Disclaimer: I’m actually OK, so don’t worry.

I’ll never love you. And you’ll never love me.

It’s not that I’m incapable of loving you, I’m sure you’re quite wonderful, and I’m sure if you got to know me you’d think you could love me too. But you can’t, everything I’ve ever let into my heart has been some self-manufactured perception of beauty, my perceptions are always wrong, and after this is verified I’m left where I started, sleeping alone in a room that resembles a crack den.

Could I fall in love and marry some incredible girl (or boy) if I opened my heart? Probably, but in the process you’d see everything that I am, and that would terrify you, you’d see this kid who more or less has his shit figured out, but absolutely detests everything he is. You’d eventually come to hate me and you’d start fucking some guy who likes Creed and Girl Talk’s new shit. This isn’t some depressing declaration, I don’t want your sympathy, I don’t want your reassurance, I’m legitimately unhappy… and I absolutely love it.

My best friend is currently in a lesbian/feminist commune in the woods of France, I’m happy she’s there, I love her so much, she’s the type of person that alleviates the sadness. My roommate from second year university is still kicking around in Montreal, and we’ll hang out, but nearly as much as I’d like. My ex-girlfriend, the individual who incited this whole cathartic project, is entirely out of my life, she’s more lost than I am, I’d quote Blue Rodeo, but they suck. It appears that anyone who certainly deserves my love and acceptance, either doesn’t need me, or I no longer give them the time of day. Shawna (the ex), you have no idea how much I loved you, but you solidified my feelings on what love is, it’s a chemical that destroys us.

Whoa, so how is this going to translate into something I love? I’m a self-deprecating little shit, how could I love my own life? It’s funny, I love the fact I can feel absolute and utter sadness, a loneliness that curls up neatly next to my diaphragm, causing me to choke up when anyone expresses anything remotely kind towards me. Being devastatingly depressed has been the norm for years, I’ve learned to love it, attaching myself to this abyss of mediocrity has in the process detached me from being so fucking numb.

There’s a lesson here. Trust me. A couple of weeks ago, all the Residence Assistants at McGill had a nice little party to celebrate being done our orientation. I trudged around the party, surly, while wielding a 26er of Jack Daniels. I sat down next to the iPod that was spewing out top 40 track after top 40 track, and in my drunken stupor I assumed the role of party DJ. It was likely the liquor, but by some miracle I turned a relatively tame party, into something slightly cooler. Kids were enjoying themselves, touching each other, and screaming the lyrics to ‘S Club Party,’ and there I was, sitting next to ten year old speakers, working a 2nd generation iPod, completely alone. Everyone else was happy… and I was sad, but it didn’t matter, I felt something, it’s that feeling you get when you hold someone’s hand for the first time, it’s like that first embrace after being away from someone you love. It’s profound… because it’s unique. Being sad has allowed me to feel something, it might not be as wonderful as what you feel, but I’m content with the fact it’ll never leave… unlike the people I’ve pushed away.

Fuck.

www.literaryfacial.com

August 1st.

I’ll be back writing ridiculous shit, along with two comrades of mine, Ed Scherrer and Brandon Barrett. Enjoy.

I’m not writing this to deliver any ontological proofs for the existence of God nor will I offer any scientific evidence that proves that He doesn’t exist. Rather, this post will describe why I hate the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (the Judeo-Christian God) more than anything else in the whole world. I will try to deliver a fair and unbiased perspective that outlines the justification for this hate. I do not wish to offend anyone who has God in their hearts; I simply want to organize my thoughts on something I completely detest.

For sake of argument, let’s assume for the duration of this post that God does in fact exist, that the Bible is more or less the Word of God and that it’s true, enjoy:

God is a Misogynist

We must first assume that for God to be worthy of our complete devotion He must possess three qualities: he must be omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent. These qualities are claimed in various contexts in both the Hebrew Scriptures and New Testament. However the first story in the Bible, the creation of the world, immediately displays that God is flawed. We see God place a tree from which Adam and Eve cannot eat from, a tree which Eve subsequently does eat from. Either God could not foresee this human error (he isn’t omniscient), created a flawed creature in His image (he isn’t omnipotent), or knew that Eve’s blunder would be justification for the Church Fathers to limit women for the rest of history (he isn’t omnibenevolent). We see Biblical references which show God not only favours man, but also sets up a scenario in which women can be easily hated and blamed from that day forward, Genesis 16-19 reads:

To the woman (God) said, “I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.” To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat of it,’ Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.”

