a thread for mundane ironists

[b]Harlan Coben

…but when in doubt, you might as well keep an open mind.[/b]

How insane is that, right Mr. Objectivist?

When you’re young, you think you have all the answers. You’re right wing or you’re left wing and the other side is a bunch of idiots. You know. When you get a little older, though, you start to more and more see the grays. Now I understand that true idiots are the ones who are certain they have the answers. It is never that simple. Do you know what I mean?

How insane is that, right Mr. Objectivist?

We don’t pray in foxholes because we are ready to meet our Maker. We pray because we don’t want to.

And how ironic is that? Besides, it doesn’t fool God.

Don’t show me paradise and then burn it down.

That ever happen to you?

I’m not sure we should get camera phones, that’s all.
She hit the remote and the car doors unlocked. She reached for the door handle. Matt hesitated.
Olivia looked at him.
What? he asked.
If we both get camera phones, Olivia said, I could send you nudies when you’re at work.
Matt opened the door. Verizon on Sprint?

This Modern World.

A sign read: YOUR STAY HERE IS TOUCH AND GO—TOUCH AND YOU GO.

Let’s imagine a context.

[b]Existential Comics

Nietzsche: God is dead.
Everyone: wow cool.
Nietzsche: No, not cool you little shits. Now we have to be God ourselves. Can you replace God? No, because are all a bunch of idiots.
Everyone: oh shit.[/b]

A true story some believe.

Online is cool as long as you can manage to use it without reading anything anyone says about anything.

Or, at the very least, not understanding anything anyone says about anything.

Russian literature is amazing because really makes you understand what it is like to be one of those people who can’t remember anyone’s name and is confused all the time.

What the hell does that even mean?!

Capitalism efficiently allocates resources according to our needs and wants.
You can tell because people die of poverty for not being able to afford their insulin while we spend hundreds of millions of dollars making new Spiderman movies every year.

Hey, they don’t call it “the virtue of selfishness” for nothing.

When you are a teenager you read Nietzsche.
When you are in your twenties you read Hegel.
When you are in your thirties you actually read Hegel, because you only pretended to read him in your twenties.

Incredibly enough, I skipped Hegel altogether.

[b]Easiest mistakes you can make in philosophy starting out:

• confusing epistemic subjectivity with metaphysical subjectivity.
• confusing speaker meaning with sentence meaning.
• confusing being able to name drop philosophers in casual conversation with a personality.[/b]

Let’s just saying confusing and move on.

[b]Bob Dylan

It’s very tiring having other people tell you how much they dig you if you yourself don’t dig you. [/b]

I can only try to imagine it myself.

He not busy being born is busy dying.

I still don’t know what the fuck that means. But point taken.

You could listen to Woody Guthrie songs and actually learn how to live.

You know, until he went electric.

I failed to communicate, that’s why I chose to leave.

Me, I’m still here of course.

I can be jubilant one moment and pensive the next, and a cloud could go by and make that happen.

Not all clouds being created equal. For example, some are attached to tornados.

I don’t think the human mind can comprehend the past and the future. They are both just illusions that can manipulate you into thinking there’s some kind of change.

There’s some kind of change alright.

[b]Blake Crouch

The box isn’t all that different from life. If you go in with fear, fear is what you’ll find.[/b]

Let’s trade boxes.

I can’t help thinking that we’re more than the sum total of our choices, that all the paths we might have taken factor somehow into the math of our identity.

Don’t get me started!

Perfection was a surface thing. The epidermis. Cut a few layers deep, you begin to see some darker shades. Cut to the bone—pitch black.

A perfect description, isn’t it?

I’ve seen so many versions of you. With me. Without me. Artist. Teacher. Graphic designer. But it’s all, in the end, just life. We see it macro, like one big story, but when you’re in it, it’s all just day-to-day, right? And isn’t that what you have to make your peace with?

Right, like you ever really can.

The older I get, the less I understand.

In other words, not being an objectivist.

Nature doesn’t see things through the prism of good or bad. It rewards efficiency. That’s the beautiful simplicity of evolution. It matches design to environment.

Until it gets to us.

[b]tiny nietzsche

sexually transmitted dementia[/b]

Sure, why not.

a toaster in every bathtub

And, it goes without saying, plugged in.

you, an art critic: bob ross is a hack who uses painting tricks to knock out hotel art
me, an art lover: bob ross is a fucking genius who transcends the genre as well as calms my anxiety about everything

You get this or you don’t.

if you can’t give up on yourself, who can you give up on?

