esrosedotblog

FACEBOOKLESS

Boy can I identify with this guy.

Labels: cultlure, cults, internet

I AM AN OBSERVER

This is an old rant. I have written it a dozen times.

But, I am revved up again so here I go.

I do not text. I do not have that service. If I get a text it costs me 25 cents and I will tell you so.

I do not have wireless on my "phone". What is a "phone" now anyway?

I am not on Facebook. I will not Twitter. I don't want fucking any of it.

I have enough trouble keeping myself away from my computer for news, blogging (mine and others), movies and the like.

But none of this computer "work" is done while you are standing there with me. I am alone.

Well, sometimes John and I do have our moments with emailing each other from across the room. A photo. A little message.

I can imagine what it would be like around here if we both texted and did the social networks and read the news and the rest of it on our "phone".

I watch people. There are folks who will not maintain eye contact but will stand aside of you, device in hand, glancing to see if a text has come in during the chat. I can feel them pull away.

I hear the problems of the social networks. Too much oversharing. Is that redundant? I suppose so. Unwanted "friends". Gossip gone awry. Private photos made public. (Hey look, if you put a photo on the internet anywhere it is public. Listen to me!)

Now this.

Ahem. Are you talking to me? (or texting?)

Everyone knows it. No one likes it.

It is the new drug.

I can get away with not being involved. I don't have a job and my friends don't expect me to. It is not a precondition for their affection.

Of course, this is because if you are my "friend" you are probably not going to be my true friend.

Boy, do I hate this shit.

I know that parents and kids use texting to stay in touch. Lovers too. A lot of relationships can benefit from it. Us? We send emails. But Jesus H. Christ! Most of what passes for important is not compared to the real, live person standing or sitting next to you.

Here is one good thing about texting. It has virtually eliminated the boorish loud mouth talking on the cell phone while others are trying to eat, think, talk or just be quietly alone. That guy is now the compulsive thumber. The screen peaker.

Progress? Not by a long shot.

Labels: cults, culture, internet

THE CULT

Many years ago, I was walking on Boylston Street in Boston and a guy came up to me and asked if I would like to take a test.

There was some other folderol about what it would do and reveal and all. He was pretty good about it.

It wasn't like the Moonies where they wanted to take you to their place for a meal. But, to take the test, you did have to walk a short distance, I think to Commonwealth Avenue, to take the test.

I declined.

That was my first and only direct contact with Scientology or a Scientologist.

Since then, to my knowledge, I have never met anyone who has anything to do with this organization. And I have met and worked with a lot of people.

I certainly paid attention when I read about their emergence in to the public sphere. Sometimes in a positive way for them, publicity and all, but often not. They seem to attract negative attention.

Many people have written about "the church" with varying degrees of success, often attracting lawsuits. Many of these articles and books are by defectors with an axe to grind and documents that have been stolen. They are easily discredited.

It has been known for a long time that the Hubbardites seek to recruit celebrities and have worked very hard on this particularly in LA and Hollywood.

We know of some prominent but fading stars who have taken it up.

But most recently, the very prominent Paul Haggis resigned from the organization in a very public way. Now, in the New Yorker, a thoroughly researched and very long, almost exhausting but never boring article has been published.

The Apostate—Paul Haggis vs. the Church of Scientology by Lawrence Wright

I bring this up because I found it fascinating on several fronts.

First and foremost is in the way that Scientology has evolved, like many churches, from a relatively informal set of principles by an interesting, if perhaps crazy guy, into a highly organized, very authoritarian organization with enforcers and lawyers and all the tools to maintain its "sanctity".

It is also interesting to read about Haggis indoctrination as a troubled young man and his failure over some 35 years to examine his beliefs in any way. Then, disruption and a failure to get answers to some pretty basic questions that he had about the outfit.

Third, I am interested in the celebrity angle. Except for a few people, the "celebrities" who belong to Scientology are not very well known. They are moneyed, very important to Scientology, but are, by and large, behind the scenes people who are given a special center to attend to their duties and, as bigger money makers, to burnish the church's image as well as to supply a whole lot of money.

Finally, I find the story of the young David Miscavige (above), the head guy, very interesting. An organization man, not a guru. A dictator, not a service oriented leader.

It is worth some time. It goes beyond the immediate sensationalism of the Scientologists and where they are going. It shows a great deal about human nature and our capacity to believe in the most outrageous stuff and to believe so much as to sell ourselves out literally and figuratively.

Labels: cults, culture, religion

THE BUZZ ISN'T THERE

This is about the Stieg Larsson books about the girl and the investigative journalist and the tattoo and the bees and the really boring, difficult read that they are.

It is unaccountable to me why these books have been successful.

They are banal, incomplete, boring. Situations dangle.

