I have been playing Final Fantasy VII Rebirth these past few days and I am really loving it. I am still pretty early on in the game, I just managed to cross the swamps. It is really good though, I quite like how the world is presented. Am looking forward to the Golden Saucer.
Posts by Reddeath26
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This will be the first in a series of entries where I try to engage with my readings for my university class, Advanced Political Thought.
Theory offers an explanatory framework for interpreting elements of reality. It describes the world, but more importantly structures how we engage with it. The questions we ask, where we direct our attention are guided by our overriding theories. The more dominant a theory is, the more invisible it is. A hegemonic theory, being naturalized, is taken for granted without its proponents consciously contemplating the criteria that is guiding their hand. Thus, with the European Empire for instance, it was a given that Europe represented the pinnacle of human achievement and that all societies were travelling along the same pathway of progression. Given enough time, they would all eventually pull themselves up and join Europe in a state of civilization. From this framework it was natural to see colonization as a civilizing mission which was providing the colonies with the appropriate cultural and social structures so that one day, they too could be civilized. A line of thought which is still present within contemporary political discourse, when Indigenous actors try to seek redress for past atrocities committed against them. Consequently, this leads to the difficulties faced by Indigenous academics within the university setting as asserted by Kidman. Oftentimes limited in their promotional pathways, it is expected that they will put on a happy display with their mere presence within academia being proof of our progress as a society. Efforts to critique the predominant neoliberal discourse can result in them being pushed to the peripheries if not out of the academic landscape in its entirety. Theory then can be seen as a way through which power is enacted and legitimated. Hooks made a similar observation from the other angle when making the case for how theory can be used as a liberatory force with healing and empowering properties. While theory has had a close relation with imperial and colonial forces, it has also been present in the countervailing forces. Indeed power is not a unidirectional force, and the same is true of theory. Academic theory then can either be used as an emancipatory force or an enslaving one.
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Pfft I'm glad Maine removed him from the ballet. It honestly doesn't surprise me in the slightest that he basically told Christ Columbus that he needed to make a cameo appearance in Home Alone 2 in order to film there. Of course he'll go back and say that they practically begged him to be in the film, dude was just a random guy who had a bunch of money back then. He wasn't in the spot light as much as he was when he was on the Apprentice or the president.
It is almost impressive that despite him being such a prominent figure in US politics for decades, I can still be amazed by the hills he is prepared to die on. As for Trump itself, it is not looking good still. He seems to be cruising to a comfortable Republican nomination and breaking records along the way. The level and depth of his support is unreal. Polls between him and Biden are also getting worse with Trump increasing his lead being recorded there too.
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This is very interesting, since so many countries rely on capitalism it's unlikely that the majority of us will get the chance to enjoy life and work less. If you were born into a rich family, most likely you wouldn't have to work a day in your life since you could inherit things from your parents. On the other hand those who worked very hard early on in their lives could potentially have saved enough money so they don't necessarily have to work as much. One of my coworkers actually did this, he worked really hard when he was younger and was able to retire pretty young but due to not really having things to do around the house and getting bored with hobbies he actually wanted to find work to do. There's another guy who's a year older than me that earns pretty decent money outside of working, he is disabled but he'd rather work as well. Some people just like to have that social interaction with other people, and they need to stay busy so they seek out work. But then again there's plenty of people like myself who wishes I had more time to just enjoy life without having to worry about financial issues, but alas I cannot stop working at this moment in time.
A lot of it can be influenced greatly by circumstantial and situational factors around your birth and formative years. Especially when it comes to your family, but even things like which country, region, or city you are born into can play a huge role. I am not from such a wealthy family myself, but growing up in New Zealand is a huge boost. I wouldn't say I have a luxurious or wealthy life at all, but I have been pretty comfortable and never really had to struggle. Whereas even living in the same country, if I had been born to a different family the challenges would have changed.
It'd be great if we could just live and strive, leave money for extra things , currency really is the biggest hoax in the world, money and the need to earn it is faker then Trump's hair
Our whole financial systems revolving around the need for indefinite increasing profit margins. Neo-liberal market values distort our cultural values as a society and disempower most people from meaninfully participating in public and community life. The extra time that would be freed up would have so many positive benefits and on so many levels to the great majority.
I feel like AI and Robotics will be the only path towards being free from work. It is much less "I need enough money to be free" than "someone needs to do the work". There will always be people who find jobs that allow them to work on the go, from home, or just basically no hours and that is great. There is also investments that allow people to simply not work. But beyond a few innovative people and the rich, there is simply no way for their no to be industry workers if the industry can't operate without them.
It could be, but I find that talk of innovations there are strikingly similar to opinion pieces that were written about the industrialization process. Those great boons to productivity were also said to have the potential to free people from work. And they did greatly improve productivity, but instead of seeing this result in lower need for work, it was used to increase profit margins for the capitalist class. I can likewise see that being the pathway for AI and Robotics. More recently this has played out with the internet as it failed to live up to its radical aspirations of liberating humanity.
