celebrity rapists?

Gus Silber (@gussilber) tweeted this last weekend – “Samsung have survived & thrived through mimicry; Nokia & RIM have failed by being themselves” bit.ly/MTsaIA

– is this to be the epitaph on the grave stone of modern music?… revealing that as an “industry” it has survived & thrived through mimicry and the pursuit of materialistic gain … with artistic integrity, authentic creativity and originality having all failed by being themselves?

and what about “worship” music and the religious gospel music “industry” which seems to follow these same materialistic trends in a vain attempt to be more “relevant”… what will its epitaph read?

… and what about these “IDOLS” type shows?

… what part have they played in the wholesale rape of authentic art and the dignity of ethnic cultures and their authentic art? … and all for the sake of materialistic gain

… and what about these “celebrities” who steer this cancerous rape of art and culture by sitting on the sensationalist and manipulative judging panels just to further their own careers … what will their epitaphs reveal?

… and what about us? … what will be our legacy? … we who watch and applaud like perverted voyeurs as this cultural and artisit rape happens before our very eyes?

talk show talk

we all love to quote memes like, “the road less travelled” and “narrow is the road to life and few find it, but broad and popular is the road to destruction and many go that way”… etc.

yet we all strive to be ‘popular’?

… amazingly the contradiction seemingly escapes us

‎’popularity’ is measured by numerically significant mass appeal

however, the masses have never really appealed to me – tragically significant, yes – but appealing, – no

…if anything it all scares me

we live with the sad realities of superficially manipulative marketing and it works extremely well in the age of  the “mindless masses” …

the offspring of it all is ‘pop’ mass hysteria, the prevailing idea of a democratic majority, hero worship based on superficial externals rather than on integrity or true greatness, rational and moral decay and rampant materialism, etc.

sure, we complain about TV and other media from time to time but apparently we fail to see that they simply give us what we demand

now if one is popular and therefore successful within this massive populist chunk of society… what might it say about the personal integrity, character, ethics,  intelligence, even the basic wisdom of those deemed “popular”?

… does the ‘popular’ button override the integrity switch?

democracy is based on measured popularity

in our day and age democracy is heralded as the supreme system of social governance and those elected into leadership and power are considered wise, ethical, righteous, virtuous, and unquestionably worthy of honour and respect

social and political leaders are deemed successful and are empowered by virtue of  the mass appeal statistics they seem to generate

so yes, size does matter

bigger is definitively better

 

religious movements and religious leaders do exactly the same thing

it’s all the same really, only the façade differs

fractionally

 

one wonders who learned from who?

if we are…

if we are free…

if we are autonomous…

if we are self determining…

if we are a supreme species…

if we are the noblest of all creatures…

if we are the reality of what is real…

if we are all we think we are…

if we are intelligent…

if we are …

 
why are we not?

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VlHICT9eNk4&feature=feedu&fb_source=message

 

 

it’s a difficult question to answer I know

… it’s a difficult question to answer I know,  … but if you had all the material resources you needed to sustain your existence and more … would you continue doing what you are now doing?

… another angle to this same hypothetical situation is, …  what would you do then? … and why would you do it?

what’s stopping you right now?

the race is not to the swift

There has been an unusually high rainfall in our area of late.

The other day I drove past a massive tree perhaps more than 12 – 14 meters high that had simply fallen over across the road and workers had hacked away at it in order to move it out of the way of the oncoming traffic.

It was a strange sight to see.  The tree still looked very healthy and the leaves were lush and full.  The cross section of the cuts revealed a perfect trunk with no blemishes visible anywhere.  It was wonderfully healthy … except that it was fallen and now dead.

What had caused the tree to fall and die was neither weakness nor old age but in fact, health, vitality, success and significant stature.

This once majestic tree now lay with the bulk of its glorious trunk cut up in smaller ugly chunks, thrown together into heaps waiting to be unceremoniously hauled away probably for firewood or maybe even just to be dumped on some smelly refuse heap.

What had happened was that the rain was so unusually heavy that the ground had become totally saturated and could no longer support the weight of the huge tree with its strong root system that had held it secure and upright for decades.

In the heavy rains it had simply lost grip and it toppled over with luminously healthy grass still lush and abundant clinging to the base where the tree had once broken through the soil.

Water is a life giver and a life sustainer but under these conditions it was the agent of death to a seasoned and majestic life form.

The tree had done everything right.  It was a triumphant survivor, a perfect specimen of life and abundant health.  But now it seemed that it was exactly this great prosperity and the weight of this undisputed glory that had caused it to fall.

I couldn’t help thinking that if it were not so large and healthy it might have still be standing today.

 

The race is not to the swift, nor does the battle always go to the strong.

Bread doesn’t always go to the wise, nor riches to men of understanding.

Favour does not always come to men of skill, but circumstance, time and chance happens to all.

 

is the net working?

it’s all very stimulating and the immediate and future benefits seem very enticing but perhaps a question that needs to be asked is if the net is really working in our new age of networking?

things are definitely brought together in a net but usually the togetherness is as a direct result of being trapped

science is revealing more and more just how connected we really are and for some this is very encouraging, for others disturbing

nevertheless we have constructed a man made cyber system on top of this natural interconnectedness and we seem to celebrate it with relish

I can’t help asking what we have left behind or perhaps even subdued that we feel we need to construct a superficial community when we are so naturally and amazingly already connected?

teach me to play

the young man rushed up to the maestro…

“teach me to be an excellent musician great master… so that I may learn to play skillfully and bring healing, peace and perspective to all peoples”

“such zeal, …but why would you want to aim so low young man?” … the maestro replied…

“if you want to excel in playing music, by all means study music diligently…”

“but rather be a student of life…”

… “for then you can play wherever and with whatever your heart desires…

… and healing, peace and perspective will be yours abundantly for the distribution”