A Post Post-Election About The Election Results

Now that I've had some time to digest the results of the election and take things into consideration, I feel as though I might as well go about making some long-winded post about it. I mean everyone needs the obnoxious politically-minded friend, so I fulfill that niche.

First off, as much as I may be fuming from the win being the sensitive little liberal that I am, I congratulate my Republican brethren for their victory. Amid the fearmongering and the gerrymandering and the voter supression, there are decent people who had valid reasons to go to this candidate. I said it before and I'll say it again, not all who went for Trump simply did it for the bigotry. I assume that many voters voted for what would be best for the US, not simply for themselves. And though each day in the election brought more astonishment that people still went for this man and the demographics show that white people were mostly supporting Trump (which means that there certainly was a race factor in all of this no matter how much you try to spin it), you stuck through it. Your passion for the man knew no bounds. I hope we can start to bridge the gap and I'll do my part to give the man the benefit of the doubt for a year or two. I won't be any doormat and I will have my reservations, but I'll play nice and maintain a level head. Assuming that he doesn't cross any large lines.

Second, to those who voted for third parties or made protest votes like going for Harambe or Bernie, as much as the liberal in me wants to choke you to death, I can't stay mad at you contrarian rapscallions. A part of me did believe that third parties had some place back then. And if there was any time to protest, this would be the one. You went with your conscience and you voted to protest a disgusting establishment that gave us two of the most unlikable human beings ever as the heads of the major parties. There was some way that people could have swayed you to the other sides but by being dismissive and arrogant certainly was not the right way. I don't have the same feeling for those who didn't vote at all. Especially in this election. Fuck you, you lazy shits.

Third, let's face it, Clinton did not cut the mustard. With Trump, the energy that his supporters had was incredible. They would die for the man. I think the only people who would for her is Lena Dunham or Samantha Bee. She did not captivate the populace, instead assuming that she had this election secured and neglecting the priorities of others. She was artificial and two-faced, with the deception from the DNC looming over her as people paved the way for her to march forward. You can make any argument you want about how these comments about her might just have to do with a sexist society, but you can't dispute that she lost. And the liberal smugness clouded the frustrations that people had with the general establishment. It may only serve to cloud further to reprimand the half of the nation that mobilized themselves enough to move forward.

Fourth, while there's a lot of factors to take in such as the intensity of the Republicans to block the Democratic vote, the passion for Donald Trump in compared to the lukewarm reception for Clinton, third-parties or protest votes taking away from Clinton, or the Democrats' utter complacency to the whole system, to me the greatest factor in this election was the media. The fucking media didn't shut up. They hyped everything to insane levels. They took the bait that Trump laid out every time and put a nice big BREAKING NEWS graphics package in front of it. You can either see them as playing into the status quo and neglecting the real anger that people had with politicians or as riding the sensationalist rollercoaster, using false equivalencies and hot air to fill in the void of true conversation about policy. Personally I see them more as the latter, since money runs their industry. Trump ruled the airwaves and the thinkpieces. And perhaps we can also be at fault of that for taking it in, but we were far past the point where we could have averted this.

Finally, amid all of this I say to all of you that it is not over. The election was close. There is still ways to push back. In a way, we can see this awful victory as a grand wake up call. The politicians didn't take the prospect of a man like him getting as far as he did, and he made it to the farthest point he could. Remain attentive and maintain the passion you have. The political infrastructures that we depended on were filled with termites. They are now being knocked down by a bulldozer with a huge shiny Trump logo on it. And in this wreckage we must restructure ourselves and push to prevent the radical or the incompetent from coming to fruition.

Don't look just to 2020 to prevent his second term, look to anything that comes near. I don't think that Democrats playing the obstructionist card will do any good. And I say that not because they have little sway in the government. But because that only furthers the frustration. The voice of the people must be heard and if that voice can stride for unity, for the betterment of the nation, they will follow it. I may not be proud of this election, but goddamn it, I'm still American! I still can see hope since there are still checks and balances in place! I believe that we can get through this! So let us keep going! For if America is terrible now, then we must try to make it great again.

Rock The Anti-Vote

It seemed as though God decided to bring the scares of Halloween early in the year by essentially subjecting the world to one of the ugliest American elections in history. I mean it’s quite horrendous that out of all the millions of people the 50 states could hold, they could only consider a rotting pumpkin-headed bigot-billionaire and a two-faced millennial-baiting robot as the best candidates to represent them. These two are hated not just by their opponents, but even by people who are under their party. They’re both corrupt, pathological liars, guilty of some sort of crime and driven by their egos. And as each day marches on they essentially drown our poor neighbours to the South with scandal after scandal. And boy it’s not like the third parties are really throwing any life preservers. What with Johnson being the libertarian scarecrow in desperate need of a brain and Stein being a green witch whose magic spells give people smallpox because they believe vaccines cause autism.