Whoa, in four verses God made women serve their husbands, he then punished men for listening to women by condemning them to death. Eternal life in paradise was no longer possible and the only certainty was death. Why would God do this? Why would God separate the sexes in such a way that one was enormously favoured by Him and the other made clearly inferior? It’s because He’s either not omnibenevolent or just really ignorant.

God is Hate

It’s commonly maintained by a lot of Christians that although the Hebrew Scriptures show a God who killed, tortured, and ruined lives, that all of this was justified and His love was proven upon the death and resurrection of Jesus in the New Testament. So God hates us, teases us, watches us as we suffer in the Old Testament and then says, through his Son, “it’s ok, you can know Me now.” Are you kidding me!!?

Basically to build on what I’m trying to say here I’ll give you a quick and dirty version of how God’s love comes through in the end.

• God blesses Abraham and his descendants declaring them to be the chosen people. A promise is made that one day they will be saved.
• God builds on this by creating a set of Laws explained by Moses, that, if followed correctly could gain the individual righteousness. These Laws however could not be fulfilled, people tried their entire lives, but they basically contradict human nature.
• A lot of suffering, Jews stay together expecting the promise of God to be fulfilled.
• Christ comes, declaring to be the Son of God, Son of Man, and the Saviour of Humanity. He dies for our sins those allowing us to know God through Christ. Promise is fulfilled.

It would appear that God did good in the end. Na, it is just Machivallian tripe, thousands devoted their entire lives to serving you and you watched them suffer to prove a point. If my best friend needs a liver to live and I remove the liver of some stranger for my friend to have life, am I really doing good? Because that’s pretty much what you did, you condemned many good people to death, in order to give people in a post-Christ world access to eternal life. Fair? No.

God is Ambiguous

We have thousands of denominations that profess to know the true meaning of God’s Word. The Catholic Church, the Orthodox Church, Protestants, Pentecostals, Snake Handlers, Mormons, etc, all claim that they see the face of God. The trouble with this is that although these religions place Christ at the center of their devotion, the means from which they see God vary. The Catholic Church structures it’s belief system into something very worldly, demanding the follower to undertake a series of sacraments to enter into a community with Christ. Protestants who follow the teachings of Calvin hold that God has already predetermined whom He feels is worthy of His Kingdom. Faith in Protestantism is paramount, pushing aside what is thought to be the very archaic teachings of the Catholic Church. Pentecostals stress a more spiritual relationship with God, entering a bond that is so linked that many actually speak in an indistinguishable language known only by God. Snake Handlers display their love for God and Christ by playing with snakes, a sign of unwavering faith and expectation that God will save them from all trouble.

Of the two billion adherents to Christianity, not one faction holds a majority in terms of followers, and as we see new denominations sprout up and new reforms on already existing faiths develop, this face of God becomes more blurred and diluted. At one point in time, a few centuries after Christ, this image was clear, and although the Christ movement was new, it was also revolutionary, painting a seemingly perfect picture of who God was. However, after the Church severed into the Western Church (Catholicism) and the Eastern Church (Orthodox) who God was would never be agreed upon again. Add onto this the teachings of Luther and Calvin, the words of Joseph Smith or the merits of Liberation Theology and you are left with a very confused, disoriented population.

As someone who studies religions, I can’t help but feel a sense of frustration at the current state of Christianity. Something that is supposed to be about love, transcendence, and happiness, has descended into this posturing effort by individuals who want to assert their personal beliefs over millions. How can God look at this situation and feel that this is good for His creation? If God is omniscient He surely knows and understands that we are intellectually feeble and seemingly unable to firmly grasp the right way. Is God guiding us to the right path? How can He be? The world is moving towards secularism and Christianity has deteriorated into a dick measuring contest.

I suppose this has left me incredibly angry at God, because if He exists I have been neglected by Him, He must know my struggles in accepting Him as something good in my life. I entered religious studies at McGill to sort of survey Christianity and attempt to understand my struggles with believing in an invisible entity. But everyday I get more frustrated and more confused. Thanks God.

Why He Matters?

