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This site is, and always will be, a work in progress. There are things I've written here that I would never have the guts to tell most people about in an ordinary conversation, so you're encouraged to snoop around.

Feel free to wander around using the sidebar to the left, and I hope you enjoy the site! If you've been here before, check out the section to find out what's been added to the site since your last visit.

I'd love to hear what you think about the site, as well as any feedback you have on my ideas, opinions, or anything else; so feel free to . Also, please sign the if you have time!!

All opinions on this site are expressly those of Atool; so if you ever need to peg the blame on someone for one of society's problems, I'm right here. showContent() } function headline($text) { global $COLOR, $NORMAL_TEXT; echo ""."

". "	". $NORMAL_TEXT->write("".$text.""). "
". blanker(1,2)."

"; } Class WhatsNew extends ToolSection { /* Initializes the section with the given information. This redefinition of the constructor is required for PHP3, but not for PHP4. Weird. */ function WhatsNew($newName, $newLevel=0) { $this->name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { ?> Whenever I add something to my homepage, I'll put it on this section so people can just check here to see if anything's new on the site.

name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { ?>

I am a secret agent. I know kung fu and can wield two .35 caliber pistols with lightning-fast speed and accuracy.

Actually, this is me as a groomsman at my friend Kris' wedding. I was handing out white parasols with butterflies on them.

Hello, my name is Atool.

That's probably the first thing I'd say to you if I met you for the first time. If I wasn't nervous. It's actually an odd phrase that my friend Erik came up with a few years ago, and I have no idea why he found it so funny. By the way, my name is actually spelled "Atul" but pronounced "uh-tool", and sometime in high school I got around to writing my name as "Atool". It's supposed to be a pun I guess, kind of like "ahammer" or "ascrewdriver". But it also looks a lot cooler than "Atul".

Umm... (atool scurries for something new to write about)

I play the guitar upside-down and backwards (read: playing a right-handed guitar left handed, without the strings reversed, because that's what felt the most natural when I was teaching myself how to play from internet guitar tabs and tutorials which did a great job at describing the technicalities of chord structure but failed to mention how to hold the thing).

I also enjoy spending time with my friends very much. They have often accused me of being silly and foppish (of course, I'm not really foppish, I just like the word "fop."). One of the most memorable times of my life was during the spring of 1997, during my senior year of high school, when I went to Mexico with my friends to build a house for a needy family in the outskirts of Tijuana.

The picture to the right, entitled The Great Fop, was taken at the building site by Ferf Schlosser.

I'm currently a math major at Kenyon college. I don't really know why I majored in math; I like it and all, but I don't do it in my spare time, and I don't want to do it for the rest of my life. In all honesty, I kind of wish I majored in film studies or philosophy. Although philosophy can get pretty depressing when you start convincing yourself that you don't have free will or something silly like that. Yet, as I've learned from many well-respected thinkers, it's still entirely possible that all my actions are predetermined, the world doesn't actually exist, and my head will evaporate.

This is my mum. Er, this was my mum, in 1979, when she was pregnant with meee. She's awesome. Definitely the coolest mum a kid could ask for, except for the fact that she wouldn't let me have a dog or cat for a pet. Grrr. But on the other hand, she makes really good Indian food, and she talks with a funny accent. My friend (who shall remain anonymous) wants to go out with her, but I'm having trouble convincing him that she doesn't look like this anymore, and she's already taken.

My dad's pretty cool too, but I don't have a picture of him looking like a badass. If I find one, I'll put it here.

If you want to dig up some dirt on me, check out this Google search for "Atul Varma". It's actually pretty accurate—almost all the links are relevant to me, not someone else named Atul Varma. It's got info on me all the way back to the early 1990's, so blackmail away.

Also, check out Fusion, my online portfolio. It has a bunch of my best artwork, papers, computer programs, websites, and my resume.

name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { global $NORMAL_TEXT; ?> These are the heroes of the Atooliverse.

B E C K S T E R begin() ?> Beckster is an accomplished hugger and a master chef of vegetarian and vegan cuisine. Drawing from her native Iowan background and her extensive knowledge of world religions and the Greek language, Beckster whips up dishes that send her foes to their knees, their taste buds rendered useless in the face of her goddess-like cooking prowess. Beckster is also a worshipping fan of Hefner, They Might Be Giants, and Pessin. end() ?>

M E R L E begin() ?> A scholar of Women's Studies, Merle can transform into a femi-nazi at will and rends the innards of her opponents by reciting the speeches of Sojourner Truth and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Additionally, Merle has intimate knowledge of human psychology and uses it to rescue her allies from the onslaught of heightened emotional stress. Her psychopower also enables her to make everyone around her think she's cool. As a side effect, however, they also think she hates them. To boot, Merle has the squishiest nose in the world. end() ?>

M O N K E Y begin() ?> Imported from Nepal, Monkey is Atool's honorary straightedge sibling and warrior bitch. She revels in hugging her friends, licking them, and chewing their nipples. A hyperactive whirlwind of brownie power, the might of this mini-titan is fueled by a supply of Pixie Stix, Nerds, and Energon Cubes. Monkey is also an adept raver and can hypnotize any foe with her jungly dancing skills. end() ?>

S T E N begin() ?> Sten didn't think the men in the black suits were serious when they mentioned something about him being unable to speak. Sten might play the guitar famously, but he definitely can't sing anymore. end() ?>

name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { global $NORMAL_TEXT; ?> These are the villains of the Atooliverse.

