Matisyahu's Blog

I headed down to the local Harvey Norman to look at a small chest freezer but before that mum shouted me brunch at the local cafe/bakery – eggs bene with salmon and wilted spinach on toasted ciabatta. It is a treat that I look forward to because for all my culinary skills I am horrible at poaching an egg so in the end I like to leave it up to ‘the experts’ who can do the job a lot better than I can. I might head down there on Monday/Tuesday to pick up something fresh – assuming that it isn’t raining or otherwise I’ll need to jump on the bus.

Anyway, getting back to the freezer, the reason for buying it is budgeting. When you have a chest freezer it is possible to bulk up on food that is on special witht he added bonus is that if I have a variety of food at home I can choose from then I’m a whole lot less tempted to get take aways when a great tasting meal is only 30 minutes alway in terms of cooking it myself. I really do wish that Pak ‘n Save would do home deliveries like Countdown but unfortunately at this stage they don’t do pickups. I am tempted, after getting my scooter back on the road, at the idea of getting something like a trailer where I can put my grocery shopping for a fortnight – one shopping trip reduces the need to do smaller shops and the extra things that get picked up in those smaller shopping trips.

Over on YouTube there is an interesting video from ‘Politics Joe’:

Although the video is entitled ‘Jon Ronson breaks down why the right are abandoning the culture war’ there are a few topics that were touched on such as how a person on social media start off pretty normal and then start going down the rabbit hole only to end up in the craziest part of the internet. I find it rather concerning isn’t the fact that people go down rabbit holes because at the end of the day we all make stupid decisions in our life but the fact that there is an army of vigilantes online hell bent on moving what has taken place online into the real world by finding out where people work and getting them fired. The problem is with such vigilantism is that it is incredibly difficult for someone who has gone down the rabit hole, had an ‘ah-ha’ moment then tries to back themselves out of what they’ve found themselves in only to find that there is no way to repair relationships and their reputation.

If we want to get over the sort of divisive culture war conspiracy theory laden nonsense that emanates out of the United States and manifests itself in other countries in a localised format then at the very least we as a society need to accept that people make mistakes but like the prodigal son they return to the fold and realising the mistake that they made. If we as a society are going to keep holding peoples past mistakes over them then how as a society are we ever going to advance forward beyond where we are today?

As humans we are never static, we’re always changing, evolving, we acquire new information and discard old information that may not be relevant any longer but if we someone makes a mistake but we maintain that once you make a mistake there is no chance of redemption then where is the incentive to admit past wrongs and do better in future? how does society benefit when a system is setup where no one is given an opportunity to get better so people instead will just double down on what they already believe? sorry to be the bearer of bad news but eventually some of Trump (and others that have gone off the rails outside of the United States) supporters are going to eventually leave his cult of personality and realise that they were sucked into the BS vortex – shouldn’t they be allowed to rebuild their life and be welcomed back?

I have my own theory why there are a number of people who take this ‘you screwed up once, no second chances’ position – their politics isn’t about transformation, isn’t about addressing issues by advancing policies that actually address real world material issues but instead they treat politics as a performative vehicle where by they can engage in moral and virtue posturing about how they’re the enlightened ones who got it right the first time. That being said, occasionally there is justice in this life because many times when those engaging in such posturing online ignore at their peril the oldest rule on the internet – the internet never forgets but eventually your past catches up with you.