2014-09-23 09:29:04 (edited by Kenzon Yeoh 2014-09-23 11:16:35)

Hello there everyone,
I'm just curious and wanted to get opinions from everyone here. Well, this is my question:
I am 14 years old and so is my other friends. One of them put a Pokemon movie as his favourite movie in a presentation my teacher asked us to do and all of the other friends laughed at him. I also notice that I myself and some of my friends are still watching cartoons that most people would consider childish like Pokemon, avatar the last airbender and the legend of Kora, Naruto, Ninja Turtle, an animation made in my country which tells about a boy and his friends having superpowers, etc. Said animation will have a movie in 2015 and my friends and I are considering to watch it, but then again we thought of the money that would be used to watch a movie considered to be childish by many people. So I thought I would like opinions from everyone here. Is this kind of behaviour childish? Also my friend told me that he kept fantasising about things like beating up people, smelling feet (Groce... But yeah), getting in love etc. Is his own behaviour childish? I tried to talk him out of it but it doesn't seem to work. I know, this isn't exactly the place to ask these kind of things, but I don't know where else to ask. So, any opinions?

Team rocket's blasting off again!

2014-09-23 10:27:21 (edited by aaron 2014-09-23 10:27:52)

Hi,
I definitely do not consider this childish, in fact I like these cartoons myself. Unfortunately, a lot of people these days lack respect for something they don't like, which is probably why they laughed at you and your friends. The annoying thing about these cartoons is they can be both light hearted and a little dark, basic but full of a lot of depth at the same time, but peopl don't seem to look at them just because they are on kids channels, which is a little unfair, particularly as a lot of these cartoons seem to target a family audience, not just kids.
Here are two examples:
It is especially being seen these days with a popular cartoon series in the My Little Pony franchise, and if someone told me a few months back that I'd be a fan of it, I would have laughed. Now I love it. In fact I can not wait for season 5, season 4 ended on a very epic storyline, epic for a show about ponies anyway. It had a villain who was trying to steel magic big time, it had temporary betrayals but those were rekindled, it had callbacks to previous episodes in the season and even before that, and it made the hole season go out with a huge positive bang for it's buck. I watched a few episodes and was quite surprised by how good they were, then the season 4 finale (which was a two parter!) came on and I was actually blown away by how much effort had been put into it.
Also, Transformers Prime is another cartoon which is absolutely amazing, and very dark, even for Transformers. Season 1 was nice, season 2 builded upon that foundation, then season 2's finale came up and actually made me exclaim, whaaaaat? no way! I had to take a break from it before watching season 3, and that one was also rather epic and full of references. I think season 2 was the best purely because of that finale, season 3 wasn't quite as good, but it's story arc was nice. Trust me, if you watch this series, the finale to season 2, called Darkest Hour, is very large scale, and very, very action packed, quite emotional to. You won't be disappointed.
To give an idea: transformers prime features everyone and everything from starscream to megatron, to unicron, multiple journeys to cybertron, and even a battle with both cybertron and earth hanging in the balance at the same time at one point.

2014-09-23 10:50:38

Hmm, you're probably right, but what about the thing I said about my friend? I think that is childish, but then again I don't know.

Team rocket's blasting off again!

2014-09-23 11:00:17

Hi Kenzon.

Always nice to see this sort of discussion, and for the record I like meeting another Avatar fan. I've been a fan of last air bender (or legend of Ang as it was markited in Britain). I just watched the first series of Kora a couple of weeks ago (was waiting to buy it on dvd), and thought it was extremely awsome!  Aman is just plane scary, and actually i can't wait to get the rest on dvd.

Either way on the entertainment front, the question is more one of good story telling than anything else. Back in the 80's and early 90's, stuff that was aimed at kids also tended to have enough by way of character, symbolism, interesting world and dark storytelling to appeal to older teenagers and indeed adults. Something like the original Dungeons and dragons series or even original transformers was always written very well, and though it didn't go into ultra gore or adult themes it was expected that young adults as well as kids would be interested. I got the original D&d series on dvd a couple of years ago and it's really quite astounding just how well the dialogue, the world and the plot work. This is one reason wy for example very adult films like Robocop got tie in series and cartoons, heck Robocop 3 was an attempt to make a pg/13 rated robocop, (admitedly rather a failure but still it happened).

Unfortunately however, things started to change, mostly I assume because business executives just tried to churn out specifically designed things created by focus groups for each age group. Stuff like MEga man battle network which really didn't have much by way of character or plot and a very sanitized idea to violence.

