Capital of Nasty Electronic Magazine
Volume II, Issue 21, Year AD MCMXCVII
Monday, May 26th, 1997
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        << CAPNASTY.ORG HAS MOVED >>

After the political problems that have arised at Internet Frontier
over the name of one of the sites I wanted to create (Gamesphobia),
I asked my friend Gard to adopt the Capnasty.org website.  He accepted
and now I am glad to announce that we are part of the great SCRIBA ORG
collective (http://www.scriba.org).  Although we start small, already
Scriba and CoN have developed a great attitude towards literature and
the proliferation of electronic media.  Together we plan to work on
making this world a better world.  Special thanks to all the other
people that have helped in one way or another to keep things going.

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  "Some Issues are great, some issues just blow.  This issue blows."

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1.	Readers' Letters
	A.	Genetic mice & haircuts
2.	POEM: Alone
3.	Do you really think that ICQ is better than IRC?
4.	Pondering about life

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 This week's Golden Testicle Web Award goes to:

 If you are good, you shouldn't use Microsoft products.

   http://netspace.net.au/~hinks/gatesdvl.gif

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1.	Readers' Letters

A.	Genetic mice & haircuts

From:             FitchDonS@aol.com
Date sent:        Wed, 21 May 1997 03:42:30 -0400 (EDT)
To:               leandro@capnasty.org
Subject:          Message of Comment on CoNEM II.20


Hi, Leandro:

You published (in CoNEM II.20):

<bigsnip>
>With a single genetic switch, scientist have created a strain of 
>supermice two to three times more muscular than usual, with big, 
>broad shoulders and massive hips.

Now if they can find a way of chemically inhibiting that "single 
gene that appears to limit muscle growth" only temporarily, it 
_could_ be useful, both medically and commercially, yes, not to 
mention the way it might revolutionize _sumo_ wrestling.  But I 
suppose such a discovery would run afoul of the same attitudes 
that cause some people to boycott foods that have been genetically 
altered to reduce the speed with which they decay in storage, or 
to die of diabetes rather than use insulin produced by genetically 
altered bacteria.  And then there are those tonnes of Toblerone 
chocolate the British have impounded, because they contain "a 
genetically altered soy product" (presumably soy-based lecithin, 
which is apparently normally ok in chocolate) -- I guess because 
those Mad Scientists have genetically altered a strain of soy 
beans to cause them to produce a larger-than-normal yield of that 
material.  

Sounds to me like the old "There are Things Man was not Meant To 
/K/n/o/w/ Do" cliche.  As far as I know, however, it's still ok 
for man to breed plants or animals (possibly excepting humans) for 
desirable characteristics, as long as they work with accidental 
("natural") variations rather than calculated ones.  To Believers 
in this school, those things that _look_ like tomatoes are 
perfectly acceptable since they were developed before artificial 
genetic manipulation was.


>I found it while reading "The Toronto Sun" at the Barber.

Oh?  You actually pay money to have your hair cut?  What 
interesting priorities this implies.


Don Fitch  
(who stopped going to Barbers when the price of haircuts 
went above two dollars (U.S.), and who recently decided that there 
are better things to do with ten minutes every day than to shave -- 
which permits spending a bit more time online, and results in a 
long gray beard which might cause people to take me seriously.

++++++

--

Hello Don, thank you for your letter:

	I don't see the problem with genetics.  I think that in a sense
it's like we were given a computer (the body) and not the "programming
language" it has been programmed with.  The DNA is a very complicated
system, and for any effective changes to take effect, they have to be
done in the early stage of development (when we are but one or two cells).
Can you imagine changing several million cells to achieve something?
It is possible, by altering genetics to make life longer as well.  We
will never be immortal, because genetically the cells know how many times
they will have to divide.  Once reached that stage, the cell lives
until it dies.  Unfortunately, like you said, many things have a certain
concept behind it, mostly religion based as well.  Perhaps it is true
that we are not meant to tinker with stuff that God created.  At the
same time, we have the technology and the knowledge to do it.. why not?
It's tempting to play God.

	As for the barber, I go to the barber once every month, or
depending how long I want my hair.  Lately I like it short, and I don't
have gray hair yet to look wise.  In fact I am way too young, and even
if I don't feel like an ignorant teenager, society considers me something
to watch out from.  Credit Card companies refuse me.  Banks think I live
off my parents.  School despises the way I behave.  My barber is one of
the few people in the neighbourhood that treats me with respect even
considering the tremendous age gap.

