"Everyone I know is brokenhearted" - kind of mustachian

[lifejoy]

http://zenarchery.com/2014/08/everyone-i-know-is-brokenhearted/

Discuss.

[Timmmy]

TLDR...

What I did read seemed kinda complainy pants. 

Those who read the whole thing... Worth it?

[sheepstache]

I keep seeing this on my facebook wall and I hate it.

Whine whine whine bitch bitch bitch.

[Middlesbrough]

The world is smaller than it use to be (physically it is actually larger) and it is easier to know about all the other problems of the world. The writer grew up and has more responsibility. Live, love, and laugh every day. Worry about what you can control and fix what you want fixed. Everything else is noise.

Liechtenstein and Haiti had the same flag for 16 years and nobody knew. That isn't the world we live in any more. That isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it does make the bad easier to discern. Don't let it get you down.

[gimp]

Remember the monkey sphere. Don't worry too much about shit outside it. And for god's sake, stop whining online. "I'm so sad." I'm sad too, because I read about half of your moronic self-pitying article.

[rocksinmyhead]

Liechtenstein and Haiti had the same flag for 16 years and nobody knew. That isn't the world we live in any more. That isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it does make the bad easier to discern. Don't let it get you down.

wow! I learned something new and fascinating today!

re. the article, I just skimmed, but I agree this guy needs to embrace the "circle of control" concept. and focus on the positive, and the things you have control over. yes, the world is a shit show in a lot of ways, but I also see lots of good things happening everywhere every day and I know a lot of good people.

plus, I think mustachianism is great for setting us free from a lot of the shit he's talking about. I don't want to fucking brand myself... but if I don't have to worry about working for a living, then I'll never have to. nor will I have to compromise my ethics to "hustle."

in summary, I think this guy would be way less depressed if he discovered MMM. it's like he literally doesn't realize that there IS another way.

[sheepstache]

Liechtenstein and Haiti had the same flag for 16 years and nobody knew.

This is the best thing I have learned all day. Thank you.

[gimp]

Great article. Even better video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8kZg_ALxEz0

[lifejoy]

Yeah. Pretty dismal view on life. Yet... I enjoyed the writing style. And looked up Naomi Klein.

[Basenji]

No. Just no. As soon as someone starts bitching about the Internet while posting on the Internet I tune out. Dude, get outside, plant a fucking tree or something. Call some friends and go hang out with them. Ugh. No.

4 alpacas: I liked the cracked.com article. Grim, but in a bracing, refreshing way.

[Middlesbrough]

I love cracked.com; they always have a funny article for the day.

[rubybeth]

I think he needs to watch this again - Louis CK, "Everything's amazing, nobody's happy" - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEY58fiSK8E

And, I like some of the music and movies out now. This guy just seems depressed, like an aging hipster shaking his fist at the sky. I think this guy either needs to see a therapist or go join the Peace Corps or something to be the change he wants to see.

[Basenji]

I think he needs to watch this again - Louis CK, "Everything's amazing, nobody's happy" - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEY58fiSK8E

And, I like some of the music and movies out now. This guy just seems depressed, like an aging hipster shaking his fist at the sky. I think this guy either needs to see a therapist or go join the Peace Corps or something to be the change he wants to see.

I love that bit.

[kite]

TLDR...

What I did read seemed kinda complainy pants. 

Those who read the whole thing... Worth it?

Nope. 

[EricL]

Well I read through it.  I think it was well enough written to do that and he did make some good points. It's hard to fault anybody who hates modern popular music in the Kardashians. But it was nevertheless still a bunch of pointless sniveling. I think he may have taken some of his "everybody can be a great person" elementary schooling a little too seriously and thought that he could actually be somebody who could actually affect things. Well you can. But you have to bust your ass doing it and, by the way, you're going to get your fucking heart broken. Really broken. Like Abraham Lincoln lifetime of melancholy fucking broken - possibly with a bullet to the head as a bonus.  Not "boo-hoo nobody's taking my online fucking Twitter comments or Internet posting seriously" broken.  This shit doesn't even count as brokenheartedness. Go live in some of those Third World cesspools and deal with the ongoing violence and poverty. Then you'll have some goddamn broken heartedness.  God, I would pay good money for the privilege of reaching through the Internet and smacking the living shit out of him.

[pipercat]

I couldn't make myself finish it, so I checked out somewhere around Gen X selling out after 9/11.  Blah, blah, blah.

Yes, there are unhappy people in the world. There always have been.  Maybe people are just more vocal about it now, posting their every thought on social media.

