Action Man: The Final Battle…Himself

Trailer for a new action movie.

Voice over man starts talking: This summer. Get ready for the most anticipating blockbuster thrill ride ever produced. He was just a cop in San Francisco readying for retirement.

Scene:Action Man fat bloated, barely fitting into his own pants. Leans back in his chair. A young rookie comes over to Action man.

Rookie: Your Henry Machete?

Action Man: That’s me.

Rookie:You’re a living legend around here. Is it true you thwarted a cocaine bust in the harbor using nothing but your bare hands to strangle all the cartel members to death after running out of bullets?

Action Man: It’s all true.

Rookie: Is it true you punched so hard you collapsed a man’s face.

Action Man: Yes

Rookie: Is it true you fought thirty ninjas at once and won?

Action Man: Yes

Rookie: Is it true…?

Action Man: All the stories are true. I made love to a hundred women to extract valuable info about the Russian mob and they showed up the next day at my house and we had another orgy and I got paid overtime. I drove one hundred twenty miles per hour through a sky scraper to catch Razario the jewel thief. I caught a bullet with my bare hands and threw it back so hard the persons head exploded. Anything you heard about me is true.

Rookie: I hope to be like you some day.

Action man: If you knew the cost. You wouldn’t be saying that.

scene: The police chief opens his office door.

chief: Machete! Get your ass in here!

Scene: action man wheezing heavily waddles his way into the chiefs office and plops himself in the chair

Chief: So you’re really going to do it this time?

Action Nan: Yep. I’m giving it up.

Chief: Retirement? Really? You’re not made for retirement. You’re made for action Henry.

Action Man: It’s time Chief. There’s no more bad guys to fight.

Chief: There’s plenty of bad guys to Fight Henry.

Action Man: Not for me. This cowboy is ready to ride into the sunset.

scene:Action Man puts his gun down on the chief’s desk with his badge. He shakes the chiefs hand.

Chief: It’s been an honor.

Action Man: Likewise. You take care chief.

scene: As he turns around action man trips on a shoe lace and falls to the floor. He face plants. His pants and underwear rip in half exposing his elephant like ass. He then lets out a loud and noxious fart. The chief in this scene ignores what is happening and is writing at his desk. Action Man rolls around trying to leverage himself up. His arms struggle under his immense girth. They shake widely. He pants red in the face. A giant purple vein throbbing in his forehead until he finally gets his pig like legs under him. And he limps out of the room.

Voice over man: He only wanted to settle down. and live a normal life again.

scene: Action man is in his house holding a picture of his dead wife. A tear comes down his face.

Voice over man: But one person would not let him.

scene: There is a knock at the door. Action man opens it. Standing in front of him is a younger version of himself.

Action man: Who are you?

Contra Action Man: I’m you.

Action man: What do you want?

Contra Action Man: I’m here to kick your ass!!!!

scene: Contra action man kicks Action Man right in the chest. Action man goes flying back and puts a hole in the wall. He can’t get out. (the budget was too small for them to cut this out so the director left it in) Contra action man is trying to get him out of the wall. He grabs his hand and pulls.

Action Man: Pull harder!!

Contra Action Man: I AM PULLING HARDER!!!!

Voice Over: This Summer Henry Machete The Action Man must face his greatest foe himself!

Scene: Many jump cuts of Action man walking with Contra action man following behind. He’s in his car and contra is following behind. He’s walking in a park. Contra is in a bush watching him with Binoculars. Action Man is ordering ice cream from an ice cream truck and he is holding up the line because he’s asking the ice cream man a lot of annoying questions. Contra Action Man is in the back of line waiting impatiently with everyone else looking annoyed at Action Man.

Action Man: I mean what kind of chocolate is it?

Ice Cream Man: Like I said it’s normal Chocolate. Nothing fancy.

Action Man: I mean is it Milk Chocolate? Is it Dark Chocolate? Salted? What are we Talking about here?

Ice Cream Man: It’s Just Chocolate.

Action Man: Can I see the menu.

