The Art of Appreciating Straightforward Opinions

It's 1 a.m. on a Saturday night. I'm supposed to get up early tomorrow for a 7 a.m. road trip with my colleagues, which means heading to bed right now is probably a good idea. But I'm known for making bad decisions, so here comes my midnight rant instead.

So today, this 2050 SAT high-school friend of mine, author of a hilariously stupid blog that I've personally been requested to write a review on, decided to change things up a bit on his page. Instead of bragging about yet another encounter with some random chick at the bar/in the gym/on the phone/in his wet dream, the guy chose to be a freaking gossip and wrote a rather lengthy and, to borrow a word from one of his critics, incoherent rant.

In 1000 words of unnecessary capitalization, awkward references, and horrific transitions, he basically called out a guy, who happens to be a HEDGE FUND MANAGER (HFM - capitalization my friend's), for being "pussified". If you don't know what that word means, Urban Dictionary is your friend, as it was mine just a few hours ago.

Anyway, my 2050 SAT friend was told by a 770 GMAT friend of his that this HFM guy has been a total slave to his wife, who, from what my friend was told, wasn't nearly as accomplished. The HFM would do anything to please his wife, from cooking for her to rubbing her feet. When he made her sad, she would post pictures of him crying for forgiveness on Facebook.

My friend, being the "gentleman" that he is, or at least claims to be, proceeds to have a few choice words for this HFM guy, while morphing into a defender-of-manliness version of Martin Luther King and calling everyone with a set of balls on this planet to step it up.

(Note: I've probably used more profanities a quarter-of-the-way through this entry than all of my previous ones combined, but only by doing so am I able to reflect the true spirit of my friend's blog post. So if you feel my language here is too vulgar, you're right and I apologize. That won't happen again).

Unsurprisingly, my friend's blog post drew the ire of anti-sexists, feminists, and generally those who have despised his blog for a long time and couldn't wait for a better opportunity to pounce.

These critics, the majority of whom understandably girls/women, felt that they've been offended by my friend's view of women, not just from this very entry but also from the general idea behind his blog. It clearly doesn't help that towards the end of this entry, he was promoting a book with a not-so-appealing-to-feminists title of "The Way of the Superior Man". The casual language he uses in this entry in particular and the blog as a whole isn't exactly feminism-friendly either. All of these, like a perfect storm, added up to some pretty harsh comments on his entry.

To me, though, I don't see a problem with the content of his entry as much as the way he receives and delivers it (gossiping, stalking the girl's Facebook photos, calling people names, etc..). I also don't see how the entry can offend those critics as much as they're making it out to be. Maybe because I'm a guy. But I thought my friend made it pretty clear in the entry that he doesn't look down on "stay-home husbands" as a whole, he's merely frustrated after being told that somehow a guy who made it to HFM level can let himself be controlled by his wife in such disrespectful manners.

It's perfectly fine for the critics to disagree with my friend, but getting that emotional over a harmless blog post? A bit too much.  

Let's be clear, even though it may sound like one, this is by no means an attempt to defend this 2050 SAT friend of mine. In fact, I, too, have so many issues with his entry that I don't even know where to start. His concept of a "gentleman" also greatly differs from mine, even moreso after his recent entry, But that doesn't change the fact that I really appreciate how he's never shy of expressing his thoughts.

For a guy who works in the media industry making money by reporting politicians' bullshit, it's safe to say that by this point I've begun to group people who aren't afraid to speak their minds into a list of endangered species that needs to be taken care of. For all his and his blog's flaws, this 2050 SAT friend of mine certainly belongs to that exclusive list. He's earned my respect, regardless of how different our viewpoints are.

Which is exactly why I decided to do what I'm doing, even though lying in bed is by far the much better alternative.

Keep up the hilariously bad yet refreshingly straightforward work, "gent".

April Fools and the Art of Learning to Take a Joke

Give me a few minutes and, as you wait, listen to this song by one of my favorite bands, Bee Gees, while I blow off the dust on this blog. It's been more than a month since my last entry, and by no means am I proud of that "record".

