Here’s what I got from this article, which was long as shit. The soldiers are bored. The enemy is nowhere obvious. The soldier death tolls are running high. The officials and higher-ups are either clueless to the morale problems, don’t give a shit about the morale problems, aren’t doing anything about the morale problems, or DO see them and DO care but condone the killings because they feel the despair of low morale and inefficiency and helplessness themselves.

It’s a tough situation – it’s too easy to sit here, thousands of miles from the Middle East with no military experience and no fucking idea of what these guys go through and feel and see on a day-to-day basis and call the killings horrendous atrocities, gruesome, cruel, unforgivable.

All I can do is imagine that something is going on here that I’m unaware of. I’m not saying the murders are okay. I’m saying that war is a force that I have never been up close with, but I know it’s powerful and I know it’s unique in the way that it changes people – the way they think, the way they feel, the way they react.

When the enemy is invisible and strikes chiefly with IEDs, which are as unpredictable as they are devastating, what the hell do you do? When you’re walking around in the middle of a desert in heavy gear carrying heavy guns, your loved ones are thousands of miles away, knowing that the next step you take or the next road you drive down could end your life, and that there’s absolutely nothing – NOTHING – concrete that you can do about it, what do you do? Where does that pent-up frustration, fear, and anger go? What’s the outlet?

How do you cultivate a desire to protect the civilians around you, when you have no choice but to wonder whether the people you’re protecting wouldn’t hesitate to kill you and your entire brigade if they had half a chance?

How do you keep remembering what you’re even fighting for, especially when there’s nothing and no one tangible that you can fight against? How do you keep yourself from hating everything and everyone you see in the strange land that surrounds you?

And finally, how do you react when you get caught? How do you deal with the fact that you enlisted in an organization to protect your loved ones and fight for your country, only to be put in situations where even sensible, rational human beings would go crazy with the stress, helplessness, hopelessness, and frustration of losing fellow soldiers and not being able to do anything? How would you react when a couple desperate attempts to deal with your situation landed you a life sentence in prison and hateful disrespect for the rest of your life?

It doesn’t make sense to me. The gruesome killings don’t make sense. But the war doesn’t either. I can’t possibly fathom any of it.

To me, these killings are just as much a representation of the awful, twisted, fucked-up-ness that is war as it is a show of baseless, abject cruelty.

This article brings some interesting questions to mind. First and foremost, does gender reassignment surgery truly and fully CHANGE a person’s gender? Or is it simply a reassignment -- a doctor telling your body that its role has been changed, that nature may have assigned it the title, equipment and duties of a female, but we now need it to assume the female role?

Furthermore (and I’m not sure how sociologically pertinent this is), I have to wonder whether a lawsuit is really necessary in this situation. I mean I understand that this guy is pissed, or hurt, or whatever. I’m sure he’s been getting shit his whole life from other people who don’t understand him, and probably even from himself as he struggles to deal with the fact that he feels out of place in his own body. So I get that he’s not cool with how this all went down. Life is hard, and I'm sure being transgendered only makes it harder.

But is a lawsuit really the answer? I mean it seems pretty understandable to me, at least on the surface, why they would want a male for this job. Restrooms aren't divided by gender because men are messier or because builders are sexist, but because we as a society decided somewhere along the line that it’s not cool to be in the intimate presence of the opposite gender while peeing.

Now I’m not speaking from a legal standpoint -- I’m a psych major and thus I can say with a fair amount of confidence that I do not know shit about manipulating the letter of the law. But since this dude knew his would-be employer was specifically looking to hire men, you’d think he would at least have been forthcoming about his past. After all, I’m sure he’s well aware that not everyone in our society would be so quick to call him a man despite his surgery and hormone treatment. HOWEVER, since he decided that his medical history was personal and private, I’m fascinated by his decision to be so open about it with other people at his place of work. It literally took his boss two fucking days to hear from someone that El’Jai (or whatever) used to be female.

So to El’Jai: even if you fully call yourself a man, and even if you don't have so much as a modicum of an idea why they would only want men for this particular job, it still blows my mind that you would decide to be so secretive about your past to your boss’s face only to turn around and share it with everyone else you work with. I understand that your life has not been the easiest, but maybe use your head a bit so these kinds of things don't happen.