P E S S I N begin() ?> Armed with piercing eyes and clever wit, Pessin is a cunning adversary. This god-among-men wins his friends through orating his incisive philosophical sermons to his classes and taking as disciples anyone who swoons at his words. But be wary, for soon he may have you doubting your own will, the reality of the world around you, and even the very existence of those you hold dear. Pessin also plays the guitar famously. end() ?>

E R I C H O N begin() ?> This soulless husk of a man gains his power through studying the black arts of mathematics and philosophy; an astute disciple of Pessin, he too has the ability to make you doubt everything you love and hate. Erichon also makes fun of Atool a lot, and as to why Atool chose Erichon to be his roommate is anybody's guess. On a side note, Erichon plays the guitar, though rather unfamously. end() ?>

R E D S C A R E begin() ?> This insane man has the unique ability to weave hypnotic yet socially destructive Communist ideas into seemingly harmless lyrical verse. RedScare's one weakness is that he is unbelievably attracted to Atool and this compromises his skills in hand-to-Atool combat. Little does Redscare know, however, that Atool has a giant crush on him and would do anything to get in bed with the Commie freak. end() ?>

name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { ?> So I was going to have this section be a page on how cool technology is, and it was going to have all these links to the programs I use and nerdy things like that.

But I'm not too keen about computers right now. Don't get me wrong—I like them, I'm not a technophobe or anything, but working on them for too long just sucks the life out of me.

For me, being a nerd represents being obsessed with efficiency. I'm sure there are nerds who aren't obsessed with efficiency (I think I'm slowly becoming one of them), but I definitely used to be very obsessed with it all. Learning Linux, Java, PHP, SQL, and all the other 3 and 4 letter acronyms out there just let me do things quicker and faster, but a little while ago I realized that I wasn't interested in actually doing anything besides doing things quicker and faster.

In other words, for me the concept of "efficiency" is like a virus because it seems to feed on itself; when I'm trying to be efficient I get so obsessed with it that I just spend all my time trying to be more efficient instead of just doing what I need to do.

If all we do is try to be more and more efficient in the way we do things, when do we have time to really enjoy life?

I think this whole attitude has been thought out by a lot of nerds before, and it's probably all old hat for them: I never quite knew what my computer science teacher meant by the famous geek phrase "it's not optimal to optimize," but I think I know what it means now.

So I figure the solution is for me to figure out when I'm getting too obsessed with efficiency. It's working so far, and as a result I'm starting to use computers less (i.e., not 24 hours a day). I think that the time I would've spent endlessly optimizing the way I use computers is now spent actually creating content, like this website.

But I'm not yet sure about what this section will contain other than this little rant. name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { ?> People are cool. I like them. Without them, life would be boring and desolate, like this page.

However, I'm a bit antisocial, which makes it hard for me to get to know them. I guess "socially awkward" would be a better term than "antisocial"; I usually have trouble interacting with a lot of people I don't know well, and I don't really know why. I guess I fear people will think Atool is a fool. So when I'm around other people, I'm sort of a "percentage" of my real self. When I'm around total strangers, I'm usually around 10% myself: this means I'm a mute automaton that only speaks (tersely) when spoken to, like a dumb puppet. When I'm with close friends, I'm usually 100% myself, which means I'm very silly, goofy, spontaneous, and social. I'm slowly trying to be more of "myself" around people I don't know well, and I guess it's working.

I can't think of anything else to put in here. name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { ?> c u l t u r e t h i e f

I love culture.

It helps me understand how the world works and how different people see the world. Altering my perception of reality is one of my favorite pasttimes, and what better a way to do that than by learning about various cultures. I think that a good deal of our beliefs and actions are shaped by social constructs like "identity", "art", and "morality", which makes culture all the rage for me.

Eventually, I believe that capitalistic societies will begin to market culture in small packages resembling laundry detergent. They don't currently package it that way.

I'm also a believer of Claude Levi-Strauss' concept of bricolage, which is a theory that claims culture is transmitted by its objects, and those objects can be used by people to develop and assimilate ideas. So, say, by playing Monopoly, a child gains knowledge about the culture that made it, and thereby learns about concepts like competition, land ownership, rampant capitalism and the construction of housing for profit, the devouring of resources without any thought towards the welfare of future generations, and going to jail for no reason.

The subsections here are some of my favorite sources for absorbing the vast muck of culture that surrounds us. name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { ?> write("film snobbery"); ?> begin() ?> These are some of my favorite directors and their films, yo.

write("Curtis Hanson - L.A. Confidential, 8 Mile"); echo $LIST_BOX_TEXT->write("Akira Kurosawa - The Seven Samurai, Yojimbo, Stray Dog, Ran"); echo $LIST_BOX_TEXT->write("Krysztof Kieslowski - Blue, White, Red"); echo $LIST_BOX_TEXT->write("Steven Soderbergh - Sex, Lies, and Videotape, Schizopolis, Out of Sight, The Limey, Erin Brockovich, Traffic, Ocean's Eleven"); echo $LIST_BOX_TEXT->write("Frederico Fellini - Nights of Cabiria, 8 1/2"); echo $LIST_BOX_TEXT->write("Joel/Ethan Coen - The Hudsucker Proxy, Fargo"); echo $LIST_BOX_TEXT->write("Yasujiro Ozu - Tokyo Story"); echo $LIST_BOX_TEXT->write("Stanley Kubrick - Dr. Strangelove, A Clockwork Orange"); echo $LIST_BOX_TEXT->write("Wim Wenders - Paris, Texas, Wings of Desire"); echo $LIST_BOX_TEXT->write("Jim Jarmusch - Mystery Train, Night on Earth"); echo $LIST_BOX_TEXT->write("John Woo - The Killer, Hard-Boiled, Face/Off"); echo $LIST_BOX_TEXT->write("Wes Anderson - Bottle Rocket, Rushmore, The Royal Tenenbaums"); echo $LIST_BOX_TEXT->write("Woody Allen - Hannah and Her Sisters"); echo $LIST_BOX_TEXT->write("Kar-Wai Wong - Chungking Express"); ?> end(); ?> I've always been a casual fan of movies, but it wasn't until the fall of 1999 when I took my first film course at college that I really started to appreciate the medium.

