more on videogames

I just read a long, but incredibly interesting and well-thought out blog or article or something. It was about video games, and what the world might be like when the gamer generations run things.

The site was http://infovore.org/talks/if-gamers-ran-the-world/ and it made me remark as to something I had written not entirely long ago. When two people who have never spoken write about many of the same things, it is quite possibly coincidence. When millions upon millions talk about it, write about it, think about it, chances are something big is happening. We have a future in entertainment unlike anything in 30,000 years of human history. It is, however, vastly more than that. As I said in my writing several weeks ago, video games are changing us, likely more than any form of entertainment has since written language. Movies, television, cell phones and such may have changed how we communicate, sure, it has globalized us. Video games have changed our very way of thought.

You see, most people who are not gamers do not understand what video games mean to us. They see games as little more, save for the cases of addiction, than tabletop games, or perhaps virtual sports. While that is, perhaps, true in the most basic sense of video games, nobody playing football or scrabble is going to make spreadsheets, read strategies and theories, statistics and debates about them, unless that person does it professionally. Gamers, on the other hand, will. Some of us will start a guild a grouping of dozens or hundreds of people. Some of us will come up with combat strategies. Some of us will try to find every single secret in a game, or max out every single statistic on every single character. In many games, how you progress is permanent, so we make plans on how to be most effecient.

For instance, when you have killed enough enemies in Tactis Ogre, you will gain a level up. You start at level one, and are able to progress to fifty. Every level you gain, you statistics increase, giving you more life, damage to the enemy, or ability to move faster, enabling you to attack an enemy before they can attack you. The issue comes in the fact that there are over twent different classes your characters can become, taking on different roles. Some will heal, some will cast magic, some will attack from afar, some will be right up in the enemy lines. Depending on the class of the character when they level, the characters statistics will increase in line with what they are best suited for. An archer will gain more agility and dexterity, which increases their speed and damage, while a wizard will gain more intellect and magic points, allowing them to cast more, and stronger, spells.

Where this gets muddy is making the most well-rounded characters for your force. All people play differently, and this allows for those differences in personality and play style to come into effect. Where I could make an entire troop of heavy, slow melee fighters, my friend may care to go with archers and healers. It is possible to win with any kind of character, but how to go about that win differs from person to person.

That may all sound like a bit much, but in reality it is what adults do nearly everyday. Make choices now that will affect the future. This is giving gamers more and more the ability to see the consequences of their actions systematically, understanding the outcomes. Or, at the very least, trying to find what effects might come from the cause of the persons choice.

so i made a website

can my website count for my blog for the next 2 weeks? im gonna write on there!

http://haddontwo.webs.com/index.htm i forgot to post that last time.

serious shit went down

so, i have these 3 groups of friends, right? i have emerald and her group, paige and her group (they are my neighbors) and matt and that group. none of the 3 have yet met eachother, but ive known matt alex and meg for a long time. these others are new.

so emerald has been living in broomfield, at this house with like 5 other people. 2 of them, a couple, hated the rest, and stole a bunch of shit. so the people whose stuff was stolen went to their house, and lots of drama came about.

but crazier are crazy dan and the aussies. dan is the brother of zach, who is dating my neighbor paige. dan is apparently daing vanessa, who is paiges best friend. kinda weird. so one time dan freaks out while drunk, breaks zachs jaw, and they dont speak for a week or two. they apologized last night. then dan freaks out AGAIN, after i left, he cut himself breaking shit, bled all over the apartment, cops were called, more shit went down.

and then there is the aussies. they met paige and then the rest of us through a mutual friend. they came over on tuesday or something, we all drank and played beer pong, and we all thought they were awesome. they told us they were from australia, all this stuff, spoke with an aussie accent, even had all these weird little things to make us think they were more australian.

turns out they arent from australia, but new orleans. and they might not be brothers. their names arent what they told us.

we are so confused.