We have two options: first, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is the God who sent his only begotten Son to deliver us from evil, and only He will judge whether we are worthy to live with Him in an eternal paradise. Or second, He isn’t real or He isn’t the God, He is just a fable created through a collection of other pagan stories. If the Judeo-Christian God doesn’t exist, His image as some all knowing, all powerful figure is a sham, and over two billion people have bought into it. We’ve fought, murdered, and conquered in the name of something that is no more real than Santa Claus. If He does exist, we have a very powerful entity watching over us, this entity may or may not love us, and this entity has the power to send us to eternal happiness or suffer in a pit of fire.

If my whole existence is some lifetime leap of faith where every action is being judged by God, then my existence is not mine, it is God’s. When I die I will either go to heaven and live in HIS Kingdom, be surrounded in HIS love, and live in an eternity provided by HIM, or I will be tossed away and live in a world very far away from God.

If I knew for a fact God existed, if I was absolutely certain, I still would not accept Him into my heart. I would hold onto the only eighty years or so of life that could be unquestionably mine, living in my body. If studying religion has taught me one thing, it is that God’s love is something I don’t want. I don’t want the love of an individual who is a misogynist, homophobe, and racist.

I fucking hate God.

This isn’t me ripping on Americans. This is me ripping on America.

Here it is folks, the biggest welfare state in the west, where the working poor literally fights for survival, where children can get sick and are denied access to premium health care, where kids are recruited to fight in a war that doesn’t make sense, and where you can be imprisoned for an extended period of time without trial. This isn’t a police state or an authoritarian regime, this isn’t a third world country or an aristocracy, no, this is the land of the free and the home of the brave. This is the United States, the most dangerous entity to global security the world has ever known.

The States currently sits 12th on the Human Development Index which surveys the average quality of life of a nation’s citizens. Straight up, this can’t be accurate. How can a nation where a mother of four has to work three jobs just to pay the bills be among the world’s elite? How can a nation so far up the list make it’s citizens pay for health care? How can a nation bill itself as prosperous and the greatest country on Earth when it’s total public debt (mortgages, insurance, basically every debt included) is a staggering 59.1 trillion dollars, more wealth than it actually has on hand. Not good. But that’s the American dream, success at any cost, consume, rape, pillage, whatever it takes to get to the top as an individual. The United States has it’s hand firmly grappling the genitals of so many countries it’s sickening, troops deployed in South Korea, they are guzzling oil like a hooker on dollar night in Saudi Arabia, they’ve invaded Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam and have installed puppet regimes all over Central America. Their justification for this is global security, when, in truth it is all about global posturing, preparing for the moment where they’ll need to snap off the genitals of these nations and gobble them down their greedy mouths.

Family in Los Angeles, father has a college education.

As I sit nestled in my Canadian paradise, equipped with a working economy and relatively void of a social hierarchy that resembles 16th century France, I can’t help but worry. Worry that the economic ‘powerhouse’ that sits to my south is going to descend into fiscal despair and social revolt. I worry that this country, Canada’s largest trading partner, is heading down an abyss from which it cannot escape. I worry that it’s friendly culture of foot-long hot dogs and milkshakes is going to be the largest third world nation in the Western Hemisphere.

Every time I tune into the American media, I scream at the top of my lungs, I look for the nearest blunt object to bash my eyes out, and can only pray that somehow my television explodes. The whole thing appears to be one massive social conditioning experiment, “God bless America! The American Dream! Patriotism!,” this is a very flawed way of teaching the masses because it simply cannot continue for an extended period of time. Most “Western” countries have moved away from nationalism and individualism and have settled on protecting the common good of humanity. The homeless in Germany live relatively comfortable lives, children in Europe go to school knowing they can attend university for free. The businessman in Oslo or Munich goes to work knowing that he not only is providing for his family, but also families less fortunate than his. Even in Canada, this remains a dream, an ideal that I hope one day I will wake up to. I fear however that this wonderful concept will never even enter the minds of the impoverished families that make up the lower class of America.

Mike earns his money giving blood… eight dollars a day.

What I fear the most however is that America will refuse to right its ways, it will continue to consume and fill it’s type two diabetes belly with the world’s riches. It will drill in Alaska, suck the Middle East dry, and point it’s dirty little terrorist finger of blame at Iran. More teenagers will be shipped him home in coffins and more families will starve on the streets of St. Louis, Detroit, and New York.

