If you read it and were rightfully perturbed, sorry about that. If for some reason you really want to read it, you don't. Have yourself a lovely day and enjoy other writings that are hopefully not also hiding mistakes like this one.
Recently thought about this story and remembered some bits of it that don't reflect the kind of behaviour I want to see in my writings, so this piece has been removed. In retrospect and re-reading it, there has been internal cringe and regret which reminds me that you should really try to be more cognizant of the subjects which you implant into your stories.
If you read it and were rightfully perturbed, sorry about that. If for some reason you really want to read it, you don't. Have yourself a lovely day and enjoy other writings that are hopefully not also hiding mistakes like this one. This one... I know there's something I want to say about this subject, but whenever I try to discuss it I find what I say to be garbled and counter-intuitive to the point I'm trying to make. Maybe I'm being overly critical of it, I don't know. Feel free to tell me if it's alright in writing or content, and feel free to argue with me if you disagree. I feel like there's something important to be said here, but I can't word it right. This is the best I could get at the subject.
Anyways, away from the self-doubt and questioning, I hope this makes some level of sense to you and that you enjoy it immensely. Or a little bit. This topic is an important one, I feel, as education is an important thing and there seems to be something wrong with it given the usual reception it has from its students and the lack of preparation twelve freaking years gives a lot of new adults. Education's Oversight by Mackinley Clevinger, January 29, 2016 Something is lost in any system as it develops to be better than its previous incarnations; a family business losing that personal touch when they become a franchise; the police force of a small town versus a large city; or a handcrafted vase at your local market versus a mass produced replica. Both versions of the system in question have their strong points, and their failings, in comparison to the other. Ideally, we would be able to live in a world that could meet these two sides in the middle to supply a public with the best of both worlds, as it were, and there is one area in particular that needs this method of treatment. The education system has developed to allow for a much larger group to be taught at any given time, the thousands upon thousands of children mandated to enter a center of learning able to be processed and, by use of a rigid system, taught all the things they are thought to need to know. Education has followed the population rise in many areas, progressing from single classrooms, teaching a bare few, to large complexes with, ideally, state of the art technology that reaches the numerous hopefuls from far and wide to bring them the best learning experience available.
I'm surprised to have written this, but I got the foot in the door and managed to shove that thing wide open to actually write a poem. Always tricky, these, but I think I did a well enough job of it. It speaks for itself, ideally, so I hope you enjoy reading it!
I Don't See Heroes by Mackinley Clevinger, January 27, 2016 If there was ever a time For a hero to appear And right all the wrongs And fight all the bad guys Then that time is now But I don’t see capes Just people And I don’t see colorful costumes Just us And villains running unopposed I do believe this may very well be the first time I've written a full-length story without any violence or essence of the supernatural in it. I mention the latter because I did once write a story for an official summative assignment about a goddess that killed a guy's husband and took away everything he loved because he reneged on a deal. I thought it was good, apparently it didn't show proper grasp of the English language or something. That wasn't something from forever ago, either, that was just a few years ago.
Anyways, unimportant, this is an experiment in writing, in that it's about people talking and their emotions rather than about killing zombies while being worried you're developing sociopathic tendencies. It feeds into some of the Essays I've been writing of late, but is still more self-contained and a story than an attempt to share my opinions in a space meant to entertain rather than just inform. I probably talk too much and should just put it up. Oh, the name is the result of having written it and not knowing what to call it, so I just went with something vague that wouldn't conflict with something I might use in the future. Jim's Moment by Mackinley Clevinger, January 26, 2016 “Jim. Jimminy Jim Jim. What are we going to do with you?” Three feet and ten years lay between me and the man sitting behind the desk I’d set my sights on, and in one afternoon he was going to lay waste to all of my carefully laid plans. My rise to the top was going to be shut down by this disgusting- “What I’ve been hearing, Jim, it hasn’t been good.” And what I know about you makes me want to vomit knowing you’re where I should be. “Your productivity’s down, Jim, and we care very deeply about our all of our highly valued employees. We want you to apply yourself to your fullest potential.” I’d ‘apply’ myself better if I were in your seat making the calls you always mess up. This one was fun to write, though I'm well aware of a startling lack of experience in this field. Still, the message within oughta be good. This comes from hearing about the enormous load of hate and bile that gets thrown at people, and wanting to say something about the *ahem* asshats who seem to exist purely to downplay anything good people do and try to ruin the lives of anyone who tries.
So, it's a long one, took me quite a while to write, but I think it may well be a goody. Let's hope so. Enjoy! Toxic People (or: Asshats) by Mackinley Clevinger, January 25, 2016 It is truly amazing what humanity is capable of. Within structured groups of like-minded people, we are capable of advancing technological research and assembling devices of such complexity and power that we were able to move men from this Earth, put them on the moon, and bring them back safely. On our own, we are capable of such selflessness and random acts of kindness to our fellow man without the barest hint or expectation of rewards or returns that it would, to use a proverb, make a saint envious. Within or without our small communities, we are able to take our passions and interests to create beautiful works of art, devices of incredible technical skill, and anything else the mind can imagine. The singular capabilities of mankind are astounding, and the nature of many to support and aid one another in these ventures is a wonderful thing to behold. Thousands of stories exist wherein people struggled for months or years to finish a project that would go on to take the world by storm, delighting thousands in the theatres, in every-day life, or in the comfort of their own home. Behind many of these achievements stand proud, strong people who gave all they had to make their dreams a reality, each with their own story of trial by fire in the fulfillment of the task they set themselves on. Arts been something I've always struggled with. The idea of being able to pick up a pencil and do something awesome is a skill I want, but before you get there, you have to draw a lot of really bad stuff. I'm of a flawed mindset that always expects some kind of perfection from myself right out of the gate, so it's been difficult to make myself draw despite knowing that everyone started at a similar level.
