Sincerity

Sincerity. It's not something we think about a lot, but it is in my opinion one of the most important virtues that is often overlooked.

The bane of sincerity is doubt, both purposely deceitful and otherwise. I will begin with the non deceitful variety. Let's consider a somewhat competitive activity which requires a good deal of skill, such as Mock Trial. Say that I do absolutely horrible on a cross examination. I completely flubbed it up. How do I know that I for sure did a mediocre job? If immediately afterwards my team mates say "good job". Don't get me wrong, compliments are great. But if you know for a fact that you didn't do very well, and you hear a "good job", that only further cements in the despair. This is where doubt comes in. How can you ever really know for sure if a compliment is sincere? Someone might just be saying that to make you feel better. A nice thought, sure, but in affect it only serves to do the opposite of the intent.

When you think about it, how many of the compliments we give are actually truly sincere? When someone asks you what you think of something, you almost never just say "terrible", even if it truly is terrible. Oh sure, we might give some constructive criticism, but it almost always ends up being "it's good but....". The word "good" is still in there. It just seems that the word has so little meaning now. Of course, the alternative would often just lead to meaningless nonconstructive criticism, which one could argue is much worse. I guess the point is that we should take care that, when we compliment someone for something amazing, to make it stand out. Not necessarily by using tons of words such as "awesome" and "amazing", although they can be good, but to actually describe why we think something is cool. That way it is easier to discern insincere comments from the sincere.

What about doubt with purposeful deceit present? Google something like "fake lottery prize winners" and you'll see numerous videos show up of people screaming in joy, only later to find out that it wasn't real. See, practical jokes in general, though they can be funny at times, bring unnecessary doubt into our lives. You ever heard the saying "if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is"? Of course you have. In fact, you would probably be pretty weary of something like someone winning a lottery ticket just like that too. It's because we've been conditioned to doubt the improbable, so that we don't end up looking silly when it proves to be fake later. In a way this is very good: it keeps us all from being too gullible, and we avoid a lot of embarrassment. But imagine, wouldn't it be great if we could trust EVERYTHING that our friends say? I'm not even including complete strangers or acquaintances here, I mean close friends. We wouldn't have to worry if we were being the focus of some sort of joke. Relationships with friends would go to a whole new level.

To close, here is a quote from David Foster Wallace. I have no idea who the guy is, but it is a good quote.

“An ad that pretends to be art is -- at absolute best -- like somebody who smiles warmly at you only because he wants something from you. This is dishonest, but what's sinister is the cumulative effect that such dishonesty has on us: since it offers a perfect facsimile or simulacrum of goodwill without goodwill's real spirit, it messes with our heads and eventually starts upping our defenses even in cases of genuine smiles and real art and true goodwill. It makes us feel confused and lonely and impotent and angry and scared. It causes despair.”

There Is No Such Thing as "Just A Game"

I was recently talking with a friend of mine on Facebook chat, and knowing that we both played Minecraft he suggested that we should go grief a random server. In case you are unfamiliar with the term, to grief on the internet means to annoy or aggravate others for no reason besides one's personal pleasure. Think of this as internet terrorism, causing as much mayhem as possible. For Minecraft, this often means to go to a server and destroy as many creations made by other players as possible, thus eliminating all the hard work they put into the building. As you might expect, I have more than a few problems with griefing. But what was especially surprising was that this good Christian friend of mine had no problems with it whatsoever. In fact, he found it funny. Now to be precise, to the best of my knowledge he hasn't actually griefed anyone. Although if I had agreed to do so with him, then he would have surely had went ahead and griefed without hesitation. (Dear Friend, if you ever happen to read this, which is unlikely. No hard feelings for mentioning you in my blog? At least I didn't say your name...)

Now what sort of excuse did my friend offer to why he saw no problems with griefing on Minecraft? That it was only a game. Now this is what I have my main problem with, and what I will direct the attention of this post to. Imagine that a young child built a sandcastle on a beach. He had spent the entire duration of his stay at the beach working on the castle, and the hours of hard work resulted in a magnificent castle. But then I came along and kicked it down just because I felt like it. There would be a public outrage all among the beach, and I would have been thought of as a completely despicable person. How can you get lower than that? Now imagine that the same child signed in on a Minecraft server and again spent quite a few hours building a detailed castle. Then I come along and destroy it. Now some people on the server would get mad at me, any admins would for sure ban me. But some people would find it funny. Now I ask you, what difference is there between these two examples? Absolutely none.