This was one reason Harry potter was such a shock to many people, sinse Hp was a book series with child protagonists very much aimed at anyone who liked a good story, heck my dad who is in his sixties knicked all my hp audio books and thought they were great! 

It's a question of where something is just plane well written, rather than it simply being written as to appeal to a particular set of people with a very standard set of symbols and methods, indeed this is why I myself tend to rather dislike superheroes and the recent trend of superhero films, sinse the characters, the situations, the ideas behind them are often very predictable and contrived and don't really have anything particularly unique about them in characters, or world, they're all a sense of style over substance.

So, in the sense of watching or reading things and being able to view them independent of intended audience or demographic, that isn't childish at all! quite the opposite in fact. Indeed, I would cryticize the kids in your class who laughed at the chap who liked a pokemon film for being too childish to try and understand what might be good about the Pokemon characteriation and just expect people to all like the same thing. That! is childish, simply thinking inside the box, and kids aren't the only ones guilty of it.

On the more general behaviour front, well it depends on what you could call emotional maturity, which has very little to do with physical age. I have met twelve year olds who I can talk to as adults, and I have met 40 year old idiots who think they themselves are the center of the universe and expect everyone to be the same as them.

For example, once at the bar in colidge I was ordering my drink and a chap (who must have been in his mid 20's), said to me "why don't you have a pint?" when I explained that I had tried beers but wasn't a fan, he said "but your a bloke you should! drink beer, if you had 20 pints then! you'd like it"

Now, anyone who thinks they should down 20 pints of beer just because they have a y chromosome and that anyone who doesn't do the same is in some way wrong, that! is childish.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2014-09-23 11:04:26

Well, I don't think this is childish. It's more childish to laugh at people and don't just accept what people likes.

Best regards SLJ.
Feel free to contact me privately if you have something in mind. If you do so, then please send me a mail instead of using the private message on the forum, since I don't check those very often.
Facebook: https://facebook.com/sorenjensen1988
Twitter: https://twitter.com/soerenjensen

2014-09-23 11:14:36 (edited by Kenzon Yeoh 2014-09-23 11:40:35)

LOL Dark, that's just quite a fantastic language you've used there... Anyways, the friend of mine that I said that keeps fantasising is crittisized by some people in my school (admitedly me being one of them). His thinking was just too much for a 14-year-old imo. Yes, it might be emotional maturity but he was making it way over the normal emotional maturity (or, I'd rather say him being a crazy guy to fantasise about those strange things). Also fun fact: he was actually 1 person - he was laughed at for saying pokemon being his favourite movie and he also is the one who fantasises about strange things I mentioned in post 1 LOL.
Also, I noticed a strange thing with myself and some others:
At first I don't like the animation I watched that's made in my country (Well, just to make my work easier, the animation's name is Boboiboy). My friend suggested it to me and let me watch a few episodes of Boboiboy and I liked it. I watched every episode there is up to now, but I left this show from about June and returned to it now. What I found weird is that when I first watched it, I think "Oh, this is gunna be my favourite show!", when I left it I thought "It will still be my favourite but whatever. I don't have time for those" and when I first thought to return to it, I thought "Why did I like this show in the first place? It isn't exactly my favourite, at least anymore". Why's that though? I mean, I liked it but why would I grow to not like it as much when I left it? At least that show returns to its spot as one of my favourites... Also that show is still developing. Its now in season 3 although season 3 hasn't yet been completed. Been patiently waited for the continuation for, what, over 3 months already. That's why I left it in the first place. It just is so slow to continue the story. No offence to the company that made the show, but I hope they return to continue the story soon. Still considering whether to watch that movie of Boboiboy coming in 2015...

Team rocket's blasting off again!

2014-09-23 12:07:19

@Slj, I wouldn't say it's a question of just realizing people like different things and let everything be. Suppose someone for example came on here and said Blindfold racer was the best racing game in the universe, and that top speed and rail racer were terrible racing games.
I don't think people would just say "oh you like what you like so that is that"

the question is realizing why! you like what you like and what is good about it, and being able to considder those characteristics independent of say the audience something is written for, and then being able to discuss the various merrits of things without holding bad opinions of others who might disagree. This is something that people learn over time, and unfortunately often I've found teenagers tend to assume "I'm right and what I like is the best thing ever" and being quite hurtful towards others who think differently.