Now I’m one of the (un)lucky few who was able to vote in this election. And I certainly have been quite invested by the whole process. Seeing Barack break the black barrier and facing the eight years of vitriol that the right had thrown on him had me hooked on the political circus. Adding on a news media that at best was sensationalist and at worst partisan, the unmitigated gall of the standard politico’s penchant for lying, and the comedians who took it upon themselves to make the days’ events more palatable to the youth made me feel like there is something so beautiful about the broken system. And well, why not throw my pebble to the pond? I was sure 2016 would be just fine.

But then the US got to where it is now. And some of us have done some soul searching.

Over the years, the way in which I viewed the political world in the US was from a very typical point of view. That being that as a young man, I was staunchly Democrat and you dirty Republicans couldn’t convince me otherwise. Indeed, I still find myself holding on to the left, especially given the current circumstances. But I’m sympathetic to the Republicans. It seems quite unrealistic that we cannot focus on the reasonable Republicans, on the moderates. Such seemed so alien, so contradictory in the media lens. And indeed I was finding myself more disenfranchised by the Democrats who seemed not to do much about what they talked about.

Even amongst this election, with an orange clown constantly tripping and saying that he never slips, and the venomous alt-righters who would happily make a conspiracy theory about how what Clinton eats is actually supporting the terrorists and call you a shilling cuck if you disagreed, I do understand why this race is closer than we’d hope it to be. I see why people can’t trust Hillary because I felt the Bern and found myself aflame after the DNC leaks. I understand that are people who would like some better border protection who aren’t doing so out of a bigoted mindset but rather a frustration and insecurity that they feel. Most importantly, for as much as I love being on the left, Christ Almighty there are some obnoxious and ignorant people who only serve to belittle you because you don’t toe their line.

The US was building up to this powder keg exploding, with the divisiveness only growing with each coming year. It would have been so nice to see some peace and compromise, to find our leaders being more reasonable and shaking hands. But it’s foolish to hope for that in 2016 after the birther issue, the Benghazi scandal and the government shutting down like a Windows 10 computer abruptly updating. America was on the edge from all the stress that the government was causing. 2016 is the electoral equivalent of screaming at a pillow and punching a wall; our anger just had to come out – we could no longer kid ourselves with the façade of civility we were maintaining.

This election has been so much of a burden, so much so that even here in Canada, I feel it necessary to talk about it because of just how much it affects the world. We mull through the speeches, the scandals, the think-pieces, the surrogates, the news coverage, the jokes, the memes, the conspiracies, the comments from strangers, the arguments with parents, the tacky merchandise, the inner thoughts and the policies of each candidate and we still feel unsure of what will come. Moreso, we feel unsure of if our decision is the right one. Not many of us Americans who vote will be completely confident in our candidate. And more so than any other year, we will vote more because of how much they can’t stand to see the other one take the helm. Such may be run-of-the-mill of elections. But in this one, we’re tired of it all. We just want some calm. 

Note: I'm well aware Halloween has passed but this was written before such.

The Quagmire Of The Latino Electorate

With the election being so close to being over you can taste the post-result riots, I've been thinking about if I should even bother to talk anymore about what's been going on. After all, there's only a few more weeks left. It would be hard to change anyone's mind about anything at this point. Anything that should be coming out of an op-ed on the election would just be a reinforcement of the author's decision or weeping for the sanity of the nation. But I'm not going to bother with either one. Anyone who knows me knows who I'm going for, why I'm going for them and why I'm not happy about it. So rather than dwell on my choice, let's dwell on the choice of the demographic that I'm part of: Latinos!

As anyone who's breathing can tell you, Latinos have been all abuzz in the 2016 election thanks to the comments that the Donald opened with when he threw his golden Made-in-China hat into the ring. When he called Mexicans drug-dealers and rapists, the left burst into moral outrage and promptly called him a racist as he crushed Republican after Republican. The idea of the wall resonated with his core, and it certainly was more of a draw when Donny threw in the added caveat of Mexico having to foot the bill. Once he got the nomination, there was more mention of Latinos in the election. For every ten or so mentions of the criminals, he would utter that "he would get the Latinos" or that "the Latinos have been betrayed". With comments like those, Democrats couldn't help but laugh and consider them the ravings of a madman. After all, they know that in their heart of hearts that us Latinos would be so adamant to march behind them after what Trump said.

