Truthiness

    Since this is really my only online outlet, I plug (generally unrelated) things on it.  So in an attempt to earn a little extra money, I opened up an Etsy account at http://pinkberet.etsy.com . Hey, every little link helps my site climb up the Google results list. J 

Okay, back to Emerson. I kind of liked his idea that the first step to self reliance is to be your own individual. I say “kind of” because he starts out talking about how we should express ourselves in new and unconventional ways, then says, “Trust thyself: every heart vibrates to that iron string,” which sounds a lot like “”. Emerson remedies this in his next sentence though (Thank goodness!). “Accept the place the divine providence has found for you, The society of your contemporaries, the connection of events.” Now this, to me, is revolutionary. Not only do we have to be true to ourselves, we actually have to embrace and enjoy that we are who we are. Maybe it’s revolutionary to me because it’s something I struggle with. I hate it when random people ask me what my major. Why? Because the instant I bring up Political Science, one of two things happens. One, they assume I want to be a politician, which I don’t; or two, they start to talk politics with me. The second isn’t really a problem is they are actually intelligently informed of both sides of the issues they want to talk about. Most of the time, however, these people either get their politics from Access Hollywood or regurgitating what their uniformed parents have told them. (Any ideas on how to fix that unwieldy sentence are welcome)

       So, these people get into super heated debates with me over things they know little about, which is a little like trying to hop over a fence by running into it. This generally results in me backing off and shutting up to avoid getting mauled. The worst ones, however, are my parents. My dad, as much as I love him, is a Republican. Which would be perfectly fine if he had opinions that backed up his dislike of Democrats. I’ve asked him why he doesn’t like Obama, to which his reply is, “He’s stupid”. Not that his heath care /spending bills/stance on abortion is stupid. I wish I could say it’s going to get better, but I can’t. The same thing happened with the Bush administration. Plenty of kids my age hated Bush because it was rebellious and trendy thing  to do. Then, when I had specific policy reasons for disliking him,(such as the way No Child Left Behind was handled and his monetary support of abstinent only sex-ed)  I was written off as being a Democrat “because [I] was young”.  The funny thing is, the people that say this often don’t really watch the news or current events.

      So, to bring the argument back to the text (sorry I got a little off track), I respect, and strive for, independence. But being different in this society is a little bit like Alaskan salmon swimming upstream. It’s hard, seemingly impossible really, but rewarding for those who make it. The irony is that our society is starting to embrace different to an extent that being unique is becoming more and more mainstream, much to the anger of our elders (I’m talking about the ones that come on Lou Dobb’s show and blame violence and pornography on homosexuality. Yeah, you read that right). The catch is though, you have to be the right kind of different, you can’t be your own kind of different. Emerson says “I hope in these days we have heard the last of conformity and consistency.”    I can’t be comfortable with my ideology, regardless of who I talk to.  Whether it’s a latte sipping lefty* college student, or a socially conservative member of the NRA, I shut up and nod. I’d rather not waste my energy on these people who don’t care about truth, just about being right.

*Oh my gosh, I loved W. I died of hysterical laughter when I heard a term that so accurately described me. 

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So if you don’t watch The Colbert Report (best fake punditry ever!) you might not know where I got my title from. Here’s the clip that corresponds to it: http://www.comedycentral.com/videos/index.jhtml?videoId=24039   

What does Emerson have to do with truthiness? Emerson encourages us to fight against it, essentially. The people I mentioned above, the ones that regurgitate what they are told without thinking at all are engaging in truthiness: “Their every truth is not quite true.” Accepting something is true without questioning it at all isn’t independence, it’s ignorance.

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In Self Reliance, Emerson says “I hope in these days we have heard the last of conformity and consistency.” I don’t know if that’s entirely true, but, our non conformists are certainly becoming less mainstream. I chose to use Jesus and Emerson in this picture because they are two mentioned in the text of Self Reliance, and Marilyn Manson was the only modern one I could think of off the top of my head….Oh, and yes, Emerson totally wore bunny slippers. He was a non-traditionalist like that.

 

Baraka

The opening shots, accompanied by the flute solo are a tad dramatic, but it sets a serious tone. It feels a little like the BBC documentary Planet Earth, but without the British narration. Baraka does not explain where any of the places it films are, adding to the mystery. Some of the places are familiar, such as the wailing wall.   Different religions are represented, almost seamlessly. the only indication that we are moving to a different religion is the change in clothing. It also serves to show how despite our differing views on religion, some things are the same, such as the use of candles, along with the use of prayer beads, which both Buddhist monks and Catholics use to meditate.
The drums are a nice fit for the volcano scene. It’s cool to see the   Canyon de Chelly since I’ve been there before. Speaking of drums, I love the dance scene. It plays again off the theme that even though we all come from different cultures, we’re not really as different as we might think.
Just as the volcano music is the water music is flowing and free, like the flight shots of birds that accompany it.
After we see the destructive nature of water with the thunderstorms, we see the toll humanity has left (is leaving?) on the earth.  Fallen trees in rainforests, Crowed buildings, sweatshops. I think one of my favorite parts in the whole movie is when the girls are rolling cigarettes in the factory and the man on the street starts smoking one. Everyday, we are connected to people we will never meet without even realizing it. The Egypt scenes of the ruins of the pyramids show the same thing happened ages ago, with the pharos forcing the workers to build their extravagant tombs.
So I know this is a little off topic, but….Oh my gosh, the poor , poor  baby chicks! They looked so cute and so fluffy but they were so unhappy and they were forced into that awful chute only to get squirted with paint and have their beaks burned off. What was even sadder was watching the ones that got tossed, probably to go to the incinerator. It’s enough to make me a want to be a vegetarian again.
Okay, back on topic now.  So another thing that all of the cultures participate in is body painting.  The Aborigines use a plastic comb to put on their paint, which juxtaposes modernization with tradition.  The man in Japan who walks around ringing a bell is another example of this in a different culture. What is interesting however, is how little the Japanese people react around him.  This hints that the Japanese, unlike Americans, have managed to modernize without losing the traditions of old.  In Japan, wearing a kimono is half the fun of summer festivals. If anyone in America walked around in a hoop skirt and bustle train, it would certainly draw attention.
The environmental message in Baraka is subtle, not preachy. It compares nature with what humans have done to the earth; some good (such as St. Peter’s Basilica and Meiji Shrine), and some bad (the overcrowded city and the air raid of the dessert).  I think that the camera’s extended shot on the tree that grows over the ruins to show that even though we think we can conquer nature, it ultimately overrides, turning ancient buildings into sand.
What I love most about Baraka, however, is that since there is no spoken language, anyone from any of the cultures in the movie can enjoy it.  It exposes the way our cultures interact with each other, the ways they are alike. And that I could get just over two pages of words out of a silent movie. 

