I have just returned from a quite enjoyable Columbus Day Weekend in the Berkshires. Becky and I spent a few days driving around, swimming, eating, exploring, and just "getting away from it all". Our modest sightseeing adventures included a pleasant hour or two in the amazing Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, where I was reminded of what may be Rockwell's most touching and familiar works, the illustrations for the Four Freedoms put forth by Roosevelt during World War Two.
I found a site detailing the Freedoms, the essays on each one published in the Saturday Evening Post (as part of a massive and hugely successful campaign for Government War Bonds), and most importantly, Roosevelt's elegant definitions of each. While not explicitly stated in our Constitution, these Freedoms are more of a moral imperative for humankind than any freedom that can be granted by the words of legislative documents.
In the future days which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms.
The first is freedom of speech and expression -- everywhere in the world.
The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way -- everywhere in the world.
The third is freedom from want, which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants -- everywhere in the world.
The fourth is freedom from fear, which, translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor -- anywhere in the world.
That is no vision of a distant millennium. It is a definite basis for a kind of world attainable in our own time and generation. That kind of world is the very antithesis of the so-called "new order" of tyranny which the dictators seek to create with the crash of a bomb.
- Franklin Delano Roosevelt, excerpted from the Annual Message to the Congress, January 6, 1941
After seeing these paintings once again in person, I was struck by their universality, and the unvarnished, straightforward way in which each relates its specific Freedom to the viewer.
Coming from a former American President, one would think that each of these Freedoms, which inspired such iconic paintings that seem to represent the liberties and values Americans hold dear, would be first and foremost granted in the nation that identified them as necessities. However, almost 70 years later, Roosevelt's vision of what might be achieved in his own "time and generation" have been eroded so gradually and subtly, that they seem to be in danger of extinction both in America and "everywhere in the world," disappearing not with a bang, but a whimper. Granted, there are certainly those among us who recognize these erosions, and aim to halt and hopefully reverse them. Unfortunately, these groups and individuals seem to be a minority these days -- not a minority in their goals, but in the mere consciousness of the need for change.
1. Freedom of Speech and Expression (Everywhere in the World): There are a brave few who still exercise this Freedom at their own peril. Today, we live under an administration that will not tolerate dissent, and intentionally isolates itself from criticism to create a perception of infallibility, inscrutability, and a clear disregard for the will of its citizens. Protest and assembly, one of our very first Constitutional Rights, is now confined to "Free Speech Zones", which are nothing more than glorified cages to protect our leaders from dissent or displeasure. Our news organizations, once trusted to deliver the truth and to expose the lies and machinations of governments around the world, are now corporate conglomerates with close ties and allegiances to political groups. The news and information we receive, mere steps away from outright propaganda, is now carefully crafted and engineered to keep us loyal, afraid, unquestioning, and woefully uninformed.
2. Freedom of Worship (Everywhere in the World): Today, everywhere in the world, religious groups are being persecuted, demonized, murdered, displaced, tortured, and oppressed. Our own government has used religion as a crowbar to draw moral distinctions between ourselves and our enemies. Our Presidential candidates are publicly hoping that we end up with a "Christian President", while fundamentalist Christian groups are gaining more and more political influence with each election cycle. Recently, a Muslim Congressman was sworn in by placing his hand on a copy of the Koran, and not the Christian Bible, causing a wave of controversy and intolerance, due to preconceived notions tying the Muslim faith with extremist terrorism and political ideology. In a direct and flagrant affront to the vision of our Founding Fathers, religion and politics have become so intertwined, that they are almost synonymous.
3. Freedom From Want (Everywhere in the World): In our world right now, 2 percent of the adult population possess over 50 percent of the world's wealth and assets, while the poorest 50 percent possess only 1 percent of this wealth according to a recent UN study. This may be a difficult set of statistics to imagine, (more on visualizing statistics here), but in terms of a representative analogy, consider this: If the entire population of Earth was represented by a group of 10 people, and the group was given 100 dollars to represent all the wealth of the world, the equivalent distribution would result in ONE PERSON posessing 99 of the 100 dollars, while the remaining 1 dollar would be SHARED by the remaining 9 people in the group.
