"I once caught a fish THIS BIG!"
Heel - Heal
By popular demand, here it is… well, by three demands. At my level three requests is popularity.
I’m going to start this yarn with a little prologue… because ending with one just doesn’t seem right. What’s it called when the drummer does the three beats after a bad one liner?
I’d like to start this anecdote by raising to the foam a little lesson of passage that all men must endure. That lesson is mature manhood. At some point all of us cross a line where we see that which we committed behind us on the rambunctious side of said line, shake our heads and say, ‘oh man’, though truthfully we’re never very far from the little trouble-maker inside us. This lesson can be enlightening, cathartic, or outright painful.
Though many may think this line is the same of the passage to manhood in the traditional sexually plundering sense, ooh baby, you couldn’t be more wrong. There is a football field worth of difference between becoming a man and becoming a mature, or at least fully coherent man. On one side there is independence and the other is responsibility. Though independence is an important lesson and vital to the achievement of responsibility, it is still quite the river to cross, and usually involves both a literal and figurative blow to the independent man’s cranium.
That blow can actually occur at any part of the anatomy.
This leads me to the Tale of The Heel.
Let me first set the scene. Picture a quaint Northern Ontario town. Picture the kind of quasi-industrial picturesque place that has a Wal-Mart, but is still somewhat excited to have been bestowed a Wal-Mart, and at that Wal-Mart is a sectioned off snowmobile parking lot. Picture lakes and trees and friendly faces that are made all the more pleasing in that they are just anonymous enough that you don’t necessarily have to say hi to them.
In early August my treasured hometown is all a buzz, in that quaint small town sort of way, with a summer festival that attracts all manner of neighboring communities in for a week of carnival rides and greasy… well, everything gets kind of greasy.
This same week attracts most of my buddies from high school. We are still close and take advantage of every opportunity to shake off the burden of our impending thirties and reacquaint ourselves with the hooligans we once were. Hooliganism is one of those traits that stands on the younger side of that aforementioned line, but somehow retains a seductive power over the refined gentleman positioned on the latter half.
The hooligan in me had quite the convincing argument for me that evening.
The notorious night began as most of those reunion nights tend to, gathering at the home of one of these buddies that has found his career in our hometown, and ingesting our first few bushels of beer.
I should interject a note of the volume of alcohol consumption that we in a cold northern climate are capable and accustomed to. It becomes not only a badge of honor, but a survivalist necessity to keep the body well pickled and therefore protected and prepared for battle. I was doing my best at this point to adhere to this adage.
I could now tell a thousand funny little stories about booze and the men that love them, and the women that hate them, and the women the men want to love, and the ensuing hate affair men have with booze after the women they wanted to love are gone and replaced by the sun and a massive hangover… but lets get to the turkey of this dinner, shall we?
At the end of any given night in my hallowed hometown in the tepid days of summer, certain ceremonial rites come into play. In our continuing quest to regain or retain our youth, we can tend to engage in some activities that might seem… odd.
At this point, the male population has been split into the haves and have-nots, and I’ll let you guess what it is the haves will soon be having. The have-nots are left to forage for all-night, red-light heated slices of pizza and finding any lingering method of making the evening memorable. This tends to be where I come in.
I don’t mean to toot my own horn, though this is my website and an essay about ME, but this is usually the part of the night where I take the stage. As it happens, boy did I choose the wrong stage!
You may have inferred at this point that I usually stand with the have-nots. It is perhaps this constant membership in the have-not roster that instilled in me a need to perform and make being a have-not and getting not, not so bad.
I’ve done it all in the name of this quest. As the night winds down, I just seem to wind up, and certainly seem to get my steam. I take dares, I break things, I disrobe, I trespass, I ingest, and do just about anything to get noticed, acknowledged, and get something even though I have-not-thing.
On this particular night the performance went as such: We left the bar in a stupor I personally hadn’t stooped to in years. This was an inebriation built over six hours, all genres of alcohol, and at one point an entire tray of shots. There were four of us left, myself, The Three Toed Sloth, Primetime, and his younger brother Time Jr. Because of the summer festival mentioned earlier, there was a luxurious Recreational Vehicle on display outside the downtown bar to advertise some misbegotten festival sweepstakes for RV enthusiasts. With one look at this massive four-wheeled testament to geriatric adventure itself, I knew I had my stage.
I was up on the rooftop deck faster than a spider monkey on PCP. I looked over my people, my three friends and the droves of nightclubers, unleashed upon the night with the closing of their surrogate homes, most of whom couldn’t care less about the genius of my imminent my aria. They were right to ignore me as they sought ignorance in each other, I was probably the twelveth meathead to seek his glory on top of this moveable mountain. It wasn’t in my Edmund Hilary-like ascent of this Everest that I would find my own immortality, however…
… it would be in my dismount.
You read it right. In a moment of unbridled beer-fueled epiphany I chose the graceful way off of the oversized, nearly twenty-foot tall RV. If no one was going to respond to my show, the showman in me had to take it up a notch and drop all the jaws before with a show-stopping finish.
Imagine now my articulate, baritone inner-monologue, wiggled slightly by the influence of ‘liquid strength’. “A cartwheel… yeah, that’ll look cool! And golly, will it ever be enriching for everybody!”
Right about now you’re probably picturing a spectacularly cartoonish crash into the asphalt below, reminiscent of Wile E. Coyote’s accordion body. I hate to let you down in that respect, but no, I landed that baby. Oh boy, I landed it too well. If there were judges watching… well, judges holding numbered cards, I would have earned a ten. I landed that puppy like a lawn dart, straight up and down. The difference between me the gymnasts out there, aside from a lifetime of training, is a soft surface, not a road, and proper footwear, not crappy flip flops, which are currently serving my lifelong boycott… bloody traitors. Maybe you thought the title of this essay was in reference to my action or the substance of my character… sadly, for my foot anyway, it’s a not-so-clever ‘single entendre’.
I planted my hands just below the corner of the roof and threw my feet into the air. A spectacular aerial ballet ensued as the night wind of that eternal split-second carried me to the ground on the wings of angels… carried me and promptly dropped me like a bag expired yak fertilizer on to that unforgiving asphalt and clearly over that manhood line I talked about earlier. “Oh Man!” Though I fell from the sky I distinctly heard the sound of God or some higher power boot-fucking my ass clear through the uprights of ‘welcome to the land of grown-up consequences’. Maybe that ‘thud’ was the sound of my calcaneous (heal bone) cracking.
You could quite literally say that I broke my foot off in my own ass.
My last images of that evening, as shock and adrenaline began to mix in my blood with nine liters of alcohol and nine more of regret, are quite clear considering my state. The first among them is my good buddy Primetime and young Jr., actually thoughtfully praising my form, and as the giggling paramedics loaded me strapped down into their meat-head-wagon, was looking out at my adoring public for that last bit of recognition. Among the eyes open in wonder and ridicule staring at the car crash that was ME, there was that recognition… the Sloth… ah hell, Andrew Geden, smiling at me with that smile I tended to get after one of my showstoppers, accompanying it with a big thumbs-up.
Why did I do it? What did I hope to achieve? What did I think would happen? Though it may be difficult to believe at this point, I am a reasonable, sometimes thoughtful, marginally educated young man with a fully functioning brain. Why, after twenty-eight years on a planet with gravity and asphalt, did I think this could end any differently? All I can say with any certainty is that I didn’t think. If my synapses were firing, it was in that part of the immature male brain that leads us in to our finest, but often our dumbest moments of greatness, and is associated with words like impetuous and exuberant. The unfortunate part of the transition, the traverse across that line of devirginized manhood into actual manhood, is that I kind of liked that version of me. I’ll miss him. Three o’clock in the morning will never be the same… if it still exists at all.
'The evening began innocently enough.' Let me say at this point that if you learned anything in the preceding, beware innocent looking evenings. Beware those reunion weekends, beware friends bearing gifts and gifts bearing friends, they love, would kill for you and love to see you happy, but do you ever get into these kinds of trouble without either? Beware what you wear, on your feet and in place of your thinking cap. Lastly, beware recreational vehicles. Personally, I’ve always been suspicious.
At the time of the requests for this little bittle, a year and a half of recovery and reflection, nicknames and funny walks have passed. I am almost fully recovered, both in terms of the condition of my right hoof and the amputation of the little hooligan performer. On certain days, usually following a lot of walking or exertion, I have stiffness and discomfort to remind me of those days of blissful ignorance and the sunny side of that manhood line. To be honest, I hope it always hurts a little, I don't really want to forget. Besides, I think a little limp kind of makes me look cowboy-cool. Maybe not.
Keep those feet on the ground and... ah, whatever. Don't break your heel, it really hurts.
Patrick "Veggie Heel" Hughes
I’m going to start this yarn with a little prologue… because ending with one just doesn’t seem right. What’s it called when the drummer does the three beats after a bad one liner?
I’d like to start this anecdote by raising to the foam a little lesson of passage that all men must endure. That lesson is mature manhood. At some point all of us cross a line where we see that which we committed behind us on the rambunctious side of said line, shake our heads and say, ‘oh man’, though truthfully we’re never very far from the little trouble-maker inside us. This lesson can be enlightening, cathartic, or outright painful.
Though many may think this line is the same of the passage to manhood in the traditional sexually plundering sense, ooh baby, you couldn’t be more wrong. There is a football field worth of difference between becoming a man and becoming a mature, or at least fully coherent man. On one side there is independence and the other is responsibility. Though independence is an important lesson and vital to the achievement of responsibility, it is still quite the river to cross, and usually involves both a literal and figurative blow to the independent man’s cranium.
That blow can actually occur at any part of the anatomy.
This leads me to the Tale of The Heel.
Let me first set the scene. Picture a quaint Northern Ontario town. Picture the kind of quasi-industrial picturesque place that has a Wal-Mart, but is still somewhat excited to have been bestowed a Wal-Mart, and at that Wal-Mart is a sectioned off snowmobile parking lot. Picture lakes and trees and friendly faces that are made all the more pleasing in that they are just anonymous enough that you don’t necessarily have to say hi to them.
In early August my treasured hometown is all a buzz, in that quaint small town sort of way, with a summer festival that attracts all manner of neighboring communities in for a week of carnival rides and greasy… well, everything gets kind of greasy.
This same week attracts most of my buddies from high school. We are still close and take advantage of every opportunity to shake off the burden of our impending thirties and reacquaint ourselves with the hooligans we once were. Hooliganism is one of those traits that stands on the younger side of that aforementioned line, but somehow retains a seductive power over the refined gentleman positioned on the latter half.
The hooligan in me had quite the convincing argument for me that evening.
The notorious night began as most of those reunion nights tend to, gathering at the home of one of these buddies that has found his career in our hometown, and ingesting our first few bushels of beer.
I should interject a note of the volume of alcohol consumption that we in a cold northern climate are capable and accustomed to. It becomes not only a badge of honor, but a survivalist necessity to keep the body well pickled and therefore protected and prepared for battle. I was doing my best at this point to adhere to this adage.
I could now tell a thousand funny little stories about booze and the men that love them, and the women that hate them, and the women the men want to love, and the ensuing hate affair men have with booze after the women they wanted to love are gone and replaced by the sun and a massive hangover… but lets get to the turkey of this dinner, shall we?
At the end of any given night in my hallowed hometown in the tepid days of summer, certain ceremonial rites come into play. In our continuing quest to regain or retain our youth, we can tend to engage in some activities that might seem… odd.
At this point, the male population has been split into the haves and have-nots, and I’ll let you guess what it is the haves will soon be having. The have-nots are left to forage for all-night, red-light heated slices of pizza and finding any lingering method of making the evening memorable. This tends to be where I come in.
I don’t mean to toot my own horn, though this is my website and an essay about ME, but this is usually the part of the night where I take the stage. As it happens, boy did I choose the wrong stage!
You may have inferred at this point that I usually stand with the have-nots. It is perhaps this constant membership in the have-not roster that instilled in me a need to perform and make being a have-not and getting not, not so bad.
I’ve done it all in the name of this quest. As the night winds down, I just seem to wind up, and certainly seem to get my steam. I take dares, I break things, I disrobe, I trespass, I ingest, and do just about anything to get noticed, acknowledged, and get something even though I have-not-thing.
On this particular night the performance went as such: We left the bar in a stupor I personally hadn’t stooped to in years. This was an inebriation built over six hours, all genres of alcohol, and at one point an entire tray of shots. There were four of us left, myself, The Three Toed Sloth, Primetime, and his younger brother Time Jr. Because of the summer festival mentioned earlier, there was a luxurious Recreational Vehicle on display outside the downtown bar to advertise some misbegotten festival sweepstakes for RV enthusiasts. With one look at this massive four-wheeled testament to geriatric adventure itself, I knew I had my stage.
I was up on the rooftop deck faster than a spider monkey on PCP. I looked over my people, my three friends and the droves of nightclubers, unleashed upon the night with the closing of their surrogate homes, most of whom couldn’t care less about the genius of my imminent my aria. They were right to ignore me as they sought ignorance in each other, I was probably the twelveth meathead to seek his glory on top of this moveable mountain. It wasn’t in my Edmund Hilary-like ascent of this Everest that I would find my own immortality, however…
… it would be in my dismount.
You read it right. In a moment of unbridled beer-fueled epiphany I chose the graceful way off of the oversized, nearly twenty-foot tall RV. If no one was going to respond to my show, the showman in me had to take it up a notch and drop all the jaws before with a show-stopping finish.
Imagine now my articulate, baritone inner-monologue, wiggled slightly by the influence of ‘liquid strength’. “A cartwheel… yeah, that’ll look cool! And golly, will it ever be enriching for everybody!”
Right about now you’re probably picturing a spectacularly cartoonish crash into the asphalt below, reminiscent of Wile E. Coyote’s accordion body. I hate to let you down in that respect, but no, I landed that baby. Oh boy, I landed it too well. If there were judges watching… well, judges holding numbered cards, I would have earned a ten. I landed that puppy like a lawn dart, straight up and down. The difference between me the gymnasts out there, aside from a lifetime of training, is a soft surface, not a road, and proper footwear, not crappy flip flops, which are currently serving my lifelong boycott… bloody traitors. Maybe you thought the title of this essay was in reference to my action or the substance of my character… sadly, for my foot anyway, it’s a not-so-clever ‘single entendre’.