To spare you the lame excuses, the main reason behind my absence is, obviously, my laziness. There would be days when I woke up in the morning determined that I'd update my blog, only to snooze through the night without any new content.

Coming up with the right topic was not that easy either. I could have just written an update on my previous post about my so-called little crush, as many of my dear readers have suggested. But then again, I don't want this blog to turn into a chronicle of my miserable romantic adventures.

Anyway, let's get back to the focus of this post. According to sources familiar with a functional calendar, today is April 1st, also known as April Fools, also known as the day you can mess with folks, make stuff up, and pretty much turn into a clown without, for the most part, consequences.

Which leads me to wondering: why can't every day be April Fools day?

Obviously I'm not advocating for legalization of year-round bullshit - this planet already houses more than enough governments and politicians. What I'm focusing on here is the "without consequences" part. Yes, I do believe that you should be able to crack jokes without consequences.

I'm sure many of you at this point are thinking to yourself: that's not how it should work. But allow me to clarify, a joke is different from an insult. Insults often, as they should, come with consequences. But a joke, by its very definition, means no harm to the receiver.

Of course it's difficult to draw a clear line between a joke and an insult. A clowny guy by nature, I've crossed that line more than a few times and paid dear prices, but the frequency of such instances is low enough for me to continue cracking jokes at my friends' expense. The majority of my American friends in college, those who have talked to me more than five times, have said stuff along the lines of "Huy, you're the funniest Asian guy I've ever met."

Not that having the best sense of humor among a group of stereotypical nerds is something to be proud of... Actually forget about it, I take that as a compliment. Thanks guys.

Anyway, my point is: a joke is harmless, and should be taken that way.

But that doesn't mean you should go out and poke fun at every person in your field of vision. From my personal experience, there are three types of people whom I identify as non joke-takers: people whom I've just met, people who don't know me well enough, and people whom I know can't take a joke to save their life.

The first two categories are pretty self-explanatory. As for the third, honestly, I do feel bad for them. It's perfectly fine to not have a sense of humor, as each individual is born with different traits. But if you take offense to every little joke thrown at you, I'm sorry, your life must be pretty sad.

That said, even if I disagree with their approach, I can at least tolerate this type of people. They don't like jokes, I'll let them be. But the worst are those who feel it's perfectly fine for them to make fun of other people, but when the joke's on them, they would inexplicably throw the most ridiculous fit you can ever imagine.

Those are the people for whom I have absolutely zero respect, even if they somehow enjoy successful careers. As many of you can attest, it's borderline impossible to offend me. I'm not saying that gives me leeway to make inappropriate jokes, but at least I'm not being a freaking hypocrite like this type of people.    

I'm gonna put an end to my rant with a little advice for those who are frequent targets of jokes. Don't react. Because the more you react, the more incentive you're giving to the jokers to keep making fun of you. Stay cool, fire a few jokes back at them if you can. That's ten times more likely to shut them up than acting like a baby or throwing fits.

Happy April Fools!

Valentine's Day and a story about my latest crush

Contrary to popular beliefs, I do have feelings. Shocking, I know. Even though I rarely show my emotions in public, I'm perfectly capable of having them just like any normal human being.

And just like any normal human being, I get this tingling feeling inside once in awhile, when a girl (yes, I'm straight) makes me feel like, in the words of Boys like Girls, "Hey, you know, this could be something".

I can't remember how many girls I've had a crush on in my life. Not because there are too many of them, but more because I don't really see the point of keeping a tally of crushes.

Each of them differs from one another and it wouldn't be fair to just group them altogether like that. Some are just flashes, some last longer than others, some I can't explain why, two turn into the real thing.

I know that most of you are still shell-shocked at the fact that a guy like me can possibly date. But it's true. In fact, I don't mean to brag (I do) but I'm 2-for-2 so far in asking girls out.

Not that having a 100% success rate is something I worry about when approaching girls, it's just that I can't stand failure. I'd get extremely and visibly upset if I fail to do something I'm determined to. So when it comes to girls, unless I am 100% sure she'd say yes to my request, I won't even think about asking her out.

With this better-safe-than-getting-denied approach, I usually take a lot of time getting to know my target. Before I can get a read on the girl and know for sure she's somewhat into me, I will absolutely never go out of my way to show my hand. I guess I'm pretty good at this, thanks to my exposure to poker.

