Spider Jerusalem & The 99% Spring

So the media sphere is all atwitter with news of this "99% Spring" thing announced by some UAW and leftist leaders.

Unlike many gunbloggers, I have a lot of leftist friends. It was weird to see them cheering the so called "Arab Spring" revolutions-y'know, those violent mob events where secular governments were overthrown in place of a couple of democratic theocracies. I don't think that is what Occupy wants-in fact it is one of those things they accuse Republicans of wanting, sometimes truthfully. But they don't see it like that; they see the word "Democracy" and their eyes get all misty and their panties get all moist and they go "Yay, pure democracy, the answer to all of our problems!" forgetting what Spider Jerusalem told us about Democracy.

You want to know about voting. I'm here to tell you about voting. Imagine you're locked in a huge underground nightclub filled with sinners, whores, freaks, and unnameable things that rape pit bulls for fun. And you ain't allowed out until you all vote on what you're going to do tonight. YOU like to put your feet up and watch television. THEY like to have sex with normal people using knives, guns, and brand-new sexual organs that you did not know existed. So you vote for television, and everyone else, as far as the eye can see, votes to fuck you with switchblades. That's voting. You're welcome.
-Spider Jerusalem

The Coptic Christians in Egypt are figuring it out.

Dark skinned Libyans are figuring it out.

Are we going to figure it out in time, or are we going to spread our legs for the knife?

"Majority" does not mean "Right." The political far left upholds these "democratic" uprisings as heroic endeavors while ignoring the fact that while they enjoyed popular support, they still suborned the human rights of individuals-and the individuals can't do a fuckin' thing about it, the individuals have submitted to the will of the collective, and all it takes is for one stupid idea to take root in the mob and you are staring genocide in the face. They don't see what they are enabling when they call for a 99% spring...but I do. They want the tyranny of majority, but most mouth breathing jackoffs will simply stampede the way they are herded and that will be over the broken bones of anyone who dissents. After all, they are the 99%, they are an overwhelming majority, and that must mean they are always right.

Naming the Inkeeper: People vs. Encounter Based Gaming

I never can quite write the adventure I am trying to for this pathfinder game.

Since most of my players are old hands at WoD but new to D&D, I sat down at work last night while the calls were slow and banged out a sort of tutorial dungeon and a town that we will be using as a base of operations when we start cracking the big dungeon I am designing. The intro dungeon is just a couple of levels and some giant rats, just an introduction to the kind of things you can expect to encounter in a dungeon so when the PC's go into the Sunken Temple of Fucka-You-Humans (working title) they don't get annihilated in the first corridor.

I put in things that a D&D gamer would expect by default but a WoD gamer would have no clue about so they know how to save against a trap, how to make an attack roll, how to target an area effect spell...it kind of ended up like every tutorial to every first person shooter ever made. And, because at heart I am a wannabe writer, I tried to shoehorn a story into it that goes with the town that I had developed.

The town was just supposed to be a base of operations, but I can't resist creating some local color, from the wisecracking bumpkin mayor to the reclusive cleric in a crumbling temple. I have details about the architecture and history of the town in the dungeon and my players will never care about it; they just want to stomp another monster. I'm not complaining about this; I don't get all butthurt about the "right" way to game and I think people that do are fuckin' stupid. But I'm looking over this adventure and going "Aaaagh, it's just the resupply point and the tutorial dungeon, you don't need these kinds of details!"

But I can't help it, man-for me, gaming is less about the mechanical encounter challenge rating and more about the human interaction element. If I want a carefully patterned, ECL appropriate campaign with five or six limited cut-and-dry options, I'd fire up a console RPG-but I don't, I want the human interaction.

So the grubby little hamlet of Muckshire now has a complete history, some kind of buried sin in the town's past, some interpersonal conflicts, and a diverse cast of townsfolk that is ENTIRELY UNNECESSARY. And I haven't even started the main dungeon yet. I just can't help it-I love people based stories more than nifty collections of traps and monsters.

