Got Your Nose

Deception can take on many forms. However, for us nerds in competition it serves a very important purpose. This is because when we play competitive games, our opponent must not know our intentions. If we disguise our intentions, it makes it much more difficult for them to read us. If the opponent can't read us, they have to guess to counter us.

As I mentioned in my previous articles, the first step is to know what your intentions are. You must be aware of each choice in a decision point. If you're at tempo advantage for instance, your natural answer is to keep attacking, and so your opponent will want to stop you from attacking. They might block, or they might do some counter move, or try to parry, or some other attack. You could guess what they're going to do. You could also condition them so they want to do one thing instead of another.

In a situation at tempo advantage, the best way of deception is to condition them not to do something when you are at advantage. A good example might be to do the fastest possible actions at tempo advantage, which discourages them from attacking. Then instead of attacking quickly, do a slower, unblockable move or a move that hits in a difficult way (such as a low attack or overhead).

As mentioned before, conditioning is a good way to persuade the opponent into doing something. But we're talking about deception here. In poker, deception is very powerful. If you can fool people into thinking you are strong when you are not, you will win many many games of poker.

Once upon a time, I was playing Capcom vs. SNK 2 with a friend of mine. It was a very tense moment and I was winning, up about 75% of my Sagat's life against his Zangief, who was almost dead at about 20%. He had a full super meter though and I told him that if he wanted to win, he would have to land final atomic buster, Zangief's throw super. Throughout the match, I reinforced this idea, that he would have to FAB me in order to win. Zangief also has another super though. It's an air grab super that jumps up and grabs people in the air and does a lot of damage, although not as much as FAB. I whiffed a crouching fierce in front of Zangief and he rolled at me. He rolled through my fierce punch, and I saw the super flash. In this situation, it would be better for me to jump, to avoid the FAB since if you jump you will avoid the grab.

But in this situation I stood still because I knew he would not do the FAB since I had been commenting on it for a good 45+ seconds. He did the airgrab predictably, I hit him out of the air and went on to win the match.

In Magic, the same can be said for cards in your hand. If you are a green player, you might pretend that you have some powerful instant casting card (such as Giant Growth) that makes one of your creature cards more powerful. If you have this buff in your hand, you might be able to use it to wipe out one of their creatures, putting you at a strong board advantage. If they think you have this card, they'll be more likely to make safer moves, which can benefit you.

So in the situation that you have the card, your 'tells' will be based around what you want them to do. If you want them to lose resources to you, you'll want to put up the air that you don't have the card. You might lie to them and say you don't have any in your deck, or just act like you don't have many tricks or are drawing bad cards. Then when they make the "smart" attacking play, you can block and pump up with giant growth, making your creature defeat theirs.

If you want them to play passively so your deck has time to build up, you'll want to suggest that you have a G-growth in your hand so that they don't attack for fear of losing card advantage, and don't block for fear of losing card advantage. In this way, you can build up your defenses safely and they won't want to attack. In some cases the fake won't stop them, but you can reinforce it quickly with a real threat - all it takes is for them to lose a strong creature to a weak blocker that gets buffed by an instant spell to make the threat very real. After that, all you have to do is suggest that you might have a G-growth in your hand. Better yet, suggest that you don't. Reverse psychology works really well.

What about... StarCraft? I haven't mentioned that game in a while.

Zerg are -really- good at deception. I'm a protoss player, but I love zerg. Zerg can spawn from any hatchery, and you can morph them into any type of unit you want with only one building needed, unlike terrans or protoss. Protoss need templar archives, gateways, robotics facilities, and so on. Zerg just need hatcheries and the appropriate tech building. So it is not uncommon to see someone switch from a heavy muta air build into a hydra/lurker ground build, to an ultra/defiler ground build as the situation demands. If you're playing versus terran, they have different counters for zerg. They need goliath/valkyrie to counter mutas, or tons of medics and marines. They need tanks to counter lurkers. By switching tech on your opponent, you screw with their counters. If you know a terran player's tendencies, you can run mutas to get them to build turrets and make lots of medic/marine, then switch to hydra/lurker and really screw their day. Now they've got to build tanks and sci vessels, except that takes a ton of effort and resources. If you're good with lurkers, you can just walk them right up to the enemy base unless they counter.

Yeah, I don't play zerg because they take too much micro, but man, they rock.

