a classmate wrote this wrote this several years ago in senior year...

[bob-o]

ok, so at my highschool we had this thing called senior speakout, where we all write speeches, and get voted into a top 8 or so. this kid, cedric mcdougal (to give him credit...) got voted into the finalists and then as a winner but then was kicked out last minute. i just found it, sitting in my email for the past two years. here ya go:
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This is the speakout that you will never get to hear – all because Mrs. Preis finds it unsuitable for your ears. Keep in mind, however, that this is the uncensored version. First, I was told that I had to tone down the obvious language – and I did. Then, just yesterday, Mrs. Preis informed me that it was still inappropriate. In order to read it to you today, I would basically have to rewrite it. In one night. So here you go, an uncensored copy of an uninhibited speech. ~Cedric McDougal

Die Free

Answer me this: why are you here? In school? Why are you here? Nobody likes school. I mean, nobody really likes it. But why do you try? Why do you follow the rules? Why do you work for a grade that means nothing? A grade is only a measure of how much you care. And in caring you are attached; in attachment you are trapped. You are not in control.

What if I told you your parents are dead? How would this make you feel? Hey, maybe you don't care about your parents. How about, your house is on fire, and you're about to lose everything you own. How about you said something stupid and everyone is laughing at you. How about you're raped, catch herpes, lose your dick. Wouldn't you regret it? Wouldn't you pity yourself? Wouldn't you cry your fucking eyes out until it didn't hurt so much? But wouldn't it still hurt?

Fuck it. That's my philosophy – it's called bliss, nirvana, enlightenment. And it is not out of your reach! I can end suffering. You can end suffering. Anyone can end suffering.

What you have to do is this: think about everything you value. Do you value money? Do you value your collection of, whatever? Do you value your hard work? Your social image? Your reputation? You friends? Your family? Your health? Think about it. Concentrate on it. Embrace it.

Now lose it. Lose everything. Smash your stupid little cell phone with its annoying "personalized" ring tone. Take out that essay you spent hours on and tear it into a thousand meaningless pieces. Crash your car; burn down your house; forget. But do not regret. And do not hope. You are not your past; you are not your future; you are not the things you have; you are not the things you don't have. Everything you feel, everything you think, is a distorted reflection of everything you are. Nothing is pure. In having nothing, you can be pure.
But the only way to have is to lose. The only way to love is to hate. The only way to feel is to not feel. The only way to live is to die. You cannot know something, truly know something, until you have known its opposite. Everything is relative. How can you say you're happy if you've never felt pain? How would you even know what happiness is? The only way to be free is to lose all freedom.
You have to let go. You have to accept the fact that you control nothing. Time doesn't care if you've won the lottery, or fallen in love, or gotten a fucking medal – you are not important. Every second you live is a second closer to the second you'll die. You cannot stop it. You cannot avoid it. You cannot run from it. And all your pain, all your worry, is born from your fear of it. Let go.

Now imagine a world with no attachment. Imagine a world in which no one fought to control the things around them. Imagine what life would be like if everyone accepted inevitability, if everyone lived for the sake of living. You wouldn't have wealth; you wouldn't have greed; you wouldn't have war or innovation or suffering or comfort. Screw the great, the powerful, the successful. The great would be the norm. The powerful would be content. The successful would be alive. And you would exist not for what you have or what you want or what you feel or what you think – you would exist for you.

I mean, just look at your life now. It's pathetic. You work, you strive, you yearn, you long for shit that you don't need. How is a stereo essential to your survival as a human being? Why must you have an iPod or an iPhone or an – I don't even care. You do not need a good body. You do not need a good image. You do not need to conform; you do not need to break conformity. It is these wants that hold you back. It is these desires that run your life. And is it worth it? Is a lifetime of dependency really worth the five minute ego trip you get from showing off the meaningless shit you have?

