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1000 results for “philosopher”
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Lend Money to an Enemy, and thou’lt gain him, to a Friend and thou’lt lose him.
Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) American statesman, scientist, philosopher, aphorist
Poor Richard (1740 ed.)Sourcing, notes: wist.info/franklin-benjamin/78…
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #benfranklin #benjaminfranklin #poorrichardsalmanac #borrowing #enemy #friend #lending #loan #money
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A quotation (sort of) from Ben Franklin
Beware, beware! he’ll cheat ’ithout scruple, who can without fear.
Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) American statesman, scientist, philosopher, aphorist
Poor Richard (1743 ed.)More about this quote: wist.info/franklin-benjamin/34…
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #benfranklin #benjaminfranklin #poorrichard #cheat #cheater $cheating #conscience #criminal #deceit #fear #fraud #getawaywith #guilt #humannature #opportunity #risk #riskassessment #risktaking #scruple #shame
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Unterrichtsbeispiel der Woche: Philosophieren im Unterricht zum Thema Frieden
Frieden ist ein vielschichtiger Begriff; als demokratischer Grundwert ist er mit anderen Werten wie Gerechtigkeit, Solidarität, Freiheit, Sicherheit oder Gleichheit verwoben und soll in Schule und Unterricht thematisiert und erfahrbar gemacht werden. Er prägt das Miteinander im kleinen sowie im großen Rahmen.
Anknüpfend an das Unterrichtsprinzip Politische Bildung kann dieser Wert in allen Unterrichtsfächern reflektiert und auch im Rahmen von Schulentwicklungsprozessen in der Schulkultur verankert werden.
Schulstufe: Volksschule, Sekundarstufe I
Methoden: Philosopohisches Gespräch, Partner- und Kleingruppenarbeit, StandbilderMaterialien und Ablaufbeschreibung finden Sie hier:
https://www.politik-lernen.at/philosophierenfrieden#schule #unterricht #beispiel #frieden #peace #philosophie #PolitischeBildung #schule #FediLZ
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2/
This discussion moves beyond a simple critique of technology to analyze a profound philosophical shift in how we define what it means to exist as human beings.This episode explores the biological, psychological, and societal costs of our tech-driven pursuit of efficiency. Key topics include:
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Verschärfte Tonlage - Die Rückkehr der Rache-Rhetorik in die Politik
Rache ist wieder Teil der politischen Debatte. Welche Folgen das für Rechtsstaat und Demokratie haben kann, beschreibt der Philosoph Fabian Bernhardt.#Rache #Rhetorik #POLITIK #FabianBernhard #Philosophie
Wenn Politiker von Rache sprechen - welche Folgen hat das für die Demokratie? -
Jeder Mensch hat mal Rachegelüste, aber man spricht eher ungern darüber. Philosoph Fabian Bernhardt schreibt über #Rache und spricht darüber hier: https://www.3sat.de/gesellschaft/sternstunde-philosophie/rache--der-ursprung-der-moral-100.html?at_medium=Social%20Media&at_campaign=Mastodon&at_specific=3sat
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@DoroBZ Ich schere alle über einen Kamm, nämlich den eines Wertkettenmodells politischer Arbeit. Es stellt sich dann die Frage, wer in welcher Form horizontal und vertikal integriert. Das kann in einer einzigen Organisation integriert stattfinden oder auch nicht. Deshalb bevorzuge ich auch den Begriff "politischer Verein", denn viele, die eher #IVV sind, bevorzugen es, sich nicht am Wettbewerb der #RSV zu beteiligen. Indes mit der Folge auf Philosophenkönige zu hoffen, die "zuhören"
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Ja, genau so ist es. Ich überlege nun ernsthaft, ob ich in den kommenden Monaten öfter mal kurze Originaltexte von Philosophinnen und Philosophen lese und auf meinem Wissenschaftsblog zu Lektüre und Dialog einlade.
Das Interesse scheint eindeutig da zu sein...
#Popper #Hersch #Blumenberg #Nietzsche #Philosophie https://scilogs.spektrum.de/natur-des-glaubens/begeistert-von-jeanne-hersch-und-damit-alleine/
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Ich halte es wirklich für ein Problem, dass auch bedeutende Philosophinnen und Philosophen zunehmend nur noch über Sekundärliteratur oder gar über Videos wahrgenommen werden.
Aus meiner Sicht ist ernsthafte Philosophie stets auch an das Lesen, Bedenken und Dialogisieren von Originalquellen gebunden.
Entsprechend freue ich mich über das starke Interesse an der #Popper - Originaltextstelle zum #Toleranzparadox & auch über die dialogische Debatte darüber! 😃
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Never thought, that these theoretical philosophical considerations would be applied by a dictator in my lifetime
Gödel's Loophole
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6del's_LoopholePoppers paradox o tolerance
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance -
Das Toleranz-Paradoxon beschreibt die Annahme, dass eine Gesellschaft, die uneingeschränkte #Toleranz übt, nicht in der Lage sein wird, Intoleranz wirksam zu bekämpfen. Laut dem Philosophen Karl #Popper, der dieses #Paradoxon formulierte, würde dies dazu führen, dass die Intoleranten die tolerante Gesellschaftsordnung abschaffen und somit die Toleranz als solche vernichten. Folglich müssen tolerante Menschen gegenüber Intoleranten #intolerant sein, um die #tolerant|e Ordnung zu schützen.
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Auch von mir einen herzlichen Dank für das starke Video von #MaiThiNk 🙏👍
#Popper ist der mit Abstand wichtigste Philosoph meines Lebens, habe viel zu ihm gearbeitet, gesprochen, geschrieben & wurde sogar mal als #Solarpopper "beleidigt". Habe das gerne als Auszeichnung angenommen. 🤓🙌 #Solarpunk
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New episode (no. 53) alert 🚨
James McElvenny (Siegen) talks to Paul Kiparsky (Stanford) about the ancient Indian grammarian Pāṇini and the philosophical significance of his grammatical description of Sanskrit.
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When the savages of Louisiana want some fruit, they cut down the tree at the base and gather the fruit. That is how a despotic government works.
[Quand les sauvages de la Louisiane veulent avoir du fruit, ils coupent l’arbre au pied, & cueillent le fruit. Voilà le gouvernement despotique.]Charles-Lewis de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu (1689-1755) French political philosopher
Spirit of Laws [The Spirit of the Laws; De l’esprit des lois], Book 5, ch. 13 (5.13) (1748) [tr. Stewart (2018)]More about (and translations of) this quote: wist.info/montesquieu/82151/
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #montesquieu #spoils #autocracy #despotism #destruction #devastation #exploitation #inefficiency #pillage #taking #thoughtlessness #tyranny #unsustainability
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One should always have one’s boots on, and be ready to leave.
[Il faut estre tousjours botté et prest à partir, en tant que en nous est.]Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592) French essayist
Essays, Book 1, ch. 19 (1.19), “That to Philosophize Is to Learn to Die [Que Philosopher, c’est apprendre à mourir]” (1572-03) [tr. Rat (1958), 1.20]More info about (and translations of) this quote: wist.info/montaigne-michel-de/…
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #montaigne #death #mortality #preparedness #readiness
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The simple-minded murderer - Den Enfaldige Mödaren. De hans Alfredson, suède 1981.
Poignante réalisation autour d'un personnage et son époque. Le garçon est considéré comme retardé et traité comme une bête, victime des préjugés et de la bêtise. Il est pourtant philosophe et porté sur la poésie.
#archive.org #suède #sweden #thesimplemindedmurderer #denenfaldigemödaren #hansalfredson #santémentale #mentalhealthhttps://archive.org/details/the.-simple-minded.-murderer.-1982.
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A Mob’s a Monster; Heads enough, but no Brains.
Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) American statesman, scientist, philosopher, aphorist
Poor Richard (1747 ed.)More about this quote: wist.info/franklin-benjamin/16…
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #benfranklin #benjaminfranklin #democracy #emotion #intelligence #mob #mobrule #mobviolence #people #throng
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I don't publish much on Substack. I reserve it for medium-length philosophical posts like this one on quietism, igtheism, and non-cognitivism.
#philosophy #substack #blog #podcast #positions #orthodoxy #ontologicalgrammar #dinintegration #questions #opportunities
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A New Old Musical, Now Available in Book Form
I have written a new musical. It is also, simultaneously, an old musical. The story happened in 1537. Shakespeare wrote the central character in 1595 and disappeared him from the text in the same scene that introduced him. My piece sits in Renaissance dramatic verse arranged into two acts with song cues a composer can set for voice and chamber orchestra. So when I say I have written a new musical, I mean that I have written the most ancient kind of thing a person can write and I have written it in 2026 and I am calling it new because that is what it is.