yay for homecommings

so recently my father and ex-stepmother have split up, and are getting divorced, and all that stuff. she is the mother of my little sister, maddie, and currently the legal guardian. though, with luck, that will change and she will live with my father.

my dad was born and raised here in colorado, and they moved to new mexico something like 4 years ago, for a few reasons. largely because anee had grown up there, and her family was there and that jazz. so they got a place in ruidoso, but not too long after anee moved out, and now they are going through a divorce, and my dad has realized that, though he doesnt mind ruidoso, he hates new mexico. so he is moving back. and that makes me so incredibly happy.

he has the house to sell, and he is going through all the BS that comes with a divorce, and possibly trying to get maddie. while anee used to be better equipped to be a parent, i think, she has dropped and my father has risen. in the past few years he has realized what it is that he did wrong with my brother and i. as well, he has realized he wants to be here for us, get to know us as adults, get to know his new daughter in law, and get to know his new granddaughter once she is born, which should be the middle of february. i just though about how wonderful it would be if she was born on valentines day. that way, when she grows up and starts dating and stuff, the dude will only have to remember 1 day in place of two. and given that she will be half hilling, and all of us hillings are prone to forgetting things (like birthdays, and what day it is, and sometimes our own names), it will be easy for her to remember when valentines day is! alriiiight!

so, once he settles down there, he will be moving back to colorado, though he is not entirely sure where in colorado yet. he says somewhere along the front range, and that is good enough for me. even if he did move out to say sterling, it is much easier to get to than a massive 12 hour drive to get from here down to his house now.

as well, if he moves somewhere near here, it might be prudent for me to live with him while i finish up school. that is all up in the air ofcourse, but he and i got along phenominally when i lived down there last year, and i think we could do so again. i was really happy there, and it was wonderful getting to know him as an adult, when the last time i had seen him with any reasonable frequency, i had been a child still. well, like 16 or so, but not quite an adult, as much as i thought i was at that point

past nick, you suck. you stupid, silly little bastard. i hope future nick is totally smarter and cooler than past nick was. and present nick is, though im not sure it is possible to be any cooler than i am right now.

oh dear, there goes that ego again!

Videogames are becomming less of “games”

silly title, right. silly subject, eh?

i just watched a video about Warcraft, one of my favorite series of games ever. World of Warcraft has gained such popularity and praise that it is known even by people who never touch videogames, or even rarely computers. however, it has been given it’s negative connotations as well, ofcourse. anything popular will. even sex, food, and love, probably the three most popular things of all time in any species (save perhaps love) are hated and fought against in certain ways. muslims wont eat this, christians wont have this kind of sex, and as we all know recently, the mormons will only allow heterosexual love.

but that isnt the point of this little babble. the point is this: world of warcraft has over 11 million players. lets look at that. 11 million.

everyone knows the kingdom, some of the history, the culture, the achievements of scotland, right? 5.2 million people, give or take a hundred thousand.

ireland. the emerald isle, with the story of the leprechaun, banshee, and lots of drinking abd being catholic?

6 million people.

the city of new york. 8.2 million

what this means is a fake world, one made up by a few dozen writers, artists, programmers, and millions and millions of players outnumbers more than a few countries on the planet. it outnumbers new york city, beijing, tokyo, mexico city. in fact, only 2-4 cities in the WORLD have a higher population, according to wikipedia.

the land mass of world of warcraft, before its two expansions (which have easily double the overall size) was estimated by a blizzard employee at being roughly 200 square km. let us say it is now at around 400. that is larger than the city i am writing this from aurora, co. that is, a fake world, made up of polygons. 0’s and 1’s, is larger than my city. (this is all assuming that the characters in the game run at the same speed as a marathon runner, which is how the total was figured).

