from peeve to pleasure

i left for pg's after engaging in an argument about the pejorative use of the word "ashkenazi" in israel: i despise it. even if i wasn't of lithuanian origin (making me as "ashkenazi" as one can be), should i be embarrassed about wanting to be a good person, or get educated?

the term implies that we are people who "claim" to be thinking of others, people who "claim" to be getting educated, people who "claim" to be doing their duty... these are things that the non-ashkenazi doesn't lie to himself about. because in reality, everyone's looking out for themselves, and there's no chance for redemption.

the bottom line is that if everyone looked out for everyone else then they'd be looking out for themselves. it's either each man for himself, or everyone together. i choose the latter, and don't appreciate others like me being ridiculed for it.

the people who use the term come from a background where instead of fixing things they're taught to blame problems on their ancestry. that's kind of sad. remember: "no man is an island", and for every asshole out there there're thousands of really nice people that you probably just don't pay enough attention to.

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red is a great movie! we watched it until 2am, then passed out and had a lazy morning. good grief, i've been unproductive of late! i told pg that we're just going to have to split up, she's consuming *far* too much of my time :)

i've been struggling with symbian's carbide this morning, and simultaneously polished (relatively) and published another one. it's been a big week for that sort of thing.

now to figure out debugging, then head to work and get in a couple of hours before class.