Ice Cream: It’s on the side of the car. (he said exasperated)

Contra Action Man: Hurry up!!!! You’re holding up the line.

Action Man: I will take as much time as I need!

Everyone in the line sighs.

Voice Over: This Summer see the struggle of a lifetime that every man must win. The battle with himself.

Scene: They’re in action man’s living room sitting across each other in opposite Chairs.

Action Man: Like who are you? A Hallucination? A ghost? Are you a time traveling version of myself coming to warn me of something?

Contra Action Man: I’m you. That’s all you need to know.

Action Man: So you’ve come here just to beat me up?

Contra Action Man: I’m here to get you to reflect. Physically, psychologically spiritually. You’ve ruined yourself. Look at you! A fat waste of space a shell of your former glory.

Action Man: That’s easy for you to say. You’re young and good looking.

Contra Action Man: You’ve given up! I look the way I am b/c I haven’t given up. You’re making execuses.

Action Man: I’m not listening. la. la. la. la.

Scene: Contra action Man slaps Action man in the face.

Voice Over: This summer. The battle is inside.

Contra Action Man: You’re gotten fat because you hurt your leg. You put some weight on recovering and got discouraged by not looking the way you used to. You settled for how you look now. But you’re plagued by insecurities because you know you don’t measure up the standards you have set up for yourself.

Action Man:I’m not prepared to hear this.

Contra Action Man: It doesn’t matter. You need to hear this.

Action Man: This is hard.

Contra Action Man: You also haven’t fully grasped the death of your wife. And you can’t let go because you’re afraid of being alone. You are alone Henry. You convinced yourself that this is the new normal, but you’re dying for companionship. The hard truth is no woman would want you as you are. And you know that!!!

Action man: STOP!!

Contra Action Man: You’re a fat man baby! You used to fight ninjas on roof tops. You ran through buildings on fire to save people. Now you can barely put on your pants.

Action Man: No more! No More!

Contra Action Man: You must accept the truth! Otherwise you will be stuck like this and die fat and alone.

scene: Action man starts sobbing. Contra Action Man slaps him hard in the face.

Contra Action Man: Time to stop acting like a bitch!

Voice Over: This Summer. It’s going to get real like never befeore.

Scene: Action Man is doing push ups. He can barely do one before Contra action man makes him do it again. Fast montage of him jogging with Contra Action Man behind on a bicycle. Action Man is doing sit ups. He’s running after a chicken. He tries to eat a cheeseburger and Contra Action Man grabs it and throws it against the wall and replaces it with a salad.

Voice Over: This Summer. Action Man confronts his issues in Action Man: the Last Battle… Himself rated pg-13

OVER TIME LOG: A SPACE HORROR

DAY 0: My name is Robert Daniels. I decided to pick up some overtime. I might as well. I recently got dumped by my girlfriend. It was my fault. I was cheating on her. In my defense she is a bitch. I don’t think that would hold up in court or would be any proper justification to anyone else. I could’ve just dumped her myself. I’m bad at saying goodbye. I have to burn the bridge. I needed to get my mind off it. I jumped at the the chance to get out of this dump. I work on a delivery hull. A giant ship that transports cargo from one point of the galaxy to the next. Everything that people could want. Mattresses, lazer pistols, butt plugs. There’s a lot of butt plugs on this delivery. It’s going to planet X. A lot of perverts there. It’s a rave that never ends. They don’t have day or night there so there’s no proper comparison. People get hopped up on Ectasy and dance to strobe lights going off. It then switches to fog machines. Lazers might make an appearance. These people live off government welfare so everything is taken care of. They live off space cheese and moon dust. Government nutrition packs. The slug Junkies eat. They have nothing to live for only to dance. Then when they’re done. They take pop as many pills as they can, overdose and die. The dead bodies are used by drug cartels to move product to earth. The bodies are hollowed out. They stash the drugs in the body and have their drivers take it back to earth. That’s not what I’m driving thank god. I’m working a legit business. A product delivery service called Ganges. I’ve been only working here for a couple of months, but it beats moving packages in a giant warehouse. It’s an easy enough job, the auto-pilot sets the course. I have to just sit and bid my time and make sure the cargo arrives safetly. My supervisor recommended I journal. They said it would help with the loneliness. It’s going to be a while till I get there. But in the end it will be worth it. A couple of grand in the bank. When I get back I start over fresh.

