GOOD CHILDHOOD

FRIENDSHIP

GAYS & STRAIGHTS FOREVER

On a positive note, there have always been and always will be gay (bi-, gay, lesbian, transgendered) people. Laws, threats, oppression, torture, and death have not been able to stop them. Just as, on a negative note, there will always be hurtful affairs outside marriage, spousal and child abuse, addictions, hypocrisy, greed, corruption, injustice, and poor people. The flawed wiring of human creatures demands it....Now, is it possible to stop hitting our societal heads against the wall of fact, and start improving the sad, often tragic lives of us all?

RUBBER & REAL DUCKS GO VIRAL IN CHINA

COMMUNISTS AND OLIGARCHS HAVE NO SENSE OF HUMOR.....

JOSS WEDON, DIRECTOR

GRADUATES:  Action is more important than words....but words are more important than nothing.  Here are 13 minutes of funny, serious, true words than can help you, if you occasionally think of them.

The two professor-administrators at the front, who probably invited him, get his dark entertaining humor and agree. The professor in the back is probably bored and thinks he's a jerk.  You can make your own decision.  (The English is clear and non-academic.)

The problem is that at graduation ceremonies, students are thinking about partying, their dates, supportive and non-supportive families, no job, the terrifyng future, being hot or cold, holding on to their caps in the wind, eating, texting, boredom, and having a good night's sleep, hopefully with someone.

Still, the Graduation Speech Ritual is one of civilization's more useful inventions, too often unused.

http://www.upworthy.com/behold-the-bluntest-funniest-and-deadliest-graduation-speech-in-the-history-of-the-known-universe?g=2&c=upw1

AMERICA 2013 . . .

ACTIONS LEFT UNDONE

There are two specific, practical, moral things our nation can do within this year: relieve poverty and bring Americans into a sane, relatively fair economic balance. We all know it will not be done. But it is possible to do in reality. Therefore, the responsibility and blame is on the politicians of both parties, the citizens who accept and vote for them, as well as our own personal lack of compassion and courage....Writing this, I don't feel superior. I feel equal in human hypocrisy, weakness, guilt, fear, awareness, and lack of redemptive positive action.

MORALITY

ETHICAL QUESTION:  Assad is a killer who gasses his people and bombs villagers....Should America destroy Syria's Assad, who is pro-American (when its suits his purpose) and allows other religious to exist, knowing that an anti-American religious fundamentalist government will take over?  Or should we keep his brutal dictatorship in power?

DARKENED SCREEN

ROGER EBERT...the passionate, sensitive writer who inspired an army of young film directors to care about cinema as art, and have the courage to make their own personal creative films, has died of cancer. He leaves a gigantic unfillable hole in non-academic serious film criticism, cinema history, and critical awareness....Roger did not inspire me to direct films - Kurosawa, Bergman, and Fellini did - and I didn't always agree with his critical opinions (who cares), but Roger was the eyes and perception that kept me making films, despite the socializing politics and cold greed of Hollywood. Every director I ever talked with, from English-speaking countries, all cited Roger as their "guiding light". He was especially caring of film students and first-time directors who had talent but had no network of support. Now we all must continue to struggle forward, without a kind mentor, but with his powerful spirit by our side.

HATE

Why do fundamentalist clerics, extreme conservatives, ultra-nationalists, and the super-rich almost always look so tormented and ugly?

MIRRORS

In our ideal world everyone would be like us, think like us, love us unconditionally, and have the same aesthetic, political, religious, education, and social values.

There would be no human problems, health problems, money problems, family problems, civilization-made problems, or nature-made problems.

PRO-LIFE IN THE REAL SENSE

200,000+ peaceful Taiwanese, Hakka, Aborigine, and Han protestors in the Capital city, protesting against the building of yet another nuclear power plant on the pristine Taiwan coast, on a major earthquake fault, subject to tsunamis, yearly typhoons, greed, corruption, shoddy workmanship, and guaranteed human error....near Taipei, the largest city.

Unlike China, no army or police beat them ,or fired tear gas and bullets into the crowd.

Young and old, families, students, farmers, workers, fishermen, artists, sat down in front of the President Building, listening to fiery speeches, passionate songs, pleas from the heart, and terrifying scientific facts.

Controlled Western news media covered the story minimally, with headlines reducing the nearly 1/4-Million protestors to only "Tens of Thousands."

