gracefuldave

[gracefuldave]

Sometimes you need a place to share some text with a bunch of different people on different apps...

Paulo Freire is the most cited person in modern pedagogy. Even by his Wiki page he is a neo-Marxist, and considering the body count for fascist countries is in the millions and the body count for communist countries is in the hundred millions, think about what being a "neo-fascist" would mean, and to wear that proudly. His term "critical consciousness" is, in my translation, a theory for changing the world. In his own words, it is "the ability to intervene in reality in order to change it." This is the tie to critical theory, the view that the world is governed by power dynamics at the most fundamental level. This is evinced by the statement "Ask not what is true, but to whom defining true serves" (this is metaphysical non-starter in ways an undergrad should be able to see.) To put it another way, "might makes right." The insistence that power is primary, that truth is only an expression of power, justifies using power to fight back against the way things are, as seen in the culture of deplatforming, that words or ideas cause "hurt" or "trauma" or deny someone their right to "safety." If words are violence, then violence can be used justly against words. Still, change the world, sounds great. But we are speaking about education, the training of young minds. The job of a teacher is to teach students how to understand the world, not to know what *I* think the world is, but to give them the tools to come to their own conclusions, to maintain their diversity of perspective: the whole reason why diversity is valuable. After all, I might actually be wrong! An activist, however, is one who teaches them to change the world. The change is primary to them. To change without understanding is damaging - it is infinitely easier to break than to build, so what are the odds you'll make an improvement when you haven't understood what you are changing? Or, I know, it's crazy, but maybe the thing you want to change doesn't need changing! Or it's changing quite well on its own, thanks. Notice the slogans aren't "improve the world." It's always "change." Change when you're an adult and have agency over your life, so you can show you can make changes in your own life for the better before you start making them to the world as a child.

So let's then look at Brazil's education system first. This guy was exiled by the government for his subversive teaching; apparently he taught 300 adults how to read and write in 45 days. What does "read and write" mean in this context? How was it assessed? Where are they now? Even the Wiki doesn't have a link, which you think it should, as extraordinary claims need extraordinary evidence. I can't find any actual source of that. I'm trying to find English copies of Brazilian documentaries currently, to see if there is any primary footage or interviews or something. I’m not saying it’s not out there, but I don’t usually have to work this hard to find something like this. So how about data on the countries that implemented his policies? Because when he was let back into the country after the government changed and they infused their education system with his teachings, what happened to Brazil? Should we be trying to emulate theirs? Their adult literacy rate, to look at the best example to see his method in action, in 2010 was 92%, after steadily rising since the 60s. Wow, that's good news! Guess what? So did all the other Latin American countries! Brazil's not even at the top for percentage or rate of learning. 92% isn't that impressive when you look at the 99%s of Canada or even that of Uruguay!

The chapter in the book I was assigned today has a quote from Nicol, Archibald, and Baker (2012) that says culturally responsive education is "an approach to teaching and learning that facilitates critical consciousness, engenders respect for diversity, and acknowledges the importance of relationship, while honouring, building upon, and drawing from the culture, knowledge and language of the students, teachers, and local community." Leaving aside the observation that the citation is from 2012 and what that means (basically humanities courses aren't like science where the newest data is the most accurate or useful), this sounds great, unless you know Freire's term "critical consciousness." Without that bit, it actually sounds amazing, and I am actually convinced that most of that sentence is good and powerful thinking that will actually make the world better. Making learning meaningful is a powerful and important idea. It also makes your job easier, and besides, you should be able to justify to a student why you are forcing them to learn what you are teaching them - if it's not meaningful to you it won't be them. One way to do that is to engage with the student's identity, and through that, culture. It's fundamental to teaching effectively on any metric.

But, to then agitate them so they see what they, as young people, deem is unjust and empowering them to disrupt, dismantle, and destroy (their terms) that which oppresses (you're either with us or against us) is not the role of education, nor should it be, for teachers are, in fact, agents of the state. Even worse than children breaking things without first understanding them is the teacher that has accepted they cannot be neutral, cannot be a bystander, so they push forward their slightly more sophisticated worldview to make things "better," a place of authority that, in my experience, the average teacher really isn't qualified to take. The road to hell is paved with good intentions, we know this. A worldview that puts a moral imperative onto its followers, that doesn't require an appeal to truth but only power, that splits the world into good guys and bad guys so that a universal revolution for the good of the lower classes occurs and what comes will definitely be better than before we totally promise, is a story the 20th century was supposed to have taught us to recognize and avoid, for everyone's sake.