Damn straight.

this feeling is unavailable

Unless of course you’re the exception.

sometimes after a dream I try to figure out what went wrong

Me, I’ll just move on to the next one.

[b]Neal Stephenson

Fighting isn’t about knowing how. It’s about deciding to.[/b]

Or, perhaps, both?

As it turned out, imagining the fate of seven billion people was far less emotionally affecting than imagining the fate of one.

That’s certainly how it can turn out.

From long experience in places like Afghanisatan and Chechnya, Sokolov recognised, in the black jihadist’s movements, a sort of cultural or attitudinal advantage that such people always enjoyed in situations like this: they were complete fatalists who believed that God was on their side. Russians, on the other hand, were fatalists of a somewhat different kind, believing, or at least strongly suspecting, that they were fucked no matter what, and that they had better just make the best of it anyway, but not seeing in this the hand of God at work or the hope of some future glory in a martyr’s heavens.

There’s a lesson in there somewhere, he figured.

When I read a novel that I really like, I feel as if I am in direct, personal communication with the author. I feel as if the author and I are on the same wavelength mentally, that we have a lot in common with each other, and that we could have an interesting conversation, or even a friendship, if the circumstances permitted it.

Of course the author knows none of this.

He parks in the far corner of the lot, explaining that it is more logical to do this and then walk for fifteen seconds than it is to spend fifteen minutes looking for a closer space.

You know, when this is actually rational.

The problem of the librarian is that books are multi-dimensional in their subject matter but must be ordered on one-dimensional shelves.

Can anyone explain this?

[b]tiny nietzsche

my horoscope says there’s life on mars[/b]

How about that, Jacob?

it’s not a crisis if you don’t exist

What’s that make death then?

if you get killed in a dream, that’s on you, pal

You being just your brain, right?
Whatever that actually means, of course.

nihilism isn’t given, it’s earned

So, anyone here think they’ve earned theirs more than I’ve earned mine?

I want to dance on my own grave

Also, I want to put the video on youtube.

you say drug induced psychosis like that’s a bad thing

No, only that it can be.

[b]Michelangelo Antonioni

I don’t know whether I am ever bored. I never look at myself.[/b]

Clearly he’s missing the point.

One of the problems of the future world will be the use of leisure time. How will it be filled up? Maybe drugs will be distributed free of charge by the government.

Nope, nothing like that yet.

I never think in terms of alienation; it’s the others who do. Alienation means one thing to Hegel, another to Marx and yet another to Freud; so it is not possible to give a single definition, one that will exhaust the subject. It is a question bordering on philosophy, and I’m not a philosopher nor a sociologist. My business is to tell stories, to narrate with images - nothing else. If I do make films about alienation - to use that word that is so ambiguous - they are about characters, not about me.

A lucky bastard, obviously.

I’m more or less skeptical about marriage, because of family ties, relations between children and parents — it’s all so depressing.

My guess: there are exceptions.

In any case, the idea of giving “all” of reality is overly simple and absurd.

And look what happens when some attempt to give that here.

Hollywood doesn’t believe in the death penalty for anyone except people who get cable TV without paying for it. Hollywood is like being nowhere and talking to nobody about nothing.

That’s a start anyway.

[b]Krzysztof Kieslowski

For me optimism is two lovers walking into the sunset arm in arm. Or maybe into the sunrise - whatever appeals to you. [/b]

Actually, neither really comes close. But, hey, different folks, different strokes.

You make films to give people something, to transport them somewhere else, and it doesn’t matter if you transport them to a world of intuition or a world of intellect…The realm of superstitions, fortune-telling, presentiments, intuition, dreams, all this is the inner life of a human being, and all this is the hardest thing to film… I’ve been trying to get there from the beginning. I’m somebody who doesn’t know, somebody who’s searching.

Yeah, that woks for me. If barely.

Different people in different parts of the world can be thinking the same thoughts at the same time. It’s an obsession of mine: that different people in different places are thinking the same thing but for different reasons. I try to make films which connect people.

Let’s file this one under…dasein?

I have one good characteristic: I’m a pessimist, so I always imagine the worst - always. To me, the future is a black hole.

In other words, what me and my ilk call an optimist.

I believe the life of every person is worthy of scrutiny, containing its own secrets and dramas.

Can you even imagine that?

This man (Bergman) is one of the few film directors—perhaps the only one in the world—to have said as much about human nature as Dostoevsky or Camus.

You know, if you get him.

[b]PJ Harvey

I firmly disbelieve that one has to be a tortured soul to write good music.[/b]

Let alone good philosophy.