Now they're not wrong. But they're not right either.

The first thing to point out is that Latinos are not all Mexicans. I would say that this stems from a bigoted, ignorant right but even the ever-so-refined left seems to lose sight of this. Latino pretty much has just been the more sophisticated way to refer to Mexican, and it's not without reason. Mexicans are the largest part of the Latino demographic. I can't be complaining too much about them going for the main sub-section of the Latinos if they want to get the votes, but this simplifies the way in which people view how other Latinos feel politically. For example, Cubans are usually more on the Republican side of things since a good portion of them fled from the socialist Castro. Perhaps the Venezuelan-Americans are no different. You're not going to see that intricacy, that subtlety. And in fairness, it's not like there's much opportunity for that to flourish. The conflation of the Latino and the Mexican in American is far too powerful that it eventually does cause the demographic to become monolithic by force.

Secondly and more crucially, the driving issue behind the courtship between the politician and the Latino demographic is the one of illegal immigration. Democrats often bring up the way that the Republicans have pandered to xenophobic tendencies in regards to the issue. They pull out story after story about the cruelty and heartlessness of the deportation process and feel as though their pandering through these tales will get the Latinos hook, line and sinker. And here's where the issue comes in. Not all Latinos illegally came to the US. In fact, they're kind of annoyed that there are these illegals coming in, because it hurts them too. As sympathetic as legal Latinos can feel about the struggles of the illegal immigrant, they also feel as though them getting the easier way in is a slap to the face to them. Legal Mexicans are particularly annoyed as it only feeds into the stereotype they're fighting so hard against. It essentially drills in the illegal immigration issue as the main and perhaps only Latino issue the big politicians will address.

It seems shocking for some to think that there may be Latinos out there who might actually be in favor of stricter immigration laws. The idea seems treasonous to the left, because it seems that if you're a minority, even thinking Republican is absurd. Yet there are many Latinos out there in the US who are opposed to the influx of migrants coming into the country. There are Latinos out there who would like to see some sort of border protection. Maybe they might be in favor of that wall with all its conditions or maybe they're just interested in seeing something like that. These people exist. Democrats don't see that. They neither see that Latinos generally are pretty tense with the US in general. I mean removing Mexico from the equation, the US has had its field day during the Cold War readjusting the powers that be down in the South. Furthermore, while Democrats may be awfully good at pandering to Latinos, they're awful in helping Latino communities. I've said that Republicans are a bad joke but Democrats are weak satire and part of why I said that was in regards to the Latino issue. They talk a big game about fixing the system but these communities still are as underdeveloped and crime-ridden as before.

Even though these complexities do exist, it is clear though that this time around us Latinos will go for Clinton. How many of us truly trust her may be hard to say but we certainly feel that Trump is not going to do us any favors. That's not to say that there aren't some Latinos out there who could be for Trump. Though if you're looking for a reasonable one who doesn't indulge in gross self-loathing of their own culture, you're not gonna find it in Marco Gutierrez, the leader of the movement. It's more that the majority of the Latinos have come to the point that it may just be better to head left than anywhere else. Even with their faults, it is important to recognize that Democrats are at least more open-hearted on the surface level. And there are those odd candidates who actually make some concerted efforts to improve the situation.

But then there are those like Ana Navarro, who while rejecting the Republican nominee, does not reject being a Republican. There are probably many of those like her that people may not be aware of. If people are able to see more of this diversity that does exist in the Latino communities, perhaps the issues can be brought to the table in a more reasonable fashion. Heartier debates about the problems Latinos face can be addressed. The evolution of politics stems from unorthodox perspectives being shown a greater light. In this election, the issues were too simplified. Cynically it could be said that all elections are like this. But I hope that might be able to change. It'd be nice to see more of the diversity among us all with the bigotry of the nation quelled. And it would be nice to see Navarro run in 2020.

In God We Cybertrust

Technology is great. From Bill Gates being able to turn poop into water, to the looming prospect of a 3D printer and self-driving car in every home to the high speeds I can download hardcore BDSM pornography to my computer and then have the ability to plaster it on monitors on Yonge-Dundas Square, it is everything and more that the great Negroponte-damus could have ever thought to have conceived and more. Our modern world has made dreams thought to be impossible come true as the capabilities of devices grow ever more as the years go by.