I planted my hands just below the corner of the roof and threw my feet into the air. A spectacular aerial ballet ensued as the night wind of that eternal split-second carried me to the ground on the wings of angels… carried me and promptly dropped me like a bag expired yak fertilizer on to that unforgiving asphalt and clearly over that manhood line I talked about earlier. “Oh Man!” Though I fell from the sky I distinctly heard the sound of God or some higher power boot-fucking my ass clear through the uprights of ‘welcome to the land of grown-up consequences’. Maybe that ‘thud’ was the sound of my calcaneous (heal bone) cracking.
You could quite literally say that I broke my foot off in my own ass.
My last images of that evening, as shock and adrenaline began to mix in my blood with nine liters of alcohol and nine more of regret, are quite clear considering my state. The first among them is my good buddy Primetime and young Jr., actually thoughtfully praising my form, and as the giggling paramedics loaded me strapped down into their meat-head-wagon, was looking out at my adoring public for that last bit of recognition. Among the eyes open in wonder and ridicule staring at the car crash that was ME, there was that recognition… the Sloth… ah hell, Andrew Geden, smiling at me with that smile I tended to get after one of my showstoppers, accompanying it with a big thumbs-up.
Why did I do it? What did I hope to achieve? What did I think would happen? Though it may be difficult to believe at this point, I am a reasonable, sometimes thoughtful, marginally educated young man with a fully functioning brain. Why, after twenty-eight years on a planet with gravity and asphalt, did I think this could end any differently? All I can say with any certainty is that I didn’t think. If my synapses were firing, it was in that part of the immature male brain that leads us in to our finest, but often our dumbest moments of greatness, and is associated with words like impetuous and exuberant. The unfortunate part of the transition, the traverse across that line of devirginized manhood into actual manhood, is that I kind of liked that version of me. I’ll miss him. Three o’clock in the morning will never be the same… if it still exists at all.
'The evening began innocently enough.' Let me say at this point that if you learned anything in the preceding, beware innocent looking evenings. Beware those reunion weekends, beware friends bearing gifts and gifts bearing friends, they love, would kill for you and love to see you happy, but do you ever get into these kinds of trouble without either? Beware what you wear, on your feet and in place of your thinking cap. Lastly, beware recreational vehicles. Personally, I’ve always been suspicious.
At the time of the requests for this little bittle, a year and a half of recovery and reflection, nicknames and funny walks have passed. I am almost fully recovered, both in terms of the condition of my right hoof and the amputation of the little hooligan performer. On certain days, usually following a lot of walking or exertion, I have stiffness and discomfort to remind me of those days of blissful ignorance and the sunny side of that manhood line. To be honest, I hope it always hurts a little, I don't really want to forget. Besides, I think a little limp kind of makes me look cowboy-cool. Maybe not.
Keep those feet on the ground and... ah, whatever. Don't break your heel, it really hurts.
Patrick "Veggie Heel" Hughes
Beholder
Last summer I was enjoying a sunny afternoon on the rocky banks of West Vancouver’s Lighthouse Park. The sun poured down on the water at the mouth of the Burrard Inlet and ran across the lilting waves like a finger drawn across piano keys. I was hiking with a buddy and his parents who were in town for a visit, and quickly becoming addicted, as many of us have, to an intoxicating Vancouver in its habit-forming summer splendor. Things were fine lounging on that rock, a regal kind of fine, but they were about to get finer.
I noticed a young woman in a bikini below us, on a rock closer to the water that licked up at her feet. She stood at that distance just beyond detail, where the knowledge of a bikini conjures beauty in detail’s place. She was at that distance that an angel or a mermaid always seems to stand in your dreams, just past acknowledgement.
Does anyone else dream about mermaids, by the way?
She was standing and posing in a way that didn’t seem to invite the necessary sun to tan and didn’t seem overly natural, so I leaned forward to see what was making her assume an arched and tiptoed stance. About ten feet in front of her stood a man holding a huge light with a white umbrella surrounding it and a guy on one knee directing her holding a camera and an enthusiastic grin. Wait, lights… camera… hold everything, we have a model sighting!
Upon the awareness of said shutterbug, the bikini in front of me went from out of focus angel to an all-together new form of celestial entity. She was destined for the immortality of swimsuit calendars and workshop walls. I was mesmerized, until I realized the distasteful truth of my infatuation. She was just a bikini until I saw that photographer. Does that make me more interested in his and his camera’s presence than hers?
The fact that I knew that this girl was likely to be the subject of adoration for many made her instantly more adorable and admirable to me.
Can’t I pick my own angels any more?
Wasn’t it beauty I saw in the first place? Why did it take a camera and a man for me to behold it? Why did this new definition of the figure in front of me form a new image in my eyes? The level of her beauty was decided by this external force, what does that say about my ability to behold beauty?
Beauty was once in the eye of the beholder, now the beholder holds none of the cards. We are fed beauty in large, overly sugared, or should I say Nutra-Sweetened doses. Beauty and all its counterparts, style, expression, and class, have been labeled, packaged and mass-produced. Beauty is no longer the subject of poetry, but the air brushed product at the end of an assembly line.
Why is it that something isn’t beautiful until it’s beautiful to someone else?
Individualism, is this the problem? It seems that from the very moment we as a race acquired the gift of self-awareness we starting seeking someone to emulate. We ceased being apes but clung to ‘monkey see monkey do’ like a chimp in a tree. We’ve been falling in line, constructing our dogma, and seeking a supreme version of ourselves for the throne from the moment we had a voice with which to voice our conformity. Individualism isn’t the reason that model became an idol. I’m a product of the twentieth century; I’m not an individual even when I’m standing by myself.
I tend then to put the experience in that box of inherent human curiosity. You know that brightly colored box adorned with sparkling stars dangled before you by Monty Hall and certain to hold untold riches and even perhaps the key to Heaven itself? We all know that box; we know how things seem to get interesting to us when mystery and unattainability are introduced. Girls are more delectable when they give chase, chase is a gift they give the courtship. Candy is sweeter when stolen, but never even desired until desired by your little brother. We are compelled to forage when the answer to our curiosity isn’t readily provided.
Curiosity can’t be blamed for killing anything in this case, but it is our collective curiosity, and our individual need for conformity, that has killed the image of beauty, our sense of evolving style, and the power of the beholder by classifying every nuance of earth, sky and the air around us until mystery itself is rendered a mystery.
Beauty was once the muse, the divine intoxicant; it gave men that fun little step beyond sanity and woman the power to shatter that sanity. Now instead of a muse, we have a magazine cover and a strict set of guidelines. We have a fashion dictatorship that governs over more than a spring line, but indirectly over expression itself.
What is it exactly that’s inspirational about the blank expression staring at me with painted eyes from the cover of Cosmallurie Clairogue Fair? The only emotion that this literature inspires is a fear for those who once held the beholders. The fashion culture, the keepers of ‘popular beauty’, leave us with an increasingly stricter frame for the grandest gift the eyes can be given or behold. I’m convinced, and I’m not exactly expounding a theory about the speed of light here, that these periodicals are designed to train, pacify, and sort of enslave woman into subscribing to this believe of one kind of beauty. They force-feed, a ‘model’ for woman everywhere to fantasize about conforming to, and sell them makeup while doing so. I’m actually uncertain at this point if the ultimate ulterior motive of this fashion propaganda is to propagate an impossible image or just sell handbags. Both are clearly evil endeavors. Even sadder still is that most women know this, but are continually pushed, most often by each other, to praise these tomes of false imagery. Have you seen these things? I mean seriously, it’s a glossy, monthly Encyclopedia Britannica, filled with people who really truly do not at all look like the depictions presented. The actual models can’t even achieve these standards.
This quest has now reached absurd lengths with the popularization of surgical enhancement. What if I told you ten years ago that there would one day be a ‘reality’ show, where people would undergo surgery to look more like… whom or whatever? Plastic surgery does have its place, but… I can’t believe I have to say it… it is not on television. This subject is an essay unto itself, so without further digression…
Secondary to image itself in constructing the demolition of beauty is the revolving nature of trends. We live in an age where every combination of clothing, accessory, attitude and social standing has been labeled, and fluxes through a constantly changing ranking. The only constant in this ranking is that nothing remains. There was a time when a trend fit an age and a collective sense of belonging. In the early 60s the first lady showed women how to be conservatively stylish, and by the latter half of the decade Jim Morrison showed men how to be wild, yet thoughtful and brooding. It was simple, no one asked questions or sought a pigeonhole. By the mid 80s, the phenomenon of retro-style had begun. By the late 90s, the retro-flip had flopped over on itself. Trends were left with nothing but retrospective references to guide them.
Think about it for a moment. When you think of the 70s, what do you picture? Deborah Harry and Barry Gibb. When you think of the 80s its Don Johnson and a suit that burns your retinas. How about the late 90s and today? You’re back to the 60s and 70s all mish-mashed together, aren’t you? Trends, as a style based on originality is now as dead as we once thought Disco was. We are left with no creation, merely labeled boxes that everything must be filed into. The sad thing about setting a trend in our world today is that a trend isn’t a trend and originality isn’t original until acknowledged and copied by a second or second-hundredth person.
If a trend forms and no one is there to rank it, does it make a sound?
What would it take for the collective acknowledgement of our society that beauty is not contained within the impulse racks at the supermarket’s check out lines? How can we as a people take the property of beauty out of the hands of the label-makers and put it back into The Eye of the Beholder?
We have to abandon the labels, or to at least stand outside of these labels every now and then. We have to change the way we consider that which we admire. Don’t describe anything in the realm of creativity by comparing it to something that came before it. Don’t describe what you’re creating with a pop-culture reference or the closest comparison; explain the process that brought you there. Though this may seem an unsexy strategy, it will unravel the fabric holding the labels over that which once inspired us.
Imagine if once a week each one of us consciously did something completely out of the box of fashion and cliché. I mean something totally sideways, something like tying a shoe to your belt or wearing six belts. I mean replacing the word ‘please’ with ‘tickle’. I mean recognizing real beauty, by complementing someone who isn’t ready for it. If enough people were redefining beauty and creativity, the permutations would be too numerous to categorize. We could reinvent originality and rediscover what we each find beautiful.
Be Beautiful: People are ALWAYS at their best when they are cultivating their finer qualities. If you are weird, be weird; if you are boring, be boring; if you are fat, be fat, just be really good at it. If you happen to be one of those cover model types, be that kind of beautiful and revel in it.
Create Beauty: If you have a secret passion or outlet, don’t let secrecy, the clock or the deadline get in the way of it. Whether it’s playing piano, cooking, or burping the alphabet backwards, don’t let a day pass without some time spent exploring that outlet. Even paper airplane building needs a Mozart.
Think Beautiful: Far too many of us resist speaking our minds. I’m a believer in tact, at least a measure of it, but I’m also a believer in expression. Too many of us are concerned with being charming, and deal out a joke rather than sharing something meaningful. Don’t let the chance to have beautiful disagreement pass you by.
Say Beautiful: Beauty goes far too often unacknowledged. It remains unjustly just beyond detail. Maybe that’s why it has come the caged animal that once ran free, because it wasn’t chased. A sunset, a vintage car, or a stranger on the street, if you see beauty, acknowledge it. You can become the beholder again.
Beauty should not be the mold we fit into, but that which sets us apart. I for one would like to behold real beauty again. I would like to be bowled over by beauty rather than merely bombarded with the plastic version of it. There are perhaps greater causes to put the remnant strength of our individual opinion behind, but if you really think about it, what’s the point of any of it if we have to live in a world without beauty? I think remaining on a path where nothing is new and everything has been marketed; Beauty will slowly be relegated to the Memory of the Beholder.
The more I reflect on my experience with that angelic mermaid bikini, the more I wish two things: First, I wish I saw the cameraman first. Perhaps if my knowledge began with him, my image of her wouldn’t have bended into the label of bikini-model. I wouldn’t then have a memory that starts on something real and ends on a magazine cover. Second, I wish our two rocks were a little bit closer. If I could have been within that distance to appreciate her at the level of personal acknowledgement, perhaps then I wouldn’t have stamped on her that label that devalued her beauty, and perhaps then she could have acknowledged me right back.
This actually leads me to my third wish…
Hughes.
I noticed a young woman in a bikini below us, on a rock closer to the water that licked up at her feet. She stood at that distance just beyond detail, where the knowledge of a bikini conjures beauty in detail’s place. She was at that distance that an angel or a mermaid always seems to stand in your dreams, just past acknowledgement.
Does anyone else dream about mermaids, by the way?
She was standing and posing in a way that didn’t seem to invite the necessary sun to tan and didn’t seem overly natural, so I leaned forward to see what was making her assume an arched and tiptoed stance. About ten feet in front of her stood a man holding a huge light with a white umbrella surrounding it and a guy on one knee directing her holding a camera and an enthusiastic grin. Wait, lights… camera… hold everything, we have a model sighting!
Upon the awareness of said shutterbug, the bikini in front of me went from out of focus angel to an all-together new form of celestial entity. She was destined for the immortality of swimsuit calendars and workshop walls. I was mesmerized, until I realized the distasteful truth of my infatuation. She was just a bikini until I saw that photographer. Does that make me more interested in his and his camera’s presence than hers?
The fact that I knew that this girl was likely to be the subject of adoration for many made her instantly more adorable and admirable to me.
Can’t I pick my own angels any more?
Wasn’t it beauty I saw in the first place? Why did it take a camera and a man for me to behold it? Why did this new definition of the figure in front of me form a new image in my eyes? The level of her beauty was decided by this external force, what does that say about my ability to behold beauty?
Beauty was once in the eye of the beholder, now the beholder holds none of the cards. We are fed beauty in large, overly sugared, or should I say Nutra-Sweetened doses. Beauty and all its counterparts, style, expression, and class, have been labeled, packaged and mass-produced. Beauty is no longer the subject of poetry, but the air brushed product at the end of an assembly line.
Why is it that something isn’t beautiful until it’s beautiful to someone else?