DEAR MARGO ®

Margo Howard is (by far) the best, most psychologically astute, mentally healthy "advice" columnist in the international English media. Her wise advice is not always 100% correct, as she is not a mind-reader or God, but it is as close to constructive and useful reality, (not self-help dogma or nice-sounding politically-correct platitudes), as humanly possible. 

If your newspaper doesn't have it, you can read her column at no charge on the net, from Creators.com [This is not a paid endorsement.]

CULTURAL EQUALITY

All cultures are NOT equal, all people are. Cultures can be spiritually and intellectually insane. Insanity, even when shared by an entire culture, is not exotic or charming for tourists to visit. It is tragic and devastating, destroying generation after generation, dooming a nation and its people to everlasting human hell.

A GOOD WOMAN

February 3, 2013

Sotomayor, a Star on the Book-Tour Circuit, Sees a New Niche for a Justice

By JODI KANTOR

CHICAGO — At her Wednesday night book talk here, Justice Sonia Sotomayor glided through her audience of 700, dispensing homespun wisdom through a cordless microphone, interrupted by impromptu applause.

When the moderator read a question from Tabbie Major, age 7, about which books Justice Sotomayor loved as a child, she found the girl, locked her in an embrace, held on while reminiscing about Nancy Drew mysteries and then called out for a photographer to capture the moment. No need: a good portion of the crowd was already snapping pictures.

Welcome to another night in the life of Sonia Sotomayor, Supreme Court justice, current queen of the best-seller list and suddenly the nation’s most high-profile Hispanic figure.

TV IS SERIOUS

One of the greatest moments ever on television.

Not 100% true about "old" glorified America, 

but as close to the political Truth as you can find on TV.

(The Wire" was even closer social truth.)

Pilot: "THE NEWSROOM" (2012, HBO). 

Created and written by Aaron Sorkin ("Studio 60").

Starring Jeff Daniels.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=16K6m3Ua2nw&feature=youtu.be

LUCK

There is no such thing as Luck....

There is hard work, skill, patience, trust in yourself,

courage, creativity, playfulness, wonder, and love.

You need all, and love, to succeed in your dreams 

and feel there is meaning in the hard struggles of life.

Money doesn't save souls.

[Art by Oaehyun Kim]

MONEY AND THE SOUL

Mr. Kalayanasundaram worked as a Librarian for 30 years. Every month in his 30 year experience(service), he donated his entire salary to help the needy. He worked as a server in a hotel to meet his needs. He donated even his pension amount of about ten lakh rupees to the needy.

He is the first person in the world to spend the entire earnings for a social cause. In recognition to his service, United Nations Organization adjudged him as one of the Outstanding People of the 20th Century. An American organization honored him with the ‘Man of the Millennium’ award. He received a sum of Rs 30 cores as part of this award which he distributed entirely for the needy as usual.Moved by his passion to help others, Super Star Rajinikanth adopted him as his father.

COMPLEX SIMPLE SUGGESTIONS

When we get 43 suggestions at one time, it is easier to ignore them, think they are too simplistic or sugary. I never read all the "self-help" books written to help us through life, because I was cynical and did not want ADVICE....No one ever follows advice. even good advice from friends. I rebelled. I followed my own path....but it has led me back here to this 90-year-old Midwestern woman's seemingly simplistic and unsophisticated, but actually complicated, life-altering, effective suggestions. it is easier to ignore these 43 ideas, than to really consider them deeply. The hardest thing to do, is to BEGIN to follow the ones we believe are right. As a social revolutionary and humanist, I believe all the wise lady's suggestions are right, and will definitely lead to a much happier, less frustrated, more fulfilled life....and Life is our goal.

by Regina Brett, 90                                                           (Cleveland Plain Dealer Newspaper)

"To celebrate growing older, I wrote 43 lessons life taught me. It is the most requested column I've ever written."

AUSTERE POWER

from "New York Times", 1/4/13 (by Simon Romero)

AFTER YEARS IN SOLITARY,         LIFE AS URUGUAY’S PRESIDENT

MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay —  Some world leaders live in palaces. Then there is José Mujica, the former guerrilla who is Uruguay’s president. He lives in a run-down house on Montevideo’s outskirts with no servants at all. His security detail: two plainclothes officers parked on a dirt road.