Author: smackyjackjack

That 84 percent.

smackyjackjack2 Comments

With the human population nearing 7 billion, I think it is a time we examine ourselves very closely.

One thing that I find very interesting is the fact that 84% of all people on this planet, are, in one form or another, religious. The superstition of Gods and other such things has been one trait that we have not been able to shake.

33% of all humans are Christian. That makes the Vatican one of the most powerful organizations in the world. The Catholic Church is so powerful that it has become it’s own country.  I am completely dumbfounded by what humans have allowed to happen. Religion is responsible of worst atrocities ever committed, yet people still follow it blindly.

Read More »

NBA. Ready for the Playoffs.

smackyjackjack2 Comments

With the Celtics and Bulls battling it out for the top seat in the East, and the Spurs with a strong lead in the West, it is time to start thinking about the NBA playoffs.

In my opinion, it will be the Celtics and Lakers in the finals again this year. The Bulls won’t be able to stay strong as they do not have enough experience in the playoffs so far. The Bulls would be the one team that I would not mind losing to if they do make it all the way.

Derrick Rose has built his team up from basically nothing. With the help of teammates like Loul Deng and Joakim Noah, the team is great. The reason behind their greatness lies with their ability to play as a team. They work together to win. It’s not all ways the D. Rose show.Read More »

UCLA Goes Down. After the Trojans.

smackyjackjackLeave a comment

Again Florida? Really?

Today the Gator’s passed the Bruins to advance into the fourth round of the NCAA Basketball championship. The final score was 73-65.

Despite the loss, the Bruin’s put up a good fight, with both guard Reeves Nelson and center Joshua Smith getting 16 points.

The Bruins went down fighting in the tournament, leaving me with one team left to cheer for. The Blue Devils from Duke are the team I pick to win. They are in my bracket going all the way to the championship.

Last year, I picked them to win as well. Not knowing anything about college basketball I was surprised when I won the bracket competition last year. I picked the teams based on their names and their records. If I won again this year, then I will be moving to Vegas to make a career based off of betting on college games.

Despite the loss today, I can still be happy that the Bruins made it further than the Trojans.

Religion again?

smackyjackjack1 Comment

If History has taught us one thing, it’s that people do not like difference in their lives. The best examples come from religion. Christians and Muslims have had a shaky couple moments,  Jews have had it tough where ever they go, Tibetans and Chinese, Animists and Muslims, etc.

Why is it that people hate difference? If you ask anyone why they hate something, they will reply, more or less, “because it’s different.” Religion is just another excuse for people to hate other people. Religion, in my opinion, is completely unnecessary.

Humans have proven time and time again that they cannot live peacefully with religion. They have proved it through wars, murder and other terrible things. They have proved it through the stupidity of the Westboro Baptist Church, through the issuing of Fatwas, through Waco, through the Children’s Crusade, through 9/11, through Jonestown, and through the holocaust.

“But Jack, look at all of the good things religion has done for people!” Sure, religion can be good. Religion can feed the homeless, give people a reason to live, and have the occasional bake sale. But why can’t humans just do those things out of the goodness of their hearts? Do you really need to live in fear of judgement by a old man who resembles Charlton Heston to do good things? Can’t you just do them because they are good things to do?

Religion is also completely unnecessary.  Humans should, if they feel they have to, worship their form of God(s) in their own way. If humans are good at one thing it’s creating unnecessary rivalries between each other and ending up killing each other. If this wasn’t the case, then I would say, “Go ahead! have organized religion!” But it’s not. And being told to believe in things that are not true and that are prejudice is not only completely ridiculous, but also very scary.

Opinions

smackyjackjack1 Comment

I feel that I have very strong opinions. I also feel that anyone who does not share my opinions is either misinformed or uneducated.  Most times in life, there are only two options; right and wrong. It is very rare for there to be another option. In many matters, to me, it is okay for people to have different opinions, as long as they have a logical argument for this. But every so often someone may think something that is completely ridiculous, and you have to call then out on it.