Often this has nothing actually to do with whether something is good or bad, so much as it has to do with the person who holds the opinion wanting to agree with his/her friends and the crowd and not appear to be a wuss or a wimp or an outsider or a freak or whatever. This indeed is my rpoblem with a lot of blind groups.

if you showed me something that was written for kids I'd look at it as a peace of storytelling, considder the plot, characters, the story telling, production etc, and try and have an opinion based on that and if you  asked me whether I thought it was good or not I'd tell you in detail what I thought was or was not good about it and why. If you disagreed with me, well we'd have a debate (and probably a rather fun one), but I wouldn't laugh at you or think the less of you for it.

@kenzon, the fantasy thing is a rather different matter. As teenagers people will naturally begin thinking about the opposite sex, perhaps about falling in love, perhaps about other things. Often people get fairly confused about that and say weerd stuff, which again gets complicated with wanting to appear part of the crowd or wanting to appear tough or whaatever.

I am not the best person to discuss this sort of thing, but one thing I will say is that different people mature at different rates. i've met 16 year olds who have no desire to become closer to girls/boys, and I've met 14 year olds who are looking to setup a house together and have kids.

it  all depends upon the person, the culture, their body and a hole bunch of different things.

I find it very believable that your friend is considdering fallingg in love. Other weerder stuff like smelling people's feet or whatever could be an attempt to just look tough or similar, could be him being confused, or could be something else, ultimately you don't know, so it's probably just a question of baring with him on this.

As I said however I'm very much the wrong person to give you advice on that sort of thing.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2014-09-23 12:17:44

I think this is simply a matter of whether or not people can do things that either satisfy their emotions, or if they can use their intelligence to make themselves useful to society. For instane, let's say my friend and I were different, but we liked the same kind of stuff. If I were to watchthe catunes you mentioned, I would look for more of the useful themes, the abstract details instead of the other stuff, because those are not things that interest me. I do think that the way that people exercise them depends on whether or not they can separate fact from fiction or bridge the gap between fantasy and reality, optimism and pessimism, realism and whatever ism there is lol. O:-) Truth is I think we would be better of if we were more useful to society. As for your friend, I would say he was getting emotional satisfaction that is sirt of like an addiction, and it could turn bad if he doesn't put it in check. Oh, how the human brain and the rest of the world are so complex

Ulysses, KJ7ERC
She/they
Reedsy

2014-09-23 12:29:09

Meh, the problem was he is thinking about the same sex as him... I hope he snaps out of it, its embarrasing to say the least! And the larger problem is that he is thinking about those stuff and always! relates it to other people like his teachers and all that...

Team rocket's blasting off again!

2014-09-23 13:55:01

One thing you have to remember is that not everybody is the same, in literally every way possible.
You like certain shows, others may not.
You think they're awesome, others may not.
There's nothing wrong with you liking the shows, it just means that you like something different than the other people.
If they then start insulting you for it, then they're being both narrow-minded and unfair, and there very well may be nothing you can do but deal with it and try to avoid them in future.
The key concept here is that just because you're different, no matter how that difference manifests itself, doesn't mean you are wrong, childish, embarrassing, foolish, or anything else.
All it means is that you're different.
The way you can define whether a difference is good or bad, childish or mature, is how you react to it.
Take, for example, the kids who think its fine to insult you because you like a different tv show than they do.
They're basically saying that the show you like is bad, the show they like is good, and they don't care what you have to say on the subject.
I, personally, would define that as childish and rude, because not only are they being insulting, they're also not giving you a fair chance to explain your point of view, and explain why they might, in fact, be mstaken.
All of this also applies to your friend. He's different than you. He may think differently than you, act differently than you.
This doesn't mean he's in the wrong, or deserves to be laughed at.
Matter of fact, from my understanding of your posts, he's probably got an extremely difficult road to be walking, and really deserves all the help you can give him.
If by "relates it to others" in your post above, you meant that he is always talking about it to others and being laughed at, perhaps you might want to sit down with him somewhere and try to figure out a way that you can help him talk over what he's feeling, while also mentioning that it may not be the best idea to tell everybody about it, at least just yet.
If you meant that he's involving the people around him in his thoughts, I wouldn't say that's anything new; we all do that to one degree or another. If he's making his thoughts public though, I wouldn't hesitate to tell him *privately* that its making you uncomfortable; you've got feelings, too.
In the end though, all of this boils down to a few  simple things.
Firstly, try to be a person you can be proud of. Act in a way you'd be willing to share with everybody around you, and its a lot harder to go wrong.
Secondly, don't let a bunch of insulting fools ruin something you enjoy, or a friendship you have. If you can, learn to laugh at their antics, while remembering that you're being a person you're proud to be, and that you like it that way.
If you're doing something (or multiple things) that you're not happy with (don't make a snap judgement on these things, really sit down and think it out), then its also important to know that if you're determined enough you can change. If you don't like something, make a decision to act differently, and stick with that decision no matter what. It won't be easy; odds are it'll be incredibly hard, but you can do it if you really want to.
Also keep in mind that you, and everybody else on the planet, are human. You *will* make mistakes, and that's ok. You will slip up, and that's ok, too. Just remember what your goal is, and do your best to make it there.

