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Post by Marshall on Dec 12, 2023 23:58:48 GMT -5
Watch “Leave the World Behind” on Netflix. That’ll cure your hopeful holiday optimism quick. . . ,
It’s well done. The acting is great. The setting is great. The effects are infrequent, but will startle the crap out of you.
Good people trying to make their way thru very strange happenings in their used-to-be normal lives.
Quite chilling in a believable dystopian way.
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Post by Marshall on Dec 13, 2023 0:02:22 GMT -5
I’ve said it before, but I’m concerned for our personal and collective national psyche , by all the “entertainment” that is being created these days.
Buckle up? Bucky.
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Post by millring on Dec 13, 2023 5:39:35 GMT -5
I’ve said it before, but I’m concerned for our personal and collective national psyche , by all the “entertainment” that is being created these days. Buckle up? Bucky. Me too. The things we believe and don't believe any longer don't bode well for our continued civility. The world is on the brink of chaos. On the other hand: Of course, fewer and fewer people believe that David Wilcox got it right. And that's the problem. |
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Post by theevan on Dec 13, 2023 6:52:49 GMT -5
On the other hand I heard gunfire this morning about 40 minutes ago. About 8 shots, large caliber, CLOSE. This is getting all too frequent. No sirens, nothing.
No, not hunting. In the city, the dangerous city.
John, your situation with USPS is terrible. But it could be worse...you could be in Baton Rouge. Instead you drive around (for way too many hours, way too many days) in an idyllic setting.
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Post by Cornflake on Dec 13, 2023 8:22:22 GMT -5
"I’m concerned for our personal and collective national psyche, by all the 'entertainment' that is being created these days."
I'm not sure I understand, Marshall. The word "psyche" throws me.
There's a bleak mood circulating. It strikes me as a rational response to unsettling events. My list would include climate change and a very real threat to democracy. Others would have different lists.
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Post by aquaduct on Dec 13, 2023 12:44:01 GMT -5
"I’m concerned for our personal and collective national psyche, by all the 'entertainment' that is being created these days." I'm not sure I understand, Marshall. The word "psyche" throws me. There's a bleak mood circulating. It strikes me as a rational response to unsettling events. My list would include climate change and a very real threat to democracy. Others would have different lists. I'm seeing the light at the end of the tunnel myself. Sitting here 13.5 years after losing everything, I'm still married, kids are in good shape, both vehicles are paid off and still working great, the house will likely be paid off in a few months, etc. But my current hope is that the very real threat to democracy, climate change, will be obliterated as an issue in this country come June. That may even get the job I was booted from all those years ago back for me. My wife and I learned a lot back then and took the lessons to heart. Now it's all over but the shouting. And if I'm right, the country will be able to reset itself to rationality. I'm sure it will be painful, but the bottom has been reached and the only way to go from here is up. |
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Post by Marshall on Dec 13, 2023 15:45:25 GMT -5
"I’m concerned for our personal and collective national psyche, by all the 'entertainment' that is being created these days." I'm not sure I understand, Marshall. The word "psyche" throws me. From the Wiki: Psyche (psychology), the totality of the human mind, conscious and unconsciousI have an adult step-granddaughter. Great young lady. College grad. Full time Physician's Assistant. SHe recommended a TV series: Black Mirror. It's a British series. Quite well done. But it repeatedly takes a dystopian view of technology and the near future. I stopped watching because of the depressing nature of much of the future outlook. This Leave the World Behind movie does the same for me. I see an undercurrent in culture of a threat of doom. I don't see that many young people expect to have a better life than their parents generation. |
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Post by epaul on Dec 13, 2023 18:27:12 GMT -5
I just saw "Leave the World Behind", as well. Got grabbed by the big boat in the preview. There were a couple things about the film that struck me. One, Julia Roberts is still really hot. And... I just forgot the other one. Anyhoo, it was a good watch.