This man’s language and ideas and whatnot were all very … appropriate. They were intended to convey a certain emotion, and based on most of the responses, they succeeded. But contrary to what everyone here seems to think, this guy isn’t talking about what women deserve, and he’s not talking about how he would treat a woman if he got another chance to be with one. He’s in jail. The people who responded have said that the media depicts a skewed perspective of women, and that C.’s perspective was refreshing and poetic and all that bullshit. I’m fucking astonished that no one can see how skewed HIS perspective is.
First of all, he’s in JAIL! He’s talking about how he would act in certain situations -- situations that he will literally never find himself in ever again. How can his words possibly mean anything? I like how he briefly slipped in the fact that he was a douche bag when he was outside -- when what he did and said and believed and how he acted actually mattered. It’s far too easy for him to earn himself a life sentence and then decide that if he got another chance, he would treat women like fucking gold. Dude, I don’t mean to be a dick, but it doesn’t matter anymore. You fucked up, and evidently you fucked up hard enough that you lost your chance to go back and do it over again.
Second of all, how is it that I’m the only fucking person in this entire blog that seems to think his views of women are at least a full fifty or sixty years outdated? Everyone else seems to think that his viewpoint is so clear, so ideal, so apt and relevant and perfect. Dude, he literally sat there and described a list of characteristics that A) no guy will ever be, and B) no guy these days should ever TRY to be. He talked about men as if they should always be the fearless protector -- as if all women are delicate, vulnerable flowers, fully incapable of protecting, providing, and thinking for themselves. It makes me slightly sick to my stomach that apparently everyone at the school I attend, both males and females, firmly believes that this is how the relationship between a man and a woman is supposed to work. I understand that he’s focusing on males, but the way he described it, the ideal relationship involves the man protecting and looking out for and giving pleasure to the woman, who apparently just sits back and doesn’t think and doesn’t talk and just chills. Awesome, though, that I’m the asshole who has to point all this out.

“That’s the only way for me to really get a grasp on what’s going on out 'there'"
-- If I were in prison for life, I don’t think I’d want to know what was going on outside those walls, knowing that I would never be a part of that world ever again. Frankly, not only is anything outside of those walls now irrelevant, but hearing about the lives of loved ones I no longer have direct contact with would probably contribute to some bitter feelings (though some may argue that it gives them hope or happiness to hear of their loved ones’ successes and accomplishments). Anytime there is a large loss or change in a person’s life, it then becomes separated by that event: your life before, and your new, adjusted life after. I don’t truly think there is a way to mesh these two worlds in a healthy way when the physical separation is so permanent.

“Most of these people are of good nature, they just made poor choices somewhere along the way.”
-- We become the things we do, whether we like that idea or not. I believe that our behaviors, choices, and actions are direct reflections of our “nature” as human beings. Our motives behind these actions may be more deeply rooted, and are what really deserve to be further investigated. All “dumb” or “bad” behaviors and decisions stem from somewhere. I don’t believe that these kinds of behaviors are ever truly random, isolated, or independent events. The writer shows that he understands the importance of this concept when he says “I believe that we have to make sure our mistakes aren’t worthless. There’s always an underlying message that if we choose to ignore it, we will be repeating the same errors time and time again.”

“ Of the men here at Rockview, the ones who have the strongest family ties are the ones who aren’t assholes! Let’s be real, would anyone want to be friends with assholes?”
-- This made me LOL.

“That kind of support is hard to come by now a days. Everyone seems to be so much more selfish than things used to be.”
-- That kind of support is just probably harder to find in the environment that this person is in. Many people there most likely either have psychological issues or don’t have their own thoughts/lives together enough to be that great of a support system in someone else’s.

Many people in prison are part of a perpetual cycle. The question becomes can a person get themselves out of that cycle, and how? You are born into a life where you don’t have a supportive family, which makes it difficult for you to know how to establish good relationships and/or connections with anyone. As a result, you make bad choices or decisions. You suffer the consequences for those decisions, and then have no one to support you through them.

I found it quite interesting that the writer focuses an entire paragraph seemingly attempting to validate his own integrity and “goodness”. Why? Not only that, but his validation didn’t focus on any explanation of his own accomplishments, actions, or proud moments before prison, but rather on the supportive actions of others now that he IS in prison. Just because your teachers keep in contact with you doesn’t make you a respectable person. Maybe it’s the opposite and they are trying to help you fulfill some potential of which they believe you fell short. He also states that he “never hurt people physically, verbally, or emotionally” when he was home. So what did he do to deserve life in prison? Maybe he didn’t intend to hurt anyone, but I find this pretty hard to believe. Everyone has hurt someone in some way at some point in their life. That doesn’t make you a bad person. But then again, who decides what does, and just what line you need to cross in order to deserve life in prison.