Of course, the greatest advent of them all is that little thing we call the Internet. Ah, the Internet…it seemed like such a bizarre niche thing in the past. The personal computer wasn’t much with the people, with those who had it seeing it as a cryptic device that was dug up from Area 51. Graphics really had you stretching your imagination and the slow speeds gave you enough time to watch all three Godfathers on VHS. The internet itself wasn’t much to talk about, with few sites to visit and not much satisfaction coming at it as a result. If this was the cybernetic future, then boy did it seem lame. Advertisements didn’t help with the random assortment of polyhedral shapes and vector grids, the very primitive-looking rendered environments and of course any assortment of jet black, midnight blue, neon green or hot pink your little eyes could handle. It all seemed cheesy and absurd. I mean come on, you’re telling me that this little screen’s gonna take over my life? I believe you…NOT. TV will remain supreme and so will Blockbuster. So later, you loser nerd! Have fun with your stupid Apple stocks!

But much like vaporwave which adopted the aesthetics of the Web 1.0 era, the internet became shockingly successful. As computers began to improve, so did the internet. People who found themselves shackled to the grip of the television now found themselves switching to the computer and adding on the weights of the smartphone to it. More and more of us have become enslaved to the digital devices and the services that it provides. All hail Google, all hail Facebook, all hail Amazon! I am but a mere ant amongst your digital might!

Okay, I’m being quite pretentious with how tangled our lives and our devices are. And I know how us millennials feel about it when people start to go on their Luddite rant about how “technology is making us less social not more” and “how we’re so dependent on technology”, be them old farts or young farts. As a Computer Science student, I certainly find myself rejecting the negativity that people have towards technology because if that shit catches on then I’m out of job and I’ll be damned if I have no secure fallback getting out of university-I’M NOT GOING TO ROT ON THE STREETS YOU FUCKS. But you know what, I can certainly sympathize with them.

Technology, for all it’s awesome advances, also brings about horrible realities. Unmanned drones can kill hundreds in the blink of an eye. A hacker can access your bank statements in a couple of seconds. And the government clearly is spying on so many of us masturbating to pictures that could very well incriminate us. Our lives have become far more intertwined with the technological advancements that we’ve made. Things can become fads and obsolete at faster rates than we can even comprehend…and that’s not just the memes. Life is truly hyper accelerated and what keeps up still running are those devices that push us faster through the day.

I certainly find myself being incredibly aggravated by those who don’t see the massive reach that our devices have to spheres of the world as perhaps aiding in the way we relate to each other. Surely because someone is on their phone does not mean that they can’t be texting a loved one. There is emotion behind what some may see as obsession with an infernal anti-social magnifier. But it’d be foolish to say that we aren’t obsessed. I mean we’ve all been in that odd situation where we’re among friends and it seems like everyone else is on their phones despite there not being a real reason for it. Sometimes we’re the assholes that are just too immersed in some Vine or Twitter war to be more “social”. We may not be sheeple, but that doesn’t mean we don’t occasionally let out a “baa” once in a while.

More so than that, I believe that because of just how powerful our technology has gotten that we’ve managed to create a second self as a result of it. I refer to this self as the technological self, one which has a virtual face and a hardware core. The virtual face is one which changes drastically on the avenues that it traverses on the internet, it is the million of avatars that we all adopt. The hardware core is the all the information that we choose to amass and save onto our devices. Be it our stories, our memories or our shitty jokes. The technological self is both as mortal as we are and able to transcend time even beyond our death. For it is vulnerable to many attacks, ones which can destroy it quite significantly and hurt us too in the process. But is also able to leave our imprint, be it through folly or through triumph.

So to you I say but one thing – be aware of your technological self. Know that it can be susceptible to damage, so that you find about how conversations of cybersecurity can help maintain its sanctity. Know that it as big as you make it out to be, so be mindful of what you store and how you store it. Know that its beauty can be masked by its ugliness, so tread carefully. And most of all, know that there are cybernetic gods out there, some benevolent and others not. So be aware of their actions and be conscious of their motives. For soon they may reach us closer than they already do.

You Realize That This Means Culture War

In the wake of the 2016 election, we have come to see the rise of the alt-right. The alt-right is the answer to the question “What if the obnoxiousness of the liberals was combined with the blatant racism and conspiracy theories of right-wing radio hosts?” though a more concise way to see it is as one commentator put it, “fascism but with memes”.  I would say that’s the weirdest thing to come out of this year but this year has already brought Brexit causing a mini-global financial panic, a senseless violence conga from the West to the East and the most hated people America could offer being the nominees to run the nation into a second civil war, among so many other insane stories. Rest assured though, the alt-right is still in the Top 10, because it’s not exactly something that’s easy to talk about with sensible, normal people. It’s about as weird as explaining some sexual slang that Stephen Colbert uses to my mother. I mean we’re all adults here, but there’s just something so immature and bizarre about the whole thing. Much like the alt-right.

