In Which I Try To Say Positive Things

If you’ve spent longer than 5 minutes on this site or in my company, you know I complain about everything. For the sake of challenging myself, both creatively and as a writer, I asked my friends to name topics about which I had to say nice things. The goal here was for them to take things that are generally bad or have negative connotations, and I had to find the bright side in them. I only got three suggestions, the first one being ridiculously easy. So to fill in this article, I picked my most common complaints to see if I could say nice things about them too. Well let’s get to it.

President Obama

As I said, this one is easy. Though, to be fair, I’ve been quite disappointed in Obama. To save you time, here’s Bill Maher explaining why. I voted for him twice. He is a very charismatic leader. He strives to do the right thing for everyone, not just those who voted for him. He’s inspired a generation of new voters with hope, as apposed to the Tea Party who rally their troops with fear.

Global Warming (and Evolution) Deniers

Originally, only Global Warming Deniers were suggested, but I decided to lump them in with the Evolution Deniers because they use the same logic and are motivated by the same ideology. Both of these groups have missed a very critical point. Global Warming and Evolution are OBSERVABLE FACTS. What CAUSES them, is the debate. Is Climate Change man made? Is Natural Selection responsible for Evolution? Those are the real questions, but instead, these religiously inspired people focus on the result, not the cause. This has held us back as a society for decades.

While trying to say nice things about them, I have to give them credit. They have managed to not have any facts or evidence to support their claims, and no evidence or facts to disprove the scientific consensus, yet STILL HAVE PLENTY OF FOLLOWERS. This is quite the task. Imagine trying to get everyone to believe that clouds were made of pixie dust. Now imagine doing that without anything to back your claim. Now imagine succeeding. That’s what they have done.

Bureaucrats

Ok. So I had to actually google this. First of all, it’s a pain in the ass to spell. But secondly, I don’t know what it actually means. It’s one of those words that has a colloquial meaning, but no one knows what the dictionary definition is. Everyone uses it to describe a bunch of paperwork, forms, and needless process in order to get anything done.

According to Wikipedia, a bureaucracy is “a body of nonelective government officials” and/or “an administrative policy-making group.” Historically, bureaucracy referred to government administration managed by departments staffed with nonelected officials.

That doesn’t sound that bad on the face of it. It just means people who aren’t elected doing office work. The goal was to have a unified method for doing things to ensure that everyone was treated equally. That seems fine to me. I think the problem arose when people got impatient and wanted things done right away (and their way) instead of doing it the same way as everyone else. I’ve mentioned that I’m all for uniformity, and I think bureaucracy is a great way to do that.

Republicans

Now we move on to my usual targets and I’ll try to say nice things about them. Republicans, like the aforementioned Global Warming and Evolution deniers, have been immensely successful at disseminating misinformation, strawman arguments, and mass manipulation. George W. Bush was a pro at getting people to side with him, even if you disagreed with him. I was all for the Iraq war when it started. Sure I was 16, but the president made a strong argument. It was an argument based on fear and lies, though.

Republicans want a small government. Fine. I can see their point. But when it comes to stopping things they deem immoral, like abortion and homosexuality, then they want the federal government to step in. They want state’s rights. Fine. I can see their point. But when individual states legalize gay marriage or legal marijuana, then they want the government to step in.

They have managed to move further and further right, and have dragged the left to the center. Modern Democrats would be considered Republicans in the 80s.

Religion

I’ve already dedicated an entire article to the positives of religion. So read this.

My Parents

Here’s a tough one. I used to think that my parents weren’t bad people, just stupid or unprepared. Recent revelations have shown that they are, in fact, terrible fucking people. But here goes. My dad was patient. Not with me, but in general. He did an amazing job working with my little brother who had emotional and physical issues from fetal alcohol effects. He has great work ethic, a trait, I’m glad I mimic. My mom was caring, just weak and refused to stand up to “the man of the house”. On her own, she was fine. As soon as my dad was around, she joined the rest of us convicts. And that’s really all the nice things I can say about them. I mean, I guess if I lower the standard some more, at least they didn’t molest me. But they beat me. At least they weren’t alcoholics. But they were emotionally neglectful.

Well there you have it. My attempt at being nice. It’s really really hard for me. So I’m going to go look for something about which I can complain.