Hope the PC's don't burn it down in the first scene.

Chivalry in the Age of Internets

One thing I like about the gunblogger community is we treat the gals with some respect.

This thing right here, this whole crazy Smoke & Thunder thing where some dude is either shilling for the Joyce Foundation or viciously trolling his own tribe-has made me realize how prevalent this is. (We also saw this with the whole "Breda Porn" thing) Specifically, the responses of the gunnies to this behavior, which is overflowing with righteous and wrathful snark, make me glad to be a part of this community. Even the scruffy ragged edges of it.

We've gone this long being classier than we have to be. We don't even call ol' Joanie P a cunt very often though if any person deserves this epithet, is it she. However, we don't goddamn tolerate somebody talking rudely to a lady and I think if Mr. Smoke and Thunder said some of the shit he said to a lady in meatspace, he'd probably get his jaw jacked and rightfully so.

Granted, I'm not in the polite sphere of friendly gunbloggers, as evidenced by Mr. Zoomie's hater award. I can call anybody a spunk-spluttering bitch-whore-cunt-zilla on my own blog if I want. But I don't, because I recognize the convention, because I don't want a verbal smackdown, and because I AM A BETTER PERSON THAN SMOKE AND THUNDER.

If you are ego reading this, "Smoke & Thunder Admin" think about that for a minute-the guy who self identifies as Scumfuck is a better person than you. Son, I think if you aren't a troll, you need to take a good look at your own posts and figure out what kind of person you are. Maybe you need to get your mind right before you go all Hollywood nu-media on us, mkay?

After all, an armed society is a polite society, until we hit the internets and then we are all total dicks to each other, right? Google the last part of that quote and you might see why.

MOLLE & Crystal Meth

So I got my Beez Combat Systems AK chest rig in the mail not too long ago.

Besides strutting around my living room posturing like a jackass, I haven't done much with it yet. It is the first piece of MOLLE enabled kit that I have ever owned and really the only modular item as I never tried ALICE. It is replacing my Russian milsurp M-21 LBV, which is, charitably, hot, cumbersome, hard to store and too damn floppy. I didn't realize what a pain in the ass it was until I started wearing the BCS rig.

Anyway, this has me researching MOLLE attachments so I can set up a sort of minimalist ZOMG rig. The main reason I got the M-21 was because I was so sure I was going to get a good plate carrier vest set up later so the cheap rig was OK. Actually wearing it around with a pack, having it get folded up, struggling with the zipper, trying to fiddlefuck a storage method I can use in the field during our mock bugouts...it became a hassle. I had a fucking wooden hanger in my BOB just so I could take the damn vest off once in awhile and hang it off a tree. So I decided it was time for an upgrade.

This time I wanted something that was modular but that I could wear over an armor vest if needed as well as without one, so I'll have a good piece of kit even if the shit goes down before I can afford some body armor. It is very comfortable, rides right around stomach level, and holds 5 AK mags securely with elastic retention doohickeys. There is a hook-and-loop closure to a full sized admin pocket that I plan on using for maps and survival gear. The rig is low profile overall; I can cover it under a hoodie if I don't mind looking like a fat bastard. It is, quite simply, the nicest piece of kit I own.

Anyway, the problem here is that as I research MOLLE attachments to it, I'm getting that feeling like the first time a meth head sucks down on a chicken bone and lifts his head and screams WHOOOOOOOOOOOO-YEAH!!!!! I feel like I'm stepping off the deep end somehow.

I've got a bunch of rows of MOLLE stitching on the front. I want a mini Blow Out Kit, preferably in a tear away format, I want a radio pocket that will hold my FRS type blister pack radio, and I'd like a way to set up my fixed blade knife for horizontal weak side draw. Beyond that, I've got all this extra space and a deep compulsion to fill it despite the fact that it will make the rig heavier and more cumbersome.