One thing I liked doing in first person shooter games with large maps is act as a spotter without actually engaging. I'd watch many enemies move in and I'd call them as they come in, but I wouldn't engage myself. After the enemy attack had moved in, I'd attack the back end and kill guys from behind. By hiding my presence I could get a couple kills and make things way easier on the defending guys. In general, this meant we could defend with way fewer people and could devote much of our force to offense.

Another thing I liked to do in Halo is mask attacks on the enemy base in order to steal their vehicles. With a large attacking force, a group of us would attack the enemy in our vehicles. Other people would sneak in and steal the enemy vehicles and drive them to hiding places and park them, so that the enemy would not have any respawning vehicles at their base until they came to our hiding spots on foot and got them back. In the meantime, our attacking force was attacking the objective, but really they were just stalling for time so that the defenders would not stop people from stealing their vehicles (Actually, the attackers didn't know what was going on, but we did, so basically they died so we could steal vehicles. Oh well, we won anyway~)

Tricking people into doing something is sweetness. A good idea is to position yourself such that there is one very obvious thing you want to do. Then... do it! If your opponent is very good, he will probably think you are tricking him into defending against the obvious thing, then he will try to do what beats the counter move instead.

If your opponent is knocked down, you might rush at him and huddle very close as though you are going to throw him. This seems like an obvious bait for a dragon punch. Your opponent would never fall for that, so instead he will try to take the advantage, except you actually do the throw, and he gets thrown. Very tricky!

So what about real life? It is pretty nerdy to take a skill like this and apply it only in competition, right?

The answer is that you should generally not try to decieve people in real life situations. It is okay to be tricky in competition, because in the end you still show respect for the person, and in its own way, tricking and decieving them shows respect for them - it says, "you are a good enough player that I'm forced to hide my intentions when I'm playing against you."

Lying and hiding the truth in real life though are not respectful things. There is no competition or prize to be won by being dishonest.

All in Your Head

I was asked specifically to do an article on stress management. Don't hate me because I personally think this article sucks.

In order to write this article I had to do homework. I'll be really honest here. I have no idea how to deal with stress. I'm not a very stressed person generally, but doing the research for this article made me realize that when I do get stressed I tend to express it poorly. For instance, when I'm in a gaming tournament, I generally play far worse than I do in casuals. My most recent SF4 tournament, I lost in the first round to a bad Ryu player. At the last K-con SC4 tournament, I lost in the quarter finals to someone probably better than me, but the match was incredibly horrible and I made tons of mistakes.

My research generally wasn't very promising either. 99% of the stuff I read suggested either something new-agey or escapist as a means of dealing with stress. If you want any of these new-age stress management links from me, post a comment and I'll dole out some links. I have no doubt they do work for people who live generally stressful lives, but they do absolutely no good for people like me.

The escapist things, like going for a walk, or doing yoga or whatever nonsense probably works for people with stressful lives. However, when you are in a pressure situation and your performance actually matters, it doesn't work at all. You can't pause your tournament match of SF4 and do some yoga or walk out of your job interview and go jogging a few miles. You've got to cope with the stress and turn it into a positive energy that empowers you.

One way to improve your overall stress management skills in crunch time is, annoyingly, lifestyle changes. Now generally I prefer technique, such as when you get into situation x, do move y and it handles the situation better. However, healthy lifestyle changes such as eating better, exercise, and basically anything that puts dopamine in your system helps you cope with stress, since dopamine puts you in a positive state of mind. The studies I read state that cigarette smoking doesn't help (stimulants in general don't) even though dopamine is a product, which was sort of surprising to me. Marijuana does, scarily enough, as does moderate drinking (eg. a beer here or there; excessive drinking hurts).

Don't take that as an advertisement to go smoke weed, by the way.

Anyway, lifestyle changes only work if you practice them beforehand - don't go smoke a joint before a poker tournament then ask me why you lost. The idea is that you influence your body to produce more good chemicals on a regular basis. I say lifestyle changes because it's not just stuff you put in your body. Having healthy friendships and romantic relationships helps us cope with stress better and it's not just because those people are there for moral support. The relationship actually puts chemicals in our blood that help us deal with problems even when they're not around.

As a side note, rumor has it that sex is a pretty good performance drug. Coffee, soft drinks, and cigarettes are not! Don't smoke before a big match, or drink energy drinks. Drink fruit juice (pulpy juice is best) and eat a low-fat, high-fiber breakfast or lunch. Chocolate chip cookies are a pretty good performance drug, especially oatmeal chocolate chip (I'm seriously not joking).

