The Less We Have The Better Off We Are

The measure of man is his absurdity
and the more a man thinks that he has
then the greater his depth of absurdity. 

New Definitions

The News - telling the masses repeatedly, and at length,
what they can no longer do anything about.
Counsels of despair disguised as information.

Tail Wags Dog

Who Knew that the reason modern movies
have become so loud was not to disguise
how repetitive the plots are, and mask bad acting,
set design and poor direction? Nor is the noise
there to cover how competently the editing
covered a lack of continuity in the plot.

The real reason modern movies are so loud
is to cover the noise of the mass munching
of the popcorn which keeps the movie houses
(also owned by the film studios) in profit.

An Unhealthy Synesthesia?

Nowadays I have to be careful
whenever I listen to the news.

I am okay hearing about the homeless
even when they are not being housed
but instead offered sandwiches and chat
by people driven to act in good faith
who can't do as much as they ought to.

But I have to turn the radio off
when the news gives out reports
on the latest intractable war
where the opposing sides
have held their ground so long
that neither side can withdraw,
least of all at the negotiation table
where they are supposedly seeking agreement.

When I hear the latest numbers of deaths
I can almost smell the chemicals, the cordite,
and the lead fumes of the military vehicles
which keep us in small circles of collective unhappiness.

Life Beyond Blinkers?

Awe is behind the solipsism that narcissists
apply to themselves, as much as much as modest folk
might be in awe of an object or person outside of them.

That thing can be a piece of art, or an animal
who we know has a consciousness different to us.
Whatever we see with awe we are as part blind about it
as when we are when looking at ourselves.

We shift, the blinkers stay, the views change
but the limits of our recognition remain the same.

But least we partially see beyond ourselves.

Misadventure Finance

When a business becomes as big a burden
on itself as it disguises that it is
on it's employees and customers
then that company will be the last
recognise how it is about to be misused
as the kind of loss-leader
it has previously made other people
when their live would be simpler for them being slothful.

Their only other choice with how to be boss
and be reconciled to their loss-leadership.  

Great Turn-Offs Of Our Time (1)

Many phrases and stories make me turn my radio off.

Much of what passes for politics seems to be minor tragedy
dressed up as something-that-has-never-happened-before,
when it has happened before-many times.

But everyone's forgotten.

Two phrases from my radio make me hit
the mute button fast are,  'on a daily basis' for daily
and 'wrongdoing' as a stand-in for sin.

When I hear about 'sinning on a daily basis'
I turn my radio off twice as fast-I have been there
and done that and I don't need the radio report
or the free-to-air stale and stained T shirt.

Popular Sophistry

Authoritarianism always requires
that the masses misunderstand
how those in power got there
-by mis-selling their way to the top.

Such popular sophistry
is the acme method of power.

The person who understood this most
was the person who repudiated it best,
and is least understood by popular history.

Diogenes lived in a wine jar.
He cornered the market
for his own philosophy
with his through and rank
anti-authoritarian behavior.

Very few people in the modern world
dare to touch the hem of his garment
in the hope of permanent transformation. 

How To Get From Monsanto To Charles Darwin And Further Back In Several Easy Steps

When Francis Galton, cousin of Charles Darwin,
coined the phrase 'The Survival of the fittest'
it was meant to summarize Darwin's ideas
in an way that the public would find easy to grasp.

Like many similar phrases it missed much of the point
that the original work, by Darwin, meant to make.

Fitness for life was proved at least as much
by how the process of survival became apparent
from closely observing adaption to a given environment
as it was from observing the process of species becoming extinct.

But words are like wars - proof of egotism beyond belief.
If we need proof for this, consider how Galton's
rhetoric helped found the eugenics movement.
Galton started by mis-breeding cattle, then dogs
and more, until his words mis-bred with each other.

Capitalists will see those whose energies they abuse 
for profits as sub-human, as sub human as Francis Galton
once saw all life he could not directly manipulate and control.

I blame the fearful economic theories of Thomas Malthus.

God Is My Earpiece

When I recently walked some city streets,

after blowing in from the country for the day,

I less than struck by the level of activity-that was given. 

What took me aback was how many folks had gadgets in their ears.

And as they walked along they seemingly talked into thin air, 

but of course they were tuned and locked into other folk

on other gadgets, as if being on their own was abhorrent.

One of the luxuries of life in a detached house, 

alone in the country, is that I can talk all I want,
to myself, to God, or merely into the air 

-I don't need the earpiece to get there.

I Do Not Trust 'Nudge' Policies

It seems that the times these government nudges
work for best are when corporations and shops
are forced to tax individuals for what they buy,
on behalf of governments that don't want the money
but they need to curb our consumptive habits.

The tax on individual plastic bags have done it's stuff,
and the reduction in how much sugar manufacturers
put in packaged foods is the gov't's next target;
reduce the sugar or make the public pay the tax
is the threat from government to manufacturers
who under threat have changed their recipes.

I can remember when citizens paid taxes
to governments in order to receive a public service,
e.g. policing, a health service, and education.

Now it seems all these things are semi-privatized
to give the maximum support to private ownership
at public expense, and public get the message;
indirect taxes are a stick for them to be beaten with,
which they are financially better off without.

