Although a bright and able man, my husband is almost completely
helpless when faced with even the simplest domestic chore.
One day, in exasperation, I pointed out to him that our friend, Betty
had taught her husband Frank, to cook, sew
and do laundry, and that if anything ever happened to Betty,
Frank would be able to care for himself.
Then I said, "What would you do if anything happened to me?"
After considering that possibility for a moment,
my husband said happily, "I'd move in with Frank."
*.*
A small man attended a dinner where his companions
were all unusually tall.
When asked, during the course of the evening, "
Don't you feel rather small among all these big fellows?",
the little man answered proudly,
"Yes I do, I feel like a dime among a lot of pennies."
Men participate in childbirth
by coming into the room and saying, "Breathe."
Is that really sharing the experience?
If I ever have a baby again,
I want my husband to be on the table next to me,
at least getting his legs waxed
*.*
Oneliners
Some folks are so eager to find fault, you'd think there's a reward.
I only use deodorant under one arm, so I know what I would have smelled
like.
Don't worry about what people think, they don't do it very often.
I wish my mouth had a backspace key.
I either want less corruption or more chances to participate in it.
Smoking doesn't kill people. People who are trying to quit smoking kill
people.
Many great discoveries are made by not following instructions.
The older I get, the better I was.
The more things change, the more they stay insane.
Bad breath is better than no breath at all.
A pessimist is someone who complains about the noise when op****tunity
knocks.
*.*
According to a film my wife saw in her philosophy class, Bertrand
Russell received a letter from a woman who proclaimed herself a
solipsist. She went on to say that she was surprised that there
weren't more solipsists.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism>
*.*
Into a Belfast pub comes Paddy Murphy, looking like he'd just been run
over by a train. His arm is in a sling, his nose is broken, his face is
cut and bruised and he's walking with a limp.
"What happened to you?" asks Sean, the bartender.
"Jamie O'Conner and me had a fight," says Paddy.
"That little bastard, O'Conner," says Sean, "he couldn't do that to you,
he must have had something in his hand."
"That he did," says Paddy, "a shovel is what he had, and a terrible
lickin' he gave me with it."
"Well," says Sean, "you should have defended yourself, didn't you have
something in your hand?"
"That I did," said Paddy. "Mrs. O'Conner's breast, and a thing of beauty
it was, but useless in a fight."
Issue of the Times;
The Orwellian Ideology of 24 By Matt McCaffrey
I am perennially embarrassed to admit that I enjoy watching Fox TV's 24.
It
unintentionally reveals both subtle and overt problems for lovers of
liberty. Its major theme is an ongoing struggle between terrorists with
evil
machinations and federal agents (also, presumably, with evil
machinations).
Now, terrorists are apparently difficult to catch and government has
little
or no recourse in accompli****ng this goal except through violating
personal
freedoms.
One of the major problems experienced by the show's gaggle of bureaucrats
is
whether or not to ignore liberty in exchange for the capture of
terrorists.
"The common good" is a phrase constantly invoked (as it is in America
today)
by these characters, whose violations of personal liberty include, but are
certainly not limited to, illegal searches, theft, kidnapping, destruction
of property, and torture.
Naturally, these actions are deemed justified because they tend to lead to
the capture of terrorists. However, even when the show makes it
unambiguously clear that innocent people have been harassed and in some
cases even tortured, due to the frenetic pace of the show, these
atrocities
are forgotten by both the characters and the viewing audience almost as
soon
as they are committed. This is reminiscent of the torture scandals in
Guantanamo and other US-run prisons, which were a major focus of the media
for at least two or three days before being largely forgotten. Indeed, it
only drives home the prophetic nature of Orwell and his concept of the
"memory hole" into which is thrown all information that contradicts the
official line of the state.
24 also pushes the absurd dichotomy of "state vs. terrorist" - the "You
are
either with us or against us" mentality. No room is left for anyone who
genuinely cares about the preservation of personal liberty. Indeed there
is
no room for "ordinary" people at all, only the superheroes of the state
and
their archrivals the terrorists. Even when civilians do appear on the
show,
their actions are perceived and understood by the audience only vis vis
the struggle against terrorism, and never in light of other concerns.
Civilians also tend to die off rather quickly, and some innocents are
actually tortured, but, as mentioned above, these atrocities are
instantaneously forgotten in the wake of what is "really im****tant," i.e.,
what the state's agents are doing. This is a critical, if unintentional,
commentary on the American public: the means used to combat terrorism are
speedily forgotten in the wake of the realization of the ends, but, as in
24, the ends of the state are (at best) in constant flux between various
vaguely defined objectives. Again, one recollects how in 1984 the war
enemy
of the state is changed in mid-speech, similar to 24, where friends become
enemies and enemies become friends in the span of mere seconds.
Another principal problem of the program is that it of course glamorizes
the
illegal actions of the state and convinces the viewer first, that
Americans
are always at risk from all manner of terrorists, and second, that the
only
thing preventing these potential disasters are the adrenaline-fueled
adventures of federal agents. Both of these claims are of course patently
false, but they are useful to the state when it attempts to subvert or
reinforce public opinion.
The show calls to mind the brilliant propaganda films of Leni Riefenstahl,
who managed to sway the opinions of many Germans prior to World War II,
convincing them of the righteousness and glory of the Nazi Party (although
24 does not even begin to approach the impact and genius of a film like
The
Triumph of the Will).
Another, more subtle (and therefore dangerous), aspect of the program is
that it does actually discuss the issues of liberty and security. What
makes
this so potentially harmful is that the issues are presented in abstract
or
"macro" terms: there is talk of internment camps and conjecture on how
great
a price must be paid in order to ensure liberty, however the more "micro"
aspects of the issue are ignored. What I mean is that violations of
liberty
are expressed in exaggerated terms, and only then as sort of abstract
concepts regarding a future that will (implicitly) never really come into
existence.
In one memorable scene, bureaucrats debate the security issue while at the
same time federal agents prepare to search property illegally, and FBI
agents make illegal arrests. So while lip service is paid to preserving
liberty, "debate" is merely one of the state's panoply of euphemisms that
mean not "Should we eliminate personal liberties?" but rather "When will
we
eliminate those liberties?"
The show provides the veneer of discussion, while completely ignoring the
fact that the argument is moot when the discussants themselves are already
violating the rights in question. Discussion occurs, but only whiles the
systematic violation of property rights continues apace.
The show is probably trying to be topical here but it reveals, perhaps
unintentionally, a major tendency of the state. In short, the state
publicly
deplores extreme stages of totalitarianism, while quietly creeping towards
those same stages, and at the same time redefining what those stages are,
so
that a policy that would have been deemed totalitarian only a decade or
two
ago is today almost demanded by an increasingly deluded (and self-deluded)
public.
A final observation has to be made regarding the intended impact of 24 on
its audience. There is a new marketing tie-in for the current season: as
the
show cuts to commercial, a new cell phone (one used by the characters in
the
show) is displayed, and a rather cool and savvy voice asks, "Do you want
to
cruise the streets like a government agent?"
Just think, if only we could all be as hip as people employed by the
government! This would be humorous if it weren't so pathetic, but there
are
surely those watching who are influenced by this nonsense.
As enjoyable as 24 is on the surface, a more than cursory glance makes it
obvious that the show is attempting to justify and even celebrate an
ever-expanding Orwellian state. It almost makes me want to root for the
bad
guys.
Quote of the Times;
"Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our
power
to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom."
- Victor Frankel
Link of the Times;
http://www.lewrockwell.com/reed/reed116.html
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