Individualism, is this the problem? It seems that from the very moment we as a race acquired the gift of self-awareness we starting seeking someone to emulate. We ceased being apes but clung to ‘monkey see monkey do’ like a chimp in a tree. We’ve been falling in line, constructing our dogma, and seeking a supreme version of ourselves for the throne from the moment we had a voice with which to voice our conformity. Individualism isn’t the reason that model became an idol. I’m a product of the twentieth century; I’m not an individual even when I’m standing by myself.
I tend then to put the experience in that box of inherent human curiosity. You know that brightly colored box adorned with sparkling stars dangled before you by Monty Hall and certain to hold untold riches and even perhaps the key to Heaven itself? We all know that box; we know how things seem to get interesting to us when mystery and unattainability are introduced. Girls are more delectable when they give chase, chase is a gift they give the courtship. Candy is sweeter when stolen, but never even desired until desired by your little brother. We are compelled to forage when the answer to our curiosity isn’t readily provided.
Curiosity can’t be blamed for killing anything in this case, but it is our collective curiosity, and our individual need for conformity, that has killed the image of beauty, our sense of evolving style, and the power of the beholder by classifying every nuance of earth, sky and the air around us until mystery itself is rendered a mystery.
Beauty was once the muse, the divine intoxicant; it gave men that fun little step beyond sanity and woman the power to shatter that sanity. Now instead of a muse, we have a magazine cover and a strict set of guidelines. We have a fashion dictatorship that governs over more than a spring line, but indirectly over expression itself.
What is it exactly that’s inspirational about the blank expression staring at me with painted eyes from the cover of Cosmallurie Clairogue Fair? The only emotion that this literature inspires is a fear for those who once held the beholders. The fashion culture, the keepers of ‘popular beauty’, leave us with an increasingly stricter frame for the grandest gift the eyes can be given or behold. I’m convinced, and I’m not exactly expounding a theory about the speed of light here, that these periodicals are designed to train, pacify, and sort of enslave woman into subscribing to this believe of one kind of beauty. They force-feed, a ‘model’ for woman everywhere to fantasize about conforming to, and sell them makeup while doing so. I’m actually uncertain at this point if the ultimate ulterior motive of this fashion propaganda is to propagate an impossible image or just sell handbags. Both are clearly evil endeavors. Even sadder still is that most women know this, but are continually pushed, most often by each other, to praise these tomes of false imagery. Have you seen these things? I mean seriously, it’s a glossy, monthly Encyclopedia Britannica, filled with people who really truly do not at all look like the depictions presented. The actual models can’t even achieve these standards.
This quest has now reached absurd lengths with the popularization of surgical enhancement. What if I told you ten years ago that there would one day be a ‘reality’ show, where people would undergo surgery to look more like… whom or whatever? Plastic surgery does have its place, but… I can’t believe I have to say it… it is not on television. This subject is an essay unto itself, so without further digression…
Secondary to image itself in constructing the demolition of beauty is the revolving nature of trends. We live in an age where every combination of clothing, accessory, attitude and social standing has been labeled, and fluxes through a constantly changing ranking. The only constant in this ranking is that nothing remains. There was a time when a trend fit an age and a collective sense of belonging. In the early 60s the first lady showed women how to be conservatively stylish, and by the latter half of the decade Jim Morrison showed men how to be wild, yet thoughtful and brooding. It was simple, no one asked questions or sought a pigeonhole. By the mid 80s, the phenomenon of retro-style had begun. By the late 90s, the retro-flip had flopped over on itself. Trends were left with nothing but retrospective references to guide them.
Think about it for a moment. When you think of the 70s, what do you picture? Deborah Harry and Barry Gibb. When you think of the 80s its Don Johnson and a suit that burns your retinas. How about the late 90s and today? You’re back to the 60s and 70s all mish-mashed together, aren’t you? Trends, as a style based on originality is now as dead as we once thought Disco was. We are left with no creation, merely labeled boxes that everything must be filed into. The sad thing about setting a trend in our world today is that a trend isn’t a trend and originality isn’t original until acknowledged and copied by a second or second-hundredth person.
If a trend forms and no one is there to rank it, does it make a sound?
What would it take for the collective acknowledgement of our society that beauty is not contained within the impulse racks at the supermarket’s check out lines? How can we as a people take the property of beauty out of the hands of the label-makers and put it back into The Eye of the Beholder?
We have to abandon the labels, or to at least stand outside of these labels every now and then. We have to change the way we consider that which we admire. Don’t describe anything in the realm of creativity by comparing it to something that came before it. Don’t describe what you’re creating with a pop-culture reference or the closest comparison; explain the process that brought you there. Though this may seem an unsexy strategy, it will unravel the fabric holding the labels over that which once inspired us.
Imagine if once a week each one of us consciously did something completely out of the box of fashion and cliché. I mean something totally sideways, something like tying a shoe to your belt or wearing six belts. I mean replacing the word ‘please’ with ‘tickle’. I mean recognizing real beauty, by complementing someone who isn’t ready for it. If enough people were redefining beauty and creativity, the permutations would be too numerous to categorize. We could reinvent originality and rediscover what we each find beautiful.
Be Beautiful: People are ALWAYS at their best when they are cultivating their finer qualities. If you are weird, be weird; if you are boring, be boring; if you are fat, be fat, just be really good at it. If you happen to be one of those cover model types, be that kind of beautiful and revel in it.
Create Beauty: If you have a secret passion or outlet, don’t let secrecy, the clock or the deadline get in the way of it. Whether it’s playing piano, cooking, or burping the alphabet backwards, don’t let a day pass without some time spent exploring that outlet. Even paper airplane building needs a Mozart.
Think Beautiful: Far too many of us resist speaking our minds. I’m a believer in tact, at least a measure of it, but I’m also a believer in expression. Too many of us are concerned with being charming, and deal out a joke rather than sharing something meaningful. Don’t let the chance to have beautiful disagreement pass you by.
Say Beautiful: Beauty goes far too often unacknowledged. It remains unjustly just beyond detail. Maybe that’s why it has come the caged animal that once ran free, because it wasn’t chased. A sunset, a vintage car, or a stranger on the street, if you see beauty, acknowledge it. You can become the beholder again.
Beauty should not be the mold we fit into, but that which sets us apart. I for one would like to behold real beauty again. I would like to be bowled over by beauty rather than merely bombarded with the plastic version of it. There are perhaps greater causes to put the remnant strength of our individual opinion behind, but if you really think about it, what’s the point of any of it if we have to live in a world without beauty? I think remaining on a path where nothing is new and everything has been marketed; Beauty will slowly be relegated to the Memory of the Beholder.
The more I reflect on my experience with that angelic mermaid bikini, the more I wish two things: First, I wish I saw the cameraman first. Perhaps if my knowledge began with him, my image of her wouldn’t have bended into the label of bikini-model. I wouldn’t then have a memory that starts on something real and ends on a magazine cover. Second, I wish our two rocks were a little bit closer. If I could have been within that distance to appreciate her at the level of personal acknowledgement, perhaps then I wouldn’t have stamped on her that label that devalued her beauty, and perhaps then she could have acknowledged me right back.
This actually leads me to my third wish…
Hughes.
D.A.D.
My Favorite Entries:
Drunk And Disorderly
Dumb As Dirt
Doobies All Day
Clearly inspired by the picture.
Thanks for commenting.
AcroNumb
Of all the things in the world that annoy me, there is an underlying uselessness that threads them all together. I don’t tend to concern myself with politics, or controversy, or isms for that matter. I really just tend to get irked by the things that I feel are using up brain cells that would be better served committing pornography to long-term memory. Among those things that needn’t be proudly stands the Acronym.
“Excuse me, sir. Seeing as how the V.P. is such a V.I.P., shouldn't we keep the P.C. on the Q.T.? 'Cause of the leaks to the V.C. he could end up M.I.A., and then we'd all be put out in K.P.” Robin Williams – Good Morning Vietnam; 1987
Have you ever been left in the dark because you couldn’t crack the code of a phrase squashed into letters and dots? Were you ever left out of a certain reindeer game because you were unaware of the latest abbreviated adolescent euphemism? Have you ever found yourself square in the middle of a social faux pas because you mixed I.O.U and I.U.D.?
Acronyms are about brevity and some say brevity is the soul of wit. Needless to say, this essay will be witty, but due to the subject matter, and for you guys with diminutive attention spans, it will also be brief.
I consider it a reasonable possibility that I may one day have the devotion of a staunch group of followers, that praise my rantings with unconditional reverence. Should that time come and my disciples feel inclined to devise a list of the Gospels of Our Hughes, one of the ones right near the top will read: “I have a problem with people who have a problem with words.” Acronyms fall right on the altar of that gospel. People will always have problems and many words will be rented by fools, but what I can’t figure is why we feel compelled to waste time using shortcuts?
Some will now propose the defense of efficiency. Why would I want to spend my time talking when I can get my point across in letters crossed with points? Why would I describe the contents of my sandwich when I can get away with B,L, and T? Am I the only one who sees that the fine line between genius and insanity as The Great Wall of China compared to the fine little line that separates efficiency and laziness? In our age of unqualified quantity we’ve immatured in our worship of the shortest distance between two points... or several points. ‘The fast way’ has universally become the best way, but what flavors and details have we then left along the way? It’s lazy to always fall back on the quicker or faster option as a default. The drive-thru window at your local fast food joint is an efficient source of nourishment, but is far bested by the steak dinner that awaits us at home on the other side of a little elbow grease and motivation. There’s no denying that faster isn’t always better. Could we then also agree that being efficient for the sake of efficiency is like having a hamburger when steak waits at home?
This is how I feel about acronyms over taking our succulent one-inch-cut grade ‘A’ discourse. I always feel a little bit confused when people deliberately under use when they have the chance to over take and gorge on the vastness of smooth unpointed words worth taking. When did talking, conversing, convulsing, exaggerating, expounding, and blathering become too expensive a commodity to for our valuable time?
Like everything else worth complaining about, Acronyms do have their place. Imagine how quickly the roots of democracy would have crumbled if we always had to say ‘The United States of America’ in full every time. I believe a very likely contributor to the fall of communism, despite unsound Marxist Theories, was that people got sick of that brutally long U.S.S.R. acronym. Some phrases and titles aren’t worth saying in full at all times, some simply sound better as their abbreviated alter egos, like UFO and SCUBA. Most however, simply are not simple at all and ruin what they were designed to represent.
As a companion, Acronyms have Abbreviation, which also can be a needed, but tend to be the lethargic way to get out a thought probably better left unthought. An example of the exception that proves me unruly is the very medium on which I share my itches. Web Log becomes ‘Blog’ and suddenly we have a means of being mean that comprises still more thoughts that probably shouldn't… I think you know where I’m going with this. Proposed system of measurement: if the thought isn’t valuable enough to qualify even the words used to express it, it is probably better suited for the W.P.B. (waste paper basket)
Like everything else that has its good side, we have exploited it until that side is rubbed and diluted to ineffectuality, or spoiled and seduced by the dark side. I’m happy that we can yell ‘SOS!’ in an emergency, but I find it unfortunate that many people have no clue what it is they’re yelling. (Si Opus Sit, for those out there keeping track… in Latin)
A problem almost as severe as the watering down and repackaging of our language is an Acronym’s removal of communication, replacing it with a secret code. Not everyone is necessarily privy to a phrase or a title that has been masked as initials and alternating periods. We’ve all been part of a dinner conversation that ejected us unexpectedly when our companions switch from English to E.N.G.L.I.S.H. Don’t you tend to feel there’s something hidden behind these little word cliques? Even if you know the definition those points are hiding, isn’t there something deceptive and duplicitous about a word or phrase unwilling to show its face?
From getting around something that was taking too long or occupying too much time or tongue muscle energy, we have evolved to vacuum sealing and dehydrating everything with the space to shrink. In our tireless quest to eradicate adventure, question, and color from our daily lives, our language is becoming a victim to an age that puts the ‘www’ ahead of the world itself.
As always I propose the solution. Every word in our language deserves the respect of a proper address. In formal correspondence and notation proper names are said in full and then referred to in shorter form. As long as you say Mr. Patrick Hughes once in the address, you are then free to roll it back to Patrick, Hughes, Pat… insert your favorite nickname here. Address the word or phrase once in full and then feel free to walk all over it following that courtesy. “The Central Intelligence Agency is the keystone of Intelligence for the American Government. Where would the Government be without the Intelligence of the C.I.A.?” Let the sun shine into the spaces between words and punctuation, don’t plug them with points. I think our language, our verbal discourse, and the ears being let in on the thought deserve that much, don’t you?
UFO and SCUBA are of course exempt from this rule.
I assume that most of my readers, critics and passersby are of the learned, or at least clever sort. To you I ask this question: How much does it bug you when someone in your presence uses a word, like innocuous or serendipitous, to which they clearly don’t know the meaning? Do you think they should be allowed to use that word?
P.S. How many of you out there know what P.S. stands for?
P.P.S. Sorry, I guess that wasn’t very short.
XOXO, P.H.
“Excuse me, sir. Seeing as how the V.P. is such a V.I.P., shouldn't we keep the P.C. on the Q.T.? 'Cause of the leaks to the V.C. he could end up M.I.A., and then we'd all be put out in K.P.” Robin Williams – Good Morning Vietnam; 1987
Have you ever been left in the dark because you couldn’t crack the code of a phrase squashed into letters and dots? Were you ever left out of a certain reindeer game because you were unaware of the latest abbreviated adolescent euphemism? Have you ever found yourself square in the middle of a social faux pas because you mixed I.O.U and I.U.D.?
Acronyms are about brevity and some say brevity is the soul of wit. Needless to say, this essay will be witty, but due to the subject matter, and for you guys with diminutive attention spans, it will also be brief.
I consider it a reasonable possibility that I may one day have the devotion of a staunch group of followers, that praise my rantings with unconditional reverence. Should that time come and my disciples feel inclined to devise a list of the Gospels of Our Hughes, one of the ones right near the top will read: “I have a problem with people who have a problem with words.” Acronyms fall right on the altar of that gospel. People will always have problems and many words will be rented by fools, but what I can’t figure is why we feel compelled to waste time using shortcuts?