2014-09-23 15:06:47

@John, I am afraid I disagree. The solution is never quite as simple as just "admit different people are different and be proud" sinse usually there are far more complex things going on behind any expression of an opinion at all, whether that's a person's attraction to others or if they like a given tv series. It's understanding those things that is the key, and of course understanding yourself.

@Green gables fan, I'm afraid I didn't exactly follow your post very well. I'm not sure where intelligence figures into this or "being useful to society" Indeed, to be brutally honest my personal thought is "society!" as a hole is pretty scummy, doesn't like anything different from itself and ignores anything it can't cope with, plus has nasty habbits of making instant judgements of people and who is respected, especially in society's obsessions with appearance and wealth. Individuals are another matter, and being useful to individuals is a very different thing, but that's not really related to whether you like a given tv series or what.

@Kenzon, on the surface there is absolutely nothing wrong with someone being attracted to people of the same sex, for all that the majority of people think it is. It sounds however from your description that your more major problem is your friend's attitude, what he says in public etc. If this is true there might be something about your friend and I agree with John that perhaps talking to him is a good idea. If however your problem is just! that your friend is attracted to men, well then this is the point you yourself need to not! be like the majority and try some understanding.

I remember being shocked myself when I found out a chap who was a friend of mine at university, someone I knew very well, had got together in my room to do logic with and attended the same tutorials was actually gay, sinse I had always assumed that someone who was gay would have something quite definably other and detectable about them. it wasn't that I had any objection, I just thought there was a "Gay!" vibe that I'd pick up.

Well, there isn't! contrary to popular opinion not all gay men waltz around in pink frilly trousers and lisp, and not all gay women wear black leather and are built like pro wrestlers, both are just peoplee like anyone else.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2014-09-23 15:14:56 (edited by afrim 2014-09-23 15:19:31)

Those kinds of behaviours are definitely not childish, I am 18 years old, and I’d watch any series of Naruto or Mortal kombat rather than a film. Though they might sound much childish to a group of audience, they are in particular educational games. For example, in some series of Naruto, people can learn very well how to love their country/nation, how to sacrifice for your friends. Also, there are other series who are not especially designed for children, I think a ten years old child wouldn’t feel a very emotional scene like a fifteen or seventeen one. Though they might consist of cruelty, brutality and nastiness, it doesn’t mean that they promote violence to children, they do deal with those kinds of scenes even in different films and TVs.
And something much interesting. If you watch any tutorial on youtube regarding to these games, who people call them childish, you will realize that those who explain are up to 20 or 23 years old. smile

2014-09-23 15:27:24

Sorry. Mortal Kombat is the last series anyone I know would call childish. lol Most anime that's been mentioned here are designed to be targetted for young boys who are in their early to mid teens, so no, if you enjoy those I wouldn't suggest that your behaviour is childish. I can't comment about your friend though... and Afrim made some good points. some of those shows, Naruto in particular, may have a surface and style that's very obnoxious... but there are many good themes buried in most Japanese animation that go far beyond children and young teens.

Discord: clemchowder633

2014-09-23 16:57:15

I'm 25, and still love a lot of anime including Pokemon, so no, i certainly don't think that kind of thing is childish. I do think that your friend should learn how to keep his personal fantasys to himself, as ultimately, people most likely won't be able to understand or be able to handle the strange nature of his thoughts. As an example, i love the smell of my girlfriend's body, and no, not just her hair, or any other part that might have perfume on it. I won't go in to much detail, but i will say i love certain areas of her body that smell unique to say the least, and many people would find this gross, or probably tell me that i was off my rocker for enjoying that kind of smell. But, they are my fantasys afterall, and i keep them to myself unless, someone is curious to know about them.