[gracefuldave]

A blank page is a good listener

Hi there. I know, it’s been a while. I KNOW, you hate journals that start like this. But just listen.

Leaving always feels like running away. Running away isn’t always wrong. It does highlight regrets. It creates new ones. You can’t ever return to where you left. You will always miss something. You can barely be present for yourself, let alone others, let alone strangers.

No one has life figured out. There’s no real escape for us hedgehogs. Its a balance between opposites, that make a whole, that we must maintain, in perpetuity. The rewards feel like they are in direct proportions to the loses. It feels zero sum. Add in the undeniable tragedy of existence, either for you or for those you love, OR for the strangers who suffer in your stead so that you can be a lucky outlier. There’s a resigned cruelty here.

I don’t love enough. I don’t care enough. I don’t give enough. I don’t do enough. I watch. I take in too much. I think too much. I judge too much.

I don’t look at others and wonder how everyone has it all figured out except for me. I look around at all those who think they’ve got it and shake my head. I don’t think anyone can help me. I think I know what everyone will say. I’ve done more work on these problems. I know my faults. I know what I should do. But I don’t do.

Being alone is easier, but limited. Being around others when you’d rather be alone isn’t good. It  makes you lie.

There’s never enough time. I’m still learning to be okay with doing my best and falling short. I’m still learning to not see good that I’ve done as falling short. I’m still learning to put my ego down.

I think I’m improving. I don’t think there’s a resolution. I still wouldn’t resubscribe to existence if asked.

I can’t tell if writing helps or it just puts time between the moment and the now.

-Dave

[gracefuldave]

Can't believe Google is telling me I'm the first person to ask this...

QUESTION! If a player with Dack Fayden's emblem redirects a burn spell to a planeswalker, does that player get to take control of the planeswalker because of the emblem? I am unclear if redirections choose new targets via targeting and if they do, if that triggers the emblem.

[gracefuldave]

The Only Living Boy in New York

Appearances. That of experience plays itself out on a surface level. Every moment goes only a few millimeters. We see others going miles but we worry about our oh thinnest of skins.

I appear to be an outsider on a swing at 1am on a Wednesday. I appear be playing my part well. I long for the day when I’m too old to change and cons take solace in the unchanging world I have built.

I am plumbing the wells of musical inspiration, yet another appearance - telling truths with its lies.

We sense the world around us and think, “My, how convincing this world of appearance is. Good thing my faculty of reason shows me the truth,” yet we never show this voice the same curtesy of skepticism. That Object is Other, but the voice which is assures us of this gets not such treatment.

For the laundry list of fallbacks alcohol has, at least you still retain the ability and desire to press your self into the world.

What if I’m all wrong? Or what if I’m no longer right?

I’m sorry I wasn’t a better person so I could make up for your short comings for the both of us.

I’m terrified of meeting someone.

It’s weird how the grade schoolers I teach are as stoked on Pokémon as I was at that age and yet we have nothing to talk about.

If you don’t write because you don’t feel like it, yet you feel like you’re disappointing your audience, yet you’re the only one who hears what you’re saying, yet you’re the only one listening, whose fault is that blank page?

Nietzsche was a troll.

I wrote that because I’m a troll.

“Nietzsche” is one of the only words Apple didn’t have to autocorrect tonight.

I am smiling at the thought of the faces of the people who are reading this reacting to reading this.

I would do horrible things to live in a summer’s night for eternity. That is still a hypothesis I’m working towards testing in my own wayward way of never moving forward.

If what I said was what I meant then my name would go down in history. This is the curse of all expressives.

It’s amazing anyone has accomplished anything ever and we’re not all dead a hundred times over.

-Dave

[gracefuldave]

Does being resurrected count as a short rest?

Our Dragonborn Fighter, about to have his flesh dissolved by a black dragon’s acid breath (via outofcontextdnd)

[gracefuldave]

I found this imported Force Awakens soundtrack CD at the Virgin Megastore and dude, I… I just don’t know if this movie will be any good

[gracefuldave]

[gracefuldave]

The picture I saw and tried to keep is above. The song I heard and tried to understand is to the right. http://songexploder.net/the-long-winters The Wrath of the Sea is below. http://existentialcomics.com/comic/18

[gracefuldave]

The Commander Thinks Aloud

As soon as the boat started moving, I knew I would find myself on the ocean. The frustration of transit had stuck with me - more so than ever before. A tight start to the day with some reasoned out snoozes by a tired mind had put me one sailing back. A quiet bus driver on a lazy route held up by construction on a seaside road put me back the second; this one just in time to have sales held for a the lifetime of ten minutes.