To those of you who kind of dozed off the second I mentioned "Minecraft" (*cough*Abby*cough*), don't worry, this stuff affects you too. Think about the internet, truly a wonderful and fantastic place (I should know, I live here). The thing is, it is almost entirely devoid of responsibility or real consequences. But as I showed in my last example (is it okay if I keep mention the sandcastle example? I'm sort of proud of it), the virtual world isn't all that different from this supposed "real one". It is never "just a game" or "just the internet". It's true, you can get away with a lot of things on the internet. But just because there isn't always immediate consequences doesn't mean that it isn't wrong. Being on the internet doesn't give anyone an excuse to swear, spam, or generally be immature. Many people would disagree with me on this point, though.

I did a bit of research on this topic just for fun, and I noticed something. The griefer movement does in fact exist, and it isn't entirely made up of 12 year olds being immature just for the sake of being immature. Look at this, a youtube channel devoted to making Minecraft griefing videos. They have over 118,000 subscribers, and their videos have only slight margin more dislikes than you would expect of a popular youtube channel, which was quite depressing. Right on their channel page they wrote this: "We like to make people angry in games. It's hilarious, trust me". Why in the world is it that we the internet, as a community, are showing support to a channel such as this?

To go back to my main point, it is never "just a game". Who we are on the internet or in any online game is a reflection of who were are in "real life". A bully on the internet is a bully in real life, period. We shouldn't adjust our character or moral values just depending on what sort of situation we are in.

Iowa Mock Trial State Competition 2012 Part 2

It's been almost two weeks since State, and I've had some to think about the entire Mock Trial experience. Really, each year Mock Trial affects me deeply. I seriously don't know what my personality and character would be like without it. Even though I know technically we still have a celebration party, in truth Mock Trial is done for this year. And that is depressing. But that doesn't take away from how it all affected me.

One of the more infamous parts of this year was the "um bell". Basically, whenever someone said any filler word like "um" or "uh", someone else would ring the um bell. The point of it all being that if everyone was made aware of their frequent "ums", they would be able to control them in the future. Even though I personally haven't ever had a problem with saying "um" (trust me, I have more than enough other problems to compensate), I, along with the rest of my team, are extremely conscience of whenever anyone says "um", even if it be a family member of friend, and it be in an informal situation. An "um" cannot be said without warning bells going off in my head.

Another thing that Mock Trial helped me with: being able to calmly, confidently, and intelligently talk on the fly (such as ad libbing some questions or answering an unexpected objection). I've never had problems with public speaking, but I think we can all agree that thinking quickly in high pressure situations is not the sort of thing that comes naturally. After Mock Trial, any sort of off-the-cuff speaking seems easy in comparison.

And of course, the thing I love about Mock Trial the most is friends. I only got to really know some of my closer friends because of Mock Trial, and each year I get the opportunity to become friends with more and more people. What I've learned about my current group of friends is this: no matter what we do together, it is guaranteed to be enjoyable. So even in the most boring times, just being around everyone was all that I could ask for.

Iowa Mock Trial State Competition 2012 Part 1

Well, I just got back from the Mock Trial State competition in Des Moines yesterday. It was quite truly a wonderful experience.

It was different from last year in a lot of ways, though. First of all, we were much better prepared and thus we actually did fairly well. Sebastian and Cole both got astounding witness awards, and Ryan got an astounding attorney award. In addition, the other team got seventh place over all and an award for being civil and sportsmanlike. Out of all the schools that competed this year, Marion was one of the most decorated, if not THE most decorated (in terms of number of awards, anyway). Compare this with last year, where didn't get a single award and where we didn't actually win a single round. Some of this came from putting a lot more work into Mock Trial, and some of it came from a fundamental change in coaching philosophy. The point is, Mock Trial was the life of everyone on the team.