On one hand, this approach allows me to be in control of my romantic adventures, emotionally speaking. What I mean by that is, for example, if I'm really into this girl and she doesn't show any indication that she's interested, it won't really bother me as much since I haven't really invested that much emotionally either. If she does, then great, time to step it up.

And boy, there are few better feelings on this planet than knowing your crush is also into you.

On the other hand, this approach has cost me dearly as well. My first real "romantic relationship" (calling it a "relationship" might be a stretch, hence the quotation marks) ended thanks in large part to me being a bit too unassertive in expressing my feelings toward her. Distance played some role, too, but the main culprit was me.

When I'm single, the worst part of this wait-and-see approach comes when my target also employs a similar approach. I'm almost positive I've been in this sort of situation more than once, and I just couldn't break out of my mold to make a move on my target. Then again, she didn't either. So it's all good.

Anyway, coming back to the title of this post, I just want to clarify that even though I'm currently not in a relationship, I'm by no means in what they call "hunting mode". If the right fit comes, then so be it. If not, I'll happily just move along with my life. Desperation equals emotional weakness, and I don't tolerate emotional weakness.

Lately, though, there's this one girl whom I've been thinking about quite a bit. The chances of me and her working out are slim for a variety of reasons, but I can't deny the fact that she's been on my mind for the past few weeks.

She's cute, that's for sure. But more importantly, to me at least, she has a drive, a concrete goal that she is willing to go the extra mile to achieve. That is something all of my previous crushes have in common.

As you might have guessed, I have yet to show her any indication that I'm attracted to her, apart from a few text messages and small talks. We won't see each other again until after Tet holiday, so chances are this could be another flash crush. But then again, we will definitely see each other, so there could still be something.

I don't have any stand-out features that can make a good first impression on girls. There's nothing special about my appearance, I don't work out, I don't use flowery language, I don't have pick-up lines at the ready. The first impression of me, to most girls, is that I'm a quiet and somewhat weird person. And I don't mind that, since it's somewhat true.

But if I can get my target to talk to me a few times, just the two of us, magic tends to happen. And I'm speaking from history. I'm terrible at making a good first impression, but certainly adept at leaving a lasting one.  
     
Normally, stories about my love life are mostly confidential, some even classified as top-secret. But in the spirit of Valentine's Day as well as my inability to think of a different topic, I decide that this could be a nice change of pace from my usual ramblings about socio-political things, stuff some of you don't really give a crap about.

And yes, also because it's 10 p.m. on freaking Valentine's Day and I'm just sitting around in my room having nothing else better to do.

I do have my Valentine, though, in case you're curious. I asked her out this afternoon, and she said yes. Here's a beautiful photo of me and her together:

Happy Valentine's Day everyone!

The Art of Saying "I'm Sorry"

As some of you may have heard, the otherworldly smart Benedict Cumberbatch recently proved to us that he's human after all, as he messed up on live television by using an outdated terminology and describing his fellow actors with the adjective "colored".

How this statement offends a certain group of people or not isn't the point here. This is a classic case of abusing political correctness™ in my book, but that's a story for another day. What really matters here, for me at least, is how Sherlock Cumberbatch owned up to his mistake.

So this is, word for word, what Benedict Cumberbatch had to say after his blunder.

I offer my sincere apologies. I make no excuse for my being an idiot and I know the damage is done... I feel the complete fool I am...

I'm gonna go ahead and admit that I'm a big Cumberbatch fanboy. In fact, he's on my ultra-exclusive list of guys on this planet whom I'd say there's a non-zero percent chance of me turning gay just for them. But the fact that I might be a little biased doesn't take away how awesome this apology is. Straight to the point. No excuses. No conditions. No asking for sympathy.

Kids, this is how you should say sorry.

Even if those offended by Cumberbatch aren't satisfied with his apology, I think he's done his part.

But seriously though, how much cooler can this guy get? There's still something to be learned from him even when he screws up.