My tastes in film are like most people's taste in books; I like viewing films for mind-opening interpretation and analysis, but I also like viewing films for visual splendor and fun value (my favorite movies of all time are the ones that have a mix of both). So, as a result my taste in movies ranges from "heavy" works like 8 1/2, Walkabout, and My Dinner With Andre to fun thingies like Face/Off and Transformers: The Movie. The only kinds of movies I don't like are the ones that are blandly formulaic.

Over the summer of 2000, I started writing some film reviews/commentaries on the IMDB. None of them contain spoilers, so they're safe to read if you've never seen them before. Here they are (in alphabetical order):

1. 28 Days (2000)
2. Batman (1989)
3. Bottle Rocket (1996)
4. Bowling for Columbine (2002)
5. Chuck&Buck (2000)
6. Conceiving Ada (1997)
7. Dancer in the Dark (2000)
8. Dernier combat, Le (1983)
9. Erin Brockovich (2000)
10. Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982)
11. Fifth Element, The (1997)
12. French Connection, The (1971)
13. Go (1999)
14. Groove (2000)
15. Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, The (2001)
16. Mariachi, El (1992)
17. Plan 9 from Outer Space (1958)
18. Risky Business (1983)
19. Shallow Hal (2001)
20. Sleepless in Seattle (1993)
21. Smoke Signals (1998)
22. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990)
23. Titan A.E. (2000)
24. Traffic (2000)
25. Trainspotting (1996)
26. X-Men (2000)

This list might not be up to date; the latest version can be found here. Keep in mind, though, that these commentaries aren't very objective, and reflect what I value about certain kinds of films; I can be pretty fanatical right after I've seen a movie I'm really crazy (or not crazy at all) about, and that's usually when I write a review. My opinions on movies can also change pretty often, so just because I slammed (or drooled over) a movie in a review doesn't mean I still hate it (or love it).

Steven Soderbergh is God

Every single one of Soderbergh's films I've seen so far has been a masterpiece in its own totally different way, and I've been anxiously waiting for him to come out with a total dud, but it's not working. I was blown away by Sex Lies & Videotape, Schizopolis, Out of Sight, the Limey, Erin Brockovich, and Traffic. The most interesting thing about his films is that they're all very different from one another, although one thing they share in common is that they're all very accessible to the general public (with the possible exception of Schizopolis).

One of my favorite things about this director is his ability to show the sides of famous actors that audiences have never seen before; with "Out of Sight" he proved that George Clooney and Jennifer Lopez could act, and "Erin Brockovich" was one of Julia Roberts' first films that wasn't a cutesy romantic comedy. Soderbergh even proved that he could act when he cast himself as the main character of Schizopolis (and he's also incredibly good at it). Continuing this trend, he put Catherine Zeta-Jones in a very serious role in "Traffic", and it's a far cry from the cliche sex object she played in Entrapment, The Haunting, and similar films. Whatever Soderbergh's next film is, I'd really like to see him cast Arnold Schwarzenegger as the male lead. That would rawk.

name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { ?> Scud: The Disposable Assassin

My favorite funny comic of all time. An eccentric mix of John Woo-inspired action scenes, characters reminiscent of Jeunet and Caro's twisted surreality, biting social commentary, and a freakishly funny potpourri of pop-culture parodies. Scud's creator, Rob Schrab, takes everything we know about American culture and just... well, does something with it. At first I was kind of weirded out by this comic, but after the first few issues I was either driven insane or started to understand why this series is so incredibly cool.

Check out www.scud.com for the website.

Watchmen

The most intellectually engaging comic I've ever read. They call it a "postmodern reworking of the superhero comic" or something like that, and, like a lot of people, I still have no idea what the term "postmodern" really means except that it involves something about morality not being universal (or simply not existing at all), and a bunch of themes that are associated with that concept (skepticism about the existence of absolute truths, God, etc).

In Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (the writer and artist) explore what would happen in a "real world" in which the pulp fiction and superhero comics of the 1930's (Superman, Batman, etc) actually influenced a handful of people to become masked vigilantes. The book recognizes the fact that anyone crazy enough to don a costume and fight crime would have to be very unique, meaning that they're either really messed up, or very brave. Or both. Regardless, they're still very human, and they want to change the world. Moore uses such characters as lenses for examining humanity; each individual represents a different world-view. For instance, one person sees the world as black and white (actions are either good or evil, the latter must be punished), another is more of a Machiavellian utilitarian concerned with maximizing the greater good at the cost of some necessary harm, and another simply sees human beings as lumps of moving matter. Using these characters, Moore examines issues ranging from ethics to self-image and sexuality to the nature of society, human interaction, insanity, and much more. Any attempt at fully explaining the full scope of this book would either be incomplete or too long-winded, so I'll just stop now and restate the obvious: this is the most intellectually engaging comic I've ever read.

Oh, and just because this book is postmodern doesn't mean it has no plot—it does have one, I'm just not giving any of it away. :)

If you've read Watchmen, check out The Annotated Watchmen, an interesting guide to possible symbolism inherent in the book.