(PART 2)

Zach did an excellent job of summing up the fact that it’s possible to turn out normal, become a productive member of society, and lead a satisfying life regardless of your parents‘ sexual orientation. There’s no use in my reiterating that. But what I applaud most is not the immense passion with which he spoke, but the fact that he had to courage to stand up and speak at all. Many people, myself included, would find it difficult to stand up and speak with the unwavering confidence Zach had.

Society dictates a very specific framework for how a functional family must be structured. His speech, however, proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that the functions of a family (namely to provide, protect, teach and prepare) are all possible regardless of whether or not the traditional structure of the family is preserved. He also proves, apparently, that a family can thrive regardless of whether or not our society or government even recognizes it as a family. Zach’s speech hopefully allowed the audience to open up to the idea that the typical mental construct of a family is more plastic than most people realize, and that what society deems a successful, acceptable familial unit can be achieved in an enormous number of ways.

This was a well-organized, emotionally-driven, and ultimately extremely powerful speech. I share a similar experience with Zach. I consider myself from a family with two dads -- when I was four years old, my parents got a divorce and I was raised primarily by my father and his partner. I know first hand what it’s like growing up in this atmosphere. I know what it’s like to be a preteen trying to mentally manage the fact that my family is drastically different than everyone else’s. I know what it’s like to accept the fact that our situation will never be normal and that the general public will continue to raise its eyebrows at my family structure. But most importantly, I know what it’s like to get past all of this and still be able to enjoy the sometimes chaotic but always fulfilling experience of being raised in a loving environment.

Proponents of this system would probably say that if we tried something different, a system more open to new ideas where the individual gets to decide how they learn best, that too many kids wouldn’t know what was good for them – that too many kids WOULD cheat, or would think of ways to get around the system. When in fact if these kids were socialized to know the inherent value of education, and socialized to understand that they will always be the only ones in charge of their own destiny, this wouldn’t be a problem. A system where kids got to decide what they learned, and how they learned it, would also eventually bring value back to the college degree. Not all kids, after all, would want to or be capable of the sort of learning that is praised in our modern society – the kind of systematic, detached, forced knowledge acquisition learning that is often fostered through the use of stimulant medications like Adderall and Ritalin. The artsy kids would be allowed to eat mushrooms and think creatively and make mindblowing shit, the science nerds would be allowed to study physics and chemistry and spend a full third of their lives in the classroom, the gearheads would be allowed to mess around with cars and gadgets in their shops, the indecisive kids would be allowed to flip flop back and forth between potential courses of action, and everyone in between would be allowed to do whatever the fuck they wanted. Of course not all these kids would make it to college. Some would.. but some would become carpenters, some would become starving artists, some would become janitors, some would pick up other trades, some would drop out… etc. And suddenly a college degree has meaning again!
Isn’t it also funny that as the narrator mentioned, ours is by far the most stimulated of any other generation – we have computers and video games and smart phones and digital television – and yet, BECAUSE of the obvious fact that we respond to all this excessive stimulation with diverted focus, we are fed more stimulants. How counterintuitive is that? ..I should mention that I say this while typing on a computer with my smart phone next to me and my earbuds in, Adderall (and coincidentally, Ritalin as well tonight) pumping steadily through my veins. Oh sweet irony.

