: It still tastes like ham and smells like ham and looks like ham. RIGHT?!?!?
Estragon: Yes…I think.
Vladimir: So there has to be some kind of ham designer, right?
Estragon: Yes…well….maybe…I guess….
Vladimir: Evolution couldn’t have designed ham.
Estragon: Wait…why not?
Vladimir: Because it is perfect.
Estragon: What is perfect?
Vladimir: Ham! Ham is perfect!
Estragon: Compared to what?
Vladimir: To a universe without ham.
Estragon: How can you tell?
Vladimir: God wouldn’t have created it if it weren’t perfect. Ham is in our universe. Therefore, ham is perfect.
Estragon: Okay, now I’m really confused. If God is perfect and created a world that is the most perfect possible world for us, why does he create people who smash ham and watches in bags?
Vladimir: To test us.
Estragon: Why?
Vladimir: To see how much we love him.
Estragon: Oh…so we show him we love him by not smashing things in bags?
Vladimir: Yes!
Estragon: I see. So that’s the point of the whole thing!
Vladimir: YES! That’s the point. We have the choice whether to smash ham or watches or even possums in bags. If we choose not to, we do it because we love God. And if we do that we will be rewarded.
Estragon: With a nice watch?
Vladimir: Maybe with a watch. Maybe with eternal happiness. We’re not exactly sure. We just know that the reward is going to be REALLY good.
Estragon: And if we smash things in bags?
Vladimir: Then bad things happen to us. REALLY bad things. Things like sickness or eternal suffering or boils on our face.
Estragon: Boils on our face?!?!?!
Vladimir: It won’t be a problem for you if you just do what you are supposed to.
Estragon: So these are the rules?
Vladimir: Yes.
Estragon: And if I follow them, I’ll be…………happy???
Vladimir: Unless God has another plan for you. But eventually you’ll be happy. At some point.
Estragon: Will I get a watch?
Vladimir: If that is what you desire and that is God’s plan and you follow the rules then, yes, you will get a watch.
(At this exact moment, a giant meteor hits the earth obliterating smashing it into a million pieces. The entire human race, including Estragon and Vladimir, are destroyed in a firey, horrible instant without warning)
The Tyranny of Tradition 