all in all, what does all this say? all these little statistics and comparrisons? simply put, we are adding land. fake land. fake place. WoW is one of hundreds of MMORPGs(massively multiplayer online roleplaying game) out there, and while likely the largest in landsize, and by far the largest in population, if each MMO is even 1/4 the size of wow, we have added considerable amount of “land” to the earth. sure, each human needs a living space at the very least (or only roughly 6′x6′x4′ or so according to tolstoy), but give it time and maybe the only necissary space a human will need is place for them to sleep, bath, eat, and use the restroom. the rest could all be in cyberspace. which terrifies me, but it is indeed possible someday.

i guess my overall point in this is, we have reached a turning point in entertainment. where videogames are not simply just that. I have been playing WoW since the night before it hit store shelves. that is 4 years this month. I have taken breaks, i have stopped playing for months at a time, i have gone from playing hours on end to not playing more than a few hours a week, as i do now. But i have been here, creating it, changing it, shaping it. I have been here giving ideas and input, writing to programmers and designers, to fellow players, and former players, and will-be players. i have been a part of warcraft since warcraft 2, fighting as an orc, a troll, a human, an elf, a goblin, a dwarf, a skeleton. and clicking sheep until they blew up.

WoW has evolved past being a game. I have friends from the game, and several others, that in a time of need i could turn to. they have helped me with homework, with philosophy, with my writing, and with my life’s troubles. they have made me smile and laugh, made me angry and feel all around like shit. we have built an economy where things are valueable because WE give them value. if you never play WoW, you will not know that i could sell a purple gem (let alone know what i meant by purple gem) for several dollar. real dollar. USD. green, cash, bills. we have made leaders, and we have made outcasts. we have formed stategies to take down virtual foes, and other players. we have honed our abilities to hear, and see, and listen to others. I can hear when a rogue goes stealth, and with my sound system i know where in the playing field they did. i tell the difference between which spell an enemy is casting simply by the color of the sparkles in their hand, and from this i can tell how best to survive, and indeed beat them.

friends, family, and even people i hardly know have given me more crap for playing videogames than i care to relate. but in reality, videogames have enhanced my ability to read and write. they have given me more insight into philosophy, psychology, anthropology, literature, cinema, musica. Indeed, it is because of videogames that i am as in to history as i am today. without dynasty warriors, i would never have known the history of china i do today. sure, i may have learned it at a later point, but i know it. now. because videogames piqued my interest.

i learned about the Id because of Xenogears. I learned about the Han dynasty because of dynasty warriors. i learned about samurai because of probably 3000 games ive played (samurai are in everything). i know about computers largely so i could get my games running the best way they could on my machine. i have taken apart and rebuilt my playstation numerous times to clean it, to learn it, to understand it. and because i get bored.

videogames are not just games. they are so much more for one single reason. they are made by people whos interests vary just as much as books, movies, shows, plays, discussions and anything else you can think of. if you like it, someone has made a game about it, or included it in a game, or has been influenced by it in the making of the game.

videogames are shaping the planet as much as literature has. the fights of “they corrupt our kids!”, the business that has boomed. japan is forever changed by this. the US is certainly changing, and even european developers, later to jump on ship in a big way, will be forever altered. i suspect in 100 years, children in history class, students in economic classes, and people all over the planet will note 3 things about our time. globilization of economy. the rise of the internet. and the rise of new media, most notably videogames.

Yay for the election…

…being over!

i didnt vote, ive never voted, and chances are pretty decent i wont ever vote. at least, not for office. i might vote on propositions, ammendments etc. but i wont vote on a politician, unless i actually LIKE the person. studying history, there have been maybe 10 presidents i would have actually voted FOR, and all of them were before i was born, or before i could vote in 1 case. i like obama, but not quite enough for me to vote for him. i likeD mccain, before he became a patsy to his party. but even before, i wouldnt have voted for him. bill clinton i might have voted for, but im not positive. both rooseveldts, maybe jfk, lincoln, jefferson, jackson, madison. i wouldnt have voted for washington, to be honest, because when you only have 1 person running that has ANY chance of winning, its not needed. maybe polk, just because i like him, but if i were around at the time, prolly not.