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That is such an unusual way for people to look at it from my perspective. It just seems a given that people should have sick leave for when they are unwell. As it is well known that people need time to recover when they are sick. I also think it is legitimate for people to use them for mental health days. That would be awesome for you to come visit! Yes, it is expensive here 😬😬. I am glad you didn't get in trouble and are recovering!
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I don't really have any hard resolutions, but rather some more generalised goals I want to work on. Going to the gym more regularly, I will start that goal this Sunday. Which is pretty doable, as I was essentially doing that already. Just took a few weeks off over Christmas. To try and read more, both in terms of books and academic articles. To write more and get more comfortable with writing, will use my blog here for that. Also to be more active on the forums I am on. Also to be better at replying to people on the Slowly app. Finally to go well with uni and not lose focus of my passion.
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I recently read an anthropology article which looked at digital nomads and how they realize the potential of breaking away from the standard relationship we have with work. Some of the people interviewed during the anthropologists field research work as little as 4 hours per week. Such a lifestyle leaves plenty of room for community building, self development and leisure/relation in general. Indeed there have been plenty of writing published looking at the toll which our excessive work hours take on us on an individual and public level. The basic notion being that how our work and personal lives are arranged creates a scarcity of time and energy which prevents these resources from being used in areas that would enable greater individual and social flourishing. Which is quite depressing when you go back to the beginning of the 20th century and there was so much hope and optimism in political writing that as our productivity and technologies were improving we would see a decreasing need for people to work such long hours. Rather it would free up significant portions of our lives for other pursuits. Something which has not only not played out, but has in many instances gone in the opposite direction. Productivity has increased drastically, labour compensation has fallen drastically. Which raises some issues which were also looked at in the anthropological article. The people interviewed were able to achieve these low levels of work for a number of reasons. One avenue was that they already had significant financial capital to support their transition to settup their new lifestyle, secondly they also did so by moving to Thailand where living costs were vastly cheaper, finally the pandemic circumstances created more need for their businesses. Some actually had so much demand they started declining so they wouldn't return to their previous work life balance. One of the limitations was despite the personal views of the people there, they still felt the strong cultural values regarding the value of work. The protestant work ethic creates within people a strong notion that there is an ethical judgment behind how much time and effort a person devotes to working and being productive. It has even creeped into our recreational pursuits and home life where we are expected to be productive here too. Consequently the informants of the study would often find themselves needed to justify and explain their behaviours so as to not seem lazy to friends and family back home. Such an overwhelming mindset makes the transition more difficult.
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I hope they will both be okay, although I have to admit I feel more sympathy for the coworker who had a stroke. That really is an eventful day and sadly none of it was of the positive variety. Although I guess it might be a positive that the former coworker won't be interfering with people's equipment and "fixing them." How big is the company you work for? 50-100 people? I am meaning the particular physical location you work at, not the company in its entirety.
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That really sucks to hear, I hope that you are feeling better now. Having a bad cold is already draining enough to deal with. Never mind the terrible labour laws that exist over there. I can't imagine not having sick leave, we get 10 days a year here in New Zealand.
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Timesplitters Rewind is a remake of the Timesplitters trilogy. I think it was announced something like 2016 but due to the scope of the project and the size/availability of the team it is going to be a lengthy process. When it comes out it will be available for free. Fan remakes can be really good, the Elder Scrolls Daggerfall one just recently got its proper release too. I had heard in coverage of Sonic Origins that there were fan releases that were better, The same can also be the case with mods and games that get remastered, such as Skyrim Anniversary Edition.
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I need to get the Pixel remasters at some point, but I currently own 1, 2, 4, 5, and 6 via the collections on the PS1. (I even own the original Super Famicom version of V which is my favorite. I love VI too!) Sometimes the remasters don't do a good job preserving the original game which is a shame. The Turok 3 remaster isn't a 100% replica of the original game since there were a few layout changes in the first level of the game. I'm not sure why they made these few small changes, but other than that it did a good job remastering a game that desperately needed it.
I am not sure if the pixel remasters would be improvements on your current versions, aside from load times. I am thinking primarily of 4, I would assume it would be the same for 5 and 6 though. I remember you mentioning that 5 was your favourite on Off Topix. That is fair enough, I am pretty bad with my money and own multiples of a lot of the Final Fantasy titles. I even own 3 of all 6 pixel remasters. Sometimes the changes can improve the experience and other times they can make them worse. There have been plenty of games that without remasters and remakes that I would never have tried. Fan remakes can also be amazing for games that aren't seen by gaming companies as financially viable enough. I am really excited for Timesplitters Rewind!!
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with how poor gaming preservation is, for a lot of titles remakes and remasters are the most easily accessible way to play them. It is a real shame that they can prove necessary for this reason, because as mentioned by SuperLegend, they imperfectly preserve the titles. That being said, I am quite fond of playing remakes and remasters of older titles. Both for those that I never previously played and also for those I am wanting to experience again. I have been working my way through the Final Fantasy Pixel Remasters for instance, am up to 6, and I love them.