Apart from learning to control what comes out of your mouth, a lesson here in this incident is what constitutes an appropriate apology. I've heard so many people in the past who said sorry to me, and right after that handing me a barrage of reasons and excuses, as if they're trying to make me feel sorry for them instead.

It's fine if you have valid reasons for messing up, but the point remains: you mess up. That alone deserves a proper apology, one that should not be along the lines of "I'm sorry, but...".

There's no "but". Just say you're sorry, and mean it. If you get an earful for that, so be it, because chances are you deserve one. Also, when you apologize to someone up front and later on explaining to them what leads to your mistake, it works much better than trying to convince them, in the heat of the moment, to forgive you.
 
By the way, my dear readers, I'm sorry for my recent two-week absence. But I do have an excu... never mind.

The Right not to be Offended

It's been a full week since my last entry. When I decided to resume blogging, I set a goal for myself to have at least two posts per any given week. And here I am, two weeks in, already falling short of my goal.

I do have a valid excuse, though. A day after my previous entry, something terrible happened. Paris, whose beauty more than justifies its Enlightenment name as the City of Light, was shrouded in darkness as the French capital became the target of yet another cowardly act of terrorism.  

As someone who makes a living covering world news, I had no choice but to devote full attention to this event and its aftermath, which is still present on every single news outlet's front page as of today.

I was still able to hang out with friends and maintain some semblance of a social life, but mentally, I was worn out.

On the bright side, the event did give me something to touch on in this entry.

A day after our live coverage of the Paris massacre, my editor-in-chief sent a memo to the entire world news crew, asking us not to use any photos of Charlie Hebdo's cartoons in our articles, citing some ambiguous political correctness reasons.

To be honest, I don't blame him for doing so. As the head of a non-government publication, he has every right to exert caution, preventing the newspaper from unnecessary backlash from the politically correct™, and unwanted attention from a dysfunctional Central Committee of Propaganda and Education, who would routinely look for the most trivial reasons to impose a fine.

Heck, even CNN, The New York Times, and a few other big-name outlets decided against posting pictures of Charlie Hebdo cartoons.

So my boss and those in charge at CNN chose not to show the cartoons to the public. That's fine. But what bothers me is the amount of "experts" who try to be politically correct™ and say something along the lines of "OK you can have freedom of speech, but..."

The main point of these "experts" is that while they support freedom of speech, they also find the Charlie Hebdo cartoons unnecessarily offensive. In other words, they question Charlie's decision to publish the cartoons.

I'm sorry, what?

That's basically the definition of an oxymoron if you ask me.

Here's something the "experts" may not know or just willfully neglect: pretty much every single thing that comes out of your mouth will "offend" a certain group of people. That's just how life works.

I am an atheist. Religion has absolutely zero meaning to me. This is the truth, but by saying that, I've offended a couple billion people who's religiously-affiliated.

But let's see it from my point of view. I spent 4 years in a Christian college, living with roommates and receiving an education from professors who hold Jesus Christ to the highest regard.

By these politically correct™ "experts"' logic, during those 4 years, should I take some degree of offense at the fact that every single person around me firmly believes, whether they publicly say that or not, that I am going to spend eternity in a pit of fire suffering torment for the "sins" I have committed until the end of days?

I'm no human behavior expert but I'm pretty sure that's not really a nice thing to say. So should I go around the college, collect all the Bibles and light them on fire to prove my point that I've been offended?

Probably not. And that's just one example. There's this one girl living across my dorm room in my senior year who legitimately tried to convert me to Christianity. When she finally gave up her effort a few days later, this was what she told me:

"Huy, you should really think about it. Either you're a Christian, or you're a faggot."

I'm sure she didn't mean it, she knew I was a goofy kind of guy who wouldn't get offended by stuff like this. But I had a valid reason to be offended, because you know, she's basically saying my entire family are faggots, joking or not.

Back to the Charlie Hebdo cartoons, I'm sure every single Muslim is offended by the "blasphemous" illustration of their Prophet. But that doesn't give any of them the right to commit such a cowardly act.

Even worse, while the decision to not publish these cartoons will spare the likes of CNN some hate mails from their Muslim readers, it actually plays right into the hands of these radical terrorists. It creates something the media called "Islamophobia", or the fear of Islam, which is exactly what the Islamic State or al-Qaeda want, and exactly what the true Muslims dread.

