Put Your Channel Where Your Mouth Is

I want to be a magnetar flare. I want to place the Earth between two very jealous black holes. I want to have a voice made out of atom-splitting laser beams, and sing love songs with supernovas. If there were an Earth-massed black hole available, I'd drill a tunnel into Gaea's heart and there I'd build a nest for a "blow-job" of a different nature that would swallow us all. The thought of having my right hand made of matter, as it is, and the left, out of anti-matter makes me want to applaud such a situation. If you haven't guessed it yet, I'll confess it plainly, I would really enjoy the destruction of our planet. Or any planet, I don't want anyone surmising that my desire is one begot of malice towards Earth. On the contrary I love Earth, its beautiful, if anything I wouldn't mind human extinction. Humans aren't that relevant to earth. But despite this irrelevance, I'd have a problem with anyone or thing destroying the entire planet over hatred for any of the earthlings found under its skies. However, as dramatically beautiful as Earth may be, it is only well deserving of a beautiful, dramatic death. Rushing into the sun, life dying, terrain melting and boiling, oceans steaming into vapors, crust melting off until only a tubular core of iron remains to be quickly absorbed by the star, like a snack. Or a sudden halt, stopping the planet and everything on it, meeting a thousand mile per hour resistance to the extreme cease of motion. The resistance, like a thousand mile per hour hurricane sweeping the entire planet. Or maybe gravity can disappear and everything held together by such a force will disband. Or a head-on collision with another planet will do the trick.

The History Channel is ridiculous! There is an obsession on that channel to program shows about end-of-the-world scenarios. Whether these apocalypses are scientific or superstitious, they both carry a precautionary "thou-shalt-beware" tone that implies we, the viewers, should worry. What have these scenarios really to do with history? All these programs about hypothetically destroying or creating worlds should fit farther properly on the Syfy channel. As science fiction tends to be a study of facts and then a logical theorizing on hypothetical situations or circumstances based on those facts, countdown shows such as "10 Ways to Destroy the Earth" would deem more than suitable for a channel dedicated to the genre of science fiction; as oppose to one dedicated to the subject of history. And besides, Syfy needs it. Seriously folks, Malibu Shark Attack! This original Syfy production frightens me by existing more than the horrible CAD abortions that were meant to be "goblin sharks" in the film itself.

As for superstitious apocalypses, doomsday theories, judgement days, and all other biblical disasters to come; these have in my opinion, even less to do with history, besides document how idiotic man can be or become. These programs would be more appropriately placed on Discovery or some religious network.

Let me just say, I love seeing the Earth's atmosphere blown off by a hypothetical gamma burst, in fact it sort of turns me on. Like the tidal wave in Day After Tomorrow, such destruction is like the destruction of blank canvas into a masterpiece painting. I hold my breath and goosebumps peek from out my arms. So what should be terrifying and precautionary, becomes for me, sweet promises and playfully tender teases. Sure its on the wrong channel, possibly on purpose. 2012 is just around the corner, after all. Why not whistle a little fear into the majority who've no idea what 2012 is. We need a new Y2K, most weren't sure what Y2K even was, just that it was a possible threat on a considerable scale and eventually it was spread to armageddon proportions. Likewise has 2012 become a new armageddon built from the ideas of conscious elevation and civilizations' fall and restructuring. I could see why some would fear such a change, especially if such "some" stand to lose power due to this reorganization. Yet, truth is, "some" most likely don't worry about such superstitions; perhaps even, "some" are profiting from the hype. I on the other hand, root for the possibility of a beautiful and dramatic finale. One that no one can see coming or prepare for.

The UN, UN-Nazi'd the World

Idiocracy - (2006) Directed by Mike Judge

Starring Luke Wilson, Maya Rudolph, Dax Shepherd

Today I discovered first-hand, the patient efforts that must be in ones possession to view the film Idiocracy on network television. For starters, Mike Judge's dystopia (or utopia, as ignorance is bliss) about a future so dumbed down the people lose the most rudimentary knowledge, such as water makes plants grow, is not as an amazing film as it is just plainly and painfully as frightening as reading 1984.

Idiocracy is a satire and its viewing brings about an analysis of today's value on intelligence declining in favor of pop culture addicts, non-thinking workers, and desensitized half-wits who can be entertained and controlled as technologies advance. I watched this film on Comedy Central and at every commercial break the same ads and promotions where again displayed before me as if I'd change my mind since the last time they came around. Disgusting fast food, cellphones, cars, online hook-up sites, and movie trailers. So naturally, I should buy this car, meet someone on this site, call her on this cellphone through this provider, watch this movie and afterwards take her to eat this food.

The movie is absolutely correct. But sitting there in front of a television, which is the biggest advocate of The Moron, it was really difficult to finish the program. I felt like a boxer, boxing a winning opponent and my trainer, at my corner, is shouting useful advice and strategies but not to me. He's shouting them to my opponent. Alright, that was an awful analogy. Let me give it another go. It felt more like sitting for a dentist, who uses candy to fill a cavity. As I said the movie is absolutely correct, in that the masses for whom entertainment and consumption are tailored for, are at a risk of becoming idiots. However, this film excludes those who stand to benefit by an idiotic populace. This is not a failure of the movie as it wasn't intended to do much more than critique how mindlessly we enjoy ourselves today and the consequences of this behavior.

"Men who think neolithically about themselves and so scientifically about matter, that they can devise and manufacture the weapons of modern war, are not likely to found a stable civilization. One should either be entirely neolithic or entirely modern. It is in the power of educationalists to breed up a generation that shall be entirely modern."

Technology does not make you modern. Regardless of the apps on your i or G phone, regardless of tracking devices in your car or passport, the appliances in your kitchen or the entertainment system in your living room. However, all these ideas were creatively designed, engineered, and marketed by innovative and highly imaginative people. Yet, this technology does not exercise creativity or constructive imagination in the consumer. Where are we heading then? The above quote is by Aldous Huxley and was from an essay written in 1926. Why is it still just as true? As Eyedea wrote on the subject of technology, "...we think we're so smart but there's not much to know." Sadly, there is much to know, an infinity of possible answers to unasked questions and curiosities, but we don't want to think about it. Such wonders, I state sarcastically, belong exclusively to scientists.

I hope others have watched Idiocracy and got the message. To me, Idiocracy is not about, What If This Were To Happen? Its about Look, This Is Happening!

At the end of the movie, as is usual of network television, the credits were sped up and cut to half a screen, shared with a brief review of upcoming programs, so that the viewer would not become bored, as an idiot would become if constant activity weren't maintained.

Ingredients for a Proud Smile

Hearing two or three Lhasa songs in the film, Cold Souls and just as recently hearing an RJD2 instrumental played at each end of commercial breaks for the TV Series Madmen, makes me happier than I can say.