If this is the American dream, I don’t want to be there for the nightmare.

Coming up next is the one thing I hate more than anything else. Ninety-nine blogs and then after tomorrow I might never write again. Can I hate what something represents so much that I feel nauseous? Can I place that hate in my heart and let it grow and cultivate into something that causes me anxiety attacks, murderous rage, and a perpetual migraine? Can I live for a moment in that hate, drenched in elitism and patriotism, slathered in extra larges and mass hysteria? Can I take all that hate cultivated in my heart and for one moment, one instant, spew perfect hatred? I can. I hope I can. Ladies and Gentlemen, my heart is full.

Will someone get me a knife so I can slice the seminal vesicle or fallopian tube (don’t want to be gender exclusive!) of every little fucker who refers to an inanimate object as ‘gay’. For serious, you’re making yourself look like a donkey douche, and you’re just embarrassing everyone else who has to associate themselves with you. This is the third issue in a row where a certain group is protected under the law in my country, but still suffer difficult setbacks in our heteronormative culture.

We inappropriately create a binary scale with regards to sexual orientation, really it’s difficult to imagine that as a heterosexual I’m just as straight as every other heterosexual on the Earth. To me this is the first problem with homophobia in our culture, we treat it as something that is an Other, something that we can’t associate with because we are so fundamentally different from their lifestyle. I can’t help but be angered at how axiomatically flawed this lens is, this is similar to the race issue, the whole “I’m white, he’s black, we’re different” mentality. It is so 1950s and leaves us with a face of progression that is pockmarked and scarred.

“But Luke, how do we fix something that is so entrenched in the hearts of many people?” Simple, train yourself to be apathetic to sexual orientation, simply don’t give a fuck if a guy/girl is into a girl or a guy or a transgendered individual. Sexual preference represents so little about who an individual is. Start with yourself, don’t align yourself with a particular sexuality, date who you want, fuck who you want.

Really for me it all boils down to language and words. Identifying as gay or straight is simply yet another label that defines the individual, which to me makes no sense. This issue with words extends into the ridiculously stupid debate on gay marriage, many opponents of gay marriage will say, “have a civil union, but don’t take our word.” This is just homophobic bullshit, Christ heteros, you should be so lucky, going your entire life not having to constantly reveal yourself as a heterosexual and catching flak for it. The fact opponents of gay marriage want to put linguistic road blocks in the way of people being happy is unfair and selfish. I’m glad Canada has pushed through the gay marriage issue, however the possibility of this being overturned in the future scares the shit out of me.

Really, relative to what goes on in the rest of the world, being gay in the west is a paradise. The following is a list of countries where homosexuality is heavily punished:

Bangladesh - Life in prison to death.

Iran - Prison for life (in many cases).

Saudi Arabia - Death.

UAE - Death

Barbados - Life in prison.

Jamaica - Ten years hard labour.

Trinidad and Tobago - 25 years.

Guyana - Life in prison.

Many African countries have punishments ranging from prison sentences to execution.

All of this because of who an individual loves. Gay movements are forced underground in many of these countries, leaving homosexuals perpetually terrified of being caught for something they can’t avoid.

A homosexual in the west is left with an unfortunate dilemma, either remain silent about who they are attracted to their entire lives, or have to constantly reveal themselves as being gay not knowing how their sexuality is going to be perceived. Next time you think about calling something or someone gay just because it’s the easiest word to say, think about who you might be offending. Think that the person you are calling gay with a malevolent tone is considering coming out… and your words have ruined their happiness. If you don’t identify as being gay you have a huge choice, refrain from using hurtful words and refuse to associate sexual orientation with who a person is OR continue to be a fucking asshole and perpetuate an issue that can be easily fixed.

Just stop being so fucking stupid with your choice of words.

There was this guy who used to hang out at the front gates of McGill University with a sign that essentially blamed the Jews for everything. Free speech laws allowed him to display his fuckery for the whole world to see and as a result he created a Hitler-sized paw print all over my fabulously liberal institution. This guy would spend all day in the blistering heat or freezing cold proudly displaying the fact that he hated Jews. He would endure criticism, chicken nuggets hurled at his face, and people threatening to kill him, yet he still spat his racist tripe all over the streets of Montreal. From my understanding all of this hate stemmed from someone hitting on him while he worked at Montreal Jewish Hospital. His whole life became a perpetual plea for the young impressionable minds of McGill to join with him in his hate.