The piece is called The Apothecary of Mantua: A Musical Drama in Two Acts. It is now available as a book.
Let me sit with that sentence for a moment, because the marketing copy people at every other publishing house would tell me to cut it. “A musical now available as a book” is a paradox. Musicals are performed. Books are read. A musical that is a book is either a cast recording liner notes expanded to absurdity or it is something else entirely, which is what this is.
This is a reading edition of a complete dramatic work. Book and lyrics by me. Score to be written by someone else. The someone else is, for the moment, a hypothetical someone whose name I do not yet know, but whose phone number I hope to be given in the next six months. More on that in a moment.
What is in the book
The published volume contains the full libretto across two acts and twenty scenes. Act One runs nine scenes, Act Two runs eleven. Tommaso Vesperi wakes on a Tuesday morning in early autumn 1537, opens his shop on Via del Cigno, and by that evening has sold a vial of poison to a young Veronese nobleman who leaves forty ducats on the counter and disappears into a plague of his own making. In Act Two, everything arrives at once. A morning Watch presence crosses the piazza. A sixteenth-century statute on the books punishes the sale of mortal drugs with death. Tommaso has a decision to make about whether to run, and if he does not run, what to do with the forty ducats before the Watch Captain crosses his threshold.
The libretto itself runs about a hundred pages of the paperback. The rest of the volume is apparatus. There is a production bible covering historical setting, character backstory, relationships, timeline, world-building, and scene-by-scene structural outline. Following that, a composer’s reference with meter assignments per character, a rhyme family inventory, scene-by-scene musical specifications, voice-and-orchestra split architecture, and a duration summary. Then a production and staging section for directors and designers. And four scholarly essays on Mantua in 1537, on the apothecary trade and Paracelsian medicine, on the Mantuan Jewish community in the early Cinquecento, and on Shakespeare’s minor source character.
The total is 338 pages. I am saying this because the scope matters to how you should think about the piece. A typical acting edition of a musical libretto is sixty to ninety pages, cue script dimensions, cheap paper, minimal apparatus. The Apothecary of Mantua takes a different posture. It is a scholarly reading edition that happens to contain a performable musical, or, depending on how you squint at it, a performable musical that happens to travel with four hundred pages of scholarship.
Why publish a musical as a book
The practical answer is that the piece needs to exist in a durable form before a composer sets it, and books are the most durable form we have invented. Composers who want to score the work need a physical copy to read, mark up, argue with, and carry to the piano. Directors who want to produce it need the production bible. Conservatories that want to assign it as a teaching text for dramatic writing or for scholarly research on the source and period need the essays. The book form serves all three audiences.
The philosophical answer is that I have been running David Boles Books Writing & Publishing since 1975, when I was ten years old and got paid for an article in a Lincoln newspaper, and the house was founded on the premise that writers should own the means of production. I do not wait for permission to publish the things I write. The Apothecary of Mantua is the latest demonstration of that premise and it will not be the last.
Critics outside the operation sometimes push on the 1975 founding date. They say a ten-year-old with a check from a newspaper is not a publishing house. My response is that a publishing house is what you do next after your first check. What I did next was decide that my writing would continue, that it would be paid for, and that the infrastructure to deliver it to readers would be mine rather than rented from someone else’s imagination. Fifty-one years later, David Boles Books has published a catalog I can barely track on a good day, and the Apothecary is the newest title on the list.
What happens now
The book is on Amazon in paperback for $19.99. The Kindle edition is $9.99. There is a letter-size download edition for composers who want to print it at home and mark it up with a pencil. All three editions are available through BolesBooks.com.
And here is where I would like to address any composers who may be reading this. You exist. I know you exist because BolesBooks.com gets traffic from music conservatories and I know what kind of person goes looking for a 338-page scholarly reading edition of a musical drama at two in the morning on a Tuesday. That person is a composer between commissions who is restless and scrolling and wondering whether the next project might have already been written and might be waiting to be found.
If you are that composer, this one wants you. Four hundred and twenty-nine years of silence is a long tuning note, and Tommaso Vesperi has been waiting all this time for someone with a score in their head to walk into the shop and ask him what the apothecary of Mantua sounds like in the key of his own voice. I would be delighted to talk with you about setting it. Reach out through BolesBooks.com and we will find an hour to talk about what you hear when you read the first scene.
A new old musical. Now available in book form. The composer seat is still open. A tortoise still hangs from the rafters of the shop. Forty ducats still sit on the counter. And somewhere in the plague rolls of 1527 there is a woman named Fiammetta whose orchestral theme is waiting for the first chord that will make her real again.
Come and write it.
#apothecary #book #broadway #community #composer #davidBoles #love #lyrics #musical #poison #publication #romeoAndJuliet #score #shakespeare #storytelling #writing -
https://apobangpo.space/@pixelcats/114820949371820314
A conversation amongst #Kpop fans included this mention of the variety of fans and the importance of inclusivity and mutual respect in the fandom here on Mastodon - qualities sorely lacking in some other Kpop spaces.
Anyway, that part of the conversation reminded me of the history of inclusivity and mutual respect, which in turn set me thinking about religious "toleration" in early modern European history, which in turn reminded me of the Edict of Torda in the Transylvania of 1568:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edict_of_Torda
I was going to finish there with a pronouncement of "There's a lot more to Transylvania than Dracula!" which is true, but, on reflection, a bad note on which to end because it sounds smug and condescending.
Yes, early modern history is fascinating, anybody who can visit Transylvania should do so, and "toleration" deserves much attention from both a historical and philosophical point of view - but shouldn't I be more alive to today's interest in vampirism and to goth subcultures ? Shouldn't I remember that, in the words of @pixelcats, "all ways of stanning are valid" and that includes the stanning of Transylvania too?
From Kpop to C16 Torda and back again!
#Inclusivity #MutualRespect #Toleration #EarlyModernHistory #EdictOfTorda #Transylvania #Dracula #Vampires #Goth #Subcultures #Fandom #Stanning #Kpop
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Others, Otherness, Othering
Who are the others who live in the townships just up the road? Who are they who buy luxury penthouses jutting over the ocean? Who are the others who crawl the water pipes at night? Who are they who sip champagne from a five-star hotel patio at sunset? Who are the others who lick takeaway containers thrown in gutters? Who are they who order designer sneakers from abroad?
I have seen others with large kind eyes, wild demented eyes and skillfully made-up eyes. I have seen others with scars and rashes who scramble into bushes at dusk. And those who saunter, hips swinging, heels clicking, along main road pavements just for show.
Who are the others? Why are some people ‘the other’ who eat from trash bins? Why are some people the ‘others’ who fly in jet planes to luxury destinations? Why was I born me, he was born he and she was born she? Why is my skin light and your skin dark?
The Other and Apartheid
I remember growing up during Apartheid. I could roam freely, safely, across the open veld, into the huge tunnels under the main roads, along the railway lines and into the pine forests. A Zulu woman worked for us, cleaning our house. She lived over the hill, in a completely different vicinity. Flora was ‘the other’, a stranger in our home. I was so naïve.
The Ethics Centre explains it like this:
The Other is a term used to capture the ways other people are different from us. It’s also used to describe the people who we keep distant from us because we decide they’re not like us. The process of Othering occurs when we turn fellow humans into abstract entities we can distance ourselves from or treat as less-than-human.
For Flora, we were ‘the other’, too. We had a large house with a large garden, hot water, electricity and cupboards full of food. During Apartheid, the process of “Othering” was exacerbated by a system that classified all South Africans into four racial categories: White, Black (Bantu), Coloured (mixed race), and Indian/Asian. Here, the Other was treated as “not me” or “not us,” often viewed as inferior or threatening to the in-group.
Opposites Attract
Zygmunt Bauman suggests that the idea of otherness is essential to the way in which society creates categories of identity. He argues that identities are structured as a division or contrast between two things that are represented as being entirely different.
‘Woman is the other of man, animal is the other of human, stranger is the other of native, abnormality the other of norm, deviation the other of law- abiding, illness the other of health, insanity the other of reason, lay public the other of the expert, foreigner the other of state subject, enemy the other of friend. ‘This reminds me of the Yin and Yang of life. The incessant attraction and repulsion of forces we live with every minute of every day. Think about black and white, male and female, day and night, summer and winter, high tide and low tide, fatigue and energy, sun and moon. One cannot exist without the other. They flow in and out, infinitely, from soft to hard, the calm to the storm. Without depression, we would not experience joy.