I decide immediately if I like a person and if I do, then I’m myself, and if I don’t, then I give nothing.

Okay, but is that extreme enough?

I find it hard myself to feel justified to sing in a very politically direct way about war or social conditions because I feel so ignorant of a lot of it.

Right, like there’s nothing to be done about that.

Being a recording artist and having thousands of people listening to your music and singing your songs, and paying for it? It feels great!

Though surely not as great as we feel here.

I feel that my dreamscapes are part of my everyday life, and sometimes I can’t tell the difference.

Tell me about it. You know, as a philosopher.

Well, I’m quite a self-deprecating person.

Shouldn’t we all be?
Well, not counting you of course. Or, for that matter, me.

[b]Ani DiFranco

If you don’t ask the right question, every answer seems wrong.[/b]

We’ll need a context of course. The right one in particular.

Life is a sleazy stranger, who looks vaguely familiar; flirting with a bimbo named disaster at the end of the bar.

My guess: not necessarily your life.

Lying in bed, you know, you don’t seem so tall.

Especially in the middle of the night.

I think the music industry, for instance, is such a huge, multibazillion-dollar industry and it’s become very, very savvy. There’s a very short grace period in which actual human rebellion or resistance can thrive before it’s co-opted by these huge companies. And all of youth culture is packaged and sold back to us at this furious rate these days. I think it’s part and parcel to this corporate encroachment on our lives in general.

She means this: youtu.be/SlIiD-_duec
Or she might as well mean that.

Love is a piano dropped from a fourth story window, and you were in the wrong place at the wrong time.

A little help with this one.

When I was four years old they tried to test my IQ, they showed me this picture of three oranges and a pear. They asked me which one is different and does not belong; they taught me different was wrong.

I think she missed the point. Or they did.

[b]Bjork

Nature is our chapel.[/b]

When it isn’t a slaughterhouse.

Football is a fertility festival. Eleven sperm trying to get into the egg. I feel sorry for the goalkeeper.

Not to worry, she means soccer.

Emotions weren’t created to just lie around.

Not conting the times we wish they were.

When I was a teenager in Iceland people would throw rocks and shout abuse at me because they thought I was weird. I never got that in London no matter what I wore.

What explains that? Other than the obvious.

I’m going to prove the impossible really exists.

Any updates on this?

Everything that a guy says once, you have to say five times.

You know, if you’re counting.

[b]so sad today

treat everyone with kindness but also try to avoid everyone[/b]

Or, sure, the other way around.

if you need me i’ll be worrying about shit beyond my control

Unless of course you’d like to make it worse.

i’m basing my entire self-esteem on something but i forget what it is

Not that it isn’t still working.

in space no one can hear your dumb opinion

Down here though we read them loud and clear.

being born is a lot of pressure

Starting with just sliding down out of the hole.

you’re damn right i’m misinterpreting the situation as way worse than it is

In other words, fuck the insurance company.

[b]Brad Thor

… have a smile for everyone you meet and a plan to kill them.[/b]

You know, if you’re a pragmatist.

You know when I told you the joke about how a friend will help you move, but a real friend will help you move a body? I was only kidding.

In other words, now that the body has been found.

…all members of Congress should be required wear NASCAR uniforms. You know, the kind with the patches? That way we’d know who is sponsoring each of them.

In the interim, you can go here: opensecrets.org/influence/

[b]There are many lay people and scholars alike, both with and without the Muslim community, who feel that the pure orthodox Islam of the fundamentalists could never survive outside the context of its seventh-century Arabian origins. Apply twenty-first-century science, logic, or humanistic reasoning to it and it falls apart.

They believe this is why Islam has always relied so heavily on the threat of death. Question Islam, malign Islam, or leave Islam and you will be killed. It is a totalitarian modus operandi that silences all dissent and examination, thereby protecting the faith from ever having to defend itself.[/b]

Next up: fundamentalist Christians.

There aren’t many honest men or women in Washington anymore. Politicians get where they are by the sheer force of their egos, not their convictions. And you know what? It’s our fault as voters. We don’t demand better candidates, so we end up getting what we deserve—on both sides of the aisle.

No, really, on both sides.

Incredible brilliance often dwells on the razor’s edge of madness…

I know that mine once did.

[b]Mark Manson

Humans are attracted to each other’s rough edges.[/b]

If not exactly the opposite.

The fact is, people who base their self-worth on being right about everything prevent themselves from learning from their mistakes. They lack the ability to take on new perspectives and empathize with others. They close themselves off to new and important information.

