One day I came upon a plastic figurine of an Native American among my son's playthings and I immediately marveled over the fact that it had never once occurred to my son to murder that redskin!
I spent my youth playing cowboys/settlers and Indians and the poor natives NEVER won. To be fair, I also spent countless hours hunting Nazis and Japs but I was (not that I was consciously aware of it, especially at the time) a victim of my environment. We'd play all day and watch Rawhide, Gunsmoke, McHales Navy and Twelve O'clock High/Rat Patrol/Hogan's Heroes at night.
Ironically, when Star Trek/Lost in Space came along, didn't we channel our energy into killing aliens just as zealously.
So when I see how this phenomenon has been 'adapted' to our current cultural soup, I am alarmed to note the 're-imagining' of the past, where the facts are being 'massaged' to protect the guilty. (Perhaps the most glaring example of this is 'Morning in America', also known as the Reagan years (the worst presidency ever!) The only ones saying otherwise are those too young to remember what it was really like!
But I digress, the topic is how easily your perceptions are altered. Now what does this have to do with writing?
Everything, it all begins with ideas on paper!
One of my 'alter ego's' favorite questions is 'How can you be expected to make correct decisions without accurate information?'
Well, good citizen, this applies to you as well. How will we save ourselves/our children from those who control the eye that never blinks?
Maybe you should have a word with your congressman next time you bump into him/her...oh, that's right, they live in Washington, you NEVER bump into them! (and they've been re-elected how many times?)
Here's an idea, maybe you can write to them (not that they'll read what you communicate, they have 'people' for that...)
But once again I digress, let us return to that plastic figurine and how it never occurred to my son to kill it? (A decidedly good thing.)
Now reflect for a moment on how the 'eye that never blinks' is molding our children's tomorrow.
Can you say (anything but) "reality TV' But those young, impressionable minds don't know that, what, you kids watch Anime?
Now be afraid, be very afraid (because they're raising a bunch of 'Pollyannas' and we can only wonder why?)
I spent my youth playing cowboys/settlers and Indians and the poor natives NEVER won. To be fair, I also spent countless hours hunting Nazis and Japs but I was (not that I was consciously aware of it, especially at the time) a victim of my environment. We'd play all day and watch Rawhide, Gunsmoke, McHales Navy and Twelve O'clock High/Rat Patrol/Hogan's Heroes at night.
Ironically, when Star Trek/Lost in Space came along, didn't we channel our energy into killing aliens just as zealously.
So when I see how this phenomenon has been 'adapted' to our current cultural soup, I am alarmed to note the 're-imagining' of the past, where the facts are being 'massaged' to protect the guilty. (Perhaps the most glaring example of this is 'Morning in America', also known as the Reagan years (the worst presidency ever!) The only ones saying otherwise are those too young to remember what it was really like!
But I digress, the topic is how easily your perceptions are altered. Now what does this have to do with writing?
Everything, it all begins with ideas on paper!
One of my 'alter ego's' favorite questions is 'How can you be expected to make correct decisions without accurate information?'
Well, good citizen, this applies to you as well. How will we save ourselves/our children from those who control the eye that never blinks?
Maybe you should have a word with your congressman next time you bump into him/her...oh, that's right, they live in Washington, you NEVER bump into them! (and they've been re-elected how many times?)
Here's an idea, maybe you can write to them (not that they'll read what you communicate, they have 'people' for that...)
But once again I digress, let us return to that plastic figurine and how it never occurred to my son to kill it? (A decidedly good thing.)
Now reflect for a moment on how the 'eye that never blinks' is molding our children's tomorrow.
Can you say (anything but) "reality TV' But those young, impressionable minds don't know that, what, you kids watch Anime?
Now be afraid, be very afraid (because they're raising a bunch of 'Pollyannas' and we can only wonder why?)
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