I'll say it again: let go. Sit back. Close your eyes. When you open them you will see a different world. You will see light after having seen dark. You will see something after having seen nothing. And in the instance your eyes first open you will be born again. The world is only what we perceive it to be. If we perceive nothing, what does the world matter to us? If we do not see it, smell it, feel it, taste it, hear it, think it, how do we know it exists? Why do we care? It is because we know that eventually, we will open our eyes. We think we can keep things the same, we think we can hold the world still.

But the world is never still. And we are slowly learning this fact. Everything changes, from hour to hour, minute to minute, second to fucking millisecond. T.S. Elliot once wrote that when a train departs "and the passengers are settled... You are not the same people who left that station / Or who will arrive at any terminus." You are changed. You are altered. You, your mind, your essence, your soul – time passes as the train the passes and you pass with it.

Just think, if you fall asleep right now, you will not wake up – a different you will open his eyes and he will see a different world. The you that fell asleep, the world that you last saw – these things will no longer exist. They will have been consumed by the past, absorbed by the way things can never be again. The past is gone.

So deal with it. Stop trying to hold on. Stop trying to control things. Stop your stupid pursuit of righteous self importance. Stop worrying, stop caring, stop searching for meaning, because there is none. Stop asking right or wrong, stop fucking living for others, stop your mind, stop your soul, stop everything that isn't the thing you are – just be. Exist as you are. Don't live caged by influence but don't revel in stagnation, either. Just lie back and be. Just live life detached and die free.
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i wondered what all you rant experts thought of this. have at it.

bob-o

[Pariah]

I'm not a "rant expert" but I like it

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I thought it was pretty well-written, but incredibly stupid.

[The Johnny]

Answer me this: why are you here? In school? Why are you here? Nobody likes school. I mean, nobody really likes it. But why do you try? Why do you follow the rules? Why do you work for a grade that means nothing? A grade is only a measure of how much you care. And in caring you are attached; in attachment you are trapped. You are not in control.

I went thru highschool so i could get into university, if thats what you mean by "grades mean nothing".... What else is there to do? be some stoner/alcoholic that "is in a band" and hopes to hit it big someday? Become a waiter? You are not in control any way you slice it.

Now lose it. Lose everything. Smash your stupid little cell phone with its annoying "personalized" ring tone. Take out that essay you spent hours on and tear it into a thousand meaningless pieces. Crash your car; burn down your house; forget. But do not regret. And do not hope. You are not your past; you are not your future; you are not the things you have; you are not the things you don't have. Everything you feel, everything you think, is a distorted reflection of everything you are. Nothing is pure. In having nothing, you can be pure.
But the only way to have is to lose. The only way to love is to hate. The only way to feel is to not feel. The only way to live is to die. You cannot know something, truly know something, until you have known its opposite. Everything is relative. How can you say you're happy if you've never felt pain? How would you even know what happiness is? The only way to be free is to lose all freedom.
You have to let go. You have to accept the fact that you control nothing. Time doesn't care if you've won the lottery, or fallen in love, or gotten a fucking medal – you are not important. Every second you live is a second closer to the second you'll die. You cannot stop it. You cannot avoid it. You cannot run from it. And all your pain, all your worry, is born from your fear of it. Let go.

Really, this is just a nihilistic orientalistic hippie pothead speaking.

Now imagine a world with no attachment. Imagine a world in which no one fought to control the things around them. Imagine what life would be like if everyone accepted inevitability, if everyone lived for the sake of living. You wouldn't have wealth; you wouldn't have greed; you wouldn't have war or innovation or suffering or comfort. Screw the great, the powerful, the successful. The great would be the norm. The powerful would be content. The successful would be alive. And you would exist not for what you have or what you want or what you feel or what you think – you would exist for you.

Imagining fairy tale lands is useless if they cannot be achieved

I mean, just look at your life now. It's pathetic. You work, you strive, you yearn, you long for shit that you don't need. How is a stereo essential to your survival as a human being? Why must you have an iPod or an iPhone or an – I don't even care. You do not need a good body. You do not need a good image. You do not need to conform; you do not need to break conformity. It is these wants that hold you back. It is these desires that run your life. And is it worth it? Is a lifetime of dependency really worth the five minute ego trip you get from showing off the meaningless shit you have?