Some will now propose the defense of efficiency. Why would I want to spend my time talking when I can get my point across in letters crossed with points? Why would I describe the contents of my sandwich when I can get away with B,L, and T? Am I the only one who sees that the fine line between genius and insanity as The Great Wall of China compared to the fine little line that separates efficiency and laziness? In our age of unqualified quantity we’ve immatured in our worship of the shortest distance between two points... or several points. ‘The fast way’ has universally become the best way, but what flavors and details have we then left along the way? It’s lazy to always fall back on the quicker or faster option as a default. The drive-thru window at your local fast food joint is an efficient source of nourishment, but is far bested by the steak dinner that awaits us at home on the other side of a little elbow grease and motivation. There’s no denying that faster isn’t always better. Could we then also agree that being efficient for the sake of efficiency is like having a hamburger when steak waits at home?
This is how I feel about acronyms over taking our succulent one-inch-cut grade ‘A’ discourse. I always feel a little bit confused when people deliberately under use when they have the chance to over take and gorge on the vastness of smooth unpointed words worth taking. When did talking, conversing, convulsing, exaggerating, expounding, and blathering become too expensive a commodity to for our valuable time?
Like everything else worth complaining about, Acronyms do have their place. Imagine how quickly the roots of democracy would have crumbled if we always had to say ‘The United States of America’ in full every time. I believe a very likely contributor to the fall of communism, despite unsound Marxist Theories, was that people got sick of that brutally long U.S.S.R. acronym. Some phrases and titles aren’t worth saying in full at all times, some simply sound better as their abbreviated alter egos, like UFO and SCUBA. Most however, simply are not simple at all and ruin what they were designed to represent.
As a companion, Acronyms have Abbreviation, which also can be a needed, but tend to be the lethargic way to get out a thought probably better left unthought. An example of the exception that proves me unruly is the very medium on which I share my itches. Web Log becomes ‘Blog’ and suddenly we have a means of being mean that comprises still more thoughts that probably shouldn't… I think you know where I’m going with this. Proposed system of measurement: if the thought isn’t valuable enough to qualify even the words used to express it, it is probably better suited for the W.P.B. (waste paper basket)
Like everything else that has its good side, we have exploited it until that side is rubbed and diluted to ineffectuality, or spoiled and seduced by the dark side. I’m happy that we can yell ‘SOS!’ in an emergency, but I find it unfortunate that many people have no clue what it is they’re yelling. (Si Opus Sit, for those out there keeping track… in Latin)
A problem almost as severe as the watering down and repackaging of our language is an Acronym’s removal of communication, replacing it with a secret code. Not everyone is necessarily privy to a phrase or a title that has been masked as initials and alternating periods. We’ve all been part of a dinner conversation that ejected us unexpectedly when our companions switch from English to E.N.G.L.I.S.H. Don’t you tend to feel there’s something hidden behind these little word cliques? Even if you know the definition those points are hiding, isn’t there something deceptive and duplicitous about a word or phrase unwilling to show its face?
From getting around something that was taking too long or occupying too much time or tongue muscle energy, we have evolved to vacuum sealing and dehydrating everything with the space to shrink. In our tireless quest to eradicate adventure, question, and color from our daily lives, our language is becoming a victim to an age that puts the ‘www’ ahead of the world itself.
As always I propose the solution. Every word in our language deserves the respect of a proper address. In formal correspondence and notation proper names are said in full and then referred to in shorter form. As long as you say Mr. Patrick Hughes once in the address, you are then free to roll it back to Patrick, Hughes, Pat… insert your favorite nickname here. Address the word or phrase once in full and then feel free to walk all over it following that courtesy. “The Central Intelligence Agency is the keystone of Intelligence for the American Government. Where would the Government be without the Intelligence of the C.I.A.?” Let the sun shine into the spaces between words and punctuation, don’t plug them with points. I think our language, our verbal discourse, and the ears being let in on the thought deserve that much, don’t you?
UFO and SCUBA are of course exempt from this rule.
I assume that most of my readers, critics and passersby are of the learned, or at least clever sort. To you I ask this question: How much does it bug you when someone in your presence uses a word, like innocuous or serendipitous, to which they clearly don’t know the meaning? Do you think they should be allowed to use that word?
P.S. How many of you out there know what P.S. stands for?
P.P.S. Sorry, I guess that wasn’t very short.
XOXO, P.H.
Offended Recently?
When's the last time someone cared enough to offend you?
Just so you know, I care.
Oh yeah, and God Bless Johnny Cash.
RemoTe Control - RemoVe Control
I am sick of liking TV. I am so tired of seeking meaning and acknowledgement in a box that no longer offers any. Despite its unfathomable potential, we as unwitting consumers are continuingly offered product and ‘productions’ by people who are changing the message this medium once carried, and who are now essentially filling spaces between commercials. One of the universe's saddest truths is that the bliss runs right out of an addiction the moment you realize you’re addicted and that the thing you’re addicted to brings nothing to the relationship. Movies and television are intentionally not art anymore, but a carefully constructed distraction specifically designed not to elicit a reaction. We are better consumers and tamer dictatees when we remain in that zone of unstimulated melancholy, not too excited and not too angry about it. Our hallowed magic box is a swinging golden pendulum watch, put to the beat of a low monotone influence. ‘You are now under my power…‘
Perhaps I should give up hope, drop my remote control cold turkey and cast aside my illusions about potential and meaning, but I just can’t ignore that part of my brain gasping for sustenance. As broadly as I intend to swath my brush, there are some sparkles amidst the wash of blandness. These hints of genius tend to be found on the last bastions of crea-TV-ty, cable networks. There are some great examples of satire that remain sadly at a 'cult' status because they are far too frighteningly original be offered in the mainstream. As tempted as I am to delve and obliterate the ‘value’ of ‘Reality’ TV, Infotainment, Infomercials, the Makeover Culture, and all things American Idyllic, I’ll save that bullet for another showdown. By virtue of the fact that cable networks needn’t pander to affiliates, regional psychoses and advertising trends, they have the freedom to paint colors and images on their canvas not limited to the three colors portioned out by the moral minority.
But why? Why wouldn’t they want to expand and innovate on the offerings emanating from the most influential tool of mass communication human eyes have ever seen? TV was once a window that showed you something beyond your four walls. It has become the thing that clutters the space between the good parts of your magazine and pulls your attention to billboards and storefronts, to the Joneses living room window and out of your own valuable life. The listlessly addictive quality of television is of course not a new development, but the movement towards stillness and unnovation is a terminal illness contracted through an overly sensitive society. This fear of fear has changed the idea of entertainment from thought-provoking to anesthesia. Remember when the idea of only fearing fear itself was a promising notion?
I’m not one for conspiracies, I do happen to think we are still far away from Big Brother’s dreaded telescreens, but the fact of the aforementioned matter is that we are consumers, demographics, cost analysis bar graphs, and least of all observers of moving art. Art is sadly the sensitive little brother of commercialism and though they attempt to compete and thus stimulate one another and live symbiotically, the dominant of the two quickly emerges. Although paying the bills is certainly important, this big brother must realize that there will come a point when hypnosis and blissful ignorance will simply lose its zest. At least I hope they will.
Don’t you kind of hate TV a little every time you turn it on? Either you hate the offering, the repetition, the advertising manipulation, or the fact that the perfect channel is unattainable no matter how much you search. There once was a time when the purveyors of the boob tube thought they had to provide something interesting enough to attract you to the glowing light in the corner of your rumpus room. Today, network executives know you’re there, they know the TV isn’t over in the corner anymore, but hung over your ‘family’ room in plasmatic splendor, and they know you are flipping. Oh yes, you’re watching, they know you’re watching. They don’t have to worry about keeping you; the new challenge is defining you.
That isn’t even to say that I hate or blame advertising. Sadly, as annoying as they tend to be, commercials are increasingly becoming the last gasps of individuality allowed on network television. Though the walls have been built, the lines drawn and the labels labeled, within these staunchly targeted schematics an occasional thirty-second flash of brilliance can occur. Every now and then we see something in these hypnotic commands in the vein of truly inspired satire. Commercials that have become part of the lexicon of our society deserve a valid place in our collective consciousness, unless they involve greedy lawyers or dancing tacos. Even though they represent a practice some would call suspect, they captured and represent the time they held our attention, like any notable literature.
I am not equipped nor am I willing to become some sort of a crusader against some evil been fed to us through a coaxial cable and a picture tube. Quite to the contrary, it is actually my contention that TV isn’t nearly evil enough. It used to be evil. It used to show us awful evils, like the first glimpse of Elvis Presley’s sexually abhorrent pelvis, Mary Tyler Moore as a housewife bold enough to wear scandalous Capri pants, and a politically frightening bigoted patriarch like Archie Bunker. It used to challenge and inform, and commit all sorts of atrocities that made it great, tore it down, and built it up again. Television should strive to offend the previous notion of friendly entertainment because in doing so it could finally encourage the last evolutionary step and teach the masses to CHANGE THE CHANNEL.
This little issue, though quite obvious in a broad sense, is at the center of nearly every social problem we endure as slightly evolved hairless primate consumers. Changing the channel is something we can all do to encourage a tolerance, not ignorance, of what’s going on on the other channels, both figuratively and literally, but not intended for us specifically. If we desire, we can all be and feel offended as a member of a group by any subject under the sun. In fact, I can be offended as a non-nocturnal person by the partisan setting of the sun every evening, which clearly gives favor to nocturnes and therefore alienates my non-nocturnal sensitivities. If we know that an offending sunset opposes our delicate daytime morals as it ushers in a cruel night sky, we have the option as progressive channel changers to turn on a light, perhaps the one over our heads, and peacefully have our light, while the other guys have their night. After all, what’s the alternative?
I can’t get over people who complain about what they see on TV, because, firstly and quite frankly, they stifle and badger, and censor, and ruin it for everybody else. Secondly and more strangely though is that hitting one of two little arrows on the remote control beside the title ‘channel’ is so easy. It is so simple to put that pain behind you, and what’s more, if you desire you don’t ever have to see it again. That’s a power control you hold in your hand that the remote provides you.
The even wilder aspect of our collective sensibility is that although I know nearly every individual mind out there reading this rhetoric likely agrees with me, a staggering amount will still one day stand with a group oppose to something that isn’t trying to hurt them, and is merely presenting a different image than that of the world they see, that they ironically see from the same ‘intelligence’ box.
So, we have this new golden calve that sits like a god on the stage of nearly every living room in western society. That box has gone from being a technological wonder in the 40s and 50s, to a world-shrinking video-telephone library in the 50s and 60s, to an instrument of social satire and questionable authority in the 70s, to MTV’s pulpit in the 80s, to societies two-way mirror in the 90s, which leads us to the window of pre-emptive defense it now stands as today. Commercial trends of refabrication and demographic, product spot compliance have tamed it, while lobbyists and social interests now hold the chair and whip. How do we get the vision back in TV? Can you imagine if a situation comedy about a middle-aged bigot and his spineless housewife, living with their liberal daughter and her schlub activist son in law were proposed today? In 1970 this groundbreaker was known as ‘All in the Family’, thirty years later and such discussions would be the very chemistry of Un-PC. Bibles would be thumped so hard God himself would have to plug his ears. And what if a pop star had the temerity to shock the crowd and flash a nipple, then apologize and admit it was a mistake, back when Archie Bunker began squawking at poor old Edith? Do we really think it would have shattered as many sensibilities? Would it not have fallen by the wayside? Back then we hadn’t yet defined political correctness and therefore hadn’t evolved into our current fixation on protecting people who didn’t ask to be protected. Would it even have been mentioned in some satirical essay, written by a clever, playful, handsome, thoughtful, quasi-brilliant, thin, tall, dark… Would anyone really still be talking about it?
From a growing understanding of free speech, satire, interpretation, and an acceptable level of gratuitous nudity, we have begun a spiral of pre-emptive defense. Though this reverse censorship was born of a desire for a harmless medium, it has become a stifling source of fear in sheep’s clothing. I personally can’t wait another thirty years for this cycle to make its revolution before we revolt. We have to shock ourselves out of this, and of course, I have the recipe for mayhem to think outside of the box we love so much, teach the masses to use their remote for good, and give a little respect to the evil.
For decades we’ve been going about this the wrong way. We’ve tried and tried to respectfully ask people to learn to accept that not everything will necessarily appeal to everyone. Tolerate, turn a blind eye, CHANGE THE CHANNEL… please.
What needs to happen is a mass exodus. We have to throw a huge, jagged rock into the pond and see how much water has the courage to trickle back. How do we accomplish such a thing? Quite simply, OFFEND THE HELL OUT OF PEOPLE. Throw the power of expression, the might of something so atrociously politically incorrect on one end of the seesaw, so that those who can’t handle it will be catapulted to the far reaches of their dial, and those who have a craving for it will be glued and fascinated and finally quenched. Channels will change and hopefully so will sensibilities.
I want to see something so cleverly offensive that it leaves me drained, that I fear to look but can’t turn away. Let me make it clear that I want this pageant of filth to ride on the sunny side of offensive without offending. If we are going to alienate people, let’s do it in a way that moves us forward not downward. Let’s offend people the way Lenny Bruce, Trey Parker and Matt Stone offend people, by examining our collective weaknesses, not preying on them. Jerry Springer and ‘Girls Gone Wild’ succeed only at giving us something to look at, not something to think about. We’ll give them something to fear, but it will be more satirically inflective than fear itself.
To the victor that spoils, go the spoils. To the broadcaster that takes this plunge, puts a middle finger to the sky, and throws this cycle off its axis, I guarantee two things. First you will incur the wrath of every person who thinks their values encapsulate or supercedes those of others, and in doing so you will lose the backing of those that keep their backs up. You will likely be forced to hold your breath. But following that comes not just desserts, but the feast. You will be the leader, the rebel, the flag that we the starved minority have been seeking. The weight of the seesaw will again come to balance, it always does, and you will reap the benefits of establishing the rightful meaning of sensitivity… until that meaning deserves its own abolishment.
I don’t want to create a form of channel partisanship. I don’t think the answer is to create factions and offend all the time. It is interesting how as a species we need to be reminded that counter-culture inevitably becomes culture, and it is those who remember history that are doomed to benefit from it.