As a rule, everyone should be fair, just and have the patience and maturity to listen to the other side of the argument. But there are some people who are so ignorant, so stupid that they cannot be treated the same way.

Take, for instance, the Tea Party.  These are the people who are under the illusion that homosexuals are a mistake, that a government that does its job is bad, and that “elitists” should not be in a position of power.  First of all, who cares if some one is gay? It really does not matter in any way.

Secondly,  a government is supposed to do the things the citizens cannot do by themselves.  The proposed idea of taking its power away would lead to political and social ruin.

Finally, I don’t think the Tea Party “Patriots” understand what an elitist is.  An elitist is defined as a person who believes that a society would be ruled by the elite.  Well no duh it should. The point of an indirect democracy is to vote and single out the best and smartest citizens to represent the other citizens. You don’t want  a hick from Kentucky to be put into a position of power. Why would anyone think that that is okay?

It is not okay to let people believe in things  that are so blatantly wrong. It is not okay to be the fair and just when someone’s beliefs are harmful to others. Some people, as bad as this will sound, need to be told they are wrong.

The Radiant Child

smackyjackjack1 Comment

Jack’s Movie Pick of the Week

The Radiant Child is the story of Jean-Michel Basquiat.

Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child Poster

Jean-Michel Basquiat has been described as the most important artist of his generation.  Basquiat was born December 22nd, 1960 in New York city.  He was interested in art from an early age. His small cartoons and doodles eventually blossomed into a career.

Basquiat had a short career. He died of a drug overdose shortly before going out to a concert with his friends on August 12th, 1988. In his short life, Basquiat managed to creat some of the most powerful and unique art of his time. His art was praised by one of Basquiat’s best friends, Andy Warhol.

Final Verdict

This is a good documentary about a very important artist. The editing is a bit rough at times, and the film itself could have been cut more. But aside from that, the story is engaging, and the subject is intriguing.  This is a good documentary for those who love expressionism.

The Art of the Steal

smackyjackjackLeave a comment

Jack’s Movie Pick of the Week

The documentary The Art of the Steal is the story of the struggle to control the late Albert C. Barnes’ priceless collection of post-impressionist art.

Albert Barnes was born into a poor Philadelphia family on January 2nd, 1872. He worked his way out of the slums by inventing Argyrol, a drug used to protect babies against venereal diseases.   The drug was mass marketed and Barnes made millions.

Around this time, a new type of art was starting to become popular.  This art was called post impressionism, or early modern art.  Popular artists in this field were Henri Rousseau, Van Gogh and Paul Cézanne to name a few.

Barnes noticed that this would eventually become famous and stocked up on as much of it as possible.

He started the Barnes Foundation as a place to educate people about the wonders of art.  The building was designed to teach, not to show. He started several very successful art classes based out of the art lousy building.  Just how much art was there? It is appraised at over $25 billion dollars worth.  And that isn’t even counting the priceless and un-appraiseable art such as Van Gogh’s “Postman”.

When Barnes died in a car accident in 1951, he made several things very clear in his will. First of all, the art was to never be removed from the walls of the Barnes Foundation. Secondly, the art must be used to educate. And most importantly, he said that the art may never be sold. He also did not want the Foundation to become a museum.

After a series of rather bad managers, the Barnes Foundation was in dire need of money.  The art was eventually sold to many of Barnes’ old nemeses.  It was sold to museums and the art was squandered to many different museums.

As of now, the city of Philadelphia has ignored Barnes’ dream to create a peaceful location to learn about Pre-modern art. The Foundation is set to move to the center of Philadelphia to become a museum. This is being done to boost the tourism of the city.

Final Verdict

WATCH THIS MOVIE!! It is a great documentary that shows the heist of a multi-billion dollar collection of art. The more people who watch this movie the better.