But all that stitching! All that lovely stitching! Virgin space yearning for the touch of my gear! What am I gonna do with all this space? Christ knows I don't need much else on my ZOMG rig. Yet here I am, browsing cross draw pistol holsters and IPOD pouches and dump pouches and tactical Fastex Buckled Double Dildo sheaths with triple retention and Christ almighty knows what else and I get the feeling that addiction is a real possibility here.

Is there a support group for this?

Carnal Linguistic Love Affair

My relationship with the English language is fundamentally Nabokovian.

No, nothing that involves Pedobear-the language predates me by some time. If anything, this is a Mrs. Robinson affair.

Nabokov was well known to simply love the English language and the flowery expressions that were possible within it's boundaries. The bastard could go on and on for days describing a rusty light pole or a flock of butterflies touching down on a wilted peony in a cracked flowerpot. Everyone (read: no one) has read Lolita, which is an OK example, but give Pale Fire a try and you'll really see it. Thusly:

All my stories are webs of style and none seems at first blush to contain much kinetic matter. For me style is matter.
-Vladimir Nabokov

You'll notice in this blog that I tend to ramble on the same way a lot; once I get into a sexy word groove it becomes difficult for me to pull out. Like ol' Vlad, I hate psychology and I love flowery phrases. Perhaps unlike Nabokov, I don't stick to courtly love; I fucking love the spoken word and that love includes choking and double penetration. To wit:

• I don't always use proper spelling and grammar, sometimes because I am lazy or stoned and miss a mistake, and sometimes because I don't give a fuck because the language is mine and I'll use and abuse it as I see fit.
• I make it a point to use every derogatory slur towards every race, gender, ethnicity, religion and identity. All of 'em. The words are there, I didn't make 'em up, and I will by God use them-because the language is mine, and I'll use it and abuse it as I see fit.
• I use the slang of every deviant subculture, even those that are not my own, sometimes to illustrate my point and sometimes just because I think it's funny-because the language is mine, and I'll use it and abuse it as I see fit.
• And sometimes I just go on and on and lose my point. If you've ever wondered if me going "Wait, what was I talking about again?" is a cheeky self deprecating affectation, you are sorely mistaken-that is simply the machine gun cadence of my thoughts and sometimes I have a dead primer in there somewhere. Tap, rack, bang, motherfuckers-the language is mine and I'll use it and abuse it as I see fit.

The relationship is an all consuming worship and adoration with a predatory aftertaste. I can't help it, nor would I if I could-I love the language and I love to hold the language down and fuck it in the ass while it pounds on the window crying for a policeman. Okay, maybe a little pedobear, goddamn it.

Yet here we are, aren't we? Somehow you keep reading my shit. And I thank you for that-but know this; there will be literary abortions up in this piece, drivel that follows no accepted format or style and may only make sense to one person. If you fit in the Grammar Nazi camp, you will be driven to apoplexy-but you were warned. Beyond that I say only this, in the words of the acknowledged master of the art of flowery nonsense.

There is only one school of literature - that of talent.
-Vladimir Nabokov

CBTT Settles the Great Debates: Martial Arts vs. Combat Sports

Today in CBTT settles the great debates: Martial Arts vs. Combat Sports. Don't worry, I'm not going to go all Phil Elmore on you. I don't have a stake; I enjoy both methodologies.

In case you aren't familiar with this debate, this question is generally the AR/AK or .45/9mm of the martial arts communities. Some people choose to view this question as "What art is best for surviving a street encounter?" and some choose to view it as "MMA is superior and fuck all you faggots." (Note that this is not a question.) It seems to boil down to "Should an martial sport with full contact be considered superior for street fighting than a martial art with no or extremely limited contact?" That will be the version we discuss here.

(Full disclosure-I have trained heavily in both methodologies, with a later emphasis on Filipino stick arts. Also, I have a bit of gutter experience that predates most of my training.)