Mini-plots seem concocted and inserted for sheer effect, neither story telling or advancing the plot that is at the core of the books. The dialog is wooden. Even the sex scenes are sexless.

Of course, in a culture where over half of the best sellers are sausage ground from the same old meat, Danielle Steele and so on, the quality issue is at a par. What I don't get is that the two principals are so unattractive and unlikable and, indeed, foolish and the girl nearly insane, that they would not be the kind of heroes that make for a good read in the first place. They are lousy characters.

When I read the first one I nearly doubled over with boredom at the interlacing financial network of the family that, well, never mind. It turns out that the story is really about sadistic murders and a missing person. None of the huge financial corporate superstructure is important. It is not even a red herring. It is filler.

Filler and anecdotal episodes of traditional thriller tropes.

The second book wasn't much better and by the time I was through with it and had seen the trimmed down story in the first Swedish film, I was done with it.

The film was pretty good actually. They threw out huge chunks and made the characters at least intelligent and only neurotic enough to be interesting.

So. I am going to see the second Swedish film and, when it comes out on DVD, the third and that is it.

My rule of not seeing a film on a book I read or reading a book about a film I saw has already been sullied.

The mystery remains.

Why have these been so popular.

I do love this kind of fiction when it is done well. We read every Robert Crais and Lee Child book published. But even these only stay on the Best Seller list for a few weeks.

I have found that others share my puzzlement. At last, a critical essay appears in The New Yorker by Joan Acocella,

Man of Mystery

Another interesting thing is that even the provenance and the editing of these books is shrouded in mystery. Larssen died 7 months after he wrote the books and did not really work hard on editing at all. The ownership of the copyright is all screwed up,

Time will tell, I suppose. There are going to be American films. They will have to edit the stories and, of course, Hollywoodize them. I will not see them. I will not buy the possible next volume that is said to be in Larssen's computer that he left.

I will not participate.

It is bullshit. Group buzz. The good part is that so many people are reading. But if they are reading trash then what happens next? I can't even go there.

Labels: cults, culture

THE WRECKAGE OF AMERICA

I can't tell you how pathetic I think that this all is.

Ten Favorite iPhone Apps

Don't take this personally if you have as many "apps" or are as coy and insufferable as David Pogue. You can't help it. You have been seduced and reduced to bits.

I really do think that this is the funeral pyre of American, hence World, culture. I mean it!

What a harvest of time wasters. Fake calls. As if the real ones aren't bad enough.

I know. I carry on about this on a fairly regular basis but no one is listening. Probably because they are all blowing into their microphone and playing "an instrument" on four holes.

Get your fucking kid a real instrument. Get them out in the park to play. Rip the phone out of their hands and put it on the shelf for a few days.

I have given up on the adults.

Think of the waste of engineering and scientific talent on this kind of shit. How about if it were applied to some of the world's real problems.

OK. I give up. For this time.

Labels: computer, cults, culture, engineering, environment

PARTISAN JUSTICE

The Supremes showed their colors yesterday.

A bitter, divided, sectarian, politicized court caught in the culture wars.

Justices’ Ruling Blocks Cross Removal

I know where this cross is. I have seen it. It is butt ugly and, really, not much of a blight on the landscape. It is more of a cultural insult. A "fuck you" from the usual christist perps.

They have disguised the case as a matter of war memorializing. What it really is about is the integration of church and state and the imposition of a sectarian symbol in a publicly owned National Monument.

Graffiti.

The thing here is the arguments. You have to read through them.

Alito's words about the sweep of crosses in graveyards is myopic. It fails to see that there are crescents and six sided stars and, surprisingly, many markers with no religious symbol on them at all.

If they were to see a limited view of the field then the "no affiliation" markers are the ones they should see.

Kennedy wrote it for the minority.

The minority rejected that view. “The cross is not a universal symbol of sacrifice,” he wrote in a dissent joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor. “It is the symbol of one particular sacrifice, and that sacrifice carries deeply significant meaning for those who adhere to the Christian faith.” ........NYT

These are the Bush Justices in their full flower right before, if we have the luck for it, being cut down to size again.

The photo is of the cross when it was covered after the last lower court rulings.

If you want to see what it looks like without the covering, Google it yourself.

Labels: christist watch, cults

FADEBOOK

This was predictable.

Facebook Exodus

I have never joined one of these.

Not that I haven't had invites to do so.

From the beginning I have written back something like this.

Dear ............

Thanks for the email. It is good to hear from you.

I am sorry to say that I have a long-time policy to abstain from Facebook, MySpace, Twitter or any of the social networks.

I think that they are a spam-magnet and, inevitably, an invasion of privacy.

I would love to hear from you by regular email anytime. (Or, if appropriate, "I am happy we exchange email and I would love to continue").

It is bad enough that there are these cliques and shit. I see, from time to time, some people get bent because they have not been invited to join a site. Jeez. All that.

