Here are some videos I found with Jerry Mander on the topic of sustainability of our way of life on this planet.
Mander is the author of “Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television”, a very well thought out and well organized book on, not just television, but capitalism, and our widening separation from the natural world through technology.
Based on my comments from my last post, I wanted to include these videos as well. The first two are only a few minutes long. The last one is around 50 minutes long.
If these embedded videos don’t work well, you can also find them on FORA.tv.
As wit my last post, I’ll write my take on these videos in the comments section.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Sunday, February 22, 2009
The Crash Course
This is a website my dad sent me. From ChrisMartenson.com. It’s a condensed assessment on the difficulties of sustaining our way of life on this planet.
Worth checking out. There are 20 chapters. I didn’t time it exactly, but if you watch the videos straight through, it’ll take about two hours. But it goes by quickly (I would open two windows so you can have the next chapter(s) ready and then just leap frog between windows).
Anyway, here is the link:
The Crash Course
I’ll write my comments in the comments section of this post so you can develop your own opinions before looking at mine.
Worth checking out. There are 20 chapters. I didn’t time it exactly, but if you watch the videos straight through, it’ll take about two hours. But it goes by quickly (I would open two windows so you can have the next chapter(s) ready and then just leap frog between windows).
Anyway, here is the link:
The Crash Course
I’ll write my comments in the comments section of this post so you can develop your own opinions before looking at mine.
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Thoughts on Fast Food Nation, 1984, Brave New World, Ishmael, and Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television
After scouring Dave’s ESL Café most of last night reading about teaching in Korea or Vietnam, well, it was exciting at first, but looked like there were a few problems with housing expenses in Vietnam and various other crap with pay in Korea. As I’ve mentioned some time ago, I just don’t think I have it in me to travel overseas again. The travel bug has long been dealt with. I wish I still had it, but I’m pretty sure I don’t.
Well, I guess the real problem is not the what-have-you that I would have to deal with over there. It’s more that I know nothing would be that different for me over there than it is here. Not being driven to go from my own motivation would make it an aimless wandering.
There is something else in my mind that I need to take care of that will not be fixed this time by changing my geographic location.
I don’t know why, but the more I read Fast Food Nation, the more I feel the urge to stay here in the US. I mean, it’s not like that book or the chain of books I’ve been reading are giving me a positive view of America. They’re not. But, like, it seems with the kind of attention books like Fast Food Nation are bringing to Americans there might be changes on the way, and that I may be able to take some part in it.
Though, it’s hard to say. The type of problems we’re going into, like with the economic situation, are not really too different than what has happened in the past. The late 1800s had difficulties with large corporations becoming more powerful than government. And, yeah, there was The Sherman Act to break up the trusts. But it’s 2009 now, and what has really changed?
I suppose people have always got to stand up to counter those who would try to get away with atrocities. And it’s not like I think no one should. But I also want to have some idea of an attainable endpoint.
When I read books like Ishmael, Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television, and Fast Food Nation, it just, to me, looks like America is set up to be the way it is, the way it has been. I’m just not sure what will change the course that we’re on.
When I was writing ways to pass unicru, I also mentioned that the whole premise of the test was something out of Orwell’s 1984. But thinking about it now, it seems more like Huxley’s Brave New World. Unicru tests look for Epsilons and Gammas. Unicru is systematically putting people in their places in an overt way.
If not for the overtness, I’d say that life is like this anyway…that everyone has different aptitudes and will find different places in life. But the way things are set up now, large corporations are narrowing the parameters to a more homogenous base that is going to keep excluding more and more people in the population. Frankly, I think what is really happening in the US is more frightening than what happened in BNW or 1984.
But like in 1984, I though the way Winston did. That the answer lies in the Proles. But the Proles weren’t concerned. And even if they were, what power would they have to do anything?
Even worse, in Huxley’s Brave New World, people didn’t even know they were captive. So long as they had their soma, they were happy. (In America, TV and drugs are our soma.) When the savage tried to free the Deltas by throwing the soma out the window, they were just perplexed and threw a fit.
In Ishmael, all the animals in the zoo were in captivity. But different animals had different capacities of comprehending their captivity. All of the animals knew something wasn’t right. But, for example, all the tiger was able to ask was, “Why, why, why, why?” Whereas the gorilla (Ishmael) asked (to the effect of), “Why is the life outside of captivity interesting and pleasant and the life in captivity boring and unpleasant?”
For me, I see why. So I think, “How can this be changed?”
Well, I guess the real problem is not the what-have-you that I would have to deal with over there. It’s more that I know nothing would be that different for me over there than it is here. Not being driven to go from my own motivation would make it an aimless wandering.
There is something else in my mind that I need to take care of that will not be fixed this time by changing my geographic location.
I don’t know why, but the more I read Fast Food Nation, the more I feel the urge to stay here in the US. I mean, it’s not like that book or the chain of books I’ve been reading are giving me a positive view of America. They’re not. But, like, it seems with the kind of attention books like Fast Food Nation are bringing to Americans there might be changes on the way, and that I may be able to take some part in it.
Though, it’s hard to say. The type of problems we’re going into, like with the economic situation, are not really too different than what has happened in the past. The late 1800s had difficulties with large corporations becoming more powerful than government. And, yeah, there was The Sherman Act to break up the trusts. But it’s 2009 now, and what has really changed?
I suppose people have always got to stand up to counter those who would try to get away with atrocities. And it’s not like I think no one should. But I also want to have some idea of an attainable endpoint.
When I read books like Ishmael, Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television, and Fast Food Nation, it just, to me, looks like America is set up to be the way it is, the way it has been. I’m just not sure what will change the course that we’re on.
When I was writing ways to pass unicru, I also mentioned that the whole premise of the test was something out of Orwell’s 1984. But thinking about it now, it seems more like Huxley’s Brave New World. Unicru tests look for Epsilons and Gammas. Unicru is systematically putting people in their places in an overt way.
If not for the overtness, I’d say that life is like this anyway…that everyone has different aptitudes and will find different places in life. But the way things are set up now, large corporations are narrowing the parameters to a more homogenous base that is going to keep excluding more and more people in the population. Frankly, I think what is really happening in the US is more frightening than what happened in BNW or 1984.
But like in 1984, I though the way Winston did. That the answer lies in the Proles. But the Proles weren’t concerned. And even if they were, what power would they have to do anything?
Even worse, in Huxley’s Brave New World, people didn’t even know they were captive. So long as they had their soma, they were happy. (In America, TV and drugs are our soma.) When the savage tried to free the Deltas by throwing the soma out the window, they were just perplexed and threw a fit.
In Ishmael, all the animals in the zoo were in captivity. But different animals had different capacities of comprehending their captivity. All of the animals knew something wasn’t right. But, for example, all the tiger was able to ask was, “Why, why, why, why?” Whereas the gorilla (Ishmael) asked (to the effect of), “Why is the life outside of captivity interesting and pleasant and the life in captivity boring and unpleasant?”
For me, I see why. So I think, “How can this be changed?”
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Song that has been stuck in my head…
Note: I don’t really want to go to Boston, it’s just...I mean if you heard the song then you...Yeah. I’m going to stop now.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Pseudo ex-pat or ex-pat in denial?
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…The mug and chopsticks holder are from Daiso (a 百えん or dollar shop equivalent that is popular in Japan). The bowl and chopsticks are from a Vietnamese supermarket in the International District...
Ok, I wrote that opener a few weeks ago. Today I went to the international district again and bought bok choy and mochi. I’m not going to say this is getting out of hand...well, I mean, I really haven’t written enough to suggest that I am...but, like, I don’t know. I guess I could be happy that I have access to food from Asia while living here in Seattle. Like the best of both worlds. And, really, when I was living in Japan, I got excited when there was a Pizza Hut and a grocery store that carried American products.
Well, availability of certain foods is one thing, but a sense of doing something worthwhile with your time is quite another. (I’m sure there’s a better way to say that.) When I was reading Fast Food Nation the other day and came across that line (written in the title section in the previous post), that just pretty much surmised what I feel...well, what I know people are thinking about where I am and what I appear to be pursuing.
The chapter that quote was from was even more profound, if not disconcerting. That statement was made to a person who had done better things in his life but circumstances ended up pressuring him to find his way in the construct of this corporate society. At the time he was attending a travel agent class and his instructor asked him said question. While he is “doing well” now (he owns about 5 Little Caesar’s Pizza joints), it’s still not really where he fits in.
For me, having seen more than what this country has to offer, it’s difficult to just settle back in and pretend that the things people value here really matter to me. Nonetheless, I’m starting to see some opportunities here and I’m investigating them. But I wonder if I’ll ever do anything as important or significant as what I was doing overseas. Yes, there was crap in the EFL industry, but ultimately, at the end of the day, I felt I was doing something worth my time.
I left Taiwan because I felt if I stayed I’d run out of the money I’d saved from Japan and end up stuck there in a rat race. I thought certainly, I’d have good opportunities in Seattle, especially with my background. But as I’ve been unable to get into the salaried fields I wanted to get into and with higher costs of living and health care in the US, I’m starting to think this could be an even worse rat race.
To go back overseas could make me look fickle, like I can’t make up my mind. But as I’d learned early on when I came back to Seattle from Taiwan...you can never “go back” (or “come back”). Time only moves forward. What I took with me from Taiwan is different than when I’d left a year earlier. So, if I were to go back overseas, it wouldn’t be the same as before. I’d take what I’ve learned here with me.
Of course, one thing I’d learned looking at Taiwan in hindsight is that maybe I should try sticking it out longer before trying something else. There are reasons I came back from Taiwan. So, I’ll keep trying to find something here. But if things don’t work out... ha ha! As I said when I was hemming and hawing over this on the other side almost two years ago...I still have that TEFL Certificate.
(Hmm...actually, this isn’t the post that I said it. But there was one where I said I still have that TEFL Certificate. Still, that post I’ve linked to is interesting to read since I was in Taiwan at the time.)
Sunday, February 1, 2009
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