The Importance of Being Earnest

Martial Arts Articles Punching Bag
21

I can take on sub-contracting writers for Mid-Atlantic Combat Sports at any time. I’m trying to ease the burden of material on myself so I have time to hunt down interviews that will get more loyal readers, anyway.

Fair warning, I do all kinds of crazy shit with language in my non-news writing. I have quite the collection of lad-lit and combat sports themed fiction I imagine you’d have a lot more respect for than what I do at MATCS. But, that site is for straight news. So, if you break away from structure too much over there for the sake of cleverness I’ll be clipping a lot in the editing process.

PM me if you’re really interested. Our beat is pretty far away from where you live but if you want to do it just to write we can probably figure out something.

22

[quote=Conde Koma;2334861]i think you could benefit from a rhetoric class. there’s too many asides and detours until you get your point. i love essays, but even i was getting bored halfway through.

Keep It Organized, Keep It Simple.[/quote]

I’ve taken one. I thought it was kind of bullshit.

[quote=battlefields;2334859]You’re right. Many articles on cracked.com, even ones with a distinct purpose, seem to have no conclusion by either trailing into obscurity, or stopping abruptly. Doesn’t make it any harder to read, mind you.

Although your point in the above story is obscured by your ire soaked opinion, you do make it.[/quote]

95% of Cracked articles trail off into “radndomness” because they know that all those wacky, quirky, totally off-the-wall, college students who desire so badly to be a zany motherfucker, love being “random.”

Here’s a secret I’m gonna let on about this article. I have been sitting on like 3 or 4 articles right now that I wasn’t sure I wanted to post, I sat down and wrote this one at 3:00pm PST. My biggest issue I know of is that I usually do one draft writeups and never edit them. I wrote this one once through and then hit post, I’m sure there’s some mistakes in there, I just didn’t bother to go back and read it.

Self-editing isn’t checking spelling, self-editing is checking to make sure you’re not putting out shit content, this time I only half-failed myself.

[quote=Lampa;2334863]I can take on sub-contracting writers for Mid-Atlantic Combat Sports at any time. I’m trying to ease the burden of material on myself so I have time to hunt down interviews that will get more loyal readers, anyway.

Fair warning, I do all kinds of crazy shit with language in my non-news writing. I have quite the collection of lad-lit and combat sports themed fiction I imagine you’d have a lot more respect for than what I do at MATCS. But, that site is for straight news. So, if you break away from structure too much over there for the sake of cleverness I’ll be clipping a lot in the editing process.

PM me if you’re really interested. Our beat is pretty far away from where you live but if you want to do it just to write we can probably figure out something.[/quote]

News can be fun too! Look at Jeremy Clarkson, that n1gger can write news and make it interesting and fun to read!

I am really interested and I already PM’d you. I’m far away, but shit happens oever here too. And California is the mecca of mainstream MMA.

23

Nice rant dude. But, since you love language, two points.

First, an apologist is not someone who apologises to you, as you state whilst using your example of the ex karate-ka. The character in question there was defending HIMSELF by insinuating karate was teh ghey, and apologising for studying karate in the first place. You cannot be an apologist for yourself, you can only apologise for yourself. An apologist is someone who speaks or writes in defence of something else.

Second, whilst I enjoyed that, no one who writes the way you just did has any right to criticize Joyce, or any other ‘stream of consciousness’ writer.

Not meant as insults, just freindly criticism.

24

[quote=battheo;2334873]Nice rant dude. But, since you love language, two points.

First, an apologist is not someone who apologises to you, as you state whilst using your example of the ex karate-ka. The character in question there was defending HIMSELF by insinuating karate was teh ghey, and apologising for studying karate in the first place. You cannot be an apologist for yourself, you can only apologise for yourself. An apologist is someone who speaks or writes in defence of something else.

Second, whilst I enjoyed that, no one who writes the way you just did has any right to criticize Joyce, or any other ‘stream of consciousness’ writer.