So the first round at State was an extremely close match against Harlan. We did Government, which was our stronger side. In many ways it was a good easing into the unfamiliar territory of State. Nervousness began to fade and everyone on our two teams were pumped up for the next day. Back at the hotel, both teams had team meetings where we "talked about our feelings", after which we all went straight to bed (more or less, anyway). I luckily was in the same room as Gabe, who is pretty much the most mature person on either team. So unlike a few of the other more crowded rooms, we managed to get quite a bit of sleep.

Day two brought forth two more trials. In the second round we were matched against Urbandale, which just so happened to be the second best team in the state. Suffice to say that we lost, but I'm happy to say not too badly. For some reason, when we were against the best team we had ever faced, I think we ourselves did the very best that we had ever done. By the third round we were all exhausted after a long day of trial, but we managed to pick up another win against Wappello (which by the way won third place at State last year).

Now the thing about going to State is never about winning, because our skill isn't at that caliber yet. Instead, it's about the experience. Both in knowledge gained from competing against strong teams, and the great fun that comes with hanging out with friends. The thing is, due to the fact that some of my favorite people in the world being on my team, good times are guaranteed. In fact, virtually any time spent with these people almost always becomes a treasured memory. I mean, let's look at all of the reminiscing throughout this year I've had about last year's team. And I wasn't nearly as close to everyone as I am now! Here's hoping that the team from Marion Homeschool (or Highschool, if you want to be politically correct) will be just as good next year! And why don't we have another sentence with an exclamation point! Because exclamation points are cool! Seriously, I can't stop! Please help me!

Not Excluding New Friends

Currently, I'm fairly close with my group of friends. Not close as is in talking about personal problems (not for me, anyway. Perhaps one of these days?), or stopping from being awkward, but enough that if we are doing something I'm probably going to be invited. I don't have to worry about feeling "left out" or things like that. But I've beginning to wonder lately, have I been extending the same luxury to people I'm not as close to. If I'm starting to feel restricted to not let people into my "group of friends" who aren't in there already. If perhaps I should start inviting people to hang out with the "gang" even if I'm not best friends with them already.

Don't get me wrong, there is a BIG difference between thinking "that person is alone all the time. I should try to do this for them because they are an obviously miserable person that I should pity" and "I should be careful to not leave this super special awesome person from all this fun". Basically, any pity in this situation sort of ruins it. But still, it's kind of a big deal to try to extend beyond a defined group of "friends" to perhaps some other people who have been somewhat excluded. Okay, many of my "close" friends are in Mock Trial, and often we will get together during times convenient to Mock Trial, such as before. But for an example, let's take Cole. He's a pretty cool guy to hang around with, and he's on our Mock Trial team. But with the exception of today, we haven't really thought to ask him to hang out. Why not? I have no excuse. And what about Steven? The only time we really hanged around with him was when he tagged along with us to McDonalds to work on Mock Trial with Mark. But I can't give you a reason for why we don't do that more often.

I'm not so presumptuous to think that I am the only option some people have for social opportunities. All I know is that I should do my best to be the sort of person who reaches out to others. You know, a friendly person. Oh wait, that might be going too far. Does that mean I have to be optimistic too? Nice? Polite? Gah, I can't stand the thought.

I think back to when I was younger, such as ninth grade. I craved socializing with friends, and I would have snapped up opportunities such as these without hesitation. And yet I really didn't "hang" around with people much, just for the point of hanging out. Why? Because I hadn't gotten to know people at Marion very well. In the same way, people hadn't really gotten to know me. What if things had been different? What if this group of friends I have now had joined together two years ago instead of mostly just this year? We would have gained so many memories.

Socializing

I'm a nerd, so it is my responsibility to over think absolutely everything. Today the thing in question will be socializing.

Although you probably don't think of it this way, one of the most important things, if not the most important skill thing in high school is learning social skills. It's kind of a big deal. The silly thing is that how I act has a direct result on pretty much everything in my life. If I act up a lot when Mrs. Flatland is around, then she probably won't think I'm mature enough to get a good part in the next play (in case you are wondering, I've pretty much put aside all thought of getting any half-way decent part in the next play). If I'm super annoying, even more so then I already am, then the natural consequence that I will be less enjoyable to be around. And let's face it, bad things stand out a lot more than good. This isn't anything new, of course. It's mere common sense and probably isn't even worth mentioning.

