So I check mail this morning, and at some point last some some goddam bottom feeding spamming asshole has posted 112 spam comments to this website. And you know the best part? The two URLs they used have underscores in the host names. And you can't have underscores in hostnames, can you? No, you can't, because hostnames can only have alphanumerics and hyphens. So they aren't even smart assholes. They're dumb assholes. They've been at me constantly for like 9 months now, the spamming bastards. Thankfully, MT-Blacklist keeps most of them away (now if only there was a way to automatically update the blacklist).
I don't really wish harm on anyone, but after spending 20 minutes deleting comments and email there's at least one person out there who I wouldn't mind putting the hurt to. Seriously, would it really be a crime if you killed a spammer? I mean, they're a spammer, you know? It's not like they're human or anything. It's like killing a chicken or something. No big deal, right? You'd probably only have to kill like a dozen or so before the rest would shun the temptation to spam. And the world would be ten times the better place for those dozen sub-humans being gone. It sounds like a deal to me. If you spam, you should be put to death. Easy, quick, simple. No more intrusion on your digital life.
So I'm going through comment after comment and every time I click the delete button I just keep imagining the sound of a 2x4 pulping that fucker's throat. Ah... all better...
I got an email from a headhunter this morning. Like, an actual person (and not an automated troll-bot or anything) with an actual position to fill. I'm not going to send her a resume or anything; I'm happy where I'm at. But you know the sad part? My initial thought on seeing her first email was "So there's this company looking for a dude that can do perl/database stuff, and they haven't been able to fill the position by word of mouth? I wonder what's wrong with/about that company that they can't find anyone to work there..." It's like they have to resort to using a headhunter in order to hire someone. Seems like everyone these days is getting/keeping jobs based on who they've worked with, people they know, etc. as opposed to sending out resumes.
So Todd jabbers me out of the blue. And the following conversation ensues:
Message from toddler@darphbobo at 12:57:08 pm
happy hookie pookie yo
Message to toddler@darphbobo at 12:57:59 pm
floopy yappy mopey, Mo!
Message from toddler@darphbobo at 12:58:15 pm
hoopy doopy, young and stupie!
Message to toddler@darphbobo at 12:59:33 pm
Limey limpey trippy, Ren and Stimpy.
Message from toddler@darphbobo at 01:00:02 pm
Flippy fluppy, eat that Guppie!
Message to toddler@darphbobo at 01:00:51 pm
Tiny droopy, cuff my poopy!
Message from toddler@darphbobo at 01:01:47 pm
Fart and fizzle, Fo Shizzle my Nizzle!
Message to toddler@darphbobo at 01:03:17 pm
Spackle thy pickle, yet lactate doth drizzle.
Message from toddler@darphbobo at 01:04:53 pm
how's things?
Message to toddler@darphbobo at 01:05:08 pm
Tiny dancer, man-boy romancer.
And then we started talking about csh programming. I'm not sure which one of us needs to start taking his vitamins. I suspect we both do.
I've been trying to stay out of the whole Iraq/Afganistan/bin Laden thing. No matter what you think, it's a mess.
Having said that, I don't think it'll get better before it gets worse. Also, I think we should hand over Iraq to the Iraqis and butt out of the Middle East unless invited by a sovereign government to help. Then, oh, I don't know, maybe we should concentrate on finding the people who planned 9/11 and ensure that they do no further harm -- and do so swiftly and be done with it. Something like that sounds like a good course of action. Then moving forward, we as a nation should try to mind our own damn business. Whining about a problem without offering an alternative is pissing in the wind, but that's about all I can constructively think of to sort this mess out.
But will the aggression towards Western nations ever really stop? Even if we were to leave the Middle East completely? Even if Israel was somehow magically turned into Palestine? Even if another non-Muslim never again sets so much as a single foot in any Arab nation? Would that help? I don't think anything would change. It just seems to me that the average Arab "community" (for lack of a better word) holds a grudge for a long, long time. Seriously, the U.S. as a nation could bugger off and leave the Middle East completely alone and in 50 years we won't be thinking aggressively towards Muslims. But they'll still hate us.
I just recently came across a very interesting editorial about this topic. If you don't agree with the article's point, at least you're thinking about it. It got me thinking. Thinking in a more "equal opportunity" sort of way.
I can't stand any religious intolerance, regardless of who it's coming from. Mormons don't condone coffee, Catholics have a thing about birth control, Jews won't eat shelfish, Muslims would kill me for my apostasy, yada yada yada. I find it all vaguely annoying. It's not religion, per se, that offends some sensible part of me. Being a fairly staunch Apatheist, I really shouldn't care which way one bends religiously -- and I don't. I don't think less of my mother or my in-laws or my brother or anyone else for their religious beliefs.
No, it's that sense of exclusivity that most religions foster which bugs me; it's what "religion" does to a group of people more than what it does to just one person. It's too easy to manipulate people with religion. It's too easy to create religious fanatics, so altered by a warped sense of superiority and self-righteousness that they can be bent to cause unspeakable acts towards their fellow man. I'm not saying that all religion is bad. Honestly, I think belief in a supreme being does a lot of positive things for some people. I just think that religion, while possibly being good for the individual, is horrible for the society.
Most religions seem to create this powerful notion of us vs. them. Everone thinks their way is the only right way, and everyone else who doesn't believe what you believe is not going to heaven, a heathen, soulless, an infidel, whatever. Taken to its logical extreme, that notion sometimes leads to Christains persecuting Jews. Sometimes it means Catholics questioning heretics on the rack. Sometimes it leads to Puritans burning suspected witches at the stake. And sometimes it causes Muslims to shout "god is great" while . It's all the same thing. Really.
Every once in a while it seems like religion hasn't done the world as a whole all that much good.