The best defense is a good offense. Every once in a while the castle has to crumble and the peasants have to offend a previous system of values. Television has become a cigarette with a picture tube, a seductive delivery device for an addictive agent and yet another means for those with means to enforce their will upon people who should know better. We have to pick up our TVs and shake the idiots out of the box. The most influential instrument of the last century can again become the kind of place that’s worthy of our blank, dead-eyed devotion; it just has to be reminded how to offend again. I want to love it again, I want it to be the vessel it could be again. I want to be happy holding the remote and feel that I actually have control. If we can’t learn to use the buttons that change the channel, our collective voice will be stuck in mute, and I personally will be left with nothing but the one at the bottom that says SELF-DESTRUCT.
Wait, is my TV supposed to have one of these…
Stay Tuned,
Patrick Hughes
Perhaps I should give up hope, drop my remote control cold turkey and cast aside my illusions about potential and meaning, but I just can’t ignore that part of my brain gasping for sustenance. As broadly as I intend to swath my brush, there are some sparkles amidst the wash of blandness. These hints of genius tend to be found on the last bastions of crea-TV-ty, cable networks. There are some great examples of satire that remain sadly at a 'cult' status because they are far too frighteningly original be offered in the mainstream. As tempted as I am to delve and obliterate the ‘value’ of ‘Reality’ TV, Infotainment, Infomercials, the Makeover Culture, and all things American Idyllic, I’ll save that bullet for another showdown. By virtue of the fact that cable networks needn’t pander to affiliates, regional psychoses and advertising trends, they have the freedom to paint colors and images on their canvas not limited to the three colors portioned out by the moral minority.
But why? Why wouldn’t they want to expand and innovate on the offerings emanating from the most influential tool of mass communication human eyes have ever seen? TV was once a window that showed you something beyond your four walls. It has become the thing that clutters the space between the good parts of your magazine and pulls your attention to billboards and storefronts, to the Joneses living room window and out of your own valuable life. The listlessly addictive quality of television is of course not a new development, but the movement towards stillness and unnovation is a terminal illness contracted through an overly sensitive society. This fear of fear has changed the idea of entertainment from thought-provoking to anesthesia. Remember when the idea of only fearing fear itself was a promising notion?
I’m not one for conspiracies, I do happen to think we are still far away from Big Brother’s dreaded telescreens, but the fact of the aforementioned matter is that we are consumers, demographics, cost analysis bar graphs, and least of all observers of moving art. Art is sadly the sensitive little brother of commercialism and though they attempt to compete and thus stimulate one another and live symbiotically, the dominant of the two quickly emerges. Although paying the bills is certainly important, this big brother must realize that there will come a point when hypnosis and blissful ignorance will simply lose its zest. At least I hope they will.
Don’t you kind of hate TV a little every time you turn it on? Either you hate the offering, the repetition, the advertising manipulation, or the fact that the perfect channel is unattainable no matter how much you search. There once was a time when the purveyors of the boob tube thought they had to provide something interesting enough to attract you to the glowing light in the corner of your rumpus room. Today, network executives know you’re there, they know the TV isn’t over in the corner anymore, but hung over your ‘family’ room in plasmatic splendor, and they know you are flipping. Oh yes, you’re watching, they know you’re watching. They don’t have to worry about keeping you; the new challenge is defining you.
That isn’t even to say that I hate or blame advertising. Sadly, as annoying as they tend to be, commercials are increasingly becoming the last gasps of individuality allowed on network television. Though the walls have been built, the lines drawn and the labels labeled, within these staunchly targeted schematics an occasional thirty-second flash of brilliance can occur. Every now and then we see something in these hypnotic commands in the vein of truly inspired satire. Commercials that have become part of the lexicon of our society deserve a valid place in our collective consciousness, unless they involve greedy lawyers or dancing tacos. Even though they represent a practice some would call suspect, they captured and represent the time they held our attention, like any notable literature.
I am not equipped nor am I willing to become some sort of a crusader against some evil been fed to us through a coaxial cable and a picture tube. Quite to the contrary, it is actually my contention that TV isn’t nearly evil enough. It used to be evil. It used to show us awful evils, like the first glimpse of Elvis Presley’s sexually abhorrent pelvis, Mary Tyler Moore as a housewife bold enough to wear scandalous Capri pants, and a politically frightening bigoted patriarch like Archie Bunker. It used to challenge and inform, and commit all sorts of atrocities that made it great, tore it down, and built it up again. Television should strive to offend the previous notion of friendly entertainment because in doing so it could finally encourage the last evolutionary step and teach the masses to CHANGE THE CHANNEL.
This little issue, though quite obvious in a broad sense, is at the center of nearly every social problem we endure as slightly evolved hairless primate consumers. Changing the channel is something we can all do to encourage a tolerance, not ignorance, of what’s going on on the other channels, both figuratively and literally, but not intended for us specifically. If we desire, we can all be and feel offended as a member of a group by any subject under the sun. In fact, I can be offended as a non-nocturnal person by the partisan setting of the sun every evening, which clearly gives favor to nocturnes and therefore alienates my non-nocturnal sensitivities. If we know that an offending sunset opposes our delicate daytime morals as it ushers in a cruel night sky, we have the option as progressive channel changers to turn on a light, perhaps the one over our heads, and peacefully have our light, while the other guys have their night. After all, what’s the alternative?
I can’t get over people who complain about what they see on TV, because, firstly and quite frankly, they stifle and badger, and censor, and ruin it for everybody else. Secondly and more strangely though is that hitting one of two little arrows on the remote control beside the title ‘channel’ is so easy. It is so simple to put that pain behind you, and what’s more, if you desire you don’t ever have to see it again. That’s a power control you hold in your hand that the remote provides you.
The even wilder aspect of our collective sensibility is that although I know nearly every individual mind out there reading this rhetoric likely agrees with me, a staggering amount will still one day stand with a group oppose to something that isn’t trying to hurt them, and is merely presenting a different image than that of the world they see, that they ironically see from the same ‘intelligence’ box.
So, we have this new golden calve that sits like a god on the stage of nearly every living room in western society. That box has gone from being a technological wonder in the 40s and 50s, to a world-shrinking video-telephone library in the 50s and 60s, to an instrument of social satire and questionable authority in the 70s, to MTV’s pulpit in the 80s, to societies two-way mirror in the 90s, which leads us to the window of pre-emptive defense it now stands as today. Commercial trends of refabrication and demographic, product spot compliance have tamed it, while lobbyists and social interests now hold the chair and whip. How do we get the vision back in TV? Can you imagine if a situation comedy about a middle-aged bigot and his spineless housewife, living with their liberal daughter and her schlub activist son in law were proposed today? In 1970 this groundbreaker was known as ‘All in the Family’, thirty years later and such discussions would be the very chemistry of Un-PC. Bibles would be thumped so hard God himself would have to plug his ears. And what if a pop star had the temerity to shock the crowd and flash a nipple, then apologize and admit it was a mistake, back when Archie Bunker began squawking at poor old Edith? Do we really think it would have shattered as many sensibilities? Would it not have fallen by the wayside? Back then we hadn’t yet defined political correctness and therefore hadn’t evolved into our current fixation on protecting people who didn’t ask to be protected. Would it even have been mentioned in some satirical essay, written by a clever, playful, handsome, thoughtful, quasi-brilliant, thin, tall, dark… Would anyone really still be talking about it?
From a growing understanding of free speech, satire, interpretation, and an acceptable level of gratuitous nudity, we have begun a spiral of pre-emptive defense. Though this reverse censorship was born of a desire for a harmless medium, it has become a stifling source of fear in sheep’s clothing. I personally can’t wait another thirty years for this cycle to make its revolution before we revolt. We have to shock ourselves out of this, and of course, I have the recipe for mayhem to think outside of the box we love so much, teach the masses to use their remote for good, and give a little respect to the evil.
For decades we’ve been going about this the wrong way. We’ve tried and tried to respectfully ask people to learn to accept that not everything will necessarily appeal to everyone. Tolerate, turn a blind eye, CHANGE THE CHANNEL… please.
What needs to happen is a mass exodus. We have to throw a huge, jagged rock into the pond and see how much water has the courage to trickle back. How do we accomplish such a thing? Quite simply, OFFEND THE HELL OUT OF PEOPLE. Throw the power of expression, the might of something so atrociously politically incorrect on one end of the seesaw, so that those who can’t handle it will be catapulted to the far reaches of their dial, and those who have a craving for it will be glued and fascinated and finally quenched. Channels will change and hopefully so will sensibilities.
I want to see something so cleverly offensive that it leaves me drained, that I fear to look but can’t turn away. Let me make it clear that I want this pageant of filth to ride on the sunny side of offensive without offending. If we are going to alienate people, let’s do it in a way that moves us forward not downward. Let’s offend people the way Lenny Bruce, Trey Parker and Matt Stone offend people, by examining our collective weaknesses, not preying on them. Jerry Springer and ‘Girls Gone Wild’ succeed only at giving us something to look at, not something to think about. We’ll give them something to fear, but it will be more satirically inflective than fear itself.
To the victor that spoils, go the spoils. To the broadcaster that takes this plunge, puts a middle finger to the sky, and throws this cycle off its axis, I guarantee two things. First you will incur the wrath of every person who thinks their values encapsulate or supercedes those of others, and in doing so you will lose the backing of those that keep their backs up. You will likely be forced to hold your breath. But following that comes not just desserts, but the feast. You will be the leader, the rebel, the flag that we the starved minority have been seeking. The weight of the seesaw will again come to balance, it always does, and you will reap the benefits of establishing the rightful meaning of sensitivity… until that meaning deserves its own abolishment.
I don’t want to create a form of channel partisanship. I don’t think the answer is to create factions and offend all the time. It is interesting how as a species we need to be reminded that counter-culture inevitably becomes culture, and it is those who remember history that are doomed to benefit from it.
The best defense is a good offense. Every once in a while the castle has to crumble and the peasants have to offend a previous system of values. Television has become a cigarette with a picture tube, a seductive delivery device for an addictive agent and yet another means for those with means to enforce their will upon people who should know better. We have to pick up our TVs and shake the idiots out of the box. The most influential instrument of the last century can again become the kind of place that’s worthy of our blank, dead-eyed devotion; it just has to be reminded how to offend again. I want to love it again, I want it to be the vessel it could be again. I want to be happy holding the remote and feel that I actually have control. If we can’t learn to use the buttons that change the channel, our collective voice will be stuck in mute, and I personally will be left with nothing but the one at the bottom that says SELF-DESTRUCT.
Wait, is my TV supposed to have one of these…
Stay Tuned,
Patrick Hughes
Greatness
Would anyone actually have the audacity to say this guy became less cool when he started to lose his hair?
Enjoy The Essay.
Watch a Mile in Their Shoes
I had a revelation that I’d like to share with you. It wasn’t recent, in fact it’s something I’ve discussed with those gracious enough to humor me on several occasions. Nothing proceeding will shatter the earth or enlighten the endimmed, nonetheless, I have you, and I intend to keep you.
When’s the last time you really looked at someone’s walk?
They say the eyes are the windows to the soul. This may be the case, but I’ve found that windows aren’t always the most efficient way to observe. Looking through windows and into the eyes of those around you, even if the observation has the purest sociological intention, can often garner one a dubious reputation. If only there was a less intrusive and less indictable way to see the nature beneath the presentation.
Humans are at their best when their defenses are down, when they’re honest and they don’t know it.
The soul doesn’t have to be something hidden behind a window only some Curious Tom would peep through. In actual fact it is the walk that carries you that offers the key to that which you lock away. This fact eureka’d me in highly Newtonian apple-to-the-head fashion, tinted slightly by a mind far more focused on girls than science. After all, the male of the species often finds his brilliance when in pursuit of the better of the species.
It was a sunny day back in university. I was sitting on the steps of the regally-designed main administration building of The University of Ottawa preparing a solid itinerary of procrastination in the face of impending final exams, when across the courtyard a siren-song at a dog-whistle pitch swung my attention to an as yet faceless vixen walking out my life, before she’d had the chance to walk in and out of my life. Suddenly in a crowd of bustling students she, and more importantly her walk, was all I saw. Without a conscious thought I was on my feet and in pursuit.
The walk she used to prowl and parade across that courtyard spoke to me in one hundred languages. It was sultry and sophisticated. It was everything my youthful hormonally-driven motivation needed, and said volumes in high-heeled, striding sentences. I had to follow her.
It wasn’t her looks that snared me; though I could sense her attractiveness, I had yet to see her face. It wasn’t her features or curves exactly either, though she did have long slender frame, long legs with flawless lines that connected her knee-length skirt to her high-heeled shoes, and a sway to her hips that was like a gold watch swinging in front of my eyes.
Her body was her instrument and the walk was her music. I stayed far behind enough to prey and close enough to stalk. The last thing I wanted to do was upset this harmony that we shared. The second to last thing was be mistaken for the type of pursuer that made a habit of this kind of observation.
I know very little of the nature of love, I would venture to say that I know a great deal less than the average male love-bozo, but I believe a major facet of love goes to the effect of how well you know your partner or objet de desire. Love is knowledge of another person, you know them inside and out, you know what they’re going to say before they say it, what they need before they ask it. It’s knowledge born of a connection deeper than learning and observation. I can say with doubtless certainty, clouded only somewhat by that cloudy male angst, that I knew this girl I was following. I was smitten by this girl whose face I had yet to see, falling off my feet for what she did with hers.
The walk told me things about how our life together would unfold. I planned what I would say when our eyes finally met, I structured a list of the first five things I would compliment about her, and thought of how she would react to the truth of why I began pursuit. I pre-reminisced about impressing her parents and cuddling together in front of a rented video. I thought of things I very rarely consider when in prowling mode. All of this was from her walk, from something in her sway that attracted me and convinced me we were compatible.
Like any worthwhile prey, she was cunning. Her stride was long and quick, and eventually I fell behind. I lost her in a crowd soon after in front of a mall and she quickly exited my life. She was gone faster than she came. With only her walk she commanded me and seduced me. She demonstrated a part of her soul that I felt a brief but pressing need to investigate. I remember the experience vividly to this day and I never saw her face. To this day I remember that walk.
I found a park bench soon after her desertion and sank into a wash of my pedestrianic epiphany. I began to watch the people hustling, moseying, walking, strutting, prancing, stomping, trotting, moping, strolling, sauntering, and ambling all around on that busy section of campus and got to know all of them a little bit through that looking glass to the soul that none of us think to hide. I swear that in those moments of clarity I could have guessed the name, occupation, self-image, and present punctuality of everyone I observed. Had I been walking myself it would have been on air.
