Search

Sorry guys I had to quit the cult I was in to come join this one and it was quite the a chore to say the least. Just a quick question, though. Am I allowed to have contact with my family or should I remain defoo'ed? The bald guy that leads the last group I was in said that since my friends and family believe I should pay taxes, they actually are advocating for me being shot. Who would have guessed it, right? Oh well. Can I stop being a misogynist now, too? That and the posting about SJWs has me all tuckered out but ready to start fresh!

You guys really don't have conversations with people? What's getting in the way of you doing so? It seems like that's something you could make happen if you try. Do you have severe social anxiety and therefore have difficulties starting conversations with people? I'm seeing more and more people (usually under the age of 20) who don't have the tools in their arsenal to initiate conversations, develop friendships, and maintain them. I try really hard to explain how this all should work but given the fact that the people they're talking to may also have poor social skills, it makes it difficult to predict behavior/reactions at times. I feel like kids having cell phones at 7 years old is part of the problem as well as too much screen time in general.

Is there anything in particular you would like help with in regards to initiating conversations with people?

Blake, I have PTSD and I have found that Todd Whitlock's dentist office has been the most empathetic office I've ever dealt with.  One of the questions on their intake forms allowed for making a personal statement on what might help them serve you better as a patient, and that's where I mentioned some stuff about my experiences.   The dentist acknowledged my concerns without judgement or prying.  If your insurance covers them, they might be a good fit for you.

Thanks Joe. I'm sure he is covered. I don't have many restrictions on who I use. I would have to call him and get prices since my insurance only covers so much.

I don't know what the deal is but I have found dentists (I've seen 4 over the past 3 years including oral surgeons) seem extremely judgmental. It's really strange.

Thanks for the support guys!

I was going to post this on FB but reasons I can't or rather won't relate to why I'm making this post. I went to a dentist and oral surgeon today and both places offered me narcotic painkillers and both times I had to explain why I can't take them. I'm initially met with confusion and then "the look". It's a very judgmental look followed by shortness and sometimes by suppressed disgust. I really hate it. That's all.

i don't know if it's good advice or anything but i would try to get a feeling about whether it works for you two to continue, if that's something you're both interested in. it's okay if you two wind up splitting up over it. i know that will completely fuck up your shit and it is terrifying but you have to place your self and your future ability to be happy above temporary crisis. i know that's assuming that kind of split is financially viable which is a massive assumption.

i'm sorry this happened to you

I'm glad someone offered some advice and support via sharing their own experience. I wanted to touch on the idea of ending the relationship. I have done a lot of work with couples and from my experience I have never seen a relationship fully recover from infidelity. I've seen couples get to the point where they can continue in their marriage/relationship and manage to be reasonably happy but generally speaking the person who did not cheat always is looking over their shoulder and anxiety about the past is easily triggered by anything that reminds that person of their partner being unfaithful. I don't know if you are willing to keep going for the sake of your family knowing that you may never feel secure in the relationship again and be honest with yourself about whether or not you can handle that without being miserable.

I don't know the circumstances surrounding the cheating but it is definitely necessary to explore the issues that led to it. I highly recommend counseling so that you can get an unbiased 3rd party to work with you and your wife on figuring out whether or not you and her can continue in your marriage and heal.

The only 5 albums I listened to regularly that were released in 2017 were the Menzingers-After the Party, Propagandhi-Victory Lap, Anti-Flag-American Fall, Kendrick Lamar-Damn, and Eminem-Revival. If I had to rank them it would be Propagandhi, the Menzingers, and a tie with Kendrick Lamar and Eminem. I was surprised at the hate Eminem's album got considering the fact that it is a really interesting album due to the subject matter

Has anyone seen Phantom Thread? It's not playing around here but I'd like to see it even if the subject matter doesn't really interest me. It's Paul Thomas Anderson and Daniel Day Lewis so I'm sure it will be good regardless of subject matter

I'm watching a movie with Vince Vaughn called Brawl in Cell Block 99 and I'm impressed with his performance so far. It's a decent enough movie, though unoriginal. I never thought I'd find Vince Vaughn intimidating but he does a good job. It was pretty over the top but it was good for what it is.

A really shitty movie we watched this past weekend was 31 which is a Rob Zombie movie. I have no idea why I ever liked his movies. Not a likable character in the whole movie and it was torture porn with a loose outline of a bad plot.