My encounters with this gem were numerous and often hilarious through the years. From me smacking his ass as I walked by him, to him telling me I probably had Jewish roots because I didn’t agree with him, there was never a dull moment in the life of this nutfuck. Then one day he vanished, people very quickly forgot about his antics, I get boners thinking that he was beaten to death in one of Montreal’s heavily Jewish communities.

This is one example of racism that I’ve seen in one of the most liberal cities in one of the most liberal countries in the world. I’m really not sure what pisses me off so much about racism, oh wait, yes I do, it’s that everyone who thinks racism is justified is fucking dumb beyond all measure. Take Hitler for example, didn’t get into the university he wanted, took out his frustration on six million people. Ann Coulter… can’t even spell her name properly and the south during the Civil War, all inbred little fucks who lost because they pointed their guns in the wrong direction. Most racists either have small penises and have to compensate for it by ripping on another group of people or are just horribly uneducated. Let’s take Joe Redneck from northern Mississippi, Joe claims that white people are superior to blacks, I’m sure Nelson Mandela would agree with this comment. Or Torquemada, almost single handedly wiped out the Jews in Spain, dude acted tough, but would have cried like a little child if any Jew bumped into him in a dark ally.

People tend to feel they can run their mouths when they are protected by an overpowering majority, this is psychotic and is never justified. We see this with xenophobic tendencies from homogeneous populations. As nation-states become more and more diluted, the ability for an individual to voice their arrogant/ignorant opinion on race, dwindles.

Bringing myself back to my original argument, I feel very strongly that education has a very direct effect on the acceptance of race, gender, sexual orientation etc. Even in Canada we are still very far away from living in a world void of racism. All races are protected as equals under the law, but unfortunate socialization leaves us peppered with false stereotypes and an exclusionary subconscious.

Fuck, Fuck, Fuck the Patriarchy.

Really you can track back a great deal of the world’s problems to the perpetual cultivation of the patriarchy. This ‘patriarchy’ manifests itself in denying women the right to drive in Saudi Arabia, the inability for a woman to act as a religious leader in many sects, and that ‘bro’ who verbally and physically oppresses his girlfriend. We can find links to the subjugation of women in almost every facet of history: in religion, in politics, and in social environments. The hate I have for individuals who oppress women in anyway isn’t the type of hate I have for Hitler or Kim Jung Il… or even Tiger Woods. It’s a type of hatred that angers me in the most simple of ways, it surrounds me in everything I do and inundates me with a guilt I can’t avoid.

Even in a society such as mine where equal rights are protected under the law, there is an undeniable darkness that continues to cloud equality within our society. First and likely most visible is the conscious (and unconscious) objectification of women. I want to grind up the balls of those old money prep school guys who refer to sexual intercourse as ‘getting the kill,’ ‘owning her,’ or ‘pounding her.’ The humanity of the woman has been completely vanquished in these instances and her genitals are left as something that is conquered or dominated. Perhaps it’s just guys joking around, however, if you are comfortable enough to be overheard at a bar spitting sexist tripe, I can’t help but imagine what is going on in your fucked up head.

I mentioned several times throughout this blog the alarming marketing techniques for certain products, where clothing isn’t what is being sold, it’s the rail thin model sampling the product. The sexualization of our culture in terms of negative imagery is devastating. I support open sexual choices, but not when the images or mindset remains inherently slanted towards one sex.

