He watches the face of teenage freedom disintegrate slowly

A rather dramatic title, I know. Surprisingly, this post is actually about Facebook :o I suppose Twitter and other social networking sites would also relate. It's a topic brought up by my brother in a conversation we had, I'm really really tired right now, so please excuse my many impending errors.



Facebook is huge in our generation. Everyone that is someone has it, and I know that sounds like a generation but one must understand the usefulness of Facebook. It allows us to easily connect socially and meet new people. I have personally made many friends from Facebook. While people find it awkward to go up to someone and just introduce themselves, Facebook works in a different way. I can update my status with the idea in mind that my current friends will read it...But then someone who I don't really know but have as a friend (or not) reads it, and they comment. Thus, I begin to establish a friendship with this new person and hey, introductions made easy. It gives us mutual topics of conversation.

But is this really why we joined Facebook? As an individual, most people will say that they joined Facebook to keep in contact with their friends, and because their friends joined it, but I believe subconsciously at the least, there is so much more to it.

You see, back then, Facebook gave us teenagers our own little world. It was a world where we could easily escape from adults and just be ourselves with our friends. It was our own beautiful utopia. We could escape from the stress of work, chores and life just to share things with each other. We could use it as a realm of communication between each other for anything, from arranging meet ups for a project, to arranging parties to just talking and getting to know others. We could use Facebook to catch a glimpse in to the minds of our friends, in to the lives of our friends. We could see the kind of lives that others our age live and appreciate the differences.

Facebook represented teenage freedom in it's greatest entirety, it was our world...Not this world ruled by adults in their big corporations, it was our very own utopia with just our friends. This is why so many of us found it easy to get lost on Facebook, just hanging out or checking out our friends.

But alas, times change, and the greedy corporate adults invaded our own private utopia. Facebook is no longer the same, it is no longer about socializing and having fun...All of a sudden, Facebook is all about marketing and making money. It is about online scams and selling products, about companies creating names for themselves and trying to reach out to their audience, about manipulating the masses in order to gain profit.

Think about it, when we apply for a job, we are told that our employer will check our Facebook account. Was this the true intention of Facebook? Was this what we ever wanted? No, of course not. But alas, it must happen simply because we, the targeted audience has moved to a new form of entertainment, and business have adapted.

But does this not bug you my friends? Our own little world has been ruined once again. I got really annoyed to find my entire family on Facebook, they have a right to join it, and it serves them well in their own way...But man it's like an invasion, just stomping into my room and saying "hey man, sleeping here" or something.

Facebook still exists though. I have not deleted my Facebook or stopped using it, simply because my friends use it. And for that, it serves a good purpose in keeping updated with their lives, it allows me to arrange and organize events and participate in organized events, it allows me to just generally know what's going on...

But the spirit of it has died. Facebook is no longer what it once was, it is simply a dead shell, I've noticed that the enthusiasm around it is dying out too.

I suppose it is some what ironic, since Facebook itself is a large company.

But think about the bigger picture here. We are all constantly barraged by advertisements, ushered subconsciously into buying, told how to live our lives and taught what businesses want us to know...And why? Just so that those individuals can roll around in their pile of money. Our society has become absolutely monetary, it is all that seems to matter. But really? Is money all that important? These printed pieces of paper that represent success, wealth and how happy you will be life? Are there not more important things for us as human beings to do...than to greedily get money so that we are the ones living in comfort?

He wants

"When you want something that you have never had, you have to do something that you have never done. " - Anom.

He sighs at the lack of remorse in his generation

A few weeks ago, we were having a class discussion in English about whether or not we are responsible for accidentally causing a friends death. The situation described was that I am at a party and I convince my friend to drink alcohol. We are both very drunk and decide to jump off the roof into the pool and my friend does not make it.

What shocked me, was how many of my friends were saying that it is completely not my fault, or their own and that the friend in question has free will. Every one seemed to agree that it was his choice to drink the alcohol in the first place. It's really something that I've noticed a lot in our generation.

It seems like everyone just wants to hide, they don't want the responsibility. So many of us want to live in ignorance, because ignorance is bliss and all that any one seems to care about is being happy. We hide away and try to deny our own association in every action and put the blame on others.

While I agree that it is not completely my own fault in this situation, I would destroy my self with guilt. It is I who convinced my friend to drink and what ever happened after wards is the reaction to my action (in a physics way). It is the butter fly effect. It is because I was the one who offered my friend a drink that his parents have to cry, that there is one seat empty at their dinner table, that they never get to see their sons graduation.

In our discussion, the matter was more on whether we should be found guilty of manslaughter or not. I don't agree with that for sure, even if it is our fault, I don't think we should punished that harshly for something that was more of an accident than anything. This is not the point of the post though, it is the reaction that everyone seems to take. Everyone argued that they had nothing to do with his death and he could have avoided it easily.