There is almost certainly going to be disparity in wealth, class, and prosperity at any given moment, but the gap continues to widen. Millions of families and children of our own nation are without healthcare and/or living in poverty. If we are all entitled to Freedom From Want, it would seem that we are a long way from accomplishing it.
4. Freedom From Fear: Fear is the driving force behind many of our every day decisions and actions. Fear of poverty, fear of crime, theft, loss, fear of death and injury, fear of our overall loss of security. We are constantly being reminded that "September 11th Changed Everything". We are constantly reminded that dangerous enemies wish to destroy us and our way of life, and that war is the solution to any number of continually-redefined problems in our world. Fear is the primary tool of a government that wishes to control us, be it the current administration, or any totalitarian, fascist, despotic, or dictatorial government in the entire history of human civilization.
We are not free from fear-- quite the opposite. Fear is spoon-fed to us every single day, be it fear of global terrorism, or fear of dying in a car accident. Fear of killer bees, sewer explosions, drowning children, accidental fires, exploding iPods, airplane crashes, power outages, rabid dogs, sexual predators, and home invasions can be found on any nightly newscast, any day of the week.
Fear of being unnattractive makes us buy beauty products and diet pills, fear of appearing unsuccessful influences us to buy extravagant homes and luxury cars. Fear of not being loved by our children convinces us to buy them toys, vacations, and expensive birthday bashes. For centuries, fear has been the single most exploited and useful emotion of humanity. Roosevelt's narrow definition of fear as it applies to military conflict is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the amazing array of fears that we must hope to someday be rid of. However, 70 years after Roosevelt's proclamation, we are no closer to shedding the fear of physical aggression in terms of the reduction of armed conflict and a continuing struggle for permanent world peace.
I am proud to be an American that embraces a vision of these Four Freedoms. I sincerely hope that within my own lifetime, I will witness--perhaps even participate in--a common effort to move mankind closer to achieving these goals. I thank Norman Rockwell for reminding me of the true America-- one that embraces our differences, not discourages them. One that promotes peace, goodwill, and prosperity, instead of the fruitless and unconscienable war that will surely define my generation.
I came across an amazing photographic artist by the name of Chris Jordan. I cannot even begin to fathom how he creates his pieces, or how many dozens of hours of work went into each one, but they are truly amazing.
Jordan's apparent hope is to give us some concrete idea of what the statistical numbers we hear all the time are really about. For example, when you hear that 1.5 BILLION dollars a week are being spent by our government to fund the war in Iraq, sure it sounds like a lot of money. But really, you have NO IDEA how to process such a staggering quantity of ANYTHING. You have never seen a billion of anything in your entire life, with the possible exception of blades of grass in a field, grains of sand, and the like. Have you ever seen 2 million soda cans, 8 million toothpicks, or 426,000 cell phones? Nope. So, go check it out right now.
Chris Jordan has taken upon himself the task of translating these almost-meaningless numbers and statistics into tangible, concrete representations, usually laced with acid irony. His finished pieces are enormous wall murals and triptychs, which, as Jordan explains on his website, really should be seen in person for the full measure of impact and appreciation (mostly due to their staggering sizes).
Above: 426,000 Cell Phones. The actual piece is about 250 times larger than this (60 x 100 FEET)
Anyway, this stuff is interesting and highly relevant, especially if you happen to be a statistician, accountant, or anyone else dealing with huge numbers. Go check it out.
I have decided that the end of the world has officially arrived.
Here are a few indicators that I'd like you to contemplate:
1. ANOTHER REMAKE of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers". Actually, this one is just called "The Invasion". Maybe Hollywood thought if they left the "Body Snatchers" part out of the title, nobody would notice that this is the THIRD FOURTH TIME in 50 years that the same movie has been made. What makes this even more bizarre is the irony involved.
A soulless replica of a movie based on the concept of soulless replicas.