The historical claims for women being inferior are archaic to say the least, despite this, we (men) have somehow been socialized to believe that we are the better sex. One major reason for this overwhelming inaccuracy stems from institutions, still prevalent in our society, that have historically oppressed women. One massive movement that destroyed the ‘human’ aspect of a woman was the early Christ movement. Many Church leaders in the 1st-3rd century CE cited the temptress Eve as ruining mankind’s chance for eternal bliss by ‘tricking’ Adam into eating the fruit. The thoughts of the early Church fathers on the status of women were far from flattering. Tertullian in the 2nd-3rd century wrote this on the role of women, “Do you not know that you are Eve? The judgment of God upon this sex lives on in this age; therefore, necessarily the guilt should live on also. You are the gateway of the devil; you are the one who unseals the curse of that tree, and you are the first one to turn your back on the divine law; you are the one who persuaded him whom the devil was not capable of corrupting; you easily destroyed the image of God, Adam. Because of what you deserve, that is, death, even the Son of God had to die.” Rough. Although most of us (hopefully) find this absurd today, this damaging mindset has percolated down throughout the centuries. Women remain unable to obtain ordination in the Catholic Church, whether or not a Priest would cite the works of Tertullian as justification for this travesty is irrelevant, the fact is that women are still seen as inferior as leaders by one of the most powerful institutions in the world.

“But Luke, religious institutions have no effect on me whatsoever, I don’t even believe in God.” Legit, but you still live in a society that was founded on Christian values, a society where 100 years ago, everyone was Christian. You are a byproduct of everything that stems from a once powerful force. Generation after generation this force becomes more diluted as increasing secularization and pluralization takes hold, however this does not eliminate the patriarchy. We see a saturated pop culture universe where children are indirectly told that sex sells, when you have Miley Cyrus as the most visible ‘role model’ for young girls or Paris Hilton essentially resigning to the fact she is a product, is change really possible?

I can point fingers all I want but this will only turn into a rant that gets nowhere. I, as a male, have to absorb my blame, as does every other man living in a society still controlled by the patriarchy. By absorbing the blame you are at least acknowledging that in some way you are part of the problem and are aware of the problem. This isn’t something we can fix overnight as men have been conditioned to be the head of the household, head of the office, and head of the government. Change will not be easy because this is the only role we know and understand. I can only hope change does happen though, because misogyny is destructive to women and I am incredibly embarrassed that men remain a force in the oppression of the other sex.

To any bro who talks about wanting to get the kill at the bar again, I won’t kill you there, I’ll listen to what your name is during the conversation and I’ll kill you in your sleep. Trust.

Due to unforeseen circumstances I will be unable to bring you post number 5 tonight. Look for a doubleheader one day this weekend.

Sorry kidz.

I’m fine, these are just meandering thoughts and stories as I finish up the final five blogs.

Three children laughed at me on the Metro today. I smelled of rotten energy drink and chicken wings, my perv stache was poorly kept and I may or may not have had gunk in my eye. “That guy looks like such a pedophile,” they snickered, I sunk into my seat and turned up my iPod. Their glares continued to pierce my soul through the reflection of the window. I was moments away from breaking down and crying… they were eight. I reluctantly trudged up the hill to my job, which is an eclectic blend of busy work, today I stuffed envelopes, it was far from stimulating. Tonight I’ll probably have a shower and watch another Seinfeld re-run if I’m feeling adventurous. And this my friends is my life… a destructive mush of nothingness and the occasional stripping down of my perverted appearance.

My life up this point has been a non-event peppered with horribly embarrassing moments. It all started with my first memory, the day I discovered that poo came out of my body. It was Halloween 1988, I was a surly 18 month old with a chip on my shoulder, anyway my parents let me run naked through the house as they were distributing candy. The site of Peter Pans and Ghosts knocking on my door every thirty seconds got me more than excited, devastated by this new development I squeezed out a little nugget of poo, maybe the size of a pee. Discovering that this had fallen from my body absolutely terrified me, I tried to run away, only loosening my innocent bowels causing another plop of poo to fall, then another, and another. I began screaming at the top of my lungs, running out the door, and rolling around on the grass in front of my house. It’s a miracle I didn’t become some anal retentive weirdo after this event.

Fast forward four years, grade one, Mrs. Smithson’s class. I was an absolute math king at the time, this no longer is the case, however in my younger years I was a fucking calculator. Anyway, Mrs. Smithson had developed this delightful little teaching technique where we had to answer as many math questions as possible in one minute. This was the highlight of my day, I took pride in the fact that I was an absolute fiend at this math game, however, this guy named Nathan Chang began to put up some serious scores that threatened my superiority. Anyway, Nathan and I faced off in one of the most dubious math games ever, I was so into my competitive spirit that I ended up urinating midway through the test. I was so terrified of losing that I continued the test, finishing up victorious but with urine all over me. The gurlie I was into at the time, Courtney, wouldn’t talk to me for the rest of the year, but it was worth it.