Think about it: “No matter what you do, there will always be a dark and light side to it. The hard truth is that you are only pretty because someone else is considered ugly, you’re only rich because someone else is poor. Because without the opposites, there is nothing that can establish your hierarchy in this world. At any time, the black can become white and the white can become black. Hope can become despair and despair can become hope. Just like how if you keep traveling east, you will eventually arrive at the west. “
Thinking about Others
Philosopher Simone de Beauvoir believed that “Otherness is a basic category of human thought”. You are who you think you are. When you compare yourself to others, you are entrenching your ego in a world full of diverse humans. Thoughts and opinions can make or break us. Yet, they are far from real. Think about the last time you travelled to another country. You were a foreigner entering someone else’s native land – you saw them as ‘the other’, and they perceived you as ‘the other’. Think about how wars start and how couples divorce.
As soon as we think about what something is, we think about the opposite – the Other. We tend to place ourselves in context according to those around us. This helps us to define who we are at any given time. However, natural or not, Othering isn’t a neutral process – it tends to lead to the mistreatment of the people we decide are Other.
We see it playing out every day in our worlds – your world, my world, the others’ worlds. On the bus, the train, in the traffic and in the coffee shops. On the sidewalks, at work and in the gym. Keep it to yourself if you regard someone as different from you. Count your blessings that you are indeed different! Amen!
Who ARE the Others?
I know people who live in the townships just up the road. I don’t know people who buy luxury penthouses jutting over the ocean. I often see people who lick takeaway containers thrown in gutters? And I see people wearing designer sneakers from abroad. Like me, you too have seen it all. Maybe I have passed you on my morning walks? Maybe you have met my eye in your rags, or was that you in the Porsche spinning by?
Have you ever wondered why you are you and not me? When I see green do you see it too or do you see blue? Have you ever noticed how many of ‘you’ there are? The ‘you’ that greets your mother, the ‘you’ that drinks coffee with your friends and the ‘you’ that meets with colleagues in a boardroom. So, who ARE the others?
The pursuit of otherness, the sense that we are somehow different than our brothers and sisters, no matter where we find them, allows for all the other great evils: racism, sexism, homophobia, violence against gay people and against women – Anna Quindlen
#bias #differences #life #othering #others #philosophy #self -
Others, Otherness, Othering
Who are the others who live in the townships just up the road? Who are they who buy luxury penthouses jutting over the ocean? Who are the others who crawl the water pipes at night? Who are they who sip champagne from a five-star hotel patio at sunset? Who are the others who lick takeaway containers thrown in gutters? Who are they who order designer sneakers from abroad?
I have seen others with large kind eyes, wild demented eyes and skillfully made-up eyes. I have seen others with scars and rashes who scramble into bushes at dusk. And those who saunter, hips swinging, heels clicking, along main road pavements just for show.
Who are the others? Why are some people ‘the other’ who eat from trash bins? Why are some people the ‘others’ who fly in jet planes to luxury destinations? Why was I born me, he was born he and she was born she? Why is my skin light and your skin dark?
The Other and Apartheid
I remember growing up during Apartheid. I could roam freely, safely, across the open veld, into the huge tunnels under the main roads, along the railway lines and into the pine forests. A Zulu woman worked for us, cleaning our house. She lived over the hill, in a completely different vicinity. Flora was ‘the other’, a stranger in our home. I was so naïve.
The Ethics Centre explains it like this:
The Other is a term used to capture the ways other people are different from us. It’s also used to describe the people who we keep distant from us because we decide they’re not like us. The process of Othering occurs when we turn fellow humans into abstract entities we can distance ourselves from or treat as less-than-human.
For Flora, we were ‘the other’, too. We had a large house with a large garden, hot water, electricity and cupboards full of food. During Apartheid, the process of “Othering” was exacerbated by a system that classified all South Africans into four racial categories: White, Black (Bantu), Coloured (mixed race), and Indian/Asian. Here, the Other was treated as “not me” or “not us,” often viewed as inferior or threatening to the in-group.
Opposites Attract
Zygmunt Bauman suggests that the idea of otherness is essential to the way in which society creates categories of identity. He argues that identities are structured as a division or contrast between two things that are represented as being entirely different.
‘Woman is the other of man, animal is the other of human, stranger is the other of native, abnormality the other of norm, deviation the other of law- abiding, illness the other of health, insanity the other of reason, lay public the other of the expert, foreigner the other of state subject, enemy the other of friend. ‘This reminds me of the Yin and Yang of life. The incessant attraction and repulsion of forces we live with every minute of every day. Think about black and white, male and female, day and night, summer and winter, high tide and low tide, fatigue and energy, sun and moon. One cannot exist without the other. They flow in and out, infinitely, from soft to hard, the calm to the storm. Without depression, we would not experience joy.
Think about it: “No matter what you do, there will always be a dark and light side to it. The hard truth is that you are only pretty because someone else is considered ugly, you’re only rich because someone else is poor. Because without the opposites, there is nothing that can establish your hierarchy in this world. At any time, the black can become white and the white can become black. Hope can become despair and despair can become hope. Just like how if you keep traveling east, you will eventually arrive at the west. “
Thinking about Others
Philosopher Simone de Beauvoir believed that “Otherness is a basic category of human thought”. You are who you think you are. When you compare yourself to others, you are entrenching your ego in a world full of diverse humans. Thoughts and opinions can make or break us. Yet, they are far from real. Think about the last time you travelled to another country. You were a foreigner entering someone else’s native land – you saw them as ‘the other’, and they perceived you as ‘the other’. Think about how wars start and how couples divorce.
As soon as we think about what something is, we think about the opposite – the Other. We tend to place ourselves in context according to those around us. This helps us to define who we are at any given time. However, natural or not, Othering isn’t a neutral process – it tends to lead to the mistreatment of the people we decide are Other.
We see it playing out every day in our worlds – your world, my world, the others’ worlds. On the bus, the train, in the traffic and in the coffee shops. On the sidewalks, at work and in the gym. Keep it to yourself if you regard someone as different from you. Count your blessings that you are indeed different! Amen!
Who ARE the Others?
I know people who live in the townships just up the road. I don’t know people who buy luxury penthouses jutting over the ocean. I often see people who lick takeaway containers thrown in gutters? And I see people wearing designer sneakers from abroad. Like me, you too have seen it all. Maybe I have passed you on my morning walks? Maybe you have met my eye in your rags, or was that you in the Porsche spinning by?
Have you ever wondered why you are you and not me? When I see green do you see it too or do you see blue? Have you ever noticed how many of ‘you’ there are? The ‘you’ that greets your mother, the ‘you’ that drinks coffee with your friends and the ‘you’ that meets with colleagues in a boardroom. So, who ARE the others?
The pursuit of otherness, the sense that we are somehow different than our brothers and sisters, no matter where we find them, allows for all the other great evils: racism, sexism, homophobia, violence against gay people and against women – Anna Quindlen
#bias #differences #life #othering #others #philosophy #self -
Others, Otherness, Othering
Who are the others who live in the townships just up the road? Who are they who buy luxury penthouses jutting over the ocean? Who are the others who crawl the water pipes at night? Who are they who sip champagne from a five-star hotel patio at sunset? Who are the others who lick takeaway containers thrown in gutters? Who are they who order designer sneakers from abroad?
I have seen others with large kind eyes, wild demented eyes and skillfully made-up eyes. I have seen others with scars and rashes who scramble into bushes at dusk. And those who saunter, hips swinging, heels clicking, along main road pavements just for show.
Who are the others? Why are some people ‘the other’ who eat from trash bins? Why are some people the ‘others’ who fly in jet planes to luxury destinations? Why was I born me, he was born he and she was born she? Why is my skin light and your skin dark?
The Other and Apartheid
I remember growing up during Apartheid. I could roam freely, safely, across the open veld, into the huge tunnels under the main roads, along the railway lines and into the pine forests. A Zulu woman worked for us, cleaning our house. She lived over the hill, in a completely different vicinity. Flora was ‘the other’, a stranger in our home. I was so naïve.
The Ethics Centre explains it like this:
The Other is a term used to capture the ways other people are different from us. It’s also used to describe the people who we keep distant from us because we decide they’re not like us. The process of Othering occurs when we turn fellow humans into abstract entities we can distance ourselves from or treat as less-than-human.
For Flora, we were ‘the other’, too. We had a large house with a large garden, hot water, electricity and cupboards full of food. During Apartheid, the process of “Othering” was exacerbated by a system that classified all South Africans into four racial categories: White, Black (Bantu), Coloured (mixed race), and Indian/Asian. Here, the Other was treated as “not me” or “not us,” often viewed as inferior or threatening to the in-group.
