Footesoulja

Seeing what I can see, and doin what I does like I done did it before, ya dig.

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Media Manipulation

Brainwashing or the act of making someone adopt radically different beliefs through systematic and forcible pressure, is in full effect.  It is happening on a daily basis in this country, through the precanned stories delivered to us through news media. Censorship and withholding information to the general public about relevant topics around the world are being dissected to give only part of the truth or in some cases the stories are not being told at all. News has transformed into a ratings based entertainment.  A system that only looks to incite fear when necessary or to distract from what is really happening around us. Some may think that this is not true, some may think that it is a conspiracy theorist tale, or some just accept it as the new way of life.

News media organizations used to give unadulterated stories of what was happening in our country and around the world, leaving the public to make their own conclusions about topics. Today, it seems that the opinions of the news organizations and the reporters are forced upon us to tell us what we should think or believe, and to accept it as the gospel truth. When a news story broke, there was the race to be the first to deliver it to the public capturing our attention with  cathhy headlines. You could at least be told the whole story no matter what organization you may have gone to get the story. It seems that now that there are partisan news organizations that tell what they want to skew the public’s opinion and perception. It seems that the news organizations fall under right or left wing ideals as similar to the government officials they wish to pursue and give coverage. Liberals will not watch Fox News to get information other than to mock conservatives and gain ammunition to knock their ideals down. While conservative will not watch MSNBC unless it is to do the same and gain ammunition for their party. The reporters on these programs not only tell the parts of the stories that they want to, but the reporters give their politically charged opinions on the matter. The days of being able to adlib and banter to kill time in order to get the next story queued up has turned into reporters getting their own soapbox to stand upon and spew their biased ideals upon us.

You can see this when there are government representatives running for election. If a republican shows up on a Fox News program, they are promoted and respectfully grilled to show their agenda matches the ideals of the program. If this same representative goes to MSNBC they will be grilled and argued with to make them seem less credible than the liberal counterparts. The opposite will happen for a liberal between the two partisan programs. Even the stifling of news reporters by the government has taken place for instance Dan Rather. In 2005, he reported that George W. Bush may have had preferential treatment, gaining entry into the Texas Air National Guard in 1968 shortly before he would have been eligible to be drafted into for the Vietnam War. Upon his unveiling of documents that supported this story he was attacked by the Bush administration calling the documents false and discrediting him as a reporter. This caused him to resign from his position on the nightly news and ultimately from the CBS organization altogether. This is an example of what our government is able to do, rid themselves of the people that speak against their administration and bring controversial news to the American public.

Lou Dobbs from the CNN network also lost a longtime career with the organization for ruffling the feathers of the Obama administration. He questioned the legitimacy of Barak’s birth in the United States which would constitutionally prevent him from becoming president.

The birth of 24 hour news with CNN in 1980, brought upon the need for sensationalized stories for news reporting. The first all news television network had a large order to fill. They had to provide news stories and maintain ratings to stay alive on the air. This created programing that were hosted by certain subject matter experts for things like economics, sports, interview panels, and debate shows. Since these shows are on a news network and the hosts are under the guise of a reporting official, the opinions which they display on the show and promote to the public can be confused as the truth. They have the ability to voice opinions on these shows because they are not officially reporting; but due to the affiliation of being on a news network, viewers confuse these opinion based shows as reporting the truth.

This is problematic because news shows that are supposed to report news, like morning shows and late night news shows, like ABC have a lot of banter and reflection of stories that where just reported on. These reporters try to steer away from voicing opinions as you can see the reporters fighting to be conscious of their words, but the opinion still spills out. This is forcing people to conform to their opinions whether consciously or subconsciously because the more you watch you can become engrossed in their message.

The emotional factors that the news tries to play with the public is also a very good target. The agenda of news organizations is almost transparent, yet still unnoticed by people. It seems that whenever there is a political agenda both right and left wing organizations will report based on what which government party owns them. When gun control issues arise as the next hot topic there is a spread of fear. The liberal news organizations start reporting all the national crimes that involve gun use, which causes people to be fearful that a violent gun crime may happen to them. This brings up support for passing stricter gun control laws that infringe upon our Second Amendment rights. The conservatives report that the government is going to take away the constitutional rights of Americans which causes fear and an increase in gun and ammo sales. This tactic can be used in any aspect of life. If the news organizations started reporting every single car accident that happened in America nobody would want to drive anymore. The agendas are so much out in the open that it goes unnoticed.