Let me start by answering that, the reasonable version of the question. YES. An airy-fairy dancing art that teaches you to block every hit in a pre programmed dance will get you killed on the street. Why? Because typically you don't see the attack coming and YOU WILL GET HIT. Sometimes you'll get hit hard, you'll get knocked down, you'll get blindsided by three motherfuckers in a dark alley, and you won't know what to do because you've never been hit before. I've seen some very good traditional martial arts practicioners just fall apart after they get hit the first time in an MMA environment-I mean everything, technique, zen, even blind instinct just comes apart because getting hit wasn't part of the plan.

That said, the main difference between a UFC bout and a street fight isn't that you are barred from kicking nuts or gouging eyes. The main difference is that in the UFC, you pick the time, venue and opponent for the fight, and in a street fight, you don't have that luxury. The street fight tends to come up as a surprise and even if you win, your day is pretty much fucked. You can look forward to a hard fight in the UFC, a test of skill, strength and will; on the street you want the easy fight, and more importantly your opponent does too. If you can, he'll use size advantage, numerical superiority, terrain and a wide variety of weapons to make it an easy fight so he can go home and smoke crack in peace. That is the fundamental disconnect between MMA and street fighting and, despite the chest thumping superiority of some MMA types, it can ruin your plan as much as not getting hit.

Fundamentally, you will fight how you train. If you train to never get hit, to dodge and weave and block Jackie Chan style through every encounter, that is how you will fight-and you will likely lose. If you train to take a guy to the ground and punch him until someone pulls you away, you'll fight like that-and win, until the guy pulling you off has a very small, very sharp knife that he ventilates you with over and over because you weren't even looking for him. Or maybe you just keep punching him because you aren't trained to disengage, and you drub the guy to death after he passes out and you end up locked up with a bunch of his homies instead. That is not winning.

So, what can we take away from this little foray into survivalist relevance from a guy who usually writes about Disney Sex?

1. Your style is not an ego thing. There are things to take away from any art-and things to leave hanging there as well.
2. You will get hit in a street fight. Make sure you've been hit before, or you'll be amazed at how little you know after it happens, assuming they ever finish unscrewing you from that mailbox.
3. What works in the ring doesn't always work in the street and no amount of chest thumping can make it so that it does.
4. None of these styles teach you enough about situational awareness. Situational awareness > technique.
5. Any style that does not teach you about the legal ramifications of using force against another person is an incomplete style. Period.

Thank you, and please don't flood my blog with pissed off comments because you think I called your dick small. Good night, folks.

In Lieu of Any Content Today...

...I present Joe Buck Yourself.

Now fuck off, I haven't even packed a bowl yet.

Coffee Day

Let me clarify by saying I really don't drink coffee. I don't really like regular working stiff coffee slung over a sticky counter by tired eyed waitresses and I don't really like fancy eye-talian coffee slung over a glass pie case by chirpy young college graduates. I'm just not a coffee guy; when I need to stay awake I chug Mountain Dew and maybe snort an adderall. But today, on Valentines Day, I'm going to take Amanda and Gracie out on a classy date for some coffee at Starbucks, and you should too.

Why? Because fuck CSGV, god damnit. Fuck CSGV, NGVAC, MAIG, etc. Fuck 'em. Fuck 'em right in their lying face holes.

I find it sad that we, American gun owners, have to applaud a company for doing nothing more than adhering to the law as written instead of holding out for actual support, and I find it sad that the tattered pack of loudly roaring mice which comprises our opposition has any bearing at all on the policy of private companies. But you know what they say-money talks, bullshit walks, and if even half the gun owners who promised their support to starbucks on V-day come out to buy a cup of coffee, we can get their attention with something that really makes a difference in policy-record motherfucking profits.

In conclusion, Buy Starbucks, God Bless America and Fuck Dennis Hennigan. I think that covers everything I want to say today.

Those Crazy Conspiracy Theories

This story got me thinking.

Everyone on the 'progressive' side of the negotiation table at this stage likes to spew venom about that god awful biased Fox news spreading their filthy right wing biased lies.