i dont strongly believe in voting. i dont believe in democracy, or a republic, to be honest. at least, not on this scale. 300+ million people voting, when a good portion of them know even less about politics than i do, and im 20. just doesnt seem like a very good idea. the greeks had a great idea with democracy. each democratic city voted on their leaders, but their cities probably didnt ever exceed more than 1million. if that. even today, as a united country, they only have 11million. and, ofcourse, the only people who could vote were those who could UNDERSTAND politics, which was most in places like athens, but in our country not quite so much. different ideologies.

the issue i see with having a republic is, much like rome, the representatives ARENT us. sure, we can choose which are most like us, but obama is still a christian, against abortion, doesnt agree with gay marriage (though he believes that people should have the right to belief and act differently, thankfuly). we arent on the same page in many areas, and he was by far my choice in this election. governing 300 million people is difficult, even if they were all republican, or all democrat. but what makes it even more difficult is this divide that keeps growing. soon-to-be president obama talked about needing to get rid of this break between us, and while i dont think it is possible to mend, it is possible to make it less pronounced, perhaps. winning by what…200 electoral votes, it is obvious americans are not of the same mind, and thusly having a single person control any amount of it is a bad idea, i say.

i go for a tetrarchy. let the west have their president, the “mid-west” (im not sure if we count as west, or mid-west. ive heard both), the northeast, and the south east. sure, the “president” of the mid-west would have far fewer people than the other 3, much less money, power etc, but at least we would get what we did in 2000 and 2004. the northeast and the west voted almost unanimously blue, the mid-west and the south almost unanimously red. this way each area of the country would get their regional leader, chances would be better of alabama always getting the republican if they so chose, california always their democrat if they so chose. only issues i could really see are us and NM if we were mid-west, or arizona, utah if we were all west. and maybe a few states back east. it might get less done, but its hard to get less done when the government doesnt do a whole lot most of the time anyway, yeh?

all in all, im pleased with the election. aside from the judicial branch, all of our parts of government are democrat. and while i dont consider myself democrat, i am much more left than i am right. here is hoping that our new president and representatives can fix some of the mess of the past 8 years. and hopefully bush and crew wont do anything else dumb in their 2 months left.

Blank Title

I am always very bad at coming up with titles for things.

so, i really have no idea whatsoever what to write. or rather, i have several ideas, but i dont want to type them out. they seem silly, or trite. perhaps ill write a short story.

or not.

i wonder if this will count as a blog post for class. probably not. i bet if i just left it at this, shelly would leave a comment saying “no, this doesnt count for class”. she just seems like the type who would reply like that, she is a little bit snarky. not in a bad way, but i could see her making some smartass remark like that. thats honestly the only reason i go to that class. english is a boring subject. i like to write, i like to read, and i do both fairly well. by all rights, i really shouldnt be in that class. several of the people in that class shouldnt, but school requires it. damn you, education! she makes the class at least interesting enough that i didnt drop it. and she apparently has pretty good taste in music, which was the subject of our last 2 papers. Rage, Billy Joel, and Flobots. well played, teacher. well played.

now, my head kind of hurts, and its almost 5am. i should really stop staying up until 5am. fucking videogames and horror movies and audiobook. damn you too, george r. r. martin, you god-like sonofabitch.

My dear, sweet videogames

Note* i wrote this almost a year ago. it is one part of 5 (3 completed) of the most important things in my life. what makes me me.

Videogames. This may sound stupid, silly…whatever. Fuck you if you don’t like it. Videogames have helped me in many, many ways. Sure, they have done their harm, too, mainly on my schooling and my wallet. But a more than even trade, I believe.

My first videogames were Mario Bros. 3, for the Nintendo Entertainment System. My brother got it for his birthday, when he turned 8, I believe. 16 years is a long time to remember, but I remember the way my eyes were…attacked almost by the glory of those first minutes. I also received a volleyball/soccer game for the NES, but this was far more mundane. It was not long after my NES birth before my parents began to bicker, and fight, and eventually grew to hate one another. I was 6 when they were divorced, and I remember it pretty clearly. We had gotten more videogames, but all I remember now is Mario Brothers 3. It was something special, amazing.

