Thin Line Between Entertainment and War

Panem et circenses (bread and circuses)- The war gives us the former, the entertainment the latter. You might think one would need more than that to rule a nation of 300 million, but you'd be wrong. At one point it was very clear when a war was on. It was an all out, no holds barred, struggle for supremacy in which a draw was impossible. The rival armies would even have the decency to pick a good spot for the slaughter, meet up, and then just go for it; winner takes all. Entertainment too was a far more straightforward affair. You would go to a theater, watch a show, the curtain would fall and then it was over. You would get up, chat a bit about what you saw, perhaps think on it, then you go home to bed. Well, sadly these two once clearly defined and immensely popular activities have fallen from superb simplicity and into an abyss of ambiguity. America hasn't declared war since 1941, yet we have military forces in over a 100 countries. We don't even have a Secretary of War anymore, just one of Defence. What our government calls 'Wars' are really just aimless campaigns, the purpose of which seems to be perpetually changed for the public. I've no doubt that the powers that be would prefer a real war, but since no one wants to have a war with us, they must content themselves with just occupying regions for economic ends. They seem almost insincere when compared with other wars throughout history. To a historian like me it seems as though we are trying to perform Shakespeare with bad actors and a rewritten script. Which brings me to my second point on this pointless rant- Entertainment. This once brilliant outlet for mans imagination has also suffered greatly, and been diminished into a all day fiasco. Instead of the once a week to the theater, orchestra, poetry reading etc. we now have a media web surrounding and permeating our whole lives. Maybe movies haven't been getting worse, perhaps we just can't enjoy them because it's all we see, one repetitive day after the next. TV even goes so far to make entertainment out of reality, aptly called Reality TV. This officially shows that entertainment has taken over the entire culture, because it can all now fit neatly inside their programing scheme. The same could be said for war. You watch any news coverage of the so called 'war' in Iraq and it's just another show, or perhaps even a sporting event. Although our overseas conflicts have gotten farcical to the point of absurdity, the domestic war is very much real. If you are capable of tearing your eyes away from the media you see soaring prison populations, ethnic tensions, the police in all its various forms, and economic factors are all contributing to make life inside America anything but peaceful. The rich live in walled communities with outrageous security because they are so terrified, need I say anymore? This would all seem unusual if this was just one wild nation dancing to a tune no one else hears, but by God, the rest are starting to do the American Shuffle too! This thin line between entertainment and war is quickly becoming the foundation for every government on the entire planet. Democracy is a hollow word when it is seen as just another entertaining thing they show on TV and talk about on the internet. So is freedom for that matter. How free is anyone who will panic without enemies or get bored for a lack of colorful screens to stare at? Luckily I'm a student of history, and thus am never forced to face these strange occurrences without the ages to offer me gems that both comfort and disturb. Two thousand years ago Juvenal said this, it could have been written yesterday and still be valid:
"... Already long ago, from when we sold our vote to no man,
the People have abdicated our duties; for the People who once upon a time
handed out military command, high civil office, legions - everything, now
restrains itself and anxiously hopes for just two things:
bread and circuses "

Which way is home?

As we rumble along this wild adventure called humanity the road seems ever more uncertain the further we go. Sort of like one of those country roads that starts out paved, then goes to gravel, then dirt, till finally you are just driving on something your not even sure is a road anymore, but is too narrow to turn around on. Such seems to be our predicament. One result of this is that a trend towards assumption seems to be taking deep root the more lost we get. This is a time honored tradition for mankind, but the levels it is reaching in my lifetime are getting to dizzying new heights. To me this indicates a sort of unconscious reaction to the mounting evidence that we are: A) transient compositions of subatomic particles laking any definite form B) behaving more like bacteria than mammals C) have no idea what we are doing or why we are doing it. Reactionary rhetoric is bound to occur when people find themselves confused and/or scared, such is the nature of modern man. The only real problem with this is that instead of just comforting ourselves with our words and shenanigans we have now made a destructive habit of changing our surroundings to conform with them. I'm not big on pointing fingers at people or groups of people, and thus will not blame anyone for this monstrosity. Now this is a really nice planet, and I hate to see it be needlessly destroyed because humans have issues, but it's a big universe so I'm not all that horribly upset. After all, we are all just leasing our carbon and if we as a species choose to just shit on everything around us, then the sooner we will be returning it. Having said that I can't help but want mankind to start enjoying our place without this frivolously fanatic fantasy that we so ironically call progress. When it is all boiled down, most human behavior can be categorized as entertainment. We prefer to think of it as something else, but we are really just doing our damnedest to distract ourselves from the minuteness of our place and that we can't do a damn thing about it but fuck with each other in a last ditch effort to avoid facing the reality that surrounds our little globe on all sides. The poor assume they deserve more and the rich assume they should keep what they have; that's a classic drama that always gets good reviews. Here's a more time specific example- America feels her position of authority is threatened by others, others feel threatened by America's position of authority. Let us get even more personal- I want this to happen and that not to happen in my life; probably the most popular skit of all time. Now don't get me wrong, all this is entertaining as hell, but at some point the curtain must fall on this show. If I'm around I'll give it all a standing ovation, but refrain from requesting an encore. Humans used to just wander around earth enjoying the twin pleasures of our omnivore status all day and our ability to contemplate the cosmic mystery at night. Since then we have tilled a lot of soil, built a lot of cities and fought a lot of wars, but found a better existence we have not. I would just like to see a shift from presumption towards honesty- let's admit we don't know shit.