This is obviously different than what we’re used to, and it definitely makes you think about what sort of forces that shape the lives that we live and the norms that we follow every day. These forces can obviously be much, much more diverse than we may typically think. But honestly, as interesting and unique as this sort of marriage situation is, it’s logical and it seems to work fine. This, I guess, is what intrigues me more than anything – the system is based entirely on logic.
Our culture looks at marriage in a totally different way. Marriage, to us (or maybe just in my mind), should be based out of passion, love, lust, companionship and compatibility. We have that ability in our society. We enjoy that freedom, that luxury, so much so that we take it for granted. It makes me wonder how the citizens of this village view love, or if they even have a concept of love at all. Do they think of love as a feeling that takes place between two or more people when their social relationship is meeting all their basic human needs? I mean they can’t be wrong – there is no strict definition for love. But it really sheds light on how the most basic of ideas, the most seemingly straightforward emotions and concepts, are truly molded by social atmosphere and upbringing. These people may not be educated in the way that we think of ourselves as being, but they seem to have mastered the basic ideas of logic.
Even sex, something that our culture has historically treated as very emotional and passionate, is so sensibly rationed – almost disgustingly so. The brothers learn quickly that they can’t afford to entertain petty feelings like jealousy, anger or envy. Their continued well-being and the stability and welfare of their entire family unit is on the line in a way that most people in our society could ever imagine. But whether or not we agree with this arrangement, it is apparently working flawlessly for the people of this region, and if nothing else, it really serves to open our eyes to how even the most fundamental concepts of our society are susceptible to the power of the invisible strings that influence everyone.

Here's the thing about empathy: it would never work. I agree that we're all "soft-wired" for sociability, attachment, affection and belonging. I agree that the idea of a world where everyone can find a way to successfully extend their central nervous systems, where everyone can broaden their sense of identities to include every being of the human race and every creature, seems amazing. The idea of such a world is enticing and downright intoxicating. I want so badly to accept everything this man says as truth, as something that I can work toward adopting with hopes of making myself, my society and my world better. But once again, it would never work.

Let me explain what I mean by that. One of the most essential truths of life as we know it is that it's self-limiting. The author, the speaker in this video, mentions that unless we're able to embrace an understanding of real and ever-expanding empathy, he's worried "we won't make it." I'm not precisely sure what he means by that, but I can only assume he means we won't survive as a species. But here's the thing: our species won't last forever anyway. And that's god, because what gives Life such beauty is its ephemerality. Worldwide empathy and compassion is unrealistic, impossible, and unappealing -- or at least SHOULD be unappealing, especially if we're trying to make our species last as long as possible -- because the anger, aggression, competition, violence and self-interest that we experience in this world is what keeps our species from growing out of control. These things exist because if they didn't, if we all just stood around staring at each other fondly with big glistening doe eyes, we would all just fuck and love ourselves right out of existence. And we'd do it in a hurry.

I'm not saying I don't LOVE what this guy is saying, because believe it or not I do. I'm not saying that I didn't watch this video several times because I was so enraptured by his philosophy, because I did. I desperately want to live his words. It's just not realistic, practical or possible. Our world is full of violence, jealousy, depravity, malice, hatred, and ugliness.... But without that ugliness, everything beautiful would lose its luster.

I’m obviously only reading and responding to this shit because it’s been assigned to me, but I’m still literally amazed by these stories. It’s insane to me that these people, these “lifers,” have such a limited view of what the word LIFE really means. I can’t comprehend their perspective of what existence is. I can’t wrap my mind around the idea of taking someone else’s life, of having the power to extinguish something so incredibly pure and beautiful and limitless. It’s equally perplexing that by murdering someone, this person actually did something that’s somehow worse than the worst physical or emotional pain -- they took away the victim’s ability to feel, to know, to love, to hate, and to live.

I guess it makes sense, then, to lock the perpetrator up -- to essentially rob them of their life in every way besides killing them. Or is it worse? At least the victim is dead, and has no sense of how much has been taken from them. The murderer is all too aware of what they are limited to. Life, after all, is NOT life without freedom. Right?

Either way, I can only imagine that the lifer’s sense of morals is skewed. It would have to be, right? As far as I’m concerned, life does not exist behind bars. Life as we know it does not extend into prisons. Prisons are islands -- only a minute’s walk from the real world, but still somehow millions of miles segregated from the average man’s experience.

It’s sort of a cop out to say this, but for argument’s sake you could say that we’ll never know whether a lifer’s “moral compass” is on course -- we’ll never experience what they do, and vice versa. How could we know? How could we judge?

Nonphilosophically speaking, however, I believe that the people who commit murders are exactly like the people who don’t commit murders in many cases. One slip up; one stupid moment of complete thoughtlessness; one second too long spent in an emotional, judgment-blocking haze is all it takes to change a life forever. Murder has become too accessible for this generation -- sometimes all it takes is pulling an index finger a couple millimeters.

This man should feel as confident in himself and his morals as any of us, if only because he is made of the same flesh and blood that we are. He can only know what his life has given him the opportunity to experience.