Not meant as insults, just freindly criticism.[/quote]

I don’t mind Joyce. I just think that Ayn Rand nut huggers are the cancer that is killing our loving country.

Also, I know what an apologist is, I’m trying to coin the term in another metaphorical meaning for a pussy faggot who has not integrity.

I thank you for the criticism, though.

25

[quote=Sirc;2334819]A few weeks ago,…
[/quote]

damn,
after reading your post, i really have to reconsider how i write my posts from now on. you make some really good points, but damn it is fucking long and takes for-fucking-ever by internet standards to get to your point. now i know why jnp hates my rants.

26

Sirc, you are one of the most frustratingly interesting people I have never met. Your threads are like mangled car wrecks of intelligence and ire.

That is all.

bombom

27

[quote=Sirc;2334846]Seanbaby never really tries to make a point, he’s out to just shout at things to be funny and radical.

I have to say, that it’s really easy to write funny shit if you have a sense of humor and control of the language and are able to forge it together to form a penis shaped hammer to stamp your ha ha anvil with.

It’s really hard to write funny and make a point at the same time. It’s like trying to use your English teacher’s name as an anagram for the paper you’re writing in his class about the cognitive disregard of rapist’s emotions while forever ruining someone’s life. Sure it’s clever, but in the end you’re gonna get fucked if you do it wrong.[/quote]

What do you think of Maddox? hes pretty funny and his shit isnt totally without a point.

Edit: grammar sucks, but im aboutz to chauz Ho-oh so i dunt care

28

Without going into the PM conversation going on right now, Sirc reminds me of the way I used to be before I started to get more practical toward the end of college.

Except I’m still not a fan of personal essays. Once an editorial starts to be a certain amount of “far out” you might as well just write some fiction.

29

He’s a personal hero of mine.

What’s funnny is, neither of us started with English as a first language, and yet here we are honing our boners with a language that was gifted to us like pox riddled blankets from the white man.

I’ve used him in a lot of essays for school. Now that he’s a New York Time’s Best Seller, it’s totally valid to suck his cock in Academia.

[quote=Lampa;2334885]Without going into the PM conversation going on right now, Sirc reminds me of the way I used to be before I started to get more practical toward the end of college.

Except I’m still not a fan of personal essays. Once an editorial starts to be a certain amount of “far out” you might as well just write some fiction.[/quote]

Or you can sell out and write for shitty online magazines like cracked and pump out an article or two every 6 months that’s worth looking at.

30

I’m a little confused. You think Rand was a closet marxist? And she was over-reacting? Like a closeted gay that acts homophobic?

I don’t know if I see that.

31

[quote=bombom;2334879]Sirc, you are one of the most frustratingly interesting people I have never met. Your threads are like mangled car wrecks of intelligence and ire.

That is all.

bombom[/quote]

You know, that’s kind of what I go for.

So I’m on the right track, I guess.

32

[quote=JohnnyCache;2334902]I’m a little confused. You think Rand was a closet marxist? And she was over-reacting? Like a closeted gay that acts homophobic?

I don’t know if I see that.[/quote]

Why not? She came from a shitty soviet russia, absolutely hateful of the communist system to america.

She went overboard with how capitalist she was. She’s like a steroided Glenn Beck.

33

Overcompensating perhaps?

Edit: as opposed to “overreacting”

34

I mean holy fuck, Atlas Shrugged has a 100000 page monolgue about how awesome and rich some fucking 1 dimensional character was.

35

So, in your opinion, if Ulysses doesn’t deserve to be number 1, what does?

Not my first pick either, but I’m not sure I’d be able to put up something more deserving.

I did enjoy your writing although I found your use of ever-so-extreme metaphors a little too over done. That’s just me personally, entertaining as they are it seems you’re waiting for an excuse to string together a bunch of provocative images, seems predictable (much like Maddox is, at times). Just my opinion.