I think that relationships with friends would get a lot deeper if we could figure out how to deal with annoyances. It seems that we seem to be so focused on not offending or annoying others we miss out on great opportunities. You might think of this silly, but I've actually come up with a system for facebook messaging. If I've been the first one to initiate a conversation with a person several times in a row,  I wait a good amount of time before starting a conversation again, even if the person in question is online and I feel liking talking to them. Actually this is more of an idea that I had and forget to implement because I'm so caught up in the thought of social interaction over the internet, but it shows that I am a little hesitant about bothering people all the time. But then take a person that I am a really, really good friend with: Ryan. With Ryan, if I see him on Facebook I'll message him instantly without a second thought. Why? Because I know Ryan well enough that I know that there is virtually nothing I could do to annoy him. As such, probably the main reason that we've become such good friends is BECAUSE of Facebook chat (so far we've had around 22,500 messages. And that's not counting all the times we've chatted on Gmail either!). Not to use Facebook as another example, but, well, to use Facebook as another example, Facebook wall posts are very similar. There are a few people I know (Ryan, Abby, Allie, Ben etc.) who I write on their walls about anything, even if it is somewhat frivolous. This is because I know that these people enjoy wall posts as much as I do, and they don't consider wall posts spam (unless I go overboard, which I probably have a few times). The point is, I can do one of the most awesome things about Facebook  (writing on people's walls) often because I know that it is very unlikely that they would get annoyed. If we don't have to worry about annoying others, then we can reap much more benefits (in this case, more facebook wall posts!). In case you are wondering, this doesn't mean that I'm not social with other people who I perhaps don't know quite as well. What I'm saying here is that when we don't have to worry as much about discretion, socializing is much more enjoyable.

In case you are wondering, no, I'm not particularly self-conscious when it comes to socializing. In fact, I probably should learn to be a little more so in the future. Actually, the point of this post was to over-analyze something that we probably don't put to much thought into.

The Messy Mondays Guy

On Youtube there is a channel called Blimey Cow with a regular show called Messy Mondays. You've probably seen some of his videos; people mention them on Facebook a lot. But the problem is, well, the videos just aren't that good....

I guess I just don't understand him. In The Three Types Of Churches he'll go from talking about how we should worship God through not just through music, but who we are, to ridiculing people who say "Lord" or "Father God" multiple times in a prayer. Even going as far as asking if these people think that God forgot his name and needs to be reminded and that they need to "get his attention". Excuse me bud, but last I checked it is going WAY out of line to make fun of someone just because of the way that they pray. He does a very similar thing in Ten Ways to Get Girls to Like You (yes, the things I will force myself to watch for the sake of a well-researched post). He'll switch from saying things that are idiotic to things that are in fact very wise. At #9 on his countdown he mocks girls who like photography even if they aren't very good at it. He even says that 98% of girls have no business uploading photos to Facebook. And the worst of it? He encourages guys to "encourage" these photo taking enthusiast females by deceiving said girl into thinking that they enjoy their pictures. And the whole point? To encourage her to keep on taking photographs. Woah, let's take a step back here. It's true that not every girl is a super special awesome photographer, but I don't think you should go around making fun of them for it. But then #3 on his countdown is "Keep your hands to yourself". Not only is this a wise statement, but he gives a nice example too. I just don't understand why there has to be such a big difference between the things he says.

It's just that the nature of his videos is such that he just throws opinions out there on everything. Look at this video about Facebook changes. Regarding those who complain about Facebook on he Facebook, he said that "there is not even a word for how stupid you are". He continually degrades and ridicules these people, calling them "dumb" over and over again.

Yes, I understand that he uses sarcasm a ton. I also realize that the entire point of the videos is for humour. But if you ask me, even if it is sometimes in jest, throwing out words like "hate", "idiot", and "dumb" literally all the time while describing those who don't agree with you? Excuse me if that isn't funny.