With a walk one presents oneself in an often unconscious, and therefore honest way. We think about other things when we’re on our way across a parking lot, following our dogs, or approaching an interview. We walk fast when we’re anxious and tall when we’re proud. A person’s version of these walks is as unique as the pedestrians themself, but the themes are always consistent. You can always tell when a strut is deliberate and within that whether it is manifested by insecurity or egotism. You can always tell if someone’s nervous amble is triggered by something behind or something upcoming. The walk says it all; it’s a presentation we seem to rarely know we’re giving.
To the folks who don’t subscribe to the standard two-footed march, you’re included as well. Don’t think just because you use a wheelchair, prosthetics, crutches or canes, you don’t present something as you make your way down the street. Both a defeated mope and a bulletproof strut are displays that occur largely from the shoulders up. Anyone or anything capable of locomotion under their own power forgets they’re doing it at some point. They think of a point made at point A or what they’ll be when they reach point B. There is no loco-poker-face.
The next time you get a chance, watch the people around you at the mall or in the park. Do they float or bounce or drag? Are they at this location for the first time? Are they late for an appointment? Have they just made a purchase they are uncertain about? Are they mulling over a retort they wished they’d said, or intend to say? Are they walking honest? Are those new shoes? Is that guy staring at me? Does he like my walk? Should I hide or amble or do my fastest walk? See what you can learn. And try not to get into trouble.
Also feel free to test your own march, how are you pointed in travel between points? The secret to observing yourself is to allow yourself to forget to watch. Set the hourly alarm on your watch. That should give you the time to forget and will hopefully catch you in mid-strut and allow you to reflect on the moves that you convey during conveyance. Are you wheeling like Tony Monero or Hunch Quasimodo? And what exactly are you doing with that right arm?
In closing I would like to make a plea to all walks of life: Don’t let this truth I’ve unleashed affect the moving life-size signature you display, there are so very few things remaining that keep us individual. Treasure your saunter; strut like a peacock, prance like a deer, prowl like a lion, and glide like a cloud. There is always beauty in uniqueness.
As for the girl, the walk of my dreams: I didn’t like seeing you go, but I loved watching you walk away. I hope the life you eventually walked into had the good fortune of approaching you from the front.
Walk tall, all.
Patrick Hughes
When’s the last time you really looked at someone’s walk?
They say the eyes are the windows to the soul. This may be the case, but I’ve found that windows aren’t always the most efficient way to observe. Looking through windows and into the eyes of those around you, even if the observation has the purest sociological intention, can often garner one a dubious reputation. If only there was a less intrusive and less indictable way to see the nature beneath the presentation.
Humans are at their best when their defenses are down, when they’re honest and they don’t know it.
The soul doesn’t have to be something hidden behind a window only some Curious Tom would peep through. In actual fact it is the walk that carries you that offers the key to that which you lock away. This fact eureka’d me in highly Newtonian apple-to-the-head fashion, tinted slightly by a mind far more focused on girls than science. After all, the male of the species often finds his brilliance when in pursuit of the better of the species.
It was a sunny day back in university. I was sitting on the steps of the regally-designed main administration building of The University of Ottawa preparing a solid itinerary of procrastination in the face of impending final exams, when across the courtyard a siren-song at a dog-whistle pitch swung my attention to an as yet faceless vixen walking out my life, before she’d had the chance to walk in and out of my life. Suddenly in a crowd of bustling students she, and more importantly her walk, was all I saw. Without a conscious thought I was on my feet and in pursuit.
The walk she used to prowl and parade across that courtyard spoke to me in one hundred languages. It was sultry and sophisticated. It was everything my youthful hormonally-driven motivation needed, and said volumes in high-heeled, striding sentences. I had to follow her.
It wasn’t her looks that snared me; though I could sense her attractiveness, I had yet to see her face. It wasn’t her features or curves exactly either, though she did have long slender frame, long legs with flawless lines that connected her knee-length skirt to her high-heeled shoes, and a sway to her hips that was like a gold watch swinging in front of my eyes.
Her body was her instrument and the walk was her music. I stayed far behind enough to prey and close enough to stalk. The last thing I wanted to do was upset this harmony that we shared. The second to last thing was be mistaken for the type of pursuer that made a habit of this kind of observation.
I know very little of the nature of love, I would venture to say that I know a great deal less than the average male love-bozo, but I believe a major facet of love goes to the effect of how well you know your partner or objet de desire. Love is knowledge of another person, you know them inside and out, you know what they’re going to say before they say it, what they need before they ask it. It’s knowledge born of a connection deeper than learning and observation. I can say with doubtless certainty, clouded only somewhat by that cloudy male angst, that I knew this girl I was following. I was smitten by this girl whose face I had yet to see, falling off my feet for what she did with hers.
The walk told me things about how our life together would unfold. I planned what I would say when our eyes finally met, I structured a list of the first five things I would compliment about her, and thought of how she would react to the truth of why I began pursuit. I pre-reminisced about impressing her parents and cuddling together in front of a rented video. I thought of things I very rarely consider when in prowling mode. All of this was from her walk, from something in her sway that attracted me and convinced me we were compatible.
Like any worthwhile prey, she was cunning. Her stride was long and quick, and eventually I fell behind. I lost her in a crowd soon after in front of a mall and she quickly exited my life. She was gone faster than she came. With only her walk she commanded me and seduced me. She demonstrated a part of her soul that I felt a brief but pressing need to investigate. I remember the experience vividly to this day and I never saw her face. To this day I remember that walk.
I found a park bench soon after her desertion and sank into a wash of my pedestrianic epiphany. I began to watch the people hustling, moseying, walking, strutting, prancing, stomping, trotting, moping, strolling, sauntering, and ambling all around on that busy section of campus and got to know all of them a little bit through that looking glass to the soul that none of us think to hide. I swear that in those moments of clarity I could have guessed the name, occupation, self-image, and present punctuality of everyone I observed. Had I been walking myself it would have been on air.
With a walk one presents oneself in an often unconscious, and therefore honest way. We think about other things when we’re on our way across a parking lot, following our dogs, or approaching an interview. We walk fast when we’re anxious and tall when we’re proud. A person’s version of these walks is as unique as the pedestrians themself, but the themes are always consistent. You can always tell when a strut is deliberate and within that whether it is manifested by insecurity or egotism. You can always tell if someone’s nervous amble is triggered by something behind or something upcoming. The walk says it all; it’s a presentation we seem to rarely know we’re giving.
To the folks who don’t subscribe to the standard two-footed march, you’re included as well. Don’t think just because you use a wheelchair, prosthetics, crutches or canes, you don’t present something as you make your way down the street. Both a defeated mope and a bulletproof strut are displays that occur largely from the shoulders up. Anyone or anything capable of locomotion under their own power forgets they’re doing it at some point. They think of a point made at point A or what they’ll be when they reach point B. There is no loco-poker-face.
The next time you get a chance, watch the people around you at the mall or in the park. Do they float or bounce or drag? Are they at this location for the first time? Are they late for an appointment? Have they just made a purchase they are uncertain about? Are they mulling over a retort they wished they’d said, or intend to say? Are they walking honest? Are those new shoes? Is that guy staring at me? Does he like my walk? Should I hide or amble or do my fastest walk? See what you can learn. And try not to get into trouble.
Also feel free to test your own march, how are you pointed in travel between points? The secret to observing yourself is to allow yourself to forget to watch. Set the hourly alarm on your watch. That should give you the time to forget and will hopefully catch you in mid-strut and allow you to reflect on the moves that you convey during conveyance. Are you wheeling like Tony Monero or Hunch Quasimodo? And what exactly are you doing with that right arm?
In closing I would like to make a plea to all walks of life: Don’t let this truth I’ve unleashed affect the moving life-size signature you display, there are so very few things remaining that keep us individual. Treasure your saunter; strut like a peacock, prance like a deer, prowl like a lion, and glide like a cloud. There is always beauty in uniqueness.
As for the girl, the walk of my dreams: I didn’t like seeing you go, but I loved watching you walk away. I hope the life you eventually walked into had the good fortune of approaching you from the front.
Walk tall, all.
Patrick Hughes
Teach Your Kids To Swear
Would you be offended if I called you a clever fucker? You probably would be, and you’d probably have the right, but why exactly? Is it because we don’t know one another well enough for me to assume to have insight into your character or pastimes? Having referred to you as one who engages in sexual intercourse, have I offended you in assuming that you participate in such activities? Have you no patience for those who make assumptions? Is it perhaps that you don’t like to be thought clever, cunning, or thoughtful? Is it then because I cursed at you? Is it because I had the audacity to employ a term beyond the threshold of polite conversation? Like everything else we convey and exchange today, has the content of discourse become secondary to packaging? Am I the only one who thinks polite conversation needs more audacity? What if I called you a magnificent bitch?
I was having a little creative blockage today so I’ve decided to fall back on an old standard. When I can’t think of anything better to talk about I always come back to profanity. When at a function that isn’t functioning or at a party that isn’t mixing, I tend to zest up the salsa dish by inciting a melo-dramatic melo-debate on one of a few irresistible subjects. My favorite is swearing… because everyone’s favorite is swearing.
My guarantee is extended, ask a group to nominate their favorite swear and the chitchat will never stagnate.
Is it possible to be offensive without offending? As a writer I seek to do great things like provoke, challenge and affront. All worthwhile invention is based on offending a prior system of values. As humans we fear that offense, until we eventually embrace it, and await the next thing to hate. This is how I view profanity, an unfortunate and longstanding target of that need to feel offended. But what is it that we truly fear about these anatomical comparisons and matriarchal metaphors? Why are these references so closely related to vulgarity and not expression? There’s a truly interesting part of the brain that motivates us to swear, which drives us to put an outlaw word between the verbs and nouns in our statements. I believe it’s a part that should be cultivated. It’s a motivation born somewhere between exuberance and ignorance, which is akin to where humanity is its happiest. I think it’s a good offense that gets us the victories worth having.
I have a problem with people who have a problem with words. The simple fact is that to assume that some of the words we use have more power than the people sending or receiving them is truly affording us less credit than we deserve as sentient beings. The simple truth behind this simple fact is that if we take the fear away from these words than we’ll dull the edge that apparently and sadly still draws blood. If swears were less jagged, perhaps other words and the assumptions that ride them, would also be less wounding. Perhaps then understanding would be slightly less elusive.
The juxtaposition that yangs this yin is that I kind of like the edge. I like the power. I relish swearing. I see it as a gift given to our verbal exchange. I enjoy it as the zesty garnish it can be added to our automatic, pod-cloned everyday discourse. It can be the performance-enhancing drug to a lame and lagging sentence, the boustier and stiletto heals, the black ace from the dealer, the dark sunglasses… the f**king ’68 Mustang convertible. With a single profane chocolate chip what was once dough is now a cookie, what was once cowering against the wall of the dance floor now wears a snazzy white suit and points his finger high. Swearing gives personality to a series of grouped letters herded by punctuation… yet remains misunderstood. Perhaps it’s for the best, a rebel is never quite the same when he’s invited into convention, a wolf is not a wolf after it’s invited indoors. The key is to keep the little scoundrels offensive though not offending. Let’s keep profanity in the black cowboy hat, but let’s talk for a while about why we love the bad guy so much.
Our language revels in its decadent, verbose inefficiency. Its convoluted girth is its greatest strength. I myself am too often left in the unfortunate position of witnessing this inefficiency go unsavored, watching as my peers and compatriots misuse and underuse the richness of its might. Where many would argue that synonyms are often redundant and thesauruses merely replace creative thought, I say that we are blessed to have a term for every nook and cranny of our world. We not only can fly, but glide, flutter, and soar through a sky, atmosphere, or heaven that can be blue or indigo or cyan. There are words at our disposal that convey exactly what we desire, that paint a picture, and in turn give it a value far higher than one thousand and worth more than the sum of its parts.
Profanity is the tool that we all carry to illustrate the spaces between our ears and our sentences. Onomatopoeia is a term used to describe words spelled to the sound or action they represent; such as growl and swoosh. I believe swearing is the hybrid of punctuation and onomatopoeia, they fill our sentences with emotional mechanics. Much like the way a properly placed pause gives a statement both gravity or levity, and the way an onomatopoeic word describes itself, a swear provides the words around it with the edge that is in itself its own answer.
The Great George Carlin said:
Sh!t
Pi$$
F**k
Cun+
C@cks@cker
M#thrrf**krr
And Tits;
The Seven Words You Can’t Say On TV.
The Magnificent Seven: Seven words that will eternally be honored and condemned. Whether or not these harmless exiles will ever be uttered on the picture box governed by the cowards that believe words are more detrimental then graphic violence and nudity, they will always have power. There will always be a wanted poster hanging for these desperados and I for one thank Mr. Carlin for that. These little darlings are like Robin Hood, feared by the establishment, honored by the public, an outlaw with arrow-splitting aim. A word can’t cut the crap if it’s got no edge.
A good blue streak is like that outlaw folk hero, that reminder of forbidden freedom. After all, where would Nottingham have been without Robin Hood? Clearly he broke the law, but every now and then we need a troublemaker to shake things up with a little take and give. I’m certain that no one living on the residential side of Sherwood Forest was telling their children they should grow up to be an outlaw. What they were doing was saying that they needn’t fear him. Imagine if we were all so astute in identifying the threat?
The unfortunate truth is that swears or cusses were essentially designed to offend. Though now they maintain real estate in a place largely of frolic and revelry, we can’t totally ignore that their evolution is a dubious one. They emerged as blasphemy directed at or in lieu of a Superior Being that didn’t have things going quite to the blasphemers liking. As Puritanism began draping skirts over scantily clad table legs and burning witches at the stake, etiquette gave J.Q. Publique a reason to be offended. As long as there’s been a swear there’s been an ear too delicate too sustain its presence. More often that not this ear shares a head with a mouth that spouts the same barbs in accepted company; most always rather than never the path from ear to mouth is obstructed by a head with nothing in between. Where would we be without those puritan pioneers of piety? How did we get from screaming our displeasure to God to comparing each other to our peepees and hoohoos? And how does one mend an injured ear?
