In My Non-Expert Opinion

One time during an interview for an online ESL teaching job, I was told to market myself as an expert so that students would want to take my classes.

Now, I understand that the internet is full of false advertising…people pretending to be more than they are…so there’s pressure to play along with the game in order to compete with all the self-proclaimed superstars out there. Yet although I have over a decade of experience teaching, tutoring, and writing, I still don’t feel comfortable thinking of myself as any sort of expert. Though I’ve written on a daily basis since childhood — journal and blog entries, stories, poetry, you name it — I don’t know if I will ever feel as if I’ve truly mastered the art of writing.

But I guess in the era of influencers, people aren’t interested in fellow laborers — those with significant experience in a craft, but mere mortals nonetheless. No, only expert opinions matter.

Describing myself in such a way feels pretentious, though, so I avoid using labels like that.

Darkness and Chaos

From a very young age, children in the United States are now being indoctrinated to believe that they can choose their gender, humans evolved from animals, and vaccines are 100% virtuous. They are afraid to challenge these beliefs, because they witness the ridicule and character assassination aimed at adults who do so. No wonder children are growing up to become depressed, ignorant, and worst of all, entirely out of touch with God.

Of course, this isn’t new. Public schools have been indoctrination centers for a long time. Before the current postmodern, post-truth era, science as the ultimate authority was the prevailing belief thrust upon us in the 20th century. That is the paradigm which formed my worldview, since I attended public school at the turn of the 21st century, finishing before Common Core and the transgender agenda were introduced. As a teen, I didn’t believe in God and thought science could reveal all truth. Yet when I took a closer look, I found endless clashes between scientific theories, and silence on ethical questions. Science began to seem too limited to be humanity’s guiding light.

Indeed, the worship of science and technological progress for the sake of progress has greatly harmed society. We’ve become very proud of our achievements and have collectively turned away from God. We honor the people who invented the atomic bomb and the smartphone, even as these inventions have destroyed us.

That’s why I am no longer drawn toward science, as I believe many of our problems are caused by scientism, the idolization of power under the guise of progress. Technology has developed beyond the point of being beneficial. Society is now devolving with the false impression of evolving, because not all progress is automatically good.

Sometimes I Wonder Why I Was Born in the Postmodern Era

Ginsberg is weird…in a good way…I think.

In any case I enjoy the poem “Howl,” which reminds me of “The Waste Land” except funnier and less obscure.

Ginsberg is very much a modernist who focuses on the dark side of life — city gutters, drug addicts, raunchy dealings and the like — rather than writing idealistic poetry about the beauty of lilacs and songbirds. A dark sense of humor permeates his work, which I appreciate. Ginsberg somehow reminds me of the main character in One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest. His work is rebellious and humorous, and reminds me of lewd graffiti written on middle school desks by hyper and disrespectful boys who recently discovered sex, drugs, and rock & roll.

Though “Howl” seems incomprehensible at a glance, I think I understand the point…a reflection upon the confused urban lifestyle of modern people. The entire poem is practically a run-on sentence with strange and mildly disturbing lines such as, “Who ate fire in paint hotels or drank turpentine in Paradise Alley, death, or / purgatoried their torsos night after night / with dreams, with drugs, with waking nightmares, alcohol and cock and endless balls.” Trying to understand this sentence with a logical frame of mind doesn’t work.

The common saying, “He probably wrote this while he was on drugs,” almost certainly applies to “Howl.” Yet as an uncensored, unedited response to modern life…I understand. Modern life is confusing and raunchy. Many people — if not most — rebel against authority, experiment with drugs, and have casual sex with strangers.

Nothing that was once considered sacred is treated with respect anymore. As someone who happened to be born in the era of postmodernism, I witness that reality every day. Even former President Obama couldn’t resist flirting and taking a selfie during Nelson Mandela’s funeral.

Though I digress, this is just one example of the hedonistic self-absorption that characterizes America today, and that is what “Howl” is essentially about.