We live in the era of Over-simplification, capital O. As with everything else we are overdoing it.
Take for example the word LOVE. What does love mean in its core, root, essential meaning? To love someone does not mean to desire someone physically. To love someone does not mean to care for someone. These two are very closely connected but they are not the same thing and do not have to always be connected neither go always together. I care for alligators but I do not know them enough to love them or not. Even though some people think they're "Loving McDonald's" in reality they are just addicted to it So LOVE is not as simple as it seems and if we try to pretend it is not so we are just fooling ourselves.
Do you like the iPhone? The mobile without buttons. It looks sexy and simple. Technologically it is not simple. This far we all know but what is behind the simplicity that most of us so crave ? Or do they want something without really knowing what it is ? It works with a battery, I guess everybody knows that. The battery needs to be charged with a charger unlike the Nile crocodile. The body of the Nile crocodile is an organic solar-cell-battery. The Nile crocodile needs to feed once an year to survive, the rest of the time it "charges" itself with solar energy. One of the most simple, yet most developed creatures on Earth - a dinosaur. It is the most developed of its kind yet it does not have a clue about it and does not care.
We people say we care but do we really ? Simplicity is great not because of its greatness but because of the process of development through which it was achieved. This is why I feel uncomfortable around people with iPhones. They are like the Nile crocodiles - perfect yet profoundly uninformed and not caring. I sometimes even feel like I do not speak their language.
Yet Oversimplification seems so natural - the reaction to Overcomplication. Everything around us seems to be so overly complicated - states, super states, governments, wars, mass-media, economic crisis, bankrupt banks. But it is not - it is not complicated at all. Behind all these names are normal human beings. The unhappy, low, mean, spiteful, hateful, greedy, good, warm, caring, happy people. That is all.
And if your president likes to sleep around with women and men and then lies about it - most probably he will do the same service as a president. In other words your President will be two-faced, cheating and untrustworthy. But he may at the same time be caring, full of desires, full of hope - no need to Oversimplify and paint him "black". And that is what life is all about - nothing is Black or White. We need to try to live with this thought if we are to survive and have the brains to realize how, for a difference from the Nile croc.
P.S. Did you know that crocodiles (even huge ones) are a very easy prey for big cats (tigers, jaguars) ? Yes, cats LOVE using their brains all the time - for hunting, playing or manipulating their owners.
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Monday, September 14, 2009
Film Analysis
When I attended one of the schools of my life, there was a teacher and a discipline where we had to study Analysis of written material - essays, short stories, books. The goal of this discipline was to help us understand the real messages in the works - the hidden ones, the ones that mattered. I hated this discipline, I could not understand why I had to study it (so awfully difficult) but I am glad I was a diligent student. In this post I will try to be as short as possible while helping people understand what they are seeing. Very few people nowadays are capable of doing a solid art analysis and I do not claim to be one of them so please help in this exercise if you have the desire and time. Thank you!
The story is about one person who thinks he is better than the others, he is something more. Not much more, just a bit more. For this slight feeling of superiority this person manages to ruin his own life and the lives of those who he thinks he loves. This is the main negative character - he is the important one.
*Each and every one of us is taught to become him in the nowadays Western Culture of "Individualists".
This is a movie about escapism - escapism is everywhere nowadays, even in our families which it is slowly but surely annihilating. Escapism is the Religion of the Western World which led us to the worst freedom and economics crisis of all times.
*Each and every one of us is taught to "stay away and not get involved" when someone else is taken down.
This is a movie about survival when you have no one and no place. This is the most difficult film to understand because each and every one of us lives in the illusion this could not happen to them. Then half of the actions in the movie are absolutely impossible to understand.
*Each and every one of us is taught to think bad things can happen ONLY to other people, never to us. As a result we can afford to live without "thinking". Just repeat everyday habits and daydream without any real touch with real life (not artificial reality created by the mass-media).
The words of Mark Vonnegut are the best description : "We are here to help each other get through this thing, whatever it is." The best American movie for me, ever.
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