Like any modern political movement, the alt-right came about from the recesses of 4chan and Reddit, happily listening to Alex Jones grunt about globalists and sneering at progressives for being no-good cucks. At the time, there wasn’t much to be said – they just kind of seemed like disgruntled white dudes who wanted to use the privilege of anonymity to say terrible things. Then the election saw that Trump, a man who had a hatred of anyone who wasn’t white (yet had no problem with his own reflection) was not only winning, but he was being as politically incorrect and aggressive as all fuck. Thus, the alt-right came out of their basements and goose-stepped out on the streets to rally behind the man who would bring about the promise of a greater America.

Once the nomination was a lock for Trump, the alt-right could happily dance on a fractured GOP as they laughed uproariously at Sanders supporters who either sighed deeply and went with her or want to see what a lame-brain libertarian or consistently-losing green could offer them. The left pretty much wasn’t left much to retort – no matter how many times they shouted Donald Drumpf, it didn’t stop the incessant cuck-calling. They were free to spam their intolerant, nationalistic garbage around the internet, filling the media up with so much bile that Ann Coulter could come out of the ooze and plug her new book The Liberals Are A Bunch Of Fucking Cunts.

The alt-right found itself a powerful ally in Milo Yiannopoulos, an only-gay-because-I-hate-women-so-much media commentator, who fought the good fight for Gamergate despite making it very clear he fucking hates those fat virgin loser gamers. Milo knows that the way to get people to listen is to be outrageous as possible. Saying that you want to be straight as a gay guy might not be all that shocking, but saying that you want to be straight to become more oppressed? That’s gonna draw the eye…and a ton of laughs, but nevermind that– they won’t laugh for long. He turned the whole ridiculing spectacle from the left-leaning entertainers and the flamboyancy of the LGBTQ community into tools for the alt-right to use and abuse, ensuring that they would get significant attention for their batshit crazy thoughts and for their incessant spamming of the death of one particular gorilla who I’m so fucking sick of hearing about.

The alt-right has a significant amount of footing in place and they’re not as different as their more measured folks in the same political wing. Both after all agree that Obama and Hilary are a mistake, Islam is a threat to the West, and that the illegal immigrant issue needs some serious reform. The only difference is that the alt-right will call you a shill and a cuck if you disagree with them. They’re far more intense about their beliefs and they don’t fuck around despite how much of a joke I may make them out to believe. They’re a strong virus from the partisan plague that has continued to fester in the US, with this year being the moment that it turned into a complete epidemic. After all, it’s not like nationalism or insane right-wing politicians are only a US thing.

It’s a shame that we’ve gotten to this point where moderates, compromise and nuance are as absent as the headphone jack on an iPhone 7. But I suppose it’s hard to expect unity in the US unless we get horribly attacked. Even then, good luck trying to get us united. It’s not to say that the alt-right is the sole culprit of the division or even one of the greater pushers. Sure, they’re a radical bunch who’d happily tweet out KKK quotes under the handle of AryanWhitePower1488, but the Tea Party hasn’t helped in bridging that divide. The deadlocked congress hasn’t helped. Real Time With Bill Maher or The Daily Show or Last Week Tonight or really any political comedy show hasn’t really helped. But the alt-right certainly has shown that we’ve taken our division to another level.

I guess I can’t exactly pretend like I don’t have my own passionate political biases. Anytime I hear someone praising Hugo Chavez, I restrain myself from wanting to choke someone to death. Politics are always going to end up stirring enough emotion among people to get them to hate long-time friends or family members. And certainly this year is going to bring that divorce rate up higher than the number of emails that Hilary has deleted. Even when the election ends, there’s going to be a whole lot of anger about who wins and people will still be at each other’s throats. There seems to be no grey in the black and white world that has been created. Certainly the alt-right sees itself on the white side and will do it’s best to maintain this simplified world along with the smug left. I hope that things aren’t as grim and divisive as they seem. But if not, at the very least I hope they stop saying cuck so damn much.

Types of hypocrisy

“The hypocrisy about hypocrisy is that it’s only hypocrisy when you’re not the hypocrite” - Anonymous

Hypocrisy! We’re all guilty of it. Whether we’re having a fun time with friends or trying to conduct ourselves as professionally as possible, we all seem to have fallen into that all-too-human error of acting in contradiction to ourselves. It’s something that we chastise others for doing but try to justify when we do it. Hypocrisy is what makes the follies of man all the more interesting. It’s what keeps the world both rotten to its core and functioning effectively. But hypocrisy is not some simple phenomenon. In fact, there’s a variety of ways to express hypocrisy. That’s where this comes in.

