h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I thought I would do my part of this next. Feel free to append your own reasons to this discussion :
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I feel that the straight edge is the most sensible thing to do, and I don't mean sensible in the boring not having fun way, I mean in the staying alive way. I've not always been straight edge like others here. I decided to change my ways because of the damage my lifestyle was doing to my health and mind. One of the key problems I had was a growing mental dependance on alcohol. In retrospect I think the safest thing is to never start using substances because once you do it is really hard to turn back even once you're clean. As Melle Mel said "dododon't do it".
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Well that felt like an AA meeting! Anyway refinement comments are welcomed.

A rewrite :
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Why I have the edge - Take 2
First I'll define what the edge means to me. I feel that it is about choice primarily and a host of other things too many and insignificant to list. A long time ago I was radically antagonistic towards choice, mainly because with choice comes responsibility. Sartre described it [man's ability to choose] as gods curse on Mankind because anything that happens to you is your fault as a creature of free-will. My lifestyle was largely centred on destroying my free-will and thus my personal responsibility. It still manifests itself, like when you say something stupid and you just want to hide? I get that but I want to drink until I'm insensible to escape from it. Then one day I just thought that escaping responsibility is cowardly and in the long run won't help me.
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I lost the thread here, but I'll think about it and add to it.

As I was saying :
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The more you opt out of responsibility by neagting your free will the less likely you are to be able to get back. Escape is never the best option and having a clear head can increase your enjoyment of life.
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That should do.

Oh and Big Mad Mr T add Unmentionable Marauding Pillowcase and RedFish to the other sXers bit of the page or do some revision, your choice.

Hey, I'm only on here getting UCAS details for this student funding form thingy.

I'm gonna do lots of stuff to the sXe page later today, probably this evening (if not before).

Why am I Straight Edge?

Well, every person will have different reasons, and I think that is an important aspect of Straight Edge -
to do it for your own reasons, not to be popular or because other people expect you to do it.
For me the reasons are rather complex. There are positive and negative aspects. If you are really interested
to know, read on; otherwise read something else. I'm not going to get all deep and philosophical - these
are simply my reasons, whether superficial, thought-provoking, troublesome, inspirational, confusing, or whatever.
This is Part I, by the way - each question on its own. Question One:

Why don't I drink? Because I don't
like the taste of alcohol, and because I discovered I don't ever need to be intoxicated. I did drink when I was
younger. I didn't like the taste of alcoholic drinks then, either, but I forced myself to drink so that I could
get drunk. Before the time I was not a social person, I did not go to parties, I did not get along well with
other people. When I started drinking I started going to parties, I talked to people more easily and I had the
impression they liked me. I was more socially involved and more popular. Socialising with people meant drinking
with them. So I drank. But I quickly found that it wasn't good for me. So I stopped. Now I am a social outcast
again. So what? So what if I don't fit in and go along with what others do? Society isn't that great. The things
most people do aren't that wonderful. What happens at parties anyway? People talk meaningless talk and make a lot
of noise and do completely inconsequential things. If anything they do does have consequences these consequences
are typically bad ones. They don't really communicate or interact with other people.
They don't accomplish anything. They have 'fun' but it is a pretty thin kind of fun to me. And most of them don't
even remember the 'fun' they had the next day. If anything really good happens at a party, if any really meaningful
communication takes place or if any really valuable relationships are formed, it happens in spite of, and not because
of, the alcohol involved.

I am all for fun, but I enjoy fun the best when I have a clear
mind. I like to listen to music, I like art, I like reading, I like humor,
I like hiking in unspoilt natural areas, I like
thinking, I like imagining things, I like learning, I like communicating with people in an effective and meaningful
way, I like working with people at something that really matters. I have fun doing those things and I don't need
alcohol for any of them. If I liked the taste of alcohol I would still drink occasionally, but since I do not like
it I never drink any alcoholic drinks, the same way that a person who doesn't like the taste of mayonnaise won't
even occasionally put it in his salad.

Thanks for that, Pillowcase.

Does anyone mind if we quote what they say in the forums and stick it on the sXe pages occassionally?