Interpreter of Maladies

This is a little book a really cool cousin-in-law of mine gave me a while back. I guess it won the Pulitzer Prize and stuff, and I really liked it.

So I'm a native-born American citizen with Indian (immigrant) parents, and I've rarely felt particularly "Indian", as my parents raised me without telling me much about my cultural heritage. The little they did tell me about Indian culture regarded how silly they thought some of its customs were, such as arranged marriage and religious fasting.

And so I found this book incredibly interesting. I've read very little fiction about India, so I don't know how these stories compare to the rest of what's out there, but I loved every one of them. They gave me an immense amount of respect for my heritage, from its broad ideals to its intricate details. They also provided me with a viewpoint that I could easily relate to, since most of the main characters were Americans or Indians who had spent all or much of their life in America.

In particular, I was fascinated by the way the author depicts things that are normally seen by Western culture as backwards and oppressive. For instance, her portrayal of arranged marriage is interesting because it's not presented as something inferior to the American model of courtship and love, but as an alternative. I found that many of the stories in this book challenge the Western conceptions of "soulmates" and "finding the perfect match" by suggesting that an individual can love almost anyone romantically and unconditionally and can happily live with them for the rest of their days, as long as they are willing to put effort into the relationship and treat the other person with respect and understanding. Lahiri's stories are full of cultural juxtapositions that are catalysts for such ruminations, although they're often very subtle (I'm sure I missed a ton of them) so it's usually up to the reader to make the connections. Which I don't have a problem with, because it means I can read her stories over and over and keep finding new things in them.

Unlike many other short stories I've encountered, most of the stories in this book didn't have some kind of "surprise plot twist". In fact, most short stories I've read are more like full-length novels compressed into 20 or 30 pages: they have an exposition, rising action, climax, resolution, and a lot of action takes place in them. Lahiri's stories aren't like this at all; they're more like portraits that change over time. I mean, a single day in anyone's life is a story, and a very interesting one: not because all kinds of events and plot twists happen, but because of everything else. Lahiri focuses on everything else.

A still-frame portrait takes a single, uneventful instant in someone's life and makes it beautiful. Similarly, Lahiri's short stories take a few relatively uneventful days, weeks, or months in an ordinary person's life and make them seem extraordinary. Without being trite, contrived, or corny. I don't know how she accomplishes this, but I'm envious.

name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { ?> The first time I ran into the concept of a "Mental Environment" was in Kalle Lasn's book Culture Jam. Lasn makes analogies between this concept and the familiar "physical environment", which is simply how the world we live in affects us in physical ways. In the 1980's, we found evidence that our planet's ecosystem was in bad shape and could significantly affect us physically if we didn't do something about it.

Now, according to the analogy, the "Mental Environment" is the concept that our surroundings affect us not physically, but mentally: they shape how we think and what we think. For example, the information in the world around us—what our parents teach us, the way people around us behave, our physical surroundings (including a plethora of advertisements)—instructs us on how to live our lives, what we should value in life, what gives life meaning, and so forth. This sounds pretty sensible to me.

The claim Lasn makes is that, like our physical environment, our mental environment has been polluted by the world around us.

Take, for example, the fact that a huge majority of America's population has one mental sickness or another—be it Seasonal Affective Disorder, Depression, Hyperactivity, Attention Deficit Disorder, or something else. The proportion of people affected with mental sicknesses is also increasing rapidly. Some people think that psychologists have simply "made up" these disorders or are finding the silliest reasons to classify perfectly normal people as having them.

Although I don't believe this to be the case, there are other, far less ambiguous signs of pollution in our mental environment. Take the general consensus that more and more people these days are finding their lives to be devoid of meaning (disagree? watch American Beauty, Fight Club, or Office Space). The consensus that most middle-class Americans find themselves bored and apathetic most of the time, and often turn to drugs, television, video games, or the internet for a more interesting experience. Or the fact that children are going to their schools and shooting down everyone in sight (and this isn't an isolated incident—there are people at nearly every high school around America that want to do the same thing but they've never been pushed far enough or had the guts to do it). Or the fact that a huge number of women are incredibly dissatisfied with their bodies to the point that they badly hurt themselves so they can look more "beautiful".

These are not the incidences of a few freak "weirdos" in our society. Most middle-class Americans are like this, and this means that the problem isn't rooted solely in the individual, but in the culture at large.

I am positive that our mental environment is polluted.

The problem is that the issue of mental pollution is so complex that people, when faced with it, eventually give up in apathy. Now we shrug when we see another shooting spree enacted by a disgruntled member of society. We're completely unsurprised when we find out that someone we know is bulimic, and when we try to help, we cure the symptom (the person with bulimia) but not the cause: the dominant culture which tells people that "you are not a true woman unless you are thin, and the thinner you are, the more attractive, valuable, and worthy you are as a human being."

I think the major difficulty here is that it's very hard to find out what the true cause of a social problem is. Because the society which creates our culture is so vast, complex, and interconnected, it's incredibly difficult to pinpoint a source of pollution. Obviously the most short-sighted approach to a cultural problem is to regard each incident as isolated and accuse the individuals involved: concluding that children's problems are purely the result of bad parenting, for instance. More insightful analysis will accuse larger groups or structures: the community, the government, the media, corporations. Perhaps all of these people and organizations are responsible to a certain extent.

I'm pretty confused by all of it myself, and I'm trying to understand it better. I'll add blurbs to this section when I think of something interesting to write about.