Day 1: Feeling good. Slept well. It’s a glorified cot with an old army blanket, but it gets the job done. Thank god for artificial gravity. I couldn’t sleep floating around, bumping into the ceiling. I can’t believe astronauts used to do that. Trying to get some exercise. I did ten push ups. Then twenty. Thirty until my arms got tired. I wanted to do as much movement as possible before I plop myself down and watch things on the television. The super Dimensional Wi-Fi is really good here. It needs to be. Space Union standards. Thank God I’m Space Union. Going to go on a walk around the hull. Get my mind off things.

Day 2: Watched porn all day.

Day 3: I’ve been hearing weird noises. I can’t tell what they are. They’re not animals, but then again they’re not not animals. (I realize it’s douchey to write not not sue me. It’s not like anyone else is gong to read this. Who am I impressing?). It’s giving me the creeps. It might just be my nerves. I brought some whiskey on board. I might have to crack it open.

Day 3 1/2: Woke up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat. I had the terrors really bad. Had all kinds of fucked up nightmares. One where I walk into butchers room and then they’re me on the meet slab dead being hacked into pieces. The guy who’s doing the hacking turns around and it’s me but dark and with crazy eyes. He was coming at me with a meat cleaver when I woke up. No more booze tomorrow. I need to chill.

Day 4: Smoked some weed and listening to Bob Marley. It’s exactly what I need to take my mind off the nightmares I had yesterday. What a bunch of bullshit. Nothing on the radio. It’s all staticy. That’s to be expected. I’m pretty far out into space. No one’s out hear but me. No scheduled delivery trucks for hundreds of light years. Looking out the pilot window, it’s overwhelming how enormous everything is. It’s like seeing a mountain or a giant lake. The scene envelopes you as if you’re a tiny little nothing in this magnanimous enormity. I’m also just high. Better do my rounds.

Day 5: The radio’s not just staticy but broken. I tried to make a call out to main base, but nothing went out. No sound. Nothing. I’m sure when I get in range of planet X. I will get signal. It’s just going to be a few days of radio silence. I guess I will watch more reruns.

Day 6: The noises are back. The weed is not helping. It’s amplifying everything, making me more paranoid. Is it coming through the walls? Is it under the ceiling? Is it below the deck? I went into the cargo hold and I heard laughter. I baricaded the door behind me. I’m scared shitless. I need to calm down.

Day 7: I ran out of weed. The t.v isn’t working. None of the tele devices are either. I can’t watch anything and didn’t bring anything to read only to write. The noises are no longer noises. They’re voices. I hear them every other hour. It’s laughter. Then someone asking me to open the door. I’ve put headphones over my ears to drone them out. I don’t know what to do. Is this even real?

Day 8: I haven’t slept. Today the voices have been really specific. They’re threatening me now. I swear to god it sounds like my dad. They’re saying if “You don’t open this door young man. Then your ass is going to be black and blue!” I’ve been drinking the whiskey to try to calm myself. It’s not working. Hopefully it will put me to sleep. I don’t care about the terrors. I just need to rest.

Day 9: The nightmares were worse than I can ever imagine. I was floating in space and the black void was leaking into my suit. I can feel it enter my body like a hot knife. It burned through my veins. I screamed and no sound came out. It worked its way to my face. Then I woke up. There is no noise thank god. I’m huddled with my blanket over me. I will be there soon.

Day 9 1/2: The power has been cut! Life support is still on. But the ship is now drifting through space. The distress beacon isn’t working. I’m stuck here! All I can hear is the laughing coming from the other room. I yelled at it to shut up. It only laughed harder. I’m alone. I can’t sleep.