It does come across a little complainy to me.

[rubybeth]

Not "boo-hoo nobody's taking my online fucking Twitter comments or Internet posting seriously" broken.  This shit doesn't even count as brokenheartedness. Go live in some of those Third World cesspools and deal with the ongoing violence and poverty. Then you'll have some goddamn broken heartedness. 

YES, YES, YES. I recently hung out with one my family members who just got back from two years living in Ethiopia, doing counseling with families who have been affected by AIDS. She is incredibly humble about this work, but it's clearly her calling and she'll be headed back to Africa next year. This guy is probably depressed, and that's sad and unfortunate, but his sadness is not the tragedy of the world, y'know?

[sheepstache]

Well I read through it.  I think it was well enough written to do that and he did make some good points. It's hard to fault anybody who hates modern popular music in the Kardashians. But it was nevertheless still a bunch of pointless sniveling. I think he may have taken some of his "everybody can be a great person" elementary schooling a little too seriously and thought that he could actually be somebody who could actually affect things. Well you can. But you have to bust your ass doing it and, by the way, you're going to get your fucking heart broken. Really broken. Like Abraham Lincoln lifetime of melancholy fucking broken - possibly with a bullet to the head as a bonus.  Not "boo-hoo nobody's taking my online fucking Twitter comments or Internet posting seriously" broken.  This shit doesn't even count as brokenheartedness. Go live in some of those Third World cesspools and deal with the ongoing violence and poverty. Then you'll have some goddamn broken heartedness.  God, I would pay good money for the privilege of reaching through the Internet and smacking the living shit out of him.

I feel like invoking the third world is sort of the socioeconomic discussion equivalent of Godwin's Law*, but overall I like it.  Nice control of the ranting tone to create an even crescendo.  I give it a 7 in the dyspepsia olympics.

*Actually I just looked this up and learned the term I actually want is Reductio ad Hitlerum, but I feel like this is how Godwin's Law is commonly used so I'll stick with that.  You learn something new every day.

[Franklin]

This dude really needs to unplug.  He is viewing the world through a computer screen:  a watcher and not a doer.  I've spent the last three nights staring at the super moon.  He was probably staring at "friend" updates.  I'm not going to call him a complainy pants because I think he has some true mental health issues.  But for crying out loud, step away from the herd for a moment and heal your broken heart.

[EricL]

Well I read through it.  I think it was well enough written to do that and he did make some good points. It's hard to fault anybody who hates modern popular music in the Kardashians. But it was nevertheless still a bunch of pointless sniveling. I think he may have taken some of his "everybody can be a great person" elementary schooling a little too seriously and thought that he could actually be somebody who could actually affect things. Well you can. But you have to bust your ass doing it and, by the way, you're going to get your fucking heart broken. Really broken. Like Abraham Lincoln lifetime of melancholy fucking broken - possibly with a bullet to the head as a bonus.  Not "boo-hoo nobody's taking my online fucking Twitter comments or Internet posting seriously" broken.  This shit doesn't even count as brokenheartedness. Go live in some of those Third World cesspools and deal with the ongoing violence and poverty. Then you'll have some goddamn broken heartedness.  God, I would pay good money for the privilege of reaching through the Internet and smacking the living shit out of him.

I feel like invoking the third world is sort of the socioeconomic discussion equivalent of Godwin's Law*, but overall I like it.  Nice control of the ranting tone to create an even crescendo.  I give it a 7 in the dyspepsia olympics.

*Actually I just looked this up and learned the term I actually want is Reductio ad Hitlerum, but I feel like this is how Godwin's Law is commonly used so I'll stick with that.  You learn something new every day.

I'm not sure if you're rating him or me.  Yes, I did find his article difficult to digest if you didn't notice. He can sidestep years of therapy costs if he would just hit himself on the thumb with a hammer a couple times a month so he can feel real pain.

I'm not sure what to think about Godwin's Law.  It's actually a little older than the internet.  Back in the day the radical left used to call anyone they disagreed with "crypto fascists".  People generally didn't call them on it - I suspect because they didn't understand what they far left meant.  As a historian I should be glad since Godwin's Law prevents promulgation of bad history.  My favorite in recent times being "Nazism=Socialism" promoted by the far right because Hitler packaged and marketed his crazy under that label (considered moderate at he time) and the title was constricted for simple pronounciation.  Also, Nazis can make for tedious study.