Mind-game hypocrisy

Mind-game hypocrisy is hypocrisy that focuses on the hypocrite using quite a twisted set of logic that leaves their audience in a daze over their hypocrisy. It’s a hypocrisy that mostly finds its way in politics because it thrives on misleading and confusing people and lord knows that's all politics is about.

Flip-flop: Perhaps the most well-known form of mind-game hypocrisy, flip-flopping focuses on switching sides on a position very often. It makes it seem as though the hypocrite really has no true opinion on a matter since flip-flopping tends to be seen as a reaction to shifts in environment. It could be the case that they are in the process of informing themselves on a subject but never are able to properly plant themselves on a side. So when they’re asked about it on multiple occasions, they’ve found themselves swayed by different information each time, leading to a different conclusion. It may also be a reaction of peer pressure that stops them from standing firm on their opinion in certain places.

Rick is running to be mayor of the city. When asked about the issues with infrastructure, Rick says that he will fix it by putting private companies to take care of it. However, when he goes to districts where union-workers live, he says that he will only let the unions handle the infrastructure issue. But realizing that he’s angered private companies, he then says that he’ll allow for both of them to work on certain projects. With both sides pressing him as well as non-union workers, Rick tries to gravitate more to them, despite not really having much of an interest in the infrastructure issue itself.

Doublethink: Doublethink comes from the George Orwell classic 1984. In it, he describes doublethink as simultaneously holding two beliefs that contradict each other as being true without being torn by cognitive dissonance. Now, while it can be argued that doublethink is not exactly hypocrisy (since hypocrisy is more on the contradiction of actions or statements rather than accepting the contradiction), it certainly is a tool of the hypocrite since it does rely on a false appearance. For doublethink serves to paint the acceptance of a contradiction not as a fault but as a positive.

Jane is an advertising executive for a soda company. She makes the point that the soda is the best thing in existence one day, never drinking the soda at all on that day. The next, she remarks to a client that the soda is the worst tasting thing ever, having already downed twelve bottles of it. Each day her claim will be inversely proportional to how many sodas she’s had, but she is equally as confident in saying either statement despite this.

Mystery-box hypocrisy: This form of hypocrisy is somewhat similar to flip-flopping in that there is a lot of sides that are switched around. But where as flip-flopping tries to create a semblance of a belief being cemented to mask the lack of an actual opinion, mystery-box hypocrisy makes it clear that there is some belief that actually exists but it’s unclear to the audience which one is the true belief and which one is the contradiction.

George is a stockbroker whose talking to his friends about how the market is doing. In one conversation, his friend is asking if he should try to push for any stocks in mining companies. He advises against it saying that those stocks are always risky. A week or so later, another friend asks George about stocks in mining companies and he says that he should go for it as they’re very stable and safe. George himself keeps very hush-hush about his stocks, so neither friend is sure of what his actual stance on stocks are. 

Preferential hypocrisy

Preferential hypocrisy is hypocrisy which hinges on preference playing a factor into it. It’s the sort of hypocrisy that can be boiled down to “well if X does it, it’s wrong, but if Y does it, it’s a-okay!”

Dismissive hypocrisy: This is when a hypocrite makes the point that their act of hypocrisy is not that big of a deal because the matter itself was not something that they were incredibly passionate about. It tries to minimize the damage of the hypocrisy by making it seem as though there wasn’t much damage or effect on the act itself.

Jake asks his friend Sandra to set him up with a date with Marissa. Sandra says okay and brings it up to Marissa. Marissa says to Sandra that she’d never date Jake because she’d never date a guy who doesn’t know how to cook. Later on she dates Neil, whom Sandra is friends with. Sandra knows that Neil doesn’t know how to cook and confronts Marissa about her claim. Marissa scoffs at her comment and says that she wasn’t being serious about it.

Contextual icing: The contextual icing is when a hypocrite makes the point of adding a detail to the situation that attempts to justify the hypocrisy. This one is particularly tricky because there are instances where context does have a significant factor in changing a situation, thus rendering the claim that such a belief is hypocritical to be moot. What makes the context a contextual icing is when it is a very minimal factor that gives the illusion that there is more to the situation. Much like how a cake with a thin layer of icing is not much different than an identical one without it since it can be removed with just a pass of a finger over it.

The police arrest two individuals that were charged with the same crime. The first individual gets the standard ten-year sentence while the second one gets a lighter sentence of five months. When a reporter asks the judge why the second one was given a lighter sentence, the chief responds that the second individual was a woman and thus did not deserve such a harsh sentence.