2. You won't believe what I saw last night (adding to the enormous pile of reasons that I detest television). A GMC Truck commercial, nothing extraordinary in its own right. Now, I think it's safe to assume that most of us have seen, and been at least moderately disappointed by, commercials (especially for cars) that feel the need to adopt classic rock anthems from years past in order to "relate" to the prime car-buying generation. We've heard The Who, Bob Seger, and countless others selling the rights to their songs, apparently along with their very souls, to The Man for a few bucks. It never fails to fill me with sadness and disappointment.
Last night however... my mind was utterly blown. The old Genesis classic, "Turn It On Again" was the theme music in a god damn truck commercial. Now, I ask you: Does this seem as somehow wrong and surreal to you as it did to me? Maybe when you see it for yourself, you'll understand. I am a big fan of Genesis... well, at least in the true prog-rock years (which pretty much just means the years that Peter Gabriel was still in the band), but Abacab-era, Phil Collins Genesis wasn't too bad either. A frigging truck commercial. Wow.
I have a definite feeling that someday in the not-too-distant future, we'll be seeing commercials for the new Honda Hovercar 5000, with the melodious strains of Limp Bizkit or Sir Mix-A-Lot or something, preying on our sense of nostalgia to sell us junk we don't really need. Whatever.
3. In better news, I saw "The Fountain" last night for the first time. Darren Aranofsky has yet again outdone himself. Honestly, I can't even tell you anything about the movie, it would just ruin it for you. All I ask is that you go rent or buy it as soon as humanly possible, sit back, press "play" and let your mind go swirling away.
My only problem with the movie is this: Where in the name of God can Aranofsky go from here? The guy's like, in his early 30's and has already made, in my opinion three of the most incredible movies of all time; "Pi", "Requiem For a Dream" and now this. If he continues to improve his craft, I fear it will blow my mind so badly that I shall have to spend the rest of my days in a sanitarium. That, or he'll make a film so amazing, that it will simply destroy the fabric of time and space with it's fabulousness. I'm doomed either way.
Wikipedia, my favorite semi-reliable source of knowledge, describes "spam" (as it applies to email) as "Unsolicited Bulk Email". Basically, a modernized version of junk mail, except that it mostly has to do with increasing the size of your penis and helping Nigerian bankers smuggle some dead guy's money.There has probably been some form of spam in existence since the beginning of human history.
Almost everyone has, at some point, found flyers or ads or bible verses stuck under their windshield wiper. Go to Las Vegas, and you'll see guys about every 8 feet all the way down the Strip, handing out little cards to everyone who passes by, regardless of age, sex, or demeanor. These cards typically feature photos of unclothed women, complete with phone numbers for escort services, stripping agencies, or phone sex lines. It makes me wonder-- did they do this kind of thing in Ancient Rome or other eras of civilization? I can understand how movable type and the Industrial Revolution made advertising in ALL forms a lot easier, and a lot more pervasive, but in the grand scope of history, those are pretty recent developments. I do theorize that there has always been pornography or some form of selling sex, and probably there have always been scams and salesmen. Do you think cavemen handed out stones with cave-paintings on them to advertise hot cavewomen that would come to your cave and dance and grunt for only 5 pig-skulls? I think it's not only possible, but fairly likely.
So, let's move forward a couple million years, to a time and place in which every morning I have between 200 and 600 emails in my inbox. On some days, 100% of these are spam. Other days, I get one or two real messages from friends or family or clients. The other 598 messages are the most obnoxious, idiotic, unsolicited hogwash I have ever seen.
Look, I understand the principle. I work in marketing, and much of my job consists of finding cost-effective ways to raise awareness and sales of my company's products. Advertising by email costs virtually nothing, and occasionally it may actually help promote a business or gain customers. But how are you going to promote a product with subject lines full of complete nonsense? Is this actually fooling anyone? I'm talking about the really spammy stuff, the messages that have subjects like some of the ones I received today:
He my vendetta - (What does this even mean?)
Everything for you penis at low prices - (My penis has everything it needs, thanks.)
in aback as waggle - (Again, total nonsense. How is this supposed to entice me to buy things?)
New Winter Poetry Contest - Enter Now! Win 10,000 Dollars - (I don't write poetry)
In fact, Mr. David Wong has compiled a hilarious Spam Subject Line Museum at his Pointless Waste Of Time website. My examples seem rather tame compared to some of his listings. Reinforcing my point; is anyone actually opening these emails? And if not, what's the point of sending trillions of them?
