My Knife

by Jos

  Despite my mixed blood I look fully Korean. Although I was able to spread my genetic material to willing members of the opposite sex during my youth in K-Town, I had to make an effort to attract mates. Unlike Little Korea, my trip to Holland was much more to my liking. Finding adequate poontang for the night simply involved me leaning against the bar and selecting a female. My exotic looks took me far in Northern Europe. However, even a scrawny white nerd would be able to have his way with a large selection of women in many developing nations simply by virtue of being from a developed country. Nihilists don’t believe in fantasies, but there is nothing wrong with selling them. Many women easily convince themselves that by bedding a wealthy foreigner and making him fall in love with them, they will get married and be rescued from their misery; but of course, love is a hopeless racket induced by chemicals in our primitive brains.

  Rackets are an essential part of humanity – most people are in one way or another involved in some sort of racket. If something is absolutely to my benefit, I go ahead and do it. I don’t wallow in depression – everything in this book is merely a suggestion; some things have worked well for me, but if you are not satisfied by something, find another vice. Alcohol takes its toll, pot takes its toll, sex gets boring, and all of them are meaningless – everything we do is a chemical reaction inside a mechanical world. However, the death of a machine is as meaningless as the death of a bag of chemicals. Fully realizing that my death would be as meaningless as my life, I have decided to continue living because death is guaranteed.

  Now I simply do things because I feel like it – I get kicks out of committing various hell-raising activities. As a nihilist, I know that I will forget everything I have done, and that everyone will also forget everything I have done, but I do it because… because I can. I go out, I do whatever I want, whenever I want, because there is absolutely no point to anything and regardless of what happens, it will all be absolutely free of consequences given that I’m prepared to die. Some people take this as a reason to despair, but I take it as a free license for happiness and pleasure. I always wanted to live but was afraid of what would happen afterwards. The truth is that ultimately nothing happens. I like that old proverb: “The cemeteries are full of people who thought the world couldn’t get along without ‘em.”

  Surely, some environmentalist will say, “Your actions do indeed have consequences. Destructive actions will lead to innumerable acts of ecological destruction.” To the concerned environmentalists I say, so what? Even if we were to start a nuclear war and obliterate most life on earth, countless bacteria will survive, and eventually, in millions of years, other animals will evolve to replace us. When did you last shed a tear for a dinosaur? No point exists in preventing something that will have no meaning in the universe. I don’t remember crying for the death of a mosquito – another one will take its place.

  Although a classical nihilist might say that he doesn’t believe in happiness, the truth is that...

  Ishmael’s Thoughts

  That’s all there was to the document. I read it and suddenly everything stood explained: we were hedonists in recovery from nihilism; our fiction was our reality.

  This page has been intentionally left blank. It is to be filled after my death.

  Chapter VIII: Joaquín Speaks

  My Knife: ADHD-PI

  We’re by nature inclined towards superstition, curiosity, paranoia, and addiction. However, to militaristic families full of individuals with this type of brain, dominating people comes easily. Imagine being able to tell your army that tomorrow, on the eve of our battle, God would block out the sun to frighten our enemies and show them that our cause is righteous using a secret understanding of astronomy. An army convinced of its divinity fights better than any other and can by sheer hyperfocus (fanaticism) hold off even the Rome of its time. But that was ancient history. Sadly for the Kims in North Korea, The Gadhaffis in Lybia, and The Assads in Syria, the internet and AK-47s have made everyone equal. It’s ironic that a product of militaristic capitalism and a product of militaristic communism, respectively, would be the two to destroy the system which has for thousands of years been used to enslave humanity. There is no New World Order, no Illuminati, no aliens, no Elders of Zion, no humanoid reptiles; secret societies are just glorified country clubs or glorified Old Cities. The master conspiracy is greed, and what exists are militaristic families full of social artists. Trust me, there is often one person that would kill everyone if possible; some of us are very misanthropic, especially if an aspie. However, if it’s to our benefit or survival, we’ll be vassals to Hitler or the CIA, even at the expense of our “countrymen.” Survival is a trait common to almost all humans, but to some survival means a big yacht.