2014-09-23 17:23:40

Hi,
Regarding fantasies, I honelsty haven't experienced that sort of thing or at least not knowingly. For tv shows though, as I said before, I like the cartoons. I think I'll have to try watching the original transformers series.
I'm wondering, has anyone here seen the entirety of the original Yu-gi-oh series? That goes way beyond the duelist kingdom arc. I thought duelist kingdom was cool, but then it actually got even more interesting later on, as if duelist kingdom wasn't interesting enough already, suddenly, boom. Everything comes together and lots of new stuff gets revealed, and the arcs got darker and darker.

2014-09-23 17:40:23

On the anime front, well Assault freak is correct a lot of things like Naruto  are aimed at young boys anyway, they just tend to have better plotting and methods of story telling than western cartoons or series aimed at similar age groups, or at least some do, indeed some people describe  the avatar series as Western anime for that reason, though it's worth remembering that there is a lot more to anime than just Naruto, bleach, dragonball etc.

Then again as I said previously, intended audience doesn't make much difference anyway.

In terms of Mortal combat and similar game series, well remember that there are people who grew up playing older Atari systems who are now in their fourties and still maintain an interest in computer games.

I disagree however with Assault freak that the violence content of Mk  automatically makes the games adult, sinse generally speaking the morality and characters are fairly simple, and the plot to the mk games doesn't really go through any major twists or permutations that would require adult emotional understanding to get to grips with, and the violence in the games is treated in such a commical manner it's very hard to actually take at all seriously. Indeed, I always find it somewhat ironic for a series that is famous for it's gorey fatalities that plot wise, no characters ever! perminantly die and exit the series.

Of course, Mk is pure good clean fun, and very epic, and enjoyable on that reason, Ijust wouldn't class it as automatically adult because of the violence, sinse the violence is presented in such a commical fashion.

Contrast this with the episode chain of command ofStar trek next gen (the one where Picard is Tortured by the Cardassians). Now even though what you actually see on screen is very minimal in terms of gore, the awsome acting, and the genuinely scary way Patric stewart really puts across the pain and emotional hopelessness of being tortured, not to mention David Warner's awsome playing of a completely sadistic cardassian who believes himself completely in the right is genuinely disturbing, especially for such a usually safe series as Startrek, and something I would not recommend to someone under the level of emotional maturity to get it.

Indeed, I always find it interesting, and a bit worrying that the classifications for what counts as adult or childrens has nothing to do with context, actor's reactions etc, and that it's quite okay to show someone being tortured, even tortured into sobbing incoherence with the death ray so long as there is no red stuff or seriously sustained beatings.

@Aaron, original transformers is cool! I particularly like the way that it has an actual sustained ending, an ongoing plot, explains the origins of autobots and decepticons and even covers things like the awsomeness of the 1986 film, which to me will always be the ultimate  transformers, indeed if you've never heard Unicron voiced by Orson wells  confronting Galvatron with Leonard nemoy you really are missing something! big_smile.

I also as I said like the fact the plot ends, and the decepticons are, if not actually defeated, at least kicked off cybertron, albeit with some sacrifices along the way.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2014-09-23 18:21:21

Hey Kenzon, I'm 26 years old and I still watch Pokemon and other stuff like this. I am currently a dungeon master in some rpg groups and one of my favorite songs is The Lion Sleeps Tonight. I'll tell you what. If those things sounds ok to you so go on. To be mature is not to stop watching or doing things, trust me. Maturity is to care for what you do, if it wont hurt anyone else, than you're quite welcome to go on.
Best regards, Haramir.

The true blind is the one who refuses to see.

