Improvising Coherence

I am mostly quite thoughtful in conversation.
Sometimes I have said the most unexpected thing.

What surprised me the most, having said my peace,
was the suggestion that what I said was premeditated,
when it was simply what I thought was purely in the moment.

   

Modern Commodity Slaves

are rarely aware of how commodified
their servitude to the objects of their desire
can become-and they are for from the first,
and are far from last, to get caught
in tight repeating cycles, where....

desire+self abnegation=loss of self awareness.

Misanthropy Within Family

For many
the death of a near relative
they could never get on with
is the best fresh start
they will ever get.

I Like The Idea Of Forgiveness

It echoes the moment
when I check my google account
and I am about to erase my browsing history
-either selectively or completely.

I very much doubt my google data
is gone for good, or forever.
And I don't know where
the remains of it go.

But it is enough that it is gone from me,
because like what is falsely held against me
it is data that is past it use-by date. 

In Vino Violence

Life can never be too exciting for some people

Or, in truth, too extreme.

Depressing Browsing

Recently in an airport I browsed the book stand,
looking for a friendly book to read
whilst I was kept waiting for my friend.
For all I browsed, none came to hand.

In every book the plots were variations
on the themes of child-murder and detective thriller,
the-threat-to-the-family-that-comes-from-nowhere.

Child drowns/goes missing/has disturbed background
which their family will seek to hide-that sort of thing.
The child's character is found in the trail of clues
that they thoughtlessly left behind, for others to find.

Whereas the police forces all have the maverick cop
who's gift is always trouble to the force s/he works for
and they have relationship troubles too, with a side order
of a drink problem and an uneasy over-familiarity
with the criminals who also have their intuitions
about where to be, and who to be seen with,
to be sure of their alibis.

In total it made for depressing browsing,
though it was a noble enough pursuit in itself,
until I asked my friend who had finally arrived,
'What did people used to read?' He replied, 'The Bible'.

     

Mis-Education

There are plenty of reasons
why education in 'the developed world'
simply does not educate children.

The first is that the predictive systems
which drive teachers to what they do,
will raise expectations that can't be met.
Wealth leads to wealth and always will do.

The second is that Education has to be repetitious
for the information to stay pupils heads long enough
for them to pass the exams that they are told employers
think constitutes proof of fitness for work and training,
but instead the repetitions will mark pupils for life
-long after they can trace the effect of them
when employers no longer care what you learned, or when.

The third is that we have to educate ourselves
to know what education is for; to reinforce status.
By the time we have learnt this then however weird
all questions of status seem, our own status will be fixed
however much we try to re-educate ourselves
to live beyond the neediness of others.

  

Predictive News

is the new form of reporting,
where the public are told
what is going to be said
and by which government minister
as if the speech didn't matter
-the trailer was the real event.

This news reporting technique
particularly suits weak populists
who have no idea how to lead
and have nothing to say
but who's sense of privilege
leaves them no choice but to detract
from more genuine political leadership.

So expect to hear the following more often....

'A report coming out very soon says....  '

'A tweet by an american politician says...... '

'A government spokesperson has said....  '

'In a speech to be made later today
by the Prime Minister they will say....  '

All the woodworm in the political woodwork
can wriggle as anonymously as they want,
as long as the speaker gets their word reported
in the news before they have even said it,
such that nobody can rubbish it before it is said.  

The Art Of Creating Public Amnesia

How good it would be
if a lack of charisma
in a political speaker
made logic of their words shine
more than their lack of presence does.

There must be so many speakers
with a lack charisma to choose from.

Surely one of them
has points to make
that for democracy's sake
ought to be heeded?

Maybe....  ....or maybe not...

Misanthropy and Demophobia*

are closer in spirit to each other
than most humans are prepared to think,
particularly now, when more humans
live in cities than live outside of them.


*fear of crowds or large gatherings
which demophobes either avoid company
or create coping mechanisms of varying effectiveness.    

The Smooth

will always seem smooth at first,
but when we search hard enough
we will find the rough edges.....

Plu Ca Change Plu C'est La Meme

When I see the phrase 'lessons must be learned'
in the popular press after the latest selective collapse
in slow late-period Capitalism I know what they mean;

The speaker and those they represent
must be allowed to keep any money
they have trousered in the process
and their accountants not hounded
for how they let it all happen,
even when millions of citizens
will be poorer for longer periods
than the media will let itself dwell upon.

Newer firms will have to make different mistakes
and coin different evasions to mis-account
for when their own bankruptcy happens.
   

Peace Studies

Though how much bad work can be found  for otherwise idle hands
to do remains solely the knowledge of The Lord.

Home Education

Other reasons for worry are available,
but this is the most popular and banal reason possible.  

The Weather In Utopia

must always have been fair,
to the point of never being noticed.
But it was far more important
than it was believed to be at the time. 

Thought For Valentines Day

When folks choose which newspaper
they want to read, they choose the news
which has the views which they agree with.

When folks bond, and 'fall in love',
they choose a person who is different to them.

They choose each other because of their differences.
This is shown to be at it's best when lovers live
to maintain each other's differing opinions. 