Bohemian Bard or Eleoquent Facade?

So I have to admit, I have a little bit of trouble with Thoreau. I love his words- out of the context of his writing. When I read the “beat of a different drummer” in Walden, I was severely underwhelmed. 

Yeah,the man was an abolitionist, which we see in the essay “Slavery in Massachusetts” , but still. Not loving him. ”Civil Disobedience” has a few great points. Such as,”the American people [have] done all that has been accomplished; and would have done somewhat more, if the government had not sometimes got in its way”(2). I think to a certian extent this is true, but I also believe that Americans as a whole are not nessecarily happy, well adjusted,self reliant individuals. One look at CNN reveals that.  (By the way,I definitely in the non-self reliant bit of that.) I think that untill we can set aside our differences and stop murdering and stealing from each other, we will need government. Which is where Mr. Thoreau and I dissagree.

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So in light of my irrevernce to Mr. Thoreau, I decided to poke a little fun at him. You might remember a certain political cartoon from the New Yorker ( which was stupid and blatantly racially insensitive). Well, since I’m not a fan of the cartoon or Thoreau, I decided to spoof it and Thoreau at the same time!

I was debating whether or not to upload the original or not. I’ve decided against it, but if you want to see it, just google “obama new york post political cartoon”.

 

P.S. Please be nice in your comments about this. I spent most of my friday working. Yes, I am aware of how bad that makes my social life look.

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One awesome thing to come out of “Civil Disobedience” is that MLK and his supporters carried it out when the law was unjust. Here’s an audio clip of a speech called “But If Not”. Sorry there’s no text, I couldn’t find the whole text written out, and I didn’t feel like typing out 25 minutes worth of the speech.  I did however, find this quote:

“You refuse to do it because you want to live longer. You’re afraid that you will lose your job, or you are afraid that you will be criticized or that you will lose your popularity, or you’re afraid that somebody will stab or shoot or bomb your house. So you refuse to take a stand.”

I think this quote displays the same additude Thoreau has in “Civil Disobedience” when he talks about “a wise man will only be useful as a man, and will not sumbit to be ‘clay’ “(3). For both men, it’s not enough to recogzine something is wrong; a man isn’t worth anything if he doesn’t do anything about it.

\”But If Not\” Speech

Kant we stop reading Kant?

Okay, I admit that’s a little unfair. He’s a good writer, and I’m sure he’s a great guy….well, to educated white males anyway. It’s funny though, in the Enlightenment (and to some extent today) we want equality for all the people who are like us. Granted, this is a generalization, and I think most of us in this class don’t feel like this, but it still exists.

What’s scary is that Kant writes this as if he is talking about  logical, factual evidence, according to  ”Mr.Hume”.  This, at a time, when we were supposed to be progressing!

There is, however, something I have to say. Yes, Kants work infuriates me. But the funny thing about the first amendment is that as long as our opinion is protected, people whose opinions we don’t like are protected.

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Oh. So for my relation to current events, Mr. Hume, I have two examples (of the many)  for you:

p.s. It was really hard to find a good picture of Colin Powell. He’s not a very happy person in most of the pictures.

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So while I was reading Narrative of the Life of Fredrick Douglass, I couldn’t help but think about comparing Shakespeare and Douglass. Both came from modest educational backgrounds, but have been read for years as examples of literary geniuses. Another interesting connection is that both see all men as equals. Shakespeare wrote Othello, where the title character is not depicted as foolish, despite the color of his skin, and also The Merchants of Venice, which has the “hath a Jew not eyes?” monologue. In Italy, the Jewish community was not literally “slaves” as Douglass and his peers were, but it’s a similar situation.

“I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands,
organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions; fed with the same
food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases,
heal’d by the same means, warm’d and cool’d by the same winter
and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If
you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?
And if you wrong us, do we not revenge? If we are like you in the
rest, we will resemble you in that.”   

-(III.i.49–61)

 

I think if Shakespeare had been a contemporary of Douglass, he would have been an aboltionist. Maybe not one on the Underground Railroad, but I bet he would write about it.

Bonus Picture: