Category: Ethics

Censored at Stumbleupon

Final update!

Innomen’s banned from stumbleupon 🙂

Here is a copy of the email between me and Barry Conway, some yuppy stumble minion.

Hello Brandon.

We write to advise you that your StumbleUpon account – Innomen – has been suspended for a further breach of our Terms of Service.

Your account has previously been involved in a number of incidents which breached of Terms of Service, and has been the subject of a high volume of complaints from other members of StumbleUpon. On the last such occasion, we advised you – in writing – as follows:

As we advised in our previous mail, Brandon: Since your account has
now been repeatedly involved in matters of dispute in which
we have been required to intervene, you are formally advised that any
further breach of our Terms will result in the permanent suspension of
your account.

Since you have continued to write objectionable content on your Innomen account, culminating in a recent review on the StumbleUpon blog pages, we have now permanently suspended your account – Innomen.

Please be reminded that our Terms of Service allow for only one account per member, and that you should not create further accounts on our service. Should you do so, they too will be suspended.

This suspension will not be lifted, and – because you have been formally warned on previous occasions – is not subject to appeal. No further correspondence will be entered into on this matter.

A record of your account suspension will be kept on file, along with those relating to the previous incidents.

Sincerely.

Barry Conway (StumbleUpon Community Support)
[email protected]
http://www.stumbleupon.com

To which I replied…

Oh please. Are you actually so far gone that you believe any of that? No one contacted you. No one complained. I was a valuable member of the su community getting around one fan or more per day. I had 720 followers at the time of my ban. I had regular fruitful correspondence with many members and not one negative private message in over a year.

The only thing I’ve done to get myself banned is fail to kiss developer ass that’s why I’m being banned at 4 in the freaking morning. You’re having a tantrum. You people spammed me your stupid tea party and I wrote my opinion. And it hit a little too close to home.

You don’t want people reading it and so you banned me, plain and simple. You realize how legitimate you’ve made my work right? One is define by the strength of their enemies and I was just unjustly censored by what, the second largest social media site on the Internet?

And for what? Complaints you don’t intend to produce? Heh, I couldn’t have scripted a better exit.

Your rubber stamp TOS gives you the rights to do whatever you want with your ball, yet you feel the need to pretend some kind of due process where no is required or exists.

You may of course take it home with all the maturity of a wounded grade schooler. I’m content with the obvious moral high ground and now the total freedom to publicize this event. Though of course I’m well aware no one will care and those that do, you will ban. Still, it is a thrilling vindication.

I wouldn’t write back if I were you. It will only make you look worse. And your responses absolutely will be published, consider your reply consent to my terms of service 🙂

And thus ends my time as a stumbler. I am a little angry I suppose but really I’m more flattered than anything else. Honestly this is completely unjustified. I’ve been shut out of places before but never so unilaterally. I wonder how long it will take my fans to realize I’m gone, I know from experience that when a person is banned you can go right on sending them stumbles and it won’t notify you that they aren’t going anywhere.

I wonder if the stumbler I had in the cue to be sent will still be sent. Eh, no big deal. The community will live without me. My stumble upon died before they bent over to eBay’s dollar.

Time to fire up my reddit account or something lol.

It’s been a helluva ride.

———
As if their piece of shit service weren’t bloating and fucked up and broken enough, now they insist on putting my sticky post even at the top of direct comment links. So I can’t share comments without forcing my reader to scroll down through something they obviously have already read, so I’m replacing it with a link to here that was they don’t have to scroll down so far.
———

Update: To whom it may concern, I can be found here.

myspace.com/brandonsergent [myspace.com]

friendfeed.com/innomen [friendfeed.com]

Where to begin?

Ruled by silly little brats with porn and poetry.

Unconstitutional EULA restrictions.

Inability to introduce a page unless you claim to like it, despite how much people enjoy complaining.

Inability to respond to reviews.

Removal of classic layout.

Inability to archive or backup your blog.

Absurdly small character limits, and dimension limits for images.

Tactical patenting lock down of a profoundly important type of information system.

Update: I was recently told that there are many like me here and that I need to continue writing reviews because they serve a purpose.

I want to explain something because they served a personal purpose as well.

I truly felt free to say whatever was on my mind here. I no longer feel that way.

I feel like a fool for having dedicated so many hours in creating content and introducing so many people.

Literally my entire circle of friends in real life I brought to stumble.

People I don’t even know anymore in real life still regularly use stumble because of me, people I’ve only met once I’ve hooked before they went their way.

And now I regret each and every one.

The ability to randomly serve up the Internet according to human filters is profoundly important, and I helped a company that would see that ability packaged and sold.

These people would charge per line read if they had had the chance to patent reading.

This event reminded me that free speech does not exist, there are merely levels of restriction.

In short my heart just isn’t in it anymore.

If I were to create content for these people again it would be a shallow imitation of what I would actually like to say, because what I really want to say I have been Specifically Forbidden to say.

I might ‘offend’ someone.

In addition, this event was a solid vindication, a complete ‘I told you so’, a total cynical non-shock that confirms every assertion I’ve ever made about the social circles here.

I have said who rules here, I have said how, I have pointed out the total lack of ethics, and the motivation for their abandonment.

I have called out bigots and liars, ageists and hypocrites. But when I dared to demand transparency and integrity, then we see the true nature of things here.

When I asked pointed specific questions, and when I attempted to defend myself I got silence and threats.

It became clear that all my freedom was merely the result of not yet encountering what the mafia charmingly refers to as a rat, and what is known as a tattletale on playgrounds all over the country.

When it became clear that these people feel that they OWN my thoughts and opinions, when it came down to a hostage situation, change what you say or we’ll silence you completely, I lost all respect.

In a country where protection of the law is a direct function of how much you can afford to pay a lawyer, I can no longer afford to be an idealist.

I cannot risk the deletion of what I have already said. We exist at the mercy of a hydraulic despot, with water in this case being the only realistic way for a non media company to talk to potentially thousands of people who weren’t actively seeking their words.

Too often we trivialize, not realizing that information is the most important commodity on the planet, and people like this control the flow of it.

It may be just a blog to you, and if you saturate it with lyrics and porn, that’s all it will ever be, but to me it was the ears of the future, and to protect what I have already said, I shall say no more.

What I’m doing now: http://underlore.com/TBA/?p=1460

Evolution

You have the right to change your mind.

Genius is a dynamic entity and while some truths once arrived at are final, many aren’t and you’re never going to be absolutely sure which ones are which.

If you find that your view point isn’t changing, (keeping a journal is a great way to watch for this) then you might have a problem.

If you’re not at least a little embarrassed by some of the things you’ve written in the past then you’re probably not growing intellectually.

Don’t be completely ashamed of these things, and don’t be afraid to say you were wrong or you at least feel differently now.

We each make our decisions based on what we know at the time, and a fact of existence is that what you know, changes.

Don’t go back and make corrections, for one thing it’ll just draw attention, simply make your new position clear somewhere else and if asked directly, be honest.

If they want to try and shame you, let them, the both of you know how insane it is to try and scold someone for adapting, and if they don’t, well then their opinion is not worth caring about.

Just sharing 🙂

Death

Death is the enemy. Do you agree? I’ll bet you don’t. As of this writing the people likely to read my work don’t agree. They.. You.. see death as something other than an enemy. Some of you see it as the road to your god and heaven, others see it as a way to escape from one pain or many, still others see death as just a part of life and some of you don’t even think about it at all.

But I’m here to tell you death is the fucking enemy. Death is wrong. Death can be fought and defeated. Death is pointless. Death is not your friend. We must bring about the death of death itself.

Before death can be fought its horror must be apparent. Death’s most powerful weapon is its ability to convince people that it is not the enemy. People lose their only daughter in a violent car crash and they blame the car, and they invent an after life or they start a foundation in her name and death gets a pass.

But in the end death is the problem. Our lives are defined by death in the sense that most of our actions stem from the delay of it’s approach. But that is only true because we come from animals. Animals that have no purposes beyond reproducing. A system of mixing and remixing DNA for the sake and being able to continue mixing and remixing DNA. That is no longer good enough.

Evolution itself has evolved and the door is open for each individual to choose to reproduce in whatever way they like or not, to live forever or not, to finally dispatch death.

I know this is painful to read for those of you who have lost someone or are losing someone. No one likes the thought of being partly responsible for future and present deaths. It’s much better to give up, to consider the matter unavoidable, to hide behind mythology and platitude. To cry yourself out and move on. But our powers are growing and so too does our ethical responsibility.

This does not mean to the state or the god but to all humanity.

It is time to fight. And the first step is failing to surrender.

I chose not to die.

I plan not to die.

My existence matters.

I will not live on through a legacy or though the memory of others or through great deeds or through metaphor or the pleasing of a deity or the cycle of souls and lives.

I will live through action, force of will, technology and study, literally till the end of my universe. I believe this is possible, I know it. And I will do everything I can to make it happen for me and everyone else who wants it with every fiber of my being.

That is my duty to myself my parents my friends and also every life form under my rule.