Culture Jam

The full title of this book is Culture Jam: How To Reverse America's Suicidal Consumer Binge—And Why We Must. It's a great book, though it's not without its flaws. The book introduced me to the concept of the "mental environment", and in particular how consumer culture is polluting it. As you can probably tell from the title, the book is about the dangers of corporate power in general.

But beyond merely complaining about the effects of consumer culture like most college students do (myself included), Lasn digs much deeper into the issues, explaining how and why corporations are affecting our culture and the world in negative ways, and how they have come to wield as much power as they do; by the end of the book, he even outlines a plan of action for concerned citizens.

One of the most important messages Lasn sends out is that the Culture Jammer movement isn't just about a cushy middle-class citizenry getting those pesky advertisements out of every sector of our lives; it's about restoring a true state of freedom to America and, as Lasn says, changing the way meaning is produced in our society. At its best, the Culture Jamming movement is about changing our culture to offer a truly democratic way of exchanging information, and it aims to restore authenticity and a sense of meaning to our lives.

If you want to find out more about the book and what I think of it, check out my review of it here, which I wrote for the Kenyon Green Party.

You can purchase the book here at amazon.com.

name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { ?> Björk

Björk is the embodiment of everything I value about modern culture. For me, her attitude represents the total absence of repression and the triumph of emotion and free will. She is also one of the weirdest and most open-minded people I've ever seen.

But then again, I don't actually know her, so I can't really say that. Everything I know about Björk comes from her music, her music videos, this FAQ, and a dinky documentary of her that I saw on Bravo. Given what I've learned about her, I'm practically forced to idolize her, which is a shame because it sort of takes away from her humanity. But the very idea of "knowing" someone I've never met really seems quite absurd. In the end, I guess I should just enjoy her music. And that's a great gift.

I also have this huuuge crush on her.

(On the other hand, I'm proud to say that Björk is the only celebrity I've ever been with. Except for this weird fixation I had with Michael J. Fox in the third grade.)

Moving right along...

Tullycraft

Tullycraft is a bubblegum pop band that came out of Seattle circa 1994. Their music is sweet, infectious, and it's got that genuine "indie" feel—meaning it's lo-fi, not overmixed, has imperfections in the recording, and a bunch of other stuff that's now done intentionally by major record labels to make their bands appeal to the indie market. Yay capitalism!

Anyways, I've loved this band ever since my friend Charles introduced them to me a few years ago. Their songs can range from being honey-like and sweet, as in their song sweet, to switching between bouts of frantic bitterness and manic anticipation, as in their song pop songs your boyfriend's too stupid to know about. Their latest album, Old Traditions New Standards, can still be purchased online here at amazon.com.

Britney Spears

Ok, I'm being honest here. I think her music rocks. Contrary to the indie genre, I love the hi-fi, studio-perfect sound of Spears' songs. The pure energy of teen pop is something I don't hear from any other musical genre, and it is catchy as hell. In particular, I like the way some elements of her music take me back to the world of 80's pop with their attitude and some other stuff I can't really identify because I'm not a music critic, yet the music as a whole sounds like something ultra-modern, with the distorted voice-overs and other things. In the world of musical cuisine, this stuff is pure, sugar-infested candy for me; if I have too much of it at once I get sick, but moderate doses are incredibly yummy.

My friends say they hate her music, but when they're drunk, they're singing along to "Baby One More Time"... I wonder what that could mean. It seems like part of the definition of being "intelligent" or "musically mature" these days means you have to hate teen-pop, but I love this stuff.

On the other hand, although I do like Britney Spears' music, I don't think she's a positive role model for young girls because she presents herself, essentially, as nothing but a sex object; although there is intelligence behind the lyrics in her songs, these lyrics aren't emphasized in her public image, which is rooted in her sexuality and the sound (not the content) of her music.

Addendum: I heard more of her songs, and some of them really suck. Particularly the ones that are all gooey and about how she was born to make guys happy or some crap like that. But I still like her badass songs, like Stronger and What U See (Is What U Get).

Other artists

This is just a list of other artists I'm into, but I don't have enough time (or willpower) to write about all of them now. When I'm listening to one of them and feel inspired to write about why I like them, I'll probably add to this page.

begin(); ?> R.E.M. Weezer Garbage Ben Lee The Pixies Backstreet Boys Violent Femmes Buena Vista Social Club Lyle Lovett Loreena McKennitt Sloan Archers of Loaf They Might Be Giants Smashmouth Everclear Yoko Kanno Erin McKeown end(); ?>

begin(); ?> Cibo Matto Pizzicato Five Cornelius N'Sync Liz Phair Moby Radiohead For Squirrels The Sugarcubes The Murmurs Howlin' Maggie Pavement The Offspring Cake Dashboard Confessional Eminem end(); ?>

name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { ?> Being a geek, I like computer games. Innately. When I was growing up, I had no siblings, so my parents bought me one. They called it an "IBM PC", and I spent hours with it every day (I think... I don't remember much from my childhood because I don't think I really had thoughts back then).

These days I see computer games as an interactive art form, and I think of them as I do most other cultural media: while it's fine for a work of interactive art to be used for pure amusement, I think that the spectrum of possibilities for such a medium shouldn't be limited to pure entertainment. As with films and literature, some works are intended for pure amusement while others are more philosophical or intended to inform, and my favorite ones encompass all these qualities (for instance, Kurosawa's films and Shakespeare's plays both entertain, inform, and provoke thought).

Deus Ex

This is definitely my favorite game of all time. It combines the "golden triad" of artistic elements: it's incredibly fun, informative, and thought-provoking.