Do you forget? That in our society there is no free will. Many say "no once can force you." Of course they can force you, and people do force you. Maybe not forcefully but psychologically for sure. Think about my friend in this situation, he is given a choice of becoming a social out cast, to not really belong, to never really belong with his friends, or to drink with them. In a society that forces people to conform to belong, this boy really has no choice.

When he takes the drink, he thinks about the consequences which WILL happen, such as becoming an outcast. Not only at the party, but as general in his social group. If he is to deny a drink now, not knowing that taking the drink would cause his death, he would pretty much be denying drinks every time it is offered. The consequence? He won't be a part of the social group in which the act of consuming alcohol is commonly performed. He knows this.

What he does not think about are the consequences which CAN happen, such as him falling off a roof and dying. This is what his choice is based on.


Now, if I was the one who offered him the drink in the first place, that put him under pressure and created a situation where he was forced to choose, I would feel absolutely horrible. His death is 100% my fault and not as much his own. Even if it wasn't me who offered the drink per say, but rather just drank at the party, I would feel horrible for his death, because I too contributed to the social pressure.

I sigh, I sigh deeply at how my generation tries to run away. I know I'm over viewing and stereotyping here, I know there are others out there who would live their entire life in immense guilt, there are others who would commit suicide out of the guilt of their actions. But from this set of data, as well constant observations on the smallest things I have really started to believe that there is in general a serious lack of remorse in our society.

A smaller example I've seen before, is asking a friend to print something and him/her forgetting to do so. The next day when I ask, they say that they forgot mono tonally and without remorse and when I QQ a bit, they cry out "Well it's your fault your printer wasn't working." I mean really?

Or when asking a friend to edit an essay and their edit causes me to lose a mark. When I show them this, more jokingly and they go "Well, it's your fault for not re editing." Yes, it is my fault for not re editing, but do you really have such little remorse, when I had such faith in your judgement?

Maybe, hopefully YOU are one of the people who does feel immense guilt. I know it sounds masochistic, but guilt is actually a really good thing, I think. It allows an individual to grow, to create a moral compass. Guilt causes us to not do bad things, it allows us to feel for others, and thus gain empathy. Guilt can form bonds between friends and family, it can be what allows us to keep our friends. It can cause us to do great things for another.

I don't mean to criticize too much in this post, I know that this may seem offensive to many of you and many of you will think I am an idiot. I am an idiot to be honest. I know that I have no gate way into your mind, that I cannot see what you are really thinking, what you are really feeling and you are right. Maybe you are feeling immense guilt every time? But then the question arises of why you hide it? Maybe I'm just being an idiot. But please try to remember the purpose of this blog. This blog is not there to give concrete definitions of society. Rather, it is a description of how I perceive it. It is a collection of my thoughts and ideas, of the impression that society imprints on MY mind.

He wonders why

Why do you brood so much
Over things that should not occupy so much time

Why do you worry
about who you are?
No,
About who you are to others?

Why do you change?
Not for yourself,
but for others?

Have you no faith
in your friends
to believe
in you?

Or is it because of what you do?
Do you harshly gaze upon others
and fear the same in return?


Have you forgotten,
that in the end we are all so selfish,
that no one cares about who you are
they only care about who they themselves are

He wonders at others less fortunate

Have you ever wondered, how despite how hard, cruel and unfair life has been to them; people still find a way to be happy?

Yet us here in all our good fortunes, still find a way to be sad.

He wonders about the eternal promise

"Take my eyes for what I've seen, I will give my sight to you
You are free to choose whatever life to live or life to lose
Whatever god you know he knows you better than you believe
In your once and future grave you'll fall endlessly deceived"

- Bruce Dickinson, Starblind: Iron Maiden

This is most definitely going to be my most controversial post yet. Depending on who you are, you may just hate me endlessly for this post for which I apologize. Please do not be offended, I do not mean to offend anybodies religion. I simply want to express a view I have on many religious people and I do not want many of my friends to succumb to the same fate.

One may have guessed that this post is entirely about religion and a certain perspective I have on a part of it.

My personal religion isn't really important in this topic of conversation, what I can say is that I have grown up in a very strict muslim family. Years of my life have been wasted on islamic education and studying the principles and beliefs of the religion. I was to be pretty honest, highly indoctrinated until I came here to Canada and developed my own view point. If my parents were to read this post (as is a good possibility, I will probably be skinned alive :P )

How ever, despite my own religion or lack there of, I have no prejudice what so ever against others who have faith. I realize that through out history, religion has done many great things for man, I also realize that religion has held humanity back and prevented us from truly progressing. I realize that many human beings want a life with a purpose, as I do and a religion is a very common explanation to the meaninglessness of life.

