 The world has become a very small
place since our technology shrank the barriers of both distance and time.
In bygone days people used to learn about life, from the living of their
own lives. They learned about nature from working the land, they learned
about people from those that they knew or met in the everyday course of
living wherever that took place. And basically between family-life and
usually from some difficulties they gradually begin to see where they fit
in, or where they did not, into the much larger scheme of the real world.
-
- And then began the cascade of technology from electricity
and radios to the movies and telephones. Finally airplanes graduated from
something for the few to something for the many and then suddenly nothing
was ever quite the same again. After WWII the whole world wanted to be
like Americans, or so many-millions of people thought. Then in the nineteen-fifties;
television made its debut and virtually-overnight the whole world began
to change.
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- The film world acquired censors and had adopted 'standards.'
Films could not be made that pictured the good guys losing, or the bad
guys ever winning. There were also very strict rules about the propriety
of women (not-so-much for men). The problems began then when we began to
be told what was acceptable and what was not, by the silver-screens before
which so many were able to escape from reality for a few hours.
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- The problem was that the dragons-of-delusion were beginning
to work their way into films and stories that could be made into films
and the same people were controlling those films and magazines and publications,
including newspapers and radio as those who still control what we see or
read or hear about today. The world was beginning to shrink but few noticed
because it was so gradual and because it took control almost without being
noticed. However with Television that rapidly began to grow into a 24 hour
industry where there was a lot of airspace that needed to have programs
to fill all those hours and there were so many new sponsors that had to
be found to pay for all that programming. As it turned out the programming
that was to expand the minds of ordinary people, couldn't find enough sponsors;
while the programs that were mean and small and made fun of everything
in society were easy to find sponsors for. The major dramatic presentations
that dealt with history and conflict; pride and prejudice, success and
failure were just pushed side because it was the common people that loved
to have themselves entertained and neither their vocabularies or range
of interests were very wide: So television found its gold-mine in advertising,
and the United States was BLINDSIDED by the new and shiny symbols of success.
A NEW car! A bigger better everything, and of course all the personal products
that anyone might dream of, along with better more expensive versions of
everyday requirements like toothpaste and mouthwash.
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- But buried in this feeding frenzy of Madison Avenue was
a hidden weapon: The ability to absolutely destroy the public's concentration
on any story; just to watch the ads. Once attention became something that
could always be interrupted: Then commercialism had accomplished what it
set out to do; which was done to end our ability to track most of the things
in our own lives that had once been so important to us. By the 1960's television
had become a necessity in every household and every other place where people
lived as well. By the nineteen-seventies television was the one thing that
was seldom if ever turned off. Then it became "the babysitter"
and we were finished as a people.
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- By the 1980's most of the young people were certain that
they were indeed the stars of their own real-life movies and everything
else was just a backdrop for the adventures of "The Self" which
were always about either fame and fortune or power and money, but almost
never were these dreams even remotely related to how anyone might actually
go about attaining any of these fantasies.
-
- The Walkman then entered the fray and soon after was
followed by all the toys that so many can no longer live without from the
cell-phone to the i-pod, from Facebook to twitter; most young people today
could never conceive of life without television or indeed any of these
absolutely unnecessary things. All this crap was created not to make your
life easier but just to get your money in ever larger amounts. And of course
it helps that in the process your life becomes as fake as the politicians
that clutter up the airwaves everywhere. What happened? We were BLINDSIDED
by the most dangerous drug of all TELEVISION, the basic requirement
for any house that keeps on killing us each and every day from all the
fake news to the ads that promise eternal-youth or unlimited wealth but
always where everyone lives happily-after. After decades of this hyper-babble,
there is no longer very much left of what any life today might be all about.
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- People have forgotten that it was the stories about the
dark-side and the glamour and romance of drugs and sex and booze that helped
so many to venture into places that they should never have gone, without
some guidelines. Sex is after all a fantastic addition to life, when it's
part of something larger, and a drink now and then actually allows us some
relief from the drudgery of too much work, too little money and almost
no time to really play now and then. And drugs: Well there are so many
of them in almost everyone's medicine cabinet, how could that be so dangerous
afterall So why not? There are thousands of movie-stars and sports
figures that take drugs and engage in all kinds of exotic sexual exploits
and many simply want "to be like them" to just "live
the good life."