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My favourite fighting games would probably be Tekken 3, Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 3, Xenoverse 2 and Smash Bros Ultimate.
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A continuation of my previous blog entry and something I have been specifically thinking about this past week. How can I be certain that my frameworks for perceiving and thinking about the world are reliable or accurate? I have been more critically reflecting on the theories and concepts that I use to think about culture, society, politics and people. These are topics which greatly interest me. Or do they? I have spent a lot of the past 15 years furthering my understanding and grasp over them. Reading a variety of literature, primarily books, covering different theories and concepts. I have tried to learn and understand multiple different, and quite opposing, theories. The thinking has been, that with enough knowledge and proficiency, a path forward will open itself to me. That there will come a point where my self doubt doesn't over encumber me. Yet the self doubt is still there. I mean, I am someone who isn't even certain that I know which of my feelings are real or what they mean. But returning to my topic, I have been doubting whether I have the appropriate critical thinking and reading skills to have gained reliable understandings. How much of this trail was set in motion by circumstantial and coincidental occurrences. One of the dangers with a lot of theory is in how value laden it is, and how self reinforcing a lot of it can be. Once you start down a particular path it can be all too easy to construct elaborate edifices out of fragile materials. I guess in the long run, one way or another, my ongoing blog here will lay out a lot of these theories and concepts for judgment.
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You are most welcome, it did help encourage me to reflect more on what I am wanting to do and where I am wanting to go. That is still awesome you are reflecting on it though, as 34 is still pretty young. It is much more common for people to be able to go through quite radical changes later in life. When I started taking social anthropology at uni, the head of the anthropology department had only decided to go into anthropology when her marriage ended and she was in her 40s. She had been a housewife until then. Not that I am disparaging that choice, but opportunities to change can be open even with limited experience. So here is wishing the best for you!
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Yeah definitely, there have been plenty of gains which had been made when it comes to injustice that just seemed to get swept away in the reactionary backlash. We had our election year last year in New Zealand and that managed to set us back two or three decades in terms of sociopolitical progress we had made as a country. It is incredibly depressing where politics are in the US and it is only going to get worse after the election. The discouraging thing about US politics for me here in New Zealand, is that we seem to lag about a decade or so behind you a lot of the time. So trends happening there end up making their way here.
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This actually looks like a really interesting challenge. I might have to give it a go at some point in the future. I would do it on the remastered version, most likely on PS5.
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At the moment, I don't really need to worry so much about scheduling time to play games. My only responsibility are work and tasks which keep me alive. But I will need to be more deliberate once I return to uni at the end of next month.
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This past week I have had someone advise me that if I want to get over my self consciousness regarding my writing and self expression that I should get into the habit of daily writing. So here is day one of free writing. Recently I read Ravenfreak's blog entry where they reminisced about where they are in relation to their past experiences and future potentialities. This has got me thinking more about where I am too. Although, admittedly, my mind tends to be more past focused than present. Lately I have been having more misgivings about my ideals and beliefs. I used to hold a lot of them with such conviction. When I was living with my ex and we were studying together we both held the sincere belief that what we were learning would enable us to bring about positive and meaningful changes to the world. This is what politics meant at the heart of it all. The comparative and historical study of societies so that we could work towards reaching the best society. With this in mind, we expanding our knowledge on theories of the society, cultural differences, social roles, socialization, embodiment, and politics. There was a real feeling of hope. That things didn't have to remain how they were. More than that, there was a sense that positive changes were already in motion. Politics, then, it all its lofty promises and hopes, was the highest tribute we could make to love. Yet, progress seems to be quite illusionary. Take the Gaza situation, go back to writing on it in the 70s, 80s, 90s, 00s. 10s and now. It seems that there is an air of inevitability around human suffering. Read critiques of colonialism and imperialism in the political order and they speak just as forcefully to the geopolitical arrangement of the so called, postcolonial world. In 2008 I was shocked at the injustices around the world, fast-forward to the beginning of 2024 and things have not meaningfully changed. There is a tinge of guilt as I have these thoughts. Woe be to me, who can have such self reflections as if I am not part of this very world. These troubles may not reach out to me, but through my (in)actions I might as well be striking back at them. I will stop at this point, leaving some room to further address at a later time.
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It is so cliched but it is almost scary how fast time seems to fly by without us noticing it. After reading your blog post a few days ago, I have found my mind wandering in similar circles. I hope you do continue with this place, for my part I also hope that I remember to talk more. As I do like this place, I tend to be selfish though and too often use content here as springboards for my own thinking. I will be more active though as I would also like to see this place go well too.
That is really awesome to hear about your aspirations for the future. I am definitely wishing for positive results to come from them. Especially from what you have mentioned about the challenges surrounding your name change and such. Also, I have read this blog entry a few times now. It is still an enjoyable experience.