In this game, you are J.C. Denton, the latest of a nanotechnologically augmented line of government agents employed by the United Nations Anti-Terrorist Coalition. Your mission is to combat terrorism wherever it strikes. At first glance, this sounds simple and puerile enough for the premise of a computer game; but it involves a remarkable amount of depth, however, for the designers of Deus Ex intelligently portray the definition of the term "terrorist" as rather ambiguous; for instance, America's forefathers were once viewed as terrorists by the British government. I'm not going to delve any deeper into this, since I don't want to spoil the game's plot, suffice to say that the story involves a ton of conspiracies, most of which don't really seem that irrational or paranoid at all to me. Throughout the game, many issues are tackled, which made me think seriously about the implications of globalization, poverty, elite power structures and grassroots politics, police brutality, artificial intelligence, and more.

One of my favorite things about the game's story is the diversity of viewpoints within a group; this game antagonizes individual characters but almost never antagonizes groups, as all organizations (including those you oppose) have at least a few members who are honest, intelligent, and strive to make the world a better place.

The socio-political flavor of the game's story is seamlessly combined with the raw fun and open-ended structure of the game. In many senses Deus Ex is a sort of "choose your own adventure"; although your character's choices are constrained in a lot of ways, it would take a huge amount of effort to make the game more open-ended than it already is, and the game is still far less linear than 90% of the games available today. Such choices range from grand decisions that have far-reaching impacts on the story to more minute gameplay issues. An example of the latter, for instance, could be when you have to enter a locked building. In such a situation, you would be able to:

• enter the building by force by breaking a door down (often alerting nearby police or guards, which you'll have to either incapacitate or stealthily avoid)
• enter the building via a sewer or ventilation shaft
• lockpick one of the building's doors
• hack the security system to unlock the door
• wait for a guard on patrol to come through the door (thereby unlocking it as he comes through)
• incapacitate a guard and take a key to the building from his body
• figure something else out.

When you begin the game, you are essentially an ordinary human being; but as you progress through the story you acquire various "nano-augmentations" and develop skills that gradually turn your character into what amounts to a realistic superhero. The fact that you're just a "regular joe" at the beginning also allows you to relate to the character you're playing, and there's a sense of accomplishment by the end of the game because you're a fucking badass.

I could go on and on about this game, but it's hard to talk about Deus Ex without giving away spoilers about the game's story, so just play it and we can talk after that. :)

Be aware though, that the game does have many flaws; many parts of the plot are rather illogical, certain parts of the story aren't developed as much as you'd like, and some aspects of the gameplay are a little lame; but in my opinion the benefits of the game far outweigh its flaws.

If you'd like to find out more about the game, check out http://www.deusex.com, the game's official website.

This is a political game that deals with a wide variety of issues of governing a nation-state. In the midst of the Cold War, you are the newly-appointed ruler of a South American country whose ruthless dictator was recently overthrown by a coalition of three political parties with disparate ideologies. One member of the coalition was very Marxist, another member was for slow progressive reform, and the other group is composed of wealthy industrialists and bankers who were fed up with the dictator's rule. As the leader of the new government, you must choose your cabinet from members of the three political parties, and your goal is to improve the country as much as possible during your three years in office—assuming you don't get overthrown or assassinated in the process.

Of course, exactly what is meant by "improving the country" is up to you; you can attempt to improve education or the health care system, improve the lives of the rural poor by redistributing wealth and land reform, develop infrastructure, reduce corruption in the government, wipe out the followers of the fallen dictator who are still roaming the countryside and oppressing your people, improve your country's foreign or domestic economy, and a ton of other things.

But it's virtually impossible to get all of these things done, and there is no way you'll have anything resembling a utopia by the time your tenure is over; so you have to make compromises. For instance, in order to get much-needed financial and military aid from the United States you need to do what the US wants you to do; in other words, you have to be their pawn, and in the Cold War this means that you can't have anything to do with Marxism. Most attempts in land reform and redistribution of wealth and keeping food prices affordable for the poor, however, require the suppression of capitalism, which to the U.S. means that you're Marxist. If you want education and good health care for all your citizens, however, you'll need the financial aid from sources like the U.S. and the IMF. This means that you'll need a good foreign economy to repay debts, which means that you'll probably have to screw over the poorer farmers and allow big businesses to reap maximum profit for your nation. There are many different strategies to doing what you want to get done, but this is just an example of some of the issues involved in the game. Needless to say, anyone who thinks that all politicians are incompetent fools really needs to play this game to discover that it is damn hard to run a country and solutions to widespread problems aren't as easy as a lot of people would like to think they are.

Most other political simulations I've played concentrate almost entirely on military and economic power, ignoring domestic issues like poverty and education. Clearly, that isn't the case with Hidden Agenda. In this game, you consult one-on-one with a wide variety of contacts to determine your nation's agenda: these people range from landless laborers to IMF representatives, health care workers, industrialists, coffee growers, union leaders, religious leaders, bankers, teachers, rights activists, ambassadors from other countries, and more. All this helps make it the best political simulation I've ever played.

Fortunately, this game was made so long ago (1988) that it's basically free now, and you can download it here from the Home of the Underdogs. It'll basically work on any IBM compatible that has access to some kind of DOS interface (so it should work with Win95/98 and NT/2000). If you have even a slight interest in politics, try this game!

Addendum: Actually, the game isn't free per se; Jim Gasperini, the author, set up this cool thing where he'll give you the game for free if you 1) tell him what you think of it and 2) make a contribution to a NGO working in Central America. I think that's a really cool idea, as this is the first game I've come across that actually motivates the player to get involved in social justice. You can find out more about this deal here.