Yes you can quote me, the others will have to answer for themselves but I'm guessing sea and redfish wouldn't mind either.

By the way, I am not antisocial. I still have friends and go visit them and talk and so on. I just don't like typical parties and the atmosphere there. You'd think it would be different between adults and teenagers but I tell ya I've seen many guys in their forties and even older behave in a pretty immature way. I like it much more to just go and talk to a person, or two or three people, so that there can be a real discussion. Sometimes there's drinking, but never a lot of it. It isn't the Main Event. It's optional, not compulsory.

Now for the next question:


Why don't I smoke? Well, cigarette smoke smells awful to me, and I think
smoking is an activity that looks ridiculous most of the time. It doesn't even seem to me that anybody who does it
enjoys it very much. It is just a habit, an unnecessary one, that furthermore causes inconvenience for other people
and sometimes very bad problems for those doing it.
High on my list of 'things human society can do without'. If tobacco did not exist in the world at
all, nobody would feel that there was something missing in our culture,
some void or gap that needed to be filled by inhaling the fumes of burning leaves and paper. I mean, it is
just so silly. But if people want to smoke, well, I won't stop or condemn them, I'll just avoid them while they
are doing it.

But if you want more reasons, I know a number of people who got lung problems from smoking, and a number more who have heart problems or other kinds of health impairment to which smoking has probably made a great contribution. I know what 'health' means to me. It is more than simply existing - it is being and feeling strong, positive and full of energy, of having a body that *feels* clean and natural inside and outside, with all the juices flowing and all the hinges bending smoothly and freely and easily, with a healthy skin tone, healthy and attractive hair, clear eyes, sharp senses, a vigorous mind ... That's my idea of health and people who smoke heavily don't look or behave or feel like that. Nobody is perfectly healthy that's true but that makes it even stupider to do something that makes you less healthy!

i wrote everything out on a guide entry, feel free to use whatever you like... it's A538832... and yes, you may quote me whenever you like.

I like that entry it's very good. Can definitely relate on the stealing and addiction thing, very very scary stuff.

oh, definitely. looking back, i'm scared of MYSELF!

Hey - nice work. I see you've gone for the 'disclaimer' approach as well!

For the main page, will you make a short summary (like I'm ATTEMPTING to do...) or is there a particular part you wish me to quote in the "reasons" bit?

Yes, sea, I also liked that entry. I want to live very long, because I enjoy my life immensely and there are loads of stuff I still want to do. Also I know old age doesn't have to mean inactivity. I want to be jumping around the day before they put me in the box. I want to go all out till the last. So I have to stay healthy.

Here are more of my own reasons:

Why don't I engage in promiscuous sex? Well first of all promiscuous sex is not easy to have in the society I live in.
For me, being promiscuous is hardly a temptation when the majority of women that I am
attracted to are extremely hard to get. Maybe this is some deep psychological problem I have, but I tend to
fall in love with women who are totally inaccessible to me. There's always something in the way. Goodness knows,
I've tried, but so far without success. Like I said,
I will have to find out if this is because of some fault in myself, or whether it is just a sad fact, the world
not working like you want it to work.
The problem is I don't want to have sex just to have sex, I want to have sex with the person I want to have sex with.
And most women simply are not sexually attractive to me. Nothing wrong with their looks, or their personalities, I
just don't want to have sex with them. I am heterosexual, and I have a strong sex drive, but for some reason I
am out of touch with the world around me. At the moment there is not a single woman whom I regularly
come in contact with whom I would even consider having sex with. I don't think that's a good thing. I either have
to change my perceptions and expectations, or I have to find a way to meet more women until I find one that I am
attracted to who's also attracted to me.

But at least I know that sex has consequences. A kid is the most important one. Even if I suddenly start meeting
lots of attractive women and find a way to overcome whatever obstacles I feel prevent an intimate relationship,
I will not have sex very much because no form of birth control is failsafe. The best
kind of strategies have a success rate of about 97%. That means out of a hundred occasions of sexual intercourse
three might cause pregnancy. Now I don't want to put anybody through the difficulties of either having to undergo
an abortion or having to raise an unintended child. So I will not have sex with someone if both of us are not
willing to have a child and take care of him/her for about twenty years. And I don't mean 'willing' as in
'reluctant, but enduring it', I mean 'eager and intending to do it with full commitment'.