See, when you're in Las Vegas, and a guy is handing out sex-cards, you have the option of not taking one if you're not interested in paying for sex, or you could take one and throw it in the next available garbage can. If you actually wanted a midget sex message from Muswellbrook Netball Association Vice President Tracy Goldman, you would probably just call her up and ask if she would be willing to give you the scoop on midget sex (don't get your hopes up, I'm sure she's very busy). With spam, you are constantly getting dozens of repeated emails trying to sell you things that there is absolutely no chance you would ever want or need (like a midget sex message, because I'm actually not even sure what that entails. Is it a message you need to hear if you ARE a midget, or does the midget give you the message? Either way, I'm not interested).
The reason I even mention any of this is because spam is not only annoying, it is fast becoming dangerous. In recent years, spam and similar maladies like spyware, viruses, autodialers, etc. have shifted from being passive annoyances to very proactive and aggressive tools of destruction. With every safeguard we can install on our computer, some genius with way too much time on his hands finds a new loophole.
In a recent news story, a 40-year-old substitute teacher is in danger of being sentenced to 40 YEARS in prison for accidentally and unwittingly exposing a classroom full of 7th-graders to various pornographic pop-up advertisements that appeared out of nowhere while letting the kids surf the net on the class computer. As it turns out, in this case, the teacher had hired a lawyer who was woefully uninformed and unprepared to specifically place the blame on spammers and spybots. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for her appeal, as she has already been convicted of 4 felonies in this case.
A couple of years ago, some asshole company saw fit to install an ad on my computer without telling me. This ad was for something called The Amazing Diet Patch, a transdermal patch that pumped you full of some sort of diet drugs. This ad would pop up at random moments, complete with a very loud female announcer who would tell me all about the diet patch, and scare the bejesus out of my cat. When I wasn't hearing Diet Patch Lady's voice in my nightmares, I was hearing it in reality because it woke me up out of a sound sleep from the office next to my bedroom. I became so frustrated with the ad that I tracked down the phone number for the shady-sounding company that was behind the product, called them up, and demanded to be transferred to the tech department to explain how to get the thing off of my system. Since I was talking to some order-entry paean who probably had no idea what I was talking about, I got nowhere with this request.
My point is that there is no reason this ad should have been installed to begin with. If I want a diet patch, I'll go find one and buy it. If I want porn, or a midget sex message, or information on penny stocks, I'll seek it out on my own, thank you very much. I hate spam and spyware much as I would hate someone breaking the window of my apartment to sneak in while I was asleep and ask me if I wanted to buy something. Even if it was something really, REALLY good.
When spam and its ilk cross the line from annoyance to invasion, we all need to step back and realize that although there are some laws to govern this type of activity (like the CAN-SPAM act), there is no real way to enforce them until the damage has already been done, whether it's damage to your peace of mind or to your PC. So I will make a plea to all you spammers out there:
Please just stop doing what you're doing. Your way of doing business should be illegal, and at the very least it should give you trouble sleeping at night. If your products were any good in the first place, you would not need to resort to sneaky and cryptic marketing strategies. Nobody is shopping online for Diet Patches, searching for midget sex messages, or in need of any sort of herbal substitutes for marijuana unless they are really, really dumb or desperate. Your day will come!
I agree with everything you have written and have felt this way for some time...although spam has brought on the creation of http://spamusement.com/ and that site makes it all almost close to kind of acceptable.
I found a 
2. You won't believe what I saw last night (adding to the enormous pile of reasons that I detest television). A GMC Truck commercial, nothing extraordinary in its own right. Now, I think it's safe to assume that most of us have seen, and been at least moderately disappointed by, commercials (especially for cars) that feel the need to adopt classic rock anthems from years past in order to "relate" to the prime car-buying generation. We've heard The Who, Bob Seger, and countless others selling the rights to their songs, apparently along with their very souls, to The Man for a few bucks. It never fails to fill me with sadness and disappointment.
ot nowhere with this request.