My-Way-Or-The-Highway hypocrisy: You know the saying “my way or the highway”? This hypocrisy is all about that! It’s similar to contextual icing in which the optics are made to seem like the hypocrisy is not actually so. But the difference is that My-Way-Or-The-Highway hypocrisy emphasizes that the hypocrite is only for or against their belief if everything is to their specifications. Furthermore, to make it hypocrisy, they’ve yet to establish those parameters to their viewpoint until it comes true for them.

Bob says that there should be a third party to shake up the politics in his country. When Dave informs him that the Green Party, a third party has managed to get in the national debate and is polling in double digits, Bob pouts saying that he only meant if the third party was the Libertarian Party, had a charismatic Hispanic female leading the helm and had at least 5% control of the parliament in their country.

Self-serving hypocrisy

Self-serving hypocrisy is an odd term because technically all hypocrisy has some form of self-service. What makes this hypocrisy specifically self-serving though is that it particularly focuses on the interests and emotions of the hypocrite. It’s one that puts them at the center of the act.

Sellout hypocrisy: When a hypocrite is essentially letting their core beliefs be replaced by a force that overpowers them. Most of the time it may be due to money, but sellout hypocrisy can be more from pressure to be with an individual to a group. It is essentially a sharp turn from one belief to another simply to receive some reward for it.

An anti-consumerist band gets bought out by a major corporation and begins to appear in person in multiple advertisements because they really need the money.

Disgusting reflection hypocrisy: When a hypocrite has less empathy over others on an action that they themselves would do. It essentially stems from the hypocrite looking upon another person doing something they do and reacting negatively to it seeing how that is reflected. Yet rather than use that reaction to change themselves or accept that everyone faces that same emotional change, they’d much knock others down so as if to say that they have no reason to act the way they do.

Dan feels sad that no one wants to hang around with him at school. He sees a classmate of his that feels the same way and rather than ask him to play a game with him, tells him to suck up it and be more happy.

High-and-mighty hypocrisy: When the hypocrite believes their act of hypocrisy is justified because they have superior ability (or because they can afford to be hypocritical since it’s them that’s committing the act, not someone else).

Paulina runs a store. She learns from the news that employees from another store are complaining about not getting their minimum wage raised. She sides with the employees, saying that the minimum wage should be raised for them. When an employee brings up that she hasn’t raised the minimum wage for them, she rolls her eyes and says that she doesn’t have to do that because she provides far more for her employees than the other store.

Cowardly bully hypocrisy: The cowardly bully likes to push others around and tell them that they have to be a certain manner. But the cowardly bully doesn’t really act the same when their in the same situation as their counterparts. This can also be seen as the boss conundrum as the example below will demonstrate:

Neil and Zack meet together to discuss how work is going. Neil tells Zack that he wants to ask his boss for a raise but is too afraid to do so. Zack responds by constantly telling Neil that he needs to “man up” and go ahead and ask for that raise. Neil keeps chickening out and Zack keeps mocking him for his lack of initiative for it. Meanwhile, Zack too wants to ask his boss for a raise but is too afraid to do so. Yet he insists that Neil is pathetic for not being able to ask his boss for a raise.

What A Bunch Of Wieners - A Sausage Party Review

Adult animated films are a rarity in the mainstream world. They're a rarity in general. Animation has always belonged to the cuddly characters and saccharine songs that Disney have built their empire on. Granted, animation has a lot more variety to offer thanks to DreamWorks mixing it up, and even Disney has gone to challenge their own image from time to time. But there's always a box that these films will stay around in, not willing to go any further out of fear it will hurt them. Hell, it pretty much seems like people don't want to see them out of it anyways. Unless you have a show, then maybe they'll take a gander.

To me, seeing animated films break into the R-rated territory would be a wonderful sight. Which is why I sat through Sausage Party.

My enthusiasm for the film was not really up to the levels I had hoped. The script was perhaps the most perverse and warped thing involving food since a certain athiest shoved a banana up his ass. It was as offensive and derivative as a raunchy comedy could get. Easy stereotypical jokes, gratuitous swears that were as childish as they could get, and a food orgy that was 10 or so pages long. I felt like Rogen had set the prospect of adult animation far far back to the point that even saying the clean version of a swear word would be vulgar.

After some thought, I figured that perhaps the movie would serve as a catalyst for more to come. I might not like it, but maybe supporting it would lead to greater things down the line. After all, if enough money is thrown at something, Hollywood will milk that sucker 'til it's empty. Besides, a part of me did find it funny. It may be an immature part of me but one should be willing to indulge in their immaturity. Besides, I had to see just how much they would actually allow. So I got my tickets and entered into a late showing of the film, where I could count everyone who was there with only one hand. 