Day 10: The food doesn’t taste right. It all tastes like dust. It hurts my stomach to swallow, but I have to eat. Every bite conjures a sad memory I’ve long since forgotten. Released from the place in my unconscious deep in the depths, where I leave every sadness to die. They have become more vivid than my waking reality. I’m getting more and more tempted to open the door. Just to end this waking nightmare.

Day 11-15: I’m not me. It is me. The day is just the same as yesterday. I’m not me. It is me. The day is just the same as yesterday.

Day 16: I have withered into a nothing. A shell. The voice has been constant yelling “open the door!”. It’s been banging on the door trying to force it open. I’ve given up. I’m giving over. I’m going to open the door. No one is coming to help me. I have lost much of my strength. If this is where I die. If anyone comes across this tell my mother I love her.

Day infinite: I don’t know where I start and this dark land begins. I’m seduced. I’ve embraced the night. The void caresses my skin. My eyes see only dancing shadows. The plague has become my pleasure. I am the dark land, screaming death, endless abyss. It’s the reckoning. The ending of all things. The beginning of all things. Where new knowledge become revelation. You see through the split in the time fabric. You then realize the you that you think you are is not you. The real you is eternal. Pure light.

Log out: A cargo crew coming from Planet X found the log. No one was found aboard. No sign of Robert Daniels

Path For Trump Victory

The Electrion Fraud is Rampant and nothing was challenged. It’s the day Biden is supposed to transition into the White House. Trump eyes his secret phone in the oval office. He thinks to himself, “this is my last shot. They owe me one.” He picks it up speaks in high pitched binary. Aliens appariate into the room. They speak telepathically. “The star gate must be opened to stop the great old one.”Glandor, the wisest of the dmt induced time-elf-joe rogan buddha angels. nods.

It’s inauguration day, Biden’s been planning this from the beginning open the portal for the great old one to enter. And start the reign of Galthor a trans-inter dimensional. sex god. Who bestowed biden with sexual powers that are beyond his control. Biden puts his hand on the Necronomicon he requested. He’s about to invoke the spell that opens the portal. But out of the sky a lazer evizcerates all the reptilians and illuminati pedos on the stage.

Trump stands on the ashen ground. He looks around and can’t find Biden. He hears laughter. The ground shifts. Biden Emerges. A wide sadistic smile crosses his face.

“You didn’t think it would be that easy to defeat me. Did you?” He ripps his shirt off revealing thick muscle. “I knew you would try to stop me. The acolytes of Galthor have sacrificed themselves to give me their power. I’m ten times as powerful as the last time we fought.”

Trump Stands facing Biden.

“It doesn’t matter Biden. You can’t win. I’m still more powerful.”

“Let’s test it.”

Trump blinks and biden is already right on top of him. His fists go faster than the speed of light. Trump is barely blocking them.

“What’s wrong? I thought this would be easy for you?” Biden lands a punch across Trumps jaw and sends him straight threw a sky scraper. It collapses on top of him. Biden pursues through the air.

“So much for Trump.”

The ground rumbles. Bidens eyes widen. All the debris from the sky scraper flies in all directions. A massive ball of light eminates from trump. His eyes glow. Lightining is striking around him.

“I told you can’t win. Give up and the Galactic federation may go easy on you for your crimes.”

Biden bites his lip.

“I’m not giving up! You bastard!” Biden goes in for a punch. Trump grabs it easily. With his left hand he punches bidens elbow and breaks off his arm.

“AAAAAAAH!” Blood gushes from the wound.

“I’m not holding back. Not anymore. No one can protect you now!” Biden looks up his brow furrows and dark energy gathers all around him. A powerful evil auroa increases his muscle mass. He leaps toward Trump.

“You’re FULL OF MALARKYYYYY!!!!”

Trump gathers energy and shoots a powerful beam straight at Biden.

“You’re a LOOOOSEERRRRR!”

Biden disnegrates. His body is completly obliterated.