When we left the house with dad, we got an apartment, and times were good, and we got a Sega Genesis for Christmas, and with it, Sonic the Hedgehog 2. I remember when we bought a new TV, I thought it was massive. Knowing that Sonic was going to be as big as he was, I was ecstatic. In fact, the TV still is around, and is sitting next to me as I write this. By comparison, it is an old POS, and not large atal. But it was my gaming TV, and remains so even today.

When we went to visit dad, we would bring our NES with us, and we would rent games sometimes. The one game we rented most was Contra, a game that to this day is easily top 10 retro games. UUDDLRLR Start Select. It is engraved in my brain, something I cannot ever forget. It is impossible to say how many times Tyler and I have beaten that game, but it is easily in the hundreds, perhaps even low thousands. At the time, gaming was just fun, and a small escape for us. A way to forget some of the crap going on in life, to just play. That aspect of gaming has only grown for me with time. Indeed, this is why I now play so many games.

We soon moved in with Rick, my mothers fiance, and his son Todd had a Super Nintendo. We had never had one before, and barely played one, so it was incredibly exciting for us. We had Mortal Kombat 2, my first fighting game, and of course, Super Mario World. I also bought Donkey Kong Country, which is still, again, top 10 list of retro games. Mom and Rick broke up, and we decided we needed our own SNES, so Ty and I saved our money, and bought one, along with some games like Killer Instinct, Super Mario and a few others. In that apartment I had the kidney infection that kept me out of school for almost a month, and we rented DKC2. Not as good as the original, but longer, and I spent a lot of my time playing it. I beat it multiple times, and found most of the secrets.

We moved in, and back out again, of Rick’s house, and it was in this new apartment, the last I lived in Greeley, that the Playstation, N64 and Saturn came out. Tyler and I decided upon the Saturn, as it came with free games. We got Virtua Fighter 2, Virtua Cop, Sonic 3d Blast, and a game I only remember as Solar Eclipse, though I am not positive that is the name. We lived near a Gamestop, and we frequented it, saving up money and trading in to get new and different games. I still have some of those games, and though I have not played a single one in years, I would never sell my Saturn. It is a legacy.

We moved to Aurora, in with Roy, and it was there that my gaming took itself to a new level. Before, it was just fun, a pastime. Now, it had become a part of my life. With one game.

Tyler and I regretted getting the Saturn, but we loved it anyway. We decided to save up and get a Playstation together, along with a few games, namely, Coolboarders 2. We played the hell out of it, unlocking everything in the game, and having highscores that were mind boggling for 2 kids. It was around then that I remember seeing a commercial on TV. I remember very little of it, except the announcers voice, and seeing a spiky-haired blonde man with a giant sword staring up at a building. The man said “Final Fantasy….Seven”. And the title flashed across the screen. While we had lived in our last apartment, Tyler and I had gotten from our grandfather a game called Mario RPG. Neither of us had ever played an RPG before, but we spent hours and hours on the game, perfecting our characters, and understanding the world. When it came time to rent next, we decided upon FF7 and FFT, thinking they were related. We tried Tactics first, but couldn’t understand it, so we put it aside, and popped in FF7.

To this day, I remember every second of that first night in vivid clarity. The music, the senses overloaded with beauty from all angles. This game changed my life. Tyler and I stayed up til 1 in the morning, playing our new character, whom I named NickH12, thinking it would be like a highscore name. I didn’t realize we were naming this person, this character, this…avatar of US. After our time with the rental was up, we saved up and bought FF7 first thing with our Christmas money. it was the Christmas of 97′, 10 years ago. Hard to believe a decade has passed.