For those of you unaware of what Sausage Party is, basically think about all those commercials where the food comes to life. Don't you find it odd when they're all happy and cheerful even though they're going to be eaten? Well, this film takes the concept to its most logical conclusion by having the food be horrified that humans (whom they revere as gods that take them to a great beyond) are actually using them for consumption. It centers around Frank (Seth Rogen), a sausage who wants to get all up in Brenda (Kristen Wiig), a hot dog bun, by being chosen by one of the gods to enter into that great beyond. Frank then finds himself attempting to save a suicidal honey mustard (Danny McBride) who knows the real truth behind the great beyond and then having to go on a quest to prove the harsh reality of the situation, eventually coming across Sammy the Bagel (Edward Norton), Lavash (David Krumholtz), Teresa del Taco (Salma Hayek) and a douche (Nick Kroll)

Coming out of the movie, I have to say that I was neither pleasantly surprised or insanely insulted. Sure, reading the script could be seen as an insult in general but it had numbed me to what was to come. There was a way more offensive and awful way they could have taken the material on the text, and there were thankfully some awful scenes that were taken out like a piece of cheese getting slightly aroused that his dismembered dick was being eaten by rats. There was however some that stayed, like zombie corn coming out of a piece of shit and a douche raping a juice box through a draining oral act. Interestingly, the orgy scene was actually a lot more stupidly hilarious than greatly disturbing. That scene had me worried in the script as being a terrible and idiotic idea. It wasn't any less idiotic than I imagined it but thank god Point Grey knew where to take the scene.

At the same time, the film had very little moments that were incredibly creative. Any obvious joke you had in your head about a character, this movie would put it on screen. From the bagel being a nebbish Jew, to the lavash being a strict Muslim (both of which fight about how much of the aisle they should take up) to the taco being a Mexican lesbian, to the douche being a bro-tastic jerk. Perhaps the most interesting examples of this obviousness were a group of Canadian beers barging in saying "sorry" as they bumped into the main characters was a seedy mustachioed tequila bottle that takes Brenda and her other friends to a trap having the label "Sigueme" (Spanish for "follow me"). It provided a nice counter to the Nazi mustard who wanted to exterminate the juice (haw haw) or Chief Firewater, who was perhaps the most annoying character in the film (which considering that there was a literal douche being a douche is quite the achievement).

The few moments that got me were very surreal, such as when one of Frank's sausage friends ends up at the house of a druggie (named Druggie, because duh) and finds himself able to talk to him after he takes up some bath salts. There, you see a chewed up wad of gum serving as a Steven Hawking type genius and a traumatized roll of toilet paper. A part of me was wondering about how inconsistent the world of the film was as certain non-food products were also alive but others weren't but another part made me remember that I was watching a film that was probably written during a haze of marijuana smoke, so questioning such nonsense was stupid. The food fighting the humans was another fun scene, as it provided some great visual effects and gags as well as the douche controlling a man by sticking himself way up the fellow's ass and using a revolver to try and kill the heroes.

My biggest gripe with the film wasn't so much the crudeness of the humor more than it was the lack of a soul that the movie had. It tried it's best to provide some crazy imagery and talk about some heavy religious and spiritual issues but it seemed tacked on and lifeless. The issue with most adult animated works (and animated works in general) is that it will dawn too much on the perception of animation. It will use family-friendly visuals to deliver not-so-family-friendly material like sex, drugs, violence and swears. While that's something I enjoy, there's more that's required to be something that stands out. Sausage Party revels that its look is very much similar to that of a regular animated film and even makes a few ribs at Disney with a overly-extravagant musical number by Alan Menken and a Dixar logo, but aside from that, you're not left with much else. The characters are not really ones you care about for their journey since it's the jokes that take center stage, but the jokes aren't doing much more than playing on the contrast of colorful G-rated CGI with R-rated raunchiness. 

I went into this movie more for the selfish reason to see animation break the PG-13 ceiling rather than actually supporting the film itself. I surely was cynical about how well it could win me over, but I think to some degree it did do that. It would have been nice to have it more distinctly stylized and accepting that it was in a new territory, trying to do something a lot more bold with what it had to offer, but going the standard raunchy comedy route wasn't that bad of a choice after all. Animation will always be associated with wacky and fun, so if there was any way to ease people into bringing this forward, this is certainly one of the better ways to do so. I can understand those who don't want to see it and if you're one of them, I don't think there's much in my review to convince you otherwise. This is pretty much a dumb movie to stuff your face with popcorn with and take in all the absurdity that comes with it. And it may just make you think about just how much of a genocidal monster you are when your bag is empty.