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- However none of the literal costs of these kinds of lives
seems to ever penetrate the young when they are just beginning to explore
the whole panorama of the forbidden side of life. And of course by now,
all that stuffy old stuff about plans and hard work has evaporated in favor
of any and every shortcut to the FANTASTIC-life that can be created or
discovered. Where their grandparents had discovered the value of hard work
and the joys of sweat in pursuit of lasting changes in their lives; the
last few generations have failed virtually every test of themselves, as
human beings, mostly because they've never been exposed to that side of
life. Their motto could easily be: 'Instant Gratification Takes Too Long"!
And ironically the parents faced with this frustrating outlook; don't seem
to have any answer that can challenge that quirky comment: Because they
too skipped the hard stuff and now they have no idea of what to tell either
their children or their grandchildren. Many frequently mumble about television
being the bad-guy, or that education failed their kids, but what really
happened is that our lives were grossly interrupted by television and virtually
all the wrong things; if our lives were ever to be fulfilling or even possible
any longer.
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- In England today we can see this being played out across
the board. The decades of poverty and societal isolation of those that
are not privileged because the segregation which is being practiced is
the isolation of the rich and powerful from more than 90% of the population.
Now the global-new-world has decided to call for global-austerity which
translates to starving the poor and simultaneously taxing everyone who
are not elites to death. To ensure all of this, apparently the iron boots
of Fascism and Police-State brutality are mandatory everywhere now; because
the poor and disadvantaged (of all colors and faiths) don't want this new
set of rules that will end not just their way of life but their lives as
well.
-
- Hence the backlash of revolt and resistance that sometimes
ends in riots and looting. Instead of understanding what this all means
the rich and the shop-owners want their damages covered and the demonstrators
prosecuted to the fullest extent of the so-called laws that created this
now-permanent inequality in the first place. The state and its elites want
everyone that dared to burn or loot or demonstrate against them severely-punished:
Without realizing that what they have done and continue to do is hundreds
of times worse for those they do this to; than was any of the damage that
was done to them by those that now have NOTHING, precisely because of their
own extreme polices over the last fifty-years!
-
- "An online petition demands welfare-dependent rioters
convicted of offences linked to disorder sweeping the country should surrender
their state handouts. The petition, which has more than 78,000 signatures,
says: "No taxpayer should have to contribute to those who have destroyed
property, stolen from their community and shown a disregard for the country
that provides for them."
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- If 100,000 people sign the petition, it would trigger
a process that could end with MPs voting on the plan. All petitions hitting
the landmark total are referred to the backbench business committee, which
decides certain motions for Parliamentary debates. The Government website
hosting the petition was so popular it crashed under the strain tonight.
A notice posted on the page said: "Sorry if you're experiencing problems
accessing e-petitions. There is currently a much higher level of demand
than we expected."" (1)
- Which brings us all to today: "America is still
in deep denial which is still the first stage of the Awakening. This denial
will be wiped away when the dollar collapses. For now the economy is still
functioning with food and fuel available. Americans still have the illusion
of wealth and normalcy. They still are stuck in the false left right paradigm
and think some other sock puppet will turn things around.
-
- When the dollar collapses, all American illusions will
collapse with it. Deep denial will turn into deep anger. The violence I
expect in the other 3 areas on the list and all urban areas in the US,
will make all other global riots pale in comparison. America is deeply
infused with arrogance, denial, narcissism, drugs and violence. There is
no other society that I know of that has the degree of intensity and combination
of these factors."
-
- This article includes a George Carlin video called American
Bullshit 2008, which seems to sum up (A lot about America and being BLINDSIDED)
with some humor and some truths you might not have heard lately. But this
article also includes The Five Reasons for this article: Arrogance, Denial,
Narcissism, Drugs, and Violence. (2)
-
- It would seem we have a long way to go in a very short
time, but maybe, just maybe if enough of us haven't given up yet, there
might still be a path through this minefield!
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- kirwanstudios@sbcglobal.net
-
-
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- 1) Call for London Rioters to Lose Benefits
-
- http://www.nwemail.co.uk/home/call-for-london-rioters-to-lose
-financial-benefits-1.866627?referrerPath=home
-
- 2) Five Reasons Why American Riots will be the worst
in the world
- http://dont-tread-on.me/5-reasons-why-american-riots-will-be-the-worst-in-the-world/
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