Opposites Attract
Zygmunt Bauman suggests that the idea of otherness is essential to the way in which society creates categories of identity. He argues that identities are structured as a division or contrast between two things that are represented as being entirely different.
‘Woman is the other of man, animal is the other of human, stranger is the other of native, abnormality the other of norm, deviation the other of law- abiding, illness the other of health, insanity the other of reason, lay public the other of the expert, foreigner the other of state subject, enemy the other of friend. ‘This reminds me of the Yin and Yang of life. The incessant attraction and repulsion of forces we live with every minute of every day. Think about black and white, male and female, day and night, summer and winter, high tide and low tide, fatigue and energy, sun and moon. One cannot exist without the other. They flow in and out, infinitely, from soft to hard, the calm to the storm. Without depression, we would not experience joy.
Think about it: “No matter what you do, there will always be a dark and light side to it. The hard truth is that you are only pretty because someone else is considered ugly, you’re only rich because someone else is poor. Because without the opposites, there is nothing that can establish your hierarchy in this world. At any time, the black can become white and the white can become black. Hope can become despair and despair can become hope. Just like how if you keep traveling east, you will eventually arrive at the west. “
Thinking about Others
Philosopher Simone de Beauvoir believed that “Otherness is a basic category of human thought”. You are who you think you are. When you compare yourself to others, you are entrenching your ego in a world full of diverse humans. Thoughts and opinions can make or break us. Yet, they are far from real. Think about the last time you travelled to another country. You were a foreigner entering someone else’s native land – you saw them as ‘the other’, and they perceived you as ‘the other’. Think about how wars start and how couples divorce.
As soon as we think about what something is, we think about the opposite – the Other. We tend to place ourselves in context according to those around us. This helps us to define who we are at any given time. However, natural or not, Othering isn’t a neutral process – it tends to lead to the mistreatment of the people we decide are Other.
We see it playing out every day in our worlds – your world, my world, the others’ worlds. On the bus, the train, in the traffic and in the coffee shops. On the sidewalks, at work and in the gym. Keep it to yourself if you regard someone as different from you. Count your blessings that you are indeed different! Amen!
Who ARE the Others?
I know people who live in the townships just up the road. I don’t know people who buy luxury penthouses jutting over the ocean. I often see people who lick takeaway containers thrown in gutters? And I see people wearing designer sneakers from abroad. Like me, you too have seen it all. Maybe I have passed you on my morning walks? Maybe you have met my eye in your rags, or was that you in the Porsche spinning by?
Have you ever wondered why you are you and not me? When I see green do you see it too or do you see blue? Have you ever noticed how many of ‘you’ there are? The ‘you’ that greets your mother, the ‘you’ that drinks coffee with your friends and the ‘you’ that meets with colleagues in a boardroom. So, who ARE the others?
The pursuit of otherness, the sense that we are somehow different than our brothers and sisters, no matter where we find them, allows for all the other great evils: racism, sexism, homophobia, violence against gay people and against women – Anna Quindlen
#bias #differences #life #othering #others #philosophy #self -
Others, Otherness, Othering
Who are the others who live in the townships just up the road? Who are they who buy luxury penthouses jutting over the ocean? Who are the others who crawl the water pipes at night? Who are they who sip champagne from a five-star hotel patio at sunset? Who are the others who lick takeaway containers thrown in gutters? Who are they who order designer sneakers from abroad?
I have seen others with large kind eyes, wild demented eyes and skillfully made-up eyes. I have seen others with scars and rashes who scramble into bushes at dusk. And those who saunter, hips swinging, heels clicking, along main road pavements just for show.
Who are the others? Why are some people ‘the other’ who eat from trash bins? Why are some people the ‘others’ who fly in jet planes to luxury destinations? Why was I born me, he was born he and she was born she? Why is my skin light and your skin dark?
The Other and Apartheid
I remember growing up during Apartheid. I could roam freely, safely, across the open veld, into the huge tunnels under the main roads, along the railway lines and into the pine forests. A Zulu woman worked for us, cleaning our house. She lived over the hill, in a completely different vicinity. Flora was ‘the other’, a stranger in our home. I was so naïve.
The Ethics Centre explains it like this:
The Other is a term used to capture the ways other people are different from us. It’s also used to describe the people who we keep distant from us because we decide they’re not like us. The process of Othering occurs when we turn fellow humans into abstract entities we can distance ourselves from or treat as less-than-human.
For Flora, we were ‘the other’, too. We had a large house with a large garden, hot water, electricity and cupboards full of food. During Apartheid, the process of “Othering” was exacerbated by a system that classified all South Africans into four racial categories: White, Black (Bantu), Coloured (mixed race), and Indian/Asian. Here, the Other was treated as “not me” or “not us,” often viewed as inferior or threatening to the in-group.
Opposites Attract
Zygmunt Bauman suggests that the idea of otherness is essential to the way in which society creates categories of identity. He argues that identities are structured as a division or contrast between two things that are represented as being entirely different.
‘Woman is the other of man, animal is the other of human, stranger is the other of native, abnormality the other of norm, deviation the other of law- abiding, illness the other of health, insanity the other of reason, lay public the other of the expert, foreigner the other of state subject, enemy the other of friend. ‘This reminds me of the Yin and Yang of life. The incessant attraction and repulsion of forces we live with every minute of every day. Think about black and white, male and female, day and night, summer and winter, high tide and low tide, fatigue and energy, sun and moon. One cannot exist without the other. They flow in and out, infinitely, from soft to hard, the calm to the storm. Without depression, we would not experience joy.
Think about it: “No matter what you do, there will always be a dark and light side to it. The hard truth is that you are only pretty because someone else is considered ugly, you’re only rich because someone else is poor. Because without the opposites, there is nothing that can establish your hierarchy in this world. At any time, the black can become white and the white can become black. Hope can become despair and despair can become hope. Just like how if you keep traveling east, you will eventually arrive at the west. “
Thinking about Others
Philosopher Simone de Beauvoir believed that “Otherness is a basic category of human thought”. You are who you think you are. When you compare yourself to others, you are entrenching your ego in a world full of diverse humans. Thoughts and opinions can make or break us. Yet, they are far from real. Think about the last time you travelled to another country. You were a foreigner entering someone else’s native land – you saw them as ‘the other’, and they perceived you as ‘the other’. Think about how wars start and how couples divorce.
As soon as we think about what something is, we think about the opposite – the Other. We tend to place ourselves in context according to those around us. This helps us to define who we are at any given time. However, natural or not, Othering isn’t a neutral process – it tends to lead to the mistreatment of the people we decide are Other.
We see it playing out every day in our worlds – your world, my world, the others’ worlds. On the bus, the train, in the traffic and in the coffee shops. On the sidewalks, at work and in the gym. Keep it to yourself if you regard someone as different from you. Count your blessings that you are indeed different! Amen!
Who ARE the Others?
I know people who live in the townships just up the road. I don’t know people who buy luxury penthouses jutting over the ocean. I often see people who lick takeaway containers thrown in gutters? And I see people wearing designer sneakers from abroad. Like me, you too have seen it all. Maybe I have passed you on my morning walks? Maybe you have met my eye in your rags, or was that you in the Porsche spinning by?
Have you ever wondered why you are you and not me? When I see green do you see it too or do you see blue? Have you ever noticed how many of ‘you’ there are? The ‘you’ that greets your mother, the ‘you’ that drinks coffee with your friends and the ‘you’ that meets with colleagues in a boardroom. So, who ARE the others?
The pursuit of otherness, the sense that we are somehow different than our brothers and sisters, no matter where we find them, allows for all the other great evils: racism, sexism, homophobia, violence against gay people and against women – Anna Quindlen
#bias #differences #life #othering #others #philosophy #self -
St. Edith Stein Novena 2025: Introduction
That is why I am going to lure her and lead her out into the wilderness and speak to her heart.
Hosea 2:16
“It always seemed to me that our Lord was keeping something for me in Carmel that I could find only there.”
These words come from Saint Edith Stein’s own account, “How I came to Carmel,” preserved for us by her novice mistress and prioress, Mother Teresia Renata Posselt, in her biography, Edith Stein: The Life of a Philosopher and Carmelite.
What could this brilliant philosopher and renowned lecturer have been seeking? What mystery did she perceive in Carmel that even her extensive knowledge of Carmelite spirituality through reading could not satisfy? Mother Teresia Renata offers us insight:
In these words this outstanding philosopher and famous lecturer, already revered as a saint by many people, acknowledged that something was lacking before she could be completely happy and fulfilled. We ask ourselves: What could this be? And what is this Carmel from which she expected this final fulfillment that the Lord had saved up for her as the best?