The gift of discourse can be used as a weapon. Isn’t it always the ignorant of this world that turn tools into weapons? There are words beyond swears that go too far. They have a purpose crafted in injury that can have no use passed marginalization. These are words that impugn without merit, that categorize and objectify. I believe there is no place in our language or on our planet for words that paint an unwarranted caricature with a thoughtless brush. They are words that have never been needed. They are the wrath of bullies and the product of cowardly victories. Language should never be used to injure. We should always be careful with the words that have that power.
Any great thing can be overdone. A warm fire can burn too large, a stylish car can be overly ornate, and an overly enthusiastic dad can blemish his home at Christmas time. While carefully placed notes can attract mice to your song, a tune with too much sh!t will send them scurrying. Far too often swearing has crossed the line into gratuity, sullying its fine, foul tradition. ‘Everything in moderation’ is an idiom that governs profanity as well as any other province of creativity. The more treasured and respected a resource it remains, the more effective punch it gives the goddamn words around it.
It is in this vein that we must be cautious in teaching the children the art of comparing others to their private parts and excretions. Hearing a youngster belt out a surly swear at a sibling may never be as warm and delightful as say… exclaiming them yourself, but nonetheless the torch must be passed. Kids test their boundaries as they emerge and mature into the world. It’s always going to be the negligent parents whose children seek out firearms and needled arms in the place of structure and the overly disciplined children who run to them in escape of tyranny.
There is a greater value in profanity than just playful rebellion. There’s honesty and creativity, there’s those moments you utter your deepest frustrations to yourself under dark clouds of glorious filth. What comes out of your mouth when you stub your toe? Truth. What do you bellow at the neighborhood bully when he’s too far for your fists? Rage. What do you exclaim at the height of an orgasm? Ecstasy. How can such things be blasphemy?
Teach your kids to swear. Don’t stifle them when their experimental spirits erupt a f**k here or a sh!t there. Give them license to the play in moors of our language so they can gain a better perspective on the pasture. There was once a time when ‘sex’ was a dirty word parents uttered in the dark from a across the space between twin beds. How foolish does it seem now to have ‘sex education’ swept under a rug and hope kids will lose interest because of what the word could imply? To me it seems about as foolish and prudish as punishing a kid for using a word… a simple expletive… that probably was heard from the person who lays down the punishment. Well, I say teach your kids to swear. I say that the prudes can have their history because they certainly won’t have the future. I say f**k the prudes, it’s only sticks and stones that will stop them.
As with all other things, education is the key. Allow adrenalized exclamation the freedom to cultivate and it will find its proper place. I’m not suggesting, of course, that we’d all be better off if every parent with a child under twelve present their child with a loaded gun and encourage them to toddle off with their playmates. Nor do I think that those parents would be well advised to take a tour of safe injection sites or conduct lessons on joint-rolling techniques at the dining room table. I wouldn’t recommend a section of f’s, s’s, and a’s be covered in grammar, nor would I think it prudent to reward the children for calling grandma an old c*nt. It’s the parents who speak openly and accept calmly the wonder of children that earn their trust in return. Stick to positive reinforcement and education and you can avoid hearing about f**king br*cc*li at the Sunday Dinner Table. Correct them when they refer to your boss as a prick instead of an asshole, and praise them when they find a new way to put three ‘good ones’ together into one sibling insult.
I say this both tongue-in-cheek and tongue-dangling straight out in a demon waggle. I don’t like anything being left out of the game for the wrong reasons. Amidst the fear of fear and getting offended in defense, we keep putting the wrong thing on trial. It’s hypocrisy to tell our young that swearing is somehow morally wrong when in our most honest moments we tend to curse a blue streak. Hypocrisy will never disappear, but its cohorts can be deterred. The Puritan-inspired tradition of pre-emptive offense, with regards to political correctness, must be left the f*ddlest*cks behind. We have to forget what offends us and remember what’s worth defending. Free speech will always be more valuable than costly censorship. Disregard the insults not directed at you, fight the fights worth fighting, change the channel if you don’t like what you see, and remember that words can never hurt you.
Teach your kids to swear. Let them play in the dirt. Prove to them you’ll never be afraid of what they have to say. Teach them to let fly with boundless conscious thought, responsibly but brazenly. If for no other reason, allow them their foul language to take away its danger. To make something legal is to make it far less interesting. Let’s curse out a path to a place where we aren’t afraid of any words, where we aren’t offended for the sake of outdated sensibility, where meaningless symbols aren’t injected into words to cork their jagged tips, where we can get offended by worthwhile causes, like bad fashion sense and overly sassy writing. I want this place to have hypocrisy sitting a little bit closer to the back of the bus, while the tastiest fruits, flowers and thorns of our language hang their asses out the window… mooning French and German and the other wannabes.
This place also has to have free porn.
Have a $#*+ F**king Day,
Patrick Hughes
I was having a little creative blockage today so I’ve decided to fall back on an old standard. When I can’t think of anything better to talk about I always come back to profanity. When at a function that isn’t functioning or at a party that isn’t mixing, I tend to zest up the salsa dish by inciting a melo-dramatic melo-debate on one of a few irresistible subjects. My favorite is swearing… because everyone’s favorite is swearing.
My guarantee is extended, ask a group to nominate their favorite swear and the chitchat will never stagnate.
Is it possible to be offensive without offending? As a writer I seek to do great things like provoke, challenge and affront. All worthwhile invention is based on offending a prior system of values. As humans we fear that offense, until we eventually embrace it, and await the next thing to hate. This is how I view profanity, an unfortunate and longstanding target of that need to feel offended. But what is it that we truly fear about these anatomical comparisons and matriarchal metaphors? Why are these references so closely related to vulgarity and not expression? There’s a truly interesting part of the brain that motivates us to swear, which drives us to put an outlaw word between the verbs and nouns in our statements. I believe it’s a part that should be cultivated. It’s a motivation born somewhere between exuberance and ignorance, which is akin to where humanity is its happiest. I think it’s a good offense that gets us the victories worth having.
I have a problem with people who have a problem with words. The simple fact is that to assume that some of the words we use have more power than the people sending or receiving them is truly affording us less credit than we deserve as sentient beings. The simple truth behind this simple fact is that if we take the fear away from these words than we’ll dull the edge that apparently and sadly still draws blood. If swears were less jagged, perhaps other words and the assumptions that ride them, would also be less wounding. Perhaps then understanding would be slightly less elusive.
The juxtaposition that yangs this yin is that I kind of like the edge. I like the power. I relish swearing. I see it as a gift given to our verbal exchange. I enjoy it as the zesty garnish it can be added to our automatic, pod-cloned everyday discourse. It can be the performance-enhancing drug to a lame and lagging sentence, the boustier and stiletto heals, the black ace from the dealer, the dark sunglasses… the f**king ’68 Mustang convertible. With a single profane chocolate chip what was once dough is now a cookie, what was once cowering against the wall of the dance floor now wears a snazzy white suit and points his finger high. Swearing gives personality to a series of grouped letters herded by punctuation… yet remains misunderstood. Perhaps it’s for the best, a rebel is never quite the same when he’s invited into convention, a wolf is not a wolf after it’s invited indoors. The key is to keep the little scoundrels offensive though not offending. Let’s keep profanity in the black cowboy hat, but let’s talk for a while about why we love the bad guy so much.
Our language revels in its decadent, verbose inefficiency. Its convoluted girth is its greatest strength. I myself am too often left in the unfortunate position of witnessing this inefficiency go unsavored, watching as my peers and compatriots misuse and underuse the richness of its might. Where many would argue that synonyms are often redundant and thesauruses merely replace creative thought, I say that we are blessed to have a term for every nook and cranny of our world. We not only can fly, but glide, flutter, and soar through a sky, atmosphere, or heaven that can be blue or indigo or cyan. There are words at our disposal that convey exactly what we desire, that paint a picture, and in turn give it a value far higher than one thousand and worth more than the sum of its parts.
Profanity is the tool that we all carry to illustrate the spaces between our ears and our sentences. Onomatopoeia is a term used to describe words spelled to the sound or action they represent; such as growl and swoosh. I believe swearing is the hybrid of punctuation and onomatopoeia, they fill our sentences with emotional mechanics. Much like the way a properly placed pause gives a statement both gravity or levity, and the way an onomatopoeic word describes itself, a swear provides the words around it with the edge that is in itself its own answer.
The Great George Carlin said:
Sh!t
Pi$$
F**k
Cun+
C@cks@cker
M#thrrf**krr
And Tits;
The Seven Words You Can’t Say On TV.
The Magnificent Seven: Seven words that will eternally be honored and condemned. Whether or not these harmless exiles will ever be uttered on the picture box governed by the cowards that believe words are more detrimental then graphic violence and nudity, they will always have power. There will always be a wanted poster hanging for these desperados and I for one thank Mr. Carlin for that. These little darlings are like Robin Hood, feared by the establishment, honored by the public, an outlaw with arrow-splitting aim. A word can’t cut the crap if it’s got no edge.
A good blue streak is like that outlaw folk hero, that reminder of forbidden freedom. After all, where would Nottingham have been without Robin Hood? Clearly he broke the law, but every now and then we need a troublemaker to shake things up with a little take and give. I’m certain that no one living on the residential side of Sherwood Forest was telling their children they should grow up to be an outlaw. What they were doing was saying that they needn’t fear him. Imagine if we were all so astute in identifying the threat?
The unfortunate truth is that swears or cusses were essentially designed to offend. Though now they maintain real estate in a place largely of frolic and revelry, we can’t totally ignore that their evolution is a dubious one. They emerged as blasphemy directed at or in lieu of a Superior Being that didn’t have things going quite to the blasphemers liking. As Puritanism began draping skirts over scantily clad table legs and burning witches at the stake, etiquette gave J.Q. Publique a reason to be offended. As long as there’s been a swear there’s been an ear too delicate too sustain its presence. More often that not this ear shares a head with a mouth that spouts the same barbs in accepted company; most always rather than never the path from ear to mouth is obstructed by a head with nothing in between. Where would we be without those puritan pioneers of piety? How did we get from screaming our displeasure to God to comparing each other to our peepees and hoohoos? And how does one mend an injured ear?
The gift of discourse can be used as a weapon. Isn’t it always the ignorant of this world that turn tools into weapons? There are words beyond swears that go too far. They have a purpose crafted in injury that can have no use passed marginalization. These are words that impugn without merit, that categorize and objectify. I believe there is no place in our language or on our planet for words that paint an unwarranted caricature with a thoughtless brush. They are words that have never been needed. They are the wrath of bullies and the product of cowardly victories. Language should never be used to injure. We should always be careful with the words that have that power.
Any great thing can be overdone. A warm fire can burn too large, a stylish car can be overly ornate, and an overly enthusiastic dad can blemish his home at Christmas time. While carefully placed notes can attract mice to your song, a tune with too much sh!t will send them scurrying. Far too often swearing has crossed the line into gratuity, sullying its fine, foul tradition. ‘Everything in moderation’ is an idiom that governs profanity as well as any other province of creativity. The more treasured and respected a resource it remains, the more effective punch it gives the goddamn words around it.
It is in this vein that we must be cautious in teaching the children the art of comparing others to their private parts and excretions. Hearing a youngster belt out a surly swear at a sibling may never be as warm and delightful as say… exclaiming them yourself, but nonetheless the torch must be passed. Kids test their boundaries as they emerge and mature into the world. It’s always going to be the negligent parents whose children seek out firearms and needled arms in the place of structure and the overly disciplined children who run to them in escape of tyranny.
There is a greater value in profanity than just playful rebellion. There’s honesty and creativity, there’s those moments you utter your deepest frustrations to yourself under dark clouds of glorious filth. What comes out of your mouth when you stub your toe? Truth. What do you bellow at the neighborhood bully when he’s too far for your fists? Rage. What do you exclaim at the height of an orgasm? Ecstasy. How can such things be blasphemy?
Teach your kids to swear. Don’t stifle them when their experimental spirits erupt a f**k here or a sh!t there. Give them license to the play in moors of our language so they can gain a better perspective on the pasture. There was once a time when ‘sex’ was a dirty word parents uttered in the dark from a across the space between twin beds. How foolish does it seem now to have ‘sex education’ swept under a rug and hope kids will lose interest because of what the word could imply? To me it seems about as foolish and prudish as punishing a kid for using a word… a simple expletive… that probably was heard from the person who lays down the punishment. Well, I say teach your kids to swear. I say that the prudes can have their history because they certainly won’t have the future. I say f**k the prudes, it’s only sticks and stones that will stop them.
As with all other things, education is the key. Allow adrenalized exclamation the freedom to cultivate and it will find its proper place. I’m not suggesting, of course, that we’d all be better off if every parent with a child under twelve present their child with a loaded gun and encourage them to toddle off with their playmates. Nor do I think that those parents would be well advised to take a tour of safe injection sites or conduct lessons on joint-rolling techniques at the dining room table. I wouldn’t recommend a section of f’s, s’s, and a’s be covered in grammar, nor would I think it prudent to reward the children for calling grandma an old c*nt. It’s the parents who speak openly and accept calmly the wonder of children that earn their trust in return. Stick to positive reinforcement and education and you can avoid hearing about f**king br*cc*li at the Sunday Dinner Table. Correct them when they refer to your boss as a prick instead of an asshole, and praise them when they find a new way to put three ‘good ones’ together into one sibling insult.
I say this both tongue-in-cheek and tongue-dangling straight out in a demon waggle. I don’t like anything being left out of the game for the wrong reasons. Amidst the fear of fear and getting offended in defense, we keep putting the wrong thing on trial. It’s hypocrisy to tell our young that swearing is somehow morally wrong when in our most honest moments we tend to curse a blue streak. Hypocrisy will never disappear, but its cohorts can be deterred. The Puritan-inspired tradition of pre-emptive offense, with regards to political correctness, must be left the f*ddlest*cks behind. We have to forget what offends us and remember what’s worth defending. Free speech will always be more valuable than costly censorship. Disregard the insults not directed at you, fight the fights worth fighting, change the channel if you don’t like what you see, and remember that words can never hurt you.