Distracting the public from the real issues is rampant and disgusting. Our country has been in conflict around the world at an almost nonstop continuum. The Clinton era was our golden age of peace and, even then, we still had troops in Kosovo. With all the newsworthy topics to report on that effect our country, news organizations don’t even bother getting creative. They recycle the same sensational stories that they believe will give them higher ratings. We get to hear about watered down stories like what dog the first family is going to get, or what the Royal Family in England is going to wear for the then upcoming wedding. Following celebrity trends, like tabloid news has found its way into national news reports, which effectively do nothing to inform the American public with pertinent issues that affect our daily lives.  

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Closed Mouths Don’t Get FED Time

Being able to say what we want when we want is not a truth for our society anymore, at least without repercussion. It’s understandable that you won't agree with everybody and how they express their views. Just because somebody says something that is not in line with your thought process doesn't mean you should get overly offended. This hypersensitivity and the overuse and abuse of political correctness is stifling to conversations because people are worried about offending whoever is listening instead of speaking their mind. Most people have sense enough to know that saying something for shock value or being deliberately offensive is something that can be self-censored, but when things are not meant the way the speaker said or it is taken out of context that person is vilified and the lynch party comes out to assail them. I have had conversations with people and because they don’t know what to say, they stutter through, “Bla--, I mean African-American…”.

When somebody makes a public blunder whether in a moment of ill planned opinionation or through deliberation, they may be subjected to receive the same punishment. In the case of celebrities for instance, they have to come out with an apology to the person, or persons, they offended and to the general public. Bringing this a step further, organizations that may associate with such a person or just the public in general beats the offender with politically correct reprimands which may include getting fired or losing out on current or future opportunities. Much like the recent story of a college baseball player calling a thirteen year old baseball player a “slut” on social media. He was removed from the team and afterwards the girl Mo’ne Davis forgave his public insult and even asked Bloomsburg University to reinstate him, did not happen There are consequences for our actions and we have to deal with these choices, yet instances like this may be impossible to recover from.

I remember back in the Clinton era, a woman had either flipped the bird to President Clinton or verbally said “F--- you!” This woman was immediately placed under arrest. This is a real and possible direction that I see our country coming to. When you offend the wrong person or group then you may have to worry about catching a legal case or risk losing your freedom. This is not the freedom of speech that I was brought up to believe in, this is not the free America that I thought I was in.

The other problem with this censorship is that things that were not meant to be public can be made public, through the wonderful citizens-policing-citizens program that our technology and social media now provides us with. I believe this “neighbor watching” which had taken place some time ago was a pretty effective tactic used by government entities; have you heard of the holocaust? Whether somebody is feeling indignant and wanting to shed light on something that is happening like the Oklahoma SAE fraternity’s racist chant; or a complete invasion of privacy exposing personal messages between somebody, like Donald Sterling and his racist comments, it is still citizen policing. Although I personally appreciate being informed of potentially dangerous areas and people that express hatred, I don’t agree with people outing others who may not have their “papers”.

I’m black (note: not African-American) and I don’t appreciate the occurrences that have happened with these last two examples, but they are unremarkable events. We, as in minority groups, know these racist instances happen behind closed doors. We know that there are certain places in this country to be wary of and that people of color are not accepted wholly, if at all and are more or less tolerated by certain individuals. I’ve heard many comments throughout my life like, “I didn’t know racism still exists,” by some people who have been fooled or have fooled themselves, but I have been aware of it since I was three years old. They have not fooled me. Even with these problems that still plague our society, people have a right to believe what they want and express themselves. I have been in many altercations both verbal and physical because of hateful things expressed to me personally. In the matter of unbeknownst citizen policing, with the intent of exposing people’s true selves, I could care less about how they feel or what they say when they their assumed privacy. I have the ability to attempt to positively influence those I have contact with to hopefully enlighten their ignorant selves. As long as things are not directed to me and nobody has put their hands on me, they are just words.

I remember when Americans off all ethnicities were a tougher breed. I believe that the spectacle of reality television has played a role in making the American public hyper-sensitive. Everybody is over-emotional and always crying about everything whether it’s good, bad, happy, or sad. With all this blubbering people no longer have thick skin, and the rest of the worldviews Americans as a bunch of sissies and punks. Not everyone has fallen victim to this phenomenon, and there is nothing wrong with crying, however it’s demotivating when that’s the only thing you see when you turn on the television.

Political correctness has a place, but when we can’t have normal conversations with each other for fear of offending others and the potential for it being turned into  public humiliation and retaliation, nobody grows. It is just fear that regulates people instead of free thought and expression. There will continue to be people with uneducated views about others. There will continue to be people that are offensive without any regard for their fellow human beings. If someone is being respectful and makes a comment that may be deemed offensive, it is our responsibility to correct it before condemning them. After making a mistake and having been corrected it is our responsibility to learn and grow, because anything after that is a decision. Decide to grow and help others to grow and we all just might be able to get along.

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Black Un-history

If you have spent any amount of time in the American government school system since the late 1970’s or so you may be familiar with the forced teachings of historical injustices upon Black Americans from the origins of slavery through the Civil Rights movement and thereafter, aka. “Black History Month”. There are many mixed feelings from the different sides of the race barrier as to whether there should be a single month dedicated to the history of one race, or the opposite, that Black history is American history and that it shouldn’t be restricted to just one month. This at least has integration of races on both sides of this issue. American history, according to the European male American, is the perspective that has been taught as general curriculum and many feel that information has been intentionally left out.

A new perspective from a man Tony Watkins who asks the question have we have really moved beyond the shackles of slavery? With stories from freedom fighters of the civil rights movement that have not been heard. We hear about the usual Dr. King, Rosa Parks hero stories, but he goes deeper than that; to the untold stories of the people who had to endure the unspoken violence and documents them in his self-published novel, “Shackled Again?”. There are stories of when he found shackles buried in a shack on his grandmothers’ property (pictured above), a woman having a rope tied to her neck and drug behind a pickup truck, to horses trampling new black voters. These among many other stories that have been all but forgotten, depict the struggles that many people suffered but were too afraid to talk about in case it might bring the hate brought upon them back to life. He touches on todays’ society in America to see if the change that was fought for has been achieved and the effects from slavery's’ legacy  diminished, with events like the election of a black president, to the Trayvon Martin killing.

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Footesoulja turned 1 today!

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Introduction Selfie

I hate questions that make me answer things about myself even if it is not a personal type of question. It not only feels intrusive but I genuinely don’t want to tell strangers much about me. It seems like it’s not just a trust issue but an inequality of information disbursement and a need of a fair trade agreement of personal information between the asking party and myself. I don’t want to give more information than is necessary because you may have some kind of advantage over me, and knowledge is power; or you just might not care about what I’m saying and I have just wasted my time, thusly reinforcing my negative thoughts about personal sharing while making myself sound like an even more paranoid person than I actually may be, and yes I know this is a run-on sentence with incorrect structure and I said “thusly” hashtag boss status, I hate Shakespeare. I like Guy Ritchie films and I like the semi-usual cast he puts together for them. I definitely like this internet thing they have going on here, there’s a lot of information and things to do on it. Or in it? If we are always connected to the internet and accessing it from computers, tablets, phones, watches, glasses, vehicles, kitchen appliances, and need ourselves to work them and help function in our daily lives, are we not in the internet? Maybe you would prefer the matrix as a better term, we can’t discern reality or truth from the fantasy and lies the machine give us through our machines. We need the machines to keep us alive, think about the last time you didn't have your phone available to you by forgetting it, losing it, or breaking it. Most people feel a deep sense of loss and anxiety amongst other weird feelings until their digital appendage is returned to them. I am a little disappointed about the limitations to this writing assignment. Try not to use shock value? That was the first thing I thought about when I found out we had to write an introduction of ourselves. I had the first paragraph written in my head before he said not to go with shock value.   I am George Foote a student in Larson's comma Rob PhD Writing for Mass Media class, and a Communication major at the College of Saint Scholastica. If you would like to learn more about me feel free to ask, I have no problem sharing. Thank you for enduring the five minutes of thoughts that ran through my head. Good luck and follow me on twitter and my blog it’s free so why not, now do it.

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Truth, Deception & beLIEfs

In the beginning of my life or in any of our lives, we only know what we experience to be the truth, and even in our experience we can be led astray through deception. We begin our lives In medias res or in the middle of the much larger story of the universe. Through the archives of the many different forms of media, we are able to travel back into the past through flashbacks of others’ experiences that have been documented. These archives of people and their truths can be looked upon as literal accounts, though the deception in them, whether unknowingly or intentionally inserted, can be what inhibits or progresses our own way of thinking.

I say unknowingly deceive us because we are only looking at one point of view, one person’s perception of the world and what their frail memory holds onto. Two warring nations believe themselves to be the crusaders of their god and avenger to the people, while vilifying their opponent. In times past as is true today, the truth that we know that has withstood the test of time is the victor of these battles. How much of what we know would be true if Goliath slayed Daniel, if Hector killed Achilles, if Hitler and the Axis nations won the second world war? I say unknowingly because the accounts of the slave and the accounts of the master, though experiencing the same events, each has their own experience within the event. There are biases, based on one’s own sense of self and who one is and how one has been brought up to believe in things. Even the most cultured, open-minded, diverse individual has biases, and one’s truths too must be held suspect of deception.

Conversely, there are those that are willing to intentionally deceive. Through ignorance comes control and domination. Even those who are in power using deception to keep the heel of oppression on the people, may even start deceiving themselves, by believing their own falsehoods for so long that they now have become their own truths. If I set sail to discover new lands and found one place to be beautiful and the land rich, and I sailed further and found a land that was treacherous and barren, I have options. I can go back and tell the truth, and my secret land that only I know of, gets overrun by new inhabitants. I can instead, deceive people and say that my rich fertile land is icy and uninhabitable, while the uninhabitable land is lush and full of life.

If I wanted to keep a large populace under control, I could tell them of how there is a creator that can decide whether or not their suffering here on Earth will constitute them going to a better place after death. That their toiling and suffering is good for them, because they have something better to look forward to, but only through me and my religion will they be able to achieve this. I have the answers, which are sacred, secret and guarded.The rules and laws that I make up must be adhered to without question, otherwise you have blasphemed and will not receive your eternal reward.

If I wanted to control an even larger populace, I could create ignorance amongst the smartest minds that ever lived. I could make a government that controlled the education system, slowly dissecting out fundamental educational tools like a cancer. Then like aggressive chemotherapy, administer a lack of standards that allows for increased classroom sizes, underpaid teachers, and a tolerance of illiteracy and ignorance within the walls of education, which not only kills the cancer but kills the body as well. If the regression of the cancerous tumor that is educational programming happens to recur or awakens from dormancy, take away what these underpaid denizens (i.e. teachers and school boards) need most, money. If they don’t comply with the continuance of pumping the nuclear toxins into the veins of future decision makers, then they will go hungry themselves and be left out in the back alleys with capitalisms’ refuse. Once enough time has passed and the populace doesn’t even know how its own government is supposed to operate, namely by the people and for the people; I can then use the media that I strong armed and continue to infect the people with lies...I mean, my truths.

Slowly I would continue taking away rights by telling people it’s for their own good in order to keep them safe, keeping the justice system corrupt and allow for the abuse and overuse of authority, justifying the future use of mass imprisonment or martial law. Anyone caught in the justice system, even if they are innocent, will still be willing to defile their name and take a plea of a lesser charge. They will see no hope or possibility in proving their innocence because of their fear brought on by ignorance and secretly knowing of the corruption, yet too afraid to contest it. This only helps in creating more restrictions on the people and aids in taking away more rights. Afterwards I can keep them stuck in this perpetual cycle of criminal justice by not reforming them but, ensuring they have such a short leash filled with restrictions that recidivism will be inevitable.