  You can be blind to our existence, you can denounce us as contradictory to your ways, or you can try to make sure that we don’t develop a scarcity mentality, and that you don’t promote greed. We can either hoard information to use it for the benefit of humanity, or we can be trained to hoard wealth or power at the expense of everyone. In technical terms, a brain is a computer. Computers have no values, religion, or culture (anti-virus, operating system, or firewall) at birth. Some brains have a big hard drive, others smaller ones. Some have multi-core processors useful for many parallel tasks. Others have single-core processors suitable for one task at a time (ADHD). You really have no way of knowing what kind of brain you have until the operating system finishes decompiling (the child has matured), regardless of the brand (race). A brain’s success comes down to the computer model (family); and even then you can’t be sure (nor should you bother). Further, there’s the multi-racial person, the person who wins the lottery, the black sheep, the one who changes his operating system, the computer that has a malfunction (ie., bipolar disorder), and the computer that can somehow be overclocked to ridiculous levels.

  Currently, the potential of a brain is chiefly a result of whatever egg and sperm (source code) happen to bump into each other and into what social position (internet availability and guidance level) it is born. After that, there’s all that life throws its way, and whether it traumatizes it or not. Inattentive brains with OCD tendencies and a strongly hierarchical firewall, I believe from experience, are the type that can most easily be programmed to self-destruct and destroy at the command of a nefarious system administrator (authority figure). Although monotheistic operating systems have been successful because they have a built-in antivirus and firewall (fear of hell for apostasy, violating a list of religious tenets, etc.), the problem arises with hackers (cult leaders à la Osama) who, instead of replacing the operating system, simply install a nefarious virus. This virus can be simply a video with graphic images (Abu Ghraib, tomahawk cruise missile victims, etc) and extremely high-speed, repetitive statements that induce fear and paint the big picture of an enemy hell-bent on the destruction of the watcher (DOS attack). Add a little bit of borderline personality disorder – especially black-and-white thinking – and you have the perfect candidate for suicide bomber school. The urgency for a mission can be pressed by anyone who can imitate the speaking style of someone like Glenn Beck or Alex Jones. At no point in time does the hacker have to present false facts; he is simply a military general painting a big mission as mandated by voluminous facts. After all, a good, selfless soldier obeys.

  The most vulnerable brains are generally those that have had difficulty installing their environment’s mainstream operating system (Columbine, Virginia Tech) or haven’t found something to hyperfocus on (sport, art, job, video game, etc.). The difficulty in installing an operating system most often comes from a hardware-incompatible program. For example, a computer interested in computers of the same gender, wouldn’t be able to install a homophobic program or subroutine without resulting in issues throughout the whole operating system. These incompatible programs are usually installed by force, using negative emotions that will later manifest subconsciously in sometimes destructive ways. These individuals cannot be eliminated from the human popul
ation. Our genes are in every single human. In essence, the “devil” is inside every one of us. Our negative emotions – especially our fears – create the devil; once he is created, he is very real. He replicates and grows by feeding on the misery of others. He knows how to paint a big picture and make it seem real. If you’re afraid to question your big picture, you may be blinded by a dark social artist. Question a part of his big picture, and if he gets angry or calls you crazy, ask yourself: why does he get so nervous? Some artists know how to use fear to hide details from you.

  Essentially, what are we as a society willing to allow? Do we employ brute force and conformity, or do we use psychology and compassion? A tomahawk cruise missile cost a million dollars and it feeds evil. Imagine if a bomb had killed my parents as a kid. I wonder what plans the battlefield would encourage me to hatch up.

  Now that we have a more rational, scientific understanding of our brains, should we continue using an operating system developed by programmers with perhaps secret agendas? Isn’t it time we moved to an open source understanding of the universe? Or should we continue raining fire upon a people who only know scarcity and fear? Dark, militaristic artists are naturally very good at ruling people. You can recognize if your society is ruled by them immediately upon questioning details of an unsolved crime and being met with fear and anger.

  Fear

  My theory as to why the suicide rate in Korea is so high is because the culture basically rips the soul out of anyone who is ADHD-inattentive. I can still recall every single time that a teacher used negative emotions to snap me out of a daydream. I was once day-dreaming in an SAT class and the teacher screamed at me angrily and embarrassed me in front of the class. (I do admit that smiling blankly into a wall can induce paranoia – especially in my teacher, who was overweight, and bald, and clearly self-conscious. But, nevertheless, an insecure person with negative emotions like his should never be allowed near a classroom.) Only a few things can happen when schools fail to recognize someone with our condition and do what he did: either we retreat into our world, internalize it, and destroy ourselves; or we exaggerate the emotions around us. Fortunately for me, my extended family’s life revolved around comedy in a tropical country. Had I been born in a negative environment, I may have become a Sith and indeed, for a time I was one. If there is such a thing as pre-ordination, one would say it was meant to be; members of my blood hate the Sith lord of Quisqueya for suffering under him, yet others still revere him. I instead decided to understand him, even though that quest has been painful.

  Should others be afraid of people like us? We’re the Littluns of Lord of the Flies. If we’re in a place where negative emotions predominate and a drunk man can purchase a knife outside of the bar after drinking for two days, you should be extremely afraid. The investigator in the police station laughed incredulously when I told him the knife was for a conceptual art project; “I’m gonna cut some rope,” I said when asking for my knife back as soon as I was let go from being detained.

  Want to get away with it? Just make sure the other guy is poor (no Koreans or individuals from countries allied to their American masters in the CIA, though) and you might be able to pay your way out of it. Make sure he’s younger, too, since that’s an easy loophole to exploit in Korean law. Also, buy the knife the same day and look distinctive enough (think mohawk) such that the guy who sold you the knife can verify that you bought it earlier that day while drinking “Powerspade.” If you plan on using the knife, attack only limbs, since anything else can get you into serious trouble. Also, apply for a work visa in one country, wait ‘til it’s granted, but don’t pick it up. Enter Korea as a tourist (preferably with a different passport if you have dual citizenship), and do what you have planned on doing. Leave, pick up your work visa, and pay a petty fine once you return to your life as a bohemian who has sex in bar bathrooms with alcoholic, emotionally troubled English teachers. Like Ana, however, you can dispense with the visa. Only do it if you enjoy being a formal guest. Nonetheless, just make sure you don’t get caught with cannabis, since we all know that Amsterdam is more dangerous than Itaewon.

  Overall, the only thing I can say with definite certainty is that if Korea continues brushing mental problems under the table, emulating a decaying empire full of overweight Jersey Shore addicts, and using negative emotions to motivate kids to study for 20 hours a day on subjects they don’t like, the society will destroy itself, especially as Korea is on the verge of becoming a global society full of people with little interest in its values or traditions.

  Traditions

  Angry people of the world: Don’t turn to terrorism. If you can’t have someone disagree with you, move to a small, conservative town with people just like you and cut yourselves off from the world. You’ll be happy that way.

  Would-be suicide bombers: How fucking desperate can you be for virgins? I’ve been with that shit, and trust me, there’s no point. And all the people I met in that Confederate establishment on Hooker Hill: your sin, like the German people after WWI, is pride. You lost, admit it, overcome it, and move on. Your battle is not without, it is within. Know thyself.