Trump raises his fists in victory. Galandor appears and hands him the solar scepter. “You are the guardian of the sun now. farewell till the next millenia.” He disappears. Trump is given the Presidency. An angelic choir guitar solos in unison.

How To Start A Cult in 23 Easy Steps

This a practical step by step guide in how to start a cult

1. Claim to have discovered a truth that will solve everyone’s problems.
2. Claim that only you have that truth.
3. Make sure when you create the events in which this truth is discovered it’s not verifiable, but also vague enough that it isn’t falsifiable.
4. Reveal this truth at levels
5. Charge money at each level
6. Make sure it takes years to complete each level
7. Make sure you’re at the top level and no one can reach this level.
8. Have strict rules on all your followers. What they can eat, drink, where they can go, when they wake up and when the go to sleep.
9. Feed them gruel and only let them drink water. This will keep their energy low. Lethargic people are easier to control since they’re too weak to fight back.
10. Make yourself exempt of all the rules
11. Herd all your followers into an isolated compound. Somewhere hard to find and hard to escape. Woods, desert, island take your pick you’re the cult leader.
12. Have sex with everyone. Be honest this was the main reason you created the cult. Do you what you want to do. Create a special orgy chamber. Make it a point of dogma. It’s a good idea to ingrain sex in part of the social hierarchy. This will create an incentive for them to have sex with you. You set the standards. Go nuts!
13. Make drastic changes to old revelations to make people more and more dependent on you.
14. Make sure you have everyone’s money.
15. Slowly reveal that you are god.
16. Make up visions about how the world is going to end. It can be anything from a giant race war to space aliens blowing everything up and taking the faithful away. Get creative.
17. Buy a one way ticket to an exotic location. Anywhere far away.
18. Announce the big day is coming and the (mothership. Angel chariots. heavenly gates, take you pick) is going to take them away.
19. In the announcement stage, throw a mediocre party where they are treated to something beyond the sludge you’ve been feeding them. This little indulgence will make them believe the quality of their lives will improve soon. Keeping them hopeful long enough to take advantage of them. Get one last orgy in if you can.
20. Poison the grape drink you’re serving them. Make sure it’s plenty strong.
21. While the party is going say you’re going to prepare yourself for the final countdown. Sneak out the secret exit before the feds come.
22. Make sure you legally/illegally change your name months in advance with new id and fly to your exotic location.
23. Once all the money runs out from the whores and drugs. Start again from Step one.

Cool guy sketch 2

Cool dude sketch

Sketch of One cool dude.

I’ve Think You Have Watched Enough TV

Jeff is watching t.v. The room is dark. All the windows are stapled shut with heavy army blankets. He’s been sitting indian style staring into the t.v. But there is nothing on. It’s only fuzz.

At one time there might have been something on. He remembers watching cowboys fighting Indians. Maybe it was some game show with a clever catch phrase. Some thing like you are “ the last contender” or “ ultimate survivor”. It’s the kind of phrase repeated endlessly by your friends till you consider never speaking to them again. It wasn’t funny the first time and it’s not funny now.

Then the crowd applauds wildly. The sound seems to be coming from every where. His sense of direction is muddled from his collapsed perception of reality. Four television shows are going on in his mind. Each one vying for attention. The world in front drowned out from the imaginary. The hyper real taking control. Till all his thoughts are sitcoms, soap operas and game shows. He takes breaks with commercials. He’s constantly being sold on a life not his own. He has lost control.

He touches his chest. It is sunken in. It’s been weeks since he has eaten. His ribs protrude against a thin layer of skin. No fat to cover his gaunt frame. He has completely ignored his own hunger pangs. Too weak to move from where he’s sitting. He has only enough energy to move his head slightly to the left or to the right.

The tv seems to buzz louder and louder demanding more attention. More devotion from its acolyte. A lower case g god making his case to be capital g god. At this point Jeff doesn’t know the difference. He’s a zealot for television. More disciplined than any Indian guru mediating in a cave on top of a mountain. They are put to shame by his worship.