Next idea is to care less about what you're doing. I know, laugh. I know it's ridiculous but it's so true! If you care less about the outcome of whatever it is that you're doing, you'll be less stressed about it but more importantly you'll perform better.

I am someone who used to be gifted with good local competition in Soul Calibur. For a long time, 3 of the 4 best players in my state, who were also among the top 20 or so in the Northwest, were local to me. Of those 3 (I'm one of them), I was the better player. When I played against the other 2 in casuals it typically resulted in somewhere between 6-4 (bad days) and 8-2 (in the zone) win ratios for me. In competition, I almost always played better against them than the other top players, typically playing like I was 'in the zone'. When I played against decent (but typically worse) players, I tended to play a lot worse, and most tournaments I play in, I tend to get upset by someone not quite as good as me (occasionally I meet someone really good, but usually that results in me getting pasted). By comparison, the other people in my crew that I beat on a regular basis typically place first and second, and generally no lower than top four.

The reason for this is because I care far less about matches against my friends than I do about unknowns. I know I can beat my friends - I've studied their playstyles and I know them inside and out. They know my game too, so they have the same advantage against me - but despite that I know I can win. Against an unknown, there are many variables I have to think about, and it causes me a lot of stress. I am well known for losing matches against people when I could just beat them with standard frame traps and pressure (not really even having to think) just because I try to think too hard during the match.

Just saying "relax" doesn't work. Care less. The lesson is that the outcome doesn't matter as much as you think it does, so don't worry about it as much. Most likely your life will go on no matter what, and you'll be able to make up your failures even if it takes some time. If it is a life or death thing, such as a combat situation, even still worrying about it will just make you screw up. Just focus on doing what you know, because the outside stuff will just screw with your brain and make you lose your skills.

Foreknowledge helps. "Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance" is how the saying goes. If you know what to do in a particular situation, if you've got the skills to pay the bills, handling the rest is easy. If you're a guy, most likely you can just convince yourself you have the skills even if you don't.

Yes, I realize that's kind of sexist.

What's most important in this scenario is that you believe you can succeed if you just stick to your guns. This doesn't always work in competitive games but it works in pretty much any other scenario, including job interviews, college exams, and oral presentations. If you're confident in your material and your skills, it'll help you deal with the task ahead.

Preparation in general is sort of a relaxer. If you actually make the prep time, it helps to really boost confidence. A good example might be if you do rehersals before a performance and the rehersals go well. You can duplicate that scenario for an oral presentation or job interview. Combo practice and practice matches before a tournament help a lot. I used to never play casuals before a tournament because I believed 'going in cold bore' helped keep me from making dumb mistakes and kept people from learning my tricks. This is not a good idea in actual execution and you should really practice as much as you can before an event without exhausting yourself physically or mentally.

Going back to lifestyle really quick - SLEEP. I can't stress how important good sleep is for performing at 100%. Go to bed early if you have to - don't take sleeping pills. Eat a good meal (low fat, high fiber, eat a lot of food) and get some quality rest. If you sleep well and eat well beforehand you will feel over 9000 times better in the morning.

Anyway, that's most of what I have - stick to your guns, practice, live healthy and don't take the stressful situation too seriously.

And uh... don't rely on any new-age tricks or escapist methods of dealing with stress. Work with your problems, don't try to ignore them.

Minimum Standards of Entry

Somewhere along the line I realized that I'm biased.

I read a lot of other social blogs and post little random comments here and there. Most of the authors there and I have a lot of overlap. Most of them are pretty cool guys and post lots of cool stuff. Some of them post on scary stuff like religion, which I am too much of a wimp to do (I'm not a religious person so my beliefs are probably offensive to most people who read this).

The odd stuff is where we disagree. I lose a little bit of respect when self-help social bloggers suggest things about religion that I don't agree with (or more accurately, misinterpret non-religious people). I also don't really like it when people suggest that eating a normal diet is inherently bad (I realize it probably is from a health standpoint, but I am a gamer, not a dietitian).