I went straight to the top deck, set aside my suitcase, and stared into the churning water. Dark imagined shapes and glinty light ones kept my attention. And the frustration simmered there, noticeably. I am seasoned traveller, with an MA in BC Ferries and the buses who don’t get you there with time Google promised you. Yes, you’re now twice a liar, but it’s just 45 minutes; relax! Let it go. Deep breaths. Let it g- And then we started to move. I don’t think I left anything on the shore, but all that tension was lifted away, like an indrawn breath. The gears were turning.

Future Dave lives in the tropics. A casual glance at the weather for Korea two years ago had set hopes, equally casual, on experiencing life in a more ideal climate. This was incredibly false. After moving a few sizes up from Vancouver to Seoul, a promise made to Past Dave, next will be somewhere a few sizes down from Victoria. Either the dream is real - the worst day on the beach is better than the best day at the office, or it’s just a desire for greener grass. But the outcome is the same: go do it. If it’s truth, you have found happiness. If it’s something less, then at least you will know and will stop pining.

Future Dave might live on a boat. When faced with the amount of dead trees required to achieve something like a mortgage, he doesn’t start planning now, but questions instead whether Man was ever supposed to live in such a way. But when that building is spaced for exactly one (plus guest!) and can float to new neighbours and new horizons with a gentle push from the sky alone… Well, that starts to be more attractive.

I have never sailed a boat in my life. No one is ever as uncool as they are when wearing a life jacket.

But I recently found out my mother has, and did so when she was younger. My sister is currently researching the true life of pirates to fuel her creative writing. I find myself consistently staring into the distance from our deck in Sechelt, at nothing more but the ocean and the islands it holds in such a way as to be curious to my own mind, yet not so that I ever stop. These were but a few drops in the bucket that flowed over when that ferry started to move.

I even took a photo of the sun-soaked islands, their fir-ry slopes of mono-coloured majesty contrasting the deep blue of the water as starkly as the sharp white of our wake, in the hopes that this time, just this once, the dinky lens of my phone would capture the scene the way my eyes do, to mark the occasion. Then a splash of cloud covered the sun, the deep blue became grey, and serendipitously the song in my earphones reached the part where the calm lamentations of a captain in a doomed vessel is drowned out by the music. I was reminded of The Wrath of the Sea. And I felt the thrill that one gets at the start of a journey, the peace that comes after you are falling which makes the hangups you felt while looking over the edge seem so silly, juvenile, and so =’)

That is what was going through my head as I stood watching that wake change shape and feeling the boat rolled underneath me in a way I never noticed, let alone appreciated, before. The gears wear turning.

~Dave

[gracefuldave]

test

test

[gracefuldave]

Girls who don’t receive romantic/sexual attention from boys blame themselves

Boys who don’t receive romantic/sexual attention from girls blame girls

[gracefuldave]

This is fantastic.

[gracefuldave]

petition to rename the usa ‘south canada’

[gracefuldave]

Title (optional)

I really should be writing something about my Last Two Sundays. Or Market Day. Or even Starcraft. But it's not the act of writing itself that has driven me to sit down in front of my computer. I've been taking in so much lately - some work, media mostly - that I just want to DO something. I think video games have been an outlet to that. It's an activity. It's not just sitting back, it's actually doing. Very rarely that results in me doing something I "should" do like practicing my Korean, writing a trip entry, reading something I should be (though that counts as media, just hard media), or do that thing that people do, y'know socializing. Or explore the city more. I used to do that a bit. I'd done the impossible of meeting a friend of a friend whose company I enjoyed, but then they moved out of Seoul so I only see them once or twice a month. Fuck, I should actually reach out to Josh, especially since he's leaving in just under two months. This is a personal entry, in that it's completely boring and has nothing to offer to anyone else. It's not going to teach you something new. It's just that it's almost 12:30 on a night I shrugged off going out on because I was, and I really was, tired from a regular schedule where I get up at a reasonable time so I want to go to bed at a reasonable time, oh yeah, and a full day of entertaining kids for Halloween. But I'm awake, and feel like doing... anything. I think the world of human existence is fundamentally broken and even those who aren't wrecking it for everyone else and are just trying to make the best of it are only marginally better, in the long run. I think it's an uphill battle to nowhere and that anyone taking things seriously should see that. I'm also on the outside looking in. But I peek inside warily, so warily. I've spent the last 8 months working really closely with rug rats, the children that I can't imagine having of my own at this time in my life. It's a far cry from parenthood, but it's not nothing. They are cute and do cute things. I can definitely see the appeal. I don't drink that much but I've spent more time in bars lately, not recently but since I moved here, than I have since before college. I become that person I become when I'm intoxicated: less self conscious, louder, more sexually minded. I'm not a better person. I think I'm actually less of a- of a something. There's less time between thoughts to second guess, to introspect, to doubt. I definitely see the appeal. I spent a large chunk of time creating a web-like dartboard for a Halloween game. I had to use tape, scissors, pencil crayons, and styrofoam. It's craft, really. I was crafting. I have to do this every so often at work. I have to make up games and create the props for them. I have to draw, oh boy, do I have to draw. Remember how your teachers would always draw hilariously silly and bad drawings to illustrate a point on the board? I always wondered why they'd do that when they couldn't draw. I cannot draw. I draw a lot. It's either to help, heh, illustrate a point and get across a concept, or it's to make ourselves feel like we're taking steps towards solving the problem, I can't tell which. Turns out I can "draw." Anyway, all this stuff gives you the same feeling. I guess it's accomplishment? Maybe something about expression? I had to do a thing and I did it. It wasn't spectacular, it was fine. I can definitely see the appeal. But that's how they get you! That's how they get their hooks into you. And then you're stuck. Then you're caring about things, taking life seriously, getting "involved," becoming attached, investing in things. As one of the most brilliant characters in Discworld Corporal Carrot (just realized it's probably spelt differently but I've only ever encountered him via audiobook so the clever spellings Pratchett does so well are mostly lost on me) keeps saying, "Personal is not the same as important," much to the chagrin of his girlfriend. (Turns out Carrot is how it's spelled, though the kingdom of Djelibeybi is NOT spelled like the candy.) Carrot is always right, is a fantastic human being, and has yet, in the 24 books I've read so far, been able to move forward in his relationship because he is always putting the fate of the city a head of it. I like that saying. I think a lot of the pain and suffering we have in the world today would be absolved if more people would realize that. But the price is all these other things we have in life that make us human, all the things that make the bad okay, all the good that makes putting up with the bad tolerable. And that's just it. To me, they are both symptoms of the same flaw in us, one that feels so fundamental to me it's not escapable, but once you have that little tidbit you can't really put it back in the box and go along with everyone else. I think you need to throw it all away if you wanted to truly treat the cause and not the symptom. The responding cry is that life without the good would not be worth fighting for, and maybe they're right. But thinking that all the bad is allowed to continue for the sake of the good that is only good because you can compare it to the bad seems like madness to me. This week I managed to go to the store, find the right lightbulbs for the ones that just just burned out in my bedroom, bought them, installed them, all successfully for the first time. I was triumphant. But that's because the rest of existence is generally so challenging that any necessary obstacle successfully surmounted is a thing of beauty. The reason it was so beautiful is because of the contrast to the ugly. And I think about my inner experience of the ugly and I hate it so much that the beauty can't be enough. My favourite example of this needs its own paragraph. Please watch first, then read on to experience true happines: http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vC8gJ0_9o4M First props to google. I heard this on one of my many podcasts and couldn't remember more than that. "podcast arctic hiker finds cheetos" was enough to find the audio, and they weren't even cheetos. I don't think I have ever experienced joy on the level of this man as an adult. (I am also constantly amazed at the emotion my kids display. I have never been as sad as the student who realized the Spider-man pencil was too short to use for their workbooks, nor as happy as the student who I got to show the disappearing ball dollar-store magic trick to.) It seems like such a blessing to be able to find that much happiness in something so mundane as cheese doodles. All you have to do is survive in some of the most hostile conditions on this planet, alone, for extended periods of time. It's not so much the nature of the good, but the magnitude of the difference to the bad that accounts for this display of soulful joy. Things are meaningful because we give them meaning, and on some level, that is a choice we make. Things are important to us because we want them to be. This is where joy and suffering live, hand in hand. And I don't want to suffer, though I can definitely see the appeal. Anyway, now my eyes are getting heavy. What does all this have to say in terms of action on my part? Well, I am going to try and recapture the last time I felt content and happy by moving back to Victoria for a bit with as little obligations as possible. Because right now I am a stranger in a strange land, though it was that exact strangeness that got me off my ass and into the strange land to begin with. The issue is more than location, though the location shoed me the issue with the issue of location, which is valuable. I am living the same life I was in Vancouver, only with SLIGHTLY less socializing. I think I am kind of hoping that I won't recapture what I miss, because then I'll know for sure that I need to follow this path as far as it goes, go further down the rabbit hole, reduce, reduce, reduce, go on with less and less, and see where that leads. If it turns out that's home... Well. Well. I honestly don't know. I'll have to learn to live with more risk, either as one with long term financial instability, or becoming some kind of creative. Because otherwise I'll be living the life I am now forever. That wouldn't even be horrible. But I'd be living with a deep sense that things could be different, that things are wrong, and that they're never going to change. And I just don't want to be a part of that. Being is the most fundamental thing we can do. I just believe it shouldn't be difficult. ~Dave PS: Or I'm totally wrong, we'll get ourselves out of this funk, we'll recapture what we actually lost instead of simply seeing that we never had anything in the first place like I feel. Maybe we're not broken, we just broke it. My bets have been placed.

