Documentaries are for idiots

Akmal says:

I have decided to watch only educational documentaries from now on.

I find that most "controversial" documentaries have an agenda, an agenda to convince people a certain fact is true and are not trying to just inform the viewer. This is because they are created by people who already have a bias towards their claim and have no intention of disproving it. This bias is all it takes because before they even delve into research or the facts, they already "know", for example, that 9/11 was an inside job, or that the moon landing was fake, or that the Illuminati control the world etc. Now all they need to do is look for details confirming this.

We watch LOST because they want us to, apparently.

Think of this type of fact finding as sort of like staring up at the clouds. If you're already looking for, let's say, Michael Jackson's face in the clouds, you're probably going to find it, as opposed to just looking at the clouds and comparing them to pictures to see what they look like any scientist or rational human would do.

If you look closely you can see all the wires.

The next thing that happens is that the more facts they find that confirm their opinion, the more likely they are going to ignore anything that says otherwise. So any "scientist" who says, for example, that the second tower collapsed due to explosives is telling the truth. No need to check facts or to see if that guy was really a scientist or if he was some activist with his panties in a bunch whose only knowledge of explosives came from the instructions on the fireworks he used to buy as an angsty teenager.

Another problem is that most documentarists (that's not a real word) are out to shock, awe and to make MONEY. I'm looking at you Michael Moore.

"Fahrenheit 9/11 made $220 million worldwide?! Holy sh.. I mean er.. BUSH LIED!"

Filmmakers are very adept at using trickery to elicit different moods and feelings from their audience. Documentary makers are no different. This article on PsyBlog explains how Michael Moore uses different propaganda techniques in his film to sway the viewer towards the 9/11 conspiracy. Most other producers use these techniques to do the same. We only see what they want us to see so how do we know there isn't more? People don't bother to go look up references or check on the credibility of people's testimonies in documentaries. I know I usually don't and I'm sure you don't either. For all we know they could be outright lying.

Now the real problem comes when we unwittingly take this questionable content as truth and believe it. Like I said before, all it takes is a little bias towards one side of the argument and you can be hooked just like that. Before long you start believing every little half truth out there. "Bush slept with aliens" "Superheroes are real" "Your check is in the mail" "Your girlfriend will come back to you" everything.

This is why I hate documentaries like Fahrenheit 9/11, Zeitgeist, Loose Change, Sicko, An Inconvenient Truth, etc. Just like those spam emails we get with all those hidden facts about how microwaving your food will give you the shits or how coke has hidden anti-Islamic words in their logo or how your neighbor is reading your mind, documentaries like those above reveal supposedly hidden facts about things we probably wouldn't even think twice about until we were shown the "light".

So anyway, my recommendation to everyone is to take hollywood with a grain of salt and trust your own logic and not some sketchy film maker's. Go watch a movie or something, at least then you know what you're watching is made up. Unless you thought the Blair Witch Project was real, then there's no hope for you.

The beginning of the end...

Akmal says:

So this is it. I have begun to spew my opinion onto the massiveness that is the interwebs. Armageddon has begun. My name is Akmal and I shall be your host for these few brief moments where I have managed to grab hold of your internet age attention-deficit mind away from facebook.

So the day before was Valentine's day. A day you get to tell people you love them. If you do this, then all other days you get to tell them to go screw themselves for that is your well earned right. St. Valentine, the patron saint of commercialism, is who this day is named after.

According to reliable sources, there are a couple of St. Valentines, all apparently killed by the Romans. Man those Romans were douchebags. They didn't like these hippie-esque saints and promptly told them to bugger off. Roman's don't stand for that love shit. Your love ain't building Rome no more roads or aqueducts. Coliseums don't run on love, they run on blood. Saint Blood, now there's a saint the Romans would have have rooted for.

Anyway so Valentine's day is when women think "loving gifts and sweet poetry" and men think "oh crap it's Valentine's day, fuuuuuuu". Companies should take advantage of this and jack up all their prices on the morning of February 14th. That's right. That'll be $149.99 for those daffodils and $369.99 for that box of ferrero rocher. Better fork it over pal 'cause the missus don't want no frozen yogurt for her Valentine's gift.

On that topic, aren't flowers the most useless gift ever? You can't eat 'em. You can't play with 'em. Sure they look and smell nice, but they die in about 3 days and then they look and smell like rot. You wouldn't give someone a puppy that would die in 3 days, "His name is rover. Don't get too attached. No need to get him a collar just buy a shovel and a gravestone". I guess it's because you can't really get that attached to flowers. Well maybe if you're a hippie.

Now chocolates I'm all for. Not those boxes of assorted hope-I-don't-get-the-one-that-tastes-like-toejam chocolates, but nice ones like m&ms or twix. Chocolate was probably invented by some guy who was ticked off by a fat person. He may have also been responsible for the invention of cake and ice cream.

Anyway I have ranted enough. I hope all of you wasted your money well on Valentine's and bought your right to slack off for the rest of the year.