Hello My Imaginary Friends,
Three years ago I made a list of my Top 5 Pet Peeves basically things people do that annoy me. Last year, in the same vein, I made a list of my Top 5 Workplace Pet Peeves.
Now here are topics and opinions that are absolutely guaranteed to make me rant and red faced angry.
If you’ve met me socially, you’ll know I’m pretty quiet unless I’m excited or annoyed. I apologize to anyone who’s had to sit through my rambling incoherent rants.
Top 10 Statements Guaranteed to Make Éric Rant (and Angry)
10. Technology is Bad
You’ve seen the memes and the articles. Cellphones are making us antisocial etc. Don’t get me wrong, I like a good Skynet joke as much as the next nerd, but go too far and you start to sound like luddite.
The articles range from ‘WiFi scrambles our brains’ to ‘computers are killing our attention spans’ and they all have one thing in common. FEAR!
It’s easier to hate on new tech (Voice assistants, Cellphones, Self Driving Cars, Exercise trackers etc) than blame millennials for something. Hating tech has quite literally been trendy forever.
I will argue this with you. We are better off now than we’ve ever been as a society and a race.
9. We Were Better Off in the Past
Cavemen didn’t get cancer… BULLSHIT! They may have gotten it less often because they mostly died younger.
Infant mortality is at the lowest it’s ever been. There is less war now than in the past. The human race as a whole is better off than we’ve ever been.
We have a long way to go, but we’re actually moving… slowly.
8. Organic is Better
Organic produce still uses pesticides.
Organic produce still requires fertilizer.
Organic food isn’t any healthier.
In the end there are some positive aspects of organic food, but the advantages (requiring animals to live in fields, avoiding unnecessary hormones and antibiotics) should be standard practices.
Organic food is more expensive because it takes more space and resources to create the same yield of food.
7. Genetically Modified/Engineered Food is Inherently Bad
GMO’s are not inherently bad. Nor is anything else.
As long as humanity has been growing and herding food we’ve tried to make it better. We’ve used splicing, cross pollination, selective breeding, and many other methods.
Altering our food, crops, and methods is the only way we as a species can survive. Take the example of Golden Rice. It’s genetically engineered to include beta-carotene which our bodies turn into vitamin A. Vitamin A deficiency in developing countries is devastating and this rice can help fix that.
But for all those that are about less pesticides on your produce, GMOs have been developed to be resistant to pests and grow faster.
How you can see a negative in better food that grows easier, feeds more people, uses less resources, and is cheaper, is beyond me.
6. If You Like This You’re Wrong/Dumb
This might seem silly to some of you, but I have spent a long time being told I’m wrong because I like something.
It’s very trendy and common to hate on things that are popular. Just look at the hate pumpkin spice gets. There’s a certain joy in communally hating something that is popular. I’ve done it and I feel terrible. Sorry Nickelback and Nickelback fans.
It seems particularly bad towards things young women love.
I may have talked about this before
Like I said to Dragon on this letter:
Closing yourself down to the wonders of emotions and excitement lessens the experiences of life.
Anything you want to argue about?
Stay tuned for Points 5-1 on Thursday.
Later Days,
Éric