[gracefuldave]

Dr. Dic.

I got the Word of the Day email from dictionary.com for at least six years with no good reason. I saved my favourites in a folder in my Gmail that I am about to delete since I haven’t been on that mailing list in at least two years and I started noticing repeats, which was disappointing. Here they are for posterity.

deus ex machina: in ancient Greek and Roman drama, a god introduced by means of a crane to unravel and resolve the plot. Kept because it’s one of my handles I use for online gaming. Also it sounds cool.

Land of Nod: sleep. A pun on the biblical place name, the country to which Cain journeyed after slaying Abel. The Hand of Nod is the barracks building in Command and Conquer… 2 I think?

phantasmagoria: a shifting series or succession of things seen or imagined, as in a dream. Just a wicked word. There needs to be more -agorias around.

triskaidekaphobia: a morbid fear of the number 13 or the date Friday the 13th. A classic one upper when listing phobias.

arcanum: a secret; a mystery. Also a video game my cousin showed me one faithful trip to South Africa where I realized that video games on the PC was something I should pay attention to. He also showed me The Lost Vikings, which was the first entry a long list of great games I would love.

tyro: a beginner in learning; a novice. Special to me because of Teh Tyro Tourney, one of a few legendary Smash Bros. Melee tournaments hosted by Sean Berridge. He would create specialized nicknames using wit, key words, and spooky intuition.

apocryphal: not canonical. Hence: of doubtful authority or authenticity, equivocal, fictitious, spurious, false. A word that is much cooler than it should be because it has both a “y” AND a “ph.” A word I historically could never remember the definition of.

fecund: Capable of producing offspring or vegetation; fruitful; prolific. Always thought this word sounded dirty for aesthetic reasons. Or because it’s unbreakably paired with a nasally voice saying “odious and fecund.”

hypnagogic: of, pertaining to, or occurring in the state of drowsiness preceding sleep. Love to break this one out in any talk of dreams or REM sleep. Learned it officially at university. Also has a nice pairing of consonants and “y.”

gastronome: a connoisseur of good food and drink. Should one day be a D&D class or MTG card. Is fun to say.

defenestrate: to throw out of a window. A fantastic example of English verbosity being cool. A truly silly word that sounds dead serious. A+

scapegrace: a reckless, unprincipled person; one who is wild and reckless, a rascal, a scoundrel. The best scape since goat.

sesquipedalianism: given to using long words. The definition of self explanatory. Have tried on a few occasions to get the proper pronunciation and spelling down so I can actually use the word. I have never succeeded.

eristic: pertaining to controversy or disputation; controversial. Not quite sure why this one is here, but it can stay.

brisance: the shattering effect of a high explosive. An elegant word for a brutal event. Looks more like it’s a ballet move or a type of gravy boat than anything to do with explosives. Apparently it’s a new one too, from Celtic, which makes it stick out even more.

pyknic: having a rounded build or body structure. No, that is not what those mouth sounds mean.

mumpsimus: adherence to or persistence in an erroneous use of language, memorization, practice, belief, etc., out of habit or obstinacy. It is notable that this is the word for Sunday, July 1st, 2012. The cause of a large percentage of the facets of humanity that would keep me up at night if I wasn’t able to craft my apathy so expertly.

sumpsimus: adherence to or persistence in using a strictly correct term, holding to a precise practice, etc. as a rejection of an erroneous but more common form. This is the word for Monday, July 2nd, 2012. The cause of a large percentage of my non-relationships.

I found that list very revealing, almost a walk down memory lane into the person I used to be. Makes me want to unearth my old LiveJournal.

Share your own favourite words, I guess?

~Dave

[gracefuldave]

Two sentence poem; a love story.

[gracefuldave]

Greg Costikyan - Gamersgate: STFU

Telling it like it is. Too hot for the internet!

NOTE: This was originally posted by Greg Costikyan over at Gamesutra. It was taken down for excessive profanity. All I haveto say is “fuck that.” This needs to be read.

Gamersgate: STFU by Greg Costikyan

"As a male voice in the game industry," writes my daughter Vicky, "you should speak out...