It is my personal responsibility to see to it that pain is ended, that death is ended that the chains be broken, that life itself be preserved and improved, that sentience be respected, that freedom be preserved, and that I improve myself without fear of losing who I am or losing control of my fate.

The cartoon said it best. Your effort to remain what you are is what limits you.

Death is an opponent we can not truly defeat as we are, though we may indeed wound the hell out of it even now if we tried as a group. But I know better. We will not. I am not here to convince you and start a movement.

You’ve heard the logic before, you can not act. It is outside your nature. I understand and I sympathize.

No, we must become something else, as individuals and as a species. And this change will be snuck upon the most of us. It will be gradual for some, instantaneous for others. It will come from varied directions, from the cell up or machine in. Indeed there may be other paths no living human may be capable of imagining.

If there is something after death, if there are souls on the other side of the veil we can know one of two things. Either they are incapable of helping us, or they are unwilling. That either makes them powerless or compassionless.

If they look and see death as a good thing and they see pain as purposeful, they are not human. They are not our friends and family anymore, and so me must work to preserve and defend our friends and family that stand among us now and see that they stand among us for as long as they wish.

We must see if we can that they are not seduced by lies, but we must temper this with a respect for their authority over themselves.

Pain and death are our enemies. Mortal enemies. Can there be a better term for such a thing?

They must be fought. And they will be. Unto their total annihilation.

Things every kid should know.

http://www.truthdig.com/images/eartothegrounduploads/Wanted_500.jpg

“The foundation of every state is the education of its youth.” – Diogenes

  1. Facts and logic determine reality, but emotion determines perception.
  2. Power often defines value.
  3. Influence is power.
  4. No one decides to be mean.
  5. Being older doesn’t mean being smarter.
  6. Respect does not mean obedience.
  7. If someone can tell you what to do with something it’s theirs.
  8. Responsibility is usually code for control.
  9. Those who have more force others to have less.
  10. Angry people are afraid of something.
  11. If someone forces you instead of explains, you’re smarter than they are.
  12. People want you to compete because they are afraid of what you can do when you cooperate.
  13. Everyone gets something out of what they are doing.
  14. No one chooses how smart they are.
  15. No one chooses how they feel.
  16. Almost everything is a matter of opinion.
  17. Smart people can be wrong.
  18. The message is independent of the messenger.
  19. The majority can be wrong.
  20. Reality is not a democracy.
  21. Academic skill does not equal intelligence.
  22. There is a tool or trick to offset every weakness.
  23. Those that tell you loudest to work hard often aren’t working at all.
  24. You don’t have to be part of something to understand something.
  25. You could be the first.
  26. Hurting people doesn’t make you strong or right.
  27. Removing the need for something is the best way to fight it.
  28. Everything you own charges you rent.
  29. Only you know your gender.
  30. Laziness is not a bad thing.
  31. There are always more options.
  32. How you feel and think depend partly on your health.
  33. Your body is your brain’s pet.
  34. You have a limited amount of time, spend it wisely sell it rarely.
  35. People lie because the truth is a threat to them.
  36. No one can tell you what love means.
  37. Revenge is an attempt to control the past.
  38. Context changes meaning, and you can always add context.
  39. Outliving something is better than killing it.
  40. They care enough to tell you they don’t care.
  41. If they tell you they’re laughing, chances are, they aren’t.
  42. The truth doesn’t always look true.
  43. Knowing you could be wrong does not mean you are.
  44. You don’t have to be an expert to be right.
  45. No one owns a fact.
  46. You don’t have to earn the right to live.
  47. Wealth is about luck and ethics.
  48. People who want power shouldn’t get it.
  49. Genius is always outnumbered.
  50. Strangers are more complicated than you think.
  51. Everyone has a reason.
  52. Some people are immune to the truth, sometimes it’s you.
  53. There will always be things you don’t know about yourself.
  54. Not all things are scalable.
  55. Ignorance is not the same as stupidity.
  56. Maturity does not equal conformity.
  57. The really good ideas aren’t always popular.
  58. Writing is nearly immortal and often ignored.
  59. You are always entitled to an explanation that ignores authority.
  60. You do not have to be what your parents intended.
  61. Truly nice people are rarely popular, they tend to hide.
  62. You’re a completely different person after a while.
  63. Poor people exist mainly because rich people sequester wealth.
  64. It’s not holding a grudge if they continuously offend you.
  65. You will outlive all the adults, that means the future is your business.
  66. If they can’t tell you what’s in it for them, it’s a trap.
  67. Evolution doesn’t always improve things.
  68. Common sense isn’t rare, you’re just misunderstanding the actual agenda of the parties involved.

GM Foods: Starvation Is More Toxic

These are the new findings I spoke of, and the type of ideology I’m speaking too/of: http://www.truthout.org/1215091

Monsanto killed my uncle (agent orange) and took my moms career and the sight in one of her eyes(aspartame toxicity). I share that before someone calls me a suit supporter, or a slave brain.

I know about these people, but at the same time I’m still going with Penn ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIvNopv9Pa8 ) on this one, GM food fear is easy when you have food at all.

From any angle GM food being mildly (or even not so mildly) toxic is the least of our concerns as a species. Starvation is 100% toxic. Can the same be said of these foods? By definition, no, obviously.

The good thing about modifying something is you can modify it. Put simply we can fix this, and at this point all these kinds of efforts (the political anti technology anti food movement) serve to do is starve foreign people to death.

That may not mean anything to most Americans but I am not most Americans.

You may disapprove of my calling this movement anti food, but the fact is the planet without total restricting of the biosphere can not cope with our current let alone future population as it stand along side our distribution systems, this means by definition for many millions of people GM food and food are synonymous., thus attacking one is attacking the other.

We’re talking about people hungry enough to literally eat dirt (mud cookies, you probably think I’m kidding) people who’s children die crawling to UN aid stations, people who’s agricultural demands require then to literally blow into cow’s asses so they can fart in their face. (To help the cows digestion, again, not kidding.) My point isn’t to shock you but to make you aware of something, if you are arguing about GM food you don’t even know what hunger is.

So until we get that squared away, the whole feeding everyone food of any kind thing, then we can talk about repairing it, making it safer, and executing Monsanto execs. Until then, be careful about the effect of your goal and unless you are willing to have blood on your hands, unless you are willing to sacrifice strangers for your agenda, openly and honestly (and you may be right, only time will tell) then shut up because this debate is not for the timid hypocrite.

Entitlement

During this season of healthcare debate the morons incapable of checking the sum of their ideas for logical consistency tended to whine about entitlement, painting an image of lazy greed, a sort of working class fat cat.

I’ll be blunt, I do feel entitled to government healthcare, and indeed a paycheck. Here’s a list of why.

1. They make it illegal to kill myself, which means my living is forced on me by the state, therefore the state is responsible for it.

2. The state of intellectual property law and economic regulation generally makes competition by improvement impossible. Innovation is illegal.

3. Protection from death from outside sources is already an accepted government responsibility, from seat belts, to the FDA, to the Army, regulation and expenditure to protect us from death is everywhere.

4. The state has the authority to kill us if it so chooses, therefore they have the responsibility to keep us alive.

5. They have far more power over me than they have responsibility to me already. From telling me who I can marry, to which plants I can eat, to what color I can paint my house, the state intrudes on virtually every aspect of our lives to the point that it may simply be easier to make a list of legal activities and assume all else is illegal.

6. Our taxes and labor keep the state alive, we deserve a share of the profits.

7. I am prevented from exiting, as Ruby Ridge and Waco and the countless other examples of social abstinence being disallowed demonstrates.

8. I do not actually own my land, my home, or my body. I rent via taxes.

9. Congress and convicts gets free healthcare.

10. And perhaps most importantly, I didn’t break the law today, which serves one and only one purposes, to keep those in power, in power. I didn’t execute a multimillionaire, I didn’t black out the eastern seaboard, I didn’t drive a truck full of explosives into a federal building, in short I didn’t behave just like the government does and help myself at the expense of someone else, just because I can.

They owe us.

The people that whine about entitlement typically are doing so out of fear, insecurity, and callousness coupled with a Horatio Alger self serving mentality that they through pluck and determination earned what they have, which is based on willful ignorance of civics, economics, and sociology, plain and simple.

They are afraid like daffy duck’s rendition of Ali Baba, that some of their precious wealth is going to be taken away to care for the unwashed masses. And so they hoard and block and whine and cry. They also deeply fear the angry lower classes being made healthy, and so they should given their rapacious exploitation.

But ours is a government built on rebellion, and they have made themselves little better than the kings we fought and died to be free of, and now they don’t even have the common decency to protect the peasantry from the plague, unless of course its virulent and lethal enough to begin to temporarily interrupt their gluttonous accumulation of wealth.

Oh then its time for a barely tested vaccine. Because they care about us just so much.

LIFE, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. What part of “life” is unclear?

If they make it impossible for me to live by “legitimate” means, not even be rich, just live remotely comfortably, I naturally like anyone else will seek other means.

If they are smart, if they want to add a few decades onto the life span of their hold on this rotting corpse of a system, they’ll start handing out medical care.

See also: http://underlore.com/islanders/