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Post by millring on Dec 13, 2023 21:45:03 GMT -5
"I’m concerned for our personal and collective national psyche, by all the 'entertainment' that is being created these days." I'm not sure I understand, Marshall. The word "psyche" throws me. From the Wiki: Psyche (psychology), the totality of the human mind, conscious and unconsciousI have an adult step-granddaughter. Great young lady. College grad. Full time Physician's Assistant. SHe recommended a TV series: Black Mirror. It's a British series. Quite well done. But it repeatedly takes a dystopian view of technology and the near future. I stopped watching because of the depressing nature of much of the future outlook. This Leave the World Behind movie does the same for me. I see an undercurrent in culture of a threat of doom. I don't see that many young people expect to have a better life than their parents generation. We're living in the world of John Lennon's "Imagine" and it's pretty hellish. Even if religious belief is delusion, it was the universal delusion that kept the masses hopeful that there might be something more. It kept the masses believing there was something bigger than themselves and not just a little fearful that there might be hell to pay for bad behavior. It gave us appropriate shame -- the very idea that we owe others our appropriate behavior and that -- counter to the socially accepted lie -- there is very little we can do in the world that does NOT affect our fellow man. The intellectual is the only master in the world at whistling past graveyards. And there aren't many intellectuals. |
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Post by John B on Dec 13, 2023 22:00:30 GMT -5
From the Wiki: Psyche (psychology), the totality of the human mind, conscious and unconsciousI have an adult step-granddaughter. Great young lady. College grad. Full time Physician's Assistant. SHe recommended a TV series: Black Mirror. It's a British series. Quite well done. But it repeatedly takes a dystopian view of technology and the near future. I stopped watching because of the depressing nature of much of the future outlook. This Leave the World Behind movie does the same for me. I see an undercurrent in culture of a threat of doom. I don't see that many young people expect to have a better life than their parents generation. We're living in the world of John Lennon's "Imagine" and it's pretty hellish. Even if religious belief is delusion, it was the universal delusion that kept the masses hopeful that there might be something more. It kept the masses believing there was something bigger than themselves and not just a little fearful that there might be hell to pay for bad behavior. It gave us appropriate shame -- the very idea that we owe others our appropriate behavior and that -- counter to the socially accepted lie -- there is very little we can do in the world that does NOT affect our fellow man. The intellectual is the only master in the world at whistling past graveyards. And there aren't many intellectuals. I thought we were in Brave New World. |
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Post by t-bob on Dec 13, 2023 22:41:36 GMT -5
We're living in the world of John Lennon's "Imagine" and it's pretty hellish. Even if religious belief is delusion, it was the universal delusion that kept the masses hopeful that there might be something more. It kept the masses believing there was something bigger than themselves and not just a little fearful that there might be hell to pay for bad behavior. It gave us appropriate shame -- the very idea that we owe others our appropriate behavior and that -- counter to the socially accepted lie -- there is very little we can do in the world that does NOT affect our fellow man. The intellectual is the only master in the world at whistling past graveyards. And there aren't many intellectuals. I thought we were in Brave New World. And " The Lathe of Heaven" |
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Post by millring on Dec 15, 2023 5:32:13 GMT -5
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Post by Cornflake on Dec 15, 2023 8:13:18 GMT -5
John, I read Bennet's piece. If I'd known how long it was I probably wouldn't have started reading it. Mostly I agree with him on the broader and more significant issues. The piece consists in part, though, of his version of a dispute with his former bosses; I suspect they might have a different view.
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Post by millring on Dec 15, 2023 9:39:23 GMT -5
And if they do, it doesn't mean his is the more inaccurate. And I certainly wouldn't rest in the belief that they might have a different view, we don't even know what that view is, but that phantom alternate view allows us to disregard his eyewitness to the events he described.
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Post by Cornflake on Dec 15, 2023 10:05:24 GMT -5
I don't disregard his view about his having been (in effect) fired. I mean only that I'm not prepared to accept it without hearing from the other side.*
I also don't think the rights or wrongs of his firing matter very much. Who was right and who was wrong in an employment dispute? Either way, who cares besides the participants?
I think the more important issues he discusses relate to whether a publication like the Times ought to share the views of someone like Tom Cotton. That issue is linked, I think, to whether universities ought to allow pro-Palestinian demonstrators to assemble and be heard. My old-school view of free speech is that the cure for bad speech is better speech. I don't agree with those who think you shouldn't "platformize" bad speech by allowing it to be printed in the Times or heard on a campus, for essentially the reasons Bennet articulates.
* PS: As a lawyer I interviewed a lot of prospective clients. Their claims almost always sounded righteous when I hadn't yet heard what the other side had to say.
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Post by drlj on Dec 15, 2023 10:34:05 GMT -5
That damned John Lennon! Screwing things up for everybody!
And here I thought it was Keith Richards leading all astray.
I love the smell of shame in the morning.
Smells like salvation!
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