But another part of me dislikes the fake reducto ad absurdum idea behind Godwin's Law.  ("You mentioned Nazis so therefore your argument is irrelevant") There's plenty of racism, militarism, genocide, war mongering, and general craziness in the modern world -1st through 3rd - which merits a comparison to Nazism without a flighty hand wave.  And to include the 3rd world, an area considerably more complex than Nazism, under the same umbrella shrinks logical discussion under an assumption all useful discussion has been covered to no useful end. 
 A similar law could be given for all discussions involving Israel/Hamas/Gaza, which all dissolve into partisan bloviation.  (I realize just by mentioning those three I've thrown raw meat to the starving animals.)

[EricL]

Not "boo-hoo nobody's taking my online fucking Twitter comments or Internet posting seriously" broken.  This shit doesn't even count as brokenheartedness. Go live in some of those Third World cesspools and deal with the ongoing violence and poverty. Then you'll have some goddamn broken heartedness. 

YES, YES, YES. I recently hung out with one my family members who just got back from two years living in Ethiopia, doing counseling with families who have been affected by AIDS. She is incredibly humble about this work, but it's clearly her calling and she'll be headed back to Africa next year. This guy is probably depressed, and that's sad and unfortunate, but his sadness is not the tragedy of the world, y'know?

Your sister sounds like quite the gem.  God bless her.

[madame librarian]

Wow, this is not how I see the world at all. And I actually do have some statistics and real info, not just fairy farts, to back me up.

Yes, people are violently slaughtering each other, just as they have for all of history. But check out this site: http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/poverty.shtml

This is the UN's "Millennium Development Goals" website, where they post their goals to end poverty and basically make the world a better place. One of the goals was to halve extreme poverty between 1990 and 2015. That goal was met 5 years early. Another goal was to reduce by half global hunger. That goal is on track to almost be met.

The entire world has achieved equality in primary education between girls and boys. We still need to strive for equality at higher levels of education, but that alone is huge -- 20 years ago, many girls didn't go to school at all.

Maternal mortality has dropped by 45% since 1990. In some areas, it has declined by 2/3rds.

New HIV infections are declining in most regions.

Sure we have problems. Of course we do. But there are great things happening too. I think it's just as silly and delusional to focus ONLY on the negatives as it is to live in a rose-tinted bubble and pretend nobody ever suffers.

Anyway, agree with previous posters who say this guy probably has mental health issues and needs help.

[sheepstache]

Well I read through it.  I think it was well enough written to do that and he did make some good points. It's hard to fault anybody who hates modern popular music in the Kardashians. But it was nevertheless still a bunch of pointless sniveling. I think he may have taken some of his "everybody can be a great person" elementary schooling a little too seriously and thought that he could actually be somebody who could actually affect things. Well you can. But you have to bust your ass doing it and, by the way, you're going to get your fucking heart broken. Really broken. Like Abraham Lincoln lifetime of melancholy fucking broken - possibly with a bullet to the head as a bonus.  Not "boo-hoo nobody's taking my online fucking Twitter comments or Internet posting seriously" broken.  This shit doesn't even count as brokenheartedness. Go live in some of those Third World cesspools and deal with the ongoing violence and poverty. Then you'll have some goddamn broken heartedness.  God, I would pay good money for the privilege of reaching through the Internet and smacking the living shit out of him.

I feel like invoking the third world is sort of the socioeconomic discussion equivalent of Godwin's Law*, but overall I like it.  Nice control of the ranting tone to create an even crescendo.  I give it a 7 in the dyspepsia olympics.

*Actually I just looked this up and learned the term I actually want is Reductio ad Hitlerum, but I feel like this is how Godwin's Law is commonly used so I'll stick with that.  You learn something new every day.

I'm not sure if you're rating him or me.  Yes, I did find his article difficult to digest if you didn't notice. He can sidestep years of therapy costs if he would just hit himself on the thumb with a hammer a couple times a month so he can feel real pain.

I'm not sure what to think about Godwin's Law.  It's actually a little older than the internet.  Back in the day the radical left used to call anyone they disagreed with "crypto fascists".  People generally didn't call them on it - I suspect because they didn't understand what they far left meant.  As a historian I should be glad since Godwin's Law prevents promulgation of bad history.  My favorite in recent times being "Nazism=Socialism" promoted by the far right because Hitler packaged and marketed his crazy under that label (considered moderate at he time) and the title was constricted for simple pronounciation.  Also, Nazis can make for tedious study.

But another part of me dislikes the fake reducto ad absurdum idea behind Godwin's Law.  ("You mentioned Nazis so therefore your argument is irrelevant") There's plenty of racism, militarism, genocide, war mongering, and general craziness in the modern world -1st through 3rd - which merits a comparison to Nazism without a flighty hand wave.  And to include the 3rd world, an area considerably more complex than Nazism, under the same umbrella shrinks logical discussion under an assumption all useful discussion has been covered to no useful end. 
 A similar law could be given for all discussions involving Israel/Hamas/Gaza, which all dissolve into partisan bloviation.  (I realize just by mentioning those three I've thrown raw meat to the starving animals.)

Oh, yours.  Starting off with a compliment is the move of a pro.  It's a 4 on the David Mitchell scale, btw, but only because that's not really an appropriate scale because it didn't get to absurd screaming hysteria at the end.  Too short to place on the Dennis Miller scale at all.

Yeah apparently Reductio ad Hitlerum is from 1951!  I think the problem with the third world argument is that it can be used to dismiss any complaint at all from someone in the first world.  But like, no, we actually have injustices and problems that are worth working on despite the fact that we're better off than the third world.  While I'm not an OWS type, I do think we can legitimately have a discussion over inequality in the United States without turning it into 'poor people in the US have it way better than people in the third world so they should just get over it.'

For that matter, the essay reminds me a bit of Jonathan Franzen's doom-and-gloom Harper's essay about the death of the social novel except it fails to offer interesting insight or nuanced perspective.  My problem is with the subjective quality, not that he and Franzen don't stop often to acknowledge that at least they have clean drinking water.

Of course, it's only jokingly a "law."  In some discussions there are all sorts of different ways you could tie-in the third world in a relevant way.  Like Madame Librarian directly above.

ETA: To clarify, I'm not actually passing judgement on your post, I was just ranking it in a tongue-and-cheek manner and to that end mentioning the third world aspect as one would discuss the finer points of wine.

[Franklin]

Wow, this is not how I see the world at all. And I actually do have some statistics and real info, not just fairy farts, to back me up.

Yes, people are violently slaughtering each other, just as they have for all of history. But check out this site: http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/poverty.shtml

This is the UN's "Millennium Development Goals" website, where they post their goals to end poverty and basically make the world a better place. One of the goals was to halve extreme poverty between 1990 and 2015. That goal was met 5 years early. Another goal was to reduce by half global hunger. That goal is on track to almost be met.

The entire world has achieved equality in primary education between girls and boys. We still need to strive for equality at higher levels of education, but that alone is huge -- 20 years ago, many girls didn't go to school at all.

Maternal mortality has dropped by 45% since 1990. In some areas, it has declined by 2/3rds.

New HIV infections are declining in most regions.

Sure we have problems. Of course we do. But there are great things happening too. I think it's just as silly and delusional to focus ONLY on the negatives as it is to live in a rose-tinted bubble and pretend nobody ever suffers.

Anyway, agree with previous posters who say this guy probably has mental health issues and needs help.

Thanks madame.  I like your perspective.

[odput]

TLDR...

What I did read seemed kinda complainy pants. 

Those who read the whole thing... Worth it?

Nope.

For those who couldn't finish it, I will say there is ONE redeeming thought:

Not to hate those who are hurting us with their greed and psychopathic self-interest, but to simply stop letting them do it. The best way to defeat an enemy is not to destroy them, but to make them irrelevant.

Its kind of the same thing I thought of when Occupy Wall Street was going on...if you guys are so pissed at these bankers, just put them out of business (by taking your business elsewhere)

[arebelspy]

I didn't necessarily agree with it, or even like it, but I do like hearing alternative perspectives and considering them.  I do like knowing how others out there feel, and empathizing, even if it's not my experience.

Thank you for sharing.

[sobezen]

The writing sounds whiny and certainly displays a very different life perspective. Thanks for sharing.

I would encourage the writer to exercise more (improve his negative and cynical pov). Perhaps dedicate time helping others too? He sees areas of concerns and that is good.  But ultimately his wasted energy complaining is probably better spent focusing on solutions that can make a positive difference in the lives of others. Cheers!

[Beaker]

Seems like he's spent way too much time staring at the worst and most trivial aspects of Western culture, justifiably decided that he hates them... and then kept right on obsessing about them anyway. In fact, the first comment says "Why don’t you stop eating e-shit if you don’t like the taste?" and his reply is basically "screw you!"

It's a form of self-inflicted torture. Or maybe some sort of weird codependent relationship between him and "pop culture."