I happened to spend 2 high school semesters sitting next to a friend who's Muslim. Although we don't see eye-to-eye on many things, I always see her as one of the nicest and most informed persons I've ever met. She probably sees me as nothing more than a goofy clown, though.

So it really saddens me to see her religion tainted in the eyes of the public just because of the action of the extremists and the media reactions that follow. And when the public mistakenly see Islam in its narrow radical version that's filled with violence, it puts her and the majority of Muslims in the world in a bad spot.

But rest assured, my friend, I will never see Islam in that light. We can agree to disagree when it comes to how we view religion, maintain our freedom of speech and freedom of religion (or lack thereof), while not succumbing to the oxymoronic world of the politically correct™. 

I am Charlie.

"Blame the Media" Syndrome and the Impending Apocalypse™

Sit your laptop/smartphone/tablet down, or walk away from your computer. I know you've been dying to read my much-anticipated blog post, but please temporarily refrain from the urge to do so and ask the person closest to you what he/she thinks about the media of this day and age. 

Chances are, it won't be a positive assessment.

As someone who's previously studied about and currently working in the media industry, I am well aware that it's getting a lot of flak for the job it's been doing of late, and deservedly so. I'm not writing an academic essay, so excuse me for not having any credible sources to back me up, but it doesn't take a media guru to tell you how toxic the media can be if not digested properly.  

The key phrase here is "digested properly." More on that in a moment. For now, allow me to morph into an expert and explain to you a few things about the journalism profession that could help you understand why the media is what it is at the moment. 

Huy, why is the world such a dangerous place right now?

Newsflash: It isn't.  

If you feel you've been constantly bombarded with so-called "terrible" news of late, it's not because the world all of a sudden is turning into a dystopia.

Strange as it sounds, it's actually just the media doing what it's supposed to do. 

Journalism is about reporting what happens, not what doesn't happen. Just ask yourself, would you:

- Bother to read an article titled: "An uneventful day in our neighborhood"?

- Keep watching a TV segment in which the reporter goes: "I'm live here in the middle of nowhere. Nothing's going on right now, everything is perfectly fine"?

- Care to click on a link that reads: "Nobody died yesterday, according to a city official"?

Probably not. 

If you take a News-writing or any Journalism-related class, your professor will most likely ask you this question on the first day of class:

What makes a story newsworthy? 

After going around the class fielding answers, your professor will sum everything up with a few bullet points. The lists may vary depending on your textbook/professor, but all of them will contain one similar bullet point.

Human interest.

In other words, if your story has the potential to interest readers, it's fit for print. Every news publication will try to tailor its news content to the targeted audience's interest. That's why we are seeing more specialized news outlets to fit specific types of audience, instead of the everything-under-one-hub model of the past.

With all the airplane tragedies this year, the ongoing terrors of the Islamic State, or the seemingly daily citizen-police officer gunfights, it's understandable that you may feel the world is in a pretty bad shape right now. 

But it just reflects how you, yes I'm looking at you, the media consumer, wants your news served. Simple supply-and-demand rule: if the audience aren't interested, the media won't produce. 

There's a reason why the media keeps feeding you those kinds of stories.

There's a reason why those kinds of stories always draw the highest amount of clicks or receive the highest ratings.

There's a reason why the majority of news stations still implement the "if it bleeds, it leads" model in their work, or the Vietnamese equivalent of "cướp - giết - hiếp - sốc - sếch" stories. 

You guessed it. Because you want them.    

  

So Huy, are you saying it's not the media's fault?

No, at least not entirely.

To clarify, I'm not trying to defend the media by any means. A combination of lousy user-generated content, the 24/7 news cycle, and the urge to "get the scoop" have come at the dear cost of journalistic quality. I could go for days talking about my discontent with the direction the media is heading into right now. But that's beside the point. 

