Last night The Liar took a beating. It was clear. The exit polls show, though, that only a small majority of viewers saw it that way. What can we do? Stupid is rampant.
And who is responsible? Academia. It is they who rushed to embrace postmodernism and deconstruction and iconoclastic argument without discipline. They put forth a new language without a complete dictionary. Derrida's teachings are tough stuff. But what university students got were the Cliff's Notes version from wankers trying to make a name in the New Academy. As a result, people now major in the practical degrees and eschew the Arts and Sciences. And those who do go through studies in one of the liberal arts come out with an idea that everything is equal.
But they are the only ones.
The right has embraced deconstructionism as a tool that doesn't require them to believe in it. Hell, they don't even understand it. They only know it works to their advantage. There is no "authority" to which one can now appeal. Fuck the fact checkers. Say what you want. Everything is false. Everything is true.
A friend of mine who has a recent college degree talks gobbledegook all the time. When I ask her where she got her facts, she cites ridiculous internet sources. I try to tell her that ideas need to be vetted, that things need to be verifiable and replicable, but, hey man, that's old school full of the old biases. That is part of the old Master Narrative designed to help those in power keep it.
I love that stuff, so what can I do? When The Liar gets caught in a lie, he just says it isn't. There are no facts. There is no truth. Everything is what you make it.
Oh my. I've done it again. There is nothing in my life to report, and now I've opined. Opinions are dreadful stuff at best. I try so hard to avoid recording them, but I have a dearth of material to draw on just now. I must go back to the little nothings of life, small non-events that can be so surprising to gaze upon if one views at them carefully and correctly.
I will try.
yup stoopid. part of the price we pay. not so bad that they are, what's bad is when they get bought, & paid for.It is cautionary to recall bread & circuses, after all. "And remember, he said, "corporation are people too." Heinlein predicted a religious dictatorship in 2012 in 1940. The coalition of the rich & the stoopid is an old one, the easily led are the cheapest marks.
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteI have squandered my resistance
For a pocket full of mumbles such are promises
All lies and jests
Still a man hears what he wants to hear
And disregards the rest
the boxer, simon & garfunkel
Lute, Bread and Circuses. A nice reminder. I shall take it for my theme.
ReplyDeleteL, Everybody loves the sound of a train in the distance/ Everybody thinks it's true (simon and garfunkel).
They sure hit the nail on the head at times.