PhilAsify 101

Yeah I know what you're thinking. It's the middle of 2016 and I'm just now writing about the election. So I'm jumping into this a little late alright? Being on hiatus for so long, I have to play catch-up on a lot of hot blog topics so here goes. First, a disclaimer. As the title says, this is a guide for those who despise politics. I would be one of them. Trust me, I've tried to get into it and feel like it's my duty to be at the very least be informed but cot' damn I can't stand the garbage! As a child, I used to think that I just needed to get older to care about politics and that soon enough I'd be watching CNN all day like my dad does but NOPE--almost 29 years old and still can't stand CNN, C-SPAN, and all the talking heads blowing hot air either lambasting political leaders or being engaged in a circle jerk. This is my good faith attempt to breakdown the election and the candidates and the implications of the upcoming election(wh...

"Aaaagh! It's another friggin Muslim guy!" I blurted out to my wife while sitting on the couch scrolling the news sites to find out information early Sunday Morning about the Orlando Mass shooting. My family and I woke up and turned on the TV to news of a tragic shooting at a gay night club in Orlando where a whopping 50 people were killed and 53 were injured. Those were the headlines plastered across the screen of a scene where it showed men, bloody and injured being carried away from the club by friends. Others were traumatized, crying from the carnage they had just experienced. It was horrifying. All we could say while captivated by the coverage was, "Man he (the shooter) better not be Muslim." That's what prompted the search on my phone and sure enough, the idiot was. And sure enough, I reacted like Homer Simpson would when he heard something horrible happened and is praying to himself "Don't be the boy, don't be the boy" and then wh...

The Disgusting Side Effect of the Social Media/Viral Video Age Have you heard the story of Kitty Genovese ? She was a woman who was brutally stabbed to death nearby her New York apartment by a lunatic assailant. She was attacked by the man on three separate occasions during a time span of 35 minutes, all the while crying and screaming for help. Police reports declared that over 38 people heard or saw the attack—which occurred out in public—and no one intervened or even bothered to call police until AFTER the third attack when Kitty was already dead and the man fled the scene. Do you know when this incident occurred? 1964. But judging from the subject matter, you would think it just happened the other day. In fact, if it did happen today, I can’t promise you that someone would’ve intervened and helped the poor woman out but I can wholeheartedly assure you without a doubt in my mind there would be live tweets, Facebook statuses and perhaps even footage of the murder captured on ...

There's a famous saying of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) where he says, “Whoever of you sees an evil must then change it with his hand. If he is not able to do so, then [he must change it ] with his tongue. And if he is not able to do so, then [he must change it] with his heart. And that is the weakest form of faith.” “… must then change it with his hand.” aka put your big boy pants on and put a stop to it, tough guy! Even though this is a Muslim proverb, ideally this should be a universal way of thinking. Unfortunately, that's easier said than done. I've heard and read about plenty of crimes or incidents occurring in public which were REAL and people stood by and did nothing and went about their business.  This video below was a simulated experiment done "what would you do/candid camera" style to capture the reactions of the average joe. If you were about to board an elevator and when the doors opened, there was a murder being attempted, what would yo...

This ridonkulous newsbit I found on CNN.com below doesn't have an emoticon or internet acronym out there that can capture even an iota of its absurdity. Apparently, men in the Middle East have such a soft spot in their hearts (and a hard spot in their crotches) for big bushy Mustaches.  Click the link here  or just read the article entitled "Mideast Men Go Under the Knife for Manly Mustaches" and take special note of what I've highlighted in bold :

Who says "Whacked Out News" always has to be something negative? (NEWSER)  – Taxi driver Mohammad Asadujjaman says he was just following his mother's advice to always be honest when he went out of his way to find a passenger who left a handbag containing $21,000 in the back seat of his cab. The Bangladesh-born med student ended up making two 50-mile trips to Long Island to reunite his passenger, an Italian grandmother, with her cash, passport, and jewelery, the Guardian  reports.  "They were so, so, so happy," the 28-year-old cabbie said of his passenger and her family, whose vacation would have been ruined without his honesty. Asadujjaman says he was never tempted to keep the cash, and declined to accept a reward from the family, saying that he couldn't take it because he is a devout Muslim. "I'm needy but I'm not greedy," he said. "It's better to be honest." Very admirable gesture from the brother given the circumsta...

Just this past week, news broke of a man in Minneapolis, Minnesota walking into a Sign store and shooting and killing four people including the owner of the store. Who was he? A disgruntled former employer who was fired not too long before he decided to start bustin' caps. After drawing a swarm of police and SWAT teams to the scene of the crime to confront him, the man turned the gun on himself, dying before the police could apprehend him. The sad thing is, stuff like this is happening way too often. Ex-employers fired for one reason or another vowing revenge on the boss who handed them the pink slip, students grabbing guns and blasting away professors who gave them a failing grade. Patience and preseverence are a thing of the past. Accountability is now an ancient concept. Blame the economy and the curriculum all you want but in the end it's all on your own head.