Best Movies Ever?

smackyjackjack2 Comments

With the Oscars only a week away, it’s high time to blog about movies.  Out of all the movies nominated for best film of 2010, I have only seen three (The fighter, Inception and True Grit). The Fighter was by far the best. Christian Bale showed just how good of an actor he could be. That would have to be the best movie of 2010.

The Fighter might be ok for 2010, but there are other movies out there that could blow the Fighter out of the water.

THIS IS JACK BEVERLY’S FAVORITE MOVIES OF ALL-TIME!!!

The best all time drama is a tie between John Huston’s The Man who Would be King, and Werner Herzog’s Fitzcarraldo.

The Man who Would be King is based off of Rudyard Kipling‘s book of the same name. It is about two ex soldiers who decide they want to become kings of Kafiristan. Spoiler Alert!, they do. As is that wasn’t cool enough, the two soldiers are played by Sean Connery and Michael Caine. Yeah. Those two are in the same movie. It may have caused a rip in the time space continuum of awesome.

Fitzcarraldo is Werner Herzog’s epic story of a rubber baron who decides to go down the Amazon in search of rubber. Before I go any further, let me just say that Werner Herzog doesn’t make movies about any wimps. Just read the first paragraph on his film school’s website…..did you read it? Yeah. That’s pretty much Fitzcarraldo. Multiply that by the craziness it took to lug a steam boat over a mountain and you have the film that is Fitzcarraldo.

Best all time comedy is Stanley Kramer’s It’s a mad mad mad mad World.  This movie has every one of the greatest comedians of it’s time you can think of, and Ethel Merman. The crazy plot, and non stop laughability (I had to make up a word to describe it) makes it the best comedy of all time.

The best all time psychological thriller would have to be Christopher Nolan’s Memento. Usually, I don’t like many of Nolan’s films, but Memento was awesome. Basically, the film is about a guy who has very strong amnesia. He is trying to find out who his wife’s killer is, but he forgets what he does the day before. So, without giving away too much, he has to tattoo the clues he has found on himself. Pretty cool stuff.

The World’s most Typical Person

smackyjackjack1 Comment

National Geographic published a very interesting new issue this month. The magazine set out to find who was the world’s most typical person. And here HE his. 

That’s right. The world’s most typical person is Chinese. He is 28 years old, Han Chinese male.  There are 1.01 men for every woman, making the typical person a male.

The ethnic group of Han Chinese has 1.3 billion people, the largest out of any other.

However, this will all change in the year 2030 when China will no longer he the top in population, but India will be. In 2030, the most typical human being will be Indian.

Read all about it HERE.


Skinny V. Fat

smackyjackjack3 Comments

Being skinny isn’t fun.

Everyone always makes some stupid comment about me eating more. Oh right. Because I’m skinny means that  I hate food. It’s not that I hate food, it’s just that I like food to be good. I’m not like all of you food obsessed fattys who need to eat a twinkie in between their snacks or else they’ll pass out.

The odd thing about it is that I always get called skinny by really fat people. My old dentist used to always tell me to eat more. “Forget you fatty!” I wanted to say. “Hows about you lay off the Hostess cupcakes, then tell we can talk.”

I think it’s some kind of weird vendetta fat people have against  us skinny people.  Like they need to point out that we are skinny, to make themselves feel ok.

I tell you, if I were to call every fat person I see fat, then I would be the bad one. I think I’ll try that. Every time some overweight know-it-all tells me to eat more, i’ll tell him to eat less. We’ll see how that works.

I would say that as a whole skinny people have to deal with more crap that fat people. Only because it’s socially acceptable to make fun of a skinny person, and not a fat person. Maybe that’s because 62% of all American adults are overweight or obese.

I would much rather be skinny than fat. I haven’t seen many skinny people dying of heart attacks or such things. Skinny people have it good. We save money on food, we have more room on airplanes and we don’t have to squeeze through doorways.