What I'm focusing on in this blog post is the fact that media consumers need to understand that it is their responsibility to filter their own news feeds. This is what I mean by "digested properly". Yes, the media could do a better job of proportioning their news, but it doesn't help when stuff like this happens:

Here we have a recent post by WPMT-FOX43, a Central Pennsylvania TV station where I used to intern. This is an attempt by the station to "soften" up the news feed with a funny clip of an officer's reaction to being on live TV. Now look at the comments I attached to the picture.

These two are not the only ones complaining why this funny clip qualifies as news. Obviously there are people who enjoy the change of pace and find this story funny, but this just goes to show the double-standard many news consumers have these days. 

- Too much terrible news? Me no likey. 

- How about something softer to lighten the mood? Why is this even news?    

So if you're still complaining why all you see on the news are stories of mass killings, some stupid celebrity scandal, or Kim Kardashian's otherworldly butt, blame yourself first, for the media was just tailoring their content to fit YOUR need. 

So you're saying the world is still a safe place to live in?

I don't know about your world, but mine's alright. 

Of course now that I've jinxed myself, I may run into some unwanted trouble tomorrow. But even so, it doesn't change the fact that:

1. It's not just the media's fault

2. The world is not as dangerous as you may deduce from what you see on the media. 

3. There's no such thing as an Apocalypse™, or The End of the World, unless like me, you're a fan of The Carpenters. 

Why an English blog?

If you're wondering the same thing, you're not alone. Plenty have, myself included, asked me the exact same question as well. I'll address that somewhere in this entry. But first, let me briefly explain to you why blogging, something you may think is trivial, means a lot to me.

Who even blogs anymore?

I do, duh.

So why a blog in the first place? The thought of starting and maintaining a blog had been in my mind since high school. I like writing, but not the "tập làm văn" (academic essays, sort of, for those who don't speak Vietnamese) kind of writing in which you beat around the bush for 10+ pages about something that can be described adequately in one paragraph.

Okay that might be a bit exaggerated, but you get the idea. I prefer to get straight to the point in my writing, except when I decide that deliberately hiding bits of information initially would improve the quality of the piece as a whole. But that's generally not the case in essay-writing. Your professor and his mother know exactly what you're gonna write, so why not just get straight to it?

Anyway, that's probably enough ranting for this post. Back to my original point, I've always wanted to have a venue in which I can share my thoughts in letters and words. I don't speak that much, sometimes too little, as many of my friends/acquaintances can attest, as I always sought to keep personal feelings to myself. But there are certain things that I don't mind giving my take on.  

What about diaries you ask? Well, um... let's just say I hate diaries. My apologies for using such a strong word but honestly I feel diary-writing is just a bit too... narcissistic. To be clear, I'm not trying to say narcissism is necessarily a bad thing, and I'm sure there are plenty of heart-warming diary entries out there somewhere, but I just don't see the point of writing to an audience consisting of me, myself and I. To me, writing is more about the reader than the writer. If you feel it's the other way around, you're wrong we can agree to disagree.

Some have even suggested vlogging (video-blogging) instead of blogging, as they feel the former would be more entertaining. In fact, a few close friends of mine have made a name for themselves talking alone in front of a camera. For me, though, vlogging simply doesn't fit my personality. Neither does it meet my need of a venue for writing.
  
In short, a blog pretty much fits everything I want to a T.  

Choosing the language
When I started Musings of an Introvert in 2012, I was debating between a Vietnamese and an English blog. So which one did you guys think I picked?

Sorry that was lame. Anyway, I was confident in my writing skills, Vietnamese or English, but I went with the latter for a variety of reasons.

- My friends can either speak Vietnamese or English. But those who can only speak English far outnumber those who communicate exclusively in Vietnamese. Using the Venn diagram, an English blog would be accessible to a larger audience.
- Since Vietnamese is my mother tongue, it's harder for my Vietnamese writing skill to deteriorate than my English writing skill. So not only does blogging help me express my thoughts, it simultaneously gives me an opportunity to maintain, practice, and improve my writing ability in a second language as well. Two birds with one stone. I love efficiency. Who doesn't?
- English is a global language. If a stranger somehow ends up on my blog, chances are he/she will understand what I'm rambling about. The odds would be significantly lower if my rants are in Vietnamese.

Did that answer your question? Yes? Awesome. No? Please specify in the comments.