The trouble with being labeled a cynic

The trouble with being labeled a cynic

and other such problems faced by honest "misanthropes" everywhere

 Since I've started this thing, I've received several emails and comments referencing my viewpoints on the world. Several wild - albeit true - accusations have begun to fly around, an I'd like to address them once and for all. I think these things are important. I want to make sure people get their facts straight before all the vicious boars start touting off their line in a prolonged series of murky, muddled, grunts and shrieks into the night. Don't panic, it's after 5 P.M, so telling the truth is perfectly safe. This is a true disclosure of honesty, a real, raw, look at the man, and the character, you're accusing.

1. Am I, in fact, a genuine misanthrope?

Absolutely not, at least not in the 'dislike' definition of the word, and this - if there was such a thing - is a bullshit question. I may have a general sense of mistrust for my fellow patrons of Earth, but I'm a Patriot and a Lover, a real dreamer - and not some half-assed, whiskey crazed, charlatan preacher, type either. It's genuine, and it's real. It's where all these words come from. I don't hate the world, quite the opposite. I love it, for what it could be at the very least. I just believe in painting a bright target on the things that I find personally reprehensible about the circus. We're all a bunch of damnable, shit slinging, animals - and I'm no better - and sometimes these things need to be pointed out to people. The insanity we all go about in our daily acting jobs makes it impossible for me to be a misanthrope. I love the show far too much, I just think, sometimes, the scenes could stand some revision.

2. Why do you hate the world so much?
 
Again, I don't. Am I passionate, sometimes verbally violent about the things I cannot stand? Absolutely. I think there's a great number of things that are wrong with the world; one could argue I'm one of said things even, but I don't hate the world. There are moments, when I see certain colors, or shadows on the landscape of beauty, where I am certainly enraged by what I see going on around me, but by no means do I hate the world. What the actual fact is, is that I love the world. It's a place of limitless potential, populated by billions of interesting people, who, for whatever reason, opt to simply disassociate themselves with a lot of the more positive and optimistic outcomes around them. I'm outspoken about these things, and I always will be, but don't mistake that for some kind of toxic emotion directed toward the world as an entirety. If you're not going to pay attention, please stop reading.

3. Why is it you never really talk about religious or political topics in your writing?

Spirituality and politics are two of the biggest social dogs one can wrestle with, but I really don't see them as a topic that is wrong with the world. I could squabble for hours and days, and I do, about the natures of the Church - whichever one it is - and the Political state of affairs in this, and several other countries. Really, that's about all I have to say on it. I have respect for the decrepit cogs of the political system. I've stepped into the amateur ring, and see just how the ravenous dogs set upon the stage like starving, wild, jackals; ready to feast on whichever of them flinches first. Religion is much the same way, to me. It's a place where, in a lot of cases, there's no room for questions or discrepancies and those who have them are the first sacrifice to the cause -- because they just don't have what it takes to stand in the light alongside you. It's just those kind of judgements I have no time for really, in both rings. People who cannot handle the challenge of their ideas and affairs, either of the heart, the mind, or the soul, have no business ever claiming to have such things. What I think? Irrelevant for this dialogue, but I'll bring it up later - you can take that to the bank too.

 These are the questions that seem to be the most prevalent as of late, and it's sensible too. I'm sure, to the outside world, I seem to be some touting, loud mouthed, asshole; stitched up like some Frankenstein creature with a mixture of American and Turkish tobacco and jarred to life in a shot of electrified, Irish, whiskey. I can't claim this to be untrue - I wouldn't even try. It would be immoral, and would violate my creed, to be telling such lies at this hour. Is this the entirety of what I am; is my sum total just some freaked out lunatic who spent too much of his youth getting high and staring at the world through twisted glasses? That's not really for me to decide now is it? 

It's the problem with being labeled a cynic, even a misanthrope; you find yourself constantly living inside that questionable shadow of the public eye. Maybe you're just too old, too warped, too jaded, to be looking at anything in a proper, civil, light? I think that's a bunch of malarkey. I'm not too anything. I live, that's it and if I do it at a speed, in a lane, and by a vehicle that makes you feel angry, ill, or otherwise emotionally motivated; for better or worse, I'm doing something - an I'd be inclined to say it's something right.