I Dare Ya! Don't you love popular sayings? I'm particularly fond of expressions like "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder", "Laughter is the best medicine", "A Picture is worth a thousand words" and who could forget this one: powered by Splicd.com However, one that is gaining a lot of traction is the expression ,"You only live once" (aka. "YOLO" to the youngsters). YOLO has taken pop culture by storm ever since the phrase was coined in a song by rapper/singer Drake. Now it's all over people's Facebook pages, on people's T-Shirts, flooding up the Twitterfeeds (#YOLO) and is regurgitating out from the mouths of the simple-minded masses.

It's the start of a new work week, so rather than dive into my usual PhilAsifical soliloquies, I thought we go a little bit light-hearted today. I just had to share this video that I got a kick out of (pun very much intended) from the world of Mixed Martial Arts.  Though regarded as a brutal sport by critics, MMA rakes in a ton of dough in ticket sales and PPV buyrates, in large due to the hype of fighters verbally jabbing one another before getting down to real fisticuffs. The masses are suckered in plopping down the cash when the fighters hold press conferences which are merely highly publicized smack-talking sessions. Despite this, fighters usually show a great deal of respect and sportsmanship when the final bell is rung. You usually see guys who seemingly hated eachother with such passion and fervor, shaking hands, hugging and sharing laughs mainly because win or lose, they got PAIIIIID son! Dollar dollar bill ya'll! However, a line never to be crossed in the world of...

Wow. I know the shoe industry makes slaves of us all with its outrageous prices and churning out hideous design after design but I didn't know they would be so explicit and direct about their intentions! Adidas was all set to release a shoe that, check it, had shackles attached to the dang thing! Ankle cuffs! But then they canceled its promotion and shipment to stores after receiving tons of negative feedback from its facebook followers. Heres how they were pimpin' these things on Facebook last week: "Tighten up your style with the JS Roundhouse Mids, dropping in August. Got a sneaker game so hot you lock your kicks to your ankles?"

PhilAsify reviews the VICE Guide to Travel: Karachi, Pakistan Well, let me take to to the neck of the woods of my hood,  show you wat we livin' like Walkin' like a man, finger on the trigger Got money in my pocket, I'm an uptown n---- --"Neck of The Woods" Birdman ft. Lil Wayne This past weekend I sat down and watched the Vice Guide to Karachi, Pakistan. For those who don't know, VICE is a Montreal and New York City based magazine and media entity known for its whacky news columns. Their style falls in the same category of Maxim, Manswers, TMZ in that it pokes fun at pop culture and world affairs and has that sarcastic, expletive-laden and blunt sort of way it conducts its journalism that guys love.  Some of their more interesting documentaries have been travel guides to dangerous and crazy places in the world, getting a glimpse of how things operate and how a citizen can get by doing things they wouldn't want their parents to know. T...

For anyone that keeps a tab on the latest headlines, you are already aware of the depressing state the world is in. Morons are abdundant and reproducing at an alarming rate. We live in a world where a state of emergency can be called, not for a terrorist attack, not for a bomb threat or nuclear holocaust but for Justin Bieber riding around in a bus ! Of course, this is not new at all. Idiotic fan mobs have existed since the infant days of radio and television. They went bonkers for Elvis and Michael Jackson forgetting the fact that they were human beings, just like them. They took dumps, they had flaws, they slept and ate and did tons of things other than entertain. But that didn't stop them from attempting to create a stampede for a chance to publicly rape them and other popular celebrities. The more things change, the more they stay the same. Now people are going loco for a prepubescent boy that dresses and looks like a girl.

Uh, the Elevator is out of order. Sorry for the inconvenience The city of Dubai to me has always been a mystery of some sorts. When I was younger, my Pakistani relatives would always mention it when going on trips and their eyes would light up when talking about the prospect of taking a trip their and going shopping at their vast markets. When I got a little older, my cousins from Oman would talk about getting expensive items like  video game consoles, cars and such for "dirt cheap. Whenever I thought of the middle east, I always thought deserts, modest villages and such. But Dubai was an exception. They practically have the biggest and most gaudy anything, whether its their shopping malls, their indoor ski resorts, their sinfully huge buildings and artificial landmarks.  I watched a special on the travel channel about Dubai about it's transformation to the "Arabian New York" and it is just mind boggling. I mean theirs more construction workers and contractors ...

Daddy can I show you how to do a one-hit-kill? 30,000 Points! Holy Mecca! Now there's no question that their's a major issue with the kiddos these days. Their sense of entitlement is so out of whack, it's enough to make you go on a back-of-the-head slapping rampage. In these days of excess and instant gratification, people are impatient when they don't get what they want, when they want it. And this is especially the case with children. And looking at this news tidbit, it transcends race, nationality and culture.

Note: The following was a article I wrote a while back for a job interview that required me to write an article while being timed. I had to pick from a selection of writing prompts which were titles of news headlines. Out of the list I chose the above title and while I did not get the job, I thought this was pretty darn good. Probably so good that it hurt my chances to work with these folks, who knows? Without further ado... Remember the good ol’ days when people were innocent until proven guilty? When a citizen of this great country was given certain inalienable rights that could not be taken away without going through the process of having their story heard by a jury of his peers in a fair and just manner? Well it looks like these kooky concepts will be a thing of the past, brought up only when we gather around our grandchildren to dazzle them with ancient rubbish. It has been reported that the majority of Congress is putting the finishing touches on an amendment that will pr...