Strength Is Always Relative

We are either weaker or stronger
than other people, and mostly
unaware of our relative strength
because of our inter-dependence,
which started from us being born
with nothing and being dependent.

Forced dependence will always test us
-particularly when we are young
and we try to make exits from situations
where we are cared for but feel trapped.

That is when we start to want 

to be strong enough to be the neighbour 

that we would like to find in other people, 

and also strong enough to accept how we fall short

-an all too common experience in life.

The Immoral Maze

I don't know who this quote might refer to in his time
but it could apply to so many people who have become
 public figures since his death aged 94 in 1950. 

We Forgive Ourselves

when we selectively erase our histories,
which we do online, as a matter of course
whilst tidying up our computers.

But seeking forgiveness in real life,
from real people, means seeking once
to clearly remember our wrongs,
the better to undo the effects of them,
which takes much more than the press of a button.

Future News Blues

The news cycle is like the economic cycles,
news of which we muddle through and endure,
they both will boom, go bust, and have longueurs.

In the periods of inactivity
nothing is the everything
that is always about to happen.

The faster the news changes
then the more people think
that they are being thrust into a future
where the present they know feels like the past
and both offered a stability that was, at best, fleeting.
.

Unmaking Enmity

is what humans need to most with each other,
and what are least able to do with any confidence. 

Manufacturing And Non-News

Like many folk, one thing
that gets under my skin
that I wish would not
is modern advertising.

When I read my news online
I have to dodge my way past repeats
of multiples of flashing images
for the latest this and that,
which block the screen and disappear
such that the easily confused
can't go online to find their news;
the adverts destroy their concentration.

What none of those dodging their way
past being zapped would realize
is that there is a continuity of intent
in what they are dodging/reading.

Newspapers of old, up to the 1950's,
particularly 'quality' broadsheets,
did not put to news up front and first
but filled their front pages with promotions
for the products of the day by manufacturers.



e   

The Ultimate Phobia

'Islamophobia' and 'Homophobia'
are two terms among many
whose very trendiness
I struggle to comprehend.

The ultimate phobia comes
from cursing someone as 'stupid',
and making a bad deed or two
the sum of of the whole person.

There we act out our fear
of rational argument by ignoring
the vital differences between people
which multiply the sum of life.

To curse and do down the intelligence
of another is to reduce your own
to brute insensitivity, and to increase
the other persons sense of burden
to make include your contempt.

Such contempt is a live death wish.

Comfort vs Spirituality

Recently I commented
on a blog entry by a fellow blogger.
He made clear his discomfort
with how luxury guesthouses, ahem,
re-brand themselves as 'spiritual retreats'
to extend the reach of their business.

In these places any element of spirituality
present was suffocated by the comfort
the guest house felt it had to offer
to make the rooms worth the price of entry.

My comment was one of four,
when normally his posts garner
twenty to thirty comments, often more.

I could not tell from the lack of response
whether the issue was actually a non-issue,
or the apathy he drew was indicative
of the conflation of extreme comfort
with what was once known as 'spirituality',
and his readers were too comfortable to care.

Solipsism Incorporated

One symptom of depression
which unravels far less easily
than folks like to realize
is that how other people
will make us feel mean and cheap.

Particularly when family say
'We always do our best for you'
and other cliched responses
that try make it that all bad feelings
the property of the person feeling them.

A Minor Milestone

After nearly 7 years and 2700 posts, and twelve followers
-only one of whom remain a fellow active blogger-
I have reached total viewing figures of 6 figures....
It will be a long time before the next 100,000.

Rich In Pockets

I recently made a small purchase
in a local supermarket,
from the reduced section
as is my natural inclination.

I made the cashier wait
as I stood at the check out
and searched through six different pockets
for my loose change wallet.

To excuse my wasting of his time
I explained the cashier 'I am rich in pockets..... '  

In A One Track Life

...be careful of the signs you trust,
the better to read them carefully...

Good News, Good News, Good News.....

When the BBC tries to refresh the public's appetite
for everyday religion their efforts always show
how much it's listeners have poor memories,
of appetites, which were jaded in the first place.

Much of the public's forgetfulness
comes from overdosing on the media,
and ceasing to listen what is being said.

The truth about Radio 4's 'thought for the day'
is that it is meant to lift the items before and after it,
to make them fresher takes on the matters presented
than they would be were they placed elsewhere in the show.

But the thought for the day in itself
will always come across as old news
-it is hard to refresh
and rarely as inspired
as what it refreshes around it.
. 

A Talent For Restlessness?

Many people say 'I like to go for walks'
without saying anything much about why.

All walks have a beginning and an end,
only some of them have a point, a purpose.

When we see doubt another's sense of joy,
in what we see recognize as restlessness,
we will wish that they were happier being still,
whilst we fail to recognize our own skill
for unease, as we fail to be calm in ourselves.

Entropic Relationships

When in the past I have felt 'owned'
I never knew which came first-
the jealousy? Or the lies?
Whichever order they arrived in,
the result remained consistent-
a sinking spiral where one of them
fed into the other to protect both,
which ended the death of trust.