This was the first game that I loved so much, I thought about it at school. I dreamt about it. I yearned to play it at all times. Tyler and I had an agreement, that we could play without the other there, but only so long as we did not progress in the story. We leveled, bought things, explored, but it was only with both of us that we learned Cloud’s fate, Tifa’s love, Barret’s heartbreak. Aeris’ demise. After Midgar, we assumed we were moving on to disc 2, we were close to halfway, we had been playing for 20 hours already. No, this was only the beginning. On the second disc, Tyler accidentally deleted our entire memory card, and we started over. I was angry, yes, but I was happy to play it all again, relearn it, get all that I missed. I have since played the entire game 4 times, and its prequels and sequels just as many, or more.

From that point on, we bought any videogame we could get our hands on that looked good. Pokemon, Metal Gear Solid, FF8, Xenogears, Chrono Trigger. My heart swells with joy as I remember each of these. The friends I have made because of them, namely Matt, my best friend to date. I remember renting a Dreamcast and playing true 3D for the first time. I remember seeing the PS2 take hold of the market. I remember all of the events of the past decade in comparison to videogames, and music.

In 7th grade, I started to really hang out with Traevor, and he was into a game called Diablo 2. Made by the creators of Starcraft, a game he and I both also loved. He got me to try it, downloading a free trial, and I fell in love. This was how my foray into Blizzard, my favorite company, and PC gaming (and building) began. It evolved quickly, to Warcraft, Doom, Quake, and many others. It turned into a love for MMOs with RO and FF11 years later. And it now remains such with my love of WoW.

Interestingly, I still love to take out the nintendo or play an old gameboy game. There is not a single system I will not play, or would not own if not for monetary constraints. I currently own: PS2, NES, SNES, Genesis, GBA, PC, Saturn, Dreamcast, N64, and I even have a Pong game somewhere!

Videogames have changed my life. Made friends, relieved stress, taught me history, psychology, philosophy, science, literature. I know how to read, write, type and spell pretty well, because of them. They have helped pique my interest in 3 of the other 4 pillars of me, history, philosophy, music. Videogames bring my life together, and thankfully, keep it together. People may think it is pathetic that I sit around and play so many games, or that I view them as more than just a game. But like I said, fuck them. This is what I love. And what I have no intention to stop loving.

God is dead

Post #3

The famous saying of Nietzche. He was referring to the actual being, mostly, believing that humans had actually killed god.

while i dont believe god ever existed, it seems Friedrich was at least partially right. God is, seemingly, dying. Or at least going the way of Zeus, Odin, Epona, Aeron and Quetzecotl.

i was surfing around the internet last night, and came across a website, www.yesnogod.com.  this lead me to http://www.harrisinteractive.com/harris_poll/index.asp?PID=359  through a bit of google looking. for those of you too lazy to look (if anyone actually still reads this besides my professor), the percentages are out of whack. that is easily explainable, but ill get to that. the latter statistics from harris poll shows that ~90% of people believe in god (or A god, it does not specify. i think it is A god, not a monotheistic god), which seems to be fairly true. in the US i think it is likely closer to 80%, and some places as low as perhaps 50%. Wherever, however, it is likely i am in the minority, but strangely that doesnt seem the case around me.

nearly all of my friends are athiests or agnostics. of all my aquantances, i would say only 25% or so believe in god. why? partially because i cannot stand preachy “jesus freaks”, sure. but i also think it is a generational thing. which ties in with the above. europe, north america and oceania in the above list “no” is winning. i think this can be explained by a few factors. 1. most people who come across that site are linked online by a friend or someplace they frequent. online. 2. they use stumbelupon. online. 3. they do research into religious belief and fine it. online. 4. they happen upon it by incredible chance, considering how massive the internet is. online again.

notice i point out online. this is for 2 reasons. 1. people who go online are generally better educated than the human average. not a whole lot of kenyans or venuzualans go online, nor do many of them have even highschool degrees to the equivalent we have here. 2. the average person on the internet is also YOUNGER than the average human. now, most people 60 and over go on the internet for email or stocks and such in the more technologically advanced countries. but far far fewer “surf” the web than the young people. i would say the average internet surfer is between 15 and 40. not many 10 year olds or 70 year old are going to come across yesnogod.com.