  If God is real, I thank him my father was Dominican and at least made sure to have “una cajita arreglá’.” There’s nothing better than having uncensored, unlimited pay-per-view for a 10-year-old; I watched Independence Day like 30 times in one month. (You daydream so much into the movie you don’t even realize you live in the ghetto.) Yep, since my father worked all day every day and was the silent inattentive type too (you can’t hate on Lucas all the time, midi-chlorians are a bit genetic, though environment has a factor) and my mom worked in the Netherlands, I was raised by Trey Parker, Matt Stone, Boruga, Ozzy, Metallica, Malcom X, Will Smith, Donkey Kong, Scarface, and whoever I met on the street while raising hell. Analyzing everything, I think I turned out fine considering all the freedom I had in the Heights.

  Furthermore, I hereby propose that all individuals in high levels of government be subjected to publicly accessible brain scans. We all know what happened that last time an “eccentric” artist with a feminine walk and a genius for the dark arts reverse-engineered a theory and wrote a book. And if you’re listening intently in fear to a certain Texan with a “command center,” ask yourself: “Is all that anger and fear gonna take me anywhere I want to go?”

  Finally, my view on the War on Terror is that Sith lords will use the internet to learn how to seduce the masses, and some of them will be as powerful as Osama. And they themselves will sometimes believe what they are preaching. They will know how to handpick recruits with the right mind, and many will come from parts of the world not subject to international rule of law. The best way to fight terrorism, however, is by making kindles as abundant as rocks, not by dropping bombs and censoring the web. Nevertheless, we must prepare ourselves for the existential war of this century: beacons of exponential scientific progress and governance contrasted with dark patches of the world living in ignorance and fear under a Sith lord (Kim Jung-eun) or Junta (CIA; Myanmar).

  Joaquin’s Final Solution for Personal Happiness:

  Treat the very concept of race as a relic. Abandon religion and blind nationalism. Above all, conquer your fears. If you’re afraid of public speaking, you still have work left to do. Also, since I’ve decided to elevate myself to prophethood (social architect; master programmer), take heed in my advice. Here’s how to fix your country. It starts with raising your kids:

  Dominican Republic: There are a lot of powerful ADHD brains and a Japanese-level of OCD thanks to 31 years of brutal CIA-backed, unfettered fascism. Shoot on sight anyone playing baseball, hoarding pussy, or dancing merengue. To eliminate the racial inferiority complex left behind by the Spanish and later elevated to state religion by Trujillo, run an aggressive campaign promoting the virtues of Afro-European pride. Promote the belief that true racial harmony and world peace is to be found in the mixing of all the races. The entire country would be as well developed as its resort towns in less than 6 y
ears.

  South Korea: The Japanese colonization left the people with an inferiority complex which would be very hard to eliminate without extreme isolation and brutal reinforcement of Korean pride the likes of North Korea. The country is running smooth now, but it’s easy to see that the low birth rate, social stress, and scarcity-like competition will lead the country’s people to commit suicide. Eliminate the drinking culture and reduce OCD by promoting “Dutch virtues.” Extend conscription to women, reduce overall service to just one year, and also create a large artist corp.

  United States: Too many states and too many different cultures exist for a simple fascist solution. To even begin to solve America’s problems, we first need to understand World Trade Center 7. No one likes to talk about that building. The mainstream media uses race, religion, fear, hate, and the phrase “conspiracy theory” to explain why it disappeared. Well, such things don’t exist in my world; only knife-sharp logic. Economically rough times have the power to bring out the worse in people, and opportunistic artists will often paint the picture of an enemy to incite fear and blind the masses. They will use greed, secrecy, and fear. If the economic situation in America deteriorates to a desperate point, the people behind the collapse of that building may need to find scapegoats.

  The Jewish Problem: The Jews are very afraid, and rightfully so. They know the power of conspiracies and some still carry the numbers tattooed on their arms to know how dangerous they can be. They also know that all their money and brains won’t do much to stop someone who has hyperfocused their whole lives behind a baseball bat or an AK-47. They also know that Prescott Bush, the 6’4” singer who founded the Bush political dynasty, was indicted for trading with the enemy in WWII. Sure, maybe Prescott didn’t know what Hitler was up to, but I haven’t seen a member of the Bush family shed a tear over the source of their wealth.