It's why I felt the need to clarify these important questions as to the character behind these writings. I make no claims of wholesome values or affectionate tones, as I carry little space or room to hand them out - nor will I ever do so in some feeble, half-assed, fashion. I don't stand on some, self righteous, soap box, spouting off my perspective rabble like a doomsayer either. I've never been that kind of person. I don't sit back and wallow in a world where I see everything as fucked, twisted, or broken either. The things that I see as wrong with the world? I do my absolute best -- as it's my duty as a, self proclaimed, patriot and lover -- to bring about the antithesis of these points as often as possible.

The world's not hopeless, or wrong, or even all that backwards. Hell, it seems to work for a lot of people -- it even works, just as it is, for me. Just because it does work, doesn't mean I think it should work however, and just because it's not wrong? Well, shit, that has nothing to do with being right either. There's a lot of things I see in the world that need changing, and I'm quick to point them out. How else is anything supposed to, really, get better? If the swine continue to waste and want, covering the land in a blanket of malcontent and squalor; like some long dormant Vampire awoken from a millennium of slumber and set loose upon the world to feast on hope -- then you're damn right I'll stand up and scream at them. I'll do my be absolute best, because I have no other recourse, to shed some sunlight on those godless leeches.

Perhaps that's why I'm asked these questions, and labeled such unscrupulous things. I'm a moral man, who speaks when something offends his principle. I'm ill content to remain wasted in a hall of silence, just because I might rattle the bars of an, otherwise complacent, structure. I think it's my job to do these things, about people, places, and the world. If someone steps on my toe, I will not suffer the pain in silence. I'll inform them of what they did, and move on -- otherwise they're liable to just keep standing there, ignorant of any wrong doing.

That's why nothing ever gets done anymore. Nobody wants to say anything, to anyone. We've been raised to treat each other like fragile eggs; precious lives that might crack and be forever broken if the wrong words are spoken too harshly or at too loud a volume. It's just this kind of social hypochondria that's falling over gatherings of all types, everyone drunk on false truths and the value of being placated. It's the nature of politics -- and there's some of it right there for you -- of both backroom, billiard halls, and Washington D.C. Nobody wants to ever tell the truth, and if they do, they have to cover it up in so much sugar and honey that it slides down your throat without you ever knowing it was there.

I've never been a man to talk that way & I would consider it offensive of anyone to do so to me. I respect, admire, and practically demand, an honest shot taken at me. I take aim at so many things, so often, but I'll never do it as a Sniper. Hell no, that kind of thing diminishes the horrors of war and it's probably why we're so quick to have them today at all. Nobody sees the violence from the deck of a Destroyers 2000 miles off the shore of whatever country it is that's getting bombed. If war or violence is to be had, either figurative or metaphorically, I think it should be done face to face and let the chips fall where they may.

The problem with being labeled a cynic and a misanthrope is that I find I'm not taken as seriously as I should -- at least on occasion -- enjoy. Am I, perhaps, a little bitter? Absolutely not. I'm sweetened with a perspective sense of reality that may be a bitter medicine for some, but I don't try and force anyone to swallow it. My opinion is my own, and if you don't like it? Well, I'm not about to apologize for it and change what it is I have to say, so don't ask. If ever I provide a position that is, at some later point, shown to me to perhaps, be in accurate? Then I'll revise my position. I don't know everything, I won't pretend that I do, but just because I come off as 'abrasive' or 'rude' when dealing with people in social contexts is no reason to conduct myself differently. I say and do, at least most of the time, precisely what I mean, and I am not a man to go all willy-nilly with the devaluing of hollow and empty apologies to try and save face.

Of course there are other, well meaning, questions I'm occasionally asked too, but I find them far less need of correction. Their either opinions of substance related affairs, or self explanatory inquisitions that show a real lack of effort in digesting the work. I believe, firstly, in letting my reader sort out of those kind of things for themselves, and refuse to reward a principle of laziness on the latter -- no matter how well intended the question might have been. I come with a warning, an I tend to display it loudly. "I am honest." -- I wear bright colors for a reason too, everyone knows it's nature's way of showing everyone around: DANGER! HARMFUL IF SWALLOWED.

And that, ladies and gentlemen of my judging jury of peers, is a fact.