Grade ten. I was sitting on the couch with my girlfriend at the time. I had to fart so bad while we were watching He Got Game, I very elegantly tried to squeak it out but I shit my pants, I finished watching the movie as I was terrified of moving. Louise, I’m sorry I never told you this.

Grade twelve, pooed my pants again, this time in school.

I’m not sure what I’m trying to say here, either I’m a walking embarrassment, or I’m incontinent, or both. But anyway this isn’t why I hate myself.

I’m 21 years old and have absolutely nothing to show for it except for this blog and my ten year old haircut. Sure I went through the motions and got into a good university, sure I’ll end up going to law school and become a lawyer in some capacity. But I worry that I’m so apathetic and sedated that I won’t even appreciate these successes when they occur. I do this with everything, I push people away because I fear emotion on any level that isn’t in the form of instant gratification. I fear feeling, because it would make an existence I’m certain is trivial, worth something. It would instill worry, doubt, and regret, that this life I live is finite and when I cease to exist, these feelings will vanish. Irrational I know, that is why I’m so frustrated with myself.

Am I happy? In spurts, but the baseline is this type of down that is so monotonous it’s sickening. It’s this loneliness that whenever I fall in love or meet someone amazing, I instantly feel sadder, because I’ve entered their happy little lives.

I was reading this over to my friend Kate and when I finished she had a tear in her eye. She said “you need to cap it off with something a little happier,” she suggested, “but damn am I ever good looking.”

So… damn am I ever good looking.

Before you brand me as some moron who knows nothing about the sport, I spent most of my youth golfing, I have a relatively low cap and I watch boatloads of golf, especially the majors. So don’t yell at me over that.

I’m not even going to argue that he isn’t the best… cause he is.

I play with many racial issues in this post. I want to assure the reader that I don’t factor in Tiger’s race in anyway when I assess my dislike for him as a golfer. I do however feel that Tiger’s race has been a source for his popularity, personally I am glad that a sport I took so seriously throughout high school is becoming a multicultural and international game. I am worried however that race and nationality play too much of a role in assessing an individual’s greatness. My hatred for Tiger Woods has nothing to do with him as a person, like it does with the Joseph Fritzl’s or Jim Jones’ of the world. He clearly is a better person than these individuals. It just makes me sad that he doesn’t do more with his enormous gift. I expect to be slaughtered in the comment section. Enjoy:

Will someone please get me a diamond faced scoring wedge so I can shave the shit-eating grin off this guy’s face? Since this dude won his first major over ten years ago every middle age white man in America have been slaves to Tiger’s dick. And ever since I was branded as a racist for telling some cretin kid down the street from me that I don’t like Tiger, I’ve been secretly hoping the dude gets struck by lightning while rounding Amen Corner. I’ll obviously concede that Tiger’s got game, in fact, no person living or deceased has ever been remotely as good as this guy. He’ll drain impossible putts, hit 360 yard drives like it’s nothing, and still have time to make some quip after the round which every dumbass in the room will chuckle over. There are two reasons why I hate Tiger Woods, the first reason Tiger has no control over, the other he has complete control over: his following and how he handles his success.

The Following

Dude’s a fucking towel, he plays golf, and somehow he has been raised to the status of demi-God. Is it because he plays golf really well? No. Because he does so much community work? No, no. It’s because he is black. “Luke! That’s a horrible connection and is based on a ridiculous bias and subjective analysis of a guy you don’t know.” You’re right it is. I’m a terrible person, but listen to this, a few years ago Vijay Singh went on an absurd run of golf. Dude won like ten tournaments over the year, did anyone give a shit other than Jason Sobel and Johnny Miller? Nope. They were all discussing the slump Tiger was in, “When is Tiger going to be back? When will the Tiger roar again? Do you think he would prefer me topping or bottoming him?” Vijay’s glorious season was a non-event and Tiger playing garbage golf was the talk of the town.

