Total Perspective Vortex
What really happened to Trillian? Theories abound, but you can see what she's really been up to on this blog. If you're looking for white mice, depressed robots, or the occasional Pan Galactic Gargleblaster you might be better served here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/hitchhikers/guide/.
Don't just sit there angry and ranting, do something constructive.
In the words of Patti Smith (all hail Sister Patti): People have the power.
Contact your elected officials.
Don't be passive = get involved = make a difference.
Words are cool.
The English language is complex, stupid, illogical, confounding, brilliant, beautiful, and fascinating.
Every now and then a word presents itself that typifies all the maddeningly gorgeousness of language. They're the words that give you pause for thought. "Who came up with that word? That's an interesting string of letters." Their beauty doesn't lie in their definition (although that can play a role). It's also not in their onomatopoeia, though that, too, can play a role. Their beauty is in the way their letters combine - the visual poetry of words - and/or the way they sound when spoken. We talk a lot about music we like to hear and art we like to see, so let's all hail the unsung heroes of communication, poetry and life: Words.
Here are some I like. (Not because of their definition.)
Mamas, Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to be Smart Girls
(A Trillian de-composition, to the tune of Mamas, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys)
Mama don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
Don’t let them do puzzles and read lots of books
Make ‘em be strippers and dancers and such
Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
They’ll never find men and they’re always alone
Even though men claim they want brains
Smart girls ain’t easy to love and they’re above playing games
And they’d rather read a book than subvert themselves
Kafka, Beethoven and foreign movies
And each night alone with her cat
And they won’t understand her and she won’t die young
She’ll probably just wither away
Mama don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
Don’t let them do puzzles and read lots of books
Make ‘em be strippers and dancers and such
Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
They’ll never find men and they’re always alone
Even though men claim they want brains
A smart girl loves creaky old libraries and lively debates
Exploring the world and art and witty reparteé
Men who don’t know her won’t like her and those who do
Sometimes won’t know how to take her
She’s rarely wrong but in desperation will play dumb
Because men hate that she’s always right
Mama don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
Don’t let them do puzzles and read lots of books
Make ‘em be strippers and dancers and such
Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
They’ll never find men and they’re always alone
Even though men claim they want brains
Life(?) of Trillian
Single/Zero
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Oh great.
Just swutting great.
The decline of modern civilization is picking up velocity.
Now that Bret Michaels is either dying/dead/healthy and turning over a new leaf VH1 is left without a new installment of Midlife Crisis Confidential I mean Middle Aged Man Getting Drunk and Ogling 20-Year-Old Drunk Slutty Strippers I mean Rock of Love. So what is VH1 to do without a titillating must-see show? What element of society can they exploit?
Why of course, clinically psychologically impaired people, that's who!
Seriously? This may be legal. It may be
But it's wrong.
This is not an official documentary on OCD, enlightening and featuring valid and clinical research. This is a sensationalistic reality show, a la Celebrity Rehab.
The participants may or may not be really afflicted with OCD, but the point is that they allegedly are and the cameras are rolling and they're showing the more made-for-television behaviors. They're showing the weird quirks, ticks, symptoms that make OCD so difficult for the people afflicted by it. And, unfortunately, those are the same quirks, ticks, symptoms that are annoying or humorous for observers who don't know what OCD is or that they're witnessing the symptoms of a psychological disease.
Let's all go to the freak show! It'll be fun! We'll watch real people with a psychological disease say and do funny things! It'll be a riot!
VH1: You are not PBS. You are not hard hitting, credible, sensitive, documentarians.
You are not even MTV. You are MTV lite. VH1 started as the lite version, the Michael Bolton version of MTV for people who found the alternative punk and rock of MTV too brash.
VH1, you are a lite-weight, inane, sensationalizing, entertainment network generating revenue from advertising dollars earned by high ratings.
Showcasing the drunken, naked, immature antics of washed up '80s hair band musicians and the superinflated strippers who love them is entirely appropriate for VH1. Showcasing the sad, painful, harmful symptoms of a emotionally/psychologically impaired people is completely inappropriate for VH1.
And so we fall.
It's easy to blame VH1. But I'm being too quick to judge. They're merely mirroring the accepted and desired attitude of the culture that created them. We have only ourselves to blame. When did it become okay to laugh and point at people who are ill?
What's really bugging me about this is that they're cloaking the show as compassionately helping the OCD afflicted participants. True compassion is discreet. True compassion doesn't involve boasting, showcasing, showboating or profiting.
In the past there have been things that made me wept for the future. Now I'm weeping for now.