Carmel presents a mystery that cannot be taken in at a glance. Even those intimately acquainted, like Edith, with Carmelite spirituality through reading the works of its great exponents can scarcely avoid shrinking when for the first time they begin to breathe the dry air of Carmel. They soon have a sense that they have been set in a trackless desert, a waterless land that only slowly surrenders its secrets.
This is the mystery we will explore together in this novena—that “trackless desert” of Carmel revealed through Saint Edith Stein’s own writings and experience. Like the holy prophet Elijah, who waited upon God’s word in the Wadi Cherith, we will follow Edith as the Lord lures her into the spiritual desert where He speaks most intimately to the heart.
Let us attune our spiritual ears to the words of sacred Scripture and to the wisdom of Saint Edith’s writings as she draws us deeper into that “waterless land that only slowly surrenders its secrets.” May God bless us all as we journey together through these nine days.
Pray each day with St. Edith Stein
Join us every day as our novena unfoldsDay One
Into the desert (The Science of the Cross)Day Two
The darkest path (The Science of the Cross)Day Three
Dryness and emptiness (The Science of the Cross)Day Four
The desert of Carmel (A Chosen Vessel of Divine Wisdom)Day Five
We are not ruined (I Am Always in Your Midst)Day Six
Dryness, distaste, trial (The Science of the Cross)Day Seven
Oppression and dryness (The Science of the Cross)Day Eight
Purgative dryness (The Science of the Cross)Day Nine
Unbounded desert (The Science of the Cross)NOVENA PRAYER
Saint Edith Stein,
faith in the holy angels gives me confidence—
confidence to believe, in the midst of all suffering,
in the divine life-force we all share,
which flows through all creation
as the sap flows from the vine into its branches.We do not stand alone
in this fierce struggle between life and death.
“When my enemies press in on me…” (Ps 56:2),
“…then God fights for me.” (Josh 23:10)In this valley of tears,
I lift my eyes in trust to you,
you holy angels and saints:
your task is to pass on that Love
whose “beginning and end is the triune God.”
(Edith Stein, Complete Works)We are held and drawn into this radiant stream
of light and love, of life and truth.
The more we are united with you
through surrender to the divine will,
the more your love becomes our love,
your light our light.If we believe in this communion,
we already walk in the light.Intercede for us,
that we may take part in the restoration of all creation.Here mention your intentions
Our Father, Hail Mary, Glory Be
℣. Saint Edith Stein,
℟. Pray for us.Posselt, T 2005, Edith Stein: The Life of a Philosopher and Carmelite, translated from the German by Batzdorff S, Koeppel J, and Sullivan J, ICS Publications, Washington DC.
All scripture references are from The Jerusalem Bible Reader’s Edition, copyright © 1966, 1967 and 1968 by Darton, Longman & Todd, Ltd and Doubleday & Company, Inc. as accessed from The Internet Archive website.
Don’t become discouraged and give up prayer, says St. John of the Cross. We offer varying novenas to Our Lady of Mount Carmel, as well as novenas to St. Teresa of Avila, St. John of the Cross, St. Thérèse of Lisieux, Sts. Louis and Zélie Martin, St. Elizabeth of the Trinity, St. Edith Stein and St. Joseph.
LET US UNITE IN PRAYER
-
AMG Turns 15: Middle Management Speaks
By Carcharodon
15 years ago, on May 19, 2009, Angry Metal Guy spoke. For the very first time as AMG. And he had opinions: Very Important Opinions™. The post attracted relatively little attention at the time, but times change and, over the decade and a half since then, AMG Industries has grown into the blog you know today. Now with a staff of around 25 overrating overwriters (and an entirely non-suspicious graveyard for writers on permanent, all-expenses-paid sabbaticals), we have written more than 9,100 posts, comprising over seven million words. Over the site’s lifetime, we’ve had more than 107 million visits and now achieve well over a million hits each and every month. Through this, we’ve built up a fantastic community of readers drawn from every corner of the globe, whom we have (mostly) loved getting to know in the more than 360,000 comments posted on the site.
We have done this under the careful (if sternly authoritarian) stewardship of our eponymous leader Angry Metal Guy and his iron enforcer, Steel Druhm, while adhering to strict editorial policies and principles. We have done this by simply offering honest (and occasionally brutal) takes, and without running a single advert or taking a single cent from anyone. Ever. Mistakes have undoubtedly been made and we may be a laughing stock in the eyes of music intellectuals, socialites and critics everywhere but we are incredibly proud of what AMG Industries represents. In fact, we believe it may be the best metal blog, with the best community of readers, on the internet.
Now join us as the people responsible for making AMG a reality reflect on what the site means to them and why they would willingly work for a blog that pays in the currency of deadlines, abuse, and hobo wine. Welcome to the 15th Birthdaynalia.
Thou Shalt Have No Other Blogs!
Carcharodon
AMG and me
I lurked quietly on AMG for about five years, reading daily, discovering great records, but never entering the fray. Not so much as a single comment. I didn’t feel qualified to get involved. Until that is, I inexplicably decided—I’m still not sure why—to answer the 2018 casting call. To my surprise, I got a shot and, under the threatening (but surprisingly fair) tutelage of Steel Druhm, I evolved from nameless_n00b_17 to become Carcharodon Sharkboi. I figured it would be a fun hobby for a year or two.
Coming up six years and more than 250 posts later, AMG Industries is so much more than a hobby. It’s become part of my daily life. And that is because of the people and the culture here, not just the staff, but also the regular readers and commenters. Although there’s a wry humor to nearly everything we do, and more in-jokes than even the seasoned staffers can keep up with, people actually care. They care. About the music. About our editorial standards. About the quality of our output. About each other. And, apparently, about Yer Mom. Caring and having standards are rare commodities on the internet, and it makes the AMG community a special place to be a part of. Are we perfect? No. Mistakes have been made. We Melvins that make up AMG are a dysfunctional family, but you love your family and you’re always a part of it. This adoptive family helped me get through some really tough times as a new(ish) dad during the COVID lockdowns and exposed me to some really impressive people, I would likely never have met otherwise. Thanks AMG for starting this place and, along with Steel, Grier and other key players, ensuring that it remains what it’s always been: a place for appreciating the music we love, free from adverts, clickbait, and dicks. I’m proud to have played my small part in it.
AMG gave to me …
Gorguts // Colored Sands – I couldn’t tell you exactly when I started perusing AMG but I remember this being one of the first reviews I stumbled across. Today, it’s not a record I reach for often but it completely changed my perception of death metal. Until I heard Colored Sands, death metal to me fell into either the Cannibal Corpse school, or the progressive Opeth and late-era Death camp. The former wasn’t for me, the latter very much was. Gorguts ripped my preconceptions apart. The band was completely unknown to me but the technical precision and dissonance they channeled into this record blew me away. And having heard it, it’s impossible not to hear Gorguts’ influence on dozens of other bands. As Noctus opined, the “riffs are absorbing, dizzying and uncompromisingly heavy … [while the] mix is dynamic, well-balanced and above all, crushing.” But it’s more than that. It’s such a complete package and, together, all the elements are simply transcendent.
Mistur // In Memoriam – It pains me to say it but Grier was right. Okay, so it was once, about eight years ago but he was still right: Mistur’s In Memoriam is an absolute banger. It does deserve a 4.5. And I did miss it. And it’s absolutely in my top-5 black metal records of the 2010s. Would I have found it without him? Perhaps. Perhaps not. After all, I didn’t know their 2009 debut, Attende. But I didn’t need to do the work because Grier did it for me. He was also right to say that In Memoriam is packed full of highlights but that the “record is impossible to appreciate unless listened to from beginning to end.” It’s a perfectly crafted piece of Windir-inspired melodic black metal, with absolutely no fat on its “magnificently structured” carcass. Every track is excellent in its own way (the duo of “Matriarch’s Lament” and “The Sight” being my personal highlights), but the album is undoubtedly greater than the sum of its parts. As a general rule of thumb, do not trust Grier but he was right on the money about Mistur.