Sometimes I need to expand my views slightly. In the case of the diet thing it is a good thing to eat better, to lose weight, and to be more healthy. It's also a good thing to stop smoking. I write a blog about mental health and self-improvement, and quitting smoking or otherwise improving your physical health is definitely along the path of self-improvement. I personally hold those values kind of low, but I realize that actually these things are important to some people. I doubt I'll write much about physical health, but thinking on my bias a little helps me refine my viewpoints a little better.

The religion issue is sticky, and I feel a bit troubled writing about it. I am a nonreligious person. I absolutely respect people with religious beliefs though, and try to give them as much room as I can to practice their beliefs around me without being obstructive or telling them that they are inherently wrong or anything like that. Unfortunately, religious people are not willing to do the same for me, or most people practicing other religions not their own. Religious debates are very difficult and frustrating because neither one will just accept or understand the other's side as a valid belief choice (it's not like we have definitive proof of any of these things - just clues that compel us to believe). This is why I don't talk about religion - it's hard for people to understand that I don't believe because there's not enough hard facts in religion's favor, but if there were, I'd believe because it'd be obviously correct.

That of course, brings me to the actual topic. This is another rant.

I can't stand closed-minded people. I look at the people that annoy me most - drama queens, selfish jerks, and so on. The people that frustrate me the most are closed-minded people.

The reason why I dislike them so much is because it is absolutely impossible to have a real discussion with a closed-minded person.

A discussion with a normal person has us talking about a subject. I talk about my views on the subject. The other person will explain their views. I will say what I think about their views, and they'll provide a rebuttal, to better explain the reasons why they have them. If I agree with that rebuttal, I'll say so, and say that the person's views on the subject are valid. If I don't, then I'll say so. Sometimes this might end with neither person giving in, but because most people are at least somewhat open minded we will typically agree to disagree. There will be respect given for each person's point.

A closed minded person is different. They openly attack viewpoints not their own. When I explain to them how their beliefs are wrong (or even just that I disagree with them) they treat it as a personal attack and get defensive. Instead of respecting other people's viewpoints, a closed-minded person condemns them.

What bothers me so much is that closed-minded people then create a barrier that keeps them from gaining any new understanding. If a closed-minded person thinks that the world is flat, they will not accept evidence that shows that the world is not flat. They will probably treat the presentation of evidence as a personal attack, and openly condemn whoever provided it. They will probably launch attacks against that person's credibility, or use other logical fallacies in order to make the person look bad, or their argument seem wrong.

But the truth stands strong. When people try to condemn the truth, it stands firm, and people can see how ridiculous these closed-minded people are. The world is round and the earth rotates around the sun.

There is a minimum standard of entry for my respect. You -must- be an open minded person. If you are not, I cannot respect you. I cannot respect someone who chooses their uneducated ways of thinking instead of shedding their mental restraints and growing and improving as a person. No matter how much I grow as a person, this point will remain the same. If you can't take the world around you and the advice of others and change yourself, I cannot respect you.

If you're reading this and are closed-minded (unlikely!), you can change. Do it.

Actually angry?

This is not such a good post. I'm really irritated at people in general right now.

Redefining Nerds was created with the idea that I could help people. It's life-changing information for people who need a little bit of a push in the right direction. People that read it let me know in IMs and such that it's helped them out quite a bit.

This isn't so much for the people that read this site, because generally if you've actually decided to come here and read, you're probably on the right path. The problem I have is with people I talk to either on websites, in IM, in chat, or in MMOs.

Most people I talk to are okay, honestly. They have a pretty good sense of right and wrong, and understand when they make mistakes. I explain to them what was a good choice when they make a bad one, and they are usually like 'yeah, but blah makes me mad' and so on. This is okay. I feel like most people in the world fall into this category.

The people I can't stand are the selfish, jerkface people that do not have this natural code of ethics. Although they would not believe so unless you told them to their face, they absolutely do not care about anything except what they want. Anything said that they don't agree with is treated as a personal attack, and any personal goals they make are purely selfish. Any selfless actions these people do are only to make themselves look better in the eyes of other people.

Am I bad because I really, really dislike these people? I feel bad because I should not hate anyone. I am frustrated with myself because these people are horrible and I cannot change them, I can only feed their ego with attention. What do I do?

This has frustrated me a lot lately. Should I hate them, shun them? Should I actively seek their downfall? Probably not. But I struggle daily with this sort of dilemma.

What do we do with people who genuinely are only in it for themselves?

Please Select Your Character!