	To each tHAIR own ;-)
		Leandro+

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2.	POEM: Alone


Like a piece of fragile clay, my heart has been dashed upon the shores of
loneliness. Forever to be crushed beneath its stones and eroded by its
torrents. My life as it was is no more. The path that lies ahead is long, cold,
dark. There is a light that reaches out to me from the depths of longing, yet
the closer I claw towards it the fainter it gets.  Confusion, despair,
meaningless, cruel. I am.
  Alone



       Anonymous


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3.	Do you really think that ICQ is better than IRC?
			By Emanuela Corso (manu@ifront.com)

The first time that I used ICQ, I was very amazed about this new program,
so different by irc: in fact you can talk only with people that you want.
So this was the beginning of ICQ for me, I selected the people I wanted
to talk with............I thought nobody could find me on the internet
with this method.
So, after a while, one day at home, as I was talking with a friend on ICQ,
I see the sentence (which is common for ICQ users): "The user ".." added
you to his contact list".  ICQ user have their name available publically
on the Mirabilis server.  Nobody needs an authorization to talk to me....
and when I saw these "unknown" nick names like "Lemon Tree", I told
myself:"Oh my God, here we are again!".
You see, those few times I was on IRC (Internet Relay Chat) to chat with
my boyfriend at work), strange people which, just because I'm female,
would ask me some pretty weird questions (I wont say the kind of
questions I got, I'm sure you've understood!). I thought ICQ was my
escape from the IRC world and I found it can really be like the old IRC..
So my finally advice is: pay attention to the strange nicks or make joke
of them:)!!
Good luck!

manu

Note:

ICQ is a small program which load and stays in the background of your
Window environment.  It allows for direct chatting, file transfer, URL
exchange, and other neat little features (such as paging) to "improve"
communication between users.  The userlists are unfortunately available
for everyone to see, so lamers seeing a female name, automatically
attempt try their moves on the girl.
For further info, visit the site http://www.mirabilis.com and reduce
your office productivity down to zero.

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4.	Pondering about life
		by Leandro

	The other night my girlfriend and I wanted to see "A summer in la
Goulette".  Unfortunately it seems that the movie is very popular, and
when we went to the booth to buy tickets we were told it had sold out.
Still in that "movie-watching" mood, we decided to see another movie, and
ended up at the Eaton Centre.  The Eaton Centre is known for having
screens the size of your television screen, but we gave in because of
lazyness.  The movie we ended up seeing was Jerry McGuire.
        The movie wasn't really anything great, although one part left me
thinking afterwards.  It's when Jerry (Tom Cruise) realizes that he is not
really living his life.  What he was doing was because of his job, and not
something he wanted to do with his heart.
        Life at times really does seem like a complete waste of time.  All
you do is work work work, come home, try to get some rest, and repeat the
cycle.  Add into this bills you have to pay, taxes, the daily rip-off from
people as they want to feed you their bullshit.  Parents that live their
life and want to live yours as well.  Add into this money one is saving up
for university or to take that miserable tiny vacation after working for
two years non-stop.  You come to work and your are a nobody in the
collective mass.  You come home and you have to listen to the family
hysteria as they drag you in their problems.
        Why bother going on, at times I wonder.  What do I have to look
foward to in this life?  Bills, taxes, pollution, abuse from people.
My parents house and the mortage that will come with it, work, and a ton
of other problems.  I'll have to work for 40 years, sitting down, in front
of this computer screen, to then retire and hope that if I have a heart
attack the ambulance will come in time.  Life is hell.
        Already I can see everyone saying to me "life is hard" or the new
favorite "life is harsh" (too many Tequila commercials?).  I did not
expect life to be easy.  There are just too many problems, too many
things to worry about and I am not always willing nor have the mental
energy to worry about them.
        "But problems will make you strong" I've been told.  Yes, it's
true.  I've had some experiences in my life that made me strong.  But I'm
tired of having to be strong.  I want to get up in the morning and worry
about what to put on.  Instead of rushing to work to get a lousy paycheck
to barely pay the many bills I have.
        The truth is probably that I am scared.  Scared to fail in life.
Scared to find myself holding nothing in my hands.  Scared of losing in
a world where if you lose, people will gladly walk on top of you.  No
one there to help you.  Lost and alone.
        I'm not exactly a pessimist, but somedays what I see around
does get to me.  It's at moments like these when I have to stop, take a
long deep breath, stop over-thinking, and realize that I am only twenty.
Perhaps my future holds a lot more, and I don't have to stay in one place.
I have someone wonderful in my life that has helped me in moments of
trouble and I have friends that accept me for who I am (ie. they put up
with me).  I guess all I can do right now is to swallow the bitterness,
and try my best to achieve something more in this life.  A life away from
the collectiveness, and rush hours and all the other mental abuse that
deprived, frustrated people put other people through.
	I just hope that now I'll be able to worry less about work and
the problems that arrive in life, and dedicate myself more to the
things I like and the people I love.

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