Another possible consequence is AIDS. This disease is rampant in my
country, among all groups: men, women, black, white,
heterosexual, homosexual - everybody is at risk. Condoms are not failsafe - statistics may be misleading; anyways
I can think of a number of ways in which transmission of the virus can happen despite condom use. So if I want to
have sex with a person we both have to be open and honest enough with each other to speak about our respective
HIV/AIDS status, we have to be willing to undergo tests for the other's sake and to use the protective measures
the other insists on. That is a fairly large amount of commitment right there. Being that open and honest
and considerate to
a sexual partner is already beyond the level of casual sex. Some people may think that this is excessive
worrying. They
may say we can never eliminate all risks, best to just accept the risk and go ahead regardless. But the risk
involves human lives here. You not only risk death yourself, you also risk killing your partner! We have an
epidemic on this continent! Obviously people are in general
not being too careful, they are not being careful enough. If
I want to help stop the epidemic I therefore need to be more careful than the average person.

Also I am opposed to the idea that sex is the only reason for living. Some people act as if there is nothing else worth doing, or worth having in the world, and that just doesn't make sense to me. I mean most men cannot even have sex for much longer than an hour or so a day. What do you do the rest of the time? Search for sex and think about it? That seems just a little bit boring to me. I have plenty of hormones believe me and I guess I think about sex for less than half an hour total each day. I also am opposed to the view that a man's sexual prowess is his greatest attribute, and I am equally opposed to the view that women exist solely to give sexual pleasure to men. There has to be more to life than that.

Also there has to be more to SEX than that. Maybe I'm stupid because I'm inexperienced and naïve but I think that actual sexual intercourse between people has to mean something. Considering all the risks involved it has to be pretty important to make it worth pursuing. I think there must be a strong love between the two people, and a great mutual respect. Sexual intimacy is then a way to strengthen that bond and demonstrate love and commitment. I think this is important, I think this gives more satisfaction than sex that merely stimulates the genitalia and doesn't affect the people involved more deeply than that. I really would like to have such an intimate sexual relationship, that is what I am after. I do not consider myself a prude, because I think I will not mind having more than one such relationship in my lifetime, or even at the same time, but if it is not deep and intimate and meaningful and if it isn't based on trust and honesty and really strong love then it is not worth the time, the effort and the risk. And if I only manage to have one such relationship in my life it will be enough; I know I can be that committed and faithful to another person. But I am nor nearly there yet.

I don't have a normal, healthy sex life, and that's bad. But under present conditions there is nothing that
is both normal *and* healthy. The world we live in is sick, sick, sick, in so many ways. No choice made by
anyone can be completely right and appropriate. The world is in flux, things are changing rapidly. What used
to work well without causing any perceptible
problems now no longer works and is causing nightmarish catastrophes.
This is not a time for just accepting things and going along with the flow. This is the time to step back and
try to gain a new perspective on what's going on, to rethink earlier ideas, attitudes and habits.

i think that's wonderful, willem.

hmm... what to put in the main page... lemme think about it and get back to you on that, okay?

Okay next question:

Why don't I use drugs? Because the drug world, whether legal or illegal,
to me is an example of a created monster. It is something that
we have brought into existence and that just might become so big and complex and powerful that we will no longer
be able to control it and it will consume
and destroy us. In so many ways. Drugs are big business. Drug companies are
huge and immensely powerful. Drugs all have profound impacts on people. They can benefit, or they can harm.
When profit becomes the motive for dispensing drugs, benefit decreases and harm increases. At the moment
the motive of profit rules. In various ways people are made to believe that they need certain drugs. There
is the legal mainstream and the illegal undercurrent but both are flowing in the same direction. The number
of different drugs are increasing bewilderingly fast. And the effects of most of these drugs are very
poorly known. Testing of the effects of drugs is inadequate. The chemistry of the human body is too compex
for the full effects of all drugs ever to be completely known. A certain kind of drug might cause positive
effects over the course of hours, days, weeks, months or years, but after a decade might cause cancer. There
are many chemicals that have delayed effects, so that a person might use it for a short period at age
thirty and then suddenly at age fifty drop dead from the effect the drug had set in motion.

