Cassandra-Leo

I've put up a bunch of stuff I wrote a long time ago under my own name, Aaron Freed.

If I appear to be listening to two songs at once, odds are one of them is muted in order to make up for iPod plays that didn't scrobble. I make certain that they're all legit because I am borderline obsessive-compulsive about my music statistics.

I listen to far more metal than is probably good for my mental health. I also listen to prog (in fact, most of the metal I listen to is prog as well), post-rock, avant-garde, alternative, indie, various other assorted forms of rock, and game soundtracks (because let's be honest, I'm a dork). That said, I'm open to listen to just about anything as long as it's not syrupy overproduced pop crap or lyrically stereotypical rap/country, but I tend to prefer complex music. Also, while I'll often listen to music that expresses completely different political viewpoints from my own, I'm generally unable to identify with any of it on anything other than an emotional level, which probably explains why Godspeed You! Black Emperor are at the top of my charts - I agree with their political sentiments completely. (I address politics further below).

I graduated from university in December '08. I read a lot. Don DeLillo, George R.R. Martin, China Miéville, Terry Pratchett, and Thomas Pynchon are my favourite five authors writing fiction today; Vonnegut, Heinlein, Joyce, Lovecraft, Walter Miller, and Orwell were just as good when they were writing. I also read nonfiction, everything from Chomsky to Hitchens and a good deal in between. I frequent message boards a lot, both as a means of filesharing and as a means of intellectual discussion. My own board is Fool's Gold. The most frequent topics of discussion there are politics, music and literature, although we also have a running project wherein we're actually creating our own RPG (as a parody of mostly Japanese games, especially the Final Fantasy series). That said, most of the time we just fuck about and do nothing of real importance. It's great fun. Other forums I'm active at on a regular to semi-regular basis are Fated Children Forums, Freethought Forum, FFOF, and FFR. You'll probably get to know me a lot better if you post at, or at least read, one of these boards than you will through other means. I also do most of my filesharing through those forums.

I used to be a garden-variety moderate, but Bush and Obama have pushed me further and further to the left to the point where my political views now border on anarchism if not completely embracing it, and I tend to follow American politics obsessively despite the fact that they often depress the shit out of me. I dislike Republicans because they constantly do the wrong things, Democrats because they constantly do either the same wrong things or close to nothing at all, the electoral system because it actively discourages the election of anyone who's actually worth electing, and the corporate media because it actively perpetuates the system we have of two worthless political parties. While certainly an improvement over his predecessor, Obama is nonetheless indistinguishable from Bush in a number of key policy areas, as I long expected him to be (I was a Gravel/Kucinich supporter during the primaries for what it's worth, though I never harboured any delusions that either of them were electable as president), and while I voted for him on the principle of keeping Sarah Palin as far away from the White House as possible, thus far I'm not certain I can say he has even met my expectations, much less exceeded them. My plans for the future involve some vague sort of attempt to improve politics through grassroots organising, although, for various reasons (example: I'm an atheist), I harbour no delusions of being an electable candidate. There was a brief moment after the 2008 economic crash when it seemed everyone might finally be starting to wake up, but it passed and everyone is now as complacent as ever, as evidenced by the once again rampant stock market speculation despite the fact that unemployment is still in the double digits. I have no idea what the solution is.

I rant about religion a lot, which tends to puzzle people who don't live in the American South, because the particular brand of fundamentalism we're subjected here is far more vile than what people find elsewhere in the country (or, especially, in Canada or most European countries). I tend to find that religious intolerance is the cause of much suffering in the world (which greatly amuses me since Jesus was all about loving your neighbour and turning the other cheek). I suppose people who actually seem like role models are Jesus the historical figure (as opposed to the god Christianity has attempted to make him into), Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., and Heinlein's fictional Valentine Michael Smith. All were extremely effective at evoking social change through nonviolent resistance and pursued moral ends which I find difficult to question; unfortunately, all were also eventually assassinated, which is probably part of the reason I'm so cynical about the world. (If I were going to convert to a major world religion it would probably be Buddhism or Tolstoyism, as I already agree with a large number of the central teachings of each; however, I remain a staunch atheist).

I view government as being currently necessary only insofar as it protects human beings from certain things, which in an ideal world would be limited to the following things: each other, starvation, ill health, ignorance, and the forces of nature. However, as long as other countries have militaries, they remain a necessary evil; what I am coming to believe must occur, for the sake of the very survival of the world, is that all countries must come together and agree to disband their militaries simultaneously. We certainly need to end those fucking wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (and I mean really end them, not this half-assed bullshit we're seeing). In any case, such foolishness as the war on drugs and the vast amount of corporate welfare we're seeing is entirely unnecessary, and I have nothing but scorn for our government's fiscal irresponsibility. At the current rate we'll be completely owned by China and Japan in a matter of years; while spending in a depression is a necessary evil there is simply no excuse for burning through so much cash so quickly in the name of national "defence" (which ironically is increasing the number of people who want to blow the crap out of our country).

I should greatly like to see the day when governments prove to be completely unnecessary and can be abolished, but it is quite clear to me that society needs to transform itself vastly before such a system can be considered workable. I would like to devote the rest of my life to making such a transformation possible, but I severely doubt that it is fully achievable within my lifetime. My natural inclination is to distrust all governments, because I find people who seek and succeed at obtaining power tend to be untrustworthy vastly more often than they are not. As the late Douglas Adams wrote, "Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job."

If you want to listen to me rant about politics further, I do plenty of it in my livejournal, here, at least when I'm arsed to update it, which lately has been almost never. I'll also talk through more personal channels; message me or post in my shoutbox if you want to know about them. I'll generally also be glad to share rare music I have in my possession should last.fm prove inconclusive.

In addition to English, I speak decent Spanish and marginal German, both of which I'm at least several months out of practice with.

A horribly outdated list of my music library, which was last updated sometime in January 2006, is located here, and an even older list of all the CDs I owned or copied illegally (which includes stuff I hadn't ripped yet at the time I compiled the January '06 list, but which obviously does not include stuff I obtained after I compiled it) is located here, embarrassments of youth and all.

Oh, and I stole your fucking cloudsong. Beeyatch.