How ever, it is the things we do for religion that truly saddens me. Religious belief in my opinion is a very selfish act. Consider, that the primary reason anyone believes in religion is because of the promise of heaven, because they believe that believing in and being faithful to their god will promise them an eternity of happiness. People help others not for the sake of the person they are helping, but rather to get brownie points with god and move closer to their own eternal happiness. Through out history, religious beliefs have prevented humanity from taking risks or doing anything that would risk an individuals own entry to heaven.

Now, I know that most of my religious friends and anyone reading this blog really aren't like this. I know that most religious people are in fact good people, I just hope they are for the right reasons. Many kids grow up learning that doing something bad will anger god, this has been a great tool throughout history for keeping mankind in check. But it is also a major limitation, where does this "bad" begin? Generally speaking, anything that god spoke out against, or even didn't mention in one of his many holy books is considered bad, humanity is limited by this severely.

I'm not going to get into too much detail about this, because it really isn't the topic of this blog post.


It truly truly saddens me to see these intelligent, smart and great people waste away their precious lives for potentially empty promises.

For so many people, religion becomes everything. Appease god in this short meaningless life of ours so that we may obtain the eternal promise of heaven. There are so many people that spend all of their time following religion in a way or another. An example would be a priest that gives up his entire life to live one restricted completely by religion. Throughout my life, I often see people who are so immersed in their belief of heaven that they limit their lives drastically. This goes for every single religion out there, imans in islam being another example. These smart people who could have better'd humanity in so many ways waste their chance away.

But for what? The promise of eternal happiness in heaven?

But what if my friend, what if that promise is not real? What if when we die, it is the end of our existence? What if we embrace that we only have one life, one life that can end at any one second. What if everything we have learned from childhood about religion is false? What if it was all just created by humans in order to control others? What if it's all lies, lies fabricated to give us our own purpose?

What if god does not exist?


Now most of my religious friends will have cringed so hard at that statement and closed the tab. They will probably never open this blog again.

We are scared to embrace this idea, because of religions device. We have been warned of an eternity spent in hell, burning endlessly if we do not embrace the existence of god. Fear is what has controlled mankind, fear of hell.


But just speculate my friends, if god does not exist.

All these people that spend their one and only life, worshiping and trying to appease a god that may not exist. Is it not a wasted life? The promise of heaven may just disappear the moment we die, is it not a wasted life then? A priest that spend his entire life with limitations, who died a virgin because that is what his god asked of him. Is his life not wasted if god does not exist?

Or a muslim extremist, that commits suicides in the name of a god that potentially does not exist? Is it not sad that another life is thrown away for a promise that will be broken? People that wear veils, repent for their sins believing that everything is okay no matter what they have done just because they may still get into heaven. People that refuse medicinal treatment for their dying child because they wait for gods miracle; people that murder "possessed" children.

What if it's all been wasted?

It truly and deeply saddens me to see so many human beings living their life without meaning. Simply going through the motions of religious belief because they believe that this life is only a transition into eternity. Because they believe that what they do for god in this life will reward them in the future. Obviously everyone is entitled to live their life accordingly to how they see fit. I just feel that in many cases like this, people are misguided and not really aware of every possibility.

Please don't misunderstand me, continue to worship god and do your religious things. I embrace the possibility that there is a god, that there is a heaven and a greater purpose for each of us.

But what I ask, is that my religious friends please please embrace the possibility that maybe, just maybe there is no god, that maybe the promise of heaven is not real.
Continue to practice your religion, but please embrace this possibility.

The reason, is that by embracing this possibility you allow yourself to live a life of fulfillment. You allow yourself to truly appreciate this life and live for the moment. You do not limit what you do in life, you do not live a life simply for heaven. You live.

And he steps once again into the realm of artistic creation

A few months ago, I made a post about my dreams of becoming a musician. I try to realize this dream every day and over the March break, I actually ended up recorded my second song. It's a rockish instrumental, what ever that accounts for.

Here it is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHCOMTEH0TI&feature=channel_video_title




Now, the quality in this song sucks. The recording tone is really bad, and this mostly due to how bad my equipment is. My equipment also caused a lot of recording lag thus giving me a very very hard time. That's why it's slightly out of time in a few spots, sorry about that.

How ever, this is just a demo and I plan to re record this some day with proper recording equipment instead of a rough improvised set up.


Composing this song was a delight for me, it took ages! There were so many different musical themes and various techniques I wanted to incorporate in it and it took a lot of trial and error with these. I made many nice melodies that just weren't right and at a few points I feel like I tried too hard to incorporate certain ideas that it could have done without. All in all though, I am pretty proud of what I accomplished with this song.

I know that it is no perfect creation for any one even remotely musically talented, but for me this was a massive step, I hope my faithful and much appreciated blog readers are able to appreciate this song, sorry if it has wasted your time if you don't.