I watched that movie for the first time last year. I was stunned at how good it was. The scene where Beale meets the head of the network is terrifying.
I also thought the meeting when the decided to kill him was jarring. My knee jerk was 'ok this is for the sake of the story...that isn't realistic' But as I mulled on it...its like...who in that room is going to say no? it really gets at how sociopathic organizations can be.
Brilliant .... and disheartening all at once. Happy to say other than catching a college basketball game at Buffalo Wild Wings or watching my Red Sox on MLB, I have not watched a TV show in over 6 years. Giving up TV was easy and honestly reduced my stress, anxiety and anger at what I was watching via the MSM - they are Satan and they are complicit in the downfall we are currently in.
Have never really read your Substack before, but just may start. Happened to link Howard Beal's rant today @https://nothingnewunderthesun2016.com/ after reading The Good Citizen's latest piece. Happened to see your Heinlein comment to John Carter's newest piece so I thought I would check out your writing and saw this piece. Just may start linking some of your writings.
I've never owned a smartphone. When the madness started in 2007/8 I opted out. I thought that it was a bad use of technology. That it was going to create big trouble. Plus I never had any friends, and I liked the idea of being alone. Thanks to the smartphones, I became more isoletad as the smartphone users became also more isolated.
People have changed a lot, in a few ways. They are drunk with the cameras and all the alerts and bells and whistles. When they come off of the intoxicating twitter, instagram or facebook, they often feel ashamed and tired. Like an alcoholic. Never again, the swear to themselves, only to fall again. Poor people. They are so lost.
I guess that at some point people will really be connected to a computer through interfaces in their spine. Reality imitates art.
This feels highly abstract. Perhaps you can help concretize it for me. What should we be learning from history? Further, who is we? Finally, what are those broad and true civic principles?
Yes of course it's abstract. You say that as if it's some kind of indictment...
I never used the word "we."
I could tell you what principles I think are the broad/true ones, but that's beside the point, which is that the "good guys" have none. Consider the historic impact of The Declaration of Independence or The Bill of Rights. By making such statements, and rallying people behind them, the civic movement gained power and meaning and relevance. But in modern times the "good guys" are mostly irrelevant except *maybe*, and *if we are lucky* as some kind of single-issue voting bloc.
I disagree. It’s the compliant, passive ones, the ones who follow all the rules and behave like entitled Ken’s and Karen’s when things aren’t exactly like they’ve been trained like monkeys to believe they should be, like we are all programmed the same as them, or should be, who are our downfall.
Sheeple are mostly afraid of personal responsibility, so they try to avoid it at all cost. This is why big cities are all full of them, in big numbers one can hide one's ineptitude and cowardice, accountability is heavily diluted in large crowds, and morons love that.
On the other hand, really large crowds are much easier managed and influenced by the vile jackals in politics, "nudging" think-tanks doing just that, 24/7.
When famine, cold and blackouts will hit them at full sped and amplitude, they will jump at each other's throats because they will never dare to attack their real enemies, whom they consider almighty gods, told so by their beloved flat screened mind-bending devices.
The armies of economic migrants - who actually hate the locals - will finish the job, by robbing and eventually killing them all.
Small communities can organise much better, but our governments have realised that too, so they keep pumping these "cultural enrichment" armies in the countryside as well, to dilute and break the natural cohesion of the original groups of inhabitants.
Nothing will happen, all frogs will be boiled to death, without even dreaming of thinking to make a move. The fear of being labeled anything that ends in "phobe", racist, bigot and even patriot is paralysing everyone. The West is not dying, the West is committing suicide for many years now. Everything could have been stopped so easy, by simple general non compliance with the crooked legal system, widespread adoption of the common law, proper punishment of the traitors within, and cleanup of the country.
All this did happen, but in reverse, and this is where we are. You are all welcome to keep on dreaming, hoping, praying, petitioning, writing, calling, complaining... it is much too late.
Four Arguments for the Elimination of television by Gerry Mander needs to be resurrected though he might feel differently about the gun comment decades later:
“A total departure from previous writing about television, this book is the first ever to advocate that the medium is not reformable. Its problems are inherent in the technology itself and are so dangerous -- to personal health and sanity, to the environment, and to democratic processes -- that TV ought to be eliminated forever.
Weaving personal experiences through meticulous research, the author ranges widely over aspects of television that have rarely been examined and never before joined together, allowing an entirely new, frightening image to emerge. The idea that all technologies are "neutral," benign instruments that can be used well or badly, is thrown open to profound doubt. Speaking of TV reform is, in the words of the author, "as absurd as speaking of the reform of a technology such as guns."
He calls the television network the Tube. We watch this over a network at a website, YouTube.