Gazpacho // Demon – Demon is in my top ten records of all time. From the yawing note, fragile vocal line, and keys that open the record on “I’ve Been Walking, Pt. 1a” to the final notes of “Death Room”, it gives me chills every time. I’m not someone who has overly emotional reactions to music, as a rule. But I love Demon. There is something about this record’s dark vulnerability that haunts me. And given the band’s shitty name, I probably wouldn’t have bothered with it were it not for the review here. Sitting right on the intersection of alt-rock and prog, with a few heavier riffs, I could say that it has all the progressive chops of Radiohead’s OK Computer and that there’s something of Thom Yorke in Gazpacho frontman Jan-Henrik Ohm’s quiet, emotive power. I could point to the excellent use of violin (the polka that closes “The Wizard of Altai Mountains” is just fun). I could, as AMG did in the review that hooked me in, praise the fantastic production. He also, rightly, said that “[e]very listen to brings forth new experiences, new ideas, new emotions”. But it’s more than that. Demon just has that undefinable something. It’s heart-wrenching, somber and I never tire of it.
I wish I had written …
Grymm Comments: On Mental Health Awareness and Our Favorite Music. Okay, I don’t actually wish I had written this. Nor should I have been allowed to. However, I am extremely glad that Grymm, Kenstrosity and The Artist Formerly Known As Muppet took on this project. In any space, it’s an incredibly important subject but mental health struggles seem to have an outsize impact on people in our (still relatively niche) scene, as the engagement with this piece showed. The number of incredibly personal and moving stories people felt able to share in response to Grymm‘s post made me very proud to be part of this place and I like to think that, perhaps, it helped a few people, who felt they had nowhere else to turn, feel a little less alone. Chapeau gentlemen.
I wish I could do over …
Kanonenfieber – Menschenmühle [Things You Might Have Missed 2021]. In the write-up of my favorite record of 2021, I opened with a disclaimer, setting out what this record categorically was not. It was an effort to head off what I predicted would inevitably become an issue for a German band, writing and singing about war in German … you figure it out. To be fair, when I interviewed its creator, Noise, a couple of years later, it seems I was right. Still, I don’t think my efforts helped. If anything, they sparked a pointless debate in the comments (of which I was part). I should have left well alone and just focused on this outstanding record.
I wish more people had read …
The Art of Labelling – Part I and Part II. All the way back in early 2020, while locked up in my house, I penned a two-part feature looking at three great, independent record labels—Hypnotic Dirge, Naturmacht and Transcending Obscurity. I wanted to understand the challenges, and opportunities, facing them and their founders. I found these fascinating to write and I learned a lot. Part I did ok numbers, not great but ok; Part II … less so. Given the huge amounts of time Nic, Robert and Kunal gave up to help me with these pieces, I had hoped to get more exposure for these excellent labels.
GardensTale
AMG and me
It’s hard to overstate the impact AMG has had on my life. When I found the site, checking out reviews for Book of Souls, I wasn’t listening to that much metal anymore. The quality of the writing drew me in, I got caught up on recent big releases, and the writing bug sank its teeth in me. Soon, metal had become a big part of my life again. Not long after, my partner expressed an interest as well and I introduced her to the various types and subgenres of metal, and we started going to more concerts and festivals, which is our favorite shared experience to this day. We started going to Roadburn, met and befriended several bands. We made friends from Wales at Graspop. During the pandemic, the staff started doing Zoom calls,1 and I got to know many of my fellow writers. After the pandemic, we made more friends through Roadburn and Angry Metal Days. We’ve been to Brutal Assault, with people we met at other festivals. One even moved to our city and has become a close companion since then. How much smaller would our world be without these friendships and experiences! This one shared interest—the love of music—is a wonderful, ongoing journey, that has enriched our lives in ways I can scarcely describe, and the match that set the fire was a click on a link while I was bored at work. AMG has brought my partner and me incalculable joy. Here’s to 15 more years!
AMG gave to me …
King Goat // Conduit – Conduit is important to me for several reasons. It was my first Album of the Year at AMG, with the title track a well-deserved Song of the Year. But it was also the album that showed me how wrong I was about doom metal. I had this notion that Swallow the Sun levels of drudgery were the standard for the genre, something I could (at the time) only tolerate in small amounts. Having just begun my AMG career in August that year, I was keen to unearth as much as I could from 2016, and King Goat blew my mind wide open, an obliteration of preconceptions that has served me well since. Despite the cataclysmic recalibration, I have not yet discovered a doom album to top Conduit. The mighty vocals, the colossal riffs, the cosmic scale of it all … it is a truly monumental album. Just thinking of the anthemic duet of the title track’s bridge still sends chills down my spine.
Disillusion // The Liberation – If you didn’t see this coming, welcome to AMG! I have made no secret of how much I love The Liberation.2 It is, quite literally, my all-time favorite album. The first time I heard it, it was overwhelming. The second time, “Time To Let Go” got its powerful hooks into me. Third time round, the sheer scope of “Wintertide” began to land. Every time I span it, I discovered more depth, more hooks, more intricate details, which connected all the tracks like a perfect web. It’s a bold treatise on dying and letting go, emotionally charged not just through the vocals but with every chord. I love progressive music principally for its storytelling ability, as the freedom from structure allows the music to emulate the endless ways to build a narrative arc. It’s why I love Pink Floyd and, more recently, Major Parkinson so much, and it’s the reason Edge of Sanity’s Crimson is one of the only albums I’ve done a YMIO for. But none do it better than Disillusion, and they’ve never done it better than on this album.
Madder Mortem // Red in Tooth and Claw – I’d heard Madder Mortem before, back in their Desiderata days. Although I enjoyed that album, it hadn’t stuck with me somehow. Red in Tooth and Claw brought me back into the fold in a big way, and Madder Mortem’s become one of my favorite bands since, owing to its unique sound and peerless emotional acuity. This album’s closer, “Underdogs,” remains one of the most effective and affecting tracks in the stellar discography of Norway’s best-kept secret. A disastrously scheduled and attended gig during the Marrow tour allowed my partner and me hours of drinks and conversations with the band, especially with vocalist extraordinaire Agnete Kirkevaag, and it remains the best and most personal experience I’ve had with any band. Madder Mortem will always hold a special place in my heart, and I would likely never have gone back to them if I hadn’t read Jean-Luc Ricard‘s review and decided to give a long-forgotten band another shot.
I wish I had written …
Alcest – Kodama Review. We have some mighty fine writers here at AMG, each with their own style and voice. But few could match the poetry of Roquentin. Starting out here, this was the review that made me sigh dreamily and wish for the ability to write such extraordinary prose. When you’ve been writing reviews for a while, you often find yourself trying new ways to phrase the same things; this is good, that is bad, etcetera. The Kodama piece is a masterclass in melding these points into a beautifully phrased flow, which never feels repetitive or perfunctory. Roquentin, you are missed.
I wish I could do over …
Hemina – Venus Review. I’m only human, and humans make mistakes. My biggest mistake, though, was the framing of Hemina’s Venus. A lengthy, winding progressive metal album from my early AMG career, I found the love-themed concept album trite and too cheesy. And though I may have been able to defend that musically, I was completely wrong about the concept, which dealt with the happiness love brings, as well as the drama and destruction. And the band called me out on it in the comments, in the worst way: with polite kindness. One more memory for the ‘lie awake at night’ bank, I suppose.
I wish more people had read …
Wills Dissolve – Echoes Review and Album Premiere. We don’t do a lot of premieres around here, so when we run one, it’s a special event. Hypnotic Dirge is not an unknown label, Wills Dissolve had a very good album with a great Burke cover. All the ducks in a line, right? Crickets. 3 comments, 2 of which talked about the lack of comments. Just a strange fluke, it seems, but certainly one of my bigger AMG disappointments.
Kenstrosity
AMG and me
When I first applied to write for AMG, I felt terribly unconfident that I would get anywhere with it. A certain commenter’s (Septic, you scoundrel, you) and my meatspace friends’ constant, and sometimes irritating, encouragement and support conspired to keep me from chickening out. Lo and behold, I jammed my foot into the Hall door. Just. Brutal though that training was, now that I’m here and somewhat seasoned, I can say that this gig represents one of the most rewarding and meaningful hobbies in my life. I’ve learned a ridiculous amount, both about metal at large and about writing—and made an unprecedented number of great friends along the way—in the last six years (this November), and I wouldn’t trade that for anything. I’m not the same person I was when I applied, of that there’s no doubt. But, I like to think that, with the support of the staff, the commentariat, the silly goofy Discordians, and all of the readers that keep this place vibrant and burgeoning with views, I’m better for it. I owe this place and the people in it a huge debt, one I can never repay. Thank you everyone, for everything!