36

[quote=Sirc;2334912]I mean holy fuck, Atlas Shrugged has a 100000 page monolgue about how awesome and rich some fucking 1 dimensional character was.[/quote]Never actually read it, is that the one where the guy invents a perpetual motion machine and then complains when people want to “steal it”, even though he invented it on company time, using company resources?

37

[quote=LonerFu;2334914]So, in your opinion, if Ulysses doesn’t deserve to be number 1, what does?

Not my first pick either, but I’m not sure I’d be able to put up something more deserving.

I did enjoy your writing although I found your use of ever-so-extreme metaphors a little too over done. That’s just me personally, entertaining as they are it seems you’re waiting for an excuse to string together a bunch of provocative images, seems predictable (much like Maddox is, at times). Just my opinion.[/quote]

In all honesty?

Lolita by Nabokov. Holy shit that book is amazing. I can almost masturbate to the writing. I wish, I absolutely wish, I could have just a minute fraction of the skill of wordplay and sentence structure that Nabokov has.

That is the most important american book ever. It is the greatest American novel. People say Gatsby (I love, love, love this book too), or Hucky Fin, or Jungle, but it’s Lolita. It captures the totality of America’s love for lust, obsession and hypocrisy, all the while laughing to the bank. You often in the book have to fight your urge to root for Humbert Humbert, until you remember he’s 37 and boinking a 12 year old.

My favorite favorite book, ever. ever. ever. Though Pale Fire is also equally amazing, not a great american novel.

Yep.

Or something like that. I never finished it. It is sooooo dull. I got the cliff notes from Boyd.

38

[quote=Sirc;2334876]I don’t mind Joyce. I just think that Ayn Rand nut huggers are the cancer that is killing our loving country.

Also, I know what an apologist is, I’m trying to coin the term in another metaphorical meaning for a pussy faggot who has not integrity.

I thank you for the criticism, though.[/quote]

Pleasure.

Fair enough about your use of ‘apologist’, nothing wrong with inverting a meaning for metaphorical effect, although it seemed a bit obtuse to me (obviously, as I completely missed it). The flaw may be mine. I will re-read your initial post forthwith.

I don’t mind Joyce, although I have no particular love for him. I only bought it up as a reference to the fact that any ‘personal essay’ or rant, such as your post, tends to defy certain structural conventions and isn’t actually a million miles away from from stream of consciousness. Inherent in the form I s’pose. Props on your vocabulary, imagery and metaphor, BTW.

Never read Ayn Rand. Completely against the intent of this article, I am now a little bit tempted (sorry dude, but I’m curious to see what all the fuss is about!) How bad is she anyway? Is she really CANCER bad?

Also, Sirc, I see you’re from Cuba. You guys have Clarkson over there!? Man, I didn’t know we let him talk to people outside of Britain…

39

[quote=Sirc;2334935]In all honesty?

Lolita by Nabokov. Holy shit that book is amazing. I can almost masturbate to the writing. I wish, I absolutely wish, I could have just a minute fraction of the skill of wordplay and sentence structure that Nabokov has.

That is the most important american book ever. It is the greatest American novel. People say Gatsby (I love, love, love this book too), or Hucky Fin, or Jungle, but it’s Lolita. It captures the totality of America’s love for lust, obsession and hypocrisy, all the while laughing to the bank. You often in the book have to fight your urge to root for Humbert Humbert, until you remember he’s 37 and boinking a 12 year old.

My favorite favorite book, ever. ever. ever. Though Pale Fire is also equally amazing, not a great american novel. [/quote]

Good call.

I don’t think I could ever stand Gatsby or Huck Finn as the greatest US novel ever. I might have to immolate those particular people.

40

That’s unfortunate. I’d check out some others, because it will definitely be worth it if you plan on writing more. If you absolutely can’t, check out Amazon.com: Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace (10th Edition) (9780205747467): Joseph M. Williams, Gregory G. Colomb: Books, which isn’t as good as a class and professor, but should still be helpful.