It's Wednesday again, so that means you get a slice of my fully-baked advice...it's another sample of "Fresh Uncensored Critical Knowledge for Your Life". Today's partially entertaining snippet is from Part II, "For The People You Care About", and talks a little bit about family and why you damn sure can pick them if you put your mind to it. Everybody has "family members" they don't like for whatever reason...here's how to redefine them right out of your life if you want. Check out chapter 1 of Part II, (f.u.c.k.)- Your Family.
Family is a funny thing. You see, there have been large changes in American lifestyle since the average family was made up of a man, a woman, 1.5 Beavers and an extended but predictable network of cousins, grandparents, aunts, and drunken uncles. The modern world is one of fluidity and change, which isn't the most conducive environment for some traditions...like the one which dictates what a family member is.
Traditionally, the family was thought of as the people that one sees (or dreads seeing) at holidays, weddings and funerals, those people who may look vaguely like you and have your last name either on the back of their own name or somewhere in their ancestry. You might see these people less than once a year, and in extreme cases you might not even remember you have them until they pop back up...just like genital warts.
However, what nobody seems to look at is the fact that these people had nothing to do with the circumstances of their birth. They did not choose to be related to you as a personal favor, yet are expected to be treated as such by default. In fact, it's well-known that some of these people are the most likely to try and get over on you in some fashion, expecting forgiveness based on his status as "family".
The concept of “family” being a protected subset of people with special inherent rights regardless of merit often functions as a justification for things that an average person knows that he could not get away with regarding another average person. Some of the worst shit in the world is blanketed in family quilts. This leads me to type something that will either tweak your perspective or lose me your readership: Your family just might be overrated. What would lead a person to believe something like that? Hear me out, and you might understand.
Let's start out by examining the word "family". Of course, its denotation, or technical, out-of-context, dictionary definition, points to many people's concept of a family: "a group of people sharing a common ancestry". Of course, anyone who has spent 15 minutes watching National Geographic knows that all people, being (mostly) the same species, must have common ancestry at some point. Hitler could be somewhere on your family tree, as well as any other human beings on the planet. You don't like that, do you? The crystal clear image this fact projects makes the standard definition obsolete.
Now that we've eliminated the archaic definition of what a family is, let's see how it works in practice. The word "family" is tossed around lightly. “Family” is bandied about at meaningless corporate meetings where the participants have yet to find a fuck to give about anyone else in the room. “Family” is coupled with the word "values" to describe anything that a person needs a vague phrase to appeal to people's emotions with. They even have the nerve to use it at Olive Garden restaurants (if I was really family when I’m here, you would bring me more than 3 breadsticks and refill my fucking soup for free, bitch) ...but when it all comes down to it, your family is those who support and care about you regardless of what they can get out of you.
That's about it for today. Of course there's a rest of the chapter, but that costs money. I don't do this shit for my health...well, a little, but it's still a for-profit venture, dig? Aight, until next Wednesday, if you want to check out more "Fresh Uncensored Critical Knowledge", click on keyword "ffyl quickies" here on umf, join the FfYL Facebook fanpage for a great f.u.c.k. every morning, or y'know...buy the damn book. Later, umf'ers!
Chapter 1: (f.u.c.k.)- Your Family
Traditionally, the family was thought of as the people that one sees (or dreads seeing) at holidays, weddings and funerals, those people who may look vaguely like you and have your last name either on the back of their own name or somewhere in their ancestry. You might see these people less than once a year, and in extreme cases you might not even remember you have them until they pop back up...just like genital warts.
However, what nobody seems to look at is the fact that these people had nothing to do with the circumstances of their birth. They did not choose to be related to you as a personal favor, yet are expected to be treated as such by default. In fact, it's well-known that some of these people are the most likely to try and get over on you in some fashion, expecting forgiveness based on his status as "family".
The concept of “family” being a protected subset of people with special inherent rights regardless of merit often functions as a justification for things that an average person knows that he could not get away with regarding another average person. Some of the worst shit in the world is blanketed in family quilts. This leads me to type something that will either tweak your perspective or lose me your readership: Your family just might be overrated. What would lead a person to believe something like that? Hear me out, and you might understand.
Let's start out by examining the word "family". Of course, its denotation, or technical, out-of-context, dictionary definition, points to many people's concept of a family: "a group of people sharing a common ancestry". Of course, anyone who has spent 15 minutes watching National Geographic knows that all people, being (mostly) the same species, must have common ancestry at some point. Hitler could be somewhere on your family tree, as well as any other human beings on the planet. You don't like that, do you? The crystal clear image this fact projects makes the standard definition obsolete.
Now that we've eliminated the archaic definition of what a family is, let's see how it works in practice. The word "family" is tossed around lightly. “Family” is bandied about at meaningless corporate meetings where the participants have yet to find a fuck to give about anyone else in the room. “Family” is coupled with the word "values" to describe anything that a person needs a vague phrase to appeal to people's emotions with. They even have the nerve to use it at Olive Garden restaurants (if I was really family when I’m here, you would bring me more than 3 breadsticks and refill my fucking soup for free, bitch) ...but when it all comes down to it, your family is those who support and care about you regardless of what they can get out of you.
That's about it for today. Of course there's a rest of the chapter, but that costs money. I don't do this shit for my health...well, a little, but it's still a for-profit venture, dig? Aight, until next Wednesday, if you want to check out more "Fresh Uncensored Critical Knowledge", click on keyword "ffyl quickies" here on umf, join the FfYL Facebook fanpage for a great f.u.c.k. every morning, or y'know...buy the damn book. Later, umf'ers!
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