2014-09-23 18:42:52

Ahem, let me see if I can explain it better. If I can take a little bit of John's and Dark's post, I could say in which areas I agree with and why. First of all, we all like the things we do because of our personalities. Our personalities are made up of emotions, intellect, and identity. Emotion is how you are most of the time compared to how you would feel or react to certain situation. Intellect or cognition is the core of what makes up a person by their memory, recollection, analytics and creativity. Last but not least, identity, or what you know. All of these is what I believe that contributes to the things people like. What I am simply stating here is that those who like video games and TV shows more than they do on helping others, it could have a negative impact when they could be reading an intellectually-stimulating book. I never watched Pokémon, nor have I played any of such video games, mainly because they did not appeal to me, so whenever people talk about those things I am left out, much as I would like to blend in, but cannot because I have not the experience to identify with a group of people who like the same thing. No matter, for I have other interests that help me understand the world better through different eyes.
I will say that I watched a lot of the American reality-TV shows for children which mostly involved urban fantasy and reality, such as Clifford, Caillough, Noddy, Dragon Tales, Sesame Street, etc, because they were complex and full of stimulation, whereas, no offense, pokemon has a pretty empty plot. When I am by myself, I like to relive all of those memories of when I was watching those shows, but out in public I am different unless that is, I meet somebody who shares the same interests as me.
Most people laugh at other people for their differences because they do not understand, and the fear of not understanding something is what they make fun of. It's called stigma. In Western society, everything is scripted like a mahine. Everyone is obliged to know what to say, how to say it, what to act, how to act, what and when we wear this or that, you name it. Had it been more complicated I might watch it, but again, I would not want to spend time doing something that I would hardly benefit when I could have spent time working on something more useful. Sorry for the repeat, but I hope I am making sense this time.
ONe last thing: The qualities of a person, both good and bad are found under identity, or what they know. For example, a person can have a lot of good qualities, but may not necessarily be smart, but they would not mind working hard to getting smarter. Or, you could have a person who is extremely stubborn and resistant to change, and with no way in being able to separate cause and effect. People who deserve to change the world should know the reasons behind everything while the rest can just do whatever they like.
I have a link for your friend to check out. This could help him meet other people who are LGBTQIA

Ulysses, KJ7ERC
She/they
Reedsy

2014-09-23 20:46:49

A lot of teenagers like to start thinking they're super mature and that includes shunning anything they consider aimed at a younger audience, they believe it's something they are growing out of. I experienced this myself both with warhammer 40,000 and with the fact that part of me felt drawn to the 90s action cartoons but I felt too guilty to watch them.

Fantasising about beating people up is just plain wrong no matter how you look at it. Wanting to fall in love is perfectly fine, though it isn't something to obsess over or else your friend might feel disappointed when it proves more difficult than he imagined. Smelling feet, meh, that's a personal thing and if he talks about it a lot he might need a friendly talk about the concept of too much information. Same sex attraction is perfectly natural depending on the individual, I see no difference between gender specific attraction and hair colour or body type specific attraction personally, but if he goes around trumpeting it to anyone who listens or your local area tends to be unaccepting of such matters the TMI talk might again be helpful. If he talks about obsessive sexual fantasies involving people he knows he might need a little pointer about boundaries but attraction to people you know in itself isn't harmful, I'm sure a lot of us have been distracted by a young student teacher at some point.

cx2
-----
To live by honour and to honour life, these are our greatest strengths and our best hopes.

2014-09-23 23:06:19

@Ggf, interesting thoughts, though to be honest I find some of your statements a little overly utilitarian. for example wanting to "Do something more useful" rather than watching something you like or requiring an "interlectually stimulating book" sinse there are more reasons to engage in things than just feeding of cognition or purely ceribral stimulation. Indeed, I am coming to think myself that the traditional western separation of the good, rational, purely cognitive super ego and the bad, wild, emotional uncontrolled Id is incorrect. I've often found myself that something which heavily engages my emotions or what you could call artistic or aesthetic impulses also enhances my abilities to reason inductively and creatively, quite aside from giving me access to areas of experience and personal perspectives that are different from my own and thus widening my horizon.

I agree on society though, which is indeed why I said society really isn't nice, however I am less sure on changing the world sinse realy the world doesn't want to be changed and even those with the insite and compassion to do some sort of good aren't allowed anywhere near the necessary power to do so, though that is another debate entirely.

@Cx2, I agree about the "kids cartoons are a guilty pleasure" phase, however I pretty much went through that myself when I was twelve and out the other side. By the time I was 13-18 I'd pretty much determined I liked what I liked and could even say why, whether it was cartoons (I first watched pokemon when i was 18), or really serious and hard sf, or heck books on ancient egyptian culture or astrophysics.

On the fantasies of beating people up, well I disagree that this is automatically wrong. Suppose someone with a very nasty and over bearing boss or teacher fantasied about beating them! up? Well isn't that better than doing so in person? Anger has to go somewhere, and dealing with it in your head is better than either having it fester around and cause you trouble later, or doing something more extant.

if on the other hand the fantasy is just a general one, or involved with say getting pleasure from the idea of another person's pain, then there might be something worrying happening.