Then all of a sudden, the tv turns off. Jeff’s eyes go wide. The primordial survival instinct takes over. He stands and starts hitting the side of the tv. It refuses to turn on. A prudish lover. Remaining aloof. Jeff’s strikes to the side of the tv becoming more desperate, more violent until he hits it too hard and it falls off its stand face first to the ground.

Jeff’s eyes dim. His pupils grow small. He clenches his jaw while his neck stiffens. His whole body in tension. He bends over the broken TV set. Shards of the screen all over the floor. He picks up one of the shards. He bites down on his lip hard enough to draw blood.

He takes the shard and presses it against his chest. He tenses breathing heavy. Knowing what he’s about to do he braces for the pain. He slashes hard from the top of his chest down to his stomach. He collapses. He writhes in pain screaming. The blood washes over him like a warm bath. He takes the shard and stabs himself in the stomach over and over making a giant bloody fountain.

Jeff lost all strength he releases the shard. Covering the whole in his stomach with his hands. He can feel the life draining from him. His body is cold. He shivers. He has come back to the real world. His regret is palpable. His last moments staring up at dark ceiling alone.

He blinks. White glowing figures have surrounded him. They are ancient. Long beards with clothes he can not place in any one time or place. They are otherworldly, but a happiness emanates from them. One of them smiles at Jeff. “I think you’ve watched enough tv” Jeff chuckles. His eyes close and the beings take him away.

The Only Rule for Comedy

There’s only one rule for comedy and it’s posed as a question “is it funny?”. I hear a lot of people make a lot of rules for making jokes. You can’t punch down only punch up. You can’t make a joke about a “oppressed people group”. This means nothing about gays, blacks, women, trans, Hispanics and anything else that isn’t a child or straight white man. You can only make those kinds of jokes if you are a part of one or more of those groups. How many groups you are a part of is how many passes you are allowed. No jokes about religion unless it’s about Christianity being terrible then it’s fine. No jokes about politics unless it’s the group they’re not a part of which means mostly bashing conservatives, since most comedians are liberal. Nothing in bad taste. Nothing sexual in a way that would demean the person you’re talking about. Nothing vulgar. Basically nothing interesting. Modern comedy that can be approved to air on mainstream platforms is limited to the kind of placid humor you would say in front of your grandmother

The problem is there are too many rules. When you think of something Funny it makes you laugh. When you then think to tell someone else you start editorializing. It’s a fair question to ask “will the person enjoy the joke”, but you can’t just tell him. Jokes are best enjoyed on the first hearing. So it’s a shot in the dark. You then to the best of your abilities to change the joke to fit the person’s sensibilities to the extent you know.

That example is on an individual basis. Now think when you’re on a global stage there are producers with their ideas of whats funny. There’s the network that will show your content with their own ideas of what’s funny. There’s the sponsors with how they want their brand to be perceived. Your idea of funny is now being filtered through several different self interested organizations that don’t pertain to the number one rule.

That’s why I think when it comes to humor the rule must be “is it funny?” All the other question ethical question around it is for ethics. Punching down is sometimes funny. Making a joke at someone else’s expense is often hilarious. Vulgarity, Racial humor and any other subject or style of delivery has it’s context and therefore can be funny. People have their personal preferences. Their own limits. That’s fine because what they are comfortable with telling is a part of them. Sincerity and authenticity help make the joke land on target.

How you know if something’s funny is intuitive. Does it make you laugh? Does it make other people laugh? That’s the only real metric. All the other rules just crowd out the one and only rule for humor. “Is it funny?”

Two Words I Hate

I’m starting to hate the word narrative. Narrative this, meta narrative that, over narrative, it’s irritating. The word means something. But like when someone you despise likes your favorite band. You’re not as enthusiastic to listen to them.