Is there a difference between truth and deception? It may seem that I have led you to believe that deception can be truth depending on what it is that we know or are told is true. If truth is a matter of evidence or facts or something that has been proven to have the same results time and again no matter who performs the test, then yes. Truth is true no matter how it comes to be or who is telling these truths. We should be able to exhaust it fully and it should still stand as a truth and/or reason, like 2+2 equals 4. The great minds throughout time that have studied mathematics and the sciences have brought us truths and demythologized ancient stories. Then it isn’t a question of whether there is such a thing as truth, or if deception believed by the many makes a lie a truth; but that it is belief and ignorance which lets deception live on. People once knew that the Earth was flat, and that the universe revolved around us. This was their truth, which they believed in due to their lack of knowledge and ability to discern other aspects and fundamentals of life. The universe and their ignorance deceived them because of a limited perception, which influenced their beliefs. Yet, it holds true today as it did in their time whether they knew it or not, that we are revolving around the sun and the Earth is not a flat plain which we can fall off of. Belief does not need facts or evidence if any at all, but something you are willing to uphold for personal reasons or benefit.

It takes investigation, theory, experimentation, and the knowledge of previous truths, amongst other things to dispel deception. How lazy have we become, that we don’t even want to know the truth about anything that is affecting us in our own time. We, as in the communal populace, are willing to accept whatever the powers that be say, without question or investigation into the truth. If you are trying to figure out what I mean by this, or don’t think there is reason to doubt what is being entered into the archives of today in medias res, then you too are the part of the herd that is being willfully deceived.

-George Foote

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I made one

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BeefNuggetsprez3.1

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Media Development: Speech Through Written Word

https://docs.google.com/document/d/16I-P-Zg4XR3miwk4wJhd9BB6aUMcwYQmULRvCsrmCpE/pub

PREZI LINK

http://prezi.com/cdlqqih9brdb/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy

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BEEF NUGGETS REMIX

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How Did We Get Here?

Before the beginning and in no particular order, there was a spirit/entity/energy/deity or in my world God. He was lonely in the nothingness of everything and nothing, and got a creative notion. Through thought, or feeling, or will, He commanded there be a Big Bang of energy and matter creating everything from nothing. The energy and matter spewed forth accelerating at unimaginable speeds outward, and colliding with each other creating new elements, stars and planets. All this took millions and billions of years, and to God who is outside of time it was instantaneous. As things took shape through the chaotic universe God decided to create subjects that would praise and love Him, and so he made the Angels.

            There were different types of Angels with different duties and some greater than others, yet this did not seem to fulfill His desire. God then went on to create a habitable world for His new creation to live. He made sure there was a star near it to provide warmth and light, and to promote microbes and organisms to grow and evolve into new forms of living things. Through the millions of years after the formation of the Earth, the planet cooled down and gasses escaped, water was formed, land formed, and plants and animals continued to evolve. After a certain point God made the Garden of Eden which could have also been outside of time as is God and in it He created Adam in His own image. When I think about what that means, it could be that the soul or energy was that of God’s image in a metaphysical sense. People weren’t people as we see them today, but more spirit-like beings. According to the Bible God’s image is something so profound that us as humans are unable to withstand or perceive His actual face or even His voice. Yet Adam and his wife Eve (who was created from Adam’s rib, which throws off the spirit-like idea) were able to speak with God without their heads exploding, which can help justify the metaphysical beings of Adam and Eve. Also, God exiled them out of the garden when they ate of the forbidden fruit, because it stated that if they were to then eat of the tree of life then they themselves would be like God, i.e. gods themselves. Due to the fact that they sinned they then were brought out of God’s grace and saw they were naked, or they became the humans as we see ourselves today.

            The serpent that convinced them to eat the forbidden fruit was the fallen angel Lucifer who was the most beautiful angel God had made. Lucifer was jealous of being placed lower than man and rebelled against God along with many other angels. They were cast out of Heaven and sent to Hell which is his domain of ruling, where his intention are to bring the fall of man. There have been many descriptions of Hell which I can create a mental picture of it. Fire that consumes without consuming, wretched smells of sulfur and unimaginable things.