Other Games

This is just a list of other games I really like, but I don't have enough time (or willpower) to write about all of them now. When I'm playing one of them and feel inspired to write about why I like it, I'll probably add to this page. For convenience, though, I've added a link to a game's homepage where applicable.

begin(); ?> Marvel vs. Capcom 2 Jet Grind Radio No One Lives Forever Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri Sid Meier's Civilization Soul Calibur Rainbow Six Tony Hawk's Pro Skater Grim Fandango The Last Express end(); ?>

begin(); ?> Alter Ego Rameses Photopia A Mind Forever Voyaging Final Fantasy IV Unreal Tournament Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers Bushido Blade Planescape: Torment Advance Wars end(); ?>

name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { ?> This section will be used for all kinds of issues that I have an opinion on; they can be societal, political, scientific, ethical, or anything else. So I guess this is the unofficial "reflective thoughts and philosophy" side of my homepage.

I'm also happy to discuss these issues with anyone, so if you have feedback, please !

name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { ?> It wasn't until just the end of the 2000 election that I got slightly interested in politics in general (before that I was apathetic, even repulsed by it). Since then my interest has skyrocketed. I'm not entirely sure what my political views are as of yet, and I'm still trying to determine where I stand on most issues. I guess I tend to be a little left-leaning but at the same time I'm pretty empathic with a lot of conservative issues like Buchanan's stance on multiculturalism.

I guess my main "rule of thumb" is that I never want to fall into the trap of objectifying any political party as "a bunch of idiots" because I think there are intelligent people in any organization who honestly want to make the world a better place. So my main goal is to understand why people from all political perspectives see things the way they do.

Despite the fact that I have no firm political views yet, I recently joined my local campus Green Party rather than the Democrats or Republicans. The thing that really interests me in Green parties in particular isn't so much their stances on particular issues as it is their paradigm of "grassroots" politics, or the idea that it is the common people who should influence the politics of a government rather than the elite few (e.g. career politicians, corporations, etc). Because of this, the Green party strives to educate and inform, to make all people interested in politics and the world around them, to convince them that they can make a difference. For me, the message of the Green Party is "Hey! Stop being apathetic, get involved in your community, be a responsible citizen, because that's the only way our country can be a better place!" rather than "Just vote for us and we'll fix everything".

In this way, I think the Greens aim to enhance democracy and make people aware of politics rather than shoving their political views down other people's throats. I really like that.

Addendum: Oops. No, most Green politicians seem to shove their political views down other people's throats about as much as anyone else.

Lately I've been getting the idea that most people think of "Democracy" as a system in which the majority get to force their preferences upon everyone else. It also seems like a lot of people want to defend free speech, but only when it's speech that agrees with their ideas.

Reason Magazine

I ran into this magazine around the beginning of 2002, following a link from a banner ad on The Christian Science Monitor. I guess it's supposed to be a Libertarian magazine, and I'm not sure exactly what the Libertarian "platform" is per se, besides the general consensus that freedom is good stuff. Regardless, the thing I really like about this magazine is the fact that its articles--whether I ultimately agree with them or not--are written in a very logical manner. Most recent articles I've read generally fall into one of two categories: in the case of "objective news" articles, the reader is overloaded with irrelevant information that he can do nothing with; or, in the case of opinion pieces, the author simply blurts out his opinion with ambiguous "statistics" which he has selected and interpreted in a way such that they support what he's writing.

In most Reason articles, however, the author builds an actual argument that provokes thought and motivates rational conversation. Sure, the author may use ambiguous or selective statistics to support his argument, but it's ultimately the argument and the logical progression of thoughts within it--not the stats, the conclusion or final "opinion"--that provide the true substance of the writing. And because the articles are written so rationally, it's easy to figure out what exact parts of it you agree or disagree with, and for what reasons. I think there's a good reason why Reason's called Reason.

So anyhow, if you're interested, check it out at www.reason.com.

Other Random Links

ifeminists - The Individualist Feminism movement advocates the equal treatment of men and women as individuals under just law ("just laws" being laws that protect peaceful individuals). This basically means that ifeminists look to abolish any forms of gender discrimination that may affect women in a positive or negative way (this includes things like affirmative action). They also seek to decriminalize prostitution and pornography, because they believe that what a peaceful individual wants to do with his or her own body is his or her own business.

My comments on Michael Moore's film, Bowling for Columbine - Ok, to put it simply, I didn't like it much.

Reason's interview with Jesse "The Body" Ventura - When the guy became governor, I didn't know anything about him except that he used to be a pro wrestler. Well, I think that most of what he says in this interview makes a lot of sense.

name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { ?> I don't know much about economics. I have very little knowledge about things like supply and demand. In fact, I was positively turned off by the field until a little while ago... The entire study just seemed to be obsessed with making profit and having nothing else to do with reality.

Then I found out that economics actually used to be a branch of philosophy called "moral philosophy". It turns out that most of the founders of economics were actually philosophers and social scientists trying to make the world a fairer place for everyone. Imagine that.

This idea intrigued me a lot, and gave me an immense amount of respect for the field. Although I still think that most of today's economists (I think they're called "neoclassical economists") are a bit too obsessed with making money; it seems like they assume that the world is a better, fairer place just because big companies are making more money. But hey, what do I know about it.

Free Market Capitalism Rocks ... kind of.

I think that Adam Smith's concept of a Lassiez-Faire economy is sound, and Adam Smith seemed like a pretty wacky guy. He once sleepwalked fifteen miles, and that is really cool.