And, no, not only the Kids, Mr. Objectivist.

A more interesting question, a question that most people never consider, is, ‘What pain do you want in your life? What are you willing to struggle for?’ Because that seems to be a greater determinant of how our lives turn out.

I’ll struggle for none myself.

There’s a saying in Texas: “The smallest dog barks the loudest.” A confident man doesn’t feel a need to prove that he’s confident. A rich woman doesn’t feel a need to convince anybody that she’s rich.

Okay, but what if you leave Texas?

I try to live with few rules, but one that I’ve adopted over the years is this: if it’s down to me being screwed up, or everybody else being screwed up, it is far, far, far more likely that I’m the one who’s screwed up.

Of course, we’re the exceptions.

We are actually often happier with less. When we’re overloaded with opportunities and options, we suffer from what psychologists refer to as the paradox of choice. Basically, the more options we’re given, the less satisfied we become with whatever we choose, because we’re aware of all the other options we’re potentially forfeiting.

Still, most will take their chances with more.

[b]Natalie Portman

My dad’s a doctor, and when I was 8, I went to one of his medical conferences where they were demonstrating laser surgery on a chicken. I was so mad that a chicken had to die, I never ate meat again. [/b]

See how these things happen?

I’m afraid of everything. But maybe when you’re afraid of everything, it sort of seems like you’re scared of nothing.

Well that sort of seems ridiculous to me.

When I was in nursery school, the teachers asked me, y’know, ‘What does your dad do for a living?’ So I said ‘He helps women get pregnant!’ They called my mom and they were like, ‘What exactly does your husband do?’

That actually sounds like a true story.

I’d rather be smart than a movie star.

Turns out that she’s both. Also, drop dead gorgeous. You know, if that matters.

Lying is the most fun a woman can have without taking her clothes off.

She ought to run for president then.

If you’re an actress or a musician, everyone thinks you’re hot.

Let’s note the ones who aren’t.

[b]so sad today

life is the worst phase[/b]

Not counting death of course.

I’m a fucking idiot but at least i’m dumb as shit

Let’s expalin the difference.

embarrassed to be alive: the musical

Filmed entirely in the Oval Office.

sorry my emotional honesty leaked out and got on you

Or here: sorry my intellectual honesty leaked out and got on you

comparing myself to people who don’t really exist

Don’t we all?

can I count on you to let me down?

After all, you can count on me.

[b]Woody Allen

If you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans. [/b]

Is there anyone who hasn’t been quoted as saying this?

More than any other time in history, mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness. The other, to total extinction. Let us pray we have the wisdom to choose correctly.

Ever the optimist.

The great question of philosophy remains: If life is meaningless, what can be done about alphabet soup?

So, has that ever come up here?

There are two important things in the world, the first is sex. The other isn’t all that important.

Let’s not go there, Woody.

A: Socrates is a man.
B: All men are mortal.
C: All men are Socrates.

Except here of course.

Marriage is the death of hope.

And [possibly] not just his.

[b]Joni Mitchell

Nobody understood The Reoccurring Dream, but after September 11, when we were coerced to do a national duty and go out and shop, surely people could begin to see what I was getting at. [/b]

See what you make of it: youtu.be/P-HlAw3clwQ

We call for the three great stimulants of the exhausted ones, artifice, brutality, and innocence.

Your three might be different. Or your first three.

The land of litigation, the courts are like game shows. Take what’s behind the curtain the jury cries.

Or what’s in the box.

When I began experimenting, people weren’t ready for it. Once it’s in its second and third generational stages, people can accept it.

Maybe. But, for me, there’s her first album. And then all the rest of them.

Lazy reviewers look up other people’s reviews and they write the same thing, so you get people writing crap based on crap.

That’s sort of how it works here, he thought.

I still believe in the power of the word, that words inspire.

Needless to say: For better or for worse.

[b]Lisa Taddeo

We pretend to want things we don’t want so nobody can see us not getting what we need.[/b]

We not including me in particular.

Sometimes there’s nothing better on earth than someone asking you a question.

And then sometimes there’s nothing worse.

Her whole life stretches out before her, a path of imprecise but multiple directions. She could be an astronaut, a rap star, an accountant. She could be happy.

Not many of us that isn’t true of.

She’s never understood exactly what it means to seethe until tonight.

Not many of us that isn’t true of.

There should be a stronger word than regret.

Better yet, nothing to regret.

Sleep is not sweet but dumb.

Not counting the dreams of course.