I get in debates all the time about how to make a character in a roleplaying game. Most people I talk with suggest that concept is the most important thing about a character and that everything else should fit around it.

I dislike this theory. I'll be talking about RP-oriented characters here, so mostly pen and paper characters. However, if you roleplay in other games such as MUDs or MMOs or whichever, this is also valuable information.

My belief is that one must take a balanced approach to character building. You can't be happy with a character if your guy or girl isn't fun to play in game terms. You'll also be less happy if your character isn't interesting in roleplaying terms. Separating roleplaying even further, your character needs a good, interesting personality and enough backstory to look into as the game progresses.

The first thing I recommend is a style. You don't want it to be too specific, but you want to help shape what your character's class and abilities will be, and give you an insight into their personality. If you have no idea on your character's personality, skip this step. We'll come back to roleplaying design in general later, so this is just a kicker to get you started.

Your style is mostly your character's general attitude (cocky? shy? smart? funny? wise?) combined with a few little things about what your character does in adventuring (hack things with swords? magic? sneakyness? diplomacy?). Don't be too specific at this step. No backstory, period. If this step results in you being only able to pick one class or build or whatever at this point, you've gone much too far.

Build is the next important thing. If you're not good at this step, ask someone who is. I cannot stress this enough - it is a total pain in the butt to go through a whole campaign as a character whose abilities you decide aren't fun.

First, eliminate anything that doesn't fit your character's style. This step should be pretty obvious. If this narrows your choices down to one thing, ask yourself very seriously if that's what you want. Then ask your pro minmaxer friends if it's a good idea. I've been asked before if some top tier build or strategy would be good by roleplaying friends before. I explained very indepth that it was, and why it was. They went on to make characters that they had a blast playing.

Anyway, even if you think you're a pro minmaxer it's good to ask friends for advice anyway. When I wanted to make a particular character, I asked one of my good pro minmaxer friends if it was a good idea, and he talked about his experiences and how he thought my idea would not be fun. In the end his advice helped me make a choice that I would enjoy.

Anyway, through trial and error (talking with pro friends) you should come to a character class and spec that you will be happy with. Most roleplayers scoff at me when I suggest this step. However, when I go over this step with roleplaying friends they come to me and say how fun playing their character is. When I go back to the people who scoff at me, they are playing their concept characters and being like "well I like my character, but I don't really like this or this" to which I reply "well you should have taken these abilities instead, and it would be more fun for you."

So after you have your style and basic idea for character and a concrete (set mostly in stone) build, you get to the fun parts. You can do the next two steps in either order.

What is their personality? Now that we know their skills and such we can think more clearly on who they are as a person. What drives them and motivates them?

One of the big tests I do for each player in my PnP games is to have them sit down and do a MBTI type analysis (in character) such as the one on humanmetrics.com. Even if the end result isn't exactly what the player is expecting, letting them answer the questions helps put them in the mindset to play that character better. All of the players I've run this through have said it's an amazing tool as long as they're not being held to exactly what the test says. That's not the point, though. The point is to aid you in 'thinking in character.'

As with the build portion you'll want to probably ask people about this sort of thing. The GM will be able to give you advice here but that's more important for our last step. Other players will be able to say "this sounds fun" or give you suggestions for your personality.

The last step is backstory and justifications. This is the fun part for me. It's fun to minmax, sure, but it's much more fun to make up why all the minmaxing actually occurs. At this point we know your characters' abilities and probably their future ones too. We know a lot about their personality, although maybe we don't if you skipped step 3 (you'll need to do it after this).

Go over everything your character can do and ask yourself, "why?" If you can't figure out exactly why right offhand, come back to it. This should be organic, really, and it can take place during Step 2. If you've got certain skills you picked out, ask yourself, "Why did I learn them? Who taught them to me?" If you've got certain powers or abilities, ask yourself exactly why they are what they are. What do they do outside of the world of game mechanics?

This is the best time to hook up with the GM because he can give you tons of details about your world. If this is a MUD/MMO environment, get with a fellow player who knows a lot about the game world. If you do this then you can more easily integrate yourself into the game world. It gives you more hooks because people don't have to interact directly with something about you - they only have to be interested in some other aspect of the already existing game world, letting you get involved more easily in roleplaying.

The other trick is that in a pen and paper world you can actually create parts of the game world this way. The GM most likely doesn't have his whole world designed, so any bit of it you want to include into your game helps his job a lot. Unless he is the DM of the Rings, anyway.

Lastly, after our four steps, we want to finish up. Add some finishing touches to your personality or backstory, and fine-tune your abilities to better match up to your character's history. Sometimes this involves making small sacrifices in ability, but don't worry about that as much as you should worry about the overall concept. Talk with your powergamer friends about any choices you make (sometimes seemingly small choices are huge) and talk with your GM about any tweaks to your character or backstory.

Every little bit you let your GM know keeps him in the loop. More importantly, it lets him know you're excited about playing, and that helps keep him motivated. When I have players that are really into my game and want to do things in it, it really motivates me to make new and cool stuff for them to explore and discover.

I'm going to go over my player group now because literally all of them used this method and all of them are extremely excited about the characters they are playing.

Fejn is a samurai who hears the spirit of the sword. Her people live in the forest, and hear the spirits of the trees, but not Fejn. She listens to the heart of the sword, instead. The spirit of the blade guides and protects her. In game mechanics she is a dual wielding monstrosity that can handle literally any threat, and she has tons of HP, too.

Maximillion (yes the 'o' is intentional) is a young, naive engineer who grew up under a family of traders. He's curious about the world and incredibly optimistic, and his gadgets are always handy to have around. In game mechanics, he's incredibly number crunched and he has the potential to do the highest single hit damage of any character. He also produces a number of different gadgets, each with some gamebreaking special effect in the form of either buffs or debuffs.

Seanna is a blind mage from the same people as Fejn, and she is relatively naive compared to most mages. She has impressive magical talent, though, and is a natural expert at all forms of magic, both offensive and defensive. In game mechanics, she also deals ridiculous damage from the main types of magic available to her class, and is reasonably durable despite being a 'squishie' type of character. Her blindness is done in the sake of minmaxing but creates awesome character drama.

Kalenreth, or Kal is a wolf-man thief with ties to the local thieves' guild. He's got a skill for literally any scenario, thanks to his guild training. He's a big loudmouth but his mouth is equally good for getting him out of a jam. He's relatively loyal to his party but his first loyalty is to the thieves guild. He won't hesitate to do whatever it takes to get the job done. In game mechanics, he's got a skill for everything, he's nimble and hard to hit, and he often supplies the party with stolen goods.

Spencer, although that's not actually his real name, is a bounty hunter. His goals don't really mesh well with the rest of the party, but in Spencer's player's case that's sort of the point. He creates a lot of interesting drama, and his practical advice often tempers the rest of the team to consider things they otherwise wouldn't. In gameplay terms he's also an offensive beast, but he has flexible damage types and control effects added in, giving him some added punch to make up for his less-than-Faen/Max single hit power. He can also use his control effects while still tearing stuff up, which is highly effective.

Eddie is kind of the exception. He's an older sorceror with the power to summon incredible creatures. He's the most powerful class in gameplay terms but he is kind of a wallflower. Still, he has fun playing his character despite being kind of a wallflower player. He built his character mostly around being strong but has no idea what is strong. He is by far not having the most fun out of all of my players.

Thus! You should use this method whenever possible! It will let you make fun, enjoyable characters and everyone will have an awesome time playing with you.

I need a Hero

http://amfix.blogs.cnn.com/2009/05/08/dont-ask-dont-tell-continues-under-obama/

Watch that.

The summary: A US Army lieutenant states that he is openly gay because he believes that deception and isolation is wrong. The Army discharges him and he still wants to serve. He's going on trial to plead his case to a military court (we hope).

This dude is a hero. A frickin hero.

I'm so proud of people like this who stand up for what's right even when what is right is really, really hard to stand up for in a place like the military. When I was in the USMC claiming to be gay and coming out was seen as an 'easy out' for people who thought they were in over their heads.

I really don't have a whole lot to say here because this really speaks for itself. It's a clear message to the rest of the world - a guy fighting for his country and is good at what he does is shunned because he swings the other way. If there's anything worth fighting for, it's the liberties that say the only thing that matters is merit - if you're an excellent leader, your sexual preferences should not matter.

George W. Bush said, that he didn't think atheists were Americans. He claimed that he thought America was 'one nation under God' and atheists had no place.

Voters have made the choice for Obama as a black President, and gotten rid of that trash Bush. It's a long road towards making this world a better place, though. Hopefully the Obama administration can help this Army LT get back to his men and keep making them strong warriors.

No, not that kind of warrior.

Short post. Not a whole lot to say because this topic should speak for itself.

Morality is Subjective

This post is not contradictory to my previous post. It is referring to people who are not me, and people who should not be you. Unfortunately, if you haven't read my post on morality NOT being subjective, you probably will be one of the people I'm talking about here. So please, read that post first.

I watch Survivor. I really, really like that show. It's one of my favorite shows because it displays a more or less pure version of human behavior. I don't really care about immunity or anything else. What I love about it is the human drama and more importantly, seeing people manipulating other people.

Unlike other games, success in Survivor is directly tied to your likability. You can go far on being a physical player but you cannot win the game on it alone. The strategy in the game is simple yet deep. It is one of the purest forms of competition ever devised - where the only thing that wins the game is votes cast for or against you by the people you play the game with.

In Survivor, subjective morality is practically the name of the game.

Lying and deception are by their very nature amoral. I can think of very few (none offhand) people who would say to me that lying is okay, or that intentionally deceiving people is okay. It happens all the time in Survivor, though. Most of the time I cheer people on who deceive others in that game because deception is central to a strong game.

Interestingly enough though, even though almost everyone (there are exceptions) is sort of morally bankrupt out there, certain competitors show up as 'good guys' and others as 'bad guys'. Often times the good guys are not actually very good guys and are deceptive schemers. The bad guys almost always are deceptive schemers.

Morally we sort of pick sides, though - as though deceiving a certain amount is okay, or in a certain way is okay. Morally we say things like, "I won't lie to these people" or "I won't do this to these people" but is it really okay to lie just to some people? Isn't that the same as saying "I won't kill these people, but everyone else is okay"?

So this article is about moving people. Morality is subjective in most people's minds. I'm gonna teach you how to use it. Use it for good, please.

Everyone has their own idea of what is good and evil. Moreover - everything someone does is eventually justified in a good light in their minds. Not all people are vulnerable to this but the people that aren't are generally extremely emo/depressed people. Even most emo people are vulnerable to this. Even I am, although I am pretty good at recognizing this trick so don't try to use it on me.

People want to think of themselves as good people. Before I watched Survivor tonight I was talking with my parents at dinner (they took me out to a Japanese place, yummy) about accidentally leaving money at a restaurant. My stepdad joked that the people there would suddenly pretend not to speak English if he were to lose money there. I knew this not to be true because if he were to lose money in the restaurant and come back for it, it would make the person who found it feel like they were stealing. Most people would give the money back.

The people that wouldn't exist but are much rarer. People like that genuinely believe that what they did wasn't stealing. They'll justify it in their mind, like 'they lost it, they shouldn't have lost it so it's mine' or they will not think of you as a real person. Some way it will be justified in their mind as morally correct. However, if you challenge the people about it you are very likely to feel guilty because the person who the money belongs to is right there. It feels like stealing.

In this way you can theoretically bend people's morals in order to make what you want them to do look morally right. You can tell them things like "finders keepers," or you can say "you should let the front desk know because they probably left it there on accident." Those two statements reinforce morals (peer pressure) and make people feel better when they make the choice you want them to make. Please don't suggest the finders keepers line.

The main reason I suggest this is because if you ask people to think about the people they are hurting, they'll feel guilty. If you suggest moral ways of solving their problem, you can convince them to do the right thing.

So let's say you've got a friend who is a griefer of whatever kind. I'll use the trashtalking halo or SF or whatever player who disses on everyone who sucks and is generally not fun to be around. If you point out the morally good thing to do (explain what they did wrong nicely) and suggest it as a superior option, ideally making them feel a little guilty about the person they emotionally hurt, they're more likely to stop their behavior. If you morally reinforce them over this time period, they'll be likely to change their ways and be a much better player (in terms of behavior, probably in terms of skill too, since they'll have more people to play against!)

One more thing that is sort of related to this is the stubborn idea that everyone believes the same thing you do. I of course do not think that everyone believes the same thing I do. I try not to push too hard my ideas on people. You shouldn't either. If someone doesn't want to listen, you can treat it as their loss. More though, if someone wants to start a fight over some belief that you have, you should probably not fight too hard. I do, and it almost always makes people not like me.

Sigh.

Anyway, so morality isn't subjective... except in everyone else's mind. Use this power wisely, guys.