AMG gave to me …
Sulphur Aeon // Gateway to the Antisphere – Up until discovering this review, back when I first encountered AMG in 2017, I listened almost exclusively to metalcore, Evanescence, and operatic symphocheese. Then I hit play on this incredible record, and my life forever changed. I’d heard snippets of death metal and other extreme fare before, but it never clicked. Sulphur Aeon, on the other hand, had me swooning within seconds, initiating what was, effectively, the musical equivalent of the Big Bang in my brain. A whole universe of metal, extreme and otherwise, expanded exponentially before me in an instant. Those cosmic wonders revealed to me in the process, provided endless hours of joy, excitement, and vigor, the likes of which I could never anticipate. With time, I only grew fonder of Gateway to the Antisphere, until it eventually became a Ken icon, the standard by which I judge all other records of its ilk, even today.
Slugdge // Esoteric Malacology – If you asked me to curate a Top 10 metal records of the 2010s, Esoteric Malacology easily hits my Top 3. If you asked me to curate a Top 10 metal records of all time, Esoteric Malacology easily hits my Top 5.[Um … what?! – Carcharodon] Much like Gateway to the Antisphere before it, Slugdge’s fourth LP clicked immediately and, all these years later, shines just as bright, if not brighter. Rarely does a week go by without me picking this back up for some quirky, proggy death metal fun. Esoteric Malacology even transcends the trend of clumsy lyrics endemic to metal writ large, instead showcasing devilishly clever prose and subversive messaging that conveys meaningful themes, and compelling emotional depth. Then you have the stellar performances of this dynamic duo (now trio), perhaps most effectively portrayed in Song o’ the Decade contender “Putrid Fairytale,” which remains to this day my favorite piece of progressive death metal of the modern era. Needless to say, I love this record. HAIL MOLLUSCA!!!
Unfathomable Ruination // Finitude – Brutal tech death doesn’t get better than this. Easily my most cherished Kronos find, Unfathomable Ruination’s unbelievable triumph of crushing artistry left me speechless when I first span it. Considering this was my first foray into the dense, challenging extremities of more technical music, I expected Finitude to fly way over my head. I found myself bewildered that its impenetrable density and ridiculously high level of detail were so effortless for me to access. Blame that on the record’s immense groove and flawlessly structured writing. With enough time to acclimate to the intense environment conjured by Unfathomable Ruination, I found greater appreciation for its nuanced detailing and deeply satisfying tones. Hell, that perfect snare alone brings enough aural pleasure to overwhelm even the coldest spirit. At the end of the day, you should just go read Kronos‘ review of this beast, as it explains, more eloquently than I ever could, why this should be on everyone’s essential listening schedule.
I wish I had written …
In This Moment – A Star-Crossed Wasteland Review. Boy was I mad when I found this piece for one of my favorite metalcore albums. While my confounding taste is the butt of many a joke for my colleagues and our readers alike, seeing a 1.0 for this record truly hurt my soft baby heart at the time. Given the chance, my assessment would’ve likely precluded me from being hired by AMG Inc in the first place, but nothing could change how dear this record is to me. Even now, over a decade since its release, I still regularly reach for these romantic, adventurous, and theatrical tunes.
I wish I could do over …
Ascend the Hollow – Echoes of Existence Review. I’ll be frank, this review is bad. Like, really bad. Partly due to the last minute nature of the piece and partly due to my unbridled enthusiasm for the record itself, I unleashed a tidal wave of unhinged band comparisons, more than half of which don’t make any sense in retrospect. An insane density of passive voice further plagues this write-up. It’s actually kind of embarrassing. The only things that wouldn’t change much are the overall score and some of the hard points of my analysis. Otherwise, this post desperately needs an overhaul.
I wish more people had read …
Into the Obscure: Straight Line Stitch – When Skies Wash Ashore. While I’m over the moon that one of the band members unexpectedly dropped by in the comments to offer kind words for my coverage of Straight Line Stitch’s excellent When Skies Wash Ashore, I do wish more readers had given this album a chance. Many didn’t bother to even read this article because of the tags, unwilling to spend even five minutes of their time. For an album personally significant to me, that felt pretty lame.
Holdeneye
AMG and me
What does Angry Metal Guy mean to me? Honestly, this is a question that I’m constantly trying to answer. As life goes on, and my kids enter their busy teen years, my hunger to listen to, and write about, new music has definitely waned. But there was a time when this music blog was exactly what I needed in my life. I’ve never felt totally fulfilled by my job as a firefighter, and I went through a period where I questioned whether it was actually the career for me. I considered going back to school or switching professions in order to be able to better use some of my seemingly untapped skills. I’d been reading AMG off and on for years at that point and had already fantasized about joining the roster of talented writers when a casting call came about. I answered the call, forever marring the Angry Metal archives with my questionable taste and questionable humor—and forever changing my life. Put simply, Angry Metal Guy is where I found my voice; it’s where I realized that no matter what it is that I want to say, I have a natural ability to say it in a way that seems to resonate with people. I may have dreams of writing something a little more meaningful than a heavy metal review filled with potty humor, but if that dream should one day come to fruition, all those poop, fart, and penis jokes will have been instrumental in bringing it about.
AMG gave to me …
Anaal Nathrakh // The Whole of the Law – When I first heard this record, it was unlike anything I’d ever heard. Grymm‘s review and the album’s subsequent success during List Season 2016 convinced me to give this thing a whirl, despite it lying way outside my wheelhouse. Sure, I’d enjoyed some extreme metal before, but Anaal Nathrakh was in a whole different league for me. Until The Whole of the Law, I never dreamed I could actually like something so insanely … well … insane. The project’s brand of philosophical violence hit me at a time when I was struggling to reshape my worldview after deconstructing my inherited Christian faith, and just about everything about the album’s aesthetic clicked with me. This record has fueled many a sweaty therapy session in Holdeneye‘s Iron Dungeon of Pain and Enlight(dark)enment™, and it opened me up to a whole new world of musical brutality.
Sabaton // Carolus Rex – This one will probably shock a lot of people. I was a late adopter when it came to Sabaton, and I never really gave their early records a shot because I felt the whole history-metal thing was too gimmicky. But when Angry Metal Guy and Steel Druhm gave Carolus Rex the old tag-team tongue bathing, I took notice. I think the conceptual nature of the album really helped the band’s schtick resonate with me. It was the first time an album had me running to Wikipedia to learn more about the events described in the music, and this combination of learning history and enjoying heavy metal has become the best part of every new Sabaton release since. It’s no exaggeration to say that Sabaton has become one of my favorite bands of all time, and I’ll always be grateful to this site’s malevolent dictators for showing me the way.
Candlemass // Epicus Doomicus Metallicus – If I had to choose a feature that solidified Angry Metal Guy as my go-to metal blog, it would have to be when Angry Metal Guy and Steel Druhm each curated their personal top 50 heavy metal songs of all time back in 2011.3 These features reveal a lot of each of their personalities and their tastes in music, and I found a lot in common with both lists. I used them as tools for broadening my musical horizons, but no other new-to-me album hit me as hard as Candlemass’ EDM. Steel recommended “A Sorcerer’s Pledge” as a ‘doom odyssey akin to Rainbow’s “Stargazer,”‘ and that was all the nudge I needed to give the full album a try. As far as I know, EDM was the first full-fledged doom album I ever loved, and it has grown into a personal desert-island record. Thanks, Boss!
I regret nothing! But I wish I could do over …
Scardust – Strangers Review. While I don’t actually wish I could do this one over, I wish I would have done it harder. Strangers is a world-class album, and it’s only gotten better in the years since its release. This should have been a 4.5, minimum, and it should have been my Album o’ the Year for 2020. I took so much delight in how divisive the album was for our beautiful commenters, and I can only imagine how much more fun it would have been to watch you guys lose it over an even higher score. Scardust is a uniquely talented band, and I really wish I could have helped insert that glowing eggplant into even more earholes.
Sentynel
AMG and me
AMG landed in my life at a pivotal time for my music taste. I stumbled into 70s classic rock and prog in my early teens, and on to Nightwish, Blind Guardian then Isis by my late teens. Searching for more, I found the Skyforger review here and, unwittingly, an endless deluge of new music. I am terribly novelty-seeking, and AMG has kept me interested in music – not for me the endless adulthood of listening to one’s teenage favorites. I’ve picked three highlights I haven’t already written anything about anywhere below, but choosing was a brutal process and I had over a dozen Desert Island Discs-worthy choices shortlisted. But the music is only part of it. Ten years of running the servers here has taught me a lot, and it’s also a source of pride how stable it’s been over that time.4 Eventually, I was talked into trying my hand at reviewing. It’s been rewarding and great for my writing more generally, even if I don’t have time to write as much as I’d like. Huge, huge thanks to Dr. Wvrm‘s editorial help and support. Finally: there’s a weird, worldwide crew of friends behind this site, and I’m proud to be a part of it.