However, I also think that Smith's conception of the "Invisible Hand"—the societal and market conditions that cause a free market economy to regulate itself—carries with it the condition that it is dependent on the state of society. If the society is healthy and functioning, then the invisible hand will be healthy and functioning; but if society isn't working right, then the invisible hand won't work right either. That's because manufacturers, in order to be profitable, will be required to make the kinds of products that a sick society wants to buy.

Here's an example of what I'm talking about.

The line at the bottom of this Diesel ad says "Think of all the bad things in the world. Then think about shopping ... that's why I love shopping."

"Yes!" say the neoclassical economists. "If this advertising strategy gets people to buy the product, then the company will prosper, the national economy will improve, and the world will be a better place!"

Yes, the world will definitely be a better place once consumers buy Diesel's $130 jeans and ignore t he rest of those "bad things in the world" around them, like poverty and inequality. Which means that companies are free to use those "bad things" to their advantage in order to make more profit; because hey, consumers won't care about all those "bad things" like sweatshops and deforestation—they just want their cool jeans.

This kind of advertising strategy works because our culture, at least partially through a half-century of advertising, has been shaped to value secluding oneself away from everyone else (in a magical land called Suburbia) and indulging oneself in a fit of rampant consumerism to satisfy their every desire, while the rest of the world dies around them. And it's a feedback loop, because most of these people will hold the kinds of corporate jobs that help maintain the consumer binge. They will become part of a system that does not heal a sick society, but hurts it more.

According to Smith's free market phi losophy, a company that makes a bad product is supposed to go out of business, but that can't happen when the consumers are idiotic, ignorant, misinformed, or apathetic. I think Adam Smith would not be proud of what we've become.

Perhaps it's corporate control of the media and advertising promoting rampant consumerism that has made our society this sick. Maybe it's something else entirely. Whatever the cause, our society isn't healthy right now, and that means the invisible hand isn't working right either. And that means that the free market isn't doing what it's supposed to be doing: making the world a better, fairer place for everyone.

If you want to find out more about why I think our culture is unhealthy and what this means for our own lives, I suggest you check out Toolness' section if you haven't already.

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Sorry, but the guestbook has been disabled because spammers found it and started going nuts.

name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { global $THIS_URL; $GUESTBOOK_FILE = "guest.txt"; global $action, $gbook_submit, $gbook_name, $gbook_email; global $gbook_loc, $gbook_comment; if ($gbook_submit) { echo "You shouldn't be here. If you are a spambot, then I hope you segfault a nasty one and cause a cataclysmic chain reaction that ends up electrocuting whatever asswipe created you."; return; if ($gbook_name == "") { echo "At least fill in your name, dood!"; echo "

". "Go back"; } else { if ($gbook_comment == "") $gbook_comment = "[no comment]"; /* read the contents of the old guestbook file */ $fd = fopen($GUESTBOOK_FILE, "r+"); $gbSize = filesize($GUESTBOOK_FILE); $gbContents = fread($fd, $gbSize); /* create a new guestbook file */ $fd = fopen($GUESTBOOK_FILE, "w+"); $gbook_date = date("F j, Y"); fwrite($fd, "\n"); /* append the contents of the old guestbook file */ fwrite($fd, $gbContents); fclose($fd); /* email atool about the guestbook entry. */ if ($gbook_email == "") $gbook_email = "unknown"; if ($gbook_name == "") $gbook_name = $gbook_email; global $REMOTE_ADDR; mail("Atool ", "[ TOOLNESS ] Guestbook entry from ".$gbook_name, "Location: ".$gbook_loc."\nRemote IP: ".$REMOTE_ADDR."\n----\n\n".$gbook_comment, "From: ".$gbook_name." <".$gbook_email.">"); echo "Thanks for signing the guestbook, dood."; echo "

Go back to ". "the guestbook"; } } else { ?> g u e s t b o o k

Please take some time to sign the guestbook! The only required thing you have to fill out is your name, and it's nice to know who all visited this site. If you've got any comments about the site, feel free to post 'em here, too!

Sign the guestbook

Got a question for Atool? Have any suggestions, compliments, or criticisms? Wanna just randomly flame Atool or stroke his ego?

I'm leaving out my email address entirely here, out of paranoia that evil spambots will find it and destroy me. But I'm always welcome to meeting new people and stuff, so if you'd like to contact me, just use the form below and your comments will automatically be emailed to me. The only required fields you have to fill out are your name and your comments (although giving your email address is needed if you want a reply).

name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { global $THIS_URL; global $contact_submit, $contact_name, $contact_email; global $contact_comment; global $REMOTE_ADDR; if ($contact_submit) { if ($contact_name == "" || $contact_comment == "") { if ($contact_name == "") echo "You didn't fill out your name!

"; if ($contact_comment == "") echo "You didn't write any comments!

"; echo "

". "Go back"; return; } if ($contact_email == "") $contact_email = "unknown"; //mail("Atool ", // "[ TOOLNESS ] Comments from ".$contact_name, // "Remote IP: ".$REMOTE_ADDR."\n----\n\n".$contact_comment, // "From: ".$contact_name." <".$contact_email.">"); echo "Sorry, this feature has been disabled due to spamming."; echo "

Go back to ". "the Contact section"; } else contactForm(); } } Class Bjork extends ToolSection { /* Initializes the section with the given information. This redefinition of the constructor is required for PHP3, but not for PHP4. Weird. */ function Bjork($newName, $newLevel=0) { $this->name = $newName; $this->level = $newLevel; } function showContent() { ?>