When he tells you to turn off the Tube, do you feel inclined to stop the video? Or did you wait, just long enough, to see how it ends, well past the middle of the sentence you knew was coming?
The struggle to end one's addiction to the network begins with recognizing that you are interacting with a tube to talk with others about this. We might remember mocking older Senators for calling it a big world of tubes, but maybe the Senator wasn't so much misinformed but indicating how much more of our networks are now The Network. It's one big Tube, and You are in it.
Enjoyed the reflection. So has anything changed in the last 40 odd years? If anything the isolation and drift toward even more dependency has increased. Secularism has diminished any thought of a force greater than the self leaving a huge hole that a religious sense was once used to fill. Morality has achieved perfection by being totally relative to the circumstance; youth fears nothing, everything is OK if your local tribe accepts it. Of course, like all generalizations it's not true.
Some of us, maybe those who follow these pages, are likely to be independent thinkers mostly because we read and ponder meaning. We are more likely to be suspicious of what others say or do. Perhaps we actually ask why.
In 1976 we were seeing the end to a period of prosperity and hubris about the future. Poor Mr Ford, a decent guy (probably too decent) was replaced by Carter. But the excesses of the late 60's arrived to doom Carter much like the excesses of 2009 now doom Biden. The people arriving in office are affected considerably by earlier times.
Bit of self sufficiency might insulate us from the coming problems. With a growing distrust in our leaders we may be able to just squeak by. At least I have hope the more will discover how much damage these experts have caused.
I watched that movie for the first time last year. I was stunned at how good it was. The scene where Beale meets the head of the network is terrifying.
I also thought the meeting when the decided to kill him was jarring. My knee jerk was 'ok this is for the sake of the story...that isn't realistic' But as I mulled on it...its like...who in that room is going to say no? it really gets at how sociopathic organizations can be.
Yes.
They are psychopaths, lacking a human conscience. It is my opinion they lack a human soul as well.
The more things change, the more they stay the same. It’s so disheartening (& frankly, frightening)….
Classic monologues. The verbal currency of satisfying populist rants are never subject to inflation due to scarcity.
heh
Brilliant .... and disheartening all at once. Happy to say other than catching a college basketball game at Buffalo Wild Wings or watching my Red Sox on MLB, I have not watched a TV show in over 6 years. Giving up TV was easy and honestly reduced my stress, anxiety and anger at what I was watching via the MSM - they are Satan and they are complicit in the downfall we are currently in.
That’s rather concrete -- the TV 📺 of 1976 not only includes the TV but the WSJ, Atlantic, NY Times of 2022.
🗞
Have never really read your Substack before, but just may start. Happened to link Howard Beal's rant today @https://nothingnewunderthesun2016.com/ after reading The Good Citizen's latest piece. Happened to see your Heinlein comment to John Carter's newest piece so I thought I would check out your writing and saw this piece. Just may start linking some of your writings.
You may like some things and not others :)
That's Ok, if we were all the same would be a pretty boring world!!!!
The most important one is the Coleys toxins piece front and center though I haven’t talked about it much of late.
I've never owned a smartphone. When the madness started in 2007/8 I opted out. I thought that it was a bad use of technology. That it was going to create big trouble. Plus I never had any friends, and I liked the idea of being alone. Thanks to the smartphones, I became more isoletad as the smartphone users became also more isolated.
People have changed a lot, in a few ways. They are drunk with the cameras and all the alerts and bells and whistles. When they come off of the intoxicating twitter, instagram or facebook, they often feel ashamed and tired. Like an alcoholic. Never again, the swear to themselves, only to fall again. Poor people. They are so lost.
I guess that at some point people will really be connected to a computer through interfaces in their spine. Reality imitates art.
The problem isn't the zombies it's the "good guys" who don't learn from history and never coalesce around broad/true civic principles.
This feels highly abstract. Perhaps you can help concretize it for me. What should we be learning from history? Further, who is we? Finally, what are those broad and true civic principles?
Cheers
Yes of course it's abstract. You say that as if it's some kind of indictment...
I never used the word "we."
I could tell you what principles I think are the broad/true ones, but that's beside the point, which is that the "good guys" have none. Consider the historic impact of The Declaration of Independence or The Bill of Rights. By making such statements, and rallying people behind them, the civic movement gained power and meaning and relevance. But in modern times the "good guys" are mostly irrelevant except *maybe*, and *if we are lucky* as some kind of single-issue voting bloc.
These are honest questions. I’m not trying to be coy.
I’m trying to figure out whether I agree.
You’ve narrowed it down a little in that it feels like you’re talking about the US in particular. OK.
What’s the single issue? Do you think there is a single defining issue or a hill to die on?