And the best cheer comes through the vice
of their 'freedom of choice', as given to them
by the absolute oligarch who is farthest away.

The New Driverless Vehicles

The Christian apologist C.S. Lewis
never said 'You are a soul, you have a body',
even though it is often miscredited to him.
It is a paraphrase of one of his favourite writers
the Victorian fantasy writer George McDonald.

We now have society and faith structures in collapse,
in the face of highly dilute definitions of community.
'The soul' is no longer an essence that outlives the body
but some shouted emotion which blunts our intelligence.

Now, with the recent accumulated misuse of information,
I fear we are viewed as animals without a central drive;
fleshy automata to be defined be what we deny each other
and the deeper the denial goes the less we know what it was.  

There Is No Money

that is so old
that it does not need
to chase new wealth
and renew it's status
to give itself a future. 

Museum Culture

Now that the last known male pure white rhino is dead,
and the species is as beyond revival as it was protection,
which museum-turned research scientists' laboratory
is going to outbid the rest for displaying his remains?

If you have not heard who has bid yet,
don't worry there will be one.

Just wait for the announcement,
where they say the will be proud
to add this extinct beast to their collection. 

The Unknown Future Self

In the midst of death
we seem to be alive,
but for how much longer?

And when will we prove
as deathly to those around us
as death seems to us in our life?

Time is the measure of life,
we had better use it well
whilst it gives us time to.

A Working Definition Of Intelligence

-the ability of one species to destroy another,
if not many more, whilst destroying the terrain
that those other species depend upon.

This is done through having no awareness
that they are the apex of the food chain
and they are destroying the chain below them
that their descendants will depend on.  

The Double Double Standard

Double standards are common in life.
Indeed single common standards are hard,
hard to to achieve in one's self
and harder still to witness in others
when we are so variable and divided.

What strikes me hardest is how familiar
each of us can be with our own double standards.

But what is obvious to us is much less clear
to other people, particularly those
whom we protest are closest to us.

Some people see forgiveness
in the blindness of other people,
and many times that is alright.

But most times our sense of charity
melts into sentimentality
in a ways that we fail to recognise.

Personal Growth In Old Age

comes more by chance than solid planning.
Old people find that renewal comes to them
in how they respond to fresh mistakes they make,
mistakes which they have never made before.

Equality Vs Justice

Creating 'supportive handicaps' that are free of condescension
towards those with the less takes much more forethought 
than ever we attempt, or would accept for ourselves.

Decarte Vs Strindberg

Decarte wrote 'I think therefore I am'
as if thought were proof of life,
though the quality of the thoughts,
on the scale from utter foolishness
to the most profound wisdom
seemed immaterial to him at the time.

On the whole I prefer Strindberg
who said 'I dream therefore I exist'.
Because dreams have their own logic
and intelligence. In our experience
there is no point in trying to gainsay
what you can't remember when you wake up.  

R.I.P. NME

This is what it used to be like 

When it was on form and witty
about the media that it was a part of.

Post-Modern Capitalism is...

Money and inequality
multiplied by a sophistry
which ties them (and us)
into tight little knots
that nobody can undo.

New Blog Update

Here is a long form blog
that I have been writing
on and off for nearly two years.

It is the length of a book,
and it is as well edited
as I have been able to make it,
on my own with the mild dylexia*
that I know that I live with.

The link is to the introduction,
with descriptions of each chapter
and links to each of the 42 chapters
that it ended up becoming.

It won't get any longer
but it might become
even more tidied up
later this year.


*it is a very common condition,
and it is mostly the symptom
of a collapsing education system.

I Would Never Advise..... (1)

A narcissist to 'look in the mirror'
-either metaphorically or literally.

They might well be consumed
by their own appearance all over again.

The Hope Of Heaven

is nearly nothing to do with an eternity
where virtue is rewarded, or the certainty
of the punishment of vice.

Heaven is much more about the absence
of elections, where anxious leaders
seem prepared to do everything possible
to have their anxieties assuaged,
everything except for them to lead their countries.

Particularly when what they want done
they want done most to the public and their opposition.      

The Victories Of Tyrants

live on through the systems
built to advantage them,
politically materially and socially.
And also through guilt that corrodes
those who colluded with them,
against their free will and better judgement.

For Faster Breeding Futures

Plutocracy is to democracy
what plutonium is to renewable energy.
Both make life go faster than we expect,
but when they reach maximum momentum
both will also burn out and poison
what their sponsors meant them to support.

The Label Vs The Life

Mental health now comes with many more labels
than it did in the past, when it was a binary
and the divider that sustained both labels was fear.

Back then mental health was good or bad
and either way it had to be sufficient for the day.

But with the shiny new words come increased possibilities,
new choices of irresponsibility for ourselves and other people.

Thank You Mr de Tocqueville

for pointing out to me
how in any democracy
the great mass of people
will massage public opinion
until all contrary minority opinions
cannot be held with any credibility
within the pages of the popular press.

A Photograph

Photography is not a skill I am known for.
The number of times I have photographed my buddy
and chopped of his feet as I pressed the button is a joke
that has repeated itself far too often for our comfort.
Nonetheless I am proud to have captured this set of reflections
of a small statue in the double glazing of our local (perpetually closed) arts centre.