AMG gave to me …
The Ocean // Pelagial – This is the obvious choice for this spot; my favorite record of the 2010s and possibly ever. I never tire of listening to Pelagial, over a decade later. From the opening piano to the last guitar line fading into electrical noise I am transfixed. Sitting on the boundary between prog and post-metal, it’s rich, melodic, even catchy at times, crushing at others. Each of its moods and styles hits perfectly, while the narrative and thematic arc of a descent into the deep gives it an enduring coherence. It’s taken me a few attempts to actually write this piece because I keep getting distracted just listening to it. I’ll never stop seeking out new music, but contenders to Pelagial’s throne are few and far between.
Esben and the Witch // Older Terrors – Perhaps the record I reference the most while trying to explain my specific music taste. This is an incredibly me album. Sparse, hypnotic, atmospheric, Older Terrors does an awful lot with very little. The balance here is incredibly delicate. Getting music this minimalist to have real impact is hard, and the albums where it works are some of my all-time favorites. Here, the folk stylings—the sense of forests, rituals and magic—are key to its success. I associate this album with its cover art much more viscerally than anything else I listen to. It’s genuinely transportive; pressing play feels like stepping into that starlit forest.
Vienna Teng // Aims – Ah, how can I pass up an opportunity to write about an album that only tangentially qualifies for this section on a bunch of axes? I mentioned my love of Teng’s work in my 2023 AotY list, but I think Aims is particularly special. It’s at once incredibly catchy and poppy, yet also very experimental, and really shows off her lyrical and thematic flair. “The Hymn of Acxiom” casts an internet marketing database as a choral hymn, more relevant now than ever; “Landsailor” is a love duet between humanity and capitalism.5 These songs sit alongside more traditional themes of love and loss. They’re heavy subjects handled in a way that’s sensitive and moving. None feel out of place, and I still get them stuck in my head out of the blue regularly. Metal isn’t completely devoid of meaningful lyrics—last year’s Wayfarer did a good job here, for example—but it’s rare that I would describe anything as poetic, or that it makes me think to this degree.
I wish I could do over …
Mitochondrial Sun – Mitochondrial Sun Review. When I penned this review, I was very new to actually writing here, and hadn’t quite figured out my voice or a writing process that really worked for me. I don’t think I did a terrible job by any means, and this isn’t the only thing I’ve underrated here either (looking at you, Musk Ox), but this record is really something special and deserved both a better review and more attention generally.
Huck N Roll
AMG and me
I am olde, and I am stuck in my ways. I only ever read reviews at two sites, and the first of those was AMG. When I applied to write here, I knew for sure I would not get the gig. But by some stroke of luck, AMG Himself missed my application and Steel—perhaps just wanting an equally olde curmudgeon on staff—brought me in. I loved every minute of it. Hopefully, I became a better writer, thanks to all the talented miscreants I was with. What a great group of people – the writers and the regular (and irregular) commenters. It’s certainly a regret of mine that life got in the way and I had to leave the team.
It was the actual reviews on AMG that got me hooked. They were irreverent, entertaining, and always, always brutally honest. Hands down AMG could (and still can, even with 4.0ldeneye)6 be counted on more than any other site for the TRVE review. No 5.0-pandering to labels and bands: if it sucked, it sucked, and if it was good, well, it sucked less.
You might also be surprised to learn what great people these AMG writers are because, once you get behind the review curtain, they are a bunch of sweethearts. I miss them all!7
AMG gave to me
Darkher // Realms – The year I started with AMG, I was a deer in the headlights. Thankfully, I didn’t have to do a full year-end list, just a quick Top Ten(ish). And tops for me was Realms, from Darkher. Thanks to my good friend Grymm’s amazing writeup, I jumped on this album and never jumped off. This album got me more into doom than I’d ever been, and it’s a genre I still go to quite often (although more in the dark of winter than other times). I still spin the vinyl quite a bit. Thanks Grymm!
The Night Flight Orchestra // Amber Galactic – Another of my albums of the year that I discovered thanks to the undying admiration of my (still) good friend Dr. Fisting. Such fun. And when the guy from Bear Mace says he loves it, well, you take him seriously folks! I always read all the reviews here (still do!) and sample anything highly-rated. Amber Galactic is a big reason why.
A whole bunch of super friends // Whether they know it or not – Yes, even you, Grier!8
I wish I had written …
More YMIO features on Kiss. I did manage one for Love Gun but still, the site is sorely lacking in Kiss material.9 There should be two dozen YMIO features now.10 There should be an album ranking.11 There should be … well, maybe that’s enough.
But seriously, I wish I had written a lot more than I did in my final days. Having to cut down to two reviews a month sucked. I love finding new bands (Sermon) and writing about them, and doing it half as much, meant I was also way less engaged with the rest of the staff. So it was a double whammy. Less new music, and less camaraderie.
I wish I could do over …
Raven – Metal City. If I had known the olde feller from Raven was going to pounce on the comments because I said his album was a 2.5, I would have gone lower just to get him going even more. Nothing in my AMG days made me prouder than “Off you fuck, chief” becoming the catchphrase of the year. And Steel, I never bothered listening to All Hell’s Breaking Loose but I know for a fact you overrated it!12
#2024 #Alcest #AMGTurns15 #AnaalNathrakh #AscendTheHollow #BlogPost #BlogPosts #Candlemass #Darkher #Disillusion #EsbenAndTheWitch #Gazpacho #Gorguts #GrymmCommentsOn #Hemina #HypnoticDirgeRecords #InThisMoment #Kanonenfieber #KingGoat #Kiss #MadderMortem #MentalHealthAwareness #Mistur #MitochondrialSun #NaturmachtProductions #Raven #Sabaton #Scardust #Slugdge #StraightLineStitch #SulphurAeon #TheNightFlightOrchestra #TheOcean #TranscendingObscurity #UnfathomableRuination #ViennaTeng #WillsDissolve
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MARCUS: For such is the work of philosophy. It cures souls, draws off vain anxieties, confers freedom from desires, drives away fears.
[Nam efficit hoc philosophia: medetur animis, inanes sollicitudines detrahit, cupiditatibus liberat, pellit timores.]Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC) Roman orator, statesman, philosopher
Tusculan Disputations [Tusculanae Disputationes], Book 2, ch. 4 (2.4) / sec. 11 (2.11) (45 BC) [tr. Peabody (1886)]More about (and translations of) this quote: wist.info/cicero-marcus-tulliu…
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #cicero #tusculandisputations #calming #encouragement #medicine #mentalhealth #mind #philosophy #soothing
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MARCUS: For such is the work of philosophy. It cures souls, draws off vain anxieties, confers freedom from desires, drives away fears.
[Nam efficit hoc philosophia: medetur animis, inanes sollicitudines detrahit, cupiditatibus liberat, pellit timores.]Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC) Roman orator, statesman, philosopher
Tusculan Disputations [Tusculanae Disputationes], Book 2, ch. 4 (2.4) / sec. 11 (2.11) (45 BC) [tr. Peabody (1886)]More about (and translations of) this quote: wist.info/cicero-marcus-tulliu…
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #cicero #tusculandisputations #calming #encouragement #medicine #mentalhealth #mind #philosophy #soothing
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MARCUS: For such is the work of philosophy. It cures souls, draws off vain anxieties, confers freedom from desires, drives away fears.
[Nam efficit hoc philosophia: medetur animis, inanes sollicitudines detrahit, cupiditatibus liberat, pellit timores.]Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC) Roman orator, statesman, philosopher
Tusculan Disputations [Tusculanae Disputationes], Book 2, ch. 4 (2.4) / sec. 11 (2.11) (45 BC) [tr. Peabody (1886)]More about (and translations of) this quote: wist.info/cicero-marcus-tulliu…
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #cicero #tusculandisputations #calming #encouragement #medicine #mentalhealth #mind #philosophy #soothing
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MARCUS: For such is the work of philosophy. It cures souls, draws off vain anxieties, confers freedom from desires, drives away fears.
[Nam efficit hoc philosophia: medetur animis, inanes sollicitudines detrahit, cupiditatibus liberat, pellit timores.]Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC) Roman orator, statesman, philosopher
Tusculan Disputations [Tusculanae Disputationes], Book 2, ch. 4 (2.4) / sec. 11 (2.11) (45 BC) [tr. Peabody (1886)]More about (and translations of) this quote: wist.info/cicero-marcus-tulliu…
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #cicero #tusculandisputations #calming #encouragement #medicine #mentalhealth #mind #philosophy #soothing