I do go along in the sense that one shouldnt be possesed by the need to buy everything that is put in front of us in the ways of advertisements... if everyone had a nice body i think it would be a better world, but sure, you dont "need to"...

I'll say it again: let go. Sit back. Close your eyes. When you open them you will see a different world. You will see light after having seen dark. You will see something after having seen nothing. And in the instance your eyes first open you will be born again. The world is only what we perceive it to be. If we perceive nothing, what does the world matter to us? If we do not see it, smell it, feel it, taste it, hear it, think it, how do we know it exists? Why do we care? It is because we know that eventually, we will open our eyes. We think we can keep things the same, we think we can hold the world still.

One word:

Just think, if you fall asleep right now, you will not wake up – a different you will open his eyes and he will see a different world. The you that fell asleep, the world that you last saw – these things will no longer exist. They will have been consumed by the past, absorbed by the way things can never be again. The past is gone.

Too much influence from self-help books perhaps?

[bob-o]

^^ there's the response i was expecting...

it was interesting and well-written, but there was a sensational, feel-good, nihilistic, propaganda-like air to it, strikingly similar to what a talented writer-stoner-idealist at the age of 18 would write.

bob-o

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Nice.  A long screed on why you should die on your knees.  Nice.

I want my 5 minutes back, Bob-O.

[bob-o]

I want my 5 minutes back, Bob-O.

hey, i read that fucking thing like 5 times. i think we're even.

bob-o

[Kai]

My crticisms are thus:

- The content is unoriginal. It reads like something out of a nihilistic hippy manifesto.

- The length is far too length...y. Possibly this person speaks really fast, but kids are not gonna sit still for this.

- The whole thing sounds like it was written while stoned, and then unedited afterwards. Edit edit edit.


Actually, tell your friend to scrap the whole lengthy, unedited unoriginal mess. Imploring people towards "enlightenment" seems really profound at the time but later the realization is that it doesn't do shit. People need practical means towards goals in general, and the above method is no method, just a scattering of momentary distractions before heading back into the dull gray polluted urban existence.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

The whole "Stop caring. Detach yourself. Disconnect." message was beyond nihilistic, it was fucking EMO.

[Pariah]

^^ there's the response i was expecting...

it was interesting and well-written, but there was a sensational, feel-good, nihilistic, propaganda-like air to it, strikingly similar to what a talented writer-stoner-idealist at the age of 18 would write.

bob-o

Ah, see guys it was all just a sociological experiment.
No worries

[bob-o]

Ah, see guys it was all just a sociological experiment.
No worries

oh, no, don't worry about that. i was just agreeing with johnyx...

i didn't want to throw my own opinions in right away. i was wondering how this would be recieved but i also was genuinely interested in what others thought of it. the only other opinions of this paper were told to me right after the incident where he distributed copies of the essay to the whole school. everyone was all hyped up, that's all anyone talked about for the rest of the day. oh, the stupid shit that goes on in high school...

bob-o

[Nast]

It's easy to "detach" yourself when you're a kid with few responsibilities.

[The Johnny]

i wondered what all you rant experts thought of this. have at it.

bob-o

then i posted a detailed take on the text which is what he...

^^ there's the response i was expecting...

in which im sure "response" is easy to give it another meaning if taken out of context. Response as in reply.

A lot of people here enjoy jumping the gun.

[Pariah]

i wondered what all you rant experts thought of this. have at it.

bob-o

then i posted a detailed take on the text which is what he...

^^ there's the response i was expecting...

in which im sure "response" is easy to give it another meaning if taken out of context. Response as in reply.

A lot of people here enjoy jumping the gun.

Say again?

[The Good Reverend Roger]

^^ there's the response i was expecting...

Sociological experiment ITT.

Thread over.