I'm citing principles on which the US was based, these apply to humanity generally, so no I'm not talking about the US in particular.
A lot of the "good guys" are focused on "health freedom."
I don't see a single issue unless it's that reason should prevail.
Got it. I agree with the general thrust of what you’re saying, actually.
(I just don’t think voting or seizing power is how it’s achieved.)
I never mentioned either of those. The core problem is in finding consensus on formally articulated, rationally justified principles.
I disagree. It’s the compliant, passive ones, the ones who follow all the rules and behave like entitled Ken’s and Karen’s when things aren’t exactly like they’ve been trained like monkeys to believe they should be, like we are all programmed the same as them, or should be, who are our downfall.
Refusing to coalesce around principle is a kind of passivity, so your disagreement is really an agreement in a key sense.
☠️
Sheeple are mostly afraid of personal responsibility, so they try to avoid it at all cost. This is why big cities are all full of them, in big numbers one can hide one's ineptitude and cowardice, accountability is heavily diluted in large crowds, and morons love that.
On the other hand, really large crowds are much easier managed and influenced by the vile jackals in politics, "nudging" think-tanks doing just that, 24/7.
When famine, cold and blackouts will hit them at full sped and amplitude, they will jump at each other's throats because they will never dare to attack their real enemies, whom they consider almighty gods, told so by their beloved flat screened mind-bending devices.
The armies of economic migrants - who actually hate the locals - will finish the job, by robbing and eventually killing them all.
Small communities can organise much better, but our governments have realised that too, so they keep pumping these "cultural enrichment" armies in the countryside as well, to dilute and break the natural cohesion of the original groups of inhabitants.
Nothing will happen, all frogs will be boiled to death, without even dreaming of thinking to make a move. The fear of being labeled anything that ends in "phobe", racist, bigot and even patriot is paralysing everyone. The West is not dying, the West is committing suicide for many years now. Everything could have been stopped so easy, by simple general non compliance with the crooked legal system, widespread adoption of the common law, proper punishment of the traitors within, and cleanup of the country.
All this did happen, but in reverse, and this is where we are. You are all welcome to keep on dreaming, hoping, praying, petitioning, writing, calling, complaining... it is much too late.
This is it, and it is well deserved.
Enjoy.
Four Arguments for the Elimination of television by Gerry Mander needs to be resurrected though he might feel differently about the gun comment decades later:
“A total departure from previous writing about television, this book is the first ever to advocate that the medium is not reformable. Its problems are inherent in the technology itself and are so dangerous -- to personal health and sanity, to the environment, and to democratic processes -- that TV ought to be eliminated forever.
Weaving personal experiences through meticulous research, the author ranges widely over aspects of television that have rarely been examined and never before joined together, allowing an entirely new, frightening image to emerge. The idea that all technologies are "neutral," benign instruments that can be used well or badly, is thrown open to profound doubt. Speaking of TV reform is, in the words of the author, "as absurd as speaking of the reform of a technology such as guns."
He calls the television network the Tube. We watch this over a network at a website, YouTube.
When he tells you to turn off the Tube, do you feel inclined to stop the video? Or did you wait, just long enough, to see how it ends, well past the middle of the sentence you knew was coming?
The struggle to end one's addiction to the network begins with recognizing that you are interacting with a tube to talk with others about this. We might remember mocking older Senators for calling it a big world of tubes, but maybe the Senator wasn't so much misinformed but indicating how much more of our networks are now The Network. It's one big Tube, and You are in it.
Enjoyed the reflection. So has anything changed in the last 40 odd years? If anything the isolation and drift toward even more dependency has increased. Secularism has diminished any thought of a force greater than the self leaving a huge hole that a religious sense was once used to fill. Morality has achieved perfection by being totally relative to the circumstance; youth fears nothing, everything is OK if your local tribe accepts it. Of course, like all generalizations it's not true.
Some of us, maybe those who follow these pages, are likely to be independent thinkers mostly because we read and ponder meaning. We are more likely to be suspicious of what others say or do. Perhaps we actually ask why.
In 1976 we were seeing the end to a period of prosperity and hubris about the future. Poor Mr Ford, a decent guy (probably too decent) was replaced by Carter. But the excesses of the late 60's arrived to doom Carter much like the excesses of 2009 now doom Biden. The people arriving in office are affected considerably by earlier times.
Bit of self sufficiency might insulate us from the coming problems. With a growing distrust in our leaders we may be able to just squeak by. At least I have hope the more will discover how much damage these experts have caused.
Thanks for putting this on my radar! Looks like a movie I’ll really enjoy.
Brilliant! I too have been referencing this monologue for over 2 years.