Teach your kids to swear. Let them play in the dirt. Prove to them you’ll never be afraid of what they have to say. Teach them to let fly with boundless conscious thought, responsibly but brazenly. If for no other reason, allow them their foul language to take away its danger. To make something legal is to make it far less interesting. Let’s curse out a path to a place where we aren’t afraid of any words, where we aren’t offended for the sake of outdated sensibility, where meaningless symbols aren’t injected into words to cork their jagged tips, where we can get offended by worthwhile causes, like bad fashion sense and overly sassy writing. I want this place to have hypocrisy sitting a little bit closer to the back of the bus, while the tastiest fruits, flowers and thorns of our language hang their asses out the window… mooning French and German and the other wannabes.
This place also has to have free porn.
Have a $#*+ F**king Day,
Patrick Hughes
DESENSITIVE
I saw someone die the other day. I was peacefully watching TV when it happened. It was awful; it was remorseless and cold. The murderer was brooding, yet dashing and heroic. His victim fell before him unceremoniously as I watched helplessly from my couch. No one rushed to the victim’s aide as the murderer then went on to save the day, committing no less than thirteen more homicides before he seemed satisfied. The authorities caught up with him soon after, found some justification in his actions and promptly let him go free, honoring him with congratulations. Alone in my living room I was horrified and aghast. I’d like to say this is all true, truthful though it wasn’t really true; it was one of my favorite movies.
I am utterly desensitized. If an atrocity is coming at me through a picture tube or radiating down on me from a movie screen, I can withstand unspeakable acts conceived of the world’s most troubled minds. I have witnessed carnage and gore dramatized with spot-on accuracy available to previous generations through only their most graphic nightmares. I have been raised in a pop-culture where attractive heroes and anti-heroes alike murder their enemies without impunity. I have seen the special effected, digitally constructed, award winningly acted injuries and deaths of more people than I could ever fathom counting. My nagging, naïve, useless sensitivity was amputated long ago.
I’ve seen artificial death in every possible form; impalement, hanging, dismemberment, decapitation, disemboweling, fire, water, earth, and wind: mortal injuries from gunfire ranks in the innumerable. I’ve seen the skin melt from bodies and people chewed to pieces by both beast and machine. I’ve seen deaths based on historical events and some planned for the future. Poisonings, self-inflicted arterial bleedings, plummetings from a building’s twentieth floor, head on collisions, blown up, crushed, beaten and electrocuted are all old hat. Homicide, suicide, patricide, regicide, infanticide, and genocide are all put aside. I am invincible; I cannot be disturbed. What I can’t decide is this: having shed my nasty pathos for the dramatization of human demise, have I strengthened a segment of my cerebral constitution or devolved to some form of sociopath?
Here is the problem: Headlines don’t get me like they should. I’ve developed into a mechanism detached from the catastrophes that aren’t tangible. A News Flash illustrates for me the burning falling debris from the doomed Columbia spacecraft; the news paper reports to me about snipers stalking random individuals in the Washington Area, and reckless kids that race their parent’s European cars like they were weapons. Innocent people, often elderly people, are being invaded and beaten and robbed in their homes… their homes! I hum to myself, shake my head and go on with my day.
I can remember watching the Twin Towers fall. I thought the morning’s breaking update was lying to me as I stood dumbfounded half-ready for work. I remember any remorse or horror, veiled by numbed sense of disbelief; a TV generation reaction to the most disastrous incident to befall our continent in my lifetime. It kind of worries me knowing I am not an endangered species or even really unusual in this respect. Everyone around me laughs when Arnold Schwarzenegger overkills a villain, cuing a witless witticism. What’s perhaps even more disturbing that this is not a phenomenon even unique to my peers. The generation to follow me has a video game outlet that allows them not only to witness the most inhuman acts, but also act them out themselves in the virtual realm. These games are disturbingly real and staggeringly graphic, with the only consequence being GAME OVER appearing in red letters.
What’s the answer? Do we have a problem? How will desensitization affect us in the long run? Debate after debate rattles through our society placing blame for the rising level of violence in our culture. Popular music, news media, video games, the Internet, movies, TV; every form that we employ to mass-communicate with each other has been witch-hunted at some point. In shrinking our world through the wonder of our invention we’ve promoted images and philosophies that unify us with familiarity while also giving us more faces and contrasts to fear and hate. Human Nature seems to force us farther apart the more we learn about one another.
People were once products of their environments, now the all-consuming image factories selling us artificial rock star rebels with the same face design those environments. Individuals are no longer individual, we chose our identities from a carefully crafted catalogue of modes of fashion, attitude, and demeanor. One can choose from ‘A’ –‘Ally McBeal power-suit’ through ‘Z’ -‘Jennifer LopeZ pop-diva’ though never both. One can be ‘West Coast Gansta’, ‘one of the guys from Friends’ or ‘garage-band, sk8er boy, punk mosaic’. A great deal of us invest far too much of what’s left our individuality into an image designed to sell CDs and soft drinks. Imagine if you took the money you spend last year on soft drinks and spent it on night school tuition or perhaps gangster group therapy.
One of my first memories of the movies involves my mother’s voice leaning in to me as the film opened, assuring me that the people and actions we were going to see weren’t real. They’re not really hurting each other and they certainly couldn’t hurt me. Almost every child hears these words in the spirit of ‘parental guidance’, planting the roots of media literacy in all of us. If that same voice could always be there, during designer jeans and perfume ads, during glitzy award shows, and before every music video I think we’d be on a far better path. I believe what we spend on jeans is nearly as frightening as what we spend on guns, and don’t kid yourself; in the realm of image those items aren’t too far off. What all of us need to do is listen to that nurturing voice and learn to read what’s overt below the advert. Media literacy is the necessary antidote to the onslaught of virtual carnage that surrounds and surrounds the kids of the next generation.
Everything created and marketed and packaged for us is selling an image… everything. The computer, furniture, shoes, food, music, and vehicle you buy define you as a person in this world. There’s no way around it anymore, everyone who purchases anything is buying into an image in form or another. A fourteen-year-old kid from Argentina who buys Calvin Klein jeans may not be familiar with the specifics of the androgynously chic image Calvin is selling, but he is buying into the ‘Americano’ image that Calvin represents. When Britney Spears talks about boys, when Martha Stewart suggests a centerpiece, and when Bruce Willis expires a bad guy, they are each selling an image.
Enlightenment in our society is, and will henceforth be known as media literacy. Media literacy at its core is essentially understanding that you are a customer. Questioning what you see before you in an analytical sense; Am I part of the intended target audience? What is this saying about my image? How will this improve my life? Am I buying this for need or want? I’m a customer when I go to the movies, exercise and wash my hands. The trick to being media literate is also understanding that though I may be a customer, I don’t have to buy. I prefer to peruse; as an enlightened consumer in today’s world of virtual carnage, I remain detached.
Detachment, in conjunction with a literate understanding of media muscle, will ultimately attain desensitivity. I’d like to amend my earlier admission. Though I have seen the dramatized deaths of thousands of nearly innocent characters I do not suffer from an amputation of humanity, nor does my generation. Though carnage and violence may be seen in a different light these days, our evolution as a species in a world always trying to sell us something will remain prosperous for those of us intent on seeing what’s offered for what it is.
There’s nothing wrong with buying the expensive jeans, or the Eminem CD, or the diet soda, as long as your aware of what you’re buying and what you’re buying into. The real challenge that faces my generation and the generation to follow is not witnessing the portrayal of death and violence and excess, it’s understanding that it doesn’t have to affect you as an individual. No matter what Calvin, Britney, or Bruce’s opinion, tomorrow the sun will rise and you will have to be you for a whole new day.
I am utterly desensitive; I remain attentive, entertained, and impermeable. I see virtual pain, suffering, and the gruesome demises of various super-villains for what they are. I sit unrepentantly through action movies, Pepsi commercials, and music videos well aware that I won’t be buying. I won’t apologize for enjoying the diversions that other people craft and I enjoy. After all, I’m media savvy, I’m not a monster.
I am utterly desensitized. If an atrocity is coming at me through a picture tube or radiating down on me from a movie screen, I can withstand unspeakable acts conceived of the world’s most troubled minds. I have witnessed carnage and gore dramatized with spot-on accuracy available to previous generations through only their most graphic nightmares. I have been raised in a pop-culture where attractive heroes and anti-heroes alike murder their enemies without impunity. I have seen the special effected, digitally constructed, award winningly acted injuries and deaths of more people than I could ever fathom counting. My nagging, naïve, useless sensitivity was amputated long ago.
I’ve seen artificial death in every possible form; impalement, hanging, dismemberment, decapitation, disemboweling, fire, water, earth, and wind: mortal injuries from gunfire ranks in the innumerable. I’ve seen the skin melt from bodies and people chewed to pieces by both beast and machine. I’ve seen deaths based on historical events and some planned for the future. Poisonings, self-inflicted arterial bleedings, plummetings from a building’s twentieth floor, head on collisions, blown up, crushed, beaten and electrocuted are all old hat. Homicide, suicide, patricide, regicide, infanticide, and genocide are all put aside. I am invincible; I cannot be disturbed. What I can’t decide is this: having shed my nasty pathos for the dramatization of human demise, have I strengthened a segment of my cerebral constitution or devolved to some form of sociopath?
Here is the problem: Headlines don’t get me like they should. I’ve developed into a mechanism detached from the catastrophes that aren’t tangible. A News Flash illustrates for me the burning falling debris from the doomed Columbia spacecraft; the news paper reports to me about snipers stalking random individuals in the Washington Area, and reckless kids that race their parent’s European cars like they were weapons. Innocent people, often elderly people, are being invaded and beaten and robbed in their homes… their homes! I hum to myself, shake my head and go on with my day.
I can remember watching the Twin Towers fall. I thought the morning’s breaking update was lying to me as I stood dumbfounded half-ready for work. I remember any remorse or horror, veiled by numbed sense of disbelief; a TV generation reaction to the most disastrous incident to befall our continent in my lifetime. It kind of worries me knowing I am not an endangered species or even really unusual in this respect. Everyone around me laughs when Arnold Schwarzenegger overkills a villain, cuing a witless witticism. What’s perhaps even more disturbing that this is not a phenomenon even unique to my peers. The generation to follow me has a video game outlet that allows them not only to witness the most inhuman acts, but also act them out themselves in the virtual realm. These games are disturbingly real and staggeringly graphic, with the only consequence being GAME OVER appearing in red letters.
What’s the answer? Do we have a problem? How will desensitization affect us in the long run? Debate after debate rattles through our society placing blame for the rising level of violence in our culture. Popular music, news media, video games, the Internet, movies, TV; every form that we employ to mass-communicate with each other has been witch-hunted at some point. In shrinking our world through the wonder of our invention we’ve promoted images and philosophies that unify us with familiarity while also giving us more faces and contrasts to fear and hate. Human Nature seems to force us farther apart the more we learn about one another.
People were once products of their environments, now the all-consuming image factories selling us artificial rock star rebels with the same face design those environments. Individuals are no longer individual, we chose our identities from a carefully crafted catalogue of modes of fashion, attitude, and demeanor. One can choose from ‘A’ –‘Ally McBeal power-suit’ through ‘Z’ -‘Jennifer LopeZ pop-diva’ though never both. One can be ‘West Coast Gansta’, ‘one of the guys from Friends’ or ‘garage-band, sk8er boy, punk mosaic’. A great deal of us invest far too much of what’s left our individuality into an image designed to sell CDs and soft drinks. Imagine if you took the money you spend last year on soft drinks and spent it on night school tuition or perhaps gangster group therapy.
One of my first memories of the movies involves my mother’s voice leaning in to me as the film opened, assuring me that the people and actions we were going to see weren’t real. They’re not really hurting each other and they certainly couldn’t hurt me. Almost every child hears these words in the spirit of ‘parental guidance’, planting the roots of media literacy in all of us. If that same voice could always be there, during designer jeans and perfume ads, during glitzy award shows, and before every music video I think we’d be on a far better path. I believe what we spend on jeans is nearly as frightening as what we spend on guns, and don’t kid yourself; in the realm of image those items aren’t too far off. What all of us need to do is listen to that nurturing voice and learn to read what’s overt below the advert. Media literacy is the necessary antidote to the onslaught of virtual carnage that surrounds and surrounds the kids of the next generation.
Everything created and marketed and packaged for us is selling an image… everything. The computer, furniture, shoes, food, music, and vehicle you buy define you as a person in this world. There’s no way around it anymore, everyone who purchases anything is buying into an image in form or another. A fourteen-year-old kid from Argentina who buys Calvin Klein jeans may not be familiar with the specifics of the androgynously chic image Calvin is selling, but he is buying into the ‘Americano’ image that Calvin represents. When Britney Spears talks about boys, when Martha Stewart suggests a centerpiece, and when Bruce Willis expires a bad guy, they are each selling an image.
Enlightenment in our society is, and will henceforth be known as media literacy. Media literacy at its core is essentially understanding that you are a customer. Questioning what you see before you in an analytical sense; Am I part of the intended target audience? What is this saying about my image? How will this improve my life? Am I buying this for need or want? I’m a customer when I go to the movies, exercise and wash my hands. The trick to being media literate is also understanding that though I may be a customer, I don’t have to buy. I prefer to peruse; as an enlightened consumer in today’s world of virtual carnage, I remain detached.
Detachment, in conjunction with a literate understanding of media muscle, will ultimately attain desensitivity. I’d like to amend my earlier admission. Though I have seen the dramatized deaths of thousands of nearly innocent characters I do not suffer from an amputation of humanity, nor does my generation. Though carnage and violence may be seen in a different light these days, our evolution as a species in a world always trying to sell us something will remain prosperous for those of us intent on seeing what’s offered for what it is.
There’s nothing wrong with buying the expensive jeans, or the Eminem CD, or the diet soda, as long as your aware of what you’re buying and what you’re buying into. The real challenge that faces my generation and the generation to follow is not witnessing the portrayal of death and violence and excess, it’s understanding that it doesn’t have to affect you as an individual. No matter what Calvin, Britney, or Bruce’s opinion, tomorrow the sun will rise and you will have to be you for a whole new day.
I am utterly desensitive; I remain attentive, entertained, and impermeable. I see virtual pain, suffering, and the gruesome demises of various super-villains for what they are. I sit unrepentantly through action movies, Pepsi commercials, and music videos well aware that I won’t be buying. I won’t apologize for enjoying the diversions that other people craft and I enjoy. After all, I’m media savvy, I’m not a monster.
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