And now, the inevitable co-opting (a 60's word now so commonly seen in practice that it is no longer thought to be pejorative).

It was clear from the beginning that this would all happen—data mining, viral dissemination of "private stuff", pyramiding of names (think Agway), a social Ponzi scheme.

There is no way that any of these could make money in their original form.

And so on.

It is scary to say "no" to this kind of thing. They use relationships between people as bargaining chips to get more names.

I just grit my teeth and say the n-o word and if the person is hurt and cuts me off, well, they weren't my kind of person.

This has not happened (as far as I know--maybe I have been cutoff and didn't miss it).

In fact a few people wrote to say that they had been sucked in and wanted out themselves. Another told us that the website had garnered all his email addresses and sent the invite out without his knowledge. Knowing the source, I am a bit skeptical about this, but then being cynical about FaceBook, it is believable at a certain level.

Another fad. Fades. Good riddance.

Labels: cults, culture

SPACE ATHEISTS

Say that three times, fast, and see if you can not lisp on one of the th's.

July 20th is the 40th anniversary of the moon walk. Not Jacko's. The real one.

Or not.

Vocal Minority Insists It Was All Smoke and Mirrors

These guys are hard core. Six percent.

I can see how they would figure it could be faked. Even though I have seen real moon rocks in the NASA center in Florida, who am I to know whether these came from the moon, really?

And it was all on video. None of us were there to see it.

And look at that flag in the picture. Everyone knows there isn't any wind on the moon. What the fuck is with that? A howler right in the middle of the scam.

There is some appeal in the idea that we never acheived the moon mission. That it was faked.

It is about the same appeal, in the opposite direction sort of, that there are space aliens walking among us or, perhaps, visiting us from time to time for the purpose, primarily, of sex experiments or anal probes or both.

But the government is suppressing the truth!

That is the appeal. The tickle to the lower stem of the brain where suspicion and paranoia lie.

It is appealing because in a specific way it demonstrates that, in a general way, I am not responsible for myself. There are unseen forces that govern my life and, as a result, I might just as well give up.

Then there is the profit motive. Keep reading here.

Mr. Marino, the author of the post on the Lens blog, is a 31-year-old architect born in Argentina. In an e-mail interview, he said that the political corruption during the years of dictatorship in his country shaped his thinking: “I started to realize how political corruption operates and how it is the interests of a few in power that really governs our world.”

As he traveled the world — he now lives and works in China — he picked up books contending that the landings were faked and saw documentaries including Mr. Sibrel’s, he said, which paints a dark portrait of political manipulation during the Nixon administration and somehow ties in the Vietnam War, the Titanic and the Tower of Babel before even getting to the supposed photographic evidence of lunar deception.

Mr. Sibrel, who sells his films online, has hounded Apollo astronauts with a Bible, insisting that they swear on camera they had walked on the Moon. He so annoyed Buzz Aldrin in 2002 — ambushing him with his Bible and calling him “a coward, and a liar, and a thief” — that Mr. Aldrin punched Mr. Sibrel in the face. Law enforcement officials refused to file charges against Mr. Aldrin, the second man on the Moon.

Well, I know for a fact that the Babel thing was aliens, not a government conspiracy involving NIxon.

I like Aldren's solution to the problem. Punch the disbelievers in the face. What a concept. That ought to bring them to the truth.

Labels: cults, culture

DECONSTRUCTING THE MEMORIAL

Gail Collins does a good job that I had stepped away from.

Michael, A Foreign Affair

Here is a sample. I would not have said this because I did not know it.

Still, it was a little peculiar hearing Brooke Shields’s weepy testimony about her deep friendship with Jackson given the fact that she told reporters that the last time she saw him was at Elizabeth Taylor’s eighth wedding in 1991. And while Representative Jackson Lee correctly pointed out that Jackson was acquitted of all charges in that child molestation trial, nobody really wants their memorial service dotted with comments like “People are innocent until proven otherwise!”

And look at that camera angle. The look into heaven. The pin spot! Green backlight.

It turns out that the expected "great outpouring" of grief didn't quite materialize. It was big enough to be alarming to those of us who don't understand this kind of shit but not nearly as big as Diana or Reagan.

In LA, there were no "people in the streets" rending their garments. A T-shirt vendor with a thousand shirt inventory sold only 100. Tough times.

I know. I am keeping this alive. That is my part in it.

It is not going to go away anytime soon so I think I will hang onto it awhile longer.

It has limited satisfaction, though. Mockery can be a challenging and creative business but, here, it is fairly easy. Fish in a barrel.

Labels: cults, culture, evil bastards

LOOK ALIKES

You can get a small sense of the hysteria that famous people elicit when they are abroad.

If this guy was smarter, he would put those shades down and walk a little slumped. Maybe a hat.

But I get that he really enjoys his 15 minutes of fame.