Which they do, don't get me wrong.

But they don't like it when you bring up shit like this; they don't like to be reminded that the political class of both parties have multi million dollar professional mouthpieces. They like to bitch that those evil filthy 1%er billionaires the Koch Brothers are promoting an agenda that will institute Standard White Jesus as the state religion and install heartbeat monitors on every woman's uterus to shock her if she tries to take a morning after pill, but anyone who sees evil filthy 1%er billionaire George Soros promoting an agenda to confiscate semi automatic magazine fed rifles is buying into "conspiracy theories."

I just want to put this out there. From Dictionary.Reference.Com

con·spir·a·cy
   /kənˈspɪrəsi/ Show Spelled[kuhn-spir-uh-see] Show IPA
noun, plural -cies.
1. the act of conspiring.
2.an evil, unlawful, treacherous, or surreptitious plan formulated in secret by two or more persons; plot.
3.a combination of persons for a secret, unlawful, or evil purpose: He joined the conspiracy to overthrow the government.
4.Law. an agreement by two or more persons to commit a crime, fraud, or other wrongful act.
5.any concurrence in action; combination in bringing about a given result.

That shoe fits pretty good, don't it, Georgie Boy? Why don't we take a look at my revised Media Matters Gun Facts Fellowship Boilerplate? That sounds like fun.

This post is written as part of the Media Matters Gun Folly fellowship. The purpose of the fellowship is to further Media Matters’ agenda to aggressively decry, smear, and distort inconvenient gun truths in the U.S. media. Some of the worst misinformation occurs around the issue of guns, constitutional law, and (white) extremism, the fellowship program is designed to fight this information with bald faced lies.

And to my progressive friends-is it only media bias if the other side does it?

Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies

So I finally put a bullet in the dome of my Pentex campaign.

It was a hell of a ride for all that I barely planned it past a couple of the initial scenes.

The theme of my Pentex game was "Take everything you want, and pay for it." All I did was hand the players a pile of juicy powers, ridiculous magic items, limitless resources and endless parades of cheap drugs and sex. It was, perhaps, a quintessentially American campaign.

Once you beef up a bunch of characters to an absurd high level, it becomes hard to challenge them. Frankly I ran out of challenging enemies about six months ago; I was mostly just siccing the players on each other and dropping deus ex machinas on them when we managed to stay sober enough to game at all. No point in putting a lot of thought into a dangerous foe that is going to be eviscerated by 500 claw attacks in the first combat turn. With a lot of high level characters in the party, coming up with combat challenges was just not working out-and I can't get this group to do any of that high level intrigue stuff, they don't have the patience or experience.

It was a grand, glorious orgy of carnage that I am quite happy not to repeat. Let me tell you, fomori are not characters that can really drive a campaign for very long-once the shock of acid blood and brain eating wear off, the whole business becomes a rather numb affair of whirling claws, improbable drug cocktails and ichor stained sodomy.

Anyway, the next WoD campaign is probably going to be a hard sci-fi Hunter: The Reckoning. I think that might just be the thing to revitalize our fictional lives. I'm also probably going to fire up Pathfinder; I've been enjoying the Pathfinder rulebook a lot and some of my players have never done the classic "Dungeon Crawl." With some of their main gaming exposure being World of Darkness, I'm going to enjoy the chance to show them some of the D&D tropes instead.

Heh. Poor suckers won't even see it coming.

Ruminations on Gear & Sexual Orientation

To the survivalist scumfuck on a budget, older milsurp tends to be a godsend-cheap and durable enough to function. Maybe it isn't the lightest, most effective or most ergonomic, but it has that combination of dirt cheap and bombproof that means it isn't a total waste of money. I've always advocated older milsurp even now when the trend among preppers is a "grey" approach, for those very reasons. Top shelf civillian gear is light, rugged and 'low profile' but only like a quarter of my budget is for the bug out scenario, which is the least likely scenario given my AO and capabilities. So I have to have cheap and unbreakable, with other considerations falling by the wayside.