That's the kind of problem we have. The human body is very complex. Consider the phenomenon of 'birth defects'.
That means a woman can use a drug and suffer no bad effects whatsoever. But she falls pregnant and her
baby is born deformed - without arms or legs or without a brain or something even worse. As a result
of the drugs she used. Or drugs may cause infertility, or a very subtle effect on the way the brain and
the mind works that only starts to give a person serious problems after decades of use. I'm not talking of
illegal drugs here, I'm talking of the legal kind! And the legal kind is subjected to numerous tests. The
tests don't pick everything up because testing is fallible, the different kinds of effects are too
numerous and work in too many different ways. Illegal drugs are not tested at all,
they don't have to conform to any standards whatsoever, so long as somebody is stupid enough to believe
they will make him high or 'do something' else.

The number of drugs is increasing very rapidly, much faster than tests can be devised for them. There are
so many different substances, so many different ways in which they work - for the user it's a total
leap into the dark. It might make you high, or terrified, or crazy, or sick, or dead. Making illegal
drugs legal will not change the situation. The majority of the drugs or other substances sold in
pharmacies are highly questionable anyway. Being able to find pot, coke, heroin, LSD, DMT, or whatever
in the pharmacy will not make them safe and healthy any more than being able to find a food product
on a supermarket shelf makes it nutritious. The customer will lose out, as always, and risk his/her
health and life, as always. The best strategy is to
say that the whole of it sucks and to have nothing to
do with it. Or to change the entire system so that true benefit for all sides, instead of profit for
the strongest side, is the motive.

I don't want to say all drug use is bad. Drugs have potentially beneficial effects. This is true even
of mind/mood-altering drugs. But first of all the user should know how and why the drug works. I do
this even for legal medications. I want to know exactly what kind of effect it will have on me. I
want to know exactly what's in it. I do this with food products as well. I avoid foods that have
substances in them that aren't conducive to good health. The average supermarket customer would be
horrified to know what goes into his/her favourite foods and what effects these chemicals can and do
have on the body. So knowledge is very important with foods and/or drugs. Second of all, drugs should
be used absolutely minimally. Only for a very specific and important reason. All habitual drug use is
bad. They cause a change in the natural balance of chemicals in the body and this either causes an
addiction or a disruption of normal functioning. This is always true, it is a necessary outcome of
the laws of physics, the nature of chemistry, and the way the body strives towards internal equilibrium.
And lastly illegality is always a problem. At the very least using illegal drugs means that you will
have to lie; to police, to teachers, to family members. This is not good. As a buyer of drugs you
support drug trafficking networks and the attendant violence and corrupt activities: theft, bribery,
prostitution, intimidation, assault, murder. You may yourself
get involved in these activities.
And if you are caught and
prosecuted and go to prison you will certainly not be happy. If the system changes and your favourite
drugs are legalized and all drug dealing becomes above-board, fine,
but until that happens using drugs illegally is going to cause these kinds
of problems for yourself and for others.

Some people have necessary addictions. Diabetics for instance have to use insulin because their bodies
cannot make enough of it on their own. This is unavoidable but it is still bad; if those people had any
choice they would choose to not be dependent on insulin. It is best that your body manufactures on its
own all the chemicals that it needs from the natural chemicals found in natural foods. Your body will
always manufacture the right amount - not too much, not too little - and will use it precisely where and
when it is needed. Whereas if you ingest these drugs there might be too much of them, or too little, and
they will affect not only the areas where their effect is needed, but other areas as well. So don't use drugs unless you absolutely have to. If possible build and improve your body's own systems to deal with health problems.

I think the use of mood-altering drugs by so many people is a protest against the sickness, shallowness,
emptiness, meaninglessness, dullness, oppressiveness of our society. Or it can be a manifestation, a
symptom of those things. But whatever the case, widespread drug use is not helping to make our
society any better.