You know I hate arguments. My heart starts pounding, my breathing rate goes up, and I feel like I want to fly out of my skin. And yet I just came back from an hour of discussing the effects of mass media, censorship, freedom of speech and the relative importance of freedom versus safety.

I hate that shit. It upsets me to have to argue a position when there are logical arguments for both sides, and I can see all of them, and it's just a combination of natural and nutural (yeah, I made that word up) factors that make me think the way I do and make you think the way you do.

The person I was talking with is helping me practice Korean, but it's very frustrating to try to hold a real discussion on this kind of topic when your ability to argue your point is limited to first grade vocabulary. Also, he does think that mass media is in large part responsible for the moral decline of society, and I think that's bullshit, so where does that leave us? Exactly.

I don't like hardcore gangster rap, but I don't have to listen to it, so I don't. Does it have artistic value? I don't know, maybe. Is it a legitimate form of expression that elucidates some social problems with frightening graphic clarity? Yes. Does listening to hardcore gangster rap make kids go out and shoot other kids? I don't know, maybe it does. Does it denigrate women and therefore cause men to treat women poorly? I don't know, maybe. If hardcore gangster rap were banned, would all shootings and denigration of women stop? No. So, do I think it should be banned? No.

I hate arguments.