Another word I hate when I hear it is neoliberalism. As soon as I hear it I know I’m going to get an ear full about capitalism, class struggle, proletariate. The typical Marxist buzz words espoused by yuppie upper class white chicks. It’s an all encompassing word that’s used to disparage the simple act of buying and selling. Corporations do have interests. They can be powerful. But did you ever think that collapsing power into one giant monolith would really bring poor people more freedom? It must’ve sounded good and righteous to first year philosophy students in Columbia who read the communist manifesto in high school and is now reading Walter Benjamin. But like how Karl Marx lived off his father for ten years. A philosophy predicated on mooching off daddy’s money is bound to fail.

Marx’s view of history compared to Hegel and Kant

Marx’s Version of History Compared to Hegel and Kant

 

German philosophy is crowded with ideas about History. The three thinkers Hegel, Kant and Marx have many overlapping ideas. In particular these three all develop ideas for the point and purpose of history and which way it should go. In comparison they seem to overlap and develop along three main categories, the narrative frame that history goes in, the objective of history and the method in which to obtain the objective of history.

The first thing to look at as how these thinkers narrate history, which terms they put a trajectory of history into and how that affects the way they argue their points, Immanuel Kant starts out with a postulation in his Idea for a Universal history from A Cosmopolitan View that

like every other natural event are determined by universal laws. However obscure their causes, history, which is concerned with narrating these appearances, permits us to hope that if we attend to the play of freedom of the human will in the large, we may be able to discern a regular movement in it, and that what seems complex and chaotic in the single individual may be seen from the standpoint of the human race as a whole to be a steady and progressive though slow evolution of its original endowment. (Kant, 11)

Kant views history from the level of the individual as “complex and chaotic” meaning it seems to not have a pattern that can be readily discernable. It’s only from the “standpoint of the human race as a whole” that you can see the pattern emerge and therefore put a meaningful inference to it. The pattern though to Kant is a natural one. Kant writes that

Since men in their endeavor behave, on the whole, not just instinctively, like the brutes, nor yet like rational citizens of the world according to some agreed-on plan, no history of man conceived according to a plan seems to be possible, as it might be possible to have such a history of bees or beavers. (Kant, 12)

Men according to Kant behave on the same instinctual level as “bees or beavers”. The will and actions of men behave in accordance with “nature” who on the onset like the philosopher “cannot presuppose any [conscious] individual purpose among men in their great drama, there is no other expedient for him except to try to see if he can discover a natural purpose in this idiotic course of things human.” (Kant, 12) for Kant history is termed in a natural course of things in which a purpose must be discovered by men of higher reason. Since nature, “produced men like Kepler, who subjected, in an unexpected way, the eccentric paths of the planets to definite laws; and she produced Newton, who explained these laws by a universal natural cause.” (Kant, 12) Accordingly nature produces the people like Kepler and Newton who find laws in order to explain the “universal natural cause.”

Hegel overlaps with many of Kant’s points. He seems to agree implicitly that men with higher reason are the ones that make sense of the natural history, although not termed as natural history, but an original history. They work very close together conceptually as Hegel admits a sort of chaos of information like the natural history of Kant, but unlike Kant seems to take greater pains to articulate these categories of history and what counts as a more true form of history. In his Methods of History Hegel writes the following of the original historians, that

They translate: what is externally present into the realm of mental representation, thereby bringing the outer into the inner-just as the poet works up the stuff of his own sensation into images for our minds. Of course, such original historians rely on the reports and accounts of others, since it is not possible for one person to have seen everything. But they use these sources as ingredients. These historians bind together what is vanishing down the stream of time, and place it all in the Temple of Memory to give it immortality. (Hegel, 3)

Here we see that this translation of events has a variety of forms that Hegel doesn’t find trustworthy as reliable history. The original historian wrote them all down in order to “place it all in the Temple of Memory”, so that the event may be remembered in one way shape or form. The unacceptable forms to original history according to Hegel are the

Legends, Folksongs, and traditions—these are to be excluded from, the original history, because they are obscure modes of memory, proper to the mentality of preliterate peoples. On the contrary, in original history we are concerned with peoples who knew what they were and what they wanted. (Hegel, 4)

These subjective modes of articulating history may have served a purpose of translating, “what is externally present into the realm of mental representation”. This however is to be excluded because of its connection to “the mentality of preliterate peoples.” In other words it’s of a lower reason and therefore should be ignored.