We tried to watch The Accountant last night but we got bored and turned it off. We may try to watch the rest some other night. I think Affleck was a bad choice for the lead character

Finished the complete works of Beatrix Potter and have started Dr Seuss collection.

You're trying to tell me you didn't find it riveting when Rooney Mara ate pie for ten minutes while Casey Affleck stood over her in a white sheet?!

Well that part had me sitting on the edge of my seat as did the several scenes of sheeted younger Affleck staring out of the window for elongated periods of time

I watched A Ghost Story with my wife this past weekend. They should sell the movie at CVS and Walgreens in the sleep aid section because I could not stay awake no matter how hard I tried. There was just something about the movie that made me want to sleep. My wife was able to stay awake and she said she liked it. I think she had her moments of wanting to fall asleep too.

Isn't it kind f weird how the stuff about Chris came out right before this started happening on a huge scale? I feel like it shows how movements are kind of inevitable or something...like growing out of the wave of society and not spurred by one individual. I don't know

I was thinking the exact same thing the other day. It was weird timing. I guess the flood gates couldnt hold

It is really weird how it all happened. It seems like the Harvey Weinstein stuff spurred the movement towards outing people for doing terrible things to women. What's also weird to me is that this kind of stuff has been talked about and commented on for decades and therefore it shouldn't be that big of a supririse. I think for whatever reason people thought the Mad Men style of interacting with females was completely over. Like racism (at least prior to 2016 and the rise of Trump) it seems to have become more covert which made it difficult to know how rampant it is. It's really sad and disappointing. I didn't think it was this bad and some of the people who have beeen accused is shocking to me.

I thought this article was amazing
https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2017/11/20/art-monstrous-men/

Good stuff

Blake, I think that's a really courageous and important reflection to have done and to share. You might like Marc Maron's latest wtf episode

Thanks. I'll have to give it a listen. I don't think I'm courageous at all, I'm actually afraid to talk about it because I don't want to say the wrong thing and have others think I'm a bad person. I'll just say that I behaved with certain women differently when I was younger. I think I chalked it up to it being as issue of closeness and knowing someone well but I'm not sure that's the whole story. Different people do have different boundaries but I feel like I was making assumptions about other people's  boundaries and pushing boundaries rather than starting from a position of being respectful and careful not to push boundaries. I thought it was funny when I was younger to push boundaries with both male and female friends and while I wasn't doing certain things for sexual gratification I'm sure there were people who were made uncomfortable by it. The behaviors I'm talking about are butt slapping/grabbing and similar behaviors. I feel like the fact that I would push boundaries with some and not others speaks to how men often have different standards for different women and this, I'm sure, is based on power or perceived power and status.. I wasn't thinking about that at the time but it's something I became aware of after I got older and stopped partying (that's usually but not always the context of the above mentioned behaviors). I've always been pretty timid when it comes to talking to women, especially if I'm interested in them romantically. I have always put forth an effort to make sure that consent was clear for sex and don't think I have anything to be ashamed of when it comes to that. It's the things that I would call "little things" that I'm now aware might not be so little and may have been viewed as sexual by others while not by me. That wasn't my call to make and I wish I would have been more mature, considerate, etc.

2017. The year we learned that everyone sucks. The end of 2016 has us all suspecting as much but 2017 really hit the point home.

I've always thought I was was one of "the good ones" in regards to how I treat and view women but during the past couple of years I've come to the conclusion that I engaged in behaviors that may have been harmful to women when I was younger and always filed it under being "playful". I'd like to make a separate thread about this because it opens a can of worms. I think it's a conversation worth having if others want to talk

I just read an article about men who are coming forward now, discussing their experiences being sexually assaulted by more powerful (usually older) males. It seems that nearly every actress in Hollywood has a horror story about being sexually assaulted/raped. The narcissism and abuse of power is worse that I thought. I'm not naive and have always known that this happens but it seems commonplace. I'm not even sure how one would go about effecting change.

I'm just going to have black daughter so I'm all covered.

You'd better make sure she's gay because if not you'll never be able to say terrible things about gay people and have it be a-ok.