these 4 things show that, if the overall population of the internet is even CLOSE to what those polled feel, the younger generation is far less theistic. looking at the statistics on the harris charts, that seems to be true as well. the younger you are, the less chance of theism (aside from a jump in the 18-24, which is still lower than all but the category directly after it. i feel this is due to the fact that less 18-24 year olds have been through as much education and life experience as the 25-29 year olds. this survey is from 2003, and i think it is likely the numbers for those who are NOW 25-29 are about equal to this poll).

from 95% to 82% is only a 13% difference, but 13% of the world population, if this is true, is still around 800 million people. that is more than twice the entire population of the united states. let us say that this trend keeps up, and the next generation, those who were born below the polling age (such as myself) is at 79%. perhaps the generation after us will be 75%. that is a massive amount of difference in the belief in god.

atheists and agnostics have been the minority for much longer than any nation currently on earth, save perhaps iceland (they have the worlds longest democracy). not by name, i mean, but the dynasty/political system. perhaps science is finally turning that tide.

War is war. get over it.

my teacher asked me to make sure i said this is blog post 2(as in, the second turn in of it) so…

blog post 2, shelly

now, on to it. war. this whole war in iraq, afghanistan, possibly iran if we get a certain old man as president…it sucks ass. i am a pretty big war hawk, and certainly something of an imperialist, but i disagree with these wars as much as most of the world. not because i care that people are dying, or the world hates us more. but because it is strategically and economically unsound.

bush, cheney and all their cronies likely knew about the hatred between the 3 major groups in iraq, and ignored it. they probably knew that, like the vietnamese and koreans (bush certainly would have if he hadnt pussed out of vietnam and actually served his “duty”), they would fight a geurilla war. im sure they even knew that there were no WMDs and, overall, iraq was no threat and afghanistan was very little threat. they either passed that over, or they didnt care because they wanted the wars. fine, whatever, go to war.

our “great” nation has actually had at least 1 war every generation, with the exception of one that i can think of (in between the french-american conflict/war of 1812, and before the mexican-american war. unless you count the continued battles with the american indians, but that counts more as small skirmishes, or whole-scale massacre). every other generation, from the first americans, up to us, has had at least one fairly large war, though a few ended quite quickly like the spanish-american war.

it isnt going away anytime soon. war IS the natural order of things. im sorry hippies, but people are going to kill eachother. no matter how large or small, short or long, or how powerful or weak the opponent, people will die. granted, not many americans have died (in fact, in the big picture, america actually has an incredibly low death count in war. in ww1 and ww2 combined we lost less people than a single month of the germans in ww2. hell, in vietnam we lost fewer people than died in the 30 years war, 330 years before vietnam), but thousands upon thousands of iraqi soldiers, civilians, and people just getting unlucky being there not even because of the war have died.

but so what? it sucks for their families, sure. it sucks for the kids without mothers or fathers, its terrible for the parents who lost someone. but that IS WAR.  if the american people are so bloody against it, why dont they do something about it? i think it has been pretty well demonstrated marching in the streets with little posterboards doesnt do a damn thing. it didnt work for vietnam, either. protesting didnt keep the americans from fighting the brits, or from joining ww1 or ww2. that isnt going to work. it simply doesnt.

if you dont like the war, stop being such a twat and DO SOMETHING. im perfectly content to let soldiers who decide to join the military go over there and die. its their choice. if a draft is put in, then ill fight. aside from that, fuck it.

get over it. war has been around for 7000 years, on a large scale. before that, there were skirmishes, and before that, simple fights. it isnt going away. we arent any more “civilized” or “better” than the mesopotamians, or the aryans, or the vikings. we are the same bloody, savage creatures. weve just gotten better at killing.

goddamn hippies.