            The Bible I have discovered has many stories in it, with some being historical record and some being stories to help explain the unknown or inexplicable things. These stories were passed down orally making an easy way to remember and pass information along. Some details may have been shortened or put into terms that uneducated people could understand. The universe, based on scientific evidence, took longer than the prescribed seven day Bible version. It is much easier to tell a story consisting of seven days, with specific events happening in each to explain how we came to be; instead of going through millions and billions of years of evolutionary detail. Could an all-powerful, omnipotent, omniscient God create the world in seven days, I believe so. Could that same God cause a big bang and let the natural course of things happen, I believe so more. My beliefs and faith will not allow me to believe that people came from apes or monkeys. Not having constraints of time means that you're not waiting around for things to happen. When you think or will something to happen, it is so.

            An issue I have with these stories of the Bible are the fact that you can’t determine what is factual and what is story. Like the story of Cain killing his brother Abel. Cain was fearful of others finding out what he had done, and that he too would be murdered. Seeing the given timelines of births, the story would have you believe that there are only four living humans on Earth. If this were the case, why is he worried about others killing him? Even if the incestuous undertones of being the first humans to populate the Earth were true, then that would mean there were many brothers and sisters that were present. Maybe childbirth didn't take the full nine months it does now, and women could rebound quickly after giving birth and have more children quickly. Maybe, people were able to grow and mature far more quickly as to not be dependent, for early humans starting out in a tumultuous world. They did live for almost a thousand years, back then, or so the Bible claims. What if there were these other traits they had to help spring humanity ahead quickly? If not, then that would mean that there were other people in the world. Who made them, or how did they come to be? Who then, did Cain go off with in his exile, to be able to create nations, from his own lineage? Did he run off with a sister or niece? Did he return from banishment and pick one up, or was one sent out to him? Who else was around in the world?

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Fake Ass or Real Ass: Which Are You?

You all are a bunch of fake ass, phony, fraudulent, charlatans! Take your pick of these redundant monickers you unknowingly bestow upon yourselves. The new thing today is to go out, especially onto social media sites, and tell others how real you are or profess some infinitely profound wisdom about your realness; and the superficial antics or fakeness of others. Discussing this topic doesn't quite interest me enough, the way it is heading, because then we get into the internet thugs and bullies; and that is just a demonstration of people's "ignance" which I can easily ignore.

Less ignorable for me however, is the sheer unwillingness that people, youthful ones at that, are deathly afraid of letting others know who they are. I have this Media Literacy class, and the professor authorized anybody to play some music or media at the start of class. Given this opportunity there has only been myself and three other students who have taken advantage of this; even with my coaxing and trying to let others take the opportunity to share with us, there have been no takers. It's the end of three weeks with us being together, yet there is still this intimidation of playing music as if we will find out something about them that is too personal, based solely on their musical interests. I understand the sense of privacy most of us have, my personal preference is to not let anybody know anything about me, at least not right away. Some trust and familiarity has to be established first, which is damn near impossible when the majority of them are afraid to even speak in class. Privacy or stranger danger has been engrained in a lot of us since youth e.g., don't talk to the man in the trench coat standing by the van with tinted windows who is offering you candy or to pet his dog.

This medium we call the internet, is kind of like that candy offering trench coat man. We don't know much about it or where it is going to take us, but we give up some of the most private things about us to this trench coat man. We tell him our names, date of birth, our likes and dislikes, social security and credit card numbers, who we are affiliated with, even the exact location of where we're at and what we're doing.

Some don't think of it as giving away your information to this dog walking candy man. After all, we have things like personal privacy settings, Securecode and Verisign which protect all this information that we put out there, and we're given the guise that nobody will know if we don't want them to...right? Whatever, that's what this one guy at this one place once told me, or I heard or read it somewhere, so it's got to be true. These people I was talking about, like to invent these avatars, or the "perfect me", or the "my sense of self is so obtusely skewed, here's the version of me everybody can see". Upon fabricating these tailor made metaphysical selves they, or you, or all of us, display them on the mybooks, spacefaces, and twiddlrs; only showing the world, to include the people we have actual face to face contact with, the things we think they will like about us and nothing we don't want them to know...hopefully.

All this wonderful information that we throw out onto the internet, securely or on public display is going somewhere and being saved. That topic will be saved for my next post. Main idea if it was missed, be more cautious of what you share with unknown strangers; and stop being scared to share a harmless piece of yourself with others that you have closer connections to, like a music piece. We all might hate it, but we will at least know you're human. Or not.

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Visit Original Link

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