Marx, on the other hand narrates history in different terms than Kant and Hegel. Not in terms of a natural history or original history, but a history narrated with capital as the focal point. As natural history serves Kant’s use of reason making sense of chaos or Hegel’s use of Original history in a similar fashion, Marx’s use of the concept of capital helps to develop a history focused on the use of resources of a way of understanding the problems that plague mankind. The problem for Marx isn’t men of lower reason coming into higher reason to make better informed decisions like for Kant and Hegel. It is rather the exploitation of resources grouping people in classes for a constant struggle for those resources that is the main hindrance. In the beginning of the Communist Manifesto Marx starts off with the statement that

The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles. Freedman and slave, patrician and plebian, lord and serf, guild-master and journeymen, in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in revolutionary re-constitution of society at large, or in a common ruin for contending classes. (Marx, 474)

The problem articulated by Marx is a problem of unequal distribution of resources, called capital, and the struggles it produces.

The objective of history according to Marx is to be free from this system of capitalistic exploitation. The goal for history according to Marx is Communism. For communism as articulated in the Communist Manifesto

Deprives no man of the power to appropriate the products of society; all it does is to deprive him of the power to subjugate the labor of others by means of such appropriation. (Marx, 486)

In other words to break apart the system, which exploits people to form a society where labor is not appropriated by a ruling class that according to Marx is the goal of history to reach communism and the method is revolution and overthrow of the ruling class and process of communism.

Marx though isn’t in total disagreement with Kant and Hegel. Both Kant and Hegel both agree about this theme of freedom. For Kant freedom comes from reason given by nature, “Her giving to man reason and the freedom of will which depends upon it is clear indication of her purpose.” (Kant, 14) For man is not, “to be guided by instinct” (Kant, 14) but rather from “out of his own resources” (Kant, 14) the resources are those that come from his own reason. For Kant you must triumph over instinct and establish your own reason.

Hegel’s objective for history is very much the same thing, in his Reason in History, Hegel writes that

The only thought that philosophy brings with it, in regard to history, is the simple thought of reason—the thought that reason rules the world, and that world history has therefore been rational in its course. This conviction and insight is a presumption in regard to history as such (Hegel, 12)

Hegel goes on to say that “speculative reflection has shown that reason is the substance as well as the infinite power, that reason is for itself the infinite material for all material and spiritual life.” (Hegel, 12) For Hegel has the same objective in mind as Kant that the objective for history if reason.

What is common with all these thinkers is recognizing the problems that stand in the way of reaching these objectives. For Kant recognizes the antagonisms that face reaching reason and the freedom that follows therefore he suggests that

The capacities which can be achieved by mankind, is attainable only in society, and more specifically in the society with the greatest freedom. Such a society is one in which there is mutual opposition among the members, together with the most exact definition of freedom and fixing of limits of its limits so that it may be consistent with the freedom of others. (Kant, 22)

The fixing of limits is further elaborated by Kant as a sort of constitution that sets the rights of all. Similar to Marx in the universalizing effect of his particular political solution, but has a constitutional political model rather than a communist one.

Hegel on the other hand doesn’t want to hold himself down to a single solution, as he writes in Freedom, Individual and State

Humans do not see themselves as the “means” for the goals of Reason in that entirely external sense at all. On the contrary, not only do they use the occasion to satisfy their particular interests whose content is different from the goal, but they also have a part in the rational goal itself; for that very reason they are to regarded as ends in themselves. (Hegel, 36)

Hegel doesn’t have a particular utopian vision as Marx or Kant. Rather he sees a multiplicity of circumstances as satisfying reason rather than just one.

All these thinkers view history in a certain light. They all overlap at certain points in their thinking and deviate strongly at others. What can be said though is that their interest in history is a given goal. How they narrate that goal and how they get there is different.