Anyways, I finally did start drawing, looked at other people's work for trying to figure out how in the name of all that is holy one actually does it, and have since been learning and getting marginally better. Kind of. I should try and devote more time to it to really make proper progress, but for now it's usually a good five or ten minutes every night, which has resulted in what is actually going to be the bulk of this post once I stop blathering. I'm not putting this here to shock and amaze people, more to be interesting and track progression. There's also some sketchwork from when I practice a design for woodburning, so I hope you enjoy this amateur-level entry that I have the hubris of designating as art. It's put in a Read More thingy so as not to give passer-by's an attack of fits. I wrote far too much of this one while tired, but I think it still works pretty well. This whole idea that people need to leave the safety net and explore the world to really become the people that they are is an important concept for the modern world where a focus seems to be on efficiency in the way of maximum payout for minimum effort instead of a focus on personal fulfillment and pursuing interests, so this is intended to be supportive of people in a position of "I don't know what to do" or people who never really questioned what they were going to do to instead go out and see what the world is made of.
I probably just summed up my entire article for you before you even read it. Need to stop doing that. Anyways, as I said earlier, I'm tired, so I hope you enjoy this when it goes up. Who needs to be professional? Leaving Your Hometown by Mackinley Clevinger, January 24, 2016 Humanity may be capable of moving as one when the need comes along, but the level of variation and uniqueness one can find in exploring the cultural sub-sets of a single part of one country is astounding. There are a seemingly infinite number of ways to live, to think, to view the world we all live in, or to do the things that seem incredibly simple or integral to our lives; and each of these things will mean something different to the individual people living in the hundreds of thousands of communities and cultures spread across our Earth. There was a time when these communities and the cultures they instilled in their youth were all that the young would know as they grew, and when they became old enough they would settle down and teach the same to their young. Generation after generation taught the same and expected to do the same as their teachers before them. Vast distances lay between neighboring towns, rendering any ability to travel safely difficult and dangerous enough for it to be considered impossible by most. As such, each community’s culture and system of ideas weren’t able to cross over with one another, and each community kept to itself and stayed to the same path it had walked for years. There's a trend in my writing, it seems. I oughta try and write an Essay that doesn't try to inspire people to do more with their lives than what they do now, and complain about America's politics or something. More likely I'll write about the importance of advanced education, but that doesn't mean I can't try to make myself write other stuff.
Anyways, this is the result of me doing some stuff and then thinking about how it made/makes me feel afterwards, and how it's probably important that people do physical stuff because it's good for you. Trust me, the actual piece is better than the short description, but it serves as a door opener for people only reading what they're interested in. So, hope you enjoy it, and know that I'm accepting of your judgements and opinions on my own judgements and opinions. Feedback on both subject matter and writing style are appreciated from anyone willing to take the time to pitch in their two cents, though given a busy lifestyle, go right ahead on ignoring that demand if you so wish. I'm saying too much. Physical Fitness in Modern Society by Mackinley Clevinger, January 22, 2016 Human behavior has changed throughout its history, different aspects of our lives rising and falling in importance to society as the needs changed and the system moved on from what it had once been. Casual violence, war, society structure, treatment of your fellow humans, recognition of the arts; all these things and many more have risen to prominence and fallen to dis-use time and time again over the course of our human history, and of late an important one that was once vital to human survival has fallen to the wayside, a forgotten aspect of our lives that benefits us in our entirety. I’m talking about exercise. Training and honing your body to be able to do more than sit in a vehicle for half an hour, sit at a desk all day, and drive back home to lie prostrate for eight-hours. This part of our lives, physical health, has become all but ignored by the masses going about their day-to-day business despite the service it provides to other aspects of our lives. It's nice when inspiration for a writing piece strikes and you're actually able to write the whole thing without having to obsess over getting every part write. This started as a question that had been on my mind for a bit given my reading a book that questioned a lot of what we do with our lives instead of what we want to do, and I realized that I'd recently not been spending so much time on accessory activities but still feeling like I've been spending my time well when I can clearly recall times I wanted to power through everything else to just play some games. Thus the question: 'Where do games belong in our lives?' which branched a bit into general life empowerment and the need to cut out activities that block progress in our life, while still keeping ourselves open to the actual games because they can be pretty awesome.
Games in Our Lives by Mackinley Clevinger, January 22, 2016 A large part of many people’s lives are video games, some spending their time unwinding in front of a television or their computer after a long and stressful day to get away from their problems and put themselves into the shoes of someone else doing something far away from the reality they may struggle with. Others use games as their way of business, creating entertainment that is viewed and enjoyed by millions as their preferred method of unwinding. It is no overstatement to say that the gaming industry has boomed in the last few decades, enriching a market and creating an impressive catalogue of games for their vast following to purchase and enjoy. Work has sprung up in the shadows cast by these industrial giants, the fascination by some into a certain series or personality funding the lives of numerous individuals who create multimedia based around these games and their stories. |
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November 2019
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