Yet here I am, anxiously awaiting the arrival of my Beez Combat Systems AK chest rig and my Tru-Spec 24/7 series tactical pants. Oh, yeah, sure, maybe I need a modern chest rig for a rifle class to replace the slightly above airsoft quality 'spetsnatz' LBV I have now. And maybe i need some BDUs where the goddamn crotch isn't always blowing out due to my enormous package and\or poor quality stitching. But really these are items for the lowest percentage scenario-the full on Mad Max SHTF where I need a rifle, five mags, and ninja pants-and I think the only real reason is because I want to see how the other half lives.

I'm no gear queer, but I suppose I might be a little gear bi curious.

Race Wars & Zombie Apocalypse

I placed the following response to a question on ZS for a GRE Article linked here. The question was, "Why are Gun Owners embracing the zombie metaphor?" My response follows:

I think the thing gun owners like about the zombie metaphor is the lack of moral ambiguity.

The various prep scenarios for which full battle rattle will be most important like Balkanization, ethnic conflict or dirty civil wars are rather ugly and no one wants to contemplate it too heavily. Thinking of it in terms of zombies means a clearly defined enemy with easily discernible characteristics that everyone will unite against regardless of ideology.

It is a fun thought excercise, rather than a depressing one where you may end up killing your friends and neighbors over petty differences-or worse, being killed by them for the same petty differences. With Z's, everyone gets to dress up in their mall ninja gear and fight for humanity without contemplating the heavy question of "Where do I stand in this conflict?"

I had flashbacks to making that post when I saw this and this.

So what does this mean? I mean, we're all survivalists or quasi survivalists here, we have all had a look at Matt Bracken's CW2 Cube. In times of great tension, people tend to split along racial lines. That is a historical & sociological fact, not speculation. You see it in the micro in maximum security lockdown; you see it in the macro when nations collapse. Racism is a an act of genetic insanity that defies logic, but when the Endarkenment continues people are going to clump together based on the most easily discernible characteristics-and if that ain't a heartbeat, it's gonna be skin color.

I'm going to be really sad if TEOTWAWKI is a race war instead of a zombie apocalypse. A zombie apocalypse is simple and clean in comparison.

It would prove beyond doubt that I am right; we haven't evolved one goddamn bit, have we?

More Bugout Planning

Working to set up our group's mock bugouts for the year, we are experimenting with a major paradigm shift.

It will be on the heels of a tough year. Last year was shit for preps; we did one bugout and had another bugout that got cancelled at the last minute. A lot of it was because we had to move-all of our shit ended up deep in storage and we have been drifting aimlessly in a cheap apartment trying hard not to descend to the level of primates. Apathy, laziness, rehab, incarceration, personal dramas and financial fuckery have all lined up to kick us in the balls over the past year and have dragged our preps into an all time low when I was hoping for an all time high. C'est la vie. We have to make what we can of it.

Anyway, we had been trying to cram everything into a weekend before-juxtaposing the combat training with the bushcraft and trying to do it all at once. Thinking on it now, that might have been a mistake-it seems to work okay for SF candidates doing Robin Sage but we are just a bunch of stoners and nerds in cheap web gear trying to survive the apocalypse, the whole idea was probably a bit ambitious. So we are going to split it up, do one wilderness survival event and then five or six one combat training events plus three or four general emergency preparedness drills for bugging in.

This years wilderness bugout is tentatively scheduled for late march to mid april. We are doing a minimal gear event, just knife, buttpack and water bottle. We'll build some shelters, try some primitive fires, maybe try to harvest some wild food. I don't know for sure if we are going to bug out at our usual location (some modest acreage in the southern part of the state) or if we will be trying something new. Either way we are going to focus on our bushcraft skills and save the Mall Ninja shit for another day.

So how about it, Internet? What are you plans for bugging out this year?