Tiger isn’t just the best golfer in the world. He is golf. And that’s not fair at all to the Justin Rose’s, Adam Scott’s, and Sergio Garcia’s of the world. Guys who work just as hard as Tiger, put up ridiculous scores, and have electric personalities on the course, but no one could pick them out on the street… not even the average fan. Really in this facet of my hatred I can’t blame Tiger, he was the kid Middle America could embrace and make themselves feel a little less racist. He was destined for superstar status even if he ended up being only a top twenty player. He had to become your favourite golfer, because you couldn’t cheer against the only black guy who was throwing up decent numbers. It’s an American mentality I see in the Middle states, where people are so afraid of racism that they fear by not liking an athlete who is a minority, they are somehow perpetuating racism. When in truth, they are just looking like complete dumbasses.

“But Luke, what about all the other black golfers on the PGA tour, why aren’t they superstars?” My answer is simple, there are none. There is not one golfer other than Tiger Woods on the PGA tour who is black. And here my friends is the kicker, Tiger is more Asian than he is black. Why does that fact always seem to trickle into the background? It’s because being Asian and a golfer is not as fascinating; KJ Choi, Anthony Kim, and Charlie Wi, have had great success on tour.

Of course I could be wrong, people might just like him simply because he is the best, however, as stated above this argument doesn’t hold up when we see that for a brief period of time Vijay Singh did the impossible and actually overtook Tiger as number one in the world… and nobody cared. His popularity has a great deal to do with his success, however, it is the fact that he is ‘black’ that causes him to be everyone’s glory boy. Again, this is something Tiger has absolutely no control over and I obviously don’t fault him, it is the deliriously stupid affluent middle America following that causes me to hate Tigermania.

Tiger’s Handling of His Greatness

Here is an individual who is so massive that he could actually transcend the game of golf and fix racial and social issues in his country merely by opening his mouth… but he doesn’t. One such incident was the crisis at Augusta National a few years ago. Augusta National is the home of the Masters, the most prestigious golf tournament in the world. However the course has been heavily criticized for it’s invitation-only membership system. Of the 300 members, not one is female, and only recently was the first invitation to a black man offered. There was actually a point in time when black men were playing in the Masters full well knowing that Augusta would turn them away any other time in the year. In 2003, Augusta’s exclusionary measures were supported by the KKK who celebrated the fact Augusta hasn’t offered membership to women. Straight up, when the KKK is supporting you, you should probably change your policy. Anyway, Tiger, merely by threatening to not play could have changed all of that, Augusta would have folded instantly at the thought of losing corporate sponsorships, ticket sales, and television deals. But Tiger didn’t open his mouth, he played amidst women rights groups protesting and the KKK cheering.

It is probably why he is the best in the world, he simply does not care about anything other than his own game, and that’s fine… just as long as you are not the global ambassador to a sport that has made you a millionaire many times over. As Peter Parker’s uncle said “with great power, comes great responsibility,” if you want to make this sport something more than a rich white man’s game, all you have to do is make a few comments. And not these kinds of comments:

Yep, the most memorable thing Tiger has ever said is “God damn. You fucking prick.” Typical golf talk, but not when millions of people, especially kids, look up to you as a role model.

Maybe I’m just delusional, Tiger has changed this sport forever, more kids are golfing and general golf etiquette is never a bad thing to learn. However, he remains the lone black man in the sport. If you want to find the next best black golfer, you have to look to the Nationwide Tour for a journeyman named Tim O’Neil who up until recently spent 45 weeks a year at tournaments and was up before dawn to practice his game. In 2008 he was offered a sponsors exemption to play on the tour and Will Smith actually funds a lot of his travel because he simply gets no help from outside groups. As Tiger basks in the never ending brightness of being the best, Tim O’Neil is getting another nine in after dark. As Tiger hoists another Clarett Jug and puts on another Green Jacket, Tim O’Neil is playing to put food on the table. And after Tim O’Neil there is nobody, O’Neil might sneak onto the tour with an incredible Q School one year, but in all likelihood he’ll fade into obscurity as someone who was a missed putt or an errant drive away from being what Tiger is. That is why I don’t like Tiger Woods, all he had to do was open his mouth and he could have changed this game in many wonderful ways. He could have represented what a black man can do in a game historically dominated by wealthy white men. Instead, he will only represent what a black man has done in a game historically dominated by wealthy white men.

As Tiger lays in his mansion this weekend, taking time off to rest before the British Open, a tournament he is of course favoured to win, Tim O’neil is up before dawn, getting another bucket of balls in before the course even opens. Has Tiger really opened up doors for the black man (and woman) in this game?