@Kenzon One other thing about these personal fantasies of your friend, is why your friend might be telling you. If others laugh at him for liking pokemon it is possible he's feeling alone and slightly confused. It is also possible he's trying to find soem sort of identity by weerding people out, by being deliberately outragious, it is also possible that your just a friendly fellow and he sees you as a person to confide things that worry him, or that he admires you and wants validation of what you think of him. It's sort of hard to say without knowing the chap, but that is something you might want to considder, why! does your friend feel the need to tell you these things.

You could even ask him, "why are you telling me?" so long as you did it in a friendly, rather than accusatory way.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2014-09-24 00:34:27

Identity issues are pretty common at that age, even without the same sex attraction thing going on. I agree with Dark on this subject, he may be seeking approval from a peer he feels he can most trust. And for goodness sake whatever you do don't fall into  the trap of assuming someone attracted to men will be looking for any chance to jump you.

Dark, oddly enough I never felt guilty about my interest in sci fi, science, history or mythology. It was around the age you went through that phase though, I still enjoyed some cartoons such as the 90's cartoon of the British Dennis the Menace which you know is nothing like the American Dennis but action cartoons that were running at the time like X-Men or YuGiOh I felt far too embarrassed to watch.

All that being said I'm still embarrassed about my phase of being into the original Power Rangers. Frustratingly my sister has never felt embarrassed about anything she watched as a kid ever, including pretty much every flavour of Power Rangers there was going.

cx2
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To live by honour and to honour life, these are our greatest strengths and our best hopes.

2014-09-24 01:56:56

Absolutely none of this sounds unusual.

Foot fettish and BDSM aren't that rare (especially if you spend more than 5 minutes on the internet). I don't understand either, but apparently they're some of the more popular fettishes. It isn't clear if the foot/beating people up fantasies your friend has fall into fettish territory, based on your descriptions alone. But if they do, I have to doubt they're the only one in your area (depending on population density).

They sound like your standard nerd Vs. your standard not-nerds. In the modern sense, not the way it was used in the 80s.

It sounds like someone's substituting "childish" for "weird compared to average". <10 years ago I would probably have thrown a tantrum about how those are not the same and etc etc etc (I'd be writing an essay just summarizing it). Then people invented the term "manchild" and I realized it was hopeless and turned into a spider*.



* in the sense of "I'll just sit in my web and wait for something to happen. Then eat it."

看過來!
"If you want utopia but reality gives you Lovecraft, you don't give up, you carve your utopia out of the corpses of dead gods."
MaxAngor wrote:
    George... Don't do that.

2014-09-24 02:36:58

I still watch frozen, so...

skype name: techluver
Feel free to add me.

2014-09-24 07:17:56

Well for what it's worth I still find a young kids Claymation show called Trap Door amusing in a casual sense. Even if something really is aimed at kids doesn't mean it can't have charm, and a lot of what people call kids movies are really more family movies.

Oh and there's always the muppets. Kids love them, adults love them, what's not to love.

cx2
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To live by honour and to honour life, these are our greatest strengths and our best hopes.

2014-09-24 09:42:33

Well, I wonder what is the opinion of the person voating "yes, its perfectly childish". Also, now I understand though he's still weird, what with the "Im gunna dig his b*tt", "His d*ck is sweet", and "I'm gunna smell his a*s" kinda of things he keeps saying. Its still unnerving, especially because he is! telling the public and not just to me. Others would often! laugh at him though I just said "yeah yeah, whatever", I know I should've talked to him about this but its easier said then done, especially because he didn't exactly listen. He just says "Why! There's no wrong in saying those things" or "Yeah huh". Also I don't think he would like to find gay partners, since its just fantasy after all, hopefully. Its just unnerving to see the other kids laughing at him when he says pokemon being his favourite movie, in fact I myself am wondering what movie is my favourite. Boboiboy is one of my favourite but it doesn't have any movies yet, karate kids is just too violent, avatar is too boring (No offence), etc etc. It also doesn't help that I'm easily angered (and ashamed) of myself. If people laughed at me I might have scolded them and turn beat red out of shame. Its also pretty unnerving when they say "hey you're a weakling!" and stuff. I admit I'm pretty weak (but still stronger than some of my friends) but they are! just so childish that it makes people feel unnerved. Yes, people might say they're stronger, but that doesn't! mean they can just say that to any people weaker than them, right?

Team rocket's blasting off again!