Inter caecos regnat strabo

"History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce." -Karl Marx
That quote might very well be the most succinct reason why I feel that the study of history is the most important of all academic pursuits. One great historian named Jacob Burckhardt prophesied on the dawn of the 20th century that it would be the age of the 'terrible simplifiers'. His prediction of demagogic rule by leaders of profoundly pedantic persuasions was proven to be absolutely accurate. Many people like to think that we have learned from the horrid lessons of the 20th century, but such doesn't appear to be the case to mine eyes. President Bush is nothing if not a 'terrible simplifier'. Pretty much anyone who claims you can declare war on a noun is nothing but a shameless opportunist of the worst sort. The thing about such people is that their power lay in their ability 'to mobilise the collective subconscious' as Sebastian Haffner put it. His power isn't purely institutional, although that is a large part of it. It would seem that the 40 some odd years of scare propaganda from the cold war has now become systemic; fear is now as American as apple pie. All the war protests in the world won't accomplish anything but giving the government an all to easy opportunity to single out trouble makers and raise the spectre of social chaos that always helps to legitimize any authority. Despite some promising developments the 'terrible simplifiers' seem to be as popular as ever- Ahmadinejad, Bush, Chavez etc. They all play the same game. One that was a tragedy in the age of Hitler, but now just a pathetic farce that shows just how completely hopeless democracy can be when people are primarily concerned with themselves. The Age of the Individual seems to have institutionalized 'terrible simplifiers' into our world, to which i can only quote Erasmus' immortal words- "Amongst the blind, the squinting rule".

Sic transit gloria mundi

it's the destiny of things big and small

first to slowly rise then forever fall

a feature long observed by man

but bigger than he is this plan

these my friends are the rules

want it different? join the fools

build up castles made of sand

will not change the dealt hand

occasionally we are want to yearn

for something more than our turn

this consuming constructed craving

will only lead towards aimless raving

it shouldn't be the way of this occasion

despite our desperate contemplation

if you gaze into the heavenly mirror

you'll see that we've nothing to fear

if you can fathom our deep place

you'll only see immortal grace

the void is our only true home

thus are we first here, then gone

Don't trip on the trip

The wheel of time is spinning so fast
how much longer can it really last?
stranded in a candidly quiet galaxy
kind of makes me happy to be me
for otherwise I might be unhappy
people can complain and go insane
I'm happy to be here all the same
this is really the only show in town
so try and not bring others down
this is a great epic space sojourn
and we all play our parts in turn
it isn't even like we can really fail
in the end we all can only prevail

Our Age

As I gaze upon the complete complexity and amorphous ambiguity of the modern world I can't help but ponder what others will call this phase when it is all said and done. For no matter how weird it gets, it is all just a phase, or perhaps a wild tangent, in the evolution of humanity. Perhaps a silly thing to spend my time contemplating, but it just will not leave my brain alone. Thus I try to exorcise the thought unto my blog and into other minds. Now an age can last a very long time, like the Bronze Age (a little over 2,000 years) or a mere decade like the Jazz Age. Historians, like most academics, are shameless hacks that feed off of each others imagination like a tribe of starving cannibals. Not being critical, I hope to some day make contributions to that frenzied orgy of thought. I'm just commenting that for every real thinker, there are about a thousand intellectual leeches. Anyway, a new age certainly began with the fall of Soviet Russia in 1991 and it goes on still to this day. This Age is notable for several rather interesting developments. One is that for the first time since The Age of Discovery a single nation has militarily, culturally and politically dominated the entire planet, with only paltry and pathetic opposition thus far. However, calling it the Age of America would miss the point I feel. For as I see it, America is only the champion, not the creator, of what drives this present epoch. The real foundation of this era resides in the preeminence of something that is commonly called Capitalism. Unfortunately this term has been so completely abused, misused and confused that it really is just an hollow word, and consequently won't do for a name of our age. But what is the basis of this thing called money that rules everything around me? It seems pretty plain that it is the glorification of the individual that it incarnates. That you are #1 and need only look out for your own interests. This is a radical departure from the religious piety and chauvinistic patriotism of previous Ages. Sure, people where opportunists then too, but they at least tried to cloak their intentions. This last week a study was released that stated that the world now has 946 billionaires. This would seem savagely selfish considering that a billion people live on less than a dollar a day, but that isn't the prevalent paradigm of this Age. Sure, most of the world doesn't like it, but then again most of the world is poor and affraid, so the show goes on unabated. Communities and countries are being dissolved a bit more with each passing day as traditional society crumbles amid the chaos of the present. Ruling individuals is fare easier than dominating distinct groups of people (eg Chechens, Basques, Communists, African-Americans, Pashtuns, and just about anybody else with a sense of communal destiny). In recent years we have seen groups struggle for survival as the rest of the world hops on board the global economic movement, in which ones own ambitions must take precedence over all else. I'm not saying that this is the sum total of our Age, merely the trend that seems to dominate all other features of human society in this fascinating chapter in the book of Man- The Age of the Individual

Protests

Protesting is one of the more interesting things that modern society has brought to us. Rebellion, tyrannicide, revolution, secession- these things have been around for ages, but this whole organized public complaining is rather nouveau. As I was reading the news today three rather interesting examples caught my eye. The picture above is from St. Petersburg where a Chess Grandmaster who is running for president lead an anti-Putin demonstration that ended with people getting arrested and one bad ass old lady kicking a steel riot shield (how priceless is that pic?). The other was some Danish kids demonstrating in a way that is part protest and part vandalism. A youth house that some 400 kids had been squatting in for years was recently cleared by authorities with the result of making them burn and throw things at law enforcement. This is generally called a riot, which seems to be what a protest evolves into when the people are serious about getting attention, or perhaps just letting off steam. Yet another example was seen in Zimbabwe, where protesting isn't really allowed on account of Robert Mugabe not finding it amusing. Now these people actually have something to protest- drought, food shortages, economic chaos, skyrocketing HIV/AIDS rates, and a full blown Dictatorship. All three of these protests were overcome by the tried and true technique of taking hostages, or as governments prefer to call it, arrests. In each case several hundred were arrested and then things chilled out. I guess that is the definition of a protest- complaining right up until the authorities crack down, at which time you either continue and make it a riot, or disperse and make it a waste of time.

Cowardice

Of all the worlds we could have made, this is the one we did. That isn't meant to be cynical, merely concisely honest. As a historian I know how we got here, but as a person I must ask why. At present, the only answer that comes to mind is cowardice. People will do just about anything if they are afraid. It can make one compromise every moral, break every vow, betray anyone and do things you sincerely thought yourself incapable of. Fear is the way in which all authority is established, expanded and maintained. By authority I mean the phenomenon in which one person or group gives orders and another follows them. Each revolution was the result of people caring more about a cause than their own safety. Consequently they were able to overthrow a regime; lamentably only to establish new ones. All the great things man has ever done was the result of overcoming that craven weakness that dims the soul and displaces the heart. Mankind is really only separated from the animal kingdom in that we scare and then do things completely out of harmony with the rest of the planet. One common way in which people deal with it is to inspire fear in others in an attempt to cloak their own, both from others and themselves. Apathy is another common defensive measure people use to counter being scared. It is said that the shrugging of ones shoulders is a behavioral trait that dates back to the Reign of Terror in the French Revolution. Everyday people would gather round the guillotine to watch the executions and would instinctively cringe when the blade fell. After 20,000 heads had rolled the novelty had worn off, but not the innate twinge at seeing something as awful as another person being decapitated. I see this trait alive today when people are confronted with evil. They prefer to follow in the Parisians footsteps and shrug, as opposed to doing something about it. So much simpler to be complicit as opposed to explicit. How much easier to chase after money rather than ones dreams. I deeply believe that all humans are born with hearts of resplendent valor that can only be tamed through many years of organized effort on the part of others. A wise leader once stated 'we have nothing to fear but fear itself'. Humanity must take that statement to heart if we hope for our lot to improve.