Christian Music

I think Christian worship music only sells because of the attachment people have to the religion itself, not because it holds any actual merit as musical work made with skill and talent.

I never liked worship music even back then when I was still a believer.

Just saying.

Paintings

One fine sunny day, a mall held an art exhibit.. It was situated in a part of the mall where people are bound to see it even if they're just passing by. The art pieces, being colorful as they are, caught the attention of some people, myself included. I looked up at the paintings and took good long gazes at each piece that I found interesting, looking at the coloring styles, brush strokes, and attention to detail. I even went as far as to think of probable symbolic meanings or messages those works might have conveyed.

It would've been nice if everyone else did the same but that's not the case at all. I was the only one who did what a person is expected to do at an exhibit. The others posed in front or beside the works of art and took pictures, which I assume they'll post in their Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, just so they can mindlessly post something along the lines of "Look! There is a painting beside me! I'm an art buff". Somehow, I think social media thrives on this form of pretense.

I can't help but feel insulted. As food is made to be eaten and music is made to be listened to, art is made to be enjoyed by the eyes, to be looked at and be beheld in wonder and awe. Those pricks probably think that what they're doing is some shortcut to art appreciation... but no such shortcut exists.

I wonder what the artists would feel if they knew that their art is being misused as a conduit for human stupidity, being what degrades culture instead of enriching it. Their artworks are defiled by the mere gazes of those mongrels and the flashes of their phones.

I think I was born in the wrong universe.

Spices

I don't dislike the dubstep but I used to be a fan of the original dubstep genre before the it became a very popular. With the advent of Skrillex and the divergence of what dubstep purists call "brostep", I wondered and asked myself "What is in dubstep / brostep that people like?" Though it isn't wrong to say that a lot of people don't like the genre because of its noise aspect. But I was inclined to think that this very aspect is what attracted its fans.

Before listening to dubstep, I've heard some extreme noise subgenre samples like Merzbow. For someone new to it, I found it harsh to my ears but eventually, I took a liking to it (though, I don't listen to it very often like I would if I truly enjoyed it).

So what about this noise? A few people like brostep and even fewer can appreciate the pure essence of "noise". Obviously, it's a matter of preference but I see it somewhat differently. People can only tolerate "noise" in small amounts and can't take it once the level has been raised. The noise aspect in brostep spices up the music but brostep fans who dislike the noise genre can't tolerate its pure form. They still need the electronica aspect of the music in order to listen to the "bass drops" they like.

Usually, the final step in cooking is to adjust for seasoning to see if it is to your taste. A dash of salt and some spices would be enough for that final step. Different people like varying degrees of seasoning. But when asked to ingest the spices in their pure form, they choke and spit the spices out. Their taste buds are too weak to ingest it. They still need the rest of the "normal" ingredients to eat the spices they like.

This "spicy" way of thinking can be applied to many aspects in life. One being the lifetime favorite: religion.

When turning into an agnostic, people begin to question their faiths and seek whatever is beyond. In my perspective, those who stay agnostic theist simply took a half-hearted step into agnosticism instead of taking one step further into atheism. Similar to the noise and the spice, these people are too weak and too afraid to embrace the fact. Afraid, they stubbornly stand in the middle of the road or they find convert back into theism, albeit a different religion/sect. No offense to those who prefer to remain agnostic theist - this is just what I think you're doing.

I like my life with salt and a few dashes of pepper, sometimes with habanero hot sauce.