I've been really sick the past 2 days so I may not have formed or communicated my thoughts as well as I could or should have. I guess the "but I have daughters!" defense for why one can't be sexist, misogynistic, a rapist, etc is pretty much the same thing as saying "but I have a black friend!" when accused of being racist.

We found out that the spot on Amanda's lung was nothing to worry about so fingers crossed that on 10/24 they are able to get it all and that be the end of it

Apparently Ben Affleck and Matt Damon are two of Weinstein's enablers. www.yahoo.com/entertainment/ben-affleck-matt-damon-become-guest-stars-harvey-weinstein-scandal-171213233.html?exp=vv

I'd also like to second the motion that people stop throwing out the "but we have daughters!" defense any time something like this happens. We all know daughters are special little princesses which just goes to show that we think of them differently than others and it's silly to try and pretend that because a man has a daughter that he doesn't treat other women like crap. Hopefully they don't treat other women like crap but there are obviously different standards.

I just got online and started looking at recent news and saw the story about newly outed (at least to my knowledge) sexual assaulter, Harvey Weinstein. I guess what pisses me off almost as the act itself is the knowledge that this has surely been relatively well known in Hollywood and his coworkers who are acting outraged now have most likely been helping him keep a kid on this for years. Of course I don't know that for a fact but given how most of these cases go, I'll bet it's the case. I really hope that I could say that if I were in a similar position I'd do something more than perhaps scold the person behind closed doors. I guess one never knows unless they're in that position though. I need to read about how all of this came to the public's attention.

EDIT: I saw this on Wikipedia and thought it was interesting  "In September 2009, Weinstein publicly voiced opposition to efforts to extradite Roman Polanski from Switzerland to the U.S. regarding a 1977 charge that he had drugged and raped a 13-year-old, to which Polanski had pleaded guilty before fleeing the country. Weinstein, whose company had distributed a film about the Polanski case, questioned whether Polanski committed any crime, prompting Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley to insist that Polanski's guilty plea indicated that his action was a crime, and that several other serious charges were pending."

I'm sending you all my best thoughts. I so hope everything goes well in a couple weeks. I'm sure it's really hard to stay positive around her. You're doing great. Do you have anyone you can talk to? <3

I have a therapist I will see on Saturday. I've been seeing her for years. My mom is pretty great. Thank you for your  kind words

How's it going Blake?

They found a spot on her lung when they did the chest xray so she goes in for a CT scan on Monday to see if it is cancer or something else. The 2 other moles they removed are not cancerous. She will have surgery in approximately 2 weeks to remove tissue from her forehead and will do a biopsy on lymph nodes in the face to see if the cancer has spread. Best case scenario is that she has the surgery, they get it all, and then she gets checked a couple times a year for 5 years. If it has spread they will keep doing surgeries until they get it all and she will have to see an oncologist to discuss additional options. I just hope that the spot on her lung isn't cancer because if it is, it's a whole other ball game. I will be so grateful if they can just do the surgery and get it all. I try to stay positive when I'm around her and my stepdaughter (who has settled down and not had as many issues lately) but I'm really scared and worried.

I just needed to rant. Other than my mom, I really don't have many people I feel like I can talk to openly and honestly. I like to be the helper and have a hard time asking for help. I appreciate your offer, Jer.

We will see what happens on Monday. My stepdaughter seems to be in a better mood today, Addy has been sweet and playful, and my wife has been in good spirits. It's been a good day and I'm thankful for that. Hopefully it will continue into tomorrow.

I love all their albums to different and equal degrees at this point, but Supporting Caste and Failed States took me a few extra listens to really sink in. I had to sit with the lyric sheets and let it dissolve in but now they have some of my favorite songs. This one really hit hard from the first drop. I legitimately started crying in public listening to Adventures in Zoochosis for the first time. Lower Order is a poppy but powerful song that, honestly, slapped the sense back into me irt my veganism - it's been easy for me to just have it be a habit and not something I think about. Cop Just Out Of Frame is really powerful on a few levels. Call Before You Dig is, imo, a great soft nihilist anthem haha. They're all fucking bangers.

This is the best album of the past 10 years in my opinion. I've had a chance to sit and read the lyrics while listening and I'm blown away by this album. Adventures in Zoochosis is perfect. I was listening while playing with my daughter and it hit me pretty hard.  I can't recommend this album enough, especially to old people like me (and Jer).