Got this from Andrew Sullivan's site.

Labels: cults, culture

HEATH'S CLIFF

I said some time ago that the canonization of Heath Ledger was premature and wrong.

He died of a self inflicted overdose of prescription drugs. That doesn't mean that he should have had them. It means that they are usually prescribed.

It was a soup of tranqs, sleeping pills, and other medications.

This does not make Ledger a bad person. It only makes him an addict. A person with a disease that is treatable.

It was not an accident. It was not homicide. It was self inflicted.

I don't know about his Batman performance. I admire the makeup.

But I think he has a lot of attention because he is dead. How many people went to see a dead man walking?

Now that I have said my piece again, listen to this guy who has the same ideas only better put. I suspect that he, too, is a sober refugee from the drug and alcohol wars.

Sobering Up on Heath Ledger

Also, let's not forget this man left a baby and a family and many friends behind. That doesn't make him a bad person but does show how his personal values had crumbled in the mists of his addictions.

Sad. Sorry. And nothing to elevate or reward here.

Labels: alcohol, cults, culture

PEACEFUL DEMONSTRATION

This is fun:

No Shirts at Improv Everywhere

In the old days we demonstrated for civil rights, ending of wars, and hunger.

Times change.

On the other hand, it is fun.

I like seeing the firm in question getting its pants taken off so to speak.

Take a look at the whole site.

All in good fun. I am sure there is a greater social good.

Breaking down the codes and all.

Labels: cults, culture

POP ART

The Beckhams have landed on the west coast.

Taking up residence in their "understated" 20mm estate.

Dave says he is just a regular guy.

He earns a living by doing hard physical labor.

Posh is all about fashion design. She does her own hair. She collects fashion.

That's what she says.

Careers.

It is 24/7 in the local press.

I am not too sure that there is anything wrong with this.

They have three nice boys.

So, they are attractive. So W features them in bed in their underwear.

I was looking it over.

ME!

It is phenomenal.

My friend Lynda in London says we are welcome to them. They are all Beck-weary.

But this is the frontier of the new world and we are ready.

Beckham is pretty savvy with the media. They have good management (Simon Cowell). Same as the Spice Girls.

He speaks softly and carries a big stick.

She only talks about her clothes and the designer business.

They are actually pretty close mouthed.

They let us project whatever we want on them.

I don't know about the soccer/football business. Is he good for the franchise? The US game?

Dunno.

It is all kinda irresistable.

You can't help but look them over. He has a really nice ass and he doesn't say much. The ideal fantasy date.

'Nough said.

The only fly in the ointment that I can see is that the Cruises are buzzing around them a lot. Recruising them for the cult?

But it adds a bit of negative thrill to the whole scene.

Will they fall into the pit?

Stay tuned.

Labels: cults, culture

CRUISE CONTROL

I have to admit that I view any bad publicity about Tom Cruise as a good thing.

He is so annoying. I greet any new bad news about him with pleasure.

Schadenfreud.

And in the right language too.

Tom is pissing off the Germans!

The interesting thing about arrogance is that it is no proof against blindly stepping into controversy.

In fact, in Cruise' case, the arrogance almost assures getting his dick in the wringer.

“Scientology is a totalitarian ideology,” said Berthold Graf von Stauffenberg, the eldest son of Colonel Stauffenberg and a retired West German army general. “The fact that an avowed Scientologist like Mr. Cruise is supposed to play the victim of a totalitarian regime is purely sick.”.

Of course, TC's religion wouldn't be much of an issue if he did not wear it on his sleeve, jam it down others' throats, and pose as the poster boy of his movement.

If you care to join in the bashing, here is the whole thing.

Plot Thickens in a Tom Cruise Film, Long Before the Cameras Begin to Roll

Labels: cults, culture

GEORGE

George Carlin is 70 today.

He is my age.

Here he is talking about god.

I took my kids to see Carlin as soon as they were old enough to go.

By that, I mean that they were old enough to think critically.

Nothing to do with the 'bad words'.

In fact, I think that he was doing the

'7 words you can't say on television' bit.

He is still at it.

Labels: cults, religion

CULTIST

I don't know how I feel about Mac "coming out of the cult category".

I guess I never thought that's where it was.

I have never felt that I belonged to a cult.

Nor do I intend to belong to a religion.

I am just happy to say that I have never had to deal with all the shit that Microsoft dishes up in both its design and vulnerabilities.

It just seems to make sense to be using Mac and I am always astonished to find people who are in the MS dark ages.

It would seem that there are less of those; troglodytes, masochists, and slaves to an inferior master.

Apple Cult Becoming a Religion.

Yeh.

We say novenas every night to St. Steve.

It is interesting that even the positive